WASHINGTON, 5 October — Republicans and right-wing media continue to criticize the three Democratic congressmen who traveled to Baghdad last week in a bid to avert President Bush’s push for war by getting Iraq to agree to weapons inspections.
The Congressmen — who returned Tuesday from a five-day trip to Iraq where they met Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz and the president of Iraq’s Parliament — find themselves in the center of an increasingly nasty campaign.
They have been compared to actress Jane Fonda, whose anti-war activism during the Vietnam War angered many Americans at the time. But the lawmakers have dismissed such criticism.
“We served our country in the service, and a lot of people who are criticizing us never were there when their country needed them,” Rep. David Bonior of Michigan told journalists earlier this week.
“When you interview them, ask them first what they did during the Vietnam War and see where they were. We paid. We did our part. Nobody’s going to accuse us of being traitors to our country,” Rep. Jim McDermott of Washington told journalists.
The three congressmen: Bonior, McDermott and Rep. Mike Thompson of California, all served in the military during the Vietnam War. Their visit to Iraq has especially angered some of their Republican colleagues for questioning what proof President Bush has to justify a possible attack against Iraq.
As they continue to dismiss the right-wing attacks, Bonior told journalists yesterday that an invasion of Iraq will “only further threaten national security by splintering the broad international coalition against terrorism and fuel more extremist passions against America.”
He said little discussion has been given to the humanitarian crisis facing innocent Iraqi civilians following the years of economic sanctions “a challenge America will have a moral responsibility to deal with, regardless of a regime change.”
“The Iraqi people suffer under a brutal dictatorship and they suffer under the most inhumane sanctions regime ever put in place. We must act to alleviate the anguish,” Bonior said. “To ignore it or worse, to begin another war, will only deepen the mistrust of Americans and further complicate the effort to root out terrorism.”
Congressman Thompson, meanwhile, did not support the administration’s war powers resolution delivered to Congress last Thursday. The resolution seeks to provide the president with the authority to unilaterally attack Iraq without allied or United Nations support.
Thompson, awarded a Purple Heart in the Vietnam War, serves on the House Armed Services Committee, and said he has attended classified and open briefings with administration officials. Any case of imminent danger to justify an immediate attack has not been made, he said.
“The hurdle to reverse 200 years of Constitutional democracy and US foreign policy should be extremely high,” he said. “To date, this administration has not provided the evidence of an imminent attack on our nation or our allies which would sufficiently clear that hurdle.”
Thompson said he, and his colleagues, met with Iraqi officials to convince them to allow immediate and unfettered access to UN weapons inspectors. The Congressman said gaining firsthand knowledge about Iraq would help him and Congress work with their regional allies “to address the humanitarian challenges faced by Iraqi citizens who may not be responsible for their leaders’ actions.”
“The classified briefings Congress has been presented to date have fallen short of bridging the current chasm between a rush to war and evidence of an immediate threat,” he said. “There is also a critical lack of information regarding what kind of Iraq will be left standing after a regime change and how its condition will impact our national security. The more we can learn, the better our ability will be to work with our allies and bring long-term stability to this region.”
