It may now seem to many observers that the United States not only wants to be the judge, jury and executioner over Iraq, but the investigating cop as well, and maybe a bent cop at that. The way in which the US took charge of the 12,000 pages of documents that Iraq had sent to the United Nations is breathtaking in its sheer arrogance. Arguing that the United States alone possessed secure photocopying facilities, US diplomats were able to persuade the president of the Security Council to hand the mass of files over them. This amounts to a severe lack of judgment on the part of the Colombian ambassador, whose country currently holds the presidency.
While it appears that the other four permanent members of the Council received unedited copies of Iraq’s documentation, those that were later distributed to remaining ten members, had been edited by US officials. Washington has argued that the files contained sensitive technical information about nuclear and germ warfare weaponry, which they did not believe ought to be put into the public domain. They have, therefore, been prepared to insult other ambassadors at the UN Security Council by making it clear that none of them can be trusted with this sensitive material.
But isn’t there something rather odd here? Washington has branded Iraq a terrorist nation. If this is true, if Iraq really is a rogue state bent on causing global chaos and so worthy of US invasion, then surely its deadly secrets will have been handed round long ago? So why then this sudden coyness by the Bush White House, about information that the family enemy has provided, as demanded, to the United Nations?
Two answers suggest themselves. The first is that the documents represent a large part of the truth behind Iraq’s drive to acquire weapons of mass destruction. That truth would include the details of firms in Europe and the United States who supplied equipment and technology essential to the production of nuclear bombs and chemical warfare. That truth could also focus on the extent to which US weapons expertise was given to Iraq during its long war with Iran.
The second answer is hardly less sinister. The Bush administration wanted to be sure that the files will reveal the smoking gun that they insist is there. If the evidence is lacking, they will need to be able to point to cunning omissions and sleight of hand by the Iraqis. So supposing the evidence simply does not stack up the way the White House wants? Could the editing job done by US experts have included the insertion of details, as well as the removal of allegedly sensitive information? If this were the case, did even the other four permanent members of the Security Council receive exactly the same files that left Baghdad this week?
The interception and doctoring of documents meant for the United Nations would, in US domestic law, be a serious crime. But this is foreign, not domestic, policy. What’s right for the big cop is what gets the job done. He can give a helping hand to drugs barons, back up a racist regime such as that of Israel’s Ariel Sharon and if necessary plant and rig evidence. And who is going to stop him, when he is the only one with the badge? But just because he cannot be stopped doesn’t make him right.
