A GOOD QUESTION FOR THE VOTERS:
‘WHO DO YOU TRUST?’
(Washington, D.C.): Bush
Administration officials attempting to
manage the unravelling Iraqgate cover-up
evidently are taking their cue from the
Titanic’s damage control officers: In
the face of mounting evidence to the
contrary, they continue to make
implausible claims of innocence with
respect to militarily relevant technology
transfers, misuse of
taxpayer-underwritten credits and
misrepresenting the facts.
Even President Bush has now been
obliged to acknowledge engaging in a
misrepresentation of the truth concerning
U.S. assistance to the Iraqi nuclear
weapons program. In Monday’s presidential
debate, he maintained that “The
[Iraqi] nuclear capability has been
searched by the United Nations, and there
hasn’t been one single scintilla of
evidence that there’s any U.S.
technology involved in it.” On
today’s “CBS This Morning,”
however, Mr. Bush conceded that “Maybe
I overstated it a little bit…But
I don’t believe anything other than
dual-use technology has been found.
I’ve known all along that there was
dual-use stuff.” (Emphasis added.)
This presidential retreat was
compelled in no small measure by the
public exception taken to the initial
Bush assertion by a distinguished member
of the Center’s Board of Advisors, David
A. Kay(1).
Dr. Kay was the Chief Inspector who
personally led three of the first UN/IAEA
inspections of the Iraqi nuclear weapons
program. His response (broadcast by CNN)
to the President’s debating point was as
clear-cut as it is authoritative: “[Mr.
Bush] is simply wrong.”
In fact, Dr. Kay confirmed on the NBC
“Today Show” yesterday that “There
was U.S. equipment and certainly U.S.
technology [in the Iraqi nuclear
program.]” He also
dismissed the suggestion that it was
merely obsolete technology: “…It
wasn’t very dated at all. Some of it
[was] the most advanced personal
computers, — 486 machines — Sun work
stations, very high-performance
fluorinated vacuum oil used in
centrifuges. No, it was
up-to-date equipment.”
What the President Meant
to Say
Before the President himself
acknowledged his misstatement of fact,
his State Department spokesman, Richard
Boucher, was in the unenviable position
of having to disavow the President’s
statement before a cross-examining press
corps. He did this in his regular
briefing yesterday by falling back to the
party line: “There is no evidence
that U.S. technology has made a significant
contribution to Iraq’s military
capabilities or to its program to develop
weapons of mass destruction….”
This is a formulation that National
Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft
and Acting Secretary of State Lawrence
Eagleburger have employed in recent
forays in the press — a far cry
from the President’s sweeping denial of
“one single scintilla of evidence
that there’s any U.S. technology
involved” in the nuclear
capability of Iraq. What is more, Boucher
acknowledged that the “value of
U.S.-origin dual-use commodities that
have been identified by U.N. inspectors
[used in Iraq’s nuclear weapons program]
is less than $15 million.” (An
illustrative listing of what fifteen million
dollars could, and did,
buy Saddam Hussein is broken out in the
list published by the New York
Times on 24 April 1992.)
Other Official Flim-Flams
In the process of limiting
presidentially inflicted damage, Boucher
wound up shooting the Administration in
its other foot. Consider the
following:
Item: Within
hours of asserting that the United States
“did not issue any license for the
transfer of [the electron beam welder] to
the Iraqis,” Boucher was
obliged to walk it back. When
faced with a copy of the actual U.S.
government-issued license, the State
Department confirmed that — as Dr. Kay
had charged — an electron beam-welder was
provided to the Iraqi nuclear program by
a subsidiary of Leybold AG, located in
Enfield, Connecticut.
Item:
Boucher also parroted the Administration
claim that: “There were no U.S.
weapons or technology encountered on the
battlefield….There’s no evidence that
anything was encountered on the
battlefield that was U.S. technology
— illegal, legal, [or] anything else —
or U.S. weapons.”
In fact, in May 1991, the
United States placed sanctions on Delft
Instruments precisely because it had
discovered that this American company
supplied night-vision goggles to the
Iraqis in April 1990 through its Belgian
subsidiary. Those goggles (which
amplify available light some 40,000 to
60,000 times) were found by U.S.
forces on the battlefield at Khafji
— the scene of an early, and nearly
disastrous, encounter between Iraqi and
American forces. Indeed, the enemy stole
a march on and threatened to defeat
U.S. troops precisely because he
had an unexpected capability for
night-fighting thanks to U.S. technology.
Other Delft-supplied equipment reportedly
included hand-held laser range finders,
tank periscopes and unmanned surveillance
equipment.
Item:
Incredibly, Boucher made an even more
misleading statement about non-nuclear
weapons of mass destruction: “On the
chemical and biological side, licenses
for all chemical and biological weapons
agents on the U.S. munitions list have
been denied to Iraq.”
This statement cleverly refers only to
the U.S. munitions list. Had Mr.
Boucher included reference to the Control
List — the list which actually governs dual-use
technology — he would have had
to admit that U.S. licenses were approved
to Iraq for “Bacteria/Fungi/Protozoa
(ECCN No. 4998) to the “University
of Baghdad.” The bacteria
in question? The deadly biological
warfare agent, anthrax.
Item:
Boucher also repeated the Scowcroft
contention that: “Between 1985 and
1990, there were only about $500 million
in so-called dual-use exports. That’s the
figure of items that were actually
shipped. It’s in contrast to the figure
of $1.5 billion that’s been floating
around which is the value of the licenses
that were authorized.”
Interestingly, the Commerce Department
has heretofore steadfastly told
congressional investigators, journalists,
and other interested parties that they
have no way of knowing — and do not
track — which licensed goods and
technology are actually shipped.
Consequently, it would seem to be the
case that the $500 million figure
is nothing more than a guess —
at best, a rough approximation derived
from worldwide historical experience and
certainly not a documentable fact. Given
Saddam Hussein’s voracious appetite for
such strategic technology and his
pell-mell race to bring his nuclear and
other weapons of mass destruction
programs on line, the Bush Administration
is, yet again, probably understating the
problem substantially.
The Bottom Line
Given this deplorable — and
ongoing — record of dissembling and
“waffling,” the Center
for Security Policy finds it truly
extraordinary that candidate George Bush
and his chief of staff/de facto
campaign manager Jim Baker have chosen to
make such qualities as character,
integrity and decisiveness the
centerpiece of their campaign for
reelection.
– 30 –
1. See
the Center’s Decision Brief
entitled, “’90/90
Hindsight’: Is President Bush Being
Blindsided on Iraqgate
— or Is He Part of the
Coverup?” (
October 1992).
2. See
the Center’s Decision Brief entitled, “Lies,
Damnable Lies and Scowcroft’s ‘Facts’– A
‘Baker‘s Dozen’ Contribute to
Iraqgate Coverup” (
October 1992).
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