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5 April 2003
THE debate on the United
Nations on the obsession of US President Bush to wage
war on Iraq last Friday (Saturday in Manila) after the
latest report of top UN inspector Hans Blix showcased
the irrationality of the American position, which is
supported wholeheartedly by our own obsessed president,
Gloria Arroyo.
Blix reported that the Iraq is cooperating in the world
body's demand for disarmament. And in recent days, Blix
said, there has been "substantial measure of
disarmament."
"We are not watching the breaking of toothpicks; lethal
weapons are being destroyed," Blix said.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell's reply undermined
even more the US position. He said: "I know these are
not toothpicks, but real missiles. But the problem is,
we won't know how many missiles there are, how many
toothpicks there are."
Powell's statement brings us to the question: If they
don't know how many missiles there are, why are they so
obssessed with going to war to eliminate something they
are not sure about?
The irrationality of the Bush administration is in stark
contrast to the sensible position that the French
government has taken. In the UN debate, French Foreign
Minister Dominique de Villepin was the epitome of common
sense.
Reacting to the March 17 deadline of the US, which many
said is ridiculous, De Villepin said: "Why do we need to
use force at any price when we can resolve this
peacefully?"
Why, indeed?
Ambassador Reynaldo O. Arcilla, whose expertise on
disarmament and Middle East earned him appointment as
member of the five-man committee on Afghanistan formed
by the UN Security Council a few months before 9/11,
gave some explanation in a recent speech before the
Rotary Club Makati East.
Excerpts from Arcilla's speech: "Why the seeming
obsession to attack Iraq? One analyst attributes it to
the unpublicized but real threat to US economic hegemony
from the use of the Euro as an alternative oil
transaction currency. The Federal Reserve Bank's
greatest nightmare is that OPEC will switch its
international transactions from a dollar standard to a
euro standard. Saddam sealed his fate, so to speak, when
he made the switch in November 2000 and later converted
his $10 billion reserve at the UN to euro. Imagine if
OPEC switches to euro. Everybody would have to flush
dollars out of their (central bank) reserve funds and
replace them with euro. The dollar would crash anywhere
from 20 to 40 percent, followed by a currency collapse
and massive inflation. Foreign funds would stream out of
US stock markets and dollar- denominated assets. What
you will see would be a typical Third World country
scenario.
"... That the US supported Bin Laden and the Taliban for
years and viewed them as freedom fighters against the
Russians is well known. However, there are more
intriguing things. Did you know that as late as 1998 the
US was paying the salary of every single Taliban
official in Afghanistan; that there is more oil and gas
in the Caspian Sea area than in Saudi Arabia, but you
need a pipeline through Afghanistan to get the oil out;
that UNOCAL, a giant American oil conglomerate, wanted
to build a 1000-mile long pipeline from the Caspian Sea
through Afghanistan to the Arabian Sea; that UNOCAL
spent $10 billion on geological surveys for pipeline
construction and very nicely courted the Taliban for
their support in allowing the construction to begin;
that all of the leading Taliban officials were in Texas
negotiating with UNOCAL in 1998; that in 1999 the
Taliban changed its mind and threw UNOCAL out of the
country and awarded the pipeline project to a company
from Argentina; that Mr. John Maresca, VP of UNOCAL,
testified before the US Congress and said no pipeline
will be built until the Taliban was gone and a more
friendly government was established in Kabul; that the
leader of the new government in Afghanistan formerly
worked for UNOCAL; that the special envoy appointed by
Bush to deal with that new government was the "chief
consultant to UNOCAL"; that the Bush family acquired
their wealth through oil; that Bush's Secretary of
Interior was the president of an oil company before
going to Washington; that George Bush Sr. now works with
the "Carlysle Group" specializing in armaments and huge
oil investments around the world; that Condoleezza Rice,
Bush's national security adviser, worked for Chevron
before going to Washington; that Chevron named one of
its newest supertankers after Condoleezza; that Dick
Cheney worked for the giant oil conglomerate Haliburton
before becoming vice president; that Haliburton gave
Cheney $34 million as a farewell gift when he left
Haliburton; that Haliburton is in the pipeline business;
that the US government quietly announced on 31 January
2002 that it will support the construction of the
Trans-Afghanistan pipeline; that President Musharraf of
Pakistan and President Karzai of Afghanistan announced
in February 2002 their agreement to build the proposed
gas pipeline from Central Asia to Pakistan via
Afghanistan? Stranger things may have happened but these
assertions certainly leave one wondering what the real
purpose is of the Bush administration in dealing with
Iraq, known to have the second biggest oil reserve after
Saudi Arabia.
"Aside from the seeming vested interest of Bush and his
people in the oil business, the American economy is
sagging and the US needs armed conflicts to keep the
armaments factories humming. (Lest we forget, the
Republican Party has always been associated with the
corporate military-industrial complex in the United
States.) The presidential election is just around the
corner and Bush Jr. does not want to suffer the same
fate as his father. His old man didn't get reelected
despite the surge in his popularity right after the 1991
Gulf War because of the way the economy was going. Bush
Jr. needs a victory in Iraq and timing is very
important. Get the economy going by spending more on the
war before the campaign starts for election 2004."
forwarded by ellen@i-manila.com.ph
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