##news flash..saddam left for libya##, page-5

koza memo and a few stats you bugga



what a headliner opportunity



Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war

Secret document details American plan to bug phones and emails of key Security Council members

Read the memo

Talk about it: dirty tricks?

Martin Bright, Ed Vulliamy in New York and Peter Beaumont
Sunday March 2, 2003
The Observer

The United States is conducting a secret 'dirty tricks' campaign against UN Security Council delegations in New York as part of its battle to win votes in favour of war against Iraq.
Details of the aggressive surveillance operation, which involves interception of the home and office telephones and the emails of UN delegates in New York, are revealed in a document leaked to The Observer.

The disclosures were made in a memorandum written by a top official at the National Security Agency - the US body which intercepts communications around the world - and circulated to both senior agents in his organisation and to a friendly foreign intelligence agency asking for its input.

The memo describes orders to staff at the agency, whose work is clouded in secrecy, to step up its surveillance operations 'particularly directed at... UN Security Council Members (minus US and GBR, of course)' to provide up-to-the-minute intelligence for Bush officials on the voting intentions of UN members regarding the issue of Iraq.

The leaked memorandum makes clear that the target of the heightened surveillance efforts are the delegations from Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Mexico, Guinea and Pakistan at the UN headquarters in New York - the so-called 'Middle Six' delegations whose votes are being fought over by the pro-war party, led by the US and Britain, and the party arguing for more time for UN inspections, led by France, China and Russia.

The memo is directed at senior NSA officials and advises them that the agency is 'mounting a surge' aimed at gleaning information not only on how delegations on the Security Council will vote on any second resolution on Iraq, but also 'policies', 'negotiating positions', 'alliances' and 'dependencies' - the 'whole gamut of information that could give US policymakers an edge in obtaining results favourable to US goals or to head off surprises'.

Dated 31 January 2003, the memo was circulated four days after the UN's chief weapons inspector Hans Blix produced his interim report on Iraqi compliance with UN resolution 1441.

It was sent by Frank Koza, chief of staff in the 'Regional Targets' section of the NSA, which spies on countries that are viewed as strategically important for United States interests.

Koza specifies that the information will be used for the US's 'QRC' - Quick Response Capability - 'against' the key delegations.

Suggesting the levels of surveillance of both the office and home phones of UN delegation members, Koza also asks regional managers to make sure that their staff also 'pay attention to existing non-UN Security Council Member UN-related and domestic comms [office and home telephones] for anything useful related to Security Council deliberations'.

Koza also addresses himself to the foreign agency, saying: 'We'd appreciate your support in getting the word to your analysts who might have similar more indirect access to valuable information from accesses in your product lines [ie, intelligence sources].' Koza makes clear it is an informal request at this juncture, but adds: 'I suspect that you'll be hearing more along these lines in formal channels.'

Disclosure of the US operation comes in the week that Blix will make what many expect to be his final report to the Security Council.

It also comes amid increasingly threatening noises from the US towards undecided countries on the Security Council who have been warned of the unpleasant economic consequences of standing up to the US.

Sources in Washington familiar with the operation said last week that there had been a division among Bush administration officials over whether to pursue such a high-intensity surveillance campaign with some warning of the serious consequences of discovery.

The existence of the surveillance operation, understood to have been requested by President Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice, is deeply embarrassing to the Americans in the middle of their efforts to win over the undecided delegations.

The language and content of the memo were judged to be authentic by three former intelligence operatives shown it by The Observer. We were also able to establish that Frank Koza does work for the NSA and could confirm his senior post in the Regional Targets section of the organisation.

The NSA main switchboard put The Observer through to extension 6727 at the agency which was answered by an assistant, who confirmed it was Koza's office. However, when The Observer asked to talk to Koza about the surveillance of diplomatic missions at the United Nations, it was then told 'You have reached the wrong number'.

On protesting that the assistant had just said this was Koza's extension, the assistant repeated that it was an erroneous extension, and hung up.

While many diplomats at the UN assume they are being bugged, the memo reveals for the first time the scope and scale of US communications intercepts targeted against the New York-based missions.

The disclosure comes at a time when diplomats from the countries have been complaining about the outright 'hostility' of US tactics in recent days to persuade then to fall in line, including threats to economic and aid packages.

The operation appears to have been spotted by rival organisations in Europe. 'The Americans are being very purposeful about this,' said a source at a European intelligence agency when asked about the US surveillance efforts.
........................

Take the 'War'-on-Iraq IQ Test

Do you know enough to justify going to war with Iraq?

*********************************

1. Q: What percentage of the world's population does the U.S. have?

A: 6%

2. Q: What percentage of the world's wealth does the U.S. have?

A: 50%

3. Q: Which country has the largest oil reserves?

A: Saudi Arabia

4. Q: Which country has the second largest oil reserves?

A: Iraq

5. Q: How much is spent on military budgets a year worldwide?

A: $900+ billion

6. Q: How much of this is spent by the U.S.?

A: 50% (The United States Government will spend more on the military in
fiscal year 2003, than all the rest of the countries on Earth combined)

7. Q: What percent of US military spending would ensure the essentials
of life to everyone in the world, according to the UN?

A: 10% (that's about $40 billion, the amount of funding initially
requested to fund the US retaliatory attack on Afghanistan).

8. Q: How many people have died in wars since World War II?

A: 86 million

9. Q: How long has Iraq had chemical and biological weapons?

A: Since the early 1980's.

10. Q: Did Iraq develop these chemical & biological weapons on their
own?

A: No, the materials and technology were supplied by the US government,
along with Britain and private corporations.

11. Q: Did the US government condemn the Iraqi use of gas warfare
against Iran?

A: No

12. Q: How many people did Saddam Hussein kill using gas in the Kurdish
town of Halabja in 1988?

A: 5,000

13. Q: How many western countries condemned this action at the time?

A: 0

14. Q: How many gallons of agent Orange did America use in Vietnam?

A: 17million.

15. Q: Are there any proven links between Iraq and September 11th
terrorist attack?

A: No

16. Q: What is the estimated number of civilian casualties in the Gulf
War?

A: 35,000

17. Q: How many casualties did the Iraqi military inflict on the western
forces during the Gulf War ?

A: Close to 0

18. Q: How many retreating Iraqi soldiers were buried alive by U.S.
tanks with ploughs mounted on the front?

A: 6,000

19. Q: How many tons of depleted uranium were left in Iraq and Kuwait
after the Gulf War?

A: 40 tons

20. Q: What according to the UN was the increase in cancer rates in Iraq
between 1991 and 1994?

A: 700%

21. Q: How much of Iraq's military capacity did America claim it had
destroyed in 1991?

A: 80%

22. Q: Is there any proof that Iraq plans to use its weapons for
anything other than deterrence and self defense?

A: No

23. Q: Does Iraq present more of a threat to world peace now than 10
years ago?

A: No

24. Q: How many civilian deaths has the Pentagon predicted in the event
of an attack on Iraq in 2002/3?

A: 10,000

25. Q: What percentage of these will be children?

A: Over 50%

26. Q: How many years has the U.S. engaged in air strikes on Iraq?

A: 11 years

27. Q: Were the U.S and the UK at war with Iraq between December 1998
and September 1999?

A: No

28. Q: How many pounds of explosives were dropped on Iraq between
December 1998 and September 1999?

A: 20 million

29. Q: How many years ago was UN Resolution 661 introduced, imposing
strict sanctions on Iraq's imports and exports?

A: 12 years

30. Q: What was the child death rate in Iraq in 1989 (per 1,000 births)?

A: 38

31. Q: What was the estimated child death rate in Iraq in 1999 (per
1,000 births)?

A: 131 (that's an increase of 345%)

32. Q: How many Iraqis are estimated to have died by October 1999 as a
result of UN sanctions?

A: 1.5 million

33. Q: How many Iraqi children are estimated to have died due to
sanctions since 1997?

A: 750,000

34. Q: Did Saddam order the inspectors out of Iraq?

A: No

35. Q: How many inspections were there in November and December 1998?

A: 300

36. Q: How many of these inspections had problems?

A: 5

37. Q: Were the weapons inspectors allowed entry to the Ba'ath Party HQ?

A: Yes

38. Q: Who said that by December 1998, "Iraq had in fact, been disarmed
to a level unprecedented in modern history."

A: Scott Ritter, UNSCOM chief

39. Q: In 1998 how much of Iraq's post 1991 capacity to develop weapons
of mass destruction did the UN weapons inspectors claim to have
discovered and dismantled?

A: 90%

40. Q: Is Iraq willing to allow the weapons inspectors back in ?

A: Yes

41. Q: How many UN resolutions did Israel violate by 1992?

A: Over 65

42. Q: How many UN resolutions on Israel did America veto between 1972
and 1990?

A: 30+

44. Q: How many countries are known to have nuclear weapons?

A: 8

45. Q: How many nuclear warheads has Iraq got?

A: 0

46. Q: How many nuclear warheads has US got?

A: over 10,000

47. Q: Which is the only country to use nuclear weapons?

A: the US

48. Q: How many nuclear warheads does Israel have?

A: Over 400

50. Q: Who said, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about
things that matter"?

A: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr

*********************************

Charles Sheketoff, Executive Director Oregon Center for Public Policy PO
Box 7, Silverton, OR 97381

The United States Government will spend more on the military in fiscal
year 2003, than all the rest of the countries on Earth combined.

Current expenditures are 437 billion and our past obligations are 339
billion,
this equals 776 billion. 46% of our Taxes go to the Military Industrial
Complex
(See: http://www.warresisters.org/piechart.htm)

This figure doesn't even begin to account for all of the off-budget,
black projects, homeland security, nor the 40+ billion the United States
Government will spend on intelligence in 2003.