Veterans for Common Sense

John Seebeth, 55, speaks courtesy of a hole in his throat, a hole left by a Viet Cong bullet on Aug. 21, 1969. But it wasn’t until years later that Seebeth’s consciousness was raised and his anti-war beliefs emerged.

Seebeth will share his views Monday at 7 p.m. at Issaquah library’s main branch, in a speech sponsored by the Eastside Suburban Peace Network.

In the 1980s, Seebeth became concerned about global warming.

He has devoted his life to environmental concerns and is an outspoken advocate for alternatives to gas-powered vehicles.

Dirty war

His war worries center on substances the United States began to introduce in the 1991 Gulf War.

One of his key concerns is depleted uranium.

The United States uses depleted uranium in bombs and artillery shells because it is heavier than other metals and more easily pierces armor.

Statistics show that even though only 148 died among the nearly 700,000 who fought, veterans have since reported problems related to exposure to depleted uranium.

The uranium loses half of its impact in 4.2 billion or 4.5 billion years, depending on the source.

To date, the government acknowledges 183,000, or about one in three veterans, have received disability status for one or more Gulf War-related conditions, a Veterans Administration official said.

“Now we’re going over there with these same weapons,” Seebeth said. “I love my country. If we were attacked, I’d serve. But this is not an honorable fight.”

Seebeth sees his country exchanging blood for oil, oil needed for the U.S. fleet of autos and SUVs.

Such fossil fuel boosts the global-warming phenomenon, ultimately raising water temperatures, disturbing the climate and irrevocably altering sea-related habitats — included human.

Ups and downs

Seebeth wears his emotions on his sleeve. Two subjects, kids and men he served with in Vietnam, can dampen an eye.

Born and raised in Philadelphia, Seebeth strived to escape a lower-middle-class environment by barely surviving high school and joining the Army.

His goal was to become a police officer.

In the Army, he became a medic.

“Now I was something,” Seebeth said. “We picked up the wounded out in the fields — civilians, U.S. soldiers, Vietnamese soldiers.”

Among all airborne groups, medics suffered the worst casualties, a third injured or dead. Seebeth’s helicopter, adorned with the red cross sign, carried no weapons. Sometimes, it was asked to land in heavy fire without escort.

That’s what happened Aug. 21, 1969, 25 or so miles south of Seebeth’s base at Danang.

“They had a casualty,” Seebeth said. “He was critical. If we didn’t come in and get him, his chances of surviving were small. The captain asked us what we wanted to do. No one said anything.”

They went in. It was the Hiep Duc valley.

“My left knee was shaking uncontrollably,” Seebeth said.

A bullet hit Seebeth’s armored jacket, at the top, near the neck.

The bullet splintered, and a big chunk entered his neck. When he was flown out, medics had to bring him back to life.

Seebeth received the Purple Heart for that and he and his unit won the Distinguished Flying Cross for the three days of intense activity in Hiep Duc.

The aftermath

Seebeth was mute for 17 months. He was outfitted with a Montgomery T-tube, allowing him to speak by pressing through a hole in his throat. That’s how he talks today.

Vietnam nearly ruined him. Racked by survivor’s guilt, he wound up drinking a lot and getting into two auto accidents.

Finally, a doctor talked him into returning to school.

Seebeth eventually corralled a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Indiana University and logged a year toward a master’s in social work at Ohio State University.

More importantly, he came to grips with Vietnam, concluding that his earlier zest for the mission was misplaced. He reached that point in part by doing a lot of reading.

“I didn’t read a book until my second year in college,” Seebeth said. Now he reads everything he can find on war and armaments and chemical agents and the environment.

He and his wife, Linda, keep an active bookcase in their home near the Issaquah Highlands.

The past is always there

Seebeth’s views remain affected by soldiers he saw die in Vietnam.

“I still carry them,” Seebeth said of the images in his mind. “This isn’t a responsibility I carry lightly. I shared a very special moment, eye to eye. I carry that passion, lest they die in vain.

“The responsibility is just awesome.”

Pictures of dying Vietnamese children remain as vivid.

Seebeth can weave stories that make stomachs turn and hairs bristle.

Which may be why he also likes to point out that, of Iraq’s 26 million people, half are children.

Greg Heberlein can be reached at greg.heberlein@kingcountyjournal.com or 425-453-4228.

Coordinated by the Win Without War Coalition, an umbrella protest group, the action aimed to direct at least one telephone call and fax to every U.S. senator every minute throughout the day. Organizers said they were far exceeding that goal.

The White House switchboard was also flooded and most callers heard a message that “all circuits are busy.”

Tom Andrews, a former Democratic representative from Maine who is running the organization, said more than 500,000 people had signed up on the Internet to take part and a half a million more were also expected to participate without registering on the group’s Web site (Moveon.org).

“We have hundreds of thousands of calls and faxes that we know are going in. It’s a first-of-its-kind protest and a tremendous success already,” he said. “People are making their voices heard loud and clear — don’t invade and don’t occupy Iraq.”

The Web site had a running total of what it said was the number of calls placed. As of 5 p.m. EST the number was almost 400,000. The Web site was flashing the names of individual protesters above a map of the United States with quotes from e-mails sent to the headquarters and to lawmakers. Each comment included the name and hometown of the protester.

Some protesters themselves had difficulties getting through to their representatives. Molly Lanzarotta from Boston said she had to dial several times to get through to an answering service in the office of Democratic Sen. John Kerry, a leading presidential candidate for 2004.

Others tried for long periods but eventually gave up. Brian Fry tried to call from Cleveland but kept getting the message, “all circuits are busy.” He said he would call his senators’ local Ohio offices instead and try to get through to Washington again later on or the next day.

SET TIMES TO CALL

Activists were given set times to call. Chicago marketing executive Mary Rickard was supposed to call at 3:14 p.m, 3:19 p.m. and 3:24 p.m. The faxes from people who signed onto the Web site were also programmed to go out at set times.

Telephone calls placed from Reuters to various senators received busy signals at all but two offices. At Florida Democrat Bob Graham’s office, a spokeswoman said they had received 400 calls in the first three hours of the day, well above the norm. Other senators also reported receiving many hundreds of calls, the small fraction that got through.

Andrews said the Internet had emerged as a key tool for the anti-war movement in organizing protests and instantly reaching tens of thousands of activists.

“It allows us to be in touch instantly with activists all around the country and the world. It’s a tremendous democratic tool,” he said.

Hundreds of thousands of Americans and millions more in cities around the world have taken to the streets in a series of demonstrations over the past few weeks.

However, the latest polls show a substantial but not overwhelming majority of American voters support President Bush on Iraq. Surveys suggest that around 35 to 40 percent of the electorate opposes the war.

A Time/CNN poll conducted on Feb. 19-20 found 54 percent said the United States should use military action to remove Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. The number was down 5 points from two weeks before and at its lowest level since last November. Thirty-eight percent said they were opposed.

Pollster Jennifer Laszlo, a Democrat who has recently conducted four focus groups, said support for the war was soft and opponents were far more intense in their views than many supporters.

“Republicans think this is America’s war but Democrats more and more see it as Bush’s war and they are getting more energized and more angry,” Laszlo said.

Washington (AP) – Nearly 17,000 more reserve and National Guard forces were called to duty in the last week as the Pentagon continued its Persian Gulf buildup for possible war in Iraq.

Under an order signed by President Bush three days after the 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, up to 1 million Guard and reserve troops can be called to serve for up to two years. Officials have said it is unlikely that number would be needed.

In its weekly report on mobilizations, the Defense Department said Wednesday that 16,735 were called in the preceding seven days, bringing the number now serving to more than 168,000.

Only a third of that number were on duty a month ago, before officials began the rapid buildup in the Persian Gulf.

Though the Pentagon doesn’t specify in the weekly reports where units have been sent, a substantial portion are deployed for the possible war to disarm and overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

Some also are serving in jobs aimed at strengthening homeland defense after the September 2001 terrorist attacks.

“For the National Guard and reserve, it is not a question of whether or not there will be a war in Iraq, but rather a commitment to be ready for any mission they may be called upon to do,” said Lt. Col. Dan Stoneking, a Pentagon spokesman.

Some 200,000 forces are now in place in the gulf, officials said.

Since Bush signed what is called a “partial mobilization” order in [September] 2001, 225,000 have been activated, some finishing their duty and going back to civilian life [or Reserve status].

It sounded like two behemoth icebergs colliding in the North Atlantic, but you needed the right kind of ears to hear it. Two immensely powerful forces crashed into each other over the weekend of February 15th, and the resulting thunder has set the world to trembling.

On one side were the people, who took to the streets all across the world by the tens of millions to stand against George W. Bush’s push for pre-emptive war on Iraq. The numbers, and the locations, were staggering.

More than 100,000 people took to the streets of Sydney, Australia, a nation that has been solidly in Bush’s corner on this matter. In Spain, another member of Bush’s “Coalition of the Willing,” several million protesters took over Madrid, Barcelona and 55 other cities.

Italy, another Bush ally, saw over a million citizens take to the streets of Rome. Britain, Bush’s go/no go ally of allies, saw over a million people protesting in London. Police there said it was the largest demonstration in that nation’s long history.

The Netherlands saw one hundred thousand protesters, as did Belgium and Ireland. There were protesters by the tens of thousands in Sweden, Switzerland, Scotland, Denmark, Austria, Canada, South Africa, Mexico, Greece, Russia and Japan. 500,000 protesters demonstrated in Germany, joined by three members of Gerhard Schroder’s cabinet who defied their Chancellor by being there. It was the largest demonstration ever in post-war Germany. Another 500,000 people marched in Paris and 60 other French cities.

The United States of America saw protests from coast to coast in over 100 cities nationwide. New York City was paralyzed by over a million marchers. San Francisco was taken over by well over 200,000 protesters, and Los Angeles saw over 100,000 people take to the streets. Thousands upon thousands joined them in Chicago, Philadelphia, Miami and Seattle.

This was a gathering of ordinary citizens who came together in the streets of the world in an organized event that has no precedent in all of human history.

They were brought together by a global word-of-mouth activism rooted entirely in the Internet. Were it not for this planetary connection, no such coordination could have ever taken place. Once upon a time, the world wide web was a realm dominated by dreams of profit and marketing. Those dreams have soured, leaving behind a marvelous network now utilized by very average people who can, with the click of a button, bring forth from all points on the compass a roaring deluge of humanity to stand against craven injustice and ruinous war.

The weekend of February 15th saw this force ram headlong into the will of men who walk in shadow, whose hands wield lightning and steel, pestilence and famine. In their ranks stand Presidents, Prime Ministers, corporate magnates, untouchable billionaires, and the advisors who whisper to them of empire and domination.

They are few in number, but life and death flows from their fingertips in freshets and gouts. These men control the armies and navies of great nations, nuclear and chemical nightmares beyond measure, unassailable technological weapons and walls, the financial cords which hold the package together, the water, the air, the oil, the law, and a global media machine by which they can obscure their designs with pleasing lies.

No mere citizen could do what these men in one moment can do with the crooking of a little finger. With a word, they can erase cities, deprive an entire populace of water and light, unleash disease and famine, annihilate the economies of dozens of nations, and imprison forever anyone who dares dissent. These men bleed, they sicken, they die, but in their time of life they can punch holes in the sky large enough to make Zeus wince with envy. Like the millions who marched, the gathering of such fearful powers into the hands of so few is also without precedent in all of human history.

There was, among the millions who stormed the planet last weekend, a misconception that masked the true reason for their presence in the streets. A great many people believe this looming war with Iraq is about old grudges and oil. There is logic in this; Iraq has the second largest proven stores of precious petroleum in the world, and there is a definite history of malice between House Bush and House Hussein. The truth of the matter is far more broad and deep, belittling all talk of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, and even oil. The men who pursue their goals by way of this war have a great many desires on their minds, and once more, they have the will to attain these goals by whatever means is required.

Were the protesters fully aware of whom they faced, a good many of them may well have fled in terror to cower in their homes. One does not lightly bait a bear with such terrible claws.

Does this all sound like some paranoid fantasy? If so, allow me to introduce The Project for the New American Century.

The Project for the New American Century, or PNAC, is a Washington-based think tank created in 1997. Above all else, PNAC desires and demands one thing: The establishment of a global American empire to bend the will of all nations. They chafe at the idea that the United States, the last remaining superpower, does not do more by way of economic and military force to bring the rest of the world under the umbrella of a new socio-economic Pax Americana.

The fundamental essence of PNAC’s ideology can be found in a White Paper produced in September of 2000 entitled “Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century.” In it, PNAC outlines what is required of America to create the global empire they envision. According to PNAC, America must:

* Reposition permanently based forces to Southern Europe, Southeast Asia and the Middle East;

* Modernize U.S. forces, including enhancing our fighter aircraft, submarine and surface fleet capabilities;

* Develop and deploy a global missile defense system, and develop a strategic dominance of space;

* Control the “International Commons” of cyberspace;

* Increase defense spending to a minimum of 3.8 percent of gross domestic product, up from the 3 percent currently spent.

Most ominously, this PNAC document described four “Core Missions” for the American military. The two central requirements are for American forces to “fight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars,” and to “perform the ‘constabulary’ duties associated with shaping the security environment in critical regions.” Note well that PNAC does not want America to be prepared to fight simultaneous major wars. That is old school. In order to bring this plan to fruition, the military must fight these wars one way or the other to establish American dominance for all to see.

Why is this important? After all, wacky think tanks are a cottage industry in Washington, DC. They are a dime a dozen. In what way does PNAC stand above the other groups that would set American foreign policy if they could?

Two events brought PNAC into the mainstream of American government: the disputed election of George W. Bush, and the attacks of September 11th. When Bush assumed the Presidency, the men who created and nurtured the imperial dreams of PNAC became the men who run the Pentagon, the Defense Department and the White House. When the Towers came down, these men saw, at long last, their chance to turn their White Papers into substantive policy.

Vice President Dick Cheney is a founding member of PNAC, along with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Defense Policy Board chairman Richard Perle. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz is the ideological father of the group. Bruce Jackson, a PNAC director, served as a Pentagon official for Ronald Reagan before leaving government service to take a leading position with the weapons manufacturer Lockheed Martin.

PNAC is staffed by men who previously served with groups like Friends of the Democratic Center in Central America, which supported America’s bloody gamesmanship in Nicaragua and El Salvador, and with groups like The Committee for the Present Danger, which spent years advocating that a nuclear war with the Soviet Union was “winnable.”

PNAC has recently given birth to a new group, The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which met with National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice in order to formulate a plan to “educate” the American populace about the need for war in Iraq. CLI has funneled millions of taxpayer dollars to support the Iraqi National Congress and the Iraqi heir presumptive, Ahmed Chalabi. Chalabi was sentenced in absentia by a Jordanian court in 1992 to 22 years in prison for bank fraud after the collapse of Petra Bank, which he founded in 1977. Chalabi has not set foot in Iraq since 1956, but his Enron-like business credentials apparently make him a good match for the Bush administration’s plans.

PNAC’s “Rebuilding America’s Defenses” report is the institutionalization of plans and ideologies that have been formulated for decades by the men currently running American government. The PNAC Statement of Principles is signed by Cheney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld, as well as by Eliot Abrams, Jeb Bush, Bush’s special envoy to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad, and many others. William Kristol, famed conservative writer for the Weekly Standard, is also a co-founder of the group. The Weekly Standard is owned by Ruppert Murdoch, who also owns international media giant Fox News.

The desire for these freshly empowered PNAC men to extend American hegemony by force of arms across the globe has been there since day one of the Bush administration, and is in no small part a central reason for the Florida electoral battle in 2000. Note that while many have said that Gore and Bush are ideologically identical, Mr. Gore had no ties whatsoever to the fellows at PNAC. George W. Bush had to win that election by any means necessary, and PNAC signatory Jeb Bush was in the perfect position to ensure the rise to prominence of his fellow imperialists. Desire for such action, however, is by no means translatable into workable policy. Americans enjoy their comforts, but don’t cotton to the idea of being some sort of Neo-Rome.

On September 11th, the fellows from PNAC saw a door of opportunity open wide before them, and stormed right through it.

Bush released on September 20th 2002 the “National Security Strategy of the United States of America.” It is an ideological match to PNAC’s “Rebuilding America’s Defenses” report issued a year earlier. In many places, it uses exactly the same language to describe America’s new place in the world. Recall that PNAC demanded an increase in defense spending to at least 3.8{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} of GDP. Bush’s proposed budget for next year asks for $379 billion in defense spending, almost exactly 3.8{cd9ac3671b356cd86fdb96f1eda7eb3bb1367f54cff58cc36abbd73c33c82e1d} of GDP.

In August of 2002, Defense Policy Board chairman and PNAC member Richard Perle heard a policy briefing from a think tank associated with the Rand Corporation. According to the Washington Post and The Nation, the final slide of this presentation described “Iraq as the tactical pivot, Saudi Arabia as the strategic pivot, and Egypt as the prize” in a war that would purportedly be about ridding the world of Saddam Hussein’s weapons. Bush has deployed massive forces into the Mideast region, while simultaneously engaging American forces in the Philippines and playing nuclear chicken with North Korea. Somewhere in all this lurks at least one of the “major theater wars” desired by the September 2002 PNAC report.

Iraq is but the beginning, a pretense for a wider conflict. Donald Kagan, a central member of PNAC, sees America establishing permanent military bases in Iraq after the war. This is purportedly a measure to defend the peace in the Middle East, and to make sure the oil flows. The nations in that region, however, will see this for what it is: a jump-off point for American forces to invade any nation in that region they choose to. The American people, anxiously awaiting some sort of exit plan after America defeats Iraq, will see too late that no exit is planned.

All of the horses are traveling together at speed here. The defense contractors who sup on American tax revenue will be handsomely paid for arming this new American empire. The corporations that own the news media will sell this eternal war at a profit, as viewership goes through the stratosphere when there is combat to be shown. Those within the administration who believe that the defense of Israel is contingent upon laying waste to every possible aggressor in the region will have their dreams fulfilled. The PNAC men who wish for a global Pax Americana at gunpoint will see their plans unfold. Through it all, the bankrollers from the WTO and the IMF will be able to dictate financial terms to the entire planet. This last aspect of the plan is pivotal, and is best described in the newly revised version of Greg Palast’s masterpiece, “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.”

There will be adverse side effects. The siege mentality average Americans are suffering as they smother behind yards of plastic sheeting and duct tape will increase by orders of magnitude as our aggressions bring forth new terrorist attacks against the homeland. These attacks will require the implementation of the newly drafted Patriot Act II, an augmentation of the previous Act that has profoundly sharper teeth. The sun will set on the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

The American economy will be ravaged by the need for increased defense spending, and by the aforementioned “constabulary” duties in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. Former allies will turn on us. Germany, France and the other nations resisting this Iraq war are fully aware of this game plan. They are not acting out of cowardice or because they love Saddam Hussein, but because they mean to resist this rising American empire, lest they face economic and military serfdom at the hands of George W. Bush. Richard Perle has already stated that France is no longer an American ally. As the eagle spreads its wings, our rhetoric and their resistance will become more agitated and dangerous.

Many people, of course, will die. They will die from war and from want, from famine and disease. At home, the social fabric will be torn in ways that make the Reagan nightmares of crack addiction, homelessness and AIDS seem tame by comparison.

This is the price to be paid for empire, and the men of PNAC who now control the fate and future of America are more than willing to pay it. For them, the benefits far outweigh the liabilities.

The plan was running smoothly until those two icebergs collided. Millions and millions of ordinary people are making it very difficult for Bush’s international allies to keep to the script. PNAC may have designs for the control of the “International Commons” of the internet, but for now it is the staging ground for a movement that would see empire take a back seat to a wise peace, human rights, equal protection under the law, and the preponderance of a justice that will, if properly applied, do away forever with the anger and hatred that gives birth to terrorism in the first place.

Tommaso Palladini of Milan perhaps said it best as he marched with his countrymen in Rome. “You fight terrorism,” he said, “by creating more justice in the world.”

The People versus the Powerful is the oldest story in human history. At no point in history have the Powerful wielded so much control. At no point in history has the active and informed involvement of the People, all of them, been more absolutely required. The tide can be stopped, and the men who desire empire by the sword can be thwarted. It has already begun, but it must not cease. These are men of will, and they do not intend to fail.

William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times bestselling author of two books – “War On Iraq” (with Scott Ritter) available now from Context Books, and “The Greatest Sedition is Silence,” available in May 2003 from Pluto Press. He teaches high school in Boston, MA.

Scott Lowery contributed research to this report.

In a show of support for Iraq coupled with appeals for Saddam Hussein to disarm, foreign ministers for more than half the world have urged Baghdad to comply with UN resolutions while adding their voice to the millions of people who oppose war.

A declaration prepared for a Non-Aligned Movement summit also said that if Iraq continued to cooperate with UN inspectors in eliminating weapons of mass destruction, the debilitating sanctions imposed on Baghdad after the 1991 Gulf War should finally be lifted.

Although the draft declaration endorsed today by foreign ministers addressed US concerns by stressing that Baghdad must comply with Security Council resolution 1441 – which demands that Iraq disarm – its overall tone left no doubt that the Non-Aligned Movement does not want to see a military attack.

Leaders of the movement’s 114 mostly developing nations, representing 55 per cent of the world’s population and nearly two-thirds of UN members, were expected to endorse the declaration at their summit starting on Monday.

US confrontations with Iraq and North Korea – nations allegedly possessing weapons of mass destruction – dominated preparations for the summit.

“We reiterate our commitment to the fundamental principles of the non-use of force and respect for the sovereignty, territorial integrity, political independence and security of all member states,” the document on Iraq said.

There were two days of wrangling over the document’s precise wording. The latest version dropped the characterisation by some Arab countries of any conflict as “aggression”.

“It is a balanced statement because it shows everyone is against unilateral action against Iraq or any other country,” said Gholomali Khoshroo, Iran’s deputy foreign minister. “At the same time, they have urged Iraq to cooperate with the United Nations.”

“What we want is full compliance with Resolution 1441,” said US envoy Charles Twining, an observer at the conference. “It’s really that simple.”

Iraq is a founding member of the Non-Aligned Movement, which was set up in 1955 to pave a neutral path between the United States and the Soviet bloc and which regularly opposes military action against any Third World state.

The draft declaration paid a nod to massive anti-war protests around the world, and came a day before summit host Malaysia holds a peace rally organisers expect to draw as many as 200,000 people.

“We are fully cognisant of the concerns expressed by millions in our countries, as well as in other parts of the world, who reject war and believe, like we do, that war against Iraq would be a destabilising factor for the whole region,” it said.

Not everyone at the summit faulted what the protesters perceive as US President George W Bush’s hawkish stance on Iraq. Nobel Peace laureate Jose Ramos Horta said Bush’s Iraq policy deserves more credit for boosting Baghdad’s cooperation with UN demands to disarm.

“If President Bush had not threatened to go to war in a credible manner by building forces in the region, would Saddam Hussein have invited the weapons inspectors back?” said Ramos Horta, foreign minister for East Timor, which will formally join the Non-Aligned Movement on Monday.

“Did he invite them back because of the charming French attitude or because of the German pacifist attitude, or because he knows that George W Bush means business?”

North Korea – another non-aligned state – wanted the final declaration to condemn Washington for causing its crisis over nuclear development, but diplomats from other countries baulked at that request.

Meanwhile, North Korea resisted calls by fellow summit participants to return to a key nuclear treaty, prompting some nations to say they feared peace in Asia was in jeopardy.

“We are trying to find a middle way where we take note of North Korea’s withdrawal and hope they will rejoin the Non-Proliferation Treaty,” Malaysian foreign minister Syed Hamid Albar said. “They must accept there is a fear of a nuclear threat and it will jeopardise peace and security.”

He said Malaysia is drafting wording that “we think reflects the Korean concern and also reflects the concerns of non-aligned countries”.

The North Korea crisis began in October when US officials said that Pyongyang admitted having a covert nuclear program. Washington and its allies suspended fuel shipment to North Korea as punishment, and Pyongyang retaliated by expelling UN monitors and pulling out of the treaty.

February 24, 2003 – It’s still unclear why large numbers of soldiers in the 1991 Gulf War came home with unexplained illnesses.

Now, faced with the possibility of a new war in the Persian Gulf, the Pentagon wants to try to prevent a repeat of those health problems. As NPR’s Joseph Shapiro reports, one military doctor is in charge of figuring out how.

An infectious disease specialist, Michael Kilpatrick runs the Pentagon’s Force Health Protection program. His chief responsibility is to prevent a recurrence of the health problems that plagued Gulf War veterans.

Of high concern are environmental hazards, such as burning oil fields and chemical and biological weapons, that could arise in the event of a new war with Iraq.

Kilpatrick says the first line of defense is data — and lots of it. Medical personnel now headed to the Persian Gulf are carrying laptops and personal digital assistants.

The data they collect is downloaded into a classified, centralized system and, within hours, can be accessed by Pentagon health officials in Washington, D.C.

Unmanned drone aircraft will also play a role, sampling for anthrax spores and other airborne agents. And then there are the soldier scientists who, armed with testing gear, will dig up soil samples and use hand-held devices to check the ground and water for toxins. Kilpatrick says these environmental surveillance teams will be among the first to hit the battlefront.

Veterans of the 1991 Gulf War blamed their health problems on exposure to chemicals, drugs and vaccines. At first, the Pentagon was slow to acknowledge their complaints.

As a Navy doctor, that bothered Kilpatrick. He tried to change things as a senior medical official in the office the Pentagon then set up to investigate. Kilpatrick and others arrived confident they could figure out what caused the Gulf War illnesses, but a cause was never proven.

One key problem was a lack of data. Records were missing that might have indicated which troops were in places where they may have been exposed to chemicals. Also absent were records of vaccinations against anthrax and the administration of pills against nerve agents.

Kilpatrick knows that many veterans felt betrayed by the Pentagon.

“As an individual who was on active duty as a physician at the time in the Navy, I could see that loss of trust, loss of faith in the system,” Kilpatrick said.

“We can really only deal with that by treating one patient at a time. You cannot do a propaganda campaign or a news campaign to change people’s attitudes. I think our military health-care system today is performing very well to show people we do care.”

However, some doubt that Kilpatrick’s and the Pentagon’s efforts will have much effect. Among those critics is former Army Ranger Steve Robinson.

In 1991, Robinson’s unit led Kurds through mountain passes back to their homes in northern Iraq. Later, Robinson worked for Kilpatrick as an investigator looking into the causes of Gulf War illnesses.

Now he runs a group called the National Gulf War Resource Center, which is pushing the cause of Gulf War veterans.

Robinson says the Pentagon is not doing enough to protect soldiers who may fight a new Gulf War.

Prompted by the complaints of Gulf War veterans, Congress passed a law requiring soldiers to receive medical examinations before being sent to battle.

But Robinson says what soldiers get now, a questionnaire that asks them to rate their health and provide information on medical problems, falls far short.

“Soldiers are trained to go to war,” Robinson said. “They are trained to fight and kill and do their job. No soldier is going to write down that I have bronchitis, therefore I want to be left behind while my buddies go off to Baghdad.”

At the Pentagon, Kilpatrick concedes the questionnaire is not foolproof. But he says the process has caught many health problems since it was first used in Bosnia. The Pentagon, he notes, will have other ways to monitor health, including the computer data collected on the battlefield.

But Robinson — who returned from the Gulf with his own health problems — worries that the careful plans made in Kilpatrick’s office will break down in the chaos of battle.

The National Gulf War Resource Center: http://www.ngwrc.org

The Hague – The oral deposition in Iran’s suit against the United States in the matter of the destruction of Iranian oil platforms in 1987/88 began on Monday. The suit was presented to the highest court of the United Nations in 1992 and has been handled in writing ever since.

Teheran accuses Washington of the destruction of three oil platforms in the Persial Gulf. The US argues that the attack was in retaliation of Iranian attacks of ships sailing under the American flag.

The court has scheduled three weeks to hear arguments from both sides.

The Iranian representatives accuse the USA of having provided Iraq with raw materials for chemical and biological weapons at the end of the 1980s. The US
government had delivered dangerous chemicals and deadly viruses to the Iraqi government for its war.

Washington had provided aid to Iraq in this, and other ways, in its war against Iran, said Iran’s representative at the start of the oral depositions.

Mohamat Zahedin-Labbaf, as the spokesman of the Iranian delegation, emphasized that the US could not dispute the destruction of the platforms. The US version, that it had been a matter of defense against Iranian missile attacks of ships under the US flag doesn’t hold water, he said.

In any case, the USA had violated the Friendship Treaty which both countries had signed in 1955. It is this Treaty which constitutes the legal basis for
these proceedings, according to a 1996 decision by the highest court of the United Nations. Both delegations will be able to argue their positions in detail during the next three weeks.

Professor Bruno Summa, a German expert on international law, was sworn in as the new judge at the beginning of the proceedings on Monday. The longtime University Professor at the University of Munich was elected as one of the 15 regular judges of the Supreme Court in the Hague Peace Palace.

Kuwait City (CNN) – Four U.S. soldiers were killed early Tuesday when their UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashed near Camp New Jersey, about 31 miles [50 kilometers] northwest of Kuwait City, U.S. Central Command said.

The soldiers’ names are being withheld pending notification of next of kin.

The aircraft was on a night training mission when it crashed about 1 a.m. (5 p.m. Monday EST). The four crew members were the only personnel on board the aircraft.

The cause of the crash is being investigated, Central Command said.

In Afghanistan last month, another U.S. Army Black Hawk crashed during a nighttime training mission, killing all four crew members on board.

That aircraft, an MH-60 Black Hawk modified for special operations and technically known as a Pave Hawk, went down on the Shomali Plains about seven miles [11 kilometers] due east of Bagram Air Base, headquarters for U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

London (Mirror) – US intelligence on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction was “garbage”, UN inspectors said yesterday.

They claimed “undeniable” evidence that Saddam Hussein was double-dealing over disarmament was “circumstantial, outdated or completely wrong”.

The weapons team said they found NOTHING at an alleged nuclear research site shown in satellite pictures to the UN, and NOTHING at a Saddam palace where they were given precise co-ordinates of incriminating evidence.

Other claims relating to nuclear research and missiles were also fake. Claiming the inspectors had been fed “garbage after garbage after garbage” by President Bush’s spy chiefs, one said: “We’ve better things to do than run around the country chasing bogus evidence.”

The slapdown came as Tony Blair said he would defy any peace plea from the Pope, who he meets today.

Stepping up the “moral” case for war on Iraq, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said that reports showed Saddam was planning to use chemical and bio-weapons against a range of targets.