Bill Sykes' Newsletter
from America.
(August 2003)
An ex-Brit gives his views-(without fear
or favor)---of the American Scene
Perception or Deception. (Controversy Reigns
Supreme).
Mr Bush, in his State of the Union address on
the 28th of January 2003, emphatically stated that Saddam
Hussein was trying to develop a nuclear bomb, and that
intelligence sources had confirmed that Iraq was attempting
to purchase Uranium from Niger in order to further their
aims to become a nuclear power.
Here are the exact sixteen words that caused the political
furore.
"The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of Uranium from
Africa".
I perused the complete text of President Bush’s
speech and found what I considered to be other claims
that he made regarding Iraq’s potential capabilities
in the area of chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons,
and Iraq’s support of terrorist factions such as
Al-Queda, that were far more inconclusive and of more
doubtful origin than the Niger Uranium story.
The full text of the State of the Union address can be
found on http://www.whitehouse.gov/
Where did the information come from? Why British intelligence
of course. President Bush said so, or did it come from
France or perhaps even Italy. When push comes to shove,
as the Americans would say, the answer is to find a fall
guy, a scapegoat, a sacrificial lamb.
Some one has to take the blame and it looks as if the
Director of the CIA, Mr. George Tenet has taken it upon
himself to fall upon his sword and become the sacrificial
lamb, even though the CIA were reported to have requested
that the statement made by the President in the State
of the Union address be stricken due to questionable validity.
Obviously the CIA was over ridden by a higher White House
authority and the offending statement was not deleted
- wonder who could possibly be high enough to exert such
power?
President Bush, and Prime Minister Tony Blair, (Who
it has been asserted gave authorization for the dodgy
dossier to be released). (*),
have been taken to task by their respective parliamentary
exploratory investigation committees for what has been
described as their publication of bogus and misleading
information, (and in at least one case forged documents),
with respect to Saddam Hussein’s attempts to attain
nuclear capability, and having possession of weapons of
mass destruction.
(*) The
British Foreign Secretary, Mr. Jack Straw, maintained
that the report was master minded by a Mr. Alistair Campbell,
(The Prime Minister’s Director of Communications
and Strategy), and that Downing Street had ordered the
Intelligence community to "sex up" the dossier by claiming
that Saddam Hussein had a chemical and biological weapons
capability which could be launched within 45 minutes.
There was also another case where members of the Bush
Administration, including Vice President Cheney, Secretary
of Defence Donald Rumsfeld and Security Advisor Condoleeza
Rice, continued to overstate the position that Iraq, (apparently
based upon unproven information), was importing high strength
aluminium tubes to assist in building a nuclear capability.
From the limited information made available - yes, I do
believe that aluminium tubes were imported, but not for
the reasons given.
All these things were done with the obvious intent of
promoting and furthering the White House attempts to convince
the people of the World to support their actions of going
to war with Iraq.
So the question arises, was the world at large, including
the American people, deceived, manipulated, and misled
by the rhetoric issuing from the White House in support
of starting a war against Iraq, or was it just an "honest"
mistake made by the leadership of both the United States
and Great Britain?
Mr. Bush insisted in his defence of the situation that
the information received was, quote, "Darn good intelligence".
Hmm. Perhaps there are readers out there who have intelligent
opinions on the subject. You tell me. But before you answer,
you must remember that a majority of the members of the
House of Representatives and a majority of the members
of the Senate, (Republicans and Democrats alike), voted
for the resolution that gave the President the support
he needed to overcome opposition voiced in the United
Nations Assembly in order to go to war with Iraq. Surely
not all the members of Congress who voted for the resolution
to go to war with Iraq are lacking in intelligence—who
knows, perhaps they had shares in American oil companies.
Secretary of Defence Mr. Donald Rumsfeld, and Security
Advisor Ms. Condaleeza Rice, in recent days have rapidly
backed off their previous assertions that Saddam Hussein,
"Possessed weapons of mass destruction", to a position
that Saddam Hussein was "Developing weapons of mass destruction".
I would suggest that there is a big difference between
those two statements "Possessed" and "Developing".
The regime of Saddam Hussein without a doubt was a brutal
and oppressive regime, but some Iraqis are apparently
beginning to question whether the war against Iraq by
coalition forces, (with the terrible loss of the life
of thousands of Iraqi civilians and the destruction of
many of their major cities), has freed them from such
oppression, and are making doubtful comparisons as to
whether life under the devil they knew was better than
the life they are now enduring under the current prevailing
conditions brought about by the actions of the Coalition
Army of Occupation.
Prime Minister Blair still insists that the coalition
of two did the right in going to war with Iraq, but many
members of the British Parliament are strongly criticising
the method of promoting the war and are calling for an
independent enquiry into what they call a "culture of
deceit".
We welcome feedback about any of the contents
of these newsletters. Please send all correspondence to
bill_sykes@huddersfield1.co.uk
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