The Sloth
6th August 2004, 17:05
While I'm sure the rational individuals on this board have already realized that the War in Iraq was a war of imperialism/markets/resources, I'll attempt to reinforce this further for those that have been kept in the dark, so to speak. This thread is thus directed at the Party for the International Cappie-Parasitic Gestapo a.ka. the "right opposition" on this board.
First of all, this is the way the "Executive Order Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq and Certain Other Property in Which Iraq Has An Interest" from May 22, 2003 starts out:
I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, find that the threat of attachment or other judicial process against the Development Fund for Iraq, Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, obstructs the orderly reconstruction of Iraq, the restoration and maintenance of peace and security in the country, and the development of political, administrative, and economic institutions in Iraq. This situation constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat.
It continues with the subsequent "orders"...
Section 1. Unless licensed or otherwise authorized pursuant to this order, any attachment, judgment, decree, lien, execution, garnishment, or other judicial process is prohibited, and shall be deemed null and void, with respect to the following:
(a) the Development Fund for Iraq, and
(b) all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.
You can read this in its entirety here. (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/05/20030522-15.html)
Before I continue, I'd like to say that it's extremely odd indeed that six different intelligence reports from six different nations all said the same exact thing about WMD's in Iraq, yet all six of them were horribly, horribly mistaken beyond imagination.
According to the Guerrilla News Network:
It's official. The intelligence used by the British government as a pretext for the invasion of Iraq was flawed. No - Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction that could be deployed within forty five minutes. No - the intelligence claiming Iraq was still producing chemical and biological munitions was not based on reliable sources. No - the experts on such weapons were not properly consulted during this process. No - investigations did not prove a link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. The actions of the US-UK alliance were based upon the veracity of these claims. So what went awry and who is responsible?
Well, according to today's news, "no one" is responsible. Sure, the common defense of Bush is that he acted on "bad intelligence" and didn't intentionally lie, but hey, even though that is debatable, those that did the real lying in preparation for the intelligence reports are not only not going to be held accountable, but they are not even going to be reported. "Oh well, it's all in the past, nothing can be done now" is the conservative catch-phrase of today.
The latest internal British investigation into these matters led by Lord Butler, the former Cabinet Secretary, reported that no particular individual(s) were to blame for this series of blunders. It was – he concluded – a "collective" failure.
And,
Yet Blair has presided over perhaps the most catastrophic failure in the history of British intelligence, and the worst British foreign policy blunder since the 1956 Suez crisis. Anthony Eden, the then Prime minister of Britain was ruined by the subsequent political impasse of Suez. Blair on the other hand seems to have once again earned his nickname ‘Teflon Tony' in the wake of another crisis. Mistakes were made, but apparently all decisions and claims were made – according to the Prime Minister – in "good faith." Butler’s conclusion was that the structure of decision making, intelligence analysis and distribution in a "small circle" of key officials was to blame.
Oh really? Hmmmm....
Scott Ritter is a prophet of sorts, and if we had listened to him and respected his intellect, knowledge and honesty, we could have avoided the war in Iraq and its cost in lives and dollars.
In September 2002, Time magazine asked Ritter whose Iraq policy was worse, Bill Clinton's or George W. Bush's. Ritter's response:
"Bush, because of its ramifications. It threatens a war that probably lacks any basis in law or substantive fact. It has a real chance of putting thousands of American lives at risk and seeks to dictate American will on the world."
Who is this Scott Ritter guy?
He is a former marine and a weapons inspector.
Before we attacked the Iraqi people, Ritter was often seen on television as a laughable "expert." The Fox News talking heads treated him as a lunatic. How could he be anything else when he disagreed with George W. Bush?
And Ritter has a temper, so that added to the fun. It was a treat to see him get all red faced and wonder when he'd explode.
It mattered not that Ritter was painfully honest and knew exactly what he was talking about.
This seems to happen all the time. An "expert," when having a differing opinion, even when it is backed up by facts, is "dismissed" as a "lunatic." I remember watching a video of Bill O' Reilly embarassing himself and his guest by attacking him because he said the United States helped to train and maintain the Taliban. No matter that he cited sources, facts, etc. Since he was oviously so "un-patriotic," he's unworthy to be listened to. All in the name of an irrational and emotional attachment to the government, foreign policy, etc. that is supposed to always "do the right thing." Seems as if I can't find a single fault in foreign policy since the 1920's on which a rabid right-winger won't call me on...even Hiroshima and Nagasaki are "justified." America is perfect, it seems.
A search through newspaper and magazine articles leading up to the war against Iraq leads me to these conclusions:
1) Bill Clinton was as concerned about Saddam Hussein as George W. Bush is, but less eager to risk American lives to deal with him. Unfortunately for all of us, the sexy impeachment fiasco pushed by the Republicans diverted our attention, so most of us weren't paying attention.
However, Ritter was far from happy with Clinton's support for the inspectors, or lack of it. In September 1998, he told Newsweek, "I heard somebody say it very effectively: '[Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright blocked more inspections in 1997 than Saddam Hussein did.' It's a funny quip, but unfortunately true."
2) The four days of intensive bombings ordered by Clinton at the end of 1998 probably taught Saddam that his efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction weren't worth the cost. The economic sanctions imposed by the United Nations at the end of the first Gulf War were seriously crippling Iraq, and trying to acquire those weapons simply added to Saddam's misery. He gave up but pretended not to. Saving face is a big deal for dictators, as it is for all politicians (see: "Johnson, Lyndon B."; or "Nixon, Richard M."; or "Bush, George W.")
Of course, the fact that Bill Clinton was "just as concerned" is meaningless to a communist...it shows that people are very willing to "fight over" the dual-party monopoly, a.k.a. which "party" controls the people for four or eight years, as if it mattered that much in the past. But nonetheless, this is an interesting point that was brought up.
3) The "intelligence community" never said Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. In all the articles I read, the CIA and other agencies were very careful not to overstate the danger presented by Saddam.
For example, The Washington Post reported in November 2000, "The CIA does not agree that Iraq possesses a crude nuclear weapon. 'We don't believe they have the fissile material required for a nuclear weapon,' said one senior U.S. official. ... 'Nor do we believe they currently have the infrastructure to build a nuclear weapon.'"
4) In a related matter, Clinton was far more concerned about terrorist attacks against the United States than he was about the threat of Saddam. But he had a hard time selling his concern to others, even though he tried. He originated an antiterrorist agency in government in 1994 and increased its budget every year thereafter, from an original $5.7 billion reported in 1995 to $11.1 billion in 2000.
I was unable to find any antiterrorist actions by Bush before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but that doesn't mean he didn't do anything. It could be his efforts just didn't make the public prints, or that I couldn't find the articles about them.
5) Scott Ritter took part in more than 30 inspections missions in Iraq, and probably knew more about Iraq's WMD programs than anyone. The Iraqis were very annoyed with him and accused him and other inspectors of being spies. They were right; the inspectors were pressed into spying. That was a distraction for them.
6) As a U.N. inspector, Ritter was constantly unhappy with the Iraqis because they failed to destroy all their weapons. After the inspectors were pulled out of Iraq in 1998, Ritter appeared to change his tune, saying Iraq's weapons programs were no threat.
The difference, Ritter explained to the scoffers on TV, was that as an inspector, he expected total compliance and didn't get it. Later, as an outsider, he was able to say that even without total compliance Iraq, was no threat.
"I've never given Iraq a clean bill of health," Ritter told Time in September 2002. "I've said that no one has backed up any allegations that Iraq has constituted weapons-of-mass-destruction capability with anything that resembles substantive fact."
The politicians (including Al Gore, who warned of "imminent danger" in 1998) were hyping the Iraq threat, as were my fellow jackals of the press -- especially columnists! -- but the various intelligence agencies were far more prudent. To repeat, they often cautioned against overrating the threat posed by Saddam.
So why would you hype up the threat? "Just" to go off to war?
Back to Butler and Britain:
It has not gone unnoticed that while the British government has been able to duck incoming fire over the case for war, other people have not been so fortunate. Greg Dyke, former head of the BBC, and Andrew Gilligan, the journalist the center of the furor surrounding the mysterious death of biological weapons expert Dr. David Kelly’s death that led to the Hutton inquiry, have hit back in the light of Butler’s findings. Dyke told Channel 4 news: "Dr. Kelly told Andrew Gilligan the document had been ‘sexed up’ and one of the examples of it having been ‘sexed up’….was the forty-five minute claim. Here, we are told today...that the forty-five minute claim should not have been in the document without a set of caveats, caveats that were there in the early drafts and disappeared. The question is who took out the caveats?...The BBC was perfectly right to report Dr. Kelly’s allegations."
To continue:
In the wake of the Hutton Report, both Dyke and Gilligan resigned from their positions. There was blood on the carpet, but none of it belonged to the pro-war establishment (those government officials who did resign did so because they disagreed with and criticized the lead up to war). Gilligan, along with most of the nation’s national newspapers expressed incredulity at what looked like another feat of escapology by the UK government, "Although Lord Butler says he finds no evidence of deliberate embellishment or misleading, many of his findings do exactly that." Gilligan had initially broken the story, with Dr Kelly as the alleged source, that the government had "sexed up" the published Iraq intelligence. Hutton had concluded that Gilligan’s claims were "unfounded". Renowned scientist, Richard Dawkins, (author of The Selfish Gene) remarked in response to Butler’s report, "I find it hard to understand precisely what Andrew Gilligan was supposed to have got wrong."
Despite Blair’s mild contrition in admitting "mistakes made," it was no mea culpa and there certainly do not seem to be any government resignations forthcoming. In fact, John Scarlett, chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) responsible for drawing up the September 2002 "dossier of intelligence," is to be appointed as the next head of MI6, the UK’s primary intelligence gathering agency. Scarlett is a crucial figure in this story because he was directly responsible for the intelligence that actually reached – or did not reach – the Prime Minister’s desk.
Oh, how nice. So we find the one of the culprits responsible behind the "intelligence failure," and instead of being attacked for such serious shit, he's "promoted" behind-the-scenes. I would think that at least Blair would be angry, but he's not. It doesn't matter that there was a "failure" or if there were any weapons in the first place. But then the question naturally arises....why are these governments, then, so happy about the invasion, even giving promotions to the culprits behind the "intelligence failures"? Like I said, the culprits will not be reported (I had to get this information from the Guerrilla News Network!), and most likely not punished. In this case, they are rewarded.
Speaking to an interviewer on the BBC program Panorama on July 11th 2004, Jones identifies a litany of government abuse of intelligence regarding Iraq. In 1998 the US and UK carried out a series of intense air strikes against Iraq. These were according to Blair, ostensibly "To degrade the ability of Saddam Hussein to build and use weapons of mass destruction." The UK and US acted without UN approval, bombing Baghdad on the basis of limited intelligence. Perhaps this sounds familiar? Jones’ department at the time was asked to provide intelligence on potential targets for these strikes. Referring to whether or not the targets identified were involved in a WMD program, he said, "It's on the basis of the information available to us and the assessments that my branch undertook that we did not have a high degree of confidence that any of those… that any of the facilities that we could suggest were active in the program."
Despite the lack of confidence in the identified targets, the Defense Intelligence staff were asked to sign a public statement declaring the operation a success. This is dangerous territory for the government as it clearly highlights a precedent in taking action not warranted by available intelligence. Just how sparse this intelligence was is revealed in the exchange between Jones and his interviewer, John Ware:
WARE: I just want to try and get a snapshot from you of how big the gaps were in the coverage of intelligence from Iraq. Was it known which agents had been produced since Gulf War One?
JONES: No, it wasn't.
WARE: Was it known where or how the agents were being produced?
JONES: No.
WARE: Was it known whether agent had been stockpiled or consisted only of a small reserve?
JONES: It was not known with certainty. There was a reasonable assumption that there may have been some stocks left over from the first Gulf War. If there had been any other production, then we have not identified that it had taken place.
WARE: Did you know where and how the weapons had been filled with agents? JONES: No.
WARE: Was it known how the weapons and agent had been transported and deployed?
JONES: No.
And you go off to war, anyway? Fuck! There must be another reason, right?
Fast-forward to 2002: Prior to the release of the September dossier, Jones once again had concerns about the government presentation of limited intelligence that his department provided. Important further intelligence had apparently been gathered by MI6 – Jones and his team were not allowed access to this intelligence. This is despite being told that the new information "clinched" all of his concerns and supposedly completed the intelligence picture of Iraq’s capabilities. Shortly before the release of the final intelligence dossier Jones was told that he and his team should make no further substantive comments on the issue of WMDs.
But if this is about maintaining international security from that WMD-toting Saddam Hussein, why didn't the government want new information released that would not only contradict reports of the existence of WMD's, but also dismiss them completely? War was wanted that bad, eh? And obviously, it wasn't even about "a threat" posed by Iraq.
The story becomes ever more incredible with the revelation in the Butler report that MI6 had in fact "withdrawn" crucial intelligence on WMD – that is to say, key evidence used as planks in the case against Iraq was deemed to be unfit. MI6 just didn’t bother to tell anyone – at least anyone who mattered. This apparently included Lord Hutton, and the Prime Minister, who claimed that he was only made aware of this with the publication of Butler’s report. The Prime Minister’s lack of awareness in this case seems very peculiar. A spokesman for Blair said that MI6 opted not to inform the Hutton inquiry because it was deemed "too sensitive" to be made public, while the head of MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove took the decision not to inform the Prime Minister. So just who the hell is in charge here?
Presumably, as the Prime Minister was one of the individuals under the spotlight in Hutton’s inquiry it may have seemed inappropriate to inform him of something that may have forced him to make an executive decision with regard to the investigation of which he was a subject. He may have been put into the difficult position of having to decide whether or not to quash the revelation from MI6. Yet The Telegraph this week released a damaging story, provided by one of the members of Butler’s inquiry team that indicates that Blair is very much in charge of the "independent" investigatory process. The Telegraph’s source indicated that changes were made to the Butler report, changes requested by the government – specifically concerning Blair. The original sentence allegedly expressed "the opinion that Mr. Blair personally masterminded the misleading impression left by the dossier." And - as the Telegraph goes on to point out, "The passage is important because Downing Street maintained last week that the report at no point questions Mr. Blair's "good faith."
God-damn!
I know this is running a little long, but let's get to where I'm becoming more and more interested in: the hand-over that occured June 28th.
Let's the what occured before, during, and after this "hand-over of power":
Officially, the U.S. occupation of Iraq ended on June 28, 2004. But in reality, the United States is still in charge: Not only do 138,000 troops remain to control the streets, but the "100 Orders" of L. Paul Bremer III remain to control the economy.
These little noticed orders enacted by Bremer, the now-departed head of the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority, go to the heart of Bush administration plans in Iraq. They lock in sweeping advantages to American firms, ensuring long-term U.S. economic advantage while guaranteeing few, if any, benefits to the Iraqi people.
The Bremer orders control every aspect of Iraqi life — from the use of car horns to the privatization of state-owned enterprises. Order No. 39 alone does no less than "transition [Iraq ] from a … centrally planned economy to a market economy" virtually overnight and by U.S. fiat.
Privatized industries seem to be profitable:
A sampling of the most important orders demonstrates the economic imprint left by the Bush administration: Order No. 39 allows for: (1) privatization of Iraq's 200 state-owned enterprises; (2) 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses; (3) "national treatment" — which means no preferences for local over foreign businesses; (4) unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds; and (5) 40-year ownership licenses.
And, finally....
Thus, it forbids Iraqis from receiving preference in the reconstruction while allowing foreign corporations — Halliburton and Bechtel, for example — to buy up Iraqi businesses, do all of the work and send all of their money home. They cannot be required to hire Iraqis or to reinvest their money in the Iraqi economy. They can take out their investments at any time and in any amount.
Orders No. 57 and No. 77 ensure the implementation of the orders by placing U.S.-appointed auditors and inspector generals in every government ministry, with five-year terms and with sweeping authority over contracts, programs, employees and regulations.
Order No. 17 grants foreign contractors, including private security firms, full immunity from Iraq's laws. Even if they, say, kill someone or cause an environmental disaster, the injured party cannot turn to the Iraqi legal system. Rather, the charges must be brought to U.S. courts.
Order No. 40 allows foreign banks to purchase up to 50% of Iraqi banks.
Order No. 49 drops the tax rate on corporations from a high of 40% to a flat 15%. The income tax rate is also capped at 15%.
Order No. 12 (renewed on Feb. 24) suspends "all tariffs, customs duties, import taxes, licensing fees and similar surcharges for goods entering or leaving Iraq." This led to an immediate and dramatic inflow of cheap foreign consumer products — devastating local producers and sellers who were thoroughly unprepared to meet the challenge of their mammoth global competitors.
Clearly, the Bremer orders fundamentally altered Iraq's existing laws. For this reason, they are also illegal. Transformation of an occupied country's laws violates the Hague regulations of 1907 (ratified by the United States) and the U.S. Army's Law of Land Warfare. Indeed, in a leaked memo, the British attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, warned Prime Minister Tony Blair that "major structural economic reforms would not be authorized by international law."
With few reconstruction projects underway and with Bremer's rules favoring U.S. corporations, there has been little opportunity for Iraqis to go back to work, leaving nearly 2 million unemployed 1 1/2 years after the invasion and, many believe, greatly fueling the resistance.
Quite the hand-over!
First of all, this is the way the "Executive Order Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq and Certain Other Property in Which Iraq Has An Interest" from May 22, 2003 starts out:
I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, find that the threat of attachment or other judicial process against the Development Fund for Iraq, Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, obstructs the orderly reconstruction of Iraq, the restoration and maintenance of peace and security in the country, and the development of political, administrative, and economic institutions in Iraq. This situation constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat.
It continues with the subsequent "orders"...
Section 1. Unless licensed or otherwise authorized pursuant to this order, any attachment, judgment, decree, lien, execution, garnishment, or other judicial process is prohibited, and shall be deemed null and void, with respect to the following:
(a) the Development Fund for Iraq, and
(b) all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.
You can read this in its entirety here. (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/05/20030522-15.html)
Before I continue, I'd like to say that it's extremely odd indeed that six different intelligence reports from six different nations all said the same exact thing about WMD's in Iraq, yet all six of them were horribly, horribly mistaken beyond imagination.
According to the Guerrilla News Network:
It's official. The intelligence used by the British government as a pretext for the invasion of Iraq was flawed. No - Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction that could be deployed within forty five minutes. No - the intelligence claiming Iraq was still producing chemical and biological munitions was not based on reliable sources. No - the experts on such weapons were not properly consulted during this process. No - investigations did not prove a link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda. The actions of the US-UK alliance were based upon the veracity of these claims. So what went awry and who is responsible?
Well, according to today's news, "no one" is responsible. Sure, the common defense of Bush is that he acted on "bad intelligence" and didn't intentionally lie, but hey, even though that is debatable, those that did the real lying in preparation for the intelligence reports are not only not going to be held accountable, but they are not even going to be reported. "Oh well, it's all in the past, nothing can be done now" is the conservative catch-phrase of today.
The latest internal British investigation into these matters led by Lord Butler, the former Cabinet Secretary, reported that no particular individual(s) were to blame for this series of blunders. It was – he concluded – a "collective" failure.
And,
Yet Blair has presided over perhaps the most catastrophic failure in the history of British intelligence, and the worst British foreign policy blunder since the 1956 Suez crisis. Anthony Eden, the then Prime minister of Britain was ruined by the subsequent political impasse of Suez. Blair on the other hand seems to have once again earned his nickname ‘Teflon Tony' in the wake of another crisis. Mistakes were made, but apparently all decisions and claims were made – according to the Prime Minister – in "good faith." Butler’s conclusion was that the structure of decision making, intelligence analysis and distribution in a "small circle" of key officials was to blame.
Oh really? Hmmmm....
Scott Ritter is a prophet of sorts, and if we had listened to him and respected his intellect, knowledge and honesty, we could have avoided the war in Iraq and its cost in lives and dollars.
In September 2002, Time magazine asked Ritter whose Iraq policy was worse, Bill Clinton's or George W. Bush's. Ritter's response:
"Bush, because of its ramifications. It threatens a war that probably lacks any basis in law or substantive fact. It has a real chance of putting thousands of American lives at risk and seeks to dictate American will on the world."
Who is this Scott Ritter guy?
He is a former marine and a weapons inspector.
Before we attacked the Iraqi people, Ritter was often seen on television as a laughable "expert." The Fox News talking heads treated him as a lunatic. How could he be anything else when he disagreed with George W. Bush?
And Ritter has a temper, so that added to the fun. It was a treat to see him get all red faced and wonder when he'd explode.
It mattered not that Ritter was painfully honest and knew exactly what he was talking about.
This seems to happen all the time. An "expert," when having a differing opinion, even when it is backed up by facts, is "dismissed" as a "lunatic." I remember watching a video of Bill O' Reilly embarassing himself and his guest by attacking him because he said the United States helped to train and maintain the Taliban. No matter that he cited sources, facts, etc. Since he was oviously so "un-patriotic," he's unworthy to be listened to. All in the name of an irrational and emotional attachment to the government, foreign policy, etc. that is supposed to always "do the right thing." Seems as if I can't find a single fault in foreign policy since the 1920's on which a rabid right-winger won't call me on...even Hiroshima and Nagasaki are "justified." America is perfect, it seems.
A search through newspaper and magazine articles leading up to the war against Iraq leads me to these conclusions:
1) Bill Clinton was as concerned about Saddam Hussein as George W. Bush is, but less eager to risk American lives to deal with him. Unfortunately for all of us, the sexy impeachment fiasco pushed by the Republicans diverted our attention, so most of us weren't paying attention.
However, Ritter was far from happy with Clinton's support for the inspectors, or lack of it. In September 1998, he told Newsweek, "I heard somebody say it very effectively: '[Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright blocked more inspections in 1997 than Saddam Hussein did.' It's a funny quip, but unfortunately true."
2) The four days of intensive bombings ordered by Clinton at the end of 1998 probably taught Saddam that his efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction weren't worth the cost. The economic sanctions imposed by the United Nations at the end of the first Gulf War were seriously crippling Iraq, and trying to acquire those weapons simply added to Saddam's misery. He gave up but pretended not to. Saving face is a big deal for dictators, as it is for all politicians (see: "Johnson, Lyndon B."; or "Nixon, Richard M."; or "Bush, George W.")
Of course, the fact that Bill Clinton was "just as concerned" is meaningless to a communist...it shows that people are very willing to "fight over" the dual-party monopoly, a.k.a. which "party" controls the people for four or eight years, as if it mattered that much in the past. But nonetheless, this is an interesting point that was brought up.
3) The "intelligence community" never said Saddam had weapons of mass destruction. In all the articles I read, the CIA and other agencies were very careful not to overstate the danger presented by Saddam.
For example, The Washington Post reported in November 2000, "The CIA does not agree that Iraq possesses a crude nuclear weapon. 'We don't believe they have the fissile material required for a nuclear weapon,' said one senior U.S. official. ... 'Nor do we believe they currently have the infrastructure to build a nuclear weapon.'"
4) In a related matter, Clinton was far more concerned about terrorist attacks against the United States than he was about the threat of Saddam. But he had a hard time selling his concern to others, even though he tried. He originated an antiterrorist agency in government in 1994 and increased its budget every year thereafter, from an original $5.7 billion reported in 1995 to $11.1 billion in 2000.
I was unable to find any antiterrorist actions by Bush before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but that doesn't mean he didn't do anything. It could be his efforts just didn't make the public prints, or that I couldn't find the articles about them.
5) Scott Ritter took part in more than 30 inspections missions in Iraq, and probably knew more about Iraq's WMD programs than anyone. The Iraqis were very annoyed with him and accused him and other inspectors of being spies. They were right; the inspectors were pressed into spying. That was a distraction for them.
6) As a U.N. inspector, Ritter was constantly unhappy with the Iraqis because they failed to destroy all their weapons. After the inspectors were pulled out of Iraq in 1998, Ritter appeared to change his tune, saying Iraq's weapons programs were no threat.
The difference, Ritter explained to the scoffers on TV, was that as an inspector, he expected total compliance and didn't get it. Later, as an outsider, he was able to say that even without total compliance Iraq, was no threat.
"I've never given Iraq a clean bill of health," Ritter told Time in September 2002. "I've said that no one has backed up any allegations that Iraq has constituted weapons-of-mass-destruction capability with anything that resembles substantive fact."
The politicians (including Al Gore, who warned of "imminent danger" in 1998) were hyping the Iraq threat, as were my fellow jackals of the press -- especially columnists! -- but the various intelligence agencies were far more prudent. To repeat, they often cautioned against overrating the threat posed by Saddam.
So why would you hype up the threat? "Just" to go off to war?
Back to Butler and Britain:
It has not gone unnoticed that while the British government has been able to duck incoming fire over the case for war, other people have not been so fortunate. Greg Dyke, former head of the BBC, and Andrew Gilligan, the journalist the center of the furor surrounding the mysterious death of biological weapons expert Dr. David Kelly’s death that led to the Hutton inquiry, have hit back in the light of Butler’s findings. Dyke told Channel 4 news: "Dr. Kelly told Andrew Gilligan the document had been ‘sexed up’ and one of the examples of it having been ‘sexed up’….was the forty-five minute claim. Here, we are told today...that the forty-five minute claim should not have been in the document without a set of caveats, caveats that were there in the early drafts and disappeared. The question is who took out the caveats?...The BBC was perfectly right to report Dr. Kelly’s allegations."
To continue:
In the wake of the Hutton Report, both Dyke and Gilligan resigned from their positions. There was blood on the carpet, but none of it belonged to the pro-war establishment (those government officials who did resign did so because they disagreed with and criticized the lead up to war). Gilligan, along with most of the nation’s national newspapers expressed incredulity at what looked like another feat of escapology by the UK government, "Although Lord Butler says he finds no evidence of deliberate embellishment or misleading, many of his findings do exactly that." Gilligan had initially broken the story, with Dr Kelly as the alleged source, that the government had "sexed up" the published Iraq intelligence. Hutton had concluded that Gilligan’s claims were "unfounded". Renowned scientist, Richard Dawkins, (author of The Selfish Gene) remarked in response to Butler’s report, "I find it hard to understand precisely what Andrew Gilligan was supposed to have got wrong."
Despite Blair’s mild contrition in admitting "mistakes made," it was no mea culpa and there certainly do not seem to be any government resignations forthcoming. In fact, John Scarlett, chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) responsible for drawing up the September 2002 "dossier of intelligence," is to be appointed as the next head of MI6, the UK’s primary intelligence gathering agency. Scarlett is a crucial figure in this story because he was directly responsible for the intelligence that actually reached – or did not reach – the Prime Minister’s desk.
Oh, how nice. So we find the one of the culprits responsible behind the "intelligence failure," and instead of being attacked for such serious shit, he's "promoted" behind-the-scenes. I would think that at least Blair would be angry, but he's not. It doesn't matter that there was a "failure" or if there were any weapons in the first place. But then the question naturally arises....why are these governments, then, so happy about the invasion, even giving promotions to the culprits behind the "intelligence failures"? Like I said, the culprits will not be reported (I had to get this information from the Guerrilla News Network!), and most likely not punished. In this case, they are rewarded.
Speaking to an interviewer on the BBC program Panorama on July 11th 2004, Jones identifies a litany of government abuse of intelligence regarding Iraq. In 1998 the US and UK carried out a series of intense air strikes against Iraq. These were according to Blair, ostensibly "To degrade the ability of Saddam Hussein to build and use weapons of mass destruction." The UK and US acted without UN approval, bombing Baghdad on the basis of limited intelligence. Perhaps this sounds familiar? Jones’ department at the time was asked to provide intelligence on potential targets for these strikes. Referring to whether or not the targets identified were involved in a WMD program, he said, "It's on the basis of the information available to us and the assessments that my branch undertook that we did not have a high degree of confidence that any of those… that any of the facilities that we could suggest were active in the program."
Despite the lack of confidence in the identified targets, the Defense Intelligence staff were asked to sign a public statement declaring the operation a success. This is dangerous territory for the government as it clearly highlights a precedent in taking action not warranted by available intelligence. Just how sparse this intelligence was is revealed in the exchange between Jones and his interviewer, John Ware:
WARE: I just want to try and get a snapshot from you of how big the gaps were in the coverage of intelligence from Iraq. Was it known which agents had been produced since Gulf War One?
JONES: No, it wasn't.
WARE: Was it known where or how the agents were being produced?
JONES: No.
WARE: Was it known whether agent had been stockpiled or consisted only of a small reserve?
JONES: It was not known with certainty. There was a reasonable assumption that there may have been some stocks left over from the first Gulf War. If there had been any other production, then we have not identified that it had taken place.
WARE: Did you know where and how the weapons had been filled with agents? JONES: No.
WARE: Was it known how the weapons and agent had been transported and deployed?
JONES: No.
And you go off to war, anyway? Fuck! There must be another reason, right?
Fast-forward to 2002: Prior to the release of the September dossier, Jones once again had concerns about the government presentation of limited intelligence that his department provided. Important further intelligence had apparently been gathered by MI6 – Jones and his team were not allowed access to this intelligence. This is despite being told that the new information "clinched" all of his concerns and supposedly completed the intelligence picture of Iraq’s capabilities. Shortly before the release of the final intelligence dossier Jones was told that he and his team should make no further substantive comments on the issue of WMDs.
But if this is about maintaining international security from that WMD-toting Saddam Hussein, why didn't the government want new information released that would not only contradict reports of the existence of WMD's, but also dismiss them completely? War was wanted that bad, eh? And obviously, it wasn't even about "a threat" posed by Iraq.
The story becomes ever more incredible with the revelation in the Butler report that MI6 had in fact "withdrawn" crucial intelligence on WMD – that is to say, key evidence used as planks in the case against Iraq was deemed to be unfit. MI6 just didn’t bother to tell anyone – at least anyone who mattered. This apparently included Lord Hutton, and the Prime Minister, who claimed that he was only made aware of this with the publication of Butler’s report. The Prime Minister’s lack of awareness in this case seems very peculiar. A spokesman for Blair said that MI6 opted not to inform the Hutton inquiry because it was deemed "too sensitive" to be made public, while the head of MI6, Sir Richard Dearlove took the decision not to inform the Prime Minister. So just who the hell is in charge here?
Presumably, as the Prime Minister was one of the individuals under the spotlight in Hutton’s inquiry it may have seemed inappropriate to inform him of something that may have forced him to make an executive decision with regard to the investigation of which he was a subject. He may have been put into the difficult position of having to decide whether or not to quash the revelation from MI6. Yet The Telegraph this week released a damaging story, provided by one of the members of Butler’s inquiry team that indicates that Blair is very much in charge of the "independent" investigatory process. The Telegraph’s source indicated that changes were made to the Butler report, changes requested by the government – specifically concerning Blair. The original sentence allegedly expressed "the opinion that Mr. Blair personally masterminded the misleading impression left by the dossier." And - as the Telegraph goes on to point out, "The passage is important because Downing Street maintained last week that the report at no point questions Mr. Blair's "good faith."
God-damn!
I know this is running a little long, but let's get to where I'm becoming more and more interested in: the hand-over that occured June 28th.
Let's the what occured before, during, and after this "hand-over of power":
Officially, the U.S. occupation of Iraq ended on June 28, 2004. But in reality, the United States is still in charge: Not only do 138,000 troops remain to control the streets, but the "100 Orders" of L. Paul Bremer III remain to control the economy.
These little noticed orders enacted by Bremer, the now-departed head of the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority, go to the heart of Bush administration plans in Iraq. They lock in sweeping advantages to American firms, ensuring long-term U.S. economic advantage while guaranteeing few, if any, benefits to the Iraqi people.
The Bremer orders control every aspect of Iraqi life — from the use of car horns to the privatization of state-owned enterprises. Order No. 39 alone does no less than "transition [Iraq ] from a … centrally planned economy to a market economy" virtually overnight and by U.S. fiat.
Privatized industries seem to be profitable:
A sampling of the most important orders demonstrates the economic imprint left by the Bush administration: Order No. 39 allows for: (1) privatization of Iraq's 200 state-owned enterprises; (2) 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses; (3) "national treatment" — which means no preferences for local over foreign businesses; (4) unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds; and (5) 40-year ownership licenses.
And, finally....
Thus, it forbids Iraqis from receiving preference in the reconstruction while allowing foreign corporations — Halliburton and Bechtel, for example — to buy up Iraqi businesses, do all of the work and send all of their money home. They cannot be required to hire Iraqis or to reinvest their money in the Iraqi economy. They can take out their investments at any time and in any amount.
Orders No. 57 and No. 77 ensure the implementation of the orders by placing U.S.-appointed auditors and inspector generals in every government ministry, with five-year terms and with sweeping authority over contracts, programs, employees and regulations.
Order No. 17 grants foreign contractors, including private security firms, full immunity from Iraq's laws. Even if they, say, kill someone or cause an environmental disaster, the injured party cannot turn to the Iraqi legal system. Rather, the charges must be brought to U.S. courts.
Order No. 40 allows foreign banks to purchase up to 50% of Iraqi banks.
Order No. 49 drops the tax rate on corporations from a high of 40% to a flat 15%. The income tax rate is also capped at 15%.
Order No. 12 (renewed on Feb. 24) suspends "all tariffs, customs duties, import taxes, licensing fees and similar surcharges for goods entering or leaving Iraq." This led to an immediate and dramatic inflow of cheap foreign consumer products — devastating local producers and sellers who were thoroughly unprepared to meet the challenge of their mammoth global competitors.
Clearly, the Bremer orders fundamentally altered Iraq's existing laws. For this reason, they are also illegal. Transformation of an occupied country's laws violates the Hague regulations of 1907 (ratified by the United States) and the U.S. Army's Law of Land Warfare. Indeed, in a leaked memo, the British attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, warned Prime Minister Tony Blair that "major structural economic reforms would not be authorized by international law."
With few reconstruction projects underway and with Bremer's rules favoring U.S. corporations, there has been little opportunity for Iraqis to go back to work, leaving nearly 2 million unemployed 1 1/2 years after the invasion and, many believe, greatly fueling the resistance.
Quite the hand-over!