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To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (66496)	1/17/2003 1:53:14 AM
From: Karen Lawrence	Respond to of 281500

Inspectors, US part ways on Iraq Top UN inspector Hans Blix heads to Baghdad on Sunday to push for 'active cooperation' from Iraq. By Scott Peterson \| Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor christiansciencemonitor.com MOSCOW – With a possible war in the balance, United Nations weapons chiefs are taking their demands for Iraq to more actively assist inspectors directly to Baghdad this weekend. Pressure mounted on Iraq after the discovery by weapons inspectors on Thursday of 11 unfilled chemical shells that had not been declared. UN officials said the 122mm shells were in "excellent condition," but that they do not yet constitute a "smoking gun" in terms of an Iraqi breach. Related stories: 01/17/2003 Antiwar activists reaching past usual suspects 01/17/2003 Block to block combat 01/17/2003 Inspectors, US part ways on Iraq monitortalk: Should the US invade Iraq? Discuss it in the forums. E-mail this story Write a letter to the Editor Printer-friendly version Permission to reprint/republish Hassam Mohamed Amin, head of the Iraqi Monitoring Directorate, said Thursday that the 122mm artillery rockets were not part of any illegal weapons of mass destruction program, and were part of a 1986 shipment to Iraq that were "expired 10 years ago." Iraqi officials say that all gaps in Iraq's weapons declarations will be addressed during the visit of Hans Blix, the top UN weapons inspector, which begins on Sunday. US officials said there would be no rush to judgment that might lead to war. Senior UN officials make clear that this visit, and a weapons report due before the UN Security Council on Jan. 27, do not amount to a "last chance" for Iraq to come clean on any remaining weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs. But widely diverging timetables are emerging between the US and UN over the inspectors' work that may alter America's countdown to war. Washington wants that date to mark the start of an endgame - even as inspectors press for more time as they intensify their efforts to find evidence of WMD. Against the backdrop of Washington's military buildup in the Persian Gulf, and tough threats to use force to disarm Iraq, Baghdad has not actively impeded inspectors. But top UN inspector Hans Blix and atomic energy chief Mohamed ElBaradei say they will press Iraq to "shift gear ... to active cooperation," by permitting private interviews with scientists, and by accounting for gaps that remain in Iraq's WMD declarations. But they say they need more time - much more that the Pentagon's preferred winter timeframe to launch a war. Veteran inspectors say that no amount of extra time will be enough, if Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein does not do more to exhibit a change of heart. The open doors shown to the UN are an "illusion of cooperation," says Richard Spertzel, a former US Army germ scientist, who was the UN chief bioweapons inspector in Iraq from 1994 to 1998. "Two hundred inspectors could spend from now until doomsday parading that desert and not find [anything]," Mr. Spertzel says. "It's pointless, absolutely pointless ... until Iraq is willing to cooperate, until it is willing to appear to make a credible declaration, there is nothing to inspect or investigate." UN teams are rushing to boost their numbers in Iraq to 150, to utilize an increasing number of helicopters and spy planes - and to act on recently arrived US and British intelligence data. Iraq's 12,000-page declaration on Dec. 7 - billed as Baghdad's last chance to overcome years of concealment efforts and hide-and-seek games with UN inspectors - contained fewer data on its biological programs, at least, than Iraq had already declared in 1997. "What does that tell you?" Spertzel says. He ticks off questions that remain about programs that were examined by nine UN inspections in 1997 and 1998, then picked over again by two panels of international experts. Their conclusion was that Iraq's biological declaration was "inaccurate and incomplete." A Chinese scientist insisted as well, Spertzel says, that the final report indicate that it "wasn't certain" the program had been ended. Still, no-notice inspections of the some 300 sites inside Iraq - including a second presidential palace on Wednesday - have turned up no evidence of WMD. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan this week urged patience, saying that the inspectors "are just getting up to speed." While providing "prompt access," the Iraqis "need to do a good deal more to provide evidence if we are to avoid a worse development," Mr. Blix said Wednesday. "There's still time for the Iraqis to get themselves out of a very dangerous situation." Blix has said his work will take months, and that he sees his Jan. 27 interim report as a starting point. He also plans to make a fuller report to the UN Security Council in late March, far beyond a timeline envisioned by the US. President George Bush says "time is running out" for Mr. Hussein, and that he is "sick and tired" of Iraq's "games." US national security adviser Condoleeza Rice flew to New York Tuesday to impress upon Blix that he should tighten the timeline, and interview Iraqi scientists outside Iraq. The Pentagon is increasing its troops to 150,000 in the coming weeks - toward a likely final total of 250,000, already capable of starting a war. But some experts are wary of Baghdad's apparent at-your-service attitude, and suggest that Iraq is simply supremely confident that any WMD is well out of sight. "It took us 4 1/2 years against a concealment mechanism to find the hard evidence of an offensive biological weapons program," says Terry Taylor, a British senior UN weapons inspector from 1993 to 1997. "The Iraqis have learned a lot from that process, and are more adept than they were at hiding things from the inspectors." Which explains why the UN teams - which have been criticized in Washington for not being aggressive enough in tracking down WMD programs that the US and UK insist exist in Iraq - are demanding intelligence support. "We found intelligence given to us in the 1990s to be absolutely invaluable and essential to our task," says Mr. Taylor, who is now head of the Washington office of the London-based International Institute of Strategic Studies. "Don't expect some kind of startling revelation to come out," he says, noting that acting on such intelligence in the 1990s would often require two months of planning. Don't expect a smoking gun. The document trail, instead, "is just as valid a 'smoking gun' as a hunk of metal with bio agent in it." Determining the scope of Iraq's WMD programs took hard sleuthing in the 1990s - the kind of work that UN Security Council Resolution 1441 of last November was meant to eliminate, by putting the burden of proof on Iraq. Picking through past cases is instructive, experts say, if only as a way to analyze the threat posed by Iraq today. UN experts figured, when they were pulled out in late 1998, that Iraq still had 25 or so Scud missiles, armed with a mix of chemical and biological warheads. Video and other evidence pointed to Iraqi success in warhead separation in flight and above-ground detonations - key elements, Spertzel says, to spread biological agents. Warhead fragments with anthrax tested by the UN indicated the existence of more than the five warheads Iraq said it had created and destroyed in 1991 - and were detonated in such a way that the anthrax may have been recovered. "If there were anthrax spores recovered in 1991, those spores are still good," Spertzel says. "Don't underestimate the Iraqis - they are not dummies," Spertzel says. Weaponizing biological agents in just five years, as Iraq achieved in the late 1980s, is "amazing progress."

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (66496)	1/17/2003 1:53:42 AM
From: Karen Lawrence	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

Antiwar activists reaching past usual suspects As the antiwar movement tries to gain momentum, it is gradually bringing with it more mainstream Americans, people who have never attended a rally or carried a sign. Joining them are seasoned protesters - lifelong activists or people who railed against the Vietnam War but haven't shaken their fist again until now. www.christiansciencemonitor.com By Kim Campbell \| Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor In preparation for Saturday's antiwar rally in Washington, Barbara Beaman went out on Wednesday and bought yarn. The kindergarten teacher plans to knit on the bus that will take her from Boston to the nation's capital to march with the tens of thousands of protesters who are expected to show up to oppose using military action against Iraq. Her desire to "stand up and be counted," as she puts it, came late in life. She's been a teacher since she graduated from college in 1959, but an antiwar activist for only about a year. "I've never been a highly political person," she says, "But this feels different. This whole Middle East business has implications for the rest of the world forever." As the antiwar movement tries to gain momentum, it is gradually bringing with it more mainstream Americans, people who have never attended a rally or carried a sign. Joining them are seasoned protesters - lifelong activists or people who railed against the Vietnam War but haven't shaken their fist again until now. Their convergence on Washington this weekend will offer more information to peace organizations and politicians about how strong the antiwar sentiment really is and who is embracing it. To have an effect on the White House, activists will have to win over more people like Ms. Beaman and her conservative counterparts, observers say. Some suggest the movement may be spreading enough to have an impact on policy - more so than it could have just a few weeks ago. "The Bush White House is acutely attuned to political anticipations. The demonstrations are one index of political trouble ahead for Bush, they're not the only index. But insofar as they become aware that demonstrators are coming out of their political base, I would think they'd have to pay attention," says Todd Gitlin, a cultural commentator and author of "The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage." In trying to reach middle America with their message, some peace groups are using less strident language and a populist medium - the television - to make their point. A TV ad that debuted in 13 cities Thursday from MoveOn.org urges people to "Let the inspections work." Patriotic language is key Nudging Americans to be more involved in political issues takes some finesse, particularly when opposing the government is involved. Too much talk of imperialism and not enough appeals to patriotism could hurt the movement, say social observers. Typically, public opinion about war is formed by more than just what comes from a bullhorn, however. With the Vietnam War, for example, opposition from mainstream America grew as more troops went overseas and more images of what was happening to them once they got there were available on TV. "The real issue here is how a variety of stimuli, including perhaps a well-organized protest, will affect the beliefs and the sentiments in the vast middle ground of American society," says William Galston, a public affairs professor at the University of Maryland. He uses the approach the civil rights movement took as an example of successfully persuading a broad range of Americans. Between the early 1950s and the early '60s, that group was disciplined about the language and tactics it used. "They addressed the country not as enemies of the country, but as patriotic citizens demanding that the country live up to its own ideals," says Galston, a war critic. International ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism), the organizer of this weekend's rally, uses fairly strong language about the government, but says the variety of people attracted to its rallies - including union members and Muslims - suggest its message is resonating widely. Its last rally, in October, drew 200,000 people to Washington. "We've had the largest antiwar demonstrations since the Vietnam war," says Tony Murphy, an organizer with ANSWER, a group formed shortly after Sept. 11. Rookie protesters Grass-roots efforts by ANSWER are pulling in some of the newcomers. One woman, Mary Jenkins of Falls Church, Va., picked up an ANSWER petition in order to help collect signatures after an event at her retirement home. In her youth she was opposed to the Vietnam war, but never protested in a meaningful way. But the issues of spending money on war instead of social issues and of bombing "innocent people in Iraq" has her working on a way to get to Washington this weekend. "Here I am at the age of 90, I'm so outraged about [this war]. I would go. If I could get down there I would," she says. She and other protesters, both veteran and new, say they are surprised by how many people they encounter feel so strongly about the war. Ms. Beaman, who became an activist partly because she has friends who are protesters, says her involvement has caught others off guard. As a result, they've started thinking about the issue more themselves. Social observers like Mr. Gitlin, who organized protests during the Vietnam war, say that anecdotal evidence suggests there is an undercurrent of concern about the war that isn't necessarily being demonstrated. A Monitor/TIPP poll conducted last week found that 27 percent of Americans say it is not important for the US to take military action to remove Saddam Hussein from power. That's up from 20 percent from December and 24 percent from September. Still, in the new poll, 40 percent said it was "very important" and 30 percent "somewhat important" for the US to oust Hussein. As for Beaman, her views on protesting are clear. "The more you get involved in it the more you can't not do something if you feel this is wrong."

To: Karen Lawrence who wrote (66496)	1/17/2003 9:13:03 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Bush the latest wartime president we can't trust BY JUAN ANDRADE Columnist The Chicago Sun-Times January 17, 2003 It was alarming to see President Bush addressing our troops at Fort Hood, Texas, the U.S. Army's largest military training base for ground troops, just one day after we welcomed in the new year. The base supplied an estimated 25,000 troops to the Persian Gulf War, and it's likely to send a comparable number for war against Iraq. The president's charade was as disturbing as it was sad. This guy is determined to send our superior-trained men and women to kick a little Iraqi ass and has yet to tell us why, for how long, at what price in lives lost, and at what expense. Frankly, I don't trust the president. I don't trust his motives or his judgment. After WWII, Vietnam and the Persian Gulf, I've become very skeptical of what our leaders tell the American people, critical of their intellect, honesty and motives, and disillusioned by the way they make decisions when it comes to war. Franklin D. Roosevelt was disturbingly secretive and notorious in underutilizing and undermining the very officials in his Cabinet responsible for advising him on war policy. In his book, The Conquerors, published in 2002, Michael Beschloss uses recently declassified documents to show how the president played Churchill and Stalin against each other and himself against both, and how he excessively used special envoys to create tension, rivalry and deceit among his own advisers. Had Roosevelt lived any longer, America may have won the war but lost the peace. In Reaching for Glory, published in 2001, Beschloss again uses recently declassified transcripts of taped conversations, official memos, and personal diary excerpts to show how Lyndon B. Johnson, his senior Cabinet officials and military advisers just let us drift aimlessly into war in Southeast Asia. LBJ knew we shouldn't go in, had no idea about how to win once we did, and was clueless on how to get out. Robert McNamara, Dean Rusk, McGeorge Bundy and all the rest were arguably useless in their advice to the president. In No Peace, No Honor, Larry Berman also uses recently declassified documents, including correspondence, meeting notes and memos from all warring parties, i.e., North Vietnam, South Vietnam and the United States, to show how Nixon and Kissinger effectively betrayed the government and people of South Vietnam. In short, the author makes a very compelling argument that, because of our senseless political posturing and diplomatic chicanery, the war was unnecessarily prolonged for four years at a tragic cost of 20,000 additional American lives. In my view, there's no better insight into the war-making process inside the Bush White House than Bob Woodward's latest book Bush at War. It also confirms my greatest fears. The book, is based entirely on interviews with the president and his senior inner circle, i.e., Dick Cheney, Colin Powell, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, the joint chiefs, etc., and notes from their post-9/11 meetings. When Cheney advised the president to appoint a war council and designate a chairman, Bush did, and inexplicably named himself chairman. Here's a guy who wouldn't even attend his pilot training sessions with the Texas Air National Guard and couldn't name his commanding officer, directing a war against terrorism! Reassuring isn't it? More than once, his chief of staff, Andrew Card, had to remind Bush that he's not a general. Indeed, it's very apparent that Bush has difficulty distinguishing between his role as president from commander in chief. The problem is his tendency to act and try to think like a general. Card was right, and we have reason to be concerned. As a war president, Bush can't distinguish between a general and a commander in chief. To complete anyone's distrust of presidents and U.S. foreign policy-making decisions, there's The Trial of Henry Kissinger by Christopher Hitchens. While the author makes state-supported terrorism allegations against the United States, there's sufficient veracity to make any reasonably intelligent person distrusting of decision-makers. The results can be appalling in terms of lives lost, laws broken, and profits made. During the last year Bush has learned all the right things to say to delude us into believing that he is genuinely interested in avoiding war. He's not. Without war he has nothing. If there was ever a time to question a president's competence in committing America to war, it's now. Since 9/11, Bush's approval rating has dropped from over 80 percent to 58 percent. It's obvious more Americans are starting to catch on. suntimes.com