Donald Rumsfield Shakes Hands with Sadam

Lonnie Utah

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/

I learned something yesterday. In 1983 Donald Rumsfield, special envoy to Iraq, met Sadam Hussein in Bagdad. He met with Hussein on 20 Dec 1983 to talk about "regional issues of mutual interest, shared enmity toward Iran and Syria, and the U.S.'s efforts to find alternative routes to transport Iraq's oil". Even though Iran had accused Iraq of using chemical weapons against them months earlier, since they were isolated diplomatically, Iran's accusations fell on deaf ears in the court of world opinion. Regan's condemnation of the use of chemical weapons in 1984 due to world outcry, was specifically crafted as to not implicate Iraq.

To quote from the above article,

Quote:

Quote:"The U.S., which followed developments in the Iran-Iraq war with extraordinary intensity, had intelligence confirming Iran's accusations, and describing Iraq's "almost daily" use of chemical weapons, concurrent with its policy review and decision to support Iraq in the war. The intelligence indicated that Iraq used chemical weapons against Iranianforces, and, according to a November 1983 memo, against "Kurdish insurgents" as well."

It seems to me the current Bush administration justified the use of force in Iraq based mainly upon those instances where Sadam used CW's. Many of these episodes happened before the first Gulf war in 1991. It is interesting that a current member of the Presidents administration turned a blind eye to these incidents when they happened, yet used them so doggedly to support a case for war 20 years later.

What do you think, Just curious?

Weisse Luft

Truman shook Stalin's hand at Yalta.

skwanch

Truman never invaded Russia.

Bikerman2004

Chamberlain shook hands with Hitler.

Lonnie Utah

Sadam didn't invade the US. We took care of things when he invaded Kuwait in 1990-91.

The REAL question is being dodged here. Let me expand a bit.

If Sadam was such an evil dictator, when did he commit most of his heinous acts, before or after the first gulf war . I think that most of you will find that many of the things this administration harped on happened prior to 1991.

This begs the obvious question, why didn't we get him in 1991. Yes I know that Sadam's removal wasn't part of the UN mission in Iraq. It would have also offended our Arab partners. The interesting thing was, back in 1991, there was a REAL international coalition. The world would not have supported the removal of Sadam then even if he was evil. (This is why we had to basically go it alone in 2003.)

If you take all of the things that have happened since this latest installment of the war started it becomes clear that many of the reasons we were given for it's legitimacy fall flat. Now I'm not saying that we shouldn't have gone after Sadam. I'm saying that the reasons we were given do not hold up under scrutiny looking at past events. We certainly had opportunities to do this before 2003. This leaves one big question. What were the real reasons we did it when we did?

http://www.worldhistory.com/hussein.htm

limerickman

Lonnie,
Either by accident or design you have strayed in to one of the most polarising debates raging in this entire forum.
Welcome.

The whole Iraq issue was premised upon a lie.
The lie promulgated upon the belief by the Bush administration that Hussein had WMD.
The weapons inspectors could not find WMD.
The Bush goverment repeated that the WMD was there.
They even doctored evidence and presented doctored evidence to the UN in February 2003 to uphold their lies.

Everyone of us in the anti-iraqi war movement asked repeatedly for evidence of WMD.
No proof of WMD was ever presented to prove Bush's false allegations.
Then we had the Bush goverment stating that SH had provided logistical, military, financial and ideological support to Al Qaeda.
Again, there is no evidence to suggest that these false allegations were true.

Why did the USA invade Iraq ?
Quite frankly I do not know why they invaded Iraq.
I suspect it was for oil.
Certainly the reasons for invading and occupying Iraq, given by the US goverment, have proven to be a tissue of lies that has cost 1,000 US soldiers lives and over 10,000 Iraqi lives.

Lonnie Utah

Thanks for the warm welcome. I'll try to keep it civil. I was just interested in seeing what folks thought of this. Personally I'd wasn't aware of Rumsfield's past. I've got a pretty thick skin and was sick of the 1 sided debate at moorewatch. Haven't been there much recently.

We'll see what comes of this.

limerickman

Well you'll find some rabid Bushites here and you'll find some like me who thoroughly oppose the man and his policies.
Have a read through Kerry V Bush thread in the Soapbox or Fahrenheit 9/11

skwanch

Not only are they untrue, they're not even credible, if you've done any reading whatsoever on OBL. Hussein, as a secular dictator, was someone OBL would *never* get in bed with. Further, since OBL's stated aim is to establish an Islamist state in the region, Hussein would be working against his own interests by supporting OBL. Only an incredibly short-sighted and stupid person would make that mistake, and Hussein didn't control Iraq for 3 decades by being stupid.

That Bush continues to make this claim ("I say there was a connection because there was a connection") demonstrates a breathtakingly cynical view of the intelligence and education of the average American. That he's gotten away with it thus far demonstrates a heartbreaking amount of truth in that viewpoint.

limerickman

Agreed.
But Bush and his supporters tried to claim that SH supported Al Qaeda.

Al Qaeda and SH are totally different, unconnected entities.

Weisse Luft

One more time for the slower people here:



http://www.weeklystandard.com/Conte...03/527uwabl.asp

Weisse Luft

Here's Sen. Lieberman's view from the same:

skwanch

Oh yes, the Weekly Standard. Put out by the News Corporation, same folks who run that bastion of impartiality, the Fox News Network.

be that as it may, from the same article:

"That is, it is not clear that the Iraqis knew about bin Laden's well-concealed investment in the Sudanese Military Industrial Corporation. The Sudanese very likely had their own interest in VX development, and they would also have had good reasons to keep al Qaeda's involvement from the Iraqis. After all, Saddam was exactly the kind of secularist autocrat that al Qaeda despised." - Daniel Benjamin

There's no definitive proof of a connection here, as far as I can see. The Clinton administration may have claimed one, but I never believed Clinton's claims about why those missiles were flying, then or now. I think they had a lot more to do w/ deflecting the country from Ms Lewinsky than any real OBL/alQ connection. Remove the testimony of all those who have a political axe to grind, and nobody's left standing. I need a little more than Lieberman claiming he's seen proof before I believe such proof exists.

Bikerman2004

All I know is Saddam was either incredibly stupid or thought that Bush was bluffing. All he had to do was agree to the inspections wherever and whenever. The fact that he didn't tells me something was going on there. Some here have said the WMDs were gone after 1991. If that is true, why didn't he just let the inspectors verify that? It seems he was always playing games.