Shock and Awe; the sequel

[Pharaoh]

By Mike Whitney

Yesterday's ham-fisted maneuverings reveal the administration's true objectives. Bush would like to conceal his attack on Iran behind a mask of international legitimacy. But even without Security Council approval the plan will move forward. The current showdown has nothing to do with "noncompliance" or imaginary nuclear weapons programs. It has everything to do with consolidating the vast resources of the Caspian Basin under the Stars and Stripes and fending off future threats to America's global domination.
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12245.htm
:dem: :dem: :dem:

[Emit]

1. That article

pretty much goes hand in hand with what Ritter is talking about:

He discusses his new book, Iraq Confidential-- calls US efforts for Iraq disarmament a trojan horse, and says that we really, instead, have had a policy of regime change to get rid of Saddam, even through the Clinton era. He calls his book the Rosetta Stone that explains all these: Intelligence Conspiracy, Undermining UN, Longterm goal of overthrowing Saddam, etc. He concludes by saying, "this is an administration that's hell bent on leather to go to war against Iran for the purpose of removing that regime from power."

http://www.pbs.org/kcet/tavissmiley/archive/200603/20060306.html

Ritter: One of the things - the reason why I wrote this book is
that there's a lot of confusion about what was going on
with the weapons inspections, and that manifested itself
in the ability of the Bush administration to tell the American
people that these stockpiles of WMD existed when in fact
we now know they didn't.

People are saying, what was the mistake? The intelligence
community got it wrong. I wrote this book 'cause it's the
Rosetta Stone. If you read this book, you'll understand,
(A), that the United States never had any intention of completing
the disarmament task in Iraq. The sole purpose of our
policy was to get rid of Saddam Hussein.

And disarmament was only useful insofar as it facilitated
that, by containing Saddam Hussein through the
continuation of economic sanctions and providing a
Trojan horse for U.S. intelligence community to get
into Iraq to get intelligence about Saddam Hussein's
security, so that they could follow through with their
task of removing him from power.

~snip~

Tavis: Let me break these pieces down of
the subtitle, which basically make up what the essence
of the book is. When you say intelligence conspiracy,
the Bush White House to this day says maybe we got
intelligence wrong, maybe the data wasn't as good,
as accurate as it should have been. But there was
no intelligence conspiracy. Obviously, you disagree.

Ritter: Oh yeah, I disagree totally.

~snip~

If you take a look at the resolution passed by the
United Nations in April 1991 that mandated the
work of the inspectors, it says that Iraq must be
disarmed; it says that economic sanctions will be
continued linked to Iraq's disarmament. But if Iraq
is found to be disarmed, the sanctions will be lifted.

The conspiracy manifests itself initially in May 1991
when Secretary Of State James Baker goes before
the United States Congress and says even if Iraq
complies with its obligation to disarm, economic
sanctions will not be lifted until which time Saddam
Hussein is removed from power. This means that
the disarmament process, from the very beginning,
is not about getting rid of weapons of mass destruction.

It's about creating the conditions for the maintenance
of economic sanctions based containment until the
C.I.A. can remove Saddam. So the process was
always focused on regime change, never on disarmament.

~snip~

Tavis: Tell me how, given all the commentary we're
seeing and hearing and reading about the
President's trip, how should we view what
happened in India and what happened, or
better put, what didn't happen in Pakistan on this trip?

Ritter: (laugh) Pakistan. Well, I think
what needs to be seen here is for all the rhetoric
that this administration puts out regarding nonproliferation
and disarmament, they have a totally incoherent policy.
Where India and Pakistan, two violators of the notion
of nonproliferation, India is being rewarded.

Pakistan continues to not be rewarded. And we're
talking about going to war with Iran. We can't
disassociate what occurred in India and Pakistan
from the ongoing struggle with the Iranians over
their nuclear program. This is an administration
that says one thing and does another. And I'm
very concerned.

It's totally incoherent policy; it's dangerous policy.
And it pretty much mirrors the pattern of behavior
we saw with Iraq, where we build up a threat that
doesn't exist as an excuse to go to war to get rid of a regime.

Tavis: So in your mind, the President can't
justify the distinction between the way he treated
India in rewarding them, and the way he did not
reward Pakistan.

Ritter: And the way he's behaving between Iran.
It's a totally incoherent policy, and I think people across
the board recognize it as such.

Tavis: At the end of the day, right quick, what
does that incoherent policy land us?

Ritter: It's going to land us in yet another
quagmire of own making in the Middle East called Iran.
Because this is an administration that's hell bent on
leather to go to war against Iran for the purpose of
removing that regime from power.