SubscribeA U.S. general who commanded the U.S. allied air forces in Iraq has confirmed that the U.S. and Britain conducted a massive secret bombing campaign before the U.S. actually declared war on Iraq...Starting in late May to June of 2002 a flurry of activity began both in the United States and in the Middle East. In what appears to be an admission of covert activity, chief allied air force commander Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley divulged in a little-noticed quote in the New York Times that US/British aircraft flew 21,736 sorties between June 2002 and March 2003.[Previously posted in a comment by ericb at 12:56 PM PST on June 27; more inside]
"In public, British officials were declaring their solidarity with the Bush administration's calls for elimination of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. But Straw's memo and seven other secret documents disclosed in recent months by British journalist Michael Smith together reveal a much different picture. Behind the scenes, British officials believed the U.S. administration was already committed to a war that they feared was ill-conceived and illegal and could lead to disaster.
The documents indicate that the officials foresaw a host of problems that later would haunt both governments -- including thin intelligence about the nature of the Iraqi threat, weak public support for war and a lack of planning for the aftermath of military action. British cabinet ministers, Foreign Office diplomats, senior generals and intelligence service officials all weighed in with concerns and reservations. Yet they could not dissuade their counterparts in the Bush administration -- nor, indeed, their own leader -- from going forward.
'I think there is a real risk that the administration underestimates the difficulties,' David Manning, Blair's chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote to the prime minister on March 14, 2002, after he returned from meetings with Condoleezza Rice, then Bush's national security adviser, and her staff. 'They may agree that failure isn't an option, but this does not mean they will necessarily avoid it.'
A U.S. official with firsthand knowledge of the events said the concerns raised by British officials 'played a useful role.'
'Were they paid a tremendous amount of heed?' said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. 'I think it's hard to say they were.' "
'Downing Street Memo' Has Lingering Effect
Activists Use British Documents To Mount Media Campaign, Put Bush on Defensive Over Iraq.
Evidently the "secret" part of it consisted of the US and the UK pretending it was merely enforcement of the no-fly zones, while in reality they were bombing targets well outside the area of their mandate.
Not unlike the permanent US military bases that have been constructed in Iraq
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Also in February 2002, then-CENTCOM C-in-C Tommy Franks proposed "spikes of activity" as part of the plan for the invasion of Iraq, according to his autobiography, American Soldier. In July 2002, British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon was quoted in the Downing Street Memo that "the U.S. had already begun 'spikes of activity' to put pressure on the regime."
The spikes were intended to to provoke Saddam Hussein into giving the allies an excuse for war, and were illegal according to the UK Foreign Office.
The bombing escalation, known as Operation Southern Focus, was reported by the New York Times in July 2003 (which is where the "little-noticed quote" is from) and the Sunday Times in June 2005. (Both articles quote General Mosely as saying "more than 600 bombs," were dropped, not tons, but that seems to be an error, according to Raw Story and Michael Smith's Los Angeles Times essay The Real News in the Downing Street Memos.)
The escalation included a "huge air assault" involving approximately 100 US and UK planes in September 2002 that attacked Iraq's major western air defence installation (which was outside the no-fly zone).
Raw Story has a graph showing the number of days with bombings before the official start of the war, based on figures released by the House of Commons covering March-November 2002 and October 2002-March 2002. The Colorado Campaign for Middle East Peace has a US Bombing Watch that lists media reports of bombings in 2002.
In a November 20, 2002, Pentagon briefing, Pentagon spokesperson Victoria Clarke confirmed that US pilots were "degrading air-defense facilities that the U.S. would have to take out if there were a war," and Rear Admiral David Gove, former deputy director of global operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said pilots patrolling the no-fly zones were "essentially flying combat missions." In December 2002, British defense officials "admitted privately that the 'no-fly' patrols, conducted by RAF and US aircraft from bases in Kuwait, are designed to weaken Iraq's air defence systems and have nothing to do with their stated original purpose of defending the marsh Arabs and the Sh'ia population of southern Iraq."
Congress passed the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq in October 2002. On October 7, 2002, President Bush said "Approving this resolution does not mean that military action is imminent or unavoidable."
posted by kirkaracha at 5:10 AM on June 28, 2005