Hi!
        When I sent the "Dangers of the Tongue" series, I was hoping that I would remain incognito by removing my middle and last names.  Jabou's detective work however exposed me. I had unsubscribed from the list and subsequently resubscribed to be a silent observer due to my inability to actively partake in discussions on the list because of health reasons. I have read piece upon piece regarding the Iraq-USA conflict and itched to throw in my butut. Now that I have surfaced, I'll throw in my take, answer any issues around it should there be any, before probably unsubscribing and subsequently resubscribing to remain a silent observer. 

Before giving my take on the issue, I'd like to give a background of the Gulf Crisis. Since this is not an academic paper, I shall not strictly follow the rules of reference. I have gathered the information from readings both in the past (most of the sources I have forgotten) and the present. The reason for giving a background is that reading the various opinions on the conflict, I can see that many a person has been fed right-wing propaganda and / or CNN, BBC "objective" yet not neutral news stories that have been cleverly and deliberately tailored to hide US duplicity and machinations. Ignoring the distant history of the region and the role played by the West in the creation of the conflict that has claimed so many lives, let us fast-forward to the Iran-Iraq crisis. The Iranian revolution of the seventies is a result of the violation of Iranian sovereignty by the US in the fifties and for the next quarter of a century through the restoration and support of Shah Pahlavi and other measures. During this period, the US sold over 20 billion Dollars worth of arms to Iran. When the Iranian Revolution occurred, the US offered the Shah a visa and this angered the Iranian revolutionaries so much that they occupied the US embassy and took its officials hostage. The Reagan-Bush Sr. campaign struck a deal with the Iranians to delay the release of the hostages until after the elections to give them an edge as the hostage situation was a big issue. The Iranians were rewarded   with a lot of arms through Israel. With such successes pocketed, Ayatollah Khomeini set his sights on liberating the holy cities of Karbala in Iraq and Mecca in Saudi Arabia. Iraq was the only country that had the armed forces and the population to resist such overtures and the royal families of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia provided the cash and the US the weapons for twenty four billion Dollars. Note the US switching of sides. 

The war kept on and Iran was the first to attack civilian targets by using Scud missiles. Iraq responded some three years later by attacking Teheran with Scud-B missiles. Due to a re-organisation of its armed forces from "static defence" to high-tech offensive strategy, Iraq gained the upper hand and the Iranians accepted a cease-fire. Iraq had successfully fended off Iran by 1988 but at a cost of hundreds of thousands of lives. At that point in time, Iraq's military capabilities were roughly equal to Israel's. Israel has had as a premise of its strategic planning, the notion that no single Arab state or no combination of Arab states should be  militarily stronger than it is. The US has repeatedly pledged to support it in this endeavour and this pledge is  known as the Nixon Doctrine. When it was reported in 1988 that Iraq was developing and advancing its missile capabilities, Israel became jittery and a war of words ensued culminating in threats and counter-threats that lasted for about two years. Israel and the US had were faced with a problem. Here was Iraq, an Arab state that refused to be cowed by Israel, standing as an impediment to Israeli hegemony over the Arab states. Iraq had to be disarmed but the problem was how this was going to happen. The US hatched a plot. The State Department levelled charges that Iraq had used poison gas against the Kurds even though studies carried out could not determine who was responsible for the massacre at Halabjah. Iran had also used chemical weapons during the war and some studies have concluded that it was probably the Iranians who were responsible for the Halabjah massacre. The immediate task at hand was the demonisation  of Saddam Hussein. With the might of the Western media, this allegation was made to stick. 

The dilemma for the US in this whole debacle was that Israel and Iraq were at a state of war for over forty years and could attack each other at will but the US was at war with neither. The US could not attack Iraq at will and an Israeli-Iraq war would have probably brought about another Israeli-Arab war and the US would have entered the war on Israel's side. A pretext to disarm Iraq was urgently needed and was provided through the Kuwaiti incursions into Iraqi territory and the pumping of oil from the Rumailia oil field coupled with the fact that Kuwait, together with the United Arab Emirates was exceeding OPEC oil quotas and driving the price of oil down. Just coming out of a war, this situation was untenable and as King Hassan of Morocco put it, "Kuwait was trying to stifle Iraq..." (Le Monde, August 16, 1990). With US assurances, Kuwait continued the provocations resulting in Iraqi incursion into the disputed territories and the invasion of Kuwait. The US pounced. It should be noted that while the US was encouraging Kuwait to continue with the provocations, it was also assuring Iraq that should it decide to take action, the US would not intervene but would hope that the situation would be quickly resolved. See the US duplicity? Anyway, when Iraq invaded Kuwait, the Bush Sr. administration froze the situation and did all it could to stifle peaceful resolution of the crisis be it through the UN or the Arab League. The US provided fake satellite photos to Saudi Arabia alleging Iraqi troop movement towards its borders signalling Iraqi intention to invade the kingdom. The Saudis fell for this and allowed the deployment of US troops to the kingdom. Saddam was given the ultimatum of complete withdrawal or military confrontation and he was foolish enough to choose the latter to the absolute delight of the Israelis who were as is reported, identifying targets for the US Air Force. Thus began the Gulf War and the rest is history. Iraq was defeated but the US stopped short of marching on Baghdad. Thus began over a decade of sanctions, confrontation and tribulation between Iraq, the US and the UN. George Bush Jr. became the US president under dubious circumstances and September 11th. occurred. Then came Afghanistan and Bush's pledge to deal with the "Axis of Evil" whatever that means and bang! we  are faced with the spectre of another war in Iraq.

After giving a background of the Gulf Crisis, I shall endeavour to expose the hypocrites, the bullies, the puppets and the wimps in this whole mess. Before going further, I must state that I am no supporter of Saddam Hussein. The hypocrisy of the West in this issue is however so glaring that one can't help but be angered. The basic premise for the current campaign is the supposed Iraqi possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and the need to rid the world of it. What is funny about this whole thing is that those clamouring at the top of their voices sit on the world's largest arsenals of WMDs. Isn't this the epitome of  hypocrisy? The US sits on the world's largest nuclear and other poisonous arsenals and tries to tell the rest of the world that Iraq does not have  the right to possess such. The US, which is the only country in the world to have used a nuclear bomb on another country based on racist calculations, trying to moralise? Britain, sitting on such arsenals, also trying to moralise? Both countries, fully aware of Israeli nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and Israeli refusal to let anyone inspect its plants, imposing their will to do Israel's dirty job on the rest of the world. Isn't this hypocrisy staggering?

Another glaring example of hypocrisy is the insistence that Iraq abide by UN resolutions. How many UN resolutions has Israel thrown into the toilet? Why is the US clamouring for Iraq to obey and respect UN resolutions whilst actively helping Israel to disobey and disrespect UN resolutions? When Israel violates UN sanctions and the rest of the international community, not even trying to ensure enforcement action against it, but simply trying to condemn its actions, the US vetoes it. Is this respect for UN resolutions? How many UN resolutions has the US itself violated? Talk about the pot calling the kettle black! The UN prohibits attacking nuclear facilities because of the attendant dangers yet both the US and Israel have attacked nuclear facilities in Iraq in clear contravention of UN resolutions. The US, which doesn't even bother to pay its dues to the UN but still maintains the privilege of being a member of the Security Council with veto rights preaching respect for the organisation it so disrespects.

 Saddam Hussein's violation of Iraqi human rights has become the latest war cry. Wasn't Saddam doing the same thing when he was receiving twenty-four billion Dollars worth of weapons from the US? Isn't Israel violating Palestinian human rights on a daily basis? Aren't the Kuwaiti, Saudi, Egyptian, Syrian etc. regimes dictatorships violating human rights on a daily basis? Isn't the US violating the human rights of the prisoners it is illegally keeping in Cuba? Isn't the US violating the civil rights of thousands through the PATRIOT Act? How many people have been kept incommunicado without access to legal representation and without being charged? How many people are currently being kept in British jails under the guise of anti-terrorism without being charged? Aren't these clear violations of civil liberties and human rights? Why is the US collaborating with dictatorships such as Pakistan and Egypt and sending prisoners to such countries to be tortured to extract information about al-Qaeda? Isn't the US supposed to be the guardian of democracy and human rights? Such blatant hypocrisy! Why the sudden concern about the human rights of the Iraqi people?

                                                                                                                            Buharry.
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