Kucinich Draws the Line Against War

By Rep. Dennis Kucinich, The Progressive. Posted October 29, 2002.

Unilateral military action by the U.S. against Iraq is unjustified, unwarranted and illegal. The Administration has failed to make the case that Iraq poses an imminent threat to the United States. There is no credible evidence linking Iraq to 9/11. There is no credible evidence linking Iraq to Al Qaeda. Nor is there any credible evidence that Iraq possesses deliverable weapons of mass destruction, or that it intends to deliver them against the United States.

When Iraq possessed and used weapons of mass destruction, quite sad to say, it did so with the knowledge of, and sometimes with materials from, the U.S.

During the Administration of Ronald Reagan, sixty helicopters were sold to Iraq. Later reports said Iraq used U.S.-made helicopters to spray Kurds with chemical weapons. According to The Washington Post, Iraq used mustard gas against Iran with the help of intelligence from the CIA.

Iraq's punishment? The U.S. reestablished full diplomatic ties around Thanksgiving of 1984.

Throughout 1989 and 1990, U.S. companies, with the permission of the first Bush Administration, sent to the government of Saddam Hussein mustard gas precursors and live cultures for bacteriological research. U.S. companies also helped to build a chemical weapons factory and supplied the West Nile virus, fuel air explosive technology, computers for weapons technology, hydrogen cyanide precursors, computers for weapons research and development, and vacuum pumps and bellows for nuclear weapons plants. "We have met the enemy," said Walt Kelly's Pogo, "And he is us."

Unilateral action on the part of the U.S., or in partnership with Great Britain, would for the first time set our nation on the bloodstained path of aggressive war, a sacrilege upon the memory of those who fought to defend this country. America's moral authority would be undermined throughout the world. It would destabilize the entire Persian Gulf and Middle East region. And it would signal for Russia to invade Georgia; China, Taiwan; North Korea, the South; India, Pakistan.

The U.S. must recommit itself to the U.N. Charter, which is the framework for international order. We have a right and a duty to defend ourselves. We also have an obligation to defend international law. We can accomplish both without going to war with Iraq.

There is a way out.

It must involve the United Nations. Inspections for weapons of mass destruction should begin immediately. Inspectors must have free and unfettered access to all sites.

The time has come for us to end the sanctions against Iraq, because those sanctions punish the people of Iraq for having Saddam Hussein as their leader. These sanctions have been instrumental in causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of children. Emergency relief should be expedited. Free trade, except in arms, must be permitted.

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