You will create an Osama bin Laden in every village across the Arab world. -- Arab on the streets of Cairo

War has been launched based on lies and half truths from Bush and Blair.

People in Iraq are starving and dying, dependent on UN food aid. No explanation of why: the US/UK siege of the country that prevents needed supplies from entering the country, the devastating effect of the use of depleted uranium weapons or the deliberate targeting of water supplies and civilian infrastructure during Gulf War I.

Evidence was produced to 'prove' Iraq was importing uranium from Africa for a nuclear weapons programme. The 'evidence' was found to be crudely forged documents.

We have support from a large number of countries. A measure of the support from the most vocal, Spain and Italy, is their failure to commit any troops to the US/UK coalition. Those backing war include ten former Eastern Bloc countries. Their statement supporting the war was written by a former vice-president of Lockheed.

The intervention is 'humanitarian'. No doubt that will be why cluster bombs and depleted uranium munitions will be used with their long lasting effects on the civilian population. [BVEJ newsletters passim]

Bush gave Saddam Hussein and his entourage 48 hours to leave Iraq. Less than 24 hours later Bush said Iraq would be attacked whether or not Saddam Hussein left.

Saddam Hussein was given 48 hours to leave because he operates torture chambers. Is the same ultimatum to be issued to the Saudi Royal family and other Middle East despots? What of the Israelis and war criminal Sharon, what of the torture in Central America, established with the connivance of US, or similar in Turkey?

Spot the difference: Iraq is a threat to the region. Iraqi forces will melt away like snow in a Baghdad summer.

Iraq is a near defenceless country. Reagan attacked Libya, Grenada and Nicaragua, Bush Snr invaded Panama. Bullies on the block, pick a weak and defenceless opponent and show how tough you are.

The occupation of Iraq was supposed to be a push-over. The Iraqis are mounting a brave resistance in the face of overwhelming force. They quite rightly see US/UK as an occupying force. Where are the local population welcoming the invaders with flowers? As all invaders, they are welcomed with bullets. Iraqi refugees are streaming across the border from Iraq to defend their country.

The Iraqis no more trust the Americans than they do Saddam Hussein. They know too well the Americans are after their oil.

Saddam may be a bastard, but he is also a nationalist, someone who is prepared to die to save his country. Bad he may be, coward he is not.

Histrionics by US/UK on the parading of POWs on Iraqi TV. Red Cross has quite rightly criticised both sides for parading POWs. But, abuses by both sides pales into insignificance compared with the US treatment of prisoners in Afghanistan or Israeli treatment of Palestinians. Where was the outcry on the coalition soldier with a broad smile on his face holding a gun to the head of an Iraqi prisoner?

Further histrionics that Arab TV is showing dead and mutilated bodies. This is the reality of war, not the sanitized pictures shown on Western TV or the video games of the last Gulf War.

Americans have gone into Iraq like gung-ho tooled up thugs. Not dissimilar to their behaviour in Vietnam where they 'liberated' the Vietnamese by killing anything that moved.

George Brown has found £3 billion to fund the war effort. He can't fund firestrikers with a decent wage, can't fund student grants, can't fund our hospitals, but money can be found for killing people.

George Bush is asking for $75 billion to fund the war, a further $2.5 billion for post-war reconstruction, zilch for peace-keeping.

Americans are handing out contract for reconstruction in Iraq. What right have they to hand out contracts on behalf of the Iraqis? All the contracts to date have gone to companies with close ties to the Republican Party or the Bush neo-fascists. One such company, Halliburton, former CEO Dick Cheney.

War on Iraq is to launch a New World Order. It is a demonstration of what will happen to any country that dares to defy the military might of the US. They will be bombed to shit.

War on Iraq is to launch a New Oil Order. (more on this next month)

The Middle East is disintegrating. Turkey, realising the Kurds worst fears, has invaded northern Iraq. This is a brutal army of occupation, not humanitarian liberation. Will the American call in close air support to halt the invading Turks? Iran is massing on the border and may have already crossed the border. Across all Arab countries, street protest is being brutally put down. We may see regime change in all these countries but it will be to sweep in Muslim fundamentalists, not Western style democracy.

We are embarking on a war that has no moral justification, that has no support in the country, that has no support across the world.

Can there be a Just War in Iraq? Yes, were the Iraqi people to mount a rebellion and call for support from the West there would be grounds for intervention. At the end of the last Gulf War the Iraqi people did rebel, we sat idly by and watched them mercilessly cut down.