Newsgroups: alt.politics.clinton,alt.fan.dan-quayle,talk.politics.misc
Subject: ==> Bush/Quayle Iraq Policy: Profound Errors, Duplicity, Cover-Up
Supersedes: <92284.004437U56503@uicvm.uic.edu>
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Friday, 16 Oct 1992 04:03:18 CDT
From: <U56503@uicvm.uic.edu>

Repost for new readers.

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[GOREIRAQ.TXT file date 9/29/92]  Please Distribute

 BUSH-QUAYLE IRAQ POLICY:  PROFOUND ERRORS, DUPLICITY, COVER-UP
 Gore says Bush Created Threat, Then Risked Americans to Confront It
 URGES BUSH TO ANSWER QUESTIONS, TELL THE WHOLE TRUTH

      WASHINGTON--The Bush-Quayle Administration's policy toward Iraq
 is "deeply shadowed in profound error, in duplicity, and in amoral
 disregard for our most basic values as a nation,"  Sen. Al Gore,
 D-TN, said today, delivering a sharp and specific indictment of that
 policy, concluding that "George Bush does not fit the requirements of
 the New World Order his own speechwriters once summoned up."

      The detailed record of George Bush's policy toward Iraq
 "provides a deeply disturbing look at a blatant disregard for brutal
 terrorism, a dangerous blindness to the murderous ambitions of a
 despot, and what certainly appears to be an ongoing effort to hide
 the facts from the American people whose tax dollars paid for this
 policy and whose sons and daughters risked and lost their lives in
 its pursuit," Gore said today in a speech before the Center for
 National Policy.

      Gore also questions the President's claims to be "out of the
 loop" on the Reagan-Bush Administration's decision to sell arms to
 Iran.  "Far from being 'out of the loop,' Bush seems to have been one
 of the most vigorous and vociferous advocates of the illegal side of
 the argument,"  Gore said.  "Indeed, his arguments to the contrary
 are simply no longer credible."

 Gore supported authorizing the use of force in the Persian Gulf but
 has been a strong and persistent critic of U.S. policy before and
 after Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.  As early as 1988, Gore was
 protesting Saddam Hussein's brutality and urging U.S. action.  After
 the Desert Storm cease-fire, Gore was among the first in Congress to
 raise alarms about the U.S. failure to uphold the cease-fire
 agreement and Saddam Hussein's violent treatment of the Kurds and
 Shiites.

      "George Bush wants the American people to see him as the hero
 who put out a raging fire.  But new evidence now shows that he is the
 one who set the fire.  He not only struck the match, he poured
 gasoline on the flames.  So give him credit for calling in the fire
 department, but understand who started the blaze,"  Gore said today.

      In a detailed and comprehensive speech, Gore provided a thorough
 review of the Bush-Quayle Administration's policy toward Iraq.  There
 is, he said, "substantial evidence that [the Bush]  Administration
 intentionally falsified export records and reports to Congress, and
 in the process apparently violated a number of laws intended to
 prevent such horrendous mistakes."

      Gore said of Bush:  "His poor judgment, moral blindness and
 bungling policies led directly to a war that should never have taken
 place.  And, because of his naivete, U.S. taxpayers are now stuck
 with paying the bill for $l.9 billion President Bush gave to Saddam
 Hussein even though top administration officials were repeatedly told
 Saddam was using our dollars to buy weapons technology."

      "Bush deserves heavy blame for intentionally concealing from the
 American people the clear nature of Saddam Hussein and his regime,
 for convincing himself that friendly relations with such a monster
 were possible, and for persisting in this effort far, far beyond the
 point of folly,"  Gore said.

      "In the end, the U.S. taxpayer has been left holding the bag for
 almost $2 billion of loans to Iraq which will never be repaid.  After
 bailing out the savings and loans, American taxpayers are now being
 forced by Bush's poor decisions to bail out Saddam,"  Gore said.

      "Coddling tyrants is a hallmark of the Bush foreign policy,"
 Gore said.

      "George Bush sent loan guarantees to an oil-rich dictator.
 George Bush sold dangerous technology to a criminal who was intent on
 developing and using lethal weapons.  George Bush refused to face the
 truth or hear the urgent warnings coming from his own
 Administration.  And, then, George Bush put American lives on the
 line  in a war that never would have happened except for his
 mistakes."

 "When it came time to confront the consequences of these years of
 serious mistakes, when it came time to confront Saddam Hussein's
 invasion of Kuwait with an international coalition united in its
 resolve and purpose, George Bush, all the way up to the moment the
 combat ended, displayed fortitude and skill," Gore said.  "But the
 chestnuts he pulled from the fire were his own.  His policies
 nurtured Saddam Hussein.  He was deaf to information that to any
 other ear was a fire bell in the night, ringing clearly that our
 policies were disastrously wrong."

      "Should a man who mistook Saddam Hussein for a docile ally and
 who then pursued that error to the point where the lives of hundreds
 of thousands of Americans had to be put on the line, have a second
 term as President of the United States?  Has George Bush told the
 truth, the whole truth about a policy that left our nation facing a
 brutal, murderous dictator?  If he will take credit for the victory,
 will he also take responsibility for the policy that made war
 inevitable?  The answer to these questions is, 'no'," Gore said.

 "In so many ways, George Bush does not fit the requirements of the
 New World Order his own speechwriters once summoned up.  We require a
 fresh approach from a new leader of vigor and high intelligence, of
 courage and vision, who believes to the core that the enemies of
 freedom cannot be anything but the enemies of our country.  I think
 that the people of the United States have and will take the
 opportunity to select such a leader.  Bill Clinton is that man,"
 Gore said.

      In his speech, Gore challenged the President's statement, in
 June of this year, that "We did not enhance Saddam Hussein's nuclear,
 biological, or chemical weapons capability."  Gore cited specific
 evidence to the contrary in U.S. exports:

 *    Almost 30 percent of our non-agricultural exports to Iraq
      between 1985 and 1990 went to the Iraqi military-industrial
      complex.

 *    Of these exports, there were 162 items that were licensed for
      sale despite their potential nuclear applications.      *  The
      Administration permitted the sale of powerful computers
      comparable to those used in our own missile test ranges, despite
      objections from the Department of Defense.

 *    The Administration allowed shipment of high-tech equipment
      needed for Iraq's Condor II missile, which was to have been able
      to deliver a nuclear warhead at a range of more than 600 miles.

 *    The Administration allowed for the export of materials needed
      for the infamous "supergun" project, intended to have the
      ability to launch nuclear weapons like artillery shells over
      hundreds of miles.

 *    Machine tools, lasers, and other equipment for the manufacture
      of rocket casings used in SCUD missiles were sold.  When U.N.
      inspectors went into Iraq, they found at Saddam Hussein's main
      nuclear weapons complex a carbide-tipped machine tool factory
      which had been built with technology and equipment licensed for
      export by the Bush Administration.

 *    The Administration licensed technology and equipment for
      fabricating shapes out of glass fiber over the objections of the
      Department of Defense, which noted that the purchaser was part
      of the Iraqi military-industrial complex, and that this kind of
      equipment was needed for a nuclear weapons program.  The
      Administration preferred to accept the importer's claim that the
      equipment would be used to make shower stalls.

 *    Equipment for a "detergent" factory was licensed, yet this same
      factory was used to make chemical weapons.

 *    17 licenses for the export of bacterial and fungus cultures to
      Iraq were granted, even though the CIA specifically linked the
      Iraqi government agencies involved to "biological warfare
      support and numerous other military activities."

 *    The U.N. Special Commission, once it finally got inside Iraq, is
      reported to have found equipment from 11 American companies in
      Iraqi missile and chemical weapons plants.

      Gore also pointed up the list of Iraqi customers approved by the
 Administration:

 *    The Ministry of Industry and Military Industrialization (known
      as MIMI), which was headed by a brigadier general who was Saddam
      Hussein's son-in-law, and which the CIA identified as
      "controlling Iraq's nuclear network."

 *    The Saddam State Establishment and Salah Al Din, called in an
      intelligence report "typical of Iraq's arms production
      facilities."

 *    SAAD 16, identified back in 1986 as a key missile production
      site, where as much as 40 percent of the equipment was reported
      to be U.S.-made.

 *    The Administration even sold Saddam Hussein helicopters
      for his personal use, equipped with special
      infra-red guidance and defensive systems.

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