NEWS CONFERENCE WITH

DENNIS KUCINICH (D-OH)
U.S. House of Representatives

August 20, 2002

KUCINICH: OK. I want to welcome all of you here and just to discuss the way that we're going to proceed. I said we'd start at 1:00, we're starting at 1:00. I'm going to have a brief opening statement, and our three witnesses are each going to have a statement that will at the most run for 10 minutes. After that I'm going to be asking a series of questions of each of the participants. It's our intention to have this wrapped up in one hour. I want to thank everyone who is here. Thank you for coming. And let's proceed.

In the past few months, there's been a lot of discussion about going to war in Iraq. What there has not been, however, is enough discussion about why we should not go to war. This briefing today will provide an alternative viewpoint. It will provide the American people an opportunity to hear diverse voices. It will provide for a discussion as to why war is not inevitable.

This is the first in a series of forums I plan to host. The next will be on September 4 at 1:00 p.m., and the following on September 12 at 1:00 p.m. The approach will be bipartisan.

There are many knowledgeable and well respected people in our government who are very concerned about war in Iraq. General Scowcroft, an adviser to former -- the first President Bush, Senators Lugar and Levin, House Majority Leader Dick Armey have all expressed their reservations.

I am opposed to war in Iraq. There's been no credible information linking the Iraqi regime to the 9-11 attacks or to the anthrax attacks. There's been little information concerning Iraq's possession of weapons of mass destruction or the capability or intent to deliver the weapons.

That's why we're here today. We're here to listen to diverse voices, bring forward information as to why we should not go to war in Iraq. The briefings we have in the future will do the same. It is critical that the American people, the Congress and the media, have access to viewpoints of those who believe war in Iraq is neither desirable nor inevitable.

I'm delighted to welcome our speakers today in the interest of furthering the safety and the security of the American people and of all people by providing alternatives.

Scott Ritter served as chief weapons inspector for the United Nations Special Commission in Iraq. In 1998, he resigned in protest after discovering that American spies were part of a U.N.-operated team. He's the author of "End Game," which explores the shortcoming of American foreign policy in the Persian Gulf and alternative approaches to handling the Iraqi crisis.

Phyllis Bennis is a fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. She is an outspoken author and commentator on the Middle East and continuously advocates for a just U.S. policy in the region. In 1999, she accompanied a fact-finding visit of congressional staff to Iraq. She's the editor of the Middle East Report and the author of "Calling the Shots: How Washington Dominates Today's U.N."

Finally, David Cortright. David is the president of the Fourth Freedom Forum and a visiting fellow at the University of Notre Dame. From 1977 to 1987, Dr. Cortright served as executive director of SANE, the largest U.S. peace organization.

KUCINICH: Over the past decade, he's been a leading authority on the use of incentives and sanctions as tools of international peacekeeping. He's the author-editor of nine books and many articles.

I want to thank each of our guests for being here and ask Scott Ritter to proceed.

STATEMENT OF

SCOTT RITTER
Former Chief Weapons Inspector
and
U.N. Special Commission in Iraq

RITTER: Well, thank you very much for showing the courage to have such a hearing. I think this kind of public debate and discussion is so important, so important especially in a democracy such as we call the United States of America.

It is unfortunately not what was reflected in the hearings that were held under the auspices of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a few weeks past.

Let me start right off by saying that I probably differ in regards to America's policy on Iraq from any of the people that I have the honor to be up here with. I believe that if Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction we have a case for war, and I believe we have a right and an imperative to go to war to eliminate this threat, even if that means getting rid of Saddam Hussein and putting a new regime in place.

It's been more than 10 years now that the international community has banned weapons of mass destruction in Iraq -- chemical weapons, biological, nuclear and ballistic missiles with a range of greater than 150 kilometers.

And if it can be demonstrated with fact that Iraq continues to possess these weapons, or continues to pursue acquisition of these weapons, then in my opinion Saddam Hussein is a pariah leader at the head of a rogue nation who means nothing but ill intent to the United States and the rest of the world and must be dealt with accordingly. And I would be supportive of my president and my country to go to war against Iraq under those circumstances.

However, we come to what I believe is the critical point: Does Iraq possess weapons of mass destruction? It's clear that as of December, 1998, when weapons inspectors left Iraq, that the mission of disarming Iraq had not been completed in accordance with the mandate set forth by the Security Council of the United Nations.

That mandate called for 100 percent disarmament. And because of a variety of factors -- including Iraqi lies, obstruction, and I think the inability of the Security Council to deal decisively with such lies and obstruction -- the standards of verification required to determine whether or not every aspect of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs could be accounted for were raised to an unrealistically high level.

Despite of this, we were able to ascertain a 90 to 95 percent level of disarmament, and this is remarkable and people should keep note of this. Included in this figure are all of the factories used by Iraq to produce weapons of mass destruction prior to 1991, all of the associated production equipment, and the vast majority of the product produced by these factories.

Iraq was fundamentally disarmed, qualitatively disarmed. As of December, 1998, Iraq was incapable of producing weapons of mass destruction so long as weapons inspectors were present inside Iraq.

Unfortunately, we no longer have weapons inspectors in Iraq. And I think it's imperative that we focus on why there are no inspectors in Iraq.

Contrary to popular mythology, weapons inspectors were not kicked out by Saddam Hussein. Weapons inspectors were ordered out by the United States government two days before the United States government began a unilateral bombing campaign, Operation Desert Fox, that did not have the authority of the Security Council, a bombing campaign which used manipulation of the weapons inspection process as a means of triggering this military action, and a bombing campaign which used intelligence information gathered by the weapons inspectors to target Saddam Hussein in a manner which was inconsistent with the disarmament mandate of the weapons inspectors.

RITTER: There aren't weapons inspectors in Iraq today because the United States ordered them out, and then the United States discredited the inspection program. The United States of America killed the weapons inspection program in Iraq.

Now, it's been four years, and we have to ask ourselves, What has transpired in Iraq during this time? The honest answer is, we simply don't know. We don't know.

I testified to the U.S. Senate in 1998 that within six months of the removal of weapons inspectors from Iraq, Iraq would have the ability to reconstitute important aspects of its weapons of mass destruction program, and I stand by that testimony. That is why we must be concerned about what's happening in Iraq today, and that is why we must seek to complete the disarmament mandate that the Security Council set in motion in 1991.

But we also have to be realistic in what we're looking for. If Iraq is to have weapons of mass destruction today, Iraq would have needed to reconstitute its production capability. Weapons of mass destruction are not produced in caves, they're not produced in basements, they aren't pulled out of a black hat like a rabbit at a magic show. It is science, it is technology. There is an infrastructure that would need to be reconstituted before Iraq could have these weapons, and this reconstitution is eminently detectable by the intelligence services of the United States and other nations that are focused and concerned on Iraq.

And the fact that no credible, factually based information has been brought forward to substantiate allegations of Iraq's continued possession or attempts to reacquire weapons of mass destruction today means that we have to look very carefully at these allegations.

We cannot go to war based upon rumor. We cannot go to war based upon speculation. Before we send tens of thousands of American troops off to fight, kill and be killed in our name, we have to be absolutely certain that there is a threat there worthy of war, worthy of the sacrifice.

And with all due respect to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and others who continue to claim that they know Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, if they know, it's time they put the facts on the table to back it up. Because after all, this is a democracy and at the end of the day, they are responsible to we, the people of the United States.

Thank you very much.

KUCINICH: Thank you very much. Scott Ritter.

Phyllis Bennis?

STATEMENT OF

PHYLLIS BENNIS
Fellow, Institute for Policy Studies

BENNIS: Thank you very much, Congressman. I again would like to thank you for the courage to hold this hearing. I must say I'm sorry to say that it takes courage to hold a hearing like this, but indeed, in the atmosphere of Washington today it does, and I appreciate that.

I want to speak today about two aspects of why we should not go to war against Iraq. There are many, but I will speak about the questions of international law and the United Nations, and the questions of the impact on our relations with the rest of the world.

Nelson Mandela said that an invasion of Iraq would be, quote, "a disaster." He was right. It will be a disaster. It will kill thousands of Iraqis, it will put at risk, potentially, thousands of U.S. troops, young men and women, none of whom, not the civilians in Iraq, not our troops, should be put at risk for this.

International law would be massively violated by a U.S. attack on Iraq. Article 51 of the U.N. Charter allows for self-defense for a nation to use unilateral force if an armed attack occurs. That's the language. Iraq has not attacked us. There has been no armed attack against the United States. There are other restrictions on it as well, but that's the key part to how we look at the United Nations Charter. The United Nations Charter underpins all of our respect for international law.

And if we are to be what we claim to be, which is a nation of laws, and not act like a rogue state ourselves, it requires that we abide by all of international law. We are the most powerful nation on earth. Whether we look militarily, politically, economically, culturally, we have more influence than any empire that ever existed in the world, in all of history. If we do not accept as legitimate international law, how can we expect other nations, smaller nations, weaker nations, to do so?

Richard Perle and others have said the United Nations Charter is not a suicide pact. That's certainly true. No one is asking the United States to commit suicide; we have not been attacked. And we do not have the right, it's as simple as that under international law, to attack a country on spec, a country that we are afraid may in the future create some weapon that we don't like and might give it to some other forces that we don't like, who might use it against someone we do like, and therefore now, we have the right to kill thousands on spec. We don't have that right.

The United Nations is the primary actor in determining international communities' policies toward Iraq.

BENNIS: It should not be the United States acting alone. The Security Council resolutions that are relevant here end with the words, "The Security Council remains seized of the issue." In U.N. diplo-speak, that means it's our issue. It remains a collective issue for the Security Council as a whole. It's not something for any country, in or out of the Council, to take up unilaterally.

And finally, on the question of the United Nations and international law, we also have an obligation to respect all aspects of the various U.N. resolutions that we like to cite. We hear a great deal, for example, about Resolution 687, which is the original Iraq sanctions resolution that called for the imposition of sanctions, economic sanctions against Iraq linked to eight specific paragraphs having to do with weapons of mass destruction.

We don't usually hear about Article 14 of that resolution. Article 14 says that the disarmament of Iraq should be linked to the goal of regional disarmament. It should be linked to the goal of creating throughout the Middle East region, a region, a zone free of all weapons of mass destruction.

That means that as we look at the need to disarm Iraq, and I support the need to disarm Iraq -- I was appalled throughout the 1980s that it was our government responsible for the provision to Iraq of biological weapons seed stock, as was documented in the 1994 Senate Banking Subcommittee hearings.

We also have an obligation to disarmament in this arms-glutted region. Our country is responsible for the vast majority of the arms that are flooding the Middle East. And with a region whose temperature is as high as the Middle East today, we can not afford those weapons.

Speaking of the region, this is the other major international crisis that emerges from our discussions of and threats to go to war against Iraq. The Arab allies of the United States are uniformly opposed to a U.S. war. That includes Kuwait, the country that one might think would remain the most threatened by Iraq's alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction, or future possession of weapons of mass destruction.

And yet, last March at the Arab League summit, all of the members of the Arab League, including Kuwait, reconciled with Iraq, signed new treaties of friendship and solidarity. Iraq and Kuwait jointly issued a statement involving the return to Kuwait of the stolen national archives from the Iraq-Kuwait war. Whether any of that happens in the real world is always a question. But it speaks volume that even Kuwait stands against our going to war in Iraq.

In the entire Middle East region, only Israel has said they do not object to going to war against Iraq. All of the allies that we would be depending on, whether it be Jordan, whether it be Turkey, whether it be Saudi Arabia, have said they're opposed to it.

Now, frankly, I happen to believe that if push comes to shove, there's not one of those governments who will stand resistant to a United States demand that they come on board. Why? Because they are fundamentally dependent, whether economically or militarily or both, on the United States. They will not risk that relationship. But the cost will be very heavy.

We have to weigh, in this country, whether we are prepared to ask our friends in Jordan, in Saudi Arabia and throughout the Arab world, are we prepared to ask our friends to risk being overthrown, because the risk is that severe in that region, if they sign on to a U.S. invasion of Iraq.

In Europe, we have no support. The elections that are coming up in Germany, the question of who can be a stronger opponent of a U.S. war seems to be the determining factor in who is going to be the next chancellor of Germany. Public opinion outruns political elite opinion.

Across the world, we do not have allies. That does not mean that if the U.S. begins a unilateral troop build-up, that some countries will not stand up and endorse it. The question again will be, at what price. Do we really believe that we as Americans are made safer by imposing a coerced coalition on the world, a coalition that is not supported by people in any country, but with a few governments feeling they have no choice because our president has threatened, if we do not like how you behave, we will treat you as a terrorist? I do not think that makes us any safer.

War in Iraq will further destabilize an already boiling region that is at the risk of huge crisis because of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. We cannot afford to throw oil on that already burning region. Nelson Mandela was right, invading Iraq will be a disaster.

Thank you.

KUCINICH: Thank you, Phyllis Bennis.

David Cortright?

STATEMENT OF

DAVID CORTRIGHT
President, Fourth Freedom Forum

CORTRIGHT: Thank you, Congressman Kucinich, for convening this hearing today.

There are many reasons why a war on Iraq makes no sense, but I think one of the most compelling is that there are alternative means of addressing our national security concerns regarding Iraq. And my colleagues and I at Fourth Freedom Forum and the Kroc Institute at Notre Dame have done a number of reports on viable policy options in Iraq, and I'd like to briefly outline these today.

There are four, as I see it: The first is, diplomacy to gain U.N. inspections again in Iraq. Secondly, military containment. Thirdly, deterrence. And forthly, support for a democratic transition.

Let me briefly outline these, and I have some visuals to go with them.

As Scott Ritter said, the U.N. weapons inspections during the 1990s were remarkably successful in disarming Iraq. And if we are concerned, as we should be, about that country's capacity to produce weapons of mass destruction, our number-one priority should be to get the U.N. inspectors back into the country. That is only possible through a diplomatic bargain which offers to Iraq some inducement for cooperation.

CORTRIGHT: Right now Iraq has a gun to its head. The Bush administration says, "You're dead no matter what you do." Why should they bargain under those circumstances?

In order to get an agreement, we have to offer something for their cooperation. Recent communications from Iraq have been quite clear. They seem to be suggesting that the return of inspections is possible. It's been right there in the language. But they have said there are two things that they request: One is to refrain from military attack -- the U.S. and U.K. to refrain from military attack; and secondly, that we will pledge that when the inspectors have completed their work, all the remaining sanctions will be fully lifted.

Now, this second demand is actually the language of the original Gulf War cease-fire resolution. Resolution 687 says that when the inspections and disarmament process is complete, sanctions will have no further force, period, end of the day.

This is the commitment we made legally as a government. It's what the Security Council has pledged. And this should be our position. Offer this bargain to the Iraqis. I'm convinced that they will then allow the weapons inspectors back in. They can do their job. And within a year, according to Hans Blix, this process could be completed. We could be assured of the disarmament, as Scott Ritter says we need to be, and we could proceed then to have a more normalized relationship with Iraq.

So, diplomacy to achieve arms inspection is the number-one priority.

Should that not work, there are other options, and one of those is enhanced military containment. Right now, we have a containment policy effectively. Many of the sanctions have been listed, but the primary control over Iraqi oil revenues remains in place, and this is now capturing approximately 80 percent of all Iraqi oil revenues.

Because of that, the government of Iraq has not been able to reconstitute its military capacity. Iraq is much weaker militarily today than it was in 1990. It doesn't have the resources to rebuild a massive military enterprise.

And we could work to improve that containment. And one of the ways would be to work with the neighboring countries to build a more effective monitoring system that could try to screen out nuclear materials, other weapons components, allowing civilian goods to flow in, but protecting from any imports of weapons-grade materials or other kinds of weapons capacities.

So in terms of our diplomacy, instead of trying to convince the neighboring states to go to a war that they don't want, why not go to them and say, "Let's cooperate on a border-monitoring system which allows commerce to proceed, but that tries to monitor for nuclear and other weapons capacity?"

And with that, work to try to ease further the burden on Iraq civilians. Some sanctions have been lifted, but there are others that remain that need to be lifted. And in that way, work on a containment that focuses primarily on Iraq's military capacity.

Containment can work, and it can be strengthened.

The third element is a familiar concept to us: deterrence. Deterrence works. In our international political system, the United States deterred the Soviet empire for more than 40 years. Deterrence has worked against Iraq. If we look at the pattern over the last 10, 12 years, repeatedly Iraq has backed down, made concessions in the face of the threat or the use of military force. Saddam Hussein, as Senator Levin has said, is not a suicide bomber. He's a political leader who has an interest in preserving his power and his regime.

So deterrence can work, and we can enhance that as well by organizing a cooperative approach to the deterrence of any actual acts of physical aggression by Iraq.

So let's go to the Security Council and offer some suggestion that the Security Council would agree to consult immediately on possible additional measures should Iraq cross certain red lines. For example, physical aggression against a neighboring state; demonstrated support for a terrorist act; the actual development or use of any weapons of mass destruction.

We could identify the acts that we would consider to be aggressive threats to the peace and gain advanced support from the Security Council to consult immediately on additional measures. I think this would strengthen the deterrence component and provide security assurances that we need against possible Iraqi aggression or development or use of weapons of mass destruction.

And finally, we come to the question of the political regime in Baghdad itself. Yes, it's true that Saddam Hussein is a dictatorial tyrant and the best guarantee for security and democracy in that region is to remove him. But we need more than regime change; we need a democratic, political transition in Iraq and actually in all the surrounding countries. A freely elected government, that's rule of law, where there's genuine progressive political transition in Iraq.

That can only occur through the work of the Iraqi people themselves. It can't be imposed by military means from a country 7,000 miles away.

If we look at recent history, we've seen that nonviolent citizen action works in bringing about democratic political change. In South Africa, in the countries of Eastern Europe and Russia itself, in the Philippines, in Indonesia and, most recently, in Serbia, ordinary citizens taking action through nonviolent means helped to bring down dictatorships.

Nonviolent resistance works, and we should be supporting that as our primary objective. So when we bring the Iraq opposition to Washington, we should not be encouraging them to take up arms against Saddam Hussein, which is a foolish and suicidal mission, but rather, encourage and support them in a democratic process; to build civil society, to further ease the sanctions, as I said, to help the Iraqi people to move toward the democratic transition, to remove that regime not to replace it with another military strong man, but to replace it with a genuine democratic regime.

That's the best guarantee of security and of peace in the region and for ourselves.

KUCINICH: Thank you very much, David Cortright.

We're going to move to the question phase. I'm going to start with Scott Ritter.

Mr. Ritter, does Iraq pose an imminent threat to the United States?

RITTER: If you look at Security Council resolutions calling for Iraq's disarmament, these resolutions were passed under Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter, which implies that Iraq's possession of -- well, it states, it doesn't imply that Iraq's possession of weapons of mass destruction represent a risk to international peace and security.

So, legally speaking, as long as Iraq isn't disarmed they represent a threat to the security of the United States of America. But realistically speaking, no. Iraq has been disarmed fundamentally. Their weapons programs have been eliminated. And if we got weapons inspectors back in, you can ensure that these weapons programs would not be reconstituted. Iraq has no capability today to project meaningful military power outside of its borders. Iraq poses no threat to any of its neighbors. It does not threaten its region. It does not threaten the United States. It does not threaten the world.

KUCINICH: So as a weapons inspector for -- you spent seven years...

RITTER: Yes, sir.

KUCINICH: ... weapon's inspecting? In your opinion, does Iraq have weapons of mass destruction right now?

RITTER: It's irresponsible to make a definitive answer, because we haven't had weapons inspectors there for four years. And I believe that we really do need to get weapons inspectors back in.

But I go back to what I said in my statement. For Iraq to have meaningful weapons of mass destruction capacity today, it would have had to reconstitute significant aspects of those programs which we eliminated. And that reconstitution is detectable by the intelligence services of the United States and other nations.

Donald Rumsfeld speaks of the Iraqis going deep, of having underground facilities, of hiding factories on the back of trucks. This is purely speculative hypotheticals. We have no evidence of Iraq ever building a weapons factory underground. We have no evidence of Iraq ever having laboratories on the back of trucks.

I investigated both of these for over five years. And I took in teams equipped with sophisticated ground-penetrating radar. We not only didn't find buried facilities, we found out that most of Iraq is not conducive to underground facilities. So I don't know where these facilities are that Donald Rumsfeld speaks of.

We looked for mobile trucks. And again, we launched no-notice raids on a variety of truck depots around Iraq. And we didn't find the trucks. We never had any evidence that suggested Iraq had these trucks.

So I'm skeptical of the statements made by the secretary of defense. And until he backs up these statements with credible evidence to the contrary, I stick with my assessment. It's unlikely that Iraq has reconstituted. The best way to deal with it is to get weapons inspectors back in, and then we'll be able to find out for certain what the status is.

KUCINICH: We have the ability to discern whether or not they are involved in nuclear weapons production because we have the technology to determine any gamma ray emission. Is that correct?

RITTER: Yes, sir. One of the most effective monitoring programs in place by United Nations weapons inspectors dealt with the nuclear aspects of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. Not only were every single nuclear facility destroyed and all of the production equipment destroyed, but they were blanketed with effective inspections and sophisticated gamma detection sensors that ensured that Iraq was not undergoing any covert nuclear enrichment program.

KUCINICH: Do we have the ability to determine by discerning if vented gases are being emitted? Do we have the technical ability to do that?

RITTER: I know that the United States has this capability. Whether or not this capability is being used in the region is something that I can't speak to.

KUCINICH: Does Iraq have the ability to deliver a weapon of mass destruction?

RITTER: Hypothetically speaking, Iraq could deliver a weapon of mass destruction using aircraft, they have aircraft; using short-range missiles, they have short-range missiles; using terrorist vectors, they have no known linkage with terrorists in the past of this sort.

But hypothetically speaking, if Iraq had a weapon of mass destruction, they would have the means to deliver this definitely to their neighbors, and if they used, you know, unconventional tactics, to deliver it to the United States.

But never once in Iraq's history have they demonstrated the propensity to share weapons of mass destruction technology with anyone outside of Iraq and the kind of state-sponsored terrorism undertaken by Saddam Hussein was not the sort which we're talking about now. It dealt primarily with elimination of opposition figures abroad and dealing with Iran and with Syria.

KUCINICH: Well, let me ask, based on your experience, have you ever seen an instance where it could be said that Saddam Hussein has the intention to deliver a weapon of mass destruction against the United States?

RITTER: No, exactly the opposite. There's been much made of this so-called terrorist training camp at Salman Pak (ph), located south of Baghdad. The fact is, we know exactly what Salman Pak (ph) is. Salman Pak (ph) is a camp built in the 1980s to facilitate hostage rescue training by Iraqi internal security forces. And it maintained this status until 1992, in which time the camp was transferred to the intelligence services, the Department of External Threats, the purpose of which was to focus on northern Iraq and actually eliminating Islamic fundamentalist elements that were starting to infiltrate into Kurdistan.

So rather than being a camp dedicated to training Islamic fundamentalists, it was a camp dedicated to the eradication of Islamic fundamentalists. I don't support the techniques used by Saddam, but definitely the way that camp has been depicted is false and misleading.

KUCINICH: You've made a powerful statement about the importance of resuming inspections. Well, my question is, how will the administration's stated policy goal of regime change and getting rid of Saddam Hussein affect the resumption of inspections? Is it possible?

RITTER: No. It's not just the Bush administration's stated policy of removing Saddam Hussein that will prevent inspectors going back, it's American law. Let's keep in mind that the United States Congress passed the Iraqi Liberation Act in 1998, which puts down as public law the elimination of Saddam Hussein. It authorizes almost $100 million of U.S. taxpayers' money to support an opposition to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

This is inherently inconsistent with the goals and objectives of returning weapons inspectors. If you return weapons inspectors to Iraq, you trigger the machinery of international diplomacy set forth by Security Council resolution that, if there is a finding of compliance, calls for the lifting of economic sanctions. Once you lift sanctions, you break economic containment. Once you break economic containment, you have Saddam Hussein's Iraq coming back into the fold of the international community with Saddam Hussein at the helm, and this is the exact opposite of what the Bush administration wants.

RITTER: The Bush administration does not want weapons inspectors in Iraq, and you cannot talk about the return of weapons inspectors so long as the Bush administration pursues as its number one policy objective, or any aspect of its policy objective regime removal, especially given the muddied history of weapons inspectors and the United States' manipulation of the inspection process for provoking military action and using the unique, unfettered access of the inspectors to spy on Saddam Hussein in a manner which dealt with Saddam's security, not weapons of mass destruction.

We're going to have a difficult time convincing Iraq to allow inspectors back in given this history. And until the United States changes its policy, I don't believe that Iraq will allow inspectors.

KUCINICH: Do you think that it's actually possible to work with Saddam Hussein to eliminate weapons of mass destruction?

RITTER: We worked with the government of Iraq, which was led by Saddam Hussein, for seven years, and we achieved a 90 to 95 percent level of disarmament. So, yes, I think it's inherently possible, and we've demonstrated that it does in fact work. It's not a perfect relationship, never was, and it probably never will be. But the bottom line is, the intent of the Security Council to eliminate Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were met by the weapons inspectors -- the intent. The letter of the law, no. But the intent to get rid of these weapons programs, we achieved this by 1996. Rolf Ekeus, the first executive chairman of UNSCOM, backs this up in acknowledging that we fundamentally disarmed Iraq by 1996.

KUCINICH: I want to thank you, Scott Ritter.

Let's go to Phyllis Bennis for the moment.

Does invading Iraq violate the U.N. Security Council charter, and if it does, how?

BENNIS: Article 51 of the charter is the only reference to the circumstances under which a country may use force unilaterally. And it is very narrowly drawn. It says if there has been an attack, a country can use military force unilaterally until -- and the "until" is a key word there as well -- it says until the Security Council can meet to decide what to do with it. At that point the individual country no longer has the right to move unilaterally.

Now, it certainly is true that countries throughout history and before and after the creation of the United Nations have violated that. That doesn't mean that we have the right to do it. It does stand in violation.

KUCINICH: But would an invasion justify an act of self-defense?

BENNIS: An invasion would justify. An invasion of the United States, for example, would allow us to use self-defense and to use military force. In fact, on September 11, if, for example, the U.S. had been able to scramble a jet to take down the second plane before it hit the second tower, that would itself have been a legal use of self-defense.

But the notion of a preemptive strike -- this is not anything that is allowable in international law.

KUCINICH: But what does the War Powers Act say about a preemptive strike? Do you see a connection there?

BENNIS: I don't think the War Powers Act addresses preemption at all. The War Powers Act implies that there is a rationale -- a legal rationale for going to war, and we do not have that here.

KUCINICH: Now, there are some who have suggested that the president has already received authority from Congress to invade Iraq when Congress authorized the war on terrorism. Do you have any comment on that based on your working with international law?

BENNIS: I think that's absolutely the wrong assessment. The language of the congressional resolution was quite specific. It said that it was authorizing force to be used against the perpetrators of the events of 9-11. There is absolutely no evidence, as Scott Ritter just said again, there is no evidence of a link between Iraq and September 11.

There was an effort to do a great deal of publicity about the so- called meeting in Prague between one of the hijackers and an Iraqi intelligence agency. It now turns out on the 17th of July the Prague Post ran a front page interview with the head of the Czech Republic's foreign intelligence service, who said: We have no evidence that this meeting ever even happened, let alone what was discussed at it. So that one sort of fell by the wayside.

So we now have essentially an acknowledgement -- it's not a public acknowledgement, but there's no further evidence, there just isn't anything there. There's no there there to that claim.

KUCINICH: Does it matter if the United States were to move against Iraq without international support?

BENNIS: It matters very much, for several reasons. One, if we do not have explicit United Nations authority, we stand in direct violation of the U.N. Charter, which not only puts us in a position of being an outlaw nation, which I think most Americans do not want to be, but it also sets a terrible example for other nations around the world. It says to India, "You have the right to attack Pakistan, because you're afraid of what they might do with their nuclear bombs with a catastrophic possibility of what could happen in South Asia as a result."

It's not only the legal question, however. It's also a question of what it means, what are the consequences of the United States to go in the face of world opinion and say, "We don't care what the rest of the world says, we are going to go to war anyway." What we say is we have absolute disdain for public opinion in the rest of the world. We don't care what the consequences are for our allies. And it puts Americans, ordinary Americans like us, American citizens at extraordinary risk, because people around the world know that we are a democracy that has some accountability in our government.

BENNIS: Unlike many governments, for example, in the Middle East, where very few of those governments are accountable to public opinion, our government is elected. So there's a reason why people think that American citizens traveling around the world are somehow responsible for what the policies are. That puts us at great risk.

KUCINICH: Well, there are people who say, "Look, our interests are at stake, there's a threat, we have to deal with this threat." What do you say to those people?

BENNIS: First of all, we have to be very concrete about what is a threat and what is not a threat. There is a threat in Iraq, there is a threat in many other countries around the world of weapons of mass destruction being created.

Our government has played a terrible role in the past in making that possible -- providing the seed stock for biological weapons, supporting a weakening of international covenants that are trying to control weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical in particular.

The Bush administration, unfortunately, walked away from negotiations just last November that were designed to increase the enforcement power of the international laws governing chemical weapons.

So we have to set an example. That's our first obligation, I think, as a great power.

Beyond that, we have to just be realistic and say, we don't have the evidence that this is a threat. And whatever threat there might be at some point in the future, it is not a threat now and it is not something that justifies the inevitable killing of potentially hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians and putting at risk hundreds or thousands of young Americans.

KUCINICH: Is there any case in which evidence would and should involve a response from the international community?

BENNIS: I think there should be a response from the international community. I don't think that response should be one of war. I think that we need to respond by tightening the ability of international covenants to impose strict compliance. I think we need to strengthen, for example, the International Atomic Energy Agency.

We need to strengthen the chemical weapons agency that implements the chemical weapons treaty. We have not done that. We have actually undermined that treaty by forcing out the head of the agency whose job it was to enforce the chemical weapons treaty.

I think that we have a great deal of work to do within the international community. It should be regional. We should use this as an opportunity, if we're serious about looking at the international community's possibilities, we can look at Resolution 687 itself and say this gives us a basis to think about a new way of approaching disarmament, that we're not just going after one country, we're going to talk about preventing an entire region from having access to weapons of mass destruction. That would be a tremendous advance.

And even though some people will say, "Well, if we don't provide the weapons other countries might," that's certainly true, but the other side of it is, if we set an example, other countries might follow along.

KUCINICH: Let me ask each of you this question, and that is, should the United States work with the -- or can the United States work with the U.N. Security Council to return weapons inspectors to Iraq?

BENNIS: Absolutely. We had a clear -- as clear as these diplomatic messages ever are -- a clear set of offers in the last couple of weeks from Iraq to return inspectors. Were they absolutely saying, "We completely agree with everything the Security Council said in its last resolution"? No, they were not. But there was certainly an opening to be followed through.

I think that the answer of the secretary general at the United Nations was an appropriate one, saying, this was the Security Council's position, how do you respond to this, how can we move this process forward?

I would hope that perhaps members of our own Congress would respond in a similar way. It is, after all, Congress that has the responsibility for declaring war and for allocating funds or not allocating funds to go to war.

And in that context, I think it's absolutely appropriate for Congress to take advantage of the Iraqi offer on their own and follow up with serious weapons inspectors. Perhaps those weapons inspectors could be UNMOVIC itself, the new U.N. team, to go in with members of Congress and say, "We are prepared to engage in a serious way toward getting inspectors back inside."

KUCINICH: Scott Ritter?

RITTER: Well, let's keep in mind that the United States is one of 15 members of the Security Council and one of five permanent members of the Security Council. We currently chair the presidency of the Security Council right now.

It's not a question of can the U.S. or should the U.S., we must. We are a member of the Security Council. We have an obligation as a member of the United Nations, a leader of the world, to use the council to peacefully resolve disputes. And we have a situation right now where, probably, unless weapons inspectors return to Iraq, there will be a war that will have devastating consequences.

Now, we have a big problem bridging the gap between what the Security Council wants and what Iraq will accept, and that problem comes down to that of confidence in Iraq that inspectors will never again be used as a vehicle to spy on Saddam Hussein.

So I think there's an important -- an additional element that has to come in that may not be able to be generated by the Council or by Iraq or by the secretary general, and that is that of the honest broker, somebody who can come in, not interfere with the work of the Security Council, but somebody who can come forward and say, "We will observe, we will report back to the secretary general what the facts are on the ground," so that there cannot be a repeat of December 1998 where Richard Butler unilaterally shreds agreements that were in place with the Iraqis and then uses Iraqi refusal to allow inspectors to come into a facility to facilitate an American strike.

We should take advantage, for instance, in Canada. There's a tremendous movement under way in Canada as we speak. Alexa McDonough, who is a senior Canadian member of parliament, has come out and said Canada should put its credibility as a nation on the line and say, "We will serve as the honest broker, Canada will intervene, Canada will be the observer."

RITTER: What a tremendous idea. And I think it would be great if the United States Congress could reach out to Canada and encourage Canada, or any other nation, to step forward and provide that extremely essential confidence-building mechanism that I believe has to exist if weapons inspectors are going to go back in.

Because there's no way, given the pollution and the discrediting of the inspection regime that has already taken place by the United States, that Iraq's going to allow unfettered access to inspectors without some sort of assurances that inspectors will never again be used as a means of spying on Saddam.

KUCINICH: Thank you, Mr. Ritter.

Mr. Cortright, should the U.S. work with the U.N. Security Council to return weapons inspectors to Iraq?

CORTRIGHT: Yes, absolutely. And I think, as I said at the outset, the potential that Iraq would develop these weapons and use them is a serious one. We ought to take it and try to address it.

But we can achieve the disarmament by working through the Security Council. The offer I think is on the table, from what Iraq has said, if the U.S. and U.K. will pledge not to use military force so long as Iraq is cooperating in good faith.

And secondly, if we will in fact follow the wording of Resolution 687 and lift the sanctions completely, including the financial controls, that's an inducement which is the actual letter of the law, and would allow Iraq, I think, the confidence to be able to cooperate with UNMOVIC.

Now, it's true that UNSCOM, the previous commission, was manipulated and used for spying purposes. The new commission, we have to remember, is structured differently. UNMOVIC is not an organization in which member states contribute the staff, but where the staff are actually civil servants of the United Nations, and they are obligated under their terms of employment not to work in coordination with any particular member state.

Of course there's no guarantees on this, but UNMOVIC was intentionally set up to try to minimize the political manipulation which was a difficult problem under UNSCOM. And we also have Hans Blix as the executive chairman of UNMOVIC, who has shown himself to be independent, I think seriously interested in developing a bargain here.

So we have this potential. The diplomatic offer is there to be had. The United States simply has to make the decision. Unfortunately the Bush administration, as Phyllis and Scott have said, seems to be not interested at all in returning inspectors.

This despite the fact that President Bush said early on in this debate that the number-one concern is Iraq's potential for weapons of mass destruction. And he's right on that. Saddam Hussein with nuclear weapons is a menace. Saddam Hussein without weapons of mass destruction is just another two-bit dictator, not a major concern.

KUCINICH: Let me ask you this, how can the U.S. be assured that Saddam Hussein would not hinder the inspections?

CORTRIGHT: Well, I think we could expect that they will resist. They will cause trouble, as they did during the UNSCOM period. But the new commission, UNMOVIC, is set up to deal with that.

And despite all of the obstruction, the fabrications, the lies that Iraq was responsible for during the 1990s, the first commission, UNSCOM, was successful in achieving the substantial disarmament of Iraq. You expect that when you're out there as an inspector.

KUCINICH: Can you expect to have clear access and get clear access to all the facilities?

CORTRIGHT: I think you can. There are agreements that are part of this new Resolution 1284 where the government of Iraq has agreed to allow full access to all facilities.

There is some ambiguity about the so-called presidential sites, and there was the agreement that Kofi Annan negotiated in 1998 which said that there would be some diplomats who would accompany the inspectors on some of these so-called sensitive sites. This gets back to the idea of some kind of a neutral party, an honest broker, who could be there to witness the inspection process to satisfy the concerns both of the United Nations as well as of the Iraqi government.

These things can be worked out if there's a real interest.

KUCINICH: Well, do you think if there's clear and open access that all the weapons of mass destruction which may or may not exist would be able to be ascertained?

CORTRIGHT: Yes. We can be very certain, with a high degree of confidence, on nuclear weapons capability, on long-range ballistic missiles, on the production capacity for chemical weapons.

There will always be some uncertainties and ambiguities regarding biological capabilities because of the very nature of these systems that are dual-use. And some precursor elements or chemical agents may never be found.

But 99 percent, 95 percent, whatever it is, we can be highly confident that we can get rid of the most dangerous weapons of mass destruction.

KUCINICH: I want to come right back to you, but let me ask that same question to Scott Ritter, who was weapons inspector for seven years.

If there's clear access to all the facilities, can we, you know, have some reasonable assurance that we could eliminate any weapons of mass destruction which may or may not exist?

RITTER: Despite all the obstacles that Iraq put up to the inspectors, I think we also have to highlight that there was a tremendous amount of cooperation.

But even when they didn't cooperate, let's be clear about one thing: Every time the Iraqis lied to the weapons inspectors, we uncovered the lies. We had the best forensic investigation capabilities the world has ever seen, and if UNMOVIC gets back in they will be able to replicate this. If Iraq is lying, the inspectors will find out and they will have hard evidence to back this up.

So, yes, get the inspectors in, and no matter what, no matter what, they will be able to ascertain whether or not Iraq has reconstituted significant weapons of mass destruction capability.

KUCINICH: Thank you, Scott Ritter.

David Cortright, can we reform sanctions?

CORTRIGHT: Well, there's been some progress in that direction. The, many of the worst aspects of the total trade embargo have been lifted. But I think more needs to be done.

What we've been advocating for some years is that the ban on investment needs to be lifted. Until there is the opportunity for foreign firms to invest in Iraq, their economy is going to be depressed, and especially in the oil industry.

And I think we ought to be putting our minds to how we could allow for further investment in Iraq and ways to monitor how those payments are made to the Iraqi government to try to limit the potential for them to be used for weapons redevelopment. So that's an important step.

KUCINICH: Is there a way to reform sanctions and protect civilians, so you don't have situations where you have Iraqi children dying because they can't get access to basic materials to provide health care?

CORTRIGHT: Well, the Security Council has been attempting to do that. The whole oil-for-food program was essentially an attempt. And it's had some impact, but I think until there's actual economic redevelopment we're still going to have the continuing social hardships and humanitarian consequences of these sanctions.

KUCINICH: Has containment failed?

CORTRIGHT: Well, actually, I think containment has worked. The one thing about the sanctions that has been successful is containment.

CORTRIGHT: The sanctions have not been very effective in convincing Saddam Hussein to accept U.N. resolutions. But as an instrument of military containment, they have been highly effective. Saddam Hussein is much weaker now militarily than he was in 1990. Their capacity to redevelop their weapons program has been significantly reduced. This is a partial success.

And the principal factor accounting for that has been the revenue controls. The General Accounting Office did a report earlier this year indicating that between 80 and 85 percent of all Iraqi oil revenues continued to be deposited in the U.N. escrow account.

So despite all of the smuggling and all the kickback schemes that Saddam has organized -- and they're doing a lot of that -- most of the money continues to go to the U.N. account. And that provides a way of controlling what Iraq spends its money on, and it prevents Iraq from using it for military reconstruction.

KUCINICH: I am going to ask each of our participants here to make a one-minute summary statement, and let's begin with Phyllis Bennis.

BENNIS: The United States has functionally been at war with Iraq for 12 years, a war fought with economic sanctions and with bombing, which these days goes on at about a two- to three-times-a-week basis. Many, many civilians have been killed. No one named Saddam Hussein has been hurt by this.

If we go to war, a full-scale war now, we will be risking our own position in the world. We will be throwing the Middle East into even greater turmoil. We will be antagonizing our friends and allies around the world. And we will be expressing extraordinary distain for the United Nations, for international law and for multilateral accountability. We will be, in short, acting like a rogue state. I hope that we do not do that.

KUCINICH: Scott Ritter?

RITTER: I think I've made it clear that if Iraq poses a threat to the United States, I believe the United States has the right to defend itself, and I would be supportive of that. But it's imperative that before we undertake military action to do that, that we ascertain, does Iraq pose a threat?

I hope I've made it clear to everybody in this audience that, to date, Iraq has not been found to represent a threat with anything other than speculative rhetoric. And if Iraq isn't a threat, if Iraq does not pose a national security -- a risk to the national security of the United States, then one must start asking the question, why are we speaking of war?

And when you start delving down that path, you will find that this has less to do with weapons of mass destruction -- because if we really were concerned about weapons of mass destruction, we would be speaking of returning inspectors to Iraq, not removing the regime of Saddam Hussein.

This has less to do with national security and more to do with domestic American politics, where we have allowed a handful of people to hijack the national security policy mechanisms of the United States and pursue their own ideologically driven political ambitions.

This is about people who have invested a considerable amount of political capital into the concept of regime removal. And now that they finally have their hands on the reins of power, are abusing this power to seek to fulfill what has been their own ideological ambition, the elimination of Saddam Hussein. That is not reason to go to war.

If we are to fight this war, we must be able to discern a threat from Iraq. We have not been able to do so. And short of that, it's time that the Congress of the United States, as the representatives of the people of the United States, step into the breech and take control of this agenda. It's wrong to be speaking of war when no case for war has been made.

KUCINICH: David Cortright?

CORTRIGHT: This is a dangerous moment for our country. I'm deeply worried about the consequences for our nation and for the world should we proceed with this unilateral, preemptive war without allies against Iraq.

The number-one security concern for all of us in this country is the terrorist threat. We were attacked viciously a little less than a year ago, and our number-one concern is to prevent future terrorist attacks. If we go to war against Iraq, we are going to make the terrorist threat worse in two ways.

One is because we will be a Western country attacking and occupying an Arab country, and it'll be like a recruitment poster for suicide bombers and political extremists. That's exactly what they want from us. They want us to take an extreme action so they can be motivated for extreme hostile measures toward our countries.

But it will also undermine the international cooperation that we need in the campaign against terrorism. They talk about the war against terrorism. That's not really the military action in Afghanistan. It's the international cooperation that we've been able to mobilize with more than 150 countries to deny finances to terrorists, to cooperate in an international criminal prosecution against those who perpetrated the heinous crimes of September 11.

That is our number-one priority. And if we go to war, we will divert from that, we will make the situation worse.

There are alternatives for addressing legitimate security concerns in Iraq. Let's take care of those alternatives and focus on the primary job, which is preventing future terrorist attacks.

KUCINICH: Thank you, David Cortright.

Scott Ritter has served as a chief weapons inspector for the United Nations' special commission in Iraq. I want to thank Scott.

Phyllis Bennis is a fellow of the Institute of Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.

David Cortright is president of the Fourth Freedom Forum and a visiting fellow at the University of Notre Dame.

I'm Congressman Dennis Kucinich.

I just want to summarize briefly what we've talked about, that we haven't seen evidence that the talk of going to war would really be justified on the basis of what we know at the moment about Iraq, that an attempt at war would alienate our allies, it would create instability in the Middle East, that Iraq is not showing as an urgent threat to the United States, that it would damage global counterterrorism efforts, that it could provoke Iraq to use weapons, if it has them.

I'm also concerned about the necessity for the United States to focus on our responsibilities to help Israel and Palestine deal with their grave difficulties, as well as to help India and Pakistan deal with their concerns over Kashmir.

KUCINICH: I'm also concerned that up to 250,000 American men and women troops may be asked to go over there at grave risk to their lives and the lives of innocent civilians in Iraq, that this could spark a new arms raise, and that this could end up costing the American taxpayers dearly as well.

I want to say as a member of Congress, I participated in a 1999 peace mission to Vienna to meet with the Russians to come up with a plan that, eventually, the G-8 used as a pattern to bring a resolution to the conflict in Serbia. We met with the Russians, while the Russians had, at the moment, appeared to be at loggerheads with us over Serbia. Russia could be one of those partners that could be of assistance to us at this time, as well as Canada, in trying to find a path toward resolution of these difficulties.

Iraq has made an offer to welcome members of Congress. I think that if something like that is to be pursued that it would have to be with weapons inspectors, it would have to be a bipartisan effort, and that there would have to be open and free access to all potential sites.

I believe that war is not inevitable, that peace is inevitable, but it's going to require a lot of work to get there.

I want to thank all of our participants here today. There will be another such forum on the 4th of September at 1:00 p.m., and all of you will be notified of it.

At this time, if the participants want to answer any questions of the media or if the media has any questions -- we're through with our one hour, but I think we have a few minutes to be able to answer any questions.

Do you, Scott, have a moment?

So this is open for any questions, and then, if there are none, we'll simply conclude. Anyone?

Yes?

QUESTION: Any concerns over what an invasion would mean for the energy sector? Any concern at all?

KUCINICH: Well, you know, certainly there's been speculation that we're looking at the rising price of oil. We've already seen that the oil industry, anticipating that there might be an invasion, has started to cut back on their purchase of Iraqi oil, figuring that the supply might not be there. But, you know, that's something that certainly is being taken into account.

Next question. Yes?

And if you have a question that's directed to any of the other participants, please direct it to them and they'll respond.

QUESTION: Do we have any reason to believe that there's information that the administration might have that -- Mr. Ritter, you've called for them sharing this information publicly -- that they can't share because it might leak intelligence methods or sources?

RITTER: Look, the Constitution of the United States allows for the government to carry out consultations behind closed doors. So what this means is, if the government has secret information that would risk sources and methods of intelligence, by all means, they have no obligation to share it to the general public, nor should they.

However, there is an oversight mechanism. The Senate Select Intelligence Committee comes to mind. And I have spoken with senior members of this committee, and to date, they have not been shown any such information.

If the government has this information, I would find it incumbent upon the government, the Bush administration, to share it with those members of U.S. Congress who are responsible for oversight and also share it with our allies. I have been to NATO. I have briefed NATO. I have spoken with NATO representatives. And the U.S. government continues to call Iraq a threat without providing any factual information to back this threat up.

The United States has no allies in this war on Iraq. If we have intelligence information that can show without any doubt Iraq's continued efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction or continued possession of weapons of mass destruction, we must, in the interest of our national security, share it not only with Congress, but also our allies so that we aren't going it alone.

The fact that we have no one step-by-step with us in this ongoing potential of war with Iraq speaks volumes to the fact that the government, to date, either doesn't have this information or hasn't shared it, and I'll go with the first.

KUCINICH: I would like to add, as the ranking Democrat on the Government Oversight Subcommittee that specifically has jurisdiction over the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency, we've never been provided with any kind of a briefing that would suggest and justify action against Iraq.

So if I had a briefing, I could say, "Well, we've had a briefing and I do have concerns and we should be very cautious about discounting or disconfirming the condition with respect to Iraq." But it hasn't happened.

So I just wanted to add that, because in my capacity as the ranking Democrat on that subcommittee, I think that, you know, we'd learn something. In the past administrations, although I had a difference in policy with the Clinton administration on some things, we were briefed even though I disagreed. We're not being briefed on this.

Next question. Yes?

QUESTION: Going back to what you mentioned about the Iraqi government's offer of having a U.S. congressional delegation to into Iraq, are you saying that you think it's a possibility, that you think it's likely, that you would be open to the idea?

KUCINICH: Well, I think, first of all, that it's wise to work with our allies and intermediaries. The United States had a great difficulty, as we know, in the 1999 war in Serbia, and we received help from the Russians in bringing about a resolution. Whether it's Canada or Russia, we may be able to get the help of other nations in bringing about a resolution, avoiding a war.

The U.S. Congress has played a role in the past. We're not weapons inspectors, however. So if we are invited, we would have to be accompanied by weapons inspectors, it would have to be a bipartisan delegation, there would have to be open access to all of the facilities, no interference, and then we talk about it and compare notes.

But, you know, there is a reason for some skepticism here, but I think in order to seize the moment and avoid war, which is really what we're here to do, we need to explore all available opportunities, but do it in consultation with our closest allies, do it in a bipartisan way and set some conditions about our participation.

QUESTION: Congressman, do you feel that you are in the minority in Congress, that the (inaudible) of war are louder than your call for restraint?

KUCINICH: As far as being in a minority, let me give you an example, just from my political experience going back to being a city councilman and a mayor in Cleveland.

Any one of us in life may have had the opportunity to take a position that looks like it might be ahead of a few people.

KUCINICH: But it's kind of like a bird that suddenly lights on a wire, but it's the first bird on the wire. But if you watch that wire, there are other birds that are on their way. And before you know it, there's a number of birds on that wire. I expect there's going to be a lot of company very soon on that wire, so I don't feel lonely.

And I think that we should anticipate, all of us who have taken this position, that as the American people begin to hear a broader discussion, they will begin to understand that there are many complexities here which would warrant a great deal of caution in moving toward a war with Iraq and a lot of good reasons to avoid war and to work for peace through disarmament.

Next question? Yes?

QUESTION: I think that your panel has been most helpful to restore some rationality. But assuming the worst case and war becomes imminent, I wonder if you, Congressman, or the rest of the panel could comment on the proposal of voices in the wilderness and the Christian peace-making team to send U.S. human shields to protect the Article 54 infrastructure of Iraq, that is, those items which are always banned from being attacked because the life of the civilians depends upon them?

KUCINICH: Phyllis Bennis?

BENNIS: I think it's a very important task. I think that the political role of having Americans in harm's way on the other side, if you will, is a very important statement.

When I accompanied the congressional aides to Iraq in 1999, on my return I spoke at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. And I happened to meet the commander of Operation Southern Watch, who had just rotated back from his six months in Saudi Arabia. And he was there to hear me speak, and we met, and it was very cordial.

And I said to him, you know, our sense was that for the five days that the aides were on the ground in Iraq, if nothing else, Iraqi civilians were spared five days of bombing. And he laughed and he said, "Yes, that was how we saw it, too." And I said, "Well, if that is your understanding that this really is political and this isn't about self-defense, as everybody keeps claiming, how can you justify it?" And he looked at me for a minute and he stood back and he said, (MOTIONS). That was his answer. It was political. It was amusing to a certain degree. And it was not serious.

But what was serious was the recognition that having Americans on the ground meant they were not going to bomb. They were not going to risk hurting one of those American congressional staffers. That was the serious part of what he said. And I think that is a very important role.

I do think that our most important role in this country, as citizens, as taxpayers, as residents, as Americans, is to prevent the war from happening rather than looking ahead to what we're going to do if it happens. We're going to stop it.

KUCINICH: Thank you.

David Cortright?

CORTRIGHT: Yes, I would echo what Phyllis just said. I wrote an article recently with the title, "Stop the War Before It Starts." And that really is our mission as American citizens. We have a democracy here, and we need to become more informed and to take action.

As I said earlier, we face a grave threat now. Our country is in danger, and the danger is from our own political leadership that is proposing this unilateral, preemptive war.

We have to stop it. We can, as citizens, if we organize and demand that our elected leaders put a stop to this.

KUCINICH: We'll take two more questions. Yes?

QUESTION: Well, it seems that there are some birds already sitting on that wire you mentioned, which are people like Dick Armey and Chuck Hagel. And I wonder if you are reaching out to some of your Republican colleagues to get some bipartisan movement going, perhaps a sense of Congress resolution that we, people who are out in the hinterlands, can be pushing our congresspeople to sign onto saying that we don't support a U.S. attack against Iraq?

KUCINICH: I think that when Congress returns you're going to see a lot of discussion about that. And that's why I've set the date for some other hearings on the 4th and the 12th, because there will be other members of Congress who are also going to be participating in that.

Thank you. I want to thank all of you for your presence here today, and hopefully you'll have a chance to return at our next discussion.

Thank you very much.