The U.N. Inspections in Iraq: Lessons for On-Site Verification
The author, a former government official and senior fellow at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, lays out clearly the lessons of the Iraq inspection effort. She covers a wide range of problems, from the mundane (the physical burdens of suiting up to visit contaminated sites) to the intangible (the psychology of self-censorship). The gist of the argument is simple: inspection is a much more difficult business than one would think, even when the subject is nominally cooperative. It is a great pity that the publishers have put such an absurd price on this book, because it deserves a wider distribution than libraries.
Related
As Cold War threats have diminished, so-called weapons of mass destruction -- nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and ballistic missiles -- have become the new international bugbears. The irony is that the harm caused by these weapons pales in comparison to the havoc wreaked by a much more popular tool: economic sanctions. Tally up the casualties caused by rogue states, terrorists, and unconventional weapons, and the number is surprisingly small. The same cannot be said for deaths inflicted by international sanctions. The math is sobering and should lead the United States to reconsider its current policy of strangling Iraq.
Michael J. Glennon got it wrong: don't count the UN Security Council out yet.
In Afghanistan, the Bush administration seemed determined at first to keep NATO on the sidelines. Now, as war with Iraq looms and the alliance ponders its own future, the president needs to reaffirm his commitment to the organization by including NATO in any new operation from the beginning. If not, its future relevance may come into question.

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