Posted on 10/11/2002 11:44:30 AM PDT by LibertarianInExile
If anyone doubted George Bush's intention to go to war with Iraq, that doubt should have been removed when the United States said it would "thwart" the return of the arms inspectors to Iraq until it got a new Security Council resolution.
Of course, the resolution the United States wants is just a rubber stamp to start the war. It is designed to force the Iraqis to reject it and thus provide the international cover that Bush wants for his invasion.
The meeting between the Iraqis and the arms inspectors in Vienna was quite successful. The Iraqis agreed to everything. They brought four years' worth of records and turned them over to the United Nations.
It's a shame that so many of the television commentators are so ignorant that they all, with only one exception that I saw, misreported the meeting in Vienna. They kept saying the Iraqis kept the presidential palaces "off-limits." That is factually incorrect.
Hans Blix, the head of the U.N. inspectors, has made it quite clear that his organization works for the Security Council, and since the only resolutions that exist are old ones, those are the ones he must be bound by. Among those is a Memorandum of Understanding signed in 1998 by the secretary general and Saddam Hussein. It says simply that before the presidential palaces are inspected, Iraq must be given 24 hours' notice, and a diplomat must accompany the inspectors. That certainly doesn't mean that they are off-limits. They are all available for inspection under the conditions the United Nations agreed to.
So, as things stand now, the inspectors can go back, all the housekeeping details have been agreed to, and they can start their work by Oct. 15. The Iraqis, so far as we know, will honor their agreement in regard to unconditional access. If the president had been sincere about his concern for weapons of mass destruction, he'd presumably be happy. Instead, he intends, if he can, to wreck the present agreements and force through an insulting, war-provoking resolution. He wants war, not inspections, and destruction, not disarmament.
By the way, another point of ignorance on the part of TV smiley faces: A couple of them seemed to think that if the president is opposed to the agreement, then it is null and void. Hans Blix works for the Security Council, not for George Bush or Colin Powell. Unless the Security Council tells him differently, he's sending his inspectors to Iraq whether Mr. Bush likes it or not.
So what is the United States going to do? Send F-15s to shoot down the U.N. plane? Without a majority on the Security Council, the United States cannot stop the inspectors from returning to Iraq. Maybe it will get a resolution, and maybe it won't. I hope the United States doesn't.
For too long the United States has bullied the United Nations, using blackmail and threats in order to win votes from little countries. We have used the United Nations when it suited our purposes and ignored it when it didn't. I, too, hope the United Nations shows some backbone and tells Mr. Bush: "Either obey international law or take a hike. And by the way, pay your back dues on the way out."
It's a fact that there has been no evidence produced that Iraq has any weapons of mass destruction. The worst-case scenario for Iraq is if it's really true that it doesn't have any. You can't prove a negative. If Iraq has some, it can produce them; if it does not, Iraq is out of luck. Bush and his warmongers will never believe either the Iraqis or the inspectors. Bush wants his war, and he will have it, come what may.
That's why we have a nation using the Constitution to wipe John Ashcroft's butt and giving up our fundamental rights to liberty, and abrogating our only civic duty, that is, to keep the hell out of other people's business if they don't bug us.
Israel Is a Very Costly Ally
Charley Reese
10 October 2001First, it is embarrassing that the government of the world's so-called last remaining superpower plays the role of the tail that is wagged by Israel, a nation about the size of New Jersey.
I too hope that the United States shows some backbone and tells the UN to pick up their toys and take their anti-American roadshow somewhere else; that the New York City Board of Health has declared the UN Building uninhabitable and that it's scheduled for demolition on Halloween.
Don't let the gangplank hit you in the a$$ on your way out.
Speaking of pukes, I assume you are including yourself in that crowd, because obviously you've never served and been at risk to be put in Harms Way, since you seem to think that young mens lives are somehow less costly than the Bombs we build.
And further, Both you and Charly whom I normally agree with are overlooking the fact that Iraq is in VIOLATION OF THE CEASE FIRE AGREEMENT, NULLIFYING SAID AGREEMENT; and every instance of firing on Coalition Planes in the No Fly IS AN ACT OF WAR.
GO clear out the Bong Resin, or dry out, whatever, but before you insult the men and women of this country, and it's Armed Services you might want to try shedding some ignorance...
Iraq's terror support systems will be dismantled. It can go easy or it can go hard.
First off, the votes of little countries don't matter, only the permanent 5 when it comes to the Security Council.
Second, for way too long these 'little countries' have been voting against us every chance they get, while gladly accepting our money to prop up their failed socialist experiments.
Personally, I don't care what the UN does or feels. I hope we do leave, kick them out of New York. Pay them back dues ?!?!?!?! I want to extract from them every dime they every got from us.
If Charley Reese wants to protect his conservative credentials, he should explain why he suddenly in favor of subordinating our sovereignty to a collection of third world dictatorships.
As for the Iraqi inspections, the very caveats that Reese mentions are a problem. 24 hour notice for his palaces (the size of counties) is unaceptable. ...and why should we believe Hussein this time? Everytime he promises to give the inspectors unfettered access, they get there only to find out they are not allowed access to where they really need to go.
Reese has also completely side-stepped the probability that Iraq does have WMD. He is asking us to give Hussein, who for many years actively obstructed inspections and compliance verification, the same credibility or more than we give the President. He ignores the pile of, admittedly circumstancial, evidence that indicates Iraq is working feverishly to build a nuclear bomb and further his other WMD.
Should we wait on Hussein's word, as Reese suggests, until we see a mushroom cloud in the saudi oil fields? This is not some schoolyard game where we can redo the play indefinitely because of a some cry-baby faking an injury. We have run out of cheeks to turn; he is on his 14th strike; we have bent over until we are about to kiss our own butt; this is it...no more stalling, we're going in.
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