Opponents of Strike on Iraq Muster Arguments

By Andrew Clark

August 20, 2002 (Reuters)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iraq poses no realistic threat to the United States and a unilateral attack on it would alienate America's allies, inflame the Middle East and hurt the global fight against terrorism, opponents of a U.S. military strike against Iraq said on Tuesday.

The warnings came at a Capitol Hill forum arranged amid increasing speculation the Bush administration is poised to act on repeated pledges to remove Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

The White House says Saddam is developing weapons of mass destruction and must be deposed before he can use them against America or its allies, or share them with terrorist groups.

But Scott Ritter, the former chief United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, dismissed those charges -- saying Iraq had been fundamentally disarmed after the Gulf War and the U.S. had so far presented no evidence to back up claims it was again trying to produce nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.

"Their weapons programs have been eliminated," he told the forum. "Iraq poses no threat to any of its neighbors. It does not threaten its region. It does not threaten the United States. It does not threaten the world."

Ritter, a former U.S. Marine who resigned his U.N. post in 1998 and later accused Washington of using the inspections teams to spy on Iraq, said the Bush administration was cynically using the weapons issue to justify an attack that would allow it to settle old scores with Saddam.

DOMESTIC POLITICS

"This has less to do with national security and more to do with domestic American politics," he said.

Whatever the motivations for a U.S. strike, the foreign policy consequences could be severe, said Phyllis Bennis, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies think tank.

"The Arab allies of the United States are uniformly opposed to a U.S. war," she said. "Are we prepared to ask our friends to risk being overthrown, because the risk is that severe in that region, if they sign on to a U.S. invasion of Iraq?"

A U.S. attack on Iraq, against the wishes of its Arab and European allies, could also badly hurt the global effort against terrorism cobbled together after Sept. 11, said David Cortright, president of the Fourth Freedom Forum peace group.

"We will be a Western country attacking and occupying an Arab country, and it'll be like a recruitment poster for suicide bombers and political extremists," he said.

Ohio Democratic Rep. Dennis Kucinich, who convened the forum, said several more were planned in coming months to try to keep arguments against attacking Iraq in the public eye.

"I believe that war is not inevitable, that peace is inevitable," he said. "But it is going to require a lot of work to get there."

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