[casi] ? dodgy Powell evidence and 2 ARROW briefings

["richardbyrne" <richardbyrne@DELETETHIStiscali.co.uk>]

See below 2 new ARROW briefings by Mil
I have cut out a potentially big piece of news from it, which Mil thinks
could be "dytnamite"
It regards the satelite pics of Al Taji.........
richard byrne voices


Studying the photos, the angle of the access
road behind the bunker, and the presence of trees in
the second photo indicate that the photos actually are
of two quite different bunkers. It seems that the
second photo has been chosen because it includes the
inspectors' vehicles driving through the Taji facility-to
dramatise their alleged inability to detect Iraqi
deception.


Game Over
Bush & Powell Try To Shut Down The Inspectors
ARROW Anti-War Briefing 29 (10 February 2003)
WAR PLAN IRAQ Update Number 8

CO-OPERATION IS IRRELEVANT
President Bush is determined to go to war, whatever
Baghdad does: 'Saddam Hussein can now be expected
to begin another round of empty concessions,
transparently false denials. No doubt he will play a last
minute game of deception. The game is over.'
(Telegraph, 7 Feb., p. 1) 'It would not surprise the US
if Saddam Hussein pretends all of a sudden to have a
change of heart and allow the U2 to fly or to show up
with some of the weapons he promised he never
had,' a White House spokesperson said. 'But it
wouldn't change the fact that Saddam Hussein is not
co-operating.' (Times, 7 Feb., p. 1) However much
Iraq actually co-operates with the weapons inspectors,
'Saddam is not co-operating'.
In his barnstorming briefing to the UN Security
Council on 5 Feb., Colin Powell said, 'The issue before
us is not how much time we are willing to give the
inspectors to be frustrated by Iraqi obstruction, but
how much longer are we willing to put up with Iraq's
non-compliance before we, as a council, we, as the
United Nations, say, "Enough. Enough".' (Telegraph, 6
Feb., p. 1) The only possible fate for the inspectors is
to be 'frustrated by obstruction'. The US Secretary of
State was more direct earlier: 'The question isn't how
much longer do you need for inspections to work.
Inspections will not work.'  (Independent, 23 Jan., p.
1)
One aim of the Powell presentation to the
Security Council was to undermine public and
international confidence in the inspection agencies.

THE TAJI FACILITY SHELL GAME
The most striking images used in the 5 Feb.
presentation were of the Taji weapons facility. One
satellite photo from 10 Nov. 2002 shows two shapes
by a bunker-one is alleged to be a decontamination
vehicle, and the other a security building for
monitoring leakages from the chemical weapons
allegedly stored in the bunker. A second photo taken
on 22 Dec., shows UN weapons inspectors' vehicles
approaching the 'sanitized bunkers'-from which the
vehicle and security building seem to have been
removed.
Jonathan Ban, a chemical weapons expert at the
Washington-based Chemical and Biological Arms
Control Institute, found the juxtaposition of the two
images 'strange': 'It wasn't clear to me whether the
bunkers that were shown in the second image were
the same ones that were shown in the first. If that is
what they are claiming, then I would have liked to see
more detail of the decontamination truck and the
security building being moved. And if they were
different buildings, what happened to the active
bunkers when the weapons inspectors showed up?
This is something that needs to be explained better.'
(Guardian, 6 Feb., p. 3)
Studying the photos, the angle of the access
road behind the bunker, and the presence of trees in
the second photo indicate that the photos actually are
of two quite different bunkers. It seems that the
second photo has been chosen because it includes the
inspectors' vehicles driving through the Taji facility-to
dramatise their alleged inability to detect Iraqi
deception.

THE AL-MUSSAYYIB MISDIRECTION
'Mr Powell's case for Iraqi concealment also relied
heavily on interpretation of a second set of satellite
images, which captured the al-Mussayyib weapons
facility', allegedly involved in shipping chemical
weapons from production facilities out to the field.
'The first picture, from May last year, showed a
bunker surrounded by what the US said were three
35-tonne cargo trucks, along with a decontamination
vehicle-strong evidence according to Mr Powell that
the site was being used for chemical or biological
weapons activity. A second image, taken two months
later, showed that the entire site [actually only part of
the site-ARROW] had been bulldozed and the earth
freshly graded to conceal banned weapons activity
from UN inspection teams. The images were hugely
important for the US case, because, said Mr Powell, an
Iraqi human source had confirmed that the chemical
weapons had been removed at that time.' On 13 Dec.,
inspectors went to al-Mussayyib and found only ready-
to-use pesticides.
Jonathan Ban again: 'I find it very difficult to
believe that if there was chemical weapons
contamination in the area that the Iraqis would be
able to completely get rid of that contamination. The
image shows that there are some areas of ground on
the site that haven't been graded and I think the
inspectors would be able to take samples from there
to prove conclusively whether or not there has been
recent chemical weapons activity.' (Guardian, 6 Feb.,
p. 3) Sounds like a job for those inspectors that Mr
Powell says are pointless.

US FLOUTS RESOLUTION 1441
UN Resolution 1441, which Colin Powell exhorts us
all to re-read, 'Requests all Member States to give full
support to UNMOVIC and the IAEA in the discharge
of their mandates, including by providing any
information related to prohibited programmes or
other aspects of their mandates'. (Para. 10) The
Resolution was passed on 8 Nov. 2002, but these
dramatic photos from May, July, Nov. and Dec. 2002
were not handed over to UNMOVIC-they were kept
to be publicly displayed on 5 Feb. 2003.
THE MOBILE CONFIDENCE TRICK
'Because Powell's slideshow showed Iraq giving the
UN inspectors the runaround, it also weakened Blix's
argument that more time would bring success. Talking
of the 18 lorries that are believed to be mobile
biological weapons factories, Powell asked rhetorically
how long it would take to find even a single one
among the "thousands and thousands of trucks" on
Iraq's roads... Blix's report to the UN last week put
the US on the back foot, in arguing that the inspectors
deserved more time. Powell's performance yesterday
won back a lot of that ground.' (Times, 6 Feb., p. 15)
In the real world, 'Biowar experts concede that
no scheme is too crazy for Saddam. Still, they say,
truck-mounted labs would be all but unworkable. The
required ventilation systems would make them
instantly recognizable from above, and they would
need special facilities to safely dispose of their deadly
wastes. A routine highway accident could be
catastrophic. And US intelligence, after years of
looking for them, has never found even one.'
(Newsweek, 17 Feb., p. 20)

I SAY, I SAY, HEARSAY
Richard Beeston of The Times observed that, 'most of
what General Powell said was open to interpretation.
There was no named high-ranking defector prepared
to substantiate the allegations. There was no visual
evidence of soldiers or scientists handling weapons
such as chemical or biological weapons, nor even
attempting to conceal huge items such as Scud
missiles.' His colleague Michael Evans noted that there
were 'no pictures of the inside' of any of the alleged
mobile biological weapons laboratories, nor
'photographic evidence' of a chemical weapons
programme. (Times, 6 Feb., p. 14)
Joseph Cirincione, senior associate at the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in
Washington DC, said, 'We should never go to war
based on a defector's tale. There's a long history of
defectors' tales being erroneous... It is a problem that
detectives have all the time; somebody comes to them
hoping to get something in exchange.' (Guardian, 6
Feb., p. 2)
'He barraged the members [of the Security
Council] with questions: "Who took the hard drives?
Where did they go? What's being hidden? Why?" Yet
he offered few answers and much speculation.'
(Guardian, 6 Feb., p. 1) Egyptian political scientist
Emad Shahin observed wryly, and accurately, 'The
speech was long on accusations, and short on
evidence.' (Telegraph, 7 Feb., p. 14)

THE TAPES
Many Western observers were convinced by
intercepted conversations between Iraqi military
officials. 'But doubts remain about the credibility of
the tapes, not least because many observers doubt
that senior Iraqi officers would speak so carelessly on
open telephone or radio conversations. The
conversations were also open to interpretation.
Jonathan Ban, a chemical weapons specialist said. "For
example, what do they mean by a 'modified vehicle'?
That could mean absolutely anything as could
'prohibited ammo'." ' (Guardian, 6 Feb., p. 2)

EVEN THE SPIES REVOLT
Before his speech, it was reported that Powell
'yesterday appeared to pull back from claims that he
would show the United Nations a link between al-
Qaeda and Iraq, amid anger among Washington's
spies over the way intelligence was being distorted to
prove the link existed.' (Telegraph, 4 Feb., p. 13)
There is evidence that the supposed 'link' man,
Abu Musab Zarqawi, was treated in Baghdad, but
there is no evidence he contacted Iraqi officials: 'The
intelligence is practically non-existent', said one
'exasperated American intelligence source'. The
source went on: 'It is impossible to support the bald
conclusions being made by the White House and the
Pentagon given the poor quantity and quality of the
intelligence available. There is uproar within the
intelligence community on all of these points, but the
Bush White House has quashed dissent.' The
Telegraph commented, 'This could all be dismissed as
a turf war between rival intelligence agencies were it
not for the near unanimity across the British and
American intelligence communities, including the
Defence Intelligence Agency analysts whose bosses
produced the line the White House wanted to hear.'
(Telegraph, 4 Feb. 2003, p. 13) Despite the uproar,
Powell trotted out the Party line.

1998 ALL OVER AGAIN
President Bush famously said, 'This looks like a re-run
of a bad movie and I'm not interested in watching.'
(Guardian, 22  Jan., p. 1) Let's remember that in Dec.
1998 the inspection agency UNSCOM was driven out
by the US, not by Baghdad. UNSCOM chief Richard
Butler records in his memoirs that he was called in by
US Ambassador to the UN Peter Burleigh, and
advised to be 'prudent' with the safety of UNSCOM
staff. 'Repeating a familiar script, I told him that I
would act on this advice and remove my staff from
Iraq.' (Saddam Defiant, p. 224) UNSCOM withdrew,
creating the right political climate for days of US/UK
military strikes, and leading to the destruction of the
agency. The US shut down UNSCOM in 1998 to pave
the way for war. President Bush is trying to re-run
this bad movie with UNSCOM's successor,
UNMOVIC. He must be stopped.

ARROW BOOK War Plan Iraq: Ten Reasons Against
War On Iraq by Milan Rai (Verso, 2002)
'Readable and well-sourced' The Times 'Excellent'
Tariq Ali 'Required reading' Professor Paul Rogers
More ARROW Anti-War Briefings available <j-n-
v.org> or from 0845 458 2564
PLEASE SUPPORT ARROW (Active Resistance to the
Roots of War)
We are making as many briefings as we can. Please
help with printing/distribution by sending cheques to
'ARROW' (marked 'briefings'), c/o NVRN, 162
Holloway Rd, London N7 8DQ.
PLEDGE OF RESISTANCE Sign online at the
ARROW WEBSITE <www.j-n-v.org>

*************************************************

SECOND
RESOLUTION
Defend the UN Charter: Oppose War on Iraq
ARROW Anti-War Briefing 28 (10 February 2003)
WAR PLAN IRAQ Update Number 7

EVEN WITH A NEW RESOLUTION, THIS WAR IS
WRONG
The Prime Minister is confident that he can win a
second UN Resolution, and that this will persuade a
large chunk of anti-war opinion to come over to his
side. The opinion polls show that a majority of people
in Britain oppose war on Iraq without UN
authorisation, but a majority of people would support
(or stop opposing) a war covered by a new UN
resolution.
But a war on Iraq in the present circumstances
would be an attack not only on the civilian population
of Iraq, but on the core principles of the UN itself, an
attack on the United Nations Charter. The anti-war
movement must defend the UN Charter, against the
UN Security Council if necessary.

'MATERIAL BREACH'/'SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES'
It is unlikely that a new UN Resolution will explicitly
authorise the use of force under US leadership, as UN
Resolution 84 did in July 1950, covering the Korean
War. It is more likely that the Resolution will declare
Iraq in 'material breach' of its disarmament duties, and
threaten 'serious consequences'.
These vague phrases do not amount to an
authorisation to use force. Iraq may be in 'material
breach' of past UN Resolutions, but none of them
authorised the use of force in the event of Iraqi non-
co-operation with UN inspectors. (See ARROW Anti-
War Briefing 25: Material Breach for more on this.)

WHAT THE UN CHARTER SAYS
Even if the Resolution did explicitly 'authorise' the use
of force, war would not be legal. Article 39 of the UN
Charter: 'The Security Council shall determine the
existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the
peace, or act of aggression and shall make
recommendations, or decide what measures shall be
taken in accordance with Articles 41 and 42, to
maintain or restore international peace and security.'
Art. 41 deals with nonmilitary measures.
Art. 42: 'Should the Security Council consider
that measures provided for in Article 41 would be
inadequate or have proved to be inadequate, it may
take such action by air, sea, or land forces as may be
necessary to maintain or restore international peace
and security.' So there are two tests: there has to be a
'threat to peace' and nonmilitary means are
'inadequate'.

IRAQ IS NOT A 'THREAT TO PEACE'
British Vice-Admiral Sir James Jungius KBE observed
in a letter to The Times (1 Jan., p. 25): 'Even if the
weapons do exist, where is the evidence of intent to
use them? War is too important and unpleasant a
business to be undertaken on the basis of a hunch,
however good that hunch may be.'
Former Conservative Cabinet Minister Douglas
Hogg: 'The real question is not whether he's got
weapons of mass destruction, but rather whether-if
he has got those weapons-he is a grave and
imminent threat to the rest of us... even if he had
these things, unless he's a grave and imminent threat
there isn't a moral basis for war, because the doctrine
of self-defence isn't properly invoked.' (BBC Radio 4,
The World This Weekend, 12 Jan.) At the time of
writing, it has not been proved that Iraq possesses
weapons of mass destruction (WMD)-it has certainly
not been shown that Iraq intends to use its weapons
in an aggressive manner.

'ADEQUATE' NONVIOLENT MEASURES:
INSPECTION
To contain Iraq's suspected weapons programmes: 1)
we can detect and disarm any remaining weapons
capability, and 2) we can 'freeze' Iraq's capacity to
make such weapons, to prevent their development
and use in the future.
The US has contrasted Iraqi behaviour
unfavourably with that of South Africa, which engaged
in voluntary nuclear disarmament verified by the
International Atomic Energy Authority. The head of
the IAEA, 'Mr ElBaradei later noted that, even with
co-operation, this had taken two years.' (Financial
Times, 28 Jan., p. 9) It was two years after IAEA
inspections began that South African President F.W.
de Klerk announced in Mar. 1993 that Pretoria had
actually developed 'a limited nuclear deterrent'-the
IAEA then carried out inspections over the next five
months,  building on several months of inspections in
1991. (IAEA Bulletin, Vol. 37 No. 1, search
<www.iaea.org/worldatom/Periodicals/>)
Weapons inspectors from the IAEA and the
UN Monitoring and Ongoing Verification Commission
(UNMOVIC) have only been at work in Iraq for two
months-since 27 Nov. 2002, when they started their
work almost from scratch after a four-year gap. They
need more time. Months not weeks.
'To carry out a thorough inspection would likely
take several months.' Ewen Buchanan, spokesperson
for UNMOVIC. (FT, 9 Jan., p. 10) Mohammed El
Baradei, head of IAEA inspections in Iraq, told the
Security Council on 27 Jan., 'Barring exceptional
circumstances and provided there is sustained co-
operation by Iraq, we should be able within the next
few months to provide credible assurance that Iraq
has no nuclear weapons programme. These few
months, in my view, would be a valuable investment in
peace because they could help us to avoid a war.'
(Financial Times, 28 Jan., p. 9)
'Seven out of ten Americans would give UN
weapons inspectors months more to seach for arms
inside Iraq, according to yesterday's Washington
Post.' (Times, 23 Jan., p. 15) This figure fell after Colin
Powell's misleading Security Council presentation (see
ARROW Briefing 29: 'Game Over').
The international community certainly wants
more time: 'There is no reason to give a time-limit' on
inspections, said Jean-Marc de la Sabliere, France's UN
envoy, speaking for most of the world. (Times, 10 Jan.,
p. 1)

US INTENT ON FLOUTING RESOLUTION 1284
Para. 7 of UN Resolution 1284 (from Dec. 1999) says,
'not later than 60 days' after the IAEA and UNMOVIC
have started work in Iraq, inspectors should draw up
a 'work programme' including 'the key remaining
disarmament tasks to be completed by Iraq'. 60 days
ran out on 27 Jan., but there's no plan yet.
Dr Hans Blix, head of UNMOVIC, reminded
reporters of Resolution 1284 on 9 Jan., saying that it
'foresees that we will define in due course which are
the key remaining disarmament tasks and the Security
Council will approve them. And then it will be for Iraq
to try to satisfy those tasks. So February is not the end
of time.' (<www.unmovic.org> 'Recent Items'.)
We should now be beginning the process of
verified disarmament in Iraq, not contemplating the
forced end of inspections because of US bullying.
The weapons inspectors themselves, almost half
the US public, the international community, and the
main UN Resolution governing the work of the
weapons inspectors, all want more time for inspectors
to detect and disarm-months not weeks.

'ADEQUATE' NONVIOLENT MEASURES:
MONITORING
More importantly, UN weapons inspectors could now
install throughout Iraq a system of video cameras,
radiation detectors, temperature sensors and other
devices to monitor 'dual-use' equipment that might be
used for developing weapons of mass destruction as
well as for normal civilian purposes. Video and air
sampling information could be fed back live to the
inspectors' Baghdad HQ, and then onto the UN in
New York, as they did before Dec. 1998.
Colin Powell told the Security Council on 5 Feb.
that Iraq had 'embedded key portions of its illicit
chemical weapons [CW] infrastructure within its
legitimate civilian industry': 'To all outward
appearances, even to experts, the infrastructure looks
like an ordinary civilian operation. Illicit and legitimate
production can go on simultaneously or on a dime.'
In the real world, as former UN weapons
inspector Scott Ritter has pointed out, 'individual
pieces of CW production equipment are worthless
unless they are assembled in a specific configuration, a
unique combination that would be readily discernible
to weapons inspectors.'
According to the UN inspection agency
UNSCOM, 'Only the proper combination of different
pieces of equipment in a particular configuration gives
to... these pieces of equipment the status of a CW
production facility.' (quoted by Ritter, Arms Control
Today, June 2000) As long as the video cameras are
rolling, we would know if Iraq's chemical industry was
being used to produce weapons. Temperature
sensors can apparently play a similar role for biological
weapons, and radiation detectors for any nuclear
weapons programme.

THE SECURITY COUNCIL IS NOT ABOVE THE
LAW
Careful readers will have noticed that it is up to the
Security Council to 'determine' whether there is a
threat to peace, and to 'consider' whether nonviolent
means are inadequate. However, this cannot be a
licence for the Security Council to make war at whim.
There must be some objective basis in fact for the
findings that (a) there is a 'threat to peace' and (b) that
nonviolent means are 'inadequate'.
In the present case, there are no threatening
military deployments, no signalled threats, and no
doctrine of aggressive attack-by Iraq. The evidence is
that it is the US, not Iraq, that currently poses a
'threat to peace' in the Gulf. Similarly, there are
nonviolent measures for detecting, disarming and
preventing the re-development of weapons of mass
destruction which have not yet been
exhausted-which have barely begun to be explored.
If there is a UN Security Council Resolution
which explicitly 'authorises' military action against Iraq,
we must protest against this breach of the UN
Charter, the foundations of the world's legal order. If
there is a UN Security Council Resolution which only
refers to a 'material breach' and 'serious
consequences', this is not even an attempted
'authorisation' of war. We must protect the UN
Charter-from Washington, London, and, if
necessary, the UN Security Council. The UN Charter
is there 'to save succeeding generations from the
scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has
brought untold sorrow to mankind.' (Preamble)

ARROW BOOK War Plan Iraq: Ten Reasons Against
War On Iraq by Milan Rai (Verso, 2002)
'Readable and well-sourced' The Times 'Excellent'
Tariq Ali 'Required reading' Professor Paul Rogers
More ARROW Anti-War Briefings available <j-n-
v.org> or from 0845 458 2564
PLEASE SUPPORT ARROW (Active Resistance to the
Roots of War)
We are making as many briefings as we can. Please
help with printing/distribution by sending cheques to
'ARROW' (marked 'briefings'), c/o NVRN, 162
Holloway Rd, London N7 8DQ.
PLEDGE OF RESISTANCE Sign online at the
ARROW WEBSITE <www.j-n-v.org>






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