Powell's Dubious Case

U.S. Secretary ofState Colin Powell's presentation to the UN Security Council on February 5 wasn't likely to win over anyonenot already on his side. He ignored the crucial fact that in the past several days (in Sunday's New York Timesand in his February 4th briefing of UN journalists) Hans Blix denied key components of Powell's claims.

Blix, who directsthe UN inspection team in Iraq, said the UNMOVIC inspectors have seen "no evidence" ofmobile biological weapons labs, has "no persuasive indications" of Iraq-al Qaeda links, and noevidence of Iraq hiding and moving material used for Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD)either outside or inside Iraq. Dr. Blix also said there was no evidence of Iraq sending scientists out of the country, of Iraqi intelligence agentsposing as scientists, of UNMOVIC conversations being monitored, or of UNMOVIC being penetrated.

Further, CIA and FBIofficials still believe the Bush administration is "exaggerating" information to make theirpolitical case for war. Regarding the alleged Iraqi link with al Qaeda, U.S. intelligence officials told the New York Times, "we just don'tthink it's there."

The most compellingpart of Powell's presentation was his brief ending section on the purported al Qaeda link with Iraq and on the dangers posed by the al Zarqawi network. However, hesegued disingenuously from the accurate and frightening information about what the al Zarqawi network couldactually do with biochemical materials to the not-so-accurate claim about its link with Iraq--which is tenuous and unproven at best.

A key component ofthe alleged Iraq-al Qaeda link is based on what Powell said "detainees tell us…". That claim mustbe rejected. On December 27 the Washington Post reported that U.S. officials had acknowledged detainees being beaten, roughed up,threatened with torture by being turned over to officials of countries known to practice even more severetorture. In such circumstances, nothing "a detainee" says can be taken as evidence of truth giventhat people being beaten or tortured will say anything to stop the pain. Similarly, the stories of defectorscannot be relied on alone, as they have a self-interest in exaggerating their stories and their owninvolvement to guarantee access to protection and asylum.

In his conclusion,Powell said, "We wrote 1441 not in order to go to war, we wrote 1441 to try to preserve the piece."It is certainly at least partially true that the UN resolution was an effort to "preserve thepeace," although it is certainly not true that the U.S. wrote 1441 to preempt war. Rather, the Bush administration intendedthat the resolution would serve as a first step toward war.

Finally, the"even if" rule applies. "Even if" everything Powell said was true, there is simply notenough evidence for war. There is no evidence of Iraq posing an imminent threat, no evidence of containment not working.Powell is asking us to go to war--risking the lives of 100,000 Iraqis in the first weeks, hundreds orthousands of U.S. and other troops, and political and economic chaos--because he thinks MAYBE in the futureIraq might rebuild its weapons systems and MIGHT decide to deploy weapons or MIGHT give those weapons tosomeone else who MIGHT use them against someone we like or give them to someone else who we don't like, andother such speculation. Nothing that Powell said should alter the position that we should reject a war onspec.

PhyllisBennis  is a Middle East analyst for Foreign Policy In Focusand a senior analyst at the Institute for Policy Studies. Courtesy: Znet