US media, government scramble to obscure criminal dealings with Hussein

[Karmadillo]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/dec2003/huss-d24.shtml

<edit>

In March 1984, Iraq’s battlefield use of chemical weapons became so obvious that the US government felt obliged to issue a statement condemning it. The statement denouncing the chemical weapons use contains the following extraordinary passage: “The United States strongly condemns the prohibited use of chemical weapons wherever it occurs.... the United States finds the present Iranian regime’s intransigent refusal to deviate from its avowed objective of eliminating the legitimate government of neighboring Iraq to be inconsistent with the accepted norms of behavior among nations and the moral and religious basis which it claims.”

Apparently, the US has since overcome its moral qualms with “eliminating the legitimate government” of Iraq.

Iraq reacted strongly against the statement, despite repeated American attempts to assure the government in Baghdad that the statement was issued solely for purposes of public consumption and did not indicate a change in US commitments to improve relations with Iraq. Rumsfeld was hurriedly sent back to Baghdad (in March of 1983) to deliver this message. At that time, Secretary of State George Shultz told Rumsfeld to assure his hosts that “our interests in (1) preventing an Iranian victory and (2) continuing to improve bilateral relations with Iraq, at a pace of Iraq’s choosing, remain undiminished,” despite Iraq’s illegal use of chemical weapons.

The US continued to minimize the issue of Iraqi chemical weapons use throughout the conflict. When, in 1988, the northern Kurdish town of Halabja was gassed and the Iraqi regime widely blamed, the US government moved to provide cover for Iraq. A State Department document notes that, in dealing with Congressional proposals to formally condemn the use of chemical weapons, “we should oppose legislation that uses inaccurate terms like genocide, and should try to keep the maximum amount of flexibility for the Administration in handling the issue.”

more...

[NewJeffCT]

1. rewriting history

It must be good to have a job in the field of re-writing history if you're in the Bush administration... a lot of job security.

[jbfam4]

2. Jeff

You made my day........ROFL....lol

[NewJeffCT]

5. well, remember

The white house website originally had "end to combat operations" in Iraq that was later changed to "end of major combat operations"...

The Mission Accomplished explanation was changed several times and still is a load of horse manure...

I'm sure somebody a lot more informed than me can come up with pages of stuff.

[LunaC]

3. Propaganda Alert: Iraq did NOT gas the Kurds....

"Both Iran and Iraq used chemical weapons against each other during their war. At the termination of the Iran-Iraq war, professors
Stephen Pelletiere and Leif Rosenberger, and Lt Colonel Douglas Johnson of the US Army War College (USAWC) undertook a study of
the use of chemical weapons by Iran and Iraq in order to better understand battlefield chemical warfare. They concluded that it was
Iran and not Iraq that killed the Kurds."

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=22569589

[bpilgrim]

4. NATIONAL ARCHIVE lays a LOT out... ---------------------- LINK

18 December 2003
For more information: 202/994-7000
Thomas Blanton/Malcolm Byrne

Saddam a "presentable young man" with "engaging smile,"
Let's "do business," said British Embassy in 1969.

Rumsfeld met Saddam in 1984 with instructions to improve relations,
Despite chemical weapons use and sanctuary for terrorists.

U.S. construction giant Bechtel planned to evade 1988 CW sanctions,
Now has biggest AID contract for reconstructing Iraq.

New declassified documents reveal secret U.S.-British-Iraq history;
Saddam Hussein Sourcebook published by National Security Archive.

Washington D.C., 18 December 2003 - Newly declassified documents posted today on the Web by the National Security Archive show the British Embassy in Baghdad recommending Saddam Hussein to London in 1969 as a "presentable young man" with an "engaging smile," "with whom, if only one could see more of him, it would be possible to do business."

more...
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/special/iraq/index.htm

Saddam Hussein: More Secret History
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB107/index.htm

they probably ain't got enough time though... busy with MJ and all...

peace

[Old and In the Way]

6. Nobody does moral relativism better than the war profiteers who

run our country today.

[RBHam]

7. cross-thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=955863