The Roots of the War on Terrorism:
Washington's Policies in the Middle East

excerpted from the book

State Terrorism and the United States

From Counterinsurgency to the War on Terrorism

by Frederick H. Gareau

Clarity Press, 2004, paper

p172
WASHINGTON INSTALLS AND SUPPORTS THE SHAH OF IRAN

In 1953 the CIA formulated a coup d'etat against the Mossadegh government in Iran that returned the Shah to the throne inherited from his father in 1941. The target of the communists on the left and conservative clerics on the right, the Shah had managed to survive during the rest of the forties. But in 1951 he was forced to go into exile, because of the rise to power of the popular and charismatic Mohammed Mossadegh. The most notable act of this government was the nationalization of the Anglo/Iranian Oil Co. After the 1953 coup the Shah reestablished a dictatorship that ruled the country until 1979.

p173
In 1957 Washington helped the Shah create SAVAK, the notorious security police force which silenced those who criticized the Shah or the regime. The Shah followed the trail of so many other dictators by creating a military intelligence agency. The repression was particularly brutal in the period from 1970 to 1976. He dropped any pretense of reform and adopted a policy of stifling police rule. The press was censored, people were arbitrarily arrested and harassed, and prisoners were systematically tortured.

p173
Because of its burgeoning income from petroleum sales, Iran became a special type of third world country-a rich one. By 1967 the United States terminated all economic and military aid to the country, passing all costs of its military buildup to the country itself. In 1972 President Nixon approved the sale of all types of weapons systems to the repressive regime, no matter how sophisticated the weapon, with the exception of nuclear weapons. With the huge hike in oil prices in 1973, the Shah was able to satisfy his insatiable appetite for weapons (which served in turn as a mode of transfer of Iranian oil wealth to American defense contractors). Between 1970 and 1978 he ordered $20 billion of arms from the United States.

p174
On New Year's Eve, 1978, the Shah provided a royal reception for the visiting President Carter. The President complimented the Shah with this extravagant toast:

"Iran, because of the great leadership of the Shah, is an island of stability in one of the troubled areas of the world. This is a great tribute to you and to your majesty and to your leadership and to the respect, admiration, and love which your people give to you."

One year and 15 days later, the Shah was forced into exile by a combination of religious and nationalist leaders, with the cooperation of the Iranian air force. Corruption and repression had become the defining characteristics of his regime during its last two years. The gap between the rich and the poor increased, and the Shah turned SAVAK loose on his enemies.

p174
SADDAM HUSSEIN, 1979-1990: "OUR S.O.B."

p175
Geoffrey Kemp ... head of the Middle East section of the National Security Council [in the early 1980s] explained:

"it wasn't that we wanted Iraq to win the war, we did not want Iraq to lose. We really weren't naive. We knew he was an S.O.B, but he was our S.O.B."

p177
... Iraq had become the greatest possessor and producer of chemical weapons in the third world, both in quantity and quality. Its production of these weapons began in earnest in the mid-seventies, relying mainly upon the importation of dual-use equipment from West Germany. In its 12,000-page declaration to the United Nations on December 7, 2002, Iraq detailed the history of its chemical weapons program before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. Thirty-one major foreign suppliers were identified, along with the exact amount of equipment and poison chemicals that they provided. Fourteen of the major companies were German, three each were located in Holland and Switzerland, and two each in France, Austria, and the United States. United States firms provided chemicals used in producing mustard gas and 60 tons of a chemical used for producing sarin. Sarin is an extremely toxic chemical warfare agent. Patrick L. Sloyan had already reported in Newsday in 1996, "Newsday has found that the nonprofit Rockville, Md., firm [American Type Culture Collection] made 70 government-approved shipments of anthrax and other disease-causing pathogens to Iraqi scientists between 1985 and 1989, according to congressional records." Further, ATCC "shipped 'bacillus anthracis,' twice-in May, 1986, and September, 1988. There were also two shipments of clostridium botulinum-a bacteria used to make botulinum toxin-on the same dates. The batches, frozen in tiny vials, were shipped to Baghdad's Ministry of Education .1124 United Nations weapons inspectors in Iraq in 2003 found the so-called "air force document" which indicated that the Iraq air force dropped 13,000 chemical bombs on its victims in the period from 1983 to 1988.

In March 1988 the Iraqi air force attacked the Kurdish city Halabja with mustard gas and nerve toxins. Entire families were wiped out, and the streets were littered with the corpses of men, women, and children. Other forms of life in and around the city died as well-horses, cattle, and house cats. When the world first heard of the raid, Iraqi spokesmen blamed it on Iran. Dr. Fouad Bahan, who has studied the victims, identified 250 cities and villages and 31 suspected Kurdish guerrilla bases that Iraq gassed in 1987 and 1988. Halabja was the hardest hit. According to some sources, 5,000 people were killed.

p179
The end of the first Persian Gulf war did not mean the end of Washington's support for the Saddam Hussein regime. The Bush administration continued this support until after the invasion of Kuwait. As indicated above, President Bush signed National Security Directive 26 on October 26, 1989 that defined the objectives of American policy as striving to achieve normal relations and strengthening military ties with Iraq. This explains U.S. ambassador Glaspie's interview with Saddam Hussein after American intelligence had detected Iraqi troop movements on the border with Kuwait, and after Saddam had accused Kuwait of stealing $2.4 billions in oil from his country. Glaspie was conciliatory. Impressed with Saddam's sincerity, the ambassador did not threaten war or sanctions if Iraq invaded Kuwait. She told the Iraqi dictator that her government had no opinion on such inter-Arab disputes as the Iraqi problem with Kuwait. While this interview has been widely cited as offering American approval of an Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, which Washington would subsequently use as a casus belli against Iraq as Glaspie explained later to a Congressional subcommittee, her remarks were fully in line with the existing policy of the United States. On the same day the State Department prevented the Voice of America from declaring that the United States was "strongly committed to supporting its friends in the Gulf." Six days later John Kelly, the Assistant Secretary of State for Middle Eastern Affairs, added that the United States had no formal commitment to defend Kuwait. Two days after that, on August 2, 2000, Iraq invaded Kuwait.

Iraqi forces quickly overran the tiny oil sheikdom. Attempts at mediation failed, and the Security Council authorized member states to use "all necessary means" to induce Iraq to withdraw its troops if it had not done so by January 15. The next day the second Persian Gulf war was launched in earnest. For 38 days "U.S.-led coalition forces obliterated Iraqi resistance with the most intensive bombing campaign since World War 11.1 135 an average of 2,000 sorties per day, the air armada dropped an estimated 700,000 tons of bombs on Iraq. The world was encouraged to watch this high-tech air show on TV brought to them courtesy of the United States government.

p180
The trade embargo imposed on Iraq before the second Persian Gulf war remained in force after the conflict ended. This embargo added to the suffering of the Iraqi people as they struggled to cope with the results of the war. It was not until May 20, 1996 that Saddam agreed to a program whereby Iraq was allowed to export oil in return for the importation of food, medicine, and medical equipment. Before the agreement and even after it went into effect, "hundreds of thousands of Iraqis [had] suffered from disease and malnutrition, and many [had] died from lack of proper medical treatment .

p181
WASHINGTON'S COMPLICITY IN ISRAELI STATE TERRORISM

The Partition of Palestine

At the request of Britain, a special session of the General Assembly met on April 28, 1947 to discuss and to recommend the fate of Palestine that at the time was a British mandate (a colony). The General Assembly established the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP) to investigate the conditions in the mandate and to make recommendations as to its future. After three and a half months spent conducting hearings and making field trips, the committee presented its findings and made its recommendation. Sensing that the committee would recommend the partition of the mandate, the Arab Higher Committee, which represented the Palestinian Arabs, refused to cooperate with the commission. The Palestinians opposed partition, the Jews (Zionists) supported it. The majority of the commission recommended the partition of the mandate into two states, one Jewish, the other Palestinian. To this day a Palestinian state has not been established.

p186
Washington's Support for Israel

... the diplomatic support, both inside and outside the United Nations, that Washington has given Israel. By 1989 Washington had used its veto in the Security Council 23 times to block resolutions critical of Israel. One would imagine that the special relationship between the two countries would show up in the proceedings of the United Nations. It has. In 1986 the two nations voted together 91.5 percent of the time, an extraordinary congruence surpassed only by the behavior of the now defunct Soviet bloc. Washington has almost always overlooked Israel's miserable human rights record and state terrorism committed against the Palestinians. Israeli nuclear weapons have remained a non-subject in Washington and in most of the American media.

Washington's material aid to Israel is extraordinary, especially if the postage size of the country and its small population are considered. This aid from 1948 to 1991 amounted to $53 billions, and after 1985 all of it has been gifts not loans. By 1998 this aid to Israel, both economic and military, amounted to $3 billion per year, the most given to any country. In 1978-1979 this aid represented 43 percent of all American foreign aid, and by the mid 1980's Israel was receiving an annual subsidy of $1,500 for each of its men, women, and children. Israel has also received the most sophisticated weapons from Washington, and has been beneficiary of intelligence gathered by the CIA.

p189
... Washington's support for Israel as a main reason why radical Islamists hate the United States, but clearly Washington's actions against other Muslim populations in the region-Iraqi and Iran to name only two-should also be regarded as part of this grievance. This support for Israel seems to have no limits, running the gamut from the diplomatic, to the economic and the military, including the protective silence shielding the Israeli nuclear arsenal. These Islamists recognize that the United States is the chief accomplice to Israeli state terrorism. It follows that a major way to reduce this hatred, and with it terrorism, is to stop filling this role...

If Washington is truly interested in eliminating weapons of mass destruction from the Middle East, it should insist that Israel disband its nuclear weapons program and destroy these weapons and other weapons of mass destruction. It should insist that Israel sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and carry out its provisions. This has been a demand of the Arab League, but Israel has ignored it. The fact that Israel has nuclear weapons and perhaps other weapons of mass destruction is the incentive for the Arab countries in the region to develop them to protect themselves. The desire to protect one's country against a possessing enemy has been the chief motive for the spread of these weapons in the post-World War II period. Even the motive of the first possessor, the United States, was similarly grounded. The Roosevelt administration launched a crash program to develop them, based on intelligence reports that Berlin had a nuclear program. The antagonism of the Cold War led Moscow, London, Paris, and Beijing to launch their own programs. India developed the bomb, leading its major antagonist Pakistan to do so also. One can understand why Syria, Iran, and other states in the Middle East might be similarly motivated by the threat from Israel.

State Terrorism and the United States

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