The US, UN & Iraq II

I have two questions.

1. What happens to the middle east situation, North Korea and possibly Iran who look like having a nuclear capability now if nothing is done about Hussein ?

2. What happens to the above if the current regime is overthrown and a new liberal regime installed as in the kurdish Northern Iraq territories at the moment

I am asking because I don't know and would appreciate the thoughts of those posting here

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What happened when deterrence was our military policy for 40 years against China, Russay, and East Gemany - we won.

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Hiama

Very few people are advocating doing nothing about Saddam, certainly not me. But to answer your questions in particular I would suggest if nothing was done about Saddam:

In the middle east, Iraq will dominate the region, control much of the worlds oil and determine its price, and force a settlement on Israel that Ariel Sharon won't like. Alternatively Sharon will launch a nuclear strike against Iraq as soon as they are sure Saddam has nuclear weapons. (It may be that the conventional war now is to prevent a nuclear war later).

N Korea would go its own sweet basket case way. They might even get a little more friendly with their fellow countrymen in the south.

I don't know how Iran might develop. They could forget about their 1,000,000 dead and come to some sort of working agreement with Iraq, on the basis that my enemy's enemy is my friend. (The enemy of course being the US and the American zionist entity).

I'm quite sure these considerations provide Bush with ample reasons to invade Iraq.

If a new pro west liberal regime was installed in Iraq, Iran would feel threatened on all fronts and increase its sponsorship of global terrorism against the Great Satan. This will inevitably lead to war with the United States. I would expect N Korea to likewise feel threatened and might just do something very irrational and very dangerous. As for Iraq itself, I don't think it will hold together. There will be continual ferment between Sunni Shia Kurds and Turks, and US "safe zones" holding the oil fields and associated towns and another set up around Baghdad.

Thanks for the questions, I too would appreciate the thoughts of others directed specifically to the points you make.

Now from today's Guardian:

Quote:

from http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,911662,00.html

Guardian leader column

"This problem has been brewing ever since the US emerged as sole superpower. But it has taken a rogue US administration ideologically antipathetic to multilateral restraints as typified by the UN and by international treaties to bring the problem to a head.

In other words, the mutuality of interest upon which the UN has always rested still applies, possibly even more so now. Powerful though it is, the US must recollect and embrace this basic fact of inter-dependence that it once understood so well. Ironically, the sheer scale of post-war problems may force it to do so. Other states, from Britain and France to developing country alliances, must meanwhile join in redressing the imbalance of power through reform of security council membership along supranational or geographical lines and by pooling sovereignty. Mr Bush may not get it - but he will not be president for ever. A renewed, imaginative commitment to cooperative internationalism is the only way ahead."

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Snood

QED quod erat demonstrandum

"thus it is shown"

I was expected to use this at the end of any mathematical proof at school. (And I still used it even when it wasn't shown, just in case)

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thanks, Steve.

I'd never seen it used in a conversation.

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Snood, I meant quod erat demonstrandum, or"it has been shown or demonstrated." I had just posted that soldiers, unless they were mindless cretins, could form their own judgements about what our leaders are doing.

Your post, shortly thereafter, about having been a soldier and having enough brain power to sort things out for yourself, was a perfect demonstration of what I had said.

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Quote:

I was expected to use this at the end of any mathematical proof at school. (And I still used it even when it wasn't shown, just in case)

Now that is the type of pre-emptive attack that makes sense to me.

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Appreciate the toning down of the tone here.

On either CNN or Fox News this morning, report that Iragi Republican Guard are being vaccinating en masse and issued protective gear and gas masks, against stuff the Saddam doesn't have, but plans on using anyway.

Also reported that the Republic Guard are dug in deep underground and will come out when the worse is over. Ordinary civilians have no such protection.

Also reported, that Regular Army troops are being told to fight to the death, not surrender, or else you will be shot in the back.

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Quote:

Perle: Sy Hersh "Close to Terrorist"

Criticizing administration advisor Richard Perle, the Chairman of the Defense Policy Board, appears to be an act of terrorism, in Perle's mind anyway,

Appearing on CNN with Wolf Blitzer, Perle reacted to his host's quotation of a March 17 New Yorker article by Seymour Hersh in which Hersh wrote "There is no question that Perle believes that removing Saddam from power is the right thing to do. At the same time, he has set up a company that may gain from a war."

In his article, Hersh had written "Perle is also a managing partner in a venture-capital company called Trireme Partners L.P., which was registered in November, 2001, in Delaware. Trireme's main business, according to a two-page letter that one of its representatives sent to [arms dealer Adnan] Khashoggi last November, is to invest in companies dealing in technology, goods, and services that are of value to homeland security and defense."

The bellicose Perle, a long-time advocate of a war with Iraq, told Blitzer "I don't believe that a company would gain from a war. On the contrary, I believe that the successful removal of Saddam Hussein, and I've said this over and over again, will diminish the threat of terrorism. And what he's talking about is investments in homeland defense, which I think are vital and are necessary."

Then Perle tossed his verbal hand grenade "Look, Sy Hersh is the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist, frankly."

Said an obviously shocked Blitzer "Well, on the basis of -- why do you say that? A terrorist?"

Perle replied "Because he's widely irresponsible. If you read the article, it's first of all, impossible to find any consistent theme in it. But the suggestion that my views are somehow related for the potential for investments in homeland defense is complete nonsense.

A still shocked Blitzer told Perle "But I don't understand. Why do you accuse him of being a terrorist?

Said Perle "Because he sets out to do damage and he will do it by whatever innuendo, whatever distortion he can -- look, he hasn't written a serious piece since My Lai."

http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=2003/3/10/232116

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Bush demands the security council put their cards on the table.
Oops Bush notices he has a losing hand.
Bush puts the deck of cards back in his pocket.
Credibility?

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Quote:

In its policy of ensuring the security of Middle East oil supplies, the U.S. by the mid-1980s was heavily supporting Iraq in its war against Iran, although for awhile the United States also had provided some aid to Iran (the Iran-Contra scandal). Ironically, Donald Rumsfeld served as the U.S. envoy who paved the way for the restoration of relations with Iraq in 1983, which had been severed in 1967. The U.S. along with other western nations looked upon Iraq as a bulwark against the radical Islamism of the Ayatollah's Iran, which threatened western oil interests. U.S. support for Iraq included intelligence information, military equipment, and agricultural credits. And the U.S. deployed the largest naval force since the Vietnam War in the Gulf, ostensibly for the purpose of protecting oil tankers, but which engaged in serious attacks on Iran's navy. It should be added that it was during this period of U.S. support that Iraq used poisonous gas against the Iranians and the Kurds, which the U.S. government and its media supporters now describe as so horrendous. In fact, United States intelligence information facilitated the Iraqi use of poison gas against the Iranians. In addition, the United States eased up on its own technology export restrictions to Iraq, which allowed the Iraqis to import supercomputers, machine tools, poisonous chemicals, and even strains of anthrax and bubonic plague. In short, the United States helped arm Iraq with the very horrific weaponry that administration officials are now trumpeting as justification for Saddam's forcible removal from power.9

When the Iran/Iraq war ended in 1988, the United States continued its support for Iraq, showering it with military hardware, advanced technology, and agricultural credits. The United States apparently looked to Saddam to maintain stability in the Gulf. With Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, American policy would swiftly change. And neoconservatives were hawkish in generating support for a U.S. war against Iraq. The Committee for Peace and Security in the Gulf, headed by Richard Perle, was set up to promote the war.10 And neoconservative war hawks such as Frank Gaffney, Jr., Richard Perle, A. M. Rosenthal, William Safire, and The Wall Street Journal held that America's war objective should not simply be driving Iraq out of Iran but also destroying Iraq's military potential, especially its capacity to develop nuclear weapons. The Bush administration embraced this position.11 More than this, the neoconservatives hoped that the war would lead to the removal of Saddam Hussein and the American occupation of Iraq. However, despite the urging of then Defense Secretary Richard Cheney and Undersecretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz to adopt a military plan to invade Iraq, this was never done because of the opposition from General Colin Powell, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General Norman Schwarzkopf, the field commander.12 Moreover, the U.S. had a UN mandate to liberate Kuwait, not to remove Saddam. To attempt the latter would have caused the warring coalition to fall apart. America's coalition partners in the region, especially Turkey and Saudi Arabia, feared that the elimination of Saddam's government would cause Iraq to fragment into warring ethnic and religious groups. This could have involved a Kurdish rebellion in Iraq that would have spread to Turkey's own restive Kurdish population and the Iraq Shi'ites falling under the influence of Iran that would have increased the threat of Islamic radicalism in the region.

http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2003/02/1574203.php

Note Mr. Perle's appearance here as well. The full page linked here is worth the read for anyone who thinks perhaps the administration's talk and arguments for war are curiously missing any mention of Israel/Palestine.

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sumac, you have delineated three of the many reasons that we should not attack Iraq.

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There are credible reports that Iraqi Regular Army Formations have been augmented by Political Units; Republican Guard officers and NCOs who are to shoot those who fail to fight ... that was a popular arrangement in Stalin's Army, and was employed to some extent by Hitler and by Mao.

It is also to be noted that defections, desertions, and surrenders of Iraqi troops is already being widely reported. Even with the "Stiffeners" in place, I imagine the Iraqi Regular Army, ill equipped, poorly fed, badly led, and already significantly demoralized, will surrender en masse once the shooting starts. None the less, there are still several thousand troops of greater political reliability among the Republican Guard and The Special Republican Guard. The commanders of these more "politically reliable" troops, and many of the troops themselves, are implicated deeply enough in warcrimes to motivate them to fight desperately, perceiving death in battle preferable to death on the gallows. In that the bulk of those so inclined are thugs, bullies, and cowards, as opposed to trained, disciplined, motivated, well led, well equipped, determined troops, such resistance as they offer masy be expected to be militarily ineffectual, though momentarily inconvenient. The greatest risk posed by such is to Iraqi civilians.

timber

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blatham, it is indeed the irony of ironies that we were the ones who supported Saddam, strengthened him, and allowed him to become an all-powerful dictator, crushing his people beneath his feet for two decades. We contributed to making him what he is. It is comparable to parents spoiling a child from birth and then finding out that they have created a monster.

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Sumac

Advise a grain of salt with your morning meal of administration-friendly news... http://www.salon.com/news/wire/2003/03/10/disinformation/index.html

You may recall, for example, during the initial phase of Desert Storm, reports emerging that Iraqui soldiers were entering hospitals and pulling the plugs on incubators. It was disinformation, later admitted. Or you may recall all the coverage regarding the wonderful success of the (beautifully named) Patriot missles. They were lies, later revealed.

The point isn't that Sadaam is not to be trusted. The point is that neither are stories such as you point to.

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The following is a commentary read on NPR's "Morning Edition" just now -- hastily recorded and transcribed by yrs. truly, ace typist (?):

Retired Colonel Mike Turner was Norman Schwarzkopf's personal briefing officer during Desert Shield and Desert Storm... He outlines a worst-case scenario for a US-led invasion:

"There's a saying in military circles: 'We always fight the last war.' It means that too much focus on past enemy behavior can lead to misjudging the enemy's behavior in the future. So I ask myself today, Which will this be? Desert Storm? or Somalia?

"In 1991 we had four iron-clad prerequisites for war with Iraq: a clear political instinct, overwhelming force to achieve a quick, decisive victory, a viable Arab coalition to avoid empowering extremists, and absolutely no Israeli involvement to avoid a global holy war.

"In Somalia, we ignored the most critical of these lessons. Mission creep turned our original objective of humanitarian aid into simply get.... the Somali factional leader we were battling. We committed military troops to a high-risk operation in an urban area with extraordinarily dangerous variables in play on the battlefield and with insufficient fire power thanks to then Secretary of Defense, Les Aspin.

"Now we have firmly committed ourselves to war with Iraq and our political objective is to get Saddam. The uniformed joint staff in the Pentagon strongly opposed this plan early on. It requires an attack with a force half that of Desert Storm against an entrenched urban enemy renowned for its ruthlessness in defending its own survival. The uniformed joint staff was over-ridden.

"In so many horrifying ways, this operation resembles Somalia, not Desert Storm, only with nerve gas and biological weapons. Without Turkey as a base for a northern assault a dual-pronged attack will be all but impossible. Perhaps we can pull this off. But here's a far worse scenario which is at least as likely:

"Within hours of our attack, Saddam launches Scuds on Israel. Israel's rightwing government launches a full-scale attack on Iraq, creating a holy war nightmare. Saddam, threatened with his own survival, uses chemical and biological weapons and human shields, just as he has in the past. He torches his own oil fields. Thousands of his own people are killed. Photos of American soldiers amid landscapes of Iraqi civilian bodies blanket the world press which aligns unanimously against the US. The US is condemned by NATO and the UN.

"The war ends within a few weeks, but the crisis deepens.

"The US is left to administer a political vacuum in Iraq. Iran is emboldened to help the Shiites in the south. Disease breaks out. Food and water are contaminated. The cost of the war skyrockets. The US economy is dealt a body blow.

"But the administration can find no credible way out. Britain's Prime Minister Blair is voted out of office. Meanwhile Al Qaeda, seeing an opportunity due to a shift in US focus, attacks a major US target. North Korea, emboldened by the distraction, ignores diplomatic efforts to restrain its development of nuclear weapons and begins to export weapons' grade plutonium to terrorists.

"These are not remote possibilities but possible, even likely outcomes.

"Thousands of America's sons and daughters are about to go to war with Iraq. They will do their duty. They are, without exception, the finest and bravest people I know. May God bless them. I hope their destination is Bagdhad and not Mogadishu."

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Kara

There are realities regarding international relations and strategic planning which make all such moves complicated in the extreme.

But it is this repugnant piety, the complete lack of any sense or admission of previous wrong doing or participatory responsibilty, that is such a ubiquitous tendency in US behavior and in many of it's citizens' national mythologizing, which breeds much disdain and mistrust towards the US.

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Published on Saturday, May 4, 2002 by CommonDreams.org
Fear As A Weapon (Rollback To The Right)
by Heather Wokusch

"In effect, the human being should be considered the priority in a political war. And conceived as the military target ... the human being has his most critical point in his mind. Once the mind has been reached, the 'political animal' has been defeated without necessarily receiving bullets." -taken from US Central Intelligence Agency training manual

Much has been made of Le Pen's scandalous victory in France, and greater Europe's wartime march towards the right. This while the US Administration uses its convenient terror war to justify massive internal societal engineering to the right.

What's behind both? Fear. No small wonder that Le Pen's proclaimed ideals were "famile, travail, patrie" (family, labor, homeland), a motto borrowed from war-torn 1940's France when the society turned inwards to traditional, authoritative, xenophobic values. No surprise either that the zero-tolerance crime policies of Le Pen (like those of Bush) ignore root causes, focusing instead on quick and dirty alternatives like the death penalty, more imprisonment and targeting outsiders.

Fear leaves little room for logic or moral platitudes - it demands simplistic responses to otherwise complex problems.

Granted, it's hard not to be fearful when those in power, such as US Secretary of State Colin Powell, say that the war on terror won't end "in our lifetime" and new countries are added to the "evil" list every day. It can be even harder though to rally behind battles that seem more like grotesque bullying than anything resembling justice or assisting the oppressed.

Which explains why the masses must be mobilized "in a wide scale of activities and at the highest emotional level" to support the government and its wars - according to "Psychological Operations In Guerrilla Warfare," the above-mentioned (declassified) CIA manual. Presumably intended to have been used against foreign populations, the psyop brainwashing techniques capitalizing on fear seem disturbingly familiar today.

According to the manual, "In places and situations wherever possible ... explain the operation of weapons to the youths and young men ... they are the potential recruits for our forces." Pretty easy task now that military contractors own major news networks, and propaganda pieces on the latest sexy fighting technology are derigueur. Accordingly, the US budget for military recruitment has skyrocketed in recent years, paying for 24/7 "cyber recruiters" on newly pumped-up army websites. And not to be overlooked, the schoolyard's tiny Rambos in training can get "Operation Enduring Freedom" bubble gum cards, or the cool new action figure "Tora Bora Ted, Swift Freedom Delta Force Night OPS."

The overwhelming message is clear. Facing a conflict? Scared? Just grab a gun and aim!

Yet we still act surprised when some messed-up kid, who has taken the weapons message a bit too seriously, goes commando and blows away classmates in the lunchroom.

The manual also suggests: "Be prepared with simple slogans in order to explain to the people, whether in an intentional form or by chance, the reason for the weapons" - reasons such as "The weapons will be for winning freedom: they are for you" and "Our weapons are in truth, the weapons of the people, yours." Or in weapons-producer Lockheed Martin's current lingo, the F-22 fighter is an "anti-war" plane, and "the perception of peace means less jobs for Americans." Even more to the point, another weapons manufacturer refers to its military technology with: "Someone's father, someone's daughter, someone's son -- Who will bring them home? McDonnell Douglas will."

Simple slogans hide fear and confusion by turning guilt-ridden acts of war into sanitized niceties. Bombing the life out of Afghanistan becomes "Enduring Freedom," butchery in Somalia is "Restore Hope," and the neverending terror war is "Noble Eagle." Lofty names to hide the carnage and mask our inherent complicity.

But fancy names alone can't hide staggering war-machine profits. Right after September 11th, when most companies took a dive, Lockheed Martin's share value rose by a full 30%. (Purely coincidence that a top executive of Lockheed Martin, Bruce Jackson, wrote most of the current US Administration's foreign policy platform.) Purely coincidence too, that just weeks after 9-11, Bush's home state of Texas was granted the largest military order in history - a $200 billion contract for a new fighter.

We feign surprise as blood flows in the Middle East, conveniently forgetting that the US war machine provides Israel with billions in military aid annually, thus compelling its Arab neighbors to buy increasingly sophisticated US military weaponry to compensate. (Saudi Arabia alone has forked over $33.5 billion to the US war machine in the last ten years.) Nations in conflict that we've armed to the teeth. The body count rises each day, as we shake our heads and wonder why those people just can't get along.

Meanwhile, US Vice President Dick Cheney warns that the US is considering military action against "40-50" countries and Bush adviser Richard Perle explains "This is total war. We are fighting a variety of enemies. There are lots of them out there ... If we let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely, and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy but just wage a total war, our children will sing great songs about us years from now."

But which version of the world should go forth is the burning question. Is neverending "total war" really the goal? Is the authoritative, xenophobic leadership demanded by war desirable? Each day we are trained to be fearful and to see weaponry as the solution. That makes the war on terror seem like a war on the hearts and minds of common citizens. And for those unlucky souls in Cheney's 40-50 countries, or the thousands who have already been slaughtered as collateral damage, the war on terror is looking more like terrorism everyday.

Heather Wokusch is a free-lance writer. She can be reached at [email protected]

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