How the U.S.A. armed Iraq

Perhaps Hiptastic and ilk should provide us evidence in how these chemicals were used for innocent or humane purposes. They are fond of telling us how they may have been used, but they never provide proof that they were. Yet we are to believe Iran is readying itself to develop a nuclear weapon. Now they wish us to blame other foreign providers, and forget our involvement and complicity, because the other kids were doing it too.

 

The US discovered Iraq was using chemical weapons and hushed it up. They were not friendly with Iraq but hated Iran even more and when Iran started winning the Iran Iraq war they saw it as a potential catastrophe. So they started intervening to help Iraq, just as many other countries in the region did (even Kuwait). One way they helped was by undermining efforts to publicise and condemn Iraq's use of chemical weapons. Which is completely shameful.

I want to keep to my point. There is ZERO interest in the countries and companies that supplied tens of billions worth of military hardware to Iraq and Iran, the hardware which was used for the vast majority of the killing under Saddam. There is ZERO interest in the countries and companies that provided the vast majority of the components of Iraq's WMD programs. There is enormous, insatiable interest in the minor role played by the US and US firms in proving the dual use chemicals to Iraq, chemicals which they would later be blamed for NOT providing. Because nobody care who armed Iraq, the only interest is "In which ways can we blame the US for Iraq getting armed?". If the US supplied 1%, then who gives a crap about the other 99%, the US is guilty, end of story.

I not going to get sidetracked here. The US did not provide WMDs to Iraq, period. It was also a minor player in the provision of dual use technologies and materials.

 

dude aren)t you taking this debate a bit too serious?? if someone has an opinion, he or she is just not necessarily gonna change it because of whatever you might bring up in a thread. debate but please don't get urself a heart attack over it plz...

 

Do you have any idea what your flaming temper tantrums look like to other people? Jesus Christ. You could even be correct in some of your posts but you act like a fucking child and it makes you look like you don't know what you're talking about. How old are you? Grow up, act like an adult, and maybe you can get your point across.

 

lol

 

I tried to form an ilk, but nobody wanted to join.

As for your information request, why, because you don't think Iraq chlorinated their water? You don't think they treated cattle that had been infected with Anthrax? You want me to post original documents in Arabic from the Iraqi ministry of Agriculture? Give me a break, that is a meaningless reqest.

You on the other hand couldn't answer a simple question. Do you oppose Iran's nuclear energy program? Just a yes or no, won't debate it here of course (better a new topic) but it is intersting to know the answer in the context of this debate.

I think the original idea - that the US is not guilty of something related to Iraq - has sent a lot of people into a panic, so much so that they forgot what the issue is. The US did not provide WMDs to Iraq.

HTH, for your links:

This is pre-Saddam and doesn't say they gave them weapons. You've gone from google search dumps to copying and pasting article headlines without reading them. I'm not going to bother reading the rest, if you can't be bothered why should I?

I don't have time for this. Either put together a real argument or get ignored.

 

What are you going to do - jump through my laptop screen and swing a half empty bottle of Jack Daniel's at me?

This is as internet forum. All your ranting and raving is words on screen, its water off a duck's back to me. If you're trying to get a reaction you're barking up the wrong tree.

 

Charting foreign arms deals does not necessarily absolve the US involvement, in fact one would have to look at how those arms industries were developed and who provided the technology, raw materials, and funding for said industries to be developed. And we have to look at the fact that Reagan promoted those sales by foreign countries, and now we are supposed to point our finger at them and say looky, looky?

We also need to look at who financed the purchase of those arms:

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/mar2004/iraq-m26.shtml

 

You are ignoring my points, you are ignoring my questions, and you are continually trying to go off topic. Its a shame because with all the flaming going on I was hoping we could get in some good debate.

I think I said three times I am talking about the fact that NOBODY gave Saddam WMDs. That is the point. Now you are telling me about agricultural export credits as you continually try to find new ways to blame the US.

You remain totally uninterested in who armed Iraq, and totally obsessed with "in what ways can we blame the US for other countries arming Iraq". This is not a worthwhile pursuit.

 

Shouldn't we look at who financed the purchase of said weapons? I thought the original intent of the thread was to demonstrate that the US was way down on the list of arms suppliers, as illustrated by the chart.

And I doubt he had the knowledge to make them solely without participation by the US.

 

Shouldn't we look at who financed the purchase of said weapons?

I did just a little research on that a few years ago, and remember less than that. But I think some private sector companies were actually prosecuted by the US government for providing banned materials to Saddam (if you think government is corrupt and evil, check out the defense industry sometime). A state-owned bank in Italy, I think, helped to mask the transactions. I could be very wrong on this, but you might want to check on that as well.

 

The Corporations That Supplied Iraq's Weapons Program

http://www.thememoryhole.org/corp/iraq-suppliers.htm



Key

A = nuclear weapon program
B = biological weapon program
C = chemical weapon program
R = rocket program
K = conventional weapons, military logistics, supplies at the Iraqi Ministry of Defense, and building of military plants




USA

1. Honeywell (R, K)

2. Spectra Physics (K)

3. Semetex (R)

4. TI Coating (A, K)

5. Unisys (A, K)

6. Sperry Corp. (R, K)

7. Tektronix (R, A)

8. Rockwell (K)

9. Leybold Vacuum Systems (A)

10. Finnigan-MAT-US (A)

11. Hewlett-Packard (A, R, K)

12. Dupont (A)

13. Eastman Kodak (R)

14. American Type Culture Collection (B)

15. Alcolac International (C)

16. Consarc (A)

17. Carl Zeiss - U.S (K)

18. Cerberus (LTD) (A)

19. Electronic Associates (R)

20. International Computer Systems (A, R, K)

21. Bechtel (K)

22. EZ Logic Data Systems, Inc. (R)

23. Canberra Industries Inc. (A)

24. Axel Electronics Inc. (A)

"In addition to these 24 companies home-based in the USA are 50 subsidiaries of foreign enterprises which conducted their arms business with Iraq from within the US. Also designated as suppliers for Iraq's arms programs (A, B, C & R) are the US Ministries of Defense, Energy, Trade and Agriculture as well as the Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories."

 

iraq was an oil rich state with a booming economy prior to the Iran war. They financed themselves to a great extent. Again, you seem completely mystified by the fact that the US didn't arm Iraq, and no matter how much evidence you see that other countries armed Iraq you ignore it and assume you are missing something, that, in some way we haven't discovered yet, the US must ultimately be to blame for everything.

Yes, and when everyone was disappointed to find the US was not to blame they started looking for other ways to blame the US. So someone claimed the US gave Iraq WMDs, and about six pages later nobody has been able to back that claim up, although they still believe it must be true despite the total lack of any evidence to support it.

Are you TRYING to prove my point? It had to be the US - why? Because the US is the only industrial nation in the world? Because when I provided evidence that they got help from Singapore, the Netherlands, Egypt, India, and West Germany, you just ignored it because it wasn't what you wanted to hear?

I don't have a camp, I am not responsible for what other people say.

That is complete and utter crap. I doubt you have even bothered to read back to the beginning of the thread.

I already provided it, go back and read my previous posts. And here's one more.

That is a statement from the Foreign Minister/Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq under Saddam saying that Iraq developed its own chemical weapons. You cannot get better evidence than that.

You are fitting exactly into the tunnel vision stereotype I was talking about: you are willing to consider any evidence I can provide on Iraq's WMD programme, as long as it shows the US is guilty.

Again, read the thread from the beginning. I have documented where he got the materials (Singapore, Germany, the Netherlands, etc). I have documented statements by the regime itself that they developed chemical weapons on their own. You, and everyone else here, has provided nothing, zero, nada to show that the US gave Iraq WMDs. Not one single piece of evidence.

Yeah the "everyone who disagrees with me is an idiot" show? Yeah pretty tough to find that kind of thing on amateur talk radio.
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http://www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/bioter/ussuppliedgerms.html

.

 

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sent samples directly to several Iraqi sites that U.N. weapons inspectors determined were part of Saddam Hussein's biological weapons program, CDC and congressional records from the early 1990s show. Iraq had ordered the samples, claiming it needed them for legitimate medical research."


The exports were legal at the time and approved under a program administered by the Commerce Department.




I don't think it would be accurate to say the United States government deliberately provided seed stocks to the Iraqis' biological weapons programs,'' said Jonathan Tucker, a former U.N. biological weapons inspector.


The company sent the bacteria to the University of Baghdad, which U.N. inspectors concluded had been used as a front to acquire samples for Iraq's biological weapons program.


The CDC also sent samples of a strain of West Nile virus to an Iraqi microbiologist at a university in the southern city of Basra in 1985, the records show.





Doesn't really seem like the devious plot that it's made out to be in light of the above information, if you ask me.


Wouldn't a balanced and rational human being conclude that if anything, the U.S. was duped out of those samples? I don't think anyone's denying our stupidity for entering into whatever we did back then...

 

the bar chart is garbage


david mellor was sent to iraq to sell weapons to iraq by magaret thatcher, david was an odious little man of the british government if you know nothing about him.

magaret thatcher was obsessed about selling weapons to foreign countries to make money for the british arms industry. infact during the first attack on iraq the newspaper openly complained that british made weapons were being used on british troops. magaret thatcher if you remember was the "prime minister" of britain her son also sold weapons as a side line and continues to do so, he has recently been jailed for organisising mercenary attacks against foreign states, the mercenaries languish in gaol whilst he remains at large within the community.

britain sold many wepaons to iraq as did america nice try and revising history you'd make big brother proud.

 

Well I guess that settles it then. Guy's credibility is of course much higher than the Stockholm International Peace Reasearch Institute's. I'm sure he did more research than they did anyway.

 

Exactly. Another post that cites absolutely noting. I mean come on, if the US and UK were such big suppliers, then what did they supply?

Iraq's jets were MiGs and Mirages. Their armour was T-72s, T-55s. Their rockets SA-2, SA-3, SA-6. Roland air-defence systems. Mi-24 and Gazelle attack helicopters. 155 and 122mm howitzers. Right down to the individual soldier with his AK-47.

How many of these are American or British? None. Not one.

 

The U.S. was duped out of those samples?

A rational person would question why anything like anthrax would be allowed to be shipped from the U.S. to Iraq supposedly because they really needed it, considering the way Saddam was behaving at that time.

People at a day care center could claim they were duped into giving Michael Jackson some kids for a while because he said he really needed them.

.

 

And you being someone who I assume doesn't have a background in microbiology, organic chemistry or agricultural engineering, it makes perfect sense that you would have to question why they might possibly have a use for something like that. I don't have the first clue either. But I'd be willing to bet that there are any number of good reasons/excuses that they could have come up with, in the name of scientific research and development.


If there's no use whatsoever for pathogens like that, then why is it that labs around the world keep samples of diseases like smallpox, plague, ebola, etc? When it comes to scientific research, there isn't ANYTHING that doesn't have a potential use.


So I say again. Stupid...yeah. Sinister? Don't be so sure.