U.S. Sold Saddam Weapons?

[True-Lies]

Does anyone have any credible links that link the U.S. to selling Saddam chemical weapons in the 80's? I've been hearing a lot lately about that, but I've not seen any links to support the claims made. And if someone does provide a credible link, let me beat the proverbially dead horse here (see bottom of page) and ask why do you think we have not heard more about this?

[NEMESiSZ]

No no no, this is just as baseless as the selling UBL weapons in the afghan war. Yes, the US supported the afghans against the soviets, but even if the US wanted to fund foreign al qaeda fighters, they'd have no way to contact them..likewise, Iraq had been at war with Iran, at the time, Iran had been involved in a bitter standoff with the US just years before...which would you have supported?

Nevertheless, the amount of aid given to Iraq is insignificant compared to that given to Iraq by France and Russia, including a nuclear reactor (which was destroyed in 1991).

[Jimsween]

The only proof your going to get is a bunch of vauge links saying things like, Congress gave US companies "Things" that let them sell "stuff" of which could have been agents used to create chemical weapons. But no, nothing about the US selling Iraq chemical weapons.

[True-Lies]

Ah, I see... looks like I'm going to have to bite the bullet then, and admit I was wrong by implying that weapons were sold to Iraq.

But let me get this straight for one moment, the U.S. had NEVER sold Iraq ANY dangerous weapons during the 80's?

[NEMESiSZ]

Most urban war legends can be cleared up on snopes.com, for future reference.

[True-Lies]

At 2/5/04 01:39 AM, NEMESiSZ wrote: Most urban war legends can be cleared up on snopes.com, for future reference.

And is it a liberal or conservative website? I'm not either, but I like to know which slant my sites are leaning toward :)

[NEMESiSZ]

It's neither, it's a site for verification/dismissal of urban legends, and it has a lot of political/war themed entries.

[TimScheff]

Well there's this citing evidence from the US Senate:
http://www.sundayherald.com/27572

This, citing reports and invesitagations conducted PRIOR to the first Gulf War:
http://www.counterpunch.org/boles1010.html

And this, citing US Commerce Dept. records:
http://www.indybay.org/news/2002/03/119547_comment.php

Of note is that the last article really does focus on the fact that it was US COMPANIES who sold the weapons and chemicals. While this would seem to take the blame off of the US government, keep in mind that most of the sales, because they involved elements that are or could be weapons, all sales were regulated and apporved, thus the reason the commerce department had the records.

Anthrax for Export

They didn't sell them weapons, they sold them the ingredients to make chemical and biological weapons. Which is why there are U.S. Soldiers suing U.S. corporations for affecting them with the Gulf War Syndrome.

However...

The obscure Atlanta branch of Italy's largest bank, Banca Nazionale del Lavoro, relying partially on U.S. taxpayer-guaranteed loans, funneled $ 5 billion to Iraq from 1985 to 1989. Some government-backed loans were supposed to be for agricultural purposes, but were used to facilitate the purchase of stronger stuff than wheat. Federal Reserve and Agriculture department memos warned of suspected abuses by Iraq, which apparently took advantage of the loans to free up funds for munitions. U.S. taxpayers have been left holding the bag for what looks like $ 2 billion in defaulted loans to Iraq.

[EvilGovernmentAgents]

It's one thing to have common sense. It's another to be omniscent.

Was the giving of weapons to Iraq anymore justified than giving them to the Soviets in World War 2? Was it anymore justified than arming the Afghanis against the Soviets, only to be fighting them twenty years later as the Taliban? Was it anymore justified than the Soviets giving weapons to the Iranians? AMERICANS trained and helped Vietnamese rebels in IndoChina during World War 2, and were fighting them twenty years later.

The thing is, despite all the pictures and publicity bullshitting about leaders warmly shaking hands and calling each other ''Comrades'', countries only have interests. No friends, no personal connections, no ''firm'' and ''unshakable'' and ''unbetrayable'' alliances. Time flies, people change, opinions are turned upside down, leaders come and go.

[TimScheff]

And most of those situations are all a result of a world focused first on warring and secondly on peace. We have a difficult job to lead the world away form a military mindset, with the biggest army we're the best to try and create peace through prosperity and freedom instead of threat and opression.

At 2/5/04 03:40 PM, EvilGovernmentAgent wrote: Was the giving of weapons to Iraq anymore justified than giving them to the Soviets in World War 2?

This might be a little different though.

The exports continued to at least November 28, 1989, despite evidence that Iraq was engaging in chemical and biological warfare against Iranians and Kurds since as early as 1984.

[EvilGovernmentAgents]

At 2/5/04 06:22 PM, punk_hippy wrote: The exports continued to at least November 28, 1989, despite evidence that Iraq was engaging in chemical and biological warfare against Iranians and Kurds since as early as 1984.

And the exports continued to Russia as well, despite the fact that the Soviets had a leader that killed millions, enslaved millions, threatened the governments of the West, and generally was not a very nice person. Is Saddam really any better than Stalin when it came to the value for human life? The U.S. had interests in the Middle East. It's either a friendly bloodthirsty dictator opposed to one who's not friendly. Either that, or invasion. Guess which one looks the best?

I'm not saying that giving weapons to Iraq was justified in any shape, form, or size. It seemed like a good idea at the time, it definitely did. But what can I say? Times and people change.

[EvilGovernmentAgents]

At 2/5/04 04:20 PM, TimScheff wrote: And most of those situations are all a result of a world focused first on warring and secondly on peace. We have a difficult job to lead the world away form a military mindset, with the biggest army we're the best to try and create peace through prosperity and freedom instead of threat and opression.

You say that the US has the largest army, and then say that the US should bring peace to a world with mindset on war?

How is THAT going to work? Bring peace and prosperity through threat and opression?

[Ellov]

Listen: There is No way in hell we sold Saddam Weapons. Some USMC or UN group would find out if we did, but bush isn't such a dumb ass like clinton to let something like that happen

[TimScheff]

At 2/5/04 08:00 PM, EvilGovernmentAgent wrote:

You say that the US has the largest army, and then say that the US should bring peace to a world with mindset on war?

How is THAT going to work? Bring peace and prosperity through threat and opression?

When you have a large army a plea for peace means something if you start to follow it up. Army can be used for good, commiting troops to peace keeping in lines with international efforts in response to a request for help. Thats much different than finding an area and deciding on helping our way.

The history of most of the examples from others above, are ones where we chose to use violent means to cause change. Iran is a paramount example. Britain, and later with US participation, had extremely disfavorable contracts for all of Irans oil. When a new democratic government formed after a revolution and did an audit it found Britain and the US had not been paying Iran all of the moneis owed under the contract. When Britian refused to pay what it owed, Iran broke the contract and nationalized the oil fields. In response the CIA assassinated (here the violent means) the democraticly elected leader and installed the Shah, who used opression to assure the US and UK oil contracts continued. Eventually the people rightly revolted this time with Theocratic leaders rather than the democratic government and the government was very predisposed against the US for the past. Now we had an enemy who found a Soviet ally, and we then prop up another dictator who wiped out his democratic government to fight the Theocrats. Then with the Theocrats at least partially beat back, we need war with the dictator to reinstall democracy and now need to keep threatening the Theocrats as the crawl slowly towards democracy.

If our policy was to encourage prosperity, rather than our own profit, and democracy which would lead to peace, we would have two large democracies in the area rather than facing cultures who have known opression and war for the past 1/4 century.

Our military is a relic or a symptom of this old system. It should be used sparingly to support global purposes and scaled back comparably with other nations to limit the existence of standing armies.

[Synesthesia]

At 2/5/04 08:47 PM, Ellov wrote: Listen: There is No way in hell we sold Saddam Weapons. Some USMC or UN group would find out if we did, but bush isn't such a dumb ass like clinton to let something like that happen

It happened before this Bush was president and the last Bush.
Back during the cold war.

[EvilGovernmentAgents]

At 2/6/04 01:15 AM, TimScheff wrote: When you have a large army a plea for peace means something if you start to follow it up. Army can be used for good, commiting troops to peace keeping in lines with international efforts in response to a request for help. Thats much different than finding an area and deciding on helping our way.

That's not a army. That's a peacekeeping force. Armies are meant for wars, and are trained as such. M1A1 Abram tanks aren't a nice sight to be seeing crashing through the road of your nice peaceful village. Besides, there might not be a need for them now, but disarming yourself just because you think that there isn't a threat now can end up bleeding the ass of your country, a couple of generations later. If the US is going to do what you say, bye bye marines, bye bye armored core, bye bye attack pilots, bye bye specialists, hello nice cuddly looking civilian!

The history of most of the examples from others above, are ones where we chose to use violent means to cause change. Iran is a paramount example. Britain, and later with US participation, had extremely disfavorable contracts for all of Irans oil. When a new democratic government formed after a revolution and did an audit it found Britain and the US had not been paying Iran all of the moneis owed under the contract. When Britian refused to pay what it owed, Iran broke the contract and nationalized the oil fields. In response the CIA assassinated (here the violent means) the democraticly elected leader and installed the Shah, who used opression to assure the US and UK oil contracts continued. Eventually the people rightly revolted this time with Theocratic leaders rather than the democratic government and the government was very predisposed against the US for the past. Now we had an enemy who found a Soviet ally, and we then prop up another dictator who wiped out his democratic government to fight the Theocrats. Then with the Theocrats at least partially beat back, we need war with the dictator to reinstall democracy and now need to keep threatening the Theocrats as the crawl slowly towards democracy.

''We?''

We made the decisions back then, with the same president, same congress and same leaders? The presidents did what they thought was cleaning up their predecessor's mess, and twenty years later, ''we'' get bit in the ass. Not everyone can see what's going to happen twenty years later.

If our policy was to encourage prosperity, rather than our own profit, and democracy which would lead to peace, we would have two large democracies in the area rather than facing cultures who have known opression and war for the past 1/4 century.

Unfortunately, the US wasn't the only one interested in the Middle East. Were the Soviets actually interested in mutual prosperity in the area? Were the Europeans? When leaders get elected, they have a ''responsibility'' to their people, which means that they have to make it so everyone is happily driving in BMWs, guzzling gallons of gas at the rate of a cent, ect ect. The truly sad thing is the only way people have gotten into the presidency is to gain the support of big name coporations. When they get to be president, they have some big responsibilities to fill to said coporation.

It's a stupid system. But the only way anything nowadays seems to change is only through war. If you want the US to become a nice peaceful nation, it's only going to be through conflict.

Our military is a relic or a symptom of this old system. It should be used sparingly to support global purposes and scaled back comparably with other nations to limit the existence of standing armies.

Do you know anything of militaries?

The vast majority of armies are simply standing forces meant to replace any front line troops. They're not very well trained for combat, and are reservists. The real strength of a army lies in armor corps and the airforce. Plenty of countries have powerful breakthrough division armies of their own. If the world was to scale back on militaries, all it would be would be sending reservists home, and less money to mantain tanks and aircraft.

[bumcheekcity]

At 2/6/04 05:03 PM, EvilGovernmentAgent wrote: That's not a army. That's a peacekeeping force.

To the people on the other end of their guns, it's an army.

[EvilGovernmentAgents]

At 2/6/04 05:47 PM, bumcheekcity wrote: To the people on the other end of their guns, it's an army.

Which is why armies are inherently bad choices to be peacekeepers.

[Reverend-Kyle]

At 2/6/04 05:59 PM, Juster wrote: The U.S. Never sold him crap. He was a killer back then also so that means I do not think they would sell him Chemical or Biological weapons. Heh think what he could have done then if he had such weapons.

Do you honestly believe that? It really doesn't matter what you believe; that doesn't change what happened.

He did have such weapons, and he used them on the Kurds-- which was blamed on Iran.