The UN, US and Iraq IV

Cheney ignored war chaos alert

British warnings that America was failing before the war to prepare properly for a crumbling security situation in Iraq after Saddam Hussein was ousted were ignored by Vice President Dick Cheney and the Pentagon.
In some of the first direct evidence of serious divisions between the key allies in the run-up to the conflict, the former British Ambassador to Washington, Sir Christopher Meyer, said the US had failed to focus on what might happen after Saddam had been overthrown...

In an interview with The Observer, Meyer, who was ambassador just before the war began, said there were a series of meetings between British and American officials between the signing of the United Nations Resolution 1441 last November and the start of the war in March.

The British regularly raised their concerns about how much planning was going on to secure the country after Saddam, but the issue was largely ignored.

Besides, what do you think of all the US-wishes for this visit, e.g. closure of tube, imminity for US-agents in the case of the accidental shooting of a protester, demands for the US air force to patrol above London with fighter aircraft and Black Hawk helicopters and the shipping in of battlefield weaponry to use against rioter? (These extraordinary US demands have been turned down, however, by Ministers and Downing Street during preparations for the Bush visit. )

A new study by an independent military and intelligence expert who toured Iraq recently found no evidence that Saddam Hussein tried to transfer weapons of mass destruction to terrorists.

Anthony Cordesman, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, met with top U.S. officials in Iraq, including David Kay, the CIA representative leading the search for chemical, biological and other unconventional weapons.

President Bush, in justifying the invasion and occupation of Iraq, said he feared Saddam, then Iraq's authoritarian president, would supply weapons of mass destruction to terrorist organizations such as al-Qaida.

"No evidence of any Iraqi effort to transfer weapons of mass destruction technology or weapons to terrorists. Only possibility was Saddam's Fedayeen, and talk only," Cordesman wrote of his briefing with Kay. The Fedayeen is the deposed leader's former paramilitary force.

"They're a wonderful medication -- not medication. How would you call it? They're called Ambien, which is very good. You don't use Ambien? Everybody here uses Ambien."