The Anger of a Desert Storm: Scott Ritter and the myth of WMD
When Scott Ritter, the United Nation’s Chief Weapons Inspector in Iraq, resigned in 1998, minor shockwaves rippled through the international community. A man who had been at the center of much controversy in the country, and whom the Iraqis claimed at the time was behind obstructive and intimidating tactics at the behest of the American government, had resigned in frustration at American interference in the United Nations process, claiming that UNSCOM was being used by the CIA as a front for invasion plans.
In the desert sands of Iraq, Ritter saw corruption on both sides, and an inevitable explosion of that corruption in the future. In the ensuing years, he has published a book, Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the UN and Overthrow Saddam Hussein and released a film, In Shifting Sands, which then UN chair of UNSCOM Richard Butler denounced as “propaganda”. He has been one of the most outspoken critics of the war in Iraq, and one of the most uniquely placed, as an American once deeply entrenched in the United Nations, to comment on the fundamental decline of that body in recent years.
His moral standpoint since 1998 is not without controversy, and his Wikipedia entry certainly outlines some mucky conspiracy theories that explain the shift in stance from military hawk to outspoken activist — it is not for this blog to repeat those, but one must always question the motivations for those who speak from positions of authority, even if you agree with what they say. In the context of a 15 minute radio interview, I did not do nearly enough of that here, but Ritter’s fight is generally a brave and respectable one. Ritter has often done a good enough job of answering his critics when called unamerican, as the media and political machines of the state turned against him and worked to discredit his views. In these most interesting times, when dissenting voices are dealt with through fear and paranoia, Ritter has remained steadfast. Sure, he may have sold a few books in doing so, but I have no doubt he was on a decent salary before his decision to resign.
In person, the former Marine is an intimidating presence with a booming voice and a precise, well-worn line in anger. It’s a long way from the deserts of Iraq to a community radio studio on the far side of Australia, but Ritter’s rage has not simmered.
You were a weapons inspector in Iraq for several years, at some point there was a turning point when you decided things weren’t as they ought to be.
It’s not that there was a turning point per se, as a weapons inspector from 1991 to 1998, I was fully cogniscent of not only the difficulty of our task but also the inherent contradiction in the policy of certain nations, namely the United States, when it came to supporting our tasks. Our job was a job of disarmament, getting rid of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction in accordance with Security Council mandate.
The United States is a member of the Security Council. They voted in favour of this mandate, and yet the United States had a policy that embraced regime change as opposed to disarmament, so there was always this conflict taking place between the weapons inspection process and the policy of the United States. I rode it out, so to speak, for seven years, in belief that if we could accomplish our mission, we could trump America’s policy imperatives. By 1998, it became obvious that the United States would not allow the weapons inspection process to proceed with its full integrity, void of the corruption of American influence, and so I resigned.
So you believed that UNSCOM was fatally compromised by the US’s intentions in its involvement?
It’s not what I believe, it’s a statement of fact. UNSCOM was fatally compromised by the US policy of regime change, which violated the rule of law set forth by the mandate of disarmament.
And how did that manifest on a day to day level in your work?
In a number of ways. First of all you have the overall poisoning effect that comes when you have a member of the Security Council state that economic sanctions which were linked to Iraq’s disarmament obligations, these sanctions would never be lifted, even if Iraq cooperated with the inspectors, until Saddam Hussein was removed from power. This of course being statements made by Secretary of State James Baker in May of 1991, and repeated by President George Herbert Walker Bush in June of 1991.
So the Iraqis were confronting us and saying “so why should we even co-operate with you? If we do do everything you ask us to do, it’s irrelevant, because the United States will never let the sanctions be lifted.” You have this overall poisoning effect that takes place and then you have the United States not accepting the technical findings of the inspectors.
In my case in 1992, I briefed the US intelligence community on the fact that we had pretty much come to closure on Iraq’s ballistic missile programs. That was a finding that was unacceptable to them. They created new intelligence information that had to be investigated over the course of a year-long effort, and in November of 1993 I went back to the director of the CIA and told him that all missiles were accounted for. The CIA’s response was to say that there are twelve to twenty missiles in Iraq, and that number will never change, regardless of what we do.
So again, that’s one manifestation, and a more nefarious manifestation is the CIA’s use of the unique access provided to weapons inspectors in Iraq from the mandate of disarmament given by the council, using this access not to gather intelligence in support of disarmament but to gather intelligence about the security of Saddam Hussein that facilitated the CIA’s efforts to launch a coup d’etat against Saddam and remove him from power. This of course terminally corrupted the integrity of the inspection operation, because once this became exposed after a failed coup attempt in June of 1996, when the Iraqis looked at a weapons inspector, they didn’t see somebody that was trying to disarm Iraq, but rather somebody that was trying to assassinate their president, and sadly they were correct.
It’s important to remember that, as you’ve stated, there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and the point of the process of disarmament was to disarm. Do you believe that the co-operation of the Iraqis allowed your organisation to do that fully and completely?
Absolutely not. I’ve never said that. What I’ve maintained is, based on the work of the weapons inspectors that we could account for, in verifiable fashion, 90-95% of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. We don’t know what happened to everything. Iraq claimed that they destroyed it. They said 100% was destroyed, and it turns out historically that they were correct—the CIA has acknowledged that yes, the Iraqis destroyed everything in the summer of 1991, but because the Iraqis did lie to us early on in the process, as inspectors we could not take what they said at face value. We could not give them the benefit of the doubt.
The only way we could determine that a weapon had been accounted for was to verify through documents, through visual inspection, through forensic investigation, that they had in fact been destroyed. We could only account for 90-95%, but we were able to mitigate against the unaccounted for 5-10% by putting in place the most comprehensive technologically advanced on-site inspection regime in the history of arms control, where we blanketed the totality of Iraq’s industrial infrastructure with no-notice inspections, cameras, sensors, and we were able to ascertain that Iraq neither retained weapons of mass destruction at these facilities or was reconstituting weapons.
So even though I couldn’t tell you that we could account for every single weapon, I could say that Iraq was fundamentally disarmed. But unfortunately the Security Council doesn’t give us the luxury of saying “fundamental disarmament”, the Security Council’s mandate was one hundred per cent, and that’s the benchmark that we were trying to achieve, and when I resigned in 1998, I pointed out accurately that we had not achieved our mandate, that Iraq was not disarmed in accordance with the standards set by the Security Council.
You were an outside observer of the inspections in 2002 and 2003. What was your observation of that? Do you think that was a legitimate process?
Of course it was, from an inspection standpoint, it was a legitimate process. The problem though, we come back to the same fatal flaw that haunted the original inspection process. It’s what’s going on overall that represents the problem, not the inspectors on the ground — they did their job. But it’s the environment they operated in. For instance, resolution 1441 passed by the Security Council, which mandated their work, wasn’t a resolution for disarmament, it was a resolution to justify the invasion of Iraq. It set conditions that were virtually impossible for the Iraqis to meet, and it also created opportunities for the United States to debunk anything the Iraqis did. Case in point: The Iraqis were required to submit a new declaration, listing the totality of their weapons of mass destruction. They did so, a 12,500 page dossier was submitted to the Security Council in early December. Within a week the United States dismissed this document as nothing more than a combination of lies. They said that the Iraqis have biological weapons, they have biological weapons programs, and if they don’t declare these weapons in this document, this document is fraudulent.
Well of course, the Iraqis didn’t have biological weapons, they didn’t have a biological weapons program at the time, so it wasn’t declared, so the US dismissed the document. It turns out that of all the dossiers prepared about Iraq’s WMDs by the CIA, British Intelligence, Israeli Intelligence and others, there’s only one compilation that stands the test of time. It has yet to be proven false on a single point of substantive fact. But when you have the United States casting this cloud over the inspection process, it’s very difficult for the inspectors to do their work. But they did do their work—in the short period of time they were there, they were able to debunk the totality of the CIA’s intelligence about WMDs: where they were hidden and where they were being produced.
But apparently truth didn’t matter. Colin Powell went before the Security Council in February and basically said that the inspection process was irrelevant, because the Iraqis, in the way that they deal with inspectors, are so prepared for the inspections that they can be perceived as telling the truth when in fact they are telling a lie. Donald Rumsfeld made an amazing statement: he said the fact that the inspectors aren’t finding weapons in Iraq is the clearest evidence yet that there are weapons in Iraq. How, as an inspector, do you overcome that rhetoric?
There is the fundamental question of the state of the United Nations. Would you say that the United Nations is now weakened because the United States disrespects it and pays no heed to it, or is the United States right to disrespect and pay no heed to the United Nations because it is weak?
I come at it from a standpoint of an American. An American who has served in the armed forces of the United States, where I took an oath to uphold and defend the constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic. Article 6 of the Constitution states that when the United States enters into an international treaty or agreement that is ratified by two thirds of the US senate, that is the supreme law of the land. We are signatories to the United Nations charter, so we don’t have the luxury of saying “oops, we don’t want to work with the UN, we’re going to walk away”. The senate can pull us out of it, but no president, no congressional leader as an individual, has the authority to say that the UN is irrelevant.
So the US has no right to say that because the UN is weak, we don’t want to a part of the UN. The UN is weak because the United States is not a true partner in the UN. It is not this singular entity, it’s a club, it’s a membership, and the United States is a key member of it. But unless everybody abides by the same set of rules, the club’s not going to work, and the United States has shown itself to be an imperfect partner. The UN will never be a viable organisation until such time as the United States decides to be a true, genuine member of that organisation.
And the imperfect partner at this time sends a most imperfect ambassador to the United Nations in John Bolton.
Well that was done on purpose. John Bolton’s soul task in going to the United Nations is to destroy the United Nations. He’s done everything in his power to do that, in terms of hijacking the reform agenda, he’s already confronting the Security Council, calling it an impotent organisation because of its refusal to stand up to Syria, to Iran, basically for its refusal to rubber-stamp the US agenda, he was picked on purpose, this was not an accident. People should not give him or the administration that appointed him the benefit of the doubt — he is a dire risk, not only to the United Nations but to the whole notion of international and security. As an American, I view him as a risk to my country, because he is destroying the framework of international law, as imperfect as it is, that has held the world together since the end of the second world war.
And he was not actually appointed by congress but by the president directly.
Again, another indication of just how flawed this character is. He would not have been appointed by congress. The advice and consent of congress was sought, and congress was prepared to reject this man, so the president took advantage of a bureaucratic manoeuvre known as a ‘recess appointment’, and put John Bolton in place.
You mentioned Iran there just briefly. You did make some claims earlier this year about the US’s intention to invade Iran.
Again, I make no claims, I only highlight stated policy objectives. Condoleeza Rice just finished testifying before the congress of the United States a month ago where she said that not only should we be prepared to stay in Iraq for another ten years, but that congress needs to be prepared for the eventuality of conflict with nations like Syria and Iran. One would have expected Congress to jump up and scream and shout, instead they said “surely you’ll advice us before the president undertakes such actions”. She responded “I will do nothing that ties the Commander-in-Chief’s hands when it comes to freedom of military action”.
The President has linked Iran as part of the so-called axis of evil, the president has stated his intention to change the nature of the regime in Iran, administration officials have testified before congress about the policy of the United States when it comes to the middle east, that is a policy of regional transformation, calling for regime change in a number of nations, and then you have the actions that are undertaken for instance the CIA’s taking under the wing of the Mujahedin-e Khalq, an Iranian opposition group that used to work for Saddam Hussein but now works for the CIA to carry out intelligence actions and sabotage bombings, direct action, inside Iran today. We’re overflying Iranian territory with unmanned aerial vehicles, and the US airforce has been placed on notice to be prepared to bomb Iran as of June 2005, when instructed to do so by the president.
I’m not making any of this up, it’s all part of the public record. The problem is people are shocked when I happen to put it all together and run it into a sentence or a paragraph, because nobody’s paying attention. People believe because we’re neck-deep in a quagmire of our own making in Iraq, that this administration would not have the ability or the desire to move on into Iran or Syria.
Now that we can use words such as ‘quagmire’ when we’re talking about Iraq, do you advocate withdrawal? Does this initial debate about weapons of mass destruction still matter in terms of the state of Iraq now, after what the invasion has done to it. Is the responsible thing to do now to stay there and fix the mess, or to get out?
Well there’s two issues there, one is does the issue of weapons of mass destruction still matter? Of course it does, especially if you live in a representative democracy that claims to believe in the rule of law. We went to war illegally. This is an illegitimate occupation. I know in a couple of weeks I may not be able to say that in Australia without fear of being arrested for sedition, but the fact of the matter is, the invasion of Iraq was an illegal invasion violating international law, and the occupation is illegitimate. What makes it illegal and illegitimate is the issue of weapons of mass destruction, and as societies we must reflect on the nature of our involvement in this conflict. Will we accept our leaders lying to us, misrepresenting information? This was not an intelligence failure, this wasn’t “oops, we got it wrong”. The intelligence services of the United States, Great Britain, Australia, Israel, France, Russia and others knew that Iraq had been fundamentally disarmed, they knew that the case that the Bush administration made about massive stockpiles was an exaggerated case, a false case, a deceptive case, a misleading case, and yet they went to war anyway, so yes we must pay attention to WMD.
But you’re right in pointing out that that is not so much a factor in what’s going on today in Iraq. Do I believe in withdrawal? Immediate withdrawal. I view Iraq as a nation on fire and the fuel that feeds that flame is the presence of American troops. The only way you’re ever going to have a hope of putting that fire out is to pull the fuel from the flame — get the troops out. We are the problem in Iraq, we are not the solution. But we need to recognise that withdrawing the American troops is not cutting and running, it’s just a recognition that the unilateral application of military force, the solution is the multilateral application of diplomacy. And this is what we need to start thinking about when we speak of coming up with a solution in Iraq. How do we get Iraq’s neighbours? How do we get the international community to come together and contain and mitigate the inevitable violence that will ensue when American troops come out?
It’s not as though there’s no violence going on right now, and when we pull the American troops out, the violence will continue, it may even expand. Unfortunately that’s the tragic consequence of invading Iraq, removing Saddam Hussein and thereby removing the glue that held an Iraqi nation together. There is chaos and anarchy, and unfortunately the only way Iraq is ever going to solve its problems is to let this play out until one side emerges dominant over the other. But that doesn’t mean that we pull out and have no checks and balances in place. Unlike Vietnam where we withdrew, the Vietnamese war didn’t follow us home. If we cut and run from Iraq and we don’t have a system in place to contain and mitigate this violence, it will follow us. Not only to the United States but to Europe, to Australia, to elsewhere. And we have to make sure that doesn’t happen.
On a personal level, you’ve been speaking out against the American government for a long time now, about the policies that have led to the situation in Iraq. In 2000 when your film came out, Richard Butler, essentially said that it was propaganda, and he said your allegations were completely false. That’s to be expected, but have you found it a difficult process, what you’re doing? Is it a dangerous one?
It’s not dangerous. Danger is going to war, danger is running into a burning building. That’s danger.
Is it difficult? Of course it’s difficult. Is it sometimes personally inconvenient? Of course. But you know, history is going to judge me properly. I spoke truth to power, and I did the right thing. Richard Butler is going to be hung by his own words. It’s absurd today to listen to what Richard Butler said in 2000 knowing full well that he knew what the true situation was, but he didn’t have the courage to stand up and say the right thing. History will judge him differently. I’m very comfortable with how I will be judged by history — yes, it’s difficult, but, you know, it’s becoming easier. Because as time passes and people reflect on what I did say and the stance I took, they know that a) it was a morally correct stance, and b) it was a factually correct stance. The longer this debacle goes on, the more solid my position becomes.