Profiles in Shame: William Scott Ritter, Jr.

Scott Ritter's mug shot, embedded from CNN

Note: This is the first installment in "Profiles in Shame", which will become an occasional feature on this web site.

This is a column I've been waiting to write for a long time, and finally got an excuse to do it: former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter made an appearance on C-Span last weekend, plugging his new book "Waging Peace", which claims to provide a strategy plan for the peace movement. He is scheduled to appear again tomorrow, Sept 9 (I don't know if it is a different program, or a repeat of the first one)

"Crooks and Liars" are all over this, and some of their comments have to be seen to be believed. This man is a god to the peace movement. Some believe he should run for President. Liberal blogger Ricky Bones claimed here that Mr. Ritter has more credibility than Ghandi!

So for those who don't know him, who is Scott Ritter? Scott Ritter is a former UN weapons inspector in Iraq, a former Marine officer, an author of several books, and an outspoken critic of President Bush and the War in Iraq. He has appeared numerous times on talk shows and written articles for websites, such as antiwar.com.

But there is another side to Mr. Ritter that is not so generally known. He is a narcissist who will literally say or do anything to get the media spotlight; from bashing the Clinton administration to bashing Bush, from railing against Saddam to defending him (see below). If that wasn't bad enough, he has also been arrested not once, but twice for soliciting underage girls on the Internet. But this is the man the anti-war crowd wants to use as its poster boy. It's unbelievable he can still show his face on TV.

When I have discussed this subject before, the typical response among Ritter's defenders is: "OK, so he has personal problems involving his sexual life. That doesn't mean he's wrong on the Iraq War." No it doesn't, but strangely the leftist media aren't quite as forgiving for scandals involving right-of-center figures, like Revs. Ted Haggard or Jimmy Swaggart, Sen. Mark Foley, and of course, very recently, Sen. Craig Roberts. Do you think you will see any of these guys on the media circuit again anytime soon?

But even without his legal problems, Scott Ritter has thoroughly discredited himself on several occasions. He essentially changes his views on Iraq to whatever will bring him the most attention at the time, in what seems to be nothing more than a desperate craving for attention. In 1998, he testified in front of Congress that he quit his job as weapons inspector because he was frustrated with the way Saddam was blocking the inspections and, quote:

[I quit] out of frustration that the United Nations Security Council, and the United States as its most significant supporter, was failing to enforce the post-Gulf War resolutions designed to disarm Iraq.

Apparently, he loved bashing Saddam and calling for more measures to be taken, as long as he felt safe that they would never happen. However, with the change in climate after 9/11, it seems he realized that war with Iraq had suddenly become more possible, so he shifted his emphasis 180 degrees to trying to prevent war by emphasizing that Iraq probably didn't have any weapons left, and so we had nothing to worry about. In doing so, he essentially became an apologist for Saddam Hussein instead. In a 2002 interview titled: "War On Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to Know"(hard copy only, or some of it here), he claimed:

We eliminated the nuclear program, and for Iraq to have reconstituted it would require undertaking activities that would have been eminently detectable by intelligence services. (page 32)

If Iraq were producing [chemical] weapons today, we’d have proof, pure and simple. (page 37)

[A]s of December 1998 we had no evidence Iraq had retained biological weapons, nor that they were working on any. In fact, we had a lot of evidence to suggest Iraq was in compliance. (page 46)[7]

Sounds a little different from the Scott Ritter of 1998, doesn't it?

In 2000, Ritter made a documentary titled: "In Shifting Sands: The Truth About UNSCOM and the Disarming of Iraq", which claimed that the US was deliberately dragging out the conflict with Saddam Hussein. It didn't get much media buzz, but its financing is significant. It was paid for with a donation of $400,000 from Iraqi-American businessman Shaker Al-Khaffaji who made a profit off of 7 million barrels of Iraqi oil, in violation of UN sanctions. Ritter denies any quid pro quo arrangement, but the connection is impossible to ignore.

But if his real intentions to support Saddam Hussein weren't evident yet, they certainly came to the surface in a Time Magazine interview later that year. Regarding a prison he once found, he quickly changes the subject:

[TIME:] You've spoke about having seen the children's prisons in Iraq. Can you describe what you saw there?

[Ritter:] The prison in question is at the General Security Services headquarters, which was inspected by my team in Jan. 1998. It appeared to be a prison for children — toddlers up to pre-adolescents — whose only crime was to be the offspring of those who have spoken out politically against the regime of Saddam Hussein. It was a horrific scene. Actually I'm not going to describe what I saw there because what I saw was so horrible that it can be used by those who would want to promote war with Iraq, and right now I'm waging peace.

Got that? Not just a prison, but a political prison for children, including toddlers for God's sake! Yet, in his arrogance he thought we should forget about it, else we might actually develop informed opinions on Iraq. If you are interested, there were some pretty outraged comments on this statement at the Command Post awhile back, including this comment: "Maybe, if this was a prison for 14yr old girls, Ritter would've been more forthcoming."

Ritter's own failings do not mean that the anti-Iraq war movement is discredited. But they would be well-advised to find a better representative for their cause.

Regarding the windows media file I linked earlier, you will see Mr. Ritter make several tired claims, including 1) That the Iraq war was illegal, and 2) that the administration shifted its reasons for the war, from WMD, to 9/11, to humanitarian reasons.

I have pointed this out before, but #1 is incorrect, and Ritter should know this better than anyone. Mandatory UN resolution 687 authorized the use of force against Saddam if he did not comply with inspections. He didn't. For 10 years. #2 is also untrue. Of course, understandably, WMDs aren't mentioned much anymore. But the administration never said Saddam was responsible for 9/11. Ever. And the humanitarian reasons for the invasion were well-discussed prior to the war. In January, 2003, President Bush said in his State of the Union address:

The dictator who is assembling the world's most dangerous weapons has already used them on whole villages -- leaving thousands of his own citizens dead, blind, or disfigured. Iraqi refugees tell us how forced confessions are obtained -- by torturing children while their parents are made to watch. International human rights groups have catalogued other methods used in the torture chambers of Iraq: electric shock, burning with hot irons, dripping acid on the skin, mutilation with electric drills, cutting out tongues, and rape. If this is not evil, then evil has no meaning. (Applause.)

And tonight I have a message for the brave and oppressed people of Iraq: Your enemy is not surrounding your country -- your enemy is ruling your country. (Applause.) And the day he and his regime are removed from power will be the day of your liberation.

Ritter did make one prediction, that many of his fans claim was on the money. Shortly after the invasion started, he claimed in a radio interview:

"The United States is going to leave Iraq with its tail between its legs, defeated. It is a war we can not win. We do not have the military means to take over Baghdad and for this reason I believe the defeat of the United States in this war is inevitable. Every time we confront Iraqi troops we may win some tactical battles, as we did for ten years in Vietnam, but we will not be able to win this war, which in my opinion is already lost"

Sounds uncanny, doesn't it? But keep in mind he imagined we would be fighting Iraqi troops for 10 years, when in fact, they gave up after three weeks. And we did, in fact, take Baghdad. Even Ritter didn't imagine our biggest problem in the long run would be Iraqis fighting each other, together with essentially a proxy war between Iraq's neighbors.

In any case, I get the distinct feeling that he wasn't just predicting this would happen, but rather, hoping it...





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