Iraq Attack (2)

"WASHINGTON (AP) - The White House on Monday quickly rejected an Iraqi offer to let members of Congress tour suspected biological, chemical and nuclear weapons sites.


Iraq's parliament speaker, Sadoun Hammadi, invited U.S. lawmakers on a three-week visit, accompanied by arms experts of their choice, to sites in Iraq where they suspect weapons of mass destruction are hidden.


Bush administration officials said the offer was hardly worth commenting on, saying visits by members of Congress would not satisfy the president's demand for rigorous inspections in Iraq.


The Bush administration similarly dismissed Iraq's offer last week for chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix to visit Iraq for technical talks that could lead to a resumption of inspections."


A) Seems Saddam is worried, and with good reason.


B) Seems we don't want to talk, we're set on war.


Am i wrong on either count?

....on both counts. The question is whether W is so obsessed with righting his father's screw-up of the Gulf War for not taking out Sadaam, that he won't even give the potential for a peaceful solution a chance?

The joker in this is that Saddam has had so many years to hide his weapons/weapons factories thoroughly that it would probably take a long time to find them. If we just go examine sites that are known as "suspected sites," guess what? They will probably be shams with the real goods super-well hidden elsewhere.


It took UN inspectors quite a while to discover some of Saddam's production capabilities and he ended up by kicking them out. Now as the ultimate deadline approaches for him, he is trying the oldest trick in the book.


We would be fools to believe or accept it. What is needed is not access to a few suspected sites but unimpeded access to ANY sites that ought to be looked at, on an unannounced basis. Would he agree to this? I doubt it, and if he did it would lead to more of the same bullshit: Look at a few sham sites, look at a few more, then when the inspectors are about to finally uncover a real site he will delay them on various pretexts while he has the stuff moved elsewhere. Besides with underground facilities it would take a very long time even if the UN were to be granted unimpeded access.


More stalling tactics as usual. He isn't even willing at this point to let the UN teams resume their full duties.


I think you are right that the USA has its eyes set on war in this case...and I believe it is the right decision. Saddam's long history is one of tyranny through force combined with dissembling for political reasons. This time it is no different.


Just pretend we are dealing with Stalin instead...and that's as much leeway as we can give Saddam.

Soddy put in a pot sized bluff bet on the turn and Bush called. Now, before the river is dealt, Soddy is offering to chop the pot. Let's see if Bush has the conviction of his read.


BR

There was another story a month or so ago about a UN official who had been making headway in getting Iraq to open up to more inspections.


As the story goes, the U.S. luanched a successful campaign to have the official replaced, apparently since we have little interest in resolving our differences with Iraq peacefully.

It's not just the US that has little or no interest in resolving matters with Saddam peacefully (which is true). All his neighbors will be glad to see him go too, as he has demonstrated that he poses a continual threat to the region. He started the Iran-Iraq war, he invaded Kuwait, and he would love to havec an excuse to gas or nuke Israel if he ever gets the weapons to do so.


Nobody in the region can afford to have this neo-Stalin developing weapons of mass destruction. It's not a matter of "peacefully resolving differences," it's a matter of getting rid of a dictator and regime the world will be much better off without--even his own people will be better off without.

"It's not just the US that has little or no interest in resolving matters with Saddam peacefully (which is true)."


Do you mean "attempting to resolve" or did your let slip your preference for pointless war over fruitful peace?


"All his neighbors will be glad to see him go too"


Have any of his neighbors endorsed the proposed war against Iraq? No neighbor country, including Kuwait, has suffered at the hands of Saddam more than Iran, and it's leaders bitterly denounced the proposed U.S. war just last week.


"He started the Iran-Iraq war,"


And the U.S. supported him throughout.


"he invaded Kuwait,"


And we invaded Vietnam, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, Indonesia invaded East Timor, Vietnam invaded Cambodia, S. Africa invaded Namibia .... Gosh, that's a lot of wars we should have been waging, including one against our ourselves.


"he would love to havec an excuse to gas or nuke Israel if he ever gets the weapons to do so"


How do you know that, a crystal ball? If it was true, why didn't he load the scud missiles that he used to bomb Israel with poison gas?

OK here's an excerpt from a UPI article. Make of it what you will.


Saddam Urges 'Holy War' on Israel

Wednesday, Dec. 27, 2000

JERUSALEM û Fiery expressions of nationalism and calls for jihad

("holy war") replaced the traditional Christmas message of "peace

on Earth and goodwill toward men" in the Middle East this

holiday season.


Iraq continues to assert itself as the incoming Bush

administration's first crisis. Dictator Saddam Hussein on Monday

called on Muslims and Christians around the world to declare a

jihad against Israel and what he called the "Zionist

conspiracy." He praised Christians and other Iraqis for standing

up to conspiracies through which "the United States, Britain and

Zionism ... have tried to bend Iraqis' will, bring

them to their knees and master their independent decision.''


In his traditional Christmas message, published on the front page

of every Baghdad newspaper, Saddam accused Israel of defiling

Muslim and Christian holy sites and trying to destroy the

Palestinians with the help of the U.S.


London's Sunday Times, meanwhile, has reported that Saddam

ordered his scientists two years ago to resume work on a plan

to make a nuclear bomb. This occurred four months before he

expelled United Nations weapons inspectors, according to a

defector quoted in the Times.


Salman Yassin Zweir, a design engineer employed by the Iraqi

Atomic Energy Commission for 13 years, was reportedly arrested

and tortured when he refused to return to the program. He

managed to escape to Jordan after being admitted to a hospital

as a result of beatings.


"Saddam is very proud of his nuclear team," 39-year-old Zweir

was quoted as saying. "He will never give up the dream of being

the first Arab leader to have a nuclear bomb."


The paper quoted a senior Western diplomat as saying that

Zweir's revelation was the "first concrete evidence of what we

feared might be happening."


Iraq was between one and four years away from making an atom

bomb when its primary facilities were destroyed in the 1991 Gulf

War, according to estimates by U.N. inspectors. Saddam's plans

for development, known as Project 3000, were further hindered by

the

arrival of U.N. inspectors after the war.


Powell, Iraq, Europe and NMD


Secretary of State-designate Colin Powell is expected to use the

Iraqi nuclear threat as a means to convince Europe to back the

proposed National Missile Defense.

The revelation comes on the heels of a claim by Iraqi Defense

Minister Lt. Gen. Sultan Hashem Ahmed that his country could

destroy Israel on the battlefield.


"Iraq can destroy Israel because it possesses a large combat

experience in dealing with all possibilities," Ahmed was quoted

as saying in an interview with the weekly Al-Zawraa newspaper

to be published this week. He added that Iraq would be willing to

send its troops to defend any Arab country threatened

by Israel.

I don't see how this translates into cause for incinerating children, which you euphamestically call "war."


The article says that Iraq was once only a few years from making a bomb, but "its primary facilities were destroyed" 12 years ago, and the project was "further hindered by the arrival of U.N. inspectors after the war."


The only claim that would spark even concern in the article is that Saddam "ordered his scientists two years ago to resume work" on the nuclear program, which Iraq has more recently offered to negotiate by allowing the inspectors back in.


So Saddam's nuclear facilities have been destroyed, haven't been rebuilt, he would like to have a bomb and wants his scientists to "work" on building one, but there's no prediction of one in sight, and he's offered to negotiate away his mass destruction program in any event.


"Jihad" against Israel? I thought the media stopped promoting the phony translation of this word into "holy war" years ago (it means "struggle," and applies in many different non-violent contexts). As for his calls for jihad against Israel, I understand that pronouncements like these are daily occurrences in the Arab world, just like U.S. officials daily demand a war against Iraq. Except that if history is any guide, the threat from the U.S. should be taken much more seriously.


Some compelling argument for killing the innocent. I agree that everyone should read it, and come to their own conclusions about the reluctance of Iraq war-hawks to support mass terror and destruction.

If Saddam ordered his scientists two years ago (according to the article) to resume work on his nuclear weapons program, and the article is 2 years old, he's been working at rebuilding them for 4 years it would seem.


Maybe if we give him another couple years he can get the job done, and then he can get Israel done. Or whatever else he would like to do with nukes on top of the chemical and biological weapons he already has.


Maybe we should just wait and trust he won't use these weapons to bully his neighbors. Maybe we should just hope these weapons don't find their way into the hands of terrorists who would attack the USA with them.


Maybe Saddam is really a man of peace after all.

and maybe he won't stall the inspectors, give them the runaround, secretly move his laboratories around, or kick the inspectors out again when they get to be too much of an interference.


Maybe all we need is a legal agreement in writing with Saddam, and a gentleman's handshake. Maybe that will surprise us this time and it will actually work.


Maybe we will wake up tomorrow and realize that everybody is happy, everybody is kind, and all this was just a bad dream.

To say that the relentless suicide bombing attacks now going on in Israel are anything less than a Holy War is sheer nonsense.


The agenda that you have proposed clearly indicates that you will not be satisfied until Israel is destroyed.


I bet that you secretly celebrated on 9-11-01.

"Have any of his neighbors endorsed the proposed war against Iraq? No neighbor country, including Kuwait, has suffered at the hands of Saddam more than Iran, and it's leaders bitterly denounced the proposed U.S. war just last week. "


We don't get along with Iran. They will denounce anything we do except mabye a civil war.


"How do you know that, a crystal ball? If it was true, why didn't he load the scud missiles that he used to bomb Israel with poison gas? "


Israel warned Iraq that if they used chemical or biological weapons against them they would retaliate with all available means including nuclear weapons. There was no reason to think they were not 100% serious. Saddam is not averse to using chemical weapons, he just understood the risk/reward ratio was not close to favorable in that case.