The presidential press conference

By David North
8 March 2003

According to an old adage, even lies should make some sense. This is a rule
that the president of the United States—for reasons that are principally
political but also partly neurological—is unable to observe. The political
aims of the Bush administration require such a blatant and continuous
falsification of reality that all connection is lost between what the
president says and what masses of people generally perceive. The lies of
the administration necessarily assume, therefore, a grotesque “in your
face” character.

Matters are not helped by the fact that the president lacks the mental
capacity, let alone the intellectual discipline, to construct a logical
argument. Yet, no matter how absurd and illogical his statements, the
people are expected to accept, without thought or reflection, whatever the
president says. That is, they are expected to behave like the personnel of
the mass media.

In the hours leading up to the president’s press conference of Thursday
night, the media predicted that Bush would use the occasion to explain to
the American people why the invasion of Iraq is necessary and unavoidable.
What he actually provided was a monotonous litany of obvious lies and non
sequiturs.

Speaking before a small and vetted audience of media hacks, who understood
that they were not to question, even indirectly, the legitimacy of the
administration’s drive to war, Bush intoned the standard mindless slogans,
revolving endlessly around the same apocalyptic theme: the imminent threat
posed by the devil incarnate, Saddam Hussein, and his Weapons of Mass
Destruction.

The United States, the president said, is “confronting the threat posed to
our nation and to peace by Saddam Hussein and his weapons of terror.”

The noted American historian Richard Hofstadter several decades ago wrote
an interesting study of the role of paranoia in American politics. Were he
still alive, he might have updated his book with an entire chapter on the
current president’s fixation with Saddam Hussein. As one listened to Bush
dwell obsessively on the Baghdad bad man, it was difficult to avoid the
impression that within the precincts of Dubya’s oddly immature imagination,
the Iraqi president has assumed the form of the bogeyman.

“Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction are a direct threat to
this country … I will not leave the American people at the mercy of the
Iraqi dictator and his weapons … Saddam Hussein is a threat to our nation …
It used to be that we could think that you could contain a person like
Saddam Hussein, that oceans would protect us from his type of terror … I
believe Saddam Hussein is a threat to the American people … He’s a murderer
… He’s a master of deception … the American people know that Saddam Hussein
has weapons of mass destruction …”

Whenever Bush attempted to wander beyond these programmed phrases, he ran
into trouble. He made statements that were blatantly false, and were
clearly and directly contradicted a little more than 12 hours later by the
leaders of the United Nations inspections program, Dr. Hans Blix and Dr.
Mohamed ElBaradei.

Bush declared in his opening statement: “Iraqi operatives continue to hide
biological and chemical agents to avoid detection by inspectors. In some
cases, these materials have been moved to different locations every 12 to
24 hours or placed in vehicles that are in residential neighborhoods.”

This claim, which simply repeats allegations made by Secretary of State
Colin Powell in his disastrous presentation to the United Nations last
month, was again refuted by Blix in his Friday report to the Security
Council.

“As I noted on 14 February,” Blix stated, “intelligence authorities have
claimed that weapons of mass destruction are moved around Iraq by trucks
and, in particular, that there are mobile production units for biological
weapons. The Iraqi side states that such activities do not exist. Several
inspections have taken place at declared and undeclared sites in relation
to mobile production facilities. Food and mobile workshops have been seen,
as well as large containers with seed processing equipment. No evidence of
proscribed activities has so far been found” (emphasis added).

Bush also declared, “We know from multiple intelligence sources that Iraqi
weapons scientists continue to be threatened with harm should they
cooperate with UN inspectors.” This claim was also challenged by Blix the
following morning. “In the last month,” he stated, “Iraq has provided us
with the names of many persons who may be relevant sources of information,
in particular, persons who took part in various phases of the unilateral
destruction of biological and chemical weapons and proscribed missiles in
1991.”

While acknowledging that the interview process was not free of problems,
Blix noted: “the Iraq side seems to have encouraged interviewees not to
request the presence of Iraqi officials, so called minders, or the taping
of the interviews.” Blix explained that the inspectors intended to request
that some interviews be held outside Iraq.

But despite certain shortcomings, Blix offered a positive assessment of the
overall progress of the interviews. He judged them to be “useful” and noted
that “Since we started requesting interviews, 38 individuals were asked for
private interviews, of which 10 accepted under our terms, 7 of these during
the past week.”

In the course of his press conference, President Bush declared repeatedly
that Iraq was not disarming. In the midst of the very public destruction of
Iraq’s Al-Samoud missiles, Bush brazenly proclaimed: “If the Iraqi regime
were disarming, we would know it because we would see it. Iraq’s weapons
would be presented to inspectors and the world would witness their
destruction.” Bush might just as well have said, “Don’t believe what you
see, because I’m telling you that you are not seeing it.”

This was too much for the normally unflappable Dr. Blix, who departed from
his generally cautious diplomatic phrasing to deliver a mocking riposte to
Bush’s preposterous assertion. “The destruction undertaken [of Al-Samoud
missiles] constitutes a substantial measure of disarmament—indeed, the
first since the middle of the 1990s,” Blix declared in his Security Council
report. “We are not watching the breaking of toothpicks. Lethal weapons are
being destroyed.”

It is instructive, and also somewhat depressing, to compare the text of
Bush’s remarks at his press conference with those of Blix and ElBaradei. In
the statements of the president, nothing that can be described even
remotely as an argument is to be found. There are, rather, a series of
assertions, laid out in sentences that are generally no more than five to
ten words long, for which no supporting evidence is presented. A typical
example of the Bush method is the following sequence of three
sentences: “Saddam Hussein is not disarming. This is a fact. It cannot be
denied.”

One need not be a supporter of the politics or mission of Blix and
ElBaradei to recognize that they are both men of high intelligence and
skill. They have the ability to integrate and synthesize a vast body of
complex evidence. In their own ways, and with the subtlety required by
their profession, they actually seek to influence international public
opinion through the force of argument. Each conclusion is appropriately
referenced to verifiable evidence.

The report of ElBaradei was especially compelling, and even more damning in
its refutation of the lies of the Bush administration than that of Hans
Blix. He began by pointing out that the objective state of Iraq’s
industrial infrastructure precludes any possibility that this country is in
a position to undertake a serious nuclear weapons program:

“At the outset, let me state one general observation: namely, that during
the past four years, at the majority of Iraqi sites, industrial capacity
has deteriorated substantially, due to the departure of foreign support
that was often present in the late 1980s, the departure of a large number
of skilled Iraqi personnel in the past decade, and the lack of consistent
maintenance by Iraq of sophisticated equipment. At only a few inspected
sites involved in industrial research, development and manufacturing have
the facilities been improved and new personnel been taken on. This overall
deterioration in industrial capacity is naturally of direct relevance to
Iraq’s capability for resuming a nuclear weapons program.”

ElBaradei’s report gave an indication of the extraordinary scope of the
inspections being conducted in Iraq, which directly contradicted the
cartoon-like images of clueless inspection personnel, groping blindly in
the dark or in the desert for impossible-to-find evidence of weapons of
mass destruction, concealed by wily Iraqis.

“The IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) has now conducted a total of
218 inspections at 141 sites, including 21 that had not been inspected
before. In addition, the Agency experts have taken part in many joint
UNMOVIC-IAEA inspections.
“Technical support for nuclear inspections has continued to expand. The
three operational air samplers have collected, from key locations in Iraq,
weekly air particulate samples that are being sent to laboratories for
analysis. Additional results of water, sediment, vegetation and material
sample analyses have been received from the relevant laboratories.

“Our vehicle-borne radiation survey team has covered some 2,000 kilometers
over the past three weeks. Survey access has been gained to over 75
facilities, including military garrisons and camps, weapons factories,
truck parks, manufacturing facilities and residential areas.”

Perhaps the most important sections of ElBaradei’s report were those that
responded to claims by the United States and Britain, trumpeted in the
press, that the Iraqis had been engaged in illegal efforts to continue
their nuclear weapons program.

The United States and Britain had alleged, with great fanfare in late 2002,
that Iraq had attempted to import aluminum tubes for the purpose of
manufacturing centrifuges required for the secret production of nuclear
weapons. This issue was declared by the British and American governments to
be a matter of paramount concern in December. Iraq’s denials of these
allegations were brushed aside by the American and British governments.

ElBaradei reported that the issue of the aluminum tubes had been carefully
investigated by the IAEA. Its conclusion: “Extensive field investigation
and document analysis have failed to uncover any evidence that Iraq
intended to use these 81mm tubes for any project other than the reverse
engineering of rockets [as Iraq had explained previously]…

“Based on available evidence, the IAEA team has concluded that Iraq’s
efforts to import these aluminum tubes were not likely to have been related
to the manufacture of centrifuges and, moreover, that it was highly
unlikely that Iraq could have achieved the considerable redesign needed to
use them in a revived centrifuge program.”

Even more devastating to the Anglo-American propaganda campaign was
ElBaradei’s exposure of the claim that Iraq had attempted to acquire
uranium from Niger. In December 2002, British intelligence claimed to have
discovered documents recording an attempt by an Iraqi official to negotiate
the purchase of uranium during a visit to Niger in February 1999. In a fact
sheet, dated December 19, 2002, the US State Department demanded to know
why Iraq’s 12,000 page submission to the United Nations “ignores efforts to
procure uranium from Niger.” The “fact sheet” asked, “Why is the Iraqi
regime hiding their uranium procurement?”

ElBaradei reported to the Security Council:

“With regard to Uranium Acquisition, the IAEA had made progress in its
investigation into reports that Iraq sought to buy uranium from Niger in
recent years. The investigation was centered on documents provided by a
number of States that pointed to an agreement between Niger and Iraq for
the sale of uranium between 1999 and 2001.

“The IAEA has discussed these reports with the Governments of Iraq and
Niger, both of which have denied that any such activity took place. For its
part, Iraq has provided the IAEA with a comprehensive explanation of its
relations with Niger, and has described a visit by an Iraqi official to a
number of African countries, including Niger, in February 1999, which Iraq
thought might have given rise to the reports. The IAEA was able to review
correspondence coming from various bodies of the Government of Niger, and
to compare the form, format, contents and signatures of that correspondence
with those of the alleged procurement-related documentation.

“Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded, with the concurrence
of outside experts, that these documents—which formed the basis for the
reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger—are in fact
not authentic. We have therefore concluded that these specific allegations
are unfounded” (emphasis added).

If we may be permitted to state the findings in less formal language, the
Blair government in London used documents forged by its intelligence
agencies to concoct a case for war.

These were eagerly seized upon by the Bush administration, which in all
likelihood knew the documents to be bogus, for the same purpose. Given the
intended consequences of this fabrication—the invasion of Iraq and the
wounding and killing of hundreds of thousands of its people—those who
planned, executed and made use of this provocation are criminals in the
most profound and essential meaning of the term.

In his conclusion, ElBaradei summed up the results of the IAEA’s work in
Iraq: “After three months of intrusive inspections, we have to date found
no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons
program in Iraq.”

The joint reports and findings of Blix and ElBaradei comprise a shattering
refutation of the statements made by the American president the night
before. But, to be frank, if their intention was only to reply to Bush,
they provided much more than what was really needed to accomplish that
limited task.

To listen to Bush meander aimlessly from one absurdity to another requires
not only the suspension of one’s judgment, but that one suspend all
cognitive activity. Having ringed Iraq with 300,000 troops, Bush declared,
for example, that “The form and leadership of that government is for the
Iraqi people to choose.” Five minutes later, he stated, “We will be
changing the regime of Iraq for the good of the Iraqi people.”

The entire press conference abounded in such stupid and thoughtless
contradictions.

Even those of us who, by dint of professional responsibility, are obliged
to listen and read what the president says cannot help but feel that they
have been somehow degraded by the experience. Despite the proverbial six
degrees of separation, one is ashamed by the spectacle of ignorance,
cynicism and sadism that is being televised from the White House. After
all, Abraham Lincoln once lived in that building.

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