Iraq WMD, Case for War
What was the case for war? How was it justified?
Sunday, June 26, 2005
General admits to secret air war - nine months of allied raids “laid the foundations” for the allied victory
General admits to secret air war - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 26, 2005 | Michael Smith
THE American general who commanded allied air forces during the Iraq war appears to have admitted in a briefing to American and British officers that coalition aircraft waged a secret air war against Iraq from the middle of 2002, nine months before the invasion began.
Addressing a briefing on lessons learnt from the Iraq war Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley said that in 2002 and early 2003 allied aircraft flew 21,736 sorties, dropping more than 600 bombs on 391 “carefully selected targets” before the war officially started.
The nine months of allied raids “laid the foundations” for the allied victory, Moseley said. They ensured that allied forces did not have to start the war with a protracted bombardment of Iraqi positions.
If those raids exceeded the need to maintain security in the no-fly zones of southern and northern Iraq, they would leave President George W Bush and Tony Blair vulnerable to allegations that they had acted illegally.
Moseley’s remarks have emerged after reports in The Sunday Times that showed an increase in allied bombing in southern Iraq was described in leaked minutes of a meeting of the war cabinet as “spikes of activity to put pressure on the regime”."
General admits to secret air war - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 26, 2005 | Michael Smith
THE American general who commanded allied air forces during the Iraq war appears to have admitted in a briefing to American and British officers that coalition aircraft waged a secret air war against Iraq from the middle of 2002, nine months before the invasion began.
Addressing a briefing on lessons learnt from the Iraq war Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley said that in 2002 and early 2003 allied aircraft flew 21,736 sorties, dropping more than 600 bombs on 391 “carefully selected targets” before the war officially started.
The nine months of allied raids “laid the foundations” for the allied victory, Moseley said. They ensured that allied forces did not have to start the war with a protracted bombardment of Iraqi positions.
If those raids exceeded the need to maintain security in the no-fly zones of southern and northern Iraq, they would leave President George W Bush and Tony Blair vulnerable to allegations that they had acted illegally.
Moseley’s remarks have emerged after reports in The Sunday Times that showed an increase in allied bombing in southern Iraq was described in leaked minutes of a meeting of the war cabinet as “spikes of activity to put pressure on the regime”."
Saturday, June 25, 2005
UK ministers told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’ 3 momths after Bush-Blair meeting in Aprill 2002 -- 1 year BEFORE war
Ministers were told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’ - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 12, 2005 | Michael Smith
MINISTERS were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.
The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.
The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair’s inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.
This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action.
Ministers were told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’ - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 12, 2005 | Michael Smith
MINISTERS were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.
The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.
The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair’s inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.
This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action.
Friday, June 24, 2005
War critics astonished as US hawk admits invasion was illegal
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | War critics astonished as US hawk admits invasion was illegal: "Oliver Burkeman and Julian Borger in Washington | Thursday November 20, 2003 | The Guardian
International lawyers and anti-war campaigners reacted with astonishment yesterday after the influential Pentagon hawk Richard Perle conceded that the invasion of Iraq had been illegal.
In a startling break with the official White House and Downing Street lines, Mr Perle told an audience in London: 'I think in this case international law stood in the way of doing the right thing.'
President George Bush has consistently argued that the war was legal either because of existing UN security council resolutions on Iraq - also the British government's publicly stated view - or as an act of self-defence permitted by international law.
But Mr Perle, a key member of the defence policy board, which advises the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that 'international law ... would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone', and this would have been morally unacceptable.
French intransigence, he added, meant there had been 'no practical mechanism consistent with the rules of the UN for dealing with Saddam Hussein'."
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | War critics astonished as US hawk admits invasion was illegal: "Oliver Burkeman and Julian Borger in Washington | Thursday November 20, 2003 | The Guardian
International lawyers and anti-war campaigners reacted with astonishment yesterday after the influential Pentagon hawk Richard Perle conceded that the invasion of Iraq had been illegal.
In a startling break with the official White House and Downing Street lines, Mr Perle told an audience in London: 'I think in this case international law stood in the way of doing the right thing.'
President George Bush has consistently argued that the war was legal either because of existing UN security council resolutions on Iraq - also the British government's publicly stated view - or as an act of self-defence permitted by international law.
But Mr Perle, a key member of the defence policy board, which advises the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that 'international law ... would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone', and this would have been morally unacceptable.
French intransigence, he added, meant there had been 'no practical mechanism consistent with the rules of the UN for dealing with Saddam Hussein'."
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
A War Waged by Liars and Morons: former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration
CounterPunch: "America's Best Political Newsletter": "June 21, 2005 | A War Waged by Liars and Morons | What is Bush's Agenda in Iraq? | By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
For what purpose has President Bush sent 1,741 US soldiers to be killed in action in Iraq (as of June 19, 2005)?
For what purpose have 15,000 - 38,000 US troops been wounded, many so seriously that they are maimed for life?
Why has the US government thrown away $300 billion in an illegal and pointless war that cannot be won?
These questions are beginning to penetrate the consciousness of Americans, a majority of whom no longer support Bush's war.
Bush's Iraq war is the first war for which Americans have not known the reason. The reasons they were given by their president, vice president, secretary of defense, national security advisor, secretary of state, and the sycophantic media were nothing but a pack of lies.
The top secret British government memos leaked to a reporter at the London Sunday Times make it completely clear that prior to the invasion President Bush knew that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction.
The memos make it completely clear that Saddam Hussein had no responsibility whatsoever for the September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The memos make completely clear that the British government regarded the invasion of Iraq as a war crime. The memos show the British government scrambling to find some way of creating "cover" in order to obfuscate the illegality of the invasion that Prime Minister Tony Blair had promised Bush to support.
One of the cover plans was itself illegal. According to yet another leaked top secret British memo in the Sunday Times on June 19, Bush decided to sharply increase the US bombings of Iraq in the hopes it would goad Saddam Hussein into a response that could be used as a pretext for invading Iraq.
According to the Sunday Times, the British Foreign Office advised the British Cabinet that legally "the allies had no power to use military force to put pressure of any kind on the regime."
...
In his June 18 weekly radio address last Saturday, Bush again lied to the American people when he told them that the US was forced into invading Iraq because of the September 11 attack on the WTC. Bush, the greatest disgrace that America has ever had to suffer, actually repeated at this late date the monstrous lie for which he is infamous throughout the world:
"We went to war because we were attacked, and we are at war today because there are still people out there who want to harm our country and hurt our citizens."
Whoever the "people out there who want to harm our country and hurt our citizens" might be, they were not Iraqis, at least not until Bush invaded their country, killed tens of thousands and maimed tens of thousands more, detained tens of thousands others, destroyed entire cities, destroyed the country's infrastructure, and created mass unemployment, poverty, pollution and disease.
The only reason Iraqis want to harm the US is because George W. Bush inflicted, and continues to inflict, tremendous harm on Iraqis.
...
In print and on TV, Bush's neocons have made clear their desire to see the US at war with the entire Muslim world: Today Iraq, tomorrow the Middle East. That the neocons believe the US can win such a war when the US cannot even occupy Baghdad or control the road to the airport indicates a frightening insanity at the center of the Bush administration and a criminal disregard for the lives of Americans and Muslims.
The neocons assured Americans that the war in Iraq would be a cakewalk over in three weeks!
The neocons told us that only 70,000 troops were needed to bring Iraq to heel!
Neocons fired the top generals who had truthfully told Congress that several hundred thousand troops, at least, would be needed!
Neocons told Congress that Iraqi oil would pay for the invasion and that America did not have to worry about the cost! So far that is a $300 billion mistake.
And Bush has retained and promoted these morons!
No one has been held accountable for this enormous disaster.
How many more American troops are going to be killed and maimed for Bush's lies? How many more Iraqi civilians must be killed, maimed, and locked up?
Bush's Iraq policy is based on lies, and force based on lies cannot bring democracy to Iraq or to any other country.
...
Why did Bush invade Iraq?
Cynical Americans say the answer is oil. But $300 billion would have bought the oil without getting anyone killed, without destroying America's reputation in the world and without stirring up countless terrorist recruits for al Qaida.
Congress gave Bush the go-ahead for the invasion because Congress trusted Bush and believed his word that Iraq had fearsome weapons that would be unleashed on America unless we preempted Saddam Hussein's attack by striking first. Congress did not give Bush the go-ahead for initiating a war in order to spend hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of American lives "building democracy in Iraq."
Will President Bush ever tell us the real reason why he committed America's treasure, the lives of American soldiers and the reputation of our country to war in Iraq?
Does he even know?
Paul Craig Roberts has held a number of academic appointments and has contributed to numerous scholarly publications. He served as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. His graduate economics education was at the University of Virginia, the University of California at Berkeley, and Oxford University. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions. He can be reached at: paulcraigroberts@yahoo.com
CounterPunch: "America's Best Political Newsletter": "June 21, 2005 | A War Waged by Liars and Morons | What is Bush's Agenda in Iraq? | By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
For what purpose has President Bush sent 1,741 US soldiers to be killed in action in Iraq (as of June 19, 2005)?
For what purpose have 15,000 - 38,000 US troops been wounded, many so seriously that they are maimed for life?
Why has the US government thrown away $300 billion in an illegal and pointless war that cannot be won?
These questions are beginning to penetrate the consciousness of Americans, a majority of whom no longer support Bush's war.
Bush's Iraq war is the first war for which Americans have not known the reason. The reasons they were given by their president, vice president, secretary of defense, national security advisor, secretary of state, and the sycophantic media were nothing but a pack of lies.
The top secret British government memos leaked to a reporter at the London Sunday Times make it completely clear that prior to the invasion President Bush knew that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction.
The memos make it completely clear that Saddam Hussein had no responsibility whatsoever for the September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
The memos make completely clear that the British government regarded the invasion of Iraq as a war crime. The memos show the British government scrambling to find some way of creating "cover" in order to obfuscate the illegality of the invasion that Prime Minister Tony Blair had promised Bush to support.
One of the cover plans was itself illegal. According to yet another leaked top secret British memo in the Sunday Times on June 19, Bush decided to sharply increase the US bombings of Iraq in the hopes it would goad Saddam Hussein into a response that could be used as a pretext for invading Iraq.
According to the Sunday Times, the British Foreign Office advised the British Cabinet that legally "the allies had no power to use military force to put pressure of any kind on the regime."
...
In his June 18 weekly radio address last Saturday, Bush again lied to the American people when he told them that the US was forced into invading Iraq because of the September 11 attack on the WTC. Bush, the greatest disgrace that America has ever had to suffer, actually repeated at this late date the monstrous lie for which he is infamous throughout the world:
"We went to war because we were attacked, and we are at war today because there are still people out there who want to harm our country and hurt our citizens."
Whoever the "people out there who want to harm our country and hurt our citizens" might be, they were not Iraqis, at least not until Bush invaded their country, killed tens of thousands and maimed tens of thousands more, detained tens of thousands others, destroyed entire cities, destroyed the country's infrastructure, and created mass unemployment, poverty, pollution and disease.
The only reason Iraqis want to harm the US is because George W. Bush inflicted, and continues to inflict, tremendous harm on Iraqis.
...
In print and on TV, Bush's neocons have made clear their desire to see the US at war with the entire Muslim world: Today Iraq, tomorrow the Middle East. That the neocons believe the US can win such a war when the US cannot even occupy Baghdad or control the road to the airport indicates a frightening insanity at the center of the Bush administration and a criminal disregard for the lives of Americans and Muslims.
The neocons assured Americans that the war in Iraq would be a cakewalk over in three weeks!
The neocons told us that only 70,000 troops were needed to bring Iraq to heel!
Neocons fired the top generals who had truthfully told Congress that several hundred thousand troops, at least, would be needed!
Neocons told Congress that Iraqi oil would pay for the invasion and that America did not have to worry about the cost! So far that is a $300 billion mistake.
And Bush has retained and promoted these morons!
No one has been held accountable for this enormous disaster.
How many more American troops are going to be killed and maimed for Bush's lies? How many more Iraqi civilians must be killed, maimed, and locked up?
Bush's Iraq policy is based on lies, and force based on lies cannot bring democracy to Iraq or to any other country.
...
Why did Bush invade Iraq?
Cynical Americans say the answer is oil. But $300 billion would have bought the oil without getting anyone killed, without destroying America's reputation in the world and without stirring up countless terrorist recruits for al Qaida.
Congress gave Bush the go-ahead for the invasion because Congress trusted Bush and believed his word that Iraq had fearsome weapons that would be unleashed on America unless we preempted Saddam Hussein's attack by striking first. Congress did not give Bush the go-ahead for initiating a war in order to spend hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of American lives "building democracy in Iraq."
Will President Bush ever tell us the real reason why he committed America's treasure, the lives of American soldiers and the reputation of our country to war in Iraq?
Does he even know?
Paul Craig Roberts has held a number of academic appointments and has contributed to numerous scholarly publications. He served as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. His graduate economics education was at the University of Virginia, the University of California at Berkeley, and Oxford University. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions. He can be reached at: paulcraigroberts@yahoo.com
Monday, June 20, 2005
From December 2002: [ignored at the time?]: The Secret War: Iraq War already under way
The Secret War: Iraq War already under way: "by John Pilger
12/20/02 'The Mirror' - - THE American and British attack on Iraq has already begun. While the Blair government continues to claim in Parliament that 'nofinal decision has been taken', Royal Air Force and US fighter bombers have secretly changed tactics and escalated their 'patrols' over Iraq to an all-out assault on both military and civilian targets.
American and British bombing of Iraq has increased by 300 per cent. Between March and November, according to Ministry of Defence replies to MPs, the RAF dropped more than 124 tonnes of bombs.
From August to December, there were 62 attacks by American F-16 aircraft and RAF Tornadoes - an average of one bombing raid every two days. These are said to have been aimed at Iraqi 'air defences', but many have fallen on mostly populated areas, where civilian deaths are unavoidable.
Under the United Nations Charter and the conventions of war and international law, the attacks amount to acts of piracy: no different, in principle, from the German Luftwaffe's bombing in Spain in the 1930s as precursor to its invasion of Europe.
The bombing is a 'secret war' that has seldom been news. Since 1991, and especially in the last four years, it has been unrelenting and is now deemed the longest Anglo-American campaign of aerial bombardment since World War Two.
The US and British governments justify it by claiming they have a UN mandate to police so-called 'no-fly zones' which they declared
following the Gulf War. They say these 'zones', which give them control of most of Iraq's airspace, are legal and supported by UN Security Council Resolution 688."
The Secret War: Iraq War already under way: "by John Pilger
12/20/02 'The Mirror' - - THE American and British attack on Iraq has already begun. While the Blair government continues to claim in Parliament that 'nofinal decision has been taken', Royal Air Force and US fighter bombers have secretly changed tactics and escalated their 'patrols' over Iraq to an all-out assault on both military and civilian targets.
American and British bombing of Iraq has increased by 300 per cent. Between March and November, according to Ministry of Defence replies to MPs, the RAF dropped more than 124 tonnes of bombs.
From August to December, there were 62 attacks by American F-16 aircraft and RAF Tornadoes - an average of one bombing raid every two days. These are said to have been aimed at Iraqi 'air defences', but many have fallen on mostly populated areas, where civilian deaths are unavoidable.
Under the United Nations Charter and the conventions of war and international law, the attacks amount to acts of piracy: no different, in principle, from the German Luftwaffe's bombing in Spain in the 1930s as precursor to its invasion of Europe.
The bombing is a 'secret war' that has seldom been news. Since 1991, and especially in the last four years, it has been unrelenting and is now deemed the longest Anglo-American campaign of aerial bombardment since World War Two.
The US and British governments justify it by claiming they have a UN mandate to police so-called 'no-fly zones' which they declared
following the Gulf War. They say these 'zones', which give them control of most of Iraq's airspace, are legal and supported by UN Security Council Resolution 688."
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office - Britain
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office - Britain - Times Online: "June 19, 2005 | Michael Smith
A SHARP increase in British and American bombing raids on Iraq in the run-up to war “to put pressure on the regime” was illegal under international law, according to leaked Foreign Office legal advice.
The advice was first provided to senior ministers in March 2002. Two months later RAF and USAF jets began “spikes of activity” designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war.
The Foreign Office advice shows military action to pressurise the regime was “not consistent with” UN law, despite American claims that it was.
The decision to provoke the Iraqis emerged in leaked minutes of a meeting between Tony Blair and his most senior advisers — the so-called Downing Street memo published by The Sunday Times shortly before the general election.
Democratic congressmen claimed last week the evidence it contains is grounds for impeaching President George Bush."
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office - Britain - Times Online: "June 19, 2005 | Michael Smith
A SHARP increase in British and American bombing raids on Iraq in the run-up to war “to put pressure on the regime” was illegal under international law, according to leaked Foreign Office legal advice.
The advice was first provided to senior ministers in March 2002. Two months later RAF and USAF jets began “spikes of activity” designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war.
The Foreign Office advice shows military action to pressurise the regime was “not consistent with” UN law, despite American claims that it was.
The decision to provoke the Iraqis emerged in leaked minutes of a meeting between Tony Blair and his most senior advisers — the so-called Downing Street memo published by The Sunday Times shortly before the general election.
Democratic congressmen claimed last week the evidence it contains is grounds for impeaching President George Bush."
British UN diplomat: WMD claims were 'totally implausible' ... 'All of my colleagues knew that, too'. ...warned under the Official Secrets Act."
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | WMD claims were 'totally implausible': "Richard Norton-Taylor | Monday June 20, 2005 | The Guardian
A key Foreign Office diplomat responsible for liaising with UN inspectors says today that claims the government made about Iraq's weapons programme were 'totally implausible'.
He tells the Guardian: 'I'd read the intelligence on WMD for four and a half years, and there's no way that it could sustain the case that the government was presenting. All of my colleagues knew that, too'.
Carne Ross, who was a member of the British mission to the UN in New York during the run-up to the invasion, resigned from the FO last year, after giving evidence to the Butler inquiry.
He thought about publishing his testimony because he felt so angry. But he was warned that if he did he might be prosecuted under the Official Secrets Act."
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | WMD claims were 'totally implausible': "Richard Norton-Taylor | Monday June 20, 2005 | The Guardian
A key Foreign Office diplomat responsible for liaising with UN inspectors says today that claims the government made about Iraq's weapons programme were 'totally implausible'.
He tells the Guardian: 'I'd read the intelligence on WMD for four and a half years, and there's no way that it could sustain the case that the government was presenting. All of my colleagues knew that, too'.
Carne Ross, who was a member of the British mission to the UN in New York during the run-up to the invasion, resigned from the FO last year, after giving evidence to the Butler inquiry.
He thought about publishing his testimony because he felt so angry. But he was warned that if he did he might be prosecuted under the Official Secrets Act."
The Downing Street Memo: There are a number of people asking about fixed and its meaning. This is a real joke.
BELLACIAO - The Downing Street Memo: Primary source or 2nd hand info - Collective Bellaciao: "Monday 20th June 2005 (18h59) :
The Memo raises the question: Did the President, the Vice President and other high level officials deliberately fabricate intelligence to convince a gullible public to accept war? These are high crimes and misdemeanors, impeachable offenses to say the least. And with the carnage in Iraq, they could all go to trial for war crimes. Is it any wonder that Bush and Co are running away from the questions?
Mr. Bush has refused to respond to the allegations, sending his PR man Scottie McClellan to brush it off as ’old news’. Is that really the extent of the checks and balances left in the good ol’ US of A? We can ask el Presidente a question, and if he says he didn’t do it... he didn’t do it- and don’t ask again unless you wanna go swimmin’ with a new pair of lead boots- capice?
Is the memo a primary source? Let’s look at their reasons not to believe the memo, starting with the funniest.
Bush devotees argued that the word ’fixed’ means something different in England. This is what the TimesOnline.co.uk
reporter who broke the story had to say re: ’fixed’ in a WaPo online chat:
Michael Smith, Sunday Times Reporter: There are a number of people asking about fixed and its meaning. This is a real joke. I do not know anyone in the UK who took it to mean anything other than fixed as in fixed a race, fixed an election, fixed the intelligence. If you fix something, you make it the way you want it. The intelligence was fixed and as for the reports that said this was one British official. Pleeeaaassee! This was the head of MI6. How much authority do you want the man to have? He has just been to Washington, he has just talked to George Tenet. He said the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. That translates in clearer terms as the intelligence was being cooked to match what the administration wanted it to say to justify invading Iraq.
'fixed as in fixed a race, fixed an election'
Another reason given for Bush’s refusal to answer these allegations is that the memo is hearsay from an insignificant aide. Ray McGovern, 27yr CIA analyst (retired), stated at the Conyers’ Hearing that the Downing Street Minutes are in fact a primary source, not merely 2nd hand information.
The Memo is actually the minutes from a top secret meeting with Blair, his cabinet and the head of MI6. As UK reporter Mr. Smith stated, 'Pleeeaaassee! This was the head of MI6. How much authority do you want the man to have?' Britain’s top spy told Blair what he learned in Washington, that war was 'inevitable' and the 'facts were being fixed' to convince the public." ...
BELLACIAO - The Downing Street Memo: Primary source or 2nd hand info - Collective Bellaciao: "Monday 20th June 2005 (18h59) :
The Memo raises the question: Did the President, the Vice President and other high level officials deliberately fabricate intelligence to convince a gullible public to accept war? These are high crimes and misdemeanors, impeachable offenses to say the least. And with the carnage in Iraq, they could all go to trial for war crimes. Is it any wonder that Bush and Co are running away from the questions?
Mr. Bush has refused to respond to the allegations, sending his PR man Scottie McClellan to brush it off as ’old news’. Is that really the extent of the checks and balances left in the good ol’ US of A? We can ask el Presidente a question, and if he says he didn’t do it... he didn’t do it- and don’t ask again unless you wanna go swimmin’ with a new pair of lead boots- capice?
Is the memo a primary source? Let’s look at their reasons not to believe the memo, starting with the funniest.
Bush devotees argued that the word ’fixed’ means something different in England. This is what the TimesOnline.co.uk
reporter who broke the story had to say re: ’fixed’ in a WaPo online chat:
Michael Smith, Sunday Times Reporter: There are a number of people asking about fixed and its meaning. This is a real joke. I do not know anyone in the UK who took it to mean anything other than fixed as in fixed a race, fixed an election, fixed the intelligence. If you fix something, you make it the way you want it. The intelligence was fixed and as for the reports that said this was one British official. Pleeeaaassee! This was the head of MI6. How much authority do you want the man to have? He has just been to Washington, he has just talked to George Tenet. He said the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. That translates in clearer terms as the intelligence was being cooked to match what the administration wanted it to say to justify invading Iraq.
'fixed as in fixed a race, fixed an election'
Another reason given for Bush’s refusal to answer these allegations is that the memo is hearsay from an insignificant aide. Ray McGovern, 27yr CIA analyst (retired), stated at the Conyers’ Hearing that the Downing Street Minutes are in fact a primary source, not merely 2nd hand information.
The Memo is actually the minutes from a top secret meeting with Blair, his cabinet and the head of MI6. As UK reporter Mr. Smith stated, 'Pleeeaaassee! This was the head of MI6. How much authority do you want the man to have?' Britain’s top spy told Blair what he learned in Washington, that war was 'inevitable' and the 'facts were being fixed' to convince the public." ...
Saturday, June 18, 2005
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office: designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war.
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office - Britain - Times Online: "June 19, 2005 | Michael Smith
A SHARP increase in British and American bombing raids on Iraq in the run-up to war “to put pressure on the regime” was illegal under international law, according to leaked Foreign Office legal advice.
The advice was first provided to senior ministers in March 2002. Two months later RAF and USAF jets began “spikes of activity” designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war.
The Foreign Office advice shows military action to pressurise the regime was “not consistent with” UN law, despite American claims that it was. ...
British bombing raids were illegal, says Foreign Office - Britain - Times Online: "June 19, 2005 | Michael Smith
A SHARP increase in British and American bombing raids on Iraq in the run-up to war “to put pressure on the regime” was illegal under international law, according to leaked Foreign Office legal advice.
The advice was first provided to senior ministers in March 2002. Two months later RAF and USAF jets began “spikes of activity” designed to goad Saddam Hussein into retaliating and giving the allies a pretext for war.
The Foreign Office advice shows military action to pressurise the regime was “not consistent with” UN law, despite American claims that it was. ...
Downing Street Minutes may be old news ... and so are all these other warning signs
Daily Kos :: Political Analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.: "The Downing Street Minutes may be old news"
The fact that George Bush told his ghostwriter in 1999 that, if given the chance, he would invade Iraq so that he could gain "political capital" may be old news
Exclusive: Bush Wanted To Invade Iraq If Elected in 2000
The fact that Bush was planning to invade Iraq during his first month in office may be old news
O'Neill: Bush planned Iraq invasion before 9/11
The fact that Dick Cheney's energy task force was mapping out Iraq oilfields in March of 2001 may be old news
Group: Cheney Task Force Eyed on Iraq Oil
The fact that Bush diverted $700 million, without the permission of congress, to Iraq war preparations in the summer of 2002 may be old news
Bush's Legal Obligation to Tell Congress About $700M for Iraq
The fact that former UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter stated in July of 2002 that Saddam had no WMDs, but was ignored, may be old news
Is Iraq a True Threat to the US?
The fact that the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate of Iraq's weapons capabilities was purposefully stripped of doubts and dissenting opinions may be old news
Doubts, Dissent Stripped from Public Version of Iraq Assessment
The fact that Sen. Bob Graham received a 25 page report from the CIA in the summer of 2002 that stated evidence of Saddam's WMD was inconclusive, but Graham was roundly ignored, if not outright mocked, may be old news
The Selling of the Iraq War: The First Casualty
The fact that chief Iraq war architect Paul Wolfowitz admitted that WMDs were just a convenient excuse to convince the country to go along with the invasion of Iraq may be old news
WMD Just a Convenient Excuse for War, Admits Wolfowitz
The fact that coalition forces drastically stepped up bombing runs during the summer of 2002 in order to goad Saddam into war may be old news
RAF bombing raids tried to goad Saddam into war
The fact that 25 former CIA officers accused the President of manipulating intelligence may be old news
Ex-CIA Accuse Bush of Manipulating Iraq Evidence
The fact that in 2002 the White House killed Pentagon plans to strike Zarqawi's camp in Northern Iraq in order to maintain the White House's claim that Iraq has ties to terrorists may be old news
Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind
The fact that the White House Silenced Experts Who Questioned Iraq Intel Six Months Before War may be old news
White House Silenced Experts Who Questioned Iraq Intel Six Months Before War
The fact that Vice President Cheney made numerous unprecedented trips to the CIA in order to pressure analysts may be old news
Some Iraq Analysts Felt Pressure From Cheney Visits
The fact that our tough guy of a President said in March of 2002 "Fuck Saddam, we're taking him out" may be old news
March Orders
Daily Kos :: Political Analysis and other daily rants on the state of the nation.: "The Downing Street Minutes may be old news"
The fact that George Bush told his ghostwriter in 1999 that, if given the chance, he would invade Iraq so that he could gain "political capital" may be old news
Exclusive: Bush Wanted To Invade Iraq If Elected in 2000
The fact that Bush was planning to invade Iraq during his first month in office may be old news
O'Neill: Bush planned Iraq invasion before 9/11
The fact that Dick Cheney's energy task force was mapping out Iraq oilfields in March of 2001 may be old news
Group: Cheney Task Force Eyed on Iraq Oil
The fact that Bush diverted $700 million, without the permission of congress, to Iraq war preparations in the summer of 2002 may be old news
Bush's Legal Obligation to Tell Congress About $700M for Iraq
The fact that former UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter stated in July of 2002 that Saddam had no WMDs, but was ignored, may be old news
Is Iraq a True Threat to the US?
The fact that the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate of Iraq's weapons capabilities was purposefully stripped of doubts and dissenting opinions may be old news
Doubts, Dissent Stripped from Public Version of Iraq Assessment
The fact that Sen. Bob Graham received a 25 page report from the CIA in the summer of 2002 that stated evidence of Saddam's WMD was inconclusive, but Graham was roundly ignored, if not outright mocked, may be old news
The Selling of the Iraq War: The First Casualty
The fact that chief Iraq war architect Paul Wolfowitz admitted that WMDs were just a convenient excuse to convince the country to go along with the invasion of Iraq may be old news
WMD Just a Convenient Excuse for War, Admits Wolfowitz
The fact that coalition forces drastically stepped up bombing runs during the summer of 2002 in order to goad Saddam into war may be old news
RAF bombing raids tried to goad Saddam into war
The fact that 25 former CIA officers accused the President of manipulating intelligence may be old news
Ex-CIA Accuse Bush of Manipulating Iraq Evidence
The fact that in 2002 the White House killed Pentagon plans to strike Zarqawi's camp in Northern Iraq in order to maintain the White House's claim that Iraq has ties to terrorists may be old news
Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind
The fact that the White House Silenced Experts Who Questioned Iraq Intel Six Months Before War may be old news
White House Silenced Experts Who Questioned Iraq Intel Six Months Before War
The fact that Vice President Cheney made numerous unprecedented trips to the CIA in order to pressure analysts may be old news
Some Iraq Analysts Felt Pressure From Cheney Visits
The fact that our tough guy of a President said in March of 2002 "Fuck Saddam, we're taking him out" may be old news
March Orders
2002 British memo: 'U.S. scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and al-Qaida is so far frankly unconvincing,' ... "It sounds like a grudge ,,,"
Excite News: "Memos Show British Concern Over Iraq Plans |
Jun 18, 1:27 PM (ET) | By THOMAS WAGNER
LONDON (AP) - When Prime Minister Tony Blair's chief foreign policy adviser dined with Condoleezza Rice six months after Sept. 11, the then-U.S. national security adviser didn't want to discuss Osama bin Laden or al-Qaida. She wanted to talk about 'regime change' in Iraq, setting the stage for the U.S.-led invasion more than a year later.
President Bush wanted Blair's support, but British officials worried the White House was rushing to war, according to a series of leaked secret Downing Street memos that have renewed questions and debate about Washington's motives for ousting Saddam Hussein.
In one of the memos, British Foreign Office political director Peter Ricketts openly asks whether the Bush administration had a clear and compelling military reason for war.
'U.S. scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and al-Qaida is so far frankly unconvincing,' Ricketts says in the memo. 'For Iraq, 'regime change' does not stack up. It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam.'"
Excite News: "Memos Show British Concern Over Iraq Plans |
Jun 18, 1:27 PM (ET) | By THOMAS WAGNER
LONDON (AP) - When Prime Minister Tony Blair's chief foreign policy adviser dined with Condoleezza Rice six months after Sept. 11, the then-U.S. national security adviser didn't want to discuss Osama bin Laden or al-Qaida. She wanted to talk about 'regime change' in Iraq, setting the stage for the U.S.-led invasion more than a year later.
President Bush wanted Blair's support, but British officials worried the White House was rushing to war, according to a series of leaked secret Downing Street memos that have renewed questions and debate about Washington's motives for ousting Saddam Hussein.
In one of the memos, British Foreign Office political director Peter Ricketts openly asks whether the Bush administration had a clear and compelling military reason for war.
'U.S. scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and al-Qaida is so far frankly unconvincing,' Ricketts says in the memo. 'For Iraq, 'regime change' does not stack up. It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam.'"
Friday, June 17, 2005
The horrific experience of an Iraqi woman Jumana Hanna == cited by the Bush administration -- was a tissue of fabrications.
War Party's Atrocity Porn: "War Party's Atrocity Porn | by William Norman Grigg | January 24, 2005
The horrific experience of an Iraqi woman Jumana Hanna -- supposedly imprisoned, raped, and tortured for years on the orders of Uday Hussein -- was cited by the Bush administration and its supporters as 'reason alone' for the war. But Hanna's story -- like the rest of the administration's case -- was a tissue of fabrications.
The face of Jumana Mikhail Hanna, a 40-year-old Iraqi expatriate who lives in northern California with her mother and children, is an instrument that appears designed for the specific task of conveying anguish. Photographs of Hanna published in the January 2005 issue of Esquire depict her in poses of agony as she visits locations in Iraq where, prior to the U.S. invasion, she was reportedly tortured.
On the strength of her story, and her usefulness in aiding occupation authorities track down Iraqi officials suspected of committing Saddam-era atrocities, Hanna became a heroine in neo-conservative circles. But subsequent developments revealed that Hanna wasn’t a brave witness, but rather a brazen con artist. Hanna’s story was perfectly tailored to the needs of Bush administration propagandists. And her ability to give photographers their desired 'money shot' – her body wracked by uncontrollable sobs, her face contorted in unspeakable grief – displayed an ability to simulate emotion worthy of a porn star."
...
In 2001, several years after the alleged events described above, Hanna sent her husband Anwar to sign the necessary documents for their children to attend school. He was purportedly arrested again, and confined to the same cellblock where he had been imprisoned for three years. Eventually his lifeless and mutilated body was "handed through the steel gate like a piece of butcher’s meat."
Following the U.S. invasion, Hanna became a valuable intelligence asset to the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), which runs the U.S.-led occupation. "Her courage in coming forward to offer U.S. officials what is very likely credible information … is helping us to root out Ba’athists [officials of Saddam’s ruling party]," stated Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in testimony before a Senate committee. CPA officials awarded Hanna several medals of honor. Ultimately, occupation forces arrested nine Iraqi officers – including a general – on the basis of Hanna’s word alone.
...
Esquire’s Solovitch, who came to regard Hanna as a hero, began to work on a biography of the Iraqi witness. To her chagrin, she learned that Hanna’s story was entirely fabricated. Hanna’s supposedly dead husband is alive and well. It was never against the law for an Iraqi to marry a non-Iraqi. While Hanna claimed to have earned an accounting degree from Oxford, she never attended Oxford, and the renowned college doesn’t offer an accounting degree. A site identified by Hanna as a "mass grave" proved to be utterly devoid of human remains.
A gynecological exam conducted in Baghdad to verify Hanna’s account of long-term – and daily – rape and sexual abuse found no physical evidence to corroborate her story. ...
...
As it turns out, Hanna did indeed spend time in jail – as a prostitute
War Party's Atrocity Porn: "War Party's Atrocity Porn | by William Norman Grigg | January 24, 2005
The horrific experience of an Iraqi woman Jumana Hanna -- supposedly imprisoned, raped, and tortured for years on the orders of Uday Hussein -- was cited by the Bush administration and its supporters as 'reason alone' for the war. But Hanna's story -- like the rest of the administration's case -- was a tissue of fabrications.
The face of Jumana Mikhail Hanna, a 40-year-old Iraqi expatriate who lives in northern California with her mother and children, is an instrument that appears designed for the specific task of conveying anguish. Photographs of Hanna published in the January 2005 issue of Esquire depict her in poses of agony as she visits locations in Iraq where, prior to the U.S. invasion, she was reportedly tortured.
On the strength of her story, and her usefulness in aiding occupation authorities track down Iraqi officials suspected of committing Saddam-era atrocities, Hanna became a heroine in neo-conservative circles. But subsequent developments revealed that Hanna wasn’t a brave witness, but rather a brazen con artist. Hanna’s story was perfectly tailored to the needs of Bush administration propagandists. And her ability to give photographers their desired 'money shot' – her body wracked by uncontrollable sobs, her face contorted in unspeakable grief – displayed an ability to simulate emotion worthy of a porn star."
...
In 2001, several years after the alleged events described above, Hanna sent her husband Anwar to sign the necessary documents for their children to attend school. He was purportedly arrested again, and confined to the same cellblock where he had been imprisoned for three years. Eventually his lifeless and mutilated body was "handed through the steel gate like a piece of butcher’s meat."
Following the U.S. invasion, Hanna became a valuable intelligence asset to the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), which runs the U.S.-led occupation. "Her courage in coming forward to offer U.S. officials what is very likely credible information … is helping us to root out Ba’athists [officials of Saddam’s ruling party]," stated Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in testimony before a Senate committee. CPA officials awarded Hanna several medals of honor. Ultimately, occupation forces arrested nine Iraqi officers – including a general – on the basis of Hanna’s word alone.
...
Esquire’s Solovitch, who came to regard Hanna as a hero, began to work on a biography of the Iraqi witness. To her chagrin, she learned that Hanna’s story was entirely fabricated. Hanna’s supposedly dead husband is alive and well. It was never against the law for an Iraqi to marry a non-Iraqi. While Hanna claimed to have earned an accounting degree from Oxford, she never attended Oxford, and the renowned college doesn’t offer an accounting degree. A site identified by Hanna as a "mass grave" proved to be utterly devoid of human remains.
A gynecological exam conducted in Baghdad to verify Hanna’s account of long-term – and daily – rape and sexual abuse found no physical evidence to corroborate her story. ...
...
As it turns out, Hanna did indeed spend time in jail – as a prostitute
Thursday, June 16, 2005
the bombings were actually systematic assaults on Iraq's capacity to defend itself. The US had never declared war. Bush had no authorization ...
More Damning than Downing Street: "
I follow Iraq pretty closely, but was taken aback when Charlie Clements, now head of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, described driving in a Baghdad neighborhood six months before the war 'and a building would just explode, hit by a missile from 30,000 feet -'What is that building?'' Clements would ask. ''Oh, that's a telephone exchange.'' Later, at a conference at Nevada's Nellis Air Force Base, Clements heard a U.S. General boast 'that he began taking out assets that could help in resisting an invasion at least six months before war was declared.'
Earlier this month, Jeremy Scahill wrote a powerful piece on The Nation's website, describing a huge air assault in September 2002,
'Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace,' Scahill writes. 'At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist.'
Why aren't we talking about this? As Scahill points out, this was a month before the Congressional vote, and two before the UN resolution. Supposedly part of enforcing 'no fly zones,' the bombings were actually systematic assaults on Iraq's capacity to defend itself. The US had never declared war. Bush had no authorization, not even a fig leaf. He was simply attacking another nation because he'd decided to do so. This preemptive war preempted our own Congress, as well as international law. "
More Damning than Downing Street: "
I follow Iraq pretty closely, but was taken aback when Charlie Clements, now head of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, described driving in a Baghdad neighborhood six months before the war 'and a building would just explode, hit by a missile from 30,000 feet -'What is that building?'' Clements would ask. ''Oh, that's a telephone exchange.'' Later, at a conference at Nevada's Nellis Air Force Base, Clements heard a U.S. General boast 'that he began taking out assets that could help in resisting an invasion at least six months before war was declared.'
Earlier this month, Jeremy Scahill wrote a powerful piece on The Nation's website, describing a huge air assault in September 2002,
'Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace,' Scahill writes. 'At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist.'
Why aren't we talking about this? As Scahill points out, this was a month before the Congressional vote, and two before the UN resolution. Supposedly part of enforcing 'no fly zones,' the bombings were actually systematic assaults on Iraq's capacity to defend itself. The US had never declared war. Bush had no authorization, not even a fig leaf. He was simply attacking another nation because he'd decided to do so. This preemptive war preempted our own Congress, as well as international law. "
A Strategy of Lies: How the White House Fed the Public a Steady Diet of Falsehoods about the war in Iraq
Global News Matrix - A Strategy of Lies: How the White House Fed the Public a Steady Diet of Falsehoo: "Posted on Wednesday, June 15 @ 21:43:33 EDT by drew
Colonel Sam Gardiner (USAF, Ret.) has identified 50 false news stories created and leaked by a secretive White House propaganda apparatus.
...
Gardiner's dogged research identified a long list of stories that passed through Rumsfeld's propaganda mill. According to Gardiner, "there were over 50 stories manufactured or at least engineered that distorted the picture of Gulf II for the American and British people." Those stories include:
The link between terrorism, Iraq and 9/11
Iraqi agents meeting with 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta
Iraq's possession of chemical and biological weapons.
Iraq's purchase of nuclear materials from Niger.
Saddam Hussein's development of nuclear weapons.
Aluminum tubes for nuclear weapons
The existence of Iraqi drones, WMD cluster bombs and Scud missiles.
Iraq's threat to target the US with cyber warfare attacks.
The rescue of Pvt. Jessica Lynch.
The surrender of a 5,000-man Iraqi brigade.
Iraq executing Coalition POWs.
Iraqi soldiers dressing in US and UK uniforms to commit atrocities.
The exact location of WMD facilities
WMDs moved to Syria.
Every one of these stories received extensive publicity and helped form indelible public impressions of the "enemy" and the progress of the invasion. Every one of these stories was false.
"I know what I am suggesting is serious. I did not come to these conclusions lightly," Gardiner admits. "I'm not going to address why they did it. That's something I don't understand even after all the research." But the fact remained that "very bright and even well-intentioned officials found how to control the process of governance in ways never before possible."
Global News Matrix - A Strategy of Lies: How the White House Fed the Public a Steady Diet of Falsehoo: "Posted on Wednesday, June 15 @ 21:43:33 EDT by drew
Colonel Sam Gardiner (USAF, Ret.) has identified 50 false news stories created and leaked by a secretive White House propaganda apparatus.
...
Gardiner's dogged research identified a long list of stories that passed through Rumsfeld's propaganda mill. According to Gardiner, "there were over 50 stories manufactured or at least engineered that distorted the picture of Gulf II for the American and British people." Those stories include:
The link between terrorism, Iraq and 9/11
Iraqi agents meeting with 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta
Iraq's possession of chemical and biological weapons.
Iraq's purchase of nuclear materials from Niger.
Saddam Hussein's development of nuclear weapons.
Aluminum tubes for nuclear weapons
The existence of Iraqi drones, WMD cluster bombs and Scud missiles.
Iraq's threat to target the US with cyber warfare attacks.
The rescue of Pvt. Jessica Lynch.
The surrender of a 5,000-man Iraqi brigade.
Iraq executing Coalition POWs.
Iraqi soldiers dressing in US and UK uniforms to commit atrocities.
The exact location of WMD facilities
WMDs moved to Syria.
Every one of these stories received extensive publicity and helped form indelible public impressions of the "enemy" and the progress of the invasion. Every one of these stories was false.
"I know what I am suggesting is serious. I did not come to these conclusions lightly," Gardiner admits. "I'm not going to address why they did it. That's something I don't understand even after all the research." But the fact remained that "very bright and even well-intentioned officials found how to control the process of governance in ways never before possible."
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Bolton orshestrated Bustani ouster: United States did not want inspectors in Iraq because it undercut the U.S. case for an invasion.
Editorial: Fig leaf for war/Paper indicates U.N. was misled: "Last update: June 15, 2005 at 7:20 AM | June 15, 2005 ED0615
...
But more important here is the use of the United Nations to fashion a rationale for war. The British briefing paper says that when Blair met Bush at his ranch in Texas, in April 2002, Blair said "the UK would support military action to bring about regime change...." But in order to do that, the paper continues, it "is necessary to create the conditions in which we could legally support military action."
The paper goes on to explain that "Regime change per se is not a proper basis for military action under international law." But it would be lawful if "authorized by the U.N. Security Council." It goes on to say that this is the preferable route, provided the Security Council does not allow the weapons-inspections process to continue indefinitely.
This is where the plot really thickens. Perhaps readers will recall that Bush's nominee for U.N. ambassador, John Bolton, recently was accused of orchestrating the 2002 ouster of Jose Bustani, head of the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons, a U.N. agency. Why did Bolton want Bustani replaced? Because Bustani was aggressively seeking to reinsert chemical weapons inspectors into Iraq. The conclusion of many observers is that the United States did not want inspectors in Iraq because it undercut the U.S. case for an invasion.
Many Bush critics accused him of "using" the United Nations to justify war, rather than truly working to avoid military conflict. But they were naturally suspect because they oppose U.S. policy. The British briefing paper is especially significant because it comes from a government that is not only astute, but is also quite friendly to Bush's objective of invading Iraq. The unavoidable conclusion is that both British and American citizens were duped into hoping that the United Nations would make such a conflict unnecessary. In fact, Britain eagerly and the United States reluctantly went to the United Nations to get a fig leaf of respectability for a war on which they had already decided.
In the end, the Security Council refused to play its role, arguing that the weapons inspectors needed more time (actually ample time) to complete their mission. Then the United States threw up its hands, branded Security Council members a bunch of hand-wringing pansies, and went to war. As the British briefing paper makes clear, that was pre-ordained.
Editorial: Fig leaf for war/Paper indicates U.N. was misled: "Last update: June 15, 2005 at 7:20 AM | June 15, 2005 ED0615
...
But more important here is the use of the United Nations to fashion a rationale for war. The British briefing paper says that when Blair met Bush at his ranch in Texas, in April 2002, Blair said "the UK would support military action to bring about regime change...." But in order to do that, the paper continues, it "is necessary to create the conditions in which we could legally support military action."
The paper goes on to explain that "Regime change per se is not a proper basis for military action under international law." But it would be lawful if "authorized by the U.N. Security Council." It goes on to say that this is the preferable route, provided the Security Council does not allow the weapons-inspections process to continue indefinitely.
This is where the plot really thickens. Perhaps readers will recall that Bush's nominee for U.N. ambassador, John Bolton, recently was accused of orchestrating the 2002 ouster of Jose Bustani, head of the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons, a U.N. agency. Why did Bolton want Bustani replaced? Because Bustani was aggressively seeking to reinsert chemical weapons inspectors into Iraq. The conclusion of many observers is that the United States did not want inspectors in Iraq because it undercut the U.S. case for an invasion.
Many Bush critics accused him of "using" the United Nations to justify war, rather than truly working to avoid military conflict. But they were naturally suspect because they oppose U.S. policy. The British briefing paper is especially significant because it comes from a government that is not only astute, but is also quite friendly to Bush's objective of invading Iraq. The unavoidable conclusion is that both British and American citizens were duped into hoping that the United Nations would make such a conflict unnecessary. In fact, Britain eagerly and the United States reluctantly went to the United Nations to get a fig leaf of respectability for a war on which they had already decided.
In the end, the Security Council refused to play its role, arguing that the weapons inspectors needed more time (actually ample time) to complete their mission. Then the United States threw up its hands, branded Security Council members a bunch of hand-wringing pansies, and went to war. As the British briefing paper makes clear, that was pre-ordained.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Evidence of false statements made by Tony Blair to Parliament and the media
Evidence of false statements made by Tony Blair to Parliament and the media: "Leaked Cabinet Office papers, September 2004: | Summary
The Butler Report of July 2004 highlighted substantial omissions of evidence regarding Iraq, but did not argue that positively false information had been given by the Prime Minister to press or Parliament. On 18 September 2004, the Daily Telegraph published extracts from a series of newly leaked documents from the Cabinet Office. With one exception, none of these were quoted in the Butler Report.[1] The full texts of these documents:
A) Provide clear evidence that the Prime Minister substantively misled Parliament and press in claiming that:
a. his government’s objective was disarmament, and not regime change by force; and that
b. as late as February 2003, no decision had been taken to invade Iraq.
Instead, they show that Blair was fully committed to regime change as early as 8 March 2002, and communicated this position to Bush and his officials. This is substantive evidence of positive falsehood on the part of the Prime Minister, not simply an omission of evidence.
B) Demonstrate that a new Security Council Resolution in 2002 and renewed inspections were designed to provide a trigger for war, as part of an explicitly set-out sequence of actions by the US/UK to provide political and legal support for invasion. Claims by the Prime Minister and others that it was only Saddam’s unwillingness to cooperate with renewed inspections that led to war were therefore misleading. These policy documents clearly show an intention to use (and arguably abuse) the UN route to provide a legal pretext for pre-decided regime change, not as a route to peaceful disarmament.
C) Show that as early as March 2002 the Prime Minister was advised that
a. intelligence on Iraqi weapons was “poor”;
b. containment had been “partially successful”, preventing Iraq’s resumption of a nuclear programme and restricting chemical and biological weapons development;
c. Iraq’s security threat was not increasing;
d. as such “current intelligence is insufficiently robust” to meet the criteria of proof required for legal justification of invasion.
The Prime Minister’s decision, taken at least as early as March 2002, to commit to regime change by force, was thus taken against the background of advice that the threat from Iraq was NOT increasing; containment was judged to be “partially successful”; and that without Iraq’s renewed rejection of weapons inspections, such a course of action would, on available evidence, not gain legal sanction under the UN Charter.
In addition, the documents demonstrate the scale of the misgivings expressed by the Prime Minister’s advisors to him and his ministers around the time that he committed to assisting regime change. The Cabinet Office, the Foreign Office, and the Foreign Secretary advised that:
a. the invasion of Iraq could not guarantee a WMD-free Iraq;
b. the invasion of Iraq could not guarantee a democratic Iraq;
c. neither the US nor the UK had credible plans for the aftermath of regime change;
d. the opposition groups relied upon so heavily before and after invasion were regarded by most Iraqis as “Western stooges”.
Contrary to recent assertions by the Prime Minister that at that time “the idea that we did not have a plan for afterwards is simply not correct”, the documents show that when the Prime Minister took the decision to support military regime change in March 2002, his officials warned him precisely that “none has satisfactorily answered how that regime change is to be secured”, and that “Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions …[of] what happens on the morning after”.[2]
Facsimiles of these documents can be seen at http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9125.htm
Evidence of false statements made by Tony Blair to Parliament and the media: "Leaked Cabinet Office papers, September 2004: | Summary
The Butler Report of July 2004 highlighted substantial omissions of evidence regarding Iraq, but did not argue that positively false information had been given by the Prime Minister to press or Parliament. On 18 September 2004, the Daily Telegraph published extracts from a series of newly leaked documents from the Cabinet Office. With one exception, none of these were quoted in the Butler Report.[1] The full texts of these documents:
A) Provide clear evidence that the Prime Minister substantively misled Parliament and press in claiming that:
a. his government’s objective was disarmament, and not regime change by force; and that
b. as late as February 2003, no decision had been taken to invade Iraq.
Instead, they show that Blair was fully committed to regime change as early as 8 March 2002, and communicated this position to Bush and his officials. This is substantive evidence of positive falsehood on the part of the Prime Minister, not simply an omission of evidence.
B) Demonstrate that a new Security Council Resolution in 2002 and renewed inspections were designed to provide a trigger for war, as part of an explicitly set-out sequence of actions by the US/UK to provide political and legal support for invasion. Claims by the Prime Minister and others that it was only Saddam’s unwillingness to cooperate with renewed inspections that led to war were therefore misleading. These policy documents clearly show an intention to use (and arguably abuse) the UN route to provide a legal pretext for pre-decided regime change, not as a route to peaceful disarmament.
C) Show that as early as March 2002 the Prime Minister was advised that
a. intelligence on Iraqi weapons was “poor”;
b. containment had been “partially successful”, preventing Iraq’s resumption of a nuclear programme and restricting chemical and biological weapons development;
c. Iraq’s security threat was not increasing;
d. as such “current intelligence is insufficiently robust” to meet the criteria of proof required for legal justification of invasion.
The Prime Minister’s decision, taken at least as early as March 2002, to commit to regime change by force, was thus taken against the background of advice that the threat from Iraq was NOT increasing; containment was judged to be “partially successful”; and that without Iraq’s renewed rejection of weapons inspections, such a course of action would, on available evidence, not gain legal sanction under the UN Charter.
In addition, the documents demonstrate the scale of the misgivings expressed by the Prime Minister’s advisors to him and his ministers around the time that he committed to assisting regime change. The Cabinet Office, the Foreign Office, and the Foreign Secretary advised that:
a. the invasion of Iraq could not guarantee a WMD-free Iraq;
b. the invasion of Iraq could not guarantee a democratic Iraq;
c. neither the US nor the UK had credible plans for the aftermath of regime change;
d. the opposition groups relied upon so heavily before and after invasion were regarded by most Iraqis as “Western stooges”.
Contrary to recent assertions by the Prime Minister that at that time “the idea that we did not have a plan for afterwards is simply not correct”, the documents show that when the Prime Minister took the decision to support military regime change in March 2002, his officials warned him precisely that “none has satisfactorily answered how that regime change is to be secured”, and that “Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions …[of] what happens on the morning after”.[2]
Facsimiles of these documents can be seen at http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9125.htm
Monday, June 13, 2005
More British memos on pre-Iraq war concerns
More British memos on pre-Iraq war concerns - Nightly News with Brian Williams - MSNBC.com: "Officials deny intelligence that facts were fixed to invade Iraq | By Andrea Mitchell | Correspondent | NBC News | Updated: 6:34 p.m. ET June 13, 2005
WASHINGTON — It started during British Prime Minister Tony Blair's re-election campaign last month, when details leaked about a top-secret memo, written in July 2002 — eight months before the Iraq war. In the memo, British officials just back from Washington reported that prewar "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" to invade Iraq.
Just last week, President Bush and Blair vigorously denied that war was inevitable.
“No, the facts were not being fixed, in any shape or form at all,” said Blair at a White House news conference with the president on June 7.
But now, war critics have come up with seven more memos, verified by NBC News.
One, also from July 2002, says U.S. military planners had given "little thought" to postwar Iraq.
“The memos are startlingly clear that the British saw that there was inadequate planning, little planning for the aftermath,” says Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
And there's more. To prepare Blair for a meeting at the president's ranch in April 2002, a year before the war, four other British memos raised more questions.
After a dinner with President Bush’s then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Blair's former national security adviser David Manning wondered, “What happens on the morning after” the war?
In yet another 2002 memo, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw asked, “What will this action achieve? Can (there) be any certainty that the replacement regime will be better? Iraq has had no history of democracy.”
Monday, Rice, now U.S. secretary of state, told Chris Matthews from MSNBC-TV's “Hardball,” “I would never claim that the exact nature of this insurgency was understood at the time that we went to war.”
Vice President Dick Cheney also told a National Press Club luncheon Monday, “Any suggestion that we did not exhaust all alternatives before we got to that point, I think, is inaccurate.”
In fact, current and former diplomats tell NBC News they understood from the beginning the Bush policy to be that Saddam had to be removed — one way or the other. The only question was when and how.
More British memos on pre-Iraq war concerns - Nightly News with Brian Williams - MSNBC.com: "Officials deny intelligence that facts were fixed to invade Iraq | By Andrea Mitchell | Correspondent | NBC News | Updated: 6:34 p.m. ET June 13, 2005
WASHINGTON — It started during British Prime Minister Tony Blair's re-election campaign last month, when details leaked about a top-secret memo, written in July 2002 — eight months before the Iraq war. In the memo, British officials just back from Washington reported that prewar "intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy" to invade Iraq.
Just last week, President Bush and Blair vigorously denied that war was inevitable.
“No, the facts were not being fixed, in any shape or form at all,” said Blair at a White House news conference with the president on June 7.
But now, war critics have come up with seven more memos, verified by NBC News.
One, also from July 2002, says U.S. military planners had given "little thought" to postwar Iraq.
“The memos are startlingly clear that the British saw that there was inadequate planning, little planning for the aftermath,” says Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
And there's more. To prepare Blair for a meeting at the president's ranch in April 2002, a year before the war, four other British memos raised more questions.
After a dinner with President Bush’s then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Blair's former national security adviser David Manning wondered, “What happens on the morning after” the war?
In yet another 2002 memo, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw asked, “What will this action achieve? Can (there) be any certainty that the replacement regime will be better? Iraq has had no history of democracy.”
Monday, Rice, now U.S. secretary of state, told Chris Matthews from MSNBC-TV's “Hardball,” “I would never claim that the exact nature of this insurgency was understood at the time that we went to war.”
Vice President Dick Cheney also told a National Press Club luncheon Monday, “Any suggestion that we did not exhaust all alternatives before we got to that point, I think, is inaccurate.”
In fact, current and former diplomats tell NBC News they understood from the beginning the Bush policy to be that Saddam had to be removed — one way or the other. The only question was when and how.
Sunday, June 12, 2005
U.S. Lacked Full Postwar Iraq Plan: "A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise."
Memo: U.S. Lacked Full Postwar Iraq Plan: "Memo: U.S. Lacked Full Postwar Iraq Plan | Advisers to Blair Predicted Instability | By Walter Pincus | Washington Post Staff Writer | Sunday, June 12, 2005; Page A01
A briefing paper prepared for British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top advisers eight months before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq concluded that the U.S. military was not preparing adequately for what the British memo predicted would be a 'protracted and costly' postwar occupation of that country."
...
Saying that "we need to be sure that the outcome of the military action would match our objective," the memo's authors point out, "A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise." The authors add, "As already made clear, the U.S. military plans are virtually silent on this point. Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden."
Memo: U.S. Lacked Full Postwar Iraq Plan: "Memo: U.S. Lacked Full Postwar Iraq Plan | Advisers to Blair Predicted Instability | By Walter Pincus | Washington Post Staff Writer | Sunday, June 12, 2005; Page A01
A briefing paper prepared for British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top advisers eight months before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq concluded that the U.S. military was not preparing adequately for what the British memo predicted would be a 'protracted and costly' postwar occupation of that country."
...
Saying that "we need to be sure that the outcome of the military action would match our objective," the memo's authors point out, "A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise." The authors add, "As already made clear, the U.S. military plans are virtually silent on this point. Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden."
Ministers were told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’: July 23, 2002: “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.
Ministers were told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’ - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 12, 2005 | Michael Smith
MINISTERS were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.
The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.
The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair’s inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.
This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action."
...
“It is just possible that an ultimatum could be cast in terms which Saddam would reject,” the document says. But if he accepted it and did not attack the allies, they would be “most unlikely” to obtain the legal justification they needed.
...
The briefing paper is certain to add to the pressure, particularly on the American president, because of the damaging revelation that Bush and Blair agreed on regime change in April 2002 and then looked for a way to justify it. ...
Ministers were told of need for Gulf war ‘excuse’ - Sunday Times - Times Online: "June 12, 2005 | Michael Smith
MINISTERS were warned in July 2002 that Britain was committed to taking part in an American-led invasion of Iraq and they had no choice but to find a way of making it legal.
The warning, in a leaked Cabinet Office briefing paper, said Tony Blair had already agreed to back military action to get rid of Saddam Hussein at a summit at the Texas ranch of President George W Bush three months earlier.
The briefing paper, for participants at a meeting of Blair’s inner circle on July 23, 2002, said that since regime change was illegal it was “necessary to create the conditions” which would make it legal.
This was required because, even if ministers decided Britain should not take part in an invasion, the American military would be using British bases. This would automatically make Britain complicit in any illegal US action."
...
“It is just possible that an ultimatum could be cast in terms which Saddam would reject,” the document says. But if he accepted it and did not attack the allies, they would be “most unlikely” to obtain the legal justification they needed.
...
The briefing paper is certain to add to the pressure, particularly on the American president, because of the damaging revelation that Bush and Blair agreed on regime change in April 2002 and then looked for a way to justify it. ...
Thursday, June 09, 2005
FLASHBACK: Claims of Saddam's Genocide Far from Proven :: from www.uruknet.info :: news from occupied Iraq - it
FLASHBACK: Claims of Saddam's Genocide Far from Proven :: from www.uruknet.info :: news from occupied Iraq - it: "FLASHBACK: Claims of Saddam's Genocide Far from Proven | Robin Miller, Media Monitors Network | February 11, 2003
Is it really true that Saddam Hussein 'gassed his own people' while committing genocide against Iraqi Kurds, images that have become woven into the fabric of the American perception of Iraq?
Human Rights Watch, the respected New York City NGO, has long championed these claims. According to its reports, 'at least 50,000 and possibly as many as 100,000 persons, many of them women and children, were killed out of hand between February and September 1988,' the victims being Iraqi Kurds 'systematically put to death in large numbers on the orders of the central government in Baghdad.' Iraq allegedly used chemical weapons in 'forty separate attacks on Kurdish targets' during a campaign that HRW characterizes as genocide. The most prominent of these purported attacks was the March 1988 'chemical assault' on the town of Halabja, in which the number of dead, according to Human Rights Watch, was 'in excess of 3,200,' or perhaps 'up to 5,000,' or even 'as many as 7,000.'[1]
Horrifying claims, these, but how much of this is true?
We know that both Iran and Iraq used chemical weapons against one another in their eight-year-long war, which ended with an August 20, 1988, cease-fire. Most of Iraq's alleged assaults on the Kurds took place while this war was raging, although Human Rights Watch claims the attacks extended into September. Iraq has acknowledged using mustard gas against Iranian troops but has consistently denied using chemical weapons against civilians.
We also know that Iraq, for what it called security reasons, forcibly relocated--within Iraqi Kurdistan--Kurds living in certain areas, much as Israel has done with the Palestinians and the U.S. did in Vietnam.
What Happened at Halabja?
The only verified Kurdish civilian deaths from chemical weapons occurred in the Iraqi village of Halabja, near the Iran border, where at least several hundred people died from gas poisoning in mid-March, 1988. We know that Iran overran the village and its small garrison of Iraqi troops; what is contested is who was responsible for the deaths--Iran or Iraq--and how large the death toll was.
The best evidence is a 1990 report by the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College.[2] It concluded that Iran, not Iraq, was the culprit in Halabja. Lead author Stephen Pelletiere, who was the CIA's senior political analyst on Iraq throughout the Iran-Iraq war, has described his group's findings:
"The great majority of the victims seen by reporters and other observers who attended the scene were blue in their extremities. That means that they were killed by a blood agent, probably either cyanogens chloride or hydrogen cyanide. Iraq never used and lacked any capacity to produce these chemicals. But the Iranians did deploy them. Therefore the Iranians killed the Kurds."[3]
Pelletiere says the number of dead was in the hundreds, not the thousands claimed by Human Rights Watch and the U.S. administration. To this day, the CIA concurs.[4]
...
And this brings us back to CIA analyst Stephen Pelletiere's question: If 100,000 people were slaughtered, where are the bodies?
...
One expert who's been particularly scathing about Gosden's claims is Dr. Gordon Prather, a nuclear physicist who was assistant secretary of the U.S. Army for science and technology in the Reagan years and informed himself on chemical agents because of his oversight responsibilities in that realm. Responding to Gosden's genocide claims, Prather is emphatic:[49]
"Your lady doctor's assertion that Iraq bombed 280 villages with poison gas is a joke you should have seen without a fact-checker. There were hundreds of villages cleared by Baghdad on the Iraqi border, but the residents were moved to new villages built for them in the interior. Western journalists were invited in to observe the process, including Karen Eliot House of the Wall Street Journal, now the president of Dow Jones International."
...
So what, then, does all this evidence tell us?
We know Saddam is a bad guy. We know he has killed people. But those aren't the questions. The allegations at issue are vastly more serious: that he purposefully murdered at least 50,000 (or 100,000, or 200,000, depending on the speaker's fervor) in an attempt to decimate Iraqi Kurds as a people, and that he used chemical weapons on 40 occasions during this campaign.
What hard evidence is there? One grave with 26 (or 27) bodies of people killed by bullets, not chemicals, and traces of two gasses at one location where four people died. That's it.
Only someone who wanted to be deceived would consider this adequate proof of genocide.[54]
FLASHBACK: Claims of Saddam's Genocide Far from Proven :: from www.uruknet.info :: news from occupied Iraq - it: "FLASHBACK: Claims of Saddam's Genocide Far from Proven | Robin Miller, Media Monitors Network | February 11, 2003
Is it really true that Saddam Hussein 'gassed his own people' while committing genocide against Iraqi Kurds, images that have become woven into the fabric of the American perception of Iraq?
Human Rights Watch, the respected New York City NGO, has long championed these claims. According to its reports, 'at least 50,000 and possibly as many as 100,000 persons, many of them women and children, were killed out of hand between February and September 1988,' the victims being Iraqi Kurds 'systematically put to death in large numbers on the orders of the central government in Baghdad.' Iraq allegedly used chemical weapons in 'forty separate attacks on Kurdish targets' during a campaign that HRW characterizes as genocide. The most prominent of these purported attacks was the March 1988 'chemical assault' on the town of Halabja, in which the number of dead, according to Human Rights Watch, was 'in excess of 3,200,' or perhaps 'up to 5,000,' or even 'as many as 7,000.'[1]
Horrifying claims, these, but how much of this is true?
We know that both Iran and Iraq used chemical weapons against one another in their eight-year-long war, which ended with an August 20, 1988, cease-fire. Most of Iraq's alleged assaults on the Kurds took place while this war was raging, although Human Rights Watch claims the attacks extended into September. Iraq has acknowledged using mustard gas against Iranian troops but has consistently denied using chemical weapons against civilians.
We also know that Iraq, for what it called security reasons, forcibly relocated--within Iraqi Kurdistan--Kurds living in certain areas, much as Israel has done with the Palestinians and the U.S. did in Vietnam.
What Happened at Halabja?
The only verified Kurdish civilian deaths from chemical weapons occurred in the Iraqi village of Halabja, near the Iran border, where at least several hundred people died from gas poisoning in mid-March, 1988. We know that Iran overran the village and its small garrison of Iraqi troops; what is contested is who was responsible for the deaths--Iran or Iraq--and how large the death toll was.
The best evidence is a 1990 report by the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College.[2] It concluded that Iran, not Iraq, was the culprit in Halabja. Lead author Stephen Pelletiere, who was the CIA's senior political analyst on Iraq throughout the Iran-Iraq war, has described his group's findings:
"The great majority of the victims seen by reporters and other observers who attended the scene were blue in their extremities. That means that they were killed by a blood agent, probably either cyanogens chloride or hydrogen cyanide. Iraq never used and lacked any capacity to produce these chemicals. But the Iranians did deploy them. Therefore the Iranians killed the Kurds."[3]
Pelletiere says the number of dead was in the hundreds, not the thousands claimed by Human Rights Watch and the U.S. administration. To this day, the CIA concurs.[4]
...
And this brings us back to CIA analyst Stephen Pelletiere's question: If 100,000 people were slaughtered, where are the bodies?
...
One expert who's been particularly scathing about Gosden's claims is Dr. Gordon Prather, a nuclear physicist who was assistant secretary of the U.S. Army for science and technology in the Reagan years and informed himself on chemical agents because of his oversight responsibilities in that realm. Responding to Gosden's genocide claims, Prather is emphatic:[49]
"Your lady doctor's assertion that Iraq bombed 280 villages with poison gas is a joke you should have seen without a fact-checker. There were hundreds of villages cleared by Baghdad on the Iraqi border, but the residents were moved to new villages built for them in the interior. Western journalists were invited in to observe the process, including Karen Eliot House of the Wall Street Journal, now the president of Dow Jones International."
...
So what, then, does all this evidence tell us?
We know Saddam is a bad guy. We know he has killed people. But those aren't the questions. The allegations at issue are vastly more serious: that he purposefully murdered at least 50,000 (or 100,000, or 200,000, depending on the speaker's fervor) in an attempt to decimate Iraqi Kurds as a people, and that he used chemical weapons on 40 occasions during this campaign.
What hard evidence is there? One grave with 26 (or 27) bodies of people killed by bullets, not chemicals, and traces of two gasses at one location where four people died. That's it.
Only someone who wanted to be deceived would consider this adequate proof of genocide.[54]
Friday, June 03, 2005
the war was already a foregone conclusion and attacks were no less than the undeclared beginning of the invasion of Iraq. ...
The Nation | Article | The Other Bomb Drops | Jeremy Scahill: "June 1, 2005 (web only)
It was a huge air assault: Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace. At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist. This was war.
But there was a catch: The war hadn't started yet, at least not officially. This was September 2002--a month before Congress had voted to give President Bush the authority he used to invade Iraq, two months before the United Nations brought the matter to a vote and more than six months before "shock and awe" officially began.
At the time, the Bush Administration publicly played down the extent of the air strikes, claiming the United States was just defending the so-called no-fly zones. But new information that has come out in response to the Downing Street memo reveals that, by this time, the war was already a foregone conclusion and attacks were no less than the undeclared beginning of the invasion of Iraq. ...
The Nation | Article | The Other Bomb Drops | Jeremy Scahill: "June 1, 2005 (web only)
It was a huge air assault: Approximately 100 US and British planes flew from Kuwait into Iraqi airspace. At least seven types of aircraft were part of this massive operation, including US F-15 Strike Eagles and Royal Air Force Tornado ground-attack planes. They dropped precision-guided munitions on Saddam Hussein's major western air-defense facility, clearing the path for Special Forces helicopters that lay in wait in Jordan. Earlier attacks had been carried out against Iraqi command and control centers, radar detection systems, Revolutionary Guard units, communication centers and mobile air-defense systems. The Pentagon's goal was clear: Destroy Iraq's ability to resist. This was war.
But there was a catch: The war hadn't started yet, at least not officially. This was September 2002--a month before Congress had voted to give President Bush the authority he used to invade Iraq, two months before the United Nations brought the matter to a vote and more than six months before "shock and awe" officially began.
At the time, the Bush Administration publicly played down the extent of the air strikes, claiming the United States was just defending the so-called no-fly zones. But new information that has come out in response to the Downing Street memo reveals that, by this time, the war was already a foregone conclusion and attacks were no less than the undeclared beginning of the invasion of Iraq. ...
