Scott Knight

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Scott Ritter (2007)

William Scott Ritter, Jr. (born July 15, 1961 ) is an American officer who became known for his role as the United Nations inspector for the UNSCOM mission in Iraq.

Career

After graduating from Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania with a bachelor's degree in Soviet history , he joined the US Marine Corps in 1984 , where he served as a reconnaissance officer for twelve years . During the Gulf War of 1991, he served ballistic missile under General as a consultant junior Norman Schwarzkopf .

UNSCOM

From 1991 to 1998 he worked as an inspector for the UNSCOM mission in Iraq, which was tasked with finding and destroying weapons of mass destruction and facilities for their production in Iraq. In January 1998, his team was denied access to several facilities and Ritter was expelled from the country by the Iraqi government on charges of working for the CIA . Scott Ritter criticized the UN for its inaction in view of Iraq's blockade of the UNSCOM mission and resigned from his post in August 1998. In this sense his book "Endgame: Solving the Iraq Problem - Once and For All" (1999) stands.

Dramatic U-turn in 1999 and criticism of US politics

In 1999 (still under Clinton) he changed his mind fundamentally and made the documentary "In Shifting Sands: The Truth About UNSCOM and the Disarming of Iraq", which was financed by an Iraqi businessman living in Detroit.

He became known to a wider public, particularly during the Bush era, for his sharp criticism of United States politics. Among other things, he now confirmed the suspicions of the Iraqi government that the CIA is trying to use the UNSCOM mission for espionage purposes. On the question of whether Iraq posed a threat from weapons of mass destruction, he stood before the Iraq war with his statements against the positions of the Bush administration based on CIA reports .

In the period that followed, Ritter published other critical books and articles on these topics, his book "War against Iraq" in German.

The Iraq Survey Group, commissioned by the armed forces of the “ Coalition of the Willing ”, confirmed Ritter's assessment in 2004 that Iraq did not have the weapons of mass destruction put forward as a reason for war.

In a speech, Ritter recommended that lobbyists such as those of the AIPAC who stand up for Israeli interests should in future be registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act for foreign interest representatives. Lobbying is their legitimate right, but their interests are not identical to US interests.

Condemnation

In 2003, Ritter was given a suspended sentence for exchanging sexual content online in 2001 with a police officer who had pretended to be a minor. Ritter protested his innocence and considered the allegations politically motivated.

In February 2009 he was again in contact with a police officer who pretended to be 15 online. After that, charges were brought again and in April 2012 he was found guilty and sentenced to 1.5 to 5.5 years in prison.

Works

  • Endgame: Solving the Iraq Crisis . Simon & Schuster, New York 1999. ISBN 0-684-86485-1 .
  • Was on Iraq . Context Books (US) / Profile Books Ltd (UK), 2002. ISBN 1-86197-636-4 .
  • Frontier Justice: Weapons of Mass Destruction and the Bushwhacking of America . Context Books, 2003.
  • Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the UN and Overthrow Saddam Hussein (with Seymour Hersh ). Nation Books, 2005.
  • Target Iran: The Truth about the White House's Plans for Regime Change . Nation Books, October 2006. ISBN 1-56025-936-1 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ New York Times, February 28, 2012
  2. ↑ Video on YouTube
  3. ^ Ex-UN inspector Scott Ritter sex sting trial begins - BBC, April 12, 2011
  4. ↑ New York Times Magazine: Scott Ritter's Other War , February 22, 2012 - Ritter justifies himself in the portrait with the words: “My personal missteps - how many Americans have died as a result of that? None. Other than my family, how many victims were there? None. "
personal data
SURNAME Knight, Scott
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ritter, William Scott Junior (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION US inspector for the UNSCOM mission
DATE OF BIRTH July 15, 1961