Rep. Nick Rahall: Waiting to Hear From Saddam Hussein

WASHINGTON — On the packed flight from Damascus to Baghdad I kept rehearsing the message I hoped to deliver personally to Saddam Hussein: The only chance you have to avert the further devastation and suffering of your country and people is to allow unconditional and unfettered access by United Nations weapons inspectors. Period. Full cooperation. No gimmicks.

I felt the message and the moment were ripe if the fruits of peace were to be harvested. I was not going to vote to put American soldiers in harm's way without making this last effort. As an Arab-American member of Congress — and as someone who has traveled extensively in the region and who has questioned American policy in the Middle East under Republican and Democratic presidents — I felt that I was a credible messenger.

I was traveling to Iraq as part of a delegation sponsored by the Institute for Public Accuracy, a nonpartisan group. We were met at the airport by representatives of the foreign minister's office. Our hosts wanted to take us immediately to a facility that had been identified as a possible nuclear weapons factory — they wanted to prove that the charges were false. I declined, stating that I was not a weapons inspector and was not going to be put in the position of vouching for anyone's innocence. The rest of the group refused to go, too.

Things went downhill from there. Our satellite phone was confiscated and our cameras, after nearly being impounded, were painstakingly "registered." V.I.P. treatment meant being the last ones through security. We soon learned that we would not be meeting with Mr. Hussein and that my speech before the Iraqi National Assembly had been canceled. So much for direct communication.

Over the next two days, I did my best to share my message with anyone who would listen. We talked with Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz and the speaker of the national assembly, who said, "We are damned if we do, damned if we don't, as your country says. It doesn't matter: we'll get hit."

On Saturday night, after our meeting with Mr. Aziz, we had dinner at a beautiful outdoor restaurant by the Tigris River. A soft breeze carried the smell of local fish roasting over an open flame. The strains of popular Arab music filtered out of a nearby house. The scene of Baghdad at dusk — its calm — moved me, and I was saddened at the thought of the devastation war would bring.

I was further moved the next night, when we had the opportunity to meet quietly with some people in a private home. As we sat in a courtyard,they agreed with us in their own way that Mr. Hussein must be removed, though they felt that America should not be the agent of that change. Still, they were pessimistic about the future. Mr. Hussein, they said, did not hear their voices. After two days in Baghdad, I know the feeling.

Also check this out about Terrorist Symp Demoncrat Rahall:
Newsmax.com | 9/22/02 | Carl Limbacher
Sunday, Sept. 22, 2002 2:11 p.m. EDT

House Dem: White House to Blame for Iraqi Inspection Switch

After visiting Iraq last week, Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., blamed the Bush administration on Sunday for Baghdad's decision to impose limits on proposed weapons inspections after Iraq first told the United Nations those inspections would be "unfettered."

"At first it appeared [the Iraqi pledge] was a step in the right direction with the first step they announced earlier this week," Rahall told WABC Radio's Steve Malzberg.

But, the West Virginia Democrat said, the Bush administration's reaction to the Iraqi offer amounted to "slamming the door in their face" by saying that even unfettered inspections would make no difference.

"They've seen statements in the past from Cheney, from Rumsfeld et al., that say inspectors don't matter, they're going to bomb anyway," the West Virginia Democrat complained to Malzberg.

"I can see what [Baghdad was] looking for," he explained. "They were looking for some light at the end of the tunnel. Because Iraqi feeling - feeling from the leadership and feeling from the people on the street - is basically they feel that they're damned if they do and they're damned if they don't.

"I truly believe that when they did not see any light at the end of the tunnel when they issued that first statement, that probably caused them to go backwards and start the game of trickery again," he added.

Rahall said that while in Baghdad last week, he hoped to secure a personal meeting with Saddam Hussein to encourage the Iraqi dictator to make a public pledge to open his schools, mosques, hospitals and presidential palaces to inspectors.

But when Saddam would not agree, Iraqi officials instead offered Rahall a chance to inspect suspected weapons sites.

He said no. "Look, I'm not a weapons inspector," the West Virginia Democrat said he told his hosts. "I wouldn't know nuclear power from powdered sugar."

Rahall told Malzberg that he would not support a resolution giving President Bush the authority to attack Iraq, complaining that "it gives the president too broad authority; it does not limit him to Iraq."

The West Virginia Democrat also insisted there was no link between Saddam and Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorist network despite the accounts from multiple Iraqi defectors who claim otherwise.

"I've been in the CIA briefings, the DIA briefings," Rahall told WABC. "There is no definitive - no conclusive proof of any link between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein." (See: Salman Pak: Iraq's Smoking-Gun Link to 9/11?)

Rep. Rahall also defended the Palestinian intifada, hinting that terrorist attacks against Israel were a legitimate "resistance" to an occupying army.

"Some of those instances ... they truly are a resistance against occupied lands, against a country [Israel] who's also violated U.N. resolutions," he explained.

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