Who's killed more Iraqi children, Bush or Hussein?

[Poiuyt]

Bush's war in Iraq has killed about 100,000 Iraqi civilians. 50% of the population of Iraq is under the age of 15, meaning that Bush is responsible for killing approximately 50,000 innocent children.. OK, Saddam wasn't any saint, but weren't most of the people he killed at least adults? Or am I wrong here?

[MercutioATC]

1. I don't think the gas discriminated among the Kurds...

A lot of children were killed by SH too.

Bush is doing it a lot faster, though...

[jjtss]

6. Do yourself a favor.....

Google up Al Jazeera and get the real story about those kurds.

[MercutioATC]

7. Interesting. I hadn't seen that before.

I'm not sure I trust Al Jazeera implicitly, but it's definitely worth exploring.

Thanks.

[sistersofmercy]

28. Nope there is report floating around stating that our government

did soil testing and discovered it was actually chems supplied to the Iranians (by the US Gov, so they would know) who did that little deed. It makes sense because prior to the gasing, the Kurds in that village had left while the Iraqi troops were there and only came back when the Iraqi troops left. Supposedly the Iranians sent the chem weapons that way thinking the Iraqi troops were still in the village. But what is really suspicious is the fact that the film footage shot was done so by reporters held on the Iranian side of the border, snuck in and out by the Iranians as soon as the smoke cleared.

[LynnTheDem]

32. There are several reports BY the US gov saying it was Iranian gas.

There are also reports saying the same thing by the US Military and the CIA.

[Dirk39]

2. Clinton

"7,000 Iraqis a month, 5,000 of them children under the age of five."

http://www.commondreams.org/views/070700-103.htm
And it was Clinton's Madelaine Albright who said it would be justified to murder one million Iraqis with the sanctions.

Sorry for that but the truth is the truth

Hello from Germany,
Dirk

[Deja Q]

5. I appreciate the truth. Thank you for posting that.

:yourock:

[Hardrada]

8. That came to my mind also.

I was going to bring that up but you beat me to it. First name that came up when I saw the question. Hello from Icebound Iowa.

[UdoKier]

20. Yeah, it sucks to have to admit that.

But Clinton LET THEM die. Bush has been murdering them. Slightly different.

But I do wish CLinton had been a bit more progressive...

But Clinton DOES deserve credit for putting an end to the genocide in E. Timor, which had gone on for 20 years before he took office.

I can't think of a damn single good thing that Bush has done since the day he slithered into the oval office.

[TrustingDog]

21. not all that different to me.

we must get over our blind loyalties to individuals and have real loyalty to what we think is right and wrong, just as we are asking our republican neighbours, friends and family to.

[Ms. Clio]

3. No, you're not wrong

And then there's the sanctions, which may have killed as many as 500,000 Iraqi children.

[Revolucionario83]

4. Iraqis have taken so much shit, its horrible.

[NAO]

9. On an absolute scale: Hussein - pro-rated deaths per year : Bush

Hussein has killed more Iraqi children than Bush, but he has been up to it for over 20 years.

Bush has only been at it since Spring 2003 (not counting the sanctions).

Lancet, the British medical journal estimated the number of unnatural civilian deaths since the war started, and they concluded that the death rate was HIGHER under Bush than it was under Saddam. Give Bush a few years, and he'll outstrip Saddam very quickly.

[GreenPartyVoter]

11. Exactly. Give baby Bu$h time.. say.. the same length of war

as fought in Viet Nam, which is what we look like we are heading for.

----------------------------------------------------------
Save this nation one town, county, and state at a time!
http://timeforachange.bluelemur.com/electionreform.htm#why

[Ms. Clio]

12. Where is your evidence for all these deaths under Saddam?

Seriously, do you have figures to support that claim? Or are you blaming Hussein for the deaths of Iraqi children under sanctions? Are you aware that prior to the first Gulf War, the worst health problem faced by Iraqi children was obesity?

There is no doubt that external, not internal, forces are directly responsible for far more Iraqi deaths.

[NAO]

13. I read it in "The Nation" and the article cited "Lancet"

I think they (the Lancet) used a generic "unnatural death rate" statistic.

But it's even worse if you take the sanctions into account. That would mean the additive effect of both Saddam's brutality AND the scantions TOGETHER were causing a lower death rate than Bush's war.

[Ms. Clio]

15. I guess I'm still confused--did the Lancet claim that Saddam

killed children? How did "Saddam's brutality" specifically kill children?

[DrWeird]

18. I think they count all deaths...

including disease, malnutrition, etc.

Which would mean Bush and Clinton are just as responsible.

[Ms. Clio]

22. That's what I get for being too indirect

I wanted some evidence that Saddam was directly responsible for killing multitudes of Iraqi children prior to the Gulf War--was he bombing their homes and cities, etc.?

Nor do I believe it's correct to blame him for the deaths attributed to sanctions--the blame for that rests squarely on the UN and the U.S.

[rinsd]

24. How about the war with Iran?

The disappearing of 2 million people (see Amnesty Int'l).

The child prisons(see Scott Ritter).

Just to name a few.

What is the bizaaro need for people to say Saddam wasn't such a bad guy? He was a shitbag who killed many of his own people and people in countries around him. That doesn't make Bush a Saint or invading the right choice.

I thought we were behind the black of white thinking that if Saddam is bad, Bush is good and vice versa.

[Ms. Clio]

25. Please provide links to those allegations

What I vaguely remember of "child prisons" ultimately turned out to be quite different from the original propaganda stories (and I don't remember Scott Ritter being involved in the story at all).

And what about the Iran War? What is your point there--that boys fought in the war (on both sides?) So did boys fight in the U.S. Civil War.

There is no doubt that Hussein was a brutal dictator who did all the usual brutal dictator stuff to a lot of adults--but I do not believe that he directly killed HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of Iraqi children, as the U.S. and the U.N. have done.

[rinsd]

29. Saddam STARTED the Iran-Iraq War

Therefore I would consider him a bit more responsible for said death and carnage. He also invaded Kuwait and while some horrorr stories were overblown, that wasn't a bloodless exercise.

Amnesty Int'l

A simple primer on Iraqi human rights abuses -

http://web.amnesty.org/pages/irq-article_3-eng

Iraq - 1999 http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar99/mde14.htm

1995 report on women - http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/intcam/women/womeneng.txt

"
Samira Ma'arafi, a 27-year-old woman who ran her own small
import/export business and loved to paint, was arrested by Iraqi
soldiers in November 1990. She was seized at a check-point in
Kuwait City during the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait. Since then
there has been a wall of silence about her from the Iraqi
authorities. Her mother, who has campaigned tirelessly for her
release, has had to rely on fragments of news: that her daughter
was in jail in Kuwait; that she had been moved to Iraq. The last
reported sighting of Samira Ma'arafi was in 1992, when a Lebanese
man said he had seen her on a prison bus in Baghdad.

The Gulf conflict of 1990 and 1991 is receding into history, but
in Kuwait and Iraq its aftermath continues to dominate women's
lives. Some are grieving over the loss of loved ones. As well as
the military casualties, hundreds of unarmed civilians were
murdered in Kuwait by Iraqi troops. Victims included children shot
in the head at close range whose bodies were then dumped outside
their homes.

Although allied forces succeeded in expelling Iraqi troops from
Kuwait in February 1991, they did not intervene when Iraqi
Government forces crushed mass uprisings by Kurds in the north of
the country and Shi`a Muslim Arabs in the south in March 1991.
Thousands of people went into hiding in the vast southern
marshlands area which has traditionally served as a hiding place
for government opponents and army deserters.

Since then, there have been repeated government attacks on the
marshes. The government
has drained large stretches of marshland, destroying the local economy,
and has
deliberately attacked villagers, both men and women. Several hundred
people were killed
or injured on 26 September 1993 during military attacks on villages in
the southern
marshes. A UN team which visited the area in November announced
subsequently that it could not confirm or deny allegations that
chemical weapons had been used.

When the Iraqi Government released thousands of prisoners of war
and civilian detainees in 1991, it claimed that all prisoners
arrested in the course of the conflict had been released and sent
back to Kuwait. At least 625 people Ñ among them Samira Ma'arafi Ñ
simply 'disappeared'."

More of Saddam's gentility - http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar96/#middle%20east

Scott Ritter - CHild Prison

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,351165,00.html

"You've spoke about having seen the children's prisons in Iraq. Can you describe what you saw there?

The prison in question is at the General Security Services headquarters, which was inspected by my team in Jan. 1998. It appeared to be a prison for children — toddlers up to pre-adolescents — whose only crime was to be the offspring of those who have spoken out politically against the regime of Saddam Hussein. It was a horrific scene. Actually I'm not going to describe what I saw there because what I saw was so horrible that it can be used by those who would want to promote war with Iraq, and right now I'm waging peace. "


Human Rights Watch - 1989

http://www.hrw.org/reports/1989/WR89/Iraq.htm#TopOfPage

1990 - http://www.hrw.org/reports/1990/WR90/MIDEAST.BOU-03.htm#P200_49710

There's of course more just go to www/amnesty.org or www.hrw.org

[LynnTheDem]

33. No he didn't start the Iran-Iraq war.

Iran bombing Iraq's border towns was the actual start of the war.

Iran-Iraq war

1980 4 September - Iran shells Iraqi border towns (Iraq considers this as the start of the Iran/Iraq war).

1980 17 September - Iraq abrogates the 1975 treaty with Iran.

1980 22 September - Iraq attacks Iranian air bases.

1980 23 September - Iran bombs Iraqi military and economic targets.

1981 7 June - Israel attacks an Iraqi nuclear research centre at Tuwaythah near Baghdad.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/737483.stm

If Canada publicly announced their intention of killing bush & overthrowing the US government...if Canada paid American groups to overthrow the bush regime...if Canada assassinated Rumsfeld...if Canada bombed Harvard university, killing over 200 students...and if Canada then bombed various US border towns, and the US then attacked Canada, would you say AMERICA STARTED the Canada-US war???


Hussein tried diplomacy with Khomeni; Khomeini told Hussein to piss off.

Hussein offered a no-fault end to the war thru the UN; Iran said piss off.

Lt Col Mark Buckman, USAF and Mr. Frank Esquivel, DIA - "Saddam Hussein and the Iran-Iraq War" details the several attempts at diplomacy and avoiding war with Iran, as well as Hussein's offers for ending the war to which Iran said hell no.

http://www.ndu.edu/library/n2/n015601A.pdf

STOP DRINKING THE RIGHTWINGNUT PROPAGANDA BUlLSHIT!

[Ms. Clio]

34. As has already been pointed out to you, Saddam did not start the war

Further, he was actively encouraged and directly supported by the U.S. --so again, the U.S. bears some responsibility for all the deaths related to that military conflict, as well.

What you call a "simple primer on human rights abuse" is far more complex than you seem to understand. I find your choices of links bizarre, since they don't seem to back up your claims at all.

You started out claiming that "2 million people" (out of a population of 20 million???) were "disappeared" by Saddam. Then you give me this site, http://web.amnesty.org/pages/irq-article_3-eng, that states that that: Many thousands of people “disappeared”

Quite a difference between thousands and 2 million, wouldn't you say?

Your second site, http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/aireport/ar99/mde14.htm, is an even less supportive source for your argument, because it states in one of the first paragraphs:

"Deaths of thousands of civilians, including many children, owing to malnutrition and lack of medicines as a result of the sanctions continued to be reported. In September, during consideration of the report on Iraq under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Committee on the Rights of the Child observed that children had been most affected by the sanctions.

Um, that's what I said--the U.S. and the UN sanctions were killing far more Iraqi children than Saddam ever could.

Your story about a woman who went missing in war that happened 14 years ago has absolutely no relevance to the subject at hand--but I bet many, many Iraqis could tell similar stories about their loved ones and the U.S. invasion of their country, now.

As for the so-called "children's prison," it was determined to be an orphanage:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F50D16FF345E0C758CDDAE0894DB404482

[LynnTheDem]

31. The Lancet says WE...the USA...under BUSH, have killed 100,000 Iraqi

civilians, mostly women & kids, since the start of bush's illegal immoral unjust invasion.

[Ms. Clio]

35. Yes, I know--and the sanctions killed up to 500,000 kids n/t

[XOKCowboy]

14. The difference is...

Saddam was an Iraqi. * and us (yes we are included by default) are an occupying force who are claiming to bring democracy and freedom to the Iraqis. That is a big difference.

[onenote]

27. not to the ones that died n/t

[JohnnyCougar]

16. We need a link here...

this is very interesting, but unconvincing without a link.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

30. Not to mention the Lancet article is now a few months old...no?

[Tinoire]

10. "We care more about the Iraqi people than Saddam Hussein does"

"I am willing to make a bet with anyone here that we care more about the Iraqi people than Saddam Hussein does," Albright

Sabre-rattling, neo-liberal (neo-con for those not yet on boar about the neo cancer) Albright...

'Things worth fighting for'
Foreign policy team visits OSU
By Mike Spahn
Daily Staff Reporter

COLUMBUS - President Clinton's foreign policy team met yesterday at Ohio State University with a rowdy crowd in a town hall meeting to discuss the current situation in Iraq.

Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Secretary of Defense William Cohen and National Security Adviser Sandy Berger met for 90 minutes with a crowd that often yelled and chanted in protest of possible U.S. military action against Iraq.

(snip)

Berger said the aim of a possible airstrike would be twofold: to diminish Saddam Hussein's weapons and reduce the threat to Iraq's neighbors.

"We will send a clear message to would-be tyrants and terrorists that we will do what is necessary to protect our freedom," Berger said.

(snip)



Albright said concerns about civilian loss of life will be seriously considered if airstrikes occur, but she said she thinks the U.S. cares more for the Iraqis than Saddam.

"I am willing to make a bet with anyone here that we care more about the Iraqi people than Saddam Hussein does," Albright said.

(snip)

http://www.pub.umich.edu/daily/1998/feb/02-19-98/news/news1.html
====

US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has not only conceded that sanctions are not affecting the Iraqi regime, she's also stated that sanctions are amongst the most powerful weapon in the US arsenal. The logic and cruelty defies belief. The US bends backwards to proclaim their support for human rights world wide, yet applies sanctions to a civilian population who have no control over their leaders, and whom the sanctions do not, by the US' own admission, effect.

The practical result is that sanctions systematically kill Iraqi children at a rate of up to 6000 a month and the US Secretary of State says that this is a price worth paying for the punishment of Saddam Hussein.

The number of Iraqi civilians who have died from the direct and indirect results of sanctions is just under 2 million. This is death on the same scale as Pol Pot's 'Killing Fields' of Cambodia, and thus one of the five worst genocides of the 20th century. To put it bluntly, in the words of Professor Noam Chomsky: 'This is not foreign policy, this is state sanctioned mass murder that is approaching holocaust proportions.'

(snip)

Television interview, "60 Minutes", May 12, 1996:

Lesley Stahl, speaking of US sanctions against Iraq:
"We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And - and you know, is the price worth it?"

Madeleine Albright: "I think this is a very hard choice, but the price -- we think the price is worth it."

At the Town Hall in Columbus, Ohio, Feb. 18, 1998, Ms. Albright was moved to declare:

"I am willing to make a bet to anyone here that we care more about the Iraqi people than Saddam Hussein does."

Though her logic may escape us, she may yet have some DNA molecules for compassion. On May 21 she signed an agreement between the U.S. and six Latin American countries to protect dolphins, declaring:

"This is one of the strongest agreements ever negotiated to conserve marine life."

http://www.firethistime.org/fearalbright.htm

(snip)

It's interesting to note that when Madeleine Albright was heckled in Columbus, Ohio in February 1998, while defending the administration's Iraq policy, she yelled: "We are the greatest country in the world!"
Patriotism is indeed the last refuge of a scoundrel, though Gore's and Albright's words don't quite have the ring of "Deutschland uber alles" or "Rule Britannia".

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Blum/Intro_RogueState.html

But then again... This is a woman who said "it was not a good idea to link human rights and trade and that we actually make better progress with both when they are not linked,"

Yikes. All hail the Third Way Democrats.

[Cocoa]

17. the war with Iran certainly killed a lot of kids

many of the fighters on both sides were kids.

[dpibel]

26. If you're gonna put combatants in the mix

Don't forget that nobody is giving figures for Iraqi military killed by the US in this invasion or in the marginally more justified DaddyBush war (which, we may want to recall, included the highly civilized and genteel "Highway of Death," the slaughter of thousands of people who were doing nothing more threatening than beating a hasty retreat).

If you want to include deaths of members of the armed forces in the tally of deaths for which SH was responsible, please do include everybody. Even if you want to treat the deaths in DaddyBush's war as SH's (hopefully excepting the killing of those attempting to surrender or retreating, which should be put on the US scorecard), you still have to count the armed forces deaths in the current, utterly unjustifiable invasion as the direct responsibility of BushBaby.

[Adelante]

19. Comparing one mass murderer

to another mass murderer.

[goddess40]

23. exactly, 2 wrongs don't make a right

unless your a repuke, then multiple wrongs can make a right if it benefits you.