Here's a recent speech delivered by Senator Leahy of Vermont.
Senator Leahy pretty much captures my concerns. Too bad he will be totally and completely ignored.
_____
U.S. SENATOR PATRICK LEAHY
CONTACT: Office of Senator Leahy, 202-224-4242
VERMONT
_____
Statement Of Senator Patrick Leahy
Made On The Senate Floor
Concerning Iraq
Mr. President, more than a half century ago, in the aftermath of two catastrophic world wars, the United Nations charter was signed in San Francisco. Dedicated to the prevention and peaceful resolution of conflict, the United Nations was largely a creation of the United States, with the support of the other great world powers.
The United Nations has had a difficult history. With the notable exception of the Korean War, the Soviet Union and the United States each worked throughout the Cold War to ensure that the UN Security Council remained little more than a toothless forum for debating and passing resolutions of little or no effect.
Even in recent years, the United Nations has had a string of failures. It was unable to prevent the slaughter of half a million people in Rwanda. It failed to prevent the destruction of the former Yugoslavia, which was ultimately stopped only by NATO's intervention. United Nations resolutions seeking to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have been routinely ignored.
The United Nations has also passed resolutions aimed at eliminating Iraq's nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons programs, but the Iraqi Government has flagrantly tried to subvert those resolutions.
The United Nations is frequently blamed for these failures. It is convenient to ridicule a multilateral organization that often seems to be its own worst enemy. But there are also many examples of UN successes, like peacekeeping
missions that are strongly supported by the United States but rarely involve any commitment of U.S. troops.
The UN's effectiveness depends on the political will - or lack of will - of its 191 member states. No country - no country - bears more responsibility than the United States for the success or failure of the United Nations. This has never been more true than today when solving so many of the world's problems - especially combating terrorism - depend on U.S. leadership and the cooperation of other nations.
Not surprisingly, when it has served its interests, this Administration has praised the United Nations and urged the Congress to provide the funds to support it. In fact, a Bush Administration publication declares that "Acting through the United Nations allows the United States to share the risks and costs of responding to international crises."
I applauded President Bush when he went to the United Nations last September to seek a resolution calling for the return of UN weapons inspectors to Iraq. I and others here had urged him to take that step, at a time when many of the President's advisors were insisting that a resolution was both unnecessary and unwise.
And I commended Secretary Powell for recognizing the importance of securing United Nations support for disarming Iraq, and for his work in obtaining a unanimous vote of the UN Security Council for that resolution.
Since then, the inspectors have reported mixed cooperation from the Government of Iraq. They have visited hundreds of sites but have not found significant evidence of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, despite his failure to explain what happened to the thousands of tons of
chemical and biological weapons materiel that was known to exist when the inspectors left Iraq five years ago.
The Administration's response, with justification, is that Saddam Hussein is once again playing a cat-and-mouse game of deceiving the inspectors, and that time has finally run out. But the solution is not to direct threats and name calling at some of our oldest allies, or to dismiss the UN as
irrelevant just because some of its members disagree with us. That is counter-productive and beneath a great nation.
It is no less harmful to mislead the American people. Yesterday's Washington Post reported that the President and other Administration officials continue to say publicly that the President has not made a final decision about whether to invade Iraq. These statements lack credibility, as the Pentagon continues to amass tens of thousands of U.S. troops on Iraq's borders.
Yet the White House is telling our potential coalition partners that the decision to invade Iraq has been made. The President has made it, they say, and nothing the UN Security Council says or does will change that. They warn that unless the UN Security Council abandons the inspections process and
supports a U.S.-led military invasion, the United Nations will become irrelevant.
And at the same time that White House officials dismiss any meaningful role for the Security Council in the decision to go to war, they are calling on the UN to prepare to help take care of as many as two million Iraqi refugees once the war begins. And they make no secret of the fact that they expect the UN to play a central role in the reconstruction of a post-Saddam Iraq.
Mr. President, one of the lessons of the Gulf War was that it was far safer for our troops, and of critical importance to our continued relations with the Arab world, to build a broad, international coalition in support of the use of force. The importance of that coalition has been lauded by
Administration officials and Members of Congress, time and again, in public statements and in testimony.
Nothing that has happened since, and nothing that we have heard from this President or his advisors, leads one to believe that we should go to war without such a coalition. To the contrary, with the threat of international terrorism fueled by Islamic extremists who fan the flames of hatred of
Americans, the arguments for building a strong coalition with the backing of the United Nations are even more compelling.
It has been 28 years since I was first elected to represent my State of Vermont in the United States Senate. I have served during the administrations of five presidents - Democratic and Republican. I have had my share of agreements and disagreements with each of them, on issues of great importance, from the Vietnam War to the dilemma we face today with Iraq.
But never, in all those years, have I seen such an opportunity to use the tremendous influence of the United States to unite the world behind the common goal of disarmament - and in doing so, to strengthen the United
Nations -- mishandled with such arrogance.
Today, apparently only weeks away from a war with Iraq, the United States is telling the rest of the world "we don't need you." Even though we will be risking the lives of American soldiers to enforce a United Nations resolution, we are going to war in spite of our UN allies who urge caution
and patience.
Mr. President, the Administration's ultimatum on Iraq is but the latest example of its disdain for working with other nations to solve global problems from arms control to the environment:
- They thumbed their noses at the Kyoto Treaty, even though the United States uses wastefully a quarter of the world's resources and is by far the largest contributor to global warming.
- They sabotaged the International Criminal Court, despite the fact that the United States was instrumental in its conception.
- They have walked away from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and from an agreement to strengthen the biological weapons convention.
Reasonable people may disagree about the merits of these treaties. But the Administration has simply walked away, offering no constructive alternatives, unnecessarily poisoning relations with allies and undermining our nation's interests.
This pattern has not only alienated and angered those whose support we need; it has made it easier for others to ignore their own international obligations. It has needlessly and recklessly squandered the goodwill we felt after September 11th, when the Star-Spangled Banner played outside
Buckingham Palace and Le Monde declared that "We are all Americans." It has made us less secure, not more.
I have no doubt, nor do any of us, that our armed forces can defeat Saddam Hussein's army, which according to all reports is far weaker than it was a decade ago. Nor do any of us differ about the desire to see an end to Saddam Hussein's despicable regime. But the risk that he will use chemical or
biological weapons, and the horror that could mean for our own troops, as well as the civilian casualties, are hardly mentioned by the White House.
In the meantime, the situation in Afghanistan - so recently the focus of attention - remains extremely unstable. The survival of the Karzai Government is far from certain, as Pakistan, Russia and Iran continue to provide support and sanctuary to Afghan war lords and to the Taliban who fled.
Osama bin Laden continues to broadcast threats against Americans and al Queda remains active in dozens of countries.
A nuclear crisis on the Korean peninsula threatens to spiral out of control.
In the Middle East, hardly a day passes without shootings or bombings by Israelis and Palestinians. The Administration appears to have abandoned that crisis.
Our allies are divided about the need to abort the UN inspections process and launch a preemptive, military invasion of Iraq, and a majority of the American people oppose the use of unilateral U.S. military force.
I am not among those who believe that under no circumstances would force ever be justified to disarm Saddam Hussein. But why now, when there is such discord even among those who agree about the need for Iraq to disarm?
Why now, when there is no realistic chance that Saddam Hussein will seek to carry out an act of aggression as long as the UN inspectors are there?
Why now, when the United Nations is seized with this issue?
Why now, when giving the inspectors more time could bring more key nations on board with us if force becomes necessary?
Why rush to act in a way that will weaken the United Nations, further isolate ourselves from many of our closest allies, and create more anti-Americanism and quite possibly more terrorists?
Mr. President, this country is not close to being united in favor of a preemptive, unilateral war with Iraq. It is not a question of whether we can defeat Saddam Hussein. It is a question of the long term risks to our security. The President should listen to the American people.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans have braved the freezing cold in recent weeks, as have millions of people in Europe and elsewhere, to demonstrate their opposition to the President's policy. They are protesting, not in sympathy with the Iraqi Government, but in opposition to a war that might yet be prevented.
Today, Mr. President, as our government moves inexorably towards war, we must continue to question, we must continue to debate, we must continue to do everything we can to support a policy that makes our country and the world safer, not only for tomorrow, but for next year and beyond.
And if war comes, let us be able to say that it was only because we and our allies exhausted every other option, that we acted with the support of the Security Council, and that in doing so we truly enhanced our security and made the United Nations stronger. |
