[Peace-discuss] News notes 030223

[C. G. Estabrook]

        Notes on the week's news
        from the "War on Terrorism"
        for the AWARE meeting,
        Sunday, February 23, 2003

A SUMMARY OF THE WEEK was given in the daily press -- not of course in the
editorial or news pages, but in the comics, where for years one has found
the most insightful observations in the US papers.  (Doonesbury alone is
responsible for a good number of them.)  Aaron Mcgruder ("Boondocks")
shows his characters listening to a TV announcement: "President Bush said
today it was clear that nothing short of a complete and utter disregard of
UN resolutions would stop Saddam Hussein's complete and utter disregard of
UN resolutions."

A. IRAQ

[1] WAR PARTY PREPARES TO SUBORN UNSC.  The Bush administration is
courting the nine votes it needs from the council's 15 members (assuming
no vetoes) to pass its resolution.  Hans Blix demands that Iraq destroy
its Al Samoud 2 missiles by March 1st; President Bush comments that even
if Iraq does so, that would only be "the tip of the iceberg."  The concern
among Bush administration officials is that if Saddam Hussein complies
with Hans Blix's demand that Iraq get rid of its long-range missiles,
France will argue that weapons inspections are working.  Bush's remarks
yesterday meant to cut off that argument before it starts, says the NYT.
[SLATE 2/23]

[2] EAST EUROPEAN INCUBATOR BABIES. A US lobbyist helped draft Eastern
Europeans' Iraq statement.  A former Pentagon official helped draft a
controversial statement by 10 Central and Eastern European nations this
month that supports the United States in its stand-off with Iraq,
according to a press report published in Paris. In an interview, Bruce
Jackson, a former US Defense Department official who heads a Committee for
the Liberation of Iraq, said that he was among those who helped initiate
the statement supporting the US stance, the daily International Herald
Tribune reported.  The joint statement by Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia,
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia drew
a scathing rebuke from France's President Jacques Chirac at a European
Union summit meeting in Brussels Monday. According to the report, it was
the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, Jackson's organization, that
helped distribute the text to news agencies ... Kestutis Jankauskas,
deputy chief of mission at the Lithunian embassy in Washington, said
Jackson played a "considerable role" and helped "initiate the text."
Richard Mucins, counselor at the Latvian embassy in Washington, said,
according to the paper, that Jackson suggested the following passage, one
of the most compelling sections in the statement: "Our countries
understand the dangers posed by tyranny and the special responsibility of
democracies to defend our shared values". The statement which was
published by what is known as the Vilnius 10 on February 5 is considered
as a way to help seven out of the 10 countries, which are not yet members
of NATO, to join the Atlantic alliance, says the paper, [IHT 2/20]

[3] DUDE, WHERE'S OUR NORTHERN ALLIANCE? U.S. and Turkey are said to be
close to an agreement that would allow American troops to operate from
Turkish bases, thereby creating a second front in the anticipated war with
Iraq ... U.S. troops will operate out of Turkey in exchange for about $6
billion in aid, along with other strategic assurances, such as a guarantee
that Iraqi Kurds will not be allowed to cross the border into Turkey 
 WP
reports that 95 percent of the Turkish people are opposed to the war; the
Turkish Parliament may not approve ... Newsweek reports that part of the
wrangling with Turkey has to do with that country's demands that it be
allowed to control some of the oil-rich areas of northern Iraq. According
to the Financial Times, the White House is threatening to cut off Turkey's
military aid unless it cooperates. [SLATE 2/22]

[4] DEMOCRACY MEANS WHAT WE SAY. The Washington Post reports that the Bush
administration plans to take "complete, unilateral control of a
post-Saddam Hussein Iraq," with an interim administration headed by a
yet-to-be named American civilian "of stature," such as a former U.S.
state governor or ambassador. [2/21] {"This administration does martial
plans," writes Paul Krugman, "not Marshall Plans: billions for offense,
not one cent for reconstruction." [NYT 2/21] E. g., The 2003 foreign aid
proposal the White House sent to Congress last year failed to request
money for humanitarian and reconstruction efforts in the war-ravaged
country.}

[5] WASHINGTON POST RIDES TO WAR, UNBUTTONED... "President Saddam
Hussein's government, apparently emboldened by antiwar sentiment at the UN
Security Council and in worldwide street protests, has not followed
through on its promises of increased cooperation with UN arms inspectors,
according to inspectors in Iraq. No Iraqi scientist involved in
biological, chemical or missile technology has consented to a private
interview with the inspectors since Feb. 7, the day before the two chief
UN inspectors arrived here for talks with Iraqi officials ... Although
five non-nuclear scientists did agree to questioning without a government
representative, they each insisted on making a tape recording of the
session. The inspectors refused to go forward with those interviews
because of concern that making a tape, which likely would wind up in the
government's hands, would dissuade the scientists from providing candid
answers." [WP 2/20]
	Meanwhile, CBS reports that UN weapons inspectors are "privately
complaining about the quality of U.S. intelligence and accusing the United
States of sending them on wild-goose chases," with one source referring to
the intelligence as "garbage after garbage after garbage." [2/21]

[6] WAR IS THE HEALTH OF THE STATE. Tens of thousands of Palestinians
marched in a funeral procession of a leading militant Friday, vowing
revenge after a week of violence in which Israeli forces have killed 30
Palestinians. "Sharon, prepare the coffins," organizers yelled through
loudspeakers, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. "Revenge
is coming soon, in Tel Aviv and Jaffa" ... Friday's funeral procession in
Gaza City was to honor Riyad Abu Zeid, a military commander of the Islamic
militant group Hamas, who was killed Monday in an Israeli raid. Israeli
forces have carried out a series of armored raids into the Gaza Strip in
the past week which overshadowed new international peace efforts and
roused fresh Palestinian fury. Friday, troops shot dead a Palestinian who
tossed grenades as he tried to storm the Erez border crossing between
Israel and the Gaza Strip, a frequent target of militant attacks during
the 29-month-old Palestinian uprising, the army said. Islamic Jihad, one
of the main groups behind suicide bombings on Israelis, claimed
responsibility for the attack ... Islamic Jihad denied Friday that it had
any links to four men, including South Florida University professor Sami
al-Arian, arrested in the United States on charges of conspiring to kill
more than 100 people in Israel and the occupied territories. "These
accusations are fabricated and completely baseless," the group said in a
statement faxed to Reuters in Beirut. Abdallah al-Shami, an Islamic Jihad
leader in Gaza, said Arian "is an academic who has no factional
relationship with Islamic Jihad and nothing to do with the movement."
Arian, a resident of the United States since 1975, denies any wrongdoing
...  In the West Bank village of Jamaeen, troops blew up the family home
of a Hamas militant killed last year and linked to attacks in which 13
Israelis died, the army said. Witnesses said the demolition made 10 people
homeless. At least 1,859 Palestinians and 705 Israelis have been killed
since the uprising began in September 2000. [REUTERS 2/21]

B. ELSEWHERE

[7] "FIRST IRAQ, THEN IRAN" --ISRAEL'S PM. The International Atomic Energy
Agency went to IRAN this week and were shown a network of sophisticated
machinery used to enrich uranium ... "Tehran's progress is impressive,"
said IAEA Director General ElBaradei, calling Iran's stated plans to share
certain information a "welcome measure of transparency." [NYT 2/21]
	Iranian-backed Iraqi opposition forces have crossed into northern
Iraq from Iran with the aim of securing the frontier in the event of war,
according to senior Iranian officials.  The forces, numbering up to 5,000
troops, with some heavy equipment, are nominally under the command of
Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim, a prominent Iraqi Shia Muslim
opposition leader who has been based in Iran since 1980 and lives in
Tehran.

[8] "VICTORY IS CONVINCING AMERICAN PEOPLE THAT IT WILL BE A LONG WAR"
--RUMSFELD. The United States is sending troops back to the Philippines,
and this time, rather than taking on the limited task of training Filipino
forces to combat Muslim militant group Abu Sayyaf, U.S. soldiers will
fight alongside them until the group is "wiped out." U.S. intelligence
officials claim new evidence of a connection between Abu Sayyaf and al
Qaida, but even the WP calls those ties "dated and tenuous," and notes
that U.S. officials have recently emphasized only that the group is a
threat to U.S. interests in Southeast Asia.  They claim that the country's
president asked for help, but that violates the Philippine constitution. A
U.S. official says that the constitutional prohibition against foreign
troops carrying out unilateral combat missions, is something the
Philippine government "will have to finesse." [NYT 2/21]

[9] EXPANDING THE WOT. Much is made in the press of a North Korean fighter
plane violated South Korea's airspace yesterday -- the first such
incursion in 20 years. Two artices (LAT, WSJ) describe how Syrian
President Bashar Assad thinks that the US will attack his country after
Iraq.

[10] NOW, WHAT WILL YOU NEED FOR YOUR EXPANDING WARS? The Bush
administration is planning a secret meeting in August to discuss the
construction of a new generation of nuclear weapons, including
"mini-nukes", "bunker-busters" and neutron bombs designed to destroy
chemical or biological agents, according to a leaked Pentagon document.
The meeting of senior military officials and US nuclear scientists at the
Omaha headquarters of the US Strategic Command would also decide whether
to restart nuclear testing and how to convince the American public that
the new weapons are necessary. [GUARDIAN UK 2/19]

C. AT HOME

[11] FILLING THE TERRORIST GAP. A 50-count indictment against former
Florida university professor Sami Al-Arian accuses him of leading the
American fundraising wing of the Palestinian group Islamic Jihad,
designated "terorist"tive Dept. fiat; the government's case against
Al-Arian is brought to you in part by the USA Patriot Act, which makes
some intelligence gathered in classified national security investigations
admissible in criminal court. Al-Arian's lawyer says that he did no
fundraising for the group once doing so became illegal in 1995. The NYT
quotes a terrorism analyst [sic] who terms the indictments "a
breakthrough" because they target a group other than al Qaida.
	Federal prosecutors exaggerated their success convicting would-be
terrorists last year by wrongly classifying three of four cases as
"international terrorism," a government watchdog says. Overall, almost
half of 288 convictions deemed "terrorism-related" were found by
investigators to have been wrongly classified as such for the fiscal year
that ended Sept. 30, the General Accounting Office found. [AP 2/21]
	Germany convicted Mohamed Atta's former roommate Mounir
el-Motassadeq on 3,066 counts of accessory to murder for having played a
logistical role in 9/11. El-Motassadeq said he didn't know about the plot;
the court didn't buy that and sentenced him to the max: 15 years. [USAT
2/20]

[12] THERE'S A WAR ON. In his State of the Union address, the president
pledged $10 billion over five years for AIDs relief in Africa; the
proposed '04 budget only includes a $550 million increase -- balanced by
cuts in international health-care programs for kids. [NYT 2/17]

[13] LIKE VULTURES CIRCLING A SCENE OF DEATH AND DESTRUCTION, DEMOCRATIC
CANDIDATES GATHER.  Each more atrocious than the last.  Dick Gephardt's
spinelessness gave the Bushies their congressional resolution. The awful
John Kerry had a prostate operation, but as Doonesbury would put it, it
was really his manhood they were going to remove (but they couldn't find
it).  Joe Lieberman attacks the Republicans from the Right, and John
Edwards has nice hair (nicer than Kerry's).  Dennis Kucinich suddenly
discovers he's got over his hesitations about abortion.  Meanwhile the
antiwar dream ticket remains Carol Mosely-Braun and Al Sharpton...
	FAILURE OF AMERICA'S SCHOOLS. High school students in Washington
and surrounding areas walked out of their schools Friday in protest
against the 'Bush War'. Students were threatened with expulsion or
suspension by their principals, but many said this would not stop them.  
A few hundred students held a one-hour rally at Dupont Circle. Then they
marked down Connecticut Avenue, past the White House, and on to Congress
and Capitol Hill. [MER 2/21]

{THE IMPERIAL PRESCRIPTION. The NYT's Thomas Friedman says he thinks the
Bush administration is right to confront Saddam. The problem, he says, is
that the White House "is big on attitude, weak on strategy and terrible at
diplomacy." And it lies. "There is simply no proof" that Saddam is allied
with al-Qaida. "Tell people the truth," says Friedman. "Saddam does not
threaten us today. He can be deterred. Taking him out is a war of
choice-but it's a legitimate choice. It's because he is undermining the
UN, it's because if left alone he will seek weapons that will threaten all
his neighbors, it's because you believe the people of Iraq deserve to be
liberated from his tyranny, and it's because you intend to help Iraqis
create a progressive state that could stimulate reform in the Arab/Muslim
world." [NYT 2/19]}

	"I think we ought to be very cautious about using the phrase 'War
	on Terror.' There can't be a war on terror. That is a logical
	impossibility. First of all because war is one of the principal
	means through which terror is perpetuated; and secondly because
	the USA is one of the leading terrorist states in the world."
		--Noam Chomsky

  ==============================================================
  C. G. Estabrook, Ph.D., Visiting Scholar
  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign [MC-190]
  109 Observatory, 901 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana IL 61801 USA
  office: 217.244.4105 mobile: 217.369.5471 home: 217.359.9466
  <www.carlforcongress.org>
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