DAMASCUS - In 1936, a senior aid
approached Syria's new president Hashem al-Atasi,
explaining the presidential budget which had a
special clause for "classified activities". This
was a special amount allocated by parliament for
the president to distribute at will, without
presenting receipts, or explaining himself to the
legislative branch.
Fuming, Atasi crossed
off the amount and angrily snapped, "This is
incorrect! A president should not have money to
distribute freely without being checked by
parliament. It is not his right and it is not his
money." The late Syrian leader returned the money
untouched - every single year - to the Syrian
treasury during his
tenure, 1936-1939, 1949-1951 and
1954-1955.
That story came to mind as I
heard President George W Bush request US$3 billion
for "classified activities" from the US Congress.
Bush needs secret funds much more than Atasi did
50 years ago. The Syrian president was not
occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, nor was he waging
a "war on terror" against Osama bin Laden. Then,
"classified activities" were relatively simple;
they included paying Lebanese newspapers to
refrain from criticizing Syria and distributing
gifts to certain Arab leaders.
Atasi
reasoned that this "classified activity" was being
funded by Syrian tax money and that the average
Syrian had a right to know where his taxes were
being spent. As long as this money was not being
used to improve the livelihood of ordinary
Syrians, then it was a crime for any leader to
spend it on political or clandestine activities.
Atasi would have flipped if he had heard
the rest of Bush's financial requests - $45.1
billion for combat operations in Iraq and
Afghanistan, $3.7 billion to expand and train the
Afghan National Army, $2 billion to improve Iraq's
security and $2.2 billion to cope with rising fuel
costs. Another $3 billion was wanted for
technology to battle explosive devices, such as
roadside bombs, and $2.6 billion to transport and
maintain armored vehicles.
To enhance
medical and rehabilitation services associated
with traumatic brain injury and psychological
health issues for wounded US troops in Iraq and
Afghanistan, $400 million was wanted, while $2.5
billion was the price for diplomatic efforts to
combat terrorism. The tag of $350 million was to
"expand stability in the Middle East", including
$200 million for the West Bank (no mention of
war-torn and improvised Gaza), and $100 million
for Jordan and $50 million for Lebanon.
Nothing of course to help Syria, which
hosts 1.5 million Iraqi refugees displaced by the
American mess in Iraq. Another $193.2 million in
military and economic assistance to Pakistan, and
$122.9 million for stabilization in Kenya, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Sudan and
Somalia. Finally, $15 million for the six-party
talks on North Korea's nuclear program. All in
all? A total of $70 billion requested by Bush from
Congress.
Americans might be excused for
being upset by their tax money being handed out
left-and-right, without consent and in issues that
do not affect their day-to-day lives. What makes
things more difficult is that in addition to
"classified activities", the US administration is
still vehemently committed to spreading baseless
arguments aimed at creating trouble for its
opponents in the region.
This month, we
had US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
"evidence" that North Korea was building a nuclear
reactor in Syria, saying this is why it was bombed
by Israel in September 2007. Yet the United
Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
in 2004 had looked into accusations that Syria was
pursing nuclear ambitions, and gave the Syrians a
clean bill of health.
Syria is upset with
what has recently been published as fact, claiming
that if Syria were building anything nuclear with
the North Koreans, then Israel had no right to
strike at will without informing the IAEA and the
Americans had no right in keeping this information
classified since September.
Now we are
hearing an increasing number of stories about
Iranian arms streaming into Iraq to be used by
insurgents against US troops. This is not new, but
it has exploded in the media scene over the past
week, so as to add pressure on the Iranian regime.
The US's top man in Iraq, General David
Petraeus, spoke to the British Broadcasting
Corporation, saying the number of arms found in
Baghdad which were "made in Iran" were "even
greater [than those found in southern Iraq] ... so
there is a huge concern". He mentioned artillery
rounds, "hundreds and hundreds", and said they had
marks showing they were manufactured in Tehran.
The Americans also claim they have found
advanced rockets, sniper rifles and sophisticated
roadside bombs that have "killed thousands of
US-led coalition and Iraqi forces". The US State
Department adds that an elite force of the Iranian
Revolutionary Guards Corps, the Quds Force, was
responsible for the external operations of Iran,
both in Iraq and Lebanon. The US terrorism report
for 2008 lists Iran as the "most significant"
state sponsor of terrorism. It added that the
number of US and Iraqi soldiers killed by direct
or indirect Iranian action in Iraq had reached
"thousands".
Hussein Shariatmadari, a
representative of Iran's Grand Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei and editor of the hardline Kayhan
newspaper, responded, "When Americans and Iraqis
bring such accusations, they are facing
difficulties in Iraq. When they face difficulties,
they blame Iran for them and not themselves."
Speaking to the pan-Arab daily al-Sharq al-Awsat,
he added that evidence presented to Tehran by
Iraqi officials "was not conclusive".
A
spokesman for the Sadrist movement of Muqtada
al-Sadr, accused by the Americans of receiving
funds and weapons from Tehran, added, "Iran sells
weapons to anyone who wants and the Sadr movement,
al-Qaeda and the parties in Iraq's political
process have Iranian weapons." He added,
"Therefore, it is quite natural to find Iranian
weapons because they are sold and bought and any
party can buy them."
The new set of
American accusations against Iran has caused more
than a stir in Baghdad. Prime Minister Nuri
al-Maliki sent a delegation to sound out Iranian
officials on the US-produced "evidence" and it
returned to Iraq saying the Iranians had given a
"positive" response. Government spokesman Ali
al-Dabbagh explained, "We don't want to start a
conflict with Iran. We need our own government
documentation of this interference," adding there
is no "hard evidence" of Iran's involvement in
sabotage and terrorism financing in Iraq.
What we do know for sure is that recently
Iraqi President Jalal Talabani requested the
mediation of General Qassem Soleimani, the
commander of the Quds Force, with the Sadrists.
The Iranian general responded promptly and managed
to control some of the Sadrist activities in the
southern city of Basra.
Strangely, the
Bush White House now condemns Muqtada's Mahdi
Army, but turned a blind eye to its activities
when Muqtada was working with Maliki in 2006-2007.
And it says nothing about the Badr Brigade,
another Shi'ite militia that is equally dangerous,
but unlike the Mahdi Army it is pro-American.
In
his book At the Center of the Storm, CIA director George Tenet recalls
that on September 12, 2001, while walking into the
White House, he bumped into Richard Pearle, "one
of the godfathers of the neo-conservative movement
and, at the time, head of the Defense Policy
Board". He adds, "Ours was little more than a
passing acquaintance ... As the doors closed
behind him, we made eye contact and he nodded. I
had just reached the door myself when Pearle
turned to me and said, 'Iraq has to pay a price
for what happened yesterday. They bear
responsibility'." He adds, "I was stunned but said
nothing. Eighteen hours earlier, I had scanned
passenger manifests from the four hijacked
airplanes that showed beyond doubt that al-Qaeda
was behind the attacks." The story tells
volumes about decision-makers in Washington.
Pearle felt comfortable - if Tenet's story is true
- to blame a sovereign state of a horrendous
terrorist attack on the United States, without a
shred of evidence.
History repeats itself
in strange ways.
Sami Moubayed is
a Syrian political analyst.
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2008 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved.
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