Can anyone justify opposition to the FIRST Gulf War? Gephardt supporters?

[DealsGapRider]

I'm reading in Slate.com how Gephardt led the House opposition AGAINST the first Gulf War and then joined in rounding up votes FOR the recent invasion of Iraq.

This strikes me as the behavior of a deeply cynical, finger-in-the-wind politician. The first Gulf War was, in my opinion, eminently defensible. The second clearly was not.

I wasn't old enough to remember the arguments against going to war in 1991. Can anyone explain to me the reasons for opposing the war?

A lot of people on DU are saying that they could never vote FOR someone who voted for the use of force authorization last year. I'm wondering whether I could vote for someone who voted against authorizing the use of force in 1991. If they couldn't vote to use force in such a clear cut case in which war was justified, do they have what it takes to defend our country today?

http://slate.msn.com/id/2088209/

:dem:

[SCantiGOP]

1. cause of the two gulf wars

These arrogant people put their countries on top of our oil !!

[shance]

65. Exactly.

Im a Dean supporter through and through, and yet dont agree with him on his support of Gulf War I and Afghanistan. Seems as more information is being revealed, there is less and less logic and truth behind the reasoning for those invasions as well.

The more I have read and researched the first Gulf War, the more I see it essentially is no different than this current invasion. It was an invasion based on lies as well, and an agenda that had nothing to do with what Americans were being told by the first Bush Administration and the media.

Interestingly enough, that is where I greatly admire Gephardt and Kerry. They both stood against the first Gulf War, which had some pretty solid support from most Americans behind it (seems to me). Its funny - at the time I supported it, although in truth I didnt know what the heck I was supporting. I was just doing the blind flag wrap like everyone else.

Perhaps our leaders actually start out with conviction, but the dysfunction and dishonesty in DC eventually wears them down and they eventually join those others that have become soft. Im beginning to think that.

Term limits I think are not only good for American citizens but seems to me more and more that it would also keep our Democracy "fresh" and energized with new blood and people coming in and out. Right now its stale, words are hollow, the voices are all blurring into one another, our leaders arent really seeming to take their jobs seriously enough, and look at who is paying for it.

[LuCifer]

2. Got me...

...cuz I sure can't justify it. April what's-her-face, then the ambassitor to Iraq if I am not mistaken, said to the Iraq gov't "WE TAKE NO POSITION ON ARAB-ARAB CONFLICTS" and then "OOPS, WE CHANGED OUT MINDS!" as the St. Pete Times exposed (anyone got the link to this, assuming it's even online since it was from the early 1990's, again if I'm not mistaking) so that's my 50 cents.

Lu

[Kolesar]

4. April Glaspie

here is a different link:
http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/ARTICLE5/april.html

edit: the antiwar.com link, I am sure this will be good:
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j011501.html

[ret5hd]

3. thru april gilispie (sp?)...

we had given saddam permission to invade kuwait, which in itself was somewhat defensible because of kuwait's practice of "slant drilling" (stealing iraqi oil).

[THUNDER HANDS]

5. Kerry also opposed the first war

I was too young to remember GW1 (I remember the Simpsons being preempted by war coverage, and me getting rather annoyed at that) but I imagine the best case for opposing it would have been...

...um...beats me?

I wish Kerry would have opposed both of them, but I'm glad that he firmly denounced the first one and (at least) was cautious about getting involved in the second one.

[Brotherjohn]

6. Even most conservatives now admit that it was really about oil...

There is a legitimate debate to be had over whether or not "defending our interests" should include "defending the oil we depend upon". Especially when we could devote a fraction of the resources we currently spend on defense to development of alternative energy sources, and probably be freed from oil dependence within a couple of decades. Especially since, if we did not have such cheap and plentiful oil, our lives may be, shall we say, more incovenient. But would they be endangered?

I agree that Gulf War I was more defensible. A sovereign nation WAS invaded (and not by us), when Iraq invaded Kuwait. We had the support of the U.N. and nearly every Arab neighbor (most even contributed troops). At that point, Iraq WAS in the midst of developing nuclear weapons, and DID possess chemical and biological weapons. It was a far cry from the current situation, in which we initiated hostilities and invaded a sovereign nation.

But the justifications used to "promote" the Gulf War were also subject to question. The masses of troops on the Saudi border are now known to have been exaggerated drastically if not made up entirely. The "removing babies from incubators" story was also likely a PR lie. The "gassed his own people" story, still used today, is also subject to mutliple interpretations (including by our own intelligence). There is dabate as to who gassed whom (Iraq or Iran), but in any case, this was during full-scale war, sponsored in part by us (especially the chemical weapons part). There is even debate as to whether we implicitly encouraged Hussein to go into Kuwait (baited him, as it were).

[DealsGapRider]

7. Oil definitely had something to do with it.

But so what? We're not the only country that depends on Middle Eastern oil. If we had stood by and let Saddam roll into Saudi Arabia and seize control of 60% of the world's oil, the global economy would have collapsed. There would have been a worldwide depression and lots of people would have suffered. Would you war opponents have preferred that?

Also, the fact that Kuwait was being raped and looted by Iraqis was at least part of the equation. We couldn't just sit back and allow such a naked act of aggression to go unresponded to (no sarcasm intended...I know how hypocritical this sounds in light of recent events, but hey, I opposed the war. The SECOND war. Not the first.)

[Brotherjohn]

18. As I said, I think Gulf War I was more defensible...

... I was simply pointing out arguments against it.

As far as the act of aggression, unquestionably it needed to be responded to. Unless you believe that we "egged them on" (April Gillespie story posted by others here).

As far the global economy collapsing, that aspect of your claim is largely conjecture. A) Conjecture that Iraq would even have gone into Saudi Arabia at all and B) conjecture that this action would have collapsed the global economy.

Even if they had gone into Saudi Arabia, we likely could have expelled them as fast as we did from Kuwait. If they went that far, I don't think anyone on the planet would not have said they could have gotten away with that. The global economy would only collapse if they were to be left in control of Saudi oil (and then, that is still conjecture; nations could still deal with Iraq... the terms would just shift). But if war is truly the last resort, and this was the big danger, then we could have repelled them if that danger came to be (again, just for argument's sake).

But the bigger picture is this... why are we continually fighting wars over oil? If we would only make a realistic effort at developing renewable resources, this would not even be an issue.

[salin]

24. Even April Glappie has confirmed the story

if it had been so defensible, why the heavy PR used to tilt public sentiment (that was yawning) with the KuWait baby story (also well documented that it was a lie and was PR). The Saddam as devil story wasn't eaten up til the Baby story.

The first war was just as trumped up and hard to justify as the second one. The main difference is that the first one had a precursor event (which we didn't cause, but we could have prevented); and the second one was believed to have a precursor event (there was an event - that wasn't tied but most of the public did tie it) in the second case much of the public tied 911 to the war and that event had a direct impact where the KuWait story did not (and as I suggest before, had it alone been justified, we would't have had the KuWait dead babies PR lie). So to much of the public's (misguided through manipulation of intel) belief the second war was more justified than the first.

[Brotherjohn]

33. I agree with most of what you say, but I don't think April Gillespie...

... confirmed this.

I recently went back and looked at her congressional testimony where some say she did so (someone had a link to a link posted here, I think). I found nothing of the sort, although I can see where some would have used what she said out of context to imply that. I think she used the words about an "Arab-Arab conflict" somewhere, but elsewhere, she says she made it VERY clear to Hussein that we held out the right to do whatever we thought was necessary if Iraq invaded Kuwait, and that we would not take it lightly. Not that I'm one to defend either war. I think, in the end, both were unneccesary (especially the last), and the Bushies all but wished for them.

If you have a link to such an admission by April Gillespie, please post it.

That being said, again, I agree with most of what you say. If the war was so defensible, why the big PR blitz (which was mostly lies)? We are a government "of the people, by the people, and for the people", so why can't we just be given the unvarnished truth? The powers that be can still do what they want, but we can vote them out if we think they did not do what WE wanted. (interestingly, we did vote Bush I out, though I think it was over the economy and "no new taxes", and not Iraq)

[salin]

41. interesting New Yorker article

http://www.markdanner.com/newyorker/100190_Though_rhetoric.htm

Something else I read described it slightly differently - that she admitted to the 'US would not take sides in Arab-Arab conflicts' - but that she additionally said that she expected anything to be dealt with through peaceful means (this is slightly different than... but if you don't use peaceful means... the US military will act).

The thing is, that she, as ambassador, very much was in the position to know the nature of Saddam and aggression as her administration had been supporting him in the Iran-Iraq war. I believe there was some concern voiced about the possible use of chemical weapons in that conflict (which is rather interesting, given that we helped with the acquisition of materials for those weapons - see the Rumsfeld pic below from, I believe 1986). And if this NewYorker article is correct, his ranting and raving should have suggested to her that peaceful means was not what he was suggesting. Thus she definitely sent mixed signals, that a wise ambassador - knowing the nature of the leader with whom she was speaking, should have KNOWN was so soft as to send a green light. COuld be that she was a poitically appointee who was woefully inept as not to realize this - which would be an explanation - but that is a rather defamatory explanation and I have never read anything to suggest that.

The thing that is problematic, and there is evidence on this very thread below, is that people who at the time expressed grave concerns about that war were painted to be "sympathetic" with Hussein. That was most often not the case. More true in point was the recognition that there were (are) many brutal dictatorships - some of which WE actively have supported in their attrocities (think El Salvador in the eighties and the Nicaragua Contras; or before those, Pinochet in Chile, and Marcos in the Phillipines who was more corrupt than brutal but horrendous nonetheless). And that unless we, as a country, were to begin pursuing foreign policy based on interventionist policies of policing the world, that this situation was no worse than the concurrent events going on in Serbia/Croatia (and then Bosnia) under Milosovic. Ironically - at the time I felt that where we were not acting (Europe) was a more immediate human rights disaster crisis than where we did intervene - which solidified my own view of myself not as a pacifist, but as one who very held more of a human rights bar and a high one at that (as in - immediacy - that ongoing "cleansing" was occurring at the moment and intervention could prevent it), rather than reasons of strategic defense (oil reserves, which was later acknowledged as a major rationale for the war.)

[el_gato]

9. Hussein was told

on the eve of that war that we had no interest in the affairs between
Iraq and Kuwait effectively giving him the greenlight.

Gulf War I was a scam.

[Rich Hunt]

13. yeah, I remember that

The Gulf War was my first encounter with "the memory hole".

I remember even Rush Limbaugh chiding fellow conservatives for saying it wasn't about oil - he said on the radio, "of course it's about oil!"

[Minstrel Boy]

48. Arguing for the first Gulf War in the Senate, Bob Dole said

"We are in the Mideast for three letters: oil. O-I-L."

That proved a bit too blunt for most legislators' sensibilities, so a few days later they were treated to the babies-tossed-from-incubators fabrication.

[BurtWorm]

8. The main reason to be against Gulf War I: George HW Bush

did a similar thing to what the present Bushists did, went all over the map in search of a plausible, politically safe reason for supporting the war. Check into the history of it. Americans weren't immediately convinced the war was worth entering. GHWB tried oil right away. American enthusiasm plummeted. Then he tried talking up Saddam as Hitler, which led to the question of why the US spent so much building up Saddam's regime. April Glaspie's signal to Saddam that the US didn't care about inter-Arab territorial disputes was also problematic. There were a lot of reasons to be against Gulf War I.

[StandWatie]

12. facile reasons..

if there is anything worth going to war over it's the principle of sovereignty and the inadmisability of annexing land by conquest. If only the world would react the same way every time with the same united resolve instead of only when it can be used as a cover for oil interests.

[DealsGapRider]

16. Well said.

[BurtWorm]

17. Not facile. Prescient.

Bush I could very easily have made the case that sovereignty was the sole issue. He eventually was backed into that corner by Powell, I think, who understood what Bushists II don't: you have to have an exit strategy.

[Cocoa]

19. "principle of soverignty" is simply not believable

we had just completed invading a soverign country to arrest its president, among many other violations of other latin american countries' soverignty. Principle had nothing to do with the Gulf War.

[StandWatie]

21. oh, I know that..

Hypocrisy is always bad, but it doesn't make GW1 worse because we are hypocrites, we are just hypocrites.

The world should have stood up to us in Panama also.

[JHB]

28. Except that Saddam didn't annex it right away...

...reports were that he was going to set up a puppet regime but leave it nominally independent. He changed it to annexation to up the ante for what was at first muddled international reaction to his move.

Poppy Bush dithered for three days, until after a meeting with Margaret Thatcher when all of a sudden he became Mr. Rock-Firm "This shall not stand".

My own opinion is that if he publicly (or even privately on the phone to Saddam) had taken the hard line from the get-go Saddam would have yanked his troops back and declared the whole thing a "punitive raid" after the fact. In fact, throughout the build-up and right up to a Russian initiative on the eve of the war, there were back-channel indications that Saddam would withdraw as long as he had some sort of face-saving figleaf and wasn't publicly running with his tail between his legs. Some of these overtures were more worthy of consideration than others, but they were all shut out by Bush thanks to him deliberately goading Saddam.

Most of the opposition to the first Gulf War sprang from this sort of ingenuousness by Bush: His "extra mile for peace" was really just a beeline for war. The only delay in starting hostilities was that required by logistics to move our forces into position, and not one moment longer. He claimed Iraqi forces were massed to move into Saudi Arabia, but that was a lie. We heard about Iraqi atrocities, but the most prominent ones presented were fabrications made up by a US P.R. firm. Not to mention the fact that the very people who were calling loudest for war had, merely a few months earlier, touted Saddam's Iraq as a great place to do business.

In short, protestors of the '91 war thought Saddam was bad but controllable, and they didn't trust the motives and actions of the Bush Administration, a situation the protestors of the recent invasion can probably sympathize with.

[StandWatie]

29. I was a protestor

for all those reasons, but I changed my mind later on. Even if he just set up a puppet government (like we did in Panama right before that) it's still wrong and if someone would jump on us the same way everyone piled on Saddam for it that would be the end of nation-state wars.

[JasonBerry]

45. Is there any country more guilty of this than the United States?

Over the last 200+ years, is ANY country more guilty of this than the USA? The British empire, maybe? No.....not even close. The United States would have been invaded hundreds of times (if there were a superior power to risk it) if violating sovereignty and annexation were cause for invasion.

[DealsGapRider]

49. Blame America First!

Does the fact that we have ugly chapters in our history mean that we should give dictators the green light to invade their neighbors? Does the fact that we have done unwholesome things in our past mean that we should not try to be a force for good in the world today?

I swear to God...every Democrat I know, myself included, gets furious when they hear feeble-minded stooges like Sean Hannity call liberals the Blame America First crowd a la San Francisco 1984. But then every time I log on to DU, I see this kind of bullshit. Oh well, when this kind of anti-American crap alienates swing voters, at least you won't have to wonder why!

[Cocoa]

51. we arguably DID give Saddam the green light to invade Kuwait

and we DID support Saddam in his aggression against Iran.

It's not blaming America, it's evaluating America's justifications in the light of what we know about America.

[StandWatie]

52. ok, that's annoying

Like I said, hypocrisy doesn't make for a bad war alone, but it is odious and worth commenting on and without criticism it will never be fixed.

[JasonBerry]

54. The Truth Hurts, huh?

It is NOT "anti-American" to point out the imperialist nature of U.S. foreign policy.

Are you on the right board? We value dissent at DU, my friend. Nobody here appreciates being called, "Anti-American." I know I certainly don't and I'll patiently wait for an apology from you.

[DealsGapRider]

57. Sorry.

No apology.

"Over the last 200+ years, is ANY country more guilty of this than the USA?"

Yes, the Soviet Union. And many, if not most, of the ugliest chapters in our history -- the stuff that no doubt offends you do deeply -- took place in direct response to the actions of the Soviet Union. Sometimes we had to choose between vicious dictators who were pro-Soviet and vicious dictators who were pro-US. It's sad we had to make such choices, but this is the real world.

[JasonBerry]

62. NO APOLOGY?

You think you can come here to DU and call someone "Anti-American" for suggesting that the United States has committed countless acts of aggression?

It is clear from your original post you are young. But one thing you should learn sooner, rather than later: don't come here and call someone who has fought a lifetime for democratic ideals, "Anti-American."

I am sorry that acts of aggression committed by the United States do not offend you!
To me, that says a lot about you - NOT me.

[DealsGapRider]

64. I recognize the ugly chapters in our history.

And I don't think all those who share this recognition are anti-American.

But there is a difference between regretfully acknowledging these chapters in our history and gleefully pointing them out at every opportunity. I see a lot of the latter on DU and not much of the former. There seems to be a great willingness to curry-comb the earth looking for examples of American evil or ascribing some malevolent motive to every foreign policy decision America has made in the last 200 years. Every time some unfortunate episode occurs somewhere around the globe, there are always plenty of posters eager to jump in and assign blame for the most obscure phenomena on something the United States has done. It makes me ill.

[el_gato]

68. you brought this subject up

and now your whining because people don't see it your way.

[DealsGapRider]

72. This may come as a surprise to many...

...but you can have an adultlike discussion about American foreign policy without reflexively producing a list of all the pernicious acitons the American government has engaged in over the last 100 years.

Yes, I brought this subject up (wish I hadn't), but I did not mean to invite an avalanche of crap along the lines of we-created-saddam-it's-our-fault-he's-a-monster-US-sanctions-killed-500,000-Iraqi-children-everything-bad-that-happens-in-the-world-is-the-fault-of-the-US-why-don't-we-all-just-slit-our-wrists-and-do-humanity-a-favor.

:puke:

[el_gato]

77. your hyperventilating

seems to me everyone here is talking about what led up to GWI
and nothing else.

If you don't like the truth go turn on the tv.

[JasonBerry]

69. Well, Considering...

Considering that you will only hear dissenting viewpoints on U.S. foreign policy in media outside of the mainstream (like DU), some of us feel it is IMPORTANT to point out these facts of U.S. history here -- otherwise it isn't talked about!

Keep in mind, you posted the original post asking what the arguments were for opposing Gulf War I. Remember? Some of us answer honestly and are accused of "anti-American crap"!! (YOUR WORDS). You are perfectly welcome to your opinion - but you are NOT welcome to call opinions that are progressive in nature, "Anti-American" --- NOT AT DU.

[DealsGapRider]

75. There is nothing progressive...

...about a worldview that says that the US is the sole repository of evil.

[JasonBerry]

78. Did I Say That???

YOU are the one claiming that because some of us stand up and speak the truth where it isn't heard elsewhere, that we are saying the United States is the "sole repository of evil." I haven't, nor has anyone else said that! This entire thread has proved you did not post your "question" with intellectual honesty and curiosity your message claimed. It was FLAME BAIT - plain and simple. My last post here in this thread.

[el_gato]

79. no one has said that

NOt one single person here has espoused "a worldview that says that the US is the sole repository of evil" and you have failed in your efforts to force us to see things your way. This failure is why you are resorting to straw man arugements at this point.

You asked why anyone would be opposed to GWI and you don't like the
answer. If you didn't want an honest answer then why did you ask?

[DealsGapRider]

83. Okay.

"go stick your head back in the sand and pretend we're the good guys." - Treepig

Sorry, that sounds pretty anti-American to me.

"You asked why anyone would be opposed to GWI and you don't like the
answer. If you didn't want an honest answer then why did you ask?"

I guarantee you that the majority of the Democrats who voted against the first Gulf War didn't subscribe to all the views posted in this thread about how the CIA is responsible for Saddam's rise and that sort of nonsense. I am sure they had principled objections and I was interested to learn what they were. Instead I got a bunch of bile about how the situation was all the fault of the US and how we were responsible for failing to stop it, it was a product of the US propaganda machine, etc. Bile.

I'm sorry I asked the question, really. It was not flame bait, swear to God.

[salin]

86. You lump together many things as "bile"

as if each thing is as 'illegitimate' of a protestation as the other.

I do think that the over reliance on propoganda in order to garner public support for military action - suggests that the administration at the time knew that on the merits alone, the public would not be willing to spend the dollars and risk american lives to support the war. Thus I believe it is a legitimate issue to raise.

The fact that we were providing weapons, and were aware of the use of chemical weapons in a war (in which it is documented that we provided arms to both sides), is worth noting - as it raises questions about the stated rhetoric used at the time against Sadam.

Note all of these things happened under two extremely related US administrations. Administrations that also had a nasty little habit, in relation to an overly hyper reaction to the cold war (and honestly believing that the very economically starved Nicaragua and El Salvador if it were to fall to rebels were a serious threat to US security.), of providing arms and financing to regimes that were as repressive of Sadam's and some that exhibited aggression against neighbors by harboring rebels that were trying to topple that neighboring country's government (thus - acts of "aggression" against another country).

This is not saying everything that is evil in the world fall into the US's lap as being responsible. It is to say that during a period of 12 years we had some pretty chaotic and conflicting foreign policy actions relating to regimes that were ostensibly as brutal as Sadam Hussein, and as such why there was some real skepticism to the sudden declared need for war as a response to the Invasion of Kuwait in absense of consistent actions elsewhere.

Can you dispute these things? Why, if they are true, is it spewing bile? I had real problems with the policies under Reagan (who I felt was worse than Bush1,) does that make me a bile-spewing anti american? Than if so - what the hell is the use of free speech if we are all supposed to interpret things and say things in the same exact way?

[treepig]

99. ok, you've now lost all credibility

you promised to put me on IGNORE before i posted that statement, so how did you ever find it?

:freak:

[Cocoa]

82. you said you wanted to hear the reasons for the opposition

You're getting some good answers, why don't you think about them?

[salin]

87. because, clearly none are true... they are all lumped together as bile.

:shrug:

[Cocoa]

10. I protested that war

I didn't even realize that there was significant resistance in Congres to it, I'm pretty surprised that Gep led the opposition, which I read for the first time in that article you posted.

I don't think there's consensus that the first Gulf War was justified, even in hindsight.

But at that time, there was no history of UN sanctions, and I saw it in the same light as the Panama invasion, where we were suddenly going after a thug that we'd been propping up for a long time.

And leading up to the war, I was convinced that Bush was derailing any attempt to settle it peacefully, I was convinced that what he wanted was the war itself.

I think there's a much greater legal basis for the current action, though still way too inadequate, with the UN sanctions, and the Iraq Liberation Act passed under Clinton. The first Gulf War was pure power politics.

[el_gato]

15. me too!

[blm]

11. After the first war, data came out that revealed how much WMDs Poppy

had arranged for Saddam to receive throughout the 80s and up till the invasion of Kuwait, much of it against the will of Congress who stopped aid to Iraq years before. Look into Iraqgate. Look into Henry Gonzalez' congressional speeches laying the case out night after night.

That's why so many Dems and Clinton were so certain that the chemical and bioweapons were there. In fact, the second war had MORE justification based on what came out of Iraqgate and the UN resolutions that said Saddam must be disarmed of those weapons or the UN would enforce the disarming themselves.

[el_gato]

14. Henry Gonzalez

http://fas.org/spp/starwars/congress/1992/h920224g.htm

THE CASE OF IRAQ AND THE EXPORT-IMPORT BANK
Henry B. Gonzalez, (TX-20)
(House of Representatives - February 24, 1992)

[bpilgrim]

20. Gulf War Crimes - warning *GRAPHIC*

WAR CRIMES

A Report on United States War Crimes Against Iraq to the Commission of Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal

by Ramsey Clark and Others





Incinerated body of an Iraqi soldier on the "Highway of Death," a name the press has given to the road from Mutlaa, Kuwait, to Basra, Iraq. U.S. planes immobilized the convoy by disabling vehicles at its front and rear, then bombing and straffing the resulting traffic jam for hours. More than 2,000 vehicles and tens of thousands of charred and dismembered bodies littered the sixty miles of highway. The clear rapid incineration of the human being suggests the use of napalm, phosphorus, or other incindiary bombs. These are anti-personnel weapons outlawed under the 1977 Geneva Protocols. This massive attack occurred after Saddam Hussein announced a complete troop withdrawl from Kuwait in compliance with UN Resolution 660. Such a massacre of withdrawing Iraqi soldiers violates the Geneva Convention of 1949, common article 3, which outlaws the killing of soldiers who "are out of combat." There are, in addition, strong indications that many of those killed were Palestinian and Kuwaiti civilians trying to escape the impending seige of Kuwait City and the return of Kuwaiti armed forces. No attempt was made by U.S. military command to distinguish between military personnel and civilians on the "highway of death." The whole intent of international law with regard to war is to prevent just this sort of indescriminate and excessive use of force.
(Photo Credit: © 1991 Kenneth Jarecke / Contact Press Images)

"It has never happened in history that a nation that has won a war has been held accountable for atrocities committed in preparing for and waging that war. We intend to make this one different. What took place was the use of technological material to destroy a defenseless country. From 125,000 to 300,000 people were killed... We recognize our role in history is to bring the transgressors to justice." Ramsey Clark

Ramsey Clark served as U.S. Attorney General in the administration of Lyndon Johnson. He is the convener of the Commission of Inquiry and a human rights lawyer of world-wide respect. This report was given in New York, May 11, 1991.

more...
http://www.deoxy.org/wc/wc-index.htm

listen...
http://www.deoxy.org/audio/bushgulf.ram
(real player required)

Peace

[DealsGapRider]

26. Anything with Ramsey Clark's name on it is, by definition, bullshit.

The man is a couple sandwiches short of a picnic. This is the guy who tirelessly defended Slobodan Milosevic.

"What took place was the use of technological material to destroy a defenseless country."

Excuse me? That country, which had initiated war with Iran and then brutally invaded Kuwait, could hardly be called "defenseless." What a joke of a statement. And a joke of a man.

[el_gato]

27. you've been had

your looking at this through a vacuum.

the war with iran was fomented by western defense contractors
and the "brutality" claim of the Kuwait invasion is of questionable
merit.

http://www.guerrillanews.com/war_on_terrorism/doc2332.html
I think one of the interesting things we discovered doing our research is that the scandal that surrounded the Hill & Knowlton campaign that sold the first Gulf War to the people of the U.S. involving phony testimony before a phony Congressional hearing by a 15 year-old girl who claimed that Iraqi soldiers were murdering babies in hospitals in occupied Kuwait by throwing them out of incubators, now we see in a new light. That was a bizarre story that came to light a year after the U.S. drove Iraq out of Kuwait. We reported on that in our first book, "Toxic Sludge is Good for You." John MacArthur of Harper's, the CBC show The Fifth Estate and ABC News all did excellent reporting, unfortunately a year after the fact, revealing that this testimony, which helped precipitate the first U.S. decision to go to war against Iraq, was the creation of the Hill & Knowlton PR firm, and the American people were duped into thinking that Saddam was a baby killer.

[DealsGapRider]

31. I don't know about the baby story...

But I think the fact that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was brutal is a fairly indisputable historical fact. Hundreds were killed. Thousands were subjected to torture and rape by Saddam's army and intelligence apparatus. It was an invasion, for Christ's sake. Whoever heard of a gentle invasion?

If your hostility to American foreign policy has so blinded you that it prevents you from acknowledging evil when it's right in front of your face, you've got serious problems.

[Cocoa]

32. surely you've seen this photo

[DealsGapRider]

37. So what?

Republicans are evil. We already knew that. Does that mean we should give Saddam free reign to rape, pillage and murder just because a previous Repug administration was cozy with him?

[Cocoa]

44. it means the humanitarian argument is bogus

the war with Iran was much more brutal, including the use of chemical weapons which we knew about, and we supported that war.

And what's with "previous administration"? Did Bush Sr. represent a radical break from Reagan?

[el_gato]

34. ooohhh

when all else fails GET INFLAMMATORY!

The fact that I point out the high levels of propaganda surrounding the justification for GWI means I'm blind. Hmmmm.....okay.

Pardon me I thought we were having a serious discussion. My bad.
:eyes:

[treepig]

36. you've fallen hook line and sinker for the demonization of saddam

campaign.

the following article is reproduced in it's entirety because it's

"Not copyrotten (nor spell-checked, apparently). Reproduction and redistribution encouraged."

But What About Saddam?
======================
FAV Note:
The following text comes from Peace Porridge #30.
For more information about Peace Porridge, look at the end of the page.

**********************

I've been to Iraq three times in the past four years. Each time I go
someone asks me whether I met Saddam. The first question the editor of
my local newspaper asked me was, "Did you ever meet a dictator you
didn't like?" That was the high point. The interview went downhill from
there.

I can't figure it out. I go to Nicaragua every year; but no one has
ever asked me if I met Enrique Bolanos; or if I met Jean Chritien when
I went to Canada, or Vicente Fox when I visited Mexico. Perhaps, when
the US government and its propaganda machine demonize a head of state,
people confuse the head of state with the country and its population.

I try to avoid talking about Saddam. My work in Iraq with Veterans for
Peace is rebuilding water treatment plants which were deliberately
destroyed through war and sanctions.

Saddam is irrelevant. He isn't drinking polluted water because of
sanctions, but millions of Iraqis are. Saddam's children aren't dying
from water-borne diseases, but hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children
have died of water-borne diseases because of sanctions. Iraqi children
will continue to die needlessly until the sanctions are lifted and the
12 year old state of war is ended. Saddam is the excuse for continuing
the slaughter.

I've been told that if I don't talk about Saddam, no one will listen to
me. I've also been told that if I don't repeat the litany, "Saddam is a
brutal dictator who gassed his own people," I will have no credibility.

Whether I'm talking to a pro-war hawk, or an anti-sanctions activist,
it's the same litany, "Saddam is a brutal dictator who gassed his own
people." Something is wrong. If everybody agrees, why repeat it?
Strange. This litany would seem to obscure some important truth.

Below, I will debunk some common myths relating to Saddam Hussein; and
then suggest an hypothesis concerning the hidden truth behind the
demonization of Saddam.

----------------

MYTH: By gassing civilians at Halabja, Saddam placed himself on the
level of Hitler and a few other genocidal maniacs.

FACT: It's almost never stated that this happened during the war with
Iran, and that both sides used poison gas (although Iraq did so first).
It's also rarely stated that much of the raw materials and technical
knowledge to produce these weapons came from the US, which at the time,
raised no protest to the gassing of civilians at Halabja.

Most major participants in World War I used poison gas. After WWI,
Britain gassed the Afghans, France the Moroccans, Italy the Ethiopians,
and so it went among the "civilized" Western powers. During WWII Japan
attempted to spread anthrax and plague among the Chinese, a feat the US
also attempted in North Korea some years later.

The US has a long history of using biochemical weapons. As early as the
18th century, European immigrants deliberately spread smallpox among
the indigenous peoples of North America. The US sprayed Vietnam
copiously with dioxin containing agent orange, poisoning the land, the
people, the food and water supply, and its own soldiers. The US is now
using a toxic fumigant in its war against Columbia, again poisoning the
land, the people, and the food and water supply. In each case, the
victims are mostly civilians.


MYTH: No other country would use biochemical weapons on its own people,
like Saddam did.

FACT: The US has also used biochemical agents against its own people.
During the early decades of the cold war, the US Army routinely used
unsuspecting US citizens as human guinea pigs to test nuclear and
biochemical weapons. On many occasions, the US Army released the toxic
heavy metal compound, zinc cadmium sulfate, which causes birth defects
and developmental retardation, in US and Canadian cities, sometimes in
close proximity to schools. This heinous and unpunished crime took
place at a time of (relative) peace.


MYTH: If Saddam stopped building palaces, he could provide for his
people. Sanctions have nothing to do with the excessive childhood
mortality in Iraq.

FACT: During the 1980's Saddam built an educational and health care
system in Iraq that was the envy of the Arab world. Childhood mortality
in Iraq fell by an astounding 38% in a decade. By 1990, Iraq was well
on its way to achieving a level of education and health care comparable
to the industrialized world.

This changed dramatically with the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the
ensuing sanctions. UNICEF has blamed sanctions for an excess of 500,000
child deaths over an 8 year period.

Iraq gets no cash through the oil for foods program, so virtually all
cash, including the palace-building fund, comes through the black
market trade, which is estimated at less than $1 billion per year. Even
if the black market trade is as much as $8 billion, it would provide
each Iraqi with only $1 per day. Try providing for your child on $1 a
day.


MYTH: Saddam is a threat to global peace.

FACT: What global peace? The world has been at war for most, if not
all, of my 60 years.

Interestingly, in a recent UK Mirror poll, 75% identified Saddam
Hussein as a threat to world peace, second only to the ubiquitous Osama
bin Laden, whereas George W. Bush finished third at 51%. After Israel,
Britain is the staunchest ally of the US, yet over half of the British
people think that Bush is a threat to world peace, and 22% identify him
as the greatest threat to world peace. What would the results be in a
worldwide poll?


MYTH: We must invade Iraq now. If Saddam gets weapons of mass
destruction (WMDs), he'll use them or give them to terrorists.

FACT: There is only one nation that has irrevocably demonstrated to the
world its willingness to use nuclear weapons, and it's not Iraq.
Further, the US routinely threatens to use nuclear weapons, even
against non-nuclear states. Saddam's use of biochemical weapons pales
in comparison.

The US demonstrated in the 1980's its desire to not only arm terrorist
groups, but to create them, specifically the Afghan Mujaheddin and the
Nicaraguan Contras. The US continues to train Latin American terrorists
at the School of the Americas and continues to arm terrorist death
squads in Columbia and Guatemala. No connection between Saddam and
Al-Qaeda or any other armed group has ever been substantiated.

Israel is a thermo-nuclear power and one of the world's most
aggressive, expansionist countries. Few in the US propose disarming
Israel or even cutting off the over $3 billion of aid the US has given
Israel every year since 1967. India and Pakistan were within a hair's
breadth of nuking each other. Few propose disarming India and Pakistan.
With the breakdown to Russian society, Russia is by far the world's
most likely source of nuclear proliferation. Few propose taking
measures to secure Russia's nuclear arsenal.

With all these aggressive irresponsible nuclear powers about, why
invade Iraq because it might have stashed away a few biochemical
weapons or might acquire some nuclear weapons in the future?


MYTH: Iraq must be invaded because Saddam is in violation of UN
resolution 687, calling on him to destroy all WMDs and submit to UN
inspections.

FACT: UN inspections have in the pass been used for espionage. Iraq
would probably allow UN inspectors to return, if given assurances that
they would not be used again for espionage.

Other countries flout the UN with impunity. Israel is in violation of
dozens of UN resolutions. Israel, India and Pakistan are in violation
of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The US doesn't even pay its
dues to the UN.


MYTH: Saddam has twice attacked his neighbors. Unless disarmed now, he
will do so again.

FACT: Both attacks were with the apparent blessings of the US. The
Iran-Iraq war was a proxy war which Saddam fought with material and
intelligence from the US. With Iraqi troops amassed on the border of
Kuwait, US ambassador April Glaspie virtually invited invasion by
saying to Saddam, "But, we have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts,
like your border disagreement with Kuwait." If the US had unequivocally
opposed these acts of aggression, it is unlikely that either of them
would have occurred.

Meanwhile, it is conveniently ignored that Israel has attacked all its
neighbors: Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, and Egypt. It is
unlikely that these acts of aggression could continue if the US cut off
the over $3 billion it gives to Israel every year.


MYTH: Saddam must be taken out because he is a brutal dictator who
oppresses his own people.

FACT: The world is full of brutal dictators. The world is full of
oppressors and abusers of human rights. Many dictators such as
Pakistan's Pervez Musharraf are good friends of the US. Many of the
world's most heinous human rights abusers like Ariel Sharon are good
friends of the US.

The US could oppose dictators by supporting democracy. Yet the US
opposes Iran's Mohammad Khatami and Palestine's Yassir Arafat, both
democratically elected heads of state in a region with very little
democracy. The US could strike a fierce blow against human rights
abusers by supporting the International Criminal Court (ICC). The US
opposed the ICC.

-----------------

So, instead of repeating the litany, "Saddam is a brutal dictator who
gassed his own people," perhaps, we should ask why the United States is
so bent upon destroying Iraq? Clearly it has nothing to do with weapons
of mass destruction, threats to neighbors, dictatorships, human rights
violations, or any other reason put forward by the US.

Some answers I have heard are oil, revenge, and stupidity. All three
make some sense, but don't fit the facts completely.

Here is an hypothesis which does fits the facts. The US is bent on
destroying Iraq for the same reason it destroyed Nicaragua and has been
trying to destroy Cuba for 43 years. It cannot tolerate that a third
world country should follow an independent course and place the health
and education of its citizens before the profits of US based
multi-national corporations.

No other explanation I've heard fits the facts so well. Every third
world country that has placed the health and education of its citizens
before the profits of the multi-nationals has earned the enmity of the
US. It doesn't matter whether the country has oil. It doesn't matter
whether they have done anything aggressive toward the US. It doesn't
matter whether the US president is a clever Clinton or a bungling Bush.

Whenever possible the US has crushed these upstarts and dismantled
their health and education infrastructures. The Mossadegh government in
Iran, Sukarno in Indonesia, Allende in Chili, and the Sandinistas in
Nicaragua are some of the better known examples.

While Iraq was fighting a proxy war against Iran for the US, it was far
too valuable an ally to crush. But, that changed in 1990. Iraq was
enticed into Kuwait, and then crushed in the Persian Gulf War. Iraq's
health and education infrastructure were destroyed, but Saddam remained
in power. And this has continued through 12 years of murderous
sanctions.

Now sanctions are unraveling. Little by little the world is calling for
their end or quietly ignoring them. So the US now contemplates open war
and invasion.

But, again, Saddam is just an excuse. The real war is, and always has
been, against education and health care. The goal is to keep the
children poor, sick, and illiterate, the resources in the hands of the
multi-nationals, and to let Iraq serve as an example to any other
country that might contemplate pulling itself up from third world
status.

This, indeed, is the important truth hidden by the demonization of
Saddam Hussein.

-Tom Sager

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Peace Porridge is published occasionally and sent out as blind copies.
To subscribe, email [e-mail] with subject, INCLUDE ME.

I welcome comments on these mailings. Where appropriate, I respond as
time permits. I hope you find Peace Porridge a nourishing alternative
to the glut of junk news which we are constantly fed by government and
corporate controlled media.

Not copyrotten. Reproduction and redistribution encouraged.

[DealsGapRider]

38. So, you think Saddam was a good guy?

[treepig]

40. and do you enjoy living in a simplistic black and white world?

clearly, there were abuses under saddam, for example here is the actual report from amnesty international ( http://web.amnesty.org/report2003/irq-summary-eng )

The death penalty continued to be applied extensively. Scores of people, including possible prisoners of conscience, were executed during the year. The victims included suspected members or sympathizers of political and religious opposition groups, and army officers suspected of having contacts with the opposition abroad. In many cases it was impossible to determine whether the executions were judicial or extrajudicial, given the secrecy surrounding them.

In March, five people were executed in the General Security Directorate in Baghdad, reportedly for murdering a Ba'ath Party official and a policeman in the village of al-Wahabi near al-Kufa. Hussain al-Sayyid Hammadi al-Buhadma, Kamil al-Sayyid Muhsin 'Abbas al-Buhadma, Hamza 'Uwayd Jouida 'Idan, Qassem al-Sayyid Jaber Hamza and 'Inad al-Sayyid 'Abbas Hamza had been arrested in December 2001. Their families were reportedly denied proper funeral ceremonies. It was not known if the five had been tried.
Three army officers, including Mohammad Abdallah Shahin and Mohammad Najib, were reportedly executed in Mosul in March for their alleged criticism of the Iraqi President.
In July, five people from Basra were executed in Abu Ghraib Prison. Fadhel Mrawwadh 'Inaya al-Hamdani, Salah Jabr al-Hamdani, Falah Jabr al-Hamdani, Jassem Ahmad al-Hamdani and 'Ali Jawwad al-Haydari had been arrested at the end of 2001 and were reportedly accused of membership of illegal Shi'a Muslim opposition groups.

ok, compare the scores of people (less than 200 i presume, or else the more alarmist term 'hundreds' would probably have been used) executed by saddam with the hundreds of thousands that were killed by the u.s. sanctions, or the tens of thousands killed by u.s. troops. which is worse?

or, compare the scores of people executed by saddam with mr. bush's record in texas (admittedly, the reasons for the executions were much different).

furthermore, there are about 1,000,000 christians in iraq - when we provide democracy to iraq i don't envy their fate one bit.

[DealsGapRider]

42. This moral equivalence makes me ill.

I know that's a Freeper term, but you're so far out there that I almost feel conservative.

Suggesting that Saddam is only responsible for killing scores or perhaps hundreds of people during his reign is pure fantasy. You dishonor the tens of thousands of innocent people who have died at his hand. You're obviously determined to ignore all evil that doesn't emanare from America's shores, so I won't bother debating you.

I'm embarrassed you're on DU. Hitting ignore now.

[treepig]

43. i pay taxes in the united states

and am therefore directly responsible for the evils committed by this country - hence my greater concern with u.s. atrocities than those committed entirely by foreigners.

are you able to provide evidence to debunk:

1. the cia was instrumental in saddam's rise to power?

2. the u.s.-supported iraq-iran war killed some 1,000,000 iraqis?

3. coalition troops during gulf war I killed some 200,000 (or more) iraqis?

4. bush I/clinton's sanctions killed 500,000 iraqi children; furthermore these sanctions deliberately targeted the civilian population, not saddam?

5. the current attack has probably killed upwards of 30,000 iraqis?

ok, go stick your head back in the sand and pretend we're the good guys. i say we get out of iraq ASAP, the people have suffered enough at our hands.

[salin]

67. It isn't a question of whether or not he was a brutal dictator

it is a question of what we do about brutal dictators as a matter of course. There is brutal suppression in China. There are several blood baths ongoing along with great suppression in Africa. There is the brutal regime in North Korea. There is the repression of women and lack of human rights in our the countries of our allies Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Are we supposed to invade and liberate each one?

The question of the invasion of Kuwait was a tricky one. I believed that perhaps the expelling of Iraq was legitimate going in and trying to topple Saddam at the expense of huge casualties, while we turned a blind eye to ethnic cleansing in Croatia, and while we bailed on the slaughters by War Lords in Somalia gave the Iraq action in light of other inaction a coloring that looked like our goals were not as noble as they were stated to be. In the wake of the Iran-Contra scandals, and the hand that the then current Administration had played in the very deceptive actions (selling arms simultaneously to Iran and to Iraq; arming the Contras while supporting the terrorist regime in El Salvador) made the whole endeavor appear to be more about strengthening position in KuWait and Saudi Arabia, than it did about liberating people from Saddam. And in the end we didn't do that (the humanitarian reason for going in).

Being skeptical given the context and the absense of action on other fronts is about being skeptical of a particular administration and their motivations and the wisdom of their actions is very different than being "anti american". Funny how those who make that charge were so very critical of Clinton's actions in bombing the Afghanistan camp, taking action in Bosnia and Kosovo as well as the ongoing bombings in Southern Iraq. I, for one, was supportive of Bosnia and Kosovo, had concerns about the bombings in Southern Iraq and didn't know enough about the circumstances in Afghanistan to take a stand. I was also deeply troubled at our lack of action in Rwanda. None of this is moral relativism - it is a different lens, perhaps, of what is a "just war", and a deep held belief (instilled in me by family members that are vets) that war is a very serious response - that it should always be a last response, that its threat may sometimes be needed but in threatening it the seriousness of the endeavor (for those killed it is a final solution) there must be solemnity and respect (not Yee Haw go bombem) for those that are likely to lose their life, property and means of living as a result of the war - and in wieghing those likely losses recognizing that the situation is so grave that there is no other response.

Given that the weapons inspectors who were disarming weapons in Iraq were on the ground in Iraq - and that the international community was behind the inspectors - including threatening force in absense of compliance with the inspections or in the face of demonstration defiance of the sanctions - the unilateral war - started long before the inspections would be complete - in no way matched the high bar of last resort. The reaction of the public and our administration in particular that seemed to have a cheerleading gleeful tone, as opposed to solemnity in face of any other response, belied their view of war (more as a game than horrific, though sometimes necessary, reality).

[el_gato]

50. the biggest weasel response of the day

I knew it was coming "You Saddam Lover!"
That is the most pathetic method of debate possible.
So if we point out the bullshit surrounding GWI
we're saddam supporters.

HOW FUCKING PATHETIC and it doesn't change the facts.
GWI was trumped up just like this more recent war.
But I knew you'd have a brain hemorrhage and start
screaming freeper trash.

[DealsGapRider]

60. It's a legitimate question to ask.

Look at one of the points that person posted:

"During the 1980's Saddam built an educational and health care
system in Iraq that was the envy of the Arab world. Childhood mortality in Iraq fell by an astounding 38% in a decade. By 1990, Iraq was well on its way to achieving a level of education and health care comparable to the industrialized world."

Did you catch that? This post is suggesting that Saddam was some benevolent leader who was improving the lives of his citizens before the evil US came along and fucked everything up. It's pure rubbish. The man is a monster and if someone can't bring himself to acknowledge that -- or can't acknowledge it without making some gratuitous comment about concomitant US evil -- than the question deserves to be asked.

[el_gato]

66. disprove the statement then

I think the Saddam as a bloody monster hell bent on destroying the world meme is a littel overblown. He was nothing more than another CIA supported two bit dictator just like Noriega, except that he was sitting on top of a shitload of high quality crude.

The fact is Iraq was becoming more prosperous as a whole prior to GWI and I think that was the point of this persons post.

I'm not defending saddam but the UN sanctions are responsible for massive amounts of suffering by the iraqi people, espcially children.
So I guess that means the UN is a monster too.

The main point to keep in mind is that he would never even have been
in power was it not for covert support of his coup by western corporate interests.

I simply prefer rational cool-headed discussion to
your SADDAM LOVER SADDAM LOVER garbage.

[DealsGapRider]

80. ?

"The fact is Iraq was becoming more prosperous as a whole prior to GWI"

This is arrant nonsense. The war with Iran exhausted the Iraqi economy and took a MASSIVE toll on the country's infrastructure, to say nothing of the loss of life. That was the whole reason Iraq invaded Kuwait...because Kuwait helped bankroll the war with Iran and when they called in their loans, Saddam could not afford to repay them.

I also reject on principle the notion that the US is responsible for the deaths of those Iraqi children under the sanctions. Those sanctions were legitimate responses to Saddam's failure to cooperate with UN mandates. Also, Saddam spent lavishly on his palaces and other amenities during the 1990s. If he had wanted to invest in his country's healthcare, he could have done so. Those deaths are the fault of Saddam, not the UN and not the US.

And anyway, if you oppose UN sanctions to prevent rogue states from developing WMD and obviously oppose armed force, what other option does the international community have to get dictators to disarm? Or would you be perfectly happy to let them build chem/bio weapons with impunity, so long as we don't disrupt municipal water supplies?

[treepig]

101. yeah, punish the children for the sins of saddam - very moral indeed!

The devastation of the Gulf War and the sanctions that preceded and sustained such devastation changed all that. Often forgotten is the fact that sanctions were imposed before the war-in August of 1990-in direct response to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. After the liberation of Kuwait, sanctions were maintained, their focus shifted to disarmament. In 1991, a few months after the end of the war, the U.N. secretary general's envoy reported that Iraq was facing a crisis in the areas of food, water, sanitation, and health, as well as elsewhere in its entire infrastructure, and predicted an "imminent catastrophe, which could include epidemics and famine, if massive life-supporting needs are not rapidly met." U.S. intelligence assessments took the same view. A Defense Department evaluation noted that "Degraded medical conditions in Iraq are primarily attributable to the breakdown of public services (water purification and distribution, preventive medicine, water disposal, health-care services, electricity, and transportation). . . . Hospital care is degraded by lack of running water and electricity."

According to Pentagon officials, that was the intention. In a June 23, 1991, Washington Post article, Pentagon officials stated that Iraq's electrical grid had been targeted by bombing strikes in order to undermine the civilian economy. "People say, 'You didn't recognize that it was going to have an effect on water or sewage,'" said one planning officer at the Pentagon. "Well, what were we trying to do with sanctions-help out the Iraqi people? No. What we were doing with the attacks on infrastructure was to accelerate the effect of the sanctions."

http://www.harpers.org/online/cool_war/cool_war.php3?pg=2

[Cocoa]

102. "Saddam spent lavishly on his palaces"

omfg are you trying to hit ALL the talking points?

I absolutely LOVE it when Bremer and company bring this up. They are shocked, SHOCKED at people living in obscene luxury while many others are living in squalid ethnic ghettos. What kind of sick society would allow such a thing?

[charlie]

71. AMERICA does not do ANYTHING

but rotten people in power can commit acts in America's good name. Do you consider strong criticism of Dubya and crew slurs against America?

BTW, it's true that in the mid 80s Iraq had a prosperous burgeoning middle class and was a model example of Arab secular governance, whether you like it or not. Compared to western societies, Iraq was repressive and austere, but it was head and shoulders above other ME states. In the latter years before the 90's, obesity was a major problem amongst its youth. Acknowledging reality is not cheerleading Saddam, he is and always will be a miserable fuck. But discounting the truth because you deem it somehow anti-American or lionizing Saddam is bordering on mental illness.

[bicentennial_baby]

30. The Highway of Death was no joke

Warning: graphic photos in link

http://digitaljournalist.org/issue0212/pt_index.html

[JasonBerry]

47. THIS is what Ramsey Clark called War Crimes

AND HE WAS RIGHT......
The infamous, "Highway of Death."

[Character Assassin]

46. What an utter farce. The 'Highway of Death' was completely justified

First of all, there is no legal protection for retreating troops. They are not classified as non-combatants just because they are retreating and not reurning fire. Second, announcing compliance with a UN Resolution is meaningless: they did not formally surrender and remained legitimate military targets.

My opinion from some of the post-war analysis is that, in fact, we didn't kill enough of them, especially Republican Guard. These Iraqi soldiers people feel so sorry for had been raping and robbing the Kuwait people for 6 months at the time.

They were withdrawing, but it was a fighting withdrawal. They didn't sit there and take the attacks peacefully, they were fighting back. Also, they were taking the spoils of war with them: tanks, armored cars, trucks, autos, fire trucks, etc... The UN Resolution stipulated that they were to leave everything behind, which if you look at the pictures of the highway, they clearly were not doing.

I have no sympathy for those Iraqi's that were doing their best to pillage more from Kuwait on their withdrawal. The pictures from the highway shows tanks and APCs, it also shows Mercedes, Rolls Royces, and the like.

The bet. They lost. Tough luck.

[Rich Hunt]

55. funny...

That's funny, because I've talked to a number of Gulf War vets who *don't* feel that way about the "Highway of Death". Many of them were scarred by the experience.

[treepig]

56. huh???

you say They didn't sit there and take the attacks peacefully

WTF!!!

they shouldn't have fought back when attacked?


Killing of hundreds of fleeing soldiers
"We met the enemy," recalled 1st Lt. Greg Downey, describing an encounter on February 25, the second day of the ground war. "They were a sad sight with absolutely no fight left in them." Referring to the fact their leadership had stranded them, he added, "The hate I had for any Iraqi dissipated."

After the cease-fire was declared, the retreating Iraqis had been assured safe passage. Many had thrown away their weapons. Tanks were loaded on trucks with their cannons aimed to the rear. "Some of the tanks were in travel formation, and their guns were not in any engaged position," said Sgt. Stuart Hirstein of the 124th Military Intelligence Battalion.

On March 2, deep inside Iraq, a five-mile-long retreating column of Iraqis approached the causeway across Lake Hammar, near the Rumaila oil field west of Basra. They ran into the U.S. forces McCaffrey had deployed right across the line of retreat. McCaffrey ordered a devastating attack. The U.S. military forces sealed off the causeway with Apache attack helicopters and artillery fire, pinned the Iraqi column on the road, and pounded them for five hours with wave after wave of bomb, tank, artillery, and missile attacks.

http://www.themilitant.com/2000/6424/642461.html

and were the u.s. troops really in danger?

Operation Desert Storm was intended to be a one-sided slaughter. "We didn't go up there looking for a fair fight with these people," says McCaffrey. The "new American way of war," he says, is to pulverize the enemy with overwhelming force at the cost of the fewest possible casualties. When McCaffrey was a company commander in Vietnam, GIs fought the enemy from 20 yards away with rifles and grenades. Now the goal is to annihilate the enemy before it can get off a shot. Superior technology and training made this possible in Desert Storm. The war, remarked one British commander, was "rather like a grouse shoot."

Time after time, U.S. tanks spotted Iraqi tanks through their thermal-imaging sights before the Iraqis even knew the Americans were close. The lethal range of the main gun of an American M1A1 tank exceeds that of the gun on the Iraqis' Soviet-made T-72s by almost a mile. At the Battle of 73 Easting on the second day of the gulf war, nine American tanks killed 28 Iraqi tanks in 23 minutes —in a driving sandstorm. Not a single American tank was scratched. In the battle of Medina Ridge, six American Apache helicopters destroyed 38 tanks. Since the Apaches were three miles away in darkness and rain when they fired their Hellfire rockets, the Iraqis literally did not know what hit them. Even when the Army went "over the top" into the Iraqi trenches, the slaughter was wholesale. An armored bulldozer buried alive the Iraqi defenders, unless they came out with their hands up. Terrified, Iraqi soldiers tore off all their clothes to prove they were harmless.

Such carnage was acceptable as long as it wasn't on TV. It wasn't until video cameras recorded American warplanes shooting up Iraqi cars and busses fleeing Kuwait on the so-called Highway of Death that President Bush decided to call an end to the massacre. A decade later, McCaffrey says he welcomes a public debate over the nature and goals of war. He worries that the American people —and even younger Army officers —have forgotten about the hard slogging of ground combat in Vietnam, and that they have an unreal view of modern warfare. "Do we understand that when we use military force decisively, we are actually killing people and breaking up their equipment? Do we understand that? Do you understand that when you actually apply power, you don't want a fair fight?" McCaffrey showed no signs of repentance or even disquiet. The lopsided nature of the Battle of Rumaylah, he told NEWSWEEK, made it "one of the happiest days of my life."

http://www.cannabisnews.com/news/5/thread5805.shtml

[Character Assassin]

59. No, you've missed the point....

you say They didn't sit there and take the attacks peacefully

WTF!!!

they shouldn't have fought back when attacked?

Of course they had the right to fight back when attacked. That's not the point. They were not under some special protection by the UN or any other body when they were attacked. They were still legitimate combatants, and combatants in the act of mass looting at that.

These weren't choir boys.

[salin]

81. Hey CA

as a libertarian I would have guessed that you would have been against the foreign intervention in 1991. Are you debating about strategy given that we were there - or were you in favor of Desert Storm?

while your assessment may be correct (am not so well read up on the Geneva Convention or other accepted international law), I do not believe that mass slaughter was appropriate. Especially with alternatives of capture (isn't that what one does with surrender). If one is fired upon - most certainly one should fire back (that is if these "retreating soldiers" were firing, they should be fired upon), but various accounts suggest that this was not the case of all who were slaughtered.

To me it is more indicative of one of the devastating effects of those sent to wage war. In order to kill in battle, often one must dehumanize the enemy. It is hard to turn that on and off. Then after being fired at earlier, it is hard (and understandably so) to have trigger fingers and expect an ambush scenario and to thus then start acting "preemptively". Having had numerous vietnam era vet acquaintances and friends - the horrors of war - both what physically happened to them and psychologically what stayed with many for many years (both in terms of what they witnessed, and in terms of what they found themselves doing) haunted them for decades after.

[Character Assassin]

94. It's a rather ambiguous situation.

as a libertarian I would have guessed that you would have been against the foreign intervention in 1991. Are you debating about strategy given that we were there - or were you in favor of Desert Storm?

I am debating the strategy. The intervention itself can be looked at both ways. Non-iniation of force dictates not reacting. However, seeking to further promulgate liberty for other peoples dictates intervention.

while your assessment may be correct (am not so well read up on the Geneva Convention or other accepted international law), I do not believe that mass slaughter was appropriate. Especially with alternatives of capture (isn't that what one does with surrender).

Without knowing more specifics about the forces available to the Allied Forces in the vicinity to do so, I can't really comment on that possibility.

If one is fired upon - most certainly one should fire back (that is if these "retreating soldiers" were firing, they should be fired upon), but various accounts suggest that this was not the case of all who were slaughtered.

Not all, certainly, but taking fire from indistinct targets in a convoy of 6,000+ people and heavy equipment makes that differentiation quite difficult.

To me it is more indicative of one of the devastating effects of those sent to wage war. In order to kill in battle, often one must dehumanize the enemy. It is hard to turn that on and off. Then after being fired at earlier, it is hard (and understandably so) to have trigger fingers and expect an ambush scenario and to thus then start acting "preemptively". Having had numerous vietnam era vet acquaintances and friends - the horrors of war - both what physically happened to them and psychologically what stayed with many for many years (both in terms of what they witnessed, and in terms of what they found themselves doing) haunted them for decades after.

Seeing combat can indeed leave lifelong, traumatic memories.

[salin]

96. while we do have a bit of a different world view

again I think we are more in agreement than disagreement. Especially on acknowledgement of where more info is needed.

Who says those with differing views can't have civil discussion... I think some folks around here should take note.

[Cocoa]

61. what was the military objective of that slaughter?

they were going back to Iraq, didn't we want that?

Did we slaughter them as punishment for their raping and pillaging? Are we sure all of them were guilty, were there any trials? Are we punishing our soldiers now who are raping and pillaging right now in Iraq, are they being incinerated for their crimes?

Did we recover any of those stolen vehicles and return them to their rightful owners? According to the photos I've seen not a lot of those luxury cars looked particularly drivable.

[DealsGapRider]

85. EXCUSE ME???

"Are we punishing our soldiers now who are raping and pillaging right now in Iraq, are they being incinerated for their crimes?"

What a wretched post. Are you suggesting that our soldiers are running around raping Iraqi women and stealing for their own gain? I haven't heard a single story along these lines. And even if it did happen in isolated cases, it's despicable to compare the US military to the Iraqi occupiers of Kuwait, who raped and pillaged at will.

Disgusting.

[salin]

88. hold 0n - I read this differently

I didn't see any accusation against US soldiers. Was asking (in response to your statements of the Iraqi soldiers raping and pillaging in Kuwait) if the massacre was in response to the IRaqi soldiers 'raping and pillaging' and if massacre as opposed to arrest, trials etc. was an appropriate punishment - if the point of the massacre was punishment for said raping and pillaging.

[DealsGapRider]

89. I don't think this could get much clearer...

"Are we punishing our soldiers now who are raping and pillaging right now in Iraq, are they being incinerated for their crimes?"


Sorry, but there's only one implication to draw from that statement -- that US soldiers serving in Iraq are engaging in rape and theft. And I say that's an outrageous claim. Do you agree?

[salin]

92. never mind

Caught the gist of the legal vs massacre argument. I missed the switch from Iraqi soldiers to US soldiers.

I have to agree that was over the top. No evidence present.

Sorry for the confusion and my initial post - which was erased because it made no sense.

[treepig]

93. don't know about rape, but plenty of examples of theft

have been reported, here's the first one that popped up:

American troops allegedly committed theft and vandalism at Baghdad International Airport, causing millions of dollars worth of damages.

Time magazine cites US officials, Iraqi Airways staff and other airport workers in its story of US troops stealing duty-free items, needlessly shooting up the airport, and trashing five serviceable Boeing airplanes.

"I don't want to detract from all the great work that's going into getting the airport running again," said Lieutenant John Welsh, the army civil-affairs officer in charge of bringing the airport back into operation. "But you've got to ask if this could have been avoided; did we shoot ourselves in the foot here?"

What was then called Saddam International Airport fell to soldiers of the 3rd Infantry Division on April 3. Time quotes airport workers as saying that for the next two weeks, soldiers stationed in the airport's main terminal helped themselves to items in the duty-free shop including alcohol, cassettes, perfume, cigarettes and expensive watches.

http://www.rediff.com/us/2003/jul/07iraq1.htm

i can post dozens more if you wish

[salin]

95. theft is very different

than rape. There has been some unfortunate behavior - including those awful photos developed in Britain from a returning UK soldier that suggest torture. But I believe actions are being taken in that case. I hope that in other cases of criminal behavior corrective, legal action is taken.

But I do not assume that there is massive "raping" and the like going on.

[Cocoa]

97. In fact I have heard stories of stealing

a reporter for the AP or Reuters witnessed a U.S. soldier taking cash from an Iraqi he had stopped at a checkpoint. A bunch of other Iraqis started complaining loudly and he gave it back. The military itself confirmed stories like this.

And it's a fact of ANY occupation that the occupiers will abuse the occupied. It comes from human nature and the total power imbalance of the situation, and from reports I've been reading this particular occupation is worse than usual, the military is unusually unconcerned about what the troops are doing to the Iraqis.

An example is that the military is not keeping strict track of Iraqis killed and wounded in raids, as is customary. This indifference suggests to me that there is no accountability, and that spells bad news for the Iraqis.

[tinnypriv]

22. Easy - diplomatic options were on the table*

Next question.





* If you think Saddam's invasion of Kuwait justified resorting immediately to force (rejecting diplomatic options), I'd be interested in knowing if you would have supported bombing of the United States (which also invaded a country on a laughable pretext - Panama).

[StandWatie]

25. I would support a violent response

I don't really think there was any way out as far as negotiating with Saddam really, any concessions granted would further dilute the intent of international law as these things weren't his to bargain with in the first place, he had to withdraw. Same in Panama.

[tinnypriv]

35. I would argue that the immediate sanctions and diplomatic options worked

Insofar as they were applied.

In fact, they were required to be followed until the security council deemed them "proven to be inadequate". That didn't happen - the US immediately moved to the area of force even when clear evidence of ther effectiveness was becoming apparent (article 41, chpt 7 of the UN charter).

Of course Saddam was entitled to no "concessions" (since he was engaged in aggression), but the "linkage" issues mentioned by his government were actually legitimate and should have been addressed regardless.

Whether a vague non-committal statement supporting addressing those issues (I/P, WMD etc) while simultaneously demanding prior withdrawl would have worked, nobody knows.

Since no argument of following "the letter of the law" could be made (bearing in mind the "proven to be inadequate" point), I think those diplomatic options should have been followed until they were honestly rejected by the UN-SC.

After that, force would have been justified. Before that, it wasn't.

[denverbill]

23. Opposition to GW I was minimal, at best.

Whereas 40% of more opposed GW II, only around 10% opposed GW I.

I think much of the opposition must have been due to the fact that there was a lot of fear that we'd have many, many casualties. In wars up to GW I, an entrenched army fighting in a narrow border would take a force double it's size (at least) to attack successfully, and usually resulted in many thousands of casualties. For all we knew, we might have 10,000 dead evicting Saddam from Kuwait. Saddam, at the time, had a battle-hardened army which was the 4th largest in the world. We sent over 250,000 men to attack an army of 1,000,000 or more.

I supported GW I, mostly. The UN's primary purpose should be to safeguard territorial integrity, so that Germany can't invade France, China can't invade India, and the US can't invade Mexico. We were justified in kicking Saddam out.

The thing I didn't support was reinstalling the Emir of Kuwait and his family. Personally, during the buildup to the war, I kept thinking Saddam should go to the UN and say "OK, I'm putting it up to a vote of the Kuwaiti people. They can vote for becoming part of Iraq, vote to go back under the Emir, or vote to become a democracy."

[Yupster]

63. More than half the Democrats in the House

voted against GW I. How do you call than minimal opposition? The Democrats were the majority party in the House at the time.

[denverbill]

74. Well, I admit, that's more than I remembered.

My memory may be faulty, but I sure as heck don't recall more than a very few scattered protests, whereas public opinion was pretty solid behind Bush.

Poor Geb. I think his OPPOSITION to GW I was based in part on his intention to run for President against GHWB in 1992. The success and popularity of GW I pretty much knocked him out of the race in 1992. Now, he intends to run again in 2004, and his SUPPORT of the war is what is hurting him this time around.

[Cocoa]

84. I remember it that way too

I was in College at the time, so a little isolated from the outside world, but I remember the impression of overwhelming public support. The protests I went to were feeble compared to the ones this time, and they were pretty much ignored.

I also remember Paul Wellstone's opposition, and the sense that he was considered kind of a radical.

[Yupster]

98. Here are the numbers

Aug 2, 1990 Iraq invades and overruns Kuwait

Jan 12 1991 House votes 250-183 to authorize force to remove Iraq
from Kuwait.

Senate votes 52-47 to authorize force to remove Iraq
from Kuwait.

Jan 17 1991 Operation Desert Storm begins, the first day of a month long air offensive.

[Brian Sweat]

39. Yes,

If instead of telling Hussein that we didn't care if he invaded Kuwait, we had told him that we were going to kick his ass, there is a good chance he might not have invaded. That is the basis for my after the fact opposition. I support the war at the time, but I did not have all of the facts.

[Yupster]

90. There's no doubt

There was a serious foreign policy blunder in not making clear to Saddam that his invasion would be fought.

But again, that was over and done with. The question then was what should be done about it?

[salin]

100. Back then

I was more in the sanctions group. Looking back that ended up being pretty ugly medicine. Still not sure which was better/worse and which had worse consequences for Iraqis and for the US. Still torn over the war as a response, in the face of absense of action in other horrendous situations around the world. Was most certainly against the most recent war - primarily for the dangerous peril it puts the US in the future - in terms of forcing geopolitical power realignments in response to a perceived abuse of SuperPower, and concerns of other countries that the US could pull the same kind of inevitable war on them. I predict that in the long run - this action (and the continued foreign policy of attempted destabilization of multiple regions of the world) will hurt US interests in both the short and long term.

[Yupster]

53. Some people are pacifists - it's their honest opinion

That's a reasonable point of view of many people.

[Yupster]

58. I think it's clear

that there was a diplomatic blunder made by our Ambassador there. Whether that can be blamed on her or the president to me doesn't have anything to do with your question.

The question is once Saddam conquered Kuwait, why would someone not want to kick him out. I don't think it really matters which mistakes got us to that point. The point is we were at that point. So now what?

The arguments at the time was that we should allow sanctions on Iraq to be given time to work, and eventually those sanctions would wrench Saddam out of Kuwait. That was the prevailing Democratic argument that was used in the congressional debate. It was a rush to war. Allow sanctions to work. Most Democratic congressmen bought that view and voted against the war. I belieev Colin Powell also agreed with the samctions instead of war policy.

I think today, most would agree that it was a poor argument. Sanctions would not have worked ever. Saddam was more than happy to sit in Iraq, with or without Kuwait and outlast any sanctions the world put on him.

Certainly if someone would vote against Gulf War I and for Gulf War II, I would scratch my head as I see much more justification for Gulf War I than II.

[el_gato]

73. those were not "mistakes" Yupster

you say: "I don't think it really matters which mistakes got us to that point."

Those weren't mistakes. They were calculated moves.

[Yupster]

91. Can't find my tinfoil hat, so

until I find it, I'll not believe that Bush wanted Saddam to invade Kuwait just so he could turn around and kick him out.

[el_gato]

103. do some research

I would suggest you take a closer look at this whole issue.

http://fas.org/spp/starwars/congress/1992/

no tinfoil needed and that is a pathetic attempt to
avoid actual research in the facts by labeling it tinfoil

[ulysses]

70. How did Desert Storm

involve "defending our country"?

[JasonBerry]

76. Having read through this entire thread

It is clear to me this was posted as FLAME BAIT. Period.