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Banned
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and......frogza, even after Rumsfeld's highly publicized Dec., 1983 visit with Saddam, the <h5>relationship and the support</h5>, the U.S. turning a blind on what you and others, today, claim as justification for the invasion and occupation of Iraq, after all of the initial justifications emphasized over and over by the Bush administration were revealed to be misleading, deceptive, or false,
continued, and went on and on for nearly another seven years......note the U.S. non-reaction to the 1988 reports of the gassing of the Kurds in northern Iraq....business as usual. Your argument today is as empty and hypocritical as any advanced by Bush or Cheney to justify the invasion of Iraq,
Quote:
http://www.ithaca.edu/politics/gagnon/talks/us-iraq.htm
1983:
The State Dept. once again reported that Iraq was continuing to support terrorist groups
- Iraq had also been using chemical weapons against Iranian troops since 1982; this use of chemical weapons increased in 1983. The State Dept. and the National Security Council were well aware of this.
- Overriding NSC concerns, the Secretaries of Commerce and State pressured the NSC to approve the sale to Iraq of Bell helicopters "for crop dusting" (these same helicopters were used to gas Iraqi Kurds in 1988).
In late 1983, Reagan secretly allowed Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, to transfer US weapons to Iraq; Reagan also asked the Italian prime minister to channel arms to Iraq
December 1983 was a particularly interesting month; it was the month that Donald Rumsfeld -- currently US Secretary of Defense and one of the most vocal proponents of attacking Iraq -- paid a visit to Saddam Hussein in Baghdad as Reagan's envoy.
Rumsfeld claims now that the meeting was about terrorism in Lebanon.
But State Dept. documents show that in fact, Rumsfeld was carrying a message from Reagan expressing his desire to have a closer and better relationship with Saddam Hussein.
Just a few months before Rumsfeld's visit, Iraq had used poison gas against Iranian troops. This fact was known to the US. Also known was that Iraq was building a chemical weapons infrastructure.
NBC and The New York Times have recently reported that Rumsfeld was a key player in the Reagan administration's strong support for Iraq, despite knowing of Iraq's use of chemical weapons. This relationship became so close that both Reagan and VP Bush personally delivered military advice to Saddam Hussein. [1]
1984
In March, the State Dept. reported that Iraq was using chemical weapons and nerve gas in the war against Iran; these facts were confirmed by European doctors who examined Iranian soldiers
The Washington Post (in an article in Dec.1986 by Bob Woodward) reported that in 1984 the CIA began secretly giving information to Iraqi intelligence to help them "calibrate" poison gas attacks against Iranian troops.
1985
The CIA established direct intelligence links with Baghdad, and began giving Iraq "data from sensitive US satellite reconnaissance photography" to help in the war.
This same year, the US House of Representatives passed a bill to put Iraq back on State Dept. supporters of terrorism list.
The Reagan administration -- in the person of Secretary of State George Schultz -- pressured the bill's sponsor to drop it the bill. The bill is dropped, and Iraq remains off the terrorist list.
Iraq labs send a letter to the Commerce Dept with details showing that Iraq was developing ballistic missiles.
Between 1985-1990 the Commerce Dept. approved the sale of many computers to Iraq's weapons lab. (The UN inspectors in 1991 found that: 40% of the equipment in Iraq's weapons lab were of US origin)
1985 is also a key year because the Reagan administration approved the export to Iraq of biological cultures that are precursors to bioweapons: anthrax, botulism, etc.; these cultures were "not attenuated or weakened, and were capable of reproduction."
There were over 70 shipments of such cultures between 1985-1988.
The Bush administration also authorized an additional 8 shipments of biological cultures that the Center for Disease Control classified as "having biological warfare significance."
This information comes from the Senate Banking Committee's report from 1994. The report stated that "these microorganisms exported by the US were identical to those the United Nations inspectors found and recovered from the Iraqi biological warfare program."
Senator Riegle, who headed the committee, noted that: "They seemed to give him anything he wanted. It's right out of a science fiction movie as to why we would send this kind of stuff to anybody." [2]
1988
The Reagan administration's Commerce Dept. approved exports to Iraq's SCUD missile program; it was these exports that allowed the extension of the SCUDs' range so that in 1991 they were able to reach Israel and US bases in Saudi Arabia.
In March, the Financial Times of London reported that Saddam had recently used chemical weapons against Kurds in Halabja, using US helicopters bought in 1983.
Two months later, an Asst. Secretary of State pushed for more US-Iraq economic cooperation.
In September of that year, Reagan prevented the Senate from putting sanctions on Iraq for its violation of the Geneva Protocol on Chemical Weapons.
The US also voted against a UN Security Council statement condemning Iraq's use of chemical weapons. [3]
1989
In March, the CIA director reported to Congress that Iraq was the largest chemical weapons producer in the world.
The State Dept reported that Iraq continued to develop chemical and biological weapons, as well as new missiles
The Bush administration that year approved dozens of export licenses for sophisticated dual-use equipment to Iraq's weapons ministry.
In October, international banks cut off all loans to Iraq. The Bush administration responded by issuing National Security Directive 26, which mandated closer links with Iraq, and included a $1 billion loan guarantee.
This loan guarantee freed up cash for Iraq to buy and develop WMDs.
This directive was suspended only on August 2, 1990, the day Iraq invaded Kuwait.
One US firm reportedly contacted the Commerce Dept. two times, concerned that its product could be used for nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Bush's Commerce Dept requested and received written guarantees from Iraq that the equipment was only for civilian use.
1990
Between July 18 and August 1 (the day before the invasion), the Bush Administration approved $4.8 million in advanced technology sales to Iraq's weapons ministry and to weapons labs that were known to have worked on biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.
So when US ambassador April Glaspie told Saddam the US did not have an official position on disputes between Arab countries, is it any wonder that he thought the US would look the other way when he invaded Kuwait? After this close and very supportive relationship with the Republican administrations throughout the 1980s?
We all know about the Gulf War. But I want to bring in one more piece of history here, from after the Gulf War.
Dick Cheney, before becoming Vice President, was CEO of Halliburton Corp. from 1995 until August 2000, when he retired with a $34 million retirement package.
According to the Financial Times of London, Halliburton in that time period sold $23.8 million of oil industry equipment and services to Iraq, to help rebuild its war-damaged oil production infrastructure. For political reasons, Halliburton used subsidiaries to hide this. [4]
More recently, the Washington Post on June 23, 2001, reported that figure was actually $73 million.
The head of the subsidiary said he is certain Cheney knew about these sales.
Halliburton did more business with Saddam Hussein than any other US company.
Asked about this by journalists by ABC News in August 2000, Cheney lied and said "I had a firm policy that I wouldn't do anything in Iraq, even arrangements that were supposedly legal." [5]
The US media never followed up on this.
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Quote:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story...4314%2C00.html
When US turned a blind eye to poison gas
America knew Baghdad was using chemical weapons against the Kurds in 1988. So why, asks Dilip Hiro , has it taken 14 years to muster its outrage?
Sunday September 1, 2002
The Observer
When it comes to demonising Saddam Hussein, nothing captures the popular imagination in America better than the statement that 'he gassed his own people'. This is an allusion to the deployment of chemical weapons by Iraq's military in the Iraqi Kurdistan town of Halabja in March 1988 during the Iran-Iraq war, and then in the territory administered by the Tehran-backed Kurdish rebels after the ceasefire five months later.
As Iraq's use of poison gases in war and in peace was public knowledge, the question arises: what did the United States administration do about it then? Absolutely nothing. Indeed, so powerful was the grip of the pro-Baghdad lobby on the administration of Republican President Ronald Reagan that it got the White House to foil the Senate's attempt to penalise Iraq for its violation of the Geneva Protocol on Chemical Weapons to which it was a signatory.....
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