Ex-CIA analyst- Iraq war a 'crime'

~ Ray McGovern spoke to about 200 people at the Osage Community Centre in Cape Girardeau.

The Iraq war is a "supreme international crime" and America will either leave voluntarily soon or be driven out by escalating violence in a debacle that will rival Vietnam, a former top analyst with the CIA said Saturday.

In a speech lasting more than 90 minutes, Ray McGovern, who retired after 27 years with the spy agency, suggested that impeachment of President George Bush should be considered and that the latest legislation on fighting terrorism is shredding constitutional rights.

The United States and its allies invaded Iraq on manipulated intelligence designed to convince the world that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons capable of killing thousands, if not millions, of people, McGovern told a gathering of about 200 at the Osage Community Centre in Cape Girardeau. Not only was that intelligence wrong, he said, but documents released in Britain and the United States show the intelligence agencies were strong-armed into making their conclusions fit the policy for war.

"There is no escaping the conclusion that what our country has done is commit the supreme international crime of starting a war of aggression," McGovern said. Aggressive war, he noted, was considered the most serious charge against Nazi leaders at Nuremberg because all other crimes of that regime stemmed from the charge of starting a war.

And, like the worst regimes America has fought politically and militarily, he said, Congress is now enacting a law that allows torture, kidnapping and "putting people in black holes without telling anyone where they are."

McGovern spent 27 years in the CIA. He reached the top echelons of the agency, conducting one-on-one briefings with the highest officials, chairing the National Intelligence Estimates group and, upon retiring, receiving a medal of commendation from President George H.W. Bush.

That background leads McGovern to see dangers on many fronts from continuing the Iraq war. But the biggest issue, he said, is whether to continue.

He invoked the death of Jeremy Shank of Jackson to make his point. Shank's father, Jim Shank, said in an interview soon after his death that his son in Iraq had concluded the war wasn't worth any American lives.

"I don't know how you honor soldiers who have died in this war by putting more of them at risk," McGovern said.

Now is the time for action, McGovern said, alluding to the coming election without mentioning it directly. It is important, he said, "that we not sit by and wring our hands and say 'what can we do?' We need to decide what to do and do it -- and do it in the next six weeks."

Due to the length of his speech, about a third of the audience filed out without waiting for the question-and-answer period that followed. One audience member, Ed Dodson, said he was offended that McGovern compared the situation in the United States to that of Germany under the Nazi regime.

"If this was Germany after 9-11, he wouldn't have been allowed to speak," he said. "I believe fighting terrorism is justified on every front."

But Douglas Prostorog, who stayed to listen to McGovern respond to questions, said he became even more convinced that the war should end. Prostorog said he never supported the war.

And, he said, the talk prepared him to convince people wavering in their views on the war that it should be stopped. "A lot of people aren't decided one way or the other," he said. "I have to find ways to reach those people."

McGovern's visit is one of several he is making across Missouri and northern Arkansas. A transcript of his talk and an audio of the speech can be heard at www.raymcgovernincape.org.

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126