POLITICS ~ UP CLOSE & PERSONAL!!!

Commentary

By Ghali Hassan

Online Journal Contributing Writer


Mar 17, 2006, 12:46

‘Terrorism is the calculated use of violence or threat of violence to attain goals that are political, religious, or ideological in nature. This is done through intimidation, coercion, or instilling fear’ [1].

‘Terrorism is the use, or threat, of action which is violent, damaging or disrupting, and is intended to influence the government or intimidate the public and is for purpose of advancing a political, religious or ideological cause,’ Britain Terrorism Act 2000.<?XML:NAMESPACE PREFIX = O />

‘All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state or in any manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations,’ Article 2(4) UN Charter.

One of the common myths about the US war against the Iraqi people is that the US and its Western allies are on a “mission” to help the Iraqis in their aspiration for “democracy” and “freedom.”

However, a brief analysis of the crimes committed against the Iraqi people in the last 15 years shows that the main aim of the US and its allies is the destruction of Iraq and Iraqi society.

Prior to 1990, Iraq was one of the more prosperous and economically advanced countries in the Arab world, boasting a sizeable middle class; technical capacity; and, compared to other Middle Eastern countries, relatively high standards of education and health care, as well as high numbers of women educated and contributing to the economy and the well-being of society.

As a result of the 1991 US war, Iraq’s industrial and agricultural capacity was completely destroyed by US bombings.

Iraq’s, transportation and infrastructure systems were obliterated. “The world must learn that what we say goes,” said George Bush I to enthusiastic applause of “freedom-loving” Americans.

The war was a one-sided massacre of innocent civilians masquerading as “liberation of Kuwait.”

Just after the heavy bombings ceased, in March 1991, a UN mission to Iraq led by the then Under-Secretary-General Martti Ahtisaari, described “near-apocalyptic results [wrought by the US War] upon the economic infrastructure of what had been, until January 1991, a rather highly urbanized and mechanized society.

Now, most means of modern life support have been destroyed or rendered tenuous. Iraq has, for some time to come, been relegated to a pre-industrial age, but with all the disabilities of post-industrial dependency on an intensive use of energy and technology.”

More than 88,500 tons of bombs were dropped on Iraq during the 1991 US war.

A large number of these bombs were encased in ‘depleted’ (DU) uranium, a radioactive by-product of the enrichment process used to make nuclear fuel.

The ‘dust’ which has a half-life of 4.5 billion years contaminates the air, land and water, and causes chromosomal radiation damage, especially to soft tissue, pregnant women and their fetuses.

[2]  Cancer researchers in Iraq and in the West have shown that due to DU residue, the ‘rate of cancer has increased nine-fold since the 1991 US war,’ particularly among pregnant women and their babies.

According to the Pentagon's own report, the US-UK dropped 320 tonnes of DU on Iraq in 1991.

Greenpeace puts the figure at an estimate of 800 tones. More that 100,000 DU shells dropped on the city of Basra and its surroundings. The destruction was deliberate and a long-lasting act of terrorism.

Eric Hoskins, a Canadian physician and coordinator of a Harvard study team, reported that the US War on Iraq “effectively terminated everything vital to human survival in Iraq -- electricity, water, sewage systems, agriculture, industry and health care.”

[3] "All of Iraq’s 11 major electrical power plants as well as 119 substations were completely destroyed.

Eight multi-purpose dams were repeatedly hit and destroyed -- this wrecked flood control, municipal and industrial water storage, irrigation and hydroelectric power.

The health and education systems weren’t spared. Twenty-eight civilian hospitals and 52 community health centres were hit."

In addition, more than 676 schools were damaged, including 38 completely destroyed (Media Lens 01 July 2002). Was all this for the sake of returning a tin-pot dictator to Kuwait?

Research by Thomas Nagy, professor of Expert Systems at George Washington University, revealed that the US military knew the effects of their attacks on the civilian population and proceeded with them nonetheless.

Nagy wrote: “The health effects of the destruction of the water treatment system were not merely foreseeable in principle but were actually foreseen“. (The Progressive, September 2001).

As Barton Gellman of the Washington Post wrote at the time quoting a Pentagon source; “People say, 'You didn't recognize that it was going to have an effect on water or sewage,’” said the planning officer.

“Well, what were we trying to do with [United Nations-approved economic] sanctions -- help out the Iraqi people?  No.  What we were doing with the attacks on infrastructure was to accelerate the effect of the sanctions.” (Washington Post, 23 June 1991)

To ensure that Iraq would be unable to repair or replace of what had been destroyed, the US and Britain maintained the genocidal sanctions against the Iraqi people, enforced by a massive military presence and weekly bombing raids designed to terrorise the Iraqi population.

The sanctions have greatly impaired Iraq’s ability to import the nutrients, medicines and other materials necessary to saving the lives of even their toddlers.

The health care system has deteriorated, and the education system and standard of living were near collapse. In addition, the sanctions were designed to isolate Iraq from the rest of the world and destroy the fabric of Iraqi society.

A once prosperous nation is being systematically de-developed, de-skilled and reduced to penury. As the 1999 UNICEF report points out:

“In marked contrast to the prevailing situation prior to the events of 1990-1991, the infant mortality rates in Iraq today are among the highest in the world, low infant birth weight affects at least 23 percent of all births, chronic malnutrition affects every fourth child under five years of age, only 41 percentof the population have regular access to clean water, 83 percent of all schools need substantial repairs.

The ICRC [Red Cross] states that the Iraqi health-care system is today in a decrepit state. UNDP [UN Development Program] calculates that it would take 7 billion dollars to rehabilitate the power sector country-wide to its 1990 capacity.” [4]

Former UN Assistant Secretary General Denis Halliday has repeatedly denounced what was happening as “a systematic program . . . of deliberate genocide.” His statements appeared in the New York Times and other mainstream media during 1998, so it can hardly be contended that the world, the American public in particular, was ”unaware” of them. He resigned from his post and refused to be part of this deliberate genocide.

It is estimated that the sanctions killed more than 1.6 million Iraqis.

 The UN's own report revealed that 5,000 Iraqi children under the age of 5 were dying each month due to its own policy of implementing the sanctions.

Madeleine Albright, then US Secretary of State, openly confirmed Denis Holliday’s assessment. When Albright was asked in an interview on 60 Minutes on 12 May 1996, whether she had considered the resulting death of 500,000 Iraqi children, she calmly announced that, “We think the price is worth it” to see that US objectives were achieved. Democrats or Republicans; they all participated in the crimes against the Iraqi people and in the destruction of Iraq.

According to John and Karl Mueller (Sanctions of Mass Destruction, Foreign Affairs May/June 1999), the sanctions ”have taken the lives of more people in Iraq than have been killed by all so-called weapons of mass destruction throughout history.” Therefore Iraq's genocide “arguably was the greatest genocide of the post World War II era.” Despite a worldwide outcry against the sanctions, the US and Britain -- with tacit approval from other Western states -- continued to enforce the sanctions violently.

The 13-year long sanctions on Iraq were the UN's biggest and most profitable mass murder in the history of the UN. While Iraqis children were malnourished and starved to death, obesity and corruption among UN member states and bureaucrats increased to levels unknown in the organization’s history. The pretext for this deliberate mass murder was Iraq’s alleged possession of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). It was well known that Iraq neither had WMD, nor posed a threat to the American people.

Iraq’s Resistance to this form of international terrorism proved to be successful. In 2002, despite the Anglo-American orchestrated terror against the Iraqi people, Iraq showed all signs of moving forward, and leaving the genocidal sanctions behind.

****EXCERPT FROM ARTICLE***

[1] US Army Operational Concept for Terrorism Counteraction (TRADOC Pamphlet No. 525-37, 1984).

[2] Laka Foundation (1999). Depleted Uranium: A Post-War Disaster for Environment and Health. Amsterdam, the Netherlands: Laka Foundation.

[3] Hoskins, Eric (1992). The Truth behind Economic Sanctions, in Ramsey Clark et al. (Eds.), War Crimes: A Report on United States War Crimes against Iraq (Washington, D.C: Maisonneuve Press, 1992).

[4] CAFOD (2001). A People Sacrificed: Sanctions Against Iraq. London: Caritas Europe.

[5] Mandel, Michael (2004). How America Gets Away with Murder. Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto Press.

[6] Shahak, Israel, (Ed.). (1982). The Zionist Plan for the Middle East. Belmont, MA: A.A.U.G. Inc. (p. 8-11).