JOHN HOWARD AND THE MISLEADING OF PARLIAMENT AND THE AUSTRALIAN PEOPLE OVER SADDAM’S WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

This article was first published here on 13 June 2012 and is republished in the light of a call being made by an eminent group of Australians led by Malcolm Fraser for an enquiry into the decisions that led to Australia joining the US-led invasion of Iraq on March 2003.

During the lead up to the war against Iraq that began on 20 March 2003, Australian Prime Minister John Howard told the Australian people and the Australian Parliament that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. On the 18 March 2003 Howard told the Australian Parliament that these weapons were “a direct, undeniable and lethal threat to Australia and its people” and, for this reason, Australia will be part of a coalition that will ‘disarm’ Saddam Hussein.[1]

Howard’s announcement that Australia would join the coalition to attack Iraq was the culmination of nearly 18 months of Western anti-Saddam propaganda and rhetoric that had begun soon after 9/11. During that entire period between 9/11 and prior to the announcement to the House of Representatives on the 18 March 2003, Howard had always denied that any decision had been made to join with the coalition in any attack on Iraq.

Howard’s decision to join the coalition to attack Iraq was, so Howard told the Australian people, based on the notion that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. This rhetoric was completely in line with the rhetoric of the other members of the coalition that also took part in or supported the attack against Iraq.

John Howard first mentioned Iraq just 10 days after the 9/11 attacks during an interview with Neil Mitchell on Radio 3AW on 21 September 2001:

MITCHELL:

Israeli intelligence is suggesting Iraq sponsored this attack, is that likely?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well, I wouldn’t rule that out but I’m not saying that I’m convinced that that was the case. We would have to have an open mind on that. There are documented and published suggestions of some of the hijackers having been in touch with people in Iraq. I read another report of that in one of the newspapers this morning.

MITCHELL:

I guess that expands the possibility of any military action from Afghanistan to include Iraq.

PRIME MINISTER:

Well, I have to be careful how I speculate in a situation like that but going back to basics once again, the American’s dilemma is that if they can’t, by diplomatic pressure and by the weight of world opinion, encourage those who are currently harbouring suspected terrorists to hand them over they then have to ask themselves what other alternative do we have. If they don’t then do anything at all then hasn’t terrorism scored a very significant victory?[2]

However, while this was the first mention of Iraq after the 9/11 event, Howard had already promised the US only the day after the attack, “that Australia will provide all support that might be requested of us by the United States in relation to any action that might be taken”.[3]

The statement was emphatic and, in typical Howard style, had been carefully considered. True to his word, Howard soon offered Australian troops to help with the US attack against Afghanistan. The Americans, together with the British, launched their attack against the Taliban and al Qaeda on 7 October 2001 and by 17 October 2001, Howard had announced Australia’s military commitment to the war against Afghanistan.[4]

The question of Iraq is next seriously discussed by Howard on 10 February 2002 in a TV interview with journalist Laurie Oakes. The discussion arose as a result of President George W. Bush’s State of the Union Address which had been delivered on 29 January 2002, just five months after 9/11, in which Bush had referred to Iran, Iraq and North Korea as an ‘Axis of Evil’.

In his discussion with Oakes, Howard attempted to discreetly back-pedal from his 12 September 2001 commitment of “Australia will provide all support that might be requested of us by the United States in relation to any action that might be taken” Oakes asked Howard:  “…does his [Bush’s] axis of evil statement commit Australia in any way?”

The conversation then ran thus:

PRIME MINISTER:

No, not ... no, it doesn't. We are only ... we will only commit our forces to any kind of action as a result of a separate, deliberative decision by the Australian government ...

OAKES:

So we're not going all the way with the USA?

PRIME MINISTER:

There is ... well, I'll, you know, let me define our relationship with the United States in a positive way. If there is an American request for Australian forces to be involved in future action, then that will be considered afresh. Our decision to be involved in Afghanistan does not automatically commit us to involvement elsewhere.

The Americans know that, the Americans don't presume on our friendship. We are close, there is no ally closer to the United States at present, and I think everything we have done has been in Australia's interests. And I think President Bush's speech was a first class one and I understood full well the language he used and why he did it.[5]

Clearly, in the heat of the moment in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Howard, on 12 September 2001, had made a unilateral decision to back Bush and the US no matter what and, despite Howard’s later comment about only committing forces to any kind of action being as a result of a deliberative decision by the Australian government, Howard remained firmly committed to his promise to Bush. Everything Howard said and did from then on was with a view to fulfilling his promise to Bush regardless of anything that might distract from that including, as it transpired, the wishes of the Australian people.[6]

For the next thirteen months right up to the eve of the invasion, Howard made every effort to deceive the Australian people and the Australian Parliament by claiming that, one, Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction which, two, Howard claimed were a “a direct, undeniable and lethal threat to Australia and its people”; and, three, right up to the eve of war, he continued to claim that he had made no decision about committing Australia to go to war against Iraq as an ally of the US.

As shall be shown using bona-fide evidence, the first two of these claims by John Howard were patently and deliberately false. Both the circumstantial evidence and the balance of probabilities regarding the falseness of the third claim are compelling.

With regard to the first two claims, the second is contingent on the first. If Howard knew that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction prior to committing Australia to war against Iraq, then obviously Howard’s claim that they were “a direct, undeniable and lethal threat to Australia and its people” could not be valid and, therefore, was a blatant lie.

With regard to the third claim, the circumstantial evidence clearly shows that Howard had made a decision to go to war long before the announcement on the 18 March 2003. However, this paper will confine itself to the verifiable evidence that relates to Howard’s deliberately false claim that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and that they were a “direct, undeniable and lethal threat to Australia and its people”.

The accusation that John Howard deliberately lied to and misled the Australian people and Parliament revolves around whether or not Howard knew that Saddam Hussein had destroyed his weapons of mass destruction after the First Gulf War which ended in 1991. 

On 7 August 1995, Hussein Kamel al-Majid and his wife defected from Iraq. Kamel was the son-in-law of Saddam Hussein. He was also the Minister of Industries and was responsible at various stages of his career for developing Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and later, after the First Gulf War, for secretly destroying Iraq’s WMD’s in accordance with the allies demands after the war.

On 22 August 1995, Hussein Kamel was debriefed by the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It was during this debriefing that Kamel disclosed what he knew about Saddam’s WMD’s and, crucially, that he had personally seen to it that all of Iraq’s WMDs had been destroyed.[7] The reason for the secrecy at the time was that Iraq did not wish it to be known to Iran that it no longer had any WMDs. Clearly, the US and their allies went along with the ruse since the debriefing was not made public at the time.

In the lead up to the attack against Iraq, it was Kamel’s disclosures about Saddam’s WMD’s that were primarily used to support the allegation that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Omitted, however, was Kamel’s insistence, in the same debriefing, that these weapons had been destroyed and, more to the point, that it was Kamel that had organised their destruction.

After the allies had consolidated their hold over Iraq, it soon became apparent that there were no WMD’s despite a concerted effort by the allies to find them. When Howard on 2 February 2004 was later confronted about the fact that there were no WMD’s to be found and asked if there would be an inquiry into the intelligence failures during the lead up to the war, Howard said:

You’ve got to bear in mind of course that almost all of the intelligence that came our way in relation to the war against Iraq pertained from British and American sources. It didn’t come from our own independent sources, obviously it was independently assessed and so forth but it was primarily British and American intelligence and I’ll see what the detail of that that statement is.[8]

      

Part of that intelligence that Howard says was gained from US and British sources was Hussein Kamel’s debriefing transcript. Indeed, Howard actually referred to it and to Hussein Kamel by name in his Ministerial Statement to Parliament on 4 February 2003 when he said:

There are 6500 chemical bombs - including 550 shells filled with mustard gas, 360 tonnes of bulk chemical warfare agent - including 1.5 tonnes of the deadly nerve agent VX, 3000 tonnes of precursor chemicals - 300 tonnes of which could only be used for the production of VX, and over 30 000 special munitions for the delivery of chemical and biological agents - all unaccounted for.

In 1995, the international community was confronted by Iraq's massive programme for developing offensive biological weapons - one of the largest and most advanced in the world.

Despite four years of intensive inquiries and searches, the weapons inspectors did not even know of its existence until Saddam's son-in-law, Hussein Kamal defected. Faced with its duplicity Iraq finally admitted to producing aflatoxin - which causes cancers, the paralysing poison botulinum and anthrax bacteria.

It admitted to manufacturing 8 500 litres of anthrax. A single gram is enough for millions of fatal doses. Dr Blix wants proof that the anthrax has been destroyed - and so do we.

Iraq must account for the large quantity of undeclared growth media for biological weapons and for all its SCUD B ballistic missiles. It must explain why it has rebuilt equipment and facilities destroyed by previous inspection teams.[9]

Clearly, Howard had access to Kamel’s debriefing transcript and was well aware that the material he was referring to in his statement had been destroyed by Kamel long ago and, contrary to Howard’s assertion otherwise, had, therefore, all been accounted for by Kamel.

Because Howard was eager to tell the Parliament and the Australian people about the WMD’s Saddam Hussein once had by presenting them as WMD’s that Saddam Hussein still had, Howard deliberately misled the Parliament and lied to the Australian people by failing to tell them that these weapons no longer existed and that, crucially, the source of this withheld information was the same source as the source he relied on to accuse Saddam Hussein of still having WMD’s.

In trying to defend himself against being touted as a liar, Howard may well say that he had not been advised that Kamel had said that he had destroyed Saddam’s WMD’s, but then that would lead to accusations that he had been deliberately mislead by our allies the US since the disclosure about having destroyed the WMD’s was part of the original statement about what WMD’s Saddam had.

No matter what way one looks at it, Howard is unable to escape the fact that he either misled Parliament and the nation or, alternatively, he and the Australian people were deliberately misled by President George W. Bush and his administration. Given Howard’s close relationship with Bush, however, the alternative is an unlikely scenario. 

 

ENDNOTES

---

 [1] John Howard, “Iraq Speech’, House of Representatives Hansard, 18 March 2003. p. 12506.

 [2] John Howard, “Transcript of the Prime Minister the Hon. John Howard MP interview with Neil Mitchell, Radio 3AW”, 21 September 2001. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Interview/2001/interview1248.html  Accessed 2 June 2012.

 [3] John Howard, “Transcript of the Prime Minister the Hon. John Howard MP, press conference – Ambassador’s residence, Washington, DC”, 12 September 2001. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Interview/2001/interview1239.html  Accessed 2 June 2012.

 [4] Media Release, “Force Deployment”, 17 October 2001. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Release/2001/media_release1342.html  Accessed 2 June 2012.

 [5] John Howard, “Transcript of the Prime Minister the Hon. John Howard MP, Interview with Laurie Oakes, Sunday Program”, 10 February 2002. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Interview/2002/interview1507.html  Accessed 2 June 2012.

 [6] 76% of Australians were against Australia taking part in the war against Iraq without UN approval. See: Brendon O'Connor and Srdjan Vucetic, ‘Another Mars-Venus divide? Why Australia said 'yes' and Canada said 'non' to involvement in the 2003 Iraq War’, Australian journal of International Affairs, Vol. 64, No. 5, pp. 526 — 548, November 2010.  p. 535.

 [7] ‘Testimony of General Hussein Kamel’, UNSCOM/IAEA, 22 August 1995. http://www.downingstreetmemo.com/docs/unscom950822.pdf  Accessed 12 June 2012.

 [8] John Howard, “Transcript of the Prime Minister the Hon. John Howard MP doorstop interview, Perth”, 2 February 2004. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Interview/2004/Interview666.html  Accessed 12 June 2012.

 [9] John Howard, “Ministerial Statement to Parliament on Iraq”, 4 February 2003. http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/10052/20080118-1528/pm.gov.au/media/Speech/2003/speech69.html  Accessed 12 June 2012.

WAR AGAINST IRAN: THE SYRIAN FACTOR

A recent report in The Australian has brought to light the way in which the fighting in Syria is being regulated by the US. According to the report, the CIA is denying anti-Assad fighters the heavier weapons they need to oust the al-Assad regime. In effect, by drip-feeding the rebels the arms they need in this way, the war is being deliberately prolonged by the US despite the fact that the US in its rhetoric clearly wants the al-Assad to go.

There can only be one explanation for this; Obama, while telling the world he wants to see the back of al-Assad in Syria, doesn’t want the war to end prior to the November elections.

This could mean that the US and Israel have other plans for Syria after the US Presidential elections.

With Syria out of the Iran equation, Israel would find it difficult to justify an attack against Hezbollah when an attack against Iran is launched by Israel and the US. When such an attack does occur, which in all likelihood will be after the election regardless of who wins, Israel and the US will also launch an all-out attack against Syria as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon. This way it ensures that only the anti-Assad faction that the US approves of will become the new Syrian government and at the same time Israel retains the ‘pre-emptive strike’ excuse for attacking Hezbollah. If al-Assad of Syria were to be deposed now, it would cut off supplies to Hezbollah. And with no supplies, it would be difficult for Israel to justify launching a pre-emptive attack against Hezbollah.

The bigger picture dictates that, when the final confrontation comes after the elections, it would be better to deal with all of Israel’s enemies at once rather than have a whole series of smaller wars. One big war and its fait accompli as far as the Zionist/Neocon cabal are concerned. They want to kill a lot of birds in one glorious Final Confrontation.

It’s time to be on the streets demanding an end to this nonsense.  

WAR AGAINST IRAN: ISRAEL PREPARES FOR ‘MULTI-FRONT CONFRONTATION’

Israeli Defence Force (IDF) chief Benny Gantz was quoted in Arutz Sheva on Friday that “Recent events require the IDF to prepare for every scenario - even a multi-front confrontation.”

The recent events that Gantz was referring to were the attack against an Egyptian military unit last week that Israel blamed on Palestinian ‘jihadists’ from the Gaza Strip. Hamas, the Palestinian resistance organisation that governs the Gaza Strip, has denied that the men behind the attack on the Egyptians were from the Gaza. Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has accused the Israeli Mossad organisation for the attacks. Meanwhile, military action in the Sinai has continued over this last weekend when Egyptian security forces killed some six gunmen of unknown origin.

Apart from the recently developed situation in the Sinai, the general situation in the Middle East has also prompted Gantz to proffer statements that seem to be preparing the Israeli people generally for an all out regional war particularly against their arch-enemy, Iran.

The most recent of Middle East developments has been the reshuffling of the military hierarchy by Muslim Brotherhood Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi. The move seems to have removed most, if not all, powers from the Egyptian military and handed them to the civilian government. The move is bound to be of concern to the Israelis who will see the move as increasing the power of Islamists in Egypt.

The latest National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) regarding Iran’s supposed ‘nuclear weapons program’ has, it seems, also added to the potentially explosive mix of conditions that could lead to the final confrontation with all of Israel’s enemies.

The way things are lining up at the moment, the final confrontation which could destroy much of the Middle East is now only months away.

BOLT MANAGES TO DIVIDE THE ABORIGINAL COMMUNITY WITH HIS RACISM

Somehow, Andrew Bolt, Australia’s foremost and loudest racist, has managed to divide the Aboriginal community by giving voice to some Aboriginal people that, for purely political reasons, have chosen also to deny those that claim Aboriginal heritage any rights that other more obviously Aboriginal people are able to currently enjoy.

Little do they realise that these people are cutting off their noses to spite their face.

Bolt’s intention ultimately is simply to deny all Aboriginal people any special rights or privileges based on their Aboriginality. Bolt has begun his racist campaign by attempting to pick on Aboriginal people that had lost their appearance of being Aboriginal arguing that they were not actually Aboriginal and therefore not entitled to the various rights and privileges that other Aboriginal people enjoy.

Bolt came unstuck with this endeavour when, not only did he claim that some Aboriginal people were not Aboriginal and therefore not entitled to these various special rights and privileges, but they were being fraudulent in claiming these rights and privileges because, so Bolt claimed, they knew that were not Aboriginal and were only claiming Aboriginality in order to have the rights and privileges accorded to Aboriginal people.

Fortunately, the Aboriginal people that were thus maligned took Bolt to court on the basis that Bolt had defamed them by saying they were frauds. Judge Mordy agreed that they had, indeed, been defamed because the Aboriginal people concerned had identified as Aboriginal long before any of them could have had any understanding about what rights and privileges were available to them. The Judge also found that, while they may have lost their Aboriginal appearance, it did not make them any the less Aboriginal from the point of view of heritage.

Now Bolt is trying another tack. A few Aboriginal people have stated that some people who claim Aboriginal heritage look like ‘whitefellas’ to them. Bolt has given these people a voice at this blog. But you have to wonder why these people are turning against their own. There could be two reasons. One, they are racist themselves and see the full-blood Aboriginal as the only true Aboriginal and, therefore, are the only people entitled to the rights and privileges afforded to Aboriginal people, and, two, they want to big note them selves for political reasons, as clearly Bess Price, an Aboriginal women who wants to stand as a Country Liberal Party candidate in the upcoming Northern Territory elections, is doing. Similarly, one has to wonder why Aboriginal artist Dallas Scott would also want to split hairs over Aboriginality.

Aboriginal people have been abused ever since ‘whitefellas’ first stepped foot in their lands. It’s a pity that it is ‘whitefellas’ that are again abusing Aboriginal people by causing divisions amongst them in this way. It will be the beginning of the end for Aboriginal people if people like Bolt succeed in getting those with more obvious Aboriginality to also shun those with a less obvious claim to Aboriginality in their heritage as Bolt has.

It’ll be a very dark day indeed when some groups of Aboriginal people tell another group of Aboriginal people that their Aboriginality has been effectively bred out of them, because it will then be only a matter of time before they are all gone forever.   

WAR AGAINST IRAN: THE ‘SANCTIONS’ FAÇADE

While Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu has been champing at the bit to attack Iran, the US and its allies have been demanding that sanctions and diplomacy be given a chance to work before any decision is taken to attack Iran to halt its so-called ‘nuclear weapons program’.

Or, at least, that’s the impression that Israel and the US want to present to the world. The reality, however, is vastly different.

All that Israel and the US are waiting for now is, not for the sanctions to work, but for the 6 November Presidential elections to be over and done with. Until then, both Israel and the US need to continue the façade of ‘waiting for the sanctions to work’.

The recent spate of visits by powerful US figureheads, the Republican candidate Mitt Romney and US defence Secretary Leon Panetta, have been to perpetuate the illusion that it is the US that are holding back Israel from launching a ‘unilateral’ attack against Iran’s ‘nuclear weapons program’. While Romney has said that, if he becomes president, he will support an Israeli ‘unilateral’ attack, Panetta is continuing with the administrations stance of insisting that ‘sanctions’ be given a chance to work. But it’s not the sanctions Obama and Romney are interested in seeing work; it’s the care both are taking not to commit the US people to yet another war that is clearly for Israel that bothers them most.

No matter who wins the election, the final confrontation against Iran will begin. And, to continue the façade of Israel finally not being able to restrain itself any longer, it will launch the initial strike against Iran’s nuclear facilities ‘unilaterally’ and then immediately withdraw leaving the US to bomb the Iranians into regime change while the Israelis take on Hezbollah and Hamas closer to home in an effort to finish them off once and for all and providing them with an excuse to occupy the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and south Lebanon with a view ultimately of annexing these places to form what will become Greater Israel.

It should be made perfectly clear; when Israel strikes Iran, there will be absolutely nothing ‘unilateral’ about.

ROMNEY TELLS NETANYAHU THAT U.S. WILL SUPPORT ISRAELI ‘UNILATERAL’ STRIKE AGAINST IRAN IF HE IS ELECTED PRESIDENT

During a speech to leading ultra-Zionists in Israel, Mitt Romney said that, if he is elected President next November, he will support an Israeli ‘unilateral’ attack against Iran. His words, as reported in Haaretz, were unmistakable:  “We recognize Israel's right to defend itself, and that it is right for America to stand with you”. Though Romney was careful not to commit the US to a first strike against Iran, the message was clear.

As I have repeatedly argued at this blog in the past, there is no way that Israel can ‘unilaterally’ attack Iran. Israel can only launch an attack against Iran with the complete support of the US. There can, therefore, be no such thing as an Israeli ‘unilateral attack’ on Iran. While Israel might launch the first strikes against Iran to make it seem that Israel has attacked ‘unilaterally’, the reality is that any attack against Iran by Israel will be coordinated and closely planned with the US and in conjunction with a US follow-up attack during which period Israel will launch ‘pre-emptive’ attacks against Hezbollah in Lebanon and against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

With this speech, Romney has effectively committed the US, and possibly their allies, to a war against Iran on behalf of Israel.

Just to balance the situation from Obama’s side, US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta on Sunday has told reporters that the administration ‘would respect Israel’s ability to make decisions about its security’ leaving it open for Israel to decide when it wants to start the war. Obama and Romney’s desire not to directly commit the US to war this side of the election is all that is now preventing an attack against Iran.

As yet, there are no massive demonstrations against such a war; a war that has the potential to be far more devastating for the entire region than Iraq ever was.

PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES PANDER TO AMERICAN’S WISHES RATHER THAN COME CLEAN ON FOREIGN POLICY

In my post yesterday I pondered the notion that, once the elections were out of the way, whoever was elected President would soon mount an attack against Iran. My reasoning was, one, that neither candidate wanted to talk too seriously about war this side of the elections through fear of alienating large chunks of American voters who’ve simply had enough of America’s wars and their costs, while, two, war against Iran for the purpose regime change is the ultimate endgame for both the US and Israel and would be something that either candidate would feel free to do after being elected.

This position has led to some observers of the election pointing out that both candidates seem to have similar endgame foreign policies with regards to Iran which, so they are telling the electorate, reflect a desire to resolve the problems with Iran and its so-called nuclear weapons program via sanctions and diplomacy while leaving the military option firmly on the table.

Let’s be clear about this; both sides want to see regime change in Iran. This is the real goal of both Obama and Romney. The question of Iran’s so-called nuclear weapons program is merely an excuse by which regime change will ultimately be effected. There is absolutely no bona fide evidence that Iran has a nuclear weapons program and, even if it did and Iran actually managed to build a bomb, using it would be the last thing it would ever do – literally. The US knows this and so do the Israelis. And both are armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons.

To see what Republican foreign policy really is all about one need look no further than Romney’s foreign policy advisor team. While the likes of GOP ‘good ol’ boys’ Henry Kissinger, James Baker and George Schultz are mentioned, they are there merely for window dressing and credibility. Others, however, have a well-known reputation for their anti-Iran warmongering rhetoric. Neocon warhawks Eliot Cohen, John Bolton, John Lehman, ultra-Zionist Paula Dobriansky and ex-Blackwater executive Cofer Black all lurk menacingly in the background. All of these neocons have advocated attacking Iran to effect regime change. They are all part of Romney’s foreign policy team.

As for Obama; as I explained, if he wins the election to gain a second term he will become a nothing-to-lose President who will need to answer only to the long term interests of the US and history.

The future does not bode well in a post-November 2012 world.

THERE’LL BE WAR AFTER THE 2012 U.S. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS – NO MATTER WHO WINS

In an article today in Commentary magazine, neoconservative writer Jonathan Tobin asks: ‘Who can be trusted to act on Iran?’ The question, of course, is rhetorical. What he’s really asking is; is Romney any more likely to attack Iran than Obama?

The answer is simple. After the election is over, no matter who wins, Iran will be attacked.

The reason Tobin asks the question is because, while Romney has said ‘nothing is off the table’ – just as Obama has and George W before him did – neither Romney nor Obama has said they will actually attack Iran no matter what.

The reality is that both contenders for the Presidency need to tread a fine line in the lead up to the election. On one side of the line, a war-weary American people aren’t interested in heading off to yet another war for the Israelis – or anyone else. Already the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost them dearly in both blood and treasure to the point where many equate the current economic crisis in America with the debts that America has incurred because of the wars. They are unlikely to support a candidate that promotes war.

But on the other side of the line is America’s long-term end-game for the Middle East in which Israel plays a crucial role that both candidates acknowledge. Neither candidate can entirely ignore that.

If Obama wins the election, he becomes a second term nothing-to-lose president who can do as he pleases where the only consequences he must face is how historians will portray him after his presidency is over. While Obama has been saying he wants to give sanctions and diplomacy a chance before doing anything else, he has quietly and steadfastly been building up American forces in the Gulf ready to attack. All he needs is a casus belli. One will quickly arise just as soon as the election is over – the Israelis will see to that.

If Romney gets up on the 6 November it will be on the back of economic promises of a return to prosperity. But, for Romney war is much easier. He’s a Republican for a start. Once he goes to war, he’ll claim that the election gave him a mandate to deal with Iran as he sees fit. And, of course, the war machine is already in place.

In short, no matter who wins, the world loses and tens of thousands will die.