Posted on 02/10/2003 3:39:17 PM PST by SkyRat
CIA Veterans' Warning on Iraq War
Newsmax Wires Monday, Feb. 10, 2002
WASHINGTON -- CIA veterans have warned the Bush administration not to go to war against Iraq, saying that doing so would further widen the divide between the Western and Islamic worlds and increase the incidence of terrorism.
In a statement sent to media organizations earlier this week, the retired CIA officials also referred to an agency assessment report last fall, which, they said, opposed a military offensive against Iraq.
They urged the Bush administration to "re-read" the CIA report that pointed out: "The forces fueling hatred of the United States and fueling al Qaida recruiting are not being addressed" and that "the underlying causes that drive terrorists will persist."
That CIA report cited a Gallup poll last year of almost 10,000 Muslims in nine countries, in which respondents described the United States as "ruthless, aggressive, conceited, arrogant, easily provoked and biased."
Terrorism, the CIA veterans said, is like malaria. "You don't eliminate malaria by killing the flies. Rather you must drain the swamp. With an invasion of Iraq, the world can expect to be swamped with swamps breeding terrorists. In human terms, your daughters are unlikely to be able to travel abroad in future years without a phalanx of security personnel."
Referring to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's presentation at the U.N. last week, the veterans said: "We give him an 'A' for assembling and listing the charges against Iraq, but only a 'C-' in providing context and perspective."
Powell, they said, effectively showed that Iraq is not cooperating fully with U.N. Security Council Res. 1441 but "the narrow focus on (the resolution) has diverted attention from the wider picture."
The key question, they said, is whether Iraq's flouting of a U.N. resolution justifies war. "Secretary Powell's presentation does not come close to answering it," they observed.
The veterans argued that there were other U.N. resolutions that had never been implemented and asked if the United States would be willing to go to war to implement those resolutions as well.
'Root Causes'
They observed that the Arab-Israel conflict was among "the root causes not only of terrorism" but also provided Saddam Hussein with an excuse to arm himself.
Challenging the perception that Iraq is a grave threat to the United States, the veterans urged the administration to reconsider its Iraq policy, as presenting Iraq as a threat to the world's only superpower did not sound very convincing.
The veterans refer to an Oct. 7, 2002 letter the CIA sent to the Senate Intelligence Committee in which the agency said that the probability is low that Iraq would initiate an attack with weapons of mass destruction or give them to terrorists. That was so unless: "Should Saddam conclude that a U.S.-led attack could no longer be deterred, he probably would be come much less constrained in adopting terrorist actions."
For now, continued the CIA letter: "Baghdad appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or chemical/ biological warfare against the United States."
With his back against the wall, "Saddam might decide that the extreme step of assisting Islamist terrorists in conducting a weapons-of-mass- destruction attack against the United States would be his last chance to exact vengeance by taking a large number of victims with him."
They added: "It is our view that an invasion of Iraq would ensure overflowing recruitment centers for terrorists into the indefinite future. Far from eliminating the threat, it would enhance it exponentially."
Discussing the possibility of the Iraqi use of chemical weapons, the veterans said it has been the judgment of the U.S. intelligence community for over 12 years that the likelihood of such use would greatly increase during an offensive aimed at getting rid of Saddam.
Referring to Powell's claim that Saddam had recently authorized his field commanders to use chemical weapons, the CIA veterans said: "We find this truly alarming. We do not share the Defense Department's optimism that radio broadcasts and leaflets would induce Iraqi commanders not to obey orders to use such weapons, or that Iraqi generals would remove Saddam Hussein as soon as the first U.S. soldier sets foot in Iraq."
They said the last time the United States sent more than 600,000 troops to the Gulf, one of three came back ill -- many with unexplained disorders of the nervous system.
"Today's battlefield is likely to be even more sodden with chemicals and is altogether likely to yield tens of thousands more casualties," they added.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
As bad as it might be now, it will inevitably be worse to wait. It's moral. Let's go!
Heck yes, much better to wait until we lose a few million Americans to Nuclear or Biological attacks because we let somone like Sadam stay around long enough to supply our enemies with the means to destroy us.(/Sarcasm). So where did these idiots come from? Maybe CIA veterans = Clinton Stooges?
The key question, they said, is whether Iraq's flouting of a U.N. resolution justifies war. "Secretary Powell's presentation does not come close to answering it," they observed.
The veterans argued that there were other U.N. resolutions that had never been implemented and asked if the United States would be willing to go to war to implement those resolutions as well.
That's something I've found quite vexing about this entire march to war. The goalposts seem to have steadily moved so that Iraq's violation of UN resolutions is now an a priori cause for war. Aside from the fact that this confers a dangerous level of exclusive legitimacy to the United Nations, it hardly suffices as a stand-alone justification for war. Not that I've doubted since a year or so ago that we'd finish off the '91 business with Saddam, one way or another...
More inspections!! This will only play tag with Saddam for weeks, months, maybe years, until he again throws the inspectors out over some imagined limitation on a limitless charter. Then what?
9/11 and Saddam are the same threat!! Al Qaeda simply gives Saddam deniability. He trained or paid for or supported the last squad of bad guys and is doing the same for future squads. His best shot is to put disasters in place, set one off as proof, and then threaten the next group until he gets what he wants.
The first thing he'll want is Israel, then Kansas, then Iran, and so on. It isn't a question of conflict or not, it is a question of "when." Is this not clear to all?
They urged the Bush administration to "re-read" the CIA report that pointed out: "The forces fueling hatred of the United States and fueling al Qaida recruiting are not being addressed" and that "the underlying causes that drive terrorists will persist."
Clearly, I don't give a rat's ass about the underlying causes. Kill Americans, threaten us, you die. Note to CIA veteran's. They hate us becuase their evil religion tells them to hate us--or at least all non-Muslims. Why the hell is that so hard to figure out?
| the veterans urged the administration to reconsider its Iraq policy, as presenting Iraq as a threat to the world's only superpower did not sound very convincing.
Yes, any claim that Iraq represents a serious threat to the sovereignty of the United States is ludicrous. Has anyone suggested such a thing? Is Bush getting up there warning people that if we don't attack Iraq, Saddam will conquer the U.S. and we'll all be living under Ba'ath Party rule? Of course not. So why even put something like this in the article? It's like saying, "I think you are stupid, so I'm going to feed you this BS." It is the nature of WMD's that a small number of people can kill a large number of people... all at once, in one strike. They don't have to conquer the country. They don't have to install Sadddam Hussein as Ruler of North America. All they have to do is kill ten or twenty thousand people. Would they do it? They did do it. As it happened, only about 3,000 people actually died. But that was a miracle. They sure as hell tried. Saddam would never provide them with anthrax or botulinum? That's a hell of a bet to take with other people's lives. |
Isn't this just a re-tread of the ominous warnings about us going into Afghanistan after 9/11, this time with Iraq used in the template?Challenging the perception that Iraq is a grave threat to the United States, the veterans urged the administration to reconsider its Iraq policy, as presenting Iraq as a threat to the world's only superpower did not sound very convincing.
Again, substitute Afghanistan for Iraq and these bozos could use the same logic. Unfortunately, that logic cost us thousands of innocent, defenseless American lives on our own soil.
Draining the Swamp involves dropping thermonuclear devices on several Arab and muslim cities and exterminating people wholesale.
That's not on the table yet .... after a couple of chem/bio attacks on the US ... we'll see.
These guys have been so wrong about so many things for so long. When we get our hands on the files that show Saddam's involvement not just with Al Qaeda, but with tens of other terrorist groups, the CIA's "See No Evil" crowd will be exposed as a group of charlatans.
This is what they're afraid of, not Saddam.
Be Seeing You,
Chris
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Including this sort of argument immediately makes me discount everything around it. It virtually screams "liars at work."