posted on August 29, 2002 06:38:17 AM new
Yep, he sure did - with U.S. assistance throughout, even to the point of issueing official denials for him at the time. Nevertheless, today it is the most popular refrain used in attempts to justify the need to attack Iraq despite worldwide lack of support or approval.
posted on August 29, 2002 08:19:14 AM new
Yet another "opinion" piece used to bolster "flexible facts". Actually, that linked piece says no such thing. No where does it say that the U. S. "assisted" in gassing the Kurds.
You've become so predictable and so boring, Krs. Reminds me of that old adage, Familiarity breeds contempt
Now I remember why I rarely bother to read here anymore.
posted on August 29, 2002 08:56:34 AM new
Edited to remove non working link..article in following post.
This article reports that, according to senior military officers with direct knowledge of the secret program, U.S. officials "provided Iraq with critical battle planning assistance at a time when American intelligence agencies knew that Iraqi commanders would employ chemical weapons in waging the decisive battles of the Iran-Iraq war."
So it's hypocritical to the max to use this as an excuse to attack Iraq.
posted on August 29, 2002 09:04:38 AM new
This is an exerpt of the article that I tried to link.
August 18, 2002, Sunday
FOREIGN DESK
OFFICERS SAY U.S. AIDED IRAQ IN WAR DESPITE USE OF GAS
By PATRICK E. TYLER (NYT)
WASHINGTON, Aug. 17 -- A covert American program during the Reagan administration provided Iraq with critical battle planning assistance at a time when American intelligence agencies knew that Iraqi commanders would employ chemical weapons in waging the decisive battles of the Iran-Iraq war, according to senior military officers with direct knowledge of the program.
Those officers, most of whom agreed to speak on the condition that they not be identified, spoke in response to a reporter's questions about the nature of gas warfare on both sides of the conflict between Iran and Iraq from 1981 to 1988. Iraq's use of gas in that conflict is repeatedly cited by President Bush and, this week, by his national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, as justification for ''regime change'' in Iraq.
The covert program was carried out at a time when President Reagan's top aides, including Secretary of State George P. Shultz, Defense Secretary Frank C. Carlucci and Gen. Colin L. Powell, then the national security adviser, were publicly condemning Iraq for its use of poison gas, especially after Iraq attacked Kurds in Halabja in March 1988.
During the Iran-Iraq war, the United States decided it was imperative that Iran be thwarted, so it could not overrun the important oil-producing states in the Persian Gulf. It has long been known that the United States provided intelligence assistance to Iraq in the form of satellite photography to help the Iraqis understand how Iranian forces were deployed against them. But the full nature of the program, as described by former Defense Intelligence Agency officers, was not previously disclosed.
posted on August 29, 2002 09:35:33 AM new
Okay, let's assume the worst: That we aided Hussein, knowing that he would employ chemical weapons. What bearing does that have on the current situation? Does that mean we should now allow Hussein to develop nuclear weapons, again knowing that he will not hesitate to use them? Should our past mistake dictate our future actions?
posted on August 29, 2002 09:55:07 AM new
In 1991, during "Operation Desert Storm" against Iraq the U.S and allied planes dropped 88,000 tons of bombs on Iraq. That makes Hirshima look like child's play.
So now, you are asking why we should trust Iraq....based on "their" prior behavior? I ask you why should anyone trust us...especially with George W. Bush in charge. We have more weapons of mass destruction than any country in the world. And the entire world is very concerned.
posted on August 29, 2002 10:33:55 AM new
I find it difficult to believe there's no prcedures in place for this type of thing. If someone is deemed unfit to be a leader, is war the only way to get rid of him/her?
I think he's a jerk too twinsoft. I think he should be eliminated but surely there are other ways to do it besides declaring war on his country. (??)
posted on August 29, 2002 11:29:28 AM new
twinsoft,
Your question isn't to the topic, as that was only to point out the hypocrisy in the use of the phrase for justification of war against Iraq and to hopefully raise a bit of hilarious vitriol from some certain housewife in the gallery as it has done above, in answer I would submit that the bush administration has no evidence that Saddam is close to a nuclear capability nor has he aquired any necessary reactive material to do so. He isn't going to be nuclear capable in the near future and may well never be, according to the best evidence available. He does have certain stores of chemical agents, and retained a few of his notoriously innacurate Scud missiles but lacks the delivery capacity to directly threaten this country.http://www.msnbc.com/news/799977.asp#BODY That being the case there is no reason to attack him other than to reassure the position of Israel against him as is often proposed we do. However advantageous it may be to have us do the bidding of some middle eastern entities against others I for one think that we ought better stick to fighting our own battles if there are any and return to letting our major defense industries make their profits selling to others as has been done so successfully in the near past.
Sometimes it seems that bush thinks that he has a mandate to overturn anything and everything that Clinton layed in place, but he would do better to realize that like the details or not Clinton's mechanisms in world relations worked toward peace and enrichened us all. If others would entreat to make peace, why, Bill would give them a place to meet, but if it was war they chose he made sure that we were first in line to offer them weaponry. Meanwhile we all, us Americans, simply sat back and watched our capital gains accrue.
posted on August 29, 2002 06:00:54 PM new
>Bush certainly wants to be a dictator.
So long as this F'n moron has the power to point out any American Citizen that he doesn't like and have them hauled away, their Constitutional Rights revoked, held inncommunicato, without legal representation or charges being made, put on trial by secret tribunals not open to public scrutiny, I *REFUSE* to dignify those dictatorial powers by handing Bush the honorable title of President. Should you?
posted on August 29, 2002 06:04:57 PM new
Borillar, I have never [except for a couple of times and purely by accident] called him president. He is not presidential...he seems to think he is more like the Pope. The head of western religion and the leader of the used-to-be-free world.The RR still loves him but some others are wiseing up.
posted on August 29, 2002 07:47:39 PM new
What KRS is attempting to point out is the enormity of the hypocrisy coming from the White House - and, I suspect, of Americans in general. That we aided and abetted Sadaam to gas his own people makes us as culpable as the German people were to Hitler's regime of gassing Holocaust victims. Just because they weren't Jews and were Iraqis instead, does that make us any less abominable to the eye of history? We will be remembered as being in denial of what we are doing - first to allow our government to support any regime that gasses it's own people, let allow soldiers on a battlefield; and also, for the second round where we deny that we are guilty of that atrocity by way of our complicity and denial. While it is We who allowed our government to go that far without even a single cry of foul play, it is now the fault of this administration that falsely uses the facts to urge us to attack Sadaam that is trying to make us ALL a bunch of hypocrites to the world and to all of the history books yet to come! Should we just sit by, as did the German people when those atrocities against the Jews occurred? Or when WE sat by and allowed our government to do any damned thing that it pleases without accountability, should we continue to do the same thing? Do we not have a duty, not to just ourselves but to our posterity to spread the word on the facts to everyone we know and to strongly urge them to do the same thing? Do not let the truth of our crime of apathy condemn us and to silence it with further apathy.
posted on August 29, 2002 08:07:58 PM new
The problem is propaganda, wouldn't you say? At the time, I don't think many people knew what was really going on with Iraq. It's what you learn after the fact that makes you feel like nobody did anything. Governments are too secretive when it comes to how they deal with other countries and the Presidents are usually out of office by the time something leaks out, so I wouldn't call it apathy really.
[ edited by kraftdinner on Aug 29, 2002 08:08 PM ]
posted on August 29, 2002 08:32:33 PM new
Earlier, in one thread or another, I was going to say something along the lines of that Bush makes Lyndon Johnson look like Jimmy Carter.
Then tonight on public radio,
there was an interview with a Greek journalist (whose name unfortunately had like 6+ syllables) who was discussing how the CIA did everything they coulld to squash US documents released last month ("Greece/Turkeyi",
around US involvement and support of the junta in order to avoid "US embarrasment", as well as his entry to the U.S.
I'm sorry that I can't cite sources better than this. (Helen? )
There is nothing new under the sun here, is there?
posted on August 29, 2002 08:33:03 PM new
Borillar, I know that KRS is trying to point out the hypocrisy of it all. Our government is known for that throughout the world. Look at the hypocritic attitude in Afghanistan that seems to have led Bin Laden to hate us. We are hypocrites! The American people aren't as a whole but the government most certainly is.
Krafty has a good point...government is so secretive anymore that we never know what is happening to even give a hue and cry till it's almost.. or is... too late.It really isn't apathy..it's the misinformation we the people are given.
although it's quite true that there are a lot of butts sticking in the air with the heads in the sand.
[ edited by rawbunzel on Aug 29, 2002 08:33 PM ]
posted on August 29, 2002 08:33:49 PM new
Yet it is apathy, or it is worse than that. The most common response of German citizens after WW2 when asked how they could have sat by while Hitler committed the atrocities in Germany that he did was "We just didn't know", but the overall consensus in history is that that could not be true. They could have known, but preferred not to ask or seek information about the meaning of the things that happened around them each day concerning people who in many instances had been their friends and neighbors for years, even generations. They MUST have known that something was awry; that they then failed to find out what is was is as lenient as history has been with them.
Do these things have application today? No, not in the same way as yet. Still there is enough now that is different, enough that is being discussed, that the people have cause enough to question with a critical viewpoint the doings of the current administration. To decide not to do so is a conscious decision to forgo their right of review and deny their responsibility as citizens in this country.
posted on August 29, 2002 11:39:57 PM new
But you have to hear about something first krs before you can go finding out the truth. I don't believe that the average Joe German realized what was really going on. I don't think anyone did until much later.
Bush has been secretive with his plans from the beginning. Now with the 'war', everything is Classified, so you can't say people are apathetic for not knowing what he's up to.
posted on August 30, 2002 01:02:19 AM new
Oh sure. People who had lived on your block for as long as you remember are no longer there in the morning after a night of truck noises and jackboots and shouting coupled with wailing, loud slams and the crying of children and you didn't know? Nonsense.
"so you can't say people are apathetic for not knowing"
Certainly you can say that. When there has been secretive hiding of the minutes of meetings with no reason to hide them except the claim of 'executive priviledge' there's cause enough to ask. When common people are whisked off the streets with no charge or complaint against them known except the 'national security' claim for secrecy there's reason to ask or object. He and his crew have been secretive in areas that should be public knowledge, and that very fact is all the whiff required for a person to begin to wonder and object. There's no need to know every detail to know that hiding them is a violation of the principles of government by the people. To say "Oh, well they hide things so I couldn't know and then can't be termed apathetic or aquiescent" is a poor excuse and a feeble way to avoid responsibility. To accept that these things are done in the cause of 'the war' is objectionable since there is no war declared.
Anyway, there is much to be found out if one looks for it; hints that something is wrong either with your personal idea of what freedom or democracy or citizenship means or with what is being done to them. People are now being searched in bus stations. How long before you are stopped on the street and made to turn out your pockets or be body searched? If they take you away instead of merely confiscating your nail file will you then be awakened? Too late..you're it.
