Thursday, April 10, 2003

Gin, Rummy - Rummy, Gin

I was trying to decipher this quote from Donald Rumsfeld as reported by ABC News Australia:
We are in the process of trying to liberate that country and at the moment, when the war ends, and the Coalition forces occupy, the areas where those capabilities, chemical and biological weapons are likely to be, to the extent they haven't been moved out of the country, it obviously is important to find them.
I was unable to recognize this as actual use of language, so I tried using Altavista's Babelfish to translate it into German, because Rumsfeld's roots are German and I thought his grammatical structure may be similar. I don't speak German, so I then had to translate it back. In German:
Wir sind bei dem Versuchen, dieses Land zu befreien und im Augenblick, wenn der Krieg beendet, und die Koalitionkräfte besetzen, die Bereiche, wo jene Fähigkeiten, chemischen und biologischen Waffen wahrscheinlich sind zu sein, im Umfang, den sie nicht aus dem Land heraus verschoben worden sind, es ist offensichtlich wichtig, sie zu finden.
And back to English:
We are with trying to release this country and at the moment, if the war terminates, and occupy the coalition forces to find the ranges, where those abilities to be chemical and biological weapons are probable to the extent, which they were not shifted from the country, it are obviously important, them.
This didn't help. So I tried translating to French and back:
We are in the course of test to release this country and at the present time, when the war finishes, and the forces of coalition occupy, the sectors where these weapons of possibilities, chemical and biological are likely to be, until the degree which they were not moved out of the country, it is obviously significant to find them.
And spanish and back:
We are in the process to try to release that country and at the moment, when the war finishes, and the forces of the coalition occupy, the areas where those biological arms of the capacities, chemistries are probable and to be, to the degree which they have not moved of the country, it is obvious important to find them.
My last hope was Russian, especially with all the rumors of Saddam chilling at the Embassy and all (this rumor will not die, as reported in the Tehran Times). So (english to Russian via Paralink, back to English with Babelfish):
We are found in the process of the attempt to free that country and at present, when military ends, and forces of coalition occupy, the region, where those abilities, chemical and biological means, probably, will be, to the degree they were not peremeshcheny(tronuty) from the country, it is obviously important to find them.
As you can see, none of this worked. So I used my own patented BS Translation device and came up with this:
Syria has been cooperative in facilitating the movement of people out of Iraq into Syria, and then in some cases, they stayed there and found safekeeping there.
Sorry, that was actually Rumsfeld as well. Oops! Apparently, translating Rumsfeld requires knowledge of Orwellian Doublespeak, which I am, unfortunately, expert as I am, though not in Doublespeak per-se, unable, at present time, though if able would pursue doing, the translation of him.