On November 11, the International Action Centre called for demonstrations in San Francisco, New York and other cities should the Pentagon launch a military attack on Iraq.
The IAC has just sent a delegation to Iraq, led by former Attorney General Ramsey Clark, to document the impact on the Iraqi people of seven years of US-led sanctions.
Writing from Baghdad on November 10, delegation member Gloria La Riva declared that the Clinton administration is "building up a war fever for one reason ... to justify continuing the murderous sanctions that have already killed more than 1.4 million people, including more than 750,000 Iraqi children. Clinton says he wants to stop Iraq from manufacturing so-called weapons of mass destruction, but these sanctions are the real weapons of mass destruction."
In New York, IAC organiser Sara Flounders called upon "all anti-war activists to join the IAC in protesting the US war drive. We must be on a heightened state of alert. The Republicans in Congress have joined in the push for a new war. It's time to organise ... to demand that there be no new military attack on Iraq.
"As devastating as a military attack can be, it's also true that the seven years of sanctions have done far more damage to Iraqi society and killed 10 times more people than the Gulf War itself. So we must demand that the sanctions also be ended."
The IAC points out that the Pentagon has over 200 warplanes in the region and 22,000 troops. It has the aircraft carrier Nimitz in the Persian Gulf and just flew more fighters to its air-base in Turkey.
"Washington is the aggressor, not Baghdad. On October 23, Kenya and Egypt joined France, Russia and China in abstaining in a Security Council vote on a new set of sanctions against Iraq that Washington had pushed. After this sign of growing US isolation, Washington hardened its actions against Iraq and provoked the current crisis", the IAC said.