• unnecessary because Iraq, horrendous and brutal as its government under Saddam Hussein’s Baath regime certainly is, doesn’t constitute any threat to anyone outside of Iraq. The claim that an impoverished country permanently at the brink of total collapse would or even could attack anyone else, let alone Europe or the United States, is an insult to the intelligence of the public. For the last twelve years, Iraq has attacked absolutely no one outside of its borders. They know that if they did attack in peacetime, they’d simply be pulverized. The only realistic danger from Iraq is a desperate counterstrike if the country itself is attacked. And it is unclear whether the country is able to do even that. The U.S. government knows this perfectly well, but instead of telling its people and the world the truth, as would be its sworn duty, it chooses to stir hysteria about a totally invented danger allegedly emanating from Iraq.
• murderous, because we know that (according to the environmental organization Greepeace) the last Gulf war in 1991 led to the death of 150,000 Iraqis during the 42-day war and its immediate aftermath. The U.S. government now plans to lob the same amount of cruise missiles into Baghdad and the other big cities of Iraq during the first three days of the war that were launched during the whole 42 days of the Gulf war in 1991, and they have announced their intention to use the rest of the (enormous) weaponry at their disposal just as brutally. If you can live with perhaps half a million Iraqi men, women, and children slaughtered within a few weeks for the "liberation of Iraq from the terrorist Saddam Hussein regime" and all the other reasons rationalizing the slaughter, you can of course allow your government to go ahead and do it. If not, say No to this war and join the 12 million people worldwide who demonstrated against the war on February 15, and the vast majorities all over the world who are strenuously opposed to it.
• illegal, because international law as laid down in the Charter of the United Nations doesn’t allow it. The Charter of the U.N. is for the nations of the world what the U.S. Constitution is for the United States. The U.S. government says Iraq is not heeding a (growing) number of U.N. resolutions. But the number of U.N. resolutions that are not heeded by the government of the United States of America is monumental. It may sound hard to believe, but check it out on the internet. The U.S. government says Saddam Hussein doesn’t respect the U.N. But at the same time, the U.S. government itself has no respect at all for the U.N. In fact, it says if the highest organ of the U.N., the U.N. Security Council, doesn’t go along with the U.S. government, the U.S. government will kick the Security Council in the teeth and to hell with the U.N.
• dangerous, because everybody knows what unsavory states like North Korea, Iran, Pakistan etc. will do if the U.S. really attacks Iraq: get nuclear bombs and other weapons of mass destruction for the first time, or get more if they already have them. And here’s a very simple question: If you were in their shoes, wouldn’t you do the very same thing? Do you think this will make the world a safer place? And finally this war is
• unpatriotic, because it severely endangers the life of all American (and not a few European) citizens. An attack against Iraq, totally unprovoked as it is, will spark with absolute certainty a wave of brutal terrorist counterattacks against goals in the West. When and where is impossible to determine until the terrorist bombs, aircraft, or whatever hit their targets. The leaders of the U.S. government know this perfectly well. Already in October 2001, shortly after the terrible WTC attacks, CIA chief George Tenet warned against attacking Iraq, since this would inevitably lead to an increase in terrorism against targets in the U.S. These attack would be organized not necessarily by Iraq itself, but by people all over the world who are angered by what the see as arrogant superpower behavior. It is easy to see that, of course, Tenet is entirely right. And even Bush, Powell, Cheney and Rumsfeld must know that he is right. How else but unpatriotic can one then call the behavior of Secretary of State Powell, President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, who apparently care little about the life of the American citizens whose welfare they have sworn to defend? For the next terrorist attack on innocent American (or European) citizens, the terrorists themselves will not be the only ones to blame. These future atrocities will then be also the responsibility of the present members of the U.S. government.

But you can stop them. You, not them, are the people. We want you to join us in the fight to prevent irreparable harm before it is to late.

At the brink of a totally senseless war with literally millions of lives at stake, we ask you not to support the wrong politics of your government.

Stop your government from waging a war that is unnecessary, murderous, illegal, dangerous and unpatriotic.