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| Britain |
| Blair feels the heat over Iraq as weasels meet |
| 2003-02-25 |
| The chasm between Britain and France over Iraq widened last night when the two countries clashed bitterly on a second United Nations resolution, designed as the trigger for war. That chasm was already a mile wide. Now it's wider. As Tony Blair prepared for a crucial Commons debate on Iraq tomorrow, France stepped up the pressure by circulating to the UN separate proposals aimed at averting military action by calling for the weapons inspections to continue. The timetable would be far more generous, stipulating a delay of four months before the inspectors provided a first important progress report compared with the two-week deadline for a Security Council vote being pushed by the Prime Minister and President George Bush in their draft, introduced yesterday afternoon. Of course, after that first report the inspectors would get another four months so as to make a second report to compare to the first report. And then another four months for a tie-breaker. Nobody, nobody out-gauls the French. Hours earlier, Mr Bush indicated yet again that his patience with diplomacy had all but run out. He urged the UN to prove it was "a body that means what it says". The President had "very little hope left" that Saddam Hussein would respond to the diplomatic pressure, his spokesman, Ari Fleischer, said. Especially with the Frenchies running interference for Saddam. In a boost for the White House and Mr Blair, their tough stance appeared to be vindicated by President Saddam himself, in remarks to CBS News last night. Dan Rather, the news Actually this could be fun, and I nominate Fred, Steve and Alaska Paul to do the closed-captioning for Saddam if it ever happens. The quarrel over the way ahead on Iraq deepened when Britain, America and Spain co-sponsored the draft UN resolution that concluded that "Iraq has failed to take the final opportunity afforded it in resolution 1441". Oh, we got Spain on board the resolution? Good! Dominique de Villepin, the French Foreign Minister, described the move as an "error" and "too hasty", leaving no doubt that France, the veto-holding leader of the anti-war camp Mexico and Chile had BETTER pay attention when we ask them for support. M. de Villepin said: "There are some countries that think Where were the Belgians? President Chirac said on his arrival in Berlin that France's plan, backed by Germany and Russia, would establish "a timetable for Iraq's disarmament, programme by programme, relating to weapons of mass destruction". He continued: "We see no reason to change our The French plans were dismissed by Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, as treating President Saddam "like a Mr. Straw, as usual, gets it right. |
| Posted by:Steve White |
| #7 I agree. It might help already if all these sales got more public attention. And you are right: France didn't ask. Nor was the Florida flight school interested why some of its wannabe pilots wanted to skip the starting and landing part. I guess that would not happen again. No more three monkeys. We need to keep a much better track of what goes where. And not just our stuff. A centralized multinational database might help. Especially when France exports something harmless and Germany exports something harmless, but the combo isn't harmless anymore. Dubious countries would need to agree to strict supervision to make sure that they don't misuse legit stuff. It's not easy. Children suffer a lot in Iraqi hospitals because a lot of drugs can't be imported. Fear of dual use. How to make the right decision? |
| Posted by: True German Ally 2003-02-25 22:47:59 |
| #6 TGA, "Well, to provide a nation with technology to produce nuclear energy isn't criminal per se. Every nation has the right to use nuclear energy for peaceful uses." Yep. And its perfectly possible to have a nuclear reactor that cannot produce weapons grade material. Oddly enough, Iraq wasn't interested in that kind of reactor. And nobody in France was interested in asking why. When we criticize France for exporting nuclear technology to a state run by a dictator I would like to know which states were provided with nuclear technology by the U.S Good point. But whichever nations the US has provided nuclear technology to don't seem to be ones that the US and the West in general are worrying about. I believe the news media would mention that fact if that was the case. My point is: Morale is a rather limited factor when it comes to exporting things and making money. For any country. NOT exporting any weapons to any non democratic states would be a good start. Well, lets dream on... An extremely good point. I think we both agree that more good judgement needs to be exercised in these situations. However, one problem is that many kinds of seemingly benign products could be misused by an ill-intentioned country. If you sell a country a hospital, they've got a potential biowarfare facility. A pharmaceutical facility could be the hard core of a chemical weapons production line. Heck, even giving a nation nothing more than food and medical aid frees up money that the country in question could use to purchase weapons. Ultimately, it all comes down to the nature of the government running the country to which you're selling stuff. In an often short-sighted world, there's an obvious problem. |
| Posted by: Patrick Phillips 2003-02-25 21:56:56 |
| #5 Well, to provide a nation with technology to produce nuclear energy isn't criminal per se. Every nation has the right to use nuclear energy for peaceful uses. Frankly I don't know what kind of nation Iraq was in 1975. I suppose its aggressive stance against Israel was reason enough not to encourage nuclear energy in Iraq. So I think Israel took the right steps to get rid of the problem. I just don't like the hypocrite stance. When we criticize France for exporting nuclear technology to a state run by a dictator I would like to know which states were provided with nuclear technology by the U.S. And I might be interested to know more about the business relations between Israel and apartheid South Africa. And... well I stop here. My point is: Morale is a rather limited factor when it comes to exporting things and making money. For any country. NOT exporting any weapons to any non democratic states would be a good start. Well, lets dream on... |
| Posted by: True German Ally 2003-02-25 21:36:16 |
| #4 True German Ally, Your general criticism of US policy at the time is legit -- although I don't regret using Iraq to derail Iranian fundamentalism any more than I regret using the Soviet Union to wreck Nazism in World War II. However, the anthrax comment is a bit out of line. At the time, it wasn't difficult at all for a national government or even a research institute to get all the anthrax it wanted. Why? Because anti-anthrax research was considered a desirable thing. There was a (short sighted) tendency to view anthrax as primarily a cattle problem, not something you used against people. So in the context of a lot of medical / agricultural aid to Iraq, the Iraqis got anthrax that they could have simply purchased otherwise. On the other hand, everyone with a shred of common sense knows there is a problem with nuclear reactors that produce material that can be used to create a nuclear weapon. Germ weapons and chemical weapons are properly classifed as weapons of mass destruction. But a nuclear weapon is an order of magnitude worse. The civilized world has got to get it's head out of its collective ass a realize that you just don't sell a reactor to anybody who has the cash. I don't know what France's current posture is relative to that problem. But in the past, they definitely made some bad decisions. |
| Posted by: Patrick Phillips 2003-02-25 20:41:26 |
| #3 You might consider a back up photo of Saddam shaking hands with Rumsfeld in Baghdad 1983, along with a list of nasty US anthrax that was authorized and delivered to Iraq as late as 1989. Talking about splinters and beams... I guess no Western nation covered itself with glory back then, right? |
| Posted by: True German Ally 2003-02-25 19:44:14 |
| #2 There's a universal truth: in the toughest of times is when you find out who your friends truly are. Even if the British back out at the last minute, no one here will doubt that they are indeed our true friends. Even if you don't agree with a friend, you don't handle it by using a knife in the back. |
| Posted by: RW 2003-02-25 11:57:13 |
| #1 "We see no reason to change our illogic, which is the illogic of peace, and turn toward a logic of war - ever." |
| Posted by: RW 2003-02-25 01:15:58 |