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Re: Talking some more...and more...

Posted By: SiliconDream =PN= (host-66-202-12-108.col.choiceone.net)
Date: 6/15/2003 at 2:56 a.m.

In Response To: Re: Talking some more...and more... *PIC* (Archer »–)›)

: No, because it's not true. Saddam Hussein, embodying him
: by his horrendous atrocities, was not anything the US
: did. We had no idea about the mass murders and the gas
: raids that were dropped on the Kurds or used against
: the Iranians until it was far too late. Nor did we
: give him those weapons of mass destruction (the French
: and Russians did most of it, as they, along with Iraq,
: did not sign on to the WHO's nonproliferation act on
: biological and chemical weapons).
: Saddam Hussein's slightly less Communistic Socialism was
: a bit more palatable, as much as they were very close
: allies with Moscow, but Saddam Hussein was in
: opposition to the crazy Iranians, a much bigger threat
: at the time. So, we supported him in his war against
: them.
: But we didn't give him weapons. Again, that was the
: Russians, the Soviets; heck, the serial numbers on all
: the Iraqi rifles are in Russian characters. They flew
: MIGs, and used Russian tanks.

On the matter of arms trading...

Most of Iraqi conventional hardware is Russian and French, true. (Iraq also favores French Mirage fighters.) However, if you're talking WMD development technology--uranium enrichment, detonator components, bioweapons labs and seed stocks, and so forth--the main suppliers appear to have been Germany, the United States and Britain, in that order.

The Iraqi weapons program dossier released last year lists 80 supplier companies from Germany, 24 from the US, 17 from Britain, 8 from France, 7 from Belgium, 6 from Russia, and a couple dozen other companies from various Western nations (as well as various national governments). Germany seems to have been Iraq's primary support for chemical weapons development in particular, while British companies provided mostly nuclear development assistance (missile parts, detonators and the like).

I don't know the full extent of the US contribution, but we do know a great deal about its bioweapons component from the1994 Senate Committee report on U.S. Chemical and Biological Warfare-Related Dual Use Exports to Iraq and Their Possible Impact on the Health Consequences of the Persian Gulf War. Anthrax, Clostridium species, Staphylococcus, West Nile virus, nerve gas components and human DNA samples are among the many US government-licensed bioactive exports to Iraq between 1980 and 1992.

Of course, most arms/dual-use tech deals between Iraq and the rest of the world were conducted via private companies, so it's always difficult to say whether a given national government consciously intended to assist Iraqi weapons development. But a whole lot of people around the world were looking the other way, at the very least.

As for violations of the Iran-Iraq Nonproliferation Act, the only nations I know to have been charged with this are Russia and China. I wouldn't be surprised if various other countries were also culpable, though. (Assuming that's the Nonproliferation Act you were referring too, which is part of US law. WHO can't pass Acts--at least, not ones anyone would listen to).

Hello to everyone, by the way. :-) Listen, I just figured out that the Head is...nah, forget it.

If anyone's playing Shadowbane on the Death server, stop by Braialla's Hope and say hello. Well, you wouldn't be playing right NOW anyway because there's enough lag to make a guy long for a Myth Deathmatch game on a 56k...but in general, stop by at some point in the next few months when the developers actually fix it. :-)

--SiliconDream

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