The US, The UN and Iraq

Timber,

Surprise and panic. I won't sleep well tonight. Confirmation is critical, please keep me informed of any further developments in re. DPRK smallpox capability. To say I'm concerned is an understatement.

For the moment all this other stuff becomes very low priority. If the DPRK has the capability of unleashing smallpox, they absolutely must be stopped. Let's get on with Iraq, the timetable may need to be moved up.

timber, That certainly is bad news for many if true. When that report is confirmed, I think the conclusions drawn about Schroeder and European support for war with Iraq will definitely change. Didn't somebody also mention that France might be guilty of providing Iraq with WMD's? This turn of events will surely change many "peaceniks" minds. However, we still need that "hard" evidence to show Germany's complicity. I bet tomorrow morning's newspaper is gonna have something on the front page. c.i.

Ah com on, Ash. I am barely awake here., so no



tyho

ing is going tomake me do knewe jerrk ianoutdiredtion. Therefore, K g t bed.mg O a mighthe takenc serkjus,

Well, this has here being discussed last weekend, since opposition was looking for some themes.
The 'FAZ-Sonntagszeitung' was the only conservative paper to follow the hardest opposition line. Since Tuesday, this is no theme in any media here.


Germany: Smallpox Report Exaggerated

Germany plays down report on Iraq smallpox threat

I'm honestly wondering, why rumours and factoids are published and discussed again and again, just to feed people with new ideas for the positive effects of a war.

Listening to all the warmongers, I've learnt now that this really isn't going to be a moral war to remove an immoral dictator but has to do with US-America's security and how its citizens feel about it.

No-one talks about bringing human rights to Iraq.
Indeed, no-one talks would could be done NOW to improve the situation.

Seems, as if the only possibilty is pro-USA or against-USA.

If so, Walter, which direction is the wind blowing in Lippstadt?

re timber's quote from The Francfort Sunday Paper:

The 'Robert-Koch-Institute' homepage "Robert Koch Institute"
still refers to its last papers from 01/17/03 (on smallpocks) and 01/30(03 (bio-terrorism).

Since this are all links to pdf-data files in German, I don't present them here.

East changing to North-East now, Max. :wink:

(The complete actual weather here:Weather at Walter's )

Meanwhile, I've done a research about the "news" re. the 'small pox affair' - do you know "google.news", timber? - no other news, only that the opposition withdrew its demand for a special meeting of the Bundestag.
(The paper was written last summer by a civil servant of the Health Ministry. The purpose of this paper was to get more money -for the federal ministry- from the Länder (states) to improve protection provided by vaccination. This civil servant might have thought, exageration would be helpful. [This really could be the reason, not -like some Social Democrats said- the fact that he is a member of conservative CDU/CSU.])

Walter - Stratfor (Timber's source on this) has backed off this story: http://www.stratfor.com/corporate/

Further: if you read the excerpt Timber posted you'll see the original was carefully hedged "... if the story proves true..." etc, and that Timber additionally cautioned nothing was confirmed.

For the panicky among us: there has been no single case of smallpox in years, symptoms and transmission mechanisms are well known, and ample stores of vaccines exist. Anyone who really wants to worry about highly contagious viruses can always look up Ebola outbreaks killing dozens in the Congo right this minute - transmission uncertain, vaccine nonexistent, affected natives refusing quarantine on grounds their illness is caused by sorcery perpetrated by the foreign doctors <G>

Which is more embarrassing?

1) The fact that Brent Scowcroft, the president's father's foreign policy guru, keeps on having to resort to the opinion pages to warn the president away from some new foreign policy disaster? (These public missives, of course, are widely and I think correctly seen as veiled messages from former President Bush.)

Or

2) The fact that the Democrats apparently have to rely on Scowcroft because they have no public figure of sufficient credibility and expertise who can publicly sound the alarm when the president marches off into another bout of foreign policy ridiculousness?

Here's a hint. It ain't #1.

In last Sunday's Washington Post Outlook section, Scowcroft and Daniel Poneman tell the White House what everyone who is a) paying attention and b) not afflicted by a rich foreign policy fantasy life should know by now: that time is not on our side with North Korea and that we must act now.

Tempting as it may be for them, the folks at the White House simply can't let this situation drift into another disaster which they can then pass off on their political and press sycophants as the fault of Bill Clinton.

Very tempting, I know. Just terrible for the country.

Talking Points Memo

HoT

As Site Representative for the panicky, I must tell you that your last post is a dilly. Notice how like a marriage it is, the intial soothing calm that suddenly veers south into high terror.

High Terror Follow-up:

US plan for new nuclear arsenal


http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,898550,00.html

Elephant Siting # 7

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45652-2003Feb8.html

Slightly late in the discussion, but I read an interesting article today on this. Thought would share it with you folks

quote

Is the United Nations redundant?

Or is it the solitary obstacle to a world dominated by the United States?

Both President George W Bush and his Secretary of State Colin Powell have recently and repeatedly warned the UN that it risks irrelevance unless it endorses US war plans against Iraq.

'It's a moment of truth for the United Nations. The United Nations gets to decide shortly whether or not it is going to be relevant in terms of keeping the peace, whether or not its words mean anything,' Bush told a Congressional Republican Party policy forum on February 9.

In other words, the UN is relevant only as long as it bows to Washington's wishes.

So why does Bush want UN support anyway? Why this charade?

Quite apart from the fact that UN endorsement would give a US strike against Iraq some desperately needed legitimacy, Washington is aware that post-war Iraq will need large sums of money for reconstruction and other efforts.

Bucking conventional wisdom that a war would stimulate the US economy, Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan recently told Congress that the prospect of a war made the economic outlook more uncertain, and that President Bush's fiscal stimulus package might be premature.

Already, the US commitment to restore democracy in Afghanistan is proving a lot more expensive than originally envisaged. The organisation now in the forefront of developmental efforts in Afghanistan is the United Nations.

The need for an international organization to replace the League of Nations was first mooted officially in the Moscow Declaration issued by the United States, the Soviet Union, China and Great Britain on October 30, 1943.

The original UN members were essentially World War II allies, who conceived it as an organization of 'peace-loving' nations which would actively work to prevent more wars and support humanitarian causes.

Interestingly, the League of Nations, formed on almost the same principles after World War I, was disbanded because it failed to stop World War II.

But hopes of peaceful cooperation between the growing number of UN members, and particularly the Security Council, were smashed by the Cold War, which pitted the erstwhile Soviet Union against the United States and other members.

Today, the UN can hardly claim to be the world's 'moral conscience' keeper. After all, a huge chunk of its 191 members do not practice democracy in any form.

The fact remains that the UN -- by virtue of the fact that it runs the oil-for food program -- is one of the biggest beneficiaries of the status quo on Iraq.

Under the program, Iraq can sell oil and use the proceeds to buy humanitarian supplies and the equipment needed to keep its oil industry running.

At nearly $15 billion a year (the entire core annual UN budget is around $3 billion) this is the largest project administered by the UN, which has already collected $1.2 billion as compensation for running the programme, and holds $12 billion of Iraqi funds in escrow. The Oil-for-Food project reportedly pays the salaries of at least 4,000 UN employees.

A regime change in Iraq would mean that the UN would have to account for, and perhaps even give up, a very lucrative project.

Even the Security Council members opposing a war against Iraq -- France, Russia and China -- have obvious financial and strategic interests in maintaining the status quo on Iraq.

Russia, in fact, is Iraq's largest trading partner, having sold more than $4 billion in goods to Baghdad since 1996. Besides handling a huge chunk of Iraq's oil sales, Russian companies like Gazprom have rights to develop major Iraqi oil fields.

Baghdad also owes Moscow close to $10 million, and it is unlikely a regime that succeeds Saddam will honour that debt.

As for France, apart from oilfield development rights, it helped build Baghdad's nuclear programme until the Israelis bombed the Osirak facility in 1981.

Some say this bombing -- and the American bombing during the Gulf War -- effectively neutralized Iraq's nuclear ambitions. Others claim the attack on Osirak only forced Baghdad to move its programme underground, and that the facilities were unaffected by the Gulf war air raids.

Both France and Russia fear a regime change might not respect the rights they now hold under Saddam.

And though it officially denies this, China is reported to have made nearly $600 million by helping upgrade Iraq's fiber-optic military communications network in clear violation of UN sanctions. Some reports say Beijing also helped develop Saddam's chemical weapons program.

So all these nations, and even the UN, have obvious interests against changing the status quo in Iraq. All these nations prefer to use -- and sometimes misuse -- the UN to further their own agenda. But does that mean that the UN is no longer relevant?

Far from it.

A recent Los Angeles Times reported that as many as 65 per cent of Americans believed that UN approval is necessary before any strike on Iraq.

UN sanctions forced the removal of apartheid in South Africa. UN relief agencies and peacekeepers can be seen working in almost all the world's trouble spots, be they due to war or natural causes. Various UN programmes have brought succor and development to many developing nations.

Even if we ignore all the good work, even if we attribute the basest of motives to its objections to a strike against Iraq, the UN will still be relevant.

Because until something better comes along, it allows 191 nations of the world a common platform.

Because despite all it still has a lot of inherent goodwill -- however misplaced -- among most of those 191 nations, whether they are democratic or not.

If anything, the UN needs to be further strengthened and revamped. It also needs to be made more representative.

So that the collective opinion of the world can be more clearly heard and acted upon.

So that a solitary nation, by virtue of its economic and military might, cannot hope to intimidate or dominate the rest of the world.

Unquote

Thanks for that, Gautam.
Very interesting.

I'd like to see that obligation extend to murdering thugs like Robert Mugabe. ooops, no oil. Too bad Zimbabwe. You starve.

How very uncouth of you, Wilso, to bring up such little discrepancies in "our" administrations world view . . . hmmmm . . .

HofT, according to the radio news this morning, in Franklin County, Ohio, in which i live, the last known case of smallpox was in 1949. According to the same report, there is NO vaccine in Franklin County. Wonder if my immunization from 1970 before they sent me overseas still protects me . . .

The info about Germany/bioweapons has been floating around for a while, largely in connection with US and other suppliers in the late 80's (not sure of dates). I've never seen all the info -- which countries sold which WMD materials at which time -- pulled together in a cohesive package in US mainstream media (nor am I holding my breath!). It has always seemed to me that although Saddam is a vicious dictator and all that good stuff, one of the primary motives for invasion is that Iraq has been one of those international cesspools, not unlike the eastern European countries before WWII that Eric Ambler wrote about so eloquently! Certainly my reaction to the administration's decision to invade Iraq was that an invasion would give the US (and European and other) weapons dealers the opportunity to cover their tracks, destroy the evidence. Focusing on Germany's links to this mess (if indeed they are truly there), and at this particular point!, is politically motivated... for sure. By the way, a letter to yesterday's NYTimes also suggests, quite rationally I believe, that the smallpox vaccinations taking place now in the US are entirely politically motivated. Even in the deeply Republican, pro-Bush stronghold where I live, the attitude seems to be, "Government intervention! Politics! Bush isn't the man we thought he was! All these guys are dirty! Whaddya expect!"

Since Stratfor was the source given for this German/smallpox tidbit, I also have to add Stratfor's self-description, for those not familiar with it. "Stratfor is one of the world's leading global intelligence firms, providing clients with geopolitical analysis and industry and country forecasts to mitigate risk and identify opportunities. Stratfor's clients - who include Fortune 500 companies and major government agencies - receive accurate, predictive intelligence on issues that directly impact their interests. As a result, they are better equipped to navigate the turbulent global business environment of the 21st century, in which business leaders have increasingly had to grapple with an ever-expanding global marketplace and a wide range of political, economic, and security uncertainties."

This is a company which cannot be accused of having independent judgement. It is far from independent, being one of many info-props of the defense industry. These guys aren't looking for ways of preserving the peace -- ain't no money in that, pal...

For those of you who would place such blind faith in the UN to solve all the problems of the world and that the US subjugate the interests of all US citizens to this band of parasites, please examine the following link. After reading the UN Charter you may come to the conclusion that it is nothing but idealistic but impotent platitudes. All but the most deeply entrenched among you will realize why the UN is on the verge of imploding.

http://www.un.org/Overview/Charter/chapter4.html

Oops--scroll to the bottom of the page for the "Table of Contents" and access to the entire text of the Charter.

Setanta - am no specialist in bioweapons, but my impression is the vaccines are handled in federal program (CDC, Atlanta), not by counties.

Tartarin - had also noted bias in Stratfor's reporting, but, oddly, calibrated it differently; here's another site:
http://www.cdi.org/

Perception - it's a talk shop, sure, but the only forum shared by 191 countries; btw, implosion isn't a possibility - the thing is kept inflated by continuous generation of hot air <G>