Summer 2002.                   The drumbeat for war commences in louder earnest from June through August 2002, with the doctrine of preemption getting boosted by the highest office in the land. The spin allies in media are apprised of their talking points and rapidly fall in line; by the end of summer, the fall offensive – leading up to the congressional elections of 2002 – is fully ready to launch. Also in June 2002, “Operation Southern Focus” begins, with U.S. aircraft dropping over 600 bombs on Iraqi air defenses up until the beginning of the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

June 1-7, 2002:

 

June 1, 2002 – Bush gives the commencement address at the West Point Military Academy. The doctrine is preemption:

 

“The attacks of September the 11th required a few hundred thousand dollars in the hands of a few dozen evil and deluded men. All of the chaos and suffering they caused came at much less than the cost of a single tank.      

The dangers have not passed. This government and the American people are on watch. We are ready, because we know the terrorists have more money and more men and more plans. 

The gravest danger to freedom lies at the perilous crossroads of radicalism and technology. When the spread of chemical and biological and nuclear weapons, along with ballistic missile technology, when that occurs, even weak states and small groups could attain a catastrophic power to strike at great nations.

Our enemies have declared this very intention and have been caught seeking these terrible weapons. They want the capability to blackmail us or to harm us or to harm our friends. And we will oppose them with all our power.       

For much of the last century, America’s defense relied on the Cold War doctrines of deterrence and containment. In some cases, those strategies still apply, but new threats also require new thinking.             

Deterrence, the promise of massive retaliation against nations, means nothing against shadowy terrorist networks with no nation or citizens to defend.

 

[So, the very smallness or weakness of another country becomes a justification for attacking it.]

 

“Containment is not possible when unbalanced dictators with weapons of mass destruction can deliver those weapons on missiles or secretly provide them to terrorist allies . . . Our security will require the best intelligence to reveal threats hidden in caves and growing in laboratories. Our security will require modernizing domestic agencies, such as the FBI, so they’re prepared to act and act quickly against danger.     

    Our security will require transforming the military you will lead, a military that must be ready to strike at a moment’s notice in any dark corner of the world.     

 

[He is not referring to Belgium.]

 

“And our security will require all Americans to be forward-looking and resolute, to be ready for pre-emptive action, when necessary, to defend our liberty and to defend our lives.”

 

June 4, 2002 – Rep. Richard Gephardt (D-Missouri), says in a speech in Washington, D.C., that he would support use of force to oust Saddam Hussein.

 

June 5, 2002 – The British defense minister, traveling with Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to a meeting in Brussels, Belgium, tells U.S. reporters that Iraq has stepped up attacks on British and American planes patrolling the ‘no-fly’ zones in Iraqi airspace.

 

Same day – A Prague newspaper reports again the previously discredited story that 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta met in Prague with an Iraqi secret agent.

 

June 6, 2002 – Vice President Cheney gives a speech to the National Association of Home Builders in which he says,

 

“We are especially concerned about any possible linkup between terrorists and regimes that have or seek weapons of mass destruction.In the case of Saddam Hussein, we have a dictator who is clearlypursuing these deadly capabilities—defying the U.N. resolutions he agreed to, and kicking U.N. weapons inspectors out of his country. Saddam has also shown that he is willing to use weapons of mass destruction. He used them in his war against Iran, and has used them against his own people.     

This gathering danger requires the most careful, deliberate, and decisive response by America and our allies. A regime that has gassed thousands of its own citizens—a regime that hates America and our friends—must never be permitted to threaten America with weapons of mass destruction.”



[These posts will be continued after Christmas.]