Ex-marine turned UNSCOM weapons inspector said that President George W. Bush has received and signed of on orders for an aerial attack on Iran planned for June 2005.The implied goal is the destruction of Iran's alleged program to develop nuclear weapons, but Ritter said neoconservatives in the administration also expected that the attack would set in motion a chain of events leading to regime change in the oil-rich nation of 70 million -- a possibility Ritter regards with great skepticism.
Ritter also claims that the January 30 elections, which Bush calls a turning point in the history of Iraq, a milestone in the advance of freedom, were not so after all. Ritter said that U.S. authorities in Iraq had manipulated the results in order to reduce the percentage of the vote received by the United Iraqi Alliance from 56% to 48%. Ritter claims an official involved in the manipulation was the source of the information. It appears this will soon be reported in the New Yorker by Seymour Hersh.
Scott Ritter's talk was a culmination of a long evening devoted to discussion of Iraq and U.S. foreign policy. Before Ritter spoke, Dahr Jamail narrated a slide show on Iraq focusing on Fallujah. He showed more than 100 vivid photographs taken in Iraq, mostly by himself. Many of them showed the horrific slaughter of civilians. Jamail argued that U.S. mainstream media sources are complicit in the and helped sustain support for it by deliberately downplaying the truth about the devastation and death it is causing.
The Friday Feb. 18 event in Olympia was sponsored by South Puget Sound Community College Student Activities Board, Veteran's for Peace, 100 Thousand and Counting, Olympia Movement for Justice and Peace and the United for Peace of Pierce County.
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