BY MAURICE WILLIAMS
The Clinton administration continues its preparations for launching a military assault against Iraq, while pressing to trample on that nation's sovereignty. A resolution approved March 2 by the 15-member United Nations Security Council sets the stage for more provocations by Washington to justify bombing raids. "With today's Security Council resolution," said UN secretary general Kofi Annan, "the government of Iraq fully understands that if this effort to insure compliance through negotiation is obstructed by evasion or deception, as were previous efforts, diplomacy may not have a second chance."

After the Security Council vote U.S. president William Clinton declared, "Iraq must make good its commitment to give the international inspectors immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to any suspect site, any place, any time."

The Security Council resolution, sponsored by London and Tokyo, demands "immediate and full compliance by Iraq without conditions or restrictions" with the inspections agreement brokered by Annan and signed by Iraqi officials at the gunpoint of an impending bombardment by Washington. "Any violation would have severest consequences," the resolution warns.

Baghdad "should be under no illusion," Clinton declared March 3. "The meaning of `severest consequences,' is clear. It provides the authority to act if Iraq does not turn the commitment it has now made into compliance."

"We sought from the very beginning the clearest possible message, and we don't think you can be clearer than when you say `severest consequences,' " added State Department spokesman James Rubin. "Those are clear diplomatic code words for military action."

UN inspections of alleged military sites - including factories and hospitals - were imposed on Baghdad after the 1990 - 91 Gulf War, in which U.S.-led forces slaughtered some 150,000 Iraqi workers and peasants and crippled the country's infrastructure. Since then Washington has insisted on maintaining a tight economic embargo on Iraq, and U.S. warplanes enforce a ban on the Iraqi government flying planes over more than half of their country.

On March 1 a dispute over the so-called arms inspection pact reached on February 23 broke out between Iraqi ambassador Nizar Hamdoon and chairman of the United Nations Special Commission Richard Butler. The Iraqi official asserted during a television interview on CNN that the "weapons inspection teams" would be subordinate to diplomats chosen by Annan.

Butler responded that the accord "makes it perfectly clear that the absolute core of these inspections" would be based on individuals handpicked by him. A new special group is to be assigned to investigate eight "presidential sites" that had previously been off limits to Butler's team. Reports filed by this special group "will go from me, through the secretary general, to the Security Council," Butler declared in a separate interview on CNN. Baghdad has accused Butler of using too many U.S. and British personnel.

"The ability to turn up on no notice" is a key aspect of the agreement, Butler asserted. "We don't want to telegraph in advance that we're coming."

Inspections are now going on every day in Iraq, although not at the presidential sites. The UN "inspectors" claim that the Iraqi government has "dual use" equipment - machinery capable of producing military as well as civilian goods.

Without presenting any evidence Butler claimed January 26 that the Iraqi government has biological weapons loaded onto missiles that could be on mobile missile launchers and driven away to avoid being hit by bombs. Butler had also claimed that Baghdad was conducting "possible biological testing on human beings" at a prison facility, though other UN officials said his supposed evidence proved nothing.

Washington claims authority to use force
Besides Washington, London is the only other government of the five permanent members of the Security Council that supports White House claims that it already has the authority to use military force. Paris, Beijing, and Moscow - all of which have veto power in the Security Council - opposed any resolution explicitly granting Washington the authority to resort to automatic military action. "We consider that automatic action is not acceptable," French president Jacques Chirac told the French daily Le Monde. "The Security Council should debate" any plans for military action, he added.

The Russian foreign ministry insisted that the UN document was "not an automatic green light to use force."

The White House argues the opposite and has made clear its determination to press ahead unilaterally with its military operation, regardless of what the governments of France, Russia, and China say. "This gives the green light to our policy of diplomacy and force," declared U.S. ambassador to the UN William Richardson. He said the UN resolution "did not preclude the unilateral use of force."

U.S. state department spokesman Rubin asserted March 2 that in "private discussions" U.S. officials have gained "assurances from key governments, including those who are on the Security Council, that they would be more supportive of that [military] action if Iraq were to violate this agreement. We've made clear, we don't see the need to return to the Security Council if there is a violation of this agreement."

Meanwhile, Washington plans to maintain its massive arsenal of 36,000 troops, 400 warplanes, and dozens of ships indefinitely, ready for a military onslaught against the Iraqi people.

The public debate among U.S. ruling circles over the aims and methods of the military operation in advancing Washington's interests has continued.

"We have to have a long-term effort to overthrow him [Iraqi president Saddam Hussein]," said Senator John McCain. "It's our goal to remove him from power."

U.S. Senate majority Leader Trent Lott, who denounced the UN agreement, said the Clinton administration's policy of "containment doesn't seem to get what we want."

The February 26 Wall Street Journal suggested several options, including "using Army Special Forces or other irregular troops to conduct hit-and-run raids deep inside Iraqi territory."  
 
 
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