Dazzled by the Pinstripes:
Powell at the United Nations
by Frida Berrigan and William Hartung
Dissident Voice
February 10, 2003
There was no
Adlai Stevenson confrontation. There was no "smoking gun" revelation.
Secretary of State Colin Powell's performance before the United Nations was
more of a "pinstripe" performance. In the movie "Catch Me if You
Can," grifter Frank Abagnale asks, "why do the Yankees always
win?" Its not because they have Mickey Mantle like everyone thinks, but
because "people can't take their eyes off the pinstripes."
Powell's
presentation, complete with satellite images, enlarged photographs and
audiotapes, and delivered with his trademark self-assurance, was a perfect
"pinstripe" performance. He looked and sounded so confident and
credible that questioning or contradicting him was almost not an option.
And it would be
hard to refute much of what he presented. Most of it is not new- like the
assertion that Saddam Hussein is a dictatorial human rights abuser who used
chemical weapons in the 1980s. Some of it sounds credible -- like the notion
that Saddam Hussein would try to elude inspectors. Other elements of Powell's
brief were less persuasive, like his efforts to prove a definitive link between
Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda or his claims about mobile Iraqi bioweapons laboratories
Despite the
substantive limitations of Powell's case, he clearly won wide acclaim due to
the forcefulness with which he made his case. Scores of editorialists,
columnists, and TV commentators have embraced Powell's statement as the last
word on why the United States must go to war with Iraq. Even Mary McGrory, the
veteran liberal columnist at the Washington Post, was moved to write a column
entitled "I'm Persuaded."
But try not to
get distracted by the pinstripes. The central questions, despite what Powell
presented, are the same as they has always been. Is Iraq an imminent threat to
the United States or its allies? And will military action against him eliminate
or inflame that threat?
To answer this
question one need look no further than the Central Intelligence Agency, which
says that Saddam Hussein is not a threat, and will not become one unless he is
attacked. In an October 7th letter to Senator Bob Graham (D-FL) CIA director
George Tenet wrote, "Baghdad for now appears to be drawing the line short
of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW (chemical and
biological weapons) against the United States." Tenet continues with the
big but. "Should Saddam conclude that a U.S. led attack could no longer be
deterred, he probably would become much less constrained in adopting terrorist
actions." A threatened and cornered Saddam Hussein could even take the
"extreme step of assisting Islamist terrorists in conducting a WMD
(weapons of mass destruction) attack against the United States." But only
if he is attacked.
A
well-documented new report by the Fourth Freedom Forum concludes that despite
Secretary of State Powell's histrionics, "independently verifiable
evidence is lacking on the most essential security concerns - Iraq's alleged possession
of weapons of mass destruction, and its [alleged] operational links to Al
Qaeda." The report notes that Powell's allegations regarding mobile
biological weapons labs were based entirely on the testimony of prisoners and
defectors, while UN weapons inspectors and experts on biological weapons
continue to question the existence and even the practicality of such mobile
facilities. As former CIA official Vincent Cannistraro has noted, Iraqi
defectors are notoriously unreliable, and their main motivation is
"telling the Defense Department what they want to hear."
If Iraq is
hiding chemical and biological weapons; Saddam Hussein may be hiding his
country's relative weakness, not its growing military strength. According to a
1999 UN experts panel report, the inspections of the 1990s eliminated "the
bulk of Iraq's proscribed weapons programs." Former chief UN weapons
inspector for Iraq Rolf Ekeus has suggested that the task for current
inspectors involves "tracking down the pathetic remnants of what Iraq had
in 1998." Continued inspections and monitoring will be more than adequate
to contain Saddam Hussein's regime and eliminate his ability to use chemical or
biological weapons against his own people or other nations. And inspections
won't cost $100 to $200 billion or result in thousands of casualties, as a war
is likely to do.
The Bush
administration should help the inspectors finish their work, not pull the rug
out from under them by launching an ill-advised military intervention. War
should be the tool of last resort. That used to be Colin Powell's position. He
had it right the first time around.
Links:
Contested Case: Do the Facts Justify the
Case for War in Iraq? Fourth Freedom Forum, February 2003.
http://www.fourthfreedom.org/php/t-si-index.php?hinc=dossier_report.hinc
Frida
Berrigan is a Senior Research Associate at the Arms
Trade Resource Center of the World Policy Institute. Email: berrigaf@newschool.edu.
William D. Hartung is the Center's
Director and a Senior Fellow at the Institute. E-mail: Hartung@newschool.edu