Posted on 04/22/2004 8:08:33 PM PDT by Graybeard58
There are scandals, and then there are scandals.
John Rowland and his cigars, hot tub and expensive suits don't measure up. Forget about Dick Cheney and his energy task force. Bill Clinton's bimbo eruptions? Martha Stewart's lies to federal prosecutors? It's laughable.
If you're looking for a scandal with real substance and potential for enduring outrage, look to the U.N. oil-for-food kickback scheme. But be prepared to look long and hard without finding much. Most politicians are running for cover on this one, and the media are letting them get away with it.
The idea behind oil-for-food was generous and compassionate. By the mid-1990s, Iraqis were known to be enduring severe hardship because of economic sanctions imposed on the recalcitrant Saddam Hussein regime.
To help keep Iraqi bodies and souls together, the United Nations arranged for Iraq to sell limited quantities of oil. Proceeds would be distributed in the form of food, medicine and other essentials.
But when it comes to corruption, the United Nations makes Enron Corp. look like the Little Sisters of the Poor. In January, an Iraqi newspaper released the names of 270 foreign nationals who reportedly accepted oil allocations and other kickbacks from Hussein in exchange for funneling billions to the dictator for his own nefarious uses.
Many of the 270 hailed from France, Russia and other countries that later led international opposition to the war, ostensibly on humanitarian grounds and the principles of sovereignty.
Preliminary estimates suggest Hussein and his partners skimmed 10 percent from the $67 billion oil-for-food program, the largest humanitarian enterprise in history. Hussein slipped away with as much as $5.7 billion more by using the program as a cover for an oil-smuggling operation.
He was motivated by a desire to buy weapons, build palaces and engage in other illicit enterprises he could not have pursued openly. He also expected that his beneficiaries in foreign governments and industries would serve as a firewall against enemies who might move against him.
But that was before Sept. 11, 2001. It is one of the ironies of history that the terrorist movement Hussein supported proved to be his undoing. Had America not been attacked, Hussein would still be in power, and his oil-for-food scheme would still be enriching him and his patrons abroad.
But there's nothing ironic about the comportment of France, Germany, Russia and other nations that led the opposition to the war and have refused to lend a hand. Had these countries bellied up to the bar from the outset, the war and its aftermath would have yielded inestimably less destruction and bloodshed on both sides.
Curiously, Americans seem focused on the Bush administration's honest miscalculations concerning weapons of mass destruction and the depth of Iraqi resistance to occupation, while simultaneously averting their eyes from evidence of massive corruption in the United Nations and the anti-war nations. Most believe the administration received faulty intelligence on WMDs, and in any event this was not the sole justification for war. But what possibly could justify opposition intended primarily to conceal a criminal enterprise?
Spain and Honduras are withdrawing more than 1,000 troops from Iraq because the U.S.-led coalition has been unwilling to turn the job of rebuilding Iraq over to the United Nations. While such a transfer of power would be tantamount to FDR putting Al Capone in charge of economic-recovery programs during the Great Depression, at least President Bush would never again be flummoxed when a reporter asked him to identify the biggest mistake he's made as president.
Why not move them to one of those?
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