The Bush administration may have temporarily retreated from its bellicose threat to unleash war on Iraq in order to effect a regime-change, but this does not mean the US stance against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has softened.

Bush told the UN General Assembly last Thursday that the US would work with the United Nations to eliminate Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. But he also threatened the world body that the US would act unilaterally if the UN failed to enforce its resolutions on Iraq.

The hawks in Bush's cabinet are pushing for an attack on Iraq later this year. Pentagon Defence Policy Board head Richard Perle wrote in Britain's Daily Telegraph that Bush would "act alone if necessary" and that Iraq's offer to allow UN inspectors to return would not influence the decision to attack.

Why then did Bush turn to the UN to eliminate Iraq's weapons of mass destruction?

Public opinion, in the US and other countries, notably in Europe, has forced Bush to postpone his imperialist adventure for regime-change in Iraq. Both Republican and Democrat congressmen and senators in the US have cautioned him against acting unilaterally.

'Baseless accusations'

Opposition to the war has come from every corner of the world. Even in Britain, two-thirds of those who took part in a recent poll opposed the war and considered it unjustified, despite Prime Minister Tony Blair's servility to Bush.

What are the Bush administration's reasons for going to war against Iraq which has been reduced to a bread-basket case as a result of the decade-old UN economic sanctions?

For months Bush and his officials, using the pliant western media, have been stirring up war hysteria in the US by accusing Iraq of having links with al-Qaeda, and of developing and accumulating weapons of mass destruction.

Only three days prior to his UN speech, Bush and his "poodle" Blair, after a joint strategy session, claimed that "there was sufficient evidence to act against President Saddam Hussein".

Bush's accusation has been proved false and baseless.

Two days after Bush met Blair, a Washington Post report, citing senior intelligence officials and other sources, revealed that "the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had yet to find convincing evidence of an Iraqi terrorist link despite redoubled efforts to collect and analyse information related to Iraq".

Scott Ritter, a former member of the US Marine Corps, is a card-carrying Republican who voted for Bush in the last election. He had spent seven years in Iraq with the UNSCOM weapons inspection teams, performing detailed investigations into Iraq's weapons programme.

He told a meeting in Boston on July 23 that Iraq neither has weapons of mass destruction nor threatening ties to international terrorism and, therefore, there was no basis for a war on Iraq.

Accusing Bush of lying, he said: "The Bush administration has provided the American public with little more than rhetorically laced speculation.

"There has been nothing in the way of substantive fact presented that makes the case that Iraq possesses these weapons or has links to international terrorists, that Iraq poses a threat to the United States of America worthy of war".

Hidden agenda

Iraq has agreed to unconditional resumption of the UN weapons inspection programme in the belief encouraged by secretary-general Kofi Anna, that the admission of inspectors would be the first step in the eventual lifting of sanctions.

The US has adamantly refused to link the lifting of sanctions with weapons inspection. The objective of the sanctions was to pressure Iraq to destroy its weapons of mass destruction, which the country has done.

UN chief arms inspector Hans Bliz, in the British newspaper The Daily Mirror , rejected US and British claims that Iraq possesses nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Since the purpose for which the sanctions were imposed has been achieved, why is the US opposing the linking of the weapons inspection with the lifting of the sanctions?

Because it has another agenda — regime change. Why should the international community collude with the US in implementing its illegal project?

Iraqi rights violated

The continued imposition of sanctions constitutes a serious violation of the economic and social human rights of 20 million Iraqis. This has created a devastating human toll.

UNICEF estimates that 5,000-6,000 children under the age of five die each month as a direct result of sanctions.

Former French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine called the sanctions "cruel, because they exclusively punish the Iraqi people and the weakest among them, and ineffective, because they don't touch the regime".

Denis Halliday, an assistant secretary-general to the UN who started the oil-for-food programme in Iraq and his successor Hans von Sponeck have both resigned, calling the economic sanctions "genocide".

The real agenda of the Bush administration is not the destruction of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction but replacement of Saddam and his regime with a pliant one that would serve the interests of the US oligarchy.

In 1991 Bush Sr had ordered Saddam's removal through covert action. In 1998, the Republican-controlled Congress passed the Iraqi Liberation Act which attempted to legalise the removal by the US of a head of state, which is considered illegal under international law.

Ritter revealed that, in 1999, Bush's officials and advisers — Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfield and his assistant Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Armitage, Robert Zoellick and Pentagon adviser Richard Perle among others — had sent an open letter to President Bill Clinton condemning him for failing to fully implement the Iraqi Liberation Act.

They demanded that he used the American military to facilitate the Iraqi opposition's operations inside Iraq, to put troops on the ground and move up to Baghdad to get rid of Saddam. These are the very people who are now calling the shots in the Bush administration.

Power-for-oil game plan

In August, in response to Iraq's offer to hold talks with UN weapons inspectors, Bush arrogantly scorned the offer and reiterated that US determination to effect a regime change in Iraq remains unchanged.

The Bush administration is bent on a regime change in Iraq because Saddam — whom the US and the West supported for 12 years during his proxy war against Iran to contain 'Islamic fundamentalism' — is now perceived to be a threat to the economic and geo-political interests of the US oligarchy.

US foreign policy is determined not by the American people but by the industrial-military complex, oil companies, large corporations and the Israeli lobby supported by the Christian Right.

The US is looking for a Hamid Karzai in Iraq who will allow US oil companies to exploit the substantial resources, look after US interests in the region, and abandon the Palestinian cause.

The rush is already on to parcel out Iraq's oil resources. The Washington Post reported on Sept 16 that ".... a US-led ouster of President Saddam Hussein could open a bonanza for American oil companies long banished from Iraq, scuttling oil deals between Baghdad and Russia, France and other countries and reshuffling world petroleum markets, according to industry officials and Iraqi opposition leaders".

Towards tyranny

The Bush administration's policy of trying to bring about regime-change by force is morally reprehensible and in gross violation of the UN Charter and international law.

Annan, speaking before Bush addressed the General Assembly, reminded the latter that while any country has the right to fight back when attacked, only the UN could authorise the use of force in cases that go beyond straight-forward self defence.

If the US is allowed to bring about a regime change in Iraq through war it would be a precedent that would further encourage the hawks in the administration, whom Mandella called dinosaurs, for similar action in Iran, North Korea, Libya and even Egypt.

It would lead to a tyrannical world order based on military might and not the rule of law. We cannot and must not, allow this to happen. Progressive governments and civil society organisations must pool their resources and oppose Bush's drift towards a tyrannical world order.

SM MOHAMED IDRIS is the chairperson of Justice International Malaysia.