.......
For them Saddam's guilt, whatever that may be, is a
foregone conclusion as the US appointed regime
prepares to charge him and his men with war crimes
on three accounts: gassing the Kurds in Halabja in
1988, the invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and the
1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. According to Stephen
Pelletiere who was the Central Intelligence
Agency's senior political analyst on Iraq during
the Iran-Iraq war and a professor at the Army War
College from 1988 to 2000 disputes the guilt of
Saddam Hussein but not the crime of the innocent
Kurds that were killed in Halabja. He was privy to
the classified reports produced by the United
States Defence Intelligence Agency after
conducting investigation into the matter. The
report clearly stated that the Kurds were killed
in the cross fire as both parties used chemical
weapons but Saddam certainly did not target the
Kurds intentionally. Furthermore, investigation
into the bodies of the dead Kurds showed that they
were killed by cyanide-based gas which was used by
the Iranians whilst the Iraqis used mustard based
gas. From the onset the US was fully complicit for
supplying the materials knowing that they were
being used for making weapons and were used in the
battlefields against Iran. According to its own
records it continued to supply the materials even
after the Halabja incidence. Logic dictates that
if you revile something and constantly lecture the
world about it then you should set the example by
not trading with it! Thus, the outrage in the
Western intelligentsia in 2003 as opposed to 1988
was politically motivated and clearly dishonest.
Unless of course it took fifteen years for the
news to travel to London and Washington! In any
case, the fanatics simply ignored such
inconvenient points. Saddam's intention to
invade Kuwait was known to the US ambassador April
Gillespie who in fact gave a clear approval by
recognising that Iraq's dispute with Kuwait is
an internal matter between the two nation. Many
ordinary Americans do not know that Kuwait was
part of the southern province of Iraq (Walayah of
Basra) for centuries. Iraq has far greater right
to claim Kuwait than the US has over the Hispanic
territories that it annexed. It was the British
colonial designs that created such fault lines in
order to keep the Islamic world divided and weak,
its gravitas naturally increased after the
discovery of oil. The Kuwaiti movement for
unification with Iraq in 1950s were ruthlessly
hunted down by the Kuwaiti regime with the help of
the British. Truth is the first casualty of war
and the US hired a PR company called Hill and
Knowlton to market the first Gulf war to the
American public. The Kuwaiti government gave $10.7
million to Hill and Knowlton for their services.
CNN-TV broadcasted a 15-year-old Kuwaiti girl in
the US claiming that the Iraqi soldiers were
taking the incubators and left the babies to die
on the floor. Subsequent investigation clearly
exposed the story to be built on lies just like
the WMD claims over Iraq. No doubt there were some
Kuwaiti casualties but it was far less than the
Iraqi casualties of 100,000 plus. Eventually, the
Iraqi troops with the unarmed civilians were
withdrawing in February 26th and 27th 1991 in
compliance with the UN resolution. The US forces
at the behest of the Kuwaiti regime attacked the
retreating soldiers and civilians; massacred tens
of thousands of people. These were men, women and
children that posed no threat to the US armed
forces.The ever moaning Americans should visualise
this as multiple 9/11s and a real act of
terrorism. Later this road became to be known as
the "highway of death". It was reported that
the US marines fought with each other to take a
pot-shots at the Iraqis. Using sophisticated
weapons and wearing US uniform means immunity
from terms like barbaric, savage, terrorist and
criminal! Their motivation to commit such crimes
was fuelled by their racist outlook and inherent
sadistic nature as was shown at Abu-Ghraib. This
is surely one of the most heinous war crimes in
contemporary history. Saddam can be penalised to
an extent for the initial invasi on although he
had good reasons but war crimes were in reality
committed by the Kuwaiti regime and the US
government on the "highway of death". Again do
not expect fanatics to question their beliefs, so
such matters were simply ignored by the entire
establishment including the UN. The war with Iran
was clearly backed by the US government and both
sides on the battlefield suffered casualties. The
Western arms industry made good profit and fuelled
the war by supplying weapons to both sides. There
was no record of any genocide committed by the
Iraqi regime against the Iranians and if the rules
of war was violated, both sides are guilty.
......
(by Yamin Zakaria)
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