ACTIONS TO OBJECT TO MILITARY THREAT AGAINST IRAQ

Iraq Action Coalition
http://leb.net/IAC/

(1) Writing to the Boston Globe (see Sample Letter and today's Editorial, below)

2) Calling White House Comments Line 202-456-1111

(3) Voting on today's CNN poll at http://cnn.com/WORLD/mideast

(4) Calling your Senators and Reps: 202-224-3121 Reps 202-225-3121 Senators

(5) (If you live in the Boston area) Attending Thursday Nov 5 talk by Denis Halliday at Harvard Hall (room 202) at 6:00. Denis resigned his post as UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq because the UN policies becasue the sanctions are "a totally bankrupt concept." Bring along any friends who think the Globe might be right about it being "Time to crack down on Saddam" (see below). Come and ask Mr. Halliday about his experience in Baghdad.

Sample Letter to the Editor:

The Globe's Nov 3 editorial, "Time to crack down on Saddam," completely ignores the deaths of over 1.6 million Iraqi civilians (UNICEF 1996).

In September I traveled to Iraq, which you and Albright refer to as "the box." I didn't see Saddam Hussein there. What I saw was the effects of our "muddling through" - starving children (30% of children are acutely malnourished per UNICEF 1998), hospitals doing operations without anesthesia, college graduates doing 2-3 jobs of manual labor.

Iraq is finished. It is a nation of impoverishment. Of starving people who can rarely afford an egg. Of children who have never eaten a banana, nevermind a candy bar. Of cancer patients who lack medicine to either cure them or dull the pain. Of constant power failures. Of rationed food and contaminated water. There is nothing left. Not even hope.

Iraqis are in complete despair. They are held hostage by the last remaining Super Power - a nation once known for its humanity, especially toward the children of our world.

One pediatrician asked me, "It's been 8 years. As a country, we are finished. We know the US is the Master of the Universe. What more do you want?" I see you would have me answer, "What we want is to crack down."

Nancy Gust Arlington

THE EDITORIAL FROM THE BOSTON GLOBE FOLLOWS:

NOV 3 1998
A BOSTON GLOBE EDITORIAL Time to crack down on Saddam

After giving his word to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan last February and then breaking it, after tweaking the Clinton administration and finding no resistance, Saddam Hussein's regime has declared itself in complete defiance of UN Security Council resolutions requiring inspection and monitoring of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

US officials have been trying to put the best possible face on the new crisis, saying they have more support now from other Security Council members because the United States refrained from threatening military action three months ago, when Saddam forbade UN inspectors from doing their job. This is, at best, a curious argument.

Saddam, who has never lacked for audacity, has seized the opportunity presented by a US policy that amounts to an indefinite holding action, a self-deluding assertion that the combination of economic sanctions and UN weapons inspections may keep Saddam forever in a box.

But it was President Clinton's passivity over the past three months that induced Saddam to show the world he cannot be kept in a box. In effect, Saddam's officials are saying that Iraq must be allowed to keep its biological and chemical weapons as well as the missiles to deliver them, and at the same time the Iraqi dictator must be allowed to sell Iraqi oil, pocket the proceeds, and use the money to rebuild his military machine.

In a show of contempt for the Security Council, Saddam has even demanded the firing of Richard Butler, the Australian diplomat who has directed the UN inspection teams with tenacity and patience. The demand was equivalent to a convict insisting that his parole officer be sacked. For his part, Butler has presented a lucid summary of the challenge facing the Security Council.

''The council has made binding international law,'' Butler said Monday. ''Iraq has to be disarmed under that law. It if refuses to comply and do the things required ... the council has to consider what steps it will take to see that law is enforced.'' Clinton ought to heed Butler. The time for muddling through has long passed.

This story ran on page A15 of the Boston Globe on 11/03/98.

© Copyright 1998 Globe Newspaper Company.

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