While
I am working with the already famous Greenspan book, I read
an article published by El País, a Spanish newspaper
with a circulation of more than 500,000, according to
reports; I would like to pass this on to the readers. It is
signed by Ernesto Ekaizer, and it literally reads:
“Four weeks before the Iraq invasion
which happened in the night of March 19 to 20, 2003, George
W. Bush publicly sustained his demands of Saddam Hussein in
the following terms: disarmament or war. In private, Bush
acknowledged that war was inevitable. In a long private
conversation with the then Spanish president, José María
Aznar, held on Saturday, February 22, 2003 at the Crawford
Ranch in Texas, Bush made it clear that the moment had come
to get rid of Saddam. ‘We have two weeks. In two weeks our
military will be ready. We will be in Baghdad at the end of
March', he told Aznar.
“The moment has come to get rid
of Saddam.
“As
part of this plan, Bush had accepted, on January 31, 2003
--after an interview with the British Prime Minister Tony
Blair-- to make a last diplomatic manoeuvre: to introduce a
second resolution to the United Nations Security Council.
His objective: to clear the way legally for a unilateral war
that the United States was getting ready to unleash with
more than 200,000 soldiers who were in the region ready to
attack.
“Bush was aware of Blair’s internal
difficulties and he knew of Aznar’s. Only seven days before
that meeting at the Crawford Ranch, three million people
were demonstrating in several Spanish cities against the
imminent war. ‘We need your help with our public opinion’,
Aznar asks. Bush explains to him the scope of the new
resolution that he is going to present: ‘The resolution will
be tailor made to help you. I don’t care about the
content’. To this, Aznar replies: ‘That text would help us
to be able to co-sponsor it and be its co-authors, and get
many people to sponsor it’. Aznar, then, offers to give
Bush European coverage, together with Blair. Aznar’s dream
of consolidating a relationship with the United States,
following in the footsteps of the United Kingdom, was about
to become reality.
“Aznar had travelled with his wife,
Ana Botella, on February 20 to the United States making a
stopover in Mexico to persuade President Vicente Fox
–unsuccessfully– of the need to support Bush. On the 21st,
the couple, accompanied by the President’s assistants,
arrived in Texas. Aznar and his wife stayed at the ranch
guest house.
“In the meeting on the following
day, Saturday, President Bush, his then National Security
Advisor Condoleezza Rice, and Daniel Fried, the chief of
European Affairs at the National Security Council, were
present. Aznar, on his side, was accompanied by his
international policy advisor, Alberto Carnero and the
Spanish Ambassador in Washington, Javier Rupérez. As part
of the meeting, Bush and Aznar had a four-way telephone
conversation with the British Prime Minister Tony Blair and
the Italian President Silvio Berlusconi.
“Ambassador Rupérez translated from
the English for Aznar and also from the Italian for
Condoleezza Rice; another two interpreters did the same for
Bush and his collaborators. It was Rupérez who drafted the
minutes of the conversation in a memorandum that has been
kept secret until today.
“The conversation is impressive
because of its direct, friendly and even menacing tone when,
for example, they refer to the necessity of some countries
like Mexico, Chile, Angola, Cameroon and Russia, members of
the UN Security Council, voting for the new resolution as a
show of friendship towards the United States or else they
would have to suffer the consequences.
“They are cautioned about zero
expectations for the work of the inspectors, whose chief,
Hans Blix, had dismantled just one week earlier, on February
14, the arguments presented by United States Secretary of
State Colin Powell at the Security Council on February 5,
2003, with ‘solid facts’ enthusiastically supported by the
Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ana Palacio. The same
facts that Powell himself later described as a bunch of
lies.
“The Blix Report
“According to Blix, Iraq was taking
steps towards active cooperation in solving the pending
issue of disarmament. His tone had been less critical than
that of his report of January 27, 2003. ‘Since we arrived
in Iraq three months ago we have made more than 400
inspections, with no advance warning at 300 sites. Until
now, the inspectors have found no prohibited weapons…If Iraq
decides to cooperate even more closely, the period of
disarmament by the inspections can still be short´, the
chief inspector pointed out.
“The General Director of the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed El
Baradei released information on February 14 that there were
still some technical issues left to clear up. But, he added,
‘now there are no more disarmament problems left to solve’.
According to him, absolutely no proof had been found that
Iraq had been carrying out nuclear activities or activities
related to nuclear energy, another clear lie about what
Powell had stated about the Iraqi nuclear program.
“Both the first results of the
inspections and the end of the United States preparations
led Bush to set the beginning of the military operation
towards the date of March 10, 2003. Later, nine days were
added in order to get the second resolution. The process of
moral persuasion in which Aznar and Palacios worked by
phone and in bilateral meetings did not succeed in pulling
in more than four votes: those of the three promoters and
Bulgaria. They needed 9 votes.
“The failure of this legal coverage
for the imminent war led Bush, with Blair and Aznar, to
agree to a summit meeting in the Azores on March 16, 2003, a
place suggested by Aznar as an alternative to Bermuda for a
reason he explained to Bush: ‘Just the name of these
islands suggests an item of clothing that is not exactly the
most appropriate for the seriousness of the moment in which
we find ourselves’. There, on that March 16, Blair, Bush
and Aznar decided to replace the United Nations Security
Council. They usurped its functions to declare war on Iraq
at their own risk. On the morning of March 17, the United
Kingdom ambassador at the UN announced in New York the
withdrawal of the second resolution. A defeat in the voting
would have complicated even further the race towards war.”
Fidel Castro Ruz
September 27, 2007.
7:25 p.m.
