From: HADCRJAM@admin.uh.edu (MILLER, JIMMY A.)
Subject: re:Secret Loans to Iraq, Bush's War Strategy, blah, blah...
Organization: University of Houston Administrative Computing
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 15:35:01 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.20


>    "State Department reasoning was outlined with admirable clarity by
>    _New York Times_ chief diplomatic correspondent Thomas Friedman.
>    If the society suffers sufficient pain, Friedman explained, Iraqi
>    generals may topple Mr. Hussein, "and then Washington would have
>    the best of all worlds: an iron-fisted Iraqi junta without Saddam
>    Hussein."

  This is of course, the reasoning of this particular individual, and not
known to any factual degree.

>    "The operation of holding a civilian population hostage while tens of  
>    thousands die from starvation and disease raises only one problem:  
>    unreasonable soft-hearted folk may feel some discomfort at having  
>    "sat by and watched a country starve for political reasons"  
>    "[...] With luck, then, this huge exercise in state terrorism may
>    proceed unhampered by the bleeding hearts and PC left-fascists."
>
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  
>[Taken from Z magazine (see bottom), 10/91, _Aftermath: Voices from  
>Below_ by Noam Chomsky]  
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -  

--Noam Chomsky is a noted linguist.  Where he feels he has gained the
--credential to discuss political conflict is unknown to this poster.

>"The distinction between war, on the one hand, and slaughter and   
>state terrorism, on the other, is one that should be observed."  

  Indeed.  You should try it sometime.


>3. The "Gulf War" in Retrospect   


>Two crucial events of the recent past are the accelerating   
>breakup of the Soviet system and the Gulf conflict.  With regard   
>to the former, the U.S. is largely an observer.  As a matter of   
>course, the media must laud George Bush's consummate skill as a   
>statesman and crisis manager, but the ritual exercise lacks   
>spirit.  It is plain enough that Washington has little impact on   
>developments and no idea what to do as the Soviet system lurches   
>from one crisis to another.

And has nothing to do with the topic, true or not.

>  The response to Saddam Hussein's   
>aggression, in contrast, was a Washington operation throughout,   
>with Britain loyally in tow, reflecting the U.S. insistence upon   
>sole authority in the crucial energy-producing regions of the   
>Middle East.   

  I think the Saudi's, Kuwaiti's, and even the Iranians might find this
surprising.  The idea that the US might wish to protect important friends
seems to have become criminal.  Fascinating.

>Now that the U.S. has achieved its major aims and there is no   
>longer any need to terrify the domestic public and whip up   
>jingoist hysteria, government-media rhetoric has subsided and it   
>is easier to survey just what happened in the misnamed "Gulf War"   
>-- misnamed, because there never was a war at all, at least, if   
>the concept "war" involves two sides in combat, say, shooting at   
>each other.  That didn't happen in the Gulf.   

 I must remember to inform the captured pilots they weren't shot at.
Obviously, the artillery which struck at my friend's forward position
never occured.  There were no Scud launches, no wounded, no deaths
from Iraqi fire.  It was all a big sound stage in California, apparently.
Amazing.  All that AA fire we saw on TV was merely fireworks to celebrate
the arrival of US planes over Baghdad.  Most illuminating.

>invasion of Panama.  In these terms it falls well short of   
>Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, and cannot remotely be   
>compared with the near-genocidal Indonesian invasion and   
>annexation of East Timor, to mention only two cases of aggression   
>that are still in progress, with continuing atrocities and with   
>the crucial support of those who most passionately professed   
>their outrage over Iraq's aggression.   

  Ahh, the old, "They're being hypocritical" line.  The most important
thing here is not that the US and the UN lived up to its creed, but
has failed to do so before.  When a wrong is righted, even for base
reasons, it is still righted.

>The second phase of the conflict began with the U.S.-U.K. attack   
>of January 15 (with marginal participation of others).  

 Only the US had the manpower and military capability to even try.

>This was   
>slaughter, not war.  Tactics were carefully designed to ensure   
>that there would be virtually no combat.   

  This is commonly referred to as "good generalship".  War is not an
effort to get your men into battle, but rather to force the enemy to
accept your terms.  This is often accomplished by killing lots of the 
opponent, forcing them into an untenable position, or both.  Contrary 
to popular belief, wars are not sporting events, with well-defined rules 
and umpires to adjuticate them.

>The first component was an aerial attack on the civilian   
>infrastructure, targeting power, sewage and water systems; that   
>is, a form of biological warfare, designed to ensure long-term   
>suffering and death among civilians so that the U.S would be in a   
>good position to attain its political goals for the region.

 One moment its not warfare, the next it is.  Make up your mind.  It
is important to note that if Saddam Hussein would stop prevaricating,
much of these items would be fixed by now, if they haven't been already.
The Kuwaiti oil fires are out well ahead of most predictions.

>Since the casualties are victims of the United States, we will   
>never have any real idea of the scale of these atrocities, any   
>more than we have any serious idea of the civilian toll in the   
>U.S. wars in Indochina.  These are not proper topics for inquiry. 

  Given the above, one wonders who the casualties really are the victims of;
the US, or their own government?

>This component of the attack does not qualify as war: rather it   
>is state terrorism on a colossal scale.   

 Whups.  It's not war again.  I'm getting dizzy.

>The second component of the U.S.-U.K. attack was the slaughter of   
>Iraqi soldiers in the desert, largely unwilling Shi'ite and   
>Kurdish conscripts it appears, hiding in holes in the sand or   
>fleeing for their lives -- a picture quite remote from the   
>Pentagon disinformation relayed by the press about colossal   
>fortifications, artillery powerful beyond our imagining, vast   
>stocks of chemical and biological weapons at the ready, and so   
>on.  Pentagon and other sources give estimates in the range of   
>100,000 defenseless victims killed, about half during the air   
>attack, half during the air-ground attack that followed.  Again,   
>this exercise does not qualify as war.  

 I suspect participants on both sides would beg to differ.  Tell an Iraqi
he wasn't in a war and you will be laughed out of Baghdad.  I might also
note that in almost ALL cases, the numbers and effectiveness of the
WEAPONS was quite accurately portrayed by the military.  The battle-skill
of the Iraqi soldier was was harped on by the press and the non-uniformed
"experts" who flooded the airwaves.  Tony Cordesman, who appeared many times
on ABC, often stated his belief that the Iraqi army was for the most part
not well-trained, and battle-weary as opposed to battle-hardened, very
different from many other "experts".  But he was a rarity.

 Accounts after the fact note that many of those missing from Iraqi 
formations were not killed, but simply deserted before the battle even 
began.  Again, any general who allows the enemy a "fighting chance"
is an idiot.  This is not the olympic games.

>In the words of a British   
>observer of the U.S. conquest of the Philippines at the turn of   
>the century, "This is not war; it is simply massacre and   
>murderous butchery." The desert slaughter was a "turkey shoot,"   
>as some U.S. forces described it, borrowing the term used by   
>their forebears butchering Filipinos {note: Luzviminda Francisco   
>and Jonathan Fast, _Conspiracy for Empire_ (Quezon City, 1985),   
>302, 191.} -- one of those deeply-rooted themes of the culture   
>that surfaces at appropriate moments, as if by reflex.   

 "Turkey Shoot" also was used to describe the Marianas air battles in
WWII, where American pilots downed hundreds of Japanese planes to a 
handful of their own.

  Also note the attempt to link reprehensible acts performed by people long
dead with acts perfromed today, as if the two were one and the same.  A neat
propaganda ploy.

[repetitive diatribe deleted]

  This part may be the first almost-true item brough up so far.  
Politicians, especially old Cold Warriors, have a fetish for stability, 
even at great human cost.  Nevertheless, the quoting of a New York Times
correspondent hardly qualifies as hard facts--it is opinion only.

>The operation of holding a civilian population hostage while tens   
>of thousands die from starvation and disease raises only one   
>problem: unreasonable soft-hearted folk may feel some discomfort   
>at having "sat by and watched a country starve for political   
>reasons," just what will happen, UNICEF director of public   
>affairs Richard Reid predicted, unless Iraq is permitted to   
>purchase "massive quantities of food" -- though it is already far   
>too late for the children under two, who have stopped growing for   
>six or seven months because of severe malnutrition, we learn from   
>his report in the Canadian press.  But Bush's ex-pal may help us   
>out of this dilemma.  The _Wall Street Journal_ observes that   
>Iraq's "clumsy attempt to hide nuclear-bomb-making equipment from   
>the U.N. may be a blessing in disguise, U.S. officials say.  It   
>assures that the allies [read: U.S. and U.K.] can keep economic   
>sanctions in place to squeeze Saddam Hussein without mounting   
>calls to end the penalties for humanitarian reasons." {note:   
>Kathy Blair, _Toronto Globe and Mail_, June 17, 1991; _WSJ_, July   
>5, 1991.} With luck, then, this huge exercise in state terrorism   
>may proceed unhampered by the bleeding hearts and PC   
>left-fascists.   

 Note the shifting of blame.  While Saddam continues to flout the
agreements made at the cease-fire, violating them whenever he gets
the chance, the US is made responsible for all the suffering that
results.  The idea that Saddam's compliance with the UN resolutions
might end the embargo seems to continually escape the "bleeding
hearts and left-fascists."

>In keeping with its fabled dedication to international law and   
>morality, the U.S. is naturally demanding that compensation to   
>the victims of Iraq's crimes must have higher priority than any   
>purchase of food that might be allowed -- under U.N. (meaning   
>U.S.) control, of course; a country that commits the crime of   
>disobeying Washington has plainly lost any claim to sovereignty.   

 The idea that the victims deserve compensation from crimes seems to
not apply when the US insists upon it, a rather interesting
reversal from typical liberal policies on victim's rights--most
of which I tend to agree with.
 It is also worth noting that a formula was developed that would allow
Iraq to make needed purchases of food and medicine while still starting
to pay reparations to Kuwait--but this is forgotten or ignored by the
"US is always evil" crowd.

>While proclaiming this stern doctrine with suitable majesty,   
>the Bush Administration was keeping the pressure on Nicaragua to   
>force these miscreants, who committed the same unspeakable crime,   
>to abandon their claims to reparations for a decade of U.S.   
>terror and illegal economic warfare as mandated by the   
>International Court of Justice.  Nicaragua finally succumbed, a   
>capitulation scarcely noticed by the media, mesmerized by   
>Washington's lofty rhetoric about Iraq's responsibilities to   
>compensate its victims.   

 Nicaragua's repudiation of leftist terror exports to other countries
has allowed US to start to flow again, as well as UN credits.

>As Third World observers have no difficulty in perceiving, the   
>"ominous halo of hypocrisy" can rise beyond any imaginable level   
>without posing a serious challenge for the cultural commissars of   
>the West.   

 The third world should have no trouble spotting this halo, as many 
of those involved have been brilliant hypocrits themselves.

>The third phase of the conflict began immediately after the   
>cease-fire, as Iraqi elite units, who had been largely spared by   
>the U.S. attack, proceeded to slaughter first the Shi'ites of the   
>South and then the Kurds of the North, with the tacit support of   
>the Commander-in-Chief, who had called upon Iraqis to rebel when   
>that suited U.S. purposes, then went fishing when the "iron fist"   
>struck.   

 Here is more of the only reasobly true material here.  The "stability
fetish" struck a cruel blow to the Kurds and Shi'ites.  I found it
reprehensible.

>journalists observing the slaughter listened to Gen. Schwartzkopf   
>boasting to his radio audience that "We had destroyed the   
>Republican Guard as a militarily effective force" and eliminated   
>the military use of helicopters. {note: _Spectator_ (London),   
>Aug. 10, April 13, 1991.}   

 This is in obvious conflict with Schwartzkopf's own words own American
TV, where admitted being "suckered" by the Iraqis into allowing them to
use helicopters to get around in, due to the damaged roads and bridges.

>This is not quite the stuff of which heroes are fashioned, so the   
>story was finessed at home, though it could not be totally   
>ignored, particularly the attack on the Kurds, with their Aryan   
>features and origins; the Shi'ites, who appear to have suffered   
>even worse atrocities right under the gaze of Stormin' Norman,   
>raised fewer problems, being mere Arabs.   

 Gen. Shwartzkopf, like most good generals, did what he was told, and
did not get involved.  It is worth noting that the same left-wingers
who said we had no business interfering in Iraq screamed the loudest when
the US did just that.

>Again, this slaughter hardly qualifies as war.   

 Since both sides were shooting at each other, it does qualify for war by
your earlier definition.  Or does it change to suit the needs of the moment.

>In the most careful analysis currently available, the Greenpeace   
>International Military Research Group estimates total Kuwaiti   
>casualties at 2-5,000; and Iraqi civilian casualties at 5-15,000   
>during the air attack, unknown during the ground attack,   
>20-40,000 during the civil conflict, perhaps another 50,000   
>civilian deaths from April through July along with another   
>125,000 deaths among Shi'ite and Kurdish refugees. {note:   
>Greenpeace press release, July 23, 1991; Environet.}   

 Greenpeace is well known for its contacts in Iraq.  Note the
heavy sarcasm.  Since the only place it is possible they were allowed
real access was to the Kurdish refugee camps, that is the only
figure which I am likely to give any credence.  The veracity
of any Iraqi source remotely related to the government is highly
unlikely, and it is doubtful Greenpeace was allowed to roam freely
to make any accurate determination.

>In brief, from August 1990 through July 1991, there was little   
>that could qualify as "war." 

 True.  For almost 6 months, nothing happened besides plunder and rapine
in Kuwait.  Until Jan 17.

>The distinction between war, on the one hand, and slaughter and   
>state terrorism, on the other, is one that should be observed.   

 You would do well to take your own advice.


semper fi,

Jammer Jim Miller 
Texas A&M University '89 and '91
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