Bush could reopen old rifts

Old riffs?

More like gaping shrapnel wounds, in need of debriding.

Analysis: Bush could reopen old rifts - Yahoo! News:

WASHINGTON - President Bush's disclosure of previously secret CIA prisons overseas and his unapologetic defense of hardball tactics in the war on terrorism may rub salt in a diplomatic wound his administration had hoped to heal.

Allies the Bush administration badly needs to accomplish foreign policy goals in the Middle East and beyond are among those troubled by both CIA prisons and the detention facility at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Bush said he has emptied CIA prisons on foreign soil for now, but he didn't promise to close them. His plan for new trials of terrorism suspects at Guantanamo ensures that a facility detested by some close allies (Saudi Arabia,) and barely tolerated by others (Britain,) will remain open indefinitely.

Much of Bush's message was intended for domestic political consumption ahead of the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks and midterm congressional elections that threaten Republican control of Congress.