Al Qaeda-Saddam Hussein Pre-war Ties Revisited

A Master Terrorist's First Days in Bahgdad

With the death of "Abu Ayyub al Masri (aka Abu Hamzah al-Muhajir, the military leader of al Qaeda in Iraq) and Hamid Dawud Muhammad Khalil al Zawi (aka Abu Umar al-Baghdadi, the overall leader of AQI)", the Weekly Standard's Thomas Joscelyn takes another look at the links between the Ba'athist regime and al Qaeda.

"...here is one fact the press is not likely to trumpet: Abu Ayyub al Masri set up shop in Saddam’s Iraq roughly ten months prior to the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. His presence there was tracked by the CIA. The agency was even concerned that al Masri and his al Qaeda compatriots might be planning terrorist attacks outside of Iraq from Baghdad."

[---]

"(George) Tenet writes: "...by the spring and summer of 2002, more than a dozen al-Qa’ida-affiliated extremists converged on Baghdad, with apparently no harassment on the part of the Iraqi government. They had found a comfortable and secure environment in which they moved people and supplies to support Zarqawi’s operations in northeastern Iraq.

Among the al Qaeda operatives who moved to Baghdad in May 2002 was an Egyptian named Yussef al Dardiri. As The Washington Post first reported, Yussef al Dardiri is Abu Ayyub al Masri’s real name."

[---]

"Saddam’s Baghdad was a neo-Stalinist capital, and it is difficult to believe that al Qaeda terrorists would set up shop there, coordinate their activities with other al Qaeda terrorists in northeastern Iraq, and engage in a variety of other activities without Saddam knowing it. One important al Qaeda terrorist was even briefly detained in Baghdad during this period, but Saddam ordered him released.

At a minimum, Tenet’s testimony rebuts one of the more prevalent Iraq war myths – that there were no al Qaeda terrorists present in Saddam’s Iraq until the American invasion opened the door for them.

There is more to this story than Tenet lets on.

For example, there is evidence that Saddam actively fostered al Qaeda’s presence on Iraqi soil. In Abdel Bari Atwan's The Secret History of al Qaeda, Dr. Muhammad al Masri (a known al Qaeda mouthpiece) and Baathist sources explain that Saddam funded the relocation of al Qaeda operatives to Iraq “with the proviso that they would not undermine his regime.” Saddam also sent “messengers to buy small plots of land from farmers in Sunni areas” and “[i]n the middle of the night soldiers would bury arms and money caches for later use by the resistance.”

Dr. al Masri told Atwan that Iraqi army commanders “were ordered to become practicing Muslims and to adopt the language and spirit of the jihadis.” When al Qaeda operatives arrived in Iraq, they “were put in touch with these commanders, who later facilitated the distribution of arms and money from Saddam’s caches.”

From this vantage point, it is not surprising that the places where Saddam’s regime was strongest ended up hosting al Qaeda. Abu Ayyub al Masri himself was killed not far from Saddam’s hometown of Tikrit.

There is additional evidence that Saddam called for terrorists throughout the region to relocate to Iraqi soil. And, in February 2003, Osama bin Laden himself called on Muslims to fight alongside Saddam Hussein’s forces. Saddam and his regime were “infidel” socialists, bin Laden said. But they were better than the Americans. “There is nothing wrong with a convergence of interests here,” bin Laden argued.

There are deeper ties here as well. Abu Ayyub al Masri was a member of the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ), which Ayman al Zawahiri led since the 1980s. The EIJ’s cooperation and eventual merger with al Qaeda provided Osama bin Laden with much of the muscle and tactical capabilities his organization needed to blossom into an international terrorist threat. Zawahiri also influenced bin Laden in profound ways, crucially contributing to the terror master’s plans for creating an international jihadist coalition.

Zawahiri always found utility in cooperating with rogue states when it suited his interests. For instance, the 9/11 Commission found that Zawahiri “had ties of his own” to Saddam’s regime.

Iraqi Intelligence documents discovered in post-Saddam Iraq provided additional context to the 9/11 Commission’s finding. One document, in particular, notes that Saddam’s intelligence services and Zawahiri’s EIJ agreed to cooperate in operations targeting Zawahiri’s long-time enemy: Hosni Mubarak’s regime in Egypt.

Abu Ayyub al Masri was one of Ayman al Zawahiri’s longest-serving lieutenants. Zawahiri found it convenient to cooperate with Saddam on occasion.

Lo and behold, we find that Abu Ayyub and other senior EIJ members relocated to Saddam’s Baghdad in 2002. And Abu Ayyub had plotted terror inside Iraq ever since."

Now, put all that together with what we know about an Iraqi ambassador to the Vatican and his trip to Niger in February, 1999.

And Now, Back to Our Useful Idiot

Sean says: "...ya, international rules and conventions be damned, there's oil in them hills...oh wait it was because of WMDs, nope that's not it, it was because Saddam was bad, nope that's not it, it was because of freedom and democracy, oh wait...no that isn't it either"

I have dealt with the smaller points in Sean's monotonous, machine generated leftie speak here. I will cover the idiocy of the "it's-all-about-oil" meme in a future posts and as I've already said, I will deal with the WMD issue in a separate post, as well, but some of it has to be discussed here, because it is relevant. What I want to deal with in this post is Sean's ridiculous assertion that Saddam Hussein's tyranny - you know, his flouting of those international rules and conventions - had nothing to do with the decision to invade. The case has been made over and over again both here on my blog (see my Epistles to Foud, starting here, for a recent example.) and on dozens of others, not to mention by legions of knowledgeable folks using the entire panoply of media available today.

What Sean is asserting is that the decision to invade was not motivated by Hussein's record as an incorrigible tyrant, he is revealing himself to be a pathetic fool. It was precisely because of Saddam Hussein's record that the showdown took place. His very long record on the issue is why he could not be trusted, no matter what he said or did with respect to UN resolution 1441 or with any other previous attempt to make him come clean on his WDM. The two were absolutely inseparable. Want proof? Read on.

I'll start with statements from the mouth of that man so hated and maligned by the left, George W. Bush:

August 10, 2002:

"I have constantly said that we owe it to our children and our children's children to free the world from weapons of mass destruction in the hands of those who hate freedom. This is a man who has poisoned his own people, I mean he's had a history of tyranny."

November 8, 2002:

"All patriotic Iraqis should embrace this resolution as an opportunity for Iraq to avoid war and end its isolation. Saddam Hussein cannot hide his weapons of mass destruction from international inspectors without the cooperation of hundreds and thousands of Iraqis -- those who work in the weapons program and those who are responsible for concealing the weapons. We call on those Iraqis to convey whatever information they have to inspectors, the United States, or other countries, in whatever manner they can. By helping the process of disarmament, they help their country.

Americans recognize what is at stake. In fighting a war on terror, we are determined to oppose every source of catastrophic harm that threatens our country, our friends, and our allies. We are actively pursuing dangerous terror networks across the world. And we oppose a uniquely dangerous regime -- a regime that has harbored terrorists and can supply terrorists with weapons of mass destruction; a regime that has built such terrible weapons and has used them to kill thousands; a brutal regime with a history of both reckless ambition and reckless miscalculation.

The United States of America will not live at the mercy of any group or regime that has the motive and seeks the power to murder Americans on a massive scale. The threat to America also threatens peace and security in the Middle East and far beyond. If Iraq's dictator is permitted to acquire nuclear weapons, he could resume his pattern of intimidation and conquest and dictate the future of a vital region."

January 31, 2003: (Press conference with Tony Blair.)

Bush: "Saddam Hussein is not disarming. He is a danger to the world. He must disarm. And that's why I have constantly said and the Prime Minister has constantly said this issue will come to a head in a matter of weeks, not months."

Blair: "The whole point about the present situation is that when President Bush made his speech to the United Nations, when we went down the United Nations route, we passed Resolution 1441. And I think it really repays reading that, because we said very clearly that Saddam had what we said was a final opportunity to disarm, and that he had to cooperate fully in every respect with the U.N. weapons inspectors. As Dr. Blix said in his report to the Security Council earlier this week, he's not doing that. And therefore, what is important is that the international community comes together again and makes it absolutely clear that this is unacceptable. And the reason why I believe that it will do that is precisely because in the original Resolution 1441, we made it clear that failure to disarm would lead to serious consequences. So this is a test for the international community. It's not just a test for the United States or for Britain. It's a test for the international community, too. [Read: for the United Nations] And the judgment has to be, at the present time, that Saddam Hussein is not cooperating with the inspectors, and therefore is in breach of the U.N. resolution. And that's why time is running out."

February 6, 2003: The World Can Rise to the Moment. The whole thing is relevant, as it further elaborates on Hussein's infamous and nefarious cat and mouse game, which he continued to play, right up until the invasion, but I will quote only two passages, again by Bush:

"This is the situation as we find it. Twelve years after Saddam Hussein agreed to disarm, and 90 days after the Security Council passed Resolution 1441 by a unanimous vote, Saddam Hussein was required to make a full declaration of his weapons programs. He has not done so. Saddam Hussein was required to fully cooperate in the disarmament of his regime; he has not done so. Saddam Hussein was given a final chance; he is throwing that chance away."

[snip]

"All the world can rise to this moment. The community of free nations can show that it is strong and confident and determined to keep the peace. The United Nations can renew its purpose and be a source of stability and security in the world. The Security Council can affirm that it is able and prepared to meet future challenges and other dangers. And we can give the Iraqi people their chance to live in freedom and choose their own government.

Saddam Hussein has made Iraq into a prison, a poison factory, and a torture chamber for patriots and dissidents. Saddam Hussein has the motive and the means and the recklessness and the hatred to threaten the American people. Saddam Hussein will be stopped."

Monday Moment of Truth for Iraq

(Press conference at The Azores with Bush, together with Blair, Spanish Prime Minister Aznar, and Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Bassaro : video available at link, top right corner)

President Bassaro: "We have joined this initiative and we organized it here in the Azores because we thought this was the last opportunity for a political solution -- and this is how we see it, this is the last possibility for a political solution to the problem. Maybe it's a small chance, a small possibility, but even if it's one in one million, it's always worthwhile fighting for a political solution. And I think this is the message that we can get from this Atlantic summit.

President Anzar: "We are committed on a day-to-day fight against new threats, such as terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and tyrannic regimes that do not comply with international law. They threaten all of us, and we must all act, consequently."

Listen to the video and listen especially to Tony Blair's remarks. His oratory skills are far superior to Bush's and he explains it much, much better.

So you see, Sean, it wasn't about whether he had WDM, per se. It was Saddam Hussein's continual cat and mouse game with UN resolutions pertaining to them and to various other aspects of his tyrannical rule for more than a decade. The man was dangerous and he could not be trusted.

And speaking of Tony Blair, here's the statement issued by Blair's administration. The entire thing presents Britain's humanitarian case for war: Great Britain's Dossier.

There is also the US State Department's background brief, A Decade of Deception and Defiance, published in September, 2002, which contains considerable detail under the following headings:

Saddam Hussein's Repression of the Iraqi People
Refusal to Admit Human Rights Monitors
Violence Against Women
Torture
Executions and Repression of Political Opposition
Saddam Hussein's Abuse of Children
Basic Freedoms: Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Information
Withholding of Food
Crimes Against Muslims
Saddam Hussein's Support for International Terrorism
Saddam Hussein's Refusal to Account for Gulf War Prisoners
Saddam Hussein's Refusal to Return Stolen Property
Saddam Hussein's Efforts to Circumvent Economic Sanctions

The details under these headings are worth reading, by the way, as they provide a lot of information that may cause you and Captain Taliban to rethink your position on a few things, the sanctity and usefulness of the United Nations, being one, but certainly the fools argument that the humanitarian angle had nothing to do with the decision to invade. Foud, you should, too, since your notions about pre-war Iraq are grotesquely off-base, to say the least.

And lets not forget who it was that signed the Iraq Liberation Act into law, way back in 1998, and what the man then sitting in the Oval Office had to say about Iraq and the justification for authorizing Saddam Hussein's removal.

There's also the passage of the Joint Resolution to Authorize the use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq, passed by both houses of Congress in October, 2002, just months before the invasion. Here are some relevant passages from that resolution:

"Whereas Iraq persists in violating resolutions of the United Nations Security Council by continuing to engage in brutal repression of its civilian population thereby threatening international peace and security in the region..."

[snip]

"Whereas the current Iraqi regime has demonstrated its capability and willingness to use weapons of mass destruction against other nations and its own people;..."

It's worth reading in its entirety, Sean, sweetheart, as it blows apart every one of the naive and bankrupt assumptions from Taliban Jack's Little Red Book that you just repeat ad nauseam.

And finally, three days before Baghdad fell, this was posted on White House's website: Life Under Saddam Hussein

None of this is to say that oil was not a large factor, but as I said, I'll return to that argument in a later post. But for you to make the claim that the US lead coalition's motivation had nothing to do with Saddam's human rights record and his previous history as a "bad guy" is to admit to being either a cad or a blithering idiot. Take. Your. Pick.

Oh. And my father fought in Europe in World War II to protect your sorry ass, and I'm glad he did. He signed up the day war broke out in 1939. Canada had not been attacked, nor had Great Britain. Indeed, Canada was in very little danger of being attacked. He just did the right thing, because it was the right thing.

Just curious. Do you hate Jews, too, or is it just brutally oppressed Arabs that you don't give a damn about?

More Idiocy Exposed

Don't be surprised if I expend more than a few pixels deflating the idiocy of the pseudo-left's continuous droning on and on about that war criminal, George Bush. I expect the crescendo of idiotic blather will rise ever higher until Dubya leaves town on October 22, or so. So here's one.

Over at Celestial Junk I responded to a comment posted by a Bush-Hitler-bot by referring, among other things, to UN Human Rights Special Rapporteur Max van der Stoel's reference to Saddam Hussein's regime and how Chretien's decision to force Canada to sit on our collective asses during the war to oust that monster cost us a lot of respect and stature on the international stage. As an aside, the Liberal Party's decades long policy of forced chronic starvation with respect to funding our armed forces had something to do with it as well.

Prior to posting the comment at C-Junk's blog, I did a quick Google search on Max van der Stoel and the movement started by Ann Clwyd in Britain to indict Saddam Hussein and bring him before an international court for crimes against humanity. Anyway, one of the hits retrieved in that search was this site:

Why hasn't Saddam Hussein been indicted?

This article draws upon Ms Clwyd's knowledge of human rights abuses and lays out a lot of information revealing the true nature of the Ba'athist regime. For example:

"Twenty-five years ago, while living in Cardiff, she befriended Iraqi and Kurdish students, and found it hard to believe their grim reports of life under Saddam Hussein. Evidence was plentiful for those who wished to find it however, and once elected MP for Cynon Valley (in Wales) in 1984, she also became chair of the Campaign Against Repression and for Democratic Rights in Iraq (CARDRI): ‘Even then, in the mid-1980s, I only knew the first name of CARDRI’s secretary, because people were living in such fear…. Isn’t it amazing that they were so afraid of people knowing their whereabouts and their surnames – people like us who were there to highlight the human rights abuses in their country?’"

and this:

"‘A lot of guff is talked about the effect of sanctions. There is a great deal of inaccurate information about it. We took our evidence from a wide range of people, and the conclusion we came to was that Saddam Hussein was primarily responsible for the suffering of his own people. You only have to look at what happened in the north of Iraq, in Kurdistan, where they suffer a double set of sanctions, but with far less disastrous results: the same sanctions apply, and Saddam Hussein’s sanctions apply there as well….’"

But then we learn this:

"Clwyd views the branding of Hussein and his regime as international war criminals as a third way between appeasement and military action. ‘If you want regime change, then do it through using international law, rather than by war,’ she says. ‘(Slobodan) Milosevic was indicted while he was head of state, and nobody thought that two years later, he’d be sitting before the Hague tribunal. It discredited him, and once you discredit their power base, things happen.’

At the time, a lot of people thought that indicting Milosevic was just a sideshow. ‘When Americans talk about regime change – as they do all the time now – they mean post-war. But I’m talking about regime change pre-war. On the evidence of war crimes, crimes against humanity, which we have got against leading members of Hussein’s regime, it is possible to indict them as Milosevic was indicted, which led directly to the crumbling of that regime.’"

I beg your pardon, Ms Clwyd???!! If it were not for the war in the former Yugoslavia, do you really think that Milosevic would have been captured and brought to justice? That war set up the structure of conditions that enabled his arrest. And anyone with even an inkling of knowledge about Saddam Hussein's multi-layered security apparatus would just laugh at you for thinking that someone could just walk up to him, handcuff him and send him off to Europe or somewhere to be tried. Anyone who even talked about attempting such action would have been immediately arrested and treated to one or more of the vast array of human rights violation techniques for which Hussein's layers of security apparatus goons were infamous.

The article also draws parallels between the potential prosecution of Saddam Hussein and that of ex-Chilean dictator, Augusto Pinochet. Well, I beg your pardon, again (eyes rolling). Pinochet was indeed a monster but nowhere close to the degree that Saddam Hussein was. He was also the "ex-president", ie. no longer in control of the machinery of oppression in his native country, nor, consequently, capable of horrific reprisals against anyone who might have tried to arrest him. What a pathetic joke!!

No, the evidence collected via Ms Clwyd's initiative was useful in as much as it better made the case for war which was already very, very strong, but there is no way on God's green earth that Saddam Hussein would have been brought to justice without a war, the goal of which was to topple him and end the misery of the long suffering Iraqi people. If it hadn't been for the US led war and the courage of one George W. Bush, Saddam Hussein would still be in power, his people would still be piling up in mass graves with bullets in the backs of their heads and their families forced to pay for the bullets, among a full panoply of other atrocities. George Bush is no war criminal. He is a liberator and when the leftist idiocy is finally exposed under the lens of history, we will all know this.

I've Become A Comment Freak...

...on Sun Net News' website. The other day some got to reinventing recent history by claiming Saddam Hussein was a jolly good fellow. One quoted the tired old meme about 600,000 having been killed as a result of the American invasion - by the Americans. This figure is taken from Lancet's study which assumes that war casualties spread the same way communicable disease spreads. Then there was a discussion about how many people Saddam Hussein himself had killed. Of course, I went looking. Here's what I found:

How many people did Saddam Hussein kill?

How Many People Has Saddam Hussein Killed?

How may people did Saddam Hussein kill?

How many people did Saddam Hussein kill?[Not the same as previous link.]

Documented human rights violations 1979–2003

How Many People Has Saddam Hussein Killed?

Saddam Hussein

Top 5 crimes of Saddam Hussein

Worst genocides of the 20th and 21st centuries

How many people did Saddam kill?

Trees for Our Children

Trees for Our Children is the name of a blog owned by a young university student in my home province who appears to believe without question every negative anti-American statement his commie profs pour into his head. "Billy" is anti-corporate anything, but is especially opposed to the uranium industry and has cited some far fetched nonsense about Saskatchewan's uranium mining companies being responsible for the development of leukima in Iraqi children.

For his enlightenment, I thought I would try to describe what life was like for children in Iraq prior to the American led invasion of 2003 and still is for the children of many Islamofascists, the so called "insurgents". The tiny fraction of children who may be dying from leukima in Iraq, no matter what the cause, pales in comparison to the fate of children and their families under the Ba'athist regime. The little boy who writes Trees for Our Children needs to grow up. Child-like innocents are prime targets for the brainwashing hordes who occupy so many of our universities' hallowed halls.

So, Billy, here goes:

The War Crimes of Saddam Hussein

"The Dujail Massacre of 1982: In July of 1982, several Shiite militants attempted to assassinate Saddam Hussein while he was riding through the city. Hussein responded by ordering the slaughter of some 148 residents, including dozens of children.

After Barzani cast his lot with the Iranians in the Iran-Iraq War, Hussein had some 8,000 members of Barzani's clan, including hundreds of women and children, abducted.

The worst human rights abuses of Hussein's tenure took place during the genocidal al-Anfal Campaign (1986-1989), in which Hussein's administration called for the extermination of every living thing--human or animal--in certain regions of the Kurdish north. All told, some 182,000 people--men, women, and children--were slaughtered, many through use of chemical weapons.

Wartime rhetoric regarding Hussein's "rape rooms," death by torture, decisions to slaughter the children of political enemies, and the casual machine-gunning of peaceful protesters accurately reflected the day-to-day policies of Saddam Hussein's regime. Hussein was no misunderstood despotic "madman." He was a monster, a butcher, a brutal tyrant, a genocidal racist--he was all of this, and more."


“The Head of the Snake”

"Next to the anti-aircraft guns is a white sculpture made by a Suleimaniya artist who happened to be on the grounds when I showed up. It memorializes six Kurdish children who were senselessly gunned down in the streets by the Baath."

From the comments at the above link:

"Andrew: Everyone should remember that Saddam was an ally of the USA during this time and the US government knew everything Saddam was doing.

I agree.

Everyone should also remember who got rid of the bastard when most people wanted to leave him in place.

Posted by: Michael J. Totten at March 3, 2006 08:41 AM

Grow Up! American troops may be guilty of 'humiliating' prisoners and, while I do not condone it, I certainly do not equate humiliation with rape, torture, beheading, or the cold blooded murder of innocent children! Maybe I'm in the minority....

Posted by: D Haynes at March 3, 2006 10:37 AM

Saddam Hussein's murderous and genocidal campaigns: Dujail and Afal

The hardest thing to see was the cell used to hold children before they were murdered. My translator Alan read some of the messages carved into the wall.

“I was ten years old. But they changed my age to 18 for execution. Dear Mom and Dad. I am going to be executed by the Baath. I will not see you again.”

Then, during the Anfal campaign from February to September 1988, Iraqi troops swept through the highlands of Iraqi Kurdistan rounding up everyone who remained in government-declared "prohibited zones." Some 100,000 Kurds, mostly men and boys, were trucked to remote sites and executed. Only seven are known to have escaped.

Knowing Saddam Hussein is one of history's most vicious and cruel dictators is one thing. Proving it in a court of law is another.

The grisly task of methodically finding, excavating, and cataloging Saddam Hussein's mass graves goes on. Great stores of horrendous evidence are increasing daily as murdered Kurds, Shiites, and other Saddam victims, continue to be pulled from shallow, bulldozer-dug trenches.

Even hardened invesigators have difficulty with this macabre task. These huge shallow graves are filled with families: fathers, mothers and children wearing all of their clothes on their backs for their "re-location" - with many of the children carrying their toys with them.

A chain of evidence that investigators believe will help convict Saddam Hussein begins at a windswept grave in the desert near Hatra, in northern Iraq.

The burial site - a series of deep trenches that held about 2,500 bodies, many of them women and children - is one of many mass graves that dot the country. But it was the first excavated by an American investigative team working with a special Iraqi tribunal to build cases against Mr. Hussein and others in his government.

According to Gregory W. Kehoe, the American who set up the investigative team, what was found at Hatra shows how the Hussein leadership made a "business of killing people" - the scrape marks from the blade of the bulldozer that shoved victims into the trench, the point-blank shots to the backs of even the babies' heads, the withered body of a 3- or 4-year-old boy, still clutching a red and white ball.

Babies found in Iraqi mass grave

Tiny bones

The victims are believed to be Kurds killed in 1987-88, their bodies bulldozed into the graves after being summarily shot dead.

One trench contains only women and children while another contains only men.

The body of one woman was found still clutching a baby. The infant had been shot in the back of the head and the woman in the face.

"The youngest foetus we have was 18 to 20 foetal weeks," said US investigating anthropologist P Willey.

"Tiny bones, femurs - thighbones the size of a matchstick."

Mr Kehoe investigated mass graves in the Balkans for five years but those burials mainly involved men of fighting age and the Iraqi finds were quite different, he said.

"I've been doing grave sites for a long time, but I've never seen anything like this, women and children executed for no apparent reason" he said.

Mother of All Ironies.

"They half-crushed the toddler's feet. Now, she doesn't walk, she hobbles, and Ali fears that Saddam's men have crippled his daughter for life."
[snip]

"And the faking of the mass baby funerals.

You may have seen them on TV. Small white coffins parading through the streets of Baghdad on the roofs of taxis, an angry crowd of mourners, condemning western sanctions for killing the children of Iraq.

Usefully, the ages of the dead babies - "three days old", "four days old" - are written in English on the coffins. I wonder who did that?

Ali gave us the inside track on the racket. There aren't enough dead babies around. So the regime stores them for a mass funeral.

He said that he was friends with a taxi driver - he gave his name - whose son had a position in the regime.

Ali continued: "He told me he had to go to Najaf" - a town 100 miles from Baghdad - "in order to bring children's bodies from various freezers there, and that the smell was unbearable.

"They used to collect children's bodies and put them in freezers for two, three or even six or seven months - God knows - till the smell gets so unbearable. Then, they arrange the mass funerals."

The logic being, the more dead babies, the better for Saddam. That way, he can weaken public support in the west for sanctions. That means that parents who have lost a baby can't bury it until the regime says so."

"In northern Iraq - the only part of the country where people can speak freely - we met six other witnesses who had direct experience of child torture."
[snip]

"While we were in the north of Iraq, the chairman of the Great Britain Iraq Society, Labour MP George Galloway, was in Baghdad. He popped up on Iraqi TV, saying "When I hear the word Iraq, I hear someone calling my name".

I don't agree.

When I hear the word Iraq, I hear a tortured child, screaming."


Insurgents used kids as cover, then killed them. Just one example of hundreds of such reports.

And I won't even begin to detail the thousands of children killed via the UNs oil-for-food scandal. Of course, Trees for Our Children author, Billy, will understand that all of this is due to American imperialism, because, after all, his professors have helped him learn to think for himself.

Further Adventures in Mind Expansion for the Useful Idiot: Shedding Some Light on the WDM Meme

Saskatchewan's useful idiot repeats the meme for which the left thinks it gets the most mileage: "...oh wait it was because of WMDs, nope that's not it.."

So lets take a closer look.

First of all, let's listen to President Clinton in February, 1998:



Clinton does an excellent job of summarizing the cat and mouse game for which Saddam Hussein was famous (infamous, actually). Who in their right mind would trust the Butcher of Baghdad to be forthcoming and honest in his disclosures and cooperation with UN weapons inspections? Who, that is, other than Useful Idiots goose stepping in tune to Taliban Jack and crew?

Secondly, read this:

Iraq - It's Infrastructure of concealment, deception and intimidation

Read all of it. But I'll give you just the opening thesis statement as a teaser:

"The role of the Inspectors is to monitor and verify the disarmament of Iraq as demanded by the international community at the end of the Gulf War, 12 years ago. Inspectors are not a detective agency: They can only work effectively if the Iraqi Regime co-operates pro-actively with the Inspectors. We know this can be done successfully: South Africa did it.

But Iraq has singularly failed to do this."(Emphasis mine)

Perhaps Sean, you were too busy with your studies, working your way through what must have been six, maybe seven or eight years of university, chasing the girl who would become your wife and what not, to be paying attention. You're a young guy with your life ahead of you, so who can blame you for having other priorities. But, Sean, the concealment, deception and intimidation (otherwise known as the cat and mouse game) had gone on for over a decade and continued right up until Baghdad fell. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you were not be aware of this. But if you were, then you really are in bed with the devil.

Now, here's a few more about who armed Saddam Hussein and how the sanctions were falling apart.

But Iraq did go Uranium Shopping in Niger

Did you know that Vatican City was one of only a handful of places where Iraq had full diplomatic relations and that the Iraqi Ambassador to the Vatican was the former head of Iraq's nuclear program? No, I didn't think you did. I didn't either, for that matter. But why the heck does an ambassador to the Vatican, probably the most obscure assignment and uninvolved with world politics of all possible diplomatic postings, in other words, easily ignorable, need to have expertise in nuclear weapons and why would he visit Niger, a country known for absolutely nothing except its vast deposits of uranium ore? A deal on yellowcake, perhaps? Interesting question, no? Hitch, the author of the above piece, has an interesting explanation for the whole Valerie Plame affair, too.

You want to know a bit more about which country assisted Iraq in building up its WDM program and why it took a pass on joining the Coalition of the Willing? Read this:

Germany's leading role in arming Iraq

As a matter of fact, Germany was not alone. Read these:

Syria undermined Iraq sanctions, armed Saddam

Facts about who benefits from keeping Saddam Hussein in Power

Setting the record straight on who armed Saddam

Even the Iraq Survey Group's findings, Iraq had no WMD: the final verdict, suggest he had the intent to rebuild his capacity, once the sanctions were lifted:

"Instead, the ISG report says in its conclusion that there was evidence to suggest the Iraqi regime planned to restart its illegal weapons programmes if UN sanctions were lifted."

and as we all know, the sanctions regime was rapidly breaking down, and it was not Saddam Hussein who suffered as a result of those sanctions in any case, but rather, due largely to his ability to circumvent them and exploit Western dupes through the display of sick and dead children, it was the Iraqi people who suffered.

And you know what, Sean. Even the exhaulted United Nations believed he had them:

"In a report which might alternately be termed “stunning” or “terrifying”, United Nations weapons inspectors confirmed last week not merely that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but that he smuggled them out of his country, before, during and after the war."

including Canada:

"Addressing a group of 700 university researchers and business leaders in Montreal last month, (Canada's Prime Minister, Paul) Martin stated bluntly that terrorists have acquired WMDs from Saddam. “The fact is that there is now, we know well, a proliferation of nuclear weapons, and that many weapons that Saddam Huseein (sic) had, we don't know where they are…. [T]errorists have access to all of them,” the Canadian premier warned."

and:

"Every intelligence agency in the world -- French, British, German, Russian, Czech, you name it -- agreed before the war; Jordanian intelligence can certainly confirm their opinion today."

Then there's the Congressional Resolution on Iraq, also known as the Authorization for the Use of Military Force Against Iraq'. You do know, do you not, Sean, that it is Congress, by a joint resolution of both houses, that must authorize any war that America initiates. It is not "Bush's" war.

Now, I'll turn to statements by prominent Democrats, who evidently have very short memories and very little understanding of the power of new media. It looks like all the Democrats lied, too, but not about their belief in Saddam Hussein's capacity to develop WDM and deceive the world about it. They lied about their stand on (ie. their support) for the war. Flip-floppers, all.

No Sean. The Americans and their allies went to war because George Bush and Bill Clinton told the truth.

Epistle to Foudroyaume - Installment II

Following are the next five statements from Foudroyaume's comments on John Murney's blog together with my response. Again, Foud's remarks are in bold italics. The reason I have dealt with all five of them is the single unifying thread in all of them is what appears to be Foud's complete lack of awareness of what life was like for Iraqis under Saddam Hussein.

"SH had his victims, (some, like the Kurds, haven't been treated any better in supposedly free countries, like Turkey), but it's not like the country was subject to constant feuding between thugs and fanatics."

Yes, there was no feuding between thugs and fanatics. Any one in opposition to the regime was murdered. Simple as that. Estimates vary as to the number of Iraqis killed by the regime for political activity, but I'll pick 300,000 as a reasonable middle ground. If you include the number of war dead from the Iran-Iraq war and the invasion of Kuwait that number soars to well over a million.

And about the Kurds, I presume you have heard of the Anfal Campaign and other incidents of oppression and brutality, and yes, Kurds in Turkey and elsewhere are treated badly, but only Hussein used chemical weapons, killing tens of thousands. His Regime was responsible for arbitrary arrests and assassinations, disappearances, and for sending thousands to seek asylum in other countries and need I mention the mass graves. Only 270 of them. Perhaps that's not enough.

"Also, unlke (sic) Afghanistan, where the mass of hardship was caused by the ruling regime and their opponent factions, Iraq's biggest problems were due to American sanctions."

Here's some reading for you Foud. Here, here, here , here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here. This one has a segment of the film by Iraqi Kurd, Jano Rosebiani, who is a member of a panel discussing the war. You'll notice toward the end that Rosebiani is critical about the job done by the media. No. Iraq's biggest problem was it's tyrannical government. I have lots more on that theme below and can give you even more, if you want it.

I agree that regular Iraqi people were the principal victims of the sanctions, but Saddam Hussein had the capacity to end that. He didn't, of course. Rather, he made it worse and exploited it, creating propaganda out of his distorted depiction of their effects. When the impact became known, the sanctions were modified with the introduction of the Oil-for-Food program in 1995, and I'm sure you must know how that turned out.

But why folks persist in calling them "American" sanctions needs some explaining. The fact is, they were imposed by the UN Security Council when Iraq invaded Kuwait. The Americans did impose their own sanctions, as well and while they may have been instrumental in getting the UN to impose sanctions, they were UN sanctions. Lifting the sanctions was, in fact, one of the reasons for the decision to invade Iraq in 2003. It was the United Nations that lifted them on May 23, 2003, two months after the invasion.

"I think the people of Iraq on average would have benefitted (sic) more from lifting sanctions (which would have helped foster a friendlier attitude to the west--"

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by this, Foud but I presume you think the attitude of Iraqis toward the West would have improved had Saddam Hussein been left in power. I'm not sure we could ever know that, since that's not how it turned out. But I would state unequivocally that Iraqis are far less likely to be unfriendly toward the West than other Arabs now, especially since they can now speak without fear and have no compelling reason to repeat the nauseous rhetoric of Arab Nationalism, which is so common in the rest of the Arab world. An illustration of that fact is documented here.

Iraqi opposition groups were consulted prior to the invasion. They all agreed that Saddam Hussein must be removed. It's hard to understand how anyone would think that leaving him there would be in Iraq's better interests.

"SH, unlike Taliban leaders, cared about public opinion and mayb (sic) have been willing to enter into mutually beneficial negotions (sic) if he sensed a pro-western attitude growing in Iraq--he was an opportunist, not an ideologue."

Saddam Hussein cared nothing about public opinion, other than that he be adored and obeyed. Opinions of the West about him were irrelevant. He was offered the option of going into exile. He accepted on condition that he be given $1 billion and all the information he needed on weapons of mass destruction. In other words, he would leave if he could take the means of building a WMD program in exile. That link, by the way, provides a nice summary of the decade long cat and mouse game that Saddam played with the West and with the UN. Here is another summary. This is not a man who would negotiate anything. A study of his rise to power easily shows the only thing he knows is brute thuggery. The notion that he would respond favourably to a "pro-western attitude growing in Iraq" is ludicrous on its face. No such "attitude" would be allowed to grow. Foud, you have no concept of the depth and breadth of his iron grip and the ruthlessness of his apparatus of terror.

"The Taliban, on the other hand, are whackos with guns who maintained a state in which constant terror was the norm for most. As a result of their religious-centerd (sic) governance, Afghanistan is decades behind in infrastructure and services (Iraq, by contrast, is quite modern)."

First of all, Foud, you describe the Taliban regime as one which maintained a state in which constant terror was the norm for most, as if the same was not true of Saddam Hussein. While you may be right about the Taliban, you couldn't be more wrong about Saddam Hussein. I would recommend you read "The Republic of Fear" by Kanan Makiya or "Saddam: King of Terror" by British journalist Con Coughlin or the copious writings and interviews given by Christopher Hitchens. Read the testimonies of legions of Iraqi exiles and families whose members have disappeared, whose testimonies have been collected here and here and here and here, to name only a few.

The last of the four links above describes a massive file of documents discovered in an underground labyrinth containing "three million files with new insights into the regime's repression and depravity". You'll note that among those files "(t)here is a blacklist of schoolchildren, a register of every schoolchild in Iraq, listing their relatives and their supposed political affiliations. If a file recorded that a brother or an uncle had been executed for political reasons, that child was blighted." I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach when I read that particular one, as likely you would too. But mine was a little different, because I was able to recall a conversation I was once privy to when I would have been in my late 20s or early 30s (late 1970s or early 1980s, I believe). My ex-husband's cousin visited us from Iraq and told us of what was happening. Saddam Hussein or his henchmen would visit schools and ask the children to tell him what their parents said about him. The little innocents, too young to know better, would sometimes reveal that their parents opposed his regime. Within days, the adults in the family would be arrested, murdered or disappeared. When I read about this registry, I felt certain that that story must be connected.

If that's not enough for you, read though the archives of agencies like Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International. Read the reports and testimony of the UN Special Rapporteur, Max Von der Stoel, on the gravity of the situation in Iraq under the Butcher of Baghdad in the 1990 and again in 1999. Von der Stoel described the atrocities committed by the Ba'athist regime as "the worst since World War II". Your perception of pre-war Iraq is tragically devoid of even the most rudimentary facts. What a shame that someone with your level of intellect would pass judgments on one of the most horrific regimes of the 20th century with such a paucity of knowledge.

Bush: The Worst President Ever?

Read this. Why Iraq Was Inevitable.

"...in light of what was actually known at the time about Saddam Hussein’s actions and intentions, and in light of what was added to our knowledge through his post-capture interrogations by the FBI—the decision to go to war takes on a very different character. The story that emerges is of a choice not only carefully weighed and deliberately arrived at but, in the circumstances, the one moral choice that any American President could make.

Had, moreover, Bush failed to act when he did, the consequences could have been truly disastrous. The next American President would surely have faced the need, in decidedly less favorable circumstances, to pick up the challenge Bush had neglected. And since Bush’s unwillingness to do the necessary thing might rightly have cost him his second term, that next President would probably have been one of the many Democrats who, until March 2003, actually saw the same threat George Bush did."

I might add, that in addition to the signs telling us when the war is actually over (ala Michael Totten's piece I wrote about below) are a proliferation of hindsight type summaries postulated by the media. This one, though long, is particularly good and the section about the Oil-for-Food scam is especially cogent.

"The main feature of the containment regime had become the Oil-for-Food program, set up by the United Nations in 1996 with Clinton-administration approval. Within months, the program had become a spigot of cash for Saddam and his family and cronies. The full extent of the corruption, and the full roster of who paid in and who was paid out, may not be known for decades, if ever. But the overall picture is reasonably clear, thanks again in large part to documents seized in the 2003 invasion.

Saddam had shrewdly realized that vouchers for the sale of his oil might serve as a kind of international currency, distributed by him to favored customers who would be obliged to pay him kickbacks, all out of reach of the scrutiny of the UN. Eventually, UN administrators were brought into the conspiracy as well. Within a year the program had miraculously restored Saddam’s personal wealth and power, even as the Iraqi people continued to suffer. By the time of the U.S. invasion, he had skimmed at least $21 billion from the program, in addition to the billions made through smuggled oil sales to other Middle East countries, including his old enemy Iran.

The list of recipients of Oil-for-Food vouchers grew to more than 270 names, constituting a Who’s Who of slippery international politicians and diplomats—all of whom, needless to say, opposed any talk of military action against Iraq. On the Security Council, Russia, France, and China, key adversaries of U.S. policy toward Iraq going back to Clinton days, were among Saddam’s key beneficiaries. Not only was Oil-for-Food the biggest scandal in UN history, it had turned the UN’s mandate inside out. A program established to punish a rogue tyrant was systematically making him more powerful; nations that were supposed to be his custodians had become his accomplices; and the institution whose purpose was to protect international order was destroying it. (Emphasis mine)

At the time, though, no one in the Bush administration knew this. That was why, in September 2002, President Bush was willing to yield to Colin Powell and British prime minister Tony Blair and ask the UN for one more resolution, this one explicitly threatening Saddam with military force if he did not finally comply with all the preceding resolutions against him.

What Powell found at the UN astonished even him. At a press conference, the French foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin, shrieked that “nothing! nothing!” justified war—making Powell so angry that, as he would later tell the reporter Bob Woodward, he could barely contain himself. “Any leverage with Saddam was linked directly to the threat of war,” Powell recalled, “and the French had just taken the threat off the table.” He could not believe the Europeans’ stupidity. Neither could the President. But it was not stupidity; it was self-interested duplicity."

All in all, good one for our resident useful idiots - those who worship the ground upon which the United Nations building sits and the halls through which all the tyrants' operatives scurry like rats - to read.

So What If "There's Oil in Them Hills"?

Considering yesterday's breaking news about stockpiles of yellowcake being removed from Iraq and ending up in Canada, this is as good a time as any to finish my series in response to our Useful Idiot, Sean S.. For previous installments, go here and Middle Eastern oil is the dominant source for oil hungry nations. In other words, the Middle East has the world over a barrel (pardon the pun). Not just the USA, but pretty much the entire world. Read just the first three paragraphs of this document and you'll get the drift. Consider also that Iraq has vast pools of oil reserves under her soil and is within easy reach of further vast pools in Iran, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Moreover, there are "Big Oil" interests whose head offices, CEOs and major shareholders are in many countries other than the United States. So not only is continued access to that oil vital to US interests, but it is also vital to the interests of a vast swath of humanity.

2) Consider next that during Saddam Hussein's blitzkreig strike into Kuwait in 1991 (the conflict that became known as Gulf War I) he also made it into the north east corner of Saudi Arabia and could have kept going if he hadn't been stopped by the Americans. Saudi Arabia, as you probably know, is home to the largest supply of as yet untapped oil into the world, or at least what was known to be at that time. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what was on Saddam Hussein's agenda.

3) Consider also that Saddam Hussein went to war with his eastern neighbour, Iran, in 1980. The war with Iran, locus of another large pool of oil reserves, lasted eight years and if it hadn't been for the American's crafty game of giving each side just enough support to ensure neither side would win, it is quite possible Iraq would have won. Iraq had the fourth largest army in the world at that time. Only the US, the Soviet Union and China had bigger armed forces. Saddam Hussein was a megalomaniac who wanted to control the Middle East. He imagined himself a modern day Hammurabi or Nebuchadnezzar. You were still wet behind the ears at the time, so I don't expect you to know that Saddam Hussein, as with many Third World tyrants during the Cold War, was a master at playing the Soviets off against the West. If he had defeated Iran and had, as a consequence, been in control of the Strait of Hormuz, what would have stopped him from quickly shuffling that deck?

4) Contemplate the modern day implications of Saddam Hussein being in control of all of that oil by considering this piece of war game modeling done in the 1970s, as told by blogger Soldier's Dad (link in my sidebar), a man who was in a position at that time, to know whereof he speaks:

"The modeling in the 1970's as to what would happen if Middle East oil stopped flowing was 30,000 people a month would freeze to death in the first winter in Europe. Unemployment in Europe would reach 50% withing 90 days and unemployment in the US would reach 50% in 180 days. Every energy dependent country in the world would face massive civil unrest. Then the real war would start.

Neither China nor India were particularly large energy consumers then. They are now."

We already know that Saddam Hussein spent mega oil bucks on his own ego boosting self-aggrandizement, don't we? All those palaces serve as testimony to that.

5) Finally, consider what we all know and acknowledge about his record as a brutal tyrant. The list of his crimes against his own people is way too long to go into in any depth here, but if you don't know, read just this one for a general flavour of life under the Butcher of Baghdad. His atrocities are well documented and almost every retard leftist customarily acknowledges that record, even as they cavalierly wave it aside. His people were suffering and dying under a heavy handed sanctions regime, which he, of course, with his usual deft prowess, was sidestepping with the help of his buds at the United Nations. He also had two sons, one of whom was a psychotic, drug addicted monster, waiting to take over and extend the brutality well into the next generation.

We also know, although the left is more inclined to be in denial on this one, that he had a long record of supplying support to Middle Eastern terrorists, support in the form of training, financing and providing a safe haven inside of Iraq. The man was beefing up his ties with terrorist organizations, including Al Qaeda. He had the technical know-how and the raw materials to supply them with WMD and the connections to see it accomplished. There would have been a far greater swath of humanity than just Europeans plunged into the dark ages had he been able to achieve his goals, and it wouldn't have been solely because he could have denied access by the energy hungry world to the crude. It would also have been because of what he could arrange to have done via his terrorist proxies.

Honestly, Sean, should the farce of the sanctions regime not have been lifted and, if so, do you really think it would have been a good idea to restore him to his previous status, leaving him in a position where it was possible he could be in control of all of the oil in the Middle East? Can you imagine what he or his sons could have done with all that wealth? I can tell you, sweetheart, it would not just rival the stunt we've come to know as 9/11. It would monumentally dwarf it.

Are you telling me that the left really prefers that this dynasty be left intact, just because you want to believe and promote the idea the American's only interest was getting its hands on Iraq's oil? Hell. All the Americans had to do was act like leftards, ignore the threats, make like Saddam Hussein was president of the Rotary Club, cozy up to him and buy his oil! It would have been far cheaper and a lot less costly in American lives. But don't for a minute believe it would have stopped the Husseins from carrying on with their mega-maniacal ambitions. Six years after Neville Chamberlain proclaimed "peace in our times", as he waved his document of appeasement before the British press, 48 million people in more than 30 countries were dead. Would that have been okay with you, just as long as you get to bash George Bush?

Sometimes I Wonder...

...if I shared a womb with Christopher Hitchens.

What he writes about Libya is exactly what I think, but with far more clarity and background knowledge, of course. The man is a master at offering up a plethora of pithy statements:

U.S. lacks courage vs. Gadhafi

"Far from being brutalized by four decades of domination by a theatrical madman, the Libyan people appear fairly determined not to sink to his level and to be done with him and his horrible kin.

They also seem, at the time of writing, to want this achievement to represent their own unaided effort. Admirable as this is, it doesn’t excuse us from responsibility."

[---]

"Doing nothing is not the absence of a policy; it is, in fact, the adoption of one.

“Neutrality” favors the side with the biggest arsenal. “Nonintervention” is a form of interference."

[---]

"Libya is a country with barely 6 million inhabitants. By any computation, however cold and actuarial, the regime of its present dictator cannot possibly last very much longer. As a matter of pure realism, the post-Gadhafi epoch is upon us whether we choose to welcome the fact or not. The immediate task is therefore to limit the amount of damage Gadhafi can do and sharply minimize the number of people he can murder.

Whatever the character of the successor system turns out to be, it can hardly be worsened if we show it positive signs of friendship and solidarity. But the pilots of Gadhafi’s own air force, who flew their planes to Malta rather than let themselves be used against civilians, have demonstrated more courage and principle than the entire U.S. Sixth Fleet."

Christopher Hitchens: If Saddam still ruled, there would be no Arab Spring

"The most heartening single image of the past month — eclipsing even the bravery and dignity of the civilian fighters against despotism in Syria and Libya — was the sight of Hoshyar Zebari arriving in Paris to call for strong action against the depraved regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Here was the foreign minister of Iraq, and the new head of the Arab League, helping to tilt the whole axis of local diplomacy against one-man rule. In May, Iraq will act as host to the Arab League summit, and it will be distinctly amusing and highly instructive to see which Arab leaders have the courage, or even the ability, to leave their own capitals and attend. The whole scene is especially gratifying for those of us who remember Zebari as the dedicated exile militant that he was 10 years ago, striving to defend his dispossessed people from the effects of Saddam Hussein’s chemical weapons."

[---]

"I admit that Egyptian and Tunisian and other demonstrators did not take to the streets waving Iraqi flags, as if in emulation. (Though Saad-Eddin Ibrahim, intellectual godfather of the Egyptian democracy movement, did publicly hail the fall of Saddam as an inspiration, and many leaders of the early Lebanese “spring” spoke openly in similar terms.) This reticence is quite understandable since, apart from the northern Kurdish region of Iraq from which Foreign Minister Zebari hails, the liberation of the country was not entirely the work of its own people. But this point has become a more arguable one since the Arab League itself admitted that there are certain regimes that are impervious to unassisted overthrow from within. Gaddafi’s is pre-eminently one of these, and Saddam’s was notoriously so, as the repeated terror-bombings and gassings of the Shiite and Kurdish populations amply proved."

[---]

"But even with his fangs drawn, Gaddafi remained a filthy nuisance. As The New York Times reported in a brilliant dispatch last week, he forced Western oil companies to pay the $1.5-billion fine levied on him for Lockerbie. He continued to deprive his people — just look at how poor and scruffy everybody is when seen on television — while squandering Libya’s immense wealth on personal prestige projects. His bloody interventions in Liberia and Darfur and Chad — where yet another civilian airliner was blown up, this time a French one — should long ago have earned him an indictment for war crimes and crimes against humanity. Like Saddam Hussein, he has flagrantly and hysterically insisted on defining himself as the problem, the fons et origo of Libya’s misery and the region’s woes. Why, then, do we coyly insist on the pretence that we are targeting “his forces” but not him?"

[---]

"Hoshyar Zebari happily cited as precedent the no-fly zone that for a long time protected northern and southern Iraq from Saddam Hussein’s helicopter gunships. But he knows perfectly well that the logic of this is inexorable. Every day, Saddam’s ground forces fired on those planes. Every day, the post-Kuwait ceasefire agreement became more frayed and breached. Every day, it became plainer that Iraq was the miserable hostage to the whims of a single tyrant.

The immediate task now is to assimilate those lessons, shorten the time in which the knowledge gained can be applied, call the evil by its right name, and face Gaddafi with a stark choice between his own death and his appearance in the dock."

[---]

"When the Arab League meets in May, it should welcome a new Libyan provisional government on the soil of a free Iraq. Then we will have closed the circle — and vindicated all those brave people who fell in bringing down the first and worst bastion of the ancien regime."

Yes, Brother Hitch! Yes!!

More good stuff from Hitch.

I'm afraid I'm on another side on this one, compared to some of my favourite bloggers. Glavin may be the only one with whom I'm in concert.

Maybe I'm still an old leftist at heart.

Oh, and Thank You George Bush!

Saddam Abuse Museum to Open

in Abu Ghraib.

Yes folks. There was far worse torture and abuse in that place under Saddam Hussein than a few stupid American soldiers doing their frat party pranks. And that wasn't the only venue:

Saddam Hussein's crimes against humanity

Saddam's hangman details torture

Saddam's Philippines terror connection

New Video reveals real torture scandal

Mass graves exhumed

Regime of Terror

Ambassadors of terror

Saddam Hussein: Crimes and Human Rights Abuses

An Update on the...

..."Bush lied, people died" meme:
The Dangerous Lie That ‘Bush Lied’

"In recent weeks, I have heard former Associated Press reporter Ron Fournier on Fox News twice asserting, quite offhandedly, that President George W. Bush “lied us into war in Iraq.”

I found this shocking. I took a leave of absence from the bench in 2004-05 to serve as co-chairman of the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction—a bipartisan body, sometimes referred to as the Robb-Silberman Commission. It was directed in 2004 to evaluate the intelligence community’s determination that Saddam Hussein possessed WMD—I am, therefore, keenly aware of both the intelligence provided to President Bush and his reliance on that intelligence as his primary casus belli. It is astonishing to see the “Bush lied” allegation evolve from antiwar slogan to journalistic fact.

The intelligence community’s 2002 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) stated, in a formal presentation to President Bush and to Congress, its view that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction—a belief in which the NIE said it held a 90% level of confidence. That is about as certain as the intelligence community gets on any subject.

Recall that the head of the intelligence community, Central Intelligence Agency Director George Tenet, famously told the president that the proposition that Iraq possessed WMD was “a slam dunk.” Our WMD commission carefully examined the interrelationships between the Bush administration and the intelligence community and found no indication that anyone in the administration sought to pressure the intelligence community into its findings. As our commission reported, presidential daily briefs from the CIA dating back to the Clinton administration were, if anything, more alarmist about Iraq’s WMD than the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate."

[---]

"Our WMD commission ultimately determined that the intelligence community was “dead wrong” about Saddam’s weapons. But as I recall, no one in Washington political circles offered significant disagreement with the intelligence community before the invasion. The National Intelligence Estimate was persuasive—to the president, to Congress and to the media."

[---]

"It is worth noting, however, that when Saddam was captured and interrogated, he told his interrogators that he had intended to seek revenge on Kuwait for its cooperation with the U.S. by invading again at a propitious time. This leads me to speculate that if the Bush administration had not gone to war in 2003 and Saddam had remained in power, the U.S. might have felt compelled to do so once Iraq again invaded Kuwait."

RTWT

One of These Things is Not Like the Others

1. Halabja

"Thousands were killed in 1988 when Iraqi forces bombed the city with mustard gas and nerve agents.

Saddam Hussein's government said the attack was needed to put down insurgents hiding in the city during the bloody Iran-Iraq war. But, evidence emerged that almost all the victims were civilians, most of them women and children."

"The bombing of Halabja was part of a wider campaign of attacks on Iraqi Kurds known as Anfal.

Iraqi Kurdistan Deputy Prime Minister Omar Fatah spoke at the ceremony. He criticized the international community for staying silent at the time of the attack in order to keep their good relations with Saddam Hussein's government.

He says their silence gave the dictator government of Baghdad more power to continue the Anfal operations. He says Saddam's government killed 182,000 Kurds after the Halabja attacks and if the world had stopped them, perhaps the Anfal campaign would not have continued

Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurds were displaced and deported during the Anfal campaign and 4,000 villages were destroyed."

SNIP:

"The Iraqi government approved the execution this month of Saddam's cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid, better known as Chemical Ali for his role in the gassing of Kurds."

2. "Guantanamo Bay terror suspects to be allowed family phone calls"

3. Abu Ghraib Prisoner Abuse

Maybe I should throw this in for good measure:

4. Mass graves related to Abu Ghraib under Saddam Hussein

Goodbye Crossed Sabres!

And good riddance.

Iraq to Replace Martial Monuments With Peace Art

I can't imagine a monument more ugly both in form and expression. It is so good to hear that this blight on the Baghdad cityscape it will be removed and with it, the grotesque symbolism of Saddam Hussein's megalomania.

"Before the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, all statues and monuments in public squares made reference to Saddam's Baath party or told a story about its military victories against Iraq's numerous enemies.

Along with the giant Saddam statue that U.S. troops pulled down from Baghdad's al-Firdous square before television cameras in April 2003, many other images of the former president, often in military uniform, dotted the city.

Outside an Agriculture Ministry office, a mural depicted Saddam tilling the fields with a spade. At the Justice Ministry, he appeared in a gown, holding scales of justice.

Most of the murals have since been painted over and the statues destroyed by Iraqis in the chaos that followed the invasion."

[---]

"In the heavily fortified Green Zone diplomatic compound, two pairs of giant arms emerge from the ground, hundreds of metres away from each other, holding crossed swords to form an arch across a parades ground. They were modeled on Saddam's hands and cast using 160 tonnes of bronze.

Iraq wants to replace such monuments with symbols of peace."

[---]

"We did not determine the subject matter of the art at all in order not to be accused of political influence," Timimi said. "We want beautiful statues that instil pleasure and calm."

Artists hailed the plan as symbolising their hopes."

[---]

"Iraq is ... in transition from a dictatorial system to a democracy," Timimi said. "A supporting pillar is to shift art away from a single person to depict all aspects of Iraq."

Well, Well, Well

Sometimes the New York Times holds its editorially slanted nose and allows the publication of an article like this:

A Vote of Thanks by Hussein Abdul Hussein

"“Here is another ballot, go vote again and let him take your picture,” Nabil al-Janabi, the Iraqi chargé d'affaires in Beirut, said while handing me a paper on the Day of the Great Crawl, when we — Iraqis at home and abroad — were required to vote for the only presidential candidate, Saddam Hussein."

[---]

"On Sunday, I will be driving to Arlington, Virginia, to vote for Iraq’s second post-Saddam Parliament. This time I have a choice of more than 6,000 candidates.

The election is the fifth national vote since 2005, a year in which Iraqis voted for a National Assembly, then approved the Constitution, and then elected their first Parliament. Last year we voted in provincial elections."

[---]

"Iraqis realize that their democracy is not the best, but they also know that practice makes perfect.

Since 2002 Iraqi elections have been evolving. While still not perfect, democracy is striking root.

Meanwhile, what Iraqis like me have learned is that transformation from autocracy to democracy would not have been possible without the 4,700 brave American and allied servicemen and women who lost their lives, and the many others who were wounded, for the sake of Iraq’s freedom.

Families of these heroes should know that many of us are grateful to their sons and daughters, and to the United States and its allies at large, even if they do not hear thank you often from Iraq or its leaders.

It is on days like Sunday that these sacrifices most strongly comes to Iraqi minds."

Of course, now that The One has taken responsibility for victory in Iraq, the New York Times has to speak to a different tune.

Not so with Balbulican, though, that lover of autocracy and author of this nasty missive:

"Who issues threats of consequences better that you do – huh? Nobody, thats who….. and remember, no matter what anyone says you’ve always got the invasion and occupation of Iraq to be proud of, nobody can ever take that away from you can they?"

So, my advice to you, Balb pal, is don't read this New York Times article. It may cause such severe cognitive dissonance that all that hot air between your ears will expand and the empty shell that surrounds it will explode.

However, you might want to read the original article I linked to here.

And try this one, too, from which I have lifted the few paragraphs below (emphasis mine). Note, dear Balbulican, that this piece was published in 2002, before the Americans and their many, many allies invaded Iraq, you know, the time during which the Americans offered the Butcher of Baghdad to opportunity to flee the country to find safe harbour somewhere else, an offer he jokingly refused, to his everlasting sorrow, saying only if he could take the instructions for producing WMD with him, plus $1bn, and which not even the Arab League could satisfactorily arrange:

"Since the early 1990s, the Iraqi government has relied upon a policy of deliberate expulsion of people from their homes in order to stamp out and punish political opposition and seize oil-rich areas and valuable land. In the north, there have been systematic efforts to ‘Arabise’ the predominantly Kurdish districts of Kirkuk, Khanaqin and Sinjar. To secure control of this strategically and economically vital oil-rich region, the government expelled Kurds, Assyrians and Turkmans – sometimes entire communities – from the cities and surrounding areas. In the south, Baghdad has carried out campaigns of suppression against the Marsh Arabs and other Shi’a, destroying villages and draining marshlands to hasten depopulation. Hundreds of thousands of IDPs remain without basic resources. There are well over a million internally displaced persons in Iraq, with an estimated three quarters of a million in northern Iraq alone.

In addition, over the last decade, between 1 and 2 million Iraqis are estimated to have fled Iraq. Most live in countries bordering Iraq or in the region, the largest numbers, over 250,000 in Jordan, 200,000 in Iran, and 40,000 in Syria. There are also tens of thousands of Iraqis who live in Lebanon and Turkey. The Iraqis are in addition to the huge numbers of Palestinians who live in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria and the Afghans and other refugees living in Iran and Turkey.

Assistance to refugees in these countries does not meet minimum international standards. In some cases, refugees’ freedom of movement is severely restricted; they are vulnerable to police harassment, beatings, sexual violence, extortion, arrest, detention and possible deportation; they cannot return home for fear of punishment; their chances of being offered resettlement in the US, Canada, Australia or Europe are extremely slim; they cannot integrate with local populations in the Middle East; they are refused permission to work; they live in limbo. It is not surprising that rather than remain in limbo many Iraqis choose to put their lives and the lives of their families at risk by engaging the services of human smugglers in order to try to reach the shores of Western countries to apply for asylum. The lack of safe refuge in the region, therefore, contributes to the so-called asylum crisis in Europe and elsewhere.

Outside of the Middle East, the number of Iraqis seeking asylum in the West has increased steadily in recent years. Between 1989 and the end of 2001, 277,500 Iraqis applied for asylum in western countries, mostly in Europe. Of these, the largest numbers went to Germany (84,500), followed by the Netherlands (40,900), Sweden (36,800) and the United Kingdom (23,800. The numbers of arrivals of Iraqis in Europe have continued to rise in recent years but the pattern of where Iraqis apply for asylum has changed. While Germany (37,900) continued to receive the largest number of Iraqi asylum seekers between 1999 and the end of 2001, the United Kingdom (15,700) overtook other EU countries in numbers of Iraqi asylum applicants. Iraqis are now the largest national group of asylum seekers in Europe and the UK. The alarming size of Iraq’s populations of internally displaced people, refugees and asylum seekers in the West underscore the fact that, even without a war, there already exists a world-wide Iraqi refugee crisis."

It stands to reason that during a war, the number of people seeking asylum will skyrocket, but only a blithering fool will persist in believing that Saddam Hussein's brutal rule did not produce a record number of asylum seekers before those dastardly Americans invaded. Yes. It got worse before it got better, but it is better - far better, and that is a colossal understatement.

Oh, and lest I forget, that doesn't include the estimated 600,000 Iraqis that were killed by Saddam Hussein during his reign of terror buried in both regular cemeteries and in mass graves, and they are still finding new ones. Nor are we talking about the horrific torture that took place in the Abu Ghraib prison under Saddam's orders. We're only talking about the ones that were lucky enough to escape the country.

So Balb, if you haven't done so already, I would highly recommend you read the Euston Manifesto, a position paper produced by prominent leftists, those who still have a modicum of principle and humanity in their souls. Even the prominent British leftist, William Shawcross, supported the war, much to the chagrin of his fellow leftists, and had this to say about Iraq's most recent election:

"...the transformation is extraordinary. The give and take of politics now exists in a country which, under Saddam, was described as “a concentration camp above ground and a mass grave beneath”".

Not to mention that booze soaked leftist icon and hero of mine, Christopher Hitchens.

You'll find a link to the Euston Manifesto in the sidebar right here at Stubble Jumping Redneck, under the heading "Good Stuff". Hurry, now. Before your head explodes.

Over to you.

Just what did Dubya actually say? Part I (Old Post Previously Unpublished)

This series will set the record straight for all the "it's all about oil" crowd. Using George W Bush's own words during the lead-up to the war, it is extremely easy to show that the decision to remove Saddam Hussein was far more complex and nuanced than most leftards have the capacity to understand or at least admit to having.

Speech to the United Nations, September 12, 2002, one year and one day following 9/11. [Note, link is now dead]

In this speech, Dubya makes a case that includes far more than just WMD, and whether or not you believe this justifies removal of the regime as I most certainly do, you cannot deny that the "Bush lied and people died" meme of so many leftards is just plain stupid. The parallels to the years immediately preceding WWII are eerily striking. To listen to the entire speech, follow the link above. A Real Audio link is provided on the upper right side. And now, to the speech:

Mr. Secretary General, Mr. President, distinguished delegates, and ladies and gentlemen: We meet one year and one day after a terrorist attack brought grief to my country, and brought grief to many citizens of our world. Yesterday, we remembered the innocent lives taken that terrible morning. Today, we turn to the urgent duty of protecting other lives, without illusion and without fear.

We've accomplished much in the last year -- in Afghanistan and beyond. We have much yet to do -- in Afghanistan and beyond. Many nations represented here have joined in the fight against global terror, and the people of the United States are grateful.

The United Nations was born in the hope that survived a world war -- the hope of a world moving toward justice, escaping old patterns of conflict and fear. The founding members resolved that the peace of the world must never again be destroyed by the will and wickedness of any man. We created the United Nations Security Council, so that, unlike the League of Nations, our deliberations would be more than talk, our resolutions would be more than wishes. After generations of deceitful dictators and broken treaties and squandered lives, we dedicated ourselves to standards of human dignity shared by all, and to a system of security defended by all.

Today, these standards, and this security, are challenged. Our commitment to human dignity is challenged by persistent poverty and raging disease. The suffering is great, and our responsibilities are clear. The United States is joining with the world to supply aid where it reaches people and lifts up lives, to extend trade and the prosperity it brings, and to bring medical care where it is desperately needed.

As a symbol of our commitment to human dignity, the United States will return to UNESCO. (Applause.) This organization has been reformed and America will participate fully in its mission to advance human rights and tolerance and learning.

Our common security is challenged by regional conflicts -- ethnic and religious strife that is ancient, but not inevitable. In the Middle East, there can be no peace for either side without freedom for both sides. America stands committed to an independent and democratic Palestine, living side by side with Israel in peace and security. Like all other people, Palestinians deserve a government that serves their interests and listens to their voices. My nation will continue to encourage all parties to step up to their responsibilities as we seek a just and comprehensive settlement to the conflict.

Above all, our principles and our security are challenged today by outlaw groups and regimes that accept no law of morality and have no limit to their violent ambitions. In the attacks on America a year ago, we saw the destructive intentions of our enemies. This threat hides within many nations, including my own. In cells and camps, terrorists are plotting further destruction, and building new bases for their war against civilization. And our greatest fear is that terrorists will find a shortcut to their mad ambitions when an outlaw regime supplies them with the technologies to kill on a massive scale.

In one place -- in one regime -- we find all these dangers, in their most lethal and aggressive forms, exactly the kind of aggressive threat the United Nations was born to confront.

Twelve years ago, Iraq invaded Kuwait without provocation. And the regime's forces were poised to continue their march to seize other countries and their resources. Had Saddam Hussein been appeased instead of stopped, he would have endangered the peace and stability of the world. Yet this aggression was stopped -- by the might of coalition forces and the will of the United Nations.

To suspend hostilities, to spare himself, Iraq's dictator accepted a series of commitments. The terms were clear, to him and to all. And he agreed to prove he is complying with every one of those obligations.

He has proven instead only his contempt for the United Nations, and for all his pledges. By breaking every pledge -- by his deceptions, and by his cruelties -- Saddam Hussein has made the case against himself.

In 1991, Security Council Resolution 688 demanded that the Iraqi regime cease at once the repression of its own people, including the systematic repression of minorities -- which the Council said, threatened international peace and security in the region. This demand goes ignored.

Last year, the U.N. Commission on Human Rights found that Iraq continues to commit extremely grave violations of human rights, and that the regime's repression is all pervasive. Tens of thousands of political opponents and ordinary citizens have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, summary execution, and torture by beating and burning, electric shock, starvation, mutilation, and rape. Wives are tortured in front of their husbands, children in the presence of their parents -- and all of these horrors concealed from the world by the apparatus of a totalitarian state.

In 1991, the U.N. Security Council, through Resolutions 686 and 687, demanded that Iraq return all prisoners from Kuwait and other lands. Iraq's regime agreed. It broke its promise. Last year the Secretary General's high-level coordinator for this issue reported that Kuwait, Saudi, Indian, Syrian, Lebanese, Iranian, Egyptian, Bahraini, and Omani nationals remain unaccounted for -- more than 600 people. One American pilot is among them.

In 1991, the U.N. Security Council, through Resolution 687, demanded that Iraq renounce all involvement with terrorism, and permit no terrorist organizations to operate in Iraq. Iraq's regime agreed. It broke this promise. In violation of Security Council Resolution 1373, Iraq continues to shelter and support terrorist organizations that direct violence against Iran, Israel, and Western governments. Iraqi dissidents abroad are targeted for murder. In 1993, Iraq attempted to assassinate the Emir of Kuwait and a former American President. Iraq's government openly praised the attacks of September the 11th. And al Qaeda terrorists escaped from Afghanistan and are known to be in Iraq.

In 1991, the Iraqi regime agreed to destroy and stop developing all weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles, and to prove to the world it has done so by complying with rigorous inspections. Iraq has broken every aspect of this fundamental pledge.

From 1991 to 1995, the Iraqi regime said it had no biological weapons. After a senior official in its weapons program defected and exposed this lie, the regime admitted to producing tens of thousands of liters of anthrax and other deadly biological agents for use with Scud warheads, aerial bombs, and aircraft spray tanks. U.N. inspectors believe Iraq has produced two to four times the amount of biological agents it declared, and has failed to account for more than three metric tons of material that could be used to produce biological weapons. Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons.

United Nations' inspections also revealed that Iraq likely maintains stockpiles of VX, mustard and other chemical agents, and that the regime is rebuilding and expanding facilities capable of producing chemical weapons.

And in 1995, after four years of deception, Iraq finally admitted it had a crash nuclear weapons program prior to the Gulf War. We know now, were it not for that war, the regime in Iraq would likely have possessed a nuclear weapon no later than 1993.

Today, Iraq continues to withhold important information about its nuclear program -- weapons design, procurement logs, experiment data, an accounting of nuclear materials and documentation of foreign assistance. Iraq employs capable nuclear scientists and technicians. It retains physical infrastructure needed to build a nuclear weapon. Iraq has made several attempts to buy high-strength aluminum tubes used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon. Should Iraq acquire fissile material, it would be able to build a nuclear weapon within a year. And Iraq's state-controlled media has reported numerous meetings between Saddam Hussein and his nuclear scientists, leaving little doubt about his continued appetite for these weapons.

Iraq also possesses a force of Scud-type missiles with ranges beyond the 150 kilometers permitted by the U.N. Work at testing and production facilities shows that Iraq is building more long-range missiles that it can inflict mass death throughout the region.

In 1990, after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, the world imposed economic sanctions on Iraq. Those sanctions were maintained after the war to compel the regime's compliance with Security Council resolutions. In time, Iraq was allowed to use oil revenues to buy food. Saddam Hussein has subverted this program, working around the sanctions to buy missile technology and military materials. He blames the suffering of Iraq's people on the United Nations, even as he uses his oil wealth to build lavish palaces for himself, and to buy arms for his country. By refusing to comply with his own agreements, he bears full guilt for the hunger and misery of innocent Iraqi citizens.

In 1991, Iraq promised U.N. inspectors immediate and unrestricted access to verify Iraq's commitment to rid itself of weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles. Iraq broke this promise, spending seven years deceiving, evading, and harassing U.N. inspectors before ceasing cooperation entirely. Just months after the 1991 cease-fire, the Security Council twice renewed its demand that the Iraqi regime cooperate fully with inspectors, condemning Iraq's serious violations of its obligations. The Security Council again renewed that demand in 1994, and twice more in 1996, deploring Iraq's clear violations of its obligations. The Security Council renewed its demand three more times in 1997, citing flagrant violations; and three more times in 1998, calling Iraq's behavior totally unacceptable. And in 1999, the demand was renewed yet again.

As we meet today, it's been almost four years since the last U.N. inspectors set foot in Iraq, four years for the Iraqi regime to plan, and to build, and to test behind the cloak of secrecy.

We know that Saddam Hussein pursued weapons of mass murder even when inspectors were in his country. Are we to assume that he stopped when they left? The history, the logic, and the facts lead to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein's regime is a grave and gathering danger. To suggest otherwise is to hope against the evidence. To assume this regime's good faith is to bet the lives of millions and the peace of the world in a reckless gamble. And this is a risk we must not take.

Delegates to the General Assembly, we have been more than patient. We've tried sanctions. We've tried the carrot of oil for food, and the stick of coalition military strikes. But Saddam Hussein has defied all these efforts and continues to develop weapons of mass destruction. The first time we may be completely certain he has a -- nuclear weapons is when, God forbids, he uses one. We owe it to all our citizens to do everything in our power to prevent that day from coming.

The conduct of the Iraqi regime is a threat to the authority of the United Nations, and a threat to peace. Iraq has answered a decade of U.N. demands with a decade of defiance. All the world now faces a test, and the United Nations a difficult and defining moment. Are Security Council resolutions to be honored and enforced, or cast aside without consequence? Will the United Nations serve the purpose of its founding, or will it be irrelevant?

The United States helped found the United Nations. We want the United Nations to be effective, and respectful, and successful. We want the resolutions of the world's most important multilateral body to be enforced. And right now those resolutions are being unilaterally subverted by the Iraqi regime. Our partnership of nations can meet the test before us, by making clear what we now expect of the Iraqi regime.

If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately and unconditionally forswear, disclose, and remove or destroy all weapons of mass destruction, long-range missiles, and all related material.

If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately end all support for terrorism and act to suppress it, as all states are required to do by U.N. Security Council resolutions.

If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will cease persecution of its civilian population, including Shi'a, Sunnis, Kurds, Turkomans, and others, again as required by Security Council resolutions.

If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will release or account for all Gulf War personnel whose fate is still unknown. It will return the remains of any who are deceased, return stolen property, accept liability for losses resulting from the invasion of Kuwait, and fully cooperate with international efforts to resolve these issues, as required by Security Council resolutions.

If the Iraqi regime wishes peace, it will immediately end all illicit trade outside the oil-for-food program. It will accept U.N. administration of funds from that program, to ensure that the money is used fairly and promptly for the benefit of the Iraqi people.

If all these steps are taken, it will signal a new openness and accountability in Iraq. And it could open the prospect of the United Nations helping to build a government that represents all Iraqis -- a government based on respect for human rights, economic liberty, and internationally supervised elections.

The United States has no quarrel with the Iraqi people; they've suffered too long in silent captivity. Liberty for the Iraqi people is a great moral cause, and a great strategic goal. The people of Iraq deserve it; the security of all nations requires it. Free societies do not intimidate through cruelty and conquest, and open societies do not threaten the world with mass murder. The United States supports political and economic liberty in a unified Iraq.

We can harbor no illusions -- and that's important today to remember. Saddam Hussein attacked Iran in 1980 and Kuwait in 1990. He's fired ballistic missiles at Iran and Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Israel. His regime once ordered the killing of every person between the ages of 15 and 70 in certain Kurdish villages in northern Iraq. He has gassed many Iranians, and 40 Iraqi villages.

My nation will work with the U.N. Security Council to meet our common challenge. If Iraq's regime defies us again, the world must move deliberately, decisively to hold Iraq to account. We will work with the U.N. Security Council for the necessary resolutions. But the purposes of the United States should not be doubted. The Security Council resolutions will be enforced -- the just demands of peace and security will be met -- or action will be unavoidable. And a regime that has lost its legitimacy will also lose its power.

Events can turn in one of two ways: If we fail to act in the face of danger, the people of Iraq will continue to live in brutal submission. The regime will have new power to bully and dominate and conquer its neighbors, condemning the Middle East to more years of bloodshed and fear. The regime will remain unstable -- the region will remain unstable, with little hope of freedom, and isolated from the progress of our times. With every step the Iraqi regime takes toward gaining and deploying the most terrible weapons, our own options to confront that regime will narrow. And if an emboldened regime were to supply these weapons to terrorist allies, then the attacks of September the 11th would be a prelude to far greater horrors.

If we meet our responsibilities, if we overcome this danger, we can arrive at a very different future. The people of Iraq can shake off their captivity. They can one day join a democratic Afghanistan and a democratic Palestine, inspiring reforms throughout the Muslim world. These nations can show by their example that honest government, and respect for women, and the great Islamic tradition of learning can triumph in the Middle East and beyond. And we will show that the promise of the United Nations can be fulfilled in our time.

Neither of these outcomes is certain. Both have been set before us. We must choose between a world of fear and a world of progress. We cannot stand by and do nothing while dangers gather. We must stand up for our security, and for the permanent rights and the hopes of mankind. By heritage and by choice, the United States of America will make that stand. And, delegates to the United Nations, you have the power to make that stand, as well.

Thank you very much.