Under the
circumstances, the news for 2-8/9/01, arriving a week late, may
look
like prehistory. But some mildly interesting things did happen in the
days
leading up to Armageddon: continued bombing raids; the expulsion of UN
employees;
a 'gas mishap' (under the heading Inside Iraq) which, if the
story
is true, would provide evidence of Iraqi production of chemical
weapons;
a terrorist bomb in the middle of Baghdad (but now that Mr Bush and
Mr
Blair have declared war on all terrorism of this sort we may expect firm
action
in support of the internationally recognized government of Iraq.
Mayn't
we?); another defection on the part of a member of S.Hussein's
family.Ý A more up to date news compilation will, I
hope, follow shortly.
NO FLY
ZONES
*Ý Russia denounces U.S. airstrikes on Iraq
[relating to the attack on Basra
airport,
Wednesday, August 30]
*Ý Iraqi missiles intercept raiding warplanes
[apparently on Monday, 4th
September]
*Ý U.S. planes attack southern Iraq-Pentagon
[Tuesday, 5th September]
*Ý Raids destroy a portable [SIC - PB.
'potable'?] water pipe in Iraq
[apparently
on Thursday, 7th September]
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq can purchase equipment [Extracts ‚ this
refers to telecom equipment
from
France since the Master of the World allowed a similar deal with China
in
order to get 'smart sanctions' through]
*Ý Iraq Urges UNIKOM to Report Airspace
Violations by US, British Warplanes
[includes
the following bizarre statement: 'UNIKOM Commander John A. Vize
said on
August 30 that a total of 195 military monitors can not identify the
warplanes
that fly over the Iraqi Kuwaiti border. "If I, or any of my
soldiers,
identified a US or a British or whatever aircraft by its makings,
then we
will report this," he said. Annan said in February that the UNIKOM
had
recorded more than 200 aerial violations of the border since 1991, but
it
could not determine the nationalities.']
*Ý Expelled UN employees leave Iraq quickly for
safety
*Ý Eight UN staff expelled for spying - Iraq
*Ý Expulsion of Six Staffers by Iraq Roils
[Security Council] Meeting
*Ý UN: Iraq must explain spy charges against 8
staff
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Stolen computers worth £20m 'destined for
Iraq' [The article says that '
countries
such as Iraq, Libya and Syria are barred under United Nations
sanctions
from importing sophisticated computers'. Is Syria under UN
sanctions
of this sort?]
*Ý Iraq keen to boost ties with India
*Ý Baghdad calls on Finland to reopen its
embassy in Iraq
*Ý Iran, Iraq at football war, China prepare in
secrecy
*Ý Iran beats Iraq 2-1
*Ý An Iraqi project to the Inter- Parliamentary
conference [a very
reasonable
and moderate proposal that some sort of appeals system should be
established
with regard to decisions of the Security Council]
*Ý Iraq uses the Euro in its trade deals
and, in
News, 2‚8/9/01 (2)
CAMPAIGNING
*Ý Eleven years of sanctions [general
reflections on the effect of the
blockade,
but centred on the Voices in the Wilderness fast in New York]
US
POLICY
*Ý Why Saddam Likes Getting Bombed [welldrawn
argument that present US
policy
serves S.Hussein's interest]
*Ý Book Reports on Secret U.S. Biological
Weapons Research [but the article
does
convey the naive impression that this very advanced research is being
done
entirely with a view to knowing what sort of wickedness an enemy might
get up
to]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Poison gas mishap kills 20 Iraqi soldiers
*Ý WHO concludes visit to Baghdad
*Ý Saddam relative 'seeks asylum'
*Ý Life in Sanctions-Hit Iraq Is Harsh and
Short
*Ý Several hurt in Baghdad bomb blast
*Ý Iran strongly rejects Iraq's claims on blast
involvement
OIL
& GAS
*Ý Iraq's Rasheed: Iraq says world oil prices
still too low
*Ý Gas pipeline between Turkey, Iraq
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Kurds alarm over 'smart sanctions'
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq says pilot's body proves its sincerity
on POWs
*Ý Turkish firms to hold medical fair in Iraq
This is
the news WITHOUT items relating to the aftermath of the recent
attack
on Manhattan and the Pentagon. A small (relative to what has been
published)
selection of these will appear shortly in a separate supplement.
In the
meantime, before more terrible evils fall upon the world, let us
admire
the more subtle evil of requiring Iraq to pay for the the World
Health
Organisation probe into the effects of depleted uranium (under
'Inside
Iraq') as well as the continuing air raids which may well soon
appear
to be rather insignificant. Note also how well things were going from
an
Iraqi point of view in terms of increasing international relations (see
e,g.
the article 'Trade becomes Iraq's strongest weapon') and so how very
unlikely
it is that Iraq would have been behind the events in New York.
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Iraq foils bid to smuggle out 500-year-old
Quran
*Ý 5 m students return to school in sanctioned
Iraq
*Ý Babel artistic festival in Baghdad
*Ý Iraq Blames UN Embargo for Black Fever
Outbreak
*Ý Iraq ordered to pay for uranium probe
*Ý Iraqi cabinet decides to establish new
universities, faculties
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq seeks cellphones supplier
*Ý Indian official outlines trade deals with
Iraq
*Ý Trade becomes Iraq's strongest weapon
*Ý Iraq backs Arroyo gov't, Mindanao peace
process [in Philippines]
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EAST/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iraqi Oil Ministry plans gas exports to
Syria, Jordan, Lebanon
*Ý Iraq to use the Lebanese ports
*Ý The US obstructs Syrian request on Iraq
*Ý Fire out on sanctions-busting ship
*Ý Iraqi ship towed into southern Iranian port
*Ý Iran, Iraq to Resume Searching for Missing
Soldiers
*Ý A Message from [Tunisian] President Bin Ali
to the Iraqi President
*Ý Several Iraqis wounded by attacks from
missiles against Iranian Mujahidi
Khalq
*Ý Iran prefers to run railway with Iraq
through Khorramshahr
MILITARY
MATTERS
*Ý US, UK bomb Iraqi SAM sites
*Ý Iraq poses growing threat: Rumsfeld
*Ý 8 killed in US-British air raids over
southern Iraq
*Ý Iraq: Unmanned U.S. spy plane shot down
*Ý US warplanes strike in northern, southern
Iraq
*Ý Iraq announces, US denies bombardment of
positions in Southern Iraq
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý 10 UN staff withdrawn from Iraq
*Ý Impasse on Iraq oil prices going to UN
council
It
takes two minutes thought to recognise that the outrage felt at one day
of
murder and destruction in New York and Washington might resemble the
outrage
felt at years of subjection to overwhelming force, terror, murder,
destruction
and humiliation at the receiving end of US weaponry in other
parts
of the world. A handful of the writers who follow are capable of that
two
minutes' thought. They seem to be in a minority.
*Ý Saddam Says 'Evil' U.S. Policy to Blame for
Attacks
*Ý The value of pre-emptive force [This is most
probably the logic that led
S.Hussein
to engage in the Iran/Iraq war]
*Ý Beyond the numbers: The aroused giant must
act [The Jerusalem Post urges
a final
solution to the Arab question]
*Ý Don't fight fire with fire [Simon Jenkins on
the ineffectiveness of
revenge]
*Ý A time to kill [Jerusalem Post again. Arabs
are inferior beings and
should
be crushed mercilessly, like the Germans and the Japs, for their own
good]
*Ý America has become sacrificial lamb for
terrorists [America is the
passive
suffering, innocent victim of hordes of sneaky, cowardly Arabs]
*Ý They can run and they can hide. Suicide
bombers are here to stay [Robert
Fisk.
Excellent article on the difficulties of dealing with suicide bombers]
*Ý Arab states torn on coalition against Bin
Laden [The limits of their
possibilities
given the power of public opinion ‚ which of course we, in
principle,
as democrats, support. Don't we?]
*Ý For Bush's Veteran Team, What Lessons to
Apply? [Extracts. Quite a
thoughtful
account of the practical problems facing the Pentagon planners.
For
example, on Afghanistan: 'It is not a target rich environment']
*Ý America ready for Armageddon [A view from
India]
*Ý Carter urges caution in assault on terrorism
[Carter warns that the
attack
was 'an attempt to incite a holy war between Arabs and Americans'. As
such,
it looks likely to succeed.]
*Ý Ex-CIA chief sees Iraqi fingerprints [James
Woolsey. The article refers
to a
piece by Laurie Mylroie in the Wall Street Journal which supposedly
gives
evidence, but I was unable to access it].
*Ý Russian Secret Services: Masterminds Of
Attacks On U.S. Same As Those Of
Moscow
And Volgodonsk Blasts 2 Years Ago
*Ý Hussein says Americans can learn from Iraqis
[S.Hussein's second, rather
more
dignified and statesmanlike statement]
*Ý Arabs pay lip service [The New York Post
doing its bit to stir up
anti-Arab
feeling]
*Ý Turkey Nervously Awaits US Response
I'm finding
it difficult to know how to deal with the present crisis. I
agree
with Seb Willis' view that we should try to keep the focus on Iraq and
on
sanctions, but when there is a mad elephant loose in the backyard it is
difficult
to ignore. The following does keep the emphasis on Iraq but it
will be
followed by a very cumbersome supplement on the American jihad
against
'terrorism'. There aren't that many articles but most of them are
long.
It will have no pretentions to being either comprehensive or a
selection
of the best material available and I hope that in future if I
continue
with anything like it, it will be greatly shortened.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Attacks backed by Saddam? [Lays out roughly
the case for implicating Iraq
in the
1993 World Trade Centre bombing]
*Ý Old enemies of Saddam point finger at Iraq
[Opinion in Kuwait]
*Ý Yalmas [Deputy Prime Minister of
Turkey]denies reports on attacking Iraq
*Ý Israelis believe Iraq had role in US
attack-Jane's [Account of article in
Jane's
Defense Weekly arguing that the real culprit is Hizbullah's Imad
Moughniyeh.
No precise connection with Iraq is given]
*Ý Tel Aviv points to Iraq [very short extract
in continuation of above]
*Ý Kids angry over Iraqi full-staff flag insult
URLS
ONLY
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/264/oped/Reinstitute_Iraq_weapons_inspecti
ons+.shtml
*Ý REINSTITUTE IRAQ WEAPONS INSPECTIONS
by
Leonard S. Spector & Jonathan B. Tucker
Boston
Globe, 21st September
[Rehearses
reasons for doing this almost as though the US hadn't been trying
to do
it for the past three years]
http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=politicsnews&StoryID=238715
*Ý HELMS SAYS IRAQ, SADDAM SHOULD BE U.S.
TARGETS
Reuter's,
22nd September
Jesse
Helms of course. No great surprises there.
IRAQI
REACTIONS
*Ý Saddam says U.S. response is misguided
*Ý Iraq Denies Involvement in Suicide Attacks
*Ý Iraqi deputy premier cables condolences to
American charity organization
[Voices
in the Wilderness] on attacks victims
*Ý Iraq says it got relief expertise thanks to
US strikes
*Ý Iraq urged to be neutral [The Iraqi
newspaper Babel thinks, probably
rightly,
the Iraqis should keep their heads down just at the moment]
*Ý Saddam Criticizes Bush Over Remark [about
either being with the US or
with
the terrorists]
and, in
News, 16-22/9/01
(2)
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý The sons who promote Saddam's cruel legacy
[This article by Robert Fisk
goes
back to 8th September but I missed it. It seems a good idea to produce
it now
when Fisk, who is approaching greatness in the quality of his
reporting,
is likely to be seen in some quarters as an apologist for
'terrorism'.]
*Ý Ex Iraqi official shot
*Ý Gulf War Mine Kills Three, Injures Three -
INA
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST - ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Egypt to export 250m dollars' worth of food
to Iraq
*Ý Iraq, Iran agree to coordinate on
"imperialism"
*Ý Very soon a common market between Syria,
Egypt, Iraq and Libya
*Ý Iraq Accuses Kuwait of Violating Conventions
on Joint Oil Fields
*Ý Kuwait rejects Iraq's accusation of
"excessive exploitation" of joint
oilfield
NO FLY
ZONES
*Ý British Warplanes Strike Southern Missile
Site [Near Basra. Reported on
Wednesday
19th Sept]
*Ý Iraq says it hit two US or British
planes[Near Basra and Shahban.
Thursday]
*Ý US, British warplanes strike Iraq over
no-fly zone threat [Al-Amrah and
Talil.
Friday]
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý German Industry to Uphold Ties with Iran,
Iraq International trade
*Ý Wheat export to Iraq might be delayed
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý UN sanctions committee bans Iraq from
importing helicopters for
agricultural
purposes
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Bin Laden's Plan to Destabilize
Kurdistan [Important article on radical
Islam
in the autonomous Kurdish zone. Interesting to note that it seems to
be
particularly strong in the region of Halabja, victim of the chemical
warfare
attack at the end of the Iran/Iraq war]
Jihad against 'Terrorism', 16-22/9/01 (1)
At the
moment of writing, it is still not clear what our governments are
going
to do to the people of Afghanistan. One of the articles below ('Secret
US
plans revealed', oddly enough from Pravda) suggests it might not be as
bad as
we all expect it to be: that there will be a battle to win hearts and
minds,
more carrot than stick. Clearly ‚ and very understandably under the
circumstances
‚ the nation has gone mad, and Bush has to do something. On a
very
optimistic reading he may simply be prolonging the moment of non-action
until a
more considered and reasonable approach becomes possible.
But it
seems unlikely, both on past performance and on the rhetoric that is
being
employed ‚ though this has still not descended to the level of
gangster
obscenities favoured by Bush Sr during the Gulf Massacre.
Already
with the departure of the aid organisations it seems that we have
guaranteed
the deaths of many more people than were killed at the World
Trade
Centre ‚ and a slow, lingering death of starvation and disease
probably
worse than that we have already inflicted over the past ten years
on at
least tens of thousands of people in Iraq.
The
ultimatum Bush has given the Afghans far outdoes in its brutality and
arrogance
the famous ultimatum of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the Serbs
in
1914, which precipitated the First World War (and the circumstances are
comparable.
The assassination of the heir to the throne of the great
historical
empire of Europe was the equivalent of killing the Vice President
of the
United States).
Bush
demanded that the Afghans hand over all 'terrorists', as if that word
(which
no honest commentator should ever use without wrapping it in inverted
commas)
has any meaning in that part of the world; as if Osama bin Laden's
camps
are not full of people training to fight in Kashmir, or in Chechnya.
Are
they all 'terrorists'? The ultimatum was meaningless and designed to be
so.
And
what about the means by which the United States has established itself
in
Pakistan? Does that not resemble Hitler's ultimatum to Yugoslavia when he
wanted
access to Greece in 1941? And when the Yugoslav government decided to
give in
to Hitler, did it not provoke a desperate, suicidal wave of
revulsion
among the Serb population, just as is now happening in Pakistan?
And
does the whole operation not rather resemble ... Saddam Hussein's
invasion
of Kuwait? Except that Saddam Hussein made a serious effort to
negotiate
with the Kuwaitis beforehand. In that case, it was the Kuwaitis,
the
victim, who refused to negotiate. In the present case it is the
aggressor
who is refusing to negotiate.
Taken
as I am with historical analogies I've long thought the Muslim
struggle
against the US Empire resembles the struggle of Jewish zealots
against
the Roman Empire ‚ the desperate struggle of a great religious
culture
against an immensely powerful but spiritually empty
material/technical
civilisation which is crushing it to death. The Jewish
zealots
too had a suicidal streak and the Romans regarded them as terrorist
fanatics.
Is Afghanistan fated to become the Muslim Masada?
In this
whole unpleasant spectacle there is one little flash of something
resembling
poetic genius, and that is the name 'Operation Infinite Justice'.
If the
Americans are serious about their professed aim then they are indeed
embarked
on a process that will be endless. It is as if they were to
proclaim
a war to eliminate all the evil in the world ‚ the sort of thing
the
Taliban might think to do.
Realistically,
they can only achieve it by putting the entire world under
military
occupation and 24 hour surveillance, and that is what seems to be
implied
when, with superb (and largely justified) contempt for the United
Nations
and 'International Justice', Bush says to the entire world: 'You're
either
with us or you're with the terrorists.' Either you accept our
tutelage
or you become a legitimate target.
Is that
not the end of a pluralist world? Is Bush not, to near unanimous
applause,
staking a claim to world domination that goes beyond anything
Hitler
ever imagined ‚ the whole world to be to the US as Europe would have
been to
Germany had Hitler won ‚ the 'clash of civilisations' giving way to
the
'end of history'?
US
POLICY
*Ý The fight of their lives [Article from an
Israeli point of view asking if
the US
is too effete to sustain a real war. Provides a rare glimpse of
Madeleine
Albright ‚ pre Gulf Massacre ‚ as peacenik]
*Ý It's Really War Against The Islamic Axis
[Another article from an Israeli
point
of view. The US should treat the Arab world as it treated Germany and
Japan
in the Second World War]
*Ý Should U.S. forces strike back hard? [More
of the same]
*Ý U.S. Contacts Sudan, Cuba for Help
*Ý Pressure mounts on US to get UN involved
[But ask not what the US can do
for the
UN but what the UN can do for the US]
*Ý Robert Fisk: 'Smoking them out' is not new
in the Middle East [This is
just
one of the many excellent pieces by Fisk since the crisis began. Here
he
indicates that the problems faced by the US in the region are much the
same as
those that have been faced for a long time by the governments
already
there. The country that has dealt most effectively with them is
Syria -
and he might have added Iraq ‚ and their method was the application
of
overwhelming terror]
*Ý Sanctions - Do They Help or Hurt?
[Consideration of the effectiveness of
the
sanctions already imposed on Afghanistan and Pakistan]
*Ý Scarcity of Afghan Targets Leads U.S. to
Revise Strategy [Rumsfeld
proposes
to 'drain the swamp they live in', ie, presumably, a scorched earth
policy
applied to the whole of Afghanistan. There is also a reference to
'any
revenue they derived from the sale of drugs'. No mention of the fact
that
one of the reasons for the present unimaginable degree of poverty and
famine
in Afghanistan is that the Taliban have put a complete stop to the
cultivation
of the opium poppy]
*Ý Secret US plans revealed [Surprisingly
benign view of 'Operation Noble
Eagle'.
Perhaps 'Operation Noble Eagle' is Colin Powell's plan and
'Operation
Infinite Justice' is the Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz plan]
and, in
Jihad against
'Terrorism', 16-22/9/01 (2)
WORLD
OPINION
*Ý Druze leader blames Mossad, CIA [Good ol'
Walid, never misses a trick]
*Ý African voices caution US against rash reply
[African press less than
enthusiastic
about US vengeance]
*Ý Iran Advises U.S. Against Attacking Afghans
*Ý Israel Says It Won't 'Pay Price' of
Coalition [Israel nervous about
possible
US concessions to conciliate Arabs. The problems of the definition
of
'terrorism' start here]
*Ý Black Tuesday: the view from Islamabad
[Sensible Pakistani viewpoint,
arguing
that the US 'must extend its definition of humanity to cover all
peoples
of the world' and that Muslims in western countries must cease their
refusal
to mix with the society around them]
*Ý Fears and expectations in Turkey
*Ý Japan may change pacifist constitution
*Ý US revenge action can never be called war
against terrorism [Talk by
Indian
Muslim leader reported in the Iranian press]
*Ý US attacks raise mixed feelings in Africa
[Contrast between concern for
US
suffering and lack of concern for African suffering]
*Ý US strikes will split Arab world, says
Mubarak
*Ý Waging war against terrorism [An excellent
article from India, published
in the
Pakistani paper, Dawn. The most genuinely 'philosophical' article
I've
yet seen on the subject]
*Ý Russian Orthodox Church blesses bombardments
[And, by way of contrast,
here is
Metropolitan Cyril of Smolensk, denounced by the Russian press in
1996 as
head of the tobacco smuggling mafia in Russia]
*Ý Iran refuses to allow US planes to use
airspace
*Ý 'Today we are all Americans' [Benjamin
Netanyahu seizes the time]
and, in
Jihad against 'Terrorism', 16-22/9/01 (3)
REMNANTS
OF A CRITICAL SPIRIT
*Ý BBC apologises for anti-US remarks
*Ý Letter from Tam Dalyell
*Ý Storm over Calif. congresswoman's anti-war
stand [Barbara Lee, the only
member
of Congress who voted against giving full power to the President to
engage
the country in war]
*Ý Politicians befooling Americans, says author
[Susan Sontag, in Germany]
*Ý U.S. Pacifists Speak Up as America Braces
for War [Hague Appeal for Peace
and
International Action Centre]
*Ý Anne McElvoy: Anti-Americanism blinds the
left to what's at stake [AM is
pleased
that Bush, who had shown signs of isolationism, is now going to be
obliged
to act 'as a force for good in the world.'Ý
Well, that's one way of
looking
at it. The article is in this section because it is a critique of
the
anti-war position, at least in its cocktail party-style manifestations.]
The
News is still centred on the aftermath of the attacks in New York and
Washington,
and the question of possible involvement on the part of Iraq,
and possible
reprisals whether they are involved or not. The 'Finger
Pointing
at Iraq' section is a series of articles arguing for Iraq's
involvement,
with one surprising, but superficial, exception of the Israeli
secret
service. A lot of this is a matter of who met who where but there is
also a
new defector with stories of germ warfare research. In the Supplement
(shorter
than last week's!) I have put some articles on the general
character
of US policy; and also on those countries whose co operation is
necessary
if Iraq is to get round the provisions of the Oil for Food Scheme.
There
is an interesting article on the problems posed by the enormous stocks
of
chemical weapons held by the US army.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Alert by Saddam points to Iraq ['"He was
clearly expecting a massive
attack
and it leads you to wonder why." ...' Perhaps it was something to do
with
newspaper speculation that the increased rate of bombing raids was
building
up to a massive attack.]
*Ý 'No Baghdad connection' [according to the
chief of Israeli military
intelligence,
also downplaying the likelihood of a direct Iraqi strike on
Israel]
*Ý Unholy trinity [bin Laden, Iraq and Sudan]
in chemical weapons pact
[according
to a paper by Yossef Bodansky - date not given - for the US
Congress
Task Force on Terrorism and unconventional weapons]
*Ý Drain the ponds of terror [extract from
Jerusalem Post article saying
toppling
Saddam would be easy]
*Ý Was bin Laden working with Iraq? [Laurie
Mylroie]
*Ý Bite the bullet and target Iraq [William
Safire. His argument is largely
centred
on the presence of a fundamentalist Islamic movement in the
autonomous
Kurdish region which, he says, is supported by Iraq]
*Ý Washington's hawk [Paul Wolfowitz] trains
sights on Iraq [extracts giving
some
details on Wolfowitz's background]
*Ý Eyes turn to Iraq in attack on U.S. [More
details on the Woolsey/Mylroie
thesis]
*Ý 1998 Bin Laden meeting with Iraqi
intelligence officer investigated
[Meeting
in Afghanistan and meeting between Atta and Iraqi intelligence
officer]
*Ý Hotel clue points to an Iraqi connection
[Osama bin Laden seen in Baghdad
in
1998]
*Ý Saddam has germ warfare arsenal, says
defecting physicist ['Dr al Sabiri
(not
his real name)'. Nasty tales. Nasty if they're untrue. Nastier if
they're
true.]
IRAQI
REACTION
*Ý Iraq Considers Itself a U.S. Target [Short
extracts giving strong
statement
against attacking Iraq from the Secretary General of the Arab
League]
*Ý Iraq warns US against a 'suicidal war sans
limits'
*Ý Saddam says condolences to US would be
hypocrisy
and, in
News, 23-29/9/01
(2)
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq: Iranian forces use missiles to attack
mujahedin near Baghdad [Was
this
'terrorism'?]
*Ý Rafsanjani says Iraq is blocking
implementation of UN resolution ending
imposed
war [and some Iranian responses to Sept 11, including Ayatollah
Khameini:
"America does not have the competence to guide a global movement
against
terrorism, and...Iran will not participate in any move which is
headed
by the United States."]
*Ý Egyptian- Iraqi telecommunications
*Ý Israeli jets in Turkey to bombard Iraq
*Ý 4 Alleged Iraqi Spies Reportedly Arrested
OIL
*Ý Iraq urges OPEC not to increase oil output
*Ý UN to keep tabs on alleged Iraq oil
kickbacks [Question of shortening
price
setting period still rages]
*Ý Rilwanu Lukman is OPEC new president [with
OPEC reactions to Sept 11
attacks]
*Ý War-risk cover hits Iraqi crude
competitiveness [Adverse effects of Sept
11 attacks
on Iraqi economy]
*Ý Shaky Foundations: The US in the Middle East
[Short extract from
interesting
MERIP analysis outlining Iraqi strategy to become an economic
power
even under Oil for Food]
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý U.N. Approves $365 Million in Gulf War
Reparations [The sorry tale
continues.
It includes Palestinians forced to flee Kuwait. By the Iraqis? Or
by the
Kuwaitis? And why does the article seem to suggest that there were
only
1,200 Palestinians in Kuwait at the time of the invasion?]
NO FLY ZONES
*Ý Iraq says it fired on US, British warplanes
[Raids on Dohuk, Erbil and
Nineveh
on Monday]
*Ý Western Warplanes Hit Iraq Targets-US
Spokesman [Raids on Sahban and
Nassiryah,
Thursday]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Iran's under-20 basketball team arrives in
Iraq
*Ý Thai, Iraqi World Cup campaigns end
NORTH
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Fearing strike, Iraq dismantles refineries,
rations fuel [Economic
effects
of Iraqi security measures on the Kurdish autonomous zone]
*Ý PUK Kicks Islamic From Halabja , Iran Interferes
and, in
Jihad against
'terrorism', 23-29/9/01 (1)
At the
beginning of my screed last week against the American jihad I put in
a
paragraph evoking the possibility that, under all the noise, a more
cautious
and reasonable policy might be evolving. To my great surprise, this
speculation
is still holding good. Of course, anything might happen at any
moment
but, at the time of writing, it looks as though the Powell wing in
the US
government is gaining the upper hand and that G.W.Bush is getting a
better
understanding of the complexities of the world. It even looks as
though
Mr Blair's alliance building has been useful since, as the
fundamentalist
terrorist faction of the US press often point out, allies
have a
way of limiting your freedom of action.
The
resulting disarray in these circles is reflected in some of the articles
below.
Which, I admit, is a pretty poor selection. Those wanting to compile
a
serious archive on recent events would be better just gathering together
the
excellent articles Robert Fisk has been producing for the Independent.
I have
not covered the most important matter ‚ the famine in Afghanistan and
the
withdrawal of the aid agencies. I record the fact that the government
seem to
be aware of the problem.
US
POLICY
*Ý Toppling Taliban should not be a war aim
[extract from editorial by Max
Hastings
in the Evening Standard advocating caution]
*Ý Isolating the Isolationists [Russian view
arguing in favour of a broad
coalition]
*Ý The War: A Road Map [Charles Krauthammer in
the Washington Post
(extracts).
1. Destroy Afghanistan. 2. Terrorise Syria. 3. Destroy Iran and
Iraq.
'The war on terrorism will conclude in Baghdad.' Paper, as Stalin once
remarked,
will bear anything one chooses to put on it.]
*Ý Powell is calling it wrong once again
[Apoplectic attack on Powell. We
get a
mention too as 'the West's peacenik boobs' lining up 'to denounce the
Americans
for systematically starving Iraqi children'.
*Ý Tense times in the bunker [Contradictions in
US policy and more
discontent
with Powell]
IRAQ'S
FRIENDS AND NEIGHBOURS
*Ý A trap? [Possible unfortunate consequences
for the US of its war against
terrorism.
From a Yemeni point of view]
*Ý Massive Arrest Campaign Against Arab-Afghans
[in the Yemen]
*Ý Arabs reluctant to join war [Arab League
General Secretary: "Clearly, we
would
never accept a strike against an Arab country, no matter what the
circumstances."]
*Ý Blow to US hopes for backing from key border
countries [Pakistan worried
about
US support for the Afghan Northern Alliance]
*Ý Why China is taking America's side [This and
the following, two
interesting
articles from the Asia Times on the implications for China]
*Ý China, US, and the future of Pakistan
*Ý Baharain opposes terrorism [but also
strongly opposes any attack on Iraq]
*Ý Venezuela's Chavez defends ties with Iraq,
Libya ["So if Chavez is a
friend
of this country, and a partner of that one, which is the same as the
other,
then Chavez ends up being a terrorist too ... Osama bin Chaven!"]
*Ý Set the Saudis straight [Tough talkin' from
the New York Post outlining
many
ways in which the Saudis have been misbehaving themselves]
*Ý Turkey signs up, but fears Iraq is next US
target
URL
ONLY
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_ID=1205996548
*Ý Text of Saudi kingdom's announcement [on
co-operation with the United
States]
Times
of India, 24th September
and, in
Jihad against
'terrorism', 23-29/9/01 (2)
GENERAL
INTEREST
*Ý Century of biological and chemical weapons
[General account from the BBC
of the
history of these weapons]
*Ý Disposal of Chemical Arms in U.S. Lags as
Costs Mount [Amazing story of
the US
army's problems in disposing of 31,496 tons of chemical weapons at an
estimated
cost of $24 billion]
*Ý Get educated [Bibliography of books on Osama
bin Laden, Central Asia,
terrorism,
fundamentalism]
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Powell hints US campaign could target Iraq
*Ý Iraq removed from US target list
*Ý Iraq Accuses U.S. of 'Terrorizing' the World
*Ý 'Hijacker met Iraqi diplomat in Prague'
[Fairly detailed account of
possible
Iraqi connection to Mohammad Atta]
*Ý Hussein overthrow could be risky, lawmakers
told [Also features ex-'UN' ‚
my
inverted commas, PB ‚ weapons inspector, Charles Duelfer, saying: 'In its
war
against Iran, Iraq "survived and prevailed in that war because of their
possession
of weapons of mass destruction."' Which amounts to saying that
Iraq
needs WMDs; and we can only assume Mr Duelfer approves, unless, of
course,
he wanted Iraq to be taken by revolutionary Iran?]
*Ý Other US anti terrorism attacks expected in
Sudan, Iraq, Lebanon and Iran
[Sounds
like Clinton's famous 'pinpricks' which were so lustily ridiculed by
Bush's
present team when they were in opposition]
*Ý Testing the mood in Iraq [Iraqi public
demonstrations going easy on the
anti-Americanism]
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.nydailynews.com/2001-10-01/News_and_Views/Beyond_the_City/a
126994.asp
*Ý Iraqi's Mission: To Get Bin Laden a Nuke
by BOB
PORT and GREG B. SMITH
New
York Daily News, 1st October
Story
of Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, Iraqi-trained electrical engineer, from
testimony
in Embassy bombing trial. Iraq as such does not appear to be
implicated.
Chemical factories in Sudan usually given as linked to Iraq and
bin
Laden are here given as being linked to Iran and bin Laden.
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,248-2001342151,00.html
*Ý The twin towers trail leads to Saddam
by
DANIEL FINKELSTEIN
The
Times, 3rd October
The
Laurie Mylroie thesis about Iraq's possible involvement in the 1993 WTC
bombing,
which has been given much publicity in the US, comes to the The
Times.
Whatever happened to Abdul Rahman, the blind Egyptian cleric who was
supposed
to have been the mastermind behind the 1993 bombing?
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EAST/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq-Kuwait border said calm despite
violations
*Ý Iraq, Iran exchange remains of their war
victims [So far as I know the US
and
Kuwait have never offered to return the remains of Iraqi war victims on
the
road to Basra]
*Ý Oman firms urged to boost trade with Iraq
*Ý Saudi Arabia Beats Iraq 2-1 [in the final
round of Asian qualifying for
next
year's World Cup]
MILITARY
MATTERS
*Ý Iraq Protests U.S Navy Acts Against
Iraq-bound Ships
*Ý Coalition planes strike Iraqi no-fly zone
[on Tuesday]
*Ý Allied aircraft strike artillery sites in
southern Iraq for second
consecutive
day [This and the following two pieces, each of which adds a
little
tidbit of information of its own, are on the raids on Wednesday]
*Ý Allied Planes Strike Iraqi Sites
*Ý Two persons killed in new American raids
against Iraq
*Ý Special, Not Super [Amusing stories about
unfortunate experiences of US
Special
forces fighting the same sort of war in Iraq that they will have to
fight
in Afghanistan]
and, in
News, 30/9-6/10/01 (2)
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Iraqi Kurds Reports Attack by Armed Islamic
Groups
*Ý Iraqi Kurds Brace for U.S. Attack
*Ý KDP and PUK in Washington to jointly declare
concern on situation in
northern
Iraq
*Ý Turkey shuts gateway to Iraqi
Kurdistan
URL
ONLY:
http://www.washtimes.com/op-ed/20011002-3530884.htm
*Ý Look to the Kurds in Iraq
by
Carole O¥Leary
Washington
Times, 2nd October
OIL
*Ý UK/Iraq Oil prices: European prices approved
*Ý War risk insurance dents Iraqi exports
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Russian firms win $40b Iraqi deals [They
must be desperate to get rid of
sanctions
...]
*Ý Iraq raises objections over Pakistan wheat
quality
*Ý Wheat issue: top Pakistan team to visit Iraq
shortly
CAMPAIGNING
*Ý Sanctions on Iraq labelled terrorism [by
activists in Canada]
*Ý British and US planes attack Iraq again in
battle that never ends [Good,
supportive
piece in The Scotsman. Congratulations to CASI's Per Klevnas for
an
effective interview, though animal lovers among the peacenik boobies
won't
regret too much that 'Therefore the chicken farming industry dies'.]
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý UN: Iraq spends too little on food
*Ý Iraq Denies UN Charge It Spends Too Little
on Food
IRAQIS
ABROAD
*Ý Iraqi refugees become suspects in U.S.
attacks
*Ý Danes investigate Iraqi commander
*Ý Iraqi man is ordered detained for remarks
Some
two weeks ago, Anne McElvoy of The Independent was ridiculing us
peacenik
boobies for the suggestion (made by George Monbiot among others)
that
the US ought to bombard Afghanistan with food parcels.
That
now seems to be what they are doing. And very welcome it is too. But as
Monbiot
points out in one of the articles below, it is not possible to
achieve
both the humanitarian aims and the military aims before the winter
sets
in.
The
military option confronts them with the very real prospect of letting
all
hell break loose over Afghanistan, killing large numbers of the people
whose
faces are staring out at us from the aid agency advertisements, only
for
Osima bin Laden's voice to be heard at the end of it all, saying he's
alive
and well.
Whereas,
had they been willing from the start to negotiate with the Taliban,
bin
Laden could have been out of harm's way by now. Had Clinton been willing
to
negotiate after the Embassy bombings, he could have been out of harm's
way
well before the attack on the World Trade Centre (the Taliban at that
time, if
I remember aright, suggested delivering him over to Saudi Arabia,
who,
unlike the American judicial system, could have provided the
satisfactory
spectacle of a public beheading).
But as
with Saddam Hussein, the Americans set out not to resolve the problem
but to
humiliate the bad guys (in this case, including the Taliban). After
hundreds
of thousands of deaths and an immense reservoir of resentment built
up in
the Arab world, Hussein still has not been humiliated, though a people
has
been reduced to destitution.
The
Afghans are already in a state of destitution and the Americans are
faced,
as Monbiot points out, with genocide as the only available military
option.
Unless of course they decide to abide by the terms of the UN Charter
and try
to resolve the problem by negotiation. But only a hopelessly starry
eyed
hippy would ever dream of suggesting such a thing.
US
POLICY
*Ý Let the eagle strike free [Walter Lacqueur
argues that one of 'the
paradoxical
and perverse lessons of history is that retaliating against
those
who were only marginally involved in a terrorist act may have a
considerably
beneficial impact.' Happily for us in the UK this is a lesson
that
does not seem to have been learnt - yet - by Mr bin Laden and his
friends]
*Ý No lack of work to do for a Muslim Foreign
Legion [An amusing idea from
William
Safire which, if followed through, will probably expose the lack of
Muslim
enthusiasm for the New World Order and turn the War against
'Terrorism'
into a war against Islam]
*Ý The Mullah is laughing [An Indian
commentator blurts out what none of us
dare to
say, that the US hasn't a clue what to do next]
*Ý Genocide or peace [Excellent article from
George Monbiot: 'The 19-day
suspension
of aid that came to an end yesterday may have killed thousands
already.
']
*Ý Phony Pacifists [Extracts. Article from
Washington Post arguing, with
some
passion, that people like ourselves are hypocrites because we still
want to
be defended by the very military forces we oppose. We don't actually
want to
live under a Muslim fundamentalist dictatorship. The point, however,
is that
the US and Britain do not use their forces for defensive purposes.
They
use them for aggression (which may be justified - as perhaps the
British
aggression against Germany in 1939 may have been justified. But it
wasn't
defence.). It is this aggression that has rendered them hateful in
the
eyes of the world and therefore liable to terrorist attacks. Both
countries,
but especially the US, would be very difficult to invade and
conquer,
and their purely defensive needs could be met by an enormously
reduced
military force.]
*Ý Powell: Anti-Terror Has Many Phases
*Ý Dealing with Taliban [Excellent article from
Eric Margolis on foolishness
of idea
of rebuilding Afghanistan on the basis of the Northern Alliance]
and, in
Supplement,
30/9-6/10/01 (2)
*Ý America's war on terrorism [Pakistani view
saying that the US have missed
the
opportunity to excite real, heartfelt, sympathy in the world]
*Ý A War on Many Fronts [Extracts. Anyone
wanting to understand why the US
is
disliked and despised in the world only has to read the articles of
Charles
Krauthammer. His basic thesis is that the world is too unpleasant a
place for
Americans to tolerate its continued existence. It should be
remarked
in reply to the argument on biological weapons that the genie of
this
satanic technology has been let out of the bottle, as much in the
laboratories
of the US as anywhere else, and simply cannot be put back
again]
*Ý Cold War II: America needs you, Harry Truman
[Argument that GW Bush is,
rightly
in the author's estimation, opening a new Cold War, in many ways
equivalent
to the old one, against radical Islam]
*Ý Saddam's shadow haunts quiet Americans
[extracts from interesting article
arguing
that the US cannot afford to form a real alliance - eg through a UN
mandate
- for fear of losing its freedom to act against Iraq. Outlines the
few
moves that have been made to get UN backing]
*Ý U.S. Strategists Begin to Favor Threat to
Use Nuclear Arms
*Ý 'I believe the terrorists wanted a nuclear
attack on Baghdad'
[Conversation
between famous conversationalists PJ O'Rourke and Clive James.
Some
interesting passages, once Clive James' contributions are removed, on
the
massacre on the road to Basra and the purge of the Palestinians in
Kuwait.
Ends with a complaint that the US is too innocent in world affairs
and
therefore not sufficiently interventionist. Funny to think people get
paid
for making this sort of conversation. And other people pay to hear
them.].
IRAQ'S
FRIENDS AND NEIGHBOURS
*Ý Arab states not to be targeted, assures US
*Ý Dangerous anti-Americanism next door
[Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez's
little
joke last week about 'Osama bin Chavez' didn't go down very well with
the
Miami Herald]
*Ý Islamabad plays its wild card [Interesting
Pakistani view of possible
options
for an alternative government to the Taliban (Syed Ahmed Gialani of
the
National Islamic Front of Afghanistan)]
*Ý Servility does not pay in the war against
terrorism [Indian complaint
that
the Kashmiri Muslim suicide bomb against the Indian-supported Jammu and
Kashmir
assembly isn't being taken seriously as an act of world terrorism
because
the US needs Pakistani support ... for the war against Terrorism]
Late
mailing this week, owing to travels. Most important item is probably
(under
'Finger', the Czech Prime Minister telling us he has no evidence that
Mohammad
Atta met an Iraqi diplomat in Prague. Will that get as much
publicity
as the anonymous Czech 'official' who said that he did, or might
have
done? Beyond that, only one bombing raid last week, presumably in
reaction
to the shooting down of a third drone. A fairly arbitrary
collection
of articles relating to the recent terrorist attacks on
Afghanistan
will be found in the Supplement.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Japan tells nationals near Afghanistan, Iraq
to leave
*Ý Saddam could be the next target of US
strikes [Daily Telegraph. Extracts.
Includes
a mysterious hint at the improved relations between the US and
Sudan.
See first item in the Supplement]
*Ý Iraq should be attacked says [David] Owen
*Ý Bombing goes on as US hints at attack on
Iraq
*Ý Liberating Oppressed Iraqis Ought to Be
Among the War Aims [Or 'The only
good
Muslim is a starving Muslim' by William Safire. Interesting compendium
of
American delusions, as for example: 'Mindful of the defeat of Soviet
troops by
brutalized Afghans in the 1980s, America and Britain, leaders of
the
civilized world, are making this a war of Muslim liberation. ... Bombs
on the
bad will alternate with food drops on the good ...' and, most
amusingly:
'Cool, calm killing is not our way.']
*Ý Tory leader warns of Saddam 'threat'
*Ý Hussein receives warning from US [US
ambassador to the UN John
Negroponte's
visit to the Iraqi UN ambassador. He refused the latter's offer
of a
cup of tea.]
*Ý What About Iraq? [Jim Hoagland has startling
new evidence of Iraqi
involvement
in the twin tower attack. Someone who might have been involved
in the
1993 bombing is living in Iraq. An Iraqi defector with a military
background
wasn't interrogated by US intelligence. Another one thinks he
remembers
seeing Islamists training to hijack a plane in an Iraqi airport.
Clearly
Iraq deserves to be bombed]
*Ý Mission [by former CIA director James
Woolsey to UK] sought Iraqi links
to
attacks [but apparently failed to find them]
*Ý Czech Leader Denies Atta Meetings in Prague
*Ý The Bioterror Road Doesn't Lead to Iraq [by
Scott Ritter. Disappointing
article.
If I were Jim Hoagland, William Safire or Charles Krauthammer, I
wouldn't
be convinced. And Ritter, who is anything but a genuine paid-up
peacenik
boobie, approves the war on Afghanistan]
and, in
News, 7-13/10/01
(2)
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Lorries carrying food continues to cross
border from Turkey to Iraq
*Ý Iran Accuses Iraq of Sowing Discord in
Iran-Arab Ties
*Ý Jordan asks Syria to hand over Iraqis
*Ý The First Iraqi ambassador in Bahrain since
1990
*Ý Turkish concern over possibility of
expanding its military operations to
include
Iraq
MILITARY
MATTERS
*Ý Iranian Soldiers Offer Grim Glimpse [of what
chemical warfare is like]
*Ý US loses third Predator in Iraq
*Ý Allied planes strike Iraqi military targets
CAMPAIGNING
*Ý Iraqis know what New Yorkers are suffering
[Interview with Kathy Kelly]
SCRAPING
THE BARRELL OF SELF RIGHTEOUS INSENSITIVITY
*Ý Americans used as 'human shields' sue Saddam
[Will anyone mention the odd
fact
that S.Hussein DIDN'T use them as human shields? or that the bombing
started
the moment the last of the hostages had been released? NOTE (June
2003):
Glen Rangwala subsequently showed me that I was wrong about this.
What I
was remembering was the more subtle point that the release of the
last
hostage was the moment when France stopped supporting the
Yemeni/Jordanian
efforts to find a diplomatic solution]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Sanctions and Religion Threaten Iraqi
Brewery
*Ý More Iraqi children died in July, August
because of imposed UN sanctions
*Ý The good life may be at stake in Iraq
*Ý Iran move closer to a place in the 2002
World Cup
OIL
*Ý [Saudi former oil minister] Al-Yamani warns
that attacking Iraq will
increase
oil prices
*Ý RBI nod for OVL's $5m in Iraqi block
JIHAD
AGAINST 'TERRORISM'
It is
difficult to find words to express how deeply shameful the attack on
Afghanistan
has been. Afghanistan, as everyone knows, is in the grip of a
famine
which threatens millions of lives. The aid agencies had about two
months
left before the winter sets in and much of the country becomes
inaccessible.
September was lost because of doubts as to what the intentions
of the
'coalition' (sic) were. No sooner was the aid moving again than the
bombing
began. On the clear understanding that it was unlikely to 'succeed'
(ie get
O bin Laden) before the Summer.
It
would have been better (if public opinion in the US has to be assuaged)
to have
done the spectacular bombing straightaway, Clinton style, to get it
over
with; then announce a pause until the Spring (when the conditions for
military
action are much better anyway) to let the aid in. To have renounced
the
bombing altogether to concentrate on aid would have done wonders in
turning
Muslim opinion against ObL. But to try to combine bombing and aid is
a joke in
poor taste. Enough to satisfy the empty headed public opinion of
the
'free' world (where, we are assured, we are all independent-minded
individuals,
the summit of the world historical process); but there surely
isn't a
single soul among the so-called backward peoples of the world so
stupid
as to be taken in by it.
Mr Bush
and Mr Blair have, knowingly and deliberately, engaged in a policy
which
will kill (by a conservative estimate) hundreds of thousands of people
by
starvation and disease. They have thereby outdone - and by a very large
margin
- the evil that has been attributed to Osama bin Laden. And no-one
need
ever again express surprise that German public opinion in 1942-5
tolerated
the holocaust. The phenomenon is there, here and now, plainly laid
out
before our eyes.
*Ý Alliance rivals Allies' efforts in World War
Two [Short extract.
Interesting
little item I hadn't noticed elsewhere: that in the midst of all
the
noise about the war against terrorism, sanctions - UN sanctions at that
- have
been lifted off the Sudan]
*Ý Focus-For Taliban, don't read Saddam
[Comparison between problems posed
by war
on Afghanistan and war on Iraq]
*Ý Al Jazeera, the pride of Qatar
*Ý [Jim] McDermott [Seattle] first U.S.
lawmaker to criticize attack
*Ý The new war between Georgia and Abkhazia has
started [Nothing to do with
Iraq,
or even, directly, with Afghanistan, but it may be an interesting
application
of the Joe Moore principle that the Georgian/Abkhaz war has been
reactivated]
*Ý American 'imperialism' condemned by Tehran
*Ý Bush and Blair have already lost the talking
war across the Middle East
[by
Robert Fisk]
*Ý Protests may force US to turn to ground
troops [Extract. Britain too, it
appears,
is acting in self defence because it too has been attacked by
Afghanistan.
It must be true. Its official]
*Ý Without the UN, we can never have a just end
to the Afghan nightmare [by
Charles
Kennedy. Despite the moderate tone - which amounts to an endorsement
of mass
murder - the argument is important, turning on the need to transfer
sovereignty
over the world from the US to the UN. Though Kennedy doesn't
realise
that this can't be done without rewriting the UN Charter and
dismantling
the pernicious Security Council system]
*Ý Wars & coalitions: lessons from the Gulf
war [Extract. After a rather
dreary
start about Washington's problems in putting its 'coalition' (sic)
together,
the article makes a couple of rather sharp criticisms of the
British
document on Osama bin Laden]
*Ý Recent Military Mistakes [A chronology of embarrassing
incidents]
The
news is still dominated by the question of whether or not 'we' should
bomb
Iraq, a question which, this week, takes the form of speculation about
Iraq's
possible involvement in the anthrax scare. Hence pages and pages of
repetitive,
nerve jangling tosh. No-one of course makes the point that if
Iraq is
behind it then, on the basis of the same argument the US is using to
bomb
Afgjhanistan, it could reasonably be considered to be acting in
legitimate
self defense.
The
piece de resistance of the case against Iraq is the supposed meeting
between
Mohammad Atta and an Iraqi diplomat in Prague. Readers of last
week's news
will remember the statement from the Czech Prime Minister, Milos
Zeman,
that he has no evidence of any such meeting. This has been studiously
ignored
in all the following articles until 'Atta visited Prague twice', at
the
very end. This article seems set to refute Mr Zeman's statement but ends
up
effectively confirming it.
Otherwise
it may be worth nothing that there don't appear to have been any
bombing
raids on Iraq this week (surely the effort in Afghanistan hasn't
taken
up all their absurdly inflated resources). Most recommended article in
what
follows is the Pat Buchanan piece 'Why do they hate us?' (in the
General
Policy section). But actually I think the most important
developments
are those that are indicated, though I don't pretend to
understand
them, in the Kurdish supplement.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý The suicide bomber and the Baghdad
conspiracy [Supposed meeting between
Atta
and Iraqi diplomat Ahmed Khalil Ibrahim Samir Al-Ani (see last week's
news
and 'Atta visited Prague twice', below) described in loving railway
station
novel style detail, which I've cut. Dispute between Pentagon and
State
Dept. Efforts of James Woolsey (see last week's news). Spat between US
and
Iraq ambassadors to the UN (see last week's news). Possible sighting of
OBL in
Baghdad by Arkan's lawyer (see last week's news).]
*Ý Ex-U.N. weapons inspector: Possible
Iraq-anthrax link [Richard Butler,
wouldn't
you know, thinks anthrax might have been delivered at the famous
Atta/al-Ani
meeting in Prague]
*Ý Anthrax Market Easily Accessed on Internet
["It used to be easy enough to
get,
and presumably was available in other countries as well. Lots of people
had it
before ATCC ‚ American Type Culture Collection ‚ tightened up"]
*Ý Iraq stockpiled anthrax in run-up to Gulf war
[Brief history of Iraq's
programme.
Ends with this rather surprising sentence: "Ex-CIA head James
Woolsey
has maintained that it was Iraq which provided fake passports for
all the
19 US hijackers."]
*Ý Senator says administration can't forget
about Iraq [Joseph Liberman on
the
need to give miitary support to the INC]
*Ý Invading Iraq would turn a small threat into
a big one [Defence of
current
policy]
*Ý Iraq may be behind anthrax attacks, says
ex-CIA chief [Woolsey of course.
But
doesn't include claim in 'Iraq stockpiled anthrax', above'that it was
Iraq
which provided fake passports for all the 19 US hijackers.'
*Ý Iraq Denies Role in Spread of Anthrax as
U.S. Seeks Source [US experts
arguing
against the Iraqi link to the anthrax scare. Except Butler. But
Butler
not sure ...]
*Ý Look for Iraq's Hands to Be Dirty [Free
speculation as to everyone's
possible
motives. No evidence.]
*Ý To Do Iraq or Not Do Iraq ^À That's the
Question for Dubya [Call to war
against
Iraq as a pre-emptive strike regardless of evidence. Pearl Harbour
style,
though that analogy is not given, strangely enough.]
*Ý Iraq's chemists bought anthrax from America
[More details on pre-Gulf War
policy]
*Ý Top-level source of spores feared [This
article concentrates more on the
possibility
of a Russian source]
*Ý IRAQ: Fingers pointing toward Baghdad [Iraqi
National Congress trying to
persuade
the US to bomb their country by claiming OBL/Hussein links.
Otherwise
just Prague ... Mylroie ... Butler ... high grade anthrax]
*Ý Iraqi Opposition Wants to Go Hunt Anthrax in
Iraq [Give us more money. We
can't
do anything without your money ...]
*Ý Hawks chasing the bugs all the way to
Baghdad [Details on the 'cabal'
formed
to press for an attack on Iraq and on their plans, which may be of
interest
to Turkey, for a 'new Kurdish government of Iraq'!]
*Ý Don't blame Saddam for this one [by Scott
Ritter. This is a better, more
detailed
argument than the previous one from Ritter in last week's news.
Particularly
telling is the political argument - that Iraq was 'winning' the
political
and diplomatic war and had no interest in a sudden escalation of
the
military confrontation. Though I disagree that Baghdad's aim has been to
lift
sanctions. I think they had, rightly in my view, given that up as
hopeless.
The aim was to get countries anxious to do business with them to
break
sanctions, so that the sanctions regime would become increasingly
irrelevant]
*Ý Atta visited Prague twice, Czechs confirm
[This is probably the most
important
article in this section. It appears to contradict the Czech Prime
Minister's
statement that Atta visited Prague only once and that there is no
evidence
that he met al-Ani. On reading it, however, we find that on Atta's
first
visit to Prague, he was turned back at the airport for lack of the
relevant
papers.Ý And the sole source for the
meeting with al-Ani turns out
to be
... the Iraqi National Congress! So much for the colourful fantasies
about
'Czech officials'. James Woolsey's claim that all nineteen hijackers
got
their passports from Iraq also seems to have been quietly buried. But
now we
know: for 'scholars', 'experts', 'officials' (even 'Czech
officials'),
read the Iraqi National Congress.]
URL
ONLYs:
http://members.home.net/kurdistanobserver/14-10-01-observer-irq-behind-anthr
ax.html
*Ý IRAQ 'BEHIND US ANTHRAX OUTBREAKS'
by
David Rose and Ed Vulliamy
Kurdistan
Observer (from The Observer, London), 14th October [Several of the
above
pieces bill this as an important article but it contains nothing we
don't have
from other sources. Essential argument is that only Iraq has the
capacity
to produce airborne anthrax (not the US, Britain, Russia, China,
Israel,
Syria ...)]
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011017-78587929.htm
*Ý ANTHRAX TRAIL MAY LEAD TO HIJACKERS, IRAQ
by
Jerry Seper
The
Washington Times, 17th October
Atta
and Iraqi official in Prague. Woolsey ... Butler ...
http://www.miami.com/herald/content/opinion/opcol/digdocs/067602.htm
*Ý DON'T STOP WITH BIN LADEN, AL QAEDA
by
Richard Cohen
Miami
Herald, 18th October
More of
the same ...
http://www.reuters.com/news_article.jhtml?type=topnews&StoryID=306654
*Ý AVOID IRAQ WAR, REBUILD AFGHANISTAN,
LAWMAKER SAYS
Reuter's,
20th October
Not
very interesting views of Rep. Henry Hyde of Illinois, the Republican
chairman
of the U.S. House of Representatives International Relations
Committee.
and, in
News, 14-20/10/01
(2):
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Iraqi Citizen Planned to Kill Russian President
[Happily doesn't seem to
have
any real significance with regard to Russian-Iraqi relations]
*Ý Iraq 'determined' to thwart any US-British
strike [The interest of this
article
lies in the recent visit of a Russian envoy to Iraq, keeping up
relations]
*Ý TCP [Trading Corporation of Pakistan]
considers Iraq's plea for replacing
wheat
*Ý Saddam Sends Condolences to American
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EAST/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Saddam criticizes Arab nations in U.S.
airstrikes
*Ý U.S. Assures Turkey, No Separate State in
Iraq [The American ambassador
to
Turkey informs the Turks that 'once peace had been brought to the Middle
East,Ý the Caucasus and the Balkans then Turkey
would be the leading country
in
theseÝ regions.' Is this a declaration
of US policy?]
*Ý Turkey offers help, is wary of involving
Iraq
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý 487 brides in mass wedding
*Ý Seven Iraqis killed in mine explosions
*Ý Sanctions bring unintended result, observers
say [They hit necessities
and
don't touch luxuries]
*Ý IRAQ: Years of sanctions hurt Iraqis more
than regime [This seems to be
essentially
the preceding article with the paragraphs in a different order]
MILITARY
MATTERS
*Ý Iraq Says U.S. Navy Set Ship Ablaze in Gulf
*Ý Saddam moves chemical weapons factories into
no-go zone [Considering that
the
existence of chemical and biological weapons stocks in Iraq is supposed
to be a
matter of controversy the authors of this article seem to know a lot
about
them]
OIL
*Ý Iraqi exports drop slightly under UN's
'Oil-for-Food' program
GENERAL
POLICY
*Ý Don't repeat the misery inflicted on the
Iraqis [by George Carey,
Archbishop
of Canterbury. Not quite the prophetic anger that the subject
merits
but nonetheless to his credit]
*Ý "Why do they hate us?" [One of the
dumbest sentiments that has been
touted
about lately is that at least Sept 11 has had the 'good' effect of
pulling
the US out of its 'isolationist' mode. The end of US isolationism
means
the murder of hundreds of thousands of people. Buchanan is the
arch-isolationist.
It is also the best account I have seen by an American of
how the
US appears in the eyes of the Muslim world. The paragraph giving the
'indictment'
of the US by the 'Imams' is particularly fine.
*Ý Global Eye -- Idiot Wind [On Bush Sr's
involvement in SH's pre-Gulf War
crimes.
Talking about 'idiocy' the constant repetition of the phrase 'he
gassed
his own people' rather glosses over the fact that the incident
occurred
in the middle of a civil war. Is the other side your 'own people'
in the
middle of a civil war? Was General Sherman attacking 'his own people'
when he
attacked Atlanta?]
and, in
Kurdish Supplement,
14-20/10/01
*Ý While the World Is Not Watching, Iraq Escalates
Ethnic Cleansing [New/old
measures
in the Kurdish areas still under Iraqi government control]
*Ý Iraq Occupies 30 Villages in the Border
Region with Kurdistan [Claims
that
the Iraqis have actually moved into the Kurdish autonomous zone. If
true its
a much better pretext for an attack on Iraq than the tenuous link
to the
anthrax scare. The lack of publicity only goes to prove that no-one
really
cares about the Kurds - at least not when its a matter of keeping the
Turks
onside in a 'coalition against terrorism']
*Ý Kurdish parties rely on U.S. [Powell writes
to Talabani and Barzani
saying
US will respond if Saddam attacks them 'at a time and place of our
choosing':
ie certainly not of the Kurds' choosing. The last time they
responded
to Iraqi activity in the Kurd autonomous zone, readers will
remember,
it was by dropping bombs in Southern Iraq!]
*Ý Turkey Concerned on US, Iraq and KDP [An
interesting moment for
ill-feeling
to develop between Iraqi Kurds and Turkey]
*Ý Disagreement escalates between Turkish
military and KDP [More detail on
the
above. The KDP is refusing to co-operate with Turkish raids into the
Kurdish
autonomous zone.]
*Ý Turkey Rushes Troops To Iraqi Border
[Includes a reference to two Turkish
soldiers
killed in a rocket attack 'attributed to Kurdish insurgents'. Are
they
the same two who in the articles immediately above were - accidentally
-
killed in a minefield? The indications are that the Turks are preparing
for an
invasion of the Kurdish autonomous zone to prevent the Kurds taking
over in
the event of a US attack on Iraq].
This
mailing is still dominated by the argument that the war against
Afghanistan
should be extended into a war to overthrow S.Hussein or, even
more
widely, to take on, all at once, the whole Arab and Muslim world, at
least
that part of it that constitutes a threat to Israel. The advocates of
this
position, which seems strangely to complement the ambitions of Mr bin
Laden
and his friends (an all-out Muslim jihad against the West), are still
a
little vague as to how the Arab and Muslim world should be rebuilt once it
has
been destroyed. For the moment, Arab Zoran Djindjics seem to be in short
supply,
but who knows? As Napoleon said: 'On s'engage et puis on voit'. The
bomb
Iraq lobby have scored a little coup in that the Czech interior
minister
has now confirmed that Mohammad Atta met the Iraqi diplomat, Ahmad
Khalil
Ibrahim Samir Al-Ani, ('Czechs Confirm Atta Met With Iraqi ' below)
though
the details are a little vague. Its still small stuff beside the
Times
of India story (12 October 2001,
http://www.timesofindia.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=1454238160,
recently
circulated
on the Emperors New Clothers website,
http://emperors-clothes.com/f.htm)
that the head of Pakistani intelligence
has
been asked to resign since it emerged that he paid the same Mohammad
Atta
$100,000. We would probably hear more about that if Pakistan was a
nearer
neighbour of Israel. Recommended below are the articles on oil
politics
and on Saudi politics, both in the 'General' section (news, part
2); and
once again the whole Kurdish supplement, turning on the tensions
that
have been created between Iraqi Kurds and Turks by the possibiity of an
imminent
US assault on Iraq.
IRAQI/US
RELATIONS
*Ý Saddam Shows Yank Poison Pen [This is the
same story that appears
elsewhere
as 'Saddam sends condolences to the US'. It only goes to show that
beauty
is in the eye of the beholder]
*Ý Defence chief [Air Force General Richard
Myers] hints at widening
conflict
*Ý With results like Iraq, who needs a
coalition? [Extracts. Charles
Krauthammer
argues that if the US had finished Saddam off in 1991 they
wouldn't
have had to impose the embargo and so Arabs wouldn't hate them as
much as
they do]
*Ý Security and Peace Don't Come to Faint
Hearts [Extracts. The Washington
Post
believes that everyone who might do something wicked should be offed
before
they have a chance to do it. This seems to be Saddam Hussein's
philosophy
as well.]
*Ý Advance the Story About How Saddam's Men
Help the Terrorists [William
Safire
feels this is the story of the moment. Note his admiration for
Seymour
Hersh of the New Yorker exposing Saudi duplicity. Did he admire the
same
Seymour Hersh, we wonder, when he exposed the illegal US massacre that
followed
the legal massacre on the road to Basra at the end of the Gulf War?
Note
also the reference to 'bin Laden's supply this year of 400 fanatic
"Afghan
Arabs" to Saddam to attack free Kurds in Iraq's no-flight zone'.
Readers
will learn more about that in the Kurdish section]
*Ý U.S. Seems To Ease Rhetoric On Iraq
[Extracts. Includes G.Bush Sr
defending
his decision not to seize power in Iraq in 1991]
*Ý Disease is Bush ploy, says Baghdad
*Ý U.S. Seen Set to Resurrect 'Smart Sanctions'
in Iraq [Quotes from one
Neil
Patrick, head of the Middle East programme of the Royal United Services
Institute,
saying a major attack on Iraq after Afghanistan is unlikely]
*Ý U.S. Magistrate Refuses to Release Iraqi
Suspect
*Ý Building the case against Iraq [Tough
talkin' from J.Woolsey]
*Ý Poll shows public wants Saddam targeted
*Ý Aziz: Iraq Expects U.S. Attack
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/printedition/chi
0110220223oct22.story?coll=chi%2Dprinteditorial%2Dhed
*Ý America holding its fire on Iraq
Chicago
Tribune, 22nd October
Defence
of current policy. Not to be thought of as being soft on Iraq.
http://www.baghdad.com/?action=display&article=10041374&template=baghdad/ind
exsearch.txt&index=recent
*Ý Ex-CIA Chief Suggests Iraq Involvement
The
Associated Press, 23rd October
We
learn from this that James Woolsey's law firm represents the Iraqi
National
Congress. Gosh!
REMNANTS
OF DECENCY
*Ý Vietnam days shape lawmaker's distaste for
war [Account of career of Rep
Jim
McDermott who opposed the terrorist attacks on Afghanistan]
THE
CZECH CONNECTION
*Ý Atta Visited Prague at Least Twice, Police
Say
*Ý German report links Iraqi ambassador to
Al-Qaida terror network [The
Iranian
news agency, IRNA says 'US investigators believe that Al-Ani
supplied
Atta with deadly Anthrax spores during that meeting.']
*Ý Iraqi agent with terror link was expelled by
Czechs
*Ý Czechs Confirm Atta Met With Iraqi
URL
ONLY:
http://www.nypost.com/news/worldnews/32396.htm
*Ý U.S. CZECHS OUT ATTA'S TRIP
by
DEBORAH ORIN, WILLIAM J. GORTA AND WILLIAM NEUMAN
New
York Post, 23rd October
[I
don't usually leave in photo captions but I thought readers might
appreciate
this one: Three kids in Dasht-i-Qala, Afghanistan, yesterday
snack
on one of 70,000 ready-to-eat meals dropped to the Afghan people by
U.S.
cargo planes Sunday night. - Associated Press]
WEAPONS
OF MASS DESTRUCTION
*Ý Bio-warfare Means and Motive ‚ Anthrax: Is
Saddam the missing link? [By
Khidmir
Hamza who, it appears, in addition to directing the Iraqi nuclear
weapons
programme also served 'as a director general of the Department of
Military
Industry, which oversaw much of the work on biological and chemical
weapons'
at the time of the Halabja incident. Leaving us wondering why he
hasn't
been prosecuted as a war criminal].
*Ý Khidhir Hamza: Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi
weapons program [Fairly
lengthy
interview. His basic thesis is that we should get Saddam before he
gets us,
which he is due to do, according to German intelligence, in 2005.
He
argues that the Iraqi opposition should be placed in Southern Iraq where,
he
thinks, they would secure overwhelming support. But Southern Iraq is
Shi'i
and the Shi'i are not well represented in the INC. They have their own
organisation
which is actually engaged in fighting without seeking US
permission.
They use the only tactics possible under the circumstances ‚
'terrorist'
tactics]
*ÝÝ Iraq Seeks Anthrax Tests on 2 Letters
*Ý Anthrax reveals Iraq trademark: Report
*Ý Senate anthrax could be domestic
and, in
News, 21-27/10/01
(2)
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Russian oil company develops cooperation
with Iraq, Iran
*Ý Migrant Ship Sinks Near Indonesia [More
victims of the US/British
sanctions
policy]
*Ý Obituary: Ismat Kittani [This man seems
quite extraordinary, representing
Iraq
through several changes of regime and achieving high office in the UN
while
remaining faithful to Saddam. Was this Iraq's Talleyrand?]
*Ý Malaysia, Iraq to Enhance Bilateral Ties
*Ý JETRO [Japan External Trade Organization]
pulls out of Iraq trade fair
*Ý And what about the other prime suspect? [The
state of the debate in
Australia
as to the desirability of going after Iraq]
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iran-Iraq Air Service to Resume
*Ý Rich Harvest of Mines Near Turkey's Iraqi
Border
*Ý Kuwait denies air bases used for Afghan
strikes [Suggests that Kuwait's
backing
for the US war against Afghanistan is less than whole hearted]
*Ý [Syrian vice-president Abdul Halim] Khaddam
confers with Moroccan
premier,
Iraqi trade minister
*Ý Iraqi accusations against Kuwait
*Ý US paying for giving it to Iraq: Rafsanjani [Rafsanjani
thinks Iraq is
the
source of the anthrax in the US]
*Ý On Syrian- Iraqi trade exchange
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý War May Help Women in Iraq
*Ý Iraqi Archaeologists Find Ancient Temple to
Ishtar
*Ý U.N.: Iraqis Face Persecution, Torture
[Human Rights report to General
Assembly
from Andreas Mavrommatis. Refers to apparent murder of Shi'i leader
Ayatollah
Hussein Bahr Al-Aloom]
*Ý Iraqis ponder Afghan conflict
OIL FOR
FOOD
*Ý [Irish minister for Foreign Affairs] Cowen
says Saddam fails to feed
people
[on strength of UN Sec Gen's report. Ireland is currently chairing
the UN
Security Council]
*Ý UN Gives First Evidence of Illegal Iraqi Oil
Sales
GENERAL
INTEREST
*Ý US wants global command against terrorism
[The US prepares to take over
military
management of the world]
*Ý Media's role in war [Eric Margolis points
out the obvious pro-Israeli
orientation
of many of those who have been pushing for war on Iraq]
*Ý Interview with the Prime Minister [Very
short extracts from a very long
interview.
Need to do away with civil liberties; attempt to differentiate US
policy
and Israeli policy; International Criminal Court; importance of armed
forces
to our well-being independent of actual defence needs. And the
following
outrageous exchange: 'Have the Taliban actually tried to negotiate
at any
point? Not as far as I am aware, no.']
*Ý The last oil rush [Interesting article
speculating on what should be done
if
Saudi Arabia closes the oil tap - as they should have done a long time
ago]
*Ý The United States Ought to Be Applauding
Israel's Self-Defense [William
Safire
argues that it is hypocritical to be tough on the Afghans and
criticise
Israel for being tough on the Palestinians. One can see that he
has a
point ...]
*Ý An unholy alliance [An interesting and
coherent view of a pan-Arab
anti-US
alliance which is centred on domestic struggles in Saudi Arabia and
successfully
managesÝ to turn the tide which had been
running in the US'
favour
until 1995/6]
URL
ONLY:http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,56-2001371246,00.html
*Ý A man alone
The
Times, 25th October
Tony
Blair appears as a lonely, heroic figure while The Times gives us a
rundown
of the debate as to whether or not a new round of terror attacks
should
be launched on Iraq. The Times thinks it should.
and, in
Kurdish Supplement,
21-27/10/01
*Ý Iraq Expects U.S. Attack With Kurdish,
Turkmen Cooperation
*Ý Kurdish MPs Discuss Troop Deployments to
Southern (Iraqi) Kurdistan [This
is
difficult to understand through the less than perfect English
translation,
but it seems that the Turkish Grand Assembly has passed a bill
to
permit Turkish occupation of Southern Kurdistan/Northern Iraq]
*Ý A Rocket Attack At A U.N. Station In Zakho
[Attacks on UN offices in
Southern
Kurdistan/Northern Iraq. It appears they are quite frequent. No
indication
here of who is responsible]
*Ý Iran Pressures Talabani to Terms of
Agreement with Islamic Groups
[Readers
will remember recent press reports of a Saddam/bin Laden plot to
introduce
into the autonomous Kurdish zone a terrorist Islamic movement -
the
Jund Al-Islam. This is referred to in the William Safire article,
'Advance
the story ...' above. Here it appears that the J.al-I is an
extremist
offshoot of well-established local Kurdish Islamist forces,
supported
by Iran]
*Ý Turkish Minister Insults Kurdish Cause and
KDP on TV [Strained relations
between
the KDP and Turkey. The possibility of an intensification of the US
war on
Iraq brings with it the possibility of Kurdish independence in
northern
Iraq. That brings with it the possibility of a Turkish invasion.
The KDP
are anxious to assure the Turks that they don't want independence,
and
they are willing to do this at the expense of the Kurds in Turkey]
*Ý Isn't KDP a friend? [A Turkish newspaper
defends the KDP on the grounds
that
they have faithfully supported Turkey against the PKK]
*Ý Nechirvan Barzani gives three messages in
Ankara [Assuring the Turks that
he is
their friend. Note that 'The KDP had no evidence proving the claim
that
the Jund-ul Islam group wasÝ being
directed by Osama Bin Laden']
*Ý Turkey must not let Barzani and Talabani to
have a clear field in
Northern
Iraq. [See comment on 'Turkish Minister Insults Kurdish Cause ...'
above]
*Ý Turkish troops move into Iraq
*Ý Talabani Declares Amnesty For The Militant
Islamists
The obviously
orchestrated flood of articles advocating war on Iraq
continues.
I've tried to be ruthless about cutting elements that have
appeared
before. Readers who feel shortchanged about this can refer to the
URLs.
What is
most worrying is that, in and around the Kurdish autonomous zone,
Turkey
and Iraq are both behaving as if they expect an imminent US attack;
though
I note again that there seems to have been little activity over the
'no fly
zones' since the terrorist attacks on Afghanistan began.
The overall
picture of an al-Qaida/Iraqi alliance of evil forces is a little
confused
by the amount of material that is sloshing around implicating Saudi
Arabia.
The Saudis are going up in my estimation. In the simplistic, racist
way in
which we all tend to think about other peoples in the world, I had
thought
of them as a nation of dissipated hypocrites, uselessly virtuous in
public,
uselessly sybaritic in private. Now it appears that there is a
purposeful,
intelligent elite, serious about the ideals publicly proclaimed
by the
society and willing to put its money and energy into something other
than
underground swimming pools and Hollywood films.
Stories
about Pakistani involvement, which is obviously the most significant
of all,
seem to have been buried with wonderful efficiency.
I
remark again that the all too obvious Israeli desire to widen the war into
a
confrontation between 'the West' and the whole Arab/Muslim world
complements
Osama bin Laden's desire to widen the war into a confrontation
etc. And
yet there is something very unconvincing about the alternative ‚
which
amounts to trying to split the Arab world at Israel's expense. Ariel
Sharon's
view that the American reaction to the activities of suicide
bombers
vindicates his own reaction to the activities of suicide bombers (no
negotiations
with those who refuse to hand the terrorists over) is, in the
terms
in which these people think, perfectly reasonable.
But
then, by the logic all these people apply, if Iraq was responsible for
the WTC
attacks it could legitimately plead that, considering what Iraqis
have
suffered at the hands of the US, it was only acting in self defence.
Meanwhile
the Iraqi government has come out (not for the first time) with
two
suggestions which, if anyone was willing to listen, could provide the
programme
for a really serious and worthwhile global opposition:
1) a
universal treaty banning weapons of mass destruction, with all parts of
the
world, including the US and Israel, open to inspection. This of course
has
been on the cards for a while and the main obstacle has been the US. But
even if
the papers are signed, they may well prove to be pretty useless
without
2)
abolition of the Veto system in the UN Security Council and Security
Council
decisions to be subject to approval by the International Court of
Justice
at the Hague (the real one of course, not the Security Council's own
little
puppet War Crimes Tribunal for ex-Yugoslavia).
Politics
requires the conflict of divergent interests and views, each of
them in
itself 'totalitarian' in nature. At present the conflict between
Islam
and 'the West' is sterile and can only result in a victory for the
West,
since Islam (I speak as a non-Muslim. I know many Muslims will
disagree),
unlike 'free enterprise' or in earlier times Communism or
Socialism
cannot have a universal/totalitarian appeal. It would be useful to
subsume
this rather sterile confrontation of interests and moral ideals into
a
different, more widely based confrontation of interests and moral ideals.
The
ideal of a system of world justice above ALL the nations, including the
United
States, could unite a much wider opposition and would not require
terrorist
methods. It is a pity that at present it is only the Iraqi
government
who is advocating it.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Every day, the case mounts against Saddam
[Daily Telegraph: Islamic
terrorist
conference in Baghdad three weeks before September 11th ‚ anthrax
‚ brief
history of training camps in Iraq ‚ Farouk Hijazi ‚ al-Ani in Prague
‚
activities since Sept 11]
*Ý No proof of Iraqi contamination
*Ý Saddam must go [The Times: Khidr Hamza ‚
Abdul Rahman Yasin (Iraqi
implicated
in the 1993 WTC bombing ‚ was Ramzi Yousef (convicted for the
1993
WTC bombing) an Iraqi agent? ‚ links between bin Laden and Farouk
Hijazi,
Iraqi ambassador to Turkey ‚ Atta in Prague ‚ SH still has
biological
and chemical weapons and is close to getting nuclear weapons]
*Ý The pitfalls of an attack on Iraq [A common
sense reply to the above from
a
former British ambassador to Syria and Saudi Arabia]
*Ý What is to be done about Iraq? [Evening
Standard: William Shawcross
argues
that any state that might possess biological weapons should be
destroyed.
His nerve begins to fail him, however, as he contemplates how
exactly
this should be achieved; and he has nothing to say about what you do
once
you've succeeded in destroying the state]
*Ý Baghdad Denies Iraqi Official Met Atta [Very
short extract insinuating
into our
minds the idea that al-Ani in Prague might have given Atta a packet
of
anthrax]
*Ý Stop U.S. victory says Saddam [The third of
Saddam Hussein's interesting
open
letters to the West since September 11. This is where he advocates a
general
treaty to get rid of WMDs everywhere]
*Ý Iraq smuggles agents into Germany via Prague
[It would surely be
surprising
if they didn't ...]
*Ý The Moment Has Arrived for America to Be
Bold [Jim Hoagland says: Don't
listen
to the siren voices suggesting that the US has any responsibility to
reconstruct
the countries it destroys. If the Afghans can't produce a
government
ready to submit to the US they should be allowed to rot ...]
*Ý Saddam 'still ready to use germ warfare'
[Suddenly Rolf Ekeus - remember
him? -
bursts upon the scene. When he still thought there was some chance of
his
inspection team getting into Iraq he was more circumspect about whether
or not
Iraq still had WMDs. But perhaps he isn't in charge of the inspection
team
any more. Here he is presented as 'OSCE High Commissioner for Ethnic
Minorities'.
*Ý A Lesson From Israel [This article has been
popping up all over the
place.
It advocates the very tactic of the pre-emptive strike that the
Japanese
used at Pearl Harbour. It argues that had the Israeli's not
prevented
Saddam from developing a nuclear bomb in 1981, 'there would have
been no
Desert Storm'. Given the appalling consequences of Desert Storm
(which
indirectly include the attack on the WTC) that may not have been a
bad
thing. The article gives, disapprovingly of course, the following
perceptive
quotation from the New York Times: "Even assuming that Iraq was
hellbent
to divert enriched uranium for the manufacture of nuclear weapons,
it
would have been working toward a capacity that Israel itself acquired
long
ago. Contrary to its official assertion, therefore, Israel was not in
'mortal
danger' of being outgunned. It faced a potential danger of losing
its
Middle East nuclear monopoly, of being deterred one day from the use of
atomic
weapons in war."
*Ý We should have got Saddam, says envoy {Lord
Powell's, who was
M.Thatcher's
private secretary at the time. The article does not actually
quote
him saying what he is alleged to have said in the headline].
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101011105-181598,00.html
*Ý Thinking About Saddam
by
Michael Elliott
Time
magazine, 29th October
[Elliott's
main argument for hesitating to attack Saddam seems to be that he
may
respond with biological weapons. Which amounts to saying that the
development
of biological weapons has been a necessity imposed on him by the
situation
in which, largely thanks to US policy, he finds himself]
http://www.jpost.com/Editions/2001/11/01/Opinion/Opinion.37338.html
*Ý Saddam's death labs
by Uri
Dan
Jerusalem
Post, 1st November
[the
article argues that the fact that no link has been established is proof
that
there is a link, since clearly if there was a link, Saddam would be
anxious
to conceal it, since 'Obviously he doesn't want the US to destroy
Iraq,
as it actually deserves' (interesting little phrase, all too
indicative
of the current Israeli mentality). The Iraqis have shown
themselves
to be monsters by killing four people with anthrax so (the
author's
mouth begins to water): 'In the end, it is likely that the US will
be
forced to deploy tactical nuclear weapons of the post World War II era,
in
order to demonstrate to millions of fanatical Muslims that this is how
their
crazy terrorist campaign will end'.
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Amnesty International Criticizes Iraq.
and, in
News, 28/10-3/11/01
(2)
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq lifts restrictions on Malaysians
*Ý Iraq sends requirements for wheat [to
Pakistan]
*Ý Iraqi vice-president holds "positive"
meeting with Algerian president
*Ý Irked U.S. Recalls Venezuela Envoy [Hugo
Chavez has been expressing a
sense
of moral outrage at the terrorist attack on Afghanistan].
*Ý Iraq Wishes to "Turn a New Page"
in Ties With France
*Ý World Court should oversee Security Council:
Iraq [see general
introductory
comments above]
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EASTERN RELATIONS
*Ý Afghans cast adrift at sea saved by Iraqis
[Story of Afghans summarily
expelled
from Kuwait in a boat apparently just because they were Afghans. A
bit
like the way S.Hussein treats Kurds in Kirkuk]
*Ý Iraq Says Ready to Solve Missing Persons
Issue [with Kuwait. Worth
remembering
here that the sticking point for resuming negotiations is still
Kuwait's
insistence, for no reason that is very clear to me, that the US and
Britain
should be present]
*Ý Iraq agrees to raise supply to Jordan
*Ý Iraq and UAE Sign Free Trade Agreement [Good
to see that the UAE haven't
lost
all their spirit since they broke diplomatic relations with the
Taliban]
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Kurds, Turkish parties meet on discussing
expected attacks at Iraq [A
curious
article, apparently suggesting that Turkey is pressing for the
establishment
of a Kurdish government in Iraqi Kurdistan, under the KDP,
against
the opposition of the local Turkmen minority.]
*Ý Iraq Accelerates Ethnic Cleansing of
Kirkuk
*Ý Kurdistan Developing Attributes Of Statehood
*Ý Iraq Masses Troops on Kurdish Areas
[Apparently in expectation of an
imminent,
Turkish backed, invasion]
OIL FOR
FOOD
*Ý Iraq: UN sanctions committee approves oil
prices for US market
*Ý U.N. probes Iraqi oil shipment
*Ý Iraq says OPEC indirectly financing US
attacks
*Ý US-British 'smart sanctions' Iraq plan in
doubt [Suggests that Russia's
proposal
for a clear timetable for the ending of sanctions as the reward for
the
return of weapons inspectors may, at last, be under consideration]
GENERAL
INTEREST
*Ý The reluctant Saudis: Royal family
increasingly nervous about keeping
grip on
power at home [On the growth of anti-US feeling at all levels of
Saudi
society. Note the similarity between the statements quoted from
radical
Saudi clerics and those of G.Bush (you're either with us or you're
against
us ...]
*Ý Even after a savage attack, America still
remains generous [Muslim living
in the
US points out (rightly in my view) that there has been surprisingly
little
anti-Muslim activity in the US since Sept 11. But he is perhaps a
little
naive about how benign US intentions are towards the people of
Afghanistan.
And is there not a contradiction between saying 'there is
absolutely
no moral equivalence between what the terrorists perpetrated and
American's
action abroad' and then referring to 'the economic sanctions that
are
killing thousands of Iraqi civilians every month'.
URL
ONLY:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A28010-2001Nov2.html
*Ý We're Still Chasing a Criminal
by Jim
Hoagland
Washington
Post, 2nd November
[Hoagland,
it appears, has interviewed many feared terrorists, so he knows
what
he's talking about. He sees OBL as a psychopath who 'finds an identity
otherwise
denied him in the death and destruction of others, on a massive
scale.
He ties it all together in a package of religious fantasy, vengeful
politics
and local grudges that has gathered a cult of killers around him,
just as
Abu Nidal concocted a half-baked Marxist spiel to cover his blood
lust.
It is the destruction that is attractive to bin Laden's followers and
useful
to his official sponsors. He too is embedded in a system that judges
him
neither morally nor rationally -- neither with heart nor with mind --
but
fearfully and in sick anticipation.' So all the stuff about Palestinian
grievances
and Iraqi children and Arab public opinion is a lot of tosh. The
Arabs don't
matter. There's a little bit about Iraq's sheltering of OBL's
fellow
psychopath, Abu Nidal, who, it seems, has disappeared.]
Can't
think of anything to say of a general nature about all the following.
Still
no reports of bombing in the No Fly Zones. Further unease in the
Kurdish
autonomous zone. Baghdad trade fair and, it seems, general
international
relations continuing as, or getting back to, normal. I
recommend
the articles (in the 'Finger' section) 'Who developed anthrax?';
and, in
the 'General' section, though it isn't really about Iraq:
'Contextualizing
Afghan War'.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Final US ultimate warning to Iraq [Tony told
Abdullah that George told
Tony to
tell Abdullah to tell Saddam that Iraq will be blown to bits if they
don't
let the inspectors back. This comes from 'sources at the British House
of
Commons']
*Ý A Nixonian Notion: Help Turkey Overrun Iraq
[William Safire fanstasises
on the
advantages of encouraging Turkey to take - or re-take? - Kirkuk]
*Ý The Czech connection implicates Baghdad
[Somewhat more detailed account
than
we've had so far of what the Czechs have said about the Atta/al-Ani
meeting.
The article goes on with a general account (which I've cut since it
contains
little that isn't obvious) of Czechoslovakia's pre-1989 links to
the bad
guys of the world. It forgets that pre-1989, Saddam was one of the
more or
less good guys in the world.]
*Ý Bush Sr still irked by Saddam [Bush Sr it
seems stopped the war in 1991
because
'if we had gone on 24 hours more, shooting down 25,000 Iraqi troops
running
away from Kuwait, which admittedly they had pilfered and raped and
plundered,
the world would have turned on us', which leaves us wondering
just
how many retreating Iraqi troops they did massacre on the road to
Basra.
We don't know because they immediately bulldozed all the bodies into
the
sand, and no-one has ever suggested that the specialists in mass graves
who
have been busy in Bosnia and Kosovo could be usefully employed in
digging
them up again]
*Ý No Plan to Hit Iraq [Powell in Egypt says:
'concerns like the kind that
you
have just raised' (about a possible attack on Iraq) 'are not concerns
that
should worry anybody seriously, in any serious way']
*Ý Iraq to be scrutinised after Afghanistan war
[Powell in Kuwait says that
'nations
such as Iraq, which have tried to pursue weapons of mass
destruction,
should not think that we ... will not turn our attention to
them.']
*ÝÝ Iraqi Defectors Detail Secret School for
Terrorists [The INC reveal the
existence
of a Special Ops/SAS style training camp in Iraq. Gosh.]
*Ý Who developed anthrax? [Eric Margolis
suggests that US/British
involvement
in S.Hussein's development - and use - of chemical weapons goes
much
deeper than I for one had imagined. And that there is a scandal
concerning
'British scientists' to be uncovered that is much more
interesting
than the foolish 'arms to Iraq' affair]
*Ý Bin Laden envoy was in Iraq: Iraqi dissident
[Bin Laden's associate Ayman
el-Zawahri,
of Egyptian Jihad, has visited Iraq. Which doesn't really seem
very
surprising.]
*Ý A war for the pipelines? [Extract which
makes the interesting point that,
thanks
to oil, the US CANNOT launch a war against Iraq without permission
from
the Saudis.]
*Ý Pro-Israeli lobby pushing for attack on Iraq
[It appears that the lobby
demanding
extension of the terror campaign to include Iraq is grouped under
the
portentious title 'Project for a New American Century', and it includes
Francis
Fukuyama]
*Ý U.S. Regards Iraqi Report As a Nuclear
Threat [If this article is to be
believed,
S.Hussein has openly admitted to an ongoing nuclear weapons
programme]
*Ý Zeman: Atta Contacted Agent on Plot [The
Czech Prime Minister seems to be
wanting
to atone for his earlier remarks saying he had no evidence of an
Atta/al-Ani
meeting. Now he seems to know eactly what they discussed]
URLs
ONLY:
http://news.ft.com/ft/gx.cgi/ftc?pagename=View&c=Article&cid=FT3DQAX3QTC&liv
e=true&tagid=ZZZAFZAVA0C&subheading=europe
*Ý Moscow is 'pivotal' to Iraq monitoring
by
Carola Hoyos at the United Nations and Stephen Fidler in Washington
Financial
Times, 6th November
http://news.ft.com/ft/gx.cgi/ftc?pagename=View&c=Article&cid=FT3TJ599NTC&liv
e=true&tagid=ZZZOMSJK30C&subheading=US
*Ý US TO PRESS UN OVER IRAQI WEAPON INSPECTIONS
by
Stephen Fidler and Roula Khalaf in Washington and Carola Hoyos at the
United
Nations
Financial
Times, 4th November
Both
articles are just a summaries of what we already know with regard to
the
debate whether or not to extend the terrorist campaign to include Iraq.
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Dhaka urges Iraq, Kuwait to recruit more
manpower [Strange little article
in
which Kuwaiti and Iraqi envoys appear to be acting together as a single
delegation
in Bangla Desh. Bangla Desh it seems wants to send more workers
to Iraq
(on the eve of a US invasion?). Last week we had an item saying Iraq
had
lifted travel restrictions on Malaysians, which also implied that Iraq
was a
desirable place to go to work]
*Ý Lifting a veil on prejudice [Interesting
account of Arab American
community
in Dearborn, Michigan. I've only retained opening account of Iraqi
police
brutality in 1982]
*Ý Iraq to sign oil deal with Indian, Algerian
firms
*Ý KARACHI: Iraqi property taken over
fraudulently
*Ý Philippino oil excavation in Iraq
*Ý Iraq to buy 1m ton wheat next year
*Ý Russian president to visit Baghdad
URL
ONLY:
http://www.arabicnews.com/ansub/Daily/Day/011106/2001110606.html
*Ý Iraqi deputy premier confers with deputy
chairman of the French national
society
(parliament)
Arabic
News, 6th November
A not
very clearly identified Important French Political Figure visiting
Iraq.
and, in
News, 3-10/11/01
(2)
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EASTERN-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Kuwait seizes Iraqi oil tanker: newspaper
*Ý Gulf War radicalised bin Laden - ex-spy
chief [Interview with ex-Saudi
intelligence
chief, Prince Turki al-Faisal. It seems the Taliban may have
been
about to give OBL over to the Saudis in 1998 but the project was
aborted
when Clinton launched his missile attacks. If this is the case then
Sept 11
can be pinned on Clinton].
*Ý Iraqi oil smuggling through Persian Gulf
down by 50 percent, U.S. admiral
says
[Unexplained Iranian crackdown on Iraqi oil exports]
*Ý Iraq, Syria to set up nine joint venture cos
*Ý On Syrian- Iraqi relations [Rather obscurely
worded article which
suggests
that Syrian Socialists, the Supreme Council of the Islamic
Revolution
and Syrian - I think - Kurds are all in favour of closer
Syrian/Iraqi
relations. So that's all right.]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Hussein Putting His Mark on Islamic Faith
['Faith campaign', which began
in Iraq
in 1994]
*Ý As Saddam builds his monuments, mothers
abandon their babies [Contrast
between
wealth of Baghdad and misery of Basra, to convey the impression that
the
suffering is the fault of the Iraqi government not of the blockade]
*Ý The changing face of Iraqi marriage
*Ý Fair to help fight sanctions: Iraqis [Major
trade fair taking place in
Iraq]
*Ý Iraq: a quiet time during another Middle
East war [Rather vague evocation
of UN
efforts to encourage individual economic initiatives in Iraq]
*Ý Saddam's son [Qusay] targeted in attempted
assassination
*Ý Iraq discovers major gasfield
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý UN General Assembly adopts Iraqi proposed
resolution [on depleted
uranium]
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.worldoil.com/news/newsstory.asp?ref=http://62.172.78.184/feeds/wo
rldoil/new/article_e.asp?energy24=243808
*Ý UN programme faces 1.63-billion-dollar
shortfall
World
Oil (AFP), 6th November
http://ogj.pennnet.com/articles/web_article_display.cfm?Section=OnlineArticl
es&ARTICLE_CATEGORY=TOPST&ARTICLE_ID=125944
*Ý US expected to delay Iraq oil-for-aid reform
plan proposal
Oil and
Gas Journal, 8th November
Nothing
of any interest in the article that isn't in the title.
GENERAL
INTEREST
*Ý Contextualizing Afghan War [Fine critique of
the US terror campaign from
a
democratic, secularist, anti-Taliban Pakistani position. Argues, probably
rightly
in broad outline, that the US wants to keep S.Hussein in power as a
means
of justifying their continued military presence in the region]
*Ý Shameful affair that exposed a secret world
[I reproduce this piece of
trivia
just for the amusing suggestion that during the Iran/Iraq war Britain
favoured
Iraq ... because of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie! The article
attempts
to convey the impression that Matrix Churchill war profiteering was
really
courageous espionage on behalf of MI6]
and, in
Kurdish supplement,
3-10/11/01
*Ý Iraqi Kurds' story of expulsion [Arabisation
policy in region of Kirkuk]
*Ý Iraqi Kurds Get New Assurances From
Washington [Flurry of diplomatic
activity
in the autonomous Kurdish zone. Washington ticks the KDP off for
cosying
up to Iran (and perhaps Baghdad). PUK cozies up to the Turks. Am I
not
right in thinking it used to be the KDP who were pro-Turk and the PUK
who
were pro-Iran?]
*Ý Rival Kurdish groups clash in north Iraq
[Further PUK/Islamist
confrontations]
*Ý Kurds facing acute fuel shortages [The Iraqi
government has radically cut
back on
oil supplies to the Kurdish autonomous region]
*Ý Iraq Says United Nations Squandering Its
Money In Kurdish North
*Ý PKK: We Will Not Leave Iraqi Kurdistan
*Ý Iraq and counterterrorism [PUK leader tells
Washington conference what it
wants
to hear: the Kurds want to remain in Iraq and feel they've got a lot
in
common with the Arabs, no threat to Turkey, Iraqi children dying because
of
Saddam, 'the Oil-for-Food program ... assures Iraqi citizens resources
thatÝ were never available to them before because
it compels the Iraqi
government
to spend theÝ money on them' (where have
we heard that one
before?),
Jund al-Islami was set up by OBL (without denying this we remind
readers
of the article in Kurdish Supplement, 21-27/10/01 in which Nechirvan
Barzani
said 'The KDP had no evidence proving the claim that the Jund-al
Islam
group wasÝ being directed by Osama Bin
Laden']
The
world's attention has been diverted elsewhere this week ‚ to the victory
won by
the Tajiks, Uzbeks and Hazaris over the Pashtun in Afghanistan.
Whether
this is a good thing or a bad thing for Afghanistan, it has the
depressing
side effect of confirming US governments in the notion that
mighty,
satisfying victories can be won cheaply and easily. Which puts us in
a
difficult position: do we hope the whole thing blows up in their faces,
with
all the suffering that will create for the people of Afghanistan? or do
we hope
that it will all go smoothly, thus encouraging the US‚led world
terrorist
movement to even greater efforts?
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
[NOTE (June
2003): It turned out that several articles in this section from
the
rather unpredictable website of the Bahrain Tribune, were actually
published
in 1998: 'Iraq urged to seek peaceful solution';
'Egypt
moves to avert US strike on Iraq'; 'Israeli Minister seeks to calm
panic';
'Jordan not to allow its land for US attack'; 'OPEC trapped in Iraq
quagmire']
*Ý The Iraqi connection [If you meet a man of
middle eastern appearance with
long
silvery hair, wearing jeans, silver chains and sunglasses, be afraid
... be
very afraid ... Short extract from long article which appeared last
Sunday
in the Observer]
*Ý 2 more Sept.11 hijackers tied to Iraq [This
from the New York Post
summarises
those few elements in the above Observer article that are new]
*Ý Iraq urged to seek peaceful solution [by
Yasser Arafat. The article
includes
a chilling last sentence in which the name 'Madeleine Albright'
once
again appears before our eyes]
*Ý Egypt moves to avert US strike on Iraq
[Reflects a general anxiety in the
area
that the US is planning to attack Iraq if it doesn't let inspectors in]
*Ý No deal yet with Moscow on Iraq sanctions
-Britain [Here we seem to be
back to
the question of 'smart sanctions']
*Ý Israeli Minister seeks to calm panic [over possible
consequences of a US
attack
on Iraq]
*Ý Jordan not to allow its land for US attack
[Madeleine Albright pops up
again,
in Cairo. Could it be? Could Egypt have sunk so low? that she has
been
invited there to address the Arab Women's conference???]
*Ý The Prague Connection: Saddam and bin Laden
[Extract. William Safire, who
has
already announced his intention of pushing this story for all its worth.
He has
a new detail: that Saddam sent an Iraqi specialist to Afghanistan to
attend
to OBL's kidney problems]
*Ý Next stop, Baghdad {The Jerusalem Post longs
to see democracy and freedom
throughout
the Muslim world. But doesn't democracy mean 'the street'? And
doesn't
the Jerusalem Post have some problems with 'the street' in the
Muslim
world?]
OIL
*Ý Iraq Manufactures Oil Tanks, Refiners
Through Own Efforts
*Ý OPEC losing $30 billion because of oil price
decline, says Iraq
*Ý OPEC trapped in Iraq quagmire
*Ý Iraqi oil minister comments on OPEC decision
to cut oil production
*Ý War on terrorism brings focus to oil
alternatives [Extracts. US hegemony
over
the world is seen ‚ by James Woolsey among others ‚ to require a more
virtuous
energy policy, or alternately a more vigorous destruction of
Alaska]
and, in
News, 10-16/11/01
(2)
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Saddam meets Kurds, renews dialogue offer
[This article, from CNN, has
President
Hussein addressing a delegation from the 'KDP', identified as the
KDP in power
in the autonomous zone]
*Ý Saddam Warns Kurds [Here it becomes 'a
pro-government Kurdish group']
*Ý Saddam Comments to Kurd Collaborator Group
[Here they appear as a 'Kurd
collaborator
group' ‚ rather extravagantly so ‚but they are still called the
'Kurdistan
Democratic Party'. This is a transcript of S.Hussein's speech.,
in his
own inimitable style, e.g.: 'Saddam Husayn is a peaceful and poor man
who
does not frighten anybody andÝ does not
use the language of force.
Right?
(laughs)']
*Ý KDP And PUK Meet In Dokan [The article
refers to continued 'heavy
fighting'
between the PUK and the Jund al Islam]
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Iraq lauds Mrs. Mubarak's advocacy of Arab
women's causes [In advance of
a
conference of Arab women being held in Cairo]
*Ý Kuwait jails five Iraqis for subversion
*Ý Kuwaitis Reported To Be in Iraqi Jail
*Ý Kuwait says Iraq fires mortar, complains to
UN
*Ý Syrian traders violate export conditions for
Iraq [It isn't clear if this
is to
do with UN sanctions or simply Syria's own trade legislation]
*Ý Iraq and Iran exchange war dead
*Ý US Deploys Troops to Kuwait for Exercise
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Chhabria's Jumbo group bags UN projects in
Iraq
*Ý Iraq calls on UN members to reject SC
authority
REFUGEES
*Ý No way out for Iraqi refugee [I've not been
posting many stories about
the
fate of Iraqi refugees but its all part of the same ghastly story and I
think I
should start]
After
September 11th, there were some people in the world, not many, who
expressed
joy and exultation. This was generally regarded as very
reprehensible.
But now great joy and exultation is being expressed because
of a
success achieved through the massive killing of thousands of
high-spirited
idealistic young men. It is generally assumed that their
mothers,
wives and sisters will welcome this as a liberation.
Of
course the young men in question were combatant soldiers, many of them
themselves
guilty of much bloodshed, so this does not count, technically, as
a war
crime. But to fail to see it as an immense and terrible tragedy is to
be less
than human. There is something weak about the emphasis that has been
put on
'innocent civilians'. The US, and the US alone, possess a technology
which
enables them to wage war while keeping civilian casualties to a
minimum.
They don't need to slaughter anything like the numbers they/we
slaughtered
in Germany and Japan at the end of the Second World War. Between
them,
Mr Bush and Mr Blair may only have blown apart something in the region
of a
couple of thousand innocent civilians (though there's also all the many
thousands
driven from their homes and the many more thousands ‚ probably
less
than could reasonably have been expected given the speed of the war ‚
who
will die of starvation and disease). But the Taliban collapse came about
for one
reason and one reason alone: another massacre, not the first and
certainly
not the last, conducted at a safe distance by aerial bombing.
Logically
speaking, this asymmetric war in which only one side suffers
massive
casualties is better than the endless mutual slaughter of First
World
War trench warfare. It remains nauseating. And we may wonder what it
has
achieved for the US and (if they can be said to matter) the British? It
certainly
hasn't done anything to reduce the danger of terrorism. But it has
still
achieved something. After September 11th we felt bad. Now we feel
good.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Now it's time to halt the war [Andrew Murray
gives some reasons for not
expanding
the war to Iraq. Which sound a bit like some of the reasons given
for not
launching the war on Afghanistan ...]
*Ý Schroeder: Europe Opposes War Beyond
Afghanistan [But did he say this
before
the vote on sending German troops into Afghanistan, or after?]
*Ý When the dust settles in Afghanistan, where
will Bush take his war on
terror?
[Rupert Cornwell. Extracts. Attempt to reflect on what the wider US
foreign
policy will be like after Sept 11. Much what it was before Sept 11]
*Ý Imagining the liberation of Iraq [The
Jerusalem Post looks forward (with
exemplary
concern for the wellbeing of an Arab population) to the liberation
of
Baghdad. They also conclude that sanctions aren't doing a lot of good,
since:
'Western Europe and Russia' areÝ
'trading with Saddam, including
billions
of dollars in sales of dual-use technology for weapons of mass
destruction
and ballistic missiles'. Scary, eh?]
*Ý Don't take the war to Baghdad [Similar
arguments to the Andrew Murray
article
above - Arab public opinion and even domestic US opinion (!). It
somehow
feels a bit weak. And it is defending a status quo that is itself
putrid]
*Ý Iraq 'not linked to September 11' [Given
that one assumes intelligence
agencies
always have political reasons for what they say, why should Israeli
agencies
be downplaying the possibility of an Iraqi connection to Sept 11?]
*Ý U.S. Turns Attention to Iraq
*Ý Oil fears make attack on Iraq unlikely
[Argument that we can't go to war
against
Iraq because it will push the price of oil up. Unfortunately the
argument
is rather successfully refuted in 'A case for moving against Saddam
etc'
below]
*Ý We were wrong to let Saddam go, claims Gulf
war adviser
*Ý Now we must try and free the Iraqis from
Saddam Hussein [David
Aaronovitch.
The article is mostly an expression of hatred directed against
S.Hussein.
Do any of us like him very much? He doesn't think Bush is as bad
as
Hussein, but badness is largely a matter of circumstances. The Bushes
have
killed many more people than Saddam but they've done it at a distance
through
a multitude of willing agents. Whether they would have enjoyed doing
it
themselves or not we do not know. It would have been very impolitic on
their
part to try. However, if Aaronovitch pours out a lot of spleen on folk
such as
ourselves he ends up coming to the right conclusion: 'I am now
convinced
that we must, as soon as we can, end almost all sanctions, allow
Iraq to
use its oil revenues'. And he provides the strongest, indeed the
only,
good argument I've seen all week for not invading Iraq (that is to
say,
the only argument that would cut any ice with the US administration in
the
present circumstances), namely that there is no way it could be done
without
American soldiers being obliged to wage a land war, and some of them
getting
killed]ÝÝÝ
*Ý We've only just begun, says Bush, but allies
urge caution [The emphasis
here is
on likely targets other than Iraq, all of them being Muslim]
*Ý A case for moving against Saddam after bin
Laden's defeat in Afghanistan
[A well
written article, apparently from the Iraqi opposition,Ý which
suggests
that the arguments against waging war on Iraq are less convincing
than
were the arguments against waging war on Afghanistan.]
*Ý US unlikely to widen war against terror
[Problems of pursuing war against
targets
other than Iraq. 'Failed states' can be hit with Cruise missiles
but,
and one senses the author's regret: 'In Europe' (where al-Qaeda is also
present)
'this could not be done.' Phew.]
*Ý Let's not rush into W.W. IV
and, in
News, 17-24/11/01
(2)
ENFORCING
THE EMBARGO
*Ý Navy Searching for Sailors, Iraqis
*Ý 2 US Sailors, 3 Iraqis Presumed Dead
[Sinking of unseaworthy vessel, oil
slick
in Gulf, predictable consequences of the embargo]
*Ý Iraq accuses US navy of sinking ship in Gulf
[Iraqi view of the story]
*Ý Malaysian oil tanker seized for violating UN
sanctions
*Ý A Hard Look at Iraq Sanctions [An apparently
objective, even-handed
account
which ends up with a rose-tinted spectacle view of Oil for Food and
Smart
Sanctions. Some sensible suggestions for improving smart sanctions
which
in themselves, by the fact they're not already agreed, make up a quite
severe
critique: 'permitting foreign investment in Iraq, eliminating
restrictions
on non-oil exports, and providing cash for the purchase of food
and other
goods from local producers rather than foreign suppliers'.
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EASTERN/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Saudi suspicions [General account of
Saudi/US relations. Nothing we
haven't
seen before. I've just given extracts relating to Iraq]
*Ý Gulf war fresh in its mind, Kuwait keeps eye
on Iraq [Account of life on
the
Kuwaiti side of the Iraq/Kuwaiti border]
*Ý Two Iraqis sentenced to death in Jordan
*Ý U.S. troop buildup in Kuwait sends signal to
Iraq
*Ý Iraq Says It Foiled 'Terrorist' Attack in
Baghdad
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Ottawa individuals, businesses believed to
have terrorist links to Iraq
[This
is about the anti-Iranian Mujaheedin Khalq and some of its members
operating
in Canada. But should the US decide (and it has been suggested) to
expand
the war against terrorism to Iran, surely the Mujaheedin Khalq (who
are to
Iran what the INC can't quite bring itself to be to Iraq) will turn
into
Freedom Fighters.]
*Ý Russian Ural plant builds 60 big tractors
for Iraq
IRAQI
OPPOSITION
*Ý Iraqi Opposition Rejects Money Offer
[Difficulties of establishing
terrorist
cells in Iraq without money from the US government]
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý Major-general Miguel Angel Moreno Appointed
Force Commander In United
Nations
Iraq Kuwait Observation Mission
*Ý UN doles out Gulf War reparations
*Ý Revenue for U.N. Iraq Plan Plummets
*Ý Iraq to consider return of weapons
monitoring
'WEAPONS
OF MASS DESTRUCTION'
*Ý U.S. says Iraq, N. Korea have biological
weapons [Conference on the
proposed
Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention. Sabotaged by US desire to
protect
its pharmaceutical industry from prying eyes. The US is now
proposing
among other things international rules to combat biological
weapons
production by 'making it easy for those accused in another country
to be
extradited'. Extradited where, we wonder.]
*Ý Arms Experts Say Anthrax Attacks a Wake-Up
Call [Argument that EVERYONE,
including
the US and Israel, should be subject to inspection. This is the
argument
that should be at the centre of the debate, if it can be called
that,
over weapons inspections and Iraq]
*Ý Iraq Rebuts U.S. Claims on Violating Germ
Arms Ban [Hypocrisy of US
accusations
that Iraq has biological weapons]
*Ý US will use Iraq arms threat as pretext for
attack ‚ Baghdad [Similar to
previous
but with different emphasis and details]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Former Iraqi envoy denies rift with Saddam
*Ý Hussein invites Iraqis for Ramadan [To his
palaces. You see, he's not
really
such a bad guy after all]
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý Kurds 'caught in the crossfire' [Uneasiness
over position of Kurds in the
event
of an attack on Iraq]
GENERAL
INTEREST
*Ý Return of the H-Block [Well written polemic
against the new terrorist
legislation.
Begins by evoking the case of Iraq students rounded up at the
outbreak
of the Jihad against Iraq]
Apologies
for the late delivery of the following due to a bit of travelling.
News
still dominated by the possibility that Iraq will be next, in this case
structured
by an interview and speech Bush gave on Monday ('Bush warns Iraq
on
weapons inspections'). The best articles are those that have already been
circulated:
'The hostage nation' (Von Sponeck and Halliday, under Enforcing
the
Embargo), 'A chamber of horrors so close to the 'Garden of Eden' (under
Depleted
Uranium) and 'A tale of 70 factions and 400 suits' (under Iraqi
Opposition).
There's also (under New World Order) 'US a terrorist state:
Chomsky'.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý War has only just started: Bush [Extracts.
According to an ex-Clinton
adviser,
Iraq is the 'headquarters' of world terrorism though, considering
the wrong
that has been done to it, it seems that, on the face of it, Iraq
has
shown remarkable patience and restraint, especially when compared with
the US.
Since it appears, however, that patience and restraint are not to be
rewarded,
perhaps they will change their policy ...]
*Ý Bush warns Iraq on weapons inspections
*Ý Bush turns America's fury towards Saddam
*Ý Smiles in Kabul, Then in Baghdad, Tel Aviv,
Gaza [Touchingly naive
article
which informs us that the Iraqi people are longing to be blown to
smithereens
by the people who have been starving them and depriving them of
the
means to make a living or heal their sick for the past ten years. The
article
contains one curious phrase: ' Just last month the Iraqis are said
to have
secretly executed nine pro-Syrian members of the Ba'ath Party.' Has
the
idea of a union with Syria (speed the day!) been surfacing again in the
ranks
of the Iraqi Ba'ath Party?
*Ý Not the Most Urgent Goal [Article by
ex-national security adviser to Al
Gore.
The US should continue to starve the people of Iraq until the army has
had a
chance to rest from its exertions in Afghanistan. Then go in and bomb
the
place to pieces]
*Ý Bush Iraq Comments May Set Stage for
Showdown [Extracts giving views of
ex-arms
inspection team member Tim McCarthy and his 'Monterey Institute']
*Ý Americans want a war on Iraq and we can't
stop them [Hugo Young on our
future
as just one poodle among many]
*Ý Saddam in the crosshairs [Israeli argument
that anyone who possesses
weapons
of mass destruction must be crushed. Well. Perhaps not everybody,
exactly
...]
*Ý Turkey Hints It Could Back Iraq Strikes
[Though the hint is so delicate
as to
be almost imperceptible]
*Ý War on terror will enter second phase: Tony
Blair [Just in case anyone is
hoping Tony
might put up opposition to anything Bush might want to do]
*Ý Demand for Iraq Inspections Could Be Ploy
for Attack [The myth of a
feeble
UN weapons inspection team consistently outfoxed by wily Iraqis until
having
to leave with a cry of despair is now being presented everywhere as
fact.
The real history is of a series of deliberate provocations and insults
by a
gang of US intelligence agents designed to prolong the sanctions regime
indefinitely,
despite an historically unprecedented degree of compliance on
the
part of the Iraqi government, who eventually concluded, rightly, though
rather
late in the day, that the game just wasn't worth playing].
*Ý Powell Downplays Talk of U.S. Action Against
Iraq
*Ý . . . And Now to Iraq [Extracts. Afghanistan
proves that massacre from
the air
can work (actually that was proved in Japan in 1945) and that Muslim
opposition
to US adventurism is just a lot of hot air. So go after Iraq. The
only
reason to hesitate is that he may possess nasty weapons. Moral: self
defence
under the New World Order requires the possession of nasty weapons]
*Ý Iran Warns U.S. on More Attacks
*Ý A Lonely Battle Against Terror [The lonely
battle is in fact Spain's
battle
against ETA. The Spanish Prime Minister recommends (rather late in
the
day) that the US should abide by the law. As if the US cares what the
Spanish
PM thinks. The article goes on to an account (not given here) of
Afghan
refugees in Iran]
*Ý Blair rejects Tory call for action on Iraq
[a little finger pointing at
Iraq]
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/0111/26/world/world7.html
*Ý Anthrax trail leads from Iowa to Iraq
by
Steve Fainaru and Joby Warrick
Sydney
Morning Herald (from Washington Post), 26th November
Despite
the headline, the article gives not the slightest hint of a trail
leading
to Iraq.
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20011129/us/attacks_iraq_s_weapons_3.html
*Ý Experts Sure Iraq Has Bio-Weapons
by
Dafna Linzer, Associated Press Writer
Yahoo,
29th November
Nothing
new in this. It reflects the Richard Butler rather than the Scott
Ritter
version of the history of the weapons inspectors.
OIL FOR
FOOD
*Ý Oil sales are not enough for buying the food
for the Iraqis
*Ý Changes would nullify UN oil-for-food accord-Iraq
*Ý UN Security Council Approves Iraq Sanctions
Plan
*Ý Reducing the risk of war with Iraq [Seems to
suggest that the Russians
have
agreed to implement - rather than just to consider - the full 'smart
sanctions'
policy next Summer]
and, in
News, 24-30/11/01
(2)
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EAST/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Air flights resumed between Jordan, Baghdad
*Ý Iraq ratified the free market agreement with
Algeria, UAE
*Ý Kuwaiti liberals enjoy moment in the sun
*Ý Iraq-backed terror cell nabbed in West Bank
[The connection with Iraq is
rather
nebulous]
*Ý Iraq foils Iran-linked attack
*Ý Egypt Says U.S. Vows Not to Attack Iraq
*Ý Kuwait Debates U.S.-Islamic Life [After all we've
done for them, there
are
still some of them who dare to disapprove of Barbie dolls]
*Ý Baghdad Recalls Ambassador to Turkey
ENFORCING
THE EMBARGO
*Ý Rescuers find body of U.S. seaman in Gulf
*Ý Impoverished Iraqis struggle to survive on
past's leftovers [Back to the
reality
on the ground. Though the sculptor Mohammed Ghani Hikmat, who wants
to do
'colossal monuments that often depict historical characters or were
inspired
by legends from 1,001 Nights' but is obliged instead to do
miniatures
does not greatly excite my sympathies.]
*Ý U.S. Bombs Iraqi Air Defense Site
*Ý The hostage nation [Powerful denunciation of
current UN policy by Hans
von
Sponeck and Denis Halliday]
DEPLETED
URANIUM
*Ý Going Backwards ‚ US Wins Defeat of Depleted
Uranium Study [This was
communicated
to the list and I have been unable to find a URL or date for
it, but
it seems very important that the US should be preventing a proper
investigation
of the whole question of the use of depleted uranium]
*Ý A chamber of horrors so close to the 'Garden
of Eden' [Powerful
description
from the Independent of the health effects of the Gulf War and
its
aftermath]
NORTHERN
IRAQ/SOUTHERN KURDISTAN
*Ý The Kurdistan's national federation and Jund
al-Islam group
IRAQI
OPPOSITION
*Ý A tale of 70 factions and 400 suits [An
unkind but probably accurate
description
of what the US Imperialist press like to call the 'democratic
opposition'
in Iraq. Points to the problems but doesn't say much about the
reasons
for those problems. But as in the case of S.Hussein himself what is
interesting
is the causes - why such a person should get into such a
position
- not the badness of otherwise of the individuals concerned]
IRAQ1/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Round-table conference on Russia-Iraq trade opens
in Moscow
*Ý Iraq to double its trade with India
NEW
WORLD ORDER
*Ý US a terrorist state: Chomsky [Not much
about Iraq but included just for
the
pleasure of reading someone able to see what is going on in front of his
nose]
*Ý In Role Reversal, War Criticism Is Mostly
From Right [Extract on views of
William
Kristol, editor of the US paper the Weekly Standard, on he need for
an
'American liberal, imperial role in the world'. In case anyone's
wondering,
the terms 'liberal' and 'imperial' are not at all, historically
speaking,
contradictory.]
URL
ONLY:
http://www.iht.com/articles/39860.html
*Ý Now Arab and Muslim Societies Need to Wage a
War of Ideas
by
Thomas L. Friedman
International
Herald Tribune, from The New York Times, 24th November
Moral teachings
from the most enlightened and peaceloving nation in the
world.
A treat for the masochists in our midst.
The
most important article in the following is, it seems to me, 'US forces
suspension
of Germ War pact' in the Biological Weapons section. Why is
no-one
advocating loud and clear for a UNIVERSAL weapons inspection system
which
would, of course, include Iraq ... as well as the fountainhead of all
weapons
of mass destruction ‚ the USA?
Two
separate supplements - a general interest one and a Kurdish one ‚ will,
hopefully,
follow.
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý The case for tough action against Iraq [A
confused article which points
out
that 'For most of the Cold War, Latin America either languished under
pro-Western,
murderous fascist autocracies or endured insurgency from
murderous
pro-Western guerrillas' and claims that Ayatollah Khomeini's Iran
is now
evolving towards democracy. The natural conclusion is that we should
stop
interfering and end sanctions. Instead he advocates military backing to
the
INC. Who are to Iraq (or would be if they had the bottle) what the
Contras
were to Nicaragua.]
*Ý Will Iraq be next? What the experts say [The
consensus here is against
the
likelihood of a war against Iraq at least in the short term. Somalia is
seen as
the likely next beneficiary of our attentions. For more on this see
'For
now, the military goes on hold' in the General Supplement. Possibly
vengeance
for past humiliations?]
*Ý Russia Would Oppose Attack on Iraq
*Ý Secret US plan for Iraq war
*Ý Saddam's Time Is Up [Note how the KDP, the
largest element in the
administration
of the Kurdish autonomous zone, are here reduced to an
unnamed
'Kurdish faction', and the fact that the US missile reprisal for
S.Hussein's
Kurdish intervention in 1996 was launched well away from the
action,
in Southern Iraq isn't mentioned.]
*Ý Mandela Says Attack on Iraq Would Be
'Disaster' ["The United States and
Britain
have acted without going through the United Nations...What they are
doing
is to say if you fear there could be a veto of your action, you are
entitled
to act independently of the Security Council.'' Quite. And not for
the
first time.]
*Ý Targeting Saddam: Was there an Iraqi 9/11
link? Evidence is thin, but
regime's
links to bin Laden and al-Qaeda run deep [Curious thesis that
S.Hussein
was financing the GIA in Algeria. Which seems ludicrous since the
hardline
anti-Islamist element in the Algerian army are surely spiritual
brethren
to Saddam if anyone is. We also learn that Butler's inspection team
was
penetrated by Iraqi intelligence ‚ and we always thought it was the CIA
that
had, well, rather more than penetrated it ...]
*Ý Lawmakers Urge Bush to Make Iraq Next Target
LITTLE
FINGER POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Britain should support Iraqi rebels, says
Duncan Smith
*Ý Straw warns Iraq on terror threat [Straw
says: 'under international law,
any
country was entitled to take pre-emptive military action in self-defence
if it
had "very good information" that another country or terror
organisation
was planning to attack.' Wouldn't that justify under present
circumstances
a pre-emptive strike against the US on the part of Iraq? Or
the
pre-emptive strike the Iraqis launched against Iran? Or the Japanese
against
the US ‚ who had already imposed an embargo on Japan before Pearl
Harbour?]
*Ý NATO Head Says Defense Clause May Cover Iraq
-Paper [By agreeing to the
Afghan
adventure the little chicks of NATO have agreed to anything else
Mother
Hen might decide to do. Lord Robertson dixit.]
and, in
News, 1-7/12/01 (2)
IRAQI
OPPOSITION
*Ý Iraqi opposition against US striking Iraq
[The Supreme Council for the
Islamic
Revolution ‚ the ones actually active, conducting a terrorist
campaign,
on the ground].
*Ý Iraqi opposition for forming a plenary
national government [An
anti-Saddam,
anti-US group called the Islamic reconciliation movement making
anti-US
noises on an official visit to Kuwait. Can't be bad.]
*Ý New moves for the Iraqi opposition
URL
ONLY:
http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/12/01/wirq1
01.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/12/01/ixhome.html
*Ý The search for a force to topple a tyrant
by Anton
La Guardia
Daily
Telegraph, 1st December
Standard
account of INC.
BIOLOGICAL
WEAPONS ETC
*Ý Differing Views on Anthrax Source [Is it a
government? Or isn't it? Guess
what
the ex-Iraq arms inspector thinks]
*Ý Eye on a Worldwide Weapons Cache [by Richard
Lugar. 'To restate the terms
of
minimal victory in the war we are now fighting, every nation that has
weapons
and materials of mass destruction must account for what it has,
safely
secure what it has (spending its own money or obtaining international
technical
and financial resources to do so) and pledge that no other nation,
cell or
cause will be allowed access or use.' Which is fine, but Lugar
doesn't
seem to include the US among the nations that have to do the
accounting]
*Ý Germ Weapons Talks Blocked as U.S. Points
Finger [US names 6 countries
possibly
involved in germ weapons production. Israel isn't one of them. Nor
is the
US.]
*Ý US Forces Suspension of Germ War Pact, EU
Angry [The very important
implication
of this article is that Iraq agreed to spot checks and the US
rejected
them. The EU is said to be angry. It should be a lot angrier.]
OIL FOR
FOOD
*Ý Iraq Accepts Oil Deal, Rejects List of Goods
[Indicates that the renewal
of the
Oil for Food arrangement does not quite amount to Russian endorsement
for
introducing smart sanctions next summer, as was suggested in an article
posted
last week]
*Ý The UN's Iraqi sanctions policy leaves
issues in air
IRAQI‚MIDDLE
EAST/ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Kuwait and striking Iraq [Tells us that T.Blair
and Jack Straw have told
the
Kuwaitis that 'any military strike against Iraq will be painful and
effective
as well as differ from previous strikes.' The article goes on to
discuss
the apparent disappearance of an Iraqi representative in Egypt.]
*Ý Turkish preparations of possible US attacks
against Iraq
*Ý 3,500 books collected so far, for Iraq [A
little intrusion of common
sense
and decency. Quite out of place in its present company: 'This
campaign's
philosophy emanated from the belief that we should lead practical
initiatives
to help break the embargo on Iraq, instead of only calling for a
lifting
of the embargo.'
*Ý Powell Says No Plans for Iraq Attack
*Ý No to inoculations and a halt to
fear-mongering [The very interesting
Israeli
paper Ha'aretz reckons that Iraq is quite broken as a military force
and
poses no threat to Israel in the event of a US attack]
IRAQI/INTERNATIONAL
RELATIONS
*Ý Indonesian vice-president visits Iraq
*Ý Iraqi National Executed in Okla. [Eighteenth
execution in Oklahoma this
year]
GENERAL INTEREST
SUPPLEMENT, 1-7/12/01
These
are some items of general interest, picked up on the way, relating to
the New
World Order but not directly to Iraq.
*Ý Silent Peril Lies in Wait for Afghanistan's
People [Unexploded cluster
bombs]
*Ý Uphill Bid to Oust Lone Dissenter [Attempt
by Audie Bock, former Green
Party
activist, to overthrow the only US Congress opponent of the war
against
Afghanistan, Barbara Lee. Shades of Joschka Fischer.]
*Ý The Mouth That Roars Is Testing U.S.
Patience {Hugo Chavez. The argument
is that
the US cannot afford to tolerate anything in the world other than an
unfailing
and awed state of admiration.]
*Ý U.S. Presses Terror War in 7 Nations
[Probably quite realistic assessment
of the
next moves in the jihad against 'terrorism'.]
*Ý Recycling the oil weapon [Argument that fear
of an oil embargo shouldn't
inhibit
the US drive to conquer the world, for its own safety of course]
*Ý Interpol lacks tools to fight terror, says
head [Interpol marginalised
because
it includes countries ‚ Iraq for example ‚ which the US doesn't
like.]
*Ý For now, the military goes on hold [Includes
a passing reference to a
horror
most of us probably hadn't noticed: 'the US freezing of funds linked
to
Somalia's leading financial house, al-Barakaat, is already hitting home.
Remittances
from Somalis working abroad sent via al-Barakaat are Somalia's
largest
single source of income. This US financial offensive is devastating
enough.']
The
most important item this week might be the 'Stop Press', undermining the
Mohammad
Atta meets Iraqi agent in Prague story (apparently the flights from
the US are
accounted for by another - Pakistani - Mohammad Atta). But we've
had
disapppointments on this one before. Triumph after triumph in
Afghanistan
has left the US government feeling they can do whatever they
like
(and perhaps they can). There has been a US delegation, with Turks in
tow, to
the Kurdish autonomous zone; and the US have transferred the
Headquarters
of their military operations in the Middle East and Central
Asia to
Kuwait. The Kuwaitis don't seem to mind despite some small pretense
of
opposition to the Afghan war.
STOP
PRESS
*Ý Czech paper casts doubt on suicide bomber's
meeting with Iraqi agent [If
this is
true, and it hasn't yet turned up in any of the usual sources, the
Czechs
are reverting to their first story, that Mohamed Atta only spent one
night
in Prague and they don't know what he did]
FINGER
POINTING AT IRAQ
*Ý Annan warns US against carrying terror war
to Iraq
*Ý US Policy Toward Iraq [Lengthy account of
bland address by US Ambassador
David
Mack to the Royal Institute of International Affairs. Includes a list
of nice
things the Iraqis could expect if (somehow) they could acquire 'a
new
leadership'. They would for example, be allowed to eat. And to look
after
their sick.]
*Ý Bush points to Iraq as his next target
*Ý Cheney: Iraq Still a Threat
*Ý Iraqi opposition needs unified US policy
[From the Lebanese Star,
advocating
US intervention in Iraq. Does this mean that the Syrians favour
US
intervention in Iraq? Or that the Syrians permit - um - freedom of speech
in the Lebanon?
The article includes the following very remarkable statement
I
haven't seen anywhere else: 'Donald Rumsfeld questioned the efficacy of
the
arms inspection regime by saying on Dec. 2 that 'we sent arms inspectors
into
Iraq for years, but they never found anything important.' Rumsfeld went
on to
say that the only way the West knew of the extent of Iraq's weapons
programs
was through Iraqi defectors.']
*Ý Resist the Urge to Attack Iraq [by Said
Aburish, President Hussein's
biographer.
He thinks that the US should in principle overthrow President
Hussein,
but not now. The Iraqi opposition is hopeless and contains criminal
elements.
Arab opinion would be against it. Unfortunately the triumph in
Afghanistan,
not to mention Kosovo, suggests that hopeless, criminal
oppositions
do OK when helped by massive American bombing, and that
Arab/Muslim
opinion is easily divided and will bow before the wind of stern
US
resolve. Once the right to overthrow governments at will is conceded, the
practical
objections, given the overwhelming nature of US firepower and the
total
brutality with which it is used, do not count for very much]
*Ý Attack on Iraq? [A symposium of Nobel Peace
laureates says don't go after
Iraq]
*Ý House committee gives Iraq 'one last chance'
[US House of Representatives
International
Relations Committee. Note the dissent of the One Just Man (Rep
Ron
Paul from Texas, a Republican)]
URL
ONLY:
http://www.dawn.com/2001/12/14/int16.htm
*Ý Bush has no strong case to attack Iraq
by
Henri J. Barkey
Dawn
(apparently from Washington Post), 14th December
Despite
the headline the article in principle supports an invasion but
thinks
the INC is too divided and weak to play the role of Northern Alliance
(which was
also supposed to be pretty divided and weak). We learn, or I
learn
since I didn't know it, that Chalabi is a Shia.
NEW
WORLD ORDER
*Ý 12 Americans Win Judgment Against Iraq Over
Captivity [US judge awards
$309
million damages against Iraq because of the harm done by the Iraqis to
US
citizens. Adolf Hitler is considering launching a similar plaint against
the
World Jewish Congress.]
*Ý Is the Ugly American Back? [Anxiety that if
Somalia is a target, Kenya
might
be one too]
*Ý Terror hit list drawn up by US [Indonesia,
Yemen, Somalia. Oh and Iraq.]
*Ý Bush weighs options beyond Afghanistan
[Large amounts of money going to
various
countries, including Philippines, Uzbekistan and Turkey, for
'counterterrorism'
ie purchase of weapons of mass destruction?]
*Ý U.S. needs a PR offensive to win the war of
ideas [Suggestions for
persuading
the world that Americans are really good people and only do
things
that are noble and just. The suggestions include 'Fill foreign media
with
American views and voices' and 'Develop message campaigns with
Hollywood,
Madison Avenue'. The article comes to you embellished with some
remarks
of my own about the various misapprehensions about US policy that
still
exist in the world]
*Ý Can mass murderers make peace? [Ranging over
Israel/Palestine, Iraq and
Afghanistan.
By Mahir Ali who appears to be a rather good, punchy writer]
and, in
News, 8-14/12/01 (2)
WEAPONS
OF MASS DESTRUCTION
*Ý US holds up biological weapons control,
despite anthrax attacks [We had
this news
last week but it can't be repeated too often. The US have refused
a
system of inspecting biological weapons everyone else, including Iraq, was
willing
to adopt on the grounds that they have to protect the commercial
secrets
of private companies]
*Ý U.S. Scuttles Germ War Conference
*Ý German suspected of dabbling in Iraq weapons
trade
*Ý Iraqi Defector Warns Congress of Saddam's
Weapons {Hamza talking to the
'bicameral,
bipartisan task force on non-proliferation'.]
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EASTERN-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Jordan seeks bids for oil pipeline from Iraq
*Ý Pentagon switch in Gulf heralds wider war
[You learn something every day.
I
hadn't realised that the HQ of US military operations in the Middle East
and
Central Asia was in Georgia. Georgia, readers may remember, was once the
only
member of the CIS that didn't have a former Soviet apparatchik for a
President
- until he was ousted by Edvard Chevardnaze. He who liked, while
still
Foreign Secretary of the USSR, to be photographed out fishing with
G.Bush
Sr ...]
*Ý Kuwait: U.S. move not linked to Iraq
*Ý Woolsey's admittance insufficient: Daily [It
seems that James Woolsey has
been in
Iran where he said that the US had been wrong to back Saddam during
the
Iran/Iraq war. Meaning, presumably, that they should have let Ayatollah
Khomeini
take Iraq? And, as this Iranian article argues, should they not now
accept
responsibility for President Hussein's use of chemical weapons
against
the Iranians (which, unlike the Kurdish incident, is rarely
mentioned
because it is a crime in which he US is deeply implicated)?]
*Ý Turkey to drill for oil in Kurdish-held
northern Iraq
*Ý $3.68bn of contractual agreements for
Egyptian companies in Iraq
*Ý USD 14 billion the volume of Iraqi trade
exchange with Arab states
GULF
WAR SYNDROME
*Ý Decade after gulf war, GI illnesses tied to
Lou Gehrig's disease
SOUTHERN
KURDISTAN/NORTHERN IRAQ
*Ý A High Level U.S. Delegation Visits Southern
(Iraqi) Kurdistan
[supposedly
to bring about reconciliation between the KDP and the PUK. Who
are, we
are always being told, reconciled]
*Ý USA delegation to Kurdistan to renew USA
commitment to protect Kurds
[Includes
the little detail that the US delegation includes a Turkish
contingent]
*Ý Kurds wary of Turkish troop movements
REFUGEES
*Ý Smuggler of Iraqis sent home [Saudi trying
to help three Iraqi women to
enter
New Zealand.]
*Ý Between sky and earth [Depressing tale of
the fate of refugees in
Australia]
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Cancer disaster in Iraq
What
small amount of evidence there was for an Iraqi involvment in the
events
of September 11th begins to fade into the shadow of a shadow, but
this
does not deter the Masters of War. The war against Iraq argument has
become
so dominant that I've had to hive it off into a separate, and still
pretty
big, supplement.
Silliest
quote of the week comes from this supplement, from 'The spymaster's
prescription':
'According to [James] Woolsey, Israel and the US are
hated"because
we are free"'. In fact the US is hated because it is a
terrorist
nation 'with global reach'. Its commitment to freedom and
democracy
is for purely internal consumption (and even then its principle
idea is
in fact not freedom but 'capitalism' or, rather, moneygrubbing).
Internationally
it behaves according to the most extreme precepts of the
theory
of Absolute Monarchy. It believes itself to be sovereign over the
law,
able to dictate what law is applicable, when, and to whom.
Witness
for example the trial of Slobodan Milosevic on charges which,
however
serious, still fall short of the accusations that have been levelled
against
many of the people the US is currently installing in power in
Afghanistan.
Witness also how those who never stop talking about the
desirability
of assassinating President Hussein are full of moral outrage
over
the attempt to assassinate G.Bush (in Kuwait in 1993); or that those
who
claim a legal right to 'destroy' a country which they say threatens them
(see
Jack Straw's recent defence of the principle of the pre-emptive strike,
of the
Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, for example) never consider that if
there
is one country in the world that is threatened it is surely Iraq, so
that,
under their logic, Iraq has a perfect legal right to 'destroy' the US.
But, it
seems, we're only at the beginning of many years of constant,
unremitting
hypocritical and murderous blather of this kind. That's what the
'War against
terror' is all about. Difficult to know what to do about it but
one
thing that can definitely be done is to expose it, constantly,
unremittingly,
on every possible opportunity.
And oh,
I nearly forgot, Merry Christmas.
FINGER
POINTING AWAY FROM IRAQ
*Ý Capitol Hill Anthrax Matches Army's Stocks
[Although this article says
nothing
about who was sending the anthrax or why, it seems to rule out
definitively
any possibility that it originated in a laboratory in Iraq.
Funny
this hasn't attracted much publicity. It also reveals, that the CIA,
unbeknown
to anyone, is - IS - engaged in a programme of manufacturing
anthrax]
*Ý New Clue Fails to Explain Iraq Role in Sept.
11 Attack [Article in the NY
Times
which throws doubt on Atta meets Iraqi spy story without denying it
entirely]
*Ý Czechs Insist Atta Met With Spy
*Ý Iraq link to Sept 11 attack and anthrax is
ruled out [Interesting that
the
most emphatic denial of the story should appear in the Daily Telegraph.
Doesn't
say much about the anthrax]
DEFECTORS
*Ý What are the Americans up to in Iraq?
[General Wafiq al-Samarai, who
defected
in 1994. He also pops up in the generals' reunion in the 'strategy'
supplement:
'Searching for Saddam's replacement'. Here he argues that an
attack
on Iraq is unlikely since no-one wants to have to rely on the Kurds.
One
assumes that General al-Samarai has had some experience of the Kurds]
*Ý Inspectors in Iraq? Hiding His Weapons Is
Easy for Saddam [By Khidr
Hamza. Note
that Khidr Hamza has boasted that he was in charge of chemical
weapons
production at the time of the attack on Halabja. Yet instead of
facing
prosecution for war crimes he is 'President of the Council on Middle
Eastern
Affairs'. He must be doing something to please someone]
*Ý Iraqi Defector Seeks Political Change [Najib
al'Salhi of the Movement of
Free
Officers. Defected six years ago but claims to have been clandestinely
trying
to oppose Saddam within the army for seventeen years previous to
that]
* ÝIraqi defector says he renovated secret
weapons labs [This and the next
two
articles concern Adnan Ihsan Saeed al-Haider, who gave an interview in
Bangkok,
apparently a thriving centre of anti-Saddam feeling if the 'Bangkok
Post'
is anything to go by. He specialises in cement and sealing materials
and
thinks some of the places where he works were being used for chemical or
biological
weapon manufacture]
*Ý Refugee has Iraqi terror documents [Richard
Butler is very convinced]
*Ý Brother fears for Iraqi defector
*Ý Saddam death squad bared ['Abu Zeinab
al-Qurairy, a former brigadier
general
in Iraq's Mukhabarat intelligence service', who claims to have
trained
the people behind the Sept 11th attack - or perhaps the people
behind
the people ... So why has he not been thrown into prison?]
and, in
News, 13-22/12/01
(2)
REMNANTS
OF DECENCY
*Ý "A Message From a Learned Scholar to US
President" [Denunciation of
President
Bush from an Egyptian cleric. It may have lost a bit in the
translation
but its a powerful piece of writing: 'I say, rest assured, there
is no
Muslim on earth who loves you, even if he donates blood to you or let
you set
up intelligence stations or let you design curricula for his people.
Everyone
on earth who claims to love you - and none of the Muslims can make
such a
claim - only loves you in the sense that the frightened prey loves
the
predatory beast.'
*Ý Say no to Saddam this Christmas - turn down
a date [Buying or selling
dates
from Iraq is a criminal offence liable to up to five years
imprisonment.
Or perhaps now indefinite internment without trial if one
happens
not to be a British citizen. I hope we're all taking advantage of
the
opportunity offered ...]
*Ý ...An attack adds to Iraqis' misery [Article
by US academic. Recounts
entertaining
story that shows the amiable, easygoing nature of the Iraqis
and
suggests, but very mildly and politely, that torturing them even further
isn't a
good thing to do]
LIGHTWEIGHT
NATIONS OF THE WORLD
*Ý Regimes seek way to support attack on Iraq
[Egypt and Turkey haggle over
their
price. Turkey is still whining about all the money it lost because of
the
Gulf War and the embargo. But if they were sincerely in favour of the
war and
embargo they should be ready to pay the price; if they were opposed
to
them, they should have expressed their opposition publicly. They are, to
say the
least of it, not deserving of any sympathy]
*Ý SAS may fight in Iraq [The SAS in question comes
from Australia which is
trying
to get in on the act]
URLs
ONLY:
http://www.irna.com/newshtm/eng/26151817.htm
*Ý Putin opposed to US extending war to Iraq
IRNA,
17th December
Given
what Putin represents in the world, his remarks would only be of
interest
if they were, in some way, intellectually stimulating. Which they
aren't
http://www.irna.com/newshtm/eng/26193954.htm
*Ý Schroeder warns Bush against attacking Iraq
IRNA,
17th December
Ditto
for Schroeder
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/18/international/middleeast/18ARAB.html?pagew
anted=print
*Ý The other shoe
by Neil
MacFarquhar
New
York Times, 18th December
On the
attitudesÝ of various Arab governments.
Pretty predictable.
http://www.iht.com/articles/42432.html
*Ý A Lonely Crusade Against Saddam
by
Thomas L. Friedman
The New
York Times, 20th December
On the
reasons Middle Eastern countries and Russia might have for not
wanting
to support a US attack on Iraq.
INSIDE
IRAQ
*Ý Internet in Iraq: Limited, appreciated
*Ý New 'Saddam' novel hits the stands
and, in
News, 13-22/12/01
(3)
SOUTHERN
KURDISTAN/NORTHERN IRAQ
*Ý Iraqi Kurds buoyed by US visit
*Ý U.S. Again Placing Focus on Ousting Hussein
[This appears here because I
just
give a short extract in which Talabani and the PUK present themselves
as
America's best friend in the region at the expense of Barzani and the
KDP:
'Iraqi opposition figures say Mr. Barzani has extensive business
operations
with Mr. Hussein's relatives.']
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EAST - ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Turkish oil drilling has Iraq's backing
*Ý Iraqi clergy died in exile, in Iran
*Ý Saddam Hussein Calls for Arab Summit [in
Mecca, as it happens. Perhaps
not a
bad idea given the gravity of the situation facing Muslims at the
present
time]
*Ý Egyptian medical team visits Iraq
*Ý In coordination with ICRC, Kuwait is ready
to search for Iraqi missing
*Ý Iraq set to renew oil and trade protocol
with Jordan
ENFORCING
THE EMBARGO
*Ý US navy attacks Iran oil tanker in Gulf
*Ý Iran, United States Dispute Oil Tanker
Incident
IRAQI/UN
RELATIONS
*Ý U.N. Compensation Commission Awards $132.7
Million
REFUGEES
*Ý Iraqi pleads guilty in hazmat license
bribery [Case of an Iraqi refugee
trying
to get a license to drive a heavy goods vehicle. The judge
congratulates
the FBI and US Attorney's office for behaving fairly in this
'very
difficult time in our nation's history.']
*Ý Crackdown imperils Mideast exiles [The
article covers two cases of
political
persecution in Prague: an Uzbek dissident and an Iraqi journalist.
Only
the bits dealing with the Iraqi are given here. One of the personae in
the
story is the master spy or minor functionary of the Iraqi embassy,
al-Ani,
he who is supposed to have met Mohammad Atta, so the story overlaps
with
the Mohammad Atta story above].
*Ý Iraqi ex-guard fights deportation [From
Australia. But the poor man did
everything
wrong. He should have claimed high rank in President Hussein's
personal
guard and announced that he had exciting revelations about Saddam's
secret
weapons capacity ...]
*Ý Iraqi family in fear after attacks
*Ý Security alert over Saddam link [A fellow
working for Air New Zealand who
turns
out to be Saddam Hussein's stepson]
*Ý Iraqis held in Somalia
*Ý Searching for Saddam's replacement [This
appears to be the old Clinton
establishment
gathering together a bunch of ex-cronies of S.Hussein,
top-ranking
officers of the Iraqi army at the time of the Iran/Kurdish war,
with a
view to encouraging a coup d'Ètat. This, it must never be forgotten,
has
always been the US ideal - that Saddam should be overthrown by someone
as like
him as possible]
*Ý End Iraq [Although this article makes
unpleasant reading, is deliberately
and
offensively racist, I find myself in almost total agreement with it, if
we take
the key sentence to be the following: 'Nothing is so dangerous as
leaving
an aggrieved enemy hanging on and able to strike back - he should
either
be befriended outright (the French approach) or destroyed' (He goes
on to
talk about Hannibal. It is very interesting to see how naturally and
universally
the US has taken to identifying itself with the Roman Empire). I
myself
favour what is here called the 'French' approach (if only it were)
but
recognise that the Americans are incapable of it. In which case the
logic
that flows from the second alternative, 'destroyed' (Carthago delenda
est)
prevails. It is laid out here quite well in all its glory. The only
false
note, the only piece of obvious hypocrisy, comes when, after
immeasurable
contempt has been expressed for all Arabs, everywhere, the
writer
mumbles the phrase 'making it clear that the war was against the
regime
and not the Iraqi people'. Perhaps the same could have been said of
the
Roman campaign against Carthage. There is an interesting quote from King
Faisal
in 1933 expressing great contempt for his subjects (the people who
were
delivered over to him by British imperialism). Lowry quotes it
approvingly,
but if there is any truth in it then we can only be all the
more
impressed at S.Hussein's achievement in welding such unpromising
material
into a united nation able to sustain the horrors of the 10 year war
with
Iran, followed by the horrors imposed by ourselves and our American
allies]
*Ý The Iraq Hawks {Long article in the New
Yorker by Seymour Hersh laying
out in
some detail the INC proposal for overthrowing S.Hussein. It relies
heavily
on the Shi'ites and on Iran, possibly because after the previous
effort,
from Kurdistan, relations with the Kurds are frayed. I have to
confess
that it all seems perfectly feasible to me.]
*Ý Seymour Hersh: U.S. debates move on Iraq
*Ý Is Iraq next for U.S. terror campaign? [A
very brief summary of the above
items,
plus disclaimers from Powell and Rice.]
and, in
US strategy,
13-22/12/01 (2)
*Ý Washington hawks get power boost [Guardian
article on the impetus
currently
enjoyed by the warmongers]
*Ý NSC head: Iran, Iraq, Syria must be
confronted [This is actually about
Israeli
strategy but the distinction between Israeli and US strategy with
regard
to keeping Arabs in line is becoming a little blurred]
*Ý 'U.S. has no plans to strike Iraq at
present' [Condoleezza Rice
addressing
a conference in Israel]
*Ý Liberate Iraq, Unleash Democracy [This
article gives an interesting
account
of the 1995/6 debacle in the Kurdish zone, indicating that the INC
were
comprehensively betrayed by the CIA. It doesn't mention that Iraqi
troops
entered the autonomous zone at the invitation of the KDP because the
PUK was
effectively supporting an invasion from Iran. We can only assume
that
the US breathed a huge sigh of relief when S.Hussein intervened to sort
the
whole thing out ('clean it up', as the Americans might say), despite the
massacre
of the INC presence which ensued. The article also shows the
academic
specialist in Muslim fundamentalism, Bernard Lewis, as a supporter
of the
goal of US world hegemony]
*Ý The march to Baghdad [Extract expressing
Israeli unease that if Saddam is
faced
with certain death nothing will restrain him from doing something
unimaginably
terrible]
*Ý U.S. massing its troops near Iraq
*Ý Middle Israel: The Babylonian Option[A
comparatively benign Jewish vision
of the
post Saddam settlement, leaving us wondering how the 'Middle Israel'
phrase
crept into the title]
*Ý The spymaster's prescription [A really nasty
piece of work from James
Woolsey,
speaking in Israel. It leaves me regretting that literature from
the
Nazi and Fascist eras is not more readily available. It would make for
interesting
comparisons, for example with the following: 'When this is over,
either
we are going to be held in contempt in the Mideast as we are now, or
we are
going to be feared and respected. There is nothing in between.'Ý In
one
respect, Woolsey does differ from Hitler, perhaps learning from his
experience,
when he advises Israel that 'Occupations of a hostile population
are not
easy to run'. He suggests, as if Israel needed the advice, dividing
the
Palestinians into 'self-governing' bantustans entirely at Israel's mercy
and
rigorously excluded from access to the Israeli economy. In fact much
like
the Nazi ghetto system. He concludes, however, with what one assumes is
a
light-hearted touch of satirical humour:Ý
"For democracies, war is the
last
resort. It's the first resort for dictators who need foreign enemies."]
URLs
ONLY:
http://observer.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,619658,00.html
*Ý Iraq after Saddam
by
David L Mack
The
Observer , 16th December
This is
basically the same text that appeared in last weeks (8-14/12/01)
news
report as 'US Policy Toward Iraq', this time presented as a newspaper
article.
It indicates all the good things Iraqis can expect once somehow
S.Hussein
vanishes. They may, for a start, be allowed to breathe
http://atimes.com/c-asia/CL18Ag01.html
*Ý How to unseat Saddam
by
Michael Eisenstadt
Asia
Times, 18th December
['a
condensed version of an essay that appears in the Winter 2001-02 issue
of The
National Interest (www.nationalinterest.org). Michael Eisenstadt is a
senior
fellow of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.) Foreign
Policy
Research Institute, 1528 Walnut Street, Suite 610, Philadelphia, PA
19102-3684.
For information, contact Alan Luxenberg at 215-732 3774,
extension
105 or email fpri@fpri.org or visit www.fpri.org'
These
details of where the article comes from are the only bits of hard
information
on offer. Otherwise its just a bit of armchair strategy of the
sort
anyone could put together. And people get paid for this sort of thing]
http://www.irna.com/newshtm/eng/26143751.htm
*Ý Iraqi opposition seeks Iran and US help to
topple Saddam
IRNA,
17th December
Essentially
a summary of the Seymour Hersh article given elsewhere, but
worth
noticing that the Iranian news agency doesn't deny that Iran could be
used in
this way, and note also this curious quote: 'The INC is "not the
only
Iraqi opposition group being funded by the Bush Administration and not
the
only group capable of working through Iran," the New Yorker quoted a
senior
US government official saying'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,619842,00.html
*Ý Iraqi opposition urges US to make war on
Baghdad
by
David Teather
The
Guardian, 17th December
Essentially
taken from the Seymour Hersh article.
Quote
of the week (from 'Next terrorism war target likely Yemen or in
Africa'
in the 'New World Order' section): "My feeling is that what's likely
to
happen after Afghanistan is that we'll tackle Yemen, Sudan and Somalia,
and
then Lebanon and Syria, and then we'll go after Iraq with an
ultimatum.",
Rep Tom Lantos, Democrat. Reassuring, eh?
INCITEMENT
TO HATRED
*Ý Attack Iraq, Butler urges [After this, and
others like it, can anyone
believe
that R.Butler was a suitable man to lead the 'United Nations'
weapons
inspection team? Can anyone doubt that the sole purpose of this team
had
become to devise pretexts for prolonging the sanctions regime? Can
anyone
doubt that the individual most directly, personally responsible for
the
fact that there is now no surveillance of Iraq's military capacity, is
Richard
Butler?]
*Ý Saddam's henchmen 'ordered crowds to greet
MP in Iraq' [by David Rose in
The
Observer. This is nasty piece of work aimed to blacken one of the very
few
British MPs worthy of respect, George Galloway.]
*Ý Not a 'single tear' for Iraqi leader
[Alexander Rose in the Toronto
National
Post has only just discovered S.Hussein's first book, never mind
his
second. He says its 'dreadful', so we assume it must have been
translated
into English (surely he wouldn't say such a thing without having
read
it). He's also just discovered the existence of the Koran written in
Saddam's
blood but saves himself in the nick of time from declaring that to
be
'dreadful' too. And he's found a Saudi journalist who says Saddam should
be
overthrown. So there's no problem about Arab opinion.]
*Ý 'US plans Iraq war' [This article has
Turkey, Jordan, Kuwait and Saudi
Arabia
all declaring their preparedness to cooperate in a war against Iraq]
*Ý Old plan for Iraq is topical again [Extract.
Account of plan devised by
Gen
Wayne Downing (ret) for backing INC to overthrow Saddam. We learn that
'A 1995
Kurdish insurrection in the north, half-heartedly backed by the CIA
and
instigated by the Iraqi National Congress, was crushed by Saddam in
1996.
He played one Kurdish faction off against another, executing more than
100
Chalabi supporters.' Which wasn't how I understood it at the time. It
appeared
as a confrontation between the PUK, backed by Iran, which was about
to wipe
out the KDP, which turned to Saddam for help ...]
*Ý The liberal case for attacking Iraq [This is
a remarkable piece of what
one is
tempted to call 'chutzpah'. Last week readers will recall a racist
rant
from Mr Lowry of the 'National Review' ('End Iraq'). This week he
explains
why a new Iraq massacre should be supported by left wing liberals
(and
'Owlish college professors' - somehow he just can't keep his cloven
hoof
concealed). But we learn the oddest things, for example that April
Glaspie
warned S.Hussein NOT to invade Kuwait, when we had all thought she
gave
him the go-ahead ('Saddam, the represser of women, must go'); and that
Saddam
is the enemy of the Biological Weapons Convention (though he accepted
it),
not the US (which refused it). The US refused it, it seems, because
Saddam
accepted it. If many thousands of Iraqis wre blown to smithereens ‚
and
Saddam with them ‚ then, Mr Lowry seems to be saying, the US would allow
international
inspectors to mull over the trade secrets of its
pharmaceutical
industry!]
URL
ONLY:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,625183,00.html
*Ý Plan resurfaces to target Saddam
by
Julian Borger
Guardian,
28th December
Apart
from the name 'General Wayne Downing', there really isn't anything new
in
this.
FINGER
POINTING AWAY FROM IRAQ
*Ý U.S. Inquiry Tried, but Failed, to Link Iraq
to Anthrax Attack
*Ý Doubts arise on Iraqi link to attacks
[Extract which expresses fairly
succinctly
the present state of knowledge on the Prague connection. Which
amounts
to this: Atta was, or wasn't, seen with al-Ani in Prague in April
2001.
But there is no record of him coming to Prague in April 2001]
*Ý Iraq fades as likely next target [Extract
giving little quoted annual
State
Department assessment of Iraq's activities in the terrorist domain.
Almost
non existent, it concludes.]
and, in
News, 22-28/12/01
(2)
IRAQI/MIDDLE
EASTERN-ARAB WORLD RELATIONS
*Ý Russia to make efforts not to allow bombings
of Iraq - speaker [The
interest
of this article does not lie in the opinions of the speaker of the
Russian
Duma but in the movements of the Qatari Emir sheikh Hamad bin
Hhalifa
Al Thani]
*Ý Daily cautions Saudi gov't of pro-Iraqi policy
[Iran News, warning Saudis
against
friendship with the US and Britain (responsible for the Taliban
debacle)
and also against overtures they've apparently been making towards
Baghdad]
*Ý Progress in the Iraqi-Iranian talks
[Although all this exchange of
prisoners
and of the dead seems incredibly slow and tedious, at least it is
happening,
unlike the similar negotiations with Kuwait. Perhaps because the
US and
Britain haven't insisted on inserting themselves into the process.]
*Ý Turkey Renews Mandate for North Iraq Patrols
[This renewal is opposed by
the
'Islamist opposition'. You know, the one that was the democratically
elected
government until it was overthrown by a USÝ
backed military coup]
*Ý Iraq minister to visit Tehran next month
*Ý Iran and Iraq want big cuts in oil
production
*Ý Iraq Reports a Hit on 'Enemy' Craft
*Ý Iraqi FM: Iran-Iraq relations have roots in
history
*Ý Iraq hits out at Turkey over no-fly zone
mandate [Some good advice to
Turkey
from Baghdad]
*Ý Iraqis [which is to say in this case the
Iraqi Football Federation] cut
ties
with UAE
*Ý Abu al-Ragheb [Prime Minister of Jordan] to
visit Iraq [The article seems
to
suggests that King Abdallah is willing to act as Bush's messenger boy to
Iraq]
*Ý Amman endorses construction of Jordan-Iraq
oil pipeline
*Ý Egyptian- Iraqi talks [on energy supply]
*