This article has been reproduced from the Socialist Standard (April 1999), the monthly journal of the Socialist Party of Great Britain.<\/p>\n
In a letter of November 1998 to Sir John Weston at the Permanent Mission of the United\nKingdom at the United Nations (U.N.), former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark lambasted\nthe sanctions decimating Iraqi society as a “violation of the Genocide\nConvention”. Iraq, he argued posed no real threat to the region and the idea that it\ndid was a “false fantasy created by the U.S. to justify its vast military presence in\nthe region, to dominate the oil resources and to contain Islam”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Weston’s comments were not unique. He was quite simply echoing what others have been\nsaying for some time, most notably Richard Halliday, whose high-profile resignation as\nhead of the U.N.’s humanitarian relief programme in Iraq alarmed the warmongers in\nWashington and London. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking through the Manchester<\/em> Guardian<\/em> in late February, Halliday\nvoiced his belief that the military threat from Iraq was greatly exaggerated, a\n“cop-out”, before criticising the West for eight years of sanctions that have\ncrippled Iraq far greater than any aerial bombardment endured by the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Halliday has pointed out that the sanctions violate the Geneva Convention as well as\nthe Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Rights of the Child, that they have\nseriously disrupted the quality of life in Iraq and debased a general high standard of\nbehaviour practised by the common Iraqi people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n If the bombing of Iraq no longer makes front-page news\u2014the 8 March U.S. attack,\nfor instance, only made page 12 of the Guardian<\/em> under “News in\nbrief”\u2014then it can well be imagined that the common people elsewhere,\nparticularly in Britain and the U.S., know little or nothing of the 1.2 million children\nwho died as a result of the U.N. sanctions against Iraq between August 1990 and August\n1997, or of the 6,000 who continue to die each week as a result of malnutrition and\ndisease. <\/p>\n\n\n\n While the bombing of Iraqi sites has become an almost daily occurrence, the sanctions\nare the real weapons that continue to blight the lives of the Iraqi people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Infant mortality rates have increased six-fold since 1996. Fifty percent of the Iraqi\npopulation has no access to clean water and the majority exist on a starvation diet, while\nsanitation has become a luxury. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Iraq’s per capita income has dropped from $2,900 a year to $60 a year and inflation has\nincreased to unparalleled levels. According to the Food & Agricultural Organisation,\nthe price of wheat flour, once part of the staple Iraqi diet, has gone up 1.16 million\npercent since 1990. The health service is in ruins with surgery often conducted in\nunsterile conditions and with no anaesthetic because of the embargo on supplies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile the aerial bombardment of Iraqi targets continues apace. Missile attacks are\nnow almost daily occurrences and have been since Operation Desert Fox back in December of\nlast year\u2014incidentally the biggest U.S.A. \/U.K. joint attack in the region since the\nGulf War eight years ago and one that even the less cynical could not fail to notice came\nas we were expected to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of\nHuman Rights. <\/p>\n\n\n\n As he accepted his U.S. presidential nomination in 1988, George Bush had this to say: <\/p>\n\n\n\n “This has been called the American Century because in it we were the dominant\nforce for good in the world. Now we are on the verge of a new century and what country’s\nname will be bear? I say it will be another American Century.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n These words, better than all the cant that has been used to justify U.S. aggression has\nagainst Iraq, best sum up the real U.S. mission in the Gulf. The U.S., and Britain for\nthat matter\u2014which never got used to losing its world power status after World War\nII\u2014are defending no moral high ground. They police the no-fly zones on behalf of no\nneighbour of Saddam and certainly do not defend U.S. from someone who threatens global\npeace. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The U.S. attacks are being carried out to remind U.S. of their military prowess and at\nthe bequest of their corporate elite. They are bombing Iraq to remind anyone watching that\nthe 21st century\u2014like the one we are witnessing coming to a close\u2014will be ruled\nby force and that it will be they, the U.S., who will be calling the shots. <\/p>\n\n\n\n You don’t have to read many books by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn and E.S. Herman to\nrealise the U.S. has been, and still is, the number one rogue state this century, bullying\nits way across the international stage, imposing their will on anyone not tough enough to\nstand their corner. A cursory look at the black eyes dished out in the past 50 years by\nthe U.S. and its sidekick is enough to tell U.S. which foot the boot will be on in the\ncoming century. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Why Iraq? Well in place of the “Communist threat” what other propaganda\nframework best serves U.S. interests and kills two birds with one stone? Saddam, as the\nunpredictable madman the U.S. has conditioned U.S. to believe he is, has to be punished.\nHe thus provides the U.S. with a perfect pretext for keeping the military machine alert on\n“our” behalf and to further condition U.S. to accept similar U.S.-led responses\nin the future. Moreover, the U.S. presence gives Washington tighter control over the\nregion’s oil supplies\u2014something the U.S. state department refers to as the\n“greatest material prize in world history”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n With a world shortage of not only oil but also water predicted for the 21st century,\nand with both resources high up on the agenda of all Middle East countries, it’s a\ncertainty the coming century will see, if anything, an increased U.S. presence in the\nregion and a more aggressive stance on the international stage. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Author: J.Bissett <\/p>\n\n\n\n Please email your comments about this article to feedback@worldsocialism.org<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n Back to the Politics Index<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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