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services" by selling Iraq "banned and rare chemicals" during the Iraq-Iran war. Van Anraat was lauded by the Iraqis for daring to "expose himself to extremely dangerous consequences" by selling the chemicals; he also did so "at a reasonable price compared to other offers."
In fact, many of the world's leaders, past and present, could have found themselves pilloried as co-defendants, charged with complicity in the tyrant's crimes.
For instance, later this summer the tribunal is due to consider charges against almost a hundred of Saddam's top officials for the massacre of tens of thousands of Shiites following the abortive uprising of 1991.
The Shiites were answering the repeated calls by the first President Bush for a popular revolt. Such a call was rebroadcast in Iraq by clandestine CIA radio stations and printed in millions of leaflets dropped by the U.S. Air Force across the country. Problem was, the Iraqis didn't realize until it was too late that Bush and Baker, his pragmatic secretary of state, didn't really mean it.
When it looked as if the insurgents might actually succeed, the American president turned his back. The White House and its allies wanted Saddam replaced not by a popular revolt which they couldn't control but by a military leader more amenable to U.S. interests.
So, as the United States permitted Saddam's attack helicopters to devastate the rebels, American troops just a few kilometers away from the slaughter were ordered to give no aid to those under attack. Instead they destroyed huge stocks of captured weapons rather than let them fall into rebel hands. According to some rebels in Iraq, American troops prevented them from marching on Baghdad.
Maybe I've missed something, but to date I've seen no such background given in U.S. media reports about the upcoming trial.
But what if, instead of the special tribunal--or along with it--Iraq had established a "truth commission," such as South Africa did after the defeat of apartheid? Imagine also the unimaginable: that the Iraqi government had kept Saddam alive long enough to testify about past relations with the rest of the world.
How enlightening it would have been to hear the former tyrant recount his relief when he realized in 1991 that President Bush père was actually going to help him stay in power.
Saddam might have also explained to what degree the mixed messages from the senior Bush and the State Department were responsible for his concluding there would be no adverse reaction from Washington when he invaded Kuwait in 1990.
Or Saddam might have shed some light on the invasion of Iran. According to a memo written by Alexander Haig, Ronald Reagan's secretary of state, it was the Carter White House in 1980 which encouraged Iraq--via the Saudis--to invade Iran in the first place. Because Jimmy Carter has always denied that charge, it would have been interesting to hear Saddam expound on the issue.
Can you imagine the headlines generated by Saddam and his officials describing the dealings behind the billions of dollars of arms they imported from across the globe as leaders from East and West battled for a share of the bonanza. How the German governments--east and west--for instance, closed their eyes as scores of German industries also helped Saddam build his chemical arsenal. Saddam might have had a few pithy remarks about the British under Margaret Thatcher, who were equally eager to cash in on the Iraqi arms gusher--Thatcher's son included.
It would have been enlightening to hear Saddam detail his dealings with the French and Jacques Chirac, who sold the dictator a nuclear reactor in the 1970s, though it was clear Saddam was seeking weapons of mass destruction.
This search for historical truth could have gone back to the beginnings--to the charge that the CIA was involved in organizing the action that first brought Saddam notoriety: his participation in the botched 1958 assassination attempt against Iraqi President Abd al-Karim Qasim, who had proved too nationalistic and close to the Soviets for American and British Cold War tastes.
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