``America could care less about disarming Iraq,'' says Scott Ritter. The
              ex-Marine was a hard-nosed U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq until August 1998,
              when he fell out with his boss, Richard Butler, and grew tired of the
              meddling of his own government. Ritter says that Iraq is sufficiently
              disarmed but that the United States wants to maintain U.N. sanctions as a
              means of toppling, or neutralizing, Saddam Hussein. A worthy goal, perhaps,
              but contrary to the U.N. mandate -- as the Iraqi government keeps insisting.

              Iraq once accused Ritter of being a U.S. spy. But last month, Ritter was
              allowed into Baghdad to work on a documentary film. In arms facilities, he
              was received courteously by Iraqis who had previously vilified him. He
              scoffs at Butler's recent warnings that Iraq has resupplied itself with
              weapons of mass destruction.

              By phone from Albany, N.Y., Ritter denied he has flipped or flopped since he
              left the arms control job, as an observer might conclude. He says he speaks
              with authority because he was with UNSCOM from its inception in 1991 and
              even designed its intelligence operation.

              Ritter is mindful that Saddam is dangerous and terrible but says Saddam is
              not atypical in his region. In 1982, Syrian dictator Hafez Assad massacred
              20,000 people in putting down Muslim insurgency in the city of Hama. Saddam
              killed 5,000 Iraqi Kurds with poison gas. If Saddam had killed them with
              artillery instead of poison gas, Ritter says, we would not be talking about
              them. Ritter, a rock-solid Republican, says President Bush's Hitler analogy
              trapped us in a failed policy.

              Ritter, you may recall, accused the United States of using UNSCOM
              intelligence gathering for its own ends, and he accused Butler of allowing
              it to happen. He also says Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and
              national security adviser Sandy Berger made UNSCOM delay inspections seven
              times in 1997-98 to suit the Clinton administration's political needs. But
              Ritter's main point is that by 1995, Rolf Ekeus, who was then head of
              UNSCOM, was saying Iraq was fundamentally disarmed, which meant that it was
              no longer a threat. Because of U.S. and British pressure, the U.N. continues
              to insist on 100 percent compliance with U.N. requirements. The original
              goal is impossible and unnecessary, unless the real purpose is to maintain
              sanctions no matter what.

              The Security Council must rewrite the rules of engagement in Iraq, Ritter
              says, because the second half of its mandate is essential: monitoring Iraqi
              arms so a buildup does not catch us by surprise. Iraq has not allowed
              weapons inspections since December 1998, but Ritter says Iraq will allow
              monitoring if we drop sanctions. Not suspend them, end them.

              Ritter says the Iraqis will allow us to watch them but not strip-search
              them. We can't look for every last document about missiles or every nut and
              bolt. In striving to achieve the impossible, he says, we are depriving
              ourselves of the opportunity to do what is necessary.

              Ritter was posted to General Norman Schwarzkopf's headquarters during the
              Gulf War, which Ritter says Bush ended 48 hours too soon. Ritter is not
              arguing that Saddam should have been taken out. That was impractical and
              beyond our mandate. We would have lost our Arab allies; Saudi Arabia would
              have erupted.

              But Ritter says we should have taken the extra time to destroy the
              Revolutionary Guard even if that meant killing 15,000 more Iraqis -- just
              like the ``turkey shoot'' depicted in Seymour Hersh's controversial New
              Yorker article. Those deaths among the soldiers propping up Saddam would
              have paled by comparison to the civilian deaths caused later by sanctions.
              UNICEF's figure, based on Iraqi data, is 1.5 million.

              ``The longer we continue the policy of isolation and containment,'' Ritter
              says, ``the stronger Saddam gets. In 1992, he would have lost a (fair)
              election in a landslide; now he would win in a landslide.''

              When Ritter comes to the Bay Area this weekend, he will join Denis Halliday
              at anti-sanctions events. Halliday was head of the U.N. oil- for-food
              program in Iraq until he decided it was fraudulent and that the loss of
              civilian life was unacceptable. Don't expect them to agree on everything.
              Ritter also believes that sanctions should end, but only after the U.N.
              satisfies its legal requirement, declaring that Iraq is in compliance on
              disarmament. In terms of the real world, Iraq is in compliance, he says.
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