-Caveat Lector- Print this page US fears more terrorism after Iraq By Roy Eccleston, Washington correspondent 04feb03 http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,593224 4%255E2703,00.html THE US faces a dramatically increased risk of terrorist attacks if it invades Iraq, American officials have calculated.
The US is understood to estimate the prospect of terrorism will rise by about 75 per cent if it launches military action against the regime of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Experts say it is likely Australia and other US allies would also see a rise in the terrorist threat against them, particularly if the attack on Iraq is not part of a broad United Nations-sanctioned coalition. However, it is unclear if the Howard Government has received any intelligence assessment of the scale of risk arising from its involvement in an Iraq war. Fears of increased terrorism have already surfaced in Australia, with former Liberal Party president John Valder citing the prospect as one reason for opposition to an attack on Iraq. Analysts say the Bali experience suggests Australia's vulnerability might not just be at home, but across southeast Asia where thousands of Australians live, work and holiday, and which al-Qa'ida sees as a fertile recruiting base. US academic Zachary Abuza says the region consists of "countries of convenience" to the terrorist network, and listed al-Qa'ida's strong interests in Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, The Philippines and Singapore. Iraqi Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan said a US invasion of his country would ignite suicide attacks by Iraqis in the Middle East. "Martyrs, perpetrators of suicide attacks, are our new weapons and they will not only take action in Iraq," he said in an interview with German magazine Der Spiegel. "The whole region will be set ablaze. This part of the world will become a sea of resistance and danger for Americans." CIA director George Tenet said in a letter to the US Congress last year that Iraq at the time appeared to have decided not to back terrorist attacks against the US, using conventional, germ or biological weapons. But the CIA warned that if Iraq believed an attack was imminent, Hussein might switch strategies and resort to terrorism as "his last chance to exact vengeance". In the latest issue of Foreign Affairs magazine, author Richard Betts says a US attack on Iraq could prompt Hussein to strike back inside the US using agents armed with weapons such as anthrax. A US invasion to oust Hussein would be the first attempt any nation had made to depose a leader who possessed weapons of mass destruction, said Betts, director of the Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University. While President George W. Bush has argued the risk of Iraq supplying terrorists is a reason to invade, Betts said Hussein could unleash his worst weapons, such as anthrax, if he faced the prospect of his own death. He quoted a 1993 US govern ment study that said anthrax in an aerosol released by a small plane over Washington could kill between 1 million and 3 million people. James Lindsay, a national security specialist in the Clinton administration, said an attack by Iraq inside the US was "unlikely but it's a very real possibility". "More likely are attacks overseas in the Arab and Islamic world, and in Europe, not by Iraqi agents but by elements of al-Qa'ida or by fanatical individual militants," he said. Citing the example of the Bali bombing last year, Mr Lindsay said: "As Australians know, you can kill large numbers of people with conventional car bombs." privacy � The Australian Forwarded for your information. The text and intent of the article have to stand on their own merits. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material is distributed without charge or profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this type of information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. 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