The Guilty Go Unpunished In Mass Civilian Murders

Saddam Hussein, like Osama Bin Laden, was created and empowered by the US government. In his early 20s, Saddam was recruited by the CIA to murder Iraqi Prime Minister Qasim. Saddam and his six-man hit squad moved into a Baghdad apartment and started watching for an opportunity to carry out the assassination, but when the critical moment arrived, Hussein got nervous and started shooting too soon, missing Qasim. One of the hit men got a grenade stuck in the lining of his coat. Another put the wrong kind of bullets in his gun. It was a major fuckup. The next attempt came three years later, and was more successful. Once the minister was killed, Saddam became head of the Baathist intelligence apparatus. The CIA provided lists of names of suspected Communists, and they were quickly rounded up and murdered. But Hussein’s Baathists were too weak – even with CIA help – to retain control, and by 1964 they had been outlawed by the Iraqi government. Saddam was sent off to prison. His CIA friends seemed to have forgotten all about him.
Then, in 1967, it looked like Iraq might fall to communism. Suddenly, Saddam Hussein and his Baathists from Tikrit were remembered. President Lyndon Johnson dispatched former US Treasury Secretary Robert Anderson to Baghdad on a clandestine mission to help them.
With the financial backing of US oil interests and some CIA logistical aid, Saddam Hussein was broken out of the now-infamous Abu Gharib prison.
Iraqi President Rahman Arif was soon killed in a mysterious helicopter crash. Arif had just made a deal to sell oil to the Russians, pissing off US interests and setting the stage for his demise. Soon after the death of Arif, Saddam and his Baathist militia entered Baghdad with US-supplied tanks and weapons, and seized control of the capitol.
A new government was established in 1968 with General Ahmad al-Bakr as President and Saddam Hussein as Vice President.
Saddam continued to serve US interests, but others in his party and President al-Bakr drifted into communist influence, accepting Soviet arms shipments and nationalizing the Iraqi oil company. Once more, the CIA and US oil interests turned to their man Saddam, who purged the Baathist party of suspected commies and obtained President al-Bakr’s resignation “for health reasons”. Saddam, with the CIA’s help, became Iraq’s sole leader in July of 1979.
Just over a year later, he attacked Iran – to the delight of US interests. Saddam’s Baathist party were murdering thugs, but they were warmly regarded then as our allies against the evil Ayatollahs of Iran. The US Department of Defense assisted Saddam’s military with real-time battlefield intelligence from AWACS planes flying overhead. Pharmaceutical Company CEO Donald Rumsfeld visited to see if there was anything the US could do to help out. Rumsfeld was photographed shaking hands with Hussein. A few months later, Rummy was back in Baghdad for secret talks with Saddam’s Foreign Minister, Tariq Aziz. These meetings resulted in a “back door” being created for illegal chemical and biological weapons sales.
According to a US Senate report, the following “weapons of mass destruction” were provided by the US to Iraq: Anthrax, botulism, E Coli, salmonella, West Nile fever, and several other biological agents. Other items sent from the US to Iraq included chemical warfare agents, chemical warfare production facility plans and technical drawings, biological warfare-related materials, missile fabrication and guidance equipment, and centrifuges for nuclear research.
In short, Saddam received from the first Bush administration the very weapons the second Bush administration accused him of having when we invaded Iraq!
The former chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, Don Riegle, testified that the US government approved at least 771 export licenses for biological weapons, chemical weapons, and nuclear technology to Iraq during that time.
Meanwhile, the US secretly allowed Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Egypt to transfer US weapons, including howitzers, Huey helicopters, and bombs to Iraq. These shipments were in clear violation of the Arms Export Control Act and violated international laws.
George Schultz, then Secretary of State, was given intelligence reports showing that Iraqi troops were daily using US-supplied chemical weapons against the Iranians, including deadly and outlawed nerve gases. He was also told that CIA agents provided assistance to the Iraqis on how to create and use illegal mustard gas.
The US and Great Britain blocked every UN Security Council resolution condemning Iraq’s use of chemical weapons. In fact, the U.S. became the only country on Earth that refused to sign a Security Council statement condemning Iraq’s use of chemical weapons. Two months later, the US authorized 70 more biological exports to Iraq, including at least 21 batches of lethal strains of anthrax and shipments of weapons-grade botulin poison.
By 1988, relying on US mustard gas and nerve gas, Saddam was winning the war against Iran. The US Defense Intelligence Agency was heavily involved with Iraq in battle plan assistance, intelligence gathering and debriefing. They knew what was happening. In the last major battle of the war, 65,000 Iranians were killed, mostly with poison gas – a violation of the Geneva conventions and international law. In August 1988, a cease-fire was finally declared.
After the war, the US helped Saddam commit genocide against the Kurds – the crime for which he was tried and executed.  A month after the war ended, the US sent another huge shipment of chemical weapons to Saddam. During the next two years, the Iraqi regime used these against Kurdish resistance forces in northern Iraq, killing over 100,000 civilians and destroying over 1,200 Kurdish villages. Dow Chemical knowingly sent pesticides that were used to kill civilians. A Florida chemical company produced and shipped cyanide to Iraq.
Texas US Representative Henry Gonzales testified under oath that the Bush administration had provided these illegal weapons, knowing they were being used to exterminate civilians.
Saddam went on trial for using the weapons we gave him. He was found guilty. But don’t you think the people who put these weapons in his hands, knowing how he was using them, and defended him every step of the way ought to share some of the guilt?
People in our own government put this thug in power, then helped him commit genocide. When the UN tried to stop Saddam, they were blocked by the Bush Sr. administration.
The men who knowingly helped Saddam commit his crimes against humanity are accomplices and they share the blame for what happened. It is interesting to note that Saddam was tried and executed in Iraq, not in any international court, where the whole truth might have become known.  Those who are guilty of the mass murders of civilians in Northern Iraq, and of war crimes involving the use of outlawed chemical, biological, and nerve gas weapons, happen to include some of our own former leaders.
None of these men, who are as responsible as Saddam was, will ever face justice.      BAD SAM