In this issue:

French Paper Reports Saddam Aiming for Guerrilla Warfare

Choice for U.S.: Kill 200,000 Civilians by Clobbering Baghdad, or Accept 3,000 Dead GIs

Veteran British MP Tam Dalyell Calls Blair a War Criminal

Are We Witnessing the Madness of Tony Blair? Asks London Times Commentator

France Blasts U.S. Over Iraq War

Italian Government in Trouble: U.S. Airborne Brigade Moved Out from Italian Soil

Angela Merkel, Bush Cheerleader in Germany, Increasingly Isolated in her Christian Democratic Party

Blair Calls Chirac After Summit with Bush

De Villepin Infuriated at New York Times Reports of His Remarks in London

IMF: One More Financial Shock Could Do It

From Volume 2, Issue Number 13 of Electronic Intelligence Weekly, Published Mar. 31, 2003

Western European News Digest

French Paper Reports Saddam Aiming for Guerrilla Warfare

According to the March 25 issue of the French paper Le Figaro, "Drawing on the lessons of the first Gulf War, the Iraqi regime seems to have abandoned the idea of a tactical war, in favor of guerrilla warfare fought by autonomous and mobile units," in the words of reporter Isabelle Lasserre. "On the eve of the war, Saddam Hussein divided the country into four military zones, each having large powers. This military division of the country allows the regime today to face up more efficiently to the breakdown of the lines of command with Baghdad which will follow the encirclement of cities by the coalition armies. Just before the beginning of the war, members of Saddam's Feddayin, of the paramilitary organization of the Ba'ath Party, of the Republican Guard, and of the security special forces, groups loyal to the regime, were integrated in the units of the regular army, as was the case in Uum Qasr, in order to stop them from capitulating.

"Those small mobile groups, often mixed in with the civilian population, carry out ambushes in urban areas, launch attacks against the American forces, in the same way that the Chechens have been doing for years against the Russians in Grozny," Lasserre wrote.

An op ed in the same March 25 issue of Le Figaro claimed that the fact that the Anglo-Americans opted in the beginning for a strategy aimed at "decapitating" the Iraqi regime, gave room to the regular Iraqi army, which was able to deploy itself according to its new strategy in the different cities. In his op ed, Col. Jean Claude Dufour also wrote that since the Americans didn't want to have to reconstruct infrastructure after the war, they decided not to destroy that infrastructure, with the result that the Iraqis were able to use that to their advantage.

The Americans will also pay a penalty because they didn't deploy enough troops, and have therefore not been able to take and secure cities such as Nasiriyah and Basra, Dufour said.

Finally, also March 25, the Parisian paper Liberation wrote that the Anglo-American offensive "has provoked a patriotic reflex" in Iraq. "It was supposed to be like a very large police operation aimed at stopping a small number of people linked to the dictatorship and not a war of destruction of the large Iraqi cities," but that's not how it's turning out.

Choice for U.S.: Kill 200,000 Civilians by Clobbering Baghdad, or Accept 3,000 Dead GIs

Colonel Jean Louis Dufour, military consultant with various French media, evaluated in Le Figaro March 30 the choices facing the Anglo-American war effort in Iraq. There is nothing more normal than to adapt the war plans according to need, he stated. But everything is up in the air, he asserted, because "The Iraqis are not playing by the rules. Their old tanks have no computers on board! Their airplanes are not flying. Saddam's army has done what the Serbs did in 1999, by not turning on their radar, rendering totally inoperative those missiles designed to aim toward radar signals aimed at them. Difficult to make war against an enemy who is not in conformity!" In essence, Dufour said, the Iraqis' new guerrilla tactics have forced the Anglo-Americans to demand more ground troops to secure their flanks.

The problem is, that "the American ground forces lack men. It had 780,000 soldiers in 1991, only 480,000 today. The 300,000 it will have to call up—an enormous proportion—will not be able to be reinforced." This means, continues Dufour, "that they must finish the job quickly." "If the Pentagon agrees to go into the battle of Baghdad, it would go, head down, into the trap set for it by Saddam, be forced to fight on unchosen territory, and to consent to fight a war, which aside from the Marines, only few units are prepared to fight." Traditionally, the American army has been able to win "through its crushing power." At this point, he said, "Firepower alone can force the enemy to concede." Nobody, no matter how combative, can bear the constant explosion of bombs. The Chechens were not able to hold for more than a month against the continuous firepower of the Russians, and the Iraqis, claimed Dufour, will not be able to hold much longer either. It is then up to the Bush Administration to choose between "two politically inconvenient choices: the death of 200,000 civilians or battle losses of 3,000 GIs."

Veteran British MP Tam Dalyell Calls Blair a War Criminal

"Blair, the War Criminal," was the title of an extremely important commentary March 27 in the London Guardian, written by Tam Dalyell, longest-serving member of the House of Commons. (Dalyell last weekend sent a message of greeting, and welcome for Lyndon LaRouche's efforts to stop an Iraq war, to the Schiller Institute's conference in Bad Schwalbach, Germany.)

Dalyell began his column by noting that the Labour Party in his Linlithgow, Scotland constituency, has "just voted to recommend that Tony Blair reconsider his position as [Labour] party leader, because he gave British backing to a war against Iraq, without clearly expressed support from the UN."

"Reconsider his position" is a procedural euphemism in Labour Party politics for "resign."

Dalyell wrote that he agreed with this Linlithow decision, since Blair "should be branded as a war criminal and sent to The Hague. I have served in the House of Commons, as a Labour member for 41 years, and I would never have dreamed of saying this about any one of my previous leaders. But Blair is a man who has disdain for both the House of Commons and international law. This is a grave thing to say about my leader. But it is far less serious than the results of a war that could set western Christendom against Islam."

Dalyell noted that "the overwhelming majority of international lawyers" have concluded that this war is "illegal under international law." This includes a partner in Cherie Blair's Matrix Chambers law firm (Cherie Blair being Tony Blair's wife), and Elizabeth Wilmhurst, the deputy legal adviser to the Foreign Office, who has resigned. Dalyell noted that lawyers are already "getting phone calls from anxious members of the armed forces."

Dalyell charged that Blair has given President Bush and Co. a "fig leaf" for the war, which is all the more terrible since, if Britain had held firm against the war, this might have had a strong effect on "U.S. public opinion," which might "itself have stopped the war." He insisted that he himself is far from being anti-American, having been formerly on the executive of the British-American parliamentary group, and being a distant relative of the late President Harry S Truman.

His concluding paragraph read: "As Napoleon and Hitler found with the snows at the gate of Moscow, so Blair and Bush might find that the biggest weapon of mass destruction they encounter, before the gates of Baghdad, is the Sun. They might be wise to pull out troops now, before they are cooked in the sands of the desert while laying siege to the city. They may lose political face, but the careers of Bush and Blair are of little consequence compared to environmental mayhem and military agony."

Are We Witnessing the Madness of Tony Blair? Asks London Times Commentator

Are we witnessing the Madness of Tony Blair? asked London Times commentator Matthew Paris in a March 29 column playing on the title of a movie from a few years back, The Madness of King George.

Commentator Paris expressed concern that perhaps Prime Minister Tony Blair is slowly losing his mind, much as King George III did 200 years ago, citing examples of Blair's behavior to suggest, "There are good reasons why those at the top can go quietly bonkers before their inferiors wake up to the warning signs."

The first example cited was Blair's ability to refer information that he can't share with anyone. Wrote Paris, "Cornered by reality, 'private sources' are the last refuge of the deluded." A second example of Blair's behavior cited was the circumstance when Blair claimed last week, during a joint press conference with President Bush, that two British soldiers were executed by the Iraqis in cold blood—without giving a thought to what impression that would make on the grieving parents. (The British government has since apologized to the families of the two dead soldiers for the remark, but stands by the charges.)

Paris also noted Blair's logic problem. "The Prime Minister has lost his sense of how his indignation at Iraqi brutality jars, coming from someone attacking a country whose puny forces are grotesquely outgunned by ours," he wrote. Furthermore, Blair's anger at the French for opposing the war shows that "he displays a demented capacity to convince himself that it is the other guy who is cheating."

And then there was his remark to Parliament that he would ignore UN Security Council vetoes that were "capricious" or "unreasonable," which, coming from a trained lawyer, is "stark, staring bonkers." "No sane lawyer could have said what Blair said," Paris wrote. After describing Blair's "hopeless, desperate optimism," Paris concluded, "Have the rest of the Cabinet tumbled yet to the understanding that this may not be about Iraq at all, but about the Prime Minister?"

France Blasts U.S. Over Iraq War

"France Blasts U.S. Over Iraq" was the title of an Agence France Presse wire, reporting on French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin's statements to France TV on March 25. "Force must be used only as a last resort, because it risks deepening the wounds of the world," said de Villepin. "No country can set itself up as the world's guardian"—if one nation does so, then "We could imagine tomorrow seeing force used in other crises in the world." Faced with various world crises, "we need to find each other," he continued. "How can we resolve the Middle East? Can one state resolve the crisis in the Middle East?"

The French Foreign Minister said the U.S. had "no choice" but to work through the UN, noting that the U.S. "needs the UN right now to confront the humanitarian emergency" in Iraq.

Italian Government in Trouble: U.S. Airborne Brigade Moved Out from Italian Soil

The Italian government is in trouble because the U.S. 173rd Airborne Brigade moved to Iraq from Italian soil. According to a policy statement issued by the Italian Supreme Defense Council, Italy's "non-belligerent" position on the Iraq war includes the fact that military structures in Italy cannot be used as "bases for a direct attack to Iraqi targets." Bases can be used for transit, supplies, and maintenance of vehicles. Trespassing such dispositions would violate the Italian Constitution, which rejects war.

But the U.S. 173rd Airborne Brigade, which was parachuted March 27 into Northern Iraq, was flown in from the air base in Vicenza, northern Italy. This has created an uproar in the Parliament, where the opposition, and also someone from the ranks of the majority party, have called on the government to suspend U.S.-Italian bilateral agreements. Prime Minister Berlusconi has communicated to Parliament that the U.S. 173rd Airborne Brigade will have only humanitarian aims. Senators Andreotti and Cossiga have stated that those U.S. soldiers cannot be allowed to return to Italian bases if they fire one shot.

Angela Merkel, Bush Cheerleader in Germany, Increasingly Isolated in her Christian Democratic Party

Leading Bush cheerleader in Germany, Angela Merkel, is increasingly isolated among the Christian Democrats—the party she leads, which is currently in the opposition to the ruling Social Democratic/Green Party coalition.

With the sole exception of Friedbert Pflueger (who arranged Merkel's botched U.S. trip at the end of February that drew such criticism back in Germany), none of the prominent Christian Democrats is really backing the CDU chairwoman. The trouble for Merkel began at the end of the week before last, when Edmund Stoiber, chairman of the Christian Social Union, the Bavarian-based little sister and partner of the CDU, endorsed the United Nations process as a priority, and said that the passive support which Social Democratic Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder grants to the U.S. by allowing them the use of their bases in Germany, and overflight rights in German airspace, is "the maximum that a German government should do." This in itself was a slap in Merkel's face, since she has supported the war.

Over the past few days, other CDU leaders have criticized the Iraq war as wrong, including former German Health Minister Rita Suessmuth, former CDU Party General Manager Heiner Geissler, and the CDU state section chairmen of Saarland, Lower Saxony and Hesse (Peter Mueller, Christian Wulff, Roland Koch). Suessmuth and Geissler, who also said the war is against international law, were backed up by former German President Richard von Weizsaecker. It is reported that speakers at CDU meetings these days get a lot of applause, when calling this "the wrong war."

Even taking into account that many Christian Democrats have older accounts to settle with Merkel over other issues, the fact that the rebellion against her centers around the war issue, could spell big trouble for her in the near future.

Blair Calls Chirac After Summit with Bush

According to AFP, Blair called Jacques Chirac this morning to inform him of the results of the summit with Bush. Both reportedly agreed on "the importance of the role to be entrusted to the United Nations after the conflict." Chirac communicated to Blair "his worry about the developments of the war and its consequences" and repeated to Blair "his wish that military operations would end as fast as possible with the least possible damage." Both leaders reaffirmed their common desire "that France and Great Britain work closely together" in the aftermath of the Iraq war.

De Villepin Infuriated at New York Times Reports of His Remarks in London

French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin is said to be furious at the New York Times allegations of remarks he made at a London press conference March 27. The Times report, which has also been run on numerous European and other international media, claims that in response to a journalist's question, the French diplomat said he is in favor of the Americans winning the war in Iraq.

De Villepin declared in Paris that the Times report was a falsification, and he had never said what it wrote. Instead, he had told that journalist that he would not answer his question about preferences in this war, because the journalist had apparently not listened to what de Villepin had said before, at the press conference—during which he had endorsed the return of the Iraq issue to the United Nations agenda.

French diplomatic sources in Paris interpreted the Times story as a disinformation move designed to create obstacles for de Villepin on the eve of his meeting with the Foreign Ministers of Germany and Russia in Berlin and Moscow, respectively, this past weekend.

IMF: One More Financial Shock Could Do It

One more financial shock could be too much, says IMF Director Gerd Haeusler. On March 27, the International Monetary Fund presented its semi-annual "Global Financial Stability Report" at a press conference in Frankfurt. Haeusler, who is responsible for the report, noted at the event that banks in the U.S. and Europe have so far survived a series of very severe shocks in the recent years. However, any additional shock might be too much for some financial institutions.

He said: "Three years of heavy losses have weakened the financial institutions—in particular European insurers, which are still very much engaged in stocks. There is the danger of a vicious circle: In order to receive liquidity, insurance firms are selling stocks into a falling market, thereby worsening their solvency parameters." The bankruptcy of a single insurance firm, said Haeusler, might not pose such a high risk for the stability of the financial system as the bankruptcy of a bank. But due to the rising volume of credit derivatives, the fate of insurance firms and banks is ever more inter-related.

Very dangerous as well, he emphasized, is the exposure of the U.S. "Government Sponsored Agencies" (GSA). Should long-term interest rates go up, the bond prices of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mac, as a consequence of their exposure to mortgage credits, would sink much more rapidly than government bonds.

In the present situation, Haeusler stressed, he cannot present any outlook for the world economy or financial system. Whether the Iraq war will be short or not, "post-conflict uncertainties," including high geopolitical risks, will definitely prevail for a longer time.

All rights reserved © 2003 EIRNS