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To: GST who wrote (154039)	3/8/2003 5:23:46 PM
From: Bill Harmond	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

..nor with Security council approval.

To: GST who wrote (154039)	3/9/2003 12:47:47 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Saying No to War Lead Editorial The New York Times March 9, 2003 Within days, barring a diplomatic breakthrough, President Bush will decide whether to send American troops into Iraq in the face of United Nations opposition. We believe there is a better option involving long-running, stepped-up weapons inspections. But like everyone else in America, we feel the window closing. If it comes down to a question of yes or no to invasion without broad international support, our answer is no. Even though Hans Blix, the chief weapons inspector, said that Saddam Hussein was not in complete compliance with United Nations orders to disarm, the report of the inspectors on Friday was generally devastating to the American position. They not only argued that progress was being made, they also discounted the idea that Iraq was actively attempting to manufacture nuclear weapons. History shows that inspectors can be misled, and that Mr. Hussein can never be trusted to disarm and stay disarmed on his own accord. But a far larger and more aggressive inspection program, backed by a firm and united Security Council, could keep a permanent lid on Iraq's weapons program. By adding hundreds of additional inspectors, using the threat of force to give them a free hand and maintaining the option of attacking Iraq if it tries to shake free of a smothering inspection program, the United States could obtain much of what it was originally hoping to achieve. Mr. Hussein would now be likely to accept such an intrusive U.N. operation. Had Mr. Bush managed the showdown with Iraq in a more measured manner, he would now be in a position to rally the U.N. behind that bigger, tougher inspection program, declare victory and take most of the troops home. Unfortunately, by demanding regime change, Mr. Bush has made it much harder for Washington to embrace this kind of long-term strategy. He has talked himself into a corner where war or an unthinkable American retreat seem to be the only alternatives visible to the administration. Every signal from the White House is that the diplomatic negotiations will be over in days, not weeks. Every signal from the United Nations is that when that day arrives, the United States will not have Security Council sanction to attack. There are circumstances under which the president would have to act militarily no matter what the Security Council said. If America was attacked, we would have to respond swiftly and fiercely. But despite endless efforts by the Bush administration to connect Iraq to Sept. 11, the evidence simply isn't there. The administration has demonstrated that Iraq had members of Al Qaeda living within its borders, but that same accusation could be lodged against any number of American allies in the region. It is natural to suspect that one of America's enemies might be actively aiding another, but nations are not supposed to launch military invasions based on hunches and fragmentary intelligence. The second argument the Bush administration cites for invading Iraq is its refusal to obey U.N. orders that it disarm. That's a good reason, but not when the U.N. itself believes disarmament is occurring and the weapons inspections can be made to work. If the United States ignores the Security Council and attacks on its own, the first victim in the conflict will be the United Nations itself. The whole scenario calls to mind that Vietnam-era catch phrase about how we had to destroy a village in order to save it. President Bush has switched his own rationale for the invasion several times. Right now, the underlying theory seems to be that the United States can transform the Middle East by toppling Saddam Hussein, turning Iraq into a showplace democracy and inspiring the rest of the region to follow suit. That's another fine goal that seems impossible to accomplish outside the context of broad international agreement. The idea that the resolution to all the longstanding, complicated problems of that area begins with a quick military action is both seductive and extremely dangerous. The Bush administration has not been willing to risk any political capital in attempting to resolve the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, but now the president is theorizing that invading Iraq will do the trick. Given the corner Mr. Bush has painted himself in, withdrawing troops — even if a considerable slice remains behind — would be an admission of failure. He obviously intends to go ahead, and bet on the very good chance that the Iraqi army will fall quickly. The fact that the United Nations might be irreparably weakened would not much bother his conservative political base at home, nor would the outcry abroad. But in the long run, this country needs a strong international body to keep the peace and defuse tension in a dozen different potential crisis points around the world. It needs the support of its allies, particularly embattled states like Pakistan, to fight the war on terror. And it needs to demonstrate by example that there are certain rules that everybody has to follow, one of the most important of which is that you do not invade another country for any but the most compelling of reasons. When the purpose is fuzzy, or based on questionable propositions, it's time to stop and look for other, less extreme means to achieve your goals. nytimes.com

To: GST who wrote (154039)	3/10/2003 2:19:09 PM
From: Bill Harmond	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

abcnews.go.com

To: GST who wrote (154039)	3/10/2003 6:09:21 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 164684

<<...Congressional sources say that Secretary of State Colin Powell has told the president that if the US returns to the Security Council next week for a new resolution authorizing war, it faces humiliating defeat -- by ''old Europe.''...>> Bush tactics strengthen UN brake on US power By William Pfaff Columnist The Boston Globe 3/10/2003 PARIS THE IMPENDING IRAQ war has become a watershed event. It will permanently alter the American relationship to the Islamic Middle East. It has already provoked serious change in Europe's relations with Washington. It may have lasting influence on what becomes of American society. US troops already operate inside Iraq, and President Bush and his people insist nothing short of Saddam Hussein's abdication will stop them. Nonetheless, the Turkish parliament's failure to permit an attack on Iraq via Turkey came as a staggering and unexpected blow to Washington. Even if the Turkish parliament, under intensified pressure, were to reverse its decision, an old and important American alliance has broken. The scale of international demonstrations against the war have shocked the White House. Congressional sources say that Secretary of State Colin Powell has told the president that if the US returns to the Security Council next week for a new resolution authorizing war, it faces humiliating defeat -- by ''old Europe.'' No one will have to veto the Anglo-American-Spanish resolution. It simply will fall short, possibly badly short, of the nine votes needed to pass. Some in the White House are said to argue that last weekend's capture of a senior Al Qaeda figure could be spun so as to shift attention away from Iraq and back to terrorism, while UN inspections were allowed to continue. This could save Tony Blair, reported on Thursday to want more time for the inspectors. It could mean wider support when and if the war does come. But such a backdown before the French, Germans, and Russians, after Washington's six-month buildup to war, and after all that the president has said, would itself alter the perceived international balance. President Bush, in any case, seems much too committed for anything now to stop him. Anyway, he doesn't have to go to the UN. He claims the right to go to war without further Security Council action -- even if that would mean too bad for Tony Blair and the president's other foreign allies. His neo-conservative desk strategists assure him that the geopolitical consequences of victory in the Middle East and the effect on American relations with Muslims will be positive. It will promote democracy as the way to go, while providing an intimidating display of US power. Pessimists, such as myself, say the consequences will be bad for the Middle East, for US interests, and, in the long term bad, for Israel. On past odds, pessimism is where the smart money should go. Certainly, the trans-Atlantic relationship will not be the same after this. If the administration's Iraq gamble succeeds, Washington intends to divide Europe and build a new alliance with Central and Eastern Europe as the base for US power-projection in the Middle East and Central Asia. If the gamble fails, there probably will be a general American fallback toward an embittered version of the anti-internationalist and America-first policies with which George Bush began his term two years ago. A policy metaphor recently popular in Washington has been that of European Lilliputians unsuccessfully trying to tie down an American Gulliver. The effort supposedly is led by politicians, unwilling to share the burden of global responsibility, ungrateful, longing for lost national glories etc. The recent Washington-inspired campaign against the motivations, persons and moral character of individual German, French, and even Belgian leaders has been the most vicious in postwar traans-Atlantic relations. The whole affair nonetheless has served to clarify a number of things. One is that the Bush administration has, without understanding what it was doing, created a situation in which the majority of nations see the UN as the only institution that has the possibility of checking American power and limiting the consequences of American unilateralism. In the future, shifting coalitions of the willing are likely to work through the UN and other major international institutions and use the unprecedented means the Internet provides for mass mobilization to counterbalance or contain the United States on many economic and politico-military issues. It may also be that the America will no longer be entirely free to set the international agenda. Rogue states, war against terrorism, anti-proliferation, trade globalization and other American causes may not automatically dominate international political and media attention. Washington only now is discovering that its efforts to override or divide opposition to what it wants on Iraq have created a coherent international opposition that before was not there. It has diminished rather than affirmed its old international leadership. ____________________________________________ William Pfaff is a syndicated columnist. This story ran on page A01 of the Boston Globe on 3/10/2003. © Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company. boston.com