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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (16298)	4/3/2003 5:25:45 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

<<...maybe this is his final legacy...>> Maybe Saddam has already secretly fled the country and has left his sons and former commanders to take over...there are rumors that a number of Saddam's family members have already left Iraq -- if he's going to pull 'a bin laden' he has to disappear soon...It's tougher to hide in Iraq than over in the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan. I wonder why Saddam wasn't bright enough to get a guarantee for a secure exhile arrangement where he could not be prosecuted for war crimes...Saddam is listed as one of the wealthiest leaders in the world according to Forbes and most of his money is offshore in Swiss banks (its tough to tap into that when you are being attacked or when you are underground). -s2

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (16298)	4/3/2003 5:31:59 PM
From: mt_mike	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Jim, FWIW Debka is reporting that Saddam is long gone from Baghdad and possibly in Syria. It is Debka so who knows what the information is worth.

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (16298)	4/4/2003 2:14:25 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Divvying Up the War Booty in Iraq ________________________________ by Haroon Siddiqui Published on Thursday, April 3, 2003 by the Toronto Star America invaded Iraq because, George W. Bush said, Saddam Hussein posed a danger to America. So America will pay for the war, won't it? Not necessarily. Who will verify the weapons of mass destruction that America will "find" in Iraq? United Nations inspectors, right? Wrong. Who will control post-Saddam Iraq? The U.N., under a trusteeship, no? No. The 1991 Gulf War, which cost $60 billion, was paid for almost entirely by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, which had invited the American forces in. Having marched in uninvited this time, America does not have anyone to pay the big bills. Yet. "I expect we will get a lot of mitigation, but it'll be easier after the fact than before the fact," Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told Congress long before the start of the war. Consider President Bush's recent request to Congress for a $75 billion war appropriation as merely bridge financing. The money will be recovered from future Iraqi oil revenues. Or from those for whom the neighborhood has been made safe from Saddam, principally Israel and Kuwait. Don't be surprised if the Kuwaitis are leaned on for protection money. Who should organize relief work in Iraq? The United Nations, say Tony Blair and Colin Powell. But Bush, vice-president Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld et al are not keen. They think the U.S. military can handle humanitarian aid and look good doing it. But 13 leading relief agencies, including Oxfam and Doctors Without Borders, refused to enter Iraq under any authority but the U.N.'s. So America supported last week's 45-day extension of the U.N.'s oil for food program, suspended when the war began. Who should pay for the aid? The U.S. Agency for International Development has an idea: Tap into the $8 billion oil for food escrow account. So, Iraqis must pay for the humanitarian crisis caused by the United States. Who will be the Lakhdar Brahimi of Iraq? He is the U.N. special envoy co-ordinating relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction work in Afghanistan. No one, if Bush has his way. He has named a former American general to be the military governor of post-war Iraq. Jay Garner, head of the Pentagon's new Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance, is already in Kuwait, waiting to enter Iraq. But America and Britain do want the U.N. to bless his rule. "The important thing is that we end up with something that is U.N.-endorsed," said Blair. So, having violated the will of the U.N., America wants the U.N. to legitimize its illegal invasion — and bless its post-war governor. But Washington does not want the U.N. to do any post-conflict nation building of the sort it has done in the post-Cold War era. James Baker, secretary of state to former president George W.H. Bush, confirmed that yesterday. Speaking in Toronto, he said the U.S. would oppose a U.N.-led "cumbersome and politicized administration" in post-war Iraq. Translation: Butt out. General Garner will thus keep political control until he puts in place a puppet government. Along the way, he will ensure that Americans have first dibs at the war booty. Under the oil-for-food program, the U.N. was supervising Iraqi agencies supervising the pumping of about 2 million barrels a day for revenue of about $13 billion a year. We can guess who will control the production and the revenue from now on — the U.N. or the U.S.? The bigger honeypot is the reconstruction of the entire Iraqi infrastructure. That's about a $100 billion job. Who will pay for that? International law requires "occupying belligerents" to repair the damages caused in a conflict. But the Bush administration wants the funds to come principally from Iraqi oil revenues. So, Iraqis will pay for fixing the damage wrought by the Americans. And preferably pay it to American corporations. Back in February — when Bush was ostensibly working for a peaceful solution through the U.N. — his administration called for bids to rebuild a post-war Iraq. It restricted the bidding to U.S. companies, contrary to the procurement rules of the World Trade Organization. Criticism forced Halliburton, Cheney's former employer, to pull out of the bidding. But Bechtel and other benefactors of the Republican party are very much in the running, to the chagrin of British corporations. Among Garner's other jobs, he will have to settle the issue of the $170 billion outstanding Iraqi reparations to Kuwait from the 1991 war. Plus the $60 billion Iraqi foreign debt, mostly to Russia. Which is why, it was said, Russia has been behaving the way it has, opposing American intervention. But the spectacle of America jockeying for preferential financial arrangements in every aspect of post-war Iraq is jarringly at odds with the declared noble mission of liberating Iraqis and introducing much-needed freedom and democracy to the region. ______________________________________________ Haroon Siddiqui is The Star's editorial page editor emeritus. His column appears Thursday and Sunday. Copyright 1996-2003. Toronto Star Newspapers Limited commondreams.org

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (16298)	4/4/2003 12:34:37 PM
From: NOW	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 89467

why go in: they plan to simply lay siege.

To: Jim Willie CB who wrote (16298)	4/4/2003 2:49:39 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 89467

Widespread Use of Cluster Bombs Sparks Outrage by Mark Odell Published on Friday, April 4, 2003 by The Financial Times (UK) commondreams.org Confirmation by the US and Britain of widespread use of cluster munitions in Iraq caused anger yesterday among campaigners and politicians who claimed it ran counter to the coalition's aim to minimize civilian casualties. The danger posed by the use of these weapons, designed to destroy concentrations of armour and infantry by scattering small bomblets over a wide area, was shown during the Nato bombing campaign in Kosovo in 1999 and again last year in Afghanistan. "We are appalled, in the context of a conflict where we have been assured that civilian casualties will be minimized. It is very hard to use these weapons knowing exactly who you are going to target," said Richard Lloyd, director of Landmine Action. The weapons are dropped or fired in such large quantities at any one time that, with a failure rate as high as one in 10, an attack leaves hundreds of unexploded bomblets scattered around a target site, creating a de facto minefield. Although many are unleashed as so-called cluster bombs, both the US and British armies have also fired large numbers from the ground in artillery barrages. Campaign groups such as Landmine Action and the Diana Princess of Wales Memorial Fund are targeting the use of these weapons, in the same way they successfully fought for the ban on anti-personnel mines under the 1998 Ottawa treaty. A donkey lies dead near shrapnel-riddled bus in Hilla. Forty-eight civilians were killed by cluster bombs during a coalition air raid in the southern province of Babylon. (AFP/Karim Sahib) The debate has heightened the sensitivity to their use among the military, particularly the British, as demonstrated by a bizarre chain of events yesterday. Officers at a British divisional headquarters near Basra confirmed that new cluster munitions, with a much lower failure rate, had been fired by artillery at targets around Basra, although not where they might injure civilians. Almost immediately, however, Colonel Chris Vernon, the spokesman at the British army headquarters in Kuwait, categorically denied that any such weapons had been used. Hours later, Geoff Hoon, UK defense secretary, contradicted that statement when he confirmed in parliament that British forces were in fact using cluster munitions. Mr Hoon said the weapons were used only when it was "absolutely justified . . . because it is making the battlefield safer for our armed forces". Mr Lloyd said they were in fact a threat to forces who used them, adding: "The first British casualties in Kosovo were two Ghurkhas killed clearing our own cluster munitions." The US was put on the defensive yesterday after the International Red Cross backed Iraqi claims that BLU-97 cluster bombs had been used in the town of Hilla. Brigadier-General Vincent Brooks, the spokesman at Central Command, said he did "not have any factual basis" on which to respond. But Mr Lloyd said: "We have some very clear footage of unexploded BLU-97s in the ground in Hilla. We are very clear on that and would stake our reputation on it." Paul Keetch, defense spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, said: "Cluster bombs send the wrong message to the people whose hearts and minds we are trying to win." Additional reporting by By Victor Mallet in Kuwait City, Richard McGregor at Central Command, Qatar, and Jean Eaglesham in London © Copyright The Financial Times Ltd 2003