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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (291850)	9/3/2002 10:45:00 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Unclassified Report to Congress on the Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Conventional Munitions, 1 January Through 30 June 2001 Iraq: Baghdad has refused since December 1998 to allow United Nations inspectors into Iraq as required by Security Council Resolution 687. In spite of ongoing UN efforts to establish a follow-on inspection regime comprising the UN Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the IAEA’s Iraq Action Team, no UN inspections occurred during this reporting period. Moreover, the automated video monitoring systemsinstalled by the UN at known and suspect WMD facilities in Iraq are still not operating. Having lost this on-the-ground access, it is more difficult for the UN or the US to accurately assess the current state of Iraq’s WMD programs. Given Iraq’s past behavior, it is likely that Baghdad has used the intervening period to reconstitute prohibited programs. We assess that since the suspension of UN inspections in December of 1998, Baghdad has had the capability to reinitiate its CW programs within a few weeks to months. Iraq’s failure to submit an accurate Full, Final, and Complete Disclosure (FFCD) in either 1995 or 1997, coupled with its extensive concealment efforts, suggest that the BW program hascontinued. Without an inspection-monitoring program, however, it is more difficult to determine the current status of these programs. Since the Gulf war, Iraq has rebuilt key portions of its chemical production infrastructure for industrial and commercial use, as well as its missile production facilities. Iraq has attempted to purchase numerous dual-use items for, or under the guise of, legitimate civilian use. This equipment—in principle subject to UN scrutiny—also could be diverted for WMD purposes. Since the suspension of UN inspections in December 1998, the risk of diversion has increased. After Desert Fox, Baghdad again instituted a reconstruction effort on those facilities destroyed by the US bombing, including several critical missile production complexes and former dual-use CW production facilities. In addition, Iraq appears to be installing or repairing dual-use equipment at CW-related facilities. Some of these facilities could be converted fairly quickly for production of CW agents. UNSCOM reported to the Security Council in December 1998 that Iraq also continued to withhold information related to its CW program. For example, Baghdad seized from UNSCOM inspectors an Iraqi Air Force document discovered by UNSCOM that indicated that Iraq had not consumed as many CW munitions during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s as had been declared by Baghdad. This discrepancy indicates that Iraq may have hidden an additional 6,000 CW munitions. In 1995, Iraq admitted to having an offensive BW program and submitted the first in a series of FFCDs that were supposed to have revealed the full scope of its BW program. According to UNSCOM, these disclosures are incomplete and filled with inaccuracies. Since the full scope and nature of Iraq’s BW program was not verified, UNSCOM has assessed that Iraq maintains a knowledge base and industrial infrastructure that could be used to produce quickly a large amount of BW agents at any time. Iraq also has continued dual-use research that could improve BW agent R&D capabilities. With the absence of a monitoring regime and Iraq’s growing industrial self-sufficiency, we remain concerned that Iraq may again be producing biological warfare agents. Iraq has worked on its L-29 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) program, which involves converting L-29 jet trainer aircraft originally acquired from Eastern Europe. In the past, Iraq has conducted flights of the L-29, possibly to test system improvements or to train new pilots. These refurbished trainer aircraft are believed to have been modified for delivery of chemical or, more likely, biological warfare agents. We believe that Iraq has probably continued at least low-level theoretical R&D associated with its nuclear program. A sufficient source of fissile material remains Iraq’s most significant obstacle to being able to produce a nuclear weapon. Although we were already concerned about a reconstituted nuclear weapons program, our concerns increased in September 2000 when Saddam publicly exhorted his "Nuclear Mujahidin" to "defeat the enemy." The Intelligence Community remains concerned that Baghdad may be attempting to acquire materials that could aid in reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Iraq continues to pursue development of SRBM systems that are not prohibited by the United Nations and may be expanding to longer-range systems. Pursuit of UN-permitted missiles continues to allow Baghdad to develop technological improvements and infrastructure that could be applied to a longer-range missile program. We believe that development of the liquid-propellant Al-Samoud SRBM probably is maturing and that a low-level operational capability could be achieved in the near term — which is further suggested by the appearance of four Al Samoud transporter-erector-launchers (TELs) with airframes at the 31 December 2000 Al Aqsa parade. The solid-propellant missile development program may now be receiving a higher priority, and development of the Ababil-100 SRBM – two such airframes and TELs were paraded on 31 December—and possibly longer range systems may be moving ahead rapidly. If economic sanctions against Iraq were lifted, Baghdad probably would increase its attempts to acquire missile-related items from foreign sources, regardless of any future UN monitoring and continuing restrictions on long-range ballistic missile programs. Iraq probably retains a small, covert force of Scud-type missiles. Iraq’s ACW acquisitions remain low due to the generally successful enforcement of the UN arms embargo. Baghdad has acquired smaller arms and components for larger arms, such as spare parts for aircraft and air defense systems, primarily over porous land borders via a thriving gray arms market. Iraq also acquires some dual-use and production items through the Oil For Food program. Iraq continues to aggressively seek ACW equipment and technology. cia.gov

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (291850)	9/3/2002 10:46:03 AM
From: Neocon	Respond to of 769670

fas.org

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (291850)	9/3/2002 10:55:43 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769670

Mr. Cheney on Iraq E-Mail This Article Printer-Friendly Version Subscribe to The Post Tuesday, August 27, 2002; Page A14 VICE PRESIDENT Cheney yesterday delivered the Bush administration's most extensive and forceful statement about the danger posed by the regime of Saddam Hussein and the reasons for taking preventive action against it. "There is no doubt," Mr. Cheney said, "that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction; there is no doubt that he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us." The vice president reviewed Saddam Hussein's violations of resolutions by the United Nations Security Council, recounted his evasions and deceptions of U.N. inspectors, and ticked off his history of aggression. He said it is likely that Saddam Hussein will acquire nuclear weapons "fairly soon" and that, once he has them, he will seek to dominate the Middle East and its oil supplies through nuclear blackmail. Though the facts he cited were not new, Mr. Cheney outlined a powerful case to support his conclusion that "the risk of inaction" on Iraq is "far greater than the risk of action." Even more important, he suggested that the Bush administration will soon begin to spell out the details of that case before Congress, the American public and U.S. allies -- an initiative that is both essential and overdue. Until recently President Bush and his top aides had avoided fully joining the Iraq debate, in part by asserting that no decision had been made on a course of action. Mr. Cheney reiterated that position yesterday: The president, he said, "will proceed cautiously and deliberately to consider all possible options to deal with the threat." But his speech left little room for measures short of the destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime through preemptive military action. Though European governments and some congressional leaders have urged the administration to seek the return to Iraq of U.N. weapons inspectors, Mr. Cheney appeared to dismiss that option, saying that "a return of inspectors would provide no assurance whatsoever" that Iraq's chemical and biological weapons would be neutralized. The vice president noted that some outside the administration argue that action should not be taken until there is proof Saddam Hussein is at the point of acquiring nuclear weapons. "If we waited until that moment," he answered, "Saddam would simply become emboldened and it would become even harder for us to gather friends and allies to oppose him." To those who say an Iraqi campaign would destabilize the region and interfere with the war on terrorism, Mr. Cheney bluntly rejoined: "The opposite is true. . . . Extremists in the region would have to rethink their strategy of jihad. Moderates . . . would take heart, and our ability to advance the Israeli-Palestinian peace process would be enhanced." Mr. Cheney suggested that his speech marked the beginning of an effort by the administration to build a consensus on Iraq; the president, he said, "welcomes the debate" and has asked his national security team to "participate fully" in the next round of congressional hearings next month. That is the appropriate course: The administration still has much to do if it is to lay an adequate legal, political and diplomatic foundation for the ambitious enterprise it has in mind. The evidence of Saddam Hussein's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and ambitions for using them must be more fully and convincingly detailed; so must the administration's calculation of the likely costs, in lives and resources, of destroying his regime. Mr. Cheney said yesterday that the U.S. goal would be "an Iraq that has territorial integrity, a government that is democratic and pluralistic, a nation where the human rights of every ethnic and religious group are recognized and respected." The administration must be ready to offer a realistic plan for how that goal can be achieved, and seek a congressional vote, as well as the material commitment of key allies, in support of it. Mr. Cheney was passionate and persuasive in describing the menace the administration sees in Saddam Hussein; as the debate continues, the administration must be as convincing in laying out its vision of a solution. washingtonpost.com

To: J_F_Shepard who wrote (291850)	9/3/2002 11:08:01 AM
From: Neocon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769670

Kidnapped by the Times _____Previous Columns_____ • Invoking The Hamdi Rights (The Washington Post, Aug 16, 2002) • Cheney and the CEOs (The Washington Post, Aug 9, 2002) • Disturbed Nerd Chic (The Washington Post, Aug 2, 2002) • About This Columnist Add Charles Krauthammer to your personal home page. E-Mail This Article Printer-Friendly Version Subscribe to The Post By Charles Krauthammer Sunday, August 18, 2002; Page B07 Not since William Randolph Hearst famously cabled his correspondent in Cuba, "You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war," has a newspaper so blatantly devoted its front pages to editorializing about a coming American war as has Howell Raines's New York Times. Hearst was for the Spanish-American War. Raines (for those who have been incommunicado for the last year) opposes war with Iraq. The Raines campaign is ongoing. A story that should be on Page A22, the absence of one Iraqi opposition leader (out of a dozen-odd) at a meeting in Washington, is Page A1, above the fold. Message: Disarray in the war camp. A previous above-the-fold front-page story revealed -- stop the presses! -- that the war might be financially costly. Then there are the constant references to growing opposition to war with Iraq -- in fact, the polls are unchanged since January -- culminating on Aug. 16 with the lead front-page headline: "Top Republicans Break with Bush on Iraq Strategy." The amusing part was including among these Republican foreign policy luminaries Dick Armey, a man not often cited by the Times for his sagacity, a man who just a few weeks ago made a spectacle of himself by publicly advocating the removal of the Palestinians from the West Bank. Yesterday, he was a buffoon. Today, he is a statesman. That was the comic relief. The egregious part of the story was the touting of Henry Kissinger as one of the top Republican leaders breaking with Bush over Iraq. This revelation was based on a Washington Post op-ed that Kissinger had published four days earlier. How can one possibly include Kissinger in this opposition group? He writes in the very article the Times cites: "The imminence of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the huge dangers it involves, the rejection of a viable inspection system and the demonstrated hostility of Hussein combine to produce an imperative for preemptive action." There is hardly a more succinct statement of the administration's case for war. The remarkable thing about Kissinger's article is not that he breaks with Bush but that in supporting the Bush policy of preemptive war he breaks with one of the central tenets of his own "realist" school of foreign policy. Realism is the billiard ball school of foreign policy. It cares what states do to each other on the outside, not how they govern themselves on the inside. Realism is not into regime change. Indeed, as Kissinger himself explains, preemptive attack goes against the principle enshrined at the Treaty of Westphalia: the inviolability of states. Nonetheless, in the case of Iraq, Kissinger endorses the Bush doctrine altering this 350-year-old convention because changes in technology, namely the advent of weapons of mass destruction, no longer permit us to wait for the other guy to strike first. (In our public diplomacy, Kissinger would emphasize the weapons of mass destruction more than regime change in presenting our case.) None of this deters the Times from making Kissinger one of its two major Republican poster boys breaking with the president (the other being former national security adviser Brent Scowcroft). Indeed, the very next day's paper, again the lead front-page story, reiterated the fiction, citing Kissinger (with Scowcroft) as part of "a group of leading Republicans who were warning [Bush] against going to war with Iraq." Against going to war? Kissinger makes the case not just for going to war but for going to war soon. "Waiting will only magnify possibilities for blackmail," he warns. But that is not the only reason to go to war, he adds. The war on terrorism itself is at risk if it stops with Afghanistan and spares Saddam Hussein. If we flinch, we'll see "radicals encouraged by the demonstration of American hesitation and moderates demoralized by the continuation of an unimpaired Iraq as an aggressive regional power." The Times trumpets the critics' warning about the risks of "creating greater instability in the Middle East and harming long-term American interests." But Kissinger makes precisely the opposite argument: "The overthrow of the Iraqi regime would have potentially beneficent political consequences" (my italics) -- serving to chasten "the so-called Arab street," encourage moderation in Syria and Saudi Arabia, "multiply pressures for a democratic evolution in Iran, demonstrate to the Palestinian Authority that America is serious about overcoming corrupt tyrannies and bring about a better balance in oil policy within OPEC." Quite a list. The entire Times attempt to rope Kissinger into the opposition rests on his talking about the difficulties and the importance of the post-war settlement: "Military intervention should be attempted only if we are willing to sustain such an effort for however long it is needed." But everyone knows that we will have to stay and help rebuild Iraq as a peaceful, nondictatorial state. Who says otherwise? Where is the break with Bush? It is one thing to give your front page to a crusade against war with Iraq. That's partisan journalism, and that's what Raines's Times does for a living. It's another thing to include Henry Kissinger in your crusade. That's just stupid. After all, it's checkable. washingtonpost.com