No hate. No violence Races? Only one Human race United We Stand, Divided We Fall Know Your enemy! -No time to waste. Act now! Tomorrow it will be too late You are what you know and what you do with what you know -¤- Freedom of Speech - Use it or lose it!

The Gulf War
and
Sanctions

SANCTIONS AS WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION

 

THE US-IRAQ CONFLICT, SUMMED UP "They know we own their country. We own their airspace... We dictate the way they live and talk. And that's what's great about America right now. It's a good thing, especially when there is a lot of oil out there we need." --Air force Brigadier General William Looney, head of the US Central Command's Airborne Expeditionary Force, which directs operations keeping Iraqi planes from flying south of the 32nd parallel. (Taken from an article by Kathy Kelly in the Spring 2000 Arab-American University Graduates, AAUG, Monitor).

• Iraq Surveys show 'Humanitarian Emergency' (UNICEF 08/12/1999)
• Picture Gallery of today's devastated Iraq, once an advanced nation (from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer).

The reason for American intervention, we were told, was first, to liberate Kuwait. Then it was to prevent Saddam from invading Saudi Arabia, then it was to save the world from another Hitler. Finally, it was to save the Gulf's oil resources. Bush here reveals his true desire during the Gulf War, and that is to destroy Iraq, period. No wonder he bi-passed congress on many occasions, lied to the American public, ordered the massacre of withdrawing Iraqi soldiers, twisted many arms around the world, bribed many world leaders, and completely blocked the diplomatic track, which would have, saved hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives. It seems that Saddam's invasion of Kuwait has provided Bush with the perfect pretext to destroy Iraq, then a distant-second military power to Israel. This will leave Israel as the soul regional superpower, which has, in comparison, committed an order-of-magnitude worse version of Iraq's sins: invade another country, manufacture weapons of mass destruction and violate more security council resolutions than any nation on earth.

In July 1989 (before the sanctions), 387 children under the age of five died in Iraq.
In July 1998 (after the sanctions), 6,495 children under the age of five died, a 16-fold increase from before the sanctions.

 

While many may argue that there is no justification for the Iraqi aggression against Kuwait (despite the many Kuwaiti provocations, such as border slant drilling into an Iraqi-shared oil pool, OPEC oil production agreements violation by Kuwait, Kuwait's demands of immediate loan repayment by Iraq which the latter owed the former following the Iran-Iraq war), the U.S. response to Iraq, by bombing it back to a pre-industrial age with the immense loss of life and the murderous sanctions that continued, amounting to a war crime, is way less justified in its barbaric and atrocious magnitude.

Many Iraqi soldiers and civilians (of 1-200,000 total) were killed by being buried alive or by incineration while fleeing. Many of the soldiers who were killed were not even in combat. During the Gulf War, the U.S. and allies dropped 88,000 tons of bombs (cluster, fragmentation bombs, napalm, fuel air explosives,.. all outlawed), in addition to other missiles and rockets, during 110,000 air raids. 93 percent of the bombs were free falling, while 7 percent were guided (surgical bombing), of which 30 percent missed their targets. Among the destruction were facilities essential to civilian life such as power plants, telephone exchanges, sewage and water treatment plants, whose only aim could be to destruction a nation and the will of its people.

 

 

American Public and Media

ON "SUPPORTING OUR TROOPS" "... what does it mean if somebody asks you, Do you support the people in Iowa? Can you say, Yes, I support them, or No, I don't support them? It's not even a question. It doesn't mean anything. That's the point. The point of public relations slogans like "Support our troops" is that they don't mean anything. They mean as much as whether you support the people in Iowa. Of course, there was an issue. The issue was, Do you support our policy? But you don't want people to think about that issue. That's the whole point of good propaganda." -- Noam Chomsky (Media Control)

click

14th of July Bridge, One of Many (e.g. Nasyriah, Jumhuriah, al- Ahrar) Destroyed by the U.S.

Most of the reporting that reached American audience and the west in general emanated from the Pentagon, hence severely lacking balance, as proven by the total blackout on the magnitude of the devastation and death on the Iraqi side. A quick statement of the number of dead (centered around 100,000 thousands soldiers and 15,000 civilians) sufficed for main-stream media audience. It is no wonder that this made-for-TV war started at 6:30pm EST on January 16, 1991, coinciding with National News. Alas, much of American audience today cannot distinguish between computer war games and real war, between news and entertainment.

The devastation of the Gulf War on the Iraqis took place while the American public, deprived from relevant facts and historical context and background, is reduced to the meaningless slogan-chanting: "We support our troops", as if it is the issue. The gullibility of the average American can be seen in the ease it required Sec. of Defense William Cohen in Feb 1998 to convince the public of the necessity to attack the already-crippled Iraq during the Feb 1998 campaign to bomb Iraq. All he had to do was travel around the nation carrying a five-pound sugar bag, the only gear needed for his theatrical performance of telling his audience of the horrible death this bag of sugar could cause had it been filled with Anthrax.

During each confrontation with Iraq our media never fails to show us the worried Israeli parent putting a mask on his daughter as though it is the Israelis, more so than Iraqis, are the ones to worry about their lives. Of course each time the Israeli government beam out to the world pictures of Israeli children trying their gas masks, American and German cash starts flowing into Israel

 

• Gulf War Stories the Media Loved -- Except They Aren't True (Extra Magazine, 1991)
• CBS's Dan Rather Caught Rehearsing a Bombing of Iraq with Pentagon correspondent David Martin before any bombing started by David Bauder (Associated Press 02/21/1998)
• Labour Dossier on Gas Threat is Misleading by Patrick Cockburn (Independent 11/13/1998) "There is a frightening paragraph about Iraq's nuclear programme. It says Iraq could build a crude air-delivered nuclear device 'in about five years'. But it adds that this would only happen if Iraq were 'to procure the necessary materials abroad'. By this standard Samoa and Iceland also pose a nuclear threat." -- Patrick Cockburn on the kind of information U.S. and British governments produce to mislead their people into supporting the bombardment of any weak country.
• How the Public Relations Industry Sold the Gulf War to the US -- The Mother of All Clients by John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton, part 1 (Blazing Tattles 06/1996).
• PBS Frontline Paints Distorted Picture of Gulf War. The War Against Iraq Continues by Rania Masri (03/1996)
• The Disturbing Media Eagerness for a Bloody Attack by Norman Solomon (Creators Syndicate 11/1998)
• Behind the News Coverage of Bombing and Bombast by Norman Solomon (Creators Syndicate 12/1998)
• The Imaginary Expulsions: Journalists rewrite history of Iraqi weapons inspections by Hussein Ibish (Extra! 03/2000)

Quick History

Being the colonizer of most of the region after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the early part of this century, Britain unilaterally decided to cut a chunk off of Iraq and make it a separate entity: Kuwait, suiting the needs of the then British Empire. This was part of a plan to make Kuwait (and other resourceful countries) a "client regime" for Britain/the West, with puppet leaders dependent on their master's military power for protection. This ensured that the country's resources will go to the masters' pocket, while making the Kuwaiti monarchy rich beyond dreams, all while trumpeting the west's sincere struggle to spread democracy, of course.

 

• The Gulf War Brought Out the Worst in Us by Robert Jensen (L.A. Times 05/22/2000). Demonizing one general diverts us from assessing responsibility for the slaughter.
• Our War Against Iraq: Causes & Cure by Most Rev. Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF Ret. (Institute for Space and Security Studies 01/16/1999)
• The Fire This Time: U.S. War Crimes in the Gulf Excerpts. by Ramsey Clark (1992). Excellent details of the history of the region up to the 1991 War, including U.S. and Britain's interventions. The obstruction of peace and diplomacy by the U.S. that would have averted the massive destruction of Iraq. Also includes setting-up of Iraq by the US via Kuwait, before Iraq's invasion in August 1990, and the demonization of Saddam.
• Did Clinton's Drug Czar Lead Gulf War Slaughter Of Iraqis? Multiple reports (New Yorker Magazine Press Release/AP/NYT 05/15/2000)

Was Iraq Set Up?

click

Destroyed Al-Hartha power plant, toured here by U.N. officials. Power plants, being the backbone of civilian life, were considered a primary target.

Did the U.S. give a "Green Light" to Saddam to invade Kuwait? U.S. ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie told Saddam eight days before the invasion (the U.S. still refuses to release the content of that meeting,) that "we have no opinion on your Arab-Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait." In addition, the U.S. completely blocked a peaceful resolution through the diplomatic track for which Iraq was begging before the invasion Aug 2nd, 1990, up until the Gulf War, while president Bush boasted that there will be no negotiations, no face saving, .. etc. At the end of the war, Schwarzkopf said that we were preparing for this war for the last 18 months, i.e. about 10 months before Iraq invaded Kuwait. It is noted that congress was bypassed in most of the planning for the war done by Bush, Schwarzkopf and others.

During the war the U.S. gave Iraq a clear warning against using chemical/biological. Such a clear warning, aside from Bush's TV rhetoric, was not relayed before Jan 15, 1991 when telling Saddam that the U.S. WILL attack Iraq if it didn't withdraw from Kuwait. This indicates the desire Bush had to destroy Iraq as the only regional military power, after Israel, hence further strengthening the latter's hegemony over the region. The violation of U.N. resolutions by Iraq was used by the U.S. as a justification for destroying Iraq. The U.S.'s selective enforcement of UN resolutions around the world, as in the case of shielding Israel who has violated way more resolutions than any nation, including Iraq, clearly shows the U.S.'s double standard and the use of the U.N. only when its resolutions happen to line up with U.S. interests.

 

• Ross Perot on the Gulf War: Excerpts from the third 1992 presidential debate (10/19/1992). " We told him [Saddam Hussein] that we wouldn't get involved with his border dispute ..... We told him he could take the northern part of Kuwait, [where the oil fields are located] and when he took the whole thing, we went nuts." -- Ross Perot (This statement made me, for the first time, go out and vote for someone.)
• Saddam's 'Green Light' to Invade Iran in 1980 by Robert Parry (The Consortium 1996)
• A Meeting between Saddam and U.S. ambassador Glaspie (07/25/1990).
• U.S. Conspiracy to Initiate the War Against Iraq by Brian Becker (1992)
• Gulf War: A Setup for Iraq? by Karen Nakamura (The Coastal Post 06/1998)
• The Art of Deception How the American Public Has Been Misled: The Gulf War by Jim Huck
• The CIA and the Gulf War a talk delivered on 02/20/1991 by former CIA professional officer John Stockwell (stationed in Africa and in Vietnam) at the Louden Nelson Community Center, Santa Cruz, California.
• U.N. Chief Sidelined in New Standoff With Iraq by David Usborne (Independent 11/13/1998)
• Questions About the Supposed Iraqi Threat to Saudi Arabia in l990 (iraqwar.org)
• Who lost Kuwait? When Saddam Hussein was obviously preparing to invade Kuwait, why did the U.S. send signals that it would not interfere? by Murray Waas (San Francisco Bay Guardian 01/30/1991)

U.S. Foreign Policy/Hypocrisy

Before the war the U.S. was a "friend" of Iraq, giving it intelligence on Iran, "agricultural" credit (which Saddam would convert for other uses), shielding it from criticism at the U.N., reducing its "rogue" status (to allow US defense companies to sell it weapons), even gave it biological weapons (form a Maryland company). In 1984 when the U.N. confirmed Iraq was using mustard and nerve gasses against Iranian "human wave" attacks in border war, the U.S. State Department issued only a mild condemnation, and went on to restore diplomatic relations with Iraq, in addition to opposing U.N. action against Iraq. In 1988 Iraq used chemical weapons again, against Kurdish minority in Halabjah, but the U.S. continued to maintain "agricultural" credits with Iraq, and President Reagan even blocked congressional sanctions against Iraq.

click

Baby-Milk factory destroyed by the U.S.

Today (mid 1999), Iraq's GDP is 2 percent of the Pentagon (U.S. Military) budget for 1999, and 10 percent its GDP before the Gulf War. But still the U.S. leaders and media portray it as a monsterous threat to world peace.

 

• The U.S. vs. Iraq: A Study in Hypocrisy By William Blum (02/09/1998)
• Madeleine Albright, ethically challenged by William Blum (1998)
• Iraq 1990-1991 Desert holocaust A chapter from William Blum's book "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II" (Common Courage Press, 1995)
• Saddam's Anthrax: Made in the U.S.A. (Middle East Realities 03/10/1998). The Maryland origin of Saddam's Anthrax was also admitted by American arms inspector Scott Ritter in a lecture at Brown University, Rhode Island, December 01/1998
• Deadly sanctions on Iraq are truly un-American by Maury Maverick (San Antonio Express-News 09/18/1999)
• Hypocrisy Seen in U.S. Stand on Iraqi Arms by Robin Wright (L.A. Times 02/16/1998)
• The Arming of Iraq. Testimonies and reports.
• IRAQGATE: The Big One That (Almost) Got Away Who Chased it -- and Who Didn't by Russ W. Baker (Columbia Journalism Review 03/1993). The Arming of Saddam and other scandals.
• Made in America by Dennis Bernstein (San Francisco Bay Guardian 02/25/1998)
• Liberated Kuwait: Ever since the emir was returned to his throne, repression, rape, and reprisals have become staples of life in Kuwait by Dennis Bernstein and Larry Everest (San Francisco Bay Guardian 09/09/1992).
• Thanks for Nothing by Robert Ito (Mother Jones 07/19/1999). Six Iraqi separatists who helped the CIA in its attempts to overthrow Saddam Hussein were flown to the U.S. for asylum by the Department of Defense. But the FBI and the INS, desperately trying to cover up their blunders on the case, have been trying to get them deported.
• Inspecting the Inspectors by Vincent Romano (Z Magazine 10/1998)
• US Ignited the Iraqi Oil Fields Who stood to profit by igniting Iraqi oil fields ablaze as the Republican Guard retreated during the Gulf War? (Spotlight 07/31/1999)
• CIA Blocks Manuscript Of Former Operative Agency Calls Parts Of Book Classified by Vernon Loeb (Washington Post 04/24/2000)
• Iraq: Who's To Blame by Geoff Simons (The Link/AMEU 10-11/1999)
• US Seeking Arms Clash with Iraq, Says Ex-Inspector by Kim Sengupta (The Independent 06/28/2000)
• US Iraq Policy: Policy or Humorless Joke? by Sean Gonsalves (Cape Cod Times 05/16/2000)
• "And They Called It Peace": US Policy on Iraq by Phyllis Bennis (Middle East Report Summer 2000) From a series entitled: Iraq: A Decade of Devastation

An Israeli Connection?

On the same day (08/26/1998) of his resignation, American arms inspector Scott Ritter was being investigated by the FBI for allegedly sharing classified information with Israel.

Iraq was the strongest and perhaps most educated/advanced Arab nation before the Gulf War, with a big potential since it holds the second largest oil reserve in the world. This might have forced Israel to sign a peace treaty with the Arabs and Palestinians from a weaker position (i.e. compromise more), than if Iraq was out of the picture.

 

• Israel/AIPAC Lobbied for U.S. War on Iraq by David Rogers (Wall Street Journal 01/28/1991)
• Israel's Role in the Gulf War "The Jewish lobbyists in the USA are deeply involved in the propaganda work promoting a war against Iraq." --Ha'aretz, 01/13/1991
• Former American inspector Ritter: Israel was key in unmasking Iraqi arms by David Makovsky (Ha'aretz 09/28/1998). "He [Ritter] said it demonstrated that Israel was taking seriously a UN Security Resolution passed after the Gulf War calling on all member countries to work closely with UNSCOM to disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction." Who says Israel does not abide by U.N. resolutions?
• Israel Gave Key Help To U.N. Team in Iraq: U-2 Photos Among Intelligence Shared by Barton Gellman (Washington Post 09/29/1998)
• Jewish Committee Honors Ekeus (05/14/1998). Executive Chairman of the UN Special Commission for Iraq (UNSCOM) Rolf Ekeus who helped prolong the sanctions against Iraq between 1991-97 is here rewarded by the American Jewish Committee for his teams' efforts of "laying the foundation for a stable and lasting peace in the Gulf region," (P.R. language), and ensure that only Israel has weapons of mass destruction, (factual language).
• Iraqi Opposition: A New American/Israeli Poodle? by Seth Gitell (Forward 07/31/1998 & 12/25/1998).
• Did the US Go to War for Kuwait or for Israel? by David Nes (Washington Report 03/1991)
• Israel helped U.N. get Iraqi confession, paper says (SF Jewish Bulletin 03/06/1998)
• World Jewish Congress Troubled by Pope's Planned Saddam Meeting by Douglas Davis (Jewish Telegraphic Agency 08/1999)
• AIPAC Asking Its Members to sign PRO-Sanction Letter (AIPAC Update 03/14/2000)
• Iraq pays Israel (Jerusalem Post 11/21/2000)

Articles by Charley Reese (Orlando Sentinel)

• Nothing to do with Weapons, Everything to do With Oil Prices (11/09/1997)
• Truth About Iraq Flap is Hidden in Government's Manure Pile (11/30/1997)
• Clinton's Tired, Old Actions in Iraq are Wrong in Every Way (11/22/1998)
• An Evil Man, an Evil Decision (12/20/1998)
• Embargo makes deathbeds of hospital beds for Iraqi children (03/02/1999)
• Try explaining to an Iraqi mother why her child is dead (01/27/2000)
• Bitter fruit from seeds of hate (11/26/2000)

click

Sanction Victims

As of today, (June 1998), over a million and a half Iraqis are dead due to sanctions and the Gulf War; the remaining are starving and malnourished. The Iraqi desert is littered with Depleted Uranium, used by the U.S. and Britain in making armor-piercing shells (Britain admits to that), with cancer and Lukemia rates surging through the roof. Iraqi crops are overcome by weeds. Rare diseases, such as Cholera and Typhoid --easily treated/non-existent before the war-- are now rampant in Iraq.

click

Highway of Death where Thousands of withdrawing soldiers fleeing civilians were burned alive

• U.S. War Crimes Against Iraq by Ramsey Clark (05/09/1991). Excellent details of the destruction by the U.S. and Allies.
• US War Crimes During the Gulf War by prof. Francis Boyle (New Dawn 02/1992)
• American Officials Charged for War Crimes! (The Winds 02/1997)
• Itemization and Details of the Destruction from the Washington Post (i.e., most likely a Pentagon-supplied information). But even so and regardless of how much sugar coating is added, the result as shown in this link, is still the destruction of the Iraqi society's infrastructure: bridges, power stations, water refineries, telephone exchanges, ...
• The Massacre of Withdrawing Soldiers on "The Highway of Death" by Joyce Chediac (May 9, 1991)
  • "What threat could these pathetic remnants of Saddam Hussein's beaten army have posed? Wasn't it obvious that the people of the convoy would have given themselves up willingly without the application of such ferocious weaponry?" --A BBC announcer commenting on the massacre of the withdrawing Iraqi soldiers. (Stephen Sackur, On the Basra Road, London Review of Books, 1991), pp. 25-6, cited in Theodore Draper, The True History of the Gulf War, The New York Review of Books, 30 January 1992, p. 41., p. 42.)
• U.S. Officials Believe Iraq Will Take Years to Rebuild by Patrick E. Tyler, (The New York Times 06/03/1991)
• Suffer the Children by Bert Sacks Letter to the Editor (Washington Post 02/26/2000)
• Iraq's Sacrificial Lambs by Matthew McAllester (NewsDay 06/18/2000). Its babies are dying in squalor; is UN embargo to blame?
• Letter From Iraq A Land In Limbo, Sinking Ever Lower by Howard Schneider (Washington Post 02/23/2000)
• A Shameful Policy on Iraq Editorial (Chicago Tribune 01/25/2000)
• A Morally Unsustainable Iraq Policy Editorial (Chicago Tribune 09/17/1999)
• Explanatory Memorandum Regarding the Comprehensive Embargo on Iraq Humanitarian Circumstances in Iraq (Human Rights Watch 01/2000)
• Bush salutes US air strikes on Iraq as "Lord's work" (AFP 01/19/2000)
• A Response to the National Catholic Reporter article by Charles Davis on June 18, 1999 by G. Simon Harak (Voices in the Wilderness)
• Fact Sheet On the Impact of Sanctions For Distribution
• The War on Iraq: an Unnatural Disaster by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. (AntiWar 08/27/1999)
• Iraq's Silent Agony: Nine Years of Sanctions and Distress by Alain Gresh (Le Monde Diplomatique 07/1999)
• Refugees Describe Air Raid Horrors; Iraqi Residential Areas Feel Impact by Nora Boustany (Washington Post 01/21/1991)
• Baghdad Striving to Recover Glory of Its Past; Residents Optimistic Despite War, Sanctions by Howard Schneider (Washington Post 11/29/1998)
• America's Attempt to Justify Its Role as a Superpower by Ignoring the Moral Consequences of the Persian Gulf War by Jacob Arnold (Ithaca College 1996)
• The Economic Sanctions Against the Iraqi People: Consequences and Legal Findings by Elias Davidsson (05/1996)
• Iraq: As The People Suffer by Rick McDowell (Catholic Worker Magazine - Jan/Feb 1998)
• St Matthew's tomb 'damaged in air strike' (ITN 08/24/1999)
• Iraqi Sanctions, Human Rights and Humanitarian Law by Roger Normand (Middle East Report Summer 1996)
• An Appeal to End the Sanctions on Iraq. A full-page ad in the New York Times sponsored by Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Howard Zinn and others.
• Stop The U.S. Bombing of Iraq It's More than Bad Timing: It's Illegal & Militarily Ineffectual, Foreign Policy Experts Say by Phyllis Bennis, Clovis Maksoud, Roger Normand, Joe Stork, and Steven Zunes (Foreign Policy in Focus 12/17/1998)
• A Letter to Clinton from U.S. Bishops (01/20/1998)
• U.S. Bombing The Myth of Surgical Bombing in the Gulf War by Paul Walker (1992)
  
  
  
  
  

  "Oil-For-Food" Program: US/UK's Manipulation to Prevent Iraq's "Compliance"

   

  Madeleine Albright on the removal of sanctions as a result of Iraq's "compliance": "We do not agree that if Iraq complies with its obligations concerning weapons of mass destruction, sanctions should be lifted." --Madeleine Albright from an essay by John Pilger (The Guardian 03/04/2000)

   

  click

  A child in the Amiryah shelter, One of 400 (some say 1,600) civilians killed there. The American bomb that destroyed the shelter also ruptured the hot water tanks in the basement of the structure, and gallons of scalding water boiled the families alive on the lower level. The handprints of the boiled-to-death victims can be seen on the wall of the shelter remains today.

• Allies deliberately poisoned Iraq public water supply in Gulf War (Sunday Herald 09/17/2000). ``U.S. policymakers were quite conscious of the devastating effects that "degrading" the Iraqi water purification system would have on the civilian population and on certain industries. They were aware that the "slow decline" of water purification and sewage treatment systems would mean that "incidences of disease, including possible epidemics, will become probable." They accurately predicted increases in cholera, hepatitis and typhoid. '' -- Marvin Wingfield, ADC
• France Condemns Air Raids on Iraq, China Urges Western Planes to Stop Bombing Iraq (AP/Reuters 04/07/2000)
• U.S. Ties Up Goods Headed for Iraq (Associated Press 03/27/2000)
• U.N. Chief Faults U.S., Britain for Iraqi Supply Delays by Colum Lynch (The Washington Post 03/14/2000)
• UN Sees No Change in US-Iraq Policy by Nicole Winfield (Associated Press 02/26/2000). ON U.S. BLOCKING OF HUMANITARIAN AID TO IRAQ
• UN Official Denis Halliday Quits in Row Over Aid to Iraq by Patrick Cockburn (The Independent 07/23/1998). Also here (BBC/Middle East Realities 10/03/1998)
• Why I Resigned My UN Post in Protest of Sanctions by Denis Halliday (11/05/1998)
• End the catastrophe of sanctions against Iraq by Denis Halliday (Seattle Post-Intelligencer 02/12/1999)
• UN Aid Chief Warns of Sanctions Impact on Iraq's "lost generation" (AFP 03/27/2000)
• U.N. Aide Who Quit in Protest Plans Report on Airstrikes on Iraq by Colum Lynch (The Washington Post 02/17/2000). Another UN chief quits: Jutta Burghardt, World Food Program chief joins von Sponeck and Halliday who quit in outrage over the effets of economic sanctions.
• UN envoy quits over suffering in Iraq caused by sanctions by David Usborne (The Independent 02/15/2000)
• U.N. Chief Extends Controversial Humanitarian Official's Term in Iraq by Colum Lynch (Washington Post 11/03/1999). Here, "controversial" means "Not liked by the US". Also check related The Deaths He Cannot Sanction by Michael Powell (Washington Post 12/17/1999)
• U.N. Says Oil Exports Slow to Rise to Help Needy Iraqis (Reuter 12/31/1998)
• Myths and Realities about the Sanctions (Voices in the Wilderness)
• Children Suffering from U.S.-backed sanctions on Iraq by Maury Maverick (San Antonio Express-News 02/27/1999)
• Oil-for-Food Deal Several articles from IAC
• U.N.: Iraq Stockpiles Medicines by Leon Barkho (Washington Post 05/20/1999)
• Bulk of Iraqi Oil Exports End Up in U.S. U.N. says by Leon Barkho (Nando Media 12/01/1999)
• Sanctions as Siege Warfare. by Joy Gordon (Nation 03/22/1999) As the case of Iraq has shown, there's more than one way to destroy a nation.
• Iraq: Misery and hardship: the darker side of UN sanctions by Robert Fisk (The Independent 02/25/1998) Children are dying as doctors find it impossible to buy drugs to cure them
• Interview with Scott Ritter on the Iraqi Sanctions by Ali Asadullah (iviews.com 02/02/2000)
• US used UN to spy on Iraq, aides say by Colum Lynch (Boston Globe 01/06/1999). Check BBC Report
• Annan: Arms Inspectors Helped U.S. (Associated Press 01/06/1999)
• U.S. Missiles Target the U.N. Too by Phyllis Bennis (Baltimore Sun 01/10/1999)
• Who's Lying to Who in the Gulf? by James Petras (Z Magazine 01/1999)
• Turkey Uneasy Over Secret Use of Cluster Bombs Against Iraqi Forces by United States by Lale Sariibrahimoglu (Turkish Daily News 04/04/2000)
• The Human Face of 'Collateral Damage' by Ramsey Clark (San Francisco Bay Guardian 02/20/1991)
• A Letter from Ramsey Clark to the ambassador and foreign minister of each member of the UN Security Council, and to the UN General Assembly (08/27/1999)
• Report to UN Security Council Regarding Iraq by Ramsey Clark (01/26/2000)
• The U.S. has Bombed Iraq 500 Times Since December (AFP 08/25/1999)
• A Visit to a Bombed Village What the U.S. War in Iraq Looks Like Up Close by Zachary Fink (The Progressive 10/1999). Attack on non-military targets.
• The West's Forgotten Conflict by David Usborne (Independent 06/23/2000). US & UK Have Flown 280,000 'Sorties' Bombing Iraqis
• 500 Air Strikes and More Than 100 Dead in Our Hidden War in the Gulf by Robert Fisk (Independent 08/14/1999)
• Damage Assessment by the Associated Press (12/20/1998)
• Exposed: Britain and America's merciless secret blitz on Iraq by Robert Fisk (Independent 02/1999)
• Autopsy of a Disaster: The U.S. Sanctions Policy on Iraq (Institute for Public Accuracy 11/13/1998) Fact sheet on Iraq.
• Failed President, Flawed Policy by Patrick Buchanan (Creators Syndicate 12/18/1998)
• Wagging Saddam by Robert Novak (Creators Syndicate 12/21/1998)
• Giddy Minds and Foreign Quarrels by Joseph Sobran (Universal Press Syndicate 02/17/1998)
• Clinton's War by Joseph Sobran (Universal Press Syndicate 12/17/1998)
• Statement of the Iraqi Foreign Minister of 12/17/1998 to the Press During Operation Desert Fox. Explains how Iraq was actually complying with UN inspections. See also What Non-Compliance
• Some Details of The Set-Up [of Iraq] You May Have Missed by William Blum (12/1998)
• Twisted Policy on Iraq by Sam Husseini (Washington Post 01/26/1999)
• Weapons of Mass Destruction by Christopher Hitchens (Vanity Fair 03/1999)
• Myths Used in Justifying Desert Fox
• Smart Bombs, Dumb Sanctions by Stephen Kinzer (New York Times 01/03/1999)
• Iraq Foot-and-Mouth Cattle Epidemic Worsens (BBC 03/27/1999)
  
  

  Articles by John Pilger (Guardian, New Statesman, Nation)

• Killing Iraq by John Pilger (Nation 04/14/1998)
• Squeezed to Death by John Pilger (The Guardian 03/04/2000)
• Iraq: Yet Again, They Are Lying to Us by John Pilger (New Statesman 03/20/2000)
• The Dying Rooms of the Middle East by John Pilger (New Statesman 04/03/2000)
• Slow News by John Pilger (New Statesman 05/2000)

• A Challenge to Genocide: Let Iraq Live. Essays on War and Sanctions by several authors (International Action Center)
• Apocalypse Now by Edward Said
• An American Tragedy by Edward Said (Nation 01/11-18/1999)
• Barbarians at the Gates by Edward Said (02/1999)
• After the Winter Bombs by Eqbal Ahmad (Dawn 12/1998)
• Democracy Disappears by Eric Alterman (Nation 01/11-18/1999)

   

• The UN: New Dictators of Iraq by Hugh Livingstone and Kayode Olafimihan (Living Marxism 02/1995)
• The Rotting Remains of Iraq by Jude Edwards and Kais Al-Kaisy (Living Marxism 08/1993)
• A Threat to Whom? by Will Deighton (Living Marxism 03/1998)

  click

  Charred Iraqi Soldier

• "Slaughter" is Something Other Countries Do (Extra 05/1991) Gulf War coverage
• The Decision To Kill People by Jon Carroll (San Francisco Chronicle 02/18/1998)
• Sanctions Statistics Compiled from various sources (UNICEF, WHO, FAO)
• The War That Never Ended by Naseer Aruri (09/1996)

• Bomb the Usual Iraqis (02/09/1998)
• What Would the U.S. Do Without Saddam? (09/23/96)
• Why Clinton Can't Risk Being "Soft on Saddam" (12/15/1997)
• The Bay of Camels. CIA Iraqi coup failure, (08/25/1997)
• Iraq: Beating a Dead Horse (11/15/1998)
• The Wildmen of Baghdad (11/23/1998) A history of bloody Iraq.
• Bomb the Usual Iraqis II (12/17/1998)
• Attack on Iraq Fits the Bill (12/19/1998)
• Bill: You're No Desert Fox (12/27/1998)
• It's Time to Put Away the Big Stick (01/11/1999)
• High Oil Prices: The Curse of Saddam (09/24//2000)
  
  

Articles by Noam Chomsky (Z Magazine)

The usual profound analysis one expects from this monumental figure.

• The Gulf Crisis (Z Magazine 02/1991)
• Gulf War Pullout (Z Magazine 02/1991)
• "What We Say Goes" (Z Magazine 04/1991)
• Nefarious Aggression. Chapter 6 of his book Deterring Democracy (1992)
• Rogue States (Z Magazine 04/1998)
• The Crisis in Iraq (La Repubblica/Observer 03/05/1998)

Depleted Uranium (DU)

Some of the shells used by the U.S. and Britain were made out of Depleted Uranium, a byproduct waste of nuclear fusion. This radioactive metal is very heavy compared to iron and lead, and using it has double advantage: First, it is much more efficient at armor piercing, second, firing it in an "enemy" territory will serve as a dumping technique, transforming the enemy land to a nuclear-waste dump. Due to DU, Iraqi children today suffer a four-fold increase in cancer (Lukemia and Lymphoma) rate. Also, some scientists and doctors believe that DU is the possible cause of the Gulf War Syndrome.

• Nuclear waste in others' Yards by physicist Michio Kaku
• Depleted Uranium and Education Project.
• Tank-Plinking in the Gulf By Kemp Houck (Z Magazine 07/1994)
• The West's Poisonous Legacy by Robert Fisk (The Independent 05/28/1998) and also here (Middle East Realities 03/06/1998).
• The evidence is there. We caused cancer in the Gulf by Robert Fisk (Independent 10/16/1998)
• The evidence lies dying in Basra by Robert Fisk (The Independent 01/25/2000)
• The Pentagon's Radioactive Bullet By Bill Mesler (Nation 10/21/1996))
• Depleted Uranium In The Gulf by Hugh Livingstone (Electronic Whip)
• Veterans Back Iraq Over Gulf War Illness (BBC 12/03/1998)
• The Trail of a Bullet by Scott Peterson (Christian Science Monitor 04/29/1999)
• Daru Salam
• USA Today Iraq Page
• Military will examine depleted uranium tests (CBC 02/07/2000)
• Silver Bullet: Depleted Uranium (Canadian Broadcasting Company TV)
• Military Toxic Project

• International Action Center
• Iraq Action Coalition
• Voices in the Wilderness also (here)
• UNSCOM: United Nations Special Commission
• Inside Edge from the UK, on the Sanctions.
• Against War
• Foreign Policy in Focus
• Americans Against Bombing
• Seattle Post-Intelligencer Iraq Page
• Yahoo! Full Coverage on Iraq
• Mariam Appeal
• Amnesty International - USA on Iraq
• Guardian File on Iraq