| WASHINGTON, D.C. -- After a month of playing cat-and-mouse with
Baghdad's Mad Dog, the weapons inspectors of the United Nations Monitoring
Inspection and Verification Commission (UNMOVIC) are basking in the glow of
global acclaim for their sterling work. According to the UN, the inspectors
have "earned the cooperation" of the Iraqi regime and even gone "unannounced
and unopposed" into one of Saddam's palaces. Kofi Anon thinks they're doing
a great job. So far they haven't found a thing. It's unlikely that they ever
will.
As with most UN undertakings, the UNMOVIC mission began with a
naive hope -- that Saddam Hussein would voluntarily fess up to possessing
nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. Security Council Resolution 1441,
passed unanimously with great fanfare last month, requires that Iraq provide
weapons inspectors with "immediate, unimpeded, unconditional and
unrestricted access" to suspected weapons sites. The much-hyped Iraqi
"cooperation" has thus far postponed a reckoning with reality and deterred
joint U.S.-British action to remove the threat of Saddam accumulating more
weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them. Meanwhile,
Saddam's UN ambassador defiantly insists that his country has "nothing
hidden." Everyone knows that's a lie. But you won't hear that from any of
the inspectors or their intrepid leader in absentia, Hans Blix.
The ever-so-courteous, always smiling Blix is intent on
inspecting Iraq from his luxurious UN offices in New York City. It is,
after-all, holiday season in the Big Apple. And in Iraq, it's Ramadan --
when it's tough to get a glass of wine and good cheese -- even at the Al
Rashid Hotel, the best in Baghdad.
But it's not just his penchant for the good life that has raised
concerns about Blix. It's his competence. He is after, all the, same Swedish
diplomat who served as director general of the International Atomic Energy
Agency during the very years that Iraq's blooming nuclear weapons program
went undetected. But just to show that he doesn't play favorites and prove
that he's an "equal opportunity arms inspector," Blix also ignored the North
Korean atomic-bomb-building program, as well. Some have compared him to
Inspector Cleusou in the old Pink Panther movies. But that's unfair -- to
French cops.
In his zeal to avoid offending the brutal regime in Baghdad --
Blix refers to them as his "hosts" -- he has minimized the involvement of
experienced American and British inspectors with UNMOVIC because the Iraqis
complained that they are "too aggressive in their disarmament searches." To
replace the U.S. and U.K. scientists who were experts on nuclear, biological
and chemical weapons, Blix launched an international affirmative action
hiring program that has recruited Chinese, Russian and Chilean inspectors --
but few with specialized expertise in the arcane sciences of "bugs, gas and
nukes." Apparently, Blix is looking for inspectors with know-how in other
disciplines.
One of the few Americans he did find attractive enough to put on
his team has a two-year, community college degree in "Security Management"
and a resume that includes sadomasochistic sex groups, teaching courses on
"sex slaves" and proficiency in "bondage" techniques. Given what we now know
of Saddam's torture chambers, one wonders at the reaction of the Iraqi
despot when he learned of this particular inspector's extracurricular
activities.
While the so-called inspectors and S&M aficionados wearing
UNMOVIC ID badges bumble about the Iraqi countryside like the Keystone Kops,
President Bush is talking tough. "The inspectors are not in Iraq to play
hide-and-seek with Saddam Hussein," he declared last week. But that's not
the point. There is considerable question as to whether this gang that
couldn't shoot straight would even know what they were seeing if Saddam left
it all on display.
Dr. Raymond Zilinskas, who directs the Chemical and Biological
Weapons Nonproliferation Program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies,
told my nationwide radio audience last week that, "If UNMOVIC lacks
specialized scientific expertise in biochemistry, nuclear physics,
microbiology and 'weaponization' of biological and chemical agents, they
might never know what the Iraqis have or don't have." When I asked if his
advice had been sought for UNMOVIC, he replied, "No."
Perhaps it's understandable why Hans Blix doesn't want to hear
from "Dr. Z." He's not only an expert on bio-weapons. He also knows his way
around Iraq. In 1994, as part of the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM), he
inspected 61 Iraqi biological research and production facilities and built a
database on Iraq's "dual use" biological equipment. In short, he knows what
he's talking about. No wonder Dr. Zilinskas is in Monterey, Calif., instead
of Baghdad.
Thankfully, Hans Blix and Kofi Annan aren't the only ones with a
say over what's to happen in Iraq. On Dec. 2, the British government
released a chilling, well-sourced report on crimes and human rights abuses
in Iraq. Its conclusions are horrific: "Torture is systematic. ...
Executions are carried out without due process of law. ... Relatives are
often prevented from burying the victims and have even been charged for the
bullets used." An appendix chronicles some of the methods of torture,
including rape, eye-gouging, piercing hands with an electric drill, acid
baths and electric shock.
Ahmad Chalabi, the head of the Iraqi National Congress, is using
this report to stimulate unity among other opposition leaders in the region.
Scores of defectors from Saddam's military arrive daily in camps along
Iraq's borders, professing a willingness to fight for liberty in their
homeland. Contractors have been seen at the abandoned Iraqi embassy in
Washington, preparing it for "new management." And the American and British
military build-up in the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean grows by the day.
When the Iraqi opposition takes up arms against Saddam Hussein and calls for
our help -- as surely they will -- are we going to sit idly by and wait for
a pronouncement from Hans Blix? Let us hope not.
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