Yes you did. You also wrote a nice thing about novelty and the human spirit.
REH ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keith Hudson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Thursday, August 14, 2003 9:00 AM Subject: [Futurework] The real target of the war in Iraq was Saudi Arabia > It amazes me just how long it is taking the penny to drop. The following > (except for the penultimate paragraph) is much the same as I was writing to > FW roughly this time last year when it became apparent that, whatever the > UN or anybody else said, the US were going to invade Iraq. > > KH > > > <<<< > The real target of the war in Iraq was Saudi Arabia > Jeffrey Sachs > > > The crucial question regarding Iraq is not whether the motives for war were > disguised, but why. The argument that Iraq posed a grave and imminent > threat was absurd to anybody not under the spell of round-the-clock White > House and 10 Downing Street spin. But the actual reasons for launching the > war remain obscure. The plot thickened with the release last month of the > US Congressional investigation into September 11. It seems increasingly > likely that Iraq was attacked because Saudi Arabia was deeply implicated in > the terrorist attacks. > > Two truths have long governed US energy security. The first is that Saudi > Arabia is the key to world oil stability, the accommodating supplier when > markets get too tight. It would be a potential threat to the world economy > if Saudi oil flows were disrupted. In 1973-74, with the Arab oil embargo, > the Ford presidency was brought down by the disruption of the US economy, a > point not lost on two young senior officials at the time, Donald Rumsfeld > and Richard Cheney, respectively Gerald Ford's defence secretary and White > House chief of staff. Pentagon and academic planners began making > contingency plans for the military seizure of the Middle East oilfields. > > The second truth is that Saudi Arabia has been a spigot of private wealth > for key US figures, and for the Bush extended family in particular. The > Saudi royal family lacks political legitimacy at home, so it buys US > protection from abroad. The Saudis purchase Washington influence through > consultancy contracts, big defence outlays on US military hardware, > lucrative speeches for Washington insiders, investments in US businesses > with influential figures, and the like. A long line of US senior officials > has benefited, with the Ford, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush White > House and Pentagon at the front of the line. Saudi business has helped to > make multi-millionaires of Henry Kissinger, Frank Carlucci, James Baker, > George H.W. Bush, Mr Cheney and dozens of other insiders. > > September 11 threatened these two truths. Within hours of the attack, the > White House apparently understood that senior Saudi intelligence officials > were probably involved and that 15 out of the 19 terrorists were from Saudi > Arabia. They were no doubt stunned to realise that parts of the vast Saudi > royal family were not only corrupt, but also deeply intertwined with > anti-American terror and extremist fundamentalism. A new book by former CIA > agent Robert Baer, Sleeping with the Devil*, details how the US government > had systematically turned away from the growing evidence of Saudi > complicity in fundamentalist terrorism, thereby frustrating the kind of > investigations that might have headed off September 11. > > To say that Saudi complicity in September 11 led the White House to war in > Iraq is speculative, but several insiders have suggested that the conflict > was incubated, perhaps hatched, in the immediate aftermath of the attacks. > There are at least four plausible channels that together might explain the > speed with which the decision on Iraq was taken after September 11. First, > September 11 was a dramatic confirmation that the stability of Saudi oil > was in jeopardy. The regime was unstable and perhaps even a lethal threat > to the US. The only quantitatively significant alternative to Saudi oil was > Iraqi oil, but that option was barred as long as Saddam Hussein remained in > power. The long-standing contingency plans to seize Middle Eastern oil were > probably rolled out within days of September 11. > > Second, a substitute had to be found for the US military bases in Saudi > Arabia. Like Saudi oil, the bases too were now under threat, especially > because the US presence in the Saudi kingdom was known to be the principal > irritant for al-Qaeda. Iraq would become a new base of US military > operations. Paul Wolfowitz, deputy defence secretary, has already explained > during an interview with > > Vanity Fair that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were but a bureaucratic > pretext that hid other core motives for war, including the reduction of the > US military presence in Saudi Arabia. Mr Wolfowitz's remarkable statement > seemed bizarre at the time it became public but was allowed to pass in the > US without scrutiny. But it makes full sense in the context of a White > House debate about the US's response to a teetering Saudi regime. > > Third, the Bush White House needed to issue a powerful threat to the Saudi > leadership: one more false step and you're finished. Attacking the > next-door neighbour was no doubt judged to be quite persuasive. A direct > diplomatic attack was probably ruled out by the deep and inextricable links > between the White House and the Saudi leadership. Finally, there was > probably a strong hope that the public could be diverted from the true > roots of September 11. The Bush administration needed to turn the public's > eyes away from the intelligence failures and head off the danger, however > slight, that Saudi associates of the Bush family and friends would be > implicated in the attacks. Mr Hussein was the perfect target: a true > despot, long-standing public enemy of the US and a wastrel of energy > resources needed by US consumers. > > Perhaps the Iraq war had roots other than September 11 and Saudi Arabia. > There is even a tiny, if fading chance, that the ostensible motive -- > weapons of mass destruction -- had merit. But if the Iraq war was an > opportunistic response to September 11, it is crucially important that we > know it. Thousands of lives and perhaps $100bn have gone into this war, > with little to show for it except an enraged Iraqi public and enormous > costs of occupation extending into the future. > > The US media have so far shown little interest in connecting the dots. > Meanwhile, the administration continues to play on the public's > post-September 11 fears and its pride and comfort in US military might. Yet > the questions do not fade away. The administration's seeming unwillingness > to examine the Saudi connections and the enormous costs of Iraqi occupation > are now causing concern even among the president's stalwarts in Congress. > The issues are too big to be swept aside, even by the powerful currents of > patriotism, fear and spin. > > Financial Times; Aug 13, 2003 > > * Sleeping With the Devil: How Washington Sold our Soul for Saudi Crude, by > Robert Baer (Crown Publications) The writer is director of the Earth > Institute at Columbia University > > > Keith Hudson, 6 Upper Camden Place, Bath, England > > _______________________________________________ > Futurework mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
