Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Iraq: the Strategic Necessity of War [A White Paper by Andrew Apostolou]
The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies ^ | October 8, 2004 | Andrew Apostolou

Posted on 10/18/2004 9:11:06 AM PDT by Tolik

Iraq: the Strategic Necessity of War

A White Paper by Andrew Apostolou

Executive Summary

Far from being a war of choice or a strategic distraction, military action against Iraq was an American and international strategic imperative.

The U.S., in particular, could not fight the war against terrorism while allowing Saddam Hussein’s regime—in the heart of the Middle East—to break out from containment as was happening on the eve of the war.

The Iraq campaign was not a preventive war. U.N. resolutions foresaw the restoration of stability in the Middle East through the use of force against Saddam’s outlaw regime—if that regime continued to refuse to account for the Weapons of Mass Destruction it was known to have possessed, and would not verifiably disarm.

Other mechanisms for restraining Saddam—economic sanctions and arms inspections—had already been successfully subverted by the Iraqi dictator.

Introduction: Record Criticism

The war in Iraq is portrayed by its critics as a gratuitous act, an unnecessary and costly war of choice. The most blistering criticism has come from strategists who regard operations in Iraq as a diversion from the war against terrorism. Some, such as Brent Scowcroft, a former National Security Advisor, opposed military action before the fighting began.1 Others, particularly opposition politicians in the U.S. and Britain, have formed a post-war anti­war movement.

The strategists’ critique of the Iraq war has been best summarized by Jeffrey Record, a professor at the Air War College. In a paper for the U.S. Army War College that The Washington Post called “scathing,”2 Record lambasted Operation Iraqi Freedom as:

an unnecessary preventive war of choice against a deterred Iraq that has created a new front in the Middle East for Islamic terrorism and diverted attention and resources away from securing the American homeland against further assault by an undeterrable al Qaeda. The war against Iraq was not integral to the GWOT [Global War on Terrorism], but rather a detour from it.3

By calling the Iraq war “preventive,” Record and The New York Times,4 which has echoed this view, are in effect, terming it a war of U.S. aggression. The U.S. Department of Defense defines a preventive war as “A war initiated in the belief that military conflict, while not imminent, is inevitable, and that to delay would involve greater risk.”5 Historically, it has been militarist states that have fought preventive wars, such as the war initiated by Germany in 1914, the German offensive against the Soviet Union in June 1941 and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.6 Democracies, by contrast, do not believe in “inevitable” conflict. Instead, they seek alternatives to using force, which they regard as an option of last resort.

 

A War of No Choice

The critics’ arguments rest upon bad history. By ignoring the 12 years of Iraqi defiance of the U.N., and in particular U.S. and British efforts to avoid conflict while enforcing international law, the position in Iraq is falsely portrayed as having been stable and not particularly threatening. As a result, the critics reduce the debate to the Michael Moore version of history in which the U.S. wakes up one morning and decides to attack “a sovereign nation.”7

The choice that the U.S., and the rest of the international community, faced in 2003 was not between a war to oust Saddam and continued U.N. sanctions against Iraq. Rather, the options were ending Saddam’s regime or allowing him to become free from restraint, with sanctions abandoned in all but name. As Senator John McCain has argued, “Our choice wasn’t between a benign status quo and the bloodshed of war. It was between war and a graver threat.”8

 

Collapsing Containment: How Saddam Overcame Sanctions

The containment of Iraq had failed. Saddam’s regime had both won the political and moral argument against U.N. sanctions and significantly subverted them.

U.N. sanctions against Iraq, imposed after the invasion of Kuwait and maintained longer than expected because Saddam’s regime refused to verifiably disarm, had turned into a public relations disaster for the international community. The Iraqi regime, with the assistance of parts of the U.N. system, had successfully portrayed the sanctions as pointlessly cruel. Iraqi government propaganda alleged that hundreds of thousands of children had died because of sanctions, with televised mass baby funerals supposedly proving sanctions­related starvation. Writing to the British medical journal The Lancet in December 1995, two public health researchers, Sarah Zaidi and Mary C. Smith Fawzi, estimated that 567,000 Iraqi children had died since the imposition of U.N. sanctions in August 1990.9

Not only was the “half a million dead children” figure taken at face value, the alleged deaths were blamed upon the U.S. Leslie Stahl of CBS News asked the then U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Madeleine Albright, on May 12, 1996, “We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” Dr. Albright replied, “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price, we think the price is worth it.”10 Dr. Albright has since conceded that “It was a genuinely stupid thing to say.”11

Even though the claim in The Lancet was soon repudiated,12 a 1999 UNICEF study seemingly validated the “half a million” claim. UNICEF argued that there would have been half a million fewer Iraqi infant deaths had there been no sanctions and had alleged pre-sanctions improvement in infant health continued. The statistic rested upon counting the difference between the forward projected, and probably exaggerated, downward trend of infant mortality from the 1980s compared to the rapidly rising, and certainly inflated, upward movement of infant mortality during the 1990s.

Many Iraqi regime claims about infant deaths have been exposed as fabrications. John Sweeney of the BBC reported in June 2002 that the mass baby funerals were staged. The regime accumulated dead babies in morgues, refused prompt burial as per Islamic and Eastern Christian tradition, and then arranged group funerals,13 which David Rieff confirmed post-war in The New York Times in July 2003. 14

The “baby deaths” claim was also disproved by falling infant mortality in Iraqi Kurdistan, even while the Kurds suffered the same U.N. sanctions as the rest of Iraq, as well as embargoes imposed by Saddam’s regime and the regional powers, and an inter­Kurdish civil war.15

Oil-for-Food was part of the crumbling U.N. sanctions wall. In theory, Oil-for­Food allowed Iraq to sell oil under U.N. supervision and then to use the proceeds to import “humanitarian goods.” In reality, according to the Iraq Survey Group (ISG), the U.S.-led Coalition weapons inspectors, official oil sales were part of an elaborate kickback scheme that earned the Iraqi regime some $2 billion. The ISG, led by Charles Duelfer, previously the deputy head of the U.N. weapons inspectors from 1993-2000, reported that total illicit revenues brought in $11 billion from the early 1990s to 2003.16 The definition of “humanitarian goods” was stretched by the U.N. and the Iraqi regime well beyond vital food and pharmaceuticals. Oil-for-Food was so thoroughly perverted that it was financing the “sporting ventures” of Saddam’s son Uday,17 while withholding money for cancer hospitals in Iraqi Kurdistan.18 According to Duelfer, “Prohibited goods and weapons were being shipped into Iraq with virtually no problem.”19 Indeed, sanctions subversion worked so well that in July 2000, Al-Thawrah (The Revolution), the official newspaper of the Iraqi Ba’ath party, boasted about Iraq’s defeat of the U.N. embargo.20

Saddam’s sanctions propaganda coup put the U.S. on the defensive. As Rieff has argued, the U.S. was forced to defend the sanctions.21 Saddam’s regime successfully portrayed itself as the victim, despite having slaughtered hundreds of thousands and engaged in forced population transfers and ethnic cleansing that were rivaled in recent years only by the Serbs and exceeded by Rwandan Hutus.

So effective was Iraqi propaganda that British prime minister Tony Blair, faced with large anti-war demonstrations in February 2003, conceded the point but turned the anti-sanctions argument on its head. Blair said that those who opposed the war were, in effect, calling for the suffering of the Iraqis to be prolonged:

The alternative is to carry on with the sanctions regime , which has resulted, because of how Saddam implements it, in thousands of people dying needlessly in Iraq every year. In addition, of course, many thousands of people are political detainees or are executed as a result of their political views.22

Saddam’s anti-sanctions campaign had open French and Russian support. France repeatedly undermined the very sanctions that it consistently voted for in the U.N. In 2000, France allowed flights to take off from Paris for Baghdad in breach of the air travel embargo, prompting one British minister to call French behavior “pretty contemptible.”23 Britain and the U.S. attempted in June 2001 to further loosen the embargo with so-called “smart sanctions,” hoping to mollify the anti­sanctions campaign. The “smart sanctions” initiative failed because of French, Chinese and Russian opposition.24

With war approaching in late 2002, the countries that had criticized the sanctions, and helped to neutralize them, suddenly became their staunchest supporters. As Jamie Rubin, the Clinton-era State Department spokesman sarcastically commented, “After spending 1995 to 2000 criticizing Iraq sanctions, the Germans and French fell in love with containment.25

WMD: Saddam Told the Truth?

Saddam had not only successfully made sanctions unsustainable—he had beaten the U.N. arms inspection system. The Iraqi regime retained both the capability and the intent to re-start banned weapons programs in violation of its U.N. obligations. The nature of these violations, for which the U.N. had in 1991 threatened a renewal of the Gulf War, was unknown until after the fall of Baghdad.

Most post-war debate has focused on weapons of mass destruction (WMD) stocks because of the pre-war belief that there were discoverable stockpiles in Iraq. These stocks were believed to be the remnants of the large quantities manufactured by Iraq before 1991 which the U.N. inspectors had not destroyed or which the Iraqis could not account for the disposal of. Hans Blix, the chief U.N. arms inspector, admits that before the war he had “gut feelings, which I kept to myself” that Iraq possessed banned weapons and prohibited programs.26 British and U.S. officials believed that more stocks had been recently produced, although their pre-war claims were sometimes more nuanced than is now remembered.27

The consensus between U.N. inspectors and foreign governments that Iraq possessed WMD stocks stemmed mainly from repeated Iraqi lies to U.N. inspectors and forced admissions of more substantial chemical and biological agent production than was initially declared. Speaking on February 10, 1998, the then British foreign secretary, Robin Cook, had neatly summed up Iraq’s record of dishonesty: Saddam claimed that he had only 650 litres of anthrax. The figure turned out to be 8,400 litres.28

Cook resigned from the British government on March 17, 2003 in protest against impending military action. His 2003 position was that Iraq did not have WMD in the sense of “a credible device capable of being delivered against a strategic city target,” but “probably still has biological toxins and battlefield chemical munitions.” Cook’s main concern was not Iraq-related, “What has come to trouble me most over past weeks is the suspicion that if the hanging chads in Florida had gone the other way and Al Gore had been elected, we would not now be about to commit British troops.”29                                                   

U.N. inspectors did not believe Iraqi claims that WMD stocks had been unilaterally destroyed in July and August 1991 as Iraq could not produce sufficient evidence of such destruction. Blix’s team wrote on March 6, 2003 that: Based on all the available evidence, the strong presumption is that about 10,000 litres of anthrax was not destroyed and may still exist.30

At the eleventh hour, Iraq did give the U.N. evidence indicating some unilateral anthrax destruction and soil samples collected in 1996.31 Yet even in their November 2003 report, U.N. inspectors stated that:

Owing to the extent of the destruction carried out by Iraq and the stated lack of records relating to those activities, it was not possible to fully quantify all aspects of Iraq’s account of its unilateral destruction.32

What appears to have happened, according to the ISG, is that unilateral WMD stock destruction was part of Saddam’s campaign of deception. While the U.N. suspicion of March 2003 that the stocks still existed was probably wrong, the underlying assumption of malign Iraqi intent was correct. The biological weapons stocks that were not declared to the U.N. were apparently unilaterally disposed of in 1991 and 1992, but not because Saddam wanted to comply with disarmament. Rather the Iraqi regime had “decided not to declare the offensive BW [Biological Warfare] program” to the U.N., and needed to be rid of all evidence of this banned program’s existence. As a result, the ISG “lacks evidence to document complete destruction.” The biological weapons program was only abandoned in 1995, three to four years after the stocks were disposed of.33 In addition, despite the presence of U.N. inspectors, the Iraqi regime had a series of secret laboratories in which deadly experiments were conducted upon human guinea pigs.34

As Saddam well knew, stocks are just one element of WMD. Along with “all stocks of agents,” U.N. Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 687/1991 referred to “all related subsystems and components and all research, development, support and manufacturing facilities.”35 As Duelfer observed in October 2003, “Hussein had long differentiated between retaining weapons and sustaining the capability to produce weapons.”36 Rolf Ekeus, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector from 1991-1997, had long come to the same conclusion, arguing powerfully that the “combination of researchers, engineers, know­how, precursors, batch production techniques and testing is what constituted Iraq’s chemical threat,” not the stocks.37 Ekeus has termed the criticism of the British and U.S. failure to find stocks “a distortion and trivialization of a major threat to international peace and security.”38 Nominated to head the new arms inspection mechanism in 2000, Ekeus was blocked by China, France and Russia.39

Iraq’s preference for capabilities over stocks had begun in the late 1980s, according to Ekeus,40 a strategic choice reinforced by the initial success of the U.N. inspectors. Sustaining the large, industrial WMD programs of the 1980s, programs that were easier to track and discover, was no longer possible. What was viable, however, was to retain as much of the intellectual capital and dual use infrastructure as could be concealed so that full WMD programs and, when militarily required, WMD production, could resume in the future—probably after sanctions were lifted. As the Butler inquiry in Britain found in July 2004, Iraq had “the strategic intention of resuming the pursuit of prohibited weapons programmes, including if possible its nuclear weapons programme, when United Nations inspection regimes were relaxed and sanctions were eroded or lifted.”41

Disposal of the stocks and the closing down of the BW program did not, for example, mean that Iraq could no longer acquire biological weapons. The ISG concluded that depending upon the extent of the activity ordered, “Iraq could have re­established an elementary BW program within a few weeks to a few months of a decision to do so.”42

 

WMD: The Burden of Proof

The onus was always upon Iraq, not upon the U.N. or U.S. to explain the disappearance of the WMD stocks. The U.N. demanded in 1991 that Iraq verifiably surrender the lethal agents that it had repeatedly used. UNSCR 687/1991 required that Iraq “unconditionally accept the destruction, removal, or rendering harmless, under international supervision.”43 UNSCR 1441/2002 ordered “that Iraq cooperate immediately, unconditionally, and actively” with the inspectors.44 Blix told the U.N. Security Council on January 27, 2003 that:

It is not enough to open doors. Inspection is not a game of “catch as catch can.”45

Unverified unilateral WMD stock destruction was a serious breach of Iraq’s obligations. Verification is a standard disarmament mechanism, particularly when dealing with a regime with a record of deception and falsehood.

As the history of the biological weapons program demonstrates, Saddam spurned every “last chance” because he had no intention of relinquishing his WMD capabilities and ambitions.

Iraq had numerous “last chances” to comply. For example:

 

WMD: The U.N.’s Failure

The U.N. failed because of a combination of two factors, Iraqi deception and a lack of genuine U.N. will to unravel the Iraqi programs. Unknown to the U.N., Saddam had constructed a WMD system designed to beat the inspection system. There was also an extent to which the U.N. simply did not look, at least according to U.S. monitoring of the U.N. inspectors. According to Bob Woodward, “The intelligence indicated that Blix was not reporting everything and not doing all the things he maintained he was doing.”55

The U.N. missed the Iraqi “strategic intention,” a vital part of the threat. Although Iraq’s nuclear weapons program was largely dormant after 1991, Iraqi nuclear scientist Mahdi Obeidi has written that “our nuclear program could have been reinstituted at the snap of Saddam Hussein’s fingers… Iraqi scientists had the knowledge and the designs needed to jumpstart the program if necessary.”56 Yet the U.N. wanted to give Saddam a clean bill of health. Mohammed ElBaradei, the head of the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), had told the U.N. Security Council on January 27, 2003 that “we should be able within the next few months to provide credible assurance that Iraq has no nuclear weapons program.”57

The faltering sanctions and the ineffective U.N. inspections were a dangerous combination. If the U.N. inspectors could turn up no “smoking gun,” in Blix’s misleading phrase, then Iraq would argue compellingly for a formal end to both sanctions and arms inspections. Indeed, Blix appeared willing to play along. He has since declared that Saddam was in compliance with his U.N. obligations, that “The U.N. and the world had succeeded in disarming Iraq without knowing it.”58 In fact, the ISG reports that on the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Iraq still had a chemical weapons capability and could have produced significant volumes of mustard gas within three to six months and large volumes of nerve agents within two years if it could acquire the necessary precursors.59 Iraq apparently had the capability to rapidly produce mustard gas within days, but production would not have been sustainable.60

 

The Right to Fight

The U.N. resolutions preserving the sanctions to keep Iraq in check until it verifiably disarmed also provided for a remedy if these obligations were evaded: force. Time and again, Saddam demonstrated that force alone could in some way hold him back.

The right to take military action was entrenched in UNSCR 687/1991 which suspended, but did not end, the war to liberate Kuwait.61 UNSCR 687/1991 linked the Gulf War ceasefire to Iraqi compliance with disarmament and the renunciation of terrorism, drawing upon the right to use force in UNSCR 678/1990.62 There was no doubt that military action could be used to enforce UNSCR 687/1991. Britain and the U.S. had threatened and used force in 1998 on that basis.63 UNSCR 1441/2002, adopted unanimously by the U.N. Security Council, including Syria, reminded Iraq that it faced “serious consequences” for non-compliance. UNSCR 1441/2002 found Iraq in “material breach” of 16 previous U.N. resolutions passed under Chapter 7 of the U.N. charter.64 Although UNSCR 1441/2002 called for the U.N. inspectors to report violations to the council, it did not, as per the French interpretation, prohibit “any automaticity in the use of force.”65

The most misleading debate in early 2003 centered on Hans Blix’s statement that he had yet to find “a smoking gun.” What Blix forgot was that the gun had already smoked. The U.N. had maintained its toughest ever sanctions and inspections regime to oblige Iraq to disarm because of Iraq’s record of chemical weapons use in the 1980s. As President Clinton had explained on December 16, 1998:

Other countries possess weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles. With Saddam, there is one big difference: He has used them. Not once, but repeatedly. Unleashing chemical weapons against Iranian troops during a decade-long war. Not only against soldiers, but against civilians, firing Scud missiles at the citizens of Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Iran. And not only against a foreign enemy, but even against his own people, gassing Kurdish civilians in Northern Iraq.66

No state had used chemical weapons on the battlefield so extensively since 1918. Poisons had not been used to murder civilians on such a scale since the Holocaust.

Not only was force a right, Saddam had shown it to be an effective tool against him in a way that inspections and sanctions were not. By the late 1990s, the only policy that worked was U.S. and British policed no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq and the U.S., British and Turkish supported enclave of Iraqi Kurdistan whose armed forces kept Saddam at bay as of 1996. Inspectors were only readmitted in 2002 because of the U.S. and British military build up in the Gulf. Blix acknowledged the effect of the military pressure in an entry in his diary on December 31, 2002 that “It serves to scare the Iraqis.”67

Saddam’s regime nonetheless challenged the U.S. and Britain repeatedly, firing on allied aircraft and conducting terrorist attacks in Iraqi Kurdistan. As Michael Walzer pointed out in March 2003, the U.S. was already engaged in a “little war” with Iraq.68

 

Enforcing the Suspended Sentence after 9/11

 

The Iraq position in 2001 was not stable. The crumbling sanctions regime and the lack of inspections meant that the strategic tide had turned in Saddam’s favor. The international community could not “let sleeping dogs lie.” It was the terrorist attacks of 9/11 that made tackling Iraqi defiance of the U.N. all the more urgent.

The reason was not that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 atrocities. There is no evidence that Iraq was directly involved in 9/11. Indeed, such a direct provocation of the U.S. would not have served Saddam’s interests at a time when he was defeating economic sanctions and was free from arms inspections. Just weeks before 9/11, in August 2001, the Iraqi foreign minister Naji Sabri had told the Arab satellite channel Al Jazeera that sanctions had crumbled.69 What would, however, have served Saddam well was for the international community, and in particular the U.S. and Britain, to be so thoroughly distracted by al Qaeda and the war against terrorism that they ignored, or were unable to prevent, his emergence from containment.

The various controversies over the link between 9/11 and the Iraq war, especially over Iraq-al Qaeda contacts, miss the point. Saddam was retaining banned weapons capabilities, although in a manner that intelligence agencies were neither aware of nor understood, while the very U.N. sanctions that were supposed to control him were, instead, financing him. What mattered was that thanks to Saddam, the international community was facing a significant strategic reversal in the Middle East before 9/11, a development that arguably became intolerable after 9/11.

The 9/11 terrorist attacks made addressing that incipient strategic reversal urgent. Forced to fight an unanticipated war against terrorism, the international community, and the U.S. in particular, could not gamble that Saddam would bide his time and delay his full release from containment to meet the rest of the world’s strategic needs. The long campaign in the difficult theater of operations in Afghanistan was a gift to Saddam that he would have been foolish not to take advantage of.

Contrary to Scowcroft’s statements that “there is scant evidence to tie Saddam to terrorist organizations, and even less to the 9/11 attacks. Indeed Saddam’s goals have little in common with the terrorists who threaten us, and there is little incentive for him to make common cause with them,”70 Saddam was a terror master. Iraq under the Ba’ath party had been a promiscuous state sponsor of terrorism, backing groups of different, and sometimes inconsistent ideological proclivities.71 Before 9/11 there was credible evidence available that Saddam had been in contact with al Qaeda, as noted by the 9/11 Commission.72

Military pressure on Iraq in late 2002 and early 2003 was, therefore, a final and strategically necessary action, a threat to execute the suspended sentence passed by the U.N. Security Council in 1991. Saddam’s regime had to choose to comply or die.

 

Conclusion

The war of 2003 was not a U.S. war of choice, nor a U.S. war of prevention, but a war of Saddam’s choosing. Conflict was not inevitable. Iraq was offered repeated concessions, whether through serial “last chances” or relaxation of sanctions and the inspections regime. Justice for the Iraqis was certainly delayed by the decision not to topple Saddam in 1991, whether with U.S. force or by assisting the Iraqis then rebelling against him. The legal right to enforce the sentence passed upon his regime had never lapsed. After 1991, the reasons to do so accumulated rather than diminished.

War was the option that Saddam chose. The Iraqi regime was afforded the opportunity to comply with its U.N. obligations, a genuine “last chance” that it chose not to take.


References

All internet references last viewed October 8, 2004.

 

1 “Don’t Attack Saddam It would undermine our antiterror efforts,” By Brent Scowcroft, The Wall Street, Journal August 15, 2002, available at http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110002133

2 “Study Published by Army Criticizes War on Terror’s Scope,” By Thomas E. Ricks, The Washington, Post Page A12; January 12, 2004, available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A8435-2004Jan11

3 Jeffrey Record, Bounding the Global War on Terrorism, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA, December 2003, page v, available at http://www.carlisle.army.mil/ssi/pdffiles/PUB207.pdf

4 “The Verdict Is In,” The New York Times, Section A; Column 1; Editorial Desk; Page 34; October 7, 2004, available at http://www. nytimes.com/2004/10/07/opinion/07thu1.html

5 Joint Publication 1-02, DOD Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms, As Amended Through 9 June 2004, page 419, available at http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/doddict/ and http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jel/new_pubs/jp1_02.pd f and http://www.dtic. mil/doctrine/jel/doddict/data/p/04166.html

6 Colonel Daniel L. Zajac, “The Best Offense Is a Good Defense: Preemption, Its Ramifications for the Department of Defense,” in Williamson Murray (editor), National Security Challenges for the 21st Century, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA, October 2003, pages 70-71, available at http://www.carlisle.army.mil/ssi/pdffiles/00003.pd f and http://www.carlisle. army.mil/ssi/pdffiles/PUB4.pdf

7 “Unfairenheit 9/11: The lies of Michael Moore,” By Christopher Hitchens, Slate, June 21, 2004, available at http://slate.msn. com/id/2102723/

8 Remarks by Sen. John McCain at the 2004 Republican National Convention, August 30, 2004, available at http://www.gop. com/news/read.aspx?ID=4588

9 Sarah Zaidi & Mary C Smith Fawzi, “Health of Baghdad’s children,” The, Lancetl Vol. 346, 8988, page 1485, December 2, 1995, available at http://www.iacenter.org/lancet.htm

10 Available at http://www.casi.org.uk/discuss/1999/msg00169.html

11 “Were Sanctions Right?” By David Rieff, The New York Times, Section 6; Column 3; Magazine Desk; July 27, 2003, available at http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/sanction/iraq1/2003/0727right.htm

12 “A Hard Look at Iraq Sanctions,” By David Cortright, The Nation, December 3, 2001, available at http://www.thenation.com/ doc.mhtml?i=20011203&s=cortright

13 “Iraq’s tortured children,” By John Sweeney, BBC, June 22, 2002, available at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_ own correspondent/2058253.stm

14 Rieff op.cit.

15 Mohamed M Ali & Iqbal H Shah, “Sanctions and childhood mortality in Iraq,” The, Lancetl Vol. 355, 9218, May 27, 2000, pages 1851–57, available at http://pdf.thelancet.com/pdfdownload?uid=llan.355.9218.original research.1380.1&x=x.pd (registration       f required). UNICEF, Information Newsline, “Iraq surveys show ‘humanitarian emergency’,” August 12, 1999, available at http:// www.unicef.org/newsline/99pr29.htm

16 CIA, Comprehensive Report of the Special Advisor to the DCI on Iraq’s WMD, Vol. I, “Regime Finance and Procurement,” September 30, 2004, page 4, available at    WMD http://www2.cia.gov/Iraqs     Vol1.pdf

17 Borad (sic) OF Youth and Sports M.O.U (phase 11), 13-05-00034 SECT(34) Project of construction of olympic sports city Including: Architecture works Civil works Electrical works Mechanical works All other requirements, available at http://www.un.org/Depts/ oip/dp/dp11/13-05.pd . ANNEX III [Original:l English] Distribution plan for phase XII Submitted by the government of Iraq to            f the Secretary-General in accordance with the memorandum of understanding of 20 May 1996 and Security Council resolution 1409 (2002), paragraph 237, “$20 million will be allocated for the construction of the Olympic stadium which include several electrical and mechanical works as well as sanitary installations. In addition, this amount will be utilized for the importation of equipment sets, air conditioning sets, communication networks and electronic computers,” available at http://www.un.org/Depts/ oip/dp/dp12/execsummary.pdf

18 Statement for the Record of Howar Ziad, Representative,Kurdistan Regional Government, U.N. Liaison Office Before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on International Relations, April 28, 2004, available at http://wwwc.house.gov/ international relations/108/zia042804.pdf

19 CIA, op.cit, Vol.I, “Transmittal Message,” page 11, September 23, 2004, page 11.

20 CIA, op.cit, Vol. I, “Regime Finance and Procurement,” page 5.

21 Rieff, op.cit.

22 The Prime Minister (Mr. Tony Blair M.P.) in Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. (2003). Official Reports. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). London: The Stationery Office. 12 Feb 2003: Col. 866, available at http://www.publications.parliament. uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo030212/debtext/30212-03.htm#30212-03 spmin28

23 “Peter Hain in attack on French over Iraq sanctions,” By Anton La Guardia, The Daily Telegraph, November 8, 2000, available at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2000/11/08/nirq08.xml. Hain partially retracted his statement, “Hain U-turn on criticism of French Iraq policy,” By Anton La Guardia, The Daily Telegraph, November 9, 2000 available at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2000/11/09/wirq09.xml. On the struggle to retain the sanctions, “Britain in fight to keep Iraq sanctions,” By Anton La Guardia, The Daily Telegraph, November 7, 2000, available at http://www. telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2000/11/07/nirq07.xml. See also “French jet breaks UN embargo on Baghdad,” By Anton La Guardia, The Daily Telegraph, September 23, 2000, available at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/ news/2000/09/23/wiraq23.xml

24 CIA, op.cit, Vol. I, “Regime Finance and Procurement,” page 55; Cortright, op.cit.

25 Rieff, op.cit.

26 Hans Blix, Disarming Iraq, Pantheon Books, New York, 2004, page 112, “My gut feelings, which I kept to myself, suggested to me that Iraq still engaged in prohibited activities and retained prohibited items, and that it had the documents to prove it.” See also, Blix, 2004, op.cit, pages 194 and 264.

27 “Speech on Iraq Disarmament to Council on Foreign Relations,” By Deputy Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, January 23, 2003, available at http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/t01232003_t0123cfr.html

28 The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Robin Cook M.P.) in Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. (2003). Official Reports. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). London: The Stationery Office. 10 Feb 1998: Col. 143, available at http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199798/cmhansrd/vo980210/debtext/80210-05.htm#80210­05 spmin0

29 Personal Statement (Mr. Robin Cook M.P.) in Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. (2003). Official Reports. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard). London: The Stationery Office. 17 Mar 2003: Col. 728, available at http://www.publications. parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmhansrd/vo030317/debtext/30317-33.htm#30317-33_spnew0

30 United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC), UNRESOLVED DISARMAMENT ISSUES IRAQ’S PROSCRIBED WEAPONS, PROGRAMMES New York, March 6, 2003, page 98,ll available at http://www.un.org/Depts/ unmovic/new/documents/cluster document.pdf

31 UNMOVIC, Fifteenth Quarterly, Report U.N. document S/2003/1135, November 26, 2003, page 3,l available at http://www. un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/quarterly reports/s-2003-1135.pdf

32 UNMOVIC, Fifteenth Quarterly, Report page 11.

33 CIA, op.cit, Vol. III, “Biological Warfare,” pages 1-3, available at http://www2.cia.gov/Iraqs_WMD_Vol3.pdf 34 CIA, op.cit, Vol. III, “Biological Warfare,” page 3.

35 UNSCR 687, April 8, 1991, available at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-687.pdf

36 “No Weapons Doesn’t Mean No Threat,” By Charles Duelfer, The Washington, Post page A23; October 6, 2003, available at http:// www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A48562-2003Oct5

37 “Iraq’s Real Weapons Threat,” By Rolf Ekeus, The Washington, Post page B07; June 29, 2003, available at http://www.washingtonpost. com/ac2/wp-dyn/A43468-2003Jun27

38 Ekeus op.cit.

39 “U.N. arms inspector’s nomination in doubt: France, China, Russia oppose choice,” CNN, January 18, 2000, available at http:// www.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/meast/01/18/un.iraq/

40 Ekeus op.cit.

41 Review of Intelligence on Weapons of Mass Destruction, Report of a Committee of Privy Counsellors Chairman: The Rt Hon The Lord Butler of Brockwell KG GCB CVO, Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed 14th July 2004, HC 898 London: The Stationery Office, para 397, page 99, available at http://www.butlerreview.org.uk/report/report.pdf and http://www.official­documents.co.uk/document/deps/hc/hc898/898.pdf

42 CIA, op.cit, Vol. III, “Biological Warfare,” page 2.

43 UNSCR 687, April 8, 1991, available at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-687.pdf

44 UNSCR 1441, November 8, 2002, available at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-1441.pdf 45 Briefing of the Security Council, 27 January 2003: An update on inspections, Executive Chairman of UNMOVIC, Dr. Hans Blix,

available at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/pages/security council briefings.asp#5

46 President Clinton’s address, December 16, 1998, available at http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/middle east/july-dec98/clinton 12-16.html

 

47 UNSCR 1284 December 17, 1999, available at http://www.un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-1284.pdf 48 “U.N. appears unfazed by Iraqi rejection of proposed inspections,” CNN, February 10, 2000, available at http://www.cnn. com/2000/WORLD/meast/02/10/iraq.un.02/

49 Blix, 2004, op.cit, pages 62-67.

50 Blix, 2004, op.cit, pages 65.

51 “UN Inspectors to Continue Hunt for Iraq’s Biological and Chemical Weapons,” CBW Chronicle, Volume II, Issue 4 (May 1998), The Henry L. Stimson Center, available at http://www.stimson.org/cbw/?sn=cb20020113271

52 Blix, January 27, 2003, op.cit.

53 B11X, 2004, op.cit, page 109.

54 B11X, January 27, 2003, op.cit.

55 Bob Woodward, Plrın ofAttack, Simon & Schuster, New York, 2004, page 240. See also pages 293-294.

56 «Saddam, the Bomb and Me," By Mahdi Obeidi, The New York 7imes, Late Edition - Final, Section 4, page 11, Column 2; September 26, 2004. See also "Iraq's `Nuclear Mastermind' Tells Tale ofAmbition, Deceit," By Bob Drogin, The LosAngeles 7imes, October 3, 2004, available at http://wwwlatimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iraqarms3oct03,1,4804033.story?coll=la­home-world

57 "The Status of Nuclear Inspections In Iraq: Statement to the United Nations Securiry Council," New York, January 27, 2003, Mohamed E1Baradei, Director General, International Atomic EnergyAgency, available at http://www.un.org/News/dh/iraq/elbaradei27jan03.htm

58 Blix, 2004, op.cit, page 259.

59 CIA, op.cit, Vol. III, "Iraq's Chemical Warfare Program," page 2.

60 CIA, op.cit, Vol. III, "Iraq's Chemical Warfare Program," page 13.

61 UNSCR 687, Apri18, 1991, available at http://www un.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-687.pdf

62 UNSCR 678, November 29, 1990, available at http://www un.org/Docs/scres/1990/scres90.htm

63 U.S. Department of State, Daily Press Briefing, November 12, 1998, Briefer: James P Rubin "But clearly, we're talking about our authoriry deriving from Securiry Council resolutions and inherent authoriry. Those Securiry Council resolutions refer back to Resolution 678, which authorized all necessary means, which was something endorsed by the Congress at the time," available at http://wwwglobalsecuriry.org/wmd/library/news/iraq/1998/981112db.html. For British statements see, Michael Howard M.P and the SecreØy of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Robin Cook M.P) in Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. (2003). Official Reports. ParliamenØy Debates (Hansard). London: The Stationery Office. 10 Feb 1998: Cols. 144­145 Iraq, available at http://wwwpublications.parliament.uk/pa/cm199798/cmhansrd/vo980210/debtext/80210-06.htm

64 UNSCR 1441, November 8, 2002, available at http://wwwun.org/Depts/unmovic/new/documents/resolutions/s-res-1441.pdf

65 Quai D'Orsay, "IRAQ/UNSCR 1441 JOINT STATEMENT BY THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA, FRANCE AND THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION," New York, November 8, 2002, available at http://www diplomatie.gouv fr/actu/bulletin. gb.asp?liste=20021113.gb.html&submit.x=8&submit.y=10#Chapitre2

66 Clinton, op.cit.

67 Blix, 2004, op.cit, page 110.

68 "What a Little War in Iraq Could Do," By Michael Walzer, The New York 7imes, Section A; Column 1; Editorial Desk; page 27, March 7, 2003, available at http://wwwlebanonwire.com/0303/03030702NYTasp

69 CIA, op.cit, Vol. I, page 5.

70 Scowcroft, op.cit.

71 Third public hearing of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, Statement of Judith S. Yaphe to the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, July 9, 2003, available at http://www9-l lcommission. gov/hearings/hearing3/witness yaphe.htm

72 The 9/11 Commission Report.Final Report of the National Commission on TerroristAttacks Upon the United States, W W Norton & Company, NewYork, 2004, pages 61, 66, available at http://www9-l lcommission.gov/report/index.htm


About the Author

Andrew Apostolou is the Director of Research at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. Andrew Apostolou writes on Iraq, the Middle East and Central Asia. He has also written on south eastern Europe. He formerly worked for The Economist Group’s Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), covering the former Soviet Union as of 1992. He has debated the Uzbek ambassador to the U.S. at the Council on Foreign Relations and spoken on European security at the U.S. Army War College. For two years he headed up the Economist Intelligence Unit’s customised research unit, undertaking confidential reports for a wide-range of international companies. Before joining the EIU, he was a freelance researcher on Central Asia and the Middle East for the Royal Institute of International Affairs.

 Foundation for the Defense of Democracy

1146 19th Street, NW Suite 300 Washington, DC 20036
www.defenddemocracy.org
(202) 207-0190

 

 



TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial; Foreign Affairs; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: andrewapostolou; iraq; saddam; waronterror; wmd; wot

The original file is in PDF format. Converted for your convenience with the ScanSoft.com's PDF Converter.

1 posted on 10/18/2004 9:11:09 AM PDT by Tolik
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: MNJohnnie; quidnunc; Lando Lincoln; .cnI redruM; Valin; yonif; SJackson; dennisw; monkeyshine; ...

Nailed It!
Moral Clarity BUMP !

This ping list is not author-specific for articles I'd like to share. Some for perfect moral clarity, some for provocative thoughts; or simply interesting articles I'd hate to miss myself. (I don't have to agree with the author 100% to feel the need to share an article.) I will try not to abuse the ping list and not to annoy you too much, but on some days there is more of good stuff that is worthy attention. I keep separate PING lists for my favorite authors Victor Davis Hanson, Lee Harris, David Warren, Orson Scott Card. You are welcome in or out, just freepmail me (and note which PING list you are talking about).

2 posted on 10/18/2004 9:13:18 AM PDT by Tolik
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Tolik; Cannoneer No. 4; TEXOKIE; xzins; Alamo-Girl; blackie; SandRat; Calpernia; SAMWolf; ...
Bookmarked.  (^:

Bump!

3 posted on 10/18/2004 9:40:56 AM PDT by Ragtime Cowgirl (Remember 912.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Ragtime Cowgirl

Bump!


4 posted on 10/18/2004 9:42:24 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: PhiKapMom

have you seen this ping


5 posted on 10/18/2004 9:45:38 AM PDT by NonValueAdded (Kerry: I wholeheartedly disagree with you beyond expression)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Ragtime Cowgirl; All

I spent yesterday with a former ambassador to the UN (I don't want to give more details without permission) ... I didn't even know it until half way through the afternoon - went there to let our kids play together - but we were discussing politics throughout. Somewhere along the line I asked what he did, and he gave me a run down of his resume - what nations he had served in, etc... and then that he was an ambassador to the UN... I said, only half-jokingly, "Oh, I'm sorry. Until then, I respected you."

He didn't blush at all - he hardly reacted. Later I found he completely agreed with me that the UN is now a dangerous joke. When I asked what he thought of Oil-For-Food, he got very angry and said that everyone there knew Hussein was milking the system and skimming from it "... not at first, but it is clear that Hussein knew from the beginning it was corruptable, and he aimed toward doing that from the beginning." This is someone from a smaller country. (He's now a consultant and lecturer.) He is very afraid of the terrorist threat, and he completely agreed with my take that it is a true threat to civilization. He also agrees with the way our President is dealing with it, for the most part, and is very upset with bahavior of France, Germany, USSR, China in the UN.

Later on in the day, he asked how it was that I was so capable when talking to him about this stuff - nearly a unique experience for him outside the diplomatic arena. I then introduced him to FreeRepublic.com... and he was excited to see this. Also, I asked him for his opinions of
Bush's Liberty Doctrine as expressed in http://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc/nss.html
The National Security Strategy of the United States of America

as well as at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/06/20020601-3.html
President Bush Delivers Graduation Speech at West Point

His quick scan was all positive and so happy that I had given this to him because, it appears, it is right in line with a series of lectures he is preparing.

I'll keep you all up to date on what he lets me know.

I won't be surprised to find him posting on FR at some time in the future, too... he is so excited about the way the Old Media's monopoly is now able to be bypassed. (He loved it that we exposed the CBS FRAUDcast, and are now getting the real news out in so many ways.) When I told him that I had been part of FR since 1998, he almost swooned with respect, LOL...

So, for all or your benefits, don't let anybody tell you that we at FR don't know what is going on in the world. You can hold your own with the best of 'em...


6 posted on 10/18/2004 9:52:23 AM PDT by AFPhys ((.Praying for President Bush, our troops, their families, and all my American neighbors..))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Ragtime Cowgirl
The truth will out ~ Bump!

~~ Bush/Cheney 2004 ~~

7 posted on 10/18/2004 9:53:09 AM PDT by blackie (Be Well~Be Armed~Be Safe~Molon Labe!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: Tolik

BTTT


8 posted on 10/18/2004 12:43:38 PM PDT by neverdem (Xin loi min oi)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: wardaddy; Joe Brower; Cannoneer No. 4; Criminal Number 18F; Dan from Michigan; Eaker; King Prout; ..

From time to time, I’ll post or ping on noteworthy articles about politics, foreign and military affairs. FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.


9 posted on 10/18/2004 12:48:24 PM PDT by neverdem (Xin loi min oi)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Tolik

My gratitude for this important essay.


"Bad history" is right! And I wonder what Jeffrey Record is doing as a professor at the Air War College...biased and agenda driven profs at a military institution. Have the military institutions been infiltrated by the Left too?


10 posted on 10/18/2004 2:07:34 PM PDT by eleni121 (Islam arose as an ideological movement against Rome/Byzantium...nothing has changed)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: eleni121

BTTT


11 posted on 10/18/2004 6:38:04 PM PDT by MNJohnnie (Vote Bush 2004-We cannot survive a 9-10 President in a 9-11 World)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: Tolik

The strategists’ critique of the Iraq war has been best summarized by Jeffrey Record, a professor at the Air War College. In a paper for the U.S. Army War College that The Washington Post called “scathing,”2 Record lambasted Operation Iraqi Freedom as:

FYI
BOUNDING THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM
Authored by: Dr. Jeffrey Record
Publication Date: December 2003
Type: Monograph
Length: 62 pages
ISBN: 1-58487-146-6
Free Download (help) : PDF file (right-click to "save as")
Rate this Publication: Scroll down or click here.

http://www.carlisle.army.mil/ssi/pubs/display.cfm?pubID=207&CFID=44970&CFTOKEN=77950092




Synopsis:

The author examines three features of the war on terrorism as currently defined and conducted: (1) the administration's postulation of the terrorist threat, (2) the scope and feasibility of U.S. war aims, and (3) the war's political, fiscal, and military sustainability. He believes that the war on terrorism--as opposed to the campaign against al-Qaeda--lacks strategic clarity, embraces unrealistic objectives, and may not be sustainable over the long haul. He calls for downsizing the scope of the war on terrorism to reflect concrete U.S. security interests and the limits of American military power.


12 posted on 10/18/2004 8:45:00 PM PDT by Valin (Out Of My Mind; Back In Five Minutes)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: AFPhys

Thanks for the input.


13 posted on 10/18/2004 8:50:37 PM PDT by Valin (Out Of My Mind; Back In Five Minutes)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson