posted on February 7, 2003 01:37:00 PM new
Secretary Powell laid out new intel very clearly, but for those who still don't get it or question the veracity of his presentation, just answer me two questions (coherently, please):
1) Where are the huge unaccounted-for stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons and delivery systems not addressed in Iraq's 12,200 page farce submitted to the UN Security Council? (Hans Blix has publicly stated that such materials cannot be destroyed without a paper trail, even in Iraq)
2) Why do you think he's hiding them?
When Saddam is ousted, the Iraqi people are freed from tyranny to embrace democracy, and the evidence of Saddam's hidden weapons of mass destruction are exposed (they already have been, if you're smart enough to see it), I can't wait to see what all the whiny skeptics in the world have to say.
posted on February 7, 2003 02:27:06 PM new
ferncrestmotel - If you don't mind I'll add #3.
If Saddam doesn't have the weapons you mention, as he states he doesn't, then why does he keep threatening to use them on our Armed Forces if we attack? How can he do that IF he doesn't have them? hmmmmmm
posted on February 7, 2003 02:46:41 PM new
Of Saddam's nuclear arsenal, Secretary Powell noted that Saddam's cadre of nuclear scientists is still in place and the plans and much of the technology to construct fission weapons have been in Iraq's possession for some time: "It is noteworthy that, over the last 18 months, Saddam Hussein has paid increasing personal attention to Iraqi's top nuclear scientists, a group that the governmental-controlled press calls, openly, his nuclear mujahedeen. He regularly exhorts them and praises their progress. Progress toward what end?"
posted on February 7, 2003 03:22:54 PM new
Bear, since you are quoting, how about a link to that quote, please? I'd like to read the article for myself. Thank you.
posted on February 7, 2003 03:30:07 PM new
Linda...
WHY!?! Why is it up to Saddam to prove he has or hasn't. It is up to Bush to prove he has them. Something you wrapped-in-the-flag warmongers have forgotten. We TRUE Americans believe in basic HUMAN RIGHTS. And one of those is listed in a ragged piece of paper, presently under attack by the administration, we like to call the CONSTITUTION. It states that you are innocent, YES INNOCENT, until proven guilty.
Yet they have proved nothing. And don't go bringing up Powell's report using 12 YEAR OLD PLAGURIZED POST-GRAD WORK! At least the administration could have had the COMMON DECENCY to give the original author credit for his work!
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Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Firemen, Police. We call them our heroes...but we pay them like chumps
posted on February 7, 2003 03:34:28 PM newLinda... WHY!?! Why is it up to Saddam to prove he has or hasn't. It is up to Bush to prove he has them.
Nope. It's up to Saddam per United Nations Resolution 1441. (and multiple "resolutions" before that one)
posted on February 7, 2003 03:41:11 PM new
Thank you KatyD - Yes, it's Saddam who's to disclose. I posted the link here recently that had the full text to 1441...when junquemama and I were discussing it. Very clear.
mlecher - Wrap myself in my flag? No I respect it too much for that. But I will be out front waving it full of pride. So...your intended insult, was no insult to me.
posted on February 7, 2003 03:59:36 PM new
You're waving it in the rear, not out front, dippy.. Saddam DID account for the weapons he actually had, but someone doesn't believe that and keeps making up weapons that he never did have because it doesn't matter about saddam. Bush HAS to go to war now in order to have any hope that we'll receive compensation enough to dig him out of the hole he's dug.
posted on February 7, 2003 04:11:39 PM new
I don't believe this thread. Sadaam has threaten to use the biological agents (he says he doesn't have) on any invading force.
Yet you Sheeple still revile in his name. Now hear his.....I heard it when I fought to stop the Viet Nam war....
America, LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT.
Before you get in a Huff. Listen to this.
I asked on another post... Most of you were on... "Name a better country", freer country or just another country you would like to live in. No one posted after that..excuse me Linda did. She agreed.
Most of you hide behind puffed up pen names, with no email or profile. Cowards All. If you believe what your saying Stand up. Fight for your believe. Remember this. "God hates a Coward"
If your just looking for a friend.. Come on down to reverendcolin.com. That should really pi** you off.
Amen,
Reverend Colin
posted on February 7, 2003 04:32:01 PM newSaddam DID account for the weapons he actually had,
Nope again. At least not to Dr. Blix's satisfaction. Note the last report Blix made to the UN in January, he specifically cited the biological and chemical weapons caches that were documented by UN inspectors before they left in 1998, had NOT been accounted for. Even supposing that Saddam had not manufactured anymore of these banned substances (a big stretch), the fact remains, that Iraq has STILL not accounted (either existing or destroyed) what it had before in it's most recent declaration to the UN, nor has it disclosed what happened to these weapons to Blix during the ongoing inspections. And it appears that even Blix may have limits to his patience.
posted on February 7, 2003 05:26:11 PM new
Linda K -Your point #3 is most welcome and apropos. Saddam HAS told his field commanders to use WMD if attacked. I'm relieved to find a voice of reason like yours in this forum.
mlecher - get your facts straight. According to UN resolution 1441, Saddam must prove he has no weapons of mass destruction, not Bush. Also, the US did not present the plagiarized material; it was in a dossier created by the British. Powell made reference to the dossier in his UN speech.
krs - apart from your other odd commentary, who is the "someone" making up weapons claims against Saddam?
posted on February 7, 2003 05:31:16 PM new
Kudos to Katy D, Reverend Colin, NearTheSea, and Bear 1949 for understaning this whole thing, too.
For those who don't know which side of this issue is the right one, study it. Then speak.
posted on February 7, 2003 09:06:11 PM new
colon,
I'm so happy to hear that you remained to "when I fought to stop the Viet Nam war" while I had left the country because of it. That's so brave.
The rest of you dopes might look farther than your favorite talkinh head and fox news before you speak. You're brainwashed fools.
posted on February 8, 2003 05:31:51 AM new
...while I had left the country because of it.
And returned a highly decorated veteran of the Viet Nam war
with two awards for heroism under fire and the Purple Heart, 17 awards of other combat related significance and some Vietnamese award for Gallantry, along with three presidential valorous unit citations.
posted on February 8, 2003 06:03:29 AM new
colon,
I'm so happy to hear that you remained to "when I fought to stop the Viet Nam war" while I had left the country because of it. That's so brave.
Yes it is/was. Would have went if I could have went.
When I say I fought to stop the Viet Nam war. It was with friends that had returned from Nam. They also were highly decorated. Friends that could see it was a war the United States had no intention of winning. Many of the same friends I have today.
posted on February 8, 2003 08:38:18 AM new
But Saddam did send his proof. Just because Bush & his puppets don't want to believe it DOESN'T MAKE IT SO! Where is the REAL evidence. Not picture with dates on them. Heck, I can have a picture of myself standing in front of my modern car with a date of 1940 on it. It would take a few seconds. But to date, NO ONE has had anything significant in their hands proving anything. Give me an hour and I have a recording of me and Hitler discussing Star Wars laser systems and their use in baking bread.
As for Saddam's instruction to use WOMD's. It came from an IRAQ defector who wanted the special treatment afforded those willing to make the statements the present US administration wants to hear... Again, DOESN'T MAKE IT SO!
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Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Firemen, Police. We call them our heroes...but we pay them like chumps
posted on February 8, 2003 01:27:41 PM new
I guess when we attack and Hussein bops over a Scud (which we never destroyed, but he somehow no longer has) into Israel or Saudi Arabia with some kind of nasty agent (the components of which were bought by some Swedish business man or American Indian, transhipped across 7 countries but delivered to a veternary hospital in Bagdad) THEN we'll hear the story about how "Geo. Bush and da Republicans" secreted weapons to CIA operatives in Iraq to make the revolution look bad.
posted on February 8, 2003 02:22:12 PM new
mlecher - Man, you make an artform out of being wrong!
The existance of Iraqi stockpiles of VX nerve gas, mustard gas, Anthrax, Botulinum toxin, and other chem/bio weapons, as well as close to 38,000 warheads capable of delivering them are documented in the UN Inspectors' reports from their visits to Iraq prior to 1998.
UN Resolution 1441 says Iraq must account for those weapons.
I agree, and so do the governments of Great Britain, Spain, Portugal, Czechoslovakia, Australia, Denmark, and some others I can't quote off the top of my head.
Oh yeah, The US government agrees, too.
One major problem was that most of Powell's accusations were based upon the word of anonymous sources. Given the propensity of U.S. administrations of both parties to fabricate and exaggerate threats to justify previous foreign wars--such as the alleged Gulf of Tonkin incident off the coast of Vietnam and the supposed "rescue" of American medical students in Grenada--there is an understandable reluctance by many to blindly accept such accusations.
Indeed, chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has rejected many of Powell's claims. For example, the respected Swedish diplomat has insisted that there is no evidence of mobile biological weapons laboratories, of Iraq trying to foil inspectors by moving equipment before his teams arrived, or that his organization has been infiltrated by Iraqi spies.
The weakest part of Powell's presentation was his effort to link the decidedly secular Iraqi regime with the fundamentalist al Qaeda, whose leader Osama bin Laden has referred to Saddam as "an apostate, an infidel, and a traitor to Islam." Reports cited by Powell attempting to link Saddam to affiliated groups like Ansar al Islam have come almost exclusively from anti-Saddam Iraqis in exile hoping that establishing such a link could encourage U.S. military action to oust the dictator; as a result, they are not generally considered credible. In reality, Ansar al Islam's stated goal is to overthrow the secular Baathist regime in Baghdad and replace it with an Islamist state. The efforts to tie alleged al Qaeda figure Abu Musab Al Zarqawi to the Iraqi regime have also been based largely on unattributed sources. That he received medical treatment in Baghdad is no more proof of direct involvement by the Iraqi regime in his activities than the presence of scores of al Qaeda leaders in allied countries like Saudi Arabia is proof of state collusion either. Ansar al Islam fighters and their al Qaeda supporters have been seen only in autonomous Kurdish areas beyond Iraqi government control.
Indeed, Powell's claim that there had been "decades" of contact between Saddam and al Qaeda was particularly odd, given that the terrorist network is less than ten years old.
Furthermore, none of the September 11 hijackers were Iraqi, none of al Qaeda's leaders are Iraqi, and none of the money trail has been traced to Iraq. (The same cannot be said of Saudi Arabia, but the kingdom is considered an important U.S. ally.)
Perhaps Powell's strongest arguments came in regard to some strong circumstantial evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime was not fully cooperating with the strengthened inspections regime implemented under UN Security Council resolution 1441. Virtually everybody already assumed this was the case, however, particularly since Hans Blix gave his mixed assessment of Iraqi cooperation the previous week.
Powell's claims that Iraq could spray anthrax from one its F-1 Mirage jet fighters could sound alarming until one realizes that no Iraqi military aircraft could even get as far as the border without being shot down by U.S. planes or the sophisticated anti-aircraft systems of neighboring states.
The Secretary of State did not bother mentioning that the seed stock for Iraq's anthrax was sold to Saddam Hussein back in the 1980s by the United States. Nor, in his reference to Iraq's use of chemical weapons during that period, did he mention that U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency officials helped Iraq target Iranian troop concentrations in the full knowledge that the Iraqi army was using these banned weapons. Neither did Powell acknowledge that the United States covered up for the Halabja massacre when thousands of Kurdish civilians died in an Iraqi chemical weapons attack by falsely claiming that Iran was responsible.
Furthermore, despite the U.S.-sponsored UNSC resolution 1441 that calls for all relevant intelligence information to be given immediately to UNMOVIC, key accusations made by Powell were in reference to a series of alleged incidents some months earlier about which Blix and his associates were apparently never informed.
While no one can dispute Powell's assertions of human rights abuses by Saddam Hussein, most of the examples he gave were from over a decade and a half ago, when the United States was supporting the regime. Furthermore, few in the Security Council believe that a representative of the same government that has supported thugs from Suharto to Pinochet is genuinely appalled at Saddam's human rights record.
Similarly, a government that has blocked enforcement of scores of Security Council resolutions when they have involved such allies as Indonesia, Israel, Morocco, and Turkey--including UN Security Council resolution 487, which calls on Israel to place its nuclear facilities under the safeguard of the International Atomic Energy Agency--is hardly one to complain that the United Nations "places itself in danger of irrelevance if it allows Iraq to continue to defy its will."
It is doubtful, then, that the UN Security Council would authorize the use of force under these circumstances, though there is a decent chance that, in part as a result of Powell's speech, they would be willing to ratchet up the pressure against the Iraqi dictator. For example, France has called for tripling the number of inspectors and enhancing the monitoring of Iraqi activities.
Even assuming that all of Powell's accusations are true, however, he was simply unable to make the case that war--with all its horror and potential unintended consequences--was the best solution. As the British newspaper The Independent editorialized, "The policy of containment and sanctions, pursued for 12 years, has been frustrating and messy; but it has constrained Saddam. General Powell did not tell us why we must abandon it."
(Stephen Zunes <[email protected]> is an associate professor of politics and chair of the Peace & Justice Studies Program at the University of San Francisco. He serves as Middle East editor for the Foreign Policy in Focus (online at www.fpif.org) and is the author of Tinderbox: U.S. Middle East Policy and the Roots of Terrorism <www.commoncouragepress.com>.)
posted on February 9, 2003 01:15:08 AM new
We're all just fooling ourselves. Everyone knows that no matter what, sooner or later Bush is going to shove us into a conflict with Iraq.
So, you can argue until Hell Freezes over, but that won't stop the inevitable. Therefore, I suggest that we discuss exactly what we are going to do once it happens.
Once it gets going, the new Homeland Security force is going to be rounding up 'suspected terrorist sympathizers' in secret. American citizens will be vanishing into the middle of the night, never to be sen again -- except in years to come at mass grave sites.
In the meantime, Bush will use this as a pre-text to take FULL dictatorial power, declare Martial Law and to suspend presidential elections "until the War on Terror is over."
Then, Bear, and Linda, NTS, and Colin can wear their Skull & Bones armbands in public on their black uniforms with glee!
posted on February 9, 2003 03:16:54 AM new
Borillar,
"Then, Bear, and Linda, NTS, and Colin can wear their Skull & Bones armbands in public on their black uniforms with glee! "
Your paranoia Amazes me. I already have a Allgemeine-SS Death head emblem. Picked it up many years ago when I was buying and selling the stuff. It's just one of those really evil things I had to keep. Never thought I'd have to wear it. Oh Well, for the good of the country.
