Letter from Sa'doon Hammadi to Congress
The Honorable Speaker of the US Senate,
The Honorable Speaker of the US House of Representatives,
The Honorable Members of the US Congress,
Assalamu Alaykum
My colleagues in the Iraqi National Assembly and I
have watched with interest statements made by a number
of US legislators, such as Senator Arlen Specter and
Representative Dennis J. Kucinich, in which they remind
President George W. Bush that, according to the
Constitution of the United States of America, it is the
authority of the US Congress to wage war, including the
now threatened war against Iraq. This has prompted me,
encouraged also by my fellow legislators in the Iraqi
National Assembly, to address this letter to you
Sirs,
One of the biggest problems that has existed since
1990 between our people and country on the one hand,
and the successive US administrations on the other,
along with the stubborn injustice and incessant
aggression and destruction inflicted upon our country
and people, and the comprehensive blockade unjustly
imposed on our population for twelve years now, has
been the absence of all channels of dialogue between our
two countries, the channels that might have helped
develop
a language of understanding between our respective
representatives. This has meant that your Congress and,
hence, the American people, have unfortunately been
deprived of any genuine opportunity to see the facts of the
situation for what they really are, in order that your
judgments and decisions, on behalf of your people, might
have been based on sound assessments in both objective and
practical terms. This would, no doubt, have presented your
representative bodies and those involved in political affairs
with the opportunity they need to see and observe the
situation, and then state their view and involve themselves
on the basis of solid facts, so that they would neither do
themselves the injustice of deciding and acting on ignorance,
nor bring injustice to those affected by their decisions.
This lack of communication has been the root cause of the
actions taken against our country since 1990. Had the naked
facts been put to you, and indeed to others, as they are; and
had we been able to allow dialogue the chance it
deserved both objectively and practically, then things
might have taken a different course. In this regard, you
may well remember the theatrical act presented by Naira*
about the incubators episode, which turned out to have
been a most effective factor in swaying congress in 1990
towards adopting the war decision against Iraq.
The Naira-incubators act was later exposed for the hoax that
it was; but then again too late for the damage caused to
be redressed.
The picture we have been up against since then has
been one in which the US administration might well have
been furnished with information from sources, some of
which do have their own agenda, or their own way of
imagining things. Such sources and such information
have invariably contributed towards military action to be
launched by the US government against Iraq with troops
mobilized in an orchestrated chain of developments in
which one aggression would lead to another bringing
more death to the people of Iraq and further destruction
to their country. Still, we are yet to witness real attempts
to discover the truth and distinguish right from wrong.
Sirs,
We believe that we know what is right and what is
wrong and what facts on which to establish our
judgments. But our knowledge is not enough to halt any
US-led aggression against our country and people. This
is why we would like to see your Congress, and indeed
all fair-minded people and authorities leading or shaping
American public opinion, especially the media, to have a
change to see the facts on the ground as they truly are,
and not as they may be doctored or painted to you in the
same way as the Naira episode was staged. This will help
you see the truth from both ends, while losing nothing,
but maybe gaining the benefit of a more objective
decision, regardless of the direction it may take.
Honorable Congressmen,
This, indeed, has been the essential problem through
which my country has endured the unendurable, losing in
the process, more than one million of its children alone, a
figure confirmed by the relevant agencies of the United
Nations as well as by the various other competent
international organizations, not to mention fatality
amongst youth and the elderly. This have been the
problem which, on the basis of it being unresolved, is
being used by the US administration to threaten invading
Iraq. Hence, our hope that you, and your fellow-Congressmen
may help overcome this problem by
seeking to see the true fact through direct dialogue, and
then reach your own conclusions, and decide accordingly
as you see fit.
While I hope that you find what I am trying to propose
in this letter to be worthy of your attention and
consideration, I hereby extend, on behalf of the
National Assembly of Iraq, an invitation for a delegation
to visit Iraq, comprising whatever number of
Congressmen you see fit, accompanied by experts in the
fields you deem relevant to the purpose of the visit, i.e.
chemical, biological, and nuclear. The members of such
a delegation will no doubt be equipped with whatever
data your government chooses to supply them with in
substantiation of its misguided claim that Iraq has
produced chemical and biological weapons, and is in the
process of constructing nuclear weapons. This claim has
been stated now and again by officials in the US
government and echoed by the Prime Minister of the
United Kingdom.
Once your delegation and experts from all relevant
fields have had the change to see and search in Iraq for
the places which your information insists are amongst
those established to produce biological, chemical and
nuclear weapons, while being hosted as our guests for,
say, a period of three weeks, during which time they will
be given every facility needed to search and inspect any
plants and installations allegedly producing, or intended
to produce, chemical, biological or nuclear weapons,
however deep underground such facilities may be
thought to exists, the decision will subsequently still be
yours; and I do not think that you stand to lose anything
if you were to take your decision after you have seen the
truth as it is on the ground.
Accept, please, by best regards and highest
consideration.
Dr. Sa'doon Hammadi
Speaker of the National Assembly
Of the Republic of Iraq
5th/August/2002
*Naira was a young Kuwaiti girl who was brought to the Senate,
a few days before the war was launched in 1991, to give "tearful"
testimony, in which she alleged that she had herself been
in Kuwait where she watched, amongst other things, Iraqi soldiers
rip off newborn infants from their hospital incubators in
order to steal those incubators. As it turned out later,
Naira was the daughter of the then Kuwaiti Ambassador to the USA, and
she had never been in Kuwait during the events After August 2nd 1990.
Her story had been staged with expert assistance fro Hill & Knowlton,
a Washington-based PR firm, in order to sway Congressional vote,
along with US public opinion, towards war action on the basis
of totally false information.