Salon: Bush*s See-No-Evil Man (Negroponte) Off to Baghdad

John Negroponte, the new ambassador to Iraq, proved usefully blind to the horrors perpetrated by the Honduran government in the '80s. But after Abu Ghraib, he won't be able to cover up this dirty war.

By Martin Sieff

Ahmed Chalabi is gone from the Pentagon's hall of heroes at last. But John Negroponte is still on track to become the Bush administration's viceroy as U.S. ambassador to Iraq come the transfer of sovereignty scheduled for June 30. What sort of diplomatic post is it going to be? Recent history provides some very strong pointers. And they suggest that the abuses exposed at Abu Ghraib prison could be, rather than an aberration, a warm-up for fun and games yet to come.

The same veteran cold warriors who provided a respectable political shield for the armies of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala in their slaughter of thousands of Maya Indians 20 years ago have been painstakingly put into place to provide acceptable cover for the "pacification" of Iraq following the June 30 transition to supposedly democratic rule.

The previous careers of some of the key Bush officials appointed to oversee policy in Iraq leave little doubt about how far they are willing to go. In the past they have gone that far and beyond, without limit. They have countenanced, covered up, excused and turned a blind eye to the killing of hundreds, even thousands, including the indiscriminate murder of women and children. It is an indisputable matter of public record.

The selection of Negroponte, most recently the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, has been presented in the U.S. media as a triumph of moderation and internationalism in the Bush administration's quavering policy toward Iraq. Negroponte's key qualification for his new assignment is supposedly his success in working with diplomats from other nations at the U.N.

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http://salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/05/28/negroponte/index.html