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CounterPunch
February
8, 2003
Memo For: President
Bush
Re:
War on Iraq
by
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
Secretary Powell's presentation at the UN today
requires context. We give him an "A" for assembling
and listing the charges against Iraq, but only a "C-"
in providing context and perspective.
What seems clear to us is that you need
an intelligence briefing, not grand jury testimony. Secretary
Powell effectively showed that Iraq is guilty beyond reasonable
doubt for not cooperating fully with UN Security Council Resolution
1441. That had already been demonstrated by the chief UN inspectors.
For Powell, it was what the Pentagon calls a "cakewalk."
The narrow focus on Resolution 1441 has
diverted attention from the wider picture. It is crucial that
we not lose sight of that. Intelligence community analysts are
finding it hard to make themselves heard above the drumbeat for
war. Speaking both for ourselves, as veteran intelligence officers
on the VIPS Steering Group with over a hundred years of professional
experience, and for colleagues within the community who are increasingly
distressed at the politicization of intelligence, we feel a responsibility
to help you frame the issues. For they are far more far-reaching-and
complicated-than "UN v. Saddam Hussein." And they need
to be discussed dispassionately, in a setting in which sobriquets
like "sinister nexus," "evil genius," and
"web of lies" can be more hindrance than help.
Flouting UN
Resolutions
The key question is whether Iraq's flouting
of a UN resolution justifies war. This is the question the world
is asking. Secretary Powell's presentation does not come close
to answering it.
One might well come away from his briefing
thinking that the Iraqis are the only ones in flagrant violation
of UN resolutions. Or one might argue that there is more urgency
to the need to punish the violator of Resolution 1441 than, say,
of Resolution 242 of 1967 requiring Israel to withdraw from the
Arab territories it occupied that year. More urgency? You will
not find many Palestinians, Arabs, Muslims who would agree.
It is widely known that you have a uniquely
close relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.
This presents a strong disincentive to those who might otherwise
warn you that Israel's continuing encroachment on Arab territories,
its oppression of the Palestinian people, and its pre-emptive
attack on Iraq in 1981 are among the root causes not only of
terrorism, but of Saddam Hussein's felt need to develop the means
to deter further Israeli attacks. Secretary Powell dismisses
this factor far too lightly with his summary judgment that Iraq's
weapons of mass destruction are "not for self-defense."
Containment
You have dismissed containment as being
irrelevant in a post 9/11 world. You should know that no one
was particularly fond of containment, but that it has been effective
for the last 55 years. And the concept of "material breach"
is hardly anything new.
Material Breach
In the summer of 1983 we detected a huge
early warning radar installation at Krasnoyarsk in Siberia. In
1984 President Reagan declared it an outright violation of the
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. At an ABM Treaty review
in 1988, the US spoke of this continuing violation as a "material
breach" of the treaty. In the fall of 1989, the Soviet Union
agreed to eliminate the radar at Krasnoyarsk without preconditions.
We adduce this example simply to show
that, with patient, persistent diplomacy, the worst situations
can change over time.
You have said that Iraq is a "grave
threat to the United States," and many Americans think you
believe it to be an imminent threat. Otherwise why would you
be sending hundreds of thousands of troops to the Gulf area?
In your major speech in Cincinnati on October 7, 2002, you warned
that "the risk is simply too great that Saddam Hussein will
use instruments of mass death and destruction, or provide them
to a terror network."
Terrorism
Your intelligence agencies see it differently.
On the same day you spoke in Cincinnati, a letter from the CIA
to the Senate Intelligence Committee asserted that the probability
is low that Iraq would initiate an attack with such weapons or
give them to terrorists..UNLESS:
"Should Saddam conclude that a US-led
attack could no longer be deterred, he probably would become
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, however,
"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."
Your Pentagon advisers draw a connection
between war with Iraq and terrorism, but for the wrong reasons.
The connection takes on much more reality in a post-US invasion
scenario.
Indeed, 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.
As recent events around the world attest,
terrorism 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 inundated with swamps breeding
terrorists. In human terms, your daughters are unlikely to be
able to travel abroad in future years without a large phalanx
of security personnel.
We recommend you re-read the CIA assessment
of last fall that pointed out that "the forces fueling hatred
of the US and fueling al Qaeda 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."
Chemical Weapons
With respect to possible Iraqi use of
chemical weapons, it has been the judgment of the US intelligence
community for over 12 years that the likelihood of such use would
greatly increase during an offensive aimed at getting rid of
Saddam Hussein.
Listing the indictment particulars, Secretary
Powell said, in an oh-by-the-way tone, that sources had reported
that Saddam Hussein recently authorized his field commanders
to use such weapons. 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 US soldier sets foot in Iraq. Clearly, an invasion
would be no cakewalk for American troops, ill equipped as they
are to operate in a chemical environment.
Casualties
Reminder: The last time we sent troops
to the Gulf, over 600,000 of them, one out of three came back
ill-many with unexplained disorders of the nervous system. Your
Secretary of Veterans Affairs recently closed the VA healthcare
system to nearly 200,000 eligible veterans by administrative
fiat. Thus, casualties of further war will inevitably displace
other veterans who need VA services.
In his second inaugural, Abraham Lincoln
appealed to his fellow citizens to care for those who "have
borne the battle." Years before you took office, our country
was doing a very poor job of that for the over 200,000 servicemen
and women stricken with various Gulf War illnesses. Today's battlefield
is likely to be even more sodden with chemicals and is altogether
likely to yield tens of thousands more casualties. On October
1, 2002 Congress' General Accounting Office reported "serious
problems still persist" with the Pentagon's efforts to protect
servicemen and women, including shortfalls in clothing, equipment,
and training. Our troops deserve more effective support than
broadcasts, leaflets, and faulty equipment for protection against
chemical and biological agents.
No one has a corner on the truth; nor
do we harbor illusions that our analysis is irrefutable or undeniable.
But after watching Secretary Powell today, we are convinced that
you would be well served if you widened the discussion beyond
violations of Resolution 1441, and beyond the circle of those
advisers clearly bent on a war for which we see no compelling
reason and from which we believe the unintended consequences
are likely to be catastrophic.
/s/
Richard Beske, San Diego
Kathleen McGrath Christison, Santa Fe
William Christison, Santa Fe
Patrick Eddington, Alexandria
Raymond McGovern, Arlington
Steering Group Veteran Intelligence Professionals
for Sanity Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
is a coast-to-coast enterprise; mostly intelligence officers
from analysis side of CIA, but Operations side also represented.
VIPS can be reached at vips@counterpunch.org
Today's Features
Linda Heard
Powell
at the UN: Spiel, Stunts and Special Effects
Anthony Gancarski
Peggy
Noonan, Space Case
The Columbia and the Manufacture of Tragedy
Robert Fisk
You Wanted
to Believe Him: Powell Does Beckett
Robert Jensen
Powell
at the UN:
Smoking Guns and Big Guns
William Hughes
Colin
Powell's Big Flop
Ali Abunimah
Dissecting Powell's Speech:
Hearsay and Old Allegations
Phyllis Bennis
Powell vs. Blix
The Case for War Remains Unmade
Rahul Mahajan
Responding
to Colin Powell
Is This All You've Got?
Paul de Rooij
Where Are the Incubators, Gen. Powell?
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