Who armed Saddam?

[Chanman]

Charles R. Smith
Monday, March 17, 2003

Myth vs. Fact

Name one weapon in the Iraqi arsenal that was made
in the United States.

I have offered that challenge to dozens of
so-called anti-war activists who claim that the
U.S. armed Iraq. According to these protesters for
"peace," George Bush Sr. and Ronald Reagan supplied
Iraq with tons of weapons.

None have been able to name the specific weapon -
missile, bomb, fighter, tank or shell - that is
U.S.-made or has U.S. equipment installed in it.
None have been able to name any specific weapon
system.

All of them have failed the challenge, providing no
more than allegations that U.S. parts are in Iraqi
missiles or U.S. electronics are being used by the
Iraqi military. One protester even claimed that
Iraq was armed with U.S.-made trucks.

Since when is a truck a weapon? Are the Iraqis
going to drive backwards, fuel tank first, into the
U.S. Army?

Time to separate the myth from the reality. The
propaganda spun by the far left is false. The facts
show that Iraq is armed with a wide range of
weapons - none of which came from the U.S.

Iraqi Air Force

The Iraqi air force does not fly Falcons or Eagles.
The majority of the Iraqi air force is made in
Russia. The Russian MiG and Sukhoi design bureaus
supplied Iraq with hundreds of advanced
strike-fighters and the Mach 3 Foxbat interceptor.

Saddam could field a force of advanced MiG-29
Fulcrum fighters if they had not chickened out of
combat during the Gulf War, flying to Iran for
asylum. The Iranians, who love Saddam even less
than we do, never returned the MiGs.

The remainder of the Iraqi air force comes from
France and China. The Chinese supplied Saddam with
the Chengdu F-7, a copy of the Russian MiG-21. The
F-7 can fly from unimproved runways and is known to
be a vicious in-close dog fighter.

However, the French Mirage F-1 is reportedly the
best jet fighter in Iraqi hands. You can view an
Iraqi F-1 in action on the State Department Web
site, testing a chemical spraying system.

If you still believe that the Iraqis have no
chemical weapons, think again. Iraq did not modify
its best multimillion-dollar fighter jet to spray
for fruit flies.

Anyone with half of a brain knows that you cannot
keep a modern jet fighter in the air without spare
parts. Thus the Russian, Chinese and French jets
should be museum pieces after 12 years of a
so-called U.N. ban on weapons sales to Iraq. Yet
somehow Saddam has his air force flying over 1,000
sorties a month.

Thanks to excellent reporting by Bill Gertz we now
know that France has been supplying spare parts for
Saddam's Mirage fighters. The French spare parts
arrived in Baghdad not 20 years ago during the Cold
War but last year, just in time to face our forces
today.

Merci! With friends like, that who needs enemies?

Iraqi Missiles

Perhaps the Iraqi missile force has some U.S.-made
weapons? Not. The primary Iraqi missile is the
Russian-made Scud. Other missiles include the
FROG-7 from Russia, the Exocet from France and the
Silkworm from China.

The Iraqi air defense has plenty of missiles ...
from Russia, China and France. The SA-2 Guideline,
SA-3 Goa and SA-6 Gainful SAM missiles are all of
Russian or Chinese manufacture. The French also
supplied Baghdad with a number of Roland air
defense missile systems.

Even the missile parts are from Chinese, German and
French sources. Israeli authorities know full well
what is inside Iraqi-made Scud missiles since many
of them fell on Tel Aviv during the Gulf War. The
Israelis found that the Scud warhead electronics
were made in Germany - not the U.S.A.

In addition, William Safire recently wrote a column
noting that a Chinese chemical company had supplied
rocket fuel to Iraq through a French front company.
Safire identified the fuel, the companies and the
Iraqi missile facility where it was mixed into new
Iraqi rockets. Again, the missile fuel sale was
made within the last year, just in time to make new
Iraqi missiles pointed at Kuwait, Turkey, Saudi
Arabia and Iran.

Saddam sends his love to Paris and Beijing. Without
your help he certainly could not threaten his
neighbors with nerve gas and anthrax.

Iraqi Army

Okay, if not jet fighters and missiles, then how
about tanks? Certainly the biggest weapons seller
in the world, the U.S.A., sold tanks to Iraq.

The Iraqi armor force is made up of Chinese and
Russian models familiar to any "cold" warrior. The
Iraqi T-72 and T-55 tanks are all of Russian
manufacture. The Iraqis also have a large number of
Type-59 Chinese tanks and Russian-made BMP armored
troop carriers. No M-1 Abrams here.

How about attack helicopters? The Iraqis have a
number of choppers they used against the Kurds and
Shiites.

So sorry, the Iraqi attack chopper force is Russian
and French. The Russians supplied Iraq with a large
number of the Mil-24 Hind attack helicopters, armed
to the teeth with cannon, missiles and even
chemical weapon sprayers.

The French supplied Saddam with a large number of
Gazelle attack helicopters. The same French also
managed to keep Saddam's attack helicopter force
flying today with spare parts.

Guns, then? Surely the U.S. supplied Saddam with
guns?

Nope. The main Iraqi artillery is the French 155mm
howitzer. The remainder of Iraq's artillery is
122mm Russian-made cannons and Russian-made
short-range rocket launchers. Even the Iraqi foot
soldier is armed with the venerable AK-47 of
Russian and Chinese make.

Iran-Iraq War

The facts are that during the Iran-Iraq war the
U.S. supplied Iraq with something much more
valuable than guns: satellite information on when
and where the Iranians were going to attack.

Of course, current anti-war activists seize this
piece of information without putting it into
historical context. The information was supplied
during the height of the Cold War. The main threat
to America was the Soviet Union and the biggest
fear in the Gulf was the Ayatollah Khomeini.

You remember the chant "death to America"? It
almost seems that the ayatollah invented it.
Ironically, the Ayatollah made his way to Tehran
from his home in exile - Paris.

The Reagan administration, aware that the Iranian
ayatollah had threatened to turn the Gulf into a
sea of fire, assisted Saddam so that he would not
lose the war. The assistance stopped short of
helping Saddam win the war.

In fact, when it appeared the Iraqis were on the
verge of victory, the Reagan administration
transferred real weapons to the Iranians. The
infamous Iran-Contra scandal involved a large
number of badly needed U.S. TOW anti-tank missiles
that were sold to Iran.

The U.S. missiles proved to be critical to the
Iranian defense against Iraq's superior Russian
tank force. The result was a stalemate and the war
ended.

France/Russia/China

The fact is that Saddam owes billions to France,
Russia and China for weapons purchases. Clearly,
Iraq is buying more weapons from Paris and Beijing
despite a U.N. arms embargo. Perhaps one reason why
Paris, Moscow and Beijing oppose a war in Iraq is
because they would lose their best customer.

The propaganda spun by the far left that the U.S.
armed Iraq is false and backed by no facts. The
so-called anti-war types are more interested in
slamming Bush than stopping a war. None have been
able to name one American-made weapon in the Iraqi
arsenal.

More importantly, none of them can give one good
reason why Saddam should stay in power.

 

[kosar]

part 1

October 10, 2002

Helping Iraq Kill with Chemical Weapons:
The Relevance of Yesterday's US Hypocrisy Today
by ELSON E. BOLES

You may feel disgusted by the hypocrisy of US plans to make war on Iraq and sickened at the inevitable slaughter of thousands of people. But if you could only vaguely recall the details of how deep the hypocrisy goes, then read on.

The US not only helped arm Iraq with military equipment right up to the time of the Kuwait invasion in 1989, as did Germany, Britain, France, Russia and others, but also sold and helped Iraq to integrate chemical weapons into their US-provided battle plans while fighting Iran between 1985-1988.

According to a New York Times article in August, 2002, Col. Walter P. Lang, a senior defense intelligence officer at the time, explained that D.I.A. and C.I.A. officials "were desperate to make sure that Iraq did not lose" to Iran. "The use of gas on the battlefield by the Iraqis was not a matter of deep strategic concern," he said. One veteran said, that the Pentagon "wasn't so horrified by Iraq's use of gas." "It was just another way of killing people _ whether with a bullet or phosgene, it didn't make any difference."

Now consider just how deceptive the recent comments from the White House are. In late September spokesman Ari Fleischer said that British Prime Minister Blair's dossier of evidence is "frightening in terms of Iraq's intentions and abilities to acquire weapons." A few days later, while making his case against Saddam, President Bush said "He's used poison gas on his own people." Bush deceives because he hides the fact that US officials, including his father, had no qualms about helping Saddam gas Iranians. What is truly frightening are the US policies toward Iraq, the cover ups of those policies, and the US officials who personally profit in the millions of dollars from those policies. To whatever degree Saddam is a tyrant, he would not be that without the US government.

The question is not whether Saddam is willing to use chemical or other weapons of mass destruction again. The question is whether the US is currently selling and helping countries use weapons of mass destruction.

Details about Iraq killing Iranians with US-supplied chemical and biological weapons significantly deepens our understanding of the current hypocrisy. It began with "Iraq-gate" -- when US policy makers, financiers, arms-suppliers and makers, made massive profits from sales to Iraq of myriad chemical, biological, conventional weapons, and the equipment to make nuclear weapons. Reporter Russ Baker noted, for example, that, "on July 3, 1991, the Financial Times reported that a Florida company run by an Iraqi national had produced cyanide -- some of which went to Iraq for use in chemical weapons -- and had shipped it via a CIA contractor." This was just the tip of a mountain of scandals.

A major break in uncovering Iraqgate began with a riveting 1990 Nightline episode which revealed that top officials of the Reagan administration, the State Department, the Pentagon, C.I.A., and D.I.A., collectively engaged in a massive cover up of the USS Vincennes' whereabouts and actions when it shot down an Iranian airliner in 1987 killing over 200 civilians. The "massive cover up" Koppel explained, was designed to hide the US secret war against Iran, in which, among other actions, US Special Operations troops and Navy SEALS sunk half of Iran's navy while giving battle plans and logistical information to Iraqi ground forces in a coordinated offensive.

In continuing the probe, as Koppel explained in June, 1990, "It is becoming increasingly clear that George Bush [Sr.], operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980s, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into the aggressive power that the United States ultimately had to destroy."

A PBS Frontline episode, "The Arming of Iraq" (1990) detailed much of the conventional and so-called "dual-use" weapons sold to Iraq. The public learned from other sources that at least since mid-1980s the US was selling chemical and biological material for weapons to Iraq and orchestrating private sales. These sales began soon after current Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad in 1985 and met with Saddam Hussein as a private businessman on behalf of the Reagan administration. In the last major battle of the Iran-Iraq war, some 65,000 Iranians were killed, many by gas.

Investigators turned up new scandals, including the involvement of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL), the giant Italian bank, and many of the very same circles of arms suppliers, covert operators, and policy makers in and out of the US government and active in those roles for years. The National Security Council, CIA and other US agencies tacitly approved about $4 billion in unreported loans to Iraq through the giant Italian bank's Atlanta branch. Iraq, with the blessing and official approval of the US government, purchased computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods for Iraq's missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.

However, the early reports on BNL's activities and the startling revelations that the US government astonishingly knew that BNL was financing billions of dollars of purchases illegally, were rather comical in view of later revelations regarding who was involved. US government officials didn't just know and approve, but some were employees at BNL directly or indirectly. It was Representative Henry Gonzalez (D-Texas) who relentlessly brought key information into the Congressional Record (despite stern warnings by the State Department to stop his personal investigation for the sake of "national security").

Gonzalas revealed, for example, that Brent Scowcroft served as Vice Chairman of Kissinger Associates until being appointed as National Security Advisor to President Bush in January 1989. As Gonzalez reported, "Until October 4,1990, Mr. Scowcroft owned stock in approximately 40 U.S. corporations, many of which were doing busies in Iraq." Scowcroft's stock included that in Halliburton Oil, also doing business in Iraq at the time, which had also been run by current Vice President Dick Cheney for a time. Recall that this year President George Bush Sr. faced suspicion of insider trading in relation to selling his stock in Halliburton. The companies that Scowcroft owned stock in, according to Gonzalez, "received more than one out of every eight U.S. export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several of the companies were also clients of Kissinger Associates while Mr. Scowcroft was Vice Chairman of that firm." Thus, Kissinger Associates helped US companies obtain US export licenses with BNL-finance so Iraq could purchase US weapons and materials for its weapons programs.

Many US business-men and officials made handsome profits. This included Henry Kissinger, the former Secretary of State under Richard Nixon, who was an employee of BNL while BNL was simultaneously a paying client of Kissinger Associates. Gonzalez reported that Mr. Alan Stoga, a Kissinger Associates executive, met in June 1989 Mr. Saddam Hussein in Baghdad. "Many Kissinger Associates clients received US export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several were also the beneficiaries of BNL loans to Iraq," said Mr. Gonzalez. Kissinger admitted that "it is possible that somebody may have advised a client on how to get a license."

 

[kosar]

part 2

Perhaps the most bizarre revelations about the involvement of former US officials concerned a Washington-based enterprise called "Global Research" which played a middleman role in selling uniforms to Iraq. It was run by, none other than Spiro Agnew (Nixon's former VP who resigned to avoid bribery and tax evasion charges), John Mitchell (Nixon's chief of staff and Watergate organizer), and Richard Nixon himself. In the mid-1980s, more than a decade after Watergate, Nixon wrote a cozy letter to former dictator and friend Nicolae Ceausescu to close the deal. Global Research, incidentally, swindled the Iraqis, who thought they were getting US-made uniforms for desert conditions. Instead they received, and discarded, the winter uniforms from Romania.

By late 1992, the sales of chemical and biological weapons were revealed. Congressional Records of Senator Riegle's investigation of the Gulf War Syndrome show that that the US government approved sales of large varieties of chemical and biological materials to Iraq. These included anthrax, components of mustard gas, botulinum toxins (which causes paralysis of the muscles involving swallowing and is often fatal), histoplasma capsulatum (which may cause pneumonia, enlargement of the liver and spleen, anemia, acute inflammatory skin disease marked by tender red nodules), and a host of other nasty chemicals materials.

To top it all off, there is the question as to whether Iraq's invasion of Kuwait was a set up. Evidence indicates that the US knew of Iraq's plans -- after all, the military and intelligence agencies of the two countries were working very closely. Newspaper reports about the infamous meeting between then-Ambassador Glaspie and Iraq officials, and a special ABC report in the series "A Line in the Sand," indicated that, although the US officials told Iraq that it disapproved, they indicated that the US would not interfere.

Bear in mind the attitude of the US policy makers not only regarding Iraq's use of gas against Iranians, but in general. Richard Armatige, then Asst. Sec. of Defense for International Security Affairs and now Deputy Secretary of State, said with a hint of pride in his voice that the US "was playing one wolf off another wolf" in pursuing our so-called national interest. This kind of cool machismo resembled the pride that Oliver North verbalized with a grin during the Iran-Contra hearings as "a right idea" with regard to using the Ayatollah's money to fund the Contras. The setting up of Iraq thus would be very consistent with the goals and the character of US foreign policy in the Middle East: to control the region's states either for US oil companies or as bargaining chips in deals with other strong countries, and to profit by selling massive quantities of weapons to states that will war with or deter those states that oppose US "interests."


But initially many arms suppliers opposed the war on Iraq because they had been making huge profits from arms sales to Saddam's regime during the 1980s. Indeed, one US official interviewed expressed his disappointment with Iraq's invasion and the subsequent Gulf War because the relationship with Iraq could have continued to be "very profit...uh mutually profitable."

Bush Sr. and others expected that after the war, Saddam would capitulate to US designs on the region. With a heeled Saddam, the interests of arms suppliers, defense contractors, and the many US oil corporations could be renewed. Iraqi would have to re-arm itself and invest in oil drilling and processing facilities that were destroyed by US forces. And to pay for all that, Iraq would have to sell oil cheap, which served the interests both of the giant oil corporations and the American public who had begun buying GM SUVs en masse. It would be good for US business.

The invasion today is, above all, to renew US firm's access to Iraqi oil. As reported recently in the New York Times, former CIA director R. James Woolsey, who has been one of the leading advocates of forcing Hussein from power, argues that, "It's pretty straightforward, France and Russia have oil companies and interests in Iraq. They should be told that if they are of assistance in moving Iraq toward decent government, we'll do the best we can to ensure that the new government and American companies work closely with them. If they throw in their lot with Saddam, it will be difficult to the point of impossible to persuade the new Iraqi government to work with them."

His views are of course supported by the new Iraqi government-in-waiting. Faisal Qaragholi, the "petroleum engineer who directs the London office of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), an umbrella organization of opposition groups that is backed by the United States" says that "Our oil policies should be decided by a government in Iraq elected by the people." Ahmed Chalabi, the INC leader, put it more bluntly and sadi that he favored a U.S.-led consortium to develop Iraq's oil fields, which would replace the existing agreements that Iraq has with Russia and France. "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil," Chalabi said.


Thus, following the Gulf War, Cheney, Bush Sr. and others didn't expect that Saddam would refuse to abide by US interests and join the so-called "family of nations." This is really what President Bush Jr meant when he said at a cabinet meeting on Sept. 24, 2002 that he intends "to hold Saddam Hussein to account for a decade of defiance."

There is no shock about any of this, nor of the sordid assortment of officials and individuals directly or indirectly involved -- from the infamous US-based international arms dealer Sarkis Songhanalian and former Gen. Secord, to Oliver North and Richard Nixon -- and many others. They had been part of covert US arms and drug deals and Mafia dating back decades. Iraqgate was in fact also part of Irangate, and both are about a shadow government that circumvents domestic and international laws in arming regimes and terrorist organizations to enhance the profits of US businessmen and corporations.

The public learned since the mid-1980s that the shadow government folks played all sides of various wars, and made curious business alliances. Profits were good, but there were also ideological reasons. While arming Iraq and putting proceeds into their pockets, the covert operators also armed Iran. Israel of course, had also been arming Iran since the Ayatollah came into power in order to counter Iraq. The US soon joined these operations after Regan came to power.

Oliver North, Bush Sr., Robert McFarlane, and Gen. Secord, and others purchased from the CIA spare parts for US-made weapons and more than two thousand TOW missiles, which the CIA had purchased at discount rates from the Pentagon. Secord and North sold the weapons and parts to Iran in exchange for cash and the release of US hostages in Lebanon.

In public, Ronnie Reagan repeatedly condemned negotiations with terrorists in principle and even stated on national TV that there had been no negotiations with terrorists. He went back on air a few months later and said that while he still didn't believe "in his heart" that the US had negotiated with terrorists, the facts told him "otherwise." He escaped impeachment because he "couldn't remember" signing detailed instructions for sales of weapons to Iran and for the diversion of money to the Contras.

Insiders considered these trades "business as usual." Former General Secord, for instance, unashamedly told Congressional investigators during the Iran-Contra hearings that his arms-dealing firm, the "Enterprise," which sold the TOWs to other brokers and then to Iran, was a legitimate profit-making business. And as we all know, at the other end of the deal, North channeled a portion of the proceeds from those sales through Swiss banks and to the terrorist Contras in Honduras. Their job was to overthrow the Sandinista regime that overthrew the brutal 43-year Somoza family dictatorship supported by the US.

Again, in legal terms, the scandal was not only that Reagan's administration circumvented the Boland Amendment which outlawed military support to the Contras, but also that the CIA had also mined the harbors of Nicaragua. When the US was taken to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and convicted of violating international laws, President Reagan disregarded this conviction saying the ICJ had no jurisdiction over the United States.

Bush Jr. has stated the following reasons for invading Iraq, all of which are accurate except the last: (1) Iraq used chemical weapons, (2) Iraq tried to build nuclear weapons, and (3) the US tried to bring Iraq into the "family of nations" (said first by Bush Sr). He is correct that Iraq was willing to use chemical weapons and has been trying to build nuclear weapons for years. Of course, he just fails to mention that the US was willing to sell, and to help Iraq use, chemical weapons of mass destruction and that his friends profited handsomely in so doing. He also fails to note that today Hussein is not seen as an immediate threat by it's Arab neighbors, none of whom have called for his ouster, and that Iraq has only a shadow of the power it had in 1990. There is no evidence to support Bush or Blair's claims that Iraq has and is preparing to use chemical or biological weapons.

Lastly, what about Bush Jr.'s third contention, that the US had tried to bring Saddam into the "family of nations?" In view of the thousands upon thousands of women, children, and men butchered with US battle plans and arms, as well as arms from Europe, one could only characterize that family as being composed of unscrupulous, profiteering, vile accomplices to mass murder. Perhaps this is also a reason why the Bush administration opposes the formation of the World Court and needs US politicians and military personel exempt from international law.

 

[kosar]

Iraq's Euro - American Weapons Collusion
Posted: November 10, 2002
An analysis by
Dr. Kwame Nantambu

As the Bush administration gnashes its military teeth in its resolve to launch a unilateral, bilateral or otherwise bombing of Iraq' one salient variable in this military equation seems to have been left out and/or forgotten, that is, the European-American collusion in supplying biological/chemical weapons and materials, including anthrax, to Saddam Hussein.

In the words of Rep. David Obey D-Wisconsin, then chairman of a House Appropriations sub-committee that oversaw foreign arms sales: "Western political leaders and businessmen (MNCs) must shoulder a large share of the blame for the present bloody mess in the Persian Gulf." It is as a result of this Euro-American conspiracy with Iraq that at least 5,000 Gulf War veterans filed a $1 billion class-action law suit that accuses two dozen multinational conglomerates and their subsidiaries for creating Saddam Hussein's chemical-biological war machine.

Let us recall the President Saddam Hussein was able to build his daunting (military) weapons complex mainly with help form the United States, Britian, China and France and that 70 percent of the deadly-poisoned biological and chemical weapons or the critical scientific and technical capability to produce its mammoth arsenal of sophisticated weapons of mass destruction were sold to President Hussein by European Multinational Corporations (MNCs) to the tune of $48,7 billion between 1981-1988 with the approval and protection of their governments who are the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and were members of the 1991 United States-led coalition "multi-national forces" in the Persian Gulf.

These MNCs are from France, Belgium, Switzerland, Britain, Italy, Germany, Japan, Austria and the United States and were assisted by the U.S. government-run Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the Departments of Commerce, State and Defense and National Security Council in the White House. Russia and China have also sold weapons of mass destruction to Iraq.

According to a Cable News Network (CNN)" Business News" Report by Steve Young on 20 February 1990:

..Saddam Hussein bought more than 70 percent of his chemical warfare arsenal or the makings from the so-called G-7 nations (major European industrial nations) Japan, France, United States, Italy, Britain and Germany; only Canada apparently sold nothing; experts say that's because Canada had no chemical weapons to sell. A report commissioned by the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles details how Germany sold more poison gases (and) chemicals to make them and testing facilities than any other country in the world.

Sales by 134 different German companies have been documented and the number is climbing. So far, German authorities have indicated just three German businesses .and are investigating 15 others, including ..Rhema-Labortechnik, It's been accused of building chambers to test poison gas on Iranian prisoners of war.

According to Rabbi Marvin Hier of the Simon Wiesenthal Center: "The very same agents invented by German technologies in the 1940s and put at the disposal of a dictator were again recreated in the 1990s and put at the disposal of another dictator." Saddam's chemical warfare connection in the United States include some curiosities; the Center for Disease Control sold West Nile Fever Virus (that can be converted into chemical warfare agents).

Saddam's chemical warfare suppliers include companies from Belgium (8); Switzerland (13); and Australia (27). In all, 24 countries sold chemical warfare materials to Iraq amounting to 366 companies."

To buttress this accusation, military expert Michael Leeden, points out that "German involvement with Iraq chemical weapons program started in 1977" and that "for over a decade German businessmen and scientists had played key roles in Iraq's $50 billion program to produce weapons of mass destruction ..all the while claiming they didn't know Iraq was using their exports for military purposes.

The best American estimates suggest that a majority of Iraq's nuclear, biological and chemical capacity was provided by Germans. What's more, the German government knew about all this in detail."

Let us also remember that it was the Reagan administration with George Bush Sr., as Vice President, that guaranteed Iraq's supply of arms and military supplies during its war with Iran. According to published reports, the Reagan-Bush administration "gave the green light to Western Europe to directly sell arms to Iraq" and U.S. arms "were trans-shipped to Iraq through third countries." Moreover, during the first 18 months of George Bush's presidency, Congress repeatedly pressed for the imposition of severe economic sanctions against Iraq, but then President Bush "aggressively resisted them until the day of the Kuwait invasion (2 August 1990)." In sum, therefore, the Reagan-Bush collusion created the "dictator from Baghdad" and this "repeat offender."

It is now rather hypocritical for these very same permanent members of the U.N. Security Council to cry "fowl" after the horse has already left the barn.

And it is no surprise that in mid-November 1995, the majority Third World membership in the General Assembly (now with a membership of 191 countries) decided to take up the issue of making the Security Council "more representative of the organization's membership." The proposed changes included adding new permanent members, expanding the number of non-permanent members and limiting the use of the veto power.

Third World representatives accused the Security Council of functioning as "a rubber stamp for super power aggression."

However, on 12 March 1997, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Bill Richardson, emphatically stated that the United States "cannot and will not" accept any reduction in its veto power in the Security Council.

He reiterated that the United States "opposed any expansion in the 15 - member body unless it added more permanent members." The United States only "supports adding Japan and Germany as permanent members" with veto power in the Security Council.

Of course, Saddam Hussein is not the only head of state with chemical/biological weapons of mass destruction. There are five other countries in the Middle East (Libya, Iran, Israel, Egypt and Turkey) who have such weapons, although it maybe true that Saddam is the only one who has used such weapons on his own people ten times in the past ten years.

However, this silent fact must be exposed to the extent that on 8 October 2002, the U.S. Defense Department acknowledged:

"a much wider testing of toxic weapons on its forces (American citizens ) (and the use of) chemical warfare and live biological agents during military exercise on U.S. soil, as well as in Canada and Britain. the chemical warfare agents were used during exercises ..in Alaska, Hawaii and Maryland; that a mild biological agent was used in Florida; and that CS gas, a riot-control agent was used during tests in Utah. An estimated 5,500 people (American citizens) believed to have participated in the land and sea tests, because it remains unclear, ever today, whether all of the soldiers and sailors were fully aware of the subject of the exercises and the potential risks."

Now, the Bush administration and its British ally are accusing Saddam Hussein for doing to its citizens exactly what the United States also did to its own citizens decades ago.

This public accusation by these two European governments represents the highest level of hypocrisy and deceit on their part. They are blaming the victim for his victimization and for his isolated pariah position in the Middle East. This is geo-political denial.

In addition, the Bush administration has accused President Saddam Hussein of Iraq of not only being "the new Enemy No. 1" but also of defying "16 of the U.N. Security Council resolutions." Saddam Hussein has also been accused of making "the United Nations look foolish" by President George Bush.

The fact of the matter is that it is the Bush administration that has made the United Nations "look foolish" and more like the League of Nations.

The fact of the matter is that the Bush administration has also defied United Nations resolutions.

For example, in demanding immunity from the world court, the Bush administrtion:

"has decided to renounce formally any involvement in a (U.N.) treaty creating an international criminal court and is expected to declare that the signing of the document by the Clinton administration is no longer valid. (The Bush administration) warned foreign diplomats. that their nations could lose all U.S. military assistance if they become members of the International Criminal Court without pledging to protect Americans serving in their countries from its reach."

This policy-decision by the Bush administration reflects its role as a threatening, international bully if it cannot impose and dictate its will on smaller, weaker countries in defiance of the United Nations.

But as the German Justice Minister, Herta Daeubler -Gmerlin, interjects some modicum of international sanity and equality in relation to the United Nations: "International extablished law should also apply to large nations."

And as South Africa's former President Nelson Mandela concurs: "No country should be allowed to take the law into their own hands." No U.S. President is above national law; no country is above international law. In the final analysis, therefore, it is indeed the global "arrogance of power" on the part of the Bush administration that represents "a material breach" of its "international obligations".

 

[kosar]

How did Iraq get its weapons? We sold them




By Neil Mackay and Felicity Arbuthnot



THE US and Britain sold Saddam Hussein the technology and materials Iraq needed to develop nuclear, chemical and biological wea pons of mass destruction.
Reports by the US Senate's committee on banking, housing and urban affairs -- which oversees American exports policy -- reveal that the US, under the successive administrations of Ronald Reagan and George Bush Snr, sold materials including anthrax, VX nerve gas, West Nile fever germs and botulism to Iraq right up until March 1992, as well as germs similar to tuberculosis and pneumonia. Other bacteria sold included brucella melitensis, which damages major organs, and clostridium perfringens, which causes gas gangrene.

Classified US Defence Dep-artment documents also seen by the Sunday Herald show that Britain sold Iraq the drug pralidoxine, an antidote to nerve gas, in March 1992, after the end of the Gulf war. Pralidoxine can be reverse engineered to create nerve gas.

The Senate committee's rep orts on 'US Chemical and Biological Warfare-Related Dual-Use Exports to Iraq', undertaken in 1992 in the wake of the Gulf war, give the date and destination of all US exports. The reports show, for example, that on May 2, 1986, two batches of bacillus anthracis -- the micro-organism that causes anthrax -- were shipped to the Iraqi Ministry of Higher Education, along with two batches of the bacterium clostridium botulinum, the agent that causes deadly botulism poisoning.

One batch each of salmonella and E coli were shipped to the Iraqi State Company for Drug Industries on August 31, 1987. Other shipments went from the US to the Iraq Atomic Energy Commission on July 11, 1988; the Department of Biology at the University of Basrah in November 1989; the Department of Microbiology at Baghdad University in June 1985; the Ministry of Health in April 1985 and Officers' City, a military complex in Baghdad, in March and April 1986.

The shipments to Iraq went on even after Saddam Hussein ordered the gassing of the Kurdish town of Halabja, in which at least 5000 men, women and children died. The atrocity, which shocked the world, took place in March 1988, but a month later the components and materials of weapons of mass destruction were continuing to arrive in Baghdad from the US.

The Senate report also makes clear that: 'The United States provided the government of Iraq with 'dual use' licensed materials which assisted in the development of Iraqi chemical, biological and missile-system programmes.'

This assistance, according to the report, included 'chemical warfare-agent precursors, chem ical warfare-agent production facility plans and technical drawings, chemical warfare filling equipment, biological warfare-related materials, missile fabrication equipment and missile system guidance equipment'.

Donald Riegle, then chairman of the committee, said: 'UN inspectors had identified many United States manufactured items that had been exported from the United States to Iraq under licences issued by the Department of Commerce, and [established] that these items were used to further Iraq's chemical and nuclear weapons development and its missile delivery system development programmes.'

Riegle added that, between January 1985 and August 1990, the 'executive branch of our government approved 771 different export licences for sale of dual-use technology to Iraq. I think that is a devastating record'.

It is thought the information contained in the Senate committee reports is likely to make up much of the 'evidence of proof' that Bush and Blair will reveal in the coming days to justify the US and Britain going to war with Iraq. It is unlikely, however, that the two leaders will admit it was the Western powers that armed Saddam with these weapons of mass destruction.

However, Bush and Blair will also have to prove that Saddam still has chemical, biological and nuclear capabilities. This looks like a difficult case to clinch in view of the fact that Scott Ritter, the UN's former chief weapons inspector in Iraq, says the United Nations des troyed most of Iraq's wea pons of mass destruction and doubts that Saddam could have rebuilt his stocks by now.

According to Ritter, between 90% and 95% of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were des troyed by the UN. He believes the remainder were probably used or destroyed during 'the ravages of the Gulf War'.

Ritter has described himself as a 'card-carrying Republican' who voted for George W Bush. Nevertheless, he has called the president a 'liar' over his claims that Saddam Hussein is a threat to America.

Ritter has also alleged that the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons emits certain gases, which would have been detected by satellite. 'We have seen none of this,' he insists. 'If Iraq was producing weapons today, we would have definitive proof.'

He also dismisses claims that Iraq may have a nuclear weapons capacity or be on the verge of attaining one, saying that gamma-particle atomic radiation from the radioactive materials in the warheads would also have been detected by western surveillance.

The UN's former co-ordinator in Iraq and former UN under-secretary general, Count Hans von Sponeck, has also told the Sunday Herald that he believes the West is lying about Iraq's weapons programme.

Von Sponeck visited the Al-Dora and Faluja factories near Baghdad in 1999 after they were 'comprehensively trashed' on the orders of UN inspectors, on the grounds that they were suspected of being chemical weapons plants. He returned to the site late in July this year, with a German TV crew, and said both plants were still wrecked.

'We filmed the evidence of the dishonesty of the claims that they were producing chemical and biological weapons,' von Sponeck has told the Sunday Herald. 'They are indeed in the same destroyed state which we witnessed in 1999. There was no trace of any resumed activity at all.'


Election 2003

 

[kosar]

US Companies sold Iraq Billions of NBC Weapons Materials
by William Blum Wednesday March 27, 2002 at 01:10 AM



US Companies Sold Iraq
Billions Of NBC Weapons Materials
By William Blum


The United States almost went to war against Iraq in February because of Saddam Hussein's weapons program. In his State of the Union address, President Clinton castigated Hussein for "developing nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons and the missiles to deliver them."

"You cannot defy the will of the world," the President proclaimed. "You have used weapons of mass destruction before. We are determined to deny you the capacity to use them again."

Most Americans listening to the President did not know that the United States supplied Iraq with much of the raw material for creating a chemical and biological warfare program. Nor did the media report that U.S. companies sold Iraq more than $1 billion worth of the components needed to build nuclear weapons and diverse types of missiles, including the infamous Scud.

When Iraq engaged in chemical and biological warfare in the 1980s, barely a peep of moral outrage could be heard from Washington, as it kept supplying Saddam with the materials he needed to build weapons.

Noam Chomsky suggests that this strategy is a way for America to keep control of its oil supply:

"It's been a leading, driving doctrine of U.S. foreign policy since the 1940s that the vast and unparalleled energy resources of the Gulf region will be effectively dominated by the United States and its clients, and, crucially, that no independent indigenous force will be permitted to have a substantial influence on the administration of oil production and price."

During the Iran-Iraq war, Iraq received the lion's share of American support because at the time Iran was regarded as the greater threat to U.S. interests. According to a 1994 Senate report, private American suppliers, licensed by the U.S. Department of Commerce, exported a witch's brew of biological and chemical materials to Iraq from 1985 through 1989. Among the biological materials, which often produce slow, agonizing death, were:

* Bacillus Anthracis, cause of anthrax.

* Clostridium Botulinum, a source of botulinum toxin.

* Histoplasma Capsulatam, cause of a disease attacking lungs, brain, spinal cord, and heart.

* Brucella Melitensis, a bacteria that can damage major organs.

* Clostridium Perfringens, a highly toxic bacteria causing systemic illness.

* Clostridium tetani, a highly toxigenic substance.


The report noted further that U.S. exports to Iraq included the precursors to chemical-warfare agents, plans for chemical and biological warfare production facilities, and chemical-warhead filling equipment.

The exports continued to at least November 28, 1989, despite evidence that Iraq was engaging in chemical and biological warfare against Iranians and Kurds since as early as 1984.

The American company that provided the most biological materials to Iraq in the 1980s was American Type Culture Collection of Maryland and Virginia, which made seventy shipments of the anthrax-causing germ and other pathogenic agents, according to a 1996 Newsday story.

Other American companies also provided Iraq with the chemical or biological compounds, or the facilities and equipment used to create the compounds for chemical and biological warfare. Among these suppliers were the following:

* Alcolac International, a Baltimore chemical manufacturer already linked to the illegal shipment of chemicals to Iran, shipped large quantities of thiodiglycol (used to make mustard gas) as well as other chemical and biological ingredients, according to a 1989 story in The New York Times.

* Nu Kraft Mercantile Corp. of Brooklyn (affiliated with the United Steel and Strip Corporation) also supplied Iraq with huge amounts of thiodiglycol, the Times reported.

* Celery Corp., Charlotte, NC

* Matrix-Churchill Corp., Cleveland, OH (regarded as a front for the Iraqi government, according to Representative Henry Gonzalez, Democrat of Texas, who quoted U.S. intelligence documents to this effect in a 1992 speech on the House floor).


The following companies were also named as chemical and biological materials suppliers in the 1992 Senate hearings on "United States export policy toward Iraq prior to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait":

* Mouse Master, Lilburn, GA

* Sullaire Corp., Charlotte, NC

* Pure Aire, Charlotte, NC

* Posi Seal, Inc., N. Stonington, CT

* Union Carbide, Danbury, CT

* Evapco, Taneytown, MD

* Gorman-Rupp, Mansfield, OH



In 1994, a group of twenty-six veterans, suffering from what has come to be known as Gulf War Syndrome, filed a billion-dollar lawsuit in Houston against Fisher, Rhone-Poulenc, Bechtel Group, and Lummus Crest, as well as American Type Culture Collection (ATCC) and six other firms, for helping Iraq to obtain or produce the compounds which the veterans blamed for their illnesses. By 1998, the number of plaintiffs has risen to more than 4,000 and the suit is still pending in Texas.


A larger number of American firms supplied Iraq with the specialized computers, lasers, testing and analyzing equipment, and other instruments and hardware vital to the manufacture of nuclear weapons, missiles, and delivery systems. Computers, in particular, play a key role in nuclear weapons development. Advanced computers make it feasible to avoid carrying out nuclear test explosions, thus preserving the program's secrecy. The 1992 Senate hearings implicated the following firms:

* Kennametal, Latrobe, PA

* Hewlett Packard, Palo Alto, CA

* International Computer Systems, CA, SC, and TX

* Perkins-Elmer, Norwalk, CT

* BDM Corp., McLean, VA

* Leybold Vacuum Systems, Export, PA

* Spectra Physics, Mountain View, CA

* Unisys Corp., Blue Bell, PA

* Finnigan MAT, San Jose, CA

* Scientific Atlanta, Atlanta, GA

* Spectral Data Corp., Champaign, IL

* Tektronix, Wilsonville, OR

* Veeco Instruments, Inc., Plainview, NY

* Wiltron Company, Morgan Hill, CA

The House report also singled out: TI Coating, Inc., Axel Electronics, Data General Corp., Gerber Systems, Honeywell, Inc., Digital Equipment Corp., Sackman Associates, Rockwell Collins International, Wild Magnavox Satellite Survey, Zeta Laboratories, Carl Schenck, EZ Logic Data, International Imaging Systems, Semetex Corp., and Thermo Jarrell Ash Corporation.



Other corporations recognized the military potential of their goods but considered it the government's job to worry about it. "Every once in a while you kind of wonder when you sell something to a certain country," said Robert Finney, president of Electronic Associates, Inc., which supplied Saad 16 with a powerful computer that could be used for missile testing and development. "But it's not up to us to make foreign policy," Finney told The Wall Street Journal.

In 1982, the Reagan Administration took Iraq off its list of countries alleged to sponsor terrorism, making it eligible to receive high-tech items generally denied to those on the list. Conventional military sales began in December of that year. Representative Samuel Gejdenson, Democrat of Connecticut, chairman of a House subcommittee investigating "United States Exports of Sensitive Technology to Iraq," stated in 1991:

"From 1985 to 1990, the United States Government approved 771 licenses for the export to Iraq of $1.5 billion worth of biological agents and high-tech equipment with military application. [Only thirty-nine applications were rejected.] The United States spent virtually an entire decade making sure that Saddam Hussein had almost whatever he wanted. . . . The Administration has never acknowledged that it took this course of action, nor has it explained why it did so. In reviewing documents and press accounts, and interviewing knowledgeable sources, it becomes clear that United States export-control policy was directed by U.S. foreign policy as formulated by the State Department, and it was U.S. foreign policy to assist the regime of Saddam Hussein."

Another Senate committee, investigating "United States export policy toward Iraq prior to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait," heard testimony in 1992 that Commerce Department personnel "changed information on sixty-eight licenses; that references to military end uses were deleted and the designation 'military truck' was changed. This was done on licenses having a total value of over $1 billion." Testimony made clear that the White House was "involved" in "a deliberate effort . . . to alter these documents and mislead the Congress."



As it turned out, Iraq did not use any chemical or biological weapons against U.S. forces in the Gulf War. But American planes bombed chemical and biological weapons storage facilities with abandon, potentially dooming tens of thousands of American soldiers to lives of prolonged and permanent agony, and an unknown number of Iraqis to a similar fate. Among the symptoms reported by the affected soldiers are memory loss, scarred lungs, chronic fatigue, severe headache, raspy voice, and passing out. The Pentagon estimates that nearly 100,000 American soldiers were exposed to sarin gas alone.

After the war, White House and Defense Department officials tried their best to deny that Gulf War Syndrome had anything to do with the bombings. The suffering of soldiers was not their overriding concern. The top concerns of the Bush and Clinton Administrations were to protect perceived U.S. interests in the Middle East, and to ensure that American corporations still had healthy balance sheets. - William Blum is the author of "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II" (Common Courage Press, 1995).

 

[kosar]

U.S. sold weapons to Iraq
by Salaberria Wednesday March 19, 2003 at 10:05 AM



It's true all you say in the article, but are you not forgetting the French and the Germans? They also sold Iraq deadly weapons, and now it looks as if the only bad guys were the Americans. Probably they are not angels, but, and I am a Spanish who by no means shares the views of his government, I don't think worse than the French or Germans. It is a disgrace to the worls what the U.S. are doing, but let's not be hypocritical, the other countries are not better than the U.S. So now, the peace cronies are Russia, Syria, France and Germany! How cute.


Companies, not the Gov supplied materials
by Darkstar127 Sunday March 23, 2003 at 01:16 AM
wri7913@hotmail.com


The problem I find with this column is that it attempts to paint the US Government as being a supplier of the materials for use with WMD. It wasn't the Government that established the contacts and created the supply routes, it was US Businesses who wished to make a proift off their legitimate business. As the article even admits

"Some of the companies said later that they had no idea Iraq might ever put their products to military use. A spokesperson for Hewlett Packard said the company believed that the Iraqi recipient of its shipments, Saad 16, was an institution of higher learning. In fact, in 1990 The Wall Street Journal described Saad 16 as "a heavily fortified, state-of-the-art complex for aircraft construction, missile design, and, almost certainly, nuclear-weapons research."

Saddam and his cohorts are well known for evading and obfuscating the truth about what is going on in Iraq. Just witness the past 12 yrs of Inpsections and UN resolutions for how Saddam has learned his evasiveness of the truth. Yes, the companies should have been more careful in researching who they were dealing with. However at the time they were dealing with him, they also had no idea what kind of man he really would become. As its always said, hindsight is 20/20.

Also the group who was responsible for deciding on US export policy was the Dept of Commerce in conjunction with the State Department. If you really want to look to who provided Iraq with chemical and biological weapons, you need look no further than France, or Germany.

I'll second Salaberria's comment " So now, the peace cronies are Russia, Syria, France and Germany! How cute." Its unbelievable how fast people are turning on the US. Just wait till the smoke is cleared and Iraq is liberate. The look on liberals faces will be cute.


add your comments



uS COMPANIES AND GOVERNMENT ARE SAME THING
by Monty Hanson Sunday March 23, 2003 at 09:59 AM
MontyHanson@hotmail.com


The united states government secured agricultural loans for iraq that were used to purchase weapons. ALL Iraq weapons sales were approved by U.S. gov.
Donald Rumsfeld in dec 1983 visited Iraq to assure U.S. support AFTER saddam used chemical weapons. justify this please!

I love my country
but I fear my government


add your comments



Lee Harvey
by Oswald Sunday March 23, 2003 at 10:06 AM



Donald Rumsfeld Visited Iraq in dec 1983 AFTER Saddam used chemical weapons, wasnt that a clue of what kind of man he was? ALL iraq weapons sales were approved by US gov. sales to iraq continued up to the gulf war. Saddam Hussein like Osama, like Noreiga, Moamar Aidid(somalia) ARE ALL our govenments FRANKENSTEIN creations and now our brave men and women clean up the mess of draft doging chicken hawks like Georgie jr (air national guard thanks to dad) and Dick Cheney (5 deferments in Vietnam said he had "OTHER PRIORITY's) ???

this is a cruel paradox


add your comments



Mr
by Jay Phillips Tuesday April 15, 2003 at 11:35 PM



Yes, I've seen this same "leaked" report all over the web. The funny thing is the great majority of them forget to mention the report was leaked from Germany and that NONE of the 80 or so German companies names are listed. The number of German companies is far greater than the number of US companies.

Also the report doesn't indicate that MOST of the materials supplied to Iraq occured during the Iran/Iraq war. During that time the US was very concerned that if either Iran or Iraq won the war they would be in control of large percent of the world's oil supply and would be able to leverage OPEC and greatly impact the world economy. We provided both Iran and Iraq with materials and intelligence so that the war would at most be a stalemate.

The report also does not indicate that most US support from US companies ended before or around the time of the Kuwait invasion and subsequent Gulf War. However support from countries like France, Germany, and Russia continued throughout the Gulf War and right through the current conflict. Iraq was still receiving military hardware and support right up to the end from many countries who coincidently were the strongest opponents of the US/Iraqi war.

And finally the report doesn't indicate that many of the chemicals and equipment supplied to Iraq are materials used in the processing of legitimate products, medical supplies, pesticides, fertilizers, etc. in the so called "dual use" facilities. You can't ban a substance used to make aspirin just because it can also be used to make poison.

Supplying people with "half" the truth is no better than telling them a lie. Quoting statistics when half the data is ignored or dropped because it doesn't jive with your hypothesis is nothing but junk science. Back when Saddam was just a petty tyrant we supplied him with toys to keep him occupied with his enemy to the east. When he set his sights on the rest of the world we backed off, but countries like France, Germany, and Russia did not. They continued to supply him with missles, rockets, jet fighter parts, and much more. How many US and coalition forces died as a direct result of being shot down by French and Russian missles? How many of tanks were destroyed by French and Russian rockets? We may never know.

The past is the past. It's easy to look back and point fingers, but this is now. There's a big difference between supplying weapons now and 20 or 30 years ago. Those weapons are long gone. They were out of date before the first Gulf War even started. In this new post 9/11 world, supplying a terrorist with weapons is an act of terrorism and if you aid a terrorist now you ARE a terrorist.

 

[kosar]

USA SOLD IRAQ WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION


AMERICA PROVIDED SADDAM HUSSEIN'S WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

The US government is attempting to justify their plans for war on Iraq, the world's second largest source of oil, by accusing Iraq of possessing weapons of mass destruction.

The US government has proclaimed that Saddam Hussein must be disarmed. However, recently declassified official government documents reveal that Iraq was armed with weapons of mass destruction by the USA!


SECRET DEAL

The US Defence Secretary, Donald H. Rumsfeld, is a strong supporter of president Bush's plan to invade Iraq, yet a few years ago he personally helped to supply Iraq with biological and chemical weapons!

Donald H. Rumsfeld attended a secret meeting with Saddam Hussein in Iraq on behalf of the US government in December 1983, and agreed to sell Iraq weapons of mass destruction and arranged a loan to give Saddam Hussein the money to buy them. At that time, Iraq was using weapons of mass destruction against its neighbours, and the US not only allowed this but actively supported it.


IS AMERICA MORE DANGEROUS THAN IRAQ AND AL-QAEDA?

Would a war to disarm Iraq solve the true problem? Should we invade Iraq for possessing weapons of mass destruction? Or would it be more worthwhile to stop America supporting terrorism and rogue states?

The US government supported Osama bin Laden during the cold war, and now they want to destroy al-Qaeda. But if we defeat Iraq and al-Qaeda, will it solve the problem or prevent such things from happening again?

The US government supports terrorists dangerous regimes when it suits them. America profits from selling weapons, and then profits by charging interest on the loans which allowed the weapons to be purchased! American weapons are sometimes sold to dangerous regimes, and to both sides in some conflicts. The US government supported Iraq, now they want to disarm Iraq, but while some people make money, unfortunately many people die during both processes.


SADDAM HUSSEIN'S SUSPICIOUS SILENCE:

Why did Saddam Hussein keep this fact secret, when details of such terrible American hypocrisy could have been used as a powerful weapon in his propaganda war against the USA?

What might have been revealed about the secret side of America's relationship with Iraq within the 8,500 pages that the US government removed from Iraq's 12,000 page weapons declaration before most UN security council members were allowed to see it?

 

[AR182]

i don't understand what the big deal is because at that time iran was a bigger problem than iraq was,so we sided with iraq.this happens pretty often in business & world events. you take the side with the one at the time that can benefit you.in hindsite that was a mistake, so we take actions to rectify the mistake.

 

[Chanman]

Good post Kosar. I got this in E-Mail and posted it to see the response. Didn't think I'd be overwhelmed.:thumb:

 

[Turfgrass]

The U.S. Did NOT Originally Arm Iraq !!

Was it really the United States that armed Saddam Hussein in the first place? The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute gathered the information about various countries who participated in arming Iraq and the percentage of the Iraqi arms sales business held by each.

Before and during the conduct of the war in Iraq we all heard from folks who wanted to make sure we knew that it was the United States that armed Saddam Hussein in the first place.

Now ... the details.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute gathered the information together on arms sales to Iraq from 1973 through 2002.

This graph shows the various countries who participated in arming Iraq and the percentage of the Iraqi arms sales business held by each.

Please pay particular attention to the color codes.

The very nations that didn't want to go to war against Iraq were the nations that armed Iraq in the first place.http://hawaii.indymedia.org/news/2003/04/2050.php

 

[djv]

Tanks, Planes, Guns, Certain missles are not WMD. They also cost lot of money. A 1% or 2% sale of Gas or ways to make and use it are WMD. The color codes do not tell complete story. We helped with the nasty stuff. Then we got back into helping Iran in the end just to even it out and not let Iraq win. We played both sides.
Then we ask questions why do they hate us so much.

 

[kosar]

Exactly DJV! We didn't invade because of French missles or Cold War era jets. We supposedly went there for WMD and we, without question, helped them along in a big way in that regard. That's exactly why the article that chanman posted is irrelevant, as well as that chart.

AR, totally agree that allegiances shift. Not sure that justifies this invasion though. If they didn't use these alleged banned weapons that they 'probably' have against us as we took over their country, i'm trying to figure out exactly when *would* they use them.

In addition, any chemical weapons that they might have had are fairly likely to be under somebody elses control at this time. That's exactly what we were trying to avoid. And if there aren't any to begin with, well........

 

[ferdville]

I guess you can't have it both ways. If Iraq had chemical and biological weapons as is clearly asserted here, what happened to them? Did Saddam voluntarily eliminate them because he is such a nice guy? You can't say they have them on one hand and they don't have them on the other as many would do.

I would certainly agree that Kosar's excellent and educational post is accurate. Unfortunately, that is the reality of this age we live in. Friend today - enemy tomorrow or vice-versa. Bottom line seems that each and every country looks out for their own best interests at the time of their action. This shouldn't be a big surprise.