by James Glaser
March 11, 2003

I don't like it when my President and his staff can be less than honest with the American people, so they can justify their foreign policy. Sure like most Americans I look at everything Washington says closely, but when American lives are on the line I expect that the citizens of America will be given factual information by our government so we can decide if we should support their actions.

For way over a year now George Bush and Colin Powell have been telling America of the grave danger Iraq's Nuclear Weapons Program is for our country. They know that the minute "Nuclear" anything is talked about, Americans listen because nuclear and atomic bombs are a real part of every Americans fear stemming from the Cold War.

This claim about nuclear weapons and Iraq was the rallying cry for a war with Iraq and George Bush has repeated this claim over and over for the last year and a half. We have heard of the high strength aluminum tubes, the buying of uranium from Niger, and the report from The International Atomic Energy Agency stating that Iraq was six months from a bomb.

President Bush used his "Bully Pulpit" to tell the American people of the IAEA report, that was purported to state that Iraq was just six months away from nuclear weapon production. Well come to find out there was never any report on Iraq's time line to nuclear weapons capability ever issued or written by that agency. President Bush didn't correct himself, and still today speaks of Iraq's nuclear program.

The Aluminum Tubes are another example of Washington's less than honest approach, to get the fear level of Americans up. International Atomic Energy Agency Director- General, Mohamed ElBaradel reported to the United Nations Security Council this week that the aluminum tubes Washington has been pointing at as proof of Iraq's continued nuclear program "were not suitable for a uranium enrichment centrifuge program."

Even after that report Colin Powell wouldn't let it go, but insisted that the IAEA should "keep the issue open" The IAEA report stated that "Extensive field investigation and document analysis have failed to uncover any evidence that Iraq intended to use the 81 mm tubes for any project other than reverse engineering of rockets."

The report went on to say that "After three months of intrusive inspections, we have to date found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons program in Iraq." To date the IAEA inspectors have carried out 218 inspections at 141 sites. Now remember these inspectors are working on our side and trying to find fault with Iraq and they haven't, as far as a nuclear program goes. America and these inspectors have the worlds most sophisticated satellite and ground based technology looking for signs of renewed radiation producing experiments and production in Iraq and have found none. Unlike chemical and biological weapon production, the radiation levels produced with nuclear weapon production makes it a far more detectable industry

As to the American charge of Iraq trying to buy uranium from Niger. "Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded....that these documents, which form the basis for the reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger, are in fact not authentic." "We have therefore concluded that these specific transactions are unfounded."

I don't know who provided the UN with these fake documents and that isn't really important, what is important is that valuable inspection time was wasted on false charges.

For some reason the Bush Administration feels they need to pin this Nuclear weapons charge on Iraq and Saddam Hussein in order to justify a war and Saddams removal. They must feel that all the other charges of chemical and biological weapons plus all the horror stories about how Saddam treats his own people is not enough. One would think Saddams flaunting of resolution 1441 on immediate disarmament would suffice.

Saddam Hussein's Iraq is a bad country by anyone's standard and if you brand Saddam and his form of government as "Evil," few would argue that point. It therefore bothers me to no end that George Bush and Colin Powell will stoop to telling Americans lies in order to get their backing for this war. George and Colin don't trust the American people to judge the need for this war on truthful evidence, but feel they must buttress their claims of foul deeds by Iraq.

When the lives of tens of thousands of our sons and daughters are at stake, how can anyone use lies and deceptions to put them in harms way. Where is Washington's sense of Patriotism and Justice?

The case for disarming Iraq has been made over and over and the unanimous vote by the UN Security council is proof of that. However George Bush has a personal hate for Saddam and is hell bent on his removal from office no matter what the cost in American and innocent Iraqi lives. In George Bush's eyes, time is of the essence and continued progress or not, it is time to strike.

The fact is, our inspectors, experts from the world over, are asking the Security Council for more time to verify Iraq's disarmament. I can only now conclude that disarmament of Iraq is not the goal of my country and that is why all of this false information has been foisted by the Bush Administration onto the American citizen.

George Bush felt he had to make an even stronger case for us, because disarmament was never not his goal and seeing progress in that direction could allow Saddam to stay in power. Saddam Hussein in power during the next election would be totally unacceptable for George Bush, so there will be no waiting, there will be no peaceful resolution to this problem, and tens of thousands of people will die.