Hans Blix: Is US sending out the wrong signal? 11 comments

13 Apr 2003 @ 23:22, by Quidnovi Who are we fooling here? Nuclear weapons have been scratched off the list a long time ago already. Chemical weapons? Biological weapons? None, so far, have been used. Have we found any, yet? Rumors abound. Chances are that we might still find some traces of them---though probably not in any significant amount if we do, and certainly not anything that would amount to the evidence of the "grave and gathering" threat of which it was question before the war started. But what does it matter now, whether we find some or not? We now all know that it was all false pretense. The cat is out of the bag. We are there for REGIME CHANGE (and darn proud of it, too.) That's what this has always been about. And Iraq is just the tip of the iceberg. We have apparently become the self-appointed "liberators" of the Middle East. And while some have found this a cause for celebration and others see there cause to re-evaluate their positions on Iraq, there are those who are expressing some concern over what kind of signal we are sending to the world: Hans Blix: Is US sending out the wrong signal? Madrid – Wednesday 9 April 2003 The invasion of Iraq was planned a long time in advance, and the United States and Britain are not primarily concerned with finding any banned weapons of mass destruction, the chief UN weapons inspector, Hans Blix, said in an interview on Wednesday. "There is evidence that this war was planned well in advance. Sometimes this raises doubts about their attitude to the (weapons) inspections," Blix told Spanish daily El Pais. "I now believe that finding weapons of mass destruction has been relegated, I would say, to fourth place, which is why the United States and Britain are now waging war on Iraq. Today the main aim is to change the dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein," he said, according to the Spanish text of the interview. Blix said US President George W Bush had told him in October 2002 that he backed the UN's work to verify US and British claims that Baghdad was developing biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. But he said he knew at the time "there were people within the Bush administration who were skeptical and who were working on engineering regime change". By the start of March the hawks in both Washington and London were getting impatient, he added. Blix said that he thought the US might initially have believed Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction---although its "fabrication" of evidence raised doubts about even that---but that Washington was now less convinced by its own claims. "I think the Americans started the war thinking there were some. I think they now believe less in that possibility. But I don't know---you ask yourself a lot of questions when you see the things they did to try and demonstrate that the Iraqis had nuclear weapons, like the fake contract with Niger," he explained. That was a reference to US allegations---later denied---that Iraq had sought to purchase uranium from the west African state of Niger. "I'm very curious to see if they do find any (weapons)," he said. Blix said the war, which on Wednesday entered its 21st day, was "a very high price to pay in terms of human lives and the destruction of a country" when the threat of weapons proliferation could have been contained by UN inspections. By attacking Iraq, Washington had sent the wrong message---that if a country did not possess biological, chemical or nuclear weapons, it risked being attacked. "The United States maintains that the war on Iraq is designed to send a signal to other countries to keep away from weapons of mass destruction. But people are getting a different message. Take the announcement North Korea has just made. It's tantamount to saying 'if you let in the inspectors, like Iraq did, you get attacked'. North Korea accused the United States last Sunday of using a UN Security Council discussion of its nuclear program as a "prelude to war" and warned that it would fully mobilize and strengthen its forces. "It's an important problem," Blix continued. "If a country perceives that its security is guaranteed, it won't need to consider weapons of mass destruction. This security guarantee is the first line of defense against the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." The 74-year-old Swede announced in March that he would step down from his post when his contract runs out in June. Blix's reputation for independence and resisting political pressure was sorely tested as the Iraq crisis unfolded and US officials became exasperated with his measured reports on Iraqi cooperation with his inspection teams. (In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.)

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