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Politics : World Affairs Discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3127)	1/3/2004 11:48:32 PM
From: Raymond Duray	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

Saddam and the Sunnis are partners in thuggery. George Bush is also wearing a black hat: Message 19651197 We used to scoff that he was "all hat and no cattle". Well, the truth is, George Bush is the most accomplished cattle rustler this planet has ever witnessed. See: libertyforum.org floridatoday.com!NEWSROOM/peoplestoryA1172A.htm

To: ChinuSFO who wrote (3127)	1/4/2004 8:23:46 AM
From: lorne	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 3959

The Invasion Of Iraq And Libya's Nuclear Capitulation Charles Krauthammer argues the timing of the Libyan abandonment of nuclear weapons development is too much a coincidence to have been an accident. By Randall Parker 2003 December 26 02:33 PM parapundit.com Yeah, sure. After 18 years of American sanctions, Moammar Gaddafi randomly picks Dec. 19, 2003, as the day for his surrender. By amazing coincidence, Gaddafi's first message to Britain -- principal U.S. war ally and conduit to White House war councils -- occurs just days before the invasion of Iraq. And his final capitulation to U.S.-British terms occurs just five days after Saddam Hussein is fished out of a rathole. As Jay Leno would say, what are the odds? The nine months of negotiations with Libya perfectly frame the war on Iraq and the fall of Saddam Hussein. How is it possible to ignore the most blindingly obvious collateral benefits? John O'Sullivan argues that the Bush doctrine of preemption and the invasion of Iraq helped secure Muammar Khadafy's capitulation on nuclear weapons development. First, the timing. Gadhafi approached the British to open talks on this one week before the invasion of Iraq when it was plain that Saddam was about to fall over WMDs. He hurried the announcement after Saddam was captured. At the very least, this behavior makes it look as if he was afraid of suffering the same fate. Second, there actually was military intervention against Libya -- and Gadhafi remained silent about it. A U.S.-led coalition halted Libyan ships containing WMD contraband on the high seas under the president's Proliferation Security Initiative. That told the Libyan that the United States knew a great deal about his WMD programs and was prepared to halt them by military means if necessary. Third, Gadhafi obligingly told Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi that after the invasion of Iraq he was afraid of the United States. This analysis rings true to me. We are still left Iran's quite a bit less than full abandonment of the ambitions of the mullahs to construct nuclear weapons. Plus, Kim Jong-il of North Korea is still attempting to build a nuclear arsenal. But if the invasion of Iraq helped secure Libya's capitulation then that alone justifies the invasion of Iraq in my mind. Libya has revealed North Korean and Iranian scientists and engineers were working in Libya. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi took the decision to renounce all weapons of mass destruction (WMD) on Friday night, but while at first it was thought this only had implications for Libya it is now clear that his decision has scuppered a secret partnership between Libya, Iran and North Korea formed with the intention of developing an independent nuclear weapon. New documents revealed yesterday show that the three were working on the nuclear weapons programme at a top-secret underground site near the Kufra Oasis of the Sahara in southeastern Libya. The team was made up of North Korean scientists, engineers and technicians, as well as some Iranian and Libyan nuclear scientists. There have been rumors to the effect that nuclear weapons designers from North Korea, Iran, and Libya were cooperating. But the rumors came from single sources in less prestigious publications. Turns out they were right. The nuclear weapons development cooperation between Iran, North Korea, and Libya makes the capitulation of Libya even more important. Attention is now going to become more focused on North Korea as a result of the deal with Libya. Some Bush Administration critics claim Bush's public posture toward North Korea makes it harder to come to a similar deal with North Korea. However, Balbina Hwang, a Korea analyst for the Heritage Foundation, points out that North Korea's regime sees a high profile disagreement and intentionally provocative moves as key elements of its negotiating strategy. "I wish the (North Korea) negotiations were more quiet and under the radar," Hwang said, but claimed that Pyongyang's negotiating strategy was based on "showmanship" and portraying the crisis as a standoff between itself and Washington. Hwang thinks the leaders of North Korea should learn a lesson from Libya's capitulation. "I hope they (North Korea) are learning an important lesson from this," said Balbina Hwang, a Korea analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank. "North Korea should learn what Libya has ... Ghaddafi saw what the future was, that if he did not relent and co-operate with the international community, life was going to be very difficult." Will Kim Jong-il wise up and end his nuclear ambitions? It still seems unlikely. The reason is that North Korea faces a different set of problems and opportunities than Libya. Libya has one factor going for it that the regime in Pyongyang North Korea lacks: oil. Free of sanctions the Libyans can make a lot of money and modernize without jeopardizing the regime's control. The North Korean regime sees a continuing crisis as a necessary means to try to extract aid from other countries. Absent high tensions North Korea might be ignored and a large decline in aid would pose an existential crisis for the Pyongyang regime. The path of economic reform is seen by Kim Jong-il as a process that could easily spin out of control and result in his overthrow. So North Korea still looks like a tough nut to crack.