In the President's radio address today, Bush said the following:
We know from recent history that Saddam Hussein is a reckless dictator who has twice invaded his neighbors without provocation ...
He's referring to the move into Iran in 1980 and Kuwait in 1990. We agree that Hussein was out of line invading Kuwait - but what about the case involving Iran? One person who thinks Iraq was provoked in 1980 is Nita M. Renfrew, who wrote an article in Foreign Policy (no 66, Spring 1987) entitled Who Started The War?
Here are excerpts from that piece:
... although organized units of the Iraqi army were the first to cross the Iran-Iraq border on September 22, 1980, Iran started the war.
The long-term historical cause of the war was the progressive breakdown, after Khomeini took power, of the 1975 Algiers accord. Usually viewed as a treaty settling key border disputes between Iran and Iraq, the accord was more importantly an agreement between Iran and Iraq not to interfere in each other's internal affairs. The Shah invoked this provision of the accord in 1978 when he called on Hussein to expel Khomeini from Iraq ...
When Iraq signed the accord, it hoped to settle three issues: the disputed border territories of Zain al-Qaws and Saif Saad, both strategic heights overlooking the Iraqi plains and occupied by Iran; the question of sovereignty over the Shatt al Arab waterway ...; and most important, the Kurdish revolt in the north, heavily and covertly supported by the shah in concert with Israel and the United States.
Iraq agreed to give up sovereignty over half of the Shatt al Arab by moving its southeastern border away from the far shore of the waterway to the thalweg, the deepest part of the Shatt ...
Iraq's border with Iran had already been moved back twice in this century: once in 1913 by the Constantinople Protocol negotiated between the Persian and Ottoman empires and again in 1937 by a League of Nations settlement. The rationale for this third border adjustment was that a thalweg is the line of demarcation normally used between countries when the border is along a waterway.
In exchange for one-half of the Shatt al Arab, the Shah agreed to stop inciting the Kurds to rebellion and to return the occupied territories of Zain al-Qaws and Saif Saad, which make up 210 square miles along the middle section of the border.
Four years later, when Khomeini returned to Qom, the religious center of Iran, Iran had still not returned Iraq's two territories, although Iran had taken official possession immediately of half of the Shatt al Arab.
[The Iraqis] made a serious effort to establish good relations with the new Iranian regime ... [But] the Algiers acord soon began to break down on two counts: Khomeini commenced a well-financed campaign to turn the Shiites in Iraq, who make up more than one-half of the population, against the Sunni-controlled government, and he stepped up violations of airspace and border clashes, which had largely ceased in 1975. By the summer preceding the Iraq's invasion, they were taking place almost daily.
By the fall of 1979, a year before the war broke out, border hostilities were escalating and demonstrations were being staged in front of the Iraqi embassy and consulates in Iran. Armed attacks took place along the border, and an assault on the Iraqi embassy in Tehran in injured Iraqi diplomats.
By spring 1980, top Iranian officials were proclaiming openly their intention to liberate Iraq from their Sunni oppressors. [...] A prominent Iranian military official stated that Iraq was an integral part of Iran. Meanwhile, inside Iraq there were Iranian-sponsored assassination attempts on Hussein and members of his cabinet. Bombs exploded in several ministries and at the Mustansiriyah University, killing and wounding hundreds.
Members of the Iraqi Revolutionary Command Council now differ on whether the decision to invade Iran should be traced to the precarious internal situation or to border tensions. At the time both factors played a role.
According to Iraqi sources, in summer 1980 Iran began to mass its army along the border in larger numbers and fired several times on Iraqi oil installations. On September 4 Iran shelled the Iraqi towns of Khanaqin, Mandali, Naft Kanch, and Zarbatiyah. In the minds of Iraqi leaders, the war began with that shelling. Iraq called on the Iranian government to review the terms of the Algiers accord, giving Iran a last chance to avoid war and still save face, and informed Iran that it was going to remove, by force if necessary, the occupying troops if they did not leave voluntarily. Again, Iran opened fire. It struck oil installations, attacked Mandali from the air, fired on Iraqi ships in the Shatt al Arab, and shelled Basra, Iraq's primary port.
On September 22, 1980, Hussein launched an invasion of Iran, within 6 days occupying a substantial belt along the border. He then called for a cease-fire and negotiations, both of which Khomeni unequivocally turned down.
Figures from CIA factbook (except for Russian military expenditures)
CLARIFYING NOTE: The figures are for years 2000-2002 (varies by country), and the U.S. military budget is currently over $300 billion, but we wanted to present a rough outline of how each country ranks in terms of economic strength and military expenditures.
One of our hobbyhorses is speculating what, if any, brain damage the president has experienced. We're basing this on the acknowledged heavy drinking by Bush, plus the unacknowledged heavy cocaine use. And there is Bush's conversion to Christ and extreme dedication to exercise (principally running). What's the dynamic there? We'll probably not know the full details until 50 years have transpired and confidential notes and records are released. Until then, we'll have to see if Bush's behavior in public can limn a profile of what's inside his head. One person who's taken a stab at it is William Thomas, senior reporter for Lifeboat News, who wonders: IS BUSH NUTS?
We think the essay leaves a lot to be desired, but if you want to engage in speculation, put on your tin-foil hat and give it a read.
Following the successful development of a balsa wood and duct tape drone, top Iraqi scientists have continued to push the envelope. Here, we see the latest: The M21 Infantry Fighting Vehicle, constructed out of plywood, rolling on wheels taken from Radio Flyer wagons, and not needing any gasoline for power. This terrifying weapon could be pushed across the Canadian-U.S. border, deflect a hail of fire from a BB-gun, and perhaps dent a car door before rolling to a stop.
THE DRONE AND BLIX: What can account for Hans Blix's burial of the serious news of a Saddamite drone aircraft capable of deploying chemical weapons on neighboring countries?
[...]
The drone could also presumably be used against American and British and Australian troops.
Al-Taji, Iraq -- A remotely piloted aircraft that the United States has warned could spread chemical weapons appears to be made of balsa wood and duct tape, with two small propellors attached to what look like the engines of a weed whacker. ...
Today's lesson is, don't jump to conclusions! In fact, we'll heed our own advice and note that we're not sure if the balsa wood drone is the one Blix (and Powell) were referring to - though it seems likely. Guess we'll have to wait a day or two for clarification.
A fuller story is here, and includes a photograph (click on thumbnail) of the aircraft.
On March 8, Bill Keller wrote in the New York Times:
Two weeks ago, a group of senior intelligence officials in the Defense Department sat for an hour listening to a briefing by a writer who claims - I am not making this up - that messages encoded in the Hebrew text of the Old Testament provide clues to the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden. One of the officials told me that they had agreed to meet the writer, Michael Drosnin, author of a Nostradamus-style best seller, without understanding that he was promoting Biblical prophecy.
On March 11, Michael Drosnin's letter to the newspaper is published:
I am the author of "Bible Code II: The Countdown," mentioned by Bill Keller in his March 8 column.
My Pentagon briefing about the Bible Code took place on Feb. 21 and was attended by top military intelligence officials.
[...]
Why do United States and Israeli intelligence take the code seriously? Not, as Mr. Keller writes, because "we're all a little too desperate these days," but because the Bible Code keeps coming true.
The "Bible Code keeps coming true"? Well, that's because you can read almost anything out of the Bible, or even the novel Moby Dick - as this analysis shows. Also, the book/technique was debunked six years ago in the Skeptical Inquirer. On the other hand, maybe it fits in nicely with Bush's view that "Events aren't moved by blind change and chance" but by "the hand of a just and faithful God." as this NYT-Op-Ed notes.
Much talk has sprung from Richard Perle's comments yesterday on CNN's Late Edition. He was asked about a New Yorker article by Seymour Hersh that was critical of Perle, and said, "Sy Hersh is the closest thing American journalism has to a terrorist."
We read it, and it implies that Perle is co-mingling his defense policy work with his business interests - although more needs to be learned to make a definitive judgment. What did Hersh's article tell us? That the following connections exist:
Thanks to Cursor.org for alerting us to this issue (and Atrios too).
UPDATE: Atrios reminds us that Khashoggi has a connection to Theresa LePore of Palm Beach butterfly ballot fame, so we've added that item.
Somebody we've never heard of before, William S. Lind (of UPI), wrote an interesting essay about a war with Iraq.
Excerpt:
... the real threat the United States and the American people now face is non-state players such as al Qaida, Hamas, Hezbollah and the like who have been grimly effective pioneers of non-state and extra-state forms of conflict that I and other military analysts have termed Fourth Generation warfare. They can only benefit from a U.S. war waged against Iraq -- regardless of how it turns out.
If we win, the institution of the state is further discredited in the Islamic world, and more young men will give their allegiance to non-state forces that the U.S. military with its current configuration and extremely weak human intelligence assets will find exceptionally hard to defend against. And if Saddam wins, their own governments will look even less legitimate, because they failed to stand with him against the hated American neo-Crusaders.
UPDATE: Atrios tells us that William Lind is a bigwig in Paul Weyrich's Free Congress foundation, and has written things like What If The South Had Won The Civil War? (concluding that it might have been a good thing)
Next time, we'll be more careful when citing anything from the UPI.
For the last couple of years we've been saying to our friends that Bush's long-term goal can be summarized in one sentence:
Defund the federal government.
We are pleased to see that this perception is finally catching on. Here, for instance, is a Los Angeles Times front page story, Bush Budget Has a Long Reach. Excerpts:
... the full dimensions of President Bush's new tax and spending plan are finally coming into view, and they are even more sweeping than originally thought.
... Bush has produced a proposal that, if enacted, would result in a governmental about-face as far-reaching as those of Ronald Reagan or Lyndon B. Johnson.
[Bush's] plan to revamp Medicaid and other programs Washington runs jointly with the states would be, in the words of a former Nixon administration budget official, "one of the biggest pullbacks in federal responsibility we've ever seen."
The burgeoning deficit is driven by the president's proposals and the mounting costs of retiring baby boomers. Administration estimates show the combination would drive the deficit back above 2% of GDP by 2020, above 5% of GDP by 2030, to nearly 9% by 2040 and so on.
"We're going to have to shrink the size of government," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, a conservative advocacy group with close ties to the White House. "Our goal is to cut it in half."
Which explains why Bush is so insistent on cutting taxes for those with large incomes even though modest and broader cuts would be better for the economy right now.
Why cut aggressively at the top?
Because, to quote John Dillinger, "That's where the money is."
Limbaugh, the Wall Street Journal, and various Fox News pundits never tire of pointing out that the top 1% (or 10%) are shouldering the burden for much of what the government does. Cut back taxes on those folks (or go flat-rate, or consumption tax), and you've pretty much lost the ability to tap into the wealth that the capitalist system generates.
Howard Kurtz is a regular guest on the Hugh Hewitt radio show. This Friday, he was talking about Bush's press conference, where he said:
"It's the job of the White House correspondents to ask tough questions. That's why they're there. I think the President benefited from some of that outright skepticism in Terry Moran's question, Bill Plant of CBS, and some others. Because it's sort of like an athlete getting up to the plate and having to hit major leagut pitching. The harder the question, the more that he was able to set his jaw and look into the camera and say, "It's my job to protect this country, and I'm not going to wait until it's too late."
(Sorry, no link. We taped this exchange off-the-air, and transcribed the remarks.)
