[A-List] "Blair tells his forces to prepare for war"

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

This report from London in the IHT shows a further step in the choreography
of war.

A day or two ago, Blair made of point of saying to the House of Commons
that the initial report of the arms inspectors had to be judiciously
evaluated, while the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, said more colloquially,
that he is sure Saddam Hussein is lying.

Now Bush makes a play of going along with the United Nations. Blair seems
to be winning that argument, for the price of lining the United Nations up
for war!

Informed commentary on BBC2 Newsnight in the UK says that the next turn of
the ratchet, is that the US will now give secret briefings to those of the
armed inspectors it trusts, and whole families of Iraqi scientists will be
flown out of the country, to comfortable accomodation, and no doubt a
psychological as well as in intelligence debriefing team, looking for the
excuses for war.

This intrusion onto the sovereignty of a state seems unprecedented in world
history, unless you look to conflicts between kings and the papacy in the
middle ages.

Chris Burford

___________


Blair tells his forces to prepare for war, but Blix seeks data Jill Lawless
AP Saturday, December 21, 2002

LONDON The United States and Britain should give United Nations weapons
inspectors more intelligence about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass
destruction, chief inspector Hans Blix said Friday.

Prime Minister Tony Blair, meanwhile, told British troops he was making
"all the preparations necessary" for war.

"If the U.K. and the U.S. ... have evidence, then one would expect that
they would be able to tell us where this stuff is," Blix told the British
Broadcasting Corp. radio.

On Thursday U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell accused Iraq of
"deception" and "lying" in the 12,000-page weapons inventory it handed to
the U.N.

In his first appraisal of the dossier, Blix noted that Iraq maintained it
had no nuclear, chemical or biological weapons programs "and that none have
been designed, procured, produced or stored" since the last inspections
regime ended four years ago.

Blix said western governments claimed to have evidence to the contrary, but
that inspectors were currently not in a position "to confirm Iraq's
statements, nor in possession of evidence to disprove it."

Blix told the BBC that the inspectors "don't get all the support we need"
from western governments.

"The most important thing that governments like the U.K. (United Kingdom)
or the U.S. could give us would be to tell us sites where they are
convinced that they keep some weapons of mass destruction," he said. "This
is what we want to have.

"They have all the methods to listen to telephone conversations, they have
spies, they have satellites, so they have a lot of sources which we do not
have," he added.

In a speech on the British Forces Broadcasting Service, Blair said the
government was preparing for military action _ but said war was not inevitable.

"I'm sorry about the uncertainty," Blair told troops. "I'm afraid it's
inevitable though, because at the moment we simply don't know whether Iraq
will be found in breach of the United Nations resolution.

"The key thing at the moment is to make all the preparations necessary, and
to make sure that we are building up the capacity in the region _ both the
Americans and ourselves _ and that we are able to undertake this mission if
it falls to us to do so," he added.

In an interview published Friday, Blair said Saddam was playing "hide and
seek" with U.N. weapons inspectors _ and that the United Nations would
decide whether Iraq had breached the U.N. resolution.

The United States has declared Iraq in "material breach" of the U.N.
Security Council's resolution.

Blair said weapons inspectors "will, as it were, state the facts."

"The judgment as to the seriousness of the facts is obviously a matter for
the nations of the U.N.," he was quoted as saying by The Guardian newspaper.

"Now he (Saddam) has made his declaration, if his declaration turns out to
be false then he is in breach," Blair added.

In an interview published Friday, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said
Saddam was playing "hide and seek" with U.N. weapons inspectors _ and that
the United Nations would decide whether Iraq had breached the U.N. resolution.

The United States has declared Iraq in "material breach" of the U.N.
Security Council's resolution.

Blair said weapons inspectors "will, as it were, state the facts."

"The judgment as to the seriousness of the facts is obviously a matter for
the nations of the U.N.," he was quoted as saying by The Guardian newspaper.

"Now he (Saddam) has made his declaration, if his declaration turns out to
be false then he is in breach," Blair added.