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Subject: IT'S WAR! by William Thomas


IT'S WAR!
by William Thomas

lifeboatnews.com
Jan. 16, 2003

A veteran combat officer who served more than a decade with American and
Canadian military intelligence in the world's "nightmarish" hot spots, has
told lifeboatnews.com that the word being passed in the intelligence
community is that the "kick-off" date for war against Iraq is set for January
26, 2003.

Regardless of the outcome of weapons inspections, UN condemnation, worldwide
outrage, or last-minute diplomacy, Jan. 26 is the day long range weather
forecasts predict the "weather window" will open for a round-the-clock
bombing sequel against a shattered country the size of California. The
bombers' "window of death" will remain open until the end of February.

US military officials say that the optimum time for sending ground forces
into Iraq is immediately after the bombing campaign, between mid-February and
early April, before blazing hot weather makes it difficult for troops to
function wearing rubberized chemical warfare suits. Officers add that it
will be tricky starting an offensive before mid-February, the earliest date
currently arriving troops can will be accustomed to desert conditions. [New
York Times Jan. 12/03]

Secretary of State George Shultz earlier confirmed this timetable, telling
the Financial Times last November 21 that "there will be military action. I
would be surprised if we have not acted by the end of January."

The day before, top Bush security advisor Richard Perle told British Labour
Party MPs that President Bush intends to go to war "even if inspectors find
nothing." Perle stunned the Parliamentarians by insisting that even a "clean
bill of health" from UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix would not stop
America's war machine. [Daily Mirror Nov. 21, 22/02]

By then, thousand of US Marines had already embarked for the Gulf onboard the
Belleau Woods. Helicopters and heavy armor followed in the cargo ships Bob
Hope and Fisher, with the troop transport Tarawa sailing in their wakes. [The
Observer Nov. 3/02]

Blix has loudly complained that if Washington has evidence that Iraq retains
weapons of mass destruction, it should pass the locations to UN inspectors so
they can investigate. So far, the White House has failed to provide such
evidence. Hasam Amin, the general in charge of Iraq's compliance with UN
resolutions demanding disarmament, insists: "I reiterate, Iraq has no weapons
of mass destruction." [The Observer Dec. 8/02]

NUKES DUPES
The ostensible fear is nuclear weapons. Iraq's atomic threat was centered at
Tuwaitha Heavily damaged by allied aircraft during the Gulf War, radioactive
fallout from the complex spread into Baghdad, 11 miles away. [Scorched
Earth, Vancouver Sun Nov. 21/91]. UN weapons inspectors later filled the
ruined fissile handling labs with concrete and epoxy resin.

According to UN resolution 1441 authorizing the current inspections, only the
Security Council can trigger war by declaring Iraq in "material breach" of
1441. But as recently as two days ago, the unelected US President warned
that "time was running out for Saddam" to disarm.

Bush has yet to spell out what nuclear, chemical or biological arms Iraq
retains, where they might be hidden, or how Iraq could threaten the US
without strategic missiles while more than 200 UN inspectors roam the country
accompanied by TV crews.

WHY BUSH CAN'T WAIT
Referring to mounting pressure on an unelected President, a Republican Party
aide adds that with anti-war opposition growing in the United States and
Britain, "The longer he leaves it, the greater the political risk." [The
Observer Dec. 8/02]

Though Bush Sr. convinced Americans that his attack on Panama was "justified"
in kidnapping that country's leader -- former drug-running ally Manuel
Noriega -- his son is losing the political momentum needed to again violate
UN rules against launching an unprovoked attack against another country. At
least 3,000 impoverished Panamanians were killed by US gunships and artillery
in this "model" atrocity. [see "The Panama Deception" video-documentary]

An unmistakable sign of impending war against Iraq is the call-up of National
Guard and Reserve forces, at least a month before an invasion. According to
the New York Times, the Pentagon plans to eventually mobilize more than
250,000 reservists to augment and replace regular forces.

DEPLOYING FOR WAR
Kuwaiti military sources say that as early as last June, tanks and artillery
to equip two more armored brigades began arriving in the emirate, preparing
the way for 10,000 American GIs to fly in and invade Iraq within 72 hours.
[Asia Times Nov. 14/02]

According to the Toronto Sun, US warplanes based in Turkey, Saudi Arabia,
Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar continue to bomb Iraq "almost daily".
Predatory B-2 bombers have come to roost on the Indian Ocean island of Diego
Garcia, and Fairford RAF base in England. As aging Americans grapple with
unemployment, drug abuse, failing infrastructure and lack of subsidized
health care, each $2.2 billion stealth bomber can drop 16 satellite-guided
"precision" bombs similar to the one-ton blockbuster which -- oops! -- blew
up friendly Northern Alliance officers observing the strike on Taliban forces
from a mile away.

Along with the British fleet now arriving in the region, the number of RAF
aircraft may be tripled. Jaguars based at Incirlik airbase in Turkey, and
Tornado fighter-bombers in Kuwait have joined Tornados reported to have
redeployed from Saudi Arabia to Qatar, where British military commanders have
linked with their US counterparts preparing to attack Iraq. British pilots
hope to lob newly developed "Storm Shadow" cruise missiles into a country
shorn of air defenses, while remaining hundreds of miles from any return
ground fire. [The Guardian Nov. 9/02; London Times Dec. 18/02]

The ground war has already begun, with US special forces operating in
northern Iraq since early November. American Special Ops teams are also
working with Israeli scout units in Iraq's western desert near the important
H2 airbase. [Toronto Sun Nov. 10/02]

GOOD TO GO?
More than 75,000 U.S. forces are now reported in the region. On Christmas
Eve and Jan. 10, 2003, an additional 87,000 troops were ordered deployed by
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, ensuring the magic number of 150,000 GI's
needed to invade Iraq. [New York Times Jan. 12/03]

Last week, the US Central Command finished transferring its 1,000-member
battle staff from its Tampa, Florida headquarters to Qatar, where the Al
Udeid air base remains the linchpin of the coming US attack.

Extensive preparations for war have been underway at Al Udeid for the past
year -- well before the current "crisis" over Iraq. The Arabian base boasts
one of the longest runways and most extensive fortifications in the Middle
East. Last June 13, Digital Globe's online satellite imagery showed eight
KC- 135 tankers and a huge C-17 cargo jet dwarfed by Al Udeid's vast parking
ramp. America's two million homeless would be delighted to learn that two
"new generation" warplane shelters built by US taxpayers at Al Udeid each
feature hardened concrete interiors covering 1.7 acres. [National Law Center
on Homelessness and Poverty]

Also last week, 15,000 marines embarked on troop ships from camps Pendleton
and Lejeune. As the Seay took on Patriot anti-missile batteries in Texas,
additional M-1 tanks and Apache helicopter gunships were loaded onboard the
Mendonca and Gilliland in Savannah, Georgia. According to
GlobalSecurity.org, two Patriot anti-missile batteries have already been
moved into position in Kuwait; another two are in Saudi Arabia.

Even more ominous, the 1,000-bed hospital ship Comfort has just sailed for
Diego Garcia. [New York Times Jan. 12/03]

All told, as many as four heavy US Army divisions are being sent to attack
Iraq, along with the 101st Airborne, which suffered heavy casualties from
Gulf War Illness in the last invasion of Iraq. [New York Times Jan. 12/2003;
Bringing The War Home]

The Navy is stretched thin. The aircraft carrier Constellation -- with its
Tomcat and Hornet squadrons the "Bounty Hunters", "Vigilantes" and "Death
Rattlers" -- is now on station in the Persian Gulf, with attack carriers
Harry S. Truman, Vinson and Kitty Hawk steaming to join forces. At least two
more 'Stateside carriers are on 96-hour sailing notice. Disciplinary
problems onboard the Nimitz, and the Washington's exhausted crew will likely
see both carriers withdrawn from the region. With no carriers left in Japan,
North Korea's looming nuclear threat remains unchallenged. [The Guardian
Nov. 9/02]

The US Air Force has also taken wing. All week, B-1 bombers have been
leaving in pairs from Ellsworth Air Force Base, South Dakota, bound for Oman.
An F-15 fighter unit that arrived over the burning Pentagon too late to
intervene on Sept. 11 is also winging toward the Gulf, along with F-15s from
North Carolina. Four-engine AC-130 gunships mounting a single giant Gatling
gun used to pulverize villages in Vietnam and Afghanistan are also deploying
from Florida. More robot "Predator" drones equipped with video cameras and
Hellfire missiles are being sent from Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada. [New
York Times Jan. 12/03]

Most telling of all, the transport Bellatrix has sailed from California
loaded with mobile bridges. "If you really want an indicator they are
planning an invasion, it's bridging equipment because you need it to cross
the Tigris and Euphrates," a military observer told The Guardian.

ALLIES NEEDED - APPLY WITHIN
In Britain -- where Iraq is now defined as "the enemy" by the Ministry of
Defence -- at least 200,000 citizens have taken to the streets to protest
their country's involvement in an illegal war. But British armed forces have
been on a war footing since Dec. 17. As many as 10,000 reservists are being
called up to augment a total British deployment of 30,000 troops, including
the 7 Armoured Brigade "Desert Rats" with 200 tanks, and 4 Armoured Brigade.
Baffled British defence officials complain that American war planners have
not yet revealed their plans. [London Times Dec. 18/02l New York Times Sept.
19/02]

The outflanked Saudis have not yet signed onto Washington's war plans. Last
Sept. 19, Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal told the New York Times that
the Iraqi threat must be handled without "the firing of a single shot or the
loss of a single soldier". But the prince promised that American bombers
could use Saudi bases to bomb Iraqi cities if Bush works through the UN.

Turkey is key to Pentagon plans for a northern thrust intended to pincer
Iraq's decrepit teenage conscript forces. Quickly securing northern oil
fields, American troops could hopefully prevent a war between the Turkish
Army and the Kurds. On Dec. 30, the Turkish daily Sabah reported that the
country's newly elected Islamic government has told the US it will accept
American invasion forces -- in return for 10% of Iraqi oil production. The
deal would net Ankara $5.5 billion in stolen oil revenues annually. [Arabic
News.com Dec. 31/02]

A QUICK AND EASY VICTORY?
In Germany, home to the Gulf-bound US First Infantry and First Armored
divisions, 3,000 US Army officers and civilian planners are currently
concluding a computer simulation called "Victory Scrimmage". Experts keeping
score admit that even a quick "touchdown" could see thousands more civilian
casualties in Iraq. [New York Times Jan. 12/03]

Meanwhile, press reports of a lengthy buildup continue to mislead. As
retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey observed, "Most of the ground forces will sprint
into place at the last minute." [The Christian Science Monitor Nov. 12/02]

According to Agence France-Presse, US war plans call for a "brief but
shattering air campaign", combined with a lightning push into Baghdad by US
ground forces moving from north, south and west. The ground attack will seek
to achieve tactical surprise by moving fast with maximum violence, without
waiting for overwhelming reinforcements. [Washington Post Dec. 18/02]

But unless urban areas are as heavily bombed as they were in '91 campaign,
things could go badly wrong. My military intelligence source, who helped
designate targets in Bosnia, has been watching TV coverage of the weapons
inspections with a practiced eye. He notes Iraqi troops and armor in the
background of televised news clips, taking up positions in Baghdad
neighborhoods. The footage has prompted charges of "spying" by Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein.

Captain Glenn Kozelka of the US Army's 10th Mountain Division warns that
heavy fighting in the streets of Iraq's cities could lead to US casualties of
up to 30 percent. "We call it three-dimensional warfare," Kozelka told the
Washington Post. "You can be shot from all around."

Pentagon pundits favour cordoning off Baghdad, with "escape routes" for
civilians and surrendering military personnel. They reason that smashing
critical infrastructure will quickly collapse the city, and the government of
a man widely seen as posing no threat beyond his own borders. [The Observer
Nov. 3/02]

But my source says that Saddam has "learned the lessons of massing troops and
tanks in the desert and exposing them to overwhelming bombardment." Instead,
the retired analyst and his active duty colleagues are convinced that the
fighting will be "house-to-house" -- with an armed and angry populace
fighting alongside regular army units in defense of their families and
country.

Won't the Iraqi people hail their "liberators" with open arms?

"If you've been deprived of food and medicine for 10 years, if you saw your
family killed [in bombings that leveled entire neighborhoods], you would not
feel friendly toward Americans," the combat-hardened intelligence expert said.

The last time the US went to war against a supposedly ragtag army defending
their homeland was in a place called Vietnam.

Will US forces have the stomach for house-to-house casualties? Yes, came the
answer. The problem, added this source, is that in eyes of many allied
front-line combat units, American troops instructed with comic book manuals
are seen as "not too bright."

Even worse, he said, the "management" mentality of U.S. officers more
concerned with protecting their careers than pursuing their objectives means
there are few combat leaders worthy of respect and a gun-ho effort by the
troops they send in harm's way.

Pointing to the debacles of "Operation Anaconda" and the Tora Bora campaign
in Afghanistan, which reportedly saw top terrorist suspects Osama bin Laden
and Omar Mullah escape a hesitant U.S. dragnet, he declared that "Tommy
Franks will be reluctant to commit troops aggressively, because he does not
trust the competency of his infantry troops."

Barry Posen agrees. A specialist in military analysis at MIT, Posen's premise
is that the mop-up campaign in Afghanistan was severely hampered by American
commanders' unwillingness to commit ground forces. "We didn't want to take
risks," Posen told The Observer last Nov. 3. "Tora Bora was a disaster."

"Operation Anaconda" - the American effort to encircle Al Qaeda and Taliban
forces in eastern Afghanistan's Shah-e-Kost Valley last March -- was another
fiasco. Major General Franklin Hagenbeck, "didn't know what he was doing.
He didn't send enough forces. He didn't take enough artillery. And there
was too much reliance on the Afghans," Posen posited. After meeting
determined opposition and taking casualties, Hagenbeck had to be bailed out
by 1,700 British marines. He was relieved of his command in the field.

ARMING SADDAM
US forces might be better advised to raid US corporate headquarters. Three
Congressional investigations earlier documented extensive chemical and
biological weapons and production facilities shipped to Baghdad with White
House approval prior to -- and after -- the last Gulf "war". [Bringing The
War Home]

Despite White House removal of more than 8,000 embarrassing pages from Iraq's
11,800-page weapons dossier, Geneva-based reporter Andreas Zumach has
published pages documenting how 24 US corporations and several US government
agencies "illegally helped Iraq to build its biological, chemical and nuclear
weapons programs."

Hewlett Packard, Dupont, Honeywell, Bechtel, Rockwell, Tectronics, Unisys and
Sperry were among more than two-dozen US sponsors "who gave very substantial
support especially to the biological weapons program but also to the missile
and nuclear weapons program," Zumach said. Records also show that US
government nuclear weapons laboratories Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos and
Sandia trained Iraqi nuclear scientists, and provided non-fissile material
for construction of a nuclear bomb. [Financial Times Dec. 19/02]

ARMED ROBBERY
Just who is this fearsome "enemy" who must be crushed by a country that
spends more money on weapons than the next 14 countries combined? As veteran
British war correspondent John Pilger points out, "More than half the
population of Iraq are children, and many of the rest are widows, the elderly
and the poor."

Leading British humanitarian agencies, including Save the Children and
Christian Aid, recently warned that "Years of war and sanctions have already
created an extremely vulnerable population whose ability to cope with any
additional hardship is very limited. Child mortality has risen by 160
percent under sanctions."

Driven by the United States and Britain over the past 12 years, line-item
blocking of Baghdad's attempts to procure urgently needed hospital equipment
and medicines, as well as spare parts needed to repair bombed out water
purification and sanitation plants, has led to countrywide epidemics and
malnutrition that have so far claimed the lives of more than a half-million
children under the age of five. At least 70 members of Congress have
condemned the sanctions as "infanticide".

Is Washington concerned about killing yet more children? When asked about
the number of Iraqi people slaughtered in the 1991 "Desert Storm" Gen. Colin
Powell replied, "It's really not a number I'm terribly interested in."
(Estimates at the time totaled a quarter-million Iraqi war dead.)

A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER
"The true danger is not Iraq, or Iran, or North Korea, or China," writes
Pilger. "It is the United States, and the cabal of fanatics now in charge,
led by a man who on television the other night failed to make sense in his
native tongue."

"The more we talk about our power, the more apprehension there is around the
world," concurs Edward Luck, director of the Center on International
Organization at Columbia University. "The more you talk about it, the more
other countries think the major security threat to the world is the
undisciplined use of American military power."

Why would the US risk becoming a pariah nation, while destroying the world's
oldest cities -- birthplace of the mathematics, the alphabet, calendar, laws
and 60 units of time taught in American schools?

"They know we own their country. We own their airspace. We dictate the way
they live and talk," explained aptly-named Air Force Brig. General William
Looney, describing the last carpet-bombing of Basra by B-52s. "It's a good
thing, especially when there's a lot of oil out there we need." [Washington
Post, August 30, 1999]

Stay tuned, general. War is not yet a certainty until the last pollster
sings.

# # #

PLEASE CONTACT ME FOR COMMERCIAL REPRINT RIGHTS

Author: Bringing The War Home, Scorched Earth, Chemtrails Confirmed, All
Fall Down: The Politics of Terror and Mass Persuasion.

Producer/filmmaker: "Eco War", "Waterwise", "Chemtrails: Mystery Lines In The
Sky".

William Thomas' award-winning writing and photography have appeared in more
than 50 publications in eight countries, with translations into French, Dutch
and Japanese. During and immediately after the Gulf War he served on a
three-man Gulf Environmental Emergency Response Team in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia
and Kuwait.