U.S. Tolerated, Then Villified Saddam

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - U.S. Tolerated, Then Villified Saddam (Page 1 of 2)

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:15:18 PM EDT

http://my.earthlink.net/article/nat?guid=20061230/4595f250_3ca6_1552620061230633398360

U.S. Tolerated, Then Villified Saddam
By CALVIN WOODWARD (Associated Press Writer)
From Associated Press
December 30, 2006 12:55 PM EST
WASHINGTON - When U.S. leaders decided it was time to despise Saddam Hussein, he made the perfect villain.

He was cocky and cunning. He looked dangerous and deranged standing at rallies firing a gun into the air, conduct unbecoming a head of government.

He was Hitler Lite, or as the first President Bush put it, "Hitler revisited," lacking the endless armies, but close enough for U.S. purposes. He had a history of atrocities. His black mustache heightened the aura of menace.

America's quarter-century entanglement with the Iraqi leader ended Friday at the gallows.

His hanging closed the books on a man who dealt with and benefited from the United States, then defied it, then ran like a rabbit into a hole in the ground, reduced to his own army of one....

I'm guessing the writer missed the whole murder/genocide thing. It was all about the mustache.

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:46:36 PM EDT

[#1]

He does make a point.

We were friendly with Saddam until we needed his Oil.

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:48:18 PM EDT

[#2]

Quoted:
He does make a point.

We were friendly with Saddam until we needed his Oil.

Then I should be paying .25 a gallon for gas.

Yet, I'm not.

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:49:05 PM EDT

[#3]

Lesser of 2 evils.

YOU FOOLS!

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:56:30 PM EDT

[#4]

Quoted:
He does make a point.

We were friendly with Saddam until we needed his Oil.

Posted: 12/30/2006 12:59:56 PM EDT

[#5]

We once had the British as our mortal enemies...

now they are our strongest allies.

What is your point? Clueless about historical ties and allies?

/I hate stupid people
//Knowledge is your friend

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:06:05 PM EDT

[#6]

British is a nationality.
Saddam Hussein was one man.
And yes, he was our ally. We even tried defending him when he was accused of gassing the Kurds by blaming it on Iran until further evidence came out. After that he was our enemy.

It's like Qadafi only in reverse.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:09:37 PM EDT

[#7]

Quoted:
He does make a point.

We were friendly with Saddam until we needed his Oil.

No. We were friendly with Saddam until he gased the entire village of Halabja - unlike the French, Germans, Russians and Chinese who CONTINUTED to supply him arms for years after he committed genocide using chemical weapons on his own villages.

Coincidentally, it was France, Germany, Russian and China were all against us invading Iraq to destroy his genocidal regime once and for all.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:16:50 PM EDT

[#8]

I liked OJ Simpson back before I knew he was a psycho knife wielding maniac. Does that make me somehow responsible for what he did?

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:19:43 PM EDT

[#9]

We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:23:14 PM EDT

[#10]

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

Correct...

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:28:27 PM EDT

[#11]

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:31:04 PM EDT

[#12]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

The US fucked up big when assuming that nationality would trump cultural and religious ties between sects.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:32:29 PM EDT

[#13]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Funny how that works.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:38:11 PM EDT

[#14]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Funny how that works.

Yep. Hilarious.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:40:53 PM EDT

[#15]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Funny how that works.

Yep. Hilarious.

Ironic is probably a better word.

Posted: 12/30/2006 1:59:51 PM EDT

[#16]

If he was such a good ally, why were we selling the Iranians weapons during the Iran-Iraq war?

From Wikipedia = During the early years of the war, Iran's arsenal was almost entirely American-made, left over from the Imperial Armed Forces of the dethroned Shah. Iran's foreign supporters gradually came to include Syria and Libya, through which it obtained Scud missiles. It purchased weaponry from North Korea and the People's Republic of China, notably the Silkworm anti-ship missile. Iran acquired weapons and parts for its Shah-era U.S. systems through covert arms transactions from officials in the Reagan Administration, first indirectly through Israel and then directly. It was hoped Iran would, in exchange, persuade several radical groups to release Western hostages, though this did not result; proceeds from the sales were diverted to the Nicaraguan Contras in what became known as the Iran-Contra Affair.

According to the report of the U.S. Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-Contra Affair issued in November 1987, "the sale of U.S. arms to Iran through Israel began in the summer of 1985, after receiving the approval of President Reagan."[20] These sales included "2,008 BGM-71 TOW anti-Tank missiles, and 235 parts kits for MIM-23 Hawk surface-to-air missiles had been sent to Iran via Israel." Further shipments of up to US$2 billion of American weapons from Israel to Iran, consisting of 18 F-4 fighter-bombers, 46 A-4 Skyhawk fighter-bombers, and nearly 4,000 missiles were foiled by the U.S. Department of Justice, and "unverified reports alleged that Israel agreed to sell Iran AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, radar equipment, mortar and machinegun ammunition, field telephones, M-60 tank engines and artillery shells, and spare parts for C-130 transport planes."[21] The London Observer also estimated that Israel's arms sales to Iran during the war totalled US$ 500 million annually,[22] and Time Magazine reported that throughout 1981 and 1982, "the Israelis reportedly set up Swiss bank accounts to handle the financial end of the deals."[23] For more on Israeli Hawk missile sales to Iran see.[24]

[edit] Aircraft

During war, Iran operated U.S.-manufactured F-4 Phantom and F-5 fighters, as well as AH-1 Cobra light attack helicopters. It also operated a number of F-14 Tomcat fighters, which, according to a few sources, proved devastating to the Iraqis in the early phases of the war. However, due to the Iranian government's estrangement, spare parts were difficult to obtain. Despite this the Iranians managed to maintain a constant presence with their Tomcats during the entire conflict, mostly due to a combination of spare parts acquired on the black market and parts made in Iran. These were supported by KC-135s, a refueling tanker based on the Boeing 707.[25]

Posted: 12/30/2006 2:11:02 PM EDT

[#17]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

good point.

Posted: 12/30/2006 2:14:10 PM EDT

[#18]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Funny how that works.

Yep. Hilarious.

Ironic is probably a better word.

And without the damned common courtesy to give uncle sam a reach around!!!

Posted: 12/30/2006 2:16:09 PM EDT

[#19]

More than tolerated, we gave him weapons, we gave him intelligence to help him against the Iranians, we trained his pilots here in the US, etc... All the while knowing what we know now. Then when he didn't go lock step with our plans, we villified him. A Frankenstein just like OBL.

Posted: 12/30/2006 2:30:01 PM EDT

[#20]

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons, we gave him intelligence to help him against the Iranians, we trained his pilots here in the US, etc... All the while knowing what we know now. Then when he didn't go lock step with our plans, we villified him. A Frankenstein just like OBL.

What weapons were those?
The Soviet tanks? The AK-47's, the Soviet aircraft?

pato

Posted: 12/30/2006 2:44:17 PM EDT

[#21]

Quoted:

Quoted:
We were never Saddams friend. We simply used him to tie up the Iranians.

And now Iran is using Iraq to tie us up.

Funny how that works.

Yep. Hilarious.

Ironic is probably a better word.

probably

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:17:05 PM EDT

[#22]

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:19:45 PM EDT

[#23]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie If he means WMD.

We did sell Iraq a very few conventional weapons we were not even close to a major supplier for Iraq… then we sold a few to Iran as well.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:21:17 PM EDT

[#24]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

What do you expect from a "pistol packin' libtard"?

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:21:54 PM EDT

[#25]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

October 10, 2002
Helping Iraq Kill with Chemical Weapons:
The Relevance of Yesterday's US Hypocrisy Today

by ELSON E. BOLES

You may feel disgusted by the hypocrisy of US plans to make war on Iraq and sickened at the inevitable slaughter of thousands of people. But if you could only vaguely recall the details of how deep the hypocrisy goes, then read on.

The US not only helped arm Iraq with military equipment right up to the time of the Kuwait invasion in 1989, as did Germany, Britain, France, Russia and others, but also sold and helped Iraq to integrate chemical weapons into their US-provided battle plans while fighting Iran between 1985-1988.

According to a New York Times article in August, 2002, Col. Walter P. Lang, a senior defense intelligence officer at the time, explained that D.I.A. and C.I.A. officials "were desperate to make sure that Iraq did not lose" to Iran. "The use of gas on the battlefield by the Iraqis was not a matter of deep strategic concern," he said. One veteran said, that the Pentagon "wasn't so horrified by Iraq's use of gas." "It was just another way of killing people _ whether with a bullet or phosgene, it didn't make any difference."

Now consider just how deceptive the recent comments from the White House are. In late September spokesman Ari Fleischer said that British Prime Minister Blair's dossier of evidence is "frightening in terms of Iraq's intentions and abilities to acquire weapons." A few days later, while making his case against Saddam, President Bush said "He's used poison gas on his own people." Bush deceives because he hides the fact that US officials, including his father, had no qualms about helping Saddam gas Iranians. What is truly frightening are the US policies toward Iraq, the cover ups of those policies, and the US officials who personally profit in the millions of dollars from those policies. To whatever degree Saddam is a tyrant, he would not be that without the US government.

The question is not whether Saddam is willing to use chemical or other weapons of mass destruction again. The question is whether the US is currently selling and helping countries use weapons of mass destruction.

Details about Iraq killing Iranians with US-supplied chemical and biological weapons significantly deepens our understanding of the current hypocrisy. It began with "Iraq-gate" -- when US policy makers, financiers, arms-suppliers and makers, made massive profits from sales to Iraq of myriad chemical, biological, conventional weapons, and the equipment to make nuclear weapons. Reporter Russ Baker noted, for example, that, "on July 3, 1991, the Financial Times reported that a Florida company run by an Iraqi national had produced cyanide -- some of which went to Iraq for use in chemical weapons -- and had shipped it via a CIA contractor." This was just the tip of a mountain of scandals.

A major break in uncovering Iraqgate began with a riveting 1990 Nightline episode which revealed that top officials of the Reagan administration, the State Department, the Pentagon, C.I.A., and D.I.A., collectively engaged in a massive cover up of the USS Vincennes' whereabouts and actions when it shot down an Iranian airliner in 1987 killing over 200 civilians. The "massive cover up" Koppel explained, was designed to hide the US secret war against Iran, in which, among other actions, US Special Operations troops and Navy SEALS sunk half of Iran's navy while giving battle plans and logistical information to Iraqi ground forces in a coordinated offensive.

In continuing the probe, as Koppel explained in June, 1990, "It is becoming increasingly clear that George Bush [Sr.], operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980s, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into the aggressive power that the United States ultimately had to destroy."

A PBS Frontline episode, "The Arming of Iraq" (1990) detailed much of the conventional and so-called "dual-use" weapons sold to Iraq. The public learned from other sources that at least since mid-1980s the US was selling chemical and biological material for weapons to Iraq and orchestrating private sales. These sales began soon after current Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad in 1985 and met with Saddam Hussein as a private businessman on behalf of the Reagan administration. In the last major battle of the Iran-Iraq war, some 65,000 Iranians were killed, many by gas.

Investigators turned up new scandals, including the involvement of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL), the giant Italian bank, and many of the very same circles of arms suppliers, covert operators, and policy makers in and out of the US government and active in those roles for years. The National Security Council, CIA and other US agencies tacitly approved about $4 billion in unreported loans to Iraq through the giant Italian bank's Atlanta branch. Iraq, with the blessing and official approval of the US government, purchased computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods for Iraq's missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.

However, the early reports on BNL's activities and the startling revelations that the US government astonishingly knew that BNL was financing billions of dollars of purchases illegally, were rather comical in view of later revelations regarding who was involved. US government officials didn't just know and approve, but some were employees at BNL directly or indirectly. It was Representative Henry Gonzalez (D-Texas) who relentlessly brought key information into the Congressional Record (despite stern warnings by the State Department to stop his personal investigation for the sake of "national security").

Gonzalas revealed, for example, that Brent Scowcroft served as Vice Chairman of Kissinger Associates until being appointed as National Security Advisor to President Bush in January 1989. As Gonzalez reported, "Until October 4,1990, Mr. Scowcroft owned stock in approximately 40 U.S. corporations, many of which were doing busies in Iraq." Scowcroft's stock included that in Halliburton Oil, also doing business in Iraq at the time, which had also been run by current Vice President Dick Cheney for a time. Recall that this year President George Bush Sr. faced suspicion of insider trading in relation to selling his stock in Halliburton. The companies that Scowcroft owned stock in, according to Gonzalez, "received more than one out of every eight U.S. export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several of the companies were also clients of Kissinger Associates while Mr. Scowcroft was Vice Chairman of that firm." Thus, Kissinger Associates helped US companies obtain US export licenses with BNL-finance so Iraq could purchase US weapons and materials for its weapons programs.

Many US business-men and officials made handsome profits. This included Henry Kissinger, the former Secretary of State under Richard Nixon, who was an employee of BNL while BNL was simultaneously a paying client of Kissinger Associates. Gonzalez reported that Mr. Alan Stoga, a Kissinger Associates executive, met in June 1989 Mr. Saddam Hussein in Baghdad. "Many Kissinger Associates clients received US export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several were also the beneficiaries of BNL loans to Iraq," said Mr. Gonzalez. Kissinger admitted that "it is possible that somebody may have advised a client on how to get a license."

Perhaps the most bizarre revelations about the involvement of former US officials concerned a Washington-based enterprise called "Global Research" which played a middleman role in selling uniforms to Iraq. It was run by, none other than Spiro Agnew (Nixon's former VP who resigned to avoid bribery and tax evasion charges), John Mitchell (Nixon's chief of staff and Watergate organizer), and Richard Nixon himself. In the mid-1980s, more than a decade after Watergate, Nixon wrote a cozy letter to former dictator and friend Nicolae Ceausescu to close the deal. Global Research, incidentally, swindled the Iraqis, who thought they were getting US-made uniforms for desert conditions. Instead they received, and discarded, the winter uniforms from Romania.

By late 1992, the sales of chemical and biological weapons were revealed. Congressional Records of Senator Riegle's investigation of the Gulf War Syndrome show that that the US government approved sales of large varieties of chemical and biological materials to Iraq. These included anthrax, components of mustard gas, botulinum toxins (which causes paralysis of the muscles involving swallowing and is often fatal), histoplasma capsulatum (which may cause pneumonia, enlargement of the liver and spleen, anemia, acute inflammatory skin disease marked by tender red nodules), and a host of other nasty chemicals materials.

To top it all off, there is the question as to whether Iraq's invasion of Kuwait was a set up. Evidence indicates that the US knew of Iraq's plans -- after all, the military and intelligence agencies of the two countries were working very closely. Newspaper reports about the infamous meeting between then-Ambassador Glaspie and Iraq officials, and a special ABC report in the series "A Line in the Sand," indicated that, although the US officials told Iraq that it disapproved, they indicated that the US would not interfere.

Bear in mind the attitude of the US policy makers not only regarding Iraq's use of gas against Iranians, but in general. Richard Armatige, then Asst. Sec. of Defense for International Security Affairs and now Deputy Secretary of State, said with a hint of pride in his voice that the US "was playing one wolf off another wolf" in pursuing our so-called national interest. This kind of cool machismo resembled the pride that Oliver North verbalized with a grin during the Iran-Contra hearings as "a right idea" with regard to using the Ayatollah's money to fund the Contras. The setting up of Iraq thus would be very consistent with the goals and the character of US foreign policy in the Middle East: to control the region's states either for US oil companies or as bargaining chips in deals with other strong countries, and to profit by selling massive quantities of weapons to states that will war with or deter those states that oppose US "interests."

The problem that Armatige refers to was the fact that by 1990, the US and allied arming of Iraq had given Iraq a decisive military edge over Iran, which upset the regional "balance." The thinking among the US hawks was Iraq's military needed to somehow be returned to its 1980 level. An invasion of Kuwait would enable the US to do that.

But initially many arms suppliers opposed the war on Iraq because they had been making huge profits from arms sales to Saddam's regime during the 1980s. Indeed, one US official interviewed expressed his disappointment with Iraq's invasion and the subsequent Gulf War because the relationship with Iraq could have continued to be "very profit...uh mutually profitable."

Bush Sr. and others expected that after the war, Saddam would capitulate to US designs on the region. With a heeled Saddam, the interests of arms suppliers, defense contractors, and the many US oil corporations could be renewed. Iraqi would have to re-arm itself and invest in oil drilling and processing facilities that were destroyed by US forces. And to pay for all that, Iraq would have to sell oil cheap, which served the interests both of the giant oil corporations and the American public who had begun buying GM SUVs en masse. It would be good for US business.

The invasion today is, above all, to renew US firm's access to Iraqi oil. As reported recently in the New York Times, former CIA director R. James Woolsey, who has been one of the leading advocates of forcing Hussein from power, argues that, "It's pretty straightforward, France and Russia have oil companies and interests in Iraq. They should be told that if they are of assistance in moving Iraq toward decent government, we'll do the best we can to ensure that the new government and American companies work closely with them. If they throw in their lot with Saddam, it will be difficult to the point of impossible to persuade the new Iraqi government to work with them."

His views are of course supported by the new Iraqi government-in-waiting. Faisal Qaragholi, the "petroleum engineer who directs the London office of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), an umbrella organization of opposition groups that is backed by the United States" says that "Our oil policies should be decided by a government in Iraq elected by the people." Ahmed Chalabi, the INC leader, put it more bluntly and sadi that he favored a U.S.-led consortium to develop Iraq's oil fields, which would replace the existing agreements that Iraq has with Russia and France. "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil," Chalabi said.

Note also that Bush and company have a personal stake in unilateral action. According to Leroy Sievers and the Nightline Staff at ABC, "Dick Cheney's Halliburton Co. had interests in Iraqi oil production after the [Gulf ] war."

Thus, following the Gulf War, Cheney, Bush Sr. and others didn't expect that Saddam would refuse to abide by US interests and join the so-called "family of nations." This is really what President Bush Jr meant when he said at a cabinet meeting on Sept. 24, 2002 that he intends "to hold Saddam Hussein to account for a decade of defiance."

There is no shock about any of this, nor of the sordid assortment of officials and individuals directly or indirectly involved -- from the infamous US-based international arms dealer Sarkis Songhanalian and former Gen. Secord, to Oliver North and Richard Nixon -- and many others. They had been part of covert US arms and drug deals and Mafia dating back decades. Iraqgate was in fact also part of Irangate, and both are about a shadow government that circumvents domestic and international laws in arming regimes and terrorist organizations to enhance the profits of US businessmen and corporations.

The public learned since the mid-1980s that the shadow government folks played all sides of various wars, and made curious business alliances. Profits were good, but there were also ideological reasons. While arming Iraq and putting proceeds into their pockets, the covert operators also armed Iran. Israel of course, had also been arming Iran since the Ayatollah came into power in order to counter Iraq. The US soon joined these operations after Regan came to power.

Oliver North, Bush Sr., Robert McFarlane, and Gen. Secord, and others purchased from the CIA spare parts for US-made weapons and more than two thousand TOW missiles, which the CIA had purchased at discount rates from the Pentagon. Secord and North sold the weapons and parts to Iran in exchange for cash and the release of US hostages in Lebanon.

In public, Ronnie Reagan repeatedly condemned negotiations with terrorists in principle and even stated on national TV that there had been no negotiations with terrorists. He went back on air a few months later and said that while he still didn't believe "in his heart" that the US had negotiated with terrorists, the facts told him "otherwise." He escaped impeachment because he "couldn't remember" signing detailed instructions for sales of weapons to Iran and for the diversion of money to the Contras.

Insiders considered these trades "business as usual." Former General Secord, for instance, unashamedly told Congressional investigators during the Iran-Contra hearings that his arms-dealing firm, the "Enterprise," which sold the TOWs to other brokers and then to Iran, was a legitimate profit-making business. And as we all know, at the other end of the deal, North channeled a portion of the proceeds from those sales through Swiss banks and to the terrorist Contras in Honduras. Their job was to overthrow the Sandinista regime that overthrew the brutal 43-year Somoza family dictatorship supported by the US.

Again, in legal terms, the scandal was not only that Reagan's administration circumvented the Boland Amendment which outlawed military support to the Contras, but also that the CIA had also mined the harbors of Nicaragua. When the US was taken to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and convicted of violating international laws, President Reagan disregarded this conviction saying the ICJ had no jurisdiction over the United States.

Bush Jr. has stated the following reasons for invading Iraq, all of which are accurate except the last: (1) Iraq used chemical weapons, (2) Iraq tried to build nuclear weapons, and (3) the US tried to bring Iraq into the "family of nations" (said first by Bush Sr). He is correct that Iraq was willing to use chemical weapons and has been trying to build nuclear weapons for years. Of course, he just fails to mention that the US was willing to sell, and to help Iraq use, chemical weapons of mass destruction and that his friends profited handsomely in so doing. He also fails to note that today Hussein is not seen as an immediate threat by it's Arab neighbors, none of whom have called for his ouster, and that Iraq has only a shadow of the power it had in 1990. There is no evidence to support Bush or Blair's claims that Iraq has and is preparing to use chemical or biological weapons.

Lastly, what about Bush Jr.'s third contention, that the US had tried to bring Saddam into the "family of nations?" In view of the thousands upon thousands of women, children, and men butchered with US battle plans and arms, as well as arms from Europe, one could only characterize that family as being composed of unscrupulous, profiteering, vile accomplices to mass murder. Perhaps this is also a reason why the Bush administration opposes the formation of the World Court and needs US politicians and military personel exempt from international law.

Elson E. Boles is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Saginaw Valley State University University in Michigan.

He can be reached at: [email protected]

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:23:37 PM EDT

[#26]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Truth in advertising at least. But you can take off the quotation marks.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:25:00 PM EDT

[#27]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie If he means WMD.

We did sell Iraq a very few conventional weapons we were not even close to a major supplier for Iraq… then we sold a few to Iran as well.

Nope it’s true.

We sold some outdated TOW missiles to Iran, and they gave them to Iraq. (Course I doubt they worked very well after the Iranians flew them into Iraqi tanks.)

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:26:00 PM EDT

[#28]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Truth in advertising at least. But you can take off the quotation marks.

You guys crack me up.

None of us were there. Were we??? So when there has been a demonstrable effort by the Fed's (under D and R administrations) to hide, conceal, and cover up the TRUTH, all you guys can come up with is "No, we would NEVER do anything wrong!"

I bet you guys think your mom's were virgins when they married your dads too, huh?

Maybe she was, maybe she wasn't. But you will surely never know.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:34:29 PM EDT

[#29]

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:35:16 PM EDT

[#30]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Truth in advertising at least. But you can take off the quotation marks.

You guys crack me up.

None of us were there. Were we???

And that somehow makes you right and us wrong how exactly?

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:38:38 PM EDT

[#31]

Quoted:

And that somehow makes you right and us wrong how exactly?

He listens to Alex Jones and believes him…

…and we laugh at Alex Jones.

ETA: Give it up you cannot not reason with the irrational.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:39:07 PM EDT

[#32]

Yes...so what if we did?

You need to learn a bit about Realpolitik. Nations have been doing this since long before they were nations. Ancient city states did the same thing.

BFD.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:41:07 PM EDT

[#33]

Quoted:

And that somehow makes you right and us wrong how exactly?

Because he knows, man...

He knows...

Just like the Bush/Nazi connections!

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:45:06 PM EDT

[#34]

Quoted:

Quoted:

And that somehow makes you right and us wrong how exactly?

Because he knows, man...

He knows...

Just like the Bush/Nazi connections!

He found out by using his Little Oral Annie secret decoder ring.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:49:52 PM EDT

[#35]

Quoted:

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Educate me???

You are a fucking idiot!!!

All you are doing is saying "You are wrong" "I am sorry, you are mistaken" "You're tin foil is on too tight"

So maybe the information I find is in error, fine. Say so. SHOW ME a better source with more reliable information.

Instead, you guys are sitting there playing "My dick is bigger than yours" while I'm trying to tell you about these girls over here and find out more about them myself.

Fucking ÜberKons.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:50:50 PM EDT

[#36]

Quoted:

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Educate me???

You are a fucking idiot!!!

You know, you're right...with your attitude, only an idiot would try to educate you.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:52:56 PM EDT

[#37]

Quoted:

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Educate me???

You are a fucking idiot!!!

All you are doing is saying "You are wrong" "I am sorry, you are mistaken" "You're tin foil is on too tight"

So maybe the information I find is in error, fine. Say so. SHOW ME a better source with more reliable information.

Instead, you guys are sitting there playing "My dick is bigger than yours" while I'm trying to tell you about these girls over here and find out more about them myself.

Fucking ÜberKons.

Call me a moron, but I think he did just that with his link...

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:53:49 PM EDT

[#38]

Quoted:

You know, you're right...with your attitude, only an idiot would try to educate you.

OUCH... got himself again.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:54:18 PM EDT

[#39]

Quoted:

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Educate me???

You are a fucking idiot!!!

You know, you're right...with your attitude, only an idiot would try to educate you.

My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:56:12 PM EDT

[#40]

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

True. Since a mirror shows the opposite of reality.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

Here's a hint: an "article" that refers to President Reagan as "Ronnie Reagan" probably isn't unbiased and factual.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:57:24 PM EDT

[#41]

Quoted:

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

True. Since a mirror shows the opposite of reality.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

Here's a hint: an "article" that refers to President Reagan as "Ronnie Reagan" probably isn't unbiased and factual.

Thanks for the evade.

Again, I ask you. Please direct me to a legitimate source of information on the subject matter. Please.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:57:51 PM EDT

[#42]

Quoted:
Here's a hint: an "article" that refers to President Reagan as "Ronnie Reagan" probably isn't unbiased and factual.

LOL

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:58:56 PM EDT

[#43]

Quoted:

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

True. Since a mirror shows the opposite of reality.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

Here's a hint: an "article" that refers to President Reagan as "Ronnie Reagan" probably isn't unbiased and factual.

Thanks for the evade.

Again, I ask you. Please direct me to a legitimate source of information on the subject matter. Please.

Yet again, I think he already provided you with a link.

Posted: 12/30/2006 3:59:51 PM EDT

[#44]

Quoted:

Quoted:

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

Yes lies for the intellectually lazy.

There you go again embarrassing yourself by using a idiot and liar like Eleson Boles as a source.

This bit of fantasy by Boles has been well debunked.

home.avvanta.com/~minsq/NCArchive/00000006.htm

I am not wasting any more time trying to educate you... if you want to pass on lies then it is your choice to be a liar.

Educate me???

You are a fucking idiot!!!

You know, you're right...with your attitude, only an idiot would try to educate you.

My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

is everyone upset that saddam be hanged.. or is it just that time of the month for an abnormally large number of folks......

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:01:36 PM EDT

[#45]

Quoted:

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

True. Since a mirror shows the opposite of reality.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

Here's a hint: an "article" that refers to President Reagan as "Ronnie Reagan" probably isn't unbiased and factual.

Thanks for the evade.

Again, I ask you. Please direct me to a legitimate source of information on the subject matter. Please.

Yet again, I think he already provided you with a link.

No, he has not. Thanks.

ETA: "A link" is not sufficient. You cannot responsibly form an opinion from a single source.

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:05:19 PM EDT

[#46]

Quoted:
He does make a point.

We were friendly with Saddam until we needed his Oil.

No, we were friendly with Saddam until he turned around and bit us (attacked Kuwait)...

We didn't 'need his oil' - as the outcome of ODS was that he couldn't sell any oil...

We did need Kuwait's and Saudi's oil though, and didn't want him to have control over it...

What do you do to a dog that bites it's master?

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:11:17 PM EDT

[#47]

Quoted:

Quoted:
More than tolerated, we gave him weapons

Lie.

Yep

A stupid lie.

You guys in the Young Republican's or something???

Do you know any other lines???

Here's more "lies" for you...

October 10, 2002
Helping Iraq Kill with Chemical Weapons:
The Relevance of Yesterday's US Hypocrisy Today

by ELSON E. BOLES

You may feel disgusted by the hypocrisy of US plans to make war on Iraq and sickened at the inevitable slaughter of thousands of people. But if you could only vaguely recall the details of how deep the hypocrisy goes, then read on.

The US not only helped arm Iraq with military equipment right up to the time of the Kuwait invasion in 1989, as did Germany, Britain, France, Russia and others, but also sold and helped Iraq to integrate chemical weapons into their US-provided battle plans while fighting Iran between 1985-1988.

According to a New York Times article in August, 2002, Col. Walter P. Lang, a senior defense intelligence officer at the time, explained that D.I.A. and C.I.A. officials "were desperate to make sure that Iraq did not lose" to Iran. "The use of gas on the battlefield by the Iraqis was not a matter of deep strategic concern," he said. One veteran said, that the Pentagon "wasn't so horrified by Iraq's use of gas." "It was just another way of killing people _ whether with a bullet or phosgene, it didn't make any difference."

Now consider just how deceptive the recent comments from the White House are. In late September spokesman Ari Fleischer said that British Prime Minister Blair's dossier of evidence is "frightening in terms of Iraq's intentions and abilities to acquire weapons." A few days later, while making his case against Saddam, President Bush said "He's used poison gas on his own people." Bush deceives because he hides the fact that US officials, including his father, had no qualms about helping Saddam gas Iranians. What is truly frightening are the US policies toward Iraq, the cover ups of those policies, and the US officials who personally profit in the millions of dollars from those policies. To whatever degree Saddam is a tyrant, he would not be that without the US government.

The question is not whether Saddam is willing to use chemical or other weapons of mass destruction again. The question is whether the US is currently selling and helping countries use weapons of mass destruction.

Details about Iraq killing Iranians with US-supplied chemical and biological weapons significantly deepens our understanding of the current hypocrisy. It began with "Iraq-gate" -- when US policy makers, financiers, arms-suppliers and makers, made massive profits from sales to Iraq of myriad chemical, biological, conventional weapons, and the equipment to make nuclear weapons. Reporter Russ Baker noted, for example, that, "on July 3, 1991, the Financial Times reported that a Florida company run by an Iraqi national had produced cyanide -- some of which went to Iraq for use in chemical weapons -- and had shipped it via a CIA contractor." This was just the tip of a mountain of scandals.

A major break in uncovering Iraqgate began with a riveting 1990 Nightline episode which revealed that top officials of the Reagan administration, the State Department, the Pentagon, C.I.A., and D.I.A., collectively engaged in a massive cover up of the USS Vincennes' whereabouts and actions when it shot down an Iranian airliner in 1987 killing over 200 civilians. The "massive cover up" Koppel explained, was designed to hide the US secret war against Iran, in which, among other actions, US Special Operations troops and Navy SEALS sunk half of Iran's navy while giving battle plans and logistical information to Iraqi ground forces in a coordinated offensive.

In continuing the probe, as Koppel explained in June, 1990, "It is becoming increasingly clear that George Bush [Sr.], operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980s, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into the aggressive power that the United States ultimately had to destroy."

A PBS Frontline episode, "The Arming of Iraq" (1990) detailed much of the conventional and so-called "dual-use" weapons sold to Iraq. The public learned from other sources that at least since mid-1980s the US was selling chemical and biological material for weapons to Iraq and orchestrating private sales. These sales began soon after current Secretary of State, Donald Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad in 1985 and met with Saddam Hussein as a private businessman on behalf of the Reagan administration. In the last major battle of the Iran-Iraq war, some 65,000 Iranians were killed, many by gas.

Investigators turned up new scandals, including the involvement of Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL), the giant Italian bank, and many of the very same circles of arms suppliers, covert operators, and policy makers in and out of the US government and active in those roles for years. The National Security Council, CIA and other US agencies tacitly approved about $4 billion in unreported loans to Iraq through the giant Italian bank's Atlanta branch. Iraq, with the blessing and official approval of the US government, purchased computer controlled machine tools, computers, scientific instruments, special alloy steel and aluminum, chemicals, and other industrial goods for Iraq's missile, chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.

However, the early reports on BNL's activities and the startling revelations that the US government astonishingly knew that BNL was financing billions of dollars of purchases illegally, were rather comical in view of later revelations regarding who was involved. US government officials didn't just know and approve, but some were employees at BNL directly or indirectly. It was Representative Henry Gonzalez (D-Texas) who relentlessly brought key information into the Congressional Record (despite stern warnings by the State Department to stop his personal investigation for the sake of "national security").

Gonzalas revealed, for example, that Brent Scowcroft served as Vice Chairman of Kissinger Associates until being appointed as National Security Advisor to President Bush in January 1989. As Gonzalez reported, "Until October 4,1990, Mr. Scowcroft owned stock in approximately 40 U.S. corporations, many of which were doing busies in Iraq." Scowcroft's stock included that in Halliburton Oil, also doing business in Iraq at the time, which had also been run by current Vice President Dick Cheney for a time. Recall that this year President George Bush Sr. faced suspicion of insider trading in relation to selling his stock in Halliburton. The companies that Scowcroft owned stock in, according to Gonzalez, "received more than one out of every eight U.S. export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several of the companies were also clients of Kissinger Associates while Mr. Scowcroft was Vice Chairman of that firm." Thus, Kissinger Associates helped US companies obtain US export licenses with BNL-finance so Iraq could purchase US weapons and materials for its weapons programs.

Many US business-men and officials made handsome profits. This included Henry Kissinger, the former Secretary of State under Richard Nixon, who was an employee of BNL while BNL was simultaneously a paying client of Kissinger Associates. Gonzalez reported that Mr. Alan Stoga, a Kissinger Associates executive, met in June 1989 Mr. Saddam Hussein in Baghdad. "Many Kissinger Associates clients received US export licenses for exports to Iraq. Several were also the beneficiaries of BNL loans to Iraq," said Mr. Gonzalez. Kissinger admitted that "it is possible that somebody may have advised a client on how to get a license."

Perhaps the most bizarre revelations about the involvement of former US officials concerned a Washington-based enterprise called "Global Research" which played a middleman role in selling uniforms to Iraq. It was run by, none other than Spiro Agnew (Nixon's former VP who resigned to avoid bribery and tax evasion charges), John Mitchell (Nixon's chief of staff and Watergate organizer), and Richard Nixon himself. In the mid-1980s, more than a decade after Watergate, Nixon wrote a cozy letter to former dictator and friend Nicolae Ceausescu to close the deal. Global Research, incidentally, swindled the Iraqis, who thought they were getting US-made uniforms for desert conditions. Instead they received, and discarded, the winter uniforms from Romania.

By late 1992, the sales of chemical and biological weapons were revealed. Congressional Records of Senator Riegle's investigation of the Gulf War Syndrome show that that the US government approved sales of large varieties of chemical and biological materials to Iraq. These included anthrax, components of mustard gas, botulinum toxins (which causes paralysis of the muscles involving swallowing and is often fatal), histoplasma capsulatum (which may cause pneumonia, enlargement of the liver and spleen, anemia, acute inflammatory skin disease marked by tender red nodules), and a host of other nasty chemicals materials.

To top it all off, there is the question as to whether Iraq's invasion of Kuwait was a set up. Evidence indicates that the US knew of Iraq's plans -- after all, the military and intelligence agencies of the two countries were working very closely. Newspaper reports about the infamous meeting between then-Ambassador Glaspie and Iraq officials, and a special ABC report in the series "A Line in the Sand," indicated that, although the US officials told Iraq that it disapproved, they indicated that the US would not interfere.

Bear in mind the attitude of the US policy makers not only regarding Iraq's use of gas against Iranians, but in general. Richard Armatige, then Asst. Sec. of Defense for International Security Affairs and now Deputy Secretary of State, said with a hint of pride in his voice that the US "was playing one wolf off another wolf" in pursuing our so-called national interest. This kind of cool machismo resembled the pride that Oliver North verbalized with a grin during the Iran-Contra hearings as "a right idea" with regard to using the Ayatollah's money to fund the Contras. The setting up of Iraq thus would be very consistent with the goals and the character of US foreign policy in the Middle East: to control the region's states either for US oil companies or as bargaining chips in deals with other strong countries, and to profit by selling massive quantities of weapons to states that will war with or deter those states that oppose US "interests."

The problem that Armatige refers to was the fact that by 1990, the US and allied arming of Iraq had given Iraq a decisive military edge over Iran, which upset the regional "balance." The thinking among the US hawks was Iraq's military needed to somehow be returned to its 1980 level. An invasion of Kuwait would enable the US to do that.

But initially many arms suppliers opposed the war on Iraq because they had been making huge profits from arms sales to Saddam's regime during the 1980s. Indeed, one US official interviewed expressed his disappointment with Iraq's invasion and the subsequent Gulf War because the relationship with Iraq could have continued to be "very profit...uh mutually profitable."

Bush Sr. and others expected that after the war, Saddam would capitulate to US designs on the region. With a heeled Saddam, the interests of arms suppliers, defense contractors, and the many US oil corporations could be renewed. Iraqi would have to re-arm itself and invest in oil drilling and processing facilities that were destroyed by US forces. And to pay for all that, Iraq would have to sell oil cheap, which served the interests both of the giant oil corporations and the American public who had begun buying GM SUVs en masse. It would be good for US business.

The invasion today is, above all, to renew US firm's access to Iraqi oil. As reported recently in the New York Times, former CIA director R. James Woolsey, who has been one of the leading advocates of forcing Hussein from power, argues that, "It's pretty straightforward, France and Russia have oil companies and interests in Iraq. They should be told that if they are of assistance in moving Iraq toward decent government, we'll do the best we can to ensure that the new government and American companies work closely with them. If they throw in their lot with Saddam, it will be difficult to the point of impossible to persuade the new Iraqi government to work with them."

His views are of course supported by the new Iraqi government-in-waiting. Faisal Qaragholi, the "petroleum engineer who directs the London office of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), an umbrella organization of opposition groups that is backed by the United States" says that "Our oil policies should be decided by a government in Iraq elected by the people." Ahmed Chalabi, the INC leader, put it more bluntly and sadi that he favored a U.S.-led consortium to develop Iraq's oil fields, which would replace the existing agreements that Iraq has with Russia and France. "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil," Chalabi said.

Note also that Bush and company have a personal stake in unilateral action. According to Leroy Sievers and the Nightline Staff at ABC, "Dick Cheney's Halliburton Co. had interests in Iraqi oil production after the [Gulf ] war."

Thus, following the Gulf War, Cheney, Bush Sr. and others didn't expect that Saddam would refuse to abide by US interests and join the so-called "family of nations." This is really what President Bush Jr meant when he said at a cabinet meeting on Sept. 24, 2002 that he intends "to hold Saddam Hussein to account for a decade of defiance."

There is no shock about any of this, nor of the sordid assortment of officials and individuals directly or indirectly involved -- from the infamous US-based international arms dealer Sarkis Songhanalian and former Gen. Secord, to Oliver North and Richard Nixon -- and many others. They had been part of covert US arms and drug deals and Mafia dating back decades. Iraqgate was in fact also part of Irangate, and both are about a shadow government that circumvents domestic and international laws in arming regimes and terrorist organizations to enhance the profits of US businessmen and corporations.

The public learned since the mid-1980s that the shadow government folks played all sides of various wars, and made curious business alliances. Profits were good, but there were also ideological reasons. While arming Iraq and putting proceeds into their pockets, the covert operators also armed Iran. Israel of course, had also been arming Iran since the Ayatollah came into power in order to counter Iraq. The US soon joined these operations after Regan came to power.

Oliver North, Bush Sr., Robert McFarlane, and Gen. Secord, and others purchased from the CIA spare parts for US-made weapons and more than two thousand TOW missiles, which the CIA had purchased at discount rates from the Pentagon. Secord and North sold the weapons and parts to Iran in exchange for cash and the release of US hostages in Lebanon.

In public, Ronnie Reagan repeatedly condemned negotiations with terrorists in principle and even stated on national TV that there had been no negotiations with terrorists. He went back on air a few months later and said that while he still didn't believe "in his heart" that the US had negotiated with terrorists, the facts told him "otherwise." He escaped impeachment because he "couldn't remember" signing detailed instructions for sales of weapons to Iran and for the diversion of money to the Contras.

Insiders considered these trades "business as usual." Former General Secord, for instance, unashamedly told Congressional investigators during the Iran-Contra hearings that his arms-dealing firm, the "Enterprise," which sold the TOWs to other brokers and then to Iran, was a legitimate profit-making business. And as we all know, at the other end of the deal, North channeled a portion of the proceeds from those sales through Swiss banks and to the terrorist Contras in Honduras. Their job was to overthrow the Sandinista regime that overthrew the brutal 43-year Somoza family dictatorship supported by the US.

Again, in legal terms, the scandal was not only that Reagan's administration circumvented the Boland Amendment which outlawed military support to the Contras, but also that the CIA had also mined the harbors of Nicaragua. When the US was taken to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and convicted of violating international laws, President Reagan disregarded this conviction saying the ICJ had no jurisdiction over the United States.

Bush Jr. has stated the following reasons for invading Iraq, all of which are accurate except the last: (1) Iraq used chemical weapons, (2) Iraq tried to build nuclear weapons, and (3) the US tried to bring Iraq into the "family of nations" (said first by Bush Sr). He is correct that Iraq was willing to use chemical weapons and has been trying to build nuclear weapons for years. Of course, he just fails to mention that the US was willing to sell, and to help Iraq use, chemical weapons of mass destruction and that his friends profited handsomely in so doing. He also fails to note that today Hussein is not seen as an immediate threat by it's Arab neighbors, none of whom have called for his ouster, and that Iraq has only a shadow of the power it had in 1990. There is no evidence to support Bush or Blair's claims that Iraq has and is preparing to use chemical or biological weapons.

Lastly, what about Bush Jr.'s third contention, that the US had tried to bring Saddam into the "family of nations?" In view of the thousands upon thousands of women, children, and men butchered with US battle plans and arms, as well as arms from Europe, one could only characterize that family as being composed of unscrupulous, profiteering, vile accomplices to mass murder. Perhaps this is also a reason why the Bush administration opposes the formation of the World Court and needs US politicians and military personel exempt from international law.

Elson E. Boles is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Saginaw Valley State University University in Michigan.

He can be reached at: [email protected]

Very likely, they could be...

Where did you get that from, World Net Daily?

I note that it's not even 'viable' enough to have a Reuters or AP tagline, and we all know how truthful THEY are...

Anyone can write an article these days, and all manner of strange things can be postulated by a university professor at a state school...

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:13:06 PM EDT

[#48]

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

It takes critical reasoning skills something you seen to lack…

I will try one more time.

You make a claim that the Bush family had Nazi ties then back that up with proof from a loony tune source. I cannot prove the Bush family did not have real ties Nazi there is no logical way to prove that, you cannot prove a negative. Owing stock in a company does not make you a Nazi collaborator.

What I can do is point out your source is a well know nut something you would have know if you had bothered to do a 30 second goggle search.

You see it is not up to me to prove the Bush family did not have ties to Nazi’s it is up to you to prove they did you made the claim... and do so with reliable sources not childish nutcases.

Quite frankly it takes someone of dubious character to make that kind of charge without checking it out and verifying the information as to truth… it is inexcusable you would pass on such lies as fact.

Now I am really done with trying to educate you as I don’t want to look like a idiot by trying.

Go back to embarrassing yourself.

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:22:08 PM EDT

[#49]

Quoted:

Quoted:
My attitude? Well, my attitude in this thead simply mirrors that of others.

I ask a simple question, again.

What are some sources of information that are considered "legitmate". Where can someone who is in search of info find it?

It takes critical reasoning skills something you seen to lack…

I will try one more time.

You make a claim that the Bush family had Nazi ties then back that up with proof from a loony tune source. I cannot prove the Bush family did not have real ties Nazi there is no logical way to prove that, you cannot prove a negative. Owing stock in a company does not make you a Nazi collaborator.

What I can do is point out your source is a well know nut something you would have know if you had bothered to do a 30 second goggle search.

You see it is not up to me to prove the Bush family did not have ties to Nazi’s it is up to you to prove they did you made the claim an do so with reliable sources not childish nutcases.

Quite frankly it takes someone of dubious character to make that kind of charge without checking it out and verifying the information as to truth… it is inexcusable you would pass on such lies as fact.

Now I am really done with trying to educate you as I don’t want to look like a idiot by trying.

Go back to embarrassing yourself.

Ok, let's try this for embarrasing myself.

If you google the words "bush family nazi ties" you get 1,090,000 hits.

That's over ONE MILLION. And every one is wrong?

I have read that Prescott Bush had dealings with Nazi Germany since GHWB was President.

Here is a Fox News story regarding it... linky

Documents: Bush's Grandfather Directed Bank Tied to Man Who Funded Hitler

Friday, October 17, 2003

* E-MAIL STORY
* PRINTER FRIENDLY VERSION

WASHINGTON — President Bush's grandfather was a director of a bank seized by the federal government because of its ties to a German industrialist who helped bankroll Adolf Hitler's rise to power, government documents show.

Prescott Bush (search) was one of seven directors of Union Banking Corp. (search), a New York investment bank owned by a bank controlled by the Thyssen family, according to recently declassified National Archives documents reviewed by The Associated Press.

Fritz Thyssen (search) was an early financial supporter of Hitler, whose Nazi party Thyssen believed was preferable to communism. The documents do not show any evidence Bush directly aided that effort. His position with Union Banking never was a political issue for Bush, who was elected to the Senate from Connecticut in 1952.
Reports of Bush's involvement with the seized bank have been circulating on the Internet for years and have been reported by some mainstream media. The newly declassified documents provide additional details about the Union Banking-Thyssen connection.

Trent Duffy, a spokesman for President Bush, declined to comment.

Union Banking was owned by a Dutch bank, Bank voor Handel en Scheepvaardt N.V., which was "closely affiliated" with the German conglomerate United Steel Works, according to an Oct. 5, 1942, report from the federal Office of Alien Property Custodian. The Dutch bank and the steel firm were part of the business and financial empire of Thyssen and his brother, Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, the report said.

The 4,000 Union Banking shares owned by the Dutch bank were registered in the names of the seven U.S. directors, according a document signed by Homer Jones, chief of the division of investigation and research of the Office of Alien Property Custodian, a World War II-era agency that no longer exists.

E. Roland Harriman, the bank chairman and brother of former New York Gov. W. Averell Harriman (search), held 3,991 shares. Bush had one share.

Both Harrimans and Bush were partners in the New York investment firm of Brown Brothers, Harriman and Co., which handled the financial transactions of the bank as well as other financial dealings with several other companies linked to Bank voor Handel that were confiscated by the U.S. government during World War II.

Union Banking was seized by the government in October 1942 under the Trading with the Enemy Act (search).

No charges were brought against Union Banking's American directors. The federal government was too busy trying to fight the war, said Donald Goldstein, a professor of public and international affairs at the University of Pittsburgh.

"We did not have the resources to do these things," Goldstein said.

Fritz Thyssen broke with the Nazis in 1938 over their persecution of Catholics and Jews, and fled to Switzerland. He later was arrested and spent 1941 to 1945 in a Nazi prison. His brother lived in Switzerland from 1932 to 1947 but continued to operate businesses in Germany.

The new documents were first reported by freelance writer John Buchanan in The New Hampshire Gazette.

Of course, Fox News is a low caliber news outlet of ill repute.

Here is a tidbit fron Wikipedia regarding the matter: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush

War seizures controversy

Harriman Bank was the main Wall Street connection for German companies and the varied U.S. financial interests of Fritz Thyssen, who had been an early financial backer of the Nazi party until 1938, but who by 1939 had fled Germany and was bitterly denouncing Hitler. Business transactions for profit with Nazi Germany were not illegal when Hitler declared war on the US, but, six days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt signed the Trading With the Enemy Act after it had been made public that U.S. companies were doing business with the declared enemy of the United States. On October 20, 1942, the U.S. government ordered the seizure of Nazi German banking operations in New York City.

The Harriman business interests seized under the act in October and November 1942 included:

* Union Banking Corporation (UBC) (for Thyssen and Brown Brothers Harriman). The President of UBC at that time was George Herbert Walker, Prescott Bush's father-in-law. He is the grandfather and great-grandfather of the former and current Presidents Bush.
* Holland-American Trading Corporation (with Harriman)
* the Seamless Steel Equipment Corporation (with Harriman)
* Silesian-American Corporation (this company was partially owned by German entity; during the war the Germans tried to take the full control of Silesian-American. In response to that, American government seized German owned minority shares in the company, leaving the U.S. partners to carry on the business.)

The assets were held by the government for the duration of the war, then returned afterward. UBC was dissolved in 1951. Prescott Bush was on the board of directors of UBC and held one share in the company. For it, he was reimbursed $1,500,000. These assets were later used to launch Bush family investments in the Texas energy industry. This presupposes that Union Banking Corporation was worth $4 billion, of which almost all would have been paid to the Harrimans. Critics have addressed this claim with skepticism. [5]

Toby Rogers has claimed that Bush's connections to Silesian businesses (with Thyssen and Flick) make him complicit with the mining operations in Poland which used slave labor out of Auschwitz, where the Auschwitz concentration camp was later constructed. Allegations that Prescott Bush profited from slave labor or the Auschwitz concentration camp remain unsubstantiated.

There are unsubstantiated rumors concerning Prescott Bush's associations with the Nazi party. The Anti-Defamation League has stated, "Rumors about the alleged Nazi 'ties' of the late Prescott Bush, the grandfather of President George W. Bush, have circulated widely through the Internet in recent years. These charges are untenable and politically motivated." [2] The rumors began with extreme right-wing attacks on George H.W. Bush during his 1980 presidential run and were renewed during his 1988 run.

The New York Herald-Tribune referred to the German industrialist, Fritz Thyssen, as "Hitler's Angel" and mentioned Bush only as an employee of the investment banking firm Thyssen used in the USA. The label was ironic, since by the time the Tribune article appeared, Hitler had turned on Thyssen and imprisoned him. Reportedly, however, there has been a determined effort by Canadian bloggers, apparently connected with Lyndon LaRouche, to circulate reports that Bush himself was known as "Hitler's Angel". Bloggers from the United States recently have tried to go so far as to infer that George H. Bush was diverted to the War in the Pacific to fight the Japanese because of the close family ties to Nazi Germany. Some records in the National Archives, including the Harriman papers, document the continued relationship of Brown Brothers Harriman with Thyssen and some of his German investments up until his 1951 death.[6] Investigator John Loftus has said, "As a former federal prosecutor, I would make a case for Prescott Bush, his father-in-law (George Walker) and Averell Harriman [to be prosecuted] for giving aid and comfort to the enemy. They remained on the boards of these companies knowing that they were of financial benefit to the nation of Germany." Two former slave laborers from Poland have filed suit in London against the government of the United States and the heirs of Prescott Bush in the amount of $40 billion. A class-action lawsuit filed in the U.S. in 2001 was dismissed.[7]

Posted: 12/30/2006 4:33:57 PM EDT

[#50]

Quoted:

Ok, let's try this for embarrasing myself.

If you google the words "bush family nazi ties" you get 1,090,000 hits.

That's over ONE MILLION. And every one is wrong?

I have read that Prescott Bush had dealings with Nazi Germany since GHWB was President.

Here is a Fox News story regarding it... linky

You really are trying to look like a nutcase

Clue… try actually reading the Fox story.

Being one of seven directors controlled by the Thyssen family don’t prove much considering the story points out Fritz Thyssen broke with the Nazis in 1938 and was later jailed by them. Tell me exactly what that proves... exactly.

And wikipedia nothing damning there either.

There is NOTHING in that for the Bush family to be ashamed of.

On the other hand should be ashamed but you will not be.

ETA: I must stop myself from talking to tin foil nut cases.

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - U.S. Tolerated, Then Villified Saddam (Page 1 of 2)

General » General Discussion

Warning

Confirm Action

About AR15.COM

Stay Connected

Newsletter

Contact Us