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To: Greg h2o who wrote (8948)	3/18/2003 3:45:04 PM
From: bob zagorin	Respond to of 13797

this is from Washington Post so it may be suspect Greg:) Poll: Support for Bush, War Grows By Richard Morin and Claudia Deane Washington Post Staff Writers Tuesday, March 18, 2003; 8:05 AM Americans have rallied strongly around President Bush and accepted his call for war with Iraq as the only practical way to remove Saddam Hussein and end the threat posed by his weapons of mass destruction, according to a Washington Post-ABC News Poll conducted last night. Seven in 10 said they supported Bush's televised call to go to war without the blessing of the United Nations unless Saddam Hussein and his sons leave Iraq within 48 hours. An equally large majority believe that Bush has done enough to win support from other nations. More than two in three said his policies on Iraq are the right ones, although fewer than half are strongly convinced. The public's preference for a U.N.-endorsed war also has faded into the background following the collapse of efforts by the United States and its allies to win support for a second war resolution in the U.N. Security Council. Three in four disapprove of the way the United Nations has handled the Iraqi crisis, up from slightly more than half three weeks ago. But the anger shown in these poll numbers does not reflect a desire to withdraw from the international community or to punish France for successfully derailing the second U.N. resolution backing war. Clear majorities want the United States to maintain current relations with both France and the United Nations. Only a third believe that the United States should punish France by withholding support and being less cooperative with the French government, and even fewer (one in five) say the United States should change its relationship with the United Nations. While endorsing war, Americans also acknowledge its risks. Six in 10 believe that the threat of terrorism will increase in the short term -- a view that echoes the administration's decision yesterday to raise the terrorism threat warning from yellow to orange. And they are divided on whether war with Iraq will reduce terrorism in the long run, a view at odds with Bush's justification that war with Iraq was necessary to reduce the threat of terrorism. Half of those interviewed -- 48 percent -- said the conflict would reduce terrorism in the long run, while four in 10 said it would increase the risk. A total of 510 randomly selected adults were interviewed Monday night after Bush's speech. Margin of sampling error is plus or minus 5 percentage points. The practical difficulties of doing a survey in a single night represent other potential sources of error in this poll. As at the start of previous confrontations abroad, the poll found that the country has largely united behind its president -- a unity that will be tested as the war unfolds and circumstances on the battlefield change. Nearly two in three -- 64 percent -- said they approve of the way Bush is handling the confrontation with Saddam Hussein, up from 55 percent in an ABC News survey conducted last week. Overall support for a war with Iraq also surged from 59 percent two weeks ago to 71 percent today. And the poll found equally broad support for beginning the war immediately after Bush's 48-hour deadline expires on Wednesday. At this point, roughly one in four Americans opposes the invasion. The survey was conducted as diplomatic efforts collapsed and the United States began making final preparations to begin a war that most of the world now believes is inevitable. Seven in 10 rejected giving amnesty to Hussein or his sons for crimes they may have committed if they accept exile outside Iraq, a compromise plan suggested by some Middle Eastern leaders but not embraced by the Bush administration and already rejected by Hussein. And an equally large majority -- 71 percent -- agrees with Bush that war is the only way to disarm Iraq, while about one in four believes there were other practical options. The prospects of an imminent war with Iraq clearly have captured the public's attention. More than seven in 10 poll respondents reported watching or listening to at least portions of Bush's brief speech last night. Respondents who reported having watched Bush's televised address were somewhat more likely to back the Iraqi invasion (77 percent, compared to 60 percent among those who had not seen the president's speech.) The poll suggests that the increased support for war is largely due to Democrats coming around to the president's view. Currently, roughly six in 10 Democrats said they support an attack on Iraq, compared to about four in 10 in an early March poll. At the same time, however, nearly half said they disapproved of the way Bush has handled the conflict with Iraq. Republicans remain nearly unanimous in their support for war: nine in 10 back the U.S.-led invasion, similar to polls conducted in recent weeks, and substantially higher than Democrats and political independents. Confidence in Bush's policy also differs starkly by party. An overwhelming 96 percent of Republicans said they were at least fairly confident that Bush's Iraq policy is the right one, compared to 65 percent of independents and 53 percent of Democrats. A majority of women now back the invasion of Iraq. Two thirds of those surveyed said they support a war with Iraq, compared to about half in a poll conducted two weeks ago. Eight in 10 men supported a war. © 2003 The Washington Post Company --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

To: Greg h2o who wrote (8948)	3/18/2003 4:38:12 PM
From: mister_utopia	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 13797

So far what I see are businessmen and agents in France sidestepping various embargoes, paying off certain officials, and shipping banned items to Iraq. I thought you meant the French government is funding and supporting Iraq. As far as money flowing into Iraq, most of it comes from the US due to its insatiable thirst for oil. I have no problem with the oil-for-food program, but I suspect $$$ from it do find their way in Saddam's hands. seattlepi.nwsource.com Tuesday, March 18, 2003 · Last updated 11:18 a.m. PT Oil Exports From Iraq May Be Disrupted By BRUCE STANLEY AP BUSINESS WRITER A war is almost certain to disrupt oil exports from Iraq. Here are some questions and answers relating to Iraq's oil production: Q. How big are Iraq's oil reserves? A. Iraq has an estimated 112.5 billion barrels in proven reserves, the world's second-largest after Saudi Arabia's. As many as 220 billion additional barrels are considered probable reserves. Q. Is Iraq free to sell its oil as it wants? A. No. Iraq is a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, but the bulk of its exports are overseen by the United Nations under the so-called "oil-for-food" program. Oil is Iraq's main source of foreign exchange. The United Nations set up the program in 1996 to monitor Iraqi shipments. Baghdad must spend its revenues from oil sales on humanitarian goods and nonmilitary equipment and to pay reparations dating from the 1991 Gulf War. Q. How much oil does Iraq produce and export? A. Iraq's daily production averaged 2.5 million barrels in February, according to the Paris-based International Energy Agency. U.N.-approved shipments averaged 1.7 million barrels a day last month, but analysts expect exports to dwindle in March - even without a war - as more banks and buyers grow wary of doing business in a potential conflict zone. Also, Iraq typically exports more than 300,000 barrels a day outside official U.N. trade channels, to Syria, Jordan and Turkey. Q. Who buys Iraqi oil? A. The United States tends to be the biggest importer of Iraqi crude, buying 366,000 barrels a day during December 2002. Iraq was the seventh-biggest supplier of U.S. crude imports that month, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Iraq's other customers include France, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands. Last month, about two-thirds of Iraq's exports went to importers in North and South America. More than half of this amount ended up in the United States. The buyers that deal directly with Iraq are often small, Russian-owned trading companies acting as middlemen. They ship the oil from Iraq to refiners and other users in importing countries. Q. What are conditions like in Iraq's oil fields and facilities? More than 12 years of U.N. sanctions imposed after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, which led to the 1991 Gulf War, have starved Iraq's oil industry of fresh investment, supplies and spare parts. The Iraqis have kept crude flowing in spite of these limitations, although analysts say this success may have come at the cost of permanent damage to some oil fields. Estimates of the money and time needed to upgrade Iraq's oil infrastructure vary. Some analysts argue that Iraq would need several years and tens of billions of dollars to boost its output capacity much above what it was in 1990, on the eve of Operation Desert Storm. Q. Where are Iraq's most important oil fields and facilities? A. Iraq's production is concentrated in two main geographic areas: in northern Iraq around the city of Kirkuk and in the south around Basrah. Kirkuk yields about 700,000 barrels a day, most of which is exported via a pipeline to the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, Turkey. In 1991, Kurdish fighters briefly occupied the headquarters of the Kirkuk oil facilities. The largest southern field is Rumaila, with a total output of 1.3 million barrels a day. Oil from southern Iraq is shipped largely from the Persian Gulf export terminal of Mina al-Bakr. Q. How is Iraq's oil industry organized? A. A government-run monopoly, the State Oil Marketing Organization, controls the production, processing and sale of Iraqi crude. Some U.S. officials want to dismantle the monopoly and privatize Iraq's oil industry. They argue this would boost efficiency and ensure investment opportunities for private businesses, including multinational companies from the United States. --- SOURCES: International Energy Agency, Center for Global Energy Studies, U.S. Energy Information Administration, Energy Intelligence Group, Council on Foreign Relations, The James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University, United Nations.