Former Saddam official: (Tariq Aziz) 'No genocide' against Kurds (blames Iran)

[sabra]

http://www.kxly.com/news/?sect_rank=6§ion_id=563&story_id=9035

Former Saddam official: 'No genocide' against Kurds
Associated Press

BAGHDAD, IRAQ -- A top official from Saddam Hussein's government says Iraq couldn't have launched the poison-gas attack that killed 5,600 Kurds in 1988 because it didn't have the nerve agent.

Tariq Aziz blames Iran.

Aziz is the former deputy prime minister and foreign minister. He and five others are on trial for charges connected to the attack on the Kurdish town. It was called the Operation Anfal campaign against Kurds in northern Iraq.

Among the other defendants is Ali Hassan al-Majid, also known as "Chemical Ali," who allegedly ordered the poison-gas attacks. If convicted, the defendants could be sentenced to death by hanging.

[DRoseDARs]

1. There've been external claims that it was Iran & not Iraq that did the gassing in 88 but evidence...

...isn't particularly forthcoming. I'm not sure if the truth will ever been known. :shrug:

One (somewhat biased) link claiming it was Iran not Iraq:
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0131-08.htm

[KittyWampus]

2. actually, there is evidence in one case Halabja where gas used was type Iran had

I think it was the difference between persistent and non-persistent with Iraq using the latter type.

[Joanne98]

8. I saw a law suit that Iran filed against the US,, The Iranians said..

That they thought they (Iran) might have accidently gassed the Kurds. I looked for it but can't find it. It was real interesting though.

[CONN]

10. United States Defense Intelligence Agency concluded Iranian gas

http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0131-08.htm
<snip>
This much about the gassing at Halabja we undoubtedly know: it came about in the course of a battle between Iraqis and Iranians. Iraq used chemical weapons to try to kill Iranians who had seized the town, which is in northern Iraq not far from the Iranian border. The Kurdish civilians who died had the misfortune to be caught up in that exchange. But they were not Iraq's main target.

And the story gets murkier: immediately after the battle the United States Defense Intelligence Agency investigated and produced a classified report, which it circulated within the intelligence community on a need-to-know basis. That study asserted that it was Iranian gas that killed the Kurds, not Iraqi gas.

The agency did find that each side used gas against the other in the battle around Halabja. The condition of the dead Kurds' bodies, however, indicated they had been killed with a blood agent — that is, a cyanide-based gas — which Iran was known to use. The Iraqis, who are thought to have used mustard gas in the battle, are not known to have possessed blood agents at the time.
<snip>

[struggle4progress]

12. I can't see why the Iranians would do that: they then took in about 100K Kurds as refugees

http://www.hrw.org/reports/1991/IRAQ913.htm

[barb162]

13. I have seen that story and it reads so convincingly that

we really don't know, my thought since I read it is, who the heck knows?

[IronScorpio5]

3. Tariq Aziz is a lying sob

nt.

[PittPoliSci]

4. i'm not so sure all the weapons inspectors would agree with you.

Scott Ritter, for one, has said many times that the gas used on the kurds was one that was of an Iranian variety.

[carla]

29. ...and this judgement is based on what?

A gut feeling? Read the reports and then try again...

[MasonJar]

5. What I have read in the past is that Iraq did not have the type of

gas used on the Kurds, but that Iran had that gas.

[The Stranger]

6. The Iraqis only killed 5,000? The U.S. has killed more than twenty fold that.

[Bonobo]

7. Try over 100 fold. That will be a start.

[barb162]

15. Do you have a link? The UN said last yr. about 35,000

were killed and I think it was mostly Iraqi on Iraqi killing.

[Bonobo]

16. Here.

650,000 from 2003 attributable to US invasion
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/42926

US Sanctions ressponsible for 500,000 deaths of children (UNICEF estimate)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions

86,000 men, 39,000 women, and 32,000 children killed by Allied Forces in first Gulf War (S Commerce Department’s Census Bureau )
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulf_War#Iraqi_deaths_and_wounded

Current estimate of Iraqi casualties, around 60,000
http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

[barb162]

17. The Lancet study is being clearly challenged now

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article1469636.ece (your first ref)

Second reference is on UN sanctions, not US sanctions

Third reference: First Gulf War....who is talking about that???? That's years ago! And Saddam shouldn't have invaded Kuwait. Basically the entire world agreed on that. If people died, as we know they did, that's Saddam's fault. Agreed?

The fourth reference: where in that link does it show 60,000 and is that for the entire current war or just one year or what?

[Bonobo]

18. Thanks for the Lancet link. It seems like a flawed study.

With regards to the last link, the 60,000 is originally from Iraq Body Count.
http://www.iraqbodycount.net/

As for the sanctions against Iraq, yes it was nominally the UN, but it was at US insistence and at the very least was with our strong approval.

As for the First Gulf War being "years ago" LOL! How old are you that it seems so long ago? What's the statute of limitations on talking about war's started byu the current POTUS' papa. Do I agree that it was Saddam's fault that all those people died? No, not really. But I will agree if you agree that it is our fault that our soldiers are dying in Iraq today! That would be consistent with your view at least. After all, an invasion is an invasion.

[barb162]

19. I'm pretty damned old . Gulf War 1 was in 1991

Saddam invaded a sovereign nation and the coalition kicked him out. He was the aggressor. I'd like to know what you are thinking that it was somehow okay for him to invade Kuwait. And how Bush the elder was wrong for kicking his ass out of Kuwait. If people died in Kuwait, then look at Saddam and Iraqis who were in Kuwait illegally. And yes, unfortunately our soldiers are dying because Bush invaded Iraq. But we are not responsible for Iraqi v. Iraqi violence any more than Iraqis are responsible for US street gang killings.

[Bonobo]

20. Putting words in my mouth.

Here's a good link for you... to put things in some perspective. Sadam was small potatoes on the world stage. A minor player.

On the other hand...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=385&topic_id=18607&mesg_id=18607

[barb162]

21. I'm not putting words in your mouth

WHy would I want to do that. I know Saddam was small potatos but he still invaded a sovereign nation and deserved to get his dictator ass kicked out. Basically the whole world agreed on that if you remember. Check the UN records on that. Nobody was for Saddam invading Kuwait other than Saddam.

Sorry I can't get to your link there as I have too many security things set up on my PC.

[The Stranger]

28. Maybe if you wanted to go "kick his dictator ass out," you should do so,

but the current disaster was a catastrophe launched by Neocons who hijacked the U.S. government, and, against its national interest, created new centers of propaganda ("intelligence") and promised to Congress that the U.S. would be greeted as liberators and out within six months. Of course, they knew better than that, even at the time.

[The Stranger]

27. I don't think there is much doubt that the CURRENT U.S. INVASION has cost tens (if not hundreds) of

thousands of Iraqi lives -- everything from the "shock and awe" bombing campaign, its immediate impact, to the ground invasion, the roundups, road blocks and shootings of civilians, the overall destruction of the infrastructure, which leads to disease, malnutrition, lack of medical care and more death.

That the U.S. HAS INTENTIONALLY TRIED TO SUPPRESS THE NUMBERS OF IRAQIS IT HAS KILLED is not cover to claim that it is "disputed" or, worse, that somehow "Iraqis killing Iraqis" and the civil war unleashed BY THE U.S. INVASION is not a direct result of the U.S. INVASION.

[IndianaGreen]

23. The Lancet is not a flawed study, it is a reliable cluster study

that was subjected to peer review. The problem with iraqbodycount is that it relies exclusively on published reports. The Johns Hopkins researchers interviewed families and verified the death certificates. Most of the deaths are not reported and the British press revealed that the morgues are undercounting the bodycounts under orders from Baghdad.

[carla]

30. Thank you,

IndianaGreen, you saved me a post. Accuracy is not something "official figures" are known for...therefore, the need for statistical analysis. Science does a good job uncovering the facts.

[barb162]

14. Has the US killed them or are the Iraqis killing each other?

[Henny Penny]

25. Well... if the US trains a death squad....

and the death squad is made up of Iraquis.... and the death squad kills Iraquis....

Does that mean its Iraquis killing Iraquis???

[The Stranger]

26. The U.S. killed them.

[oblivious]

32. The US has killed them.

[featherman]

9. There was a definitive Canadian medical study about this...no link

unfortunately but likely can be Googled.

The incident took place during the Iran-Iraq war in a battle zone. The findings were that the type of gas the Kurdish villagers dyed from was common in the Iranian arsenal but not the Iraqi. The whole thing was likely a unintentional but ghastly "fog of war" error attributable to wind drift but it has been used relentlessly in the anti Saddam propaganda campaign (ie."He gassed his own people").

Doesn't really matter now. The propaganda version has achieved "reality" status through continual repetition but Tariq Aziz is most likely correct according to the medical team that did the research.

Saddam was a dictator and an all-around bad guy in many, many ways but most likely not guilty of this particular crime against humanity.

[CONN]

11. NY Times OP-Ed by CIA analyst: Iranian gas

http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F60816FC3D5C0C728FDDA80894DB404482&showabstract=1

A War Crime Or an Act of War?

DISPLAYING ABSTRACT - Op-Ed article by Stephen C Pelletiere, senior CIA political analyst on Iraq during Iran-Iraq war, lays out facts in allegation that Saddam Hussein gassed Iraqi Kurds in Halabja in March 1988; says all that is known for certain is that Kurds were hit with poison gas that day, during battle with Iranians; explains that US Defense Intelligence Agency's report found both sides used gas during battle, and blamed Iranians for Kurdish deaths; notes Kurds died of cyanide-based gas that Iran, but not Iraq, had at time; explains that Iran sought control of key dam near Halabja, part of impressive Iraqi waterway system that is most extensive in Mideast; adds that Bush administration owes Americans full facts before going to war

[IndianaGreen]

22. Tariq Aziz, who passed information to CIA, is going to hang

He should tell us about the WMDs we gave Iraq to be used against Iran.

[Contrite]

24. Juan Cole: Did Saddam Gas the Kurds?

http://hnn.us/articles/1242.html

In a recent New York Times op-ed, Stephen Pelletiere argued that the March, 1988, gassing of Kurds during the waning months of the Iran-Iraq war may have been perpetrated by Iran, not Iraq. This issue has taken on importance because Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's gassing of the Kurds is often given as one ground for the U.S. to go to war to effect regime change. As it happens, Pelletiere, a former CIA analyst, is just plain wrong and appears not to have kept up with documentation made available during the past decade.

(snip)

The Baath regime launched 39 separate gas attacks against the Kurds, many of them targeting villages far from the Iran-Iraq border. Beginning at night on Thursday, March 16, and extending into Friday, March 17, 1988, the city of Halabja (population 70,000), was bombarded with twenty chemical and cluster bombs. Photographs show dead children in the street with lunch pails. An estimated 5,000 persons died. Although some analysts say the gas used was hydrogen cyanide (not in Iraq's arsenal), others have suggested it might have been sarin, VX, and tabun. Iraq is known to have these agents. (Iran is not known to have hydrogen cyanide, in any case).

High Iraqi officials, including Vice-Premier Tariq Aziz, have since admitted using chemical weapons against the Kurds. Last year, Radio Free Iraq broadcast the allegation by a former brigadier general in Saddam's air force that the command to use "extraordinary" weapons against Halabjah came from the president himself.

The Anfal campaign deeply traumatized the Kurdish people, and its psychological effects are felt powerfully to this day. Kurds of Halabja recently protested against Western skeptics who questioned whether Saddam had and would use chemical weapons. They said they were living proof that he did and would.

There is no doubt that Saddam launched this chemical weapons campaign (which was also waged on the battlefield against Iranian troops, with devastating results).

[oblivious]

31. Juan Cole is going to have to provide some documentation for that statement.

Here Aziz is on trial saying exactly the opposite.

It's strange that Professor Cole provided no citation for that accusation.