FOREIGN
PRESS REVIEW (FPR) - ‘Relevant news, views, comments and analysis from all
around the world’
Compiled
by Sanli Bahadir Koç / e-mail : sbahadir@bilkent.edu.tr / tel : +90 533
3597848 - Subscribe to
FPR
In
this issue-Click
on the numbers to go to the article. You can return to top by clicking on the
‘back’ button of your
browser
Dýþ Basýnda Türkiye /
Western Press Review / Arab Press Review / Israeli Press Review
American Press Review (Slate) / Western Press Review
|
External link -
"Building
a Better World: One Path from Crisis to Opportunity" Paul Wolfowitz at
the Brookings Institution NYT - We Still Have a Choice
on Iraq By JOHN F. KERRY From the Archive – Michael Lind – The Israel Lobby Al-Ahram Weekly – Kagan’s Thesis - Beyond Fukuyama and Huntington? The United Nations is useless but so useful |
Daily Star Can US neoimperialist march be stopped? By Patrick Seale Wall Street
Journal The
Middle East Will Unite the West. By Frederick Kempe |
H3 Guardian leader
Resolutely ignored Make-or-break time for Cyprus EU enlargement and Nato
cohesion may hinge on the ability of the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders
finally to reach an agreement, writes Simon Tisdall Talabani says a general amnesty would solve PKK issue
in Turkey Barzani warns Turkey against invasion EU hints Turkey faces long wait for accession talks |
||
|
H4 New York Times Congress Now Promises to Hold Weeks of Hearings About Iraq We Still Have a Choice on Iraq By JOHN F. KERRY
Interview With
Gerhard Schröder Arabs, by Degrees, Oppose American Attack on Iraq How We Won the War
Editorial Keeping Earth Fit for Development Afghan President Escapes Bullets |
H5 Washington Post Iraq Policy Shift Follows Pattern - Bush's Move to Consult Congress Seen as
Damage Control Cheney, Tenet Brief Leaders of Hill on Iraq Israelis Intercept 'Mega-Bomb' Arab League Foreign Ministers Vow Support for Iraq Pentagon
Supports International Forces Outside Afghan Capital |
H6 Guardian A year on, the US is now
set on remaking the world Since September 11 the US has taken charge of
three huge regions Martin Woollacott If the US and Iraq do go to war, there can only be one winner, can't
there? Maybe not Recall the Commons 'America wants to wage war on all of us' 'Regime change' seen as
new term for old enemy: colonisation Gunmen try to kill Afghan president |
||
|
H7 The Prospect – Israel lobby (part II) Adam Garfinkle
responds to Michael Lind’s allegations |
H8 National Review - Which Muslims, Mr. Scowcroft? The
Great Game |
H9 UPI - Top
al Qaida leaders interviewed Russia's
'Muslim problem' Bush --
remake Middle East Clinton:
Get bin Laden before pursuing Hussein FoxNews - New Intelligence Exposes Saddam's Nuke Push ABC - French Authorities:
Moussaoui Plotted Another Series of Attacks Pre - Emptive Strike on Iraq? Count NATO Out
|
||
|
H10 Daily Star Can US
neoimperialist march be stopped? By Patrick Seale Is the US above international justice? Al-Ahram Weekly – Kagan’s Thesis - Beyond Fukuyama and Huntington? Arab Press Review Why is Saddam playing into
Bush’s hands? Sharon: Iraqi experts and Saudi money helping
Libya go nuclear! |
H11 Slate A Real War
on Terrorism Government
by Op-Ed Wall Street Journal The Middle East Will Unite the
West. By Frederick
Kempe Iraq: Where
Have All The Democrats Gone? Some
Democrats Show Signs They Will Oppose Bush Plans |
H12 RFE/RL) Russia: Is Moscow Seeking Political Power Through Energy Wealth? Western Press Review:
Debate And Diplomacy Intensify On Iraq, Iranian Reform, And The Earth Summit |
||
H13 Christian Science Monitor The US as global sheriff
for every Dodge City
In war, some facts less factualSome
US assertions from the last war on Iraq still appear dubious. Monitor Breakfast with Joe Lieberman |
H14 Financial Times Philip Stephens: The
realpolitik of a moral war Bush seeks to ease concerns over Iraq attack Schröder's cynical campaign |
H15 Los Angeles Times Iraq Debate Looms in Congress - Government: Questions for Bush arise from both houses. Issue could influence key elections |
||
|
H16 The Times leader - Karzai is vital for the future of Afghanistan Blair - Britain
must be ready to 'pay the blood price' The United Nations is useless but so useful BUSH
needs Tony Blair. Not always, of course; there are many times since September
11 when the American President has appeared to treat the British Prime
Minister as expendable. A critical link between Saddam
and September 11 |
H17 Daily Telegraph Labour's love-in with
America is nothing new 100 jets join attack on Iraq |
H18 Independent Put Iraq aside and concentrate on the terrorist threatOf the 200-odd prisoners taken to Guantanamo
Bay for questioning, not one has been charged |
||
|
H19 MSDW’s Stephen Roach - No, terrorism did not stop a $32 trillion global economy dead in its
tracks. But it did unmask some important fault lines that underscore an
increasingly precarious foundation to this expansion. |
H20 External link - "Building
a Better World: One Path from Crisis to Opportunity" Paul Wolfowitz at
the Brookings Institution |
H21 Stratfor -Afghan
security beginning to unravel |
||
|
New York Times/ Washington Post |
Slate (American Press Review/ International Press
Review) |
Russia / Caucasus / Asia / Middle East / Arab Press Review / Israeli Press Review Ed.s from the Hebrew Press / Ha'aretz / Jerusalem Post / Debka Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) World Media Reaction (USIA) Periodicals / Think-tanks / Stratfor / Book reviews FBIS (Foreign Broadcasting Information Service) |
||
On Turkey
See also Turkey in Foreign Press by Basýn Yayýn, German
Press on Turkey, French Press on Turkey
Guardian
Resolutely ignored
Comply with the UN in Cyprus
too
Leader
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
Those who righteously deplore Iraq's flouting of UN resolutions should spare a
thought for Cyprus on their way to the front lines. There have been more
security council directives and statements since the 1974 Turkish invasion of
the island than George Bush has had crawfish hot dinners. The general assembly
demanded unanimously on November 1 that year that there be a "speedy
withdrawal of all foreign armed forces" from Cyprus and an "urgent
return" of all refugees. The security council endorsed that demand and has
since issued many of its own, notably in resolutions 367 (1975), 541 (1983) and
1251 (1999). This latter deplored the "excessive level of military forces
and armaments" on both sides of the green line, reiterated the UN's vision
of a single, bi-zonal, bi-communal, independent sovereign state, and set yet
another overoptimistic deadline for the secretary general to achieve it.
During Britain's
presidency last July, the council expressed disappointment at the lack of
progress, singled out Rauf Denktash's Turkish Cypriots for blame, and once more
urged both sides to help UN envoy Alvaro de Soto assemble at least "the
component parts of a comprehensive settlement". Yet after all this effort
and 28 years of legally binding declarations, 30,000 Turkish troops remain in
northern Cyprus, the refugees remain separated from their homes, and Mr
Denktash and President Glafcos Clerides remain glumly at odds. Today, UN
secretary general Kofi Annan will meet the two men in Paris for another brave
bash at mediation. Nobody, including Britain's special envoy David Hannay and
US diplomats, predicts a breakthrough. Stiffed again, as Mr Bush might say.
Normally this would not
matter much to the wider world. But there is now, perhaps for the first time, a
real and compelling deadline for progress. Barring a massive upset, Cyprus will
be formally invited to join the EU at its Copenhagen summit on December 12. If
it is not, its patron Greece (which piquantly assumes the EU presidency in
January) could halt the whole 10-nation enlargement in its tracks. Yet if it
is, notwithstanding the lack of a settlement, Turkey, grappling with
unpredictable autumn election outcomes, could in umbrage annex the north. Both
should keep unusually cool. But if Turkey is itself serious about joining the
EU, now is the time, finally, for it to pay heed to the UN and to have firm,
even stiffish words with Mr Denktash
Make-or-break time for Cyprus
EU enlargement and Nato
cohesion may hinge on the ability of the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders finally
to reach an agreement, writes Simon Tisdall
Thursday September 5,
2002
In the case of Iraq, Tony Blair and George Bush are fond of saying that doing
nothing is not an option. But this maxim as applied prospectively to Saddam
Hussein's regime is the exception to the rule of international relations. On
the whole, politicians faced by difficult problems are only too happy to do
nothing for as long as possible.
The ability to put off a
decision indefinitely (while appearing to be actively engaged in resolving the
issue) is in fact the true mark of the experienced statesman. Some notable
examples of this dubious skill were to be seen at the now acrimoniously
concluded Johannesburg summit on sustainable development.
Certain Israeli
politicians, for example, excel at being on the brink of doing something
positive for the peace process but never quite actually doing it. Sadly for the
Palestinians, they are matched by expert counterparts in Egypt and other Arab
countries whose tacit attachment to stasis is equally stultifying.
This ubiquitous practice
of perpetual political prevarication is all very well up to a point. But when a
decision really does have to be made, all that wasted time and bad faith can
make a solution all the harder to obtain. That is the situation that will
confront Kofi Annan in Paris tomorrow when the UN secretary general meets the
leaders of divided Cyprus.
The international
community has been trying, off and on, to sort out Cyprus for more than a
quarter of a decade - ever since the Turkish invasion of 1974 (following a
Greek military-backed coup) divided the island into two hostile entities. But
with a UN force patrolling the green line and relatively little intercommunal
violence nowadays, there have been no really urgent incentives for action. On
the contrary, the west's need to placate and appease Greece and Turkey for
various, larger geostrategic reasons has proved a continuing disincentive to
concerted efforts to grasp the Cyprus nettle.
The long expected but now
imminent invitation to the Greek Cypriot Republic of Cyprus to join the
European Union has radically altered this dynamic. The EU's invitation is
likely to come at its Copenhagen summit this December whether or not the Cyprus
dispute has been resolved - but, preferably, after it has.
David Hannay, Britain's
envoy, said this week that it was now make-or-break time for a comprehensive
settlement. The US envoy, Thomas Weston, also visiting the island, made similar
noises. For his part, Mr Annan is expected to tell the Greek Cypriot president,
Glafcos Clerides, and the veteran Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktash, that
the moment for a leap of faith and statesmanship, and a show of negotiating
flexibility, has definitively arrived and can no longer be avoided.
Yet most diplomats and
observers have zero confidence that either man will accept the message and act
on it. Neither gave any reason for optimism as they prepared to attend the
Paris meeting.
Now, suddenly coming into
focus, is the true measure of the size of the penalty that may be paid for
years of obfuscation and failure over Cyprus. If in the absence of agreement on
a settlement (or at least its outlines or principles) by December the EU
withholds its membership invitation, it is possible that Greece will move to
delay or derail the entire enlargement process involving perhaps nine other
countries.
If, on the other hand, the
invitation is issued despite the lack of a settlement, it is entirely possible
that Turkey will seek to annex the northern part of the island, thereby
confirming its permanent division and infuriating Athens. Whether Turkey would
actually take such action depends in part on the outcome of its general
election on November 3. The election has been brought forward to this year
because of the country's economic crisis. This is just the sort of complicating
factor that unexpectedly crops up when a long postponed, essentially unrelated
decision suddenly becomes urgent.
Any such Turkish action to
take the Turkish Cypriots under its constitutional wing would undoubtedly
compromise its own hopes of being asked formally to apply for EU membership at
Copenhagen. Greek moves to delay enlargement, on the other hand, just as it
assumes the EU's rotating presidency, would provoke a Europe-wide crisis.
And all this may have a
knock-on effect on Nato, of which Greece and Turkey are members, on
peacekeeping in Macedonia and Afghanistan (where Turkey currently leads the
international security assistance force) and on the future of projects such as
the proposed EU rapid reaction force. In contrast with US and British attitudes
to UN measures regarding Iraq, it would also mean that UN security council
resolutions calling for the island's reunification will in effect continue to
be flouted.
Europe's enlargement and reunification,
Nato's cohesion and unity, vital international peacekeeping operations and the
UN's credibility may thus all, to some degree at least, now depend on whether
Mr Clerides and Mr Denktash can finally be persuaded to set aside their old,
entrenched, long festering and long neglected grievances and cut a deal.
Despite Mr Bush and Mr
Blair's motto, inaction over Cyprus has been the international community's only
and favoured option. That particular pigeon may finally be coming home to
roost.
Email
simon.tisdall@guardian.co.uk
PUK leader Talabani says a
general amnesty would solve PKK issue in Turkey.
Excerpt from report entitled "Mam
Jalal meets the leader of the Turkish Justice and Development Party. The two
sides stressed consolidating bilateral relations" published by Iraqi
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) newspaper Kurdistani Nuwe on 4 September -
subheading inserted editorially
Within the framework of his official visit to Turkey, [Patriotic
Union of Kurdistan, PUK, leader] comrade Mam [honorific] Jalal [Talabani]
visited the headquarters of the Turkish Justice and Development Party, AKP,
yesterday afternoon, 3 September. He was received by the leader of the party,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
At the beginning of the meeting, the head of AKP warmly welcomed comrade Mam
Jalal and expressed his pleasure for Mam Jalal's return to Turkey.
The development of relations between the two parties occupied an important part
of the talks. In this respect, Mam Jalal stressed the development and
strengthening of the ties, and in the same way, Recep Tayyip Erdogan reaffirmed
it. Relation between the two Turkish and Iraqi peoples was another part of the
meeting, as well as the political situation in Iraq and the region. The two
sides exchanged views on the anticipated changes.
It is worth noting that AKP is one of the main Turkish political parties. It is
expected that it would achieve a significant success in the coming [general]
election in Turkey, which is due to be held early November...
It is expected that comrade Mam Jalal would be received and meet today the head
of the Republican People's Party, CHP, Deniz Baykal...
The issue of KADEK
In a reply to a question regarding the fate of KADEK [former PKK] armed men,
Mam Jalal said: I have often been asked this question, and often said and
repeat it again that the issue of KADEK can be settled through a general
amnesty by the Turkish state...
Quoting Mam Jalal, these newspapers have reported that the Iraqi opposition
wants to achieve a democratic change in Iraq, and this task is its duty; but
the Iraqi opposition does not support the invasion [of Iraq], although it needs
the support and assistance of the international community and countries, which
are Iraqi people's friends.
In another part of their follow up, these newspapers, which included important
ones like, Milliyet, Huriyet, Sabah and Zaman, wrote about KADEK's issue,
saying that Talabani believes that KDEK's issue can be settled by a general
amnesty by the Turkish state in order to allow its [KDEK's] armed men to return
to their daily life.
Source: Kurdistani Nuwe, Al-Sulaymaniyah, in Sorani Kurdish 4 Sep 02.
Turkish Poll Leader Erdogan Rules Out
Future Dervis Role.
ISTANBUL - (Dow Jones)-Turkey's Justice
and Development Party, or AKP, Chairman Recep Tayyip Erdogan reiterated
Thursday that in a future coalition government, the party has no intention of
letting Kemal Dervis be in charge of the economy.
In the last government, Dervis was in charge of an economic program supported
by a $16-billion International Monetary Fund program after Turkey's
February 2001 financial crisis.
"Frankly, I don't see Dervis being successful in his job," Erdogan
told the NTV news channel. "We would never consent to hand over the
economy to a failure."
Erdogan said to relinquish economic management to an outsider, his party
"has to be convinced about him being successful."
Turkey is scheduled to hold a general election on Nov. 3.
Erdogan's AKP is leading the opinion polls with 25% support. The AKP is trailed
by the center-left Republic Peoples Party, or CHP with 15% support. Dervis has
recently joined the CHP.
Markets hope the post election government, if not an AKP majority, will be an
AKP-CHP coalition with Dervis as deputy prime minister in charge of the
economy.
"Turkey (with the crisis) reached a turning point and has
lost major resources," Erdogan said. "There has been horrible capital
flight. We're still paying the price."
On the AKP's policy on controversial issues like the Islamic head scarf ban,
Erdogan said they will avoid any friction, but head-scarf wearing women should
have equal rights as the ones who don't.
Markets are worried that the AKP, with its pro-Islamic roots, will challenge
the secular establishment if gets into power. Islamic fashions are banned in
government offices and schools. The AKP vehemently denies the Islamist label.
"The head scarf is dictated by our religion," Erdogan said. "The
head scarf is a problem in our country which is 99% Muslim."
Erdogan's periodic references to the 99% Muslim majority make analysts
skeptical about how tolerant he would be prepared to be in government.
The AKP leader added that the scarf can't be a symbol of any political party
and the AKP won't make this issue a source of tension, but solve it through a
social compromise.
- By Selim Atalay, Dow Jones Newswires; +90 212 231 3355;
selim.atalay@dowjones.com
Back to top
Reuters
Iraqi Kurd leader warns
Turkey against invasion.
BERLIN, Sept 5 (Reuters) - The leader
of a major Iraqi Kurdish faction warned Turkey it would suffer
massive defeat if it invaded northern Iraq to prevent Kurds from carving out a
new state, a newspaper reported on Thursday.
NATO ally Turkey fears Kurdish nationalists within its own
borders. Analysts have said Ankara could invade neighbouring northern Iraq to
prevent a Kurdish enclave from making a bid for statehood in the event of a
U.S. attack on Iraq.
Massoud Barzani, leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) which controls
a swathe of northern Iraq, said he would not give up an inch of land to the
Turks.
"Not only our soldiers, but also our women, our children and our old
people would fight," Barzani was quoted as saying in the Die Zeit
newspaper.
"A Kurdish intifada would turn our streets into a graveyard for Turkish
soldiers."
Ankara regularly sends troops into northern Iraq, largely to strike at Turkey's
Kurdish rebels who have bases there.
Tensions between Turkey and Iraqi Kurds have risen in recent
weeks over fears that the Kurds would try to entrench the fragile autonomy they
have enjoyed since the 1991 Gulf War.
Turkish air bases and Iraqi Kurdish fighters could both be crucial to the
success of a possible U.S. offensive to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein for
allegedly seeking weapons of mass destruction.
Barzani did not attend a White House meeting of leading Iraqi opposition
figures last month, but he said talks with Washington were underway.
"The United States needs us because we know the area. And the Kurds are
the only ones who have relentlessly fought against Saddam. With our modern
weapons, we could win the war even without America," he said.
He declined to say whether he would allow Washington to use the Kurdish enclave
to attack Iraq.
"An important question is who comes after Saddam and how will Iraq be
ruled? Before we make concessions to the United States, we want the guarantee
of a federal system," Barzani said.
U.S. and British warplanes use a Turkish air base to patrol a "no-fly
zone" that has protected the Kurdish enclave since the end of the Gulf
War, when the Kurds rose up against Saddam and wrested control of the north.
EU hints Turkey faces long wait for
accession talks.
By Gareth Jones
BRUSSELS, Sept 5 (Reuters) - The European Commission indicated on Thursday that
Turkey might still have a long time to wait before the
European Union is ready to set a date for launching the accession talks Ankara
desperately seeks.
Turkey recently approved a package of political reforms -
including abolition of the death penalty in peacetime and boosting cultural
rights of its Kurdish minority - in the hope of winning a date at an EU summit
in Copenhagen in December.
But briefing reporters on a meeting between European Commissioner Guenter
Verheugen and new Turkish Foreign Minister Sukru Sina Gurel, a Commission
spokesman said Turkey would need to show it had made progress
in implementing the reforms.
"It is not just the texts as such adopted by parliament but the way they
are actually implemented and how they affect the daily life of citizens,"
spokesman Jean-Christophe Filori said.
"Implementation is very important. We treat all candidate countries in the
same way," he added.
The next big step in the enlargement process is the publication of the
Commission's annual reports on the candidate countries on October 16. On the
basis of those reports, the EU will decide how to proceed with all the
candidates.
"We are in a process of examination (of Turkey's
reforms). We will come back on October 16 with an overview of all issues
regarding human rights and democracy," Filori said.
NOT FAR ENOUGH?
However, signalling the latest reforms might not be enough, he added: "It
goes beyond...the issues in the reform package in the summer."
EU diplomats say the August package, though welcome, fails to address some of
their concerns, such as the role of the powerful armed forces in Turkish
politics.
Ankara, now in the throes of an economic crisis and acute political uncertainty
ahead of a November 3 general election, has long complained the EU fails to
make allowances for Turkey as a strategic Western ally in a
turbulent region.
It also suspects some EU governments secretly oppose the accession of a largely
Muslim country with a rapidly expanding population of 68 million and whose
borders stretch to Iraq.
Gurel, who replaced the veteran pro-EU liberal Ismail Cem during a political
crisis in the summer, gave Verheugen the timetable for implementing the new
reforms, Filori said.
Verheugen told Gurel the October report for Turkey would provide
a "summary table" on the human rights situation.
Concern about its human rights record is the main reason why Turkey
remains the only one of the 13, mostly ex-communist, candidate countries still
waiting to open accession talks.
Filori said Verheugen and Gurel had also briefly touched on the issue of Cyprus
ahead of Friday's meeting in Paris between U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan
and the leaders of the divided island's two communities, the Greek and the
Turkish Cypriots.
"Verheugen expressed confidence there is still enough time to reach an
agreement between the two parties," Filori said.
Cyprus, a candidate country which is on track to close accession talks with the
EU in December, is a potential flashpoint in Turkey's troubled
relations with Brussels.
The bloc says it is prepared to admit Cyprus as a divided island in the absence
of a political settlement. But if it does so, Turkey says it
might forcibly "annex" the breakaway Turkish Cypriot northern part.
Turkey invaded Cyprus in 1974 after a short-lived Greek
Cypriot coup engineered by the military junta then in Athens.
ÝÇÝNDEKÝLER
·
LA LIBRE BELGIQUE: KÜRTLERÝN, BUSH'A ÖLÇÜLÜ DESTEÐÝ
·
FINANCIAL TIMES DEUTSCHLAND: TÜRKÝYE, AB'DEN KATILIM
MÜZAKERELERÝNÝ BAÞLATMASINI TALEP EDÝYOR
·
LE SOIR: YUNANÝSTAN, POLONYA VE TÜRKÝYE 'AVRUPA POLÝSÝ'
BÜNYESÝNE KATILDI
·
ABRAR: TAHRAN-ANKARA ÝLÝÞKÝLERÝNDE YENÝ ADIMLAR
·
TO VIMA: ABD KIBRIS KONUSU ÝÇÝN ACELE EDÝYOR VE ANNAN'IN
ROTASINI ÇÝZÝYOR
L’EXPRESS DERGÝSÝ:
TÜRKÝYE’YÝ KIPIRDATMAK ÝSTEYEN KÝÞÝ...
ÜLKESÝNÝN MODERN BÝR SOLA SAHÝP OLMASI
KEMAL DERVÝÞ'ÝN TEK ARZUSU
PARÝS, 04/09(BYE)--- Tirajý haftada 560 bin olan L’Express dergisinin 05 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Nükte V. Ortaq imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yayýmlanan Ýstanbul çýkýþlý haberin çevirisi þöyledir:
18 ay önce, IMF’nin de onayýyla Dünya Bankasý'ndan, Türk ekonomisini yeniden rayýna oturtmak için geldiðinde, kalýcý olacaðýný pek kimse ummazdý. Kemal Derviþ, Türk siyasetinin içinde bir UFO gibi. 23 yýl boyunca, genç ve sarýþýn Amerikalý ikinci eþiyle tanýþtýðý ABD’de yaþadý. Sportif ve sýk sýk tenis oynuyor. Özellikle "samimi dili" ve doðrudan yaklaþýmýyla Türk siyasilerinin alýþýlagelmiþ gösteriþli ve dolambaçlý söylemlerinden çok farklý bir tutum sergiliyor. Annesi Alman, babasý Türk olan Kemal Derviþ, eðitimini Fransa’da, Ýngiltere’de ve ABD’de yaptý. Ancak bu kozmopolit kiþi, Türkiye’ye derin bir sevgi besliyor. Baþbakan Bülent Ecevit de kendisine hükümete girme teklifi götürünce tereddüt etmedi. Ekonomisi gücünü yitirmiþ ve kurtarýcý adam arayýþý içinde olan bir ülkede, ekonominin süper bakaný görevini zorluk çekmeden elde ediyor. Fakat iktidarýn gizlerine girdiðinde, soldan aþýrý saða giden ve iç anlaþmazlýklardan dolayý çarký týkayan "doða karþýtý" bir koalisyon hükümetiyle karþýlaþýyor. Ýþte o zaman, gerekli reformlarý gerçekleþtirebilecek güçlü bir hükümet kurmaya çalýþmak için siyasete girme gerekliliðini –isteðim dýþý diyor– anlýyor.
Kendini "sosyal-liberal" olarak tanýmlayan Derviþ, bakanlýk görevinden vazgeçip geleneksel olarak çok devletçi, fakat ona göre sol partilerin birleþmesi giriþimine kapýlarý kapatmama avantajýný gösteren tek parti olan CHP’ye üye olmayý seçiyor. Sembolik olarak, ülkenin en önemli iþçi sendikalarýndan birinin lokalini seçiyor. Çünkü arzusu bu: Türkiye’nin modern bir sola sahip olmasý. Sol seçmenlerin herþeyi devletten beklemeye ve özel giriþimden sakýnmaya meyilli olduklarý bir ülkede zor olabilecek bir iþ.
HAMBURGER ABENDBLATT:
ABD IRAK'A SALDIRIRSA... ASKERÝ SEÇENEKLER, ÝTTÝFAKLAR VE BUNLARIN SONUÇLARI
ÜZERÝNE SENARYOLAR
ANKARA, 04/09(BYE)--- Almanya'da yayýmlanan Hamburger Abendblatt gazetesinin 04 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Thomas Frankenfeld imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda bir yazý yer almýþtýr. Ýnternet’ten saðlanan Almanca yazýnýn çevirisi þöyledir:
Pentagon'daki stratejistler için George Bush'un Saddam Hüseyin'i zor kullanarak yýkma projesi giderek bir kabus senaryosuna dönüþmeye baþladý.
Temelde iki tür askeri seçenekten söz edilebilir. Ýlk seçenekte Irak komuta merkezlerine, haberleþme tesisleri ve hava savunma sistemlerine yoðun bombardýmandan sonra 250 bin askerin katýlacaðý bir kara harekatý bulunuyor; yani 1991 Körfez Savaþý'na benzer. Ýkinci seçenekte ise, bombardýman aþamasýna Army-Ranger, Navy Seals ve Ýngiliz SAS komandolarýnýn baskýn düzenleyerek katýlmasý bulunuyor. Bu özel birlikler Saddam ve cumhuriyet muhafýzlarýný devre dýþý býrakýrken, Amerikan danýþmanlarýn önderliðindeki Irak muhalefet birlikleri, Amerikan hava saldýrýlarýnýn desteðinde Baðdat'ýn 400 bin kiþilik ordusuna saldýracak. Bu seçenek Afganistan modeline de uygun düþüyor.
Birinci seçeneðin baþarý þansý: George W.Bush bir zamanlar babasýnýn yaptýðýnýn aksine, Baðdat'a karþý bir ittifak kuramadý. Hatta Suudi Arabistan, Kuveyt, Katar, Umman, Ürdün ve Mýsýr Irak'a bir saldýrýyý kesinlikle reddediyor. Ýslam dünyasýnýn genelinde Amerikan karþýtlýðý tehlikeli bir þekilde týrmanýyor.
Gerçi Avrupa'da Ýngiltere, Bush'u birliklerle desteklemeye hazýr ve 20 bin askerden söz edilmekte, ancak Baþbakan Tony Blair, Ýþçi Partisi ve kamuoyundaki desteðini büyük ölçüde yitirmiþ görünüyor. Ýngilizlerin yüzde 71'i savaþa katýlmaya karþý. Ayrýca Ýngiliz Genelkurmay Baþkanlýðýnýn bir fiyasko uyarýsýnda bulunduðu belirtiliyor.
Amerikan güvenlik güçleri, eskiden müttefik olan Araplarýn muhalefetinin yaný sýra, 1990 yýlýndaki gibi bir yýðýnak bölgesine de sahip deðil. Burada NATO müttefiki Türkiye gündeme gelebilir.
Ýkinci seçeneðin baþarý þansý: Bunun için ABD'nin Afganistan'daki Kuzey Ýttifaký gibi bölgede saldýrý yönü güçlü bir müttefike ihtiyacý var. Ancak Irak muhalefeti iç siyasi terör mekanizmasý sayesinde zayýf ve bölünmüþ durumda.
Müttefik olarak sadece savaþ tecrübesine sahip Kuzey Irak'taki Kürt gerillalar kullanýlabilir. Gerçekten de Bush Kürtleri yanýna almak için yoðun çaba gösterdi. Aðustos ayý baþýnda ABD Baþkaný, Kuzey Irak muhalefet gruplarýný Washington'a davet etti, ancak bu seçenekle barut fýçýsýnýn fitilini de ateþlemiþ olacaktýr.
Irak Kürtleri, Ýngiliz ve Amerikalýlarýn korumasý altýnda bulunan 36'ncý paralelinin kuzeyindeki uçuþa yasak bölgede yarý özerk bir vatan kurdular. Burasý Mesut Barzani'nin Kürdistan Demokrat Partisi ve Celal Talabani'nin Kürdistan Yurtseverler Birliði arasýnda paylaþtýrýlmýþ bir nüfuz bölgesi. Bir savaþ durumunda Kürtler bu birlikteliði riske atmýþ olurlar. Ayrýca ABD'ye de güvenmiyorlar. 1990 yýlýnda CIA ajanlarý Kürtleri isyana kýþkýrtmýþ ve daha sonra ortada býrakmýþlardý. Binlerce Kürt Saddam'ýn intikamýna maruz kalmýþtý.
Ancak Kürtlerin nihai hedefi zorbanýn yýkýlýþý deðil, Musul'un baþkent olduðu baðýmsýz bir devlettir. Türk medyasý, Talabani ve Barzani'nin devlet yapýsý üzerinde uzlaþmaya vardýðýný yazýyor. Yalnýzca ABD'nin kesin taahhütte bulunduðu bu bedele karþýlýk hayatlarýný Amerikalýlar için riske atacaklarý belirtiliyor. Ancak bu gizli pazarlýðý ne Bush, ne de Ankara kabul edebilir.
Irak'ýn yýkýlmasý ve bir Kürt devleti kurulmasý, Kürtlerin yoðun olarak yaþadýðý Türkiye'nin güneydoðusundaki sorunu yeniden alevlendirir ve tüm bölgeyi istikrarsýzlaþtýrýr. Türkler, 1918'den sonra Osmanlý Ýmparatorluðu'nun yýkýlýþýnýn acý hatýralarý arasýnda en çok toprak kaybýnýn sürmesinden korkmaktadýrlar. Bunun dýþýnda 25 milyon Kürdün bir kesimi Suriye, Ýran, Ermenistan ve Gürcistan'da yaþamaktadýr.
Amerika'nýn savaþ tehdidi altýnda Kürtlerle Türkler arasýndaki gerginlik þimdiden týrmandý. Barzani, Türk ordusunun kendi topraklarýndaki Amerikan saldýrýsýna katýlmasý durumunda, Kürdistan'ýn onlara mezar olacaðýný söylemekte.
Bu karýþýklýk içinde Türkiye'nin askeri açýdan etkili olan ittifak kabiliyeti tartýþmalýdýr. Türkiye Dýþiþleri Müsteþarý Uður Ziyal, Washington'da bir Irak harekatýnýn tüm sonuçlarýnýn bir kez daha gözden geçirilmesini ýsrarla rica etti.
LA LIBRE BELGIQUE:
KÜRTLERÝN, BUSH'A ÖLÇÜLÜ DESTEÐÝ
BRÜKSEL, 04/09(BYE)--- Tirajý 50 bin olan La Libre Belgique gazetesinin 04 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Gerald Papy imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yer alan yorumun çevirisi þöyledir:
Baðdat'a yapýlacak bir saldýrý halinde Kuzey Irak'ý kontrolleri altýnda tutan Kürt hareketleri, kilit rol oynayacak. Bu gruplar, Amerika'nýn tasarýlarýný destekleme eðilimindeler. Ancak tarih ve yerine getirilmeyen vaatler, onlarý temkinli olmaya itiyor.
Irak Kürdistaný, Irak'a karþý yapýlacak askeri bir müdahalenin baþarýya ulaþmasý için bir anahtar olacak. Körfez Savaþý'ndan bu yana Baðdat rejiminden kurtarýlan ve aralarýnda Hýristiyan azýnlýðýn da bulunduðu bölge temsilcileri için sorun, Saddam Hüseyin'e karþý bir operasyon yapýlýp yapýlmayacaðý deðil, bu operasyonun ne zaman yapýlacaðýdýr. Kuzey Irak'ý yöneten iki Kürt hareketinden biri olan Kürdistan Yurtseverler Birliði'nin Baþkaný Celal Talabani, bunun 2003 yýlý baþýnda yapýlacaðýný düþünüyor.
Talabani, Ýran'a yakýn olmasýna raðmen, son haftalarda Amerika'nýn projelerini öven açýklamalarýný artýrdý. Talabani, aðustos ayý ortalarýnda, bir savaþ halinde kontrolü altýnda tuttuðu topraklarda Amerikalý askerileri barýndýrmaya hazýr olduðunu açýkladý. Ayný zamanda Talabani, Ýslamcý Kürtlerin ve belki de Saddam Hüseyin'in ajanlarýnýn desteklediðini iddia ettiði El Kaide üyelerinin Ýran sýnýrýna yakýn köylerde bulunmasýný kýnadý.
Irak Kürdistan'ýnýn diðer gücü Mesut Barzani'nin Liderliðindeki Kürdistan Demokratik Partisi daha temkinli davranýyor. Ancak KDP kontrolündeki bölge hükümetinin bir temsilcisi, Barzani ile Talabani'nin görüþlerinde temelde bir ayrýlýk olmadýðýný açýkladý. Sadece Talabani'nin açýklamalarý biraz fazla "fevri" bulunuyor. KYB ve KDP için hedef ayný: Celal Talabani'nin deyimiyle, "birleþmiþ, laik ve demokratik bir Irak." KDP, savaþ halinde Amerikalýlarýn, demokratik ve federal bir devlet ve son zamanlarda kararsýzlýk içinde bulunan Türkiye kastedilerek, komþu ülkelerin olasý müdahalesine karþý koruma gibi garantiler vermelerini istiyor. Þu ana kadar bu türde garantiler verilmemiþ.
Saddam Hüseyin iktidarýna karþý ayaklanmaya teþvik edildikten sonra, yine Saddam Hüseyin'in eline býrakýlan Iraklý Kürtler, Washington'un yerine getirmediði vaadleri unutmadýlar. Gerçek politikanýn iþi belli olmaz.
FINANCIAL TIMES DEUTSCHLAND:
TÜRKÝYE, AB'DEN KATILIM MÜZAKERELERÝNÝ BAÞLATMASINI TALEP EDÝYOR
BERLÝN, 04/09(BYE)--- Tirajý günde 80 bin 400 olan Financial Times Deutschland gazetesinin 04 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Rainer Koch imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yayýmlanan Strazburg çýkýþlý yorumun çevirisi þöyledir:
Türkiye'nin yeni Dýþiþleri Bakaný Þükrü Sina Gürel, AB'den kesinlikle katýlým müzakerelerinin baþlamasý için tarih vermesini talep ediyor. Gürel, Strazburg'daki Avrupa Parlamentosu'nda dün yaptýðý konuþmada, Türk toplumunun, aðustos ayý baþýnda gerçekleþtirilen anayasa reformlarýnýn ardýndan "somut ve olumlu adýmlar atýlmasýný" beklediðini söyledi. Gürel, bunun müzakerelerin baþlamasýyla ilgili bir yol haritasýnýn yýl sonuna dek hazýrlanmasý konusunu da içerdiðini belirtti.
Bülent Ecevit'in hükümetindeki "þahinler"den olan Bakan, AB'nin buna olumsuz bakmasý halinde, "Türkiye'nin hayal kýrýklýðý, AB ile iliþkilerin oldukça kötüleþmesine yol açacak kadar büyük olacaktýr" tehdidinde bulundu. Türk hükümetinin, idam cezasýný kaldýrmasý ve Kürt azýnlýðýn haklarýný geniþletmesinin ardýndan, AB'nin Dönem Baþkaný Danimarka, üyelik sürecinde Ankara'ya daha da yakýnlaþýlacaðý sinyalini vermiþti.
Türkiye gerçi resmen AB adayý, fakat müzakereler henüz baþlatýlmadý. AB, aralýk ayýnýn ortasýnda Kopenhag'da yapýlacak geniþleme zirvesinde, Orta ve Doðu Avrupalý 10 aday ile Malta ve Kýbrýs'ýn üyeliði hakkýnda karar verecek. Türkiye ile iliþkiler de zirvenin gündeminde olacak. Birlik tarafýndan Ankara'nýn AB'ye yakýnlaþmasýnýn önkoþulu olarak öne sürülen demokratik reformlara, Avrupalýlýlarýn ne þekilde tepki göstereceði bilinmiyor. Öncelikle Federal Almanya hükümeti, Kopenhag'da Ankara'ya katýlým müzakereleriyle ilgili bir somut tarih verilmesine açýkça karþý çýktý. Geçen hafta Danimarka'nýn Helsingör kentinde gerçekleþen AB dýþiþleri bakanlarý toplantýsýnda da Müsteþar Günter Pfleuger, Almanlarýn konuyla ilgili tereddütlerini bir kez daha vurguladý.
AB ayný zamanda, aðýr hükümet krizine raðmen gerçekleþtirilen reformlara bir þekilde tepki göstermek ve Türkiye'yi -diðer adaylarla karþýlaþtýrýldýðýnda- Kopenhag'dan tamamen eli boþ göndermeyecek bir hamle yapmak zorunluluðuyla karþý karþýya.
Þükrü Sina Gürel, Kýbrýs meselesinin çözümünü ya da Avrupa Acil Müdahale Gücü'nün NATO'nun imkan ve olanaklarýndan faydalanmasýna izin verilmesi konusunun, Türk hükümetince üyelik için araç olarak kullandýðý iddiasýný reddederek, "bunlar Türkiye'nin güvenliðini ilgilendiren, birbirinden tamamen farklý konular" dedi.
Strazburg'daki konuþmasýnda, Ankara'nýn Kýbrýs'ýn üyeliðini hiçbir þekilde etkileyemeyeceðini açýklayan AB Komiseri Günter Verheugen, devam eden bölünmüþlüðe raðmen Avrupalýlarýn, ada cumhuriyeti için verilen üyelik yol haritasýna baðlý kalacaklarýný Türkiye'ye söylemenin en iyi baský aracý olduðunu söyledi.
LE SOIR:
YUNANÝSTAN, POLONYA VE
TÜRKÝYE 'AVRUPA POLÝSÝ' BÜNYESÝNE KATILDI
ANKARA, 04/09(BYE)--- Belçika'da yayýmlanan Le Soir gazetesinin 03 Eylül 2002 tarihli Ýnternet sayfasýnda, yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yer alan haberin çevirisi þöyledir:
Avrupa Polisi tarafýndan yayýmlanan bildiride, üç yeni ülkenin (Yunanistan, Polonya ve Türkiye) dün Strasbourg'da bulunan Avrupa Polisi genel karargahýna katýldýðý belirtildi.
Ayný zamanda NATO üyesi de olan bu üç ülkenin her birinden üç ila beþ arasýnda temsilcinin bundan böyle, Avrupa Polisi'nin daimi üyesi beþ ülkenin (Belçika, Almanya, Fransa, Lüksemburg ve Ýspanya) temsilcileriyle birlikte genel karargahta bulunacaklarý belirtiliyor.
Bildiride, AB üyelerinden Avusturya ve Finlandiya'nýn da çok yakýnda bu konuda bir anlaþma imzalayacaklarýna yer veriliyor. Ýmza töreninde konuþan Avrupa Polisi Baþkaný General Holger Kammerhoff, "Kapýlarýnýn açýk olduðunu, diðer ülkeleri de kendi alanýnda ilk olan bu karargaha katýlmaya davet ettiklerini" söyledi.
Ýtalya ise, daha önce Hollanda ve Ýngiltere'nin yaptýðý gibi Strasbourg'a bir irtibat subayý gönderecek. Böylece, yakýn bir gelecekte, 13 Avrupa ülkesi Avrupa Polisi karargahýnda temsil edilmiþ olacak.
Fransa'nýn batýsýndaki Rochelle kentinde 1992 yýlýnda imzalanan bir anlaþmayla kurulan Avrupa Polisi'nde halen, beþ daimi üyenin yaklaþýk 60 bin askeri bulunuyor. Bu kuruluþ 2003 yýlýna kadar, bir acil müdahale birimi þeklinde biçimlenecek ve böylece AB'nin öngördüðü aktif Avrupa ordusunun çekirdeðini oluþturacak.
ABRAR:
TAHRAN-ANKARA ÝLÝÞKÝLERÝNDE YENÝ ADIMLAR
TAHRAN, 04/09(BYE)--– Aþýrý dini eðilimli Abrar gazetesinin 02 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Ahmet Kazemi imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yer alan yorumun çevirisi þöyledir:
Kýsa bir süre önce Ýsmail Cem’in yerine atanan Türkiye’nin yeni Dýþiþleri Bakaný Þükrü Sina Gürel, Ýran’a yaptýðý resmi ziyaret sýrasýnda Dýþiþleri Bakaný Kemal Harrazi’nin yaný sýra, Ýran’ýn üst düzey yetkilileriyle görüþerek ikili ve bölgesel konular üzerine görüþ alýþ veriþinde bulundu.
Muhtemelen Türkiye’nin ýsrarý üzerine gerçekleþen bu ziyarette, baþta Irak sorunu ve Türkiye’nin bu konuyla ilgili özel endiþeleri olmak üzere, önemli konular ortaya konuldu. Gerçek þudur ki, Türkiye, kendisini, ABD ile Irak’a saldýrý konusunda iþbirliði yapmaya hazýrlamýþ, bu alanda olaðanüstü bir plan hazýrlayýp bazý þartlar ortaya koymuþ, ABD de Türkiye’ye bazý vaatlerde bulunmuþtur. ABD Savunma Bakan Yardýmcýsý'nýn temmuz ayýnda Türkiye’ye yaptýðý ziyarette, Washington’un 10 milyar dolar hibe, 5 milyar dolar uzun vadeli kredi, 10 milyar dolarlýk askeri borçlarýn silinmesi ve 10 milyar dolarlýk Türkiye’den ithalat içeren toplam 35 milyar dolarlýk bir yardýmý Türkiye’ye önerdiði söylenmektedir.
Buna karþýlýk turizm ve ekonomik açýdan ortaya çýkacak olan 15 milyar dolarlýk zararýn karþýlanmasý, Irak’ýn toprak bütünlüðünün korunmasý, Türkmenlerin Kuzey Irak’ta söz sahibi olmalarý ve Kürtlerin Musul ve Kerkük’e egemen olmasýnýn engellenmesi, Türkiye’nin, ABD’nin Irak’a saldýrmasýný onaylamasý için ileri sürdüðü koþullardandýr.
Ancak, Türkiye’nin iki kaygýsý var. Birincisi mülteciler konusu ve Kürtlerin Kuzey Irak’ta hareketlenmelerinin artmasý dahil ABD’nin Irak’a saldýrmasýnýn birtakým sonuçlarýndan endiþelidir. Türkiye’nin Kuzey Irak için büyük planlarý vardýr ve þu anda bile Dohuk bölgesi yakýnýndaki Bamerni Havaalaný'nýn kontrolünü ele aldýðý söylenmektedir. Yaklaþýk 5 bin kiþilik Türk gücü Kuzey Irak’ta konuþlanmýþtýr.
Ýkincisi ise, ABD’nin tek baþýna hareket etmesi ve yayýlmacýlýk politikasýna yönelik uluslararasý eleþtirilerin arttýðý da dikkate alýndýðýnda Türkiye, söz konusu saldýrýya katýlmasý halinde tecrit edilmesinden endiþe duymaktadýr.
Türkiye, Filistin sorununun çözümlenmesinden önce yeni bir cephenin açýlmasýný istemiyor. Bu yüzden Türkiye, Ýran ve Suriye gibi ülkelerle iþbirliði yapmaya ilgi duyuyor. Çünkü bu üç ülkenin Kürtlerin hareketlenmesi hususunda ortak kaygýlarý bulunmaktadýr. Hatta Türkiye, Irak’la ekonomik iþbirliði anlaþmasý imzalamaktan yanadýr.
Aslýnda Ýran, Suriye, Irak ve Yunanistan bir noktada ortak çýkarlara sahiptirler. Bu da Türkiye ile derin anlaþmazlýða sahip olmalarýdýr. Türkiye 1974’te Kýbrýs’a saldýrarak isteklerinde aþýrýcýlýk huyuna sahip olduðunu gösterdi. Türkiye, Irak’la da PKK konusunda anlaþamýyor ve Türk ordusu defalarca Kuzey Irak’a girmiþtir. Suriye ve Türkiye’nin ise Ýskenderun konusunda sýnýr anlaþmazlýklarý var ve 1998’de PKK lideri Öcalan’la ilgili olarak savaþýn eþiðine geldiler. Söz konusu ülkeler birbiriyle þu anda kayda deðer iliþkilere sahiptirler.
Suriye ve Irak iliþkileri Irak-Ýran savaþý dönemindeki gerginlik dönemini geride býrakmýþtýr. Türkiye ile ortak anlaþmazlýklara sahip olmalarý, hep bu ülkelerin Türkiye aleyhine kurduklarý gizli ve etkili ittifaklarý için bedel ödemelerine sebep olmuþtur.
Türkiye’nin ABD ile Irak’a saldýrma konusunda iþbirliði yapma kararý almasýndan dolayý Ankara, bu konunun Türkiye karþýtý bir blok oluþmasýna yol açmasýndan endiþe duymaktadýr. Nitekim Arap Birliði defalarca bu hususta Türkiye’yi uyarmýþtýr. Bu yüzden Türkiye bu aþamada, Ýran’la iþbirliði yapmaya meyillidir. Bu konu, Þükrü Sina Gürel’in Ýran ziyaretinin esas nedenidir.
Genel olarak, ABD’nin Afganistan’a saldýrmasý ve Irak’a saldýrýnýn gündeme gelmesi gibi 11 Eylül olaylarýnýn ardýndan yaþanan temel geliþmeler, Türkiye’nin dikkatini bir ölçüde komþu ülkelerle güvenlik ve askeri iþbirliði yapmaya yöneltmiþtir. Nitekim bu konu, Türkiye’nin Suriye ile askeri anlaþma yapmasýna neden olmuþtur. Türkiye’nin askeri hareketlenmelerinin artmasý doðrultusunda geçtiðimiz haziran ayýnda Türkiye ve Suriye Genelkurmay Baþkanlarý, beklenmedik bir þekilde, uzman güçlerin eðitimi, bilimsel ve teknik bilgilerin teatisi, eðitim amacýyla ordu mensuplarýnýn ziyaretleri ve ortak manevra yapýlmasý alanýnda iki askeri anlaþma imzaladýlar.
Türkiye ayný zamanda, Afganistan’da görev yapan Uluslararasý Güvenlik Destek Gücü'nün komutanlýðýný üstlenmiþtir. Ýran’ýn Afganistan’daki konumu ve uzun ortak sýnýrý da göz önünde bulundurularak, Ankara, Ýran’ýn bu alanda yardýmlarýný almak için Ýran’la iþbirliði yapmak istemektedir.
Bu aþamada Ýran ile Türkiye iþbirliði üzerinde etkili olan ve yukarýda belirtilen konularýn yaný sýra, yasadýþý göç, organize suç ve uyuþturucu madde kaçakçýlýðý, iki ülkenin iþbirliði yapmasýný gerektiren ortak tehditlerdir. Ayný zamanda Ýran ve Türkiye, birçok ekonomik konuda ortak çýkara sahiptirler ve bu konu, Ýran’dan Türkiye’ye doðalgaz aktarýlmasýna baþlanmasýyla daha da önem kazanmýþtýr. Her iki ülke stratejik açýdan birbirini tamamlamaktadýrlar.
Ýran, Türkiye’nin Orta Asya ve Körfez’e, Türkiye de Ýran’ýn Avrupa’ya giriþ kapýsýdýr. Tüm bu faktörlerle birlikte iki ülkenin uzun bir ortak sýnýra sahip olmasý, tarihi ve kültürel baðlarý, iki ülkenin her koþulda bir iþbirliði ortamýný göz önünde bulundurmalarýna neden olmuþtur.
Türkiye’nin Ýran’la iþbirliði yapmaya yönelik þu aþamada ilgisinin artmasý hususunda önemli bir noktaya da deðinmek gerekir: Siyonist rejimin Filistin’deki cinayetlerinin yeni intifadadan sonra artmasý bir bakýma Türkiye ve siyonist rejim iliþkileri üzerinde etkili olmuþtur. Aslýnda mevcut Siyonist karþýtý atmosferde Türk devlet adamlarýnýn yukarýda belirtilen nedenlerden dolayý Ýran’la iþbirliði yapmaya daha fazla ilgi duymalarý için zemin saðlanmýþtýr.
Genel olarak, geçmiþ yýllarda Ýran’ýn PKK’yý desteklediði iddiasý, Türkiye’nin terörist Halkýn Mücahidleri Örgütü'nü desteklemesi konusu, Türkiye’nin ABD ve Ýsrail’le iþbirliði, iki ülkenin özellikle enerji alanýnda Kafkasya’daki rekabetleri ve bu bölgenin güvenlik modelinin oluþum biçimi, Ýran’ýn Türkiye’nin laik rejimini devirmeye çalýþmasý iddiasý gibi Ýran karþýtý propagandalar ve çeþitli konular Ýran ve Türkiye iliþkilerini etkilemiþ ve bazý dönemlerde Ýranlýlara karþý kötü davranýlmasýna sebep olmuþtur. Buna raðmen özellikle Irak ve Afganistan geliþmeleri baþta olmak üzere 11 Eylül olaylarý sonrasý bölge koþullarý, Ýran’dan Türkiye’ye doðalgaz aktarýlmasý, Ýran’ýn PKK’yý desteklemediðinin kesinleþmesi ve ayrýca Türkiye’deki siyasi istikrarsýzlýk, bir ölçüde Türkiye’nin Ýran dahil komþu ülkelere yönelmesine neden olmuþtur. Bu yönelimin doruk noktasý Sezer’in Ýran ziyaretiydi ve Sina Gürel’in ziyareti de bu sürecin devam ettiðini göstermektedir.
TO VIMA:
ABD KIBRIS KONUSU ÝÇÝN ACELE EDÝYOR
VE ANNAN'IN ROTASINI ÇÝZÝYOR
ATÝNA, 04/09(BYE)--- Tirajý günde 46.786 olan To Vima gazetesinin 04 Eylül 2002 tarihli sayýsýnda, Anni Podimata imzasýyla ve yukarýdaki baþlýk altýnda yayýmlanan yorumun çevirisi þöyledir:
BM Genel Sekreteri Koffi Annan'ýn, Kleridis ve Denktaþ ile Paris'te 6 Eylül'de yapacaðý kritik görüþme dolayýsýyla, ABD Dýþiþleri Bakanlýðý Kýbrýs Koordinatörü Thomas Weston, Dýþiþleri Bakan Yardýmcýsý Anastasios Yannitsis ve YDP Genel Baþkaný Kostas Karamanlis ile yaptýðý görüþmelerde, Kýbrýs sorununun çözümlenmesini "her zamandan daha acil" olarak nitelendirdi.
Paris'teki görüþmenin arifesinde, bu sabah Johannesburg'ta Dýþiþleri Bakaný Yorgo Papandreu ile bir görüþme yapacak olan Annan, Türkiye Cumhurbaþkaný Ahmet Necdet Sezer ile de dün bir görüþme yapmýþtý.
Weston'un açýklamasýnda, Kýbrýs sorununun çözümlenmesinin acil olduðunu vurgulamasýna raðmen, ABD tarafýndan yapýlan deðerlendirmelere göre, Türkiye'de 3 Kasým'da yapýlacak olan seçimlerden önce esaslý görüþmelerin yapýlmasý -ve BM tarafýndan kapsamlý bir çözüm formülünün sunulmasý- mümkün deðildir. Bu deðerlendirme çerçevesinde, Annan'ýn, Kleridis ve Denktaþ ile Paris'teki görüþmesi sýrasýnda, Weston ile "ayný dili" kullanarak, konunun "acil niteliklerinden" ve çözüm için tarihi fýrsattan söz etmesi -Kýbrýs'ýn AB ile üyelik müzakerelerinin sona ermek üzere olmasý nedeniyle- böylece, tüm iþlemler için yeni bir "momentum" yaratma yönünde çaba sarfetmesi bekleniyor.
Amerikalý yetkilinin dünkü açýklamasýnda, uygulanan iþlemlerle olumlu geliþmelerin kaydedilmemesi halinde, "BM Genel Sekreteri tarafýndan seçilecek baþka imkanlarýn ve deðiþik çözümlerin aranmasý gereðinden" söz etmesi ilgi çekiciydi. Weston, konuya iliþkin bir soruya cevabýnda, daha açýk konuþamayacaðýný söyledi ve "söz konusu deðiþik çözümlerin BM Genel Sekreteri'nin misyonu çerçevesinde olmasý gereðinden" söz etmekle yetindi. ABD'nin, ne pahasýna olursa olsun, Kýbrýs'ýn AB üyeliðinden önce bir çözüm elde edilmesini baþarma çabasýnda olmasý nedeniyle, Weston'un sözünü ettiði "deðiþik çözüm ve imkanlarýn" daha önce de ifade edilen ve Kýbrýs'ýn AB üyeliðiyle birlikte yapýlacak bir "ara anlaþma" düþüncesi ile ilgili olmasý olasý sayýlýyor.
Güvenilir kaynaklardan elde edilen bilgilere göre, Weston, YDP Genel Baþkaný ile görüþmesi sýrasýnda, üyelikten önce çözümün elde edilmemesi halinde neler olacaðý hakkýnda taahhüt altýna girmeyi kesinlikle istemedi, bununla birlikte, "kötü senaryonun" gerçekleþmemesi ve krizden kaçýnýlmasý yönünde ABD'nin elinden geleni yapacaðý hakkýnda güvenceler verdi.
Kleridis ve Denktaþ ile ayrý ayrý görüþmelerde bulunmak amacýyla bugün Lefkoþa'da bulunan Weston, Karamanlis ve Yannitsis ile görüþmeleri sýrasýnda, ABD'nin, Avrupa-Türkiye arasýndaki iliþkilerin pekiþtirilmesi gereðine iliþkin görüþlerini aktardý.
Dýþiþleri Bakan Yardýmcýsý Yannitsis, "Yunan hükümetinin gün geçtikçe Türkiye'nin Avrupa'ya yakýnlaþmasý konusuna daha büyük ilgi gösterdiðini" ve "bu yöndeki çabalarýn Avrupa'ya doðru ilerleme yolunun Türkiye, Yunanistan, Kýbrýs ve bütün Avrupa için olumlu ve yapýcý olmasý gereðini" vurguladý.
New York Times Congress Now Promises to Hold Weeks of Hearings About Iraq
By DAVID FIRESTONE with DAVID E.
SANGER
ASHINGTON,
Sept. 5 — Congressional leaders said today that they would undertake weeks of
hearings and debate on whether to support military action against Iraq, a move
that could delay a final vote until after the November elections.
"I'm more concerned about getting this done right than getting it done quickly," said Senator Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the Democratic majority leader, a day after President Bush agreed to seek congressional approval before any invasion. Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi, the Republican minority leader, also made it clear that he did not favor forcing a quick vote, although on Wednesday Congressional and administration leaders had predicted that the debate could be concluded by early October.
Even as Congressional leaders discussed an extended timetable, a United Nations official said today that international weapons inspectors had identified several nuclear-related sites in Iraq where new construction or other unexplained changes had occurred since their last visit nearly four years ago.
The official said inspectors were prepared to return to Iraq immediately. But even with the cooperation of the Iraqi government, the official said, it would take about a year for inspectors to verify that Iraq was not developing prohibited weapons. [Page A12.]
Neither the timetable presented by the inspectors nor that of Congress, which could spill into the fall election campaign, is likely to satisfy administration officials, who have begun to press their case publicly that the threat presented by Iraq's weapons programs is urgent.
White House officials have said that their patience with Congress would not extend much past the current session. With no guarantee that members would return for a lame-duck, post-election session, officials said they expected a resolution of support before adjournment.
The critical questions now may not be the outcome of the debate about Iraq, but rather how long it lasts, and what effect it has on the general election campaign this fall. [Page A12.] How long it would take for the administration to field the forces needed for operations against Iraq is also not clear.
In any case, the president told voters in Kentucky and Indiana today that he did not expect a debate on Capitol Hill to alter his position.
"One thing is for certain — I'm not going to change my view" about the need to remove Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi leader, he said to applause in Louisville, Ky. "And my view is, we cannot let the world's worst leaders blackmail America, threaten America, or hurt America with the world's worst weapons."
As Congressional officials emphasized the need for international support before taking any action against Iraq, the White House said that Mr. Bush would talk on Friday to the leaders of Russia, China and France, before meeting Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain on Saturday afternoon at Camp David.
Together with the United States, those nations make up the permanent five members of the Security Council, and each could veto a security council resolution.
"This is about soliciting their views and explaining why he believes Iraq is a threat, and a threat that we have to deal with now," one senior White House official said. "It's a start. We're early in this process."
Such a deliberative approach by the lawmakers — at least three Senate committees will hold hearings — is not expected to undercut the pace of military planning, although crucial factors like mobilizing troops or deploying weapons in a war against Iraq could be greatly affected if Congress delays its support.
The Bush administration continued to pay close attention to the movement of troops and war-fighting equipment in and around Iraq.
Thomas E. White, the Army secretary, told a group of reporters today that the Army recently deployed weapons and supplies to a base in Kuwait near the border with Iraq as part of a training exercise to test both the equipment and the military's ability to move it quickly from one base to another.
Officials responsible for moving weapons throughout the area said a large volume of supplies had been shifting in and out of the gulf region.
Meanwhile, in southern Iraq today, allied warplanes attacked a command-and-control position at a military airfield about 240 miles west of Baghdad, military officials said. The United States Central Command said the strike was ordered after Iraqi forces had tried to shoot down American or British fighters that enforce the "no flight" zone over the area.
Still, the administration's most immediate concern involved persuading skeptical members of Congress to support its plans, which constitute uncharted political territory for both parties. About two dozen senators from both sides of the aisle were invited to the Pentagon today to discuss Iraqi policy with Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence. Later in the day, Mr. Cheney and Mr. Tenet provided evidence of Iraqi military capability to the top four Congressional leaders.
Although Congressional officials had been optimistic on Wednesday about moving quickly through the debate on Iraq, today they slowed their timetable after a day of consultation with many skeptical members and committee chairmen.
Mr. Lott, the Republican leader, said that Congress might also need to give the United Nations time to deliberate the issue. A final vote in Congress may not come until this fall or even next year, he said.
"It could take a little more time than just two or three weeks," Mr. Lott told reporters this morning. "So we just have to see. I don't think we should put a time line on it. I think we should do what is necessary when it is necessary."
Mr. Daschle, who had earlier in the day complained that he had not seen sufficient evidence from the administration to justify an invasion, seemed somewhat more impressed after the closed-door briefing. Speaking to reporters, he called the meeting helpful, and he said he would brief his colleagues about it.
Many of those colleagues are equally hungry for information on Iraq's military capabilities and an explanation of why Mr. Bush believes Mr. Hussein would risk his power and his life in attacking the West. Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan and the chairman of the Armed Forces Committee, said his panel would hold hearings in late September and early October to hear from both administration officials and opponents of invasion. He said he learned little from today's Pentagon briefing and predicted that the hearings would last as long as necessary to satisfy committee members.
"If it takes a month or two to do the deliberation on this, it ought to be done, and in a way which is very thorough and careful," he said. "That's important and I believe there's time to do it right." The issue will also be taken up by the Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees of the Senate.
Mr. Bush, at his appearances in Kentucky and Indiana, talked in a more colloquial way than he had before about why the United States, in his view, must move from a national security strategy of containment of nations like Iraq to one of pre-emptive action.
"My job is to not only chase down those who have hit, but to anticipate," he told a lunchtime rally in Louisville for Representative Anne M. Northup, who is running for re-election. "We're a battleground."
As part of his campaign to rally the American public, the president will be sending his highest-ranking aides out in full force this weekend to help make his case.
His vice president, secretary of state, secretary of defense and national security adviser will appear on network and cable talk shows on Sunday. While their appearances will coincide with the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, the questions they face, and the messages they offer, are certain to focus on Iraq.
We Still Have a Choice on Iraq
By JOHN F. KERRY
ASHINGTON
— It may well be that the United States will go to war with Iraq. But if so, it
should be because we have to — not because we want to. For the American people
to accept the legitimacy of this conflict and give their consent to it, the
Bush administration must first present detailed evidence of the threat of
Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and then prove that all other avenues of
protecting our nation's security interests have been exhausted. Exhaustion of remedies
is critical to winning the consent of a civilized people in the decision to go
to war. And consent, as we have learned before, is essential to carrying out
the mission. President Bush's overdue statement this week that he would consult
Congress is a beginning, but the administration's strategy remains adrift.
Regime change in Iraq is a worthy goal. But regime change by itself is not a justification for going to war. Absent a Qaeda connection, overthrowing Saddam Hussein — the ultimate weapons-inspection enforcement mechanism — should be the last step, not the first. Those who think that the inspection process is merely a waste of time should be reminded that legitimacy in the conduct of war, among our people and our allies, is not a waste, but an essential foundation of success.
If we are to put American lives at risk in a foreign war, President Bush must be able to say to this nation that we had no choice, that this was the only way we could eliminate a threat we could not afford to tolerate.
In the end there may be no choice. But so far, rather than making the case for the legitimacy of an Iraq war, the administration has complicated its own case and compromised America's credibility by casting about in an unfocused, overly public internal debate in the search for a rationale for war. By beginning its public discourse with talk of invasion and regime change, the administration has diminished its most legitimate justification of war — that in the post-Sept. 11 world, the unrestrained threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein is unacceptable and that his refusal to allow in inspectors is in blatant violation of the United Nations 1991 cease-fire agreement that left him in power.
The administration's hasty war talk makes it much more difficult to manage our relations with other Arab governments, let alone the Arab street. It has made it possible for other Arab regimes to shift their focus to the implications of war for themselves rather than keep the focus where it belongs — on the danger posed by Saddam Hussein and his deadly arsenal. Indeed, the administration seems to have elevated Saddam Hussein in the eyes of his neighbors to a level he would never have achieved on his own.
There is, of course, no question about our capacity to win militarily, and perhaps to win easily. There is also no question that Saddam Hussein continues to pursue weapons of mass destruction, and his success can threaten both our interests in the region and our security at home. But knowing ahead of time that our military intervention will remove him from power, and that we will then inherit all or much of the burden for building a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, is all the more reason to insist on a process that invites support from the region and from our allies. We will need that support for the far tougher mission of ensuring a future democratic government after the war.
The question is not whether we should care if Saddam Hussein remains openly scornful of international standards of behavior that he agreed to live up to. The question is how we secure our rights with respect to that agreement and the legitimacy it establishes for the actions we may have to take. We are at a strange moment in history when an American administration has to be persuaded of the virtue of utilizing the procedures of international law and community — institutions American presidents from across the ideological spectrum have insisted on as essential to global security.
For the sake of our country, the legitimacy of our cause and our ultimate success in Iraq, the administration must seek advice and approval from Congress, laying out the evidence and making the case. Then, in concert with our allies, it must seek full enforcement of the existing cease-fire agreement from the United Nations Security Council. We should at the same time offer a clear ultimatum to Iraq before the world: Accept rigorous inspections without negotiation or compromise. Some in the administration actually seem to fear that such an ultimatum might frighten Saddam Hussein into cooperating. If Saddam Hussein is unwilling to bend to the international community's already existing order, then he will have invited enforcement, even if that enforcement is mostly at the hands of the United States, a right we retain even if the Security Council fails to act. But until we have properly laid the groundwork and proved to our fellow citizens and our allies that we really have no other choice, we are not yet at the moment of unilateral decision-making in going to war against Iraq.
John F. Kerry, a Democrat, is a senator from Massachusetts.
New York Times
September 5, 2002
Interview With Gerhard Schröder
HANOVER, Germany, Sept. 4 — Following are excerpts from an interview with Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, reflecting on events since Sept. 11. The interview was conducted in German and translated by The New York Times.
Q. Did Sept. 11 really change the world, or is that just an American way of looking at it?
A. First of all, it is understandable that the reaction in America, which for the first time was attacked on its own territory, was more intense than in the rest of the world. But it was also interesting for me to observe how much it affected the Germans, for example, and others as well. The large demonstration in Berlin by 200,000 or 300,000 people was in fact a spontaneous expression of sympathy and solidarity. And I also experienced it much closer to home — if I may be permitted to say so — since my wife had once lived not far away, on the Upper West Side. . . .
I believe it not only changed America, but also the world, in two ways: first, it was astounding how fast and how impressively this international coalition came into being. One said that the offer of support was a self-evident duty as a friend. And Germany agreed to break with tradition in deploying military forces outside Europe.
But that is only one side of it. I think the other side is that changes have taken place because the analysis of the threat had to be changed. That is to say, in the past, countries or alliances felt themselves threatened by other countries or alliances. That was, after all, the classic confrontation in the cold war. What happened in New York and Washington — this attack on the two cities and on the people in them — has shown that there is a privatized form of war, waged by terrorist organizations, and that we have to defend ourselves against this using appropriate means, including military means.
So I believe two things have changed. First there is the question: who is threatening the civilized world? Not only countries, but also forms of privatized violence that never used to exist in this form. And the second remarkable thing is the unity at the United Nations, rallying an international coalition against terror. It is important to keep the awareness of both alive. . . .
I asked myself why the attack on New York affected so many people in the world in such a special way. I think the answer has to do with the special importance that this city has always had for all those who were forced to or wanted to leave their own country. New York is thus a symbol of asylum. This was very much the case during the Nazi period in Germany. . . .
Q. Your new defense minister, Peter Struck, said there was no threat to Germany from Saddam Hussein, and Condi Rice, of course, said the whole world was threatened.
A. I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. There is no question that dictators represent a threat. And the crucial question is: what can they do and what would they like to do to realize their threats? The problem with Saddam is making up our minds what scope for political and military action he has. Politically, he has none, unless one forces the Arab world into solidarity with him. Militarily, I believe it is hard to judge.
In my view, the threat may be overestimated by people like Ms. Rice, and underestimated by others. That is why I was one of those who were disappointed that a change of objectives took place as regards the treatment of Saddam Hussein. I think that we — all of us, together — had isolated him politically, and that there was a real opportunity of using diplomatic and economic pressure to get the inspectors admitted to the country again. The moment the debate in the United States put an end to the objective of exerting every possible kind of pressure to get the inspectors readmitted to the country so that we could discover what the real situation was, and not have to rely on surmises or intelligence reports — the moment this objective was changed, the real problem began.
How can you exert pressure on someone by saying to them: Even if you accede to our demands, we will destroy you? I think that was a change of strategy in the United States — whatever the explanation may be — a change that made things difficult for others, including ourselves.
That is one thing. The other thing is consultations. In the past it was always said: Before we do anything, we will consult with our principal allies — at least with those who take an active, very active part in the fight against international terrorism. But consultation cannot mean that I get a phone call two hours in advance only to be told, "We're going in." Consultation among grown-up nations has to mean not just consultation about the how and the when, but also about the whether.
Q. Do you believe that Cheney speaks for President Bush?
A. I am not qualified to say. The problem is that he has or seems to have committed himself so strongly that it is hard to imagine how he can climb down. And that is the real problem, that not only I have, but that all of us in Europe have. I think that a mistake has been made. It may be understandable in terms of domestic politics, but it has, of course, made things much more difficult for all those who were in agreement with the original objective of exerting pressure to have the inspectors admitted to the country.
After Sept. 11, the situation was quite different. We were among those whose military participation was likely to be requested, and we were all agreed there would be military action. And in that situation, where there is a need for secrecy, for the element of surprise, it is enough to be notified of the start of the operation just ahead of CNN or The New York Times.
The essential point is that everyone agrees on the question of whether something is going to happen. If we agree about that, we can then form different opinions, so to speak, about questions of when and how. That is the vital difference from Sept. 11. It was because I was inwardly convinced and had also been consulted that I said at the time: This thing has to be done, and I am going to force it through even if I have to call a vote of confidence, for the situation was not easy in Germany, especially with that coalition.
And that is why it is just not good enough if I learn from the American press about a speech which clearly states: We are going to do it, no matter what the world or our allies think. That is no way to treat others.
But there is another question that must be answered. According to my information, no one has a really clear idea of the political order that would follow in the Middle East. And such an idea is needed. No one has a clear idea about what the effects would be in the moderate Arab countries or what new political order might emerge after a military intervention in Iraq.
What I find particularly worrying, incidentally, is that there is so little discussion of the economic consequences for the world economy. . . .
There is another point I consider important. Germany is at present, after the United States, the second-largest provider of troops for international missions. We have almost 10,000 soldiers in the Balkans, involved in Enduring Freedom, and in Afghanistan. In 1998 we spent 170 million euros on international missions. This year it will be around 2 billion euros. I only mention this to make clear that no one can criticize us for lacking international solidarity. That is the one thing.
The other thing is that I was in Kabul and took a very close look at the situation. Germany is contributing a great deal to the international security force, perhaps more than any other country. I don't want to be unjust to the others, but I think this estimate is not far out. My concern is that we have not even begun to achieve in Afghanistan anything that could be called nation-building. Yet if that is not succeeding before the eyes of the whole world, what advantage are the masses in the third world going to see in the restoration of a country to the civilized world?
What I mean to say is, we have to prove that a return to the civilized community of nations brings a prosperity dividend. And many people are watching what is happening in Afghanistan. We are deeply committed there, and that is why I say: Before we have made any progress there, before we have proved to the disenfranchised masses in the third world that it is worth their while to return to the Western fold, to the civilized world, I would say that military interventions — in whatever terms they may be justified — tend to be counterproductive for the international coalition against terror.
Q. I first understood you to say, no unilateral action in Iraq. Then later you seemed to say Germany will not participate in an attack or help pay for one no matter what the U.N. says. Which is it?
A. Let me begin by saying that without a U.N. Security Council mandate, our Constitution would not permit any form of participation. That is quite clear.
But the other arguments that I have cited against an intervention are so important that I would also be against such an intervention if — for whatever reasons and in whatever form — the Security Council of the United Nations were to say "Yes," which I cannot imagine happening in the present situation.
I have attempted to make clear that it is not just formal considerations that induce me to say that this is the wrong way. I have told you about what harm we would do to the international coalition against terror. I have attempted to make clear that we must prove before the eyes of the world, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, that participation in the struggle against terror will also bring a peace dividend, and I know of no one who has a real concept for a new order in the Middle East which could shape the region afterward. These are for me weighty arguments that lead me to say: Of course it is important for Germany what resolutions the United Nations adopt, but these arguments — these three — they remain my own, the ones that make me say: Hands off. Especially because, as I said before, the evidence appears to be highly dubious. . . .
Q. This administration is making lots of difficulties for its friends. Do you think that Sept. 11 has changed America in a way that isn't a good way?
A. . . . I would like to answer that question with another: what is the duty of a friend in such a situation? It is the duty of friends to show solidarity, but also to use this tried and true solidarity to bring rational arguments into the political debate. The duty of friends is not just to agree with everything, but to say: We disagree on this point. . . .
Q. The nasty view is, you're in a tough campaign and you want to run against Bush, against America, for "peace," and change the subject from unemployment.
A. . . . I would never treat this issue as a matter of tactics, because the consequences would catch up with me later. We will win in Germany, and then I will have to stick by this decision, and I know what that means. In this sense it was not a tactical variant in the election campaign. . . .
Arabs, by Degrees, Oppose American Attack on Iraq
By JANE PERLEZ
AIRO,
Sept. 5 — The Arab League warned the Bush administration today against
attacking Iraq, but the public display of unanimity masked degrees of
opposition to an attack, diplomats said at the end of a two day gathering of
Arab foreign ministers.
The ministers had been expected to call formally on Iraq to readmit United Nations weapons inspectors, but a resolution at the end of the meeting, which included Iraq's foreign minister, Naji Sabri Ahmad al-Hadithi, failed to mention inspectors.
In an effort to keep up the appearance of consensus while the Iraqi was present, the closed-door meetings were devoted as much if not more to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as to Iraq, diplomats said.
Later, Mr. Hadithi expressed his gratitude to the group, saying, "We are pleased all Arab countries express total rejection of the aggressive intentions of the United States."
The secretary general of the league, Amr Moussa, who is known for his flamboyant language, said at a news conference that American military action against Iraq would "open the gates of hell in the Middle East because you can never tell the results."
Mr. Moussa was reflecting what one diplomat called "a genuine concern" that the Bush administration was intent not only on striking against Baghdad but also on remaking the map of the Middle East. According to this view, he said, pro-Israeli American officials believe that an attack on Iraq would lead to the capitulation not only of the Iraqis, but of the Palestinians, too.
It was left to Mr. Moussa, a former Egyptian foreign minister, who spoke after most of the ministers had left the headquarters, to say that the members supported the return of the weapons inspectors.
Underlying the reluctance to deal head-on with the Iraqi situation were the differences among the ministers, participants said. Some represent important regional allies whose bases are essential for the Bush administration to conduct a war against Baghdad.
Saudi Arabia, whose bases were used as a staging ground in the Persian Gulf war in 1991, has said its soil cannot be used again for an assault on Iraq. The Saudis feel far less pressure from Iraq this time than they did in 1990, when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and threatened the Saudi oil fields, diplomats said.
Of all Washington's Arab allies, economically weak Jordan feels the most exposed by the war plans against Iraq. Jordan has publicly stated that it will not allow the United States to position troops on its territory for an attack.
About half the population in Jordan is Palestinian, and an American assault against Iraq would certainly roil the Palestinians. Further complicating Jordan's situation is the presence of a large number of Iraqis. Under an exception granted by the United Nations after the 1991 war, Jordan buys most of its oil from Iraq and about 25 percent of Jordan's exports go to Iraq.
Ruled in 1991 by King Hussein, Jordan did not join the international coalition against Iraq. Under his son and successor, King Abdullah, it is not clear what route Jordan would take in the event of an attack, but Western diplomats expressed doubt that the king would tacitly side with Iraq, as his father did.
In contrast, Qatar has allowed the Bush administration to quietly position forces there and extend an air base for possible use as a command post for airstrikes against Iraq.
The government of Qatar has made it clear, though, that it would like Baghdad to allow the return of weapons inspectors.
The overwhelming message for the Iraqi foreign minister, an Arab diplomat said today, was that in order to sustain the public support that Iraq had won today, Mr. Hussein had to allow the inspectors back.
Al Qaeda Interviews to Air
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Sept. 5 (AP) — The Arab television network Al
Jazeera said today that it will broadcast interviews with two Al Qaeda members
who admit to helping plan and carry out the Sept. 11 attacks in the United
States.
Al Jazeera said that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed — a close associate of the presumed mastermind of the attacks, Mohammed Atta — and Ramzi Omar, also known as Ramzi Binalshibh, who is one of the highest-ranking Al Qaeda members and one of the most wanted fugitives in the world, were interviewed recently at a secret location, but did not elaborate further.
How We Won the War
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
he
American fleet confidently steamed off to war in the Persian Gulf recently —
and promptly got creamed.
This was an elaborate war game, not the real thing, but it reminds us that an invasion of Iraq won't necessarily be a cakewalk. Moreover, a general who participated says that the war game was fiddled with in ways that raise questions about whether the government is returning to a Vietnam-style overoptimism and myopia.
The game, Millennium Challenge 2002, was the largest such simulation ever held, involving 13,500 people. It began, key participants say, with the Americans confidently assuming that they could intercept enemy communications and predict enemy movements.
But the enemy didn't cooperate. It used motorcycle couriers instead of radio and electronic messages, and sent orders as code words inserted into the muezzins' call to prayer — and this went right by the American intelligence analysts.
The upshot was that the enemy "sank" much of the American fleet as the exercise opened. Oops.
"It shows that a relatively primitive or unsophisticated enemy can find ways to surprise you," said Robert Oakley, a veteran American ambassador who played the role of the enemy leader in the war games.
Millennium Challenge was not directly about Iraq. It was scripted as a war against Iran set in 2007. Moreover, Saddam Hussein's best options were not available to the enemy, as the war games did not permit terrorist attacks in America, shelling of Israel, use of chemical or biological weapons, or urban fighting.
Still, the $235 million exercise should teach us one clear lesson relating to Iraq: Hubris kills.
This was a simulation. So the Pentagon miraculously reconstituted its sunken fleet and attacked again.
That's standard for war games, where the idea is not just to win but also to test equipment and concepts. But the absurdism got worse. The people running the war games even ordered the enemy to pull its forces back in order to allow American units to land safely, according to Paul Van Riper, a retired Marine lieutenant general, who played the enemy's military commander.
"Then I asked to use chemical weapons," General Van Riper recalled. "That was refused."
The people running the war games even ordered the enemy to disclose some of its troop locations so that the Americans could find them, General Van Riper said. And when the enemy figured out how to move its chemical weapons around so that the Americans could not find them, that caused problems for the simulation — so control of the chemical weapons was handed over to the Americans, who then managed to destroy them.
The Pentagon view of the exercise, not surprisingly, is more glowing: U.S. technology and coordination shined (and the U.S. crushed the enemy in the end). Gen. Peter Pace, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, indicated that such war games are artificial scenarios that inevitably require a certain amount of unreality, like reviving the dead.
"I absolutely believe that it was not rigged," General Pace said. Allowing the enemy to use chemical weapons against the Americans, he said, would have disrupted the entire exercise and added to its expense.
O.K., it's true that war games are not hell. The test will be whether the Pentagon studies the mistakes made, applies lessons to Iraq planning, and sticks pins into Bushies who are unreasonably overconfident about Iraq.
I asked General Van Riper if the war games should make us nervous. "There's an unfortunate culture developing in the American military that maybe should make you nervous," he said. "I don't see the rich intellectual discussions that we had after Vietnam. I see mostly slogans, clichés and unreadable materials."
General Van Riper said the mood reminded him of the mindset in Vietnam: excessive faith in technology, inadequate appreciation of the fog of war, lack of understanding of the enemy, and simple hubris.
Myself, I'm a wimp on Iraq: I'm in favor of invading, but only if we can win easily. So can we?
I'd feel reassured if the decision to invade was being made honestly, after a rigorous weighing of all the risks. Instead I detect a cheery Vietnam-style faith that obstacles can be assumed away.
That only works in war games.
Editorial Keeping Earth Fit for Development
he
10-day World Summit on Sustainable Development, which concluded on Wednesday in
Johannesburg, angered both environmentalists and those who dismiss multilateral
accords as so much globaloney. But by any standard — let alone the often
debased one of United Nations-sponsored meetings — the gathering was honorable
and reasonably successful. The agreements that were reached on ways to fight
poverty while reducing environmental degradation can make a meaningful
difference if the nations of the world work seriously to enforce them.
The conference was diminished by the unenthusiastic participation of the United States. President Bush, alone among major world leaders, decided not to go (although he did send Secretary of State Colin Powell for a brief stop and speech). The United States, which emits 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gases, joined the OPEC oil cartel (in what one critic called an "axis of oil") to oppose clear and binding targets to increase the use of solar and wind power. By acting as a spoiler on some issues, Washington missed an opportunity to display the kind of leadership that would help it in its other international pursuits.
It's not as if the issues addressed by the conference were marginal ones. The delegates grappled with such basic problems as the fact that more than 13,000 people die each day from water-related diseases, more than 80 countries have per capita incomes lower than they were a decade ago, and some 2.4 billion people live without sanitation. Also on the agenda was the grim reality that land degradation from deforestation, waste disposal and overuse of fertilizers has rendered a third of the earth's soil unfit for growing food.
The meeting did not come up with instant solutions, but it did offer a conceptual framework and a series of targets for how to go about reducing health and environmental problems in the coming decade or two while promoting economic growth. In fact, the simple recognition that economic development and environmental protection can work in tandem may be the summit's greatest contribution. Lack of sanitation means not only soiling the environment but increased human disease and poverty. Agreeing to halve the number of people without sanitation by 2015 — as the meeting did — makes both environmental and economic sense.
Another wise move was the inclusion of corporations and nongovernmental organizations in the discussion. There may be no more efficient way to cut pollution, fight disease and reduce inequities in trade and aid than to include those participants who are major players and often former adversaries. AIDS will be conquered only with the help of drug companies. Nonetheless, the key will be governmental compliance. The United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, said there would be monitoring of goals and annual reports. Such follow-up is crucial. Without it, we may not only run out of fossil fuel. We may run out of time.
The Bully's Pulpit
By PAUL KRUGMAN
ar
is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. Colin Powell and Dick
Cheney are in perfect agreement. And the Bush administration won't privatize
Social Security.
Ari Fleischer's insistence that Mr. Powell and Mr. Cheney have no differences
over Iraq seems to have pushed some journalists into facing up, at least
briefly, to the obvious. ABC's weblog The Note described it as a
"chocolate-is-vanilla" claim, admitting that "The Bush team has
always had a credibility problem with some reporters because of their
insistence on saying 'up is down' and 'black is white.' "
But the administration needn't worry; if history is any guide, many reporters
will soon return to their usual cringe. The next time the administration
insists that chocolate is vanilla, much of the media — fearing accusations of
liberal bias, trying to create the appearance of "balance" — won't
report that the stuff is actually brown; at best they'll report that some Democrats
claim that it's brown.
The Bush team's Orwellian propensities have long been apparent to anyone
following its pronouncements on economics. Even during campaign 2000 these
pronouncements relied on doublethink, the ability to believe two contradictory
things at the same time. For example, George W. Bush's plan to partially
privatize Social Security always depended on the assertion that 2-1=4 — that we
can divert payroll taxes into high-yielding personal accounts, yet still use
the same money to pay benefits to retirees.
The Orwellian tactics don't stop with doublethink; they also include newspeak,
the redefinition of words to rule out disloyal thoughts. Again, Social Security
is a perfect example. Republican political consultants have found that in an
era of plunging stocks and corporate scandal the word "privatization"
has taken on negative connotations. The answer? Deny that personal accounts
constitute privatization, and bully the press into going along. A Republican
National Campaign Committee memo lays out the new strategy: "It is very
important that we not allow reporters to shill for Democrat demagoguery by
inaccurately characterizing 'personal accounts' and 'privatization' as one and
the same."
Is it inaccurate to say that personal accounts equal privatization? We could
argue on the merits. Under the Bush plan, a worker's personal account reflects
any gains or losses on the stocks it represents. When risks and rewards accrue
entirely to the individual, isn't that privatization?
But wait, we can do better. The push to convert Social Security into a system
of personal accounts has been led by the Cato Institute. The Bush plan emerged
directly from Cato's project on the subject, several members of Mr. Bush's
commission on Social Security reform had close Cato ties, and much of the
commission's staff came straight from Cato. You can read all about Cato's role
on the special Web site the institute set up, socialsecurity.org.
And what's the name of the Cato project to promote personal accounts? Why, the
Project on Social Security Privatization, of course.
Which brings us back to the issue of intimidation. The R.N.C.C. doesn't really
think it can convince people that privatization isn't privatization. But that's
not the goal. The memo doesn't talk about how to communicate with the public;
it's a list of demands to place on journalists. As Joshua Marshall put it at
talkingpointsmemo.com, the goal is to "mau-mau reporters out of using the
word 'privatization' in this context."
And the intimidation will probably succeed. Indeed, it's already working. As
Mr. Marshall notes, in a recent interview of the House minority leader, Richard
Gephardt, Judy Woodruff of CNN duly echoed the R.N.C.C.'s memo.
Unfortunately, this isn't just a question of Social Security policy. Once an administration believes that it can get away with insisting that black is white and up is down — and everything in this administration's history suggests that it believes just that — it's hard to see where the process stops. A habit of ignoring inconvenient reality, and presuming that the docile media will go along, soon infects all aspects of policy. And yes, that includes matters of war and peace.
The trouble is that eventually reality has a way of asserting itself. And in case you are wondering, ignorance isn't strength.
Afghan President Escapes Bullets; 25 Killed by Car Bomb in Kabul
By JOHN F. BURNS
ABUL,
Afghanistan, Sept. 5 — Afghanistan's halting progress toward stability under
its American-backed government was jolted severely today when a uniformed
gunman on the streets of Kandahar narrowly failed in an assassination attempt
on President Hamid Karzai and a huge car bomb in the heart of Kabul killed at
least 25 people and critically wounded dozens of others.
The two attacks were staged within a little more than three hours of each other in the centers of two of Afghanistan's largest cities, which lie 300 miles apart. Afghan officials immediately blamed terrorists linked to Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and said the attacks appeared to have been timed around the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.
But the officials acknowledged that they had no evidence of that in a country that remains highly volatile. An international peacekeeping force operates only in Kabul, leaving cities like Kandahar in the sway of warlords who have proved been unable to impose order or hunt down groups linked to Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
The car bomb in Kabul was the deadliest incident in the capital since the Taliban fled here in November.
For weeks, Afghan and American officials here had been warning of possible attacks around Sept. 11 by men who have eluded months of pursuit by a 7,800-member American force dedicated to hunting them down in their hinterland hideouts.
Today's attack in Kandahar appeared to have come desperately close to jeopardizing the post-Taliban government structure established by the United States and other outside powers. Reports said the bullets fired into Mr. Karzai's car as it moved through a crowd of well-wishers had come within inches of the 45-year-old president, who is widely recognized among Afghans as the linchpin of a weak government that has had difficulty extending its authority beyond Kabul.
Members of an American Special Operations forces team assigned as Mr. Karzai's bodyguards fired back, killing the gunman, but taking a casualty of their own, a soldier who was grazed in the gunfight and taken to the field hospital at the United States military base outside the city, American military officials said.
The attacks seemed likely to renew a debate about the pattern of international deployments here. In Washington, Pentagon officials who long opposed expanding the international security force in Afghanistan have in recent days shifted their view and now say enlarging it beyond Kabul may help overall security and allow American troops to leave the country sooner.
Before news of the attack became known, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz said in a speech at the Brookings Institution in Washington that expanding the international force would benefit Afghanistan, but that other countries would have to shoulder the burden.
President Bush was informed about the assassination attempt on Mr. Karzai, whom he is due to meet next week at the United Nations, while in Louisville, Ky. He did not mention the attack during a rally there, but said the United States was committed to staying in Afghanistan.
"We're not leaving," Mr. Bush said. "We want to help democracy flourish in that region, and we're not leaving because there are still Al Qaeda and their buddies roaming around."
Mr. Karzai, a native of Kandahar, had flown to the city earlier today for his youngest brother's wedding. A BBC report from the city said that at the time of the shooting, he was leaning through the open window of his car to shake the hand of a 14-year-old boy.
The governor of Kandahar, Gul Agha Shirzai, seated beside Mr. Karzai, was grazed by the gunman's bullets and was treated for neck wounds at the American hospital.
Afghan officials said an Afghan bodyguard with Mr. Karzai, identified as Habibullah, was killed after opening fire on the gunman.
The BBC, whose reporter Lyse Doucet had flown with Mr. Karzai to Kandahar, later identified the gunman as Abdul Rahman from Kajaki in Helmand Province, and quoted Mr. Shirzai as saying Afghans from Kajaki were known to have fired on American patrols in the past.
Mr. Karzai remained in Kandahar under close American guard tonight. The assassination attempt, at 6:30 p.m. local time, came while investigators were poring over the wreckage of the bombing in Kabul, which occurred on a busy street shortly after 3 p.m. and appeared intended to cause maximum casualties.
Officials gave differing accounts of the number of dead, with some saying as many as 30 had been killed, and with the possibility of further deaths as Kabul's major hospitals put out emergency appeals for blood for the critically wounded.
The site of the bombing, a street running down to the Kabul River, is lined with shops selling electrical appliances and vendors selling fruit and other wares from handcarts.
At the time of the blast, the site was crowded with shoppers preparing for the family get-togethers that occur every Friday, the Muslim holy day. Survivors said a small explosion, apparently caused by an explosive hidden in a bicycle carrier bag, had prompted onlookers to crowd together along a sidewalk when a much larger bomb in a parked car detonated three minutes later.
Bodies, some of women and children and many of them badly burned, were strewn across the road. Human tissue, shoes and scraps of clothing lay in pools of blood and broken glass, and wounded survivors staggered about in a daze appealing for help. Windows in buildings up to 150 yards from the blast were broken, including those in three ministries that overlook the site.
The car carrying the bomb was reduced to a blackened tangle of steel, and a four-wheel-drive vehicle beside it was thrown on one side like a toy.
For Kabul, a city of perhaps two million people that has been swollen by half a million refugees from Pakistan, the bombing was a severe blow.
Other bombings in recent weeks, also attributed by officials to a terrorist underground linked to Al Qaeda and the Taliban, have caused only a handful of casualties.
But there have been growing fears that a grim figure from Afghanistan's past, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who once destroyed half of Kabul while battling to take control of the city, could be about to open new attacks. Mr. Hekmatyar, an exile in Iran during the Taliban years, returned recently to the area east of Kabul and vowed to join Al Qaeda and the Taliban in a new jihad, or holy war.
The blast from today's bomb could be heard, and felt, miles away. Survivors spoke of a return to a climate of vulnerability similar to that before the Taliban takeover in 1996, when rival armies bombarded half the city into rubble.
"It brings back all the fear and terror," said Mohammed Reza, a 41-year-old government worker who was lightly grazed by the blast as he waited on the sidewalk for his watch to be repaired.
At the Emergency Surgical Center for War Victims, an Italian-run hospital where 65 of the wounded were taken, weeping relatives crowded to read names of the wounded that were posted on the street outside. A doctor moved among the crowd appealing for blood donors, saying: "We have no time. If we are to save the wounded, we must have blood."
One woman, Jahantab, could have served as a symbol for the miseries the explosion inflicted on people who have already suffered grievously from two decades of conflict here. She sat slumped against a wall across from the hospital, her face covered with dust from the blast, sobbing uncontrollably.
After a while, she told reporters that she was a widow who had lost her husband to sickness a year ago, and had taken up his old job, selling hand-held immersion heaters from a handcart. She said the explosion had thrown her 14-year-old son clear across the road, and severed his leg. "What am I to do?" she cried, over and over again.
Afghanistan's foreign minister, Abdullah, said at a news conference in Kabul after hearing of the assassination attempt in Kandahar that attempts by Al Qaeda and the Taliban to mount major bombings and assassinations had been expected in these days. There is not only the Sept. 11 anniversary, but also the commemoration here of the assassination, on Sept. 9 last year, of Ahmed Shah Massoud, the leader of the anti-Taliban resistance who has become an icon of post-Taliban Afghanistan.
Mr. Massoud's killers, two Arab men posing as a television crew, have been linked to Al Qaeda.
"This has been anticipated in the run-up to Sept. 9 and 11, that the terrorist groups will make an attempt to show that they are not gone, and that the antiterrorist campaign has not been successful," Dr. Abdullah said. "Al Qaeda and the Taliban are on the run, but they are trying to show that they are not fully destroyed."
He added, "The message today was to their own audience, to their own constituents, to extremist groups around the world, that despite all that has happened, they are still capable of these kinds of incidents."
Dr. Abdullah appeared shaken by the attempt on Mr. Karzai, as though he recognized that the government itself had endured a narrow escape. The foreign minister belongs to the dominant ethnic Tajik wing of the government, and has played a key role in bridging the differences between the Tajiks and Mr. Karzai, who is a Pashtun, Afghanistan's largest ethnic group.
Mr. Karzai, who was put forward as leader of the post-Taliban government by the United States, came to the post without a political party of his own, and without his own troops to match those of the Tajik-dominated Northern Alliance, which took control of Kabul after the Taliban.
As months have gone by, Mr. Karzai has emerged as a widely popular figure, hailed by crowds in every city he has visited, including some in the north, where Pashtuns are a small minority. He has gained credit for his handling of a succession of crises, including the assassination in July, in Kabul, of Haji Abdul Qadir, a vice president who was the only Pashtun in the government with a militia of his own.
While gaining respect, Mr. Karzai also appears to some associates to be lonely and isolated. Among his worries, aides have said, has been his disappointment at the American reluctance, at least until now, to expand the international peacekeeping force.
Another deep concern has been his personal security, even after the United States persuaded him after the Qadir assassination to accept the American bodyguards who were with him today.
But after today's attack, he appeared to have emerged untouched in spirit. Ms. Doucet, the BBC reporter, said she had spoken to Mr. Karzai shortly after the shooting and found him cheerful. "He didn't seem rattled at all," she said. "He seemed really calm. He said he had come to expect this kind of thing."
Washington
Post (Editorial page
unavailable)
Iraq Policy Shift Follows Pattern
Bush's Move to Consult
Congress Seen as Damage Control
By Dan Balz and Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, September 6, 2002; Page A19
For anyone who has watched the Bush administration during its first 19 months in office, what happened this week on Iraqi policy follows a familiar pattern: a strategic, if obvious, shift that takes the White House off the defensive and gives the president an opportunity to retake control of the agenda.
White House officials argue that the decision to launch intensive consultations with Congress and U.S. allies about how to bring about the administration's goal of a regime change in Baghdad was neither a dramatic change of heart nor a sudden retreat in the face of two weeks of damaging coverage about internal divisions and charges of unilateralism.
Others see a repeat of what happened earlier this year on the debate over whether to create a Department of Homeland Security or whether to make airport security screeners federal employees, when the administration embraced positions it had previously argued against.
In this case, the administration's problems were partly of its own making. The internal divisions spilled into public view, and the president's hawkish statements alarmed European allies. Before administration officials were prepared to begin making their public case, public opinion was shifting away from them, and when Bush returned to Washington from Texas last weekend, he faced an entirely different political climate on Iraq than when he left.
On Wednesday, the White House moved to contain the damage -- as it has done in the past. "They have consistently proven themselves willing to shift at the last moment when the tides are moving against them," said Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.).
But Kerry, a probable presidential candidate in 2004, said that what preceded this week's moves were potentially consequential mistakes that could make it more difficult for the president to rally support for getting rid of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. "They were way behind the curve in defining the nature of a real problem," he said, "and it has cost us in terms of our national security and our relationships needed to protect that security."
It was only a few weeks ago that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, standing with Bush at the president's Texas ranch, dismissed news coverage suggesting the administration was moving toward war as "a frenzy." But this week's frenzy of attention to Iraq was entirely generated by a White House whose occupants returned from the August recess anxious and ready to push the debate to a new level.
Why now? The same official put it this way yesterday: "From my perspective, because the president was ready."
Administration officials said yesterday there was never any serious consideration given to avoid consulting Congress, despite an interpretation by White House Counsel Alberto R. Gonzales that Bush has all the authority he needs, from the 1991 resolution authorizing his father to go to war against Iraq, to mount a military campaign to depose Hussein.
Though some White House officials {ndash} Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis Libby, among them {ndash} were privately squeamish about the idea of taking the case on Iraq to Congress, there was no significant opposition in the White House, officials said. "The inclination has always been to consult and we gave fairly serious indications of that," said a White House official.
Although Bush has used the words "consultation" and "debate," senior officials repeatedly say he has not made up his mind yet on an Iraqi invasion, nor has he indicated what he might ask for in a congressional resolution.
But in attempting to stipulate that they were under no obligation to seek a new resolution, the administration ceded the playing field to others, and brought rebukes upon themselves from such prominent Republicans as House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde (Ill.) and Sen. John W. Warner (Va.), ranking Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, who urged Bush in blunt terms to embrace consultation.
Gary J. Schmitt, director of the Project for the New American Century and an advocate of military action against Iraq, said the administration had a plausible case for not consulting but couldn't sustain it politically.
"What happened to them was they didn't want to start talking about the case against Iraq, but that meant they left the field open for other people to make counter arguments," he said. "They concluded that we can't let this drift even if we're not ready to go to war. That dynamic caused them to change their game plan."
More than that may have forced the administration's hand, however. Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), another possible 2004 presidential candidate, said the administration's own rhetoric created a backlash that required a change in course.
"They rattled sabers without explaining why," he told reporters yesterday, adding later, "They raised anxieties, alarmed those who oppose moving into Iraq and allowed the debate to get away from them."
Lieberman, once an advocate for acting unilaterally, if necessary, now says the United States should not go it alone.
What also drove the decision to move the debate to center stage was the pace of deliberations inside the administration about how next to proceed. Bush will speak at the United Nations on Thursday during a stay in New York to commemorate last year's terrorist attacks, an opportunity to lay out his case against Iraq.
"It is time for the discussion and it's one that not only does the Congress deserve but the American people deserve," said Dan Bartlett, White House communications director. "The president understands that if he were to choose the ultimate action that we will do it with the full moral authority of the United States, and that requires the support of the people of the United States and the Congress."
Kerry said the administration's challenge is great now as a result of its own mistakes. "They've crisscrossed the rhetorical landscape in a way that's left them with an unfocused rationale and created their own problem of credibility now on why it is they need to proceed," he said.
But Sen. Fred D. Thompson (R-Tenn.) argued that there is plenty of time to make that case successfully. "The conversation got a little ahead of the rest of the process and gave [Bush's] statements a chance to become kind of an international punching bag for awhile," he said. "Now I think that they can more systematically sell their ideas."
Staff writer Bill Miller contributed to this report.
Cheney, Tenet Brief Leaders of Hill on Iraq
Daschle Calls Presentation of
Case for Use of Force 'Helpful'
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 6, 2002; Page A01
Administration officials began detailing their case against Iraq to congressional leaders in secret yesterday, as Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle said President Bush would have an easier time winning backing from Congress for the use of force if he could first gain U.N. Security Council approval for tougher action.
Responding to demands for specific evidence about the threat posed by Iraq, Vice President Cheney and CIA Director George J. Tenet provided a highly classified briefing to the top four leaders of Congress.
Afterward, Daschle (D-S.D.) told reporters the session was "helpful" and had given the leaders a chance to ask many of the questions that have been bothering them. Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.), the minority leader, described the meeting as "interesting and troubling," suggesting that administration officials had imparted information not previously disclosed.
The briefing followed recent warnings from lawmakers in both parties that they would have difficulty supporting military action against Iraq without new intelligence information that would justify a preemptive U.S. attack. Administration officials had indicated that they possess new information about Iraqi capabilities, but had shared none of this in public or in earlier closed-door briefings with members of Congress.
Although Bush expressed the hope earlier this week of receiving a vote of support before Congress recesses in a few weeks, Daschle indicated yesterday that his own backing and that of other senators would hinge in part on Bush's success in gathering international support. He suggested that Bush try to get the kind of U.N. Security Council resolution -- authorizing the use of "all necessary means" to evict Iraqi forces from Kuwait -- that Bush's father obtained before the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
"That, too, will be a central factor in how quickly the Congress acts," Daschle told reporters. "If the international community supports it, if we can get the information we've been seeking, then I think we can move to a resolution. But short of that, I think it would be difficult for us to move until that information is provided and some indication of the level of international support is also evident."
Daschle stopped short of insisting that Bush must first win a Security Council resolution. Bush has not indicated whether he will seek a U.N. resolution, and administration officials said the most they could expect would be language backing more aggressive inspections in Iraq, leaving open the possibility of military action should Hussein resist.
Iraq was also the focus of discussion at two other closed-door administration briefings yesterday: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld joined Cheney and Tenet to talk about weapons proliferation with about 25 senators at a Pentagon breakfast, and Tenet appeared before the Senate intelligence committee. But lawmakers who attended the two sessions said they heard little that was new about Iraq. Both meetings, according to participants, were characterized by frequent interruptions from senators asking about Iraq, with the queries ranging from Iraqi weapons capabilities and the reliability of the Iraqi opposition to the need to consult with U.S. allies before taking military action.
One senior administration official said yesterday that lawmakers may not be offered an open-and-shut case on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. "There are a lot of people who would like to see a silver bullet because they would make it an easy decision," the official said. "But when you have [the] obligation and responsibility to protect an entire populace, sometimes you're not presented with a fully black-and-white decision."
The official likened the situation to the intelligence that preceded the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "People have said there was information out there and that people should have connected the dots and drawn conclusions," the official said. "It's incumbent on the president and, frankly, incumbent on the Congress to take available information and put it together."
In Louisville, Bush reaffirmed the commitment he made Wednesday to begin a public dialogue about Iraq and to consult with Congress and the allies before making a decision about military action. He mentioned plans to talk by phone on Friday with the leaders of Russia, China and France and to meet this weekend with British Prime Minister Tony Blair and, on Monday, with Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien. His purpose, he said, is to "remind them of the facts" about Hussein.
But Bush did not provide any new information on the threat that Iraq poses, reiterating only that Hussein in the past ordered invasions of Kuwait and Iran and that he "gassed his own people." Bush said he will make a more substantive case during a speech to the U.N. General Assembly on Sept. 12, appearing to endorse the position put forward by some of his senior aides that the dangers presented by Iraq are serious enough to warrant preemptive action.
"I look forward to the debate. I look forward to the American people understanding the threats we face," he said. "But one thing is for certain: I'm not going to change my view. And it's this: We cannot let the world's worst leaders blackmail America, threaten America or hurt America with the world's worst weapons."
At the Pentagon, remarks by the Army's top civilian official called attention to a recent doubling in the size of U.S. war stocks in Kuwait at a base near the border with Iraq. Army Secretary Thomas E. White told reporters about a movement in July of weaponry and war supplies from Qatar to Camp Doha in Kuwait. He described the shipment as a training exercise designed to validate the condition of war provisions. But other Army officials said much of the materiel -- which included armored vehicles as well as fuel, ammunition and other supplies -- has remained in Kuwait to provide for an expansion of ground forces ordered last autumn. Two battalions of troops have been added to the single battalion that had been in Kuwait, establishing a brigade of more than 6,000 soldiers. The buildup was intended to reinforce the U.S. commitment to thwart any Iraqi aggression against Kuwait even as American forces were fighting in Afghanistan.
White stressed that Bush has made no decision about a war against Iraq and that it would be inappropriate for him to discuss possible scenarios or timelines for an Army buildup in the gulf.
"We have done a lot with pre-positioned stocks in the gulf, making sure they're accessible and that they're in the right spot to support whatever the president wants to do," White said. "But we've done nothing specifically against any particular scenario" for war.
Staff writers Karen DeYoung and Helen Dewar contributed to this report.
Israelis Intercept 'Mega-Bomb'
Worries Grow Over Threat of
Unconventional Attacks
By Molly Moore and John Ward Anderson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, September 6, 2002; Page A01
JERUSALEM, Sept. 5 – On the eve of the Jewish New Year, Israeli civilian guards manning a back-road checkpoint today intercepted a vehicle outfitted with what authorities here described as a mega-bomb: 1,300 pounds of explosives, two barrels containing gasoline and metal shards, and a cell phone rigged as the detonator.
Foreign Minister Shimon Peres said that had the bombers reached a target, "It would have cost such loss of life that it would have changed almost the entire political situation in one moment."
The bombers' target was unknown to officials, but in the past four months, Israeli authorities have encountered at least a half-dozen efforts to carry out large-scale attacks designed to kill hundreds, even thousands, of Israelis – similar to the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States, officials said. In one case, military commandos discovered a pickup truck packed with 1½ tons of explosives intended to blow up the landmark Azrieli Towers, gleaming side-by-side skyscrapers in downtown Tel Aviv not far from Israel's military headquarters.
Other planned large-scale attacks went undetected by the authorities, however, and failed only because of bungling by the bombers, according to senior Israeli security officials.
With the approaching anniversaries of Sept. 11 and the start of the Palestinian uprising on Sept. 29 two years ago, the Israeli public and security officials have become increasingly apprehensive about a mammoth attack or other unconventional strike that could produce many more fatalities than the suicide bombings that have become the trademark of Palestinian militant groups.
"We know terrorists are always trying to outdo the last attack to continue ratcheting up the fear," Gil Kleiman, spokesman for the Israeli national police, said after this morning's discovery of the explosives-laden automobile. "All the rules are off. Mega-terror is something we're trying to deal with."
The latest example came just after 2 a.m. today when two suspicious vehicles sped past a civilian-patrolled checkpoint near the Israeli town of Pardes Hana, about 30 miles north of Tel Aviv on a dusty, winding road leading out of the West Bank, according to law enforcement officials. The volunteer sentries chased the Volkswagen Golf and Isuzu 4x4, but the two drivers leapt from the vehicles and fled. Police discovered the Isuzu loaded with 1,300 pounds of explosives, two highly flammable barrels of gasoline laced with metal fragments, and the cell phone detonator, which has become a staple of Palestinian explosives.
Sappers detonated the vehicle at the scene and police said they did not know which militant group was responsible for the bomb. Security agencies already had increased alert levels throughout the country out of concern that attackers were preparing to strike during celebrations of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year, which begins Friday evening.
Israeli military and security officials said the nation's security forces and emergency preparedness networks have expanded contingency plans for unconventional attacks, in response to evidence that militant Palestinian groups have tried to bolster suicide bombs with rat poison and have experimented with lacing bombs with cyanide and other poisonous chemicals. In two cases, officials said, Palestinians might have used suicide bombers suffering from hepatitis B to infect survivors of the attacks.
Those anxieties have been exacerbated by U.S. threats of another war against Iraq, which many Israeli officials fear would spur President Saddam Hussein to launch a chemical or biological attack against Israel.
"It's not a theoretical question," said Boaz Ganor, executive director of the International Policy Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya, just outside of Tel Aviv. "There have been concrete plans to execute this kind of attack. No one can turn a blind eye to the real risk."
So far, the highest number of deaths resulting from a single suicide bombing in Israel is the 29 people killed March 27 during a seder at the Park Hotel in the resort of Netanya. Military officials said the Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas, which asserted responsibility for the bombing, experimented with a bomb containing cyanide for use in that attack, but the cyanide could not endure the heat of the blast.
A spokesman for Hamas, Abdel Aziz Rantissi, denied that the organization had tried to enhance bombs with chemicals, describing the accusation as "propaganda by the Israelis."
"Our organization is not interested at all in using mega-attacks," Rantissi said in a telephone interview, adding that "martyr attacks" – the Palestinian term for suicide bombings and conventional military-type operations – "are enough to resist the occupation. We are not thinking at all of using other weapons that are forbidden internationally."
During the last four months, the Israeli military has discovered several huge caches of explosives, and officials said they have linked at least two to specific plots to bomb major buildings.
Two Palestinians captured by Israeli special forces in the West Bank city of Qaqilyah in April led the commandos to the first tangible evidence of plans for a mega-attack: a pickup truck packed with 1½ tons of explosives. The truck was destined for the Azrieli Towers, landmarks of Tel Aviv's skyline 16 miles to the west. The 50- and 46-story buildings include an upscale shopping mall and house the Israeli headquarters of major Western companies, including Philip Morris, AT&T Corp. and British Airways PLC. The plot was reminiscent of the first attack on the World Trade Center, in 1993.
Palestinians interrogated by Israeli security forces said members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine planned to drive the truck into the buildings' basement parking area, then detonate it. Since that discovery, the Azrieli complex and most other major office buildings and malls in Israel have imposed stringent security measures for all vehicles entering parking garages. Even drivers' purses and briefcases are inspected.
Just over two weeks ago, on Aug. 19, soldiers discovered a one-ton cache of explosives and bomb-making ingredients, including acetone and potassium, in a house in the old city warrens of Nablus in the West Bank. The Palestinian city has been under nearly continuous curfew for more than two months and suffered the greatest damage from Israeli forces during incursions last April.
"This could have taken down the Azrieli Towers," said an Israeli regional commander, describing the explosives discovered and detonated by soldiers in Nablus. "This is our twin towers. It's the dream of any terrorist in Nablus."
In at least three other instances, Israeli officials said, Palestinian militants have come perilously close to blowing up their targets: a massive fuel depot near Tel Aviv and two speeding trains.
On May 23, a bomb attached to the underside of a tank truck exploded inside Israel's biggest fuel depot, near a densely populated residential area and the interchange of three major highways. The bomb was detonated by a cell phone, officials said. Military officials now say a major disaster was averted at the Pi Glilot depot because militants used a truck carrying diesel fuel rather than a much more flammable gasoline tanker for the operation.
"They picked the wrong truck," said a senior military official. "This was the difference between a mega-terrorist attack and a flop. If the truck had been gasoline, it would have ended in thousands of deaths."
Two attempts to bomb passenger trains this summer also failed, military officials said. In one case, the bombers set up the bomb on the wrong track and detonated it just as the train whisked by on a parallel track. In the second, the bombers set off the explosive under the thickly plated locomotive, injuring the driver but leaving the train and tracks intact.
Israeli officials two weeks ago accused a Hamas cell operating from Arab East Jerusalem of helping carry out the bombings of the fuel depot and the two trains.
Asked to respond to those allegations, Hamas spokesman Rantissi said: "If Israel is blowing up houses in Gaza and Nablus and Ramallah and Bethlehem, then we will do the same. They are striking us in our cities, so why should they be safe in theirs?"
During the past few months, Israeli military, law enforcement and emergency health officials have been conducting drills to prepare for mega-attacks. In June, emergency and security workers simulated an attack on an office high-rise in which a plane crashed into the ninth and 10th stories, followed minutes later by an explosion in the building's basement. Rescue workers estimated that about 400 people would have been killed in a real such attack.
Israeli military and health officials also have focused increasingly on less predictable types of attacks. Doctors discovered over the past year that several suicide bombs have been packed with rat poison, which acts as a blood thinner and causes excessive bleeding in victims hit by tainted shrapnel.
Doctors removing bone fragments of suicide bombers that lodged in the victims of a mall bombing in Netanya and a disco bombing in Tel Aviv last year discovered that the bomber had been carrying hepatitis B and recommended treatment for victims.
Some analysts speculated that the hepatitis carriers had been selected as bombers because of the chance of spreading their disease. But other medical experts said the disease is so common in the Middle East that it was more likely that the bombers were coincidental carriers.
Even so, the findings have heightened concerns that militant Palestinian groups might begin to experiment with new methods of terror.
"There are nonconventional terrorist acts we haven't experienced yet," said a senior Israeli military official. "Chemical, biological, poisoning waters – all kinds of nightmares. We're trying to find systematic answers, but it doesn't work that way."
At the conclusion of a recent military intelligence briefing on the potential for a mega-attack in Israel, the officer ended the presentation with the admonition, "Reality is beyond imagination," according to an official who attended the session. He then flashed to the closing slide, a photograph of the airliner ripping through the second tower of the World Trade Center.
Arab League Foreign Ministers Vow Support for Iraq
By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, September 6, 2002; Page A18
CAIRO, Sept. 5 – The foreign ministers of 20 Arab nations jointly pledged today to support Iraq in a confrontation with United States, saying threats against President Saddam Hussein's regime were threats to the entire Arab world.
Handing a diplomatic boost to Iraq at the conclusion of a two-day Arab League meeting here, the ministers issued a resolution declaring their "total rejection of the threat of aggression on Arab nations, in particular Iraq, reaffirming that these threats to the security and safety of any Arab country are considered a threat to Arab national security."
The ministers' stance is the latest sign of opposition among Arab nations to any U.S. military action aimed at toppling Hussein. Support for the United States of at least some Arab countries, particularly those that share borders with Iraq, is regarded by many military analysts as crucial to a U.S. ground invasion.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri lauded the ministers' resolution as he left the closed-door meeting. Arab nations, he said, voiced a "total rejection of the aggressive intentions of the United States."
In 1990, after Iraq invaded Kuwait, 12 of what were then 21 members of the Arab League voted to condemn Iraq. Of the 12, five were from the Persian Gulf region. Many Arab nations subsequently participated in the U.S.-led coalition that drove Iraqi forces from Kuwait.
Now, however, Arab sentiments are drastically different. While political leaders across the region say they have little love for Hussein, they maintain that they no longer feel threatened by him. And, Arab leaders contend, a hasty regime change in Iraq could spark ethnic, religious and tribal clashes with the potential to spill across its borders.
"We're not pro-Saddam. We know he's a dictator," said Mustafa Fiqi, the Egyptian parliament's foreign affairs committee chairman. "But we don't want to set a precedent of removing a leader in the region by force."
Although some Arab governments have urged Iraq to permit U.N. weapons inspectors to return, the ministers' statement today did not specifically mention the inspectors. The ministers said instead they welcomed "initiatives by Iraq to forge a dialogue with the United Nations."
The ministers also echoed Iraq's recent call for a "comprehensive settlement" of all of its disputes with the United Nations, calling for an end to U.N. trade sanctions imposed on Iraq after its invasion of Kuwait.
The Arab League's secretary general, Amr Moussa, said a military strike against Iraq would "open the gates of hell" in the Middle East. Western and Arab military analysts predict that Iraq may seek to respond to any U.S. attack by launching missiles at Israel or other countries in the region in an effort to spark a wider conflict.
The Iraqi newspaper Babel, which is owned by Hussein's son Uday, urged the Arab League to support Iraq, insisting that the United States was "attempting to target Iraq as a first step toward controlling the whole Middle East region."
Despite their pledge of support for Iraq's diplomatic stance, the foreign ministers did not discuss whether they would lend military assistance to Iraq if it were attacked. The ministers "considered this issue too hypothetical, something they shouldn't go into," said Hisham Youssef, the league's spokesman.
U.S. Seeks to Broaden
Peacekeeping
Pentagon Supports
International Forces Outside Afghan Capital
By Vernon Loeb and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, September 6, 2002; Page A22
Senior Bush administration officials yesterday endorsed expansion of an international peacekeeping force in Afghanistan and hinted at deeper, broader and possibly longer U.S. involvement in the country after a gunman attempted to assassinate President Hamid Karzai in Kandahar and powerful bombs rocked Kabul, the Afghan capital.
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz issued the Pentagon's first explicit endorsement of deploying peacekeepers outside of Kabul in a speech yesterday morning at the Brookings Institution and said that the international force could be used to patrol outside the capital and assist new units of the Afghan army that the U.S. military is helping train.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the special White House envoy for Afghanistan, indicated deep concern for security in Afghanistan and said the administration is considering a variety of ways to bolster security in Kabul and elsewhere in the country.
He ruled out the use of U.S. forces in Afghanistan to expand the International Security Assistance Force -- a step numerous administration critics say is crucial to improving security throughout the country.
But Khalilzad said steps are being considered to accelerate the training of Afghan forces, and Wolfowitz disclosed that State Department Foreign Service officers have already been stationed in several regional centers to work with U.S. Special Forces in diffusing local conflicts. The U.S. military has 8,000 troops in the country who are not part of the peacekeeping force but have been involved in a variety of operations from combat to school construction.
Defense and intelligence officials in Washington said they do not know who was behind yesterday's attacks, which underscored the precarious security situation in Afghanistan and the enormous challenges that remain in reconstructing the impoverished, war-devastated nation.
The security situation in Afghanistan is better than it was a year ago, Khalilzad said, "but we have a long way to go."
President Bush expressed relief that Karzai had not been injured in the assassination attempt and said he is looking forward to meeting with Karzai next week at the United Nations in New York.
"We're not leaving," Bush said of the U.S. presence in Afghanistan during a Republican fundraiser in Louisville.
Barnett R. Rubin, a New York University expert on Afghanistan, said that yesterday's bombings in Kabul were more significant than the July assassination of Afghan Vice President Abdul Qadir because they are the worst yet in a growing series of terrorist attacks in the capital.
"This shows there is now an underground devoted to violence and disruption, probably to try to drive out the foreigners and destabilize the government," said Rubin, who traveled around Afghanistan last month.
He and other experts also said they believe that support for the ousted Taliban regime is coming back in southern and eastern Afghanistan.
"People in the Pashtun areas are increasingly resentful," said Rubin, and tend to believe that the U.S. military has a bias against them.
Wolfowitz, the Pentagon's number two official, said the administration's top security issue in Afghanistan remains finding a country to assume leadership of the International Security Assistance Force once Turkey's six-month commitment expires in December. He also called on the international community "to provide the leadership and resources necessary" to expand the peacekeeping force outside of Kabul, where its activities are now confined.
Administration critics, who have long argued that the U.S. government should be more heavily engaged in "nation building" in Afghanistan, welcomed Wolfowitz's endorsement of expanding the ISAF but called on the Pentagon to provide troops to the force.
"I think the ISAF ought to be led by the United States," said Ivo H. Daalder, a National Security Council official in the Clinton administration who is now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "This notion that we want to expand but nobody was willing to contribute [came about] because we weren't willing to lead."
Bill Durch, a senior associate at the Stimson Center in Washington and a peacekeeping expert, said the administration must be willing to commit some of the U.S. troops in Afghanistan or some other form of logistical and financial support needed to expand the ISAF.
"We have to ante up something that's tangible and on the ground for an expanded force," said Durch, who has drafted a prototype plan for expanding the force that is circulating among policy experts in Washington. "We cannot simply stand on the sidelines and encourage others to do this."
Christian Science Monitor The US as global sheriff for every Dodge City
By Chester A. Crocker and Richard H. Solomon
WASHINGTON - America's war on terrorism has
achieved some remarkable successes. It has changed the balance of forces in
Central and South Asia and placed terror networks on the defensive. No assault
on American people or interests has been carried out since Sept. 11, 2001.
But these successes will be short-lived without
a commitment to follow them with diplomacy, peacekeeping, reconstruction,
nation-building, promotion of human rights and democracy, curbs on weapons
proliferation, and a campaign to improve the impact and depth of American interaction
with the Muslim world.
A daunting task, yes. But not as daunting as an
effort to shape a more peaceful world through short-term military action alone.
Coercive power is a blunt instrument. It can defeat enemy forces, topple
narrowly based regimes, seize and hold territory, and deter or intimidate
immediate challenges.
As professional soldiers are the first to
recognize, however, successful military actions create but brief windows of
opportunity, not lasting political results. In order to have enduring strategic
impact, a successful military campaign should be viewed as buying time for
creating political responses to challenges and threats. This is how the cold
war was won.
What is required is an integrated use of
America's security-related tools: our alliances and military aid programs to
bolster friends and train local forces; our lead role in the UN, NATO, and
other international organizations to build workable restraints on weapons
proliferation and to share the burdens of peace operations and conflict
management; our negotiation resources; and our public diplomacy tools and media
and educational resources.
Long-term stability requires breaking down the
isolation of distant lands and linking local leaders to global networks
committed to economic reform and development, democracy and the rule of law,
free press, religious tolerance, and women's rights.
This broadly conceived approach can be led by
the US, but it must be developed and implemented in concert with other nations
that share our risks and values and that can help to export security to
disorderly and troubled parts of the world.
The target countries for this strategy are much
broader than many Americans realize. To be effective, we and our closest
partners must address the security challenges of a huge zone of turbulence
stretching from West Africa to Southeast Asia – a zone in which Western values
and the principles of the international system are on trial.
Afghanistan is not the only failed state that
may host criminal businesses linked to religious fundamentalism and terrorist
networks. Iraq is not the only adversary acquiring weapons of mass destruction
and threatening regional stability.
Within this zone lie some outlaws who rule by
terror and may not be reachable by anyone but a world-class sheriff and
able-bodied posse. Military interventions can create the space for moderate
reformist leaders to take charge and promote development and democracy. But it
takes a lot more than one-shot military action to secure the global equivalent
of Dodge City.
Myriad challenges confront the US and its
allies. Can we develop the ideas and instruments for a long-term conversation
about modernization and democracy with the societies of the Islamic world? How
do we best engage the Pakistans, Indonesias, Irans, and Nigerias out there,
societies with their own mega-problems?
How can we mobilize the Europeans, the Russians
and Chinese, the Japanese, and civil society groups in this effort? In how many
situations, apart from the Middle East, should the US play a lead peacemaking
role? In Sudan (a former host to Osama bin Laden where embryonic peace efforts
are struggling to gain some traction)? In Kashmir, where a nuclear standoff
commands the attention of the West? In Nigeria and Indonesia, where challenges to
weak institutions and uncertain leaders could lead to more state failures?
There is no quick and dirty military solution to
the terrorism and turmoil in the Islamic world so violently brought home last
Sept. 11.
More than a half century ago, the US responded
to an attack on its territory by mobilizing for a long-term struggle. We
created a comprehensive national strategy for engaging enemies and sustaining
friends abroad and promoting economic and social progress – and we organized
institutions and coalitions to implement that strategy.
Today, in a very different world, we have a
similar opportunity – indeed, a national requirement – to build upon our recent
military success by developing a comprehensive, long-term strategy for
mobilizing domestic resources and a global coalition in support of a more
stable international system.
• Chester A. Crocker is chairman of the board
and Richard H. Solomon is president of the US Institute of Peace. Both are
former assistant secretaries of state.
In war, some facts less factual
Some US assertions from the last war on Iraq still appear dubious.
By Scott Peterson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
MOSCOW - When George H. W. Bush ordered American
forces to the Persian Gulf – to reverse Iraq's August 1990 invasion of Kuwait –
part of the administration case was that an Iraqi juggernaut was also
threatening to roll into Saudi Arabia.
Citing top-secret satellite images, Pentagon
officials estimated in mid–September that up to 250,000 Iraqi troops and 1,500
tanks stood on the border, threatening the key US oil supplier.
But when the St. Petersburg Times in Florida
acquired two commercial Soviet satellite images of the same area, taken at the
same time, no Iraqi troops were visible near the Saudi border – just empty
desert.
"It was a pretty serious fib," says
Jean Heller, the Times journalist who broke the story.
The White House is now making its case. to
Congress and the public for another invasion of Iraq; President George W. Bush
is expected to present specific evidence of the threat posed by Iraq during a
speech to the United Nations next week.
But past cases of bad intelligence or outright
disinformation used to justify war are making experts wary. The questions they
are raising, some based on examples from the 1991 Persian Gulf War, highlight
the importance of accurate information when a democracy considers military
action.
"My concern in these situations, always, is
that the intelligence that you get is driven by the policy, rather than the
policy being driven by the intelligence," says former US Rep. Lee Hamilton
(D) of Indiana, a 34-year veteran lawmaker until 1999, who served on numerous
foreign affairs and intelligence committees, and is now director of the Woodrow
Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. The Bush team
"understands it has not yet carried the burden of persuasion [about an
imminent Iraqi threat], so they will look for any kind of evidence to support
their premise," Mr. Hamilton says. "I think we have to be skeptical
about it."
Examining
the evidence
Shortly before US strikes began in the Gulf War,
for example, the St. Petersburg Times asked two experts to examine the
satellite images of the Kuwait and Saudi Arabia border area taken in
mid-September 1990, a month and a half after the Iraqi invasion. The experts,
including a former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst who specialized in
desert warfare, pointed out the US build-up – jet fighters standing wing-tip to
wing-tip at Saudi bases – but were surprised to see almost no sign of the
Iraqis.
"That [Iraqi buildup] was the whole
justification for Bush sending troops in there, and it just didn't exist,"
Ms. Heller says. Three times Heller contacted the office of Secretary of
Defense Dick Cheney (now vice president) for evidence refuting the Times photos
or analysis – offering to hold the story if proven wrong.
The official response: "Trust us." To
this day, the Pentagon's photographs of the Iraqi troop buildup remain
classified.
After the war, the House Armed Services
Committee issued a report on lessons learned from the Persian Gulf War. It did
not specifically look at the early stages of the Iraqi troop buildup in the
fall, when the Bush administration was making its case to send American forces.
But it did conclude that at the start of the ground war in February, the US
faced only 183,000 Iraqi troops, less than half the Pentagon estimate. In 1996,
Gen. Colin Powell, who is secretary of state today, told the PBS documentary
program Frontline: "The Iraqis may not have been as strong as we thought
they were...but that doesn't make a whole lot of difference to me. We put in
place a force that would deal with it – whether they were 300,000, or
500,000."
John MacArthur, publisher of Harper's Magazine
and author of "Second Front: Censorship and Propaganda in the Gulf
War," says that considering the number of senior officials shared by both
Bush administrations, the American public should bear in mind the lessons of
Gulf War propaganda.
"These are all the same people who were
running it more than 10 years ago," Mr. MacArthur says. "They'll make
up just about anything ... to get their way."
On Iraq, analysts note that little evidence so
far of an imminent threat from Mr. Hussein's weapons of mass destruction has
been made public.
Critics, including some former United Nations
weapons inspectors in Iraq, say no such evidence exists. Mr. Bush says he will
make his decision to go to war based on the "best" intelligence.
"You have to wonder about the quality of
that intelligence," says Mr. Hamilton at Woodrow Wilson.
"This administration is capable of any lie
... in order to advance its war goal in Iraq," says a US government source
in Washington with some two decades of experience in intelligence, who would
not be further identified. "It is one of the reasons it doesn't want to
have UN weapons inspectors go back in, because they might actually show that
the probability of Iraq having [threatening illicit weapons] is much lower than
they want us to believe."
The roots of modern war propaganda reach back to
British World War II stories about German troops bayoneting babies, and can be
traced through the Vietnam era and even to US campaigns in Somalia and Kosovo.
While the adage has it that "truth is the
first casualty of war," senior administration officials say they cherish
their credibility, and would not lie.
In a press briefing last September, Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld noted occasions during World War II when false
information about US troop movements was leaked to confuse the enemy. He paraphrased
Winston Churchill, saying: "Sometimes the truth is so precious it must be
accompanied by a bodyguard of lies."
But he added that "my fervent hope is that
we will be able to manage our affairs in a way that that will never happen. And
I am 69 years old and I don't believe it's ever happened that I have lied to
the press, and I don't intend to start now."
Last fall, the Pentagon secretly created an
"Office of Strategic Influence." But when its existence was revealed,
the ensuing media storm over reports that it would launch disinformation
campaigns prompted its official closure in late February.
Commenting on the furor, President Bush pledged
that the Pentagon will "tell the American people the truth."
Critics familiar with the precedent set in
recent decades, however, remain skeptical. They point, for example, to the
Office of Public Diplomacy run by the State Department in the 1980s. Using
staff detailed from US military "psychological operations" units, it
fanned fears about Nicaragua's leftist Sandinista regime with false
"intelligence" leaks.
Besides placing a number of proContra,
antiSandinista stories in the national US media as part of a "White
Propaganda" campaign, that office fed the Miami Herald a make-believe
story that the Soviet Union had given chemical weapons to the Sandinistas.
Another tale – which happened to emerge the night of President Ronald Reagan's
reelection victory – held that Soviet MiG fighters were on their way to
Nicaragua.
The office was shut down in 1987, after a report
by the US Comptroller-General found that some of their efforts were
"prohibited, covert propaganda activities."
More recently, in the fall of 1990, members of
Congress and the American public were swayed by the tearful testimony of a
15-year-old Kuwaiti girl, known only as Nayirah.
In the girl's testimony before a congressional
caucus, well-documented in MacArthur's book "Second Front" and
elsewhere, she described how, as a volunteer in a Kuwait maternity ward, she
had seen Iraqi troops storm her hospital, steal the incubators, and leave 312
babies "on the cold floor to die."
Seven US Senators later referred to the story
during debate; the motion for war passed by just five votes. In the weeks after
Nayirah spoke, President Bush senior invoked the incident five times, saying
that such "ghastly atrocities" were like "Hitler
revisited."
But just weeks before the US bombing campaign
began in January, a few press reports began to raise questions about the
validity of the incubator tale.
Later, it was learned that Nayirah was in fact
the daughter of the Kuwaiti ambassador to Washington and had no connection to
the Kuwait hospital.
She had been coached – along with the handful of
others who would "corroborate" the story – by senior executives of
Hill and Knowlton in Washington, the biggest global PR firm at the time, which
had a contract worth more than $10 million with the Kuwaitis to make the case
for war.
"We didn't know it wasn't true at the
time," Brent Scowcroft, Bush's national security adviser, said of the
incubator story in a 1995 interview with the London-based Guardian newspaper.
He acknowledged "it was useful in mobilizing public opinion."
Intelligence
as political tool
Selective use of intelligence information is not
particular to any one presidential team, says former Congressman Hamilton.
"This is not a problem unique to George
Bush. It's every president I've known, and I've worked with seven or eight of
them," Hamilton says. "All, at some time or another, used
intelligence to support their political objectives.
"Information is power, and the temptation
to use information to achieve the results you want is almost
overwhelming," he says. "The whole intelligence community knows
exactly what the president wants [regarding Iraq], and most are in their jobs
because of the president – certainly the people at the top – and they will do
everything they can to support the policy.
"I'm always skeptical about
intelligence," adds Hamilton, who has been awarded medallions from both
the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency. "It's not as pure as the
driven snow."
Monitor
Breakfast
Selected quotations from a Monitor breakfast with Joseph Lieberman
By David T. Cook
Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, chairman of the
Senate Governmental Affairs Committee and the Democratic nominee for vice
president in the 2000 election, was Thursday's guest at the Monitor breakfast
in Washington. Here are excerpts: On whether he "salivates" for
the presidency:
"I am certainly meditating, and I am
activating – which is to say I am moving around talking to people and speaking
out on the issues and challenges of the day. But my saliva glands are, for the
moment, under control."
On
whether he communicates with former running-mate Al Gore:
"We communicate occasionally often by
e-mail....He has told me that he is undecided, literally 50-50. And, of course,
I said to him, 'The sooner you decide, the happier I will be.' And he said he
understands that and I believe him. And he said this publicly, that he will
make a decision by the end of this year.
"I love my work in the Senate. Every day is
interesting and has an opportunity to get something done. So if Al decides to
run I am going to be OK. I have been a very blessed person in my life."
On
prospects for compromise over worker rights provisions in the homeland security
bill:
"At this point, it is hard to see a
compromise. For me, the compromise is the one I suggested to Gov. [Tom] Ridge
when we first talked about it several months ago, in which I pleaded with him,
before the president put his bill in, please don't make this into a battle over
civil service and conditions of work of federal employees. It is a snare; it is
a trap, and it will make it harder for us to do what we all agree we want to do
and should do urgently – which is to create this new department of homeland
security.
"There are two things going on here: One is
a disagreement on the merits of the administration proposals. But you are
right, the other is a context of mistrust about what this administration's
intentions are regarding the rights of federal employees....Why is there a
question of trust here? This is not, generally speaking, a pro-worker,
pro-labor administration. Secondly, the very fact that the administration came
in with this proposal to give the president unprecedented, unaccountable
authority to waive the civil service rules ...has created anxiety."
On
whether the president should seek United Nation's approval before attacking
Iraq:
"Clearly, the ideal circumstance would be
if there was a United Nations Security Council resolution that was a preface to
any military action in Iraq. I know there are different proposals out to see if
the Security Council would adopt a resolution calling for aggressive, no-limits
inspections, even a large international force to be ready to go in and act
militarily to first carry out the inspections and to act militarily if there
was a problem the Iraqis gave in carrying it out. That is the ideal.
"I certainly believe it would be a mistake
for us to do this alone. We need to have allies particularly in the region from
the Arab world and beyond the region, including from Europe. But we can put
together such a coalition without a Security Council resolution if that is
impossible to obtain.
On
whether his current position on going it alone has changed since he gave a
speech at Georgetown University in February 2002:
"We would be better off if we had some
allies with us. It is as simple as that...It is clear already that if the
president decides we should act soon that we will not act alone. The question
is how many allies will be with us. There is a sense of confidence, certainly
within the administration that ...some of our allies in the region and some of
our allies in Europe will be with us."
On
how the Bush administration has handled Iraq:
"With all respect, the Bush administration
has not handled this well. They rattled sabers without explaining why and they
raised the public statements of intention against Iraq before they built the
support for carrying out those intentions either among members of Congress, the
American people, or of course our allies. [The] way in which they raised
anxieties, alarmed those who oppose a move against Iraq, and allowed debate to
get away from them ...is unfortunate."
On
how the Iraq situation is affected by rest of the Bush administration's foreign
policy:
"The fact is that the president's effort
... to get our allies around the world to join us in this quest to protect the
world from Saddam Hussein has been made much more difficult by other elements
of the Bush administration's foreign policy which are seen by people around the
world – including our closest allies in Europe and Asia – as much too one-sided
[and] unilateral.
"Basically you can't break away from a
series of international agreements and treaties that enjoy broad support
throughout the world and then turn around and say to the world 'Let's go to war
in Iraq' and expect everyone to fall in line. There has to be more
mutuality."
On
whether President Bush consulted with potential political allies (like
Lieberman) before deciding he favored regime change in Iraq:
"There were none that I know of – I know
there were none with me and there were none that I know of with anyone else.
Looking back, it is pretty clear – and I hope the people in the administration
agree with this – that right from the outset, it would have been important to
bring in people from Congress to begin this discussion, and of course to reach
out to our allies. We now have a situation where a number of our allies have
made quite strong statements of opposition or of doubt about our intentions in
Iraq. And it makes it harder to change their minds.
"I think that was a consequential failure
of diplomacy."
Los Angeles Times Iraq Debate Looms in Congress
Government: Questions for Bush arise from both houses. Issue could influence key elections.
By NICK ANDERSON and EDWIN CHEN , TIMES
STAFF WRITERS
September 6 2002
WASHINGTON--Faced with the growing likelihood of a major vote this fall on
Iraq, members of Congress on Thursday raised a host of pointed questions they
say President Bush must answer if he seeks their approval for sending U.S.
troops to topple Saddam Hussein.
Bush, meanwhile, reiterated in strong terms that he is resolved to move against
the Iraqi president, even as the administration's precise plan for doing so
remains unclear.
"I meant it when I said I'm going to consult with Congress," Bush
said at a political fund-raiser in Louisville, Ky., a day after announcing that
he would seek congressional approval before taking any action.
"One thing is for certain: I'm not going to change my view," he
added. "And my view is, we cannot let the world's worst leaders blackmail
America, threaten America or hurt America with the world's worst weapons."
The debate over Iraq could dominate the next few weeks of this year's
congressional session and, possibly, influence some critical contests in the
Nov. 5 midterm elections.
On a number of fronts Thursday on Capitol Hill and on the congressional
campaign trail, there were signs of the intensifying debate:
A spokesman for the House International Relations Committee said the panel
would quiz Bush administration officials closely on Iraq in classified
briefings and public hearings starting in the middle of this month.
Eighteen liberal House Democrats and one independent sent Bush a letter with
sharp questions about a potential military strike against Iraq, laying the
groundwork for antiwar arguments should the president decide on a full-fledged
invasion.
Several Senate candidates, Democrats and Republicans alike, announced that they
would support Bush or were leaning toward backing a bid for congressional
approval of action against Hussein. Some Democrats, however, remained skeptical
or noncommittal.
Senators from both parties took to the floor to raise questions that outlined
the evolving debate and the growing chorus for more details on the threat that
the administration says Hussein poses.
Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) wondered when the administration would
demonstrate that Hussein has, or is close to having, nuclear weapons.
"Where is the evidence?" he asked. "We have a duty to ask
questions because we are living in a very perilous time, and the war drums are
beating all around us."
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said a strike at Iraq could complicate efforts
to settle the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and set back the U.S.'s declared war
on Al Qaeda and other terrorist networks. She added that launching a major
invasion of another nation "leads to the questions of whether a preemptive
war is morally right, legally right, or politically the right way for the
United States to proceed."
Other senators who support the president, such as Democrat Zell Miller of
Georgia, said Bush must still convince the public. "I don't think the
president has made the case with the folks back home," Miller said.
"He can, and I think he will, but he hasn't yet."
Bush sought Thursday to build such support. With a fresh sense of urgency, he
declared in four animated speeches in Kentucky and South Bend, Ind., his
seemingly unalterable conviction that the United States must force a regime
change in Baghdad.
Referring to weapons of mass destruction thought by the administration to be in
Hussein's possession, Bush said in Louisville: "We must anticipate
problems before they occur. We must deal with threats to our security
today--before it can be too late."
Aboard Air Force One, White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer told reporters:
"The president believes that the evidence that we have already seen to
date is sufficient to require regime change."
Bush is scheduled to continue pressing his case today in telephone calls to the
leaders of China, Russia and France. He also is to meet Saturday at Camp David,
the presidential retreat in Maryland, with British Prime Minister Tony Blair,
one of America's staunchest allies. In addition, Bush plans to travel to
Detroit on Monday to meet with Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien.
On Capitol Hill, the questions broached by lawmakers over Iraq showed that the
administration would face a formidable task in assembling broad bipartisan
support for a military strike, especially if large numbers of U.S. troops are
involved.
While some Republicans are urging a go-slow approach, most of the skeptics are
Democrats. That was true in January 1991, when Bush's father, then-President
George Bush, won approval from a divided Congress for a resolution authorizing
the use of force against Iraq in the Persian Gulf War. The partisan divide from
1991 lingers today and could be a factor in the coming debate.
Of the 75 Democrats still in the House who voted on the 1991 war resolution, 52
opposed it. The ranks of the naysayers included such current party leaders as
Reps. Richard A. Gephardt of Missouri and Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco.
By contrast, of 67 House Republicans who remain from the vote nearly a dozen
years ago, only one voted against the resolution: Rep. Constance A. Morella of
Maryland.
Much has changed since 1991. Most important, the nation is fighting a war on
terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks. And there is growing concern about the
threat of biological, chemical or nuclear attacks from terrorists, possibly
aided by rogue states such as Iraq.
Still, some of those who voted against the 1991 resolution seem prepared to
take a similar position now. Rep. Peter A. DeFazio (D-Ore.), for instance, is
deeply skeptical of the direction taken by the current Bush administration
toward Iraq. "To date, they have not made a case that would persuade
me," DeFazio said.
He wrote a letter, signed by 18 other House liberals, demanding explanations
from Bush on Iraq's weapons capabilities and on the military and diplomatic
fallout of a possible U.S. strike against Baghdad.
While the role of foreign policy in the congressional races remains unclear,
Bush's anti-Hussein campaign could affect some key contests. The president's
announcement that he would seek approval before taking action against Iraq
raised pressure on candidates to clarify their positions on potential military
action.
Tellingly, several Democrats running for the Senate in states that Bush carried
in 2000 quickly indicated that they would vote for a resolution authorizing
action against Iraq if they were in office.
Rep. Bob Clement (D-Tenn), who's running for an open Senate seat against
Republican Lamar Alexander, said Wednesday that he would vote with Bush. Alex
Sanders, who's vying with Republican Rep. Lindsay O. Graham for an open Senate
seat in South Carolina, said through a spokesman that "if the vote were
today ... he would support the president."
And Dan Pfeiffer, spokesman for Sen. Tim Johnson (D-S.D), who is seeking
reelection, said the candidate "likely" would vote for a resolution.
"Tim definitely wants to give the president authority to do what needs to
be done," Pfeiffer said. Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster working on the
South Carolina and Tennessee Senate races, said he believes that clear
contrasts on Iraq will be rare because Democrats in more hawkish states are
unlikely to oppose the president. But he said that, even without sharp
distinctions, a prolonged Iraq debate will benefit GOP candidates by shifting
the public's focus away from the economy toward national security issues, a
Republican strength among most voters.
Democrats dispute that notion. And some Democrats believe that the
congressional vote may offer their candidates in more conservative states an
unexpected opportunity to blunt Republican attacks on their defense record.
Times staff writers Janet Hook, Richard Simon and Ronald Brownstein
contributed to this story.
|
What the
world should hear from Bush |
|
|
|
Gareth
Evans IHT |
Opposing
Saddam
BRUSSELS
It is highly appropriate that President George W. Bush has chosen his UN
General Assembly address on Sept. 12 as the occasion to fully lay out U.S.
concerns and intentions on Iraq. For all its faults, the United Nations remains
the only universally representative and comprehensively empowered body the
world has to deal with threats to international peace and security.
.
In the
present environment, any acknowledgment by Washington of that status, however
implicit, is welcome indeed.
.
But the
choice of forum won't count for much if the substance of the speech is not
compelling.
.
If a
military assault is to be launched against Saddam Hussein - with all the
carnage, destruction, loss of innocent life and sheer human misery that warfare
always entails, and that armchair generals too often ignore - then Bush is going
to have to do more than point out the monstrous way Saddam has behaved in the
past and undoubtedly still can. He is going to have to be persuasive on at
least five key issues on which the world is waiting for answers. Call them, if
you like, the five Rs.
.
Rationale. A case has
to be made not only about Saddam's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons
capability, present and future, but also about his intent, and the incapacity
of the international community to contain him, as it has for the last decade,
by measures short of military action. Preemptive self-defense can certainly be
justified, but only if there is a clear and present danger in every sense of
that phrase.
.
Right
authority. For proposed military intervention anywhere, the Security Council
should always be the first port of call. The optimal course here would be a new
ultimatum demanding the return of fully empowered weapons inspectors and
authorizing all appropriate means of redress in the event of non-cooperation.
If the United States seriously pursues this course, its position will be
infinitely stronger, even if the process breaks down with a veto by another
permanent member. But if Washington is to be seen as serious, there can be no
more talk of insisting on regime change even if inspectors go in.
.
Region. There is
every reason to believe that military action against Iraq, especially
unilateral action, will be seriously destabilizing through the whole region,
and there are not many grounds to hope that it will set flowing a democratic
tidal wave. The bottom line must always be that the consequences of military
action not be worse than the consequences of inaction, and the president simply
must be persuasive on this score.
.
Confidence
in a manageable regional reaction would be higher if the United States were to
make a big new commitment to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian problem by
initiating negotiations now on a final status political blueprint. But that,
regrettably, seems very unlikely.
.
Retaliation. There is
much well-founded concern that by far the most likely scenario for Saddam
actually using such weapon capacity as he has is the threat of his own imminent
annihilation. The worry, as it has been put, is "T - 2" - what he
will do two days before he is turned into toast. It would set a few minds at
rest, not least in Israel, for Bush to have plausible answers to this, even if
the Sept. 12 speech is obviously not the occasion for discussing how precisely
the military job will be done.
.
Reconstruction. The
international community needs a much clearer sense than presently exists as to
who or what will replace Saddam if he is overturned, whether the new regime
will be much better than the old, and in particular whether the United States
will be able and willing to maintain the occupying presence that may be
indefinitely necessary.
.
There is
also the usual question mark, accentuated by Afghanistan's experience, as to
whether the resources really will be available to accomplish the necessary
postwar reconstruction. Those of us working full-time on the prevention of
deadly conflict - wars between states, war within states or terrorist wars on
states - can get consumed with the complexity of it all: long-term structural
measures to deal with underlying causes; the toolbox of short-term responses to
deal with imminent crises; what kinds of interventions work and what don't in
dealing with situations heading out of control. But it's important from time to
time to remind ourselves of some simpler verities, starting with the time-honored
one of "Do no harm." War is an ugly, awful thing, and if we are in
the business of preventing deadly conflicts, it's a good idea not to start new
ones. Unless, that is, the case for doing so is overwhelming and the means
chosen are absolutely responsible.
.
It is that
case that the world will be waiting to hear from President Bush on Sept. 12.
.
The writer, a former foreign minister of Australia, is president
of the International Crisis Group. He contributed this comment to the
International Herald Tribune.
|
America
alone against Iraq? |
|
|
|
Thierry de Montbrial Le Monde |
The
force necessary to mount even an intermediate operation would be large enough
to require extensive basing facilities - if not in Saudi Arabia, then the
Kuwaitis and preferably the Turks must be induced to provide territory. There
lies President Bush's real problem. Although America has power in
superabundance to topple Saddam, the president must still find friends to
furnish the points of departure. To do so, he must devote time to building international
support for his anti-Iraqi policy. So far he has taken little trouble to do so.
.
He may be
planning an attack which will not require the cooperation of outsiders. That
means he will need to launch the invasion from the sea. Such an attack would be
very tricky. - John Keegan, commenting in The Daily Telegraph (London) After so
many months of bellicose gesticulation toward Iraq, failure finally to go into
action would look like an American retreat. The entire foreign policy of George
W. Bush is based on the exercise of power. The most likely prospect, although
it is not certain, is that America is going to wage war to eliminate Saddam
Hussein, perhaps in the first few months of 2003. For now, the United States
will keep playing the sheriff's role that reflects its culture. Despite all our
reservations, we are right not to contradict it to its face - provided we
accelerate the building of Europe. A weak Europe will not manage to spread its
values abroad or promote the idea of better world governance. The time has come
clearly and proudly to go for a strong Europe.
.
- Thierry de Montbrial, commenting in Le
Monde (Paris)
Wall Street Journal The
Middle East Will Unite the West.
By Frederick Kempe.
BRUSSELS - The good news in a landmark public-opinion survey out this week is
that Europeans and Americans are closer in their worldviews than the chattering
classes thought. They agree that the leading danger is the mix of terrorism and
weapons of mass destruction, they accept that military action might be
necessary to tackle this threat and they don't want America to go it alone
against Iraq.
The bad news is that these reasonable citizens have been badly served by
national leaders who haven't even begun to discuss a new trans-Atlantic agenda
for the 21st century that could rally public opinion around an answer to this
threat. That leaves a vacuum for folks like the campaigning German Chancellor
Gerhard Schroeder, who goes for whatever populist mileage he can gain from opposing
American policy instead of accepting the responsibility his country will
ultimately have to bear in a changed world.
The problem is as much a failure of memory as it is of policy. Both U.S. and
European officials forget that it was the Western alliance's patient cohesion
in the past half century that produced a grand strategic venture that remade
the world. The allies helped bring down Soviet communism, spread peace and
prosperity across the European continent and end the perverse security logic of
mutually assured destruction.
One year after September 11, a new and potentially even more ambitious
strategic venture suggests itself for these same allies. This time it is in
remaking the Greater Middle East, an area from Pakistan to North Africa, which
is the geographic source of the current terrorist threat, its financing and the
resentments that fuel it.
"The greatest likelihood of large numbers of Americans or Europeans being
killed no longer comes from a Russian invasion or even ethnic war in the Balkans,"
says Ronald Asmus, a former State Department official who was one of the
architects of NATO enlargement policies. "It comes from the threat posed
by terrorists or rogue states in the Greater Middle East armed with weapons of
mass destruction, attacking our citizens, our countries, or our vital interests
abroad."
Taking on that threat has become the strategic challenge of our time. "It
is for our generation of leaders the modern day equivalent of what facing down
Stalin was for Truman and his counterparts in 1949," says Mr. Asmus.
In answer to recent writings that focus on and exaggerate trans-Atlantic
differences, Mr. Asmus and former Clinton administration Middle East Expert Ken
Pollack are proposing a new strategic agenda for the alliance ahead of NATO's
Prague summit in November. Their views, to be published later this month in the
U.S. journal of opinion Policy Review, dissect the threat, detail its roots,
sort out the policy challenges and then propose the contours of a common
policy. It includes remaking post-Taliban Afghanistan, getting the Arab-Israeli
conflict under control, removing Saddam Hussein, promoting regime change in
Iran and backing civil society throughout the region, particularly among
current allies.
Most important, however, is the thinking behind the policy that a
non-strategic, piecemeal approach is bound to fail over time because it is the
Greater Middle East's common problems of bad governance, economic stagnation,
political alienation, miseducation and inability to come to terms with
modernity that have produced the terrorist threat. "This is a strategic
project that will take not years, but decades," say the authors.
It is easy to dismiss their vision as overly ambitious, given the depth of the
Mideast problems and the lack of Western policy agreement or coordination. Most
observers favor a more circumscribed approach that keeps the danger contained.
Yet it's hard to disagree with the logic that without such a broader plan the
U.S. will be endlessly cutting off terrorist branches without ever getting to
the roots. And the authors remind us that no one thought it possible to have a
democratic Russia and a reunified Europe when Harry Truman helped create NATO
in 1949.
America had to watch two world wars produce 50 million deaths before it
committed itself to Europe's transformation. What's clear, however, is that if
NATO doesn't begin to tackle this new challenge, then its historic enlargement
in Prague could mark the beginning of the alliance's end instead of the opening
of a bold, new chapter.
What's important in the groundbreaking public-opinion poll that showed the
trans-Atlantic closeness of views, known as Worldview 2002, is that national
leaders would find a ready public for such an initiative. The survey of 9,000
Europeans and Americans, undertaken by the Council of Foreign Relations and the
German Marshall Fund of America, shows some 75% of the Americans who were
questioned favor using U.S. troops to overthrow Saddam Hussein, but only 20 %
reckon the U.S. should do it alone.
Some 65% of the Americans and 60% of Europeans questioned say the U.S. should
only invade Iraq with U.N. approval and allied support. A clear majority of
allegedly pacifist Europeans would back military force to destroy a terrorist
camp and a far greater number of Europeans than Americans would condone force
to address humanitarian problems.
Europeans also back NATO, even more strongly than Americans. Some 69% of them
consider it essential, compared to 56% of Americans. And both sides of the
Atlantic support expansion of the alliance this autumn to include all the
candidate countries and, most interestingly, of one important non-candidate,
Russia (60% of Europeans and 68% of Americans are in favor).
To be sure, the poll also has plenty of warning bells for policy makers.
Europeans aren't willing to increase their defense spending, they have
misgivings about Bush administration leadership and they disagree among
themselves about the role Europe should play on the world stage (91% of French
want it to be a superpower, but only 48% of Germans).
But perhaps the greatest impediment to a grand Mideast strategy, however, is
differences over Israel. In measuring warmth toward countries on a thermometer
where 100 indicates a warm, favorable feeling, Americans gave Israel a 55. The
European average on Israel is 38, with Germany Poland giving Israel the lowest
grades and the U.K., France and Italy near the high end. The poll's organizers
haven't yet released another statistic that shows twice as many Europeans support
a Palestinian state as Americans.
What underlies these differences is some ugly history and strategic
differences. Many in Europe believe Ariel Sharon and Israeli-occupied
territories lie at the heart of the Mideast problem, although they agree that
even Israel's disappearance from the map wouldn't solve the region's core
problems.
But it will inescapably be on the crucible of the Middle East that the new
Western unity will be forged. Messrs. Asmus and Pollack say that "many of
the regimes in the region are failing, and one of the consequences of their
failures is a growing, possibly existential and unacceptable threat to our
countries.... While most of the world marches forward into the 21st century,
the Middle East clings to the 14th."
Their proposed policy suggests five initiatives:
Afghanistan. They see the West's success in repairing Afghanistan as key to
achieving a broader strategy. If it walks away from nation-building there,
allies would rightfully ask how it could ever stay the course in rebuilding a
post-Saddam Iraq.
Arab-Israeli Conflict. The U.S. and Europe need to bury their differences and
make a more determined and sustained effort to address the Arab-Israel
conflict. George W. Bush may be right that the Palestinian leadership has to go
at some point, but until that happens the West needs to help get the conflict
under control so that it doesn't impede actions elsewhere in the region.
Iraq. Saddam Hussein and his regime must go. That's going to require a
full-scale invasion of Iraq. The success of this operation, however, will
depend deeply on European agreement and participation in some form. Even if
American can pull off military success alone, reconstruction will be a chance
to demonstrate the trans-Atlantic community's determination to promote
pluralistic, economically liberal civil societies in the region.
Iran. America and Europe are often at odds over how to handle Iran, but what's
clear is that Iranian regime change is necessary. That said, the authors
believe it "is only a matter of time and demographics" for this to
happen. In the meantime, however, the allies need a concerted policy that
doesn't continue to reward Iran's anti-Western theocracy, which is still part
of the threat.
Friends and allies. The West would lose credibility if it unseats Saddam and
helps create a new Iraq while allowing its friends and allies, such as Saudi
Arabia and Egypt, to remain unchanged. The West can't force change on a wholly
reluctant region, but the authors note a recent paper written by 22 Arab social
scientists (and sponsored by the United Nations Development Program) that
identifies regional ailments and suggests remedies. The idea is to
"empower those striving for change and provide them with the support
necessary to achieve it."
Sound too utopian? Perhaps, says Mr. Asmus, now at the German Marshall Fund of
America. "You set the vision in a strategic direction and you see how far
you get. Even Utopian goals become reachable over time if you have a sustained
and smart strategy." And the alternative is unacceptable: An America that
goes it alone against impossible odds and a Europe that remains on the
sidelines until some 21st-century Pearl Harbor wrenches it from its slumber.
-
Fred.kempe@wsj.com.
Wall Street Journal
September 5, 2002
Politics & People
Iraq: Where Have All The Democrats Gone?
By Al Hunt
On a television program last weekend, I asked John Podesta why the current debate over Iraq was dominated by Republicans with Democrats mainly bystanders.
We are "a little bit bemused at . . . the Freudian psychodrama that's been going on between Bush 41 and Bush 43," replied the former Clinton chief of staff, quickly adding that the Democrats are "talking about a different kind of regime change, one that deals more with the president's economic team."
That has been the Democratic posture on the emerging debate over war in Iraq: Let Republicans fight it out. Iraq is important, noted Sen. Edward Kennedy, but "we can't let it replace the domestic agenda." This view is unacceptable; the stakes are too large.
The Democrats confidently expect to benefit in the November elections. With concern soaring about health care, corporate corruption and the economy, the president wants to cushion the blow from recent stock market declines; never mind that the market has more than doubled since 1993 when the Clinton administration increased taxes.
With the economy still stalling the Bush answer is -- this isn't a tough one -- more tax cuts tilted to the wealthy. These expected initiatives would exacerbate the fiscal plight of the federal and state governments and not do much to boost the economy or stock markets. But it's his one-size-fits-all panacea. Want to eradicate the West Nile virus? Cut capital gains taxes.
On foreign policy, once considered this administration's forte, the daily sniping reveals a national security team even more divided than the George Shultz-Cap Weinberger conflict 20 years ago; with Iraq the stakes are higher. The president broke no new ground in meeting with congressional leaders yesterday, but may in a United Nations speech next week.
But other than a few like Senate Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Joe Biden, who has launched hearings, and former Clinton U.N. Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, who laid out a strategic, multinational approach, what is the Democratic take on Iraq? There should be a congressional resolution, a full-scale debate and consideration of consequences. Yet the president says he will take the issue to Congress (a political, and probably a constitutional, requirement); there already is a debate raging, and who's against weighing the consequences?
We're getting Democratic doublespeak. Former Vice President Al Gore says he's all for "the overthrow of Saddam," but "the principle of 'first things first' does apply." North Carolina Sen. John Edwards thinks Americans will support "whatever action is necessary," but argues it'd be "very helpful" to have the support of Saudi Arabia. House Democratic Leader Dick Gephardt says he shares "President Bush's resolve to confront this menace head-on," but later says the president has not made the case.
The Democrats' timidity is unnecessary even politically. There was a heated debate in 1991 over the Gulf War and most Democrats -- including Dick Gephardt and Tom Daschle -- opposed the first Bush administration's war plans. President Bush waged a highly successful and quick -- if abbreviated -- war, threw Saddam out of Kuwait, and not a single Democrat suffered from their position.
Moreover, to suggest Democrats cannot stake out a position on Iraq and still focus on Mr. Bush's domestic weaknesses is to ignore history; you can walk and chew gum at the same time.
Iraq poses two potentially grave risks: Sending hundreds of thousands of young American men and women into harm's way, destabilizing important allies, then requiring a lengthy and costly occupation of Iraq -- former Reagan Navy Secretary Jim Webb charged that occupation would weaken America's security interests elsewhere, and for decades America would have "50,000 terrorist targets." Or we allow a genuinely evil despot to continue to develop lethal weapons which, under the best case, he would use as dangerous political leverage in a strategically critical region. Top Democrats need to come down in one of three camps:
• Containment: A few Democrats like maverick Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich oppose any conflict with Iraq. The more likely position will be "we have Saddam in a box," for more than 11 years he has been too weak to pose a threat to his neighbors, and the only way he'll use weapons of mass destruction is if attacked. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin is headed here.
• Coalitionists: This is the Holbrooke (and the Jim Baker) position: The road to Baghdad leads through the United Nations and the U.S. must try to assemble international support. Mr. Holbrooke believes it's politically critical to seek an unconditional, no-notice resumption of U.N. inspectors in Iraq. If this is blocked in the U.N., or if Saddam then thwarts this initiative -- one of which Mr. Holbrooke finds inevitable -- then the U.S. would have more standing when it attacks Iraq. Soon Sen. John Kerry, one of the few Democrats willing to criticize the administration's national security team, which he considers unfocused, will take a similar stand. The decorated Vietnam veteran will argue domestic and international legitimacy are essential before going to war.
• Confrontationists: The case was outlined by Vice President Cheney last week that any effort to appease Saddam would pose more of a risk. As for international support, the hawks approvingly cite Don Rumsfeld's argument that "leadership in the right direction finds followers and supporters." Look for Sen. Joe Lieberman to be in this camp.
More than a few Democratic politicians really believe that George W. Bush is over his head in this critical debate, that political guru Karl Rove carries as much weight as Don Rumsfeld or Colin Powell. Far more than his oft-maligned predecessor, they argue the Bush presidency, pandering to the social right on hot button issues, or protectionist sentiment in important electoral states, is driven by political calculations.
Maybe. But that's a tough case to make if you're MIA on the biggest issue of the day.
Wall Street Journal
September 5, 2002
Some Democrats Show Signs They Will Oppose
Bush Plans
By John Harwood and Shailagh Murray, Staff Reporters of The Wall Street Journal
WASHINGTON -- Now that President Bush has agreed to seek congressional backing for any action in Iraq, his political adversaries must weigh the risks of opposing him. And there were signs Wednesday that some key Democrats will do just that.
Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle signaled his skepticism, saying "I know of no additional information ... so compelling that it would commit the United States" to a pre-emptive strike to oust the Iraqi leader. House Minority Whip Nancy Pelosi voiced similar reservations.
And one 2004 Democratic presidential prospect, Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, declared that "there's substantial doubt that [Saddam Hussein] is as much of a threat as the Bush administration claims." Though Americans might initially rally to military action, "that support will be very short-lived once American kids start coming home in boxes," Mr. Dean warned Wednesday as he campaigned in Iowa.
Increasing Pressure
In recent weeks, congressional debate on whether to go to war has been muted while lawmakers insisted on the right to be consulted, and while proponents and skeptics within the Bush administration conducted their own quasi-public debate. The back-and-forth over the process of consultation allowed Democrats to preserve their yearlong stance of shunning argument with the president on national security, where he enjoys overwhelming public support.
But Mr. Bush's statements Wednesday, if not resolving all procedural questions, may serve to increase pressure on his critics to take a stand. And the prospect of a U.S. invasion of Iraq without unified backing from U.S. allies, the risk of backlash from other Arab nations and uncertainty about the costs of sustaining a new regime provide a wide range of potential opposing arguments for Republican mavericks and Democratic doves.
Prediction of Support
Most analysts predict, as White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer did Wednesday, that Congress ultimately will back military action just as it did before the Gulf War 11 years ago. The level of support will likely depend on how sweeping an endorsement Mr. Bush is looking for -- and whether the White House is also willing to seek United Nations backing before it launches any attack.
One top Democratic strategist in the Republican-controlled House forecast that a resolution of support will garner roughly 350 votes in favor -- including that of House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, another 2004 presidential prospect. Backing for Mr. Bush might be less lopsided in the Senate, which is narrowly controlled by Democrats.
But influential Democratic moderates, including Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, the party's 2000 vice presidential nominee, have signaled that they are likely to support the administration so long as the White House does a better job of arguing its case for action publicly.
"There's probably a persuasive case that can be made," said Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, like Messrs. Dean and Lieberman a 2004 presidential possibility. Mr. Bush "needs to tell us what the plan is," he said, but "I do believe at the end of the day that a regime change is necessary. Saddam Hussein has to be gone."
Hours after Mr. Bush's White House meeting with congressional leaders, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld went to Capitol Hill to argue the case against Iraq.
Some, like Republican Sen. Bob Bennett of Utah, credited the Pentagon chief with making the clearest presentation yet of the risks of inaction. But others said Mr. Rumsfeld offered no new information, spending much of the session briefing senators on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran. "It was not what we expected," said Sen. Thad Cochran (R., Miss.). Although senators raised many questions about Iraq -- some of the toughest came from Republicans, participants said -- Mr. Rumsfeld's noncommittal answers provided little reassurance. "I'm not prepared to vote on it today," said GOP Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, referring to the Iraq resolution.
Political Insulation
So far, Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, whose Vietnam service gives him substantial political insulation, has been one of the only members of Congress to directly challenge the White House's case for military action. While back home for the August recess, Mr. Hagel said he was peppered with questions about the administration's intentions. Constituents even stopped his car in parking lots. "It's a bigger issue than I think most people [in Washington] understand," he said. "There's an uneasiness that people have. A sense that something's not right."
Louisiana Democratic Sen. John Breaux invoked Ronald Reagan's admonition to "trust but verify," noting that Congress hasn't received verification that military action is necessary.
The debate is riskiest for Democrats, who face big challenges in their effort to regain control of Congress this November and to win back the White House in 2004. Mr. Daschle, who is pondering his own White House bid, acknowledged a general concern. "There are skeptics out there who wonder to what extent the political implications of any of this may affect the elections," Mr. Daschle said.
Democratic Concerns
For Democrats, dissent on Iraq could revive traditional concerns that they are weak on national-security issues. Though most Democrats opposed the 1991 Gulf War, all three who have run on the party's national ticket since then -- Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Mr. Lieberman -- backed military action.
Democrats with strong national-security credentials enjoy greater political freedom to challenge the administration. Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, a decorated Vietnam veteran who serves on the Foreign Relations Committee and is also exploring a 2004 presidential bid, noted that the U.S. need not "necessarily go to war" in order for Saddam "to be brought to heel."
"There's more than quote just making the case," that Saddam is a threat, Mr. Kerry said, adding that "I can't predict" whether Mr. Bush will ultimately make a persuasive case that a pre-emptive strike is called for. He also complained that the president's statement Wednesday that Congress should act before adjourning this fall represented a "completely inappropriate" deadline that carries "political connotations" in advance of the November elections.
'Blustering' on the Matter
Mr. Gore, who lost the presidency to Mr. Bush two years ago, had no comment Wednesday, said his spokesman Jano Cabrera. But in late July he voiced strong doubts about both the wisdom of a pre-emptive strike and the competence of the Bush administration's "blustering" on the matter.
"These people were supposed to be good at foreign policy," Mr. Gore told a group of young Democrats in Washington. "I don't think they are."
Washington Times
September 5, 2002
Pg. 11
Seven Eyed For NATO Status
Military, political obstacles remain
By Ted Hattori, The Washington Times
A new Senate staff report recommends admitting seven new members to NATO, adding momentum to the drive for an ambitious enlargement round when the 19-nation alliance gathers for a summit in Prague in November.
But the report to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Times, cautioned that several of the applicants posed serious military or political challenges for NATO, and that pressure should be kept on all seven Eastern European nations to meet even minimal defense-spending targets.
"Despite the pledges to meet the financial requirements, we remain skeptical of the will of each of the candidates to meet this goal once membership is granted," Patricia McNerney, the committee's Republican staff director, and David Merkel, a senior staffer for the committee, said in their report.
The seven countries are the three Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, plus Slovakia, Slovenia, Romania and Bulgaria.
Albania and Macedonia are also among the formal candidates, but few give either much chance of receiving an invitation at Prague.
The Bush administration has prodded reluctant NATO allies in Europe to agree to the largest round of expansion in the history of the 53-year-old alliance, and the first since Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic were invited to join in 1997.
The staff recommendation, which followed a tour of all the candidate countries, was sent Aug. 30 to committee Chairman Joseph R. Biden Jr., Delaware Democrat, and ranking Republican Sen. Jesse Helms of North Carolina.
Surveying the seven applicants, the report found that each poses problems as well as opportunities for NATO.
Corruption remains a serious problem in Romania, while a possible comeback by authoritarian Slovak politician Vladimir Meciar in this month's elections could complicate that country's NATO hopes. Slovenia, the report said, has only recently begun to rally public support for NATO after failing to secure membership in 1997.
More generally, the staffers found, there was a mismatch among the NATO hopefuls over what they could offer the alliance in security matters and in political terms.
"As a general matter, we found that those countries with strong assets to contribute militarily specifically Romania and Bulgaria, have more serious work remaining to develop and modernize their democratic institutions," the authors noted.
They said the countries "with strong democratic institutions, market economies, and the rule of law do not add significantly to the overall military posture of the alliance."
The report noted that many of the fears of those opposed to a major NATO expansion to the east have eased. Russia's opposition to the three Baltic candidates has softened markedly as relations between Washington and Moscow have improved in recent months.
The enlargement question has helped fuel a larger debate on the future of NATO, which no longer has its Cold War mission and has not been a major factor in the Bush administration's global war on terrorism.
Taking on new, militarily minor members only sharpens the question of NATO's effectiveness as a security force, according to Guillaume Parmentier, an analyst at the French Institute for International Relations, writing in the recent NATO Review.
Top al
Qaida leaders interviewed
From the International
Desk
Published 9/5/2002 8:24
PM
View
printer-friendly version
WASHINGTON, Sept. 5 (UPI)
-- An Arabic language satellite television station Thursday previewed an
interview with two top al Qaida leaders filmed secretly in Karachi, Pakistan.
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and
Ramzi Binalshibh, who served in Osama bin Laden's network, spoke to the al
Jazeera news channel from a hidden location in an interview that the station
says will be continued next week.
Al Jazeera, based in Qatar,
interviewed the two for its program "Top Secret," after al Qaida
operatives brought the interviewer blindfolded to a Karachi apartment. Mohammed
met him at the door and took him down a long hallway to Binalshibh, who was
ensconced on the floor of a small room.
In the second part of the
investigative program, the station says the two will speak publicly for the
first time about last September's suicide hijacking attacks on New York and
Washington.
Shortly after the attacks,
in which four U.S. jetliners were hijacked and crashed into the twin towers of
New York's World Trade Center, the Pentagon and in rural Pennsylvania, U.S.
officials charged that bin Laden was the mastermind of the plot that carried
out by cells of al Qaida. Just over 3,000 people died in the attacks.
Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, a
Kuwaiti citizen, who is on the FBI's most-wanted list and has a $25 million
bounty on his head, undertook a central planning role in the attacks, according
to U.S. officials. In addition, he was indicted in 1996 for allegedly plotting
the year before to use explosives on airliners flying to the United States from
Southeast Asia.
Ramzi Binalshibh, according
to an indictment from German authorities, was part of a Hamburg-based cell,
preparing the hijacking attacks. The United States sent out a worldwide alert
for Binalshibh after they unearthed a videotape of him that U.S. officials said
was found in an al Qaida leader's house in Afghanistan. He purportedly
delivered a martyrdom message on that tape. He is also on the FBI's most-wanted
list.
Al Jazeera said in advance
of the program that the two men in the interview described in detail how al
Qaida planned and carried out the attacks on what they call "Holy
Tuesday." The interviews were conducted recently, the station said. It did
not specify when, and did not explain how footage for the program -- including
video pictures of the blindfolded interviewer in a car and climbing the
staircase to the apartment -- was shot.
In a statement distributed
Thursday, al Jazeera said the men interviewed were the head of al Qaida's
military committee and the coordinator of the Sept. 11 operation.
The "Top Secret,"
program also included interviews with Lyndon LaRouche, the controversial
conspiracy theorist and editor of Executive Intelligence Review, French author
Thierry Meyssan, who has penned a book questioning the U.S. government's
account of the Sept. 11 attacks, former CIA chief of counter-terrorism
operations, Vince Cannistraro, who said he actually saw American Airlines
Flight 77 hit the Pentagon, and the father of Mohammed Atta, who is thought to
have been the leader of the 19 hijackers.
Atta's father, an Egyptian
lawyer interviewed in Cairo, charged that the United States was behind the
disappearance of his son and said the U.S. government had hatched a conspiracy
to blame Muslim fundamentalists for the attacks in New York and Washington.
Thursday's program was
monitored in Washington by United Press International. Al Jazeera says the second
part will air in one week, on Sept. 12.
Sept 11:
Russia's 'Muslim problem'
By Anthony Louis
From the International
Desk
Published 9/5/2002 8:23
PM
View
printer-friendly version
(Part of UPI's Special
Report on Sept. 11)
MOSCOW (UPI) -- Russia has
seen a growing tide of anti-Muslim sentiment in the form of racist attacks
against Muslim civilians and a crackdown against separatism in the restive
province of Chechnya following the U.S.-declared war on terrorism.
After Sept. 11, Russia saw
a much greater resonance for its claims that a significant threat is posed by
the spread of Islamic fundamentalism inside the country, particularly in the
predominantly Muslim autonomous republics in central Russia.
Some 20 million of Russia's
143 million people are Muslim and they are a majority in seven Russian
republics, including Chechnya and Tatarstan. Most practice a tolerant form of
the religion, but the authorities fear a small number would follow more
extremist factions.
Those fears come as Russian
authorities learned that seven of the several hundred suspected al Qaida and
Taliban members being held in the U.S. naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are
Russian.
The detained citizens are
Muslims from the autonomous republics of Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Mordovia and
Kabardino-Balkariya who had been recruited by radical Islamic organizations and
trained to fight for al Qaida, eventually finding their way to Afghanistan.
Al Qaida was held
responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that
killed 3,000 people. The United States ousted al Qaida's Taliban patrons from
power in Afghanistan late last year.
Officials in Moscow
investigating the activities of religious centers and schools in Tatarstan,
Bashkortostan and other republics in central Russia learned that a number of
students had been recruited from these centers, some of which received funding
from Wahhabi organizations in Saudi Arabia.
Russian authorities say the
recruits were encouraged to accept Wahhabism -- the highly puritanical Saudi
form of Islam which is also followed by al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden -- and
to travel to Chechnya and Dagestan in the north Caucasus, where they picked up
weapons and joined groups of rebels fighting Russian forces. Other recruits of
fundamentalist Islamic sects reportedly joined groups in Turkey and the Middle
East and eventually heading to Afghanistan, where al Qaida had set up training
camps.
"If extremist forces
manage to get a hold in the Caucasus," Putin said last year, "this
infection may spread up the Volga River, spread to other republics, and we
either face the full Islamization of Russia, or we will have to agree to
Russia's division into several independent states."
But experts say poverty in
the region is the real reason for the instability.
"The emergence of
Islamic militant groups is not the root cause of instability in Eurasia,"
said Fiona Hill a fellow at the Brookings Institution in an article in the
Orlando Sentinel in May 2001. "The real causes are abject and worsening
poverty, and the fragility of political institutions."
However, nationalist fears
combined with reports of terrorist attacks and atrocities by rebels from the
breakaway republic of Chechnya have given rise to resentment and xenophobia in
large Russian cities with significant Muslim minorities.
Over the past year,
skinheads and neo-fascists -- under the slogan "Russia for the Russians"
-- have staged unprovoked attacks on Muslims in markets and on the streets of
Moscow and other cities.
The increasing violence has
prompted Putin to decree new laws against racism and stiffen punishment for
convicted offenders charged with racially motivated hate crimes.
Dark-skinned residents of
Moscow and other large cities say they are now afraid to walk down the street
at night, following severe beatings and even murders of Azerbaijani, Tajik and
other Muslim traders assailed by gangs of Russian youths.
While the authorities have
been careful to prevent outbursts of seething racism toward Muslims, non-ethnic
Russians claim they are subject to frequent identity checks and needless
harassment by police.
On several occasions,
Muslims attacked by Russian toughs say the police walked by, ignoring the
assault, or let the assailants slip away after the attack. Police officials
dismiss the reports, but Muslims victims say a certain percentage of police
silently supports nationalist groups.
"Until the authorities
address racist attitudes within law enforcement agencies, they will continue to
be part of the problem, rather than the solution," the human rights group
Amnesty International said in a statement in April.
Muslims also say there is a
rising tide of anti-Muslim sentiment in Russia.
Recently, Putin banned
Muslim women from having document photographs taken with their headscarves on.
In August, he settled a
long-running dispute, telling the World Tatar Conference in Kazan that every
Russian citizen "must follow a single national and social standard."
A group of women in
Tatarstan, where 51 percent of the population is Muslim, decided to challenge
the ban on wearing headgear in official identity photographs in court.
Tatars also see folly in a
controversial decision by national census-takers to split Tatars into smaller
ethnic groups by asking the population to identify itself as members of
distinct ethnic groups. They consider this a discriminatory manipulation of
statistics that will result in Russians being listed as the most populous
ethnic group in some regions dominated by Muslims.
Also, after Sept. 11,
Putin's support of U.S. plans to strike and wipe out al Qaida bases in
Taliban-controlled Afghanistan gave Russia significant leeway in handling its
own growing problems with Islamic fundamentalism.
The Bush administration has
noticeably watered down its tone of criticism of the Russian military's actions
in Chechnya while the Kremlin has been able to champion its view that rebels
battling Russian federal forces are led by al Qaida-trained masterminds.
Moscow insists that al
Qaida operatives are active in the North Caucasus and the military has shown
documents belonging to Arab mercenaries and Muslim sharpshooters from around
the world killed in fighting in Chechnya.
Followers of Wahhabism have
been filmed declaring their intention to set up a fundamentalist Islamic
emirate spanning the North Caucasus, pledging to fight until victory or death.
Putin also says neighboring
Georgia is harboring hundreds of mercenaries and possibly al Qaida training
camps in the Pankisi Gorge, which lies just south of Chechnya, but out of reach
of the Russian military.
Kremlin spokesmen and both
the Russian defense and foreign ministers have gone so far as to call the Pankisi
Gorge a "wasp's nest" of "international terrorists"
preparing to launch an attack on Russian territory.
Although Georgia has turned
down repeated offers from Moscow to send Russian troops there to wipe out the
rebel bases, a recent sweep of the gorge Georgian forces resulted in the arrest
of a Moroccan-born Frenchman who, Georgian security officials said, was an al
Qaida member.
Sept. 11:
Bush -- remake Middle East
By Martin Sieff
UPI Senior News Analyst
From the International
Desk
Published 9/5/2002 5:44
PM
View
printer-friendly version
(Part of UPI's Special
Package on Sept. 11)
WASHINGTON (UPI) -- The
terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 a year ago set in motion a convulsive upheaval
that transformed U.S. policymaking toward the Middle East.
Before then, cautious old
"Bush I" internationalists were in charge and they focused on ending
the Israel-Arab conflict. After the dust from the policy battles after Sept. 11
cleared, radical "Bush II" visionaries were in the saddle and their
focus was on transforming Iraq and maybe Saudi Arabia, too.
When those two hijacked
airliners were smashed into the gleaming, towering sides of the World Trade
Towers, Secretary of State Colin Powell eagerly was looking forward to making
what he believed would be a historic speech within a few days at the annual
General Assembly of the United Nations. Powell intended to commit the United States
more publicly and firmly than ever before to supporting the creation of an
independent Palestinian state.
The fact President George
W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice, his national security advsier, had approved so
dramatic an initiative -- and one that so reversed the policies they had come
into office determined to implement eight months before -- reflected Powell's
dominant standing in administration foreign policy making at that time.
It also reflected the very
traditional perspectives through which policymakers in the White House and
National Security Council, as well as in the State Department, still viewed
Middle East issues. Resolving the Israel-Arab conflict still was seen as the
overriding primary concern. Despite the evident desire of Bush, Vice President
Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- and his team of
super-hawks at the Pentagon -- to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein as soon
as possible, that issue had far lower priority.
The issue of combatting and
defending against Middle East-based terrorism did not exist on the
administration's radar screen. The Pentagon hawks in particular were oblivious
to it. Only two days before Sept. 11, Rumsfeld had threatened to urge Bush to
veto a proposed Senate plan to divert $600 million from anti-ballistic missile
defense to fund better counter-terrorism measures.
After Sept. 11, a far
different picture emerged but it took months of dramatic war on the other side
of the world and ferocious political infighting in Washington before the
radically changed new picture became clear.
The first priority after
the horrific events of that beautiful, bright early fall morning, which claimed
some 3,000 lives, was to hunt down the terrorist organization responsible. This
proved to be al Qaida, led by Osama bin Laden, which was based in a remarkable
cave complex at Tora Bora in eastern Afghanistan, protected by the Islamic
extremist Taliban regime in Kabul.
For once, arch rivals
Powell and Rumsfeld cooperated with remarkable smoothness and effectiveness -- a
phenomenon seen neither before nor since. Powell marshalled an enormous,
virtually wall-to-wall international coalition to support U.S. plans to topple
the Taliban and destroy al Qaida in its lair. Pakistani and Russian cooperation
proved of special importance in allowing U.S. military power to be projected
into the traditionally most remote nation of Central Asia, which historically
had resisted prolonged foreign occupation since the days of Alexander the
Great. Even the Soviet Red Army had been forced to withdraw after only eight
years in the face of ferocious guerrilla resistance.
Within four months of the
terror attacks, U.S. air power and Special Forces operating in Afghanistan had
enabled the Taliban's tribal enemies, the Russian-backed Northern Alliance, to
occupy Kabul and topple the Taliban from power. U.S.-backed Alliance forces
then destroyed the Tora Bora cave complex. The first driving aim of U.S. policy
in the post-Sept. 11 world appeared to have been achieved.
In fact, at least 90
percent of al Qaida forces, including all its top leaders apart from a couple
killed in previous U.S. bombing, escaped. The Pakistani Army proved reluctant
-- to put it mildly --to prevent them from breaking through to safety.
Meanwhile, back in
Washington, U.S. policymakers debated anew how to deal with the Middle East in
the dramatically changed world with which they now were confronted.
Powell and his mainly
professional Foreign Service officials at State still wanted to defuse the
Israel-Arab conflict first. But Rumsfeld, his aggressive deputy Paul Wolfowitz
and their civilian colleagues at the Pentagon had bolder, far more ambitious
plans. Evidence to connect Saddam indisputably to the Sept. 11 attacks could
not be found but even if there was not a smoking gun, there still was a lot of
suspicious smoke.
Saddam had operated a
terrorist training complex near Baghdad where would-be terrorists were taught
how to fly hijacked airliners into buildings. One Iraqi intelligence official
had met a Sept. 11 plot mastermind at least twice in the years before the
attacks. And beyond all this, Saddam clearly was intent on developing the
weapons of mass destruction -- atomic, biological and chemical weapons, the
so-called "ABC arsenal" -- that could inflict scores of thousands or
even millions of casualties on American cities in some future attack.
Also, Bush's administration
was dominated by officials who under his father had directed the Gulf War
against Iraq a decade before but then prevented Gen. Norman Schwartzkopf's
victorious army from sweeping on to Baghdad to topple Saddam. They were now
divided. Powell opposed attacking Iraq in 2001 or 2002, just as he had at first
opposed the war to liberate Kuwait and then won the argument not to drive on to
Baghdad a decade before. On the other side, Vice President Dick Cheney,
Wolfowitz and others were determined to now finish the job.
Powell at first seemed to
win the debate within the administration after Sept. 11, when a troubled
president turned to him for support. But he opposed allowing the Northern
Alliance to capture Kabul and looked ridiculous when they did so within days of
him solemnly warning them not to. Then, one ill-conceived Israel-Palestinian
peace initiative after another he attempted blew up in his face as soon as he
launched it. His repeated efforts to prevent Israel from retaliating against an
unprecedented wave of suicide terror bomb attacks, which slaughtered hundreds
of Israeli civilians, played badly with his stature and influence too.
Powell had wanted to create
and personally preside over a prestigious international conference, preferably
held in Muslim but pro-Israel Turkey, in summer 2002 at which the independent
Palestinian State he visualized would be well and truly launched.
But Bush, Cheney and Rice,
after considering this scheme, decisively abandoned it. Bush, in particular,
appeared disgusted by the continued Palestinian attacks targeting Israeli
civilians, and the evident unwillingness or inability -- or both -- of
Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat to do anything about it.
Instead, when the president
finally did launch his own personal peace plan on June 24, the emphasis was not
on forcing Israel to swallow more sweeping concessions to the Palestinians, as
Powell had intended. Instead, the focus was on forcing the Palestinians to
reject Arafat as their leader and elect one prepared to maintain democratic
standards and honor agreements with Israel. No one in the administration
publicly said it, but every one knew Powell had been entirely emasculated in
Middle East policy making.
As Powell's influence fell,
that of far more radical figures in the administration grew. On June 1 at West
Point, Bush gave a speech that reflected how far Sept. 11 had intensified his
always-Manichean view of a world divided between black and white,
incontrovertible good and abject, unmitigated evil.
"The war on terror
will not be won on the defensive," the president said. And he pledged to
bring the battle to the enemy, disrupt his plans and confront the worst threats
before they emerge."
This new "Bush
Doctrine" clearly marked a dramatic victory for the "Attack
Iraq" hawks. But it had far more sweeping implications. It even appeared
to open the way for possible future preemptive wars to be launched against
nations such as Iran, China, or even Russia under some possible anti-Western
and fiercely nationalist successor to current President Vladimir Putin.
Although Bush and his top
officials have been careful not to commit themselves in public on their plans
for a post-Saddam Iraq and Middle East, there are increasing signs their
developing views are very radical indeed.
David Wurmser, adviser to
Under Secretary of State John Bolton, has no clout at all with Powell or his
two top advisers, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Director of
Policy Planning Richard Haas. But Wolfowitz, Under Secretary of Defense for
Policy Douglas Feith, and other influential Pentagon planners eagerly have
adopted his arguments.
Wurmser, in the past,
publicly advocated "rewarding" the Hashemite kingdom of Jordan with
chunks of a partitioned Iraq -- and also of a partitioned Syria. Now,
administration insiders said, he has found Jordan's current king, Abdullah II,
too independently minded and intractable to "reward" and has switched
to favoring making the king's uncle, Prince Hassan, the new king of Iraq
instead.
Meanwhile, Rumsfeld,
Wolfowitz and Feith's favorite Pentagon Middle East analyst, Harold Rhode,
always has urged using pro-Western, democratic Turkey as a key U.S. ally from
which to project power against Iraq. The traditionally Turko-phile Wolfowitz
and Feith eagerly support this idea.
In recent weeks, reports
even have emerged that Laurent Murawiec, a previously obscure French
intellectual and ex-disciple of Lyndon LaRouche, had addressed the highly
influential Pentagon Policy Advisory Board with the recommendation Saudi Arabia
itself be partitioned and a pro-Western democracy set up in its oil rich
Eastern Province. None of the influential figures attending the meeting, including
former National Security Adviser Richard Allen, apparently expressed any shock,
outrage or even disagreement at this wild proposal.
Taken together, all these
extraordinarily ambitious schemes amount to a plan for nation-building,
map-redrawing and social engineering across the entire Middle East more
ambitious than anything attempted in more than 80 years. Not since Winston
Churchill, then Britain's colonial secretary, created modern Iraq and Jordan
by, as he boasted at the time, "a stroke of the pen" in 1921 had any
government outside the region seriously considered anything so ambitious.
No U.S. president had given
himself over to such vast schemes since Woodrow Wilson and his aides had
redrawn the map of Europe with catastrophic results at the 1919 Versailles
Peace Conference. But the heady mixture of fear and terror after Sept. 11,
coupled with heady over-optimism after the almost casualty-free campaign in
Afghanistan that followed, clearly has gone to the heads of current
policymakers. Whether their visions will prove to be anything more than castles
in the sky remains to be seen.
--
(This analysis is part of
UPI's Special Package on the one-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terror
attacks).
-
Clinton: Get bin
Laden before pursuing Hussein
By CHELSEA J. CARTER Associated Press
Writer - (Published September 5, 2002)
SANTA ANA,
Calif. (AP) - Former President Bill Clinton urged the Bush administration
Thursday to finish the job with Osama bin Laden before taking on Iraq.
"Saddam Hussein didn't kill 3,100 people on Sept.
11," Clinton said. "Osama bin Laden did, and as far as we know he's
still alive."
Clinton made his remarks to several hundred people at a
$1,000-a-plate fund-raising event in Orange County for U.S. Rep. Loretta
Sanchez, D-Garden Grove.
Although Clinton told the audience he did not have access
to current intelligence information about Iraq, he said news reports citing
American officials say the al-Qaida network remained a threat.
"I also believe we might do more good for American
security in the short run at far less cost by beefing up our efforts in
Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere to flesh out the entire network,"
Clinton said.
Clinton said he supported President Bush's efforts in
Afghanistan, including military actions and support of the Afghan government.
He told people the real concern in Iraq was Hussein's
possible use of stockpiled chemical and biological weapons.
The former president reminded the audience of Hussein's
propensity to use the weapons in the past, citing an attack on the Kurds and
the Iran-Iraq war.
"He has maximum incentive not to use this
stuff," Clinton said. "If we go, he has maximum incentive to use it
because he knows he's going to lose."
FoxNews
New Intelligence Exposes
Saddam's Nuke Push
Friday, September 06, 2002
By Carl Cameron
WASHINGTON — Part of the new intelligence on Iraq gathered by the Bush administration to present to Congress includes additional information on how dangerously close Saddam Hussein has come to developing a nuclear weapon, Fox News has learned.
Other sources told Fox News that, in addition, there is new intelligence that Saddam has developed new means to deliver chemical and biological weapons and finally that there is intelligence information indicating that Saddam's regime has been in contact with Al Qaeda before and after the 9/11 terror attacks.
Surrounded by security, Vice President Dick Cheney and CIA Director George Tenet arrived on Capitol Hill Thursday to brief the top two lawmakers from each party in the House and Senate.
Afterward, Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., spoke to Fox News and said: "It was an important briefing -- there was some new information included in it. ... Is there evidence that he is getting prepared to be able to use biological, chemical and nuclear weapons and be able to deliver them? Yes!"
Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert seemed dour as he left the meeting -- and he also confirmed to Fox News that new intelligence about Saddam's threat and pursuit of weapons of mass destruction had been provided.
Despite the new information, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., told Fox News he remains reluctant to support military action.
While President Bush began taking his case for ousting Saddam to Americans outside the Beltway Thursday, members of his administration worked to energize a dialogue for action touched off this week by the White House.
"I take the fact that he [Saddam] develops weapons of mass destruction very seriously. I remember the fact that he has invaded two countries before. I know for a fact that he's poisoned his own people," Bush told his audience at a welcome rally in Louisville, Ky.
"He doesn't believe in the worth of each individual," he added. "He doesn't believe in public dissent."
Bush said Wednesday that he would seek congressional approval before any military action against Iraq. Sources told Fox News that two rough dates have been set for hearings by the House International Relations Committee -- one for closed-door, classified hearings with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Sept. 16; the other a week later on Sept. 23 for open hearings with Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Hastert confirmed Congress would indeed vote before the Nov. 5 midterm elections on how to deal with Saddam.
Richard Armitage, deputy secretary of state, told a Washington, D.C., luncheon audience Thursday that he believed it "very incumbent upon us to explain our case very well throughout the world, including the Arab world of course, and then to enlist as many like-minded folks to move forward with us," he said. "My own view is all of these efforts are better off done in a multilateral context."
Bush administration officials have also told Fox News that they are looking at a proposal that would utilize 50,000 troops to back up U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq as they attempt to assess the magnitude of Saddam's arsenal of weapons of mass destruction. Officials concede that it would be unlikely that the Iraqi dictator would go along with such a scheme.
Powell said the proposal did not come up in his discussions Thursday. He also said that the administration did not think it wise to prematurely "pigeonhole" any future move as multilateral or unilateral "but to make sure that the world understands the threat as clearly as we believe it should understand this threat, because it is a real one," he told reporters.
Meanwhile, Democrats on the Hill said Thursday that they are looking forward to the additional information the administration has promised to provide regarding its arguments that a regime change in Iraq is in order. Daschle told reporters that he hopes that Bush will seek out not only the support of congress, but that of the U.N. as well.
"I would think the United States would want to be in the same position it was at the point when we went to the U.N. in the early 90s [for the Persian Gulf War]," Daschle said. "If the international community supports it, if we can get the information we've been seeking, then I think we can move to a resolution.
"But short of that, I think it would be difficult for us to move until that information is provided and some indication of the level of international support is also evident," he added.
The White House certainly faces touch scrutiny of its plans, including that of former President Jimmy Carter, who declared in a Washington Post op-ed piece Thursday that "a unilateral war with Iraq is not the answer," and that such action would "alienate our necessary allies."
But Bush promised Wednesday to approach world leaders with his arguments for ousting the Iraqi dictator. He is meeting with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who has expressed agreement already that Saddam is a threat to global security, at Camp David this weekend. The president is also expected to make a speech before the U.N. on Sept. 13.
Arab League chief Amr Moussa charged Thursday that any strike by the U.S. would "open the gates of hell" in the Middle East, and urged Baghdad to readmit weapons inspectors.
"We will continue to work to avoid a military confrontation or a military action because we believe that it will open the gates of hell in the Middle East," he told reporters.
Meanwhile, it was reported today that the Army recently moved weaponry and war supplies from the Gulf nation of Qatar to a base in Kuwait near the Iraqi border to check their condition and test procedures that would be used in the event Bush orders preparations for war.
Army Secretary Thomas White said the movement was designed to periodically validate the condition of the military's weaponry and equipment, but "we've done nothing specifically against any particular scenario" for war.
Fox News' Andrew Hard and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
|
A Second Attack Planned French
Authorities: Moussaoui Plotted Another Series of Attacks
Sept. 5 — Zacharias
Moussaoui, a French citizen of Moroccan descent, was part of a second wave of
suicide hijackings planned for early 2002 in Europe and the United States,
French intelligence authorities told ABCNEWS, and they say the U.S. Justice
Department is making a mistake in identifying him as the so-called 20th
hijacker in the Sept. 11 attacks. |
|
Moussaoui is the only person charged by the United States
government as an accomplice with Osama bin Laden and the 19 hijackers in the
Sept. 11 suicide hijackings. "Moussaoui
was going to be a foot soldier in a second wave of attacks that was supposed
to culminate in early 2002 with simultaneous bombings against U.S. embassies
in Europe, the Middle East and Asia, as well as several hijackings in the
United States," said Alexis Debat, a former French Defense Ministry
official and ABCNEWS consultant. The assessment
is based on the recent interrogations of Moussaoui's al Qaeda associates,
including his alleged handler, now in custody in Europe. "The
people were trained, the cash was there. This was going to happen," said
Debat. "He was not part of the 9/11 plan." One year ago
today, in Paris, FBI and CIA agents got a full briefing on Moussaoui's terror
background from their counterparts at the French Ministry of the Interior in
Paris. In his first
interview on the subject, former French Interior Minister Daniel Vaillant
told ABCNEWS the French gave the Americans a complete dossier on Moussaoui. "We did
not hold back any information," said Vaillant. "This is the
essential point I want to communicate to you. There was nothing held
back." The French say
they told the United States they had tracked Moussaoui for years, from his
student days in London to his time in Osama bin Laden training camps in
Afghanistan to his membership in an Algerian terror group that had planned to
fly a hijacked Air France jet into the Eiffel Tower in 1994. The FBI
acknowledges there was a meeting but denies it received any such specific
information at that time. Later, the information showed up in the Justice
Department indictment of Moussaoui as conspirator of the Sept. 11 attacks,
for which he faces the death penalty. "All the
information was given just as soon as it became available in order to help American
authorities pre-empt attacks like what unfortunately was the awful tragedy of
Sept. 11," said Vaillant. "Maybe afterward there was a problem in
terms of poor use of the information we relayed, but this does not concern
the French authorities." In Custody
on Sept. 11 Moussaoui was
arrested a month before the attacks, on Aug. 16, 2001, on immigration
charges, after arousing suspicions with his flight training. Instructors at a
Minnesota flight school first tipped off the FBI in August about Moussaoui,
who showed up with lots of cash and no flying skills. FBI agents in
the field were immediately convinced Moussaoui was up to no good, so they
interviewed people at another flight school Moussaoui attended in Oklahoma.
At the time, lawyers at FBI headquarters turned down requests for a special
warrant to check Moussaoui's computer. After Sept. 11, however, the FBI found
his computer disks full of incriminating information, according to officials.
So while
Moussaoui sat in a jail in Minnesota, his case remained on the FBI back
burner and officials decided to turn him over to the French hoping they could
do more. He had been pleading with the French Consulate to facilitate his
return in the weeks prior to the Sept. 11 attacks. He actually had a flight
booked for a few days after Sept. 11. "It came
really close," said Debat. "On Sept. 11, Moussaoui had his plane
ticket back to France to be questioned, interrogated and detained in
France." Some say the
briefing American agents got one year ago this day was the last chance
authorities had to detect the al Qaeda plot to crash hijacked planes into
buildings. Whether or not
Moussaoui was supposed to be the 20th hijacker, officials believe he knew
what was coming. |
Pre - Emptive Strike on Iraq? Count NATO Out
By REUTERS
Filed at 3:48 p.m. ET
BRUSSELS, Belgium (Reuters) - Count NATO out if there is a preemptive strike on Iraq.
Officials say that even if the United States wanted to involve NATO -- which is unlikely -- it would have its work cut out making a case for offensive action by an alliance whose defining principle is self-defense.
NATO invoked its Article V mutual defense clause for the first time the day after the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington, but it was sidelined from the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan that followed.
An official at the 19-nation alliance, asked if Article V could be re-invoked for strikes on Iraq, replied ``There is no chance. ... We're talking preemptive action here and that's not part of NATO's doctrine.''
Article V of the Washington Treaty under which NATO was established in 1949 states that an armed attack against one ally or more in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack on all, legitimizing defensive action.
Diplomats said this left room for interpretation of what constitutes an attack, and if the United States did want to draw NATO into action against Iraq it could try to make a case.
``It's a legal and political question,'' said one western European diplomat at NATO's headquarters.
``How do you define an attack? Hostile intent? A shot fired? Where does clear and present danger start? If you could prove that Saddam was going to press the button on a biological weapon in the next 20 seconds, maybe you could justify action.''
NATO Secretary-General George Robertson made it clear at a meeting of defense ministers in June that the alliance would keep deterrence as its first option. ``We do not go out looking for problems to solve,'' he said.
AMBIGUOUS POLICY
However, the Center for European Security and Disarmament said in a recent newsletter that NATO's ``Strategic Concept,'' which was last updated in 1999, did not preclude preemptive action even if it did not specifically authorize it.
It noted that Robertson, pressed at a news conference to say whether NATO could take preemptive action, replied: ``Waiting for an attack to take place might not be the best choice.''
``The alliance is keeping its policy ambiguous to maximize its flexibility of response,'' the center said.
Diplomats say there is now a debate about whether to include preemptive action in the new version of NATO's ``Military Concept'' being drawn up for a summit in Prague in November.
The military concept is essentially a guide for NATO leaders giving a range of options for a range of possible threats.
Tim Garden of the Center for Defense Studies at King's College London said he expected the United States to push at the Prague summit for NATO to move toward preemption as an option.
``But I don't think it will get very far because European governments do not want to give America a blank check to carry out the kind of wars it wants,'' he said.
The center said that a recent NATO crisis management exercise -- in which a Middle Eastern country was ready to attack Turkey with biological and chemical weapons -- had underlined most allies' reluctance to be drawn into preemptive action.
``Facing the reluctance of the other allies to agree, ... the U.S. and Turkey declared themselves ready for such action, with or without the participation of others,'' it said.
Garden said several European allies, notably Germany, were firmly opposed to military action against Iraq.
In any case, the United States would not want to have its hands tied in Iraq by NATO allies.
``The United States would not wish to conduct a politically difficult operation in Iraq with all the constraints that NATO would bring,'' he said. ``The Americans felt they had problems getting clearance from other members in Kosovo: they will want to do Iraq their way, just as they did in Afghanistan.''
Morgan Stanley Dean Witter
<>Global:
One Year Later
Stephen Roach (New York)
The world tilted on September 11,
2001. The terrorist attacks on America shattered the innocence of the post-Cold
War era. A US-centric global economy was subjected to new and uncertain
strains. Since then, the world’s growth engine has continued to sputter, and
globalization -- the glue that binds the world together -- has come under
heightened pressure. But resilience has also been an unmistakable feature of
the post-9-11 world. The global economy shuddered but did not tumble into the
abyss. The passage of a year offers a fresh perspective on the impacts of the
devastating shock of a year ago. What have we learned?
For starters, financial markets have
certainly hunkered down in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks. Global
equities are still down about 13% from their September 10, 2001 levels
(dollar-based ACWI index). Not surprisingly the US -- which still accounts for
54% of world equity market capitalization -- has led the way. The S&P 500
remains some 16% below its pre-attack reading, whereas the Nasdaq is off some
22% (the Dow is down only 10%). With the Federal Reserve slashing the overnight
lending rate by 175 bp in the aftermath of 9-11, US long-term interest rates
are about 70 bp lower for a 10-year Treasury. However, with yields on the
2-year Treasury note down some 135 bp over the same period, fixed income
markets are now betting on a Fed that is a good deal more accommodative than
was thought to be the case a year ago. The dollar is a bit weaker, especially
against the euro. All this speaks of markets that are now discounting a more
tepid recovery in a US-centric world economy.
We’re all prone to hyperbole in the
midst of a shock -- especially one as painful and disturbing as the events of
last fall. I will be the first to confess that I am guilty of that, myself. I
stressed two conclusions in the immediate aftermath of 9-11 that bear special
scrutiny in that regard -- the first being that the terrorist attack
"seal(ed) the fate of the American consumer" (see my 12 September
2001 essay "The Macro of Tragedy and Healing"). Contrary to that dour
prognosis, the US consumer stepped up and spent with a vengeance in the weeks
and months immediately after 9-11. Real consumption surged at a 6.0% annual
rate in 4Q01 -- the fastest pace ever recorded for a US economy in recession.
While consumption growth subsequently slowed to a 2.5% annual rate in the first
half of 2002, the monthly data -- namely, a +1.0 % surge in July alone -- point
to a renewed acceleration this summer. Shock, or not, the American consumer
seems to spending with the same reckless abandon as ever.
I guess that’s the basic point --
reckless abandon. With the benefit of hindsight, I would now argue that the
post-shock response of the American consumer puts the endgame into even sharper
focus. This spending binge has come at a real cost -- more debt, depressed
saving, big federal budget deficits, and an increasingly voracious appetite to
extract purchasing power from asset appreciation. Household sector debt now
stands in excess of 75% of US GDP -- an all-time record and fully ten
percentage points above the debt load of a decade ago. Debt-service-to-income
ratios are within a tick of their all-time highs -- all the more astounding
since short-term market interest rates are at 40-year lows. The personal saving
rate was up a bit -- at least for a while. But this was mainly traceable to
massive tax cuts, which had the effect of shifting saving from the public
sector (i.e., budget surpluses) to the private sector. My estimates suggest
that excluding the impacts of the recent tax cut, the personal saving rate
would have risen only to about 2% -- half the published 3.9% rate in 2Q02 (see
my 7 August dispatch, "Rearranging the Deck Chairs"). Meanwhile,
courtesy of July’s spending binge, the personal saving rate plunged to 3.4%,
its lowest reading of the year.
It is this type of behavior that I
still believe "seals the fate" of the over-extended American
consumer. The counter argument is that consumers are nimble enough to draw
freely from the windfall gains of another spectacular home mortgage refinancing
cycle. The presumption is that consumers can forever augment their wage-based
purchasing power by relying on the combination of asset appreciation and tax
cuts. It overlooks the legacy of those actions -- a massive build-up of public
and private sector debt that is required to extract purchasing power from
over-valued assets. Consumers played that game during the equity bubble of the
late 1990s and are now being encouraged to go down this same route with the
housing bubble. Maybe Americans are more fatalistic in the aftermath of 9-11 --
willing to do whatever it takes to keep on spending. However, just because
consumption has surprised on the upside, doesn’t mean it will continue to do so
indefinitely. I’ve never had much sympathy for the momentum approach to macro.
In the face of adverse fundamentals, I worry more about a deep sense of denial
that continues to pervade the psyche of the American consumer. These are the
excesses that can only end in tears.
In the immediate aftermath of 9-11
I also expressed the view that the very process of globalization could be in
for a serious setback (see my 28 September 2001 opinion piece in the Financial
Times, "Back to Borders"). Cross-border connectivity seemed
likely to be less seamless as a result of higher shipping fees, increased
insurance premiums, and tighter border security. I also believed that the battle
against global terrorism would require a host of "non-productive"
responses -- increased defense spending, new homeland security efforts,
stepped-up office security, and business contingent planning initiatives
(including back-up inventory and supply-chain management, location
diversification, and package- and mail-handling security). The frictionless
models of free competition that lie at the heart of globalization and
productivity enhancement seemed to be facing profound challenges. There was new
sand in the gears of market-based systems.
The wheels of global commerce have,
indeed, begun to turn more slowly in the year following 9-11. How much of this
is traceable to the shock of terrorism or to the vicissitudes of the business
cycle is unclear, however. Our latest estimates point to a very subdued rebound
in global trade -- 5% average gains in 2002-03 following a fractional decline
in 2001. That falls well short of the 10% rebounds from earlier trade
recessions -- suggestive of a less trade-intensive recovery in this post-shock
climate. Nor can there be any doubt of the rising burden of public and private
sector security measures. At the same time, the specter of geopolitical
instability has worsened. Trade frictions are on the rise -- underscored by America’s
protectionist measures on steel and farm subsidies, to say nothing of Europe’s
successful battle for WTO-based punitive damages against US export tax
subsidies. Renewed financial crisis in Latin America -- first Argentina, then
Brazil -- has raised new questions about the IMF-led stewardship of the
international financial architecture. Moreover, instability in the Middle East
-- US versus Iraq as well as the Israeli-Palestinian dispute -- poses worrisome
threats to an ever-fragile Cold War peace. To the extent that an escalation of
global terrorism has led to a growing fragmentation of the world, I would
hardly view the experience of the past year as a plus for globalization.
In the end, it’s hard to be
terribly precise about such a post mortem. The main complicating factor comes
from the interplay between the business cycle and the post-shock response of a
US-led global economy. As always, context is key in disentangling such impacts.
And courtesy of downwardly-revised government statistics, we now know that the
US economy was in a deeper and longer recession when the terrorist attacks hit
than we had previously thought. Against that backdrop, the resilience of the
post-shock economy looks all the more impressive. But it begs the basic
question -- at what cost? To the extent that America is also in the midst of a
post-bubble business cycle -- complete with heightened deflationary risks --
the climate ahead my be even more treacherous than it appeared a year ago. On
that count, there can be no mistaking the mounting deflationary perils in the
Unites States. GDP-based prices were rising at a 2.5% rate in the four quarters
prior to last fall’s terrorist attacks. Today, that comparison has slowed to
just 1.0% in the year ending 2Q02 -- the closest America has come to outright
deflation in 48 years. That’s yet another dark cloud on the horizon of
post-shock resilience in the US economy.
Finally, it’s important to take
note of the increasingly shaky state of a US-centric global economy. No matter
how you cut it, the world is sputtering again. That’s certainly the case in
Europe, with weakness in Germany leading the way. But output expectations have
also deteriorated in Belgium and Sweden, and unemployment is again on the rise
in France. Moreover, the euro-zone purchasing managers index recorded a
broad-based decline in August, led by a deterioration in the employment
component which bodes poorly for income growth and consumer demand. Meanwhile,
the Asian outlook is fraying around the edges. That’s especially the case in
Japan, where a renewed weakening of production underscores the downside risks
evident in recently revised GDP statistics. For Asia ex Japan, the recent data
flow points to a peaking of recent export-led cyclical upturns in Korea and
Taiwan. Moreover, crisis-torn and NAFTA-linked Latin America hardly looks to be
an oasis in an otherwise shaky global climate. All in all, lacking in domestic
demand, a US-centric global economy needs the American consumer more than ever.
Therein lies a key risk, in my view.
Few will ever forget the tragic
events of last September. No, terrorism did not stop a $32 trillion global
economy dead in its tracks. But it did unmask some important fault lines that
underscore an increasingly precarious foundation to this expansion. Nor did it
bring an increasingly fragmented world any closer together. A year later, we
all long for healing. But the bottom line is that post-shock resilience came at
a real cost. That bill has yet to be paid.
Slate
A Real War on Terrorism
By Robert Wright
Updated Thursday, September 5, 2002, at 8:15 AM PT
From: Robert Wright
Subject: The Threat of Terrorism Naturally Grows
Updated Wednesday, September 4, 2002, at 8:37 AM PT
This is the second of a nine-part series on how America should fight its war on terrorism.
Yesterday, in my introduction to this series, I vowed to defend Proposition No. 1: Al-Qaida and radical Islam are not the problem. OK, now that I've got your attention: Obviously, they are a problem, and a big one. We'll have to find a way to neutralize the specific threat they pose—and in the coming days, I'll spend lots of time on the roots of Muslim rage, the structure of Islamist terrorism, and so on. Still, if we're going to treat the war on terrorism as the long-term struggle that it is, we have to first understand that the threat posed by radical Islam is just a wave that signifies a deeper, even more menacing current.
The current, driven by technological change, is described by Proposition No. 2: For the foreseeable future, smaller and smaller groups of intensely motivated people will have the ability to kill larger and larger numbers of people. They won't have to claim that they speak on behalf of a whole religion. They'll just have to be reasonably intelligent, modestly well-funded, and really pissed off. It may be hard to imagine a few radical environmentalists, or Montana militiamen, or French anti-globalization activists, or Basque separatists, or Unabomber-style Luddites, killing 100,000 people. Yet what makes this plausible is exactly what makes radical Islam such a formidable long-term threat: two enduring aspects of the evolution of technology.
First, there is the much-discussed growing accessibility of massively lethal munitions—in particular, nuclear weapons and biological weapons. (Chemical weapons, though called a "weapon of mass destruction," really aren't. They're horrible, yes; but a chemical attack by a dozen terrorists can't kill hundreds of thousands of people, as the nuclear or biological equivalent can.)
Of the two, biological weapons are in a sense spookier because the threat is so deeply ingrained in commercial progress. The things it takes to make biological weapons—fermenters, centrifuges, and the like—are in buildings you drive by routinely: hospitals, universities, pharmaceutical plants. Every year they grow in number, along with the number of people who know how to use them. And, as if it weren't scary enough that these things are essentially unregulated, the march of progress keeps creating new regulatory challenges. In July scientists announced they'd created a polio virus using mail-order DNA and a recipe available on the Internet. Hmmm ... maybe someone in the government should look into this mail-order DNA business!
If last fall's anthrax attacks were indeed, as some speculated, perpetrated by an American trying to sound a useful alarm, he/she chose a lousy germ for the job. Anthrax, though scary, is a pale harbinger of impending bio-disaster. It isn't contagious, so it's basically the equivalent of a time-release chemical weapon. Smallpox, Ebola—not to mention as-yet-unknown designer plagues—could kill millions, even tens of millions.
I could go on about the various advances that are making massively lethal attacks a layperson's sport, ranging from the already available poor man's cruise missile to the nanotechnology in Bill Joy's fevered-but-not-entirely-crazy nightmare. But the basic problem is widely recognized—Thomas Friedman called it the "superempowered angry man" in his 1999 book The Lexus and the Olive Tree—even if its magnitude is underestimated and a solution to it remains unarticulated.
The second technological force behind Proposition 1 is less widely understood: the diverse threat posed by information technology. For starters, there is the obvious value of infotech in orchestrating a terrorist attack, both in the planning and execution phases. (Mohamed Atta, while awaiting takeoff on American Airlines Flight 11, used a cell phone to keep in touch with his troops.) Less obvious but more important, there is the use of ever-cheaper, ever-more-powerful information technologies to mobilize constituencies.
One example is Osama Bin Laden's recruiting videos—deftly edited, complete with special effects—to maximize emotional impact. Twenty years ago, before cheap desktop editing, making such films was beyond the capacity of a rag-tag terrorist group—and, anyway, distributing them was hopeless since almost nobody had VCRs. Twenty years from now, distributing them will be much cheaper and easier, thanks to the emerging broadband Internet. (If you have broadband, check out Bin Laden's videos—complete with expert commentary—at www.ciaonet.org. Try to imagine yourself as an alienated Saudi or Palestinian teenager, looking for a way to channel your discontent, as you watch the powerful images of starving Iraqi babies and of a Palestinian woman being manhandled by Israeli troops.)
This high-tech mobilization of radical constituencies needn't be centrally orchestrated. Since 9/11, American pundits have griped about the propaganda issuing from TV channels run by Arab governments. But take a look at the free market at work: The new, unregulated satellite TV channels—notably Al Jazeera, founded in 1996—haven't exactly been a sedative for irate Muslims. The uncomfortable fact is that a free press often fuels antagonisms because people choose channels that bolster their biases. (Which is the most popular American cable news channel? The most ideological one—Fox.) Increasingly, "tribes"—interest groups of any kind, including radical ones—will be, in effect, self-organizing.
All of this applies to all potentially violent interest groups. Those paranoid-nationalist videotapes full of fiery Waco imagery have already instilled fear and loathing in some Americans, but the efficiency with which they reach vulnerable minds will grow as the Internet goes broadband. So, too, for the sermons of radical environmentalists or rabid animal-rights activists. All are becoming more powerful by virtue of information technology. The sudden emergence of anti-globalization demonstrators wasn't due to the sudden emergence of globalization—which, actually, hadn't emerged all that suddenly. It was due largely to the Internet, the medium by which demonstrations are cheaply publicized and organized.
True, we haven't seen much lethal terrorism from these mainly Western, well-educated groups. Then again, the fact that they're Western and well-educated means that a small number of them could turn very lethal very easily. (Remember Timothy McVeigh?) So, whatever the conversion factor by which highly hateful Muslim adolescents become terrorists—one in 10,000; one in 100,000—the conversion factor for these Western groups is scarier. (Suicidal terrorism, the thing that has made Islamic doctrine so distinctively frightening, will be less and less a prerequisite for massive atrocity as time goes on and munitions technology evolves.)
Again, the point isn't to minimize radical Islam, which is probably the biggest single threat to American security of the next decade, if not longer. But as we address that threat on its own terms, we should be building a policy framework that will apply to the larger, more generic threat as well. This is especially true in light of the fact that the current phase of rapid change—info revolution, globalization, etc.—is hardly over, and periods of rapid change tend to spawn intensely aggrieved groups. Indeed, this point is important enough to deserve official proposition status. Proposition No. 3: The number of intensely aggrieved groups will almost certainly grow in the coming decades of rapid technological, and hence social, change.
Propositions 2 and 3 together give us our first italicized policy principle: Prescription No. 1: Take your bitter medicine early. Often in the course of human events—or in the course of just living your life—you can either bite the bullet now or bite it later. In the stock market, for example, America enjoyed a wild ride in the 1990s and is now paying the price; alternatively, it could have shown more discipline and circumspection then and enjoyed more stable prosperity now. Who's to say which is better? Not me. But in the case of terrorism, I have a decided preference because in 10 or 20 years, terrorism will have much more lethal potential than it has now. So, if there are burdens we can bear now—in money, even in lives—that will dampen future terrorism, they're probably worth it.
This is a crucial principle, for the menu of policy options in the war on terrorism is loaded with short-term/long-term trade-offs. And democracy—like most other human systems of decision-making—is naturally biased toward short-term gratification.
I'm not saying, by the way, that the growing lethality of terrorism is a universal constant, immune to human influence. There are things we can do to cut access to munitions—in fact, we'll have to do some things that are beyond the imagining of the Bush administration, a point I'll address by the end of this series. But, even if these things are quite successful, scenarios of horrific death and destruction will still be more plausible in 20 years than now.
We'll get to the first of our short-term/long-term policy trade-offs later this week. But I want to close this installment by addressing an obvious question: Who cares whether a channel like Al Jazeera helps Bin Laden "mobilize his constituency"—if, after all, it takes just a handful of al-Qaida staffers to set off a nuclear bomb? So long as 19 hijackers will get the job done, why does it matter whether al-Qaida has a thousand supporters or a hundred million? It matters for several reasons, chief among them the fact that today's angry adolescents are tomorrow's terrorists. Sure, only one in 10,000, or in 100,000, of these adolescents stays angry enough to become a true terrorist, especially a suicidal one—and of that subset, only a fraction is smart, well-educated, and disciplined, and thus as dangerous as a Mohamed Atta. But it doesn't take many Mohamed Attas to markedly lower the planet's quality of life. So, keeping hundreds of thousands of adolescents from getting hateful today could save hundreds of thousands of Americans 10 or 20 years from now.
Besides, it isn't just a question of terrorist "recruits." Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, who went on a shooting spree in the Los Angeles airport on July 4, had never been to an al-Qaida training camp. But he had in some sense been tuned in to al-Qaida's wavelength, imbibing the same resentments and hatreds as al-Qaida recruits. As time goes by, and the Internet goes broadband, and satellite channels keep proliferating, wavelengths of this sort will get more powerfully enthralling.
That there was only one anti-American terrorist evident on a holiday that America-haters would love to ruin tells us that hatred, and its expression, remain at low enough levels that there's still time to salvage a reasonably peaceful future. (On July 5, the stock market breathed a sigh of relief.) At the same time, July 4 was a warning about the price of American inaction. It wouldn't take many Hadayets—walking into an airport and killing a few people before being killed—to have a major effect on American travel habits.
All of this points to Proposition No. 4: The amount of discontent in the world is becoming a highly significant national-security variable. I'll elaborate on this, and on the watershed in foreign policy it portends, tomorrow.
From: Robert Wright
Subject: Introduction: The Bush Team Fails To Get the Big
Picture
Posted Tuesday, September 3, 2002, at 8:49 AM PT
After the attacks of Sept. 11, the Bush administration depicted the war on terrorism as something that, like past wars, would have a definite ending. Secretary of State Colin Powell said we would get terrorism "by its branch and root." And President Bush's pledges of clear-cut victory weren't confined to his memorably ambitious vow to "rid the world of evil-doers." Even in less exuberant moments, he said his goal was to "rout out and destroy global terrorism." The war would be complex and multifaceted, and it might not be brief, but "its outcome is certain," Bush said. "This will not be an age of terror."
By the spring of 2002, the message had changed. Gone was the theme of certain triumph, replaced by an official sense of perpetual dread. In May, climaxing a cascade of spooky administration pronouncements, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said that anti-American terrorists would "inevitably" obtain weapons of mass destruction and use them.
Some people thought the new pessimism was tactical, a pre-emptive strike against charges that any coming terrorism had gone unforeseen. And maybe it was. But it was also acknowledgment of the truth: Wars on terrorism have very little in common with regular wars. The initial, sheerly military phase—which the Bush administration had handled capably—was just the beginning. Now, a year after 9/11, pretty much everyone realizes that we'd better have a very good, very long-run strategy.
I don't think we do. I think the Bush administration's long-run plan, to the extent that one can be discerned, is at best inadequate and at worst disastrous. So, what's my long-run plan? (Or, as a Slate reader put it via e-mail, after one of my carping columns about Bush policy, "OK, big shot ... What's the solution?") Over the next two weeks, in daily installments, I'll lay out my answer: a long-term strategy for America's war on terrorism.
My argument will come in readily attackable form. It will be organized around a series of propositions—conveniently printed in boldface—that, I claim, describe the mess we're in. Interspersed with these descriptive propositions will be policy prescriptions in italics. To refute me, all you have to do is either show that the bold-faced sentences are wrong or show that the italicized sentences don't follow from them.
Warning: Some of the propositions will be a bit cosmic, dealing with large-scale social, technological, and historical trends. I believe we're standing at a genuine threshold in history, rivaled in significance by only a few past thresholds, and that any diagnosis of our plight that doesn't include some ambitious observations about, say, the future of information technology or the history of the nation-state isn't up to the challenge.
Seven years ago, I wrote an article for the New Republic about the growing threat of terrorists using weapons of mass destruction. It would be an exaggeration to say that the piece spurred an overhaul of American policy—or even to say that it had any discernible impact, aside from briefly freaking out my wife. After Sept. 11—and the subsequent anthrax episode, and reports that al-Qaida was in the market for nukes—I thought: Well, at least now Washington will take more seriously the increasingly precarious world we live in. In a sense, Washington did. For example, Rumsfeld offered the aforementioned assurance that someday an American city would get decimated. Further, there was heightened vigilance and plans to institutionalize "homeland security." But still, virtually nobody—and certainly nobody with great influence in Washington—got what I considered to be the picture.
The picture is this: If you look back over history, you will see enduringly disastrous phases—decades if not centuries of lethal contagious disease, of ruinous war, of societal collapse, of imperial decline. Sometimes these things "just happen," but sometimes they happen because of momentous technological and social changes whose import humankind fails to reckon with. The premise of this series is that right now we're undergoing such change, and so far we're failing to reckon with it. These are dramatic times, and tomorrow I'll start with my dramatic propositions. The first one will be: Al-Qaida and radical Islam are not the problem.
From: Robert Wright
Subject: Why the World's Opinion of Us Matters
Posted Thursday, September 5, 2002, at 8:13 AM PT
This is the third of a nine-part series on how America should fight its war on terrorism.
Yesterday we reached a conclusion that was grandly christened Proposition No. 4: The amount of discontent in the world is becoming a highly significant national-security variable. Of course, there's never been a time when seething worldwide discontent was good for America's security. But in the past, for the discontent to really hurt Americans, it had to first find expression via some national government. That's why 50 years ago the basic goal of American foreign policy was simple: Make sure all national governments either like us or fear us. As we approach an age when a small group of free-lancers can traumatize a nation, the rules of foreign policy change.
The problem isn't that Washington has been wholly oblivious to this development. On the contrary: For years it's been hard to make it past the front desk of a foreign-policy think tank without noting the growing significance of "non-state actors." But chanting the "non-state" mantra isn't tantamount to getting the picture. The disconnect between mantra and picture lies with the phrase "non-state actors." Though technically accurate, it suggests the image of a finite number of enemies, lurking in dark corners, whose elimination would spell lasting security. As President Bush puts it, we'll "smoke out" the terrorists, hunt them down, and that will be that. "We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place until there is no refuge or no rest."
This sort of rhetoric acknowledges one of the two technologically driven trends behind Proposition 1 but ignores the other. Bush sees that, thanks to advancing munitions technology, a few well-organized terrorists can now do lots of damage. But he gives short shrift to the fact that, thanks to advancing information technology, intense anti-Americanism is more and more likely to become clusters of well-organized terrorists.
Once you emphasize both trends, you see what a pickle we're in. Many things you would do to "smoke out" terrorists could increase the amount and intensity of anti-Americanism in the Muslim world and elsewhere. Yes, it's nice to hunt down the few remaining al-Qaida troops in Afghanistan. But if every once in a while you accidentally bomb a Muslim wedding and kill 50 civilians—providing Al Jazeera with a week's worth of programming, fanning hatred of America across the Arab world—is the prize really worth the price?
From the beginning of the Afghanistan campaign, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld dismissed reporters' questions about civilian casualties: "When one is engaged militarily ... there are going to be unintended loss of life. It has always been the case, it certainly will be the case in this instance." In other words: Why make a big deal about what has been a feature of all past American wars? Answer: Because something basic has changed. Back during World War II, when Rumsfeld came of age, enemy civilian casualties had essentially no bearing on America's national security. Now they increase the chances of American civilians dying in the future. (Obviously, military action that risks "collateral damage" can make sense even in light of this fact; the initial liberation of Afghanistan from Taliban control was extremely valuable from the standpoint of both the average American and the average Afghan—and, in fact, it was accomplished with fewer civilian casualties than many had feared, though arguably more than was necessary.)
Even when American foreign policy is concerned with old-fashioned political actors—prime ministers, presidents, kings—public opinion abroad matters as never before. The wave of democratization over the past few decades has made many foreign governments more responsive to their citizens. Even non-democratic governments—notably some in the Islamic world—have to pay more attention to public sentiment as the information revolution proceeds; their ability to shape that sentiment via centralized control of the media is fading, while the ability of dissidents to organize grows. More and more, how governments treat America—including how thoroughly they cooperate in the war on terrorism—will depend on how their people feel about America.
To the extent that people in Washington have, since Sept. 11, seen the growing significance of public sentiment abroad, they've tended to depict the problem as one of public relations. Congressman Henry Hyde asks, "How is it that the country that invented Hollywood and Madison Avenue has such trouble promoting a positive image of itself overseas?" In July the Bush administration replied to such concerns by announcing the creation of an "Office of Global Communications." The office, an official explained, would do things like broadcast top-40 songs to Muslim youth and punctuate them with, for example, quotes from President Bush.
Well, I suppose it can't hurt. Or at least it can't hurt much. And certainly public relations matters. But it will have to be public relations of a subtle and creative sort, given the subzero credibility that information emanating from the American government carries in much of the Muslim world. And, anyway, image isn't everything. In the end there will be no substitute for Policy Prescription No. 2: The substance of policies should be subjected to a new kind of appraisal, one that explicitly accounts for the discontent and hatred the policies arouse.
To put it another way: We have to understand that terrorism is fundamentally a "meme"—a kind of "virus of the mind," a set of beliefs and attitudes that spreads from person to person. One way to squelch terrorism is to kill or arrest the people whose brains are infected with the meme, and the Bush administration has done some of that effectively. But some forms of killing and arresting—especially the kinds that get us bad publicity—do so much to spread the meme that our enterprise suffers a net loss. So, policy prescription No. 2, in some contexts, can be more precisely stated as Policy Prescription No. 3: The ultimate target is memes; killing or arresting people is useful only to the extent that it leads to a net reduction in terrorism memes.
Rephrased in these terms, the point I've been trying to drive home is that, for technological reasons, memes are getting faster and slipperier. The information age is doing for these "viruses of the mind" what dense urban living and interurban transport did for biological pathogens during the late Middle Ages. (The result of humankind's failure to reckon with this was the Black Death.) And few things drive terrorism memes farther and faster over their new electronic conduits than doing an ill-thought-out job of neutralizing people already "infected."
Seen in this light, some American anti-terrorism policies appear if not clearly wrongheaded, at least more dubious than before. After Sept. 11, we sent hundreds of troops to the Philippines to help the government fight Islamic guerrillas. Given that the Americans' essential function was just to train and guide Philippine troops, one might ask why the Americans had to be uniformed and armed—and photographed and publicized. Mightn't some locals resent this conspicuous intrusion by their former overlords, the Americans? Especially given that anti-American sentiment had already forced the government to kick Americans out of their Philippine military bases? Ensuing street demonstrations, in which thousands of Filipinos protested the new American presence and were subdued with water cannons, answered the question.
This particular mission—to confront a group known as Abu Sayyaf—had little relevance to the war on terrorism anyway. As the New York Times' Nicholas Kristof pointed out, Abu Sayyaf is basically a small group of thugs who kidnap for profit. And the assault on them was hardly an unalloyed success: One of the two Americans they had kidnapped was killed in the rescue attempt. Meanwhile, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, a larger, more genuinely ideological Philippine guerrilla group that has clearer ties to al-Qaida, was unharmed by the operation—though its leaders presumably enjoyed the demonstrations and may have capitalized on the clumsy American presence to build support. (The dicey business of handling groups like the MILF—deeply ideological Islamic separatists with substantial constituencies—we'll discuss next week. For now let me just assert that evolving information technology is going to make separatism a more and more powerful force in a manner strikingly analogous to the way the printing press eventually favored the carving of nation-states out of empires. So, sending troops in to quell other nations' separatist uprisings is not a policy that should be pursued without discernment, unless our goal is to divert the hatred of all the world's separatists toward America.)
The Philippines escapade resulted from taking the phrase "war on terrorism" literally and thinking of the enemy as a finite group of warriors, rather than a contagious mind-set that may spawn new warriors faster than you kill the old ones. We mounted a "show of force"—something that may work when you're trying to intimidate a potentially aggressive nation but that may backfire when the enemy is, in part, Muslim resentment of American power and arrogance. This suggests Policy Prescription No. 4: In a war on terrorism, applying force inconspicuously makes sense more often than in regular wars.
The potential for the pursuit of enemies to backfire applies also within America's borders. The surveillance of mosques, the interrogation of donors to Islamic charities, the detention of Muslim-American citizens for weeks without filing any charges—these things can definitely help prevent terrorist attacks. But to the extent that they make Muslim Americans feel persecuted, they also have a downside, such as making things like the July 4 airport shooting more common. My point isn't that the downside is clearly outweighing the upside; the upside of the administration's police work, both at home and abroad, has been considerable, and in most cases the net result is no doubt a gain. My point is just that administration deliberations and public debate should go beyond their present scope—the valid question of whether we're "violating civil liberties" in a legal or moral sense—and raise the separate question of whether in some cases we're planting the seeds of our own future suffering. It isn't in America's interest for the only check on Attorney General John Ashcroft's zeal to be negative feedback from judges.
Though 9/11 made Americans aware that in some sense the attitude of the world's Muslims toward America matters, this fact has yet to enter foreign-policy debate very explicitly. This summer, in a big policy shift, President Bush demanded that Yasser Arafat step aside as Palestinian leader, even if he is elected to office by a majority of Palestinians. Bush made no counterbalancing demand of Israel, even though there is one demand—ending the construction of new settlements in the West Bank—that has the support of roughly every American who thinks about these things. Bush caught some flak on this count, but I'm not aware of a single pundit who put the criticism in its most elemental terms: The speech's conspicuous asymmetry had in some intangible but real sense reduced America's national security.
Maybe this possibility never crossed Bush's mind. Months after 9/11, remember, he was still sticking by his early commitment to avoid involvement in the Israeli-Palestinian mess altogether. He abandoned that pledge only when he realized that, absent some progress on this front, he couldn't win the support of Arab leaders for a war in Iraq that he deemed vital to American security. He didn't seem to see that helping to solve the Palestinian issue would inherently add to American security, by denying Islamic anti-Americanism one of its major sources of fuel.
And, likewise, Bush doesn't seem preoccupied with the reaction of Arab Muslims to an Iraqi war. Has anyone pointed out to him one big difference between this war and his father's war? Back in 1991 Arab television was largely controlled by Arab governments that didn't want the war to incite their people. Now Al Jazeera and other alternative broadcasters exist, and I've got a feeling that Saddam Hussein will have liberal access policies for their cameramen.
In the past, one common test of a piece of foreign or defense policy was whether it could be sold to the relevant government. If the Saudi government would swallow an ongoing contingent of American troops, as it did after the Persian Gulf War, then the deal was done. Of course, Osama Bin Laden's reaction to those American troops—undergoing a kind of conversion experience that seems to have led eventually to 9/11—is something no one could have predicted. Still, someone could have pointed out that for foreign troops to be stationed in Islam's holy land is sacrilege—not just according to Bin Laden, but according to some mainstream clerics. If we had realized this, and had grasped the rapidly growing importance of public opinion abroad, that would have counted heavily against this policy.
After an early terrorist response to America's presence in Saudi Arabia—the 1996 truck bombing that killed 19 U.S. troops—American elites responded in time-honored fashion. In assessing the implications of this anti-Americanism, they focused largely on whether it could seize control of an actual government. A New York Times analysis concluded, "The consensus among outside experts and American officials is that the royal family maintains a firm grip on power and that Saudi Arabia's fundamental alignment with the United States is unlikely to change." That turned out to be true—but 9/11 still happened.
Remarkably, even after 9/11, conservative pundits were still dismissing concerns about the opinion of "the Arab Street" since the street, however angry, never seemed to boil over and topple a regime. But those 19 hijackers started out on "the Arab Street," and if "the Arab Street" weren't full of hatred of America, the Twin Towers would still be standing.
Of course, that hatred has been building for awhile. If you listed all the culturally and politically insensitive things America has done over the past two decades, you wouldn't be close to accounting for all of it. Any good war-on-terror strategy must deal more deeply with "the roots of Muslim rage," which we'll turn to tomorrow.
sidebar
Return to article
The reasons are: 1) Even from the ranks of non-rich Muslims, financial and other forms of support for terrorists can bubble up. One thing that has made it hard to figure out where Osama Bin Laden is hiding (assuming he's not dead) is the large number of households in which he'd be a welcome guest. 2) Pro-terrorist sympathies make it politically hard for governments of some Islamic states to fully join the war on terrorism. And new information technologies that defy centralized control mean that authoritarian governments can less and less control the opinions of their people and less and less afford to ignore them. 3) Indeed, such is the pluralizing power of this technology that, as we'll see in a future installment of this series, there is reason to believe that authoritarian regimes in Islamic states are doomed, so that sooner or later governments in the Islamic world will be more direct expressions of popular sentiment. In moderating today's popular sentiment in the Islamic world, we may be moderating the policies of tomorrow's governments in the Islamic world.
sidebar
Return to article
One example is the administration's intense aversion to American military casualties. This is what led it to do almost all the killing in Afghanistan remotely, from high above the battlefield—which not only leads to mistakes but, in the eyes of Muslims, gives the mistakes an infuriatingly casual, arrogant air and reinforces the stereotype of Americans as contemptible cowards. In one highly publicized incident, American bombs killed Afghans who, according to the unanimous insistence of locals, had just been out collecting scrap metal. Among the evidence used to authorize the strike was that one of the Afghans, viewed by distant airborne camera, appeared to be tall—like Osama Bin Laden!—and to be getting deferential treatment from the other men. Obviously, mistakes such as this would be less likely if ground troops were used to approach suspicious parties. Would these ground troops be exposed to risk? Yes. But war is by definition the sacrifice of military lives to keep civilians safe. When, in a war on terrorism, we get fetishistic about avoiding military casualties, we're inverting this logic, sacrificing future American civilians for the sake of present-day American soldiers. And bear in mind Policy Prescription No. 1: Take your bitter medicine early. The logic behind it suggests that the lives of a few American soldiers today could save many more civilian lives a decade or two from now. (This logic applies also to the question of whether we should now risk the lives of American soldiers in a policing capacity, to impose peace and order on Afghanistan—a question the administration has so far answered with a resounding and ill-advised "no.")
sidebar
Return to article
Just repeating what worked during the Cold War won't do. Back then we used Voice of America and Radio Free Europe to reach people who were naturally suspicious of alternative information sources, such as Pravda. Today, Middle Eastern Muslims already have trusted information sources—Al Jazeera, in particular—and we are the source they naturally and deeply mistrust.
As a recent Council on Foreign Relations report suggested, broadcasts funded by European allies may have more credibility than broadcasts funded by the United States. That report usefully conceived public relations per se as but one part of a larger mission of "public diplomacy." Public diplomacy includes student exchange programs, interfaith dialogues, international academic conferences, and the like. These programs—not part of the standard repertoire of the Madison Avenue executives that the Bush administration has favored in its new public relations push—will probably do more good than self-conscious attempts to "re-brand America." The CFR report is a good map of the landscape of public diplomacy and of the sort of government reorganization that could facilitate it.
Government by Op-Ed
By Michael Kinsley
Posted Thursday, September 5, 2002, at 12:04 PM PT
It must be hell to disagree with Colin Powell. Powell and Vice President Dick Cheney apparently disagree about Iraq. Cheney thinks that Saddam Hussein must be toppled and any further diddling is pointless. Powell thinks … well, something else. Cheney made his opinion known by articulating and defending it in a speech. Powell's view, if you read the papers literally, has spread by a mysterious process akin to osmosis. The secretary of state is "known to believe" or is pigeonholed by unnamed "associates" or (my favorite) has made his opinion known "quietly."
And yet somehow, without an audible peep, Powell has managed to dominate the public debate about whether to make war against Iraq. How does he do it? Maybe, like dogs, State Department reporters can hear frequencies beyond the range available to the normal human ear. Or maybe, just maybe, Powell has made his case using the same basic method as Cheney—that is, by opening his yap and letting words come out—only doing so with small audiences of reliably discreet journalists rather than at a convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.
"As the debate over Iraq has intensified in recent weeks," the New York Times deadpanned on Tuesday, after days of reporting Powell's opinion, "one voice has been conspicuously absent." The article went on to explore the alleged mystery of Powell's silence, undeterred by the fact that he obviously has not been silent or the strong likelihood that more than one person at the Times knows this from personal experience.
A fellow journalist told me the other day that he admires Powell for making his disagreement clear without being publicly disloyal to the president. This is indeed the conventional view among the media. But it is peculiar, if not flatly wrong, on both counts. Clear is exactly what Powell's objection is not. He's against an immediate, irrevocable commitment to off Saddam Hussein. But where he draws the line short of that, and why, are unknown—or at least unreported—and untested. If you don't publicly state your position, you don't have to defend it.
Second, if Powell's view is not that of the president, he is only avoiding "public" disloyalty in terms of the comic distinction—treasured by the media and meaningless to everyone else—between things said publicly and things said "privately" to people who are certain to make them front-page news. If Powell's views were clearly in conflict with those of President Bush, spreading them furtively would be doubly disloyal.
But Bush's role in this debate is not to have a clear view of his own. Until the past few days, his position seemed clear: This Means War. What exactly means war was not entirely clear, but the war part was. Now he has wisely retreated to lack of clarity on both the whether and the why. This allows him to function like a holy rock for which all the squabbling tribal elders can claim to be speaking. The rock is irrevocably committed to "regime change." The rock has never wavered in its call for the return of inspectors. Meanwhile the rock's channeler-in-chief, Ari Fleischer, insists that there is no disagreement even among the rock's advisers. Colin Powell disagrees with him about that.
"Disarray" is the approved label for the peculiar process by which this nation is deciding whether to go to war against Iraq. Enormous power has been vested in the editors of newspaper op-ed pages, who get to decide which former official of the previous Bush administration will get the next opportunity to remind the world that he is still alive. Bush du Jour lets his people squabble in public. All deplorably chaotic to the orderly minds of foreign policy land.
But a better word than disarray might be democracy. In theory, at least, it's like a high-minded Jeffersonian dream that the national debate about war and peace should be framed by a series of essays penned by former government officials who have withdrawn to their farms, ranches, consulting firms, and suchlike contemplative retreats. And Bush's sudden eagerness for a public debate and some kind of formal approval from Congress—though probably the result of a (justified) panic attack—may help to reverse the longest-running scandal in constitutional law: two centuries of erosion in Congress' power to declare war.
In practice, a bunch of turgid, self-regarding pronunciamentos, full of half-hidden agendas, possibly ghost-written though hardly by Thomas Jefferson's ghost, are not exactly the Federalist Papers. And the general desirability of vigorous debate doesn't solve the puzzle of how a top official who is unhappy about some administration policy should balance the demands of loyalty and honesty.
In theory, once again, this one's easy: The official should argue vigorously then rally 'round. In practice, it's trickier. Does arguing vigorously include arguing publicly? Does rallying 'round mean defending a policy you don't believe in? On most issues, there is room for a fudge factor in all of this. But if the issue is war, in which many thousands of people undoubtedly will die, the cause had better be transcendently important.
The Bush administration will decide in the next few weeks that the cause is worth the blood, or that it isn't. In either case, shouldn't someone resign?
American press review (previous day)
Guardian A year on, the US is now set on remaking the world
Since September 11 the US has
taken charge of three huge regions
Martin Woollacott
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
The new era, says Donald Rumsfeld, the American secretary of state for defence,
is characterised by a dual ignorance. There are things we know that we don't
know, and there are also things that we don't know we don't know.
He was speaking of our
knowledge of terrorist threats, but he might equally have been talking of the
extraordinary uncertainties created around the world by America's response to
those threats. Whether it is the results of the German election, the prospects
of the British or Israeli Labour parties, the fortunes of central Asian
strongmen, the shape of expanding Europe, the chances of war in the subcontinent,
or, of course, the political landscape of the Middle East, in every case the
unclear consequences of American policy have profoundly altered previous
calculations.
This is particularly true
because of the way in which the war on terror has elided into preparations for
a war against Iraq. Great as the uncertainty was over the likely course of a
war in Afghanistan, it was not as widespread as is the uncertainty now over the
waging of war in Iraq. Among the things that we know we don't know are how many
weapons of mass destruction Saddam possesses, how useable they are, and whether
he has already or will pass them on to third parties.
Also among the things we
don't know are whether the purged and repurged rump of the Iraqi officer corps,
heavily identified with Saddam and guilty of executing his criminal policies,
will fight for him or not. Perhaps they, and other servants of the regime, will
rally to the Americans, as the only force that can protect them from the
revenge of their fellow citizens. We don't know, in other words, whether it
will be an easy war or a hard war, even if the use of weapons of mass
destruction is averted or prevented. The evidence points to the former
conclusion, for American power is great and the Iraqi regime is rotten, but,
still, we do not know.
As to the emblematic
impact of this war whose course cannot be predicted, that takes us to the
second circle of ignorance. It may be that Arab and other Muslim rulers are
being dishonest when they protest against the war, but they are not being
dishonest about their relationship to their peoples, whom they apparently feel
they must appease with a show of resistance.
It is hard to read the
auguries, so complex is this interplay of deception, self-deception, bluster
and bluff. Could the first "regime change" come in countries, like
Jordan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, or even Egypt, rather than Iraq? Again, the
evidence suggests that these regimes, which have survived earlier predictions
of downfall, are not as fragile as some suppose, that popular feeling would
peak and then subside, and that the strategy of Islamist forces would be to
gain political advantage rather than to seize power. Probably, after the storm,
they would all still be standing, but again we do not know.
And America and Europe,
how much might they diverge if the United States fought and won an easy war
while Europe prophesied doom and refused to help? How much more if the war went
wrong in all the ways it might? Just to start with the simplest of questions,
if Gerhard Schröder wins the German elections, in part because of his stance on
Iraq, will he reverse himself after victory? Some knowledgeable people say he
will, but if he does not the strain on the link between the United States and
the country it used to regard as its most important European ally will be huge.
And how will the European Union survive a split in which Britain, and perhaps
France, stand with the United States and others are opposed or neutral?
Again, the chances are
that some sort of unity will be attained. That is the real meaning of the
efforts to proselytise the allies and the new readiness to take the issue to
the United Nations that George Bush has signalled and which will be reconfirmed
when he and Tony Blair meet at Camp David. Some additional legitimisation of
enforcement that will allow the United States to go ahead while different
allies take up different positions, but with none left in outright opposition,
will probably emerge. Yet that is not certain, and even with a patched-up
compromise of the kind that seems likely there could be serious damage to the
Atlantic relationship.
The greatest uncertainty
of all is that over American purposes. The outcome of the al-Qaida crisis is
that the American administration is contemplating a project of remaking the
world, particularly the Islamic world. But making the world safe for the United
States is not the same as making it safe for the rest of us. The readiness to
use power militarily is one thing, the need to use it in all its forms in a
sustained way is another. This is not just about "nation building"
but about "region building".
I n the last 12 months
America has slipped, sometimes with deliberation and sometimes reluctantly,
into a position of responsibility for three huge regions of the world, south Asia,
central Asia and the Middle East, with only the last of which it had previously
been strongly engaged. In each, it is grappling with arguments, some arising
within the administration and some coming from outside, for regime change. Iraq
is only the most immediate case.
Indeed, in the Middle East
the Bush administration has had sketched for it by supporters and lobbyists the
task of changing the nature of government and society in Iraq, Iran, Saudi
Arabia, and Palestine, to which the critics would add Israel.
The effect on Arabs was
summed up by Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of Al-Quds, the London-based newspaper:
"President Bush is today calling for replacing Arafat. Tomorrow he will
send frigates and planes to remove Saddam Hussein and on the day after tomorrow
he will point Israel at Syria and Lebanon. The day after that he will accuse
President Mubarak. The US president will then choose the colour of our clothes,
what food we eat, and maybe even whom we can marry."
There are reasons for
attacking Iraq to do with countering proliferation and preserving the security
of oil supplies, both of these, after all, being perfectly defensible
objectives. There is also a stout moral case for rescuing Iraqis from a
dictatorship they have too long endured. But how an Iraq war fits into any
halfway realistic plan for the Middle East as a whole is another of the things
we know we don't know, as is the question of whether a war in Iraq will
increase or decrease the chances of terrorist attacks on our cities. Risks by definition
cannot be precisely measured in advance, but they can be better measured than
they have been so far. Whether they will be, by Americans, Europeans or others
is another question.
Wake-up call
If the US and Iraq do go to
war, there can only be one winner, can't there? Maybe not. This summer, in a
huge rehearsal of just such a conflict - and with retired Lieutenant General
Paul Van Riper playing Saddam - the US lost. Julian Borger asks the former
marine how he did it
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
At the height of the summer, as talk of invading Iraq built in Washington like
a dark, billowing storm, the US armed forces staged a rehearsal using over
13,000 troops, countless computers and $250m. Officially, America won and a
rogue state was liberated from an evil dictator.
What really happened is
quite another story, one that has set alarm bells ringing throughout America's
defence establishment and raised questions over the US military's readiness for
an Iraqi invasion. In fact, this war game was won by Saddam Hussein, or at
least by the retired marine playing the Iraqi dictator's part, Lieutenant
General Paul Van Riper.
In the first few days of
the exercise, using surprise and unorthodox tactics, the wily 64-year-old
Vietnam veteran sank most of the US expeditionary fleet in the Persian Gulf,
bringing the US assault to a halt.
What happened next will be
familiar to anyone who ever played soldiers in the playground. Faced with an
abrupt and embarrassing end to the most expensive and sophisticated military
exercise in US history, the Pentagon top brass simply pretended the whole thing
had not happened. They ordered their dead troops back to life and
"refloated" the sunken fleet. Then they instructed the enemy forces
to look the other way as their marines performed amphibious landings.
Eventually, Van Riper got so fed up with all this cheating that he refused to
play any more. Instead, he sat on the sidelines making abrasive remarks until
the three-week war game - grandiosely entitled Millennium Challenge - staggered
to a star-spangled conclusion on August 15, with a US "victory".
If the Pentagon thought it
could keep its mishap quiet, it underestimated Van Riper. A classic marine -
straight-talking and fearless, with a purple heart from Vietnam to prove it -
his retirement means he no longer has to put up with the bureaucratic niceties
of the defence department. So he blew the whistle.
His driving concern, he
tells the Guardian, is that when the real fighting starts, American troops will
be sent into battle with a set of half-baked tactics that have not been put to
the test.
"Nothing was learned
from this," he says. "A culture not willing to think hard and test
itself does not augur well for the future." The exercise, he says, was
rigged almost from the outset.
Millennium Challenge was
the biggest war game of all time. It had been planned for two years and
involved integrated operations by the army, navy, air force and marines. The
exercises were part real, with 13,000 troops spread across the United States,
supported by actual planes and warships; and part virtual, generated by
sophisticated computer models. It was the same technique used in Hollywood
blockbusters such as Gladiator. The soldiers in the foreground were real, the
legions behind entirely digital.
The game was theoretically
set in 2007 and pitted Blue forces (the US) against a country called Red. Red
was a militarily powerful Middle Eastern nation on the Persian Gulf that was
home to a crazed but cunning megalomaniac (Van Riper). Arguably, when the
exercises were first planned back in 2000, Red could have been Iran. But by
July this year, when the game kicked off, it is unlikely that anyone involved
had any doubts as to which country beginning with "I" Blue was up
against.
"The game was
described as free play. In other words, there were two sides trying to
win," Van Riper says.
Even when playing an evil
dictator, the marine veteran clearly takes winning very seriously. He reckoned
Blue would try to launch a surprise strike, in line with the administration's
new pre-emptive doctrine, "so I decided I would attack first."
Van Riper had at his
disposal a computer-generated flotilla of small boats and planes, many of them
civilian, which he kept buzzing around the virtual Persian Gulf in circles as
the game was about to get under way. As the US fleet entered the Gulf, Van
Riper gave a signal - not in a radio transmission that might have been
intercepted, but in a coded message broadcast from the minarets of mosques at
the call to prayer. The seemingly harmless pleasure craft and propeller planes
suddenly turned deadly, ramming into Blue boats and airfields along the Gulf in
scores of al-Qaida-style suicide attacks. Meanwhile, Chinese Silkworm-type
cruise missiles fired from some of the small boats sank the US fleet's only
aircraft carrier and two marine helicopter carriers. The tactics were
reminiscent of the al-Qaida attack on the USS Cole in Yemen two years ago, but
the Blue fleet did not seem prepared. Sixteen ships were sunk altogether, along
with thousands of marines. If it had really happened, it would have been the
worst naval disaster since Pearl Harbor.
It was at this point that
the generals and admirals monitoring the war game called time out.
"A phrase I heard
over and over was: 'That would never have happened,'" Van Riper recalls.
"And I said: nobody would have thought that anyone would fly an airliner
into the World Trade Centre... but nobody seemed interested."
In the end, it was ruled
that the Blue forces had had the $250m equivalent of their fingers crossed and
were not really dead, while the ships were similarly raised from watery graves.
Van Riper was pretty fed
up by this point, but things were about to get worse. The "control
group", the officers refereeing the exercise, informed him that US
electronic warfare planes had zapped his expensive microwave communications
systems.
"You're going to have
to use cellphones and satellite phones now, they told me. I said no, no, no -
we're going to use motorcycle messengers and make announcements from the
mosques," he says. "But they refused to accept that we'd do anything
they wouldn't do in the west."
Then Van Riper was told to
turn his air defences off at certain times and places where Blue forces were
about to stage an attack, and to move his forces away from beaches where the
marines were scheduled to land. "The whole thing was being scripted,"
he says.
Within his ever narrowing
constraints, Van Riper continued to make a nuisance of himself, harrying Blue
forces with an arsenal of unorthodox tactics, until one day, on July 29, he
thinks, he found his orders to his subordinate officers were not being listened
to any more. They were being countermanded by the control group. So Van Riper
quit. "I stayed on to give advice, but I stopped giving orders. There was
no real point any more," he says.
Van Riper's account of
Millennium Challenge is not disputed by the Pentagon. It does not deny
"refloating" the Blue navy, for example. But that, it argues, is the
whole point of a war game.
Vice-Admiral Cutler
Dawson, the commander of the ill-fated fleet, and commander, in real life, of
the US 2nd Fleet, says: "When you push the envelope, some things work,
some things don't. That's how you learn from the experiment."
The whole issue rapidly
became a cause celebre at the Pentagon press briefing, where the defence
secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, got the vice-chairman of the joint chiefs-of-staff,
General Peter Pace, to explain why the mighty US forces had needed two lives in
order to win.
"You kill me in the
first day and I sit there for the next 13 days doing nothing, or you put me
back to life and you get 13 more days' worth of experiment out of me. Which is
a better way to do it?" General Pace asked.
Van Riper agrees with Pace
in principle, but says the argument is beside the point.
"Scripting is not a
problem because you're trying to learn something," he says. "The difference
with this one was that it was advertised up front as free play in order to
validate the concepts they were trying to test, to see if they were robust
enough to put into doctrine."
It is these
"concepts" that are at the core of a serious debate that underlies
what would otherwise be a silly row about who was playing fair and who wasn't.
The US armed forces are in the throes of what used to be called a
"Revolution in Military Affairs", and is now usually referred to
simply as "transformation". The general idea is to make the US
military more flexible, more mobile and more imaginative. It was this
transformation that Rumsfeld was obsessed with during his first nine months in
office, until September 11 created other priorities.
The advocates of transformation
argue that it requires a whole new mindset, from the generals down to the
ordinary infantryman. So military planners, instead of drawing up new tactics,
formulate more amorphous "concepts" intended to change fundamentally
the American soldier's view of the battlefield.
The principal concept on
trial in Millennium Challenge was called "rapid, decisive operation"
(RDO), and as far as Van Riper and many veteran officers are concerned, it is
gobbledegook. "As if anyone would want slow, indecisive operations! These
are just slogans," he snorts.
The question of
transformation and the usefulness of concepts such as RDO are the subject of an
intense battle within the Pentagon, in which the uniformed old guard are
frequently at odds with radical civilian strategists of the kind Rumsfeld
brought into the Pentagon.
John Pike, the head of
GlobalSecurity.org, a military thinktank in Washington, believes the splits
over transformation and the whole Van Riper affair reflect fundamental
differences of opinion on how to pursue the war on Iraq.
"One way is to march
straight to Baghdad, blowing up everything in your way and then by shock and
awe you cause the regime to collapse," Pike says. "That is what
Rumsfeld is complaining about when he talks about unimaginative plodding. The
alternative is to bypass the Iraqi forces and deliver a decisive blow."
Van Riper denies being
opposed to new military thinking. He just thinks it should be written in plain
English and put to the test. "My main concern was that we'd see future
forces trying to use these things when they've never been properly grounded in
an experiment," he says.
The name Van Riper draws
either scowls or rolling eyes at the Pentagon these days, but there are
anecdotal signs that he has the quiet support of the uniformed military, who,
after all, will be the first to discover whether the Iraq invasion plans work
in real life.
"He can be a real
pain in the ass, but that's good," a fellow retired officer told the Army
Times. "He's a great guy, and he's a great patriot, and he's doing all
those things for the right reasons."
Useful link
www.GlobalSecurity.org
Recall the Commons
No modern parliament can
ignore Iraq
Leader
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
Publishing his latest set of House of Commons reform plans yesterday, Robin
Cook argued that the changes in his new report were essential if parliament is
to convince the public that MPs do a good job representing modern Britain.
"Public confidence in our democracy depends on whether the public respects
parliament as relevant to their lives and believes that its scrutiny of
government is effective," the leader of the Commons told journalists.
Meanwhile, only hours earlier, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, Charles
Kennedy announced that he had written to the Speaker to ask for the recall of
parliament next week to discuss Iraq. "It would be absurd if the only
place that remained silent, in the middle of all this, is the one elected
representative body of the people of Britain," Mr Kennedy told the BBC.
There is an indivisible
connection between the two men's comments. Iraq is the issue of the moment and
the season, developing by the day, facing all nations with hard choices and
major judgments. Tomorrow Tony Blair flies to Camp David to discuss strategy
with President Bush. Next Thursday Mr Bush will be in New York to address the
United Nations general assembly in a speech which is widely expected to be a
defining statement of American policy. The storm of war is clearly gathering.
So is the storm of opposition. A remarkable 71% of people think Britain should
not be part of an invasion force if the US goes into Iraq without UN backing,
according to an ICM poll for the Daily Mirror this week; while according to an
ABC News poll only 39% of Americans are prepared to attack Iraq without allied
support. This is a debate in which MPs must be heard.
Mr Kennedy is therefore
completely right to call for the British parliament to debate these great
issues. Yesterday Mr Blair rejected the call, though Mr Cook said earlier the
question was being kept under review. But the case for a recall could hardly be
clearer or more compelling. The only point of detail on which Mr Kennedy is
open to criticism could be on the timing. It would make sense for Mr Bush to
make his UN speech and for Mr Blair to publish his fabled dossier of evidence
on Saddam Hussein's efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction before MPs
hold their emergency debate. That means the government should publish the
dossier within the next 10 days and recall parliament in the week after next.
And MPs need at least two days of debate, not just a single day.
Mr Cook would be hard put
to object to that course and it is difficult to suppose that he does. In its
welcome and wide-ranging report yesterday, his Commons modernisation select
committee not only makes an eloquent case for reconnecting parliament with the
public, but sets out a succession of practical ways in which procedures and
practices can be reformed to make that possible. The key objective of all the
reforms is to improve the job of scrutiny that MPs do. The main chosen means
are to publish more bills in draft, to allow some bills to be carried over from
one parliamentary session to the next, to make an earlier start to the
parliamentary day and to scrap many advance notice restrictions that prevent
MPs from quizzing ministers on topics of the day. Moreover, and with a
relevance that is all the more unmissable in current circumstances, Mr Cook
wants MPs to sit regularly in September. If parliament adopts all these
changes, as they should, the new rules would all be in place by next year. But
Mr Cook and the government should set an example now. They must bring MPs back
to debate Iraq the week after next.
US split on need for last chance for Saddam
As international lobbying
intensifies, will Bush risk asking for a tough new UN resolution on weapons
inspections?
Julian Borger in
Washington
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
President Bush's tough and carefully chosen words on Iraq have failed to stem
the bitter row within his administration over how to deal with Saddam Hussein.
It has instead sparked off a debate about how to put the American case to the
UN next week.
Mr Bush said in his speech
to the UN general assembly on September 12 he would point out how President
Saddam was "stiffing the world" over his weapons of mass destruction
and would "talk about ways to make sure that he fulfils his
obligations".
But there is no consensus
within the administration on whether the Iraqi leader should even be given
another chance to fulfil those obligations, laid out in the post-Gulf war
resolution 687 calling on him to disarm.
Some administration
officials interpreted the president's words as meaning the US would seek
another resolution setting a deadline on Iraqi compliance, with UN backing for
US-led military intervention if President Saddam maintained his defiance.
Others said it meant nothing of the sort.
The New York Times quoted
a senior official as playing down expectations of a new resolution, declaring:
"All we can say is we've had 16 of them and [Saddam] has not
complied."
Yesterday it was clear
only that the speech - likely to be one of the most important of the
president's term - has not yet been written, and the lobbying inside the
administration, in the US press, and abroad has become frenetic.
Much is likely to depend
on Mr Bush's talks with Tony Blair on Saturday at Camp David and his telephone
conversations with the other members of the "permanent five" in the
UN security council: France, China and Russia. The discussions will explore
whether the security council can agree on an ultimatum that is tough enough to
satisfy the administration, but is not simply a pretext for a US invasion of
Iraq.
"The ball is in
everyone's court," said a European diplomat in Washington. "This
administration wants to take the multilateral route, but they won't go down
that route if they can't get a 'last-chance saloon' ultimatum with a high
bar."
At the core of the issue
are UN weapons inspections and whether they retain any credibility. The Bush
administration believes they do not, pointing to President Saddam's record of
evasion, but in his remarks on Wednesday, Mr Bush suggested he was open to a
final attempt to make them work.
An international group of
policy experts, former US officials and military officers will today put
forward proposals for a new form of "coercive inspections". The
proposals, published by the Carnegie Endowment Institute for Peace, envisage a
50,000-strong multinational force authorised by the security council, deployed
in Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, and ready to step in to ensure
Iraqi compliance with inspections and to protect the inspectors. If Iraq
resisted it would trigger a US-led invasion.
Daryl Kimball, the head of
the Washington-based Arms Control Association, argued that the Carnegie
proposal was so militaristic that it was bound to be rejected.
"This inspections
approach borders on an invasion," he said, adding that Iraq and its
neighbours "will not see the subtle distinction between that and 100,000
troops marching on Baghdad".
Mr Kimball instead
proposed a security council resolution demanding that Iraq provide UN
inspectors unconditional and unrestricted access to suspected weapons sites
around the country, backed up by UN authorisation for the US and its allies to
use "appropriate and necessary" military force to enforce the
resolution.
But for either plan to
work, President Saddam would have to be given an incentive to cooperate, and to
be offered the chance of survival if he cooperates. That runs counter to the
Bush administration's policy of "regime change" irrespective of his
behaviour.
The Carnegie report
stipulates that the US would have to "forswear unilateral military action
against Iraq for as long as international inspections are working".
The Carnegie team, which
includes a retired air force general, Charles Boyd, once the deputy commander
of US forces in Europe, and a former chief UN inspector, Rolf Ekeus, argues the
US would have to strive "to convince Iraq and others that this is not a
perfunctory bow to international opinion preparatory to an invasion and that
the United States' intent is to see inspections succeed, not a ruse to have
them quickly fail".
But the Pentagon is
hostile to the idea of a UN-sponsored multinational force and the
administration will be loth to drop the goal of "regime change" that
has become one of its guiding principles. Washington's refusal to compromise on
that may prove to be the thorniest problem in establishing a UN consensus that
could, in turn, be all that stands in the path of a US invasion.
'America wants to wage war on all of us'
'Regime change' seen as new
term for old enemy: colonisation
David Hirst in Cairo
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
There is no better place to take the pulse of Arab and Muslim sentiment than
Cairo, hub of the two great movements which swept the region in recent times,
the pan-Arab secular nationalism of which President Nasser was the champion,
and the "political Islam" which came into its own with Nasserism's
failure and decline.
Today, from the
air-conditioned thinktanks on the banks of the Nile to the sweltering alleyways
of the splendid but dilapidated mediaeval city, the preoccupation with the two
things that seem most fateful for the future - the Israeli-Palestinian struggle
and US plans for a possible war against Iraq - is overwhelming.
"Bin Laden may have
lost a lot of his appeal," says Dia Rashwan, an expert on Islamist
fundamentalism, "but that doesn't mean the US isn't hated. It is, more
than ever, and more now from an Arab than an Islamic standpoint."
In a workshop in the City
of the Dead, Muhammad Ahmad carries on the ancient, glass-blowing craft of his
forefathers on a day when, even without the heat of his furnace, the
temperature stands at 45C. "What makes you think that Bin Laden really did
it?" he asks, giving voice to a still widespread popular suspicion.
"Bush is just using him to put us down." He adds: "The future is
dark."
Indeed, it is much darker
for most Arabs than it might have appeared in the immediate aftermath of that
apocalyptic atrocity in New York and Washington, because, one year on, it seems
clearer to them in its consequences. It is a momentous double crisis, an
external and an internal one. Long maturing, the two are inextricably
intertwined. Osama bin Laden brought both to a head.
As they see it, the US's
post-September 11 "war on terror" now boils down to an assault on
themselves. For in the Bush universe of good versus evil, it is essentially
they, with Iran thrown in, who are the evil ones. In the collision to come, the
Arabs risk further blows to all those ideals and aspirations - independence,
dignity, the unity and collective purpose of the greater Arab
"nation" - which, after centuries of foreign conquest and control,
the pan-Arabism of Nasser so triumphantly, if defectively, embodied.
Internally they are
ill-equipped to meet the external challenge, racked as they are by all manner
of social, economic, cultural and institutional sicknesses. These, the US says,
are the very conditions which threw up Bin Ladenism. Few Arab opinion-makers
would dispute it, or doubt their societies' desperate need of root-and-branch
reform, ushering in democracy, human rights, accountability. There is no more
compelling measure of that than the UN's newly released Arab human development
report. It describes a region which has fallen behind all others, including
sub-Saharan Africa, in most of the main indices of progress and development;
whose 280 million inhabitants, despite vast oil wealth, have a lower GNP than
Spain; whose annual translation of foreign books is one-fifth of Greece'.
A prime cause of this
backwardness, say the report's Arab authors, is that the peoples of the region
are the world's least free, with the lowest levels of popular participation in
government. "Those who wonder why Afghanistan became a lure for some young
Arabs and Muslims," wrote Jordanian columnist Yasser Abu-Hilala,
"need only read this report, which explains the phenomenon of alienation
in our societies and shows how those who feel they have no stake in them can
turn to violence."
Yet most Arab regimes have
ignored this damning verdict. "The fact is," says Nader Fergany, the
report's Egyptian lead author, "that governments that were repressive in
the first place have in the past year become more so. They have not learned the
lesson of September 11 - but neither has the US."
In what measure are
foreigners, or Arabs themselves, responsible for their condition? Bin Laden has
greatly sharpened that perennial Arab debate. The west's sins are deemed to
have begun with the European carve-up of the region after the first world war
and the creation of Israel; these betrayals and humiliations continued with
US-led support of repressive, corrupt or reactionary regimes enlisted as bulwarks
against communism or accomplices in the quest for an impossible, because
unjust, settlement of the Palestinian conflict.
"For us," says
Muhammad Said, a columnist at Egypt's leading newspaper, al-Ahram, "the
west always preferred control to democracy. Now 90% of the problem flows from
the Arab-Israel conflict, that continuous reminder of our colonised past."
Never before, in Arab
eyes, has the US acted so blatantly in favour of its Israeli protege, and for
domestic reasons - the triple alliance of Jewish lobby, neo-conservative
ideologues and the Christian fundamentalist right - which take little or no
stock of rights or wrongs on the ground.
For Makram Muhammad Ahmad,
editor of al-Musawar newspaper and confidant of President Mubarak, this amounts
to a sickness liable to be at least as catastrophic as the Arabs' own.
"It's terrible that a weak and ignorant man like Bush can be used this way
- you might expect it from third world countries, but from the world's only
superpower!"
In the immediate aftermath
of 9/11, Arabs say, the US did - with its talk of a Palestinian state - seem to
have learned something; it began to distance itself from those cumulative
policies of which Bin Ladenism was the ultimate, evil fruit.
"Palestine is not
only crucial in itself," says Muhammad Sid-Ahmad, another al-Ahram
commentator, "it is symbolic of US intentions everywhere. Through
Palestine, you can now see that the US just doesn't care to look for root
causes anywhere. It has adopted the Israeli definition of terror, and that
shapes its policies for the whole region."
These policies are now so
detested that they have raised the potential threat to US interests to
unprecedented levels. To retain its Middle East dominance it has to invest
resources commensurate with the threat. It can no longer rely on friendly
proxies, like Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Egypt, for they themselves will be
undermined by their connivance with it, nor on the mere "containment"
of enemies such as Saddam Hussein.
So the Arab world, says
Said, now risks being "subjected to direct or indirect colonialism".
And the very "backwardness of the Arab order makes the pursuit of such
imperial designs possible". For Arab societies are seen as "incapable
of modernising on their own, thus providing a natural gateway to
colonisation".
Such neo-colonialism
involves "regime change" by force for those the US deems beyond the
pale, and the imposition of reforms, from the school curriculum to their
position on Palestine, on those who remain within it. Of the two explicit
candidates for regime change, Iraq now has priority over the Palestinians.
Indeed Iraq has emerged as the key arena where the battle between good and evil
will be joined.
The idea, says Said, is to
"terminate" the Palestinian question by war at the expense of the
Arabs as a national group. With the overthrow of President Saddam, the US hopes
to make this richly endowed country the linchpin of a whole new pro-American
geopolitical order. Witnessing such a demonstration of US will and power other
regimes would have to bend to US purposes or suffer the same fate, be they such
traditional, "terrorist-sponsoring" opponents as Syria, or
traditional friends, such as Saudi Arabia, held to spawn terrorism through
their misrule or a general "culture" of religious extremism.
For individual Gulf states
that do not submit, says Said, "There will be nothing to stop regimes from
being changed or political successions being manipulated in the way the English
used to do in the 19th century."
There is a wall of almost
universal Arab hostility to a US assault on Iraq. But there is also a single,
very telling breach in it. However fractious, opportunist or incompetent some,
at least, of the exiled US-backed Iraqi opposition may be, they cannot be
dismissed as unrepresentative of the Iraqi people, who - unlike other Arabs -
suffer directly beneath President Saddam's monstrous tyranny.
It is an embarrassing
moral dilemma. The US hawks have tried in vain to establish President Saddam's
complicity with Bin Laden and 9/11. But that failure cannot disguise another,
much deeper affinity between the two: for after Bin Laden what more disastrous
personification of the internal Arab sickness that all right-thinking Arabs
yearn to cure than the Iraqi dictator, what country in more dire need of
democratic reform than Iraq?
Egyptian analyst Wahid
Abdul-Meguid laments that Arab objections to a US assault "amount to
solidarity with Saddam against his own people". If it were just the Arab
regimes it would not be so bad, but the truth is that the objections also come
from Arabs who oppose their own, albeit less brutally despotic regimes, for
essentially the same reasons as the Iraqis do theirs.
If Arabs really believed
that, in removing President Saddam, the US were bent on promoting a democratic
order in his place, they would be readier to join the Iraqi opposition in
tolerating such a war at least. But they don't. They point out that even if the
expected campaign does, in principle, incorporate some reformist good
intentions, so did those earlier western subjugations of the region from whose
consequences they suffer till today.
They will see it,
primarily, as an act of aggression aimed not just at Iraq, but at the whole
Arab world; and what will make it supremely intolerable is that it will be done
on behalf of, Israel, whose acquisition of a large arsenal of weapons of mass
destruction seems to be as permissible as theirs is an abomination.
Their fear is not only
that Israel will become - with the possible exception of Britain - the only other
country to join a US onslaught, but that Ariel Sharon will exploit it to kill
two birds with one stone. He will combine the completion of the Israeli
"war on terror" with another great breakthrough in Zionism's still
unfinished grand design, another mass expulsion of Palestinians of which much
of the Israeli right has long dreamed.
Destroying President
Saddam, like destroying the Taliban, could be one thing, though not nearly so
simple; managing what comes after could be another. For most Arabs, the overall
conditions, largely of Washington's own, now unprecedentedly partisan
pro-Israeli making, in which the US embarks on such an enterprise would seem to
all but guarantee its failure - and a consequent success for Bin Laden.
After all, he was always
something more than just the crazed, archaic Islamist visionary; Iraq,
Palestine - and US conduct towards them - always ranked high on his
anti-colonial, political and nationalist agenda. That is why, says the
Palestinian commentator Abdul Jabbar Adwan, he now "owes an enormous debt
of gratitude" to Mr Bush for the "political services" he has
rendered him since 9/11; far outstripping any commercial ones in the days when
"the Bushes and the bin Ladens" did oil business together.
The price of failure, in
so strategic, complex and volatile a region, would make the post-war falterings
in Afghanistan pale into insignificance, exacerbating both the Arabs' internal
crisis and its external consequences. The Arabs probably would not be the only
ones to pay the price.
"The US may be
preparing a big surprise for the region," warns Lebanese commentator Saad
Mehio, "but the Middle East may be preparing an equally big one for the
Americans. At any rate, no one should forget that it has been the most renowned
source of surprises through the ages."
Gunmen try to kill Afghan president
Gunmen try to kill Afghan
president
Sayed Salahuddin in
Kabul, Rory McCarthy in Islamabad and Julian Borger in Washington
Friday September 6, 2002
The Guardian
Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, survived a serious assassination attempt
last night thanks to his American bodyguards, hours after a car bomb exploded
in a busy market in Kabul, killing at least 22 people and injuring dozens.
Mr Karzai's American
bodyguards stepped in to protect him when an Afghan security guard opened fire
on his car during a visit to the southern city of Kandahar. The US troops shot
dead three men and one American special forces soldier was wounded.
Through a spokeswoman,
President George Bush expressed relief that Mr Karzai had survived, but the
attack and the bomb blast deepened nervousness in Washington over how much the
US-led "war on terror" has achieved in the year since the September
11 attacks.
While Osama bin Laden and
most of the al-Qaida leadership are still at large or unaccounted for, Mr
Karzai's government was its proudest achievement, but it looked less secure
than ever yesterday.
The continuing violence,
the most serious challenge to the Kabul government since it was installed in
December, also seemed likely to add to the apprehension of US generals about
starting a new war in Iraq while the old one is not over. It is not clear if
the two incidents yesterday were linked.
Mr Karzai was in the
southern city of Kandahar, once the headquarters of the Taliban, on a rare
visit outside the capital to attend the wedding of his younger brother Ahmed
Wali.
As the Afghan president
left the mansion of the Kandahar governor, a security guard fired at least two
rounds into his car. Although Mr Karzai was unhurt, the Kandahar governor, Gul
Agha Sherzai, was injured and appeared to be bleeding from the neck. However,
Mr Sherzai was released from a US military hospital late last night.
The Afghan president's
heavily armed bodyguards shouted to Mr Karzai to take cover and opened fire on
the attackers, killing three people.
"I was just outside
the gate when I heard the gunshots," said Dur Mohammed, the security chief
for the governor. "The Americans opened fire on three people and they were
killed."
Mr Karzai was rushed to
the airport on the outskirts of the city and flown out.
Hours before the
assassination attempt a powerful bomb blast struck a market near the ministry
of information in Kabul. Witnesses said they first saw a small explosion on a
bicycle.
As a crowd gathered it was
followed minutes later by a much larger blast from a bomb which appeared to be
planted in a taxi. The scene was chaotic. Pieces of flesh, sandals and clothing
littered the road. Hundreds of windows were shattered.
The deputy police chief,
Mohammed Khalil, blamed al-Qaida, the Taliban and the former prime minister and
exiled former guerrilla chief Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.
"Hekmatyar, the
Taliban and al-Qaida have revealed their black faces again," he said.
"Was this a military place? Was this a place of the Americans?"
Earlier this week Mr Hekmatyar issued a call to arms against western troops in
Afghanistan.
"This bomb was inside
a taxi. It was a very, very strong explosion," said Dul Aqa, a Kabul
police spokesman. "We can't say exactly who was behind it but we know the
last bombs were al-Qaida and Gulbuddin."
Armoured personnel
carriers and emergency vehicles with foreign troops from the International
Security Assistance Force surrounded the site as ambulances ferried at least 65
injured to hospital.
A small contingent of US
troops also inspected the site as Afghan police and soldiers cordoned off
several roads and began checking passing cars.
Police believe the first
bomb was intended to gather a large crowd before the second device exploded.
Haji Abdul Aroof, who was shopping in the market, said: "We came to see
what was happening when the second bomb went off. There was a powerful
explosion and we all ran."
Most of the injured were
being treated at the Emergency Hospital, run by an Italian aid agency, and the
government Wazir Akbar Khan hospital.
Since mid-August there
have been seven small bombings in Kabul, the latest on Sunday when one Afghan
was killed and three people, including a British soldier, were hurt.
Although there have been
no arrests, the Kabul government has used the attacks to argue that foreign
troops should stay in Afghanistan.
· Sayed Salahuddin is a Reuters
correspondent
|
||
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
