by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
National Review Online<\/em><\/p>\n In a much publicized second interview with CBS\u2019s Dan Rather, Iraqi\u2019s President Saddam Hussein insisted that continual American pressure had little effect. \u201cLook at Afghanistan. Here it is almost October 2005, and America is still fighting the Taliban, so I don\u2019t think they will dare come to our Iraq. But we are ready to be martyred nonetheless.\u201d<\/p>\n The Iraqi president who was hosting Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas also denied rumors that Iraqi agents had attempted to assassinate former President Bill Clinton. On recent disclosures of a plot against him, President Clinton left nearby Kuwait, where he had lectured his hosts on the dangers of WMD proliferation in Iraq.<\/p>\n Among the more tense moments of the Rather interview was Saddam\u2019s insistence that Iran\u2019s nuclear program demanded an \u201cArab response.\u201d The Iraqi leader also promised to increase his bounties to suicide bombers on the West Bank to $40,000 per family, and planned to expand the program to include martyrs who joined the Taliban resistance. CBS\u2019s Rather grimaced, \u201cI guess that $70-a-barrel oil give you a pretty wide berth, Mr. President.\u201d<\/p>\n In response to Iraq\u2019s insistence that U.N. inspectors would not be allowed back in, and rumors that several terrorists were residing in Baghdad, Secretary of State Rice issued a call for a continuance of the controversial no-fly zones and the U.N. embargo. \u201cWe cannot relent; the moment we do there will be a holocaust in Kurdistan. We are in a war against terror. It is bad enough that we know Abu Nidal and Abu Abbas reside in Baghdad, but Saddam is also openly harboring Abdul Rahman Yasin and Ahmed Hikmat Shakir who were connected to the plot in 1993 to blow up the World Trade Center and other anti-American terrorism. This is intolerable after 9\/11. Now we find out that this al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who fled our forces in Afghanistan is also with Saddam. And al Qaeda\u2019s affiliated Ansar al-Islam is openly operating in Kurdistan with Saddam\u2019s approval.\u201d<\/p>\n Military officials reacted to Sec. Rice\u2019s warnings with some skepticism. An unnamed Air Force general added, \u201cHoly Cow, we are up to a half-million of these sorties, going on 15 years now. At some point, we have to ask whether or not it is worth trying to take away 2\/3s of the guy\u2019s air space. When does it all end?\u201d<\/p>\n Retired Gen. Anthony Zinni who oversaw Operation Desert Fox seven years ago on Saddam\u2019s weapons\u2019 installations, warned, \u201cWe have no idea what he had, what we hit, what is left. As I said earlier, after the 1998 raid we took out 100 targets, killed maybe 2,000 Iraqis, and struck 85 percent of the WMD operations, but who knows what\u2019s there now?<\/p>\n The Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani of the PUK reacted sharply to press accounts that the British and Americans were tiring of some 15 years of no-fly zone enforcements. \u201cA day without planes means death to us, you must remember 1991 when you let him attack us from the air. We have Ansar Al \u2013Islam doing Saddam\u2019s dirty work, even though the Americans know these terrorists are connected with Osama bin Laden.\u201d<\/p>\n Reuters reported today of undisclosed arrangements concerning Saddam Hussein and French and Russian consortia to explore new areas of Iraq for possible petroleum development. But French officials hotly denied charges that they had accepted an offer of 75 percent of the revenues for each barrel pumped from all new fields developed. CIA analysts estimated that recent revenue increases of $30 to $40 per barrel in price hikes had given Saddam over $100 billion in windfall profits. One anonymous analyst asked, \u201cWhere does all this money go? Perhaps that is why France, Germany, Russia, and China are lining up to provide Saddam with anything he wants.\u201d<\/p>\n U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan promised that all the Iraqi windfall profits from recent oil spikes would fall under the auspices of the Oil-for-Food program. To ensure transparency and public audit, Secretary Annan asked his son and special envoy Kojo Annan to fly to Switzerland to consult Swiss financial institutions about monitoring oil vouchers. \u201cNo other program except such a U.N. international effort could ensure the integrity of some $50 billion in commerce. The lives of Iraqi children are at stake and we take our humanitarian task very, very seriously. It is another reminder of why we need a strong United Nations.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, Secretary Annan also warned that the U.N. program may soon have to come to an end. \u201cAfter the American inspired crisis of 2003 passed, we now see a new willingness of our member nations in the General Assembly to bring Saddam Hussein back into the family of nations. No one really wants to see another American blunder like Afghanistan.\u201d<\/p>\n On the domestic scene both conservative and liberal spokesmen voiced disappointment with President Bush\u2019s apparent vacillation and willingness to let Saddam violate the sanctions and U.N. inspections. A group of three Democratic senators \u2014 Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, and John Kerry \u2014 reminded the president that the Senate had voted overwhelmingly over three years ago to authorize the military removal of Saddam Hussein, and suggested that the old \u201cJim Baker\/Frank Carlucci realpolitik\u201d was at work again, or as Sen. Clinton put it, \u201cJust pump that oil and it\u2019s O.K. with us that he does pretty much what he wants to his people.\u201d<\/p>\n Sen. Clinton went on to hammer the president, \u201cWe need leadership, not more of the same old, same old that we see with North Korea and Iran. Could I remind the president that three years ago we cited 23 reasons to remove Saddam Hussein and approved them all by a 77 vote, and that the House got nearly 300 votes in their similar resolution? And all this follows the 1998 Iraqi Liberation Act passed by the Senate and signed by my husband.\u201d<\/p>\n Sen. John Kerry recalled for President Bush that over three years ago he had been on record to remove Saddam, and recited his earlier statement in the Senate issued in 2002: “I will be voting to give the president of the United States the authority to use force \u2014 if necessary \u2014 to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.”<\/p>\n The Project For The New American Century sent yet a third letter demanding the removal of Saddam Hussein. Spokesmen reminded President Bush that they had asked President Clinton for Saddam\u2019s overthrow in 1998 (\u201cThe only acceptable strategy is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction. In the near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action as diplomacy is clearly failing.\u201d)<\/p>\n Signers also pointed out to President George W. Bush that the group had written him as well, over four years ago and recited the key words of that September 20, 2001, warning, \u201c\u2026But even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the [9\/11] attack, any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. Failure to undertake such an effort will constitute an early and perhaps decisive surrender in the war on international terrorism.\u201d<\/p>\n One prominent signer sighed, \u201cWe are Bush\u2019s base. If the losses mount in Iraq, he can always count on us \u2014 everyone of us who signed these letters is rock solid and will stick by their Commander-in-Chief, thick or thin. There is not a single one of us who is the sort who would ask for a war, then bail when it gets hairy.\u201d<\/p>\n CNN reported that Pakistan scientist Dr. A. Q. Khan, who some believe has been involved in international nuclear trafficking, was currently in Tripoli advising those directing Libyan weapons procurement. Dr. Khan issued a press release affirming the peaceful nature of his visit. \u201cLibya, like Iran,\u201d Dr. Khan noted, \u201cis looking beyond oil and wishes to prepare itself for non-petroleum energy needs. Like Pakistan, Col. Khadafy is looking at peaceful uses of nuclear energy.\u201d<\/p>\n From Baghdad the Arab League issued a statement praising President Bahsar Assad of Syria for the work of Syrian peacekeepers in Lebanon. President Assad replied, \u201cWe will always stay to show solidarity with our Lebanese and Iraqi brothers until the Zionists stop their plots and aggression against Beirut. Our brother Saddam Hussein has shown the entire Arab nation how we can resist the American imperialists and this lion has given us the courage to stay on in Lebanon.\u201d<\/p>\n Saddam Hussein also announced to the delegates that over two million Iraqi children had starved from the ongoing U.N. boycotts. \u201cThe Zionists and British are American puppets who stir up the Kurdish and Shiite dogs against us. While the sons of the Arab world starve, the Arab nation does little. O brothers, where was the 40th SCUD? And where is the next dollar for our martyred brothers in Palestine?\u201d<\/p>\n British MP George Galloway congratulated Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz for his resistance to foreign pressures. \u201cThanks to Saddam, one of the twin virgins of Islam is still pure here in Baghdad,\u201d Galloway reportedly told Aziz, \u201cbut the other in Jerusalem has fallen.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cForeign Minister Aziz has assured me,\u201d Galloway went on , \u201cthat if the Americans come, thousands of them will never go back home. And so they wisely backed off. That should send a strong message of hope to our brothers in Damascus and Libya \u2014 and despair to all other the troublemakers in the shadows \u2014 about the American paper tiger. \u201d<\/p>\n The two sons of Saddam Hussein, the crown princes Uday and Qusai Hussein, continued their triumphant tour of foreign capitals, seeking to cement details on the new proposed Iraqi pipeline through Turkey to the Mediterranean to reach potential European markets. \u201cFortunately our friends in Brussels do not believe the lies of the Zionists and the Kurdish criminals. They know we in Iraq operate under the rule of law and the Americans are the real killers of our Iraqi children. We see a good future for Iraq and its new European partnership.\u201d<\/p>\n President Mubarak met with American officials and forecast a bright new chapter in Arab-American relations. \u201cNow that this democratic frenzy about replacing the legitimate leader of Iraq has past, I see better relations between Washington and Egypt. Some of those troublemakers in Washington had insane notions about Saddam, and really believed such nonsense. Imagine the idea of Iraqis voting for their own constitution and leaders while American soldiers stood watching it all in Baghdad! It was all quite mad, and we are all happy that the Americans have returned to their past realism of letting us handle our own affairs in the Arab world. What were they planning \u2014 to let the Iraqis put Saddam on trial in Baghdad?\u201d<\/p>\n An anonymous spokesmen for the royal family of Saudi Arabia echoed President Mubarak\u2019s relief. \u201cWe, like Saddam, have oil to sell and you need oil to buy; what more is there to know? We have our own pace, our own customs. So we are glad to see President Bush leave Iraq alone, and stop these childish games of pushing democracy down our throats in service to the Kurdish zealots and Shiite apostates. Our own leaders know what is best for our people and that is why they want nothing to do with this Zionist effort to remove Saddam Hussein, who along with us alone has helped the martyrs in Palestine. Who wants another Afghanistan mess? Bravo, President Bush for remembering who your true friends are.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u00a92005 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Just imagine a different Iraq… by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Saddam promises more bounties for suicide bombers in Rather interview<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[785],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-16F","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1695,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/so-what-happened-to-iraq\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":0},"title":"So What Happened to Iraq?","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 19, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Six years ago, the conventional wisdom was that Ayad Allawi, then prime minister of the appointed Iraqi Interim Government, was a puppet of the United States. Last month, though, the Allawi-led Iraqiya alliance won, by a narrow margin, more parliamentary seats than any\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "April 2010"","block_context":{"text":"April 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/april-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4194,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/terrorists-and-tyrants\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":1},"title":"Terrorists and Tyrants","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 28, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Rethinking why we are at war in the Middle East by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services As American casualties mount in Iraq, politicians at home now fight over who said what and when about weapons of mass destruction and the need for going to war. One of the most\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "November 2005"","block_context":{"text":"November 2005","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2005\/november-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3302,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/angry-reader\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":2},"title":"Angry Reader","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Private Papers Victor, The ostensible\u00a0cassi belli\u00a0for attacking Iraq were to destroy Saddam's WMD (nonexistent), stop his nuclear bomb development program (nonexistent), and eliminate his ties to al Qaeda (nonexistent). We can't \"win\" the Iraqi war because its illusory objectives were never possible of attainment. Over 4,000 brave Americans are dead,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "August 2008"","block_context":{"text":"August 2008","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2008\/august-2008\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4336,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-iraqi-wars\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":3},"title":"The Iraqi Wars","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 12, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Our 15-year conflict with Iraq. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online Iraq is a blur now. Everyone from Norman Schwarzkopf and General Zinni to Tommy Franks and General Abezaid is mixed up in our memories. The public can't quite separate Baathists from jihadists, Shiite from Sunni, or one coalition\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "July 2005"","block_context":{"text":"July 2005","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2005\/july-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4302,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/torn-apart-over-iraq\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":4},"title":"Torn Apart Over Iraq","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 11, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Why do we keep fighting each other over Iraq? by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online ISOLATIONISTS Most paleocons did not support either the attack on Afghanistan or Iraq \u2014 and did not in the sincere belief it was not in the interest of the United States. From the Right\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "August 2005"","block_context":{"text":"August 2005","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2005\/august-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4201,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/war-reconstruction\/","url_meta":{"origin":4257,"position":5},"title":"War & Reconstruction","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 18, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"For Bush's critics, even hindsight is cloudy. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online This is the mantra of the extreme Left: \"Bush lied, thousands died.\" A softer version from politicians now often follows: \"If I knew then what I know now, I would never have supported the war.\" These\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "November 2005"","block_context":{"text":"November 2005","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2005\/november-2005\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4257"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4257"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4257\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4258,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4257\/revisions\/4258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Saddam promises more bounties for suicide bombers in Rather interview<\/span><\/h2>\n
Terrorists in Baghdad?<\/span><\/h2>\n
No-fly zone weariness<\/span><\/h2>\n
Kurdish concern<\/span><\/h2>\n
Saddam\u2019s new oil?<\/span><\/h2>\n
U.N. to monitor windfall profits<\/span><\/h2>\n
Senators exasperated with Bush inaction<\/span><\/h2>\n
Conservatives fault Bush wavering<\/span><\/h2>\n
Pakistan nuclear antics?<\/span><\/h2>\n
Saddam chides Arab League<\/span><\/h2>\n
Galloway meets Aziz<\/span><\/h2>\n
Uday, Qusay to visit Brussels<\/span><\/h2>\n
Mubarak, royal family see a new sanity in Washington<\/span><\/h2>\n