|
The
Big Lie
By
David
Krieger
President, Nuclear Age Peace
Foundation
TFF
associate
June 23, 2003
The Bush administration told the American people over
and over again that war against Iraq was necessary
because Saddam Hussein was lying about not having weapons
of mass destruction. We were told that Saddam Hussein's
weapons of mass destruction were an imminent threat to
the United States. We were told that our government knew
where those weapons of mass destruction were located. And
yet, after another brutal war in which thousands of
innocent civilians were killed, the Bush Administration
can produce no evidence that Saddam Hussein had the
weapons of mass destruction.
Prior to the war, the Bush administration offered
detailed descriptions of Iraq's weapons programs,
including the claims famously made by Colin Powell before
the UN Security Council. Bush administration claims
included assertions that Iraq had a program for enriching
uranium, that it had weaponized thousands of liters of
biological weapons, including anthrax and botulism, and
that Iraq could launch these weapons on very short
notice.
Prior to the war, when Saddam Hussein opened his
palaces to UN inspectors, destroyed missiles with ranges
barely longer than UN restrictions and allowed the US to
send U-2 spy planes over Iraq, the Bush Administration
said it was too little, too late.
Prior to the war, when the Chief UN Weapons Inspector,
Hans Blix, said that the inspectors were receiving
increased cooperation from the Iraqis and pleaded for
more time to continue their work, George Bush said he was
growing impatient.
Prior to the war, when members of the Security Counsel
of the United Nations said they were not ready to support
the use of force against Iraq, George Bush demonstrated
his disdain for international law and the Security
Counsel of the United Nations by launching a preventive
war against Iraq.
The failure to find weapons of mass destruction after
the war is causing widespread skepticism throughout the
world about the justification for going to war. It has
become a major political scandal in the UK, where prior
to the war Tony Blair echoed the Bush administration's
claims of Iraq possessing weapons of mass
destruction.
In the UK, Robin Cook, who resigned in protest from
Tony Blair's cabinet over the war in Iraq, has written:
"Britain was conned into a war to disarm a phantom threat
in which not even our major ally really believed. The
truth is that the US chose to attack Iraq not because it
posed a threat, but because they knew it was weak and
expected its military to collapse. It is a truth that
leaves the British government in an uncomfortable
position."
It is a truth that also leaves the American people in
an uncomfortable position. It would seem that we were
also "conned into a war" by Mr. Bush and his
administration.
In a war that was sold to the American people and the
Congress on the basis of misrepresentations by the Bush
administration, more than 170 American soldiers were
killed, more than 5,000 innocent civilians lost their
lives, and thousands of Iraqi soldiers were
slaughtered.
In the aftermath of the war, US soldiers continue to
be targets of Iraqi dissatisfaction. Eleven US soldiers
were killed in the past week. Iraq remains a dangerous
place, but not because of weapons of mass
destruction.
When the US and British forces invaded Iraq, one might
have expected Saddam Hussein to use weapons of mass
destruction if he had them. Rather, the Bush
administration would have us believe that Saddam Hussein,
while preparing for the US invasion or during the US
attack, was busy destroying his weapons of mass
destruction or moving them into another
country.
Rather than show any contrition for leading the
American people into war under false pretenses, President
Bush has claimed that weapons of mass destruction have
been found. He makes this claim on the basis of the
discovery of two mobile laboratories, presumably meant
for making biological weapons, but which contain no
evidence, according to the CIA, that weapons were
actually made.
Far more honest is Lt. General James Conway, the
commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, who
stated to reporters, "It was a surprise to me then, it
remains a surprise to me now, that we have not uncovered
weapons, as you say, in some of the forward dispersal
areas. Believe me, it's not for lack of trying. We've
been to virtually every ammunition supply point between
the Kuwaiti border and Baghdad, but they're simply not
there."
Congress, which plans to hold hearings next week on
lessons learned in Iraq, should delve into the
"credibility gap" between the Bush administration's
claims regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as a
pretext for war and the failure to locate these weapons
in the aftermath of the war. These claims cannot be
dismissed, as some members of Congress would do, as
simple exaggerations. They appear to be serious
misrepresentations to the American people and the people
of the world.
The Bush administration has much to account for
regarding its highly publicized claims prior to the war
that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. While it is
appropriate to acknowledge the tyrannical nature of
Saddam Hussein's regime, concern for the human rights of
the Iraqi people was not the justification of the Bush
administration for initiating a preventive war. Their
justification, stated repeatedly, was the imminent threat
of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, and it was on this
basis that the Bush administration defied international
law and the Security Council of the United
Nations.
The buck stops with Mr. Bush. Lying about the reasons
for war and misleading the American people into
supporting a war has the look and feel of "high crimes
and misdemeanors," for which the Constitution provides
impeachment as the remedy.
©
TFF & the author 2003
Tell a friend about this article
Send to:
From:
Message and your name
|