The Fanonite

While there is little that is being done to combat Climate Change, its business potential has not escaped Big Business. From airlines [!] to Hollywood, everyone seems to be jumping on the bandwagon. In the process, the issue risks being trivialized and reduced to a bumper sticker. It is rare, however, for activists to find the establishment on their side. For this reason one report has been making the rounds in activist circles — some even holding it up as a vindication of their views – as the source is an establishment think-tank: Institute of International and Strategic Studies. In doing so, everyone seems to have suspended scepticism and is helping propagate what is nothing more than a new attempt to ratchet up fear from an established terrormonger. Climate Change is merely the bait; the hook is the familiar pantheon of demons: al-Qaida and Iran. So the same think-tank, which warned you of them menacing Iraqi WMDs, now tells you “Al-Qaida has revived, extended its influence, and has the capacity to carry out a spectacular strike similar to the September 11 attacks on America“, and that “Iran could have a nuclear weapon by 2009 or 2010″. Did someone just cry wolf?

Both statements are of course patently false, hence I wouldn’t accord this propaganda outfit unnecessary credibility by repeating its claims on Climate Change. And I hope those who are giving free publicity to its propaganda would learn a thing or two about it before they click Send on their mass mails.

Background

Founded in 1958 the IISS has strong establishment links, with former US and British government officials among its members. The Foreign Office contributed £100,000 towards the setting up of its headquarters in central London, and the opening was attended by Thatcher and Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, then secretary general of Nato. Its early work focused on nuclear deterrence and arms control and was by its own account “hugely influential in setting the intellectual structures for managing the Cold War.”

Selling the Iraq War

IISS played a key role in furnishing the pretexts for the invasion of Iraq by publishing a dossier on Iraqi WMDs, on 9 September 2002, which was edited by Gary Samore, formerly of the US State Department, and presented by Dr John Chipman, a former Nato fellow.

The dossier was immediately seized on by Bush and Blair administrations as providing “proof” that Saddam was just months away from launching a chemical and biological, or even a nuclear attack. Large parts of the IISS document were subsequently recycled in the now notorious Downing Street dossier, published with a foreword by the Prime Minister, the following week.

Unlike the British Government, IISS later claimed it made mistakes in its dossier about the extent of the Iraqi threat. It commissioned an independent assessment by Rolf Ekeus, a former head of United Nations arms inspectors in Iraq. Samore and Chipman now claim their dossier had caveats about Iraq’s supposed WMD arsenal which the Government insisted on removing from intelligence assessments - leading to “sexing up” accusations. However, in his interview with BBC on the day of the publication of the report, such caveats are conspicuously absent.

Pushing the bombing of Iran

In April 2006 The Institute was involved in briefing the media in which the BBC reported that Iran was ‘on course’ to develop nuclear weapons in ‘three years’. On being challenged the Institute backed down slightly.