Oh yes, I’d also like to point out that I’m not justifying anything. Quite frankly, I don’t really care whether the US goes to war in Iraq or not, as I’m not likely to be going over there to fight.
The U.S. has never, ever started a war solely over a nation’s “atrocities” against its own people. We’ve done peacekeeping gigs on those grounds a few times, but the only time we’ve even come close to going to war over “atrocities” is Bosnia/Kosovo–where the geographical consideration of having repeated civil wars in the middle of Europe eventually became too much to bear.
Atrocities and human rights are good additional reasons to go to war, but they are never the sole reasons. The only way it would be hyprocritical to invoke them as additional grounds now would be if we formerly supported Saddam in the cited instances, particularly the use of chemical weapons–which the U.S. government most certainly did not do. We smacked the shit out of Japan in WWII because they attacked us, but you’d better believe we went to town in the propaganda war due to the Japanese atrocities in China, which the U.S. had condemned long before we got into the war. Same deal here.
"Atrocities and human rights are good additional reasons to go to war, but they are never the sole reasons. "
Well but they are not good additional reasons unless you are prepared to admit that the 80’s policy was wrong.
“The only way it would be hyprocritical to invoke them as additional grounds now would be if we formerly supported Saddam in the cited instances…”
The US basically looked the other way and allowed American firms to export dual-use technology even though it knew that it was being used for chemical weapons. That is hardly consistent with the idea that it considered those acts so incredibly outrageous that they are now valid additional reasons to invade Iraq. If so where was the moral outrage at the time the atrocities were taking place ?. Like I said you can’t store moral outrage only to be used at a convenient time.
The difference with the Japanese case is that the US wasn’t working with the Japanese to help them win the war against China.
How is selecting another leader for the Iraqi people, instead of letting them choose a leader for themselves, democratic?
No, but I do think that Sharon’s (and Israel’s) treatment of the Palestinians is just as shameful as Saddam’s treatment of the Kurds. Israel’s even invaded other countries in the region and seized their territory, and yet they continue to receive the highest amount of US foreign aid anywhere.
Well, the confusion seems to be between an overall policy towards the Middle East and aspects of that policy as regards specific countries. The general policy towards the Middle East is this: unchallenged US dominance in the region. It is this that informs any and all policies towards individual countries. Israel, being the strongest ally in the region, gets tons of cash and military goods regardless of how it treats other populations within its borders, while Iraq only gets the goods when it’s seen as a bulwark against a challenge to US superiority, and invaded when it’s seen as that challenge. This connects every single last postwar Middle East policy from Truman to Bush.
Yes, I do - the US has done it scores of times. Where does the US get off claiming the moral high ground this time around?
It was developing nukes in the 1980s during the Iran-Iraq war, and used chemical weapons throughout. Why wasn’t that a concern to the US then, and only after the invasion of Kuwait? It thus boils down simply to the invasion of Kuwait and the concomitant challenge to US dominance in the Middle East.
Funny, Neurotik’s chart seems to indicate otherwise - crude oil prices have gone down since the Gulf War. What was the policy on Iraqi oil exports right after the Gulf War - was the oil shut off completely, and only allowed out gradually later on?
Leaving Saddam Hussein in power, and continuing the repression of Iraqis and Kurds alike. Well, as long as the oil’s flowing…
He is if he wants to be seen as protecting US oil and political interests in the region. He may not be treating Iraq the same way Reagan did, but it’s in pursuit of one and the same goal.
Neurotik - your charts are certainly interesting. I would agree that the amount of oil on the market does affect the general price of crude oil, and that there does seem to be a correlation between the amount of oil on the market and the price per barrel - serious spikes in 1973, 1979, and ~1996 - I presume that third one was due to the placement of oil sanctions on Iraq, and the price went down only as the pipes were gradually opened up again.
But let’s take a look at this chart - it’s the same as the one you linked to earlier, but broken down into pricing components. As you can see, the costs of refining and marketing, as well as the imposition of federal and state taxes, make up the majority of the price of gasoline - and are far less volatile than the price of crude oil itself. Basically, regardless of the price of crude oil, the costs to the company of refining and marketing - passed on to the consumer - and the price of gas tax - imposed directly - stay pretty much the same. Which means that even if the price of crude oil were to suddenly drop sharply - as might be the case if Iraqi oil were to be allowed full access to the market - we, as buyers of gasoline, actually wouldn’t see that much of a difference in price. Take the price of crude oil away completely, and the cost of a gallon of gas still comes out to roughly $1.00 for the consumer. Not a whole lot of change on our end.
Which part? Backing Saddam in the war with Iraq seemed like a pretty good idea at the time, and even it retrospect it makes a lot of sense.
Really? So you’re saying the U.S. government knew Union Carbide was selling materials to Iraq that would be used to produce chemical weapons, that the government had a legal basis for stopping those sales, and that it affirmatively decided not to do so? Great, let’s see the proof. I wouldn’t be surprised if that actually happened, of course, but I do so hate to see unsuopported assertions of fould government misdeeds.
It was there. We condemned the gassing of the Kurdish civilians at the time. Not so much on the military use against the Iranian army, since, after all, that was an actual war.
False. We sold Japan the oil it needed to wage war against China for several years after it started. In fact, it was America’s decision to stop selling oil to Japan that prompted them to launch the war in the Pacific, as a means of securing its own sources of oil.
Pardon me, that should be “Backing Saddam in the war with Iran seemed like a pretty good idea at the time . . .”
Oh, I agree completely, Olentzero. I don’t think that gasoline prices will be much affected either way, to be honest. Not only because of the breakdown in costs, but because of OPEC. Quite frankly, OPEC will not allow oil prices to skyrocket because it doesn’t need to give the West a massive impetus to start finding alternative energy sources and a move towards renewable energy and hybrids. At the same time, it isn’t going to let the price get too low and causing hardships for their own economies.
Which is why I think the oil argument is a chimera. Obviously, it has to be taken into consideration when developing strategic aims, but even if Iraq were to nationalize every oil field in the Middle East, it wouldn’t really make much of a difference to the supply of oil to the US and Europe, since it would be in their own best economic interest to sell it to us at roughly these prices. Indeed, having the oil in Saddam’s hands would be one of the ways to pretty much ensure a stable supply of oil since he is fundamentally a rational guy and not likely to cut off oil to the US since that would mean economic ruin and instability in his own country. And since Saddam runs a secular state, the prospect of religious fundamentalists taking over would be lower than in states like Saudi Arabia, which have their roots in using fanaticism to consolidate and expand their power.
Remember that US allies such as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc. have fully nationalized their oil production, so it wouldn’t make sense for the US to oppose Iraq doing it, so that wouldn’t be a problem at all.
Also, as an aside, does anyone else think it odd that we constantly refer to Saddam Hussein by his first name? How many other world leaders do we do that for, except for royalty that only use their first name in general press like Queen Elizabeth?
“So you’re saying the U.S. government knew Union Carbide was selling materials to Iraq that would be used to produce chemical weapons, that the government had a legal basis for stopping those sales, and that it affirmatively decided not to do so?”
Well from the Washington Post: “Although U.S. export controls to Iraq were tightened up in the late 1980s, there were still many loopholes. In December 1988, Dow Chemical sold $1.5 million of pesticides to Iraq, despite U.S. government concerns that they could be used as chemical warfare agents”
“It was there. We condemned the gassing of the Kurdish civilians at the time”
Only in a muted fashion though. Again from the WP: “.In practice, U.S. condemnation of Iraqi use of chemical weapons ranked relatively low on the scale of administration priorities, particularly compared with the all-important goal of preventing an Iranian victory.”
Did the administration make a serious effort to make Saddam stop gassing the Kurds? Not that I know of. And note that even after the Iran-Iraq war the Bush administration continued to cultivate Saddam.
“False. We sold Japan the oil it needed to wage war against China for several years after it started.”
Selling oil is rather different from giving military intelligence and facilitating the sale of weapons.
The bottom line is that you can either suppor the realpolitik of the 80’s and say that Saddam’s atrocities weren’t that important or you can say that the 80’s policy was wrong and Saddam’s atrocities are serious enough to provide additional justification for war. You can’t have both.
At the risk of sounding snide, did you actually read the article linked in the OP?
Again, from the article:
“Yeah, we’re outraged, but we’re not gonna do much about it.”
Have you got cites for any of this? From what I know of postwar history in the Middle East, nationalization of oil fields has been a highly unacceptable maneuver to the United States.
In the interests of accuracy I should add that the quote I put up about the US condemnation was about the earlier use of Iraqi chemical weapons against Iran and not the Kurds. However the correct quote which Olentzero put up says pretty much the same thing. The US was “outraged” but didn’t do much.
That shows nothing more than that the government was aware it was a dual use commodity. It utterly fails to show that the government had a legal basis for blocking the sale, or that the government knew the goods would be used to manufacture chemical weapons.
SFW? Your quote merely demonstrates that, in fact, the government condemned the very thing you now accuse the government of being hypocritical in complaining about today. That’s not government hypocricy, by any stretch of the imagination.
What the hell do you want? An immediate invasion? Particularly in light of the incontrovertable fact that no more gassing of the Kurds or anyone else ever occurred after the U.S. and the rest of the world condemned it? C’mon, man, you’re just making up stuff to complain about here.
Yeah, it’s called “diplomacy.” Works wonders in most cases. You can’t just demand immediate invasion every time another country does something naughty.
Not in the context of WWII, it wasn’t. Oil was more important to the Japanese war effort than anything else we could have sold them. That’s why FDR eventually–and I do mean eventually–decided to start an oil embargo against Japan.
Uh-uh, nope, you ain’t gonna get away with that nonsense. You can’t debate in such vague, meaningless terms. What does “that important” mean? Sure, those “atrocities” were important in the 80s. But were they, for instance that important that we should have started a war? Were they that important that we should have gone to the U.N. for economic sanctions? Were they that important that we should have laid down the dipolomatic law, or started sending arms to Iran? (No, wait, scratch that last one.) Inquiring minds want to know what the heck you’re talking about, specifically.
Bullshit. This is not an either/or discussion. Saddam’s “atrocities” were not a sufficient justification for war in 1988, and they are not a sufficient justification for war today. They are, however, legitimate justifications for war, and they may justifiably tip the balance in concert with any number of other factors. Those other factors were not present in 1988; there is a legitimate argument that they are present today.
“It utterly fails to show that the government had a legal basis for blocking the sale, or that the government knew the goods would be used to manufacture chemical weapons.”
What is this nonsense about “legal basis”? The article says that these were loopholes in existing export control procedures. Are you saying that the goverment doesn’t have the legal basis to close loopholes. Besides why couldn’t Congress pass new legislation?
As for “could” and “would” that’s pretty silly. If Iraqi atrocities were so bad shouldn’t the government have banned the sale of chemicals which could be used to make chemical weapons. Why was 100% proof that they were in fact being so used necessary?
“You can’t just demand immediate invasion every time another country does something naughty.”
This is a straw man. There were many things that the US could done short of invading Iraq.
It could have threatened to withold military intelligence and credits unless Iraq stopped gassing the Kurds. It could have closed the loopholes in its export controls. It could have brought up the issue in the UNSC and put public pressure on the Iraqis to stop. It didn’t do any of these things which indicates that it didn’t consider the gassing of Kurds to be important. Now 15 years later we are supposed to believe that it provides addtional justification for an invasion.
“Oil was more important to the Japanese war effort than anything else we could have sold them.”
But was selling oil part of an explicit policy of helping the Japanese win the war like the supply of military intelligence to Iraq? I don’t think so. It was probably a continuation of past commerical policies.
Sure. I was actually surprised when I learned about it a few years ago when I was researching something or another.
Anyways here’s links to the State Department:
Kuwait - nationalized the Kuwait Oil Co. in 1976. Also features a full welfare state, with massive education investment leading to a 79% literacy rate, free education through University, plus free universal healthcare, more or less guaranteed employment, and social security.
Qatar - has a nationalized company, called the Qatar General Petroleum Corp. Also has free education, but not so much as Kuwait (don’t have as much money).
Saudi Arabia - says that 95% of Saudi oil is produced by ARAMCO, which the State Department dubs “parastatal.” Just to make sure that meant what I thought it meant, I bipped over to the Energy Department who confirmed that it is a state corporation. Scroll down to the fourth paragraph.
Oman - government owns 60% of Petroleum Development Ltd. So partially nationalized.
Anyway, check with the Energy Dept. and the State Dept. if you want to know about other countries…I’m getting bored. 
It’s a little thing called “the law.” Perhaps you’ve heard of it?
Exactly. You need an act of Congress for that stuff, not just the whim of some bureaucrat in the Customs Service.
They eventually did. Can’t send that crap to Iraq now, can you?
Maybe. But then you also end up banning other things necessary to the people of Iraq, like chlorinated drinking water. Always a balancing act, you know.
As I recall, we were not sharing such intelligence at that point. We shut that down after they attacked the Vincennes.
We did put public pressure on Iraq to stop. Apparently, it worked damn well, considering there haven’t been any gas attacks on the Kurds in all the years since, even though they’re still no friends of Saddam.
It did many of those things. You just refuse to believe it.
But it does, amigo. Or are you saying that hoarding WMDs, threatening neighboring countries, and brutalizing your own citizens are not any kind of justification–whether sufficient or merely additional–for military action? In which case, don’t go around whining about foreign human rights abuses anywhere else in the world, because that ain’t any of our business.
Very nice, bringing in the diversion of “military intelligence” when you’re getting whipped on the sale of goods to a country involved in a war. Point of fact, the military intelligence provided to Iraq had no connection whatsoever to the nerve gas dropped on those Kurdish villages.
Just like our past commercial policy of selling merchandise–including chemical equipment–to Iraq. Thank you for making my point for me so neatly.
“You need an act of Congress for that stuff, not just the whim of some bureaucrat in the Customs Service.”
Do you have any specific evidence that these loopholes needed an act of Congress? In any case why didn’t the administration lobby Congress to change the law? IIRC the Iraq first started using chemical weapons in the early 80’s which left plenty of time to change the law by 1988 when the gassing of the Kurds started.
“As I recall, we were not sharing such intelligence at that point”
From the WP:
"Far from declining, the supply of U.S. military intelligence to Iraq actually expanded in 1988, according to a 1999 book by Francona, “Ally to Adversary: an Eyewitness Account of Iraq’s Fall from Grace.”
“We did put public pressure on Iraq to stop”
What kind of public pressure? Did the US bring the matter before the UN? Did it threaten to withold military assistance? As for the policy being a success that’s ridiculous. Saddam’s campaign lasted for more than a year IIRC. Is there a shred of evidence to believe that he desisted from using chemical weapons in the 90’s because of US public pressure in the 80’s. Since the US was no longer an ally why would it matter?
“Very nice, bringing in the diversion of “military intelligence” when you’re getting whipped on the sale of goods to a country involved in a war”
Sigh I was explaining what the difference between Japan in the 30’s and Iraq in the 80’s was. The US was not an ally of Japan and wasn’t explicitly trying to help it win the war. In the 80’s Iraq it was. Therefore your WW2 analogy is irrelevant.
minty green
There was a NYT article which stated that Reagen and top administration officials knew of Saddam’s continuing plans to develop deadly chemical agents in the 80s to be used against Iran, and they looked the other way.
The article also claimed that when Saddam used it on the Kurds in the late 80s the administration openly issued releases condemning it but was more than happy to let the issue slide below the radar. IIRC, the article also noted that some outraged legislators tried to pass law(s) severely impairing the sale of anything to Iraq and imposing economic sanctions and the bill(s) passed the Senate but was watered down and eventually defeated in the House by the administration’s efforts.
Realpolitik or not, there was a lot the US could have done in response to or even before Iraq’s development and use of deadly chemical agents but they just chose not to as it was not in their own interests. Hence, I can only conclude that it is hypocritical to make Iraq out to be a monster NOW.
I do agree that they were two different administrations but still from the perspective of a foreign policy the Saddam-gassed-his-own-people rhetoric is hypocritical. And, the truth is that is not the reason Bush wants Saddam removed. So, why even bother? Is it merely to get people riled up against him? Then, it is hypocritical propaganda.
Article I, section 8, paragraph 3 of the United States Constitution. Heck, you haven’t even bothered to identify the loopholes.
I can think of any number of potential reasons. But for every example I come up with for pharmaceuticals production or chlorinated drinking water, you’ll just complain that wouldn’t be adequate. So how 'bout you find us some real answers about whether and/or why the executive branch and/or Congress didn’t start the sanctions 10 years earlier than they did. Knock yourself out. (Partial answer: They did, in fact, subject a number of chemicals to “foreign policy controls” around 1984, when the rest of the world first started taking Iran’s complaints seriously).
Hmm, interesting. The guy seems to have been be in a position to know. I’m not at all conceding the point on the basis of one sentence from god-knows-what context, but I’ll look into it further. I note that 1988 was the last year of the war when Iraq was attempting to recapture its territory lost to Iran. Targeted military intelligence may have been necessary to place the parties in a position where they’d both be willing to end the war.
We said "“Hey Saddam! Knock that shit off!” And he did.
You recall incorrectly. Although the campaign against the Kurds lasted for quite a while, Saddam apparently only used chemical weapons one time in that campaign: When the fight started with a chemical attack on the city of Halabja in March 1988.
Nonsense. You’re claiming we shouldn’t have sold anything to Iraq because Saddam’s a nasty S.O.B., and the Japan example shows that we sell stuff to nasty S.O.B.'s all the time. Like I said, thanks for making my point for me.
Ah, see, here’s another misunderstanding. There’s a huge difference between nationalizing an oil company and nationalizing the oil fields. Let’s take Kuwait, for an example.
KOC, which was nationalized in 1976, produces jointly with Texaco in the Kuwaiti Divided Zone. So not all of the profits from that concession go to KOC. The offshore concession is held by 80% Japanese interests through the Arabian Oil Company. So basically most of the profits from oil drilled go to foreign oil companies. No harm in letting the Kuwaiti government nationalize a company in that scenario. Now if they’d nationalized the entire Kuwaiti oilfields, that would be something different. Nasser tried that in Egypt, and Mossadegh tried that in Iran; the US took strong exception to that. I haven’t looked at the other sources you provide, but your comments on them lead me to think that nothing anywhere near full nationalization of anything related to oil has been achieved in the Middle East.
Additionally, you’ll note that foreign nationals only receive some of those wonderful social benefits the State Department lists. Not so bad, unless you consider the Kuwaiti citizenship policy. It’s a harshly exclusive policy, for example denying citizenship to some 300,000 Bedoons - long-time Kuwaiti residents, the majority of whom were born there. That is approximately one-third the total population of Kuwait. Can you imagine the United States denying citizenship and the benefits thereof to some 100 million Blacks and Native Americans? Check out this ducument at the Human Rights Watch site: http://www.hrw.org/reports/1995/Kuwait.htm
My point here is that these countries aren’t the social paradises and bastions of democracy they’re made out to be. Nor is the US as tolerant of real nationalization as you tried to indicate using the sources you provided. If Iraq successfully invaded Kuwait and Saudi Arabia and fully nationalized the oilfields, and not just the native companies that owned a fraction of the oil concessions, the US would have fifty or sixty cows over the matter.
Once again, this is specious reasoning when it comes to the grounds for war. One of the primary justifications for war is a threat to either ourselves, our interests, or our close allies. In 1988, Saddam hadn’t threatened to gas either us or our allies. Sucks to be Iranian or a Kurd, but them’s the facts.
All that changed rather dramatically in 1990, when Iraq invaded an American ally with quite a lot of strategic importance, and threatened to invade an even more strategically important ally. So now we know the guy is some sort of threat to us (though I personally believe he’s been quite well contained for the last decade, and poses no real threat to anyone outside Iraq). That ratchets things up quite a bit on the threat-o-meter.
Saddam was a monster in the 1980s, though he was a useful monster as a bulwark against the monster of fundamentalist Islam in Iran. He was not, however, a threat to us, our interests, or our allies. Thus, no war.
Saddam is still a monster today. What’s more, there is a legitimate (though vastly overblown, in my estimation) argument that he is a threat to us, our interests, and our allies. Thus, the possibility of war.
The difference is really not that hard to understand, folks. That Saddam was a monster then was never sufficient basis for the U.S. to invade or isolate Iraq, and that he is a monster now is indeed a legitimate additional basis to go to war.