Now here is the important fact: after his catastrophic defeat in Kuwait, Hussein did not cease from war for one minute. The ceasefire was a wholly unilateral decision by the alliance, which Hussein, in spite of having been near to annihilated on the field, never accepted. He re-established control on Iraq while the Americans stood and watched; only a major and visible crime - the gassing of the whole town of Halabja, conveniently forgotten by the "no WMDs" crowd - did the fury of public opinion convince the remains of the Alliance - Britan and the US - to throw a partial cover over Iraqi Kurdistan, which became, thanks to it, the least unsuccessful local government in the whole Middle East.
Hussein signalled in every possible way that he did not regard the business of the war as closed. He regularly sent aircraft up in defiance of Allied no-flight zones, even though this could only result in more destroyed aircraft and more dead or wounded pilots; he deliberately targeted Allied airplanes with missile-guidance radar, though he knew that they had the tools to detect it react. But he also waged a war of a subtler kind, corrupting journalists, NGOs and UN functionaries in what has become known as the oil-for-food scandal - in financial terms, the most colossal scandal of all time. By controlling the flow of oil out of Iraq, he built up enormous financial reserves (even while the world's media were taken on guided tours to see the poor starving Iraqi children) which he used to strengthen his repressive apparatus in Iraq and extend his diplomatic reach outside. By 2000, he had managed to whittle down the opposition to Britain and America alone. If the mailed hand of the Alliance had been removed from his throat - and that looked within sight by then - nobody who had followed his clumsy but incredibly bloody career could doubt that he would have thrown himself into war again.
As for the "no WMDs" nonsense, quite apart that by 2000 every intelligence service worth the name, including the French and the Russians, was certain that Saddam had them, some curious facts (and a great deal of gas cylinders) have emerged since the invasion, which the American mass media - who are Democrat by inclination - did not broadcast. The one I personally find most significant is that until the end of his rule, Saddam kept on the Government paybook no less than 300 nuclear scientists, apparently doing nothing. An expensive luxury, one would imagine, even for a corrupt oil-rich tyrant. The obvious conclusion is that these 300 eggheads were kept on the payroll - and, no doubt, kept thinking and doing theoretical work - waiting for the moment that the Alliance would finally withdraw, after which they would have been put to work with all the resources they needed.
By his constant whittling away at the Alliance, and by his evident hostility - his was the only government that publicly rejoiced at the fall of the Twin Towers, when even Gheddafi and Castro sent public declarations of support and offers of help - Saddam had, by September 2001, placed Britain and America in front of a most unpalatable choice: either leave the Middle East and allow him to run amock as he pleased, or start the war again. And though American governance after the invasion has been quite amazingly inept, the choice made by the two governments was the only sensible one. Imagine, if you will, what would have happened if America and Britain had quit the Middle East, as Saddam intended, some time in 2002 or 2003. Kuwait would not have lasted long, and I doubt that Saudi Arabia would either. Much of the world's oil would have fallen to Saddam, who would then have attacked any one of three possible targets - Iran, Egypt or Israel. As war gripped the oilfields, an economic crisis of 1970s if not 1930s proportions would have seized the industrialized world. The growth of China and India would have been checked, with unpredictable results for their very unstable internal balance. And then, quite likely, the West would have been forced into the war anyway. By this time, one or two of the participants would have had atomic weapons, and might have used them.
But of course, people like you would find some way to blame the West and America for it all anyway.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I think it is my duty... 4th and final part.
Date: 2006-12-16 05:14 pm (UTC)Hussein signalled in every possible way that he did not regard the business of the war as closed. He regularly sent aircraft up in defiance of Allied no-flight zones, even though this could only result in more destroyed aircraft and more dead or wounded pilots; he deliberately targeted Allied airplanes with missile-guidance radar, though he knew that they had the tools to detect it react. But he also waged a war of a subtler kind, corrupting journalists, NGOs and UN functionaries in what has become known as the oil-for-food scandal - in financial terms, the most colossal scandal of all time. By controlling the flow of oil out of Iraq, he built up enormous financial reserves (even while the world's media were taken on guided tours to see the poor starving Iraqi children) which he used to strengthen his repressive apparatus in Iraq and extend his diplomatic reach outside. By 2000, he had managed to whittle down the opposition to Britain and America alone. If the mailed hand of the Alliance had been removed from his throat - and that looked within sight by then - nobody who had followed his clumsy but incredibly bloody career could doubt that he would have thrown himself into war again.
As for the "no WMDs" nonsense, quite apart that by 2000 every intelligence service worth the name, including the French and the Russians, was certain that Saddam had them, some curious facts (and a great deal of gas cylinders) have emerged since the invasion, which the American mass media - who are Democrat by inclination - did not broadcast. The one I personally find most significant is that until the end of his rule, Saddam kept on the Government paybook no less than 300 nuclear scientists, apparently doing nothing. An expensive luxury, one would imagine, even for a corrupt oil-rich tyrant. The obvious conclusion is that these 300 eggheads were kept on the payroll - and, no doubt, kept thinking and doing theoretical work - waiting for the moment that the Alliance would finally withdraw, after which they would have been put to work with all the resources they needed.
By his constant whittling away at the Alliance, and by his evident hostility - his was the only government that publicly rejoiced at the fall of the Twin Towers, when even Gheddafi and Castro sent public declarations of support and offers of help - Saddam had, by September 2001, placed Britain and America in front of a most unpalatable choice: either leave the Middle East and allow him to run amock as he pleased, or start the war again. And though American governance after the invasion has been quite amazingly inept, the choice made by the two governments was the only sensible one. Imagine, if you will, what would have happened if America and Britain had quit the Middle East, as Saddam intended, some time in 2002 or 2003. Kuwait would not have lasted long, and I doubt that Saudi Arabia would either. Much of the world's oil would have fallen to Saddam, who would then have attacked any one of three possible targets - Iran, Egypt or Israel. As war gripped the oilfields, an economic crisis of 1970s if not 1930s proportions would have seized the industrialized world. The growth of China and India would have been checked, with unpredictable results for their very unstable internal balance. And then, quite likely, the West would have been forced into the war anyway. By this time, one or two of the participants would have had atomic weapons, and might have used them.
But of course, people like you would find some way to blame the West and America for it all anyway.