A new UN testimony, revealed to andrew cockburn, shows the WMD fiasco goes back to 1997 |
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A former senior UN diplomat has revealed to me details of how, just over 10 years ago, the Clinton administration deliberately sabotaged UN weapons inspections in Iraq.
American officials were fearful that
Iraq would be officially certified as weapons-free, a development that was seen as a political liability for Bill Clinton. Thus the stage was set for the manufacture of the Iraqi WMD myth as the excuse for George Bush's catastrophic invasion of Iraq.
It was March 1997. For six years the UN inspectors had been probing the secrets of Saddam's weapons programmes, in the process destroying huge quantities of chemical munitions and other production facilities. To enforce Saddam's cooperation, Iraq was subject to crushing sanctions.
Now, Rolf Ekeus, the urbane Swedish
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| Officials were fearful Iraq would be certified as weapons-free, which would have been a political liability for Clinton |
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diplomat who headed the inspection effort, was ready to announce that his work was almost done. "I was getting close to certifying that Iraq was in compliance with Resolution 687," he confirmed to me recently.
At the time, he declared that although there were some loose ends to be cleared up, "not much is unknown about Iraq's retained proscribed weapons capabilities."
For the Clinton administration, this was a crisis. If Ekeus was allowed to complete his mission, then the suspension of sanctions would follow almost automatically.
Saddam would be off the hook and, more
importantly for the Clintonites, the neo-conservative republicans would be howling for the president's blood.
The only hope was somehow to prevent Ekeus completing his mission.
Enter Madeleine Albright, newly appointed Secretary of State. On March 26, 1997, she strode on to the stage at Georgetown University to deliver what was billed as a major policy address on Iraq. Many in the audience expected that she would extend 
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