The central focus of Iraq News is the tension between the considerable, proscribed WMD capabilities that Iraq is holding on to and its increasing stridency that it has complied with UNSCR 687 and it is time to lift sanctions. If you wish to receive Iraq News by email, a service which includes full-text of news reports not archived here, send your request to Laurie Mylroie .
I. NY POST EDITORIAL, "CLINTON AND IRAQ-FOR SHAME," OCT 1
II. WASH POST EDITORIAL, "IN SEARCH OF A POLICY," OCT 8
III. "A FUTILE GAME OF HIDE AND SEEK," WASH POST, OCT 11
IV. "ARMS INSPECTORS SHAKE THE TREE," WASH POST, OCT 12
This is the 69th day without weapons inspections in Iraq.
"Iraq News" has fallen behind on developments regarding Iraq's
proscribed weapons. This issue will focus on the recent Wash Post
reporting, the next issue will focus on last week's developments in NYC,
where Tariq Aziz left having reached no agreement on resuming weapons
inspections [nor receiving any meaningful sanction for not resuming
them], while UNSCOM and the IAEA issued their semi-annual reports. [The
UNSCOM report can be found on the website of the Federation of American
Scientists: http://www.fas.org/news/un/iraq/s/981008.htm
The WSJ, Oct 2, in "Clinton Must Convince US Lawmakers, UN, That
Policy to Contain Saddam is Sustainable," described current US policy,
"Earlier this year, the US threatened to go to war to force the Iraqi
leader to grant United Nations weapons inspectors access to suspected
weapons sites. But Washington has all but abandoned that effort, which
couldn't be sustained politically. Now the top priority is ensuring
that international economic sanctions remain in place for as long as
Saddam Hussein is in power. And when he threatens his neighbors with
weapons of mass destruction, measured American force-perhaps cruise
missiles-will be used to contain him, not all-out military
mobilization."
Huh? The New York Post editors, Oct 1, sharply criticized US
policy, "It turns out that the White House has been lying about a lot
more than just Monica Lewinsky. The issue now is nuclear weapons for
Iraq-and the potential consequences are far more significant than Bill
Clinton's future."
The Wash Post editors, Oct 8, wrote similarly, "Two months have
passed since Saddam Hussein kicked UN weapons inspectors out of Iraq . .
and the US is nowhere to be found. . . . Frustrated by this policy
failure, Congress is taking matters into its own hands. The House
overwhelmingly approved a bill, backed by Rep. Benjamin Gilman and Sens.
Trent Lott and Bob Kerrey, that would authorize the administration to
train and equip Iraqi opposition forces. The bill is a positive step;
it recognizes Saddam Hussein as the fundamental problem and his removal
as ultimately the only viable solution. But the bill doesn't force the
administration to act and there's no sign that it will. . . It comes
back, again, to US leadership."
That lack of leadership was revealed in two major Wash Post stories,
Oct 11 and 12, on UNSCOM. The Wash Post reporting bore out Scott Ritter
's charges regarding the Clinton administration's obstruction of UNSCOM.
As the Post reported, on Jan 15 1998, as the second Iraq crisis began,
the US asked Amb. Butler to withdraw Ritter from Baghdad and abort a
planned search of the headquarters of the Special Security Organization,
in charge of concealing Iraq's proscribed weapons. [For more on the SSO,
see the INC webpage http://www.inc.org.uk under "Apparatus of
Repression."]
Following the Feb 23 Annan accord, Ritter was sent to Baghdad to lead
inspections to test the accord. But Butler came under pressure from NSC
Adviser Sandy Berger and Sec State Madeleine Albright to relieve Ritter
and did so Mar 3, provoking a revolt from other team leaders. UN
ambassador, Bill Richardson, hearing of the revolt within UNSCOM, urged
Butler to retain Ritter. Richardson also found Pres Clinton, who knew
nothing about the dispute, and got him to send a "congratulatory
comment" to Butler on UNSCOM's work, and the inspection proceeded.
But the next month, as a high-ranking US official explained, a policy
review was conducted and a "'conscious policy decision' was made 'to
take the trigger out of Butler's hands for going to war' by slowing the
pace of the commission's most controversial work." That was pretty much
what Ritter charged when he resigned.
Furthermore, as the Post explained, "With inspections stopped since
Aug. 3 and no prospect in view for their resumption, the administration
now plays down their significance. Defense Secretary William S. Cohen
praised the inspectors in Senate testimony last Tuesday but counseled
'not to overstate what their role is': 'If you take a group of 20 or 30
people, and you put them in a country the size of all New England, plus
New York, plus Pennsylvania, plus New Jersey, and say, 'Go find evidence
of chemical weapons,' you are asking a great deal of those inspectors.'"
However, in a perhaps understandable attempt not to appear too
one-sided against the administration, the report glided over some
aspects of the story. The Clinton administration has never--not
once--supported UNSCOM with the threat to use military force to make
Iraq back down over a blocked inspection. Only in Clinton's second
term--late last year/early this year--did the administration threaten
force in support of UNSCOM. But that was not in response to blocked
inspections. It was in response to the provocations Iraq raised, first
regarding US weapons inspectors and then inspections of "presidential
sites," with known results.
Under Clinton, the question of blocked inspections did not arise until
after Hussein Kamil's Aug 95 defection, which prompted UNSCOM to adopt
the aggressive approach towards Iraq's concealment apparatus, known as
"Shake the Tree." The first of those inspections, in Mar 96, was
blocked for hours, although UNSCOM was eventually allowed into the sites
that it wanted to visit.
But three months later, in Jun 96, UNSCOM was prevented entirely from
entering a site, which appeared to contain SCUD missiles. UNSCOM then
followed its establish procedures, which included surrounding the site
to prevent Iraq from taking material out and turning to Washington for
support. But UNSCOM did not receive the support that it had been
accustomed to receiving from the Bush administration, which used
to fairly regularly threaten Iraq with military force, when it defied
UNSCOM.
In Jun 96, Albright, then UN ambassador, did move to try to secure a
UNSC resolution that would declare Iraq in "material breach" of the
cease-fire resolution, thereby authorizing the use of force against
Iraq. But the White House felt she was moving too fast. NSC advisor
Anthony Lake told Amb. Rolf Ekeus then, "Don't give us sweaty palms."
Lacking US support, Ekeus called off his team in Iraq and went there to
secure an agreement on access for UNSCOM, intended to make the best of a
situation in which UNSCOM did not have the necessary US support.
But in mid-July, another inspection was blocked. An informed source
explained to "Iraq News" that a disagreement over tactics followed.
Some thought that UNSCOM should respond to being blocked by quickly
calling off an inspection and reporting to the Security Council that it
had been blocked. Such a response, it was argued, would secure support
for a subsequent military attack on Iraq. But Ekeus considered that
pie-in-the-sky. UNSCOM had not received that kind of support in Jun, so
why should it in Jul? Moreover, UNSCOM had to be serious about its
inspections. If it went to a site, it had to be for a genuine purpose,
and then UNSCOM had to be serious about demanding entry. It could not
afford to be seen to be pursuing inspections in a desultory fashion, in
order to precipitate a US attack on Iraq, which wasn't likely to happen
anyway, and in the unlikely case that it did, with what result?
Indeed, throughout Clinton's first term, the White House repeatedly
refused to issue an ultimatum to Iraq, although there were several
occasions in which that would have been appropriate. The White House
seemed to have been consistently apprehensive that Iraq would not back
down in the face of a US threat and concerned about what the next step
would be, if Baghdad didn't back down. Thus, in Oct 94, following
Saddam's lunge at Kuwait, Sec Def William Perry wanted to declare a
no-drive zone in southern Iraq, raising the idea publicly. The State
Dept was agreeable. But once the US announced that it was rushing
troops to Kuwait, the advancing Iraqi forces halted and began to
withdraw. The White House hesitated to make a further demand--the
withdrawal of Iraqi forces from the south--lest Saddam defy it. So
rather than punish Saddam for his aggression, by establishing a no-drive
zone in the south, for example, the Clinton administration essentially
settled for restoring the status quo ante.
Similarly, in Aug 96, the US did nothing as Iraq's Republican Guards
marched up to Irbil, with the intent of assaulting the Iraqi National
Congress headquartered there. There was no ultimatum or warning to
Saddam about the consequences of such an assault, only a cruise missile
attack on some relatively worthless air defense sites in the south,
after the fact.
Thus, while anything might be possible, it is a little hard to
credit the Wash Post account that following the administration's failure
to back up UNSCOM in Jun 96, it found its cahones in Jul/Aug, only to
lose them by month's end, as Saddam attacked Irbil.
As for the present, the Wash Post reported, "In the policy review
that came last spring, the Clinton administration concluded that a loss
of diplomatic support left little room to back intrusive searches by
threat of US force. The best the government believed it could do for
now is to maintain a broad consensus for economic sanctions."
If that is so, it is because of the administration's stubborn refusal
to deal with the Iraq problem, when it was more manageable. Over a
period of years, the administration was repeatedly told that it had a
very serious problem with Iraq. That was particularly so following
Hussein Kamil's Aug 95 defection.
Some of the first information to emerge after Kamil's defection
concerned Iraq's bw program. In Oct 95, then Israeli ambassador, Itamar
Rabinovich, told "Iraq News" of his concern about Iraq's biological
weapons and said he would raise the issue with the US officials with
whom he dealt, including Martin Indyk.
In Dec 95, following the assassination of Itzhak Rabin, Israeli Prime
Minister Shimon Peres and Foreign Minister Ehud Barak visited Wash DC
and expressed their concern about a possible Iraqi nuclear breakout.
Barak did so in exceptionally strong terms.
Around the same time, a State Dept official proposed to take a second
look at Iraq's retained unconventional capabilities. Prior to Kamil's
defection, the US had looked at that issue in terms of keeping sanctions
on Iraq. His idea was to look at the question in terms of any
offensive threat that Iraq's unconventional capabilities might
represent. His boss agreed that he should study that matter and do so
in conjunction with a colleague from the CIA. The project seemed set
up, but it was never carried out, because the CIA never came through.
A friend, retired from the US Gov't told me of a figure within the
Gov't, working with UNSCOM, who repeatedly briefed US officials,
including one Cabinet level official, on the danger posed by Iraq's bw
program. Nothing was ever done to address the problem, nor was the
danger explained to the American public, save for a few brief moments
during the past year's Iraq crises.
In Feb 97, a large Saudi delegation, headed by the Defense Minister,
Prince Sultan, came to Washington to see whether the US was willing to
take a more aggressive stance on Iraq. The delegation received no
satisfactory answer and the Saudis soon began making their first
approaches toward Iran.
In the early spring of 97, two senior Republican foreign policy
figures, attending a dinner with Madeleine Albright, pressed her on Iraq
policy. She assured them that US policy on Iraq was in good shape.
In Jun, 97 Rolf Ekeus, as he left his position as UNSCOM chairman,
warned of UNSCOM's precarious position and Iraq's untempered ambition,
as reported in the introductory issue of "Iraq News."
Finally, as late as Mar 98, King Hussein, in a visit to Wash DC,
warned the administration of the Saddam menace [see "Iraq News," Apr 5].
Again, the administration did nothing.
What can anyone say? The administration was repeatedly told that
it had a serious problem with Iraq; disregarded those warnings; and now
really has no one but itself to blame for its problems with Iraq.
Moreover, it can only get worse, until and unless, the administration
gets a grip on the problem.