Search In Iraq Finds No Banned Weapons. (Washington Post)

Bush believes the report vindicates his administration because it shows that Hussein sought components for forbidden programs, but doesn't show that he actually GOT any, contrary to the Administration's announcements prior to war. (Washington Post) It appears that the Iraqi regime had high HOPES of having forbidden programs, but didn't quite work up the skill and materials to MAKE anything.

That's not quite what we were told when this all started.

Kay's WMD report on the CIA website is fascinating. I think my favorite quote so far is this one:

Discussions with Iraqi scientists uncovered agent R&D work that paired overt work with nonpathogenic organisms serving as surrogates for prohibited investigation with pathogenic agents.

That's right, Iraqi scientists were working with benign biological substances, but were hoping to learn things they could use with really nasty biological agents! Oh, shame on them for using harmless agents and fantasizing of harmful ones!

This is another great excerpt:

We have not yet been able to corroborate the existence of a mobile BW production effort. Investigation into the origin of and intended use for the two trailers found in northern Iraq in April has yielded a number of explanations, including hydrogen, missile propellant, and BW production, but technical limitations would prevent any of these processes from being ideally suited to these trailers. That said, nothing we have discovered rules out their potential use in BW production.

Read it a few times. Doesn't it just flow over the tongue, like cold chunky peanut butter? Don't you feel a desire to rephrase it? Something more along the lines of, "you probably couldn't make any WMDs in these trailers, but we really have no clue what they were used for, so we count these as proof that they were up to SOMETHING nefarious for now."

The report is full of "could haves." They looked into making something chemical, so they someday could have figured it out! Hussein once asked how long it would take to produce a chemical weapon, and received an estimate! They produce *gasp* ESTIMATES!! And this report reveals that scientists who studied nuclear weapons prior to 1998 were allowed to keep practicing science! YES! "In some cases, these groups performed work which could help preserve the science base and core skills that would be needed for any future fissile material production or nuclear weapons development." SCIENTISTS WERE ENGAGING IN SCIENCE THAT PRESERVED THEIR CORE SKILLS! HOLY COW!

I don't mean to make light of this, but... I was expecting something more compelling, and I feel let down, somehow.

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Are they serious? Bush aides reported being surprised that the news coverage of Kay's interim report focused on the absence so far of weapons of mass destruction.. (Washington Post) Oh, I hope they're not serious. I mean, golly. Even if THEY forgot the original rationale for entering into the war, those of us who are even somewhat sober remember it.

There's a sad article I just read about the current, chaotic state of Somalia. (BBC) There is concern that the country could become a haven for terrorists. The country didn't come onto the US' press radar until unrest after the fall of a president resulted in local warfare and the death of many UN peacekeepers. The US was involved, but the operation went badly, and many US soldiers died. Before those events, you'd think the nation didn't exist, so little was it mentioned in US papers.

Most Americans, me included, were mystified at the time. It was as if Somalia sprang into existence overnight, and was somehow magically filled with high powered guns while its people lacked most of the basics. How could it be? Where did the guns come from? There was some very basic information missing.

A great essay about Americans never understanding international events straightened me out, and so now I know what to look for. If you look at the BBC's excellent timeline of Somalia's history, you'll notice some references to the influence of the Soviets during the cold war.

Can you think of any place where the Soviets alone had influence that the US didn't try to intervene? The US apparently supported and armed warlords who were engaged in a battle of resistance against the left-leaning government, the same way the US supported resistance to the USSR in Afghanistan.

It's very similar to Afghanistan in that respect.

But for those who hadn't heard this excluded tidbit, there's an odd quote from a former American ambassador: "The US now has a coherent policy of trying to get the neighbours to take some responsibility for Somalia." Not that I expected him to bring up OUR role and responsibilities. But... But....

I enjoyed this controversial piece by former UK environment minister Michael Meacher called "This war on terrorism is bogus: The 9/11 attacks gave the US an ideal pretext to use force to secure its global domination." (Guardian UK). Meacher wants to know why the US was so interesting in starting a war so far from home against a country who, it has now been proven, did not have the resources to damage the US.

Meacher's inspiration is a report called "Rebuilding America's Defenses by the increasingly infamous Project for a New American Century, a group that has been planning US world domination (especially through military superiority) for many years, and from which many members of the Bush Administration came. Meacher is especially disturbed by a section on the required elements to shift attitudes toward it's ultra-pro-military stance:

"the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event -- like a new Pearl Harbor."

Meacher's theory is that the September 11, 2001 attacks provided the catalyst that the PNAC folks have been seeking to follow their grandest plans -- not so much by the Bush Administration's design, but by laxity that happens to coincide with militarist interests. In response to critics who accuse him of hysterics, Meacher tries to draw attention to the source of his concern - the report:

It sets out publicly as objectives for the new Bush administration control of the Gulf region, irrespective of Saddam Hussein, regime change in China, US domination of space and cyberspace, and development of biological weapons as "a politically useful tool".

All this is highly relevant to the debate currently raging in Britain as to whether the war in Iraq was justified. Ostensibly Britain was taken into a war to support US goals of combating global terror. But in reality, the evidence shows that the war on terror is largely a cover for wider US geopolitical objectives set out in the neo-conservative manifesto. This is what we should be focusing on.

Ideologically based criticisms aside, I am surprised that his suggestions that the open-ended war on terror are serving some people are so shocking (we have always had war profiteers), and that they distract his critics from the document upon which they are based. The PNAC report itself, and the appropriateness of the Bush Administration's members being blatant militarists who have not distanced themselves from a document which advocates US world domination through military action raise questions on their own.

Shouldn't there be a few more concerns over comments in the PNAC document such as this:

The United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein.

In a world of global cooperation, is it appropriate for the US to want to maintain a military presence around the world, especially in areas where it is notoriously unwanted and unwelcome? Does any nation have the right to impede the sovereignty of other nations for the sake of its financial interests in taking other nation's natural resources in order to have global dominance? Historically, the answer has always been no. Shouldn't the policies that the US is following, as outlined in this document, generate greater concern than implications that the Bush Administration has a conflict of interest with regard to security?

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A detailed analysis of the PNAC document and its operations by MoveOn, currently published at Indymedia (Idaho Indymedia) provides additional background information on the organization and funding behind this dubious conservate effort to build an empire.

I've been home ill for several days, so I missed yesterday's Bring the Troops Home demonstration here in SF. (SF Gate) Bringing the Troops home is a laudable sentiment, but I think we peace-loving people should demand more.

The costly war on Iraq relieved the Iraqi people of a despotic ruler whom the US previously helped keep in power, a belated correction to some very serious and immoral US foreign policy actions, which came at the expense of countless Iraqi lives. But the occupation is not going well, and neither the soldiers nor Iraqis are happy with it. It's time to admit that. Considering the social strife raging through lawless occupied Iraq (Washington Post) that the power vacuum has created, pulling out and abandoning the people after having created chaos is not enough.

The US finds itself in this situation because of ego and greed. The US' attempts to maintain a business monopoly over Iraqi resources and military positions while demanding money from the UN is self-serving and bound to fail. The US does not have a history of successful nation building, having intervened in dozens of nations but still only pointing to the same two examples from my parents' childhoods to prove it can be done well.

Bringing the troops home must be part of a broader plan to help the Iraqis. It's time to surrender the assets of Iraq that the US has seized to an international trustee; involve international peacekeepers and participate with and support them with US forces; set a timetable for Iraqi self-rule; and use UN resources to set up a method for Iraqis to express what it is they believe they need and their developmental priorities in a way that will result in the most needed and beneficial action. The sooner, the better.

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Yes, such a proposal may involve surrendering some of the lucrative development contracts that Bush has been granting to his donors and friends. The most important thing is that the Iraqis are getting what they need. It's bizarre to read about mobile phone contracts being let when people there don't have water or security. There are nations much closer to Iraq who can surely supply many of the people and equipment needed to give people the basics they need to live. What is best for US business isn't necessarily best for the Iraqis, and if we're still claiming this war was for Iraqi liberation, we need to get on the ball and make sure they're getting what's truly best for them.

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This goes for Afghanistan, too, which we've largely abandoned.

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The Washington Post Iraq Post-War photo galleries (Macromedia Flash) are up and full of informative photos about the way Iraqis of all stripes are living (and dying) in the post-war breakdown of order.

An interesting bit within the 'hunt for WMDs' gallery: a photo of a piece of lined paper, showing a drawing of a flask and some text which was found accompanied by a flask of powder. This discovery generated excitement among the WMD hunters. It turned out to be... a student's science homework.

(This implies the folks looking for WMDs don't have translators with them. Which seems unwise, for many reasons.)

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Cheney is refusing to drop a discredited story about hijacker Atta and an Iraqi meeting in Prague, which has been abandoned by the rest of the Bush Administration. (Washington Post)

U.S. records showed Atta living in Virginia Beach in April 2001, and they could find no indication he had left Virginia or traveled outside the United States.

Even so, on March 24, 2002, Cheney again told NBC, "We discovered . . . the allegation that one of the lead hijackers, Mohamed Atta, had, in fact, met with Iraqi intelligence in Prague."

The FBI and CIA have both confirmed that there is no evidence that Atta left the country at the time the alleged meeting took place, and the lone informer's testimony to the Czech government lost its credibility: "Havel quietly informed the White House in 2002 there was no evidence to confirm the meeting." And yet Cheney is STILL bringing it up.

Is Cheney trying to make it easy for me to say that facts are no obstacle to certain members of this Administration? This surely is the sort of attitude which resulted in members of the House Intelligence Committee accusing the administration of using information that was at least 5 years old (Washington Post).

The ongoing lawlessness in Iraq is taking tolls on Iraq's most vulnerable: especially young female children. A horrific July article called "Rape (and Silence About It) Haunts Baghdad" (New York Times, $) details an attack on a 9-year old which threatens her life -- not because of the violence of the act, but because it means her male relatives wish to kill her to cleanse their family's honor. She's only 9!

She isn't the only one: the article describes other victims, women lying about what has happened to their daughters to protect family honor, refusals by the police to act on reports, bureaucratic obstacles... I'm citing this older article, because I haven't seen this come up again recently, although families locking their girls indoors and male relatives standing guard outside of girl's schools all day are likely things that have continued along with the disorder.

This bodes badly for the country: as pointed out in a short MS Magazine interview with Jordan's Queen Noor, cultures with women participating in public life tend to moderate extremists. When women are eliminated from the public world, extreme views toward their treatment and protection flourish, including more extreme forms of fundamentalism. Which make the world less hospitable for all of us.

This is still apparent in Afghanistan, where women are still wearing the Burqa outside of Kabul, where journalists generally won't tread.