Mr. Irrelevant

http://www.intellectualconservative.com ^ | Monday, 09 September 2002 | Brian S. Wise

[BrianS.Wise]

About the time President Bush birthed the “Axis of Evil,” Scott Ritter became a very hot property. He was still in the employ of Fox News channel than, as a consultant, and could read the writing on the wall: Iraq was the only Axis nation America could logically invade, and because he was a former United Nations weapons inspector, he possessed a more intimate knowledge of Iraq’s weapons capabilities, circa 1998, than just about any other civilian. So even though his was older knowledge, it was still relevant enough to form a general base of information for Fox News channel viewers, upon which they could build as time went on.

Fast forward seven months. Just days before the first anniversary of the Tragedies, Scott Ritter has made an appearance before the Iraqi National Assembly, suggesting that there is no evidence to bolster American claims of advanced Iraqi weapons programs, and therefore no justification for war. Which brings about interesting questions: if your average American would like to gain audience with the Iraqi National Assembly – say, as a vacation stop – how does he go about getting such a thing? Secondarily, upon what is Ritter basing his new knowledge?

In answering the first question, well, your average American just doesn’t get an audience with the Iraqi National Assembly, which only shines a brighter light as to why Ritter was there and who footed the bill. On this, every possible accusation has been made, starting with “Ritter is on the Iraqi payroll and should be investigated for income tax evasion” and often ending with “Ritter is a traitor and should be investigated for espionage.” Maybe, maybe not; but by this point, even Ritter should understand how odd this all looks. Those who undergo philosophical shifts tend to do so gradually; for one example, your author didn’t flip from liberalism to Republicanism in one grand movement, rather the change came gradually.

That cannot be said of Scott Ritter, whose turn has been positively Brockian in its brevity. Self-respecting news networks have gone back to 1998, retrieved and broadcast one hawkish comment after another uttered by none other than Ritter himself, who at the time was insisting not only that Iraq’s weapons capability was further along than we thought, but that the removal of inspectors simply shouldn’t be allowed to stand. So what has changed? The political affiliation of the administration? Would this be explained if Ritter was himself a liberal Democrat and was speaking out against a Republican administration in an election year, as Daschle and company have? Hard to say; even if it were true, Daschle and company haven’t taken flights to Iraq and so publicly denounced their own nation. Neither, for that matter, has any relevant administration dissenter.

To the second question, one assumes Ritter’s new basis of knowledge comes either from the Iraqis themselves, or is simply a visceral, contrary reaction to a power he doesn’t trust (that being the United States government). Should the former be true, there is quite a bit to be said for the intellectual acumen that trusts the Iraqi government over the United States government, no matter how he despises its universal size and intrusiveness. One can make whatever arguments against this government he wishes, from the founding forward – that those who insisted most heartily on the freedom of Man continued to own slaves, that later generations wiped out Indian populations in the name of expansion, et cetera – but you can also say the same government sent five of its own citizens to die for each slave it ultimately freed, and that it made more concessions to Indians, in more sober times, than any other nation in a similar position would have made.

What you cannot say is that the United States has, in this modern time, ever gassed and slaughtered a segment of its population because it thought the people impure or considered it the enemy. Nor has its leaders met with conspirators who ended up flying airliners into buildings and killing 3,050 people. Nor can it be said the United States manufacturers and maintains nuclear weapons so that it can one day drop them on another country as a matter of trivial comeuppance for a misdeed no one can identify. (Who in the world can say Kuwait was invaded as some sort of logical program?) All of these have been, and will be, Iraq unless something is done in the near term.

Mr. Irrelevant has always been the nickname given the college player picked last in the National Football League draft; now he is Scott Ritter, having been made so by senior members of the administration, who have roundly (and patiently) explained away his concerns. Even Brit Hume has added insult to Ritter’s injury, noting on Monday afternoon that he was indeed a paid Fox News channel consultant until his views became too, well, nutty. (Mr. Hume, of course, picked a more diplomatic term.)

One logically suspects that irrelevant is exactly what Scott Ritter doesn’t want to be, thus his outrage. Should this be the case, that he’s merely a man with an inferiority complex and a desire for the spotlight, perhaps he can be excused. If not, his true motivations should be known. There is no time for him to speak out like the present; dissent can be tolerated, pandering to the enemy cannot.

[shaggy eel]

I trust that is implied at all times in the minds of most conservatives.

,,, it was within that context that I made my statement.

[palmer]

So the choices are: he's a traitor on Saddam's payroll or he has an inferiority complex and a desire for the spotlight. Do you have evidence for either of those theories?

[Dog Gone]

My opinion is that he was bought all along. His inspections found what could not be hidden in time.

Ritter was a weasel all along, and we simply weren't interested in looking hard enough earlier.

[Dog Gone]

My opinion is that he was bought all along. His inspections found what could not be hidden in time.

Ritter was a weasel all along, and we simply weren't interested in looking hard enough earlier.

[Benrand]

I see the big picture of Ritter being involved this way as calculated. But he does get pretty fired up when he's defending his position, as if he doesn't like doing it.

This whole episode is fascinating to me.

[BrianS.Wise]

To the first point, I haven't ever suggested Ritter is on the Hussein's payroll. I said he used to be on the Fox News Channel's payroll, but was dismissed. The paragraph in question was:

"In answering the first question, well, your average American just doesn’t get an audience with the Iraqi National Assembly, which only shines a brighter light as to why Ritter was there and who footed the bill. On this, every possible accusation has been made, starting with “Ritter is on the Iraqi payroll and should be investigated for income tax evasion” and often ending with “Ritter is a traitor and should be investigated for espionage.” Maybe, maybe not; but by this point, even Ritter should understand how odd this all looks. Those who undergo philosophical shifts tend to do so gradually; for one example, your author didn’t flip from liberalism to Republicanism in one grand movement, rather the change came gradually."

What is suggested here is, these are some of the things people have said. Go down the list of replies to this column, you will see the same two accusations, unsolicited.

To the second point, the inferiority complex is just a suspicion of mine, and nothing that can be confirmed. That's why I haven't written it in a column; the understanding being the officially produced column work should be taken a little more seriously than something I fire off to someone on Free Republic.

[BrianS.Wise]

And difficult to understand, yes. Something's telling me one Ritter follow up column won't be enough.

[Fred Mertz]

I just learned the other night that Ritter is married to a Russian woman.

Also, I recently read an article on Ritter (on FR) that was written in Nov 2001 (I think) that theorized that Ritter is an agent of the CIA; that made as much sense as anything else I've been reading.

[BrianS.Wise]

I've been hearing the married-to-a-Russian-woman thing all day today, too, but look: having sex with a Russian no more makes you a Iraqi poster boy than having sex with a liberal makes you a Clintonite.

Re: Ritter in the CIA. Next thing you know, people are going to have him in a book depository window overlooking Daley Plaza.

[red-dawg]

After watching his sudden transformation from his former self, I assumed at first he was just ANGRY.
Scott seemed to assume an "I told you so" type of attitude and then CLICK!!
Like a lightswitch he started to defend Iraq. It now appears that he has the coordinates to Sen. Biden's house and is giving them to Saddam.

[BrianS.Wise]

Had he called me first, I could have given him a few other sets of coordinates.

[Fred Mertz]

My final comment: I would look at who is pulling Ritter's strings rather than his personal motivations.

Thanks again for your well written piece.

[palmer]

If the inferiority complex is your unconfirmed hunch then why did you mention it at all? And apparantly you have no evidence that he is a traitor except for his trip to Iraq that the Iraqi government paid for. But I think there's more and you need to do more homework.

His speech there as excerpted on various websites was primarily to urge the assembly to reallow weapons inspections. But he has also admitted that the U.S. used inspections to spy on Iraq. In admitting that, did he hand over secret information to a foreign power? Maybe you should investigate that for your next column.

[BrianS.Wise]

Slow down a minute:

1) I haven't ever said Scott Ritter was a traitor.

2) I haven't ever said Scott Ritter was on the Iraqi payroll.

3) I have said the inferiority complex thing was just a hunch; and I have said that's why I've never put it into a column.

4) I mentioned the hunch in the first place because one tends to think and act on his own, without seeking approval from other readers at Free Republic before discussing a hunch. No one but you took it seriously. But look: the more thoroughly he's dismissed, the louder he gets. Doesn't that suggest anything to you? I suppose you thought Napoleon didn't have a complex?

5) I believe my entire next column is going to be about people who cannot understand my columns as written, and then suggest I've said things I haven't.

6) I would certainly hope the United States used weapons inspections to spy on Iraq; everything that country does is suspect. A document of surrender at the end of a war isn't a list of suggestions, it's a declaration of dominance. What I can't figure out is why, once the inspectors were kicked out, they didn't return the next week with tanks to let themselves in.

7) The day I take column suggestions into consideration, I retire.

[BrianS.Wise]

And now we'll have to carry this to another time, I've got to go ...

[palmer]

my entire next column is going to be about people who cannot understand my columns as written, and then suggest I've said things I haven't.

Then I'm the perfect person to read and comment on it!

Seriously though, your column didn't contain much other than innuendo that Ritter is a traitor. You brought it up as a strawman or whatever you want to call it, but the column's purpose was to bash Ritter as either a traitor or a loony (you wrote of no other possibilities). And your defense of your column is much better than your column IMO.

[doug from upland]

This is great. "Brockian" is now an adjective.

[Wil H]

The one essential element missing from this otherwise interesting analysis is that Scott Ritter, a low paid former civil servant, is $400,000 better off than he was four years ago.

Think that might have anything to do with it?

[big bad easter bunny]

If we knew that they would not be able to blackmail him.

[The Great Satan]

Soldiers like Scott Ritter and Timothy McVeigh are nothing new in history. The preening, self-regarding hero comes home and finds himself a nobody, and turns on his old comrades in arms. That's the story of Ajax. It's as old as Homer.