International reaction to Saddam Hussein's genocide of the Kurds in Halabja

[Cantankerous]

Saddam Hussein's use of chemical weapons against Kurds in Halabja, northern Iraq, in March 1988, is well-known, yet international reaction to this horrible atrocity is little known. The US government and its intelligence agencies suggested that Iran was responsible for the deaths of Kurdish civilians in Halabja, and the Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Intelligence Agency analyst Stephen C. Pelletiere agreed with this assessment. The British government, for its part, chose to maintain dialogue with Iraq rather than hold Iraq accountable for the genocide of the Kurds in Halabja by imposing unilateral sanctions. In the meantime, the Prevention of Genocide Act was introduced in Congress with provisions to punish Saddam Hussein for the massacre by embargoing all dual-use technological exports, stopping all Export-Import bank credits, banning US imports of Iraqi oil, and mandating US opposition to any loans by the International Monetary Fund or any other multilateral financial institution. However, the Reagan administration chose not to speak out against Saddam's genocide of the Kurds and threatened to veto the bill if a vote was held on it.

Links:
https://web.archive.org/web/20140529183 ... e_1049.jsp
https://web.archive.org/web/20180406074 ... f-war.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventio ... ct_of_1988

[Linkagain]

Truer Words never been spoken.....and yet Bush uses that Bill to Justify Invading Iraq.....in 2002:

[alvabrown]

Truer Words never been spoken.....and yet Bush uses that Bill to Justify Invading Iraq.....in 2002: tunnel rush

I agree with your point, it really is.

[LineDoggie]

Truer Words never been spoken.....and yet Bush uses that Bill to Justify Invading Iraq.....in 2002:

Actually IF you are able to read, this is casus belli for Iraq war in 2003 (get your timeline correct also :roll: )


https://www.congress.gov/107/plaws/publ ... ubl243.pdf


Here's who voted in favor of it

US Senate-
https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/ ... 7#position



US House of Representatives-
https://clerk.house.gov/evs/2002/roll455.xml#Y

[ljadw]

Saddam Hussein's use of chemical weapons against Kurds in Halabja, northern Iraq, in March 1988, is well-known, yet international reaction to this horrible atrocity is little known. The US government and its intelligence agencies suggested that Iran was responsible for the deaths of Kurdish civilians in Halabja, and the Defense Intelligence Agency and Central Intelligence Agency analyst Stephen C. Pelletiere agreed with this assessment. The British government, for its part, chose to maintain dialogue with Iraq rather than hold Iraq accountable for the genocide of the Kurds in Halabja by imposing unilateral sanctions. In the meantime, the Prevention of Genocide Act was introduced in Congress with provisions to punish Saddam Hussein for the massacre by embargoing all dual-use technological exports, stopping all Export-Import bank credits, banning US imports of Iraqi oil, and mandating US opposition to any loans by the International Monetary Fund or any other multilateral financial institution. However, the Reagan administration chose not to speak out against Saddam's genocide of the Kurds and threatened to veto the bill if a vote was held on it.

Links:
https://web.archive.org/web/20140529183 ... e_1049.jsp
https://web.archive.org/web/20180406074 ... f-war.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preventio ... ct_of_1988

Some rectifications :
There was NO genocide of the Kurds, but attacks with poison gas against those Kurds who revolted against Saddam,those who did not rebel,remained safe .

[gebhk]

I'm a tad sceptical that poson gas can tell the difference between a rebelling and a non-rebelling Kurd......

[Waleed Y. Majeed]

The gas can’t but intelligence might tell which area, town, village houses most rebels. Also have in mind the kurdish people were more devided in 1988 and some of the fractions even supported the Saddam regime. Also, in March of 1988 Iraq was still at war with Iran which supported and fought with some of the rebels such as the Peshmerga.
I’m not saying it justifies what happened in any way. Just stating there’s more to it than a one-sided attack on an innocent opponent.

Waleed

[ljadw]

Neither can do classic bombs.And, if you are a non-rebelling Kurd,why do you remain in a city occupied by rebelling Kurds ?
The fact is that the bombed city was captured by the Iranians who received the aid of a Kurdish militia .The reaction of Saddam Hussein could be expected : the city was attacked with poison gas .The claim that 5000 Kurdish civilians were killed,is unproved : a lot of them ( maybe most ) were Iranian and Kurdish soldiers .
The use of poison gas in the ME did not start in 1988.Did Britain not use poison gas against the Kurds after WWI ?(Haldane ),Egypt used poison gas in Yemen . Turkey used poison gas against the Kurds,the same for Iran .The same for AQ/ ISIS and the anti Assad coalition .Britain used poison gas in Russia in 1919, Italy in Ethiopia,Spain in Morocco ,Japan in China .Libya also used poison gas .
The reaction of the West when Turkey and Assad used poison gas against the Kurds was deafening silence .

[LineDoggie]

And, if you are a non-rebelling Kurd,why do you remain in a city occupied by rebelling Kurds ?

Same reason a non nazi party member german would find it hard to flee the reich, or a French farmer from the normandy A.O. pre D-Day

Sometimes not so easy to leave an area controlled by a military force

[ljadw]

There is no proof that the rebelling Kurds prevented the other Kurds from leaving the occupied town .The town was a military target and civilians should leave military targets .And the Kurds knew it .

[NickA]

There is no proof that the rebelling Kurds prevented the other Kurds from leaving the occupied town .The town was a military target and civilians should leave military targets .And the Kurds knew it .

Where is it suggested that civilians need to leave military targets?

Would that rule have applied to Coventry? Or Kiev? Or Saigon? Or Kandahar?

Does that rule exonerate military forces from targeting civilians (neither wearing a uniform nor obviously carrying any kind of armament) while attacking a city? What if they're a resistance force, carrying weapons entirely insufficient to do any harm to the occupation force?

What happens if the attacking force declares most of the bread-winners of an entire town/city to be "Military Aged Males" (MAMS) and shoots them if they come out?

[Waleed Y. Majeed]

This is from a western point of view (mine and Danish in this case, but would probably be similar in large parts of Europe). “Yes I would leave my home in a similar situation knowing the authorities/police/army would protect my home/land/property from looting etc. Insurance/compensation if damaged… No great worries.”

Middle Eastern point of view. “How can I leave my land? It is mine and has been the family home for several generations. It’s all I have and what about my livelihood, my family. What can I pass on to my children? I can’t leave, I must stay and if it comes to it I’ll protect it with weapon in hand!”

Leaving is not a simple or easy choice in any case, but in some parts of the world it feels safer and the right choice to make.

Waleed

[ljadw]

There is no proof that the rebelling Kurds prevented the other Kurds from leaving the occupied town .The town was a military target and civilians should leave military targets .And the Kurds knew it .

Where is it suggested that civilians need to leave military targets?

Would that rule have applied to Coventry? Or Kiev? Or Saigon? Or Kandahar?

Does that rule exonerate military forces from targeting civilians (neither wearing a uniform nor obviously carrying any kind of armament) while attacking a city? What if they're a resistance force, carrying weapons entirely insufficient to do any harm to the occupation force?

What happens if the attacking force declares most of the bread-winners of an entire town/city to be "Military Aged Males" (MAMS) and shoots them if they come out?

The rule applied to Coventry, to Hiroshima, to Dresden, to the Syrian cities that were destroyed by the USAAF, to the Belgian town of Mortsel attacked in 1943 by the USAAF with 1000 civilian deaths .
There is also no proof that the Iraqi air force targeted the Kurdish civilians ,because it is almost impossible for aircraft to target civilians :the Iraqi air force targeted the city and those Kurdish fighters who fought with the Iranian army . This was a legitimate target .They knew that there were also civilians in the city and that these would also be victims, but they did not care .
About the MAMS (as in My Lai ) :how to recognize them from partisans ? They have no ID with the inscription bread-winner . ?

[Sheldrake]

Not quite the same level of gravitas as the earlier posts, but one British response was to raise money for just what Halabja needed - an adventure playground.

About ten years ago a builder was doing some work on a house we were renting. He turned out to be a scarred scotsman called Tam Carrigan. He mentioned that he wad been in Iraq working on the Halabjaplay project. I was wondering if he was telling the truth and asked if that was his real job and wasn't there for some other reason - it was in the middle of the coalition operations. He said the locals also wondered and then asked me if I knew a colonel Sanders an artillery officer. Assuring him that the only Colonel Sanders I knew of was famous for his chicken. He said that the older locals had assumed he was some sort of British agent and called him Colonel Saunders after a British agent who had lived in the area in the 1920s and was locally notorius for pretending to be an arab but clearly a Brit in disguise.

This all sounded a tall story but the Army list did indeed have a colonel McCann Sanders RA who is mentioned by Gertrude Bell as a dinner guesst in one of her letters and served as the Military attache to Persia in the 1930s before becoming the head of military intelligence in India.

Tam's stories sounded a bit tall. He claimed his scars were from his teenaged years in Glasgow street gang warfare and that he hd apent time in prisonn for bank robbery. He also claimed to have served in the French Foreign Legion. It is not uncommon to meet walts' Walter Mitty characters who claim to have served in the armed forces. Anyone claiming service in the French Foreign Legion ought to know some military French. I asked if he knew a good song about sausages. His response was that he did bit could only sing marching up and down. He then marched around my kitchen singing Voila le Boudin
https://youtu.be/QC6-AhOmnCk
I had to accept this as a pass...

and there is a playground project
http://halabjaplay.org/

[NickA]

The rule applied to Coventry, to Hiroshima, to Dresden, to the Syrian cities that were destroyed by the USAAF, to the Belgian town of Mortsel attacked in 1943 by the USAAF with 1000 civilian deaths .

What rule are we talking about?