How the U.S.A. armed Iraq

I'll admit I haven't personally researched any of this...I just found this to be quite intriguing. Based on what I've been getting from the media I had a much different impression of the situation.

 

Your link was apparently seen as an image leech, so I can't see it...

But anyways, of the 800,000 to 1,200,000 people Saddam killed, between 800,000 and 1,200,000 of them were killed during the time frame in which he received aid and comfort from Ronald Reagan. When Saddam's killing spree lightened drastically, Republicans withdrew their support. I remember bitterly debating this back when Reagan was president, but of course conservatives back then loved Saddam, and those of us who opposed him were called (OMFG!)... "leftist anti-Murrakin librulz."

 

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zeitgeistmovie.com

 

A list of widely-cited sources and numbers is listed here. It's not hard to see why Reagan Republicans wet their panties in excitement over their hero Saddam:

"Saddam saw himself as a social revolutionary and a modernizer, following the Nasser model. To the consternation of Islamic conservatives, his government gave women added freedoms and offered them high-level government and industry jobs. Saddam also created a Western-style legal system, making Iraq the only country in the Persian Gulf region not ruled according to traditional Islamic law (Sharia). Saddam abolished the Sharia law courts, except for personal injury claims." (wikipedia)

There's so much money being made on this war nowadays that the economic pressure alone will ensure that we never succeed over there. These conservatives bleed us for every last dollar we can struggle to pay in taxes, and then they just turn around and use the money to just keep the war going.

Next we'll probably see a major push to "privatize" our armed forces, much like they've done already with our prison systems. I don't think it's any accident that they're knowingly "breaking the military" (as General Zinni and other retired generals tend to say it) that we have now.

Regarding the image, though, I think that chart is probably accurate, I did just a little research on that a few years ago, mostly on the fas.org web site, and those numbers do look like what I remember. If you calculate the total value of military goods exported by France and divide by their population, then do the same for the US, France turned out to make more weapon-money per capita than America. But that was in the 1990s, before the rise of the mega death merchants that run our country today.

 

"Saddam saw himself as a social revolutionary and a modernizer, following the Nasser model. To the consternation of Islamic conservatives, his government gave women added freedoms and offered them high-level government and industry jobs. Saddam also created a Western-style legal system, making Iraq the only country in the Persian Gulf region not ruled according to traditional Islamic law (Sharia). Saddam abolished the Sharia law courts, except for personal injury claims." (wikipedia)



Granted he turned out to be a monster, but doesn't that sound like a list of all positive things to you? Is it so impossible to understand why we thought he might have been a good guy AT THE TIME at least?


You just LOVE Hugo Chavez, don't you? I'm not sure about that but I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark of a guess.

Now let's say that instead of our government being at odds with him, we supported him because of his obviously great way in which he does everything. Now let's say that further down the line he starts committing genocide (and as it is he's currently running a brutal dictatorship).

Would you then demonize the U.S. government as being the worst bunch of fucks imaginable for "betting on the wrong horse" with Chavez, even though he's so well liked?

 

Oh and as far as Zeitgeist is concerned, I got as far as Chapter 1; went and did some research; and discovered far more fabrications than truth. So of course I don't think much of it, even though I didn't see the later parts.

 

At the time, both the US and the USSR would arm factions in a country (under the rubric of "freeing" them). Both countries took exception when their clients/customers won the local conflict and began acting in their own interests, rather than as the Big Boys wanted them to.

I do want to point out that the legend of the data lists

"Permanent Members of the UNSC who support liberating Iraq." (emphasis added)

I would suspect data presented by those who call what is going on in Iraq "liberation". And would look for a more neutral source of information.

Any Iraqi liberation that happened because of Bush's war was incidental. The war was and is for control of the oil. (BTW, Exxon et.al. won, its a shame our kids had to kill and die for that victory.)

Also, out of curisosity, do you have a nationally known radio show? Or are you a fan? or is your screen name seridipidous?

 

Fan.

 

Granted he turned out to be a monster, but doesn't that sound like a list of all positive things to you? Is it so impossible to understand why we thought he might have been a good guy AT THE TIME at least?

But Republicans worked to stop those tendencies, and nurtured the worst part of Saddam, and about a million people (and progress in the Middle East) died as a result. As one Republican Saddam-blower I knew back then said, "the sooner we wipe those towelhead Iranian sandniggers off the face of the earth, the sooner we'll have gas back down to under fifty cents a gallon." I didn't tell him that Iranians are white.

Given that the Reagan supporters I knew at that time used the Swastika as their symbol, it's not at all surprising to see where Republicans have taken their party and country.

Regarding Chavez, I don't know enough about him to venture an opinion. The fact that Bush hasn't yet assassinated him speaks well of his security detail, though.

 

I call bullshit on you and your hatemongering propaganda.

 

Does that chart include the chemical and biological weapons the US gave to Saddam, as well as the funding the US provided him? Sure, the former Soviet Union provided Iraq with most of their arms (guns, etc.), but we always hear about the atrocities of Saddam gassing the Kurds with the chemical weapons we provided him. I believe that was one of the main justifications used gain public support to invade Iraq and remove him from power. I mean, the US could have easily removed him from power in '91, but they decided against it for whatever reason.

 

Yeah, Michael Savage, you look like a fuckin' Neo-Nazi alright.

 

The data is from SIPRI, it is independent.

If Exxon won a war for oil, how come they didn't get any oil?

Sorry, you got some bad information, that's a common myth. The US never provided Iraq with chemical weapons, in fact nobody did. Iraq developed their own chemical weapons. The got most of the materials from Singapore, the Netherlands, Egypt, India, and West Germany.

 

If you believe that LIE, then I have some oceanfront property to sell you in Montana.

All one needs to do is type into any search engine (I used Google) "US supplied chemical weapons to Saddam," and they come across something like this, which I found under Google News...

Iraq had been supplied with chemical weapons by the U.S., during the Iraq-Iran war.

http://www.unobserver.com/layout5.php?id=4571&blz=1

This is taken directly from an article from the UN observer, dated 3-19-08.

 

LOL! The old "random google link = irrefutable proof" rule. Well if you find something into teH interWeb it must be true!

Not only that, but your article is clearly an editorial, not reporting! It casually mentions, in passing, that the US supplied chemical weapons to Iraq, and provides nothing to back it up or substantiate the claim. The article isn't even about chemical weapons in Iraq. You'll have to do better than that!

You don't understand. It is a widely believed myth that the US supplied chemical weapons to Iraq. Hence, it is also widely claimed on the web. For comparison, right wing (and even mainstream) media often claim that Iraq kicked out weapons inspectors. They didn't, the inspectors chose to leave. But if you google it, you will find plenty of news articles that say the inspectors were kicked out. That doesn't make it true.

Try reading this wiki article - you can say what you want about wiki, but unlike yours it provides references and details, and unless you can beat that you're out of luck! Nobody provided chemical weapons to Iraq, Saddam developed his own.

 

Where did Saddam obtain the materials to make these chemical weapons?

Look, I am not going to waste my time arguing with idiots who believe the world is flat and that the moon is made out of cheese.

Are you really such a BONEHEAD that you didn't even fully read the entire source you provided? This is DIRECTLY from the link you provided:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_poison_gas_attack

 

Calm down Rat! No need to get all worked up and start insulting people. Just prove your case.

Of course I did. But before we go there, you've already admitted you were wrong. Yep. My article says that nobody, including the US, provided Iraq with chemical weapons. I said Iraq developed its own weapons. So now you think this article proves me wrong and you right? Maybe I should ask if YOU read the article - or if you even remember what your argument was!

So now back to the article - yes the US provided thiodiglycol which was used to make the chemical weapons. But this is an industrial chemical which had many ordinary applications, and was not banned under any treaty (the chemical weapons treaty wasn't even signed until 10 years later).

So we've gone from your exciting claim - that the US provided chemical weapons to Iraq, to the the vastly watered down claim that the US provided some common industrial chemicals - chemicals which were not restricted by any treaty - to Iraq, and even then the US was a minor provider of precursor chemicals compared to the countries I mentioned. This is pretty far removed from what you claimed!

 

I am not going to stoop to the level of arguing over semantics. The fact is, the US knowingly supplied Saddam with agents -- biological and chemical -- which they knew would be used as weapons. We could sit here all day and argue over whether or not it was in good intent or bad, but anyone who isn't completely living under a rock should have a pretty good idea of what the motive was in supplying this stuff to a dictator propped up by the US government for years.

 

LOL! Semantics? If you had said the US provided Iraq fighter jets and then it turns out they provided Bauxite which could be used to make aluminum which could be used to make fighters would you consider that "semantics"? I also find it funny that you could consider it 'stooping' - so far you haven't really provided much in the way of argument besides a random google link and some hearsay, yet you feel entitled to insult me for arguments i have backed up 100%! Interesting approach to debate!

I don't think there's proof they knew what they would be used for - you haven't provided any - as I showed these are common industrial chemicals which had many applications, there wouldn't necessarily be anything suspicious about exporting them.

You are getting farther and farther off track here, and no closer to the truth. Iraq had a lot of backers besides the US, in fact the relationship between the US and Iraq was never good and often quite rocky.

And as usual you provided zero evidence that the US had a motive. But the important question is that if your reasoning was true - that the US was propping up Iraq and wanted to help them build a chemical weapons program - why was the US such a minor player in providing these chemicals? You seem, like many, to want to completely eliminate the role of all other countries so we can focus on the US role, no matter how small, and then use that to draw some conclusions which don't really make sense if you look at the big picture.