Bush's Policy on Iraq Labels U.S. as 'Belligerent Bully,'
Byrd Says
by Vicki Allen
WASHINGTON - Veteran Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd blasted President Bush on Friday for giving the United
States the image "of a belligerent bully," and said Bush's contrasting handling of threats posed by North Korea
and Iraq revealed major flaws in his foreign policy.
Byrd of West Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee that oversees federal
spending, said Bush appeared eager to apply his doctrine of taking pre-emptive military action against less
powerful countries such as Iraq, but not against countries that may pose a nuclear threat such as North Korea.
"What is the message we convey to the world if we are eager to apply a doctrine of pre-emption on those
countries with limited ability to defend or counterattack, and yet waffle over a pre-emptive response to
dangerous regimes with firepower to hit back?" Byrd said as a number of Democrats sharpened their criticisms
of Bush's handling of world affairs.
"The unanticipated result of this doctrine may be to unleash a global scramble to acquire the means to deter
the U.S. from unprovoked attacks," he said on the Senate floor.
Bush has said the United States has the right to launch pre-emptive strikes against nations that have or are
developing weapons of mass destruction that threaten the United States or its allies, which he said would
justify a U.S. attack on Iraq.
Byrd called that a bellicose position and said policy-makers must "work to restore the image of the United
States to that of strong peacekeeper instead of belligerent bully."
He said he was relieved the administration "appears to fully comprehend the folly" of a pre-emptive strike on
North Korea, which may possess nuclear weapons, and was instead trying to defuse the situation through
diplomacy.
North Korea has expelled U.N. weapons inspectors and threatened to resume missile testing in a standoff the
Bush administration has said it is determined to resolve diplomatically.
Iraq denies it has chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, and has admitted U.N. inspectors.
Byrd, who fiercely fought the resolution Congress passed in October giving Bush authority to attack Iraq if
necessary to disarm it, urged Bush to cool "the fever pitch of war rhetoric."
He complained the nation was mobilizing to attack Iraq "without so much as a whisper of debate," and said
Congress must re-evaluate the situation before any military action. |
