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It seems as though the Iranian government is certain about the damning evidence that confirms the Syrian regime’s use of chemical weapons. This causes an ethical dilemma for the Islamic Republic, including in how it presents the case to its citizens. Turning a blind eye to this information would also undermine the decades-long attempts by the Iranian government to punish those responsible for targeting citizens with a similar campaign during the Iran-Iraq war, using internationally banned chemical weapons. Iranian records indicate that the Iranian government is seeking to prosecute 400 international companies accused of providing assistance in the field of chemical weapons to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime (Al Jazeera Net, 2007).
Alsmadi, Fatima. “On Syria: Has Iran Begun to Back Down?” World Affairs, September 4, 2013.
His breath was loud and hard, his mouth open wide as he struggled to force air into his lungs. ”I am,” said Muhammad Moussavi, a ”living martyr.”
Almost 15 years after Iran’s war with Iraq ended, Mr. Moussavi and thousands of others like him are painful reminders of the long-lasting effect of Iraq’s use of chemical weapons in that eight-year conflict.
Reagan was wrong!
Bush was too.
In part.
And the reason why is in the reaping today: “By any means necessary,” is not only never necessary — for whatever it may be, there are plenty of means limited only by imagination, perhaps, and a little money: on this, in fact, on might at last take a lesson from the Mujaheddin — but the lapse of ethical and moral investment in choice, even in war, perhaps especially in war, provides The Enemy opportunity for smug one-upmanship the next historic day.
In this way, the pot rightly calls the kettle black.
In the course of Iran’s brutal eight-year war with Iraq, it turns out President Reagan knowingly shipped dual use “poisonous chemicals and deadly biological viruses” — including anthrax and bubonic plague — to Saddam Hussein.
When in 1988, Hussein gassed Kurdish forces, the White House, by comparison with the same today, seemed . . . complacent.
This line of rant gets a bump with George W. Bush’s poker-faced claim about Saddam Hussein’s nuclear WMD capability, a claim helped along, actually, by Saddam’s own belligerent deflections of UN inspections.
Nonetheless, Iraq didn’t have those goods, and Bush, the CIA, Colin Powell, and the United States of America not only lost some integrity in the matter but took on the mantle its idiot enemies — far worse, as such tykes go — would give it: i.e., a big, clumsy, lumbering imperial power.
Of course, he who points that finger — or those who point it most often — should point it back at himself (themselves).
Moreover, such American misdeeds in still recent history may be mightily overshadowed by presence and depth of evil involved. Truly, Saddam Hussein was not such a nice guy.
* * *
In the headlines as I type:
BBC News – Tony Blair: Iraq War made UK ‘hesitant’ over Syria intervention
The Iraq Hangover: Lawmakers Who Backed War Now Skittish On Syria
Evidently, while flinging spittle at the Zionist Entity for the cause of entertaining its ignorant masses, Iran has a serious (gasp!) ethical dilemma going with Syria’s use of chemical weapons.
No problem.
Then noted by Fatima Alsmadi in the above cited World Affairs piece: “The Martyr Foundation claims that 100,000 people in Iran were injured as a result of exposure to chemical gases during that war.”
If there’s a real basis for justice in the world, it may not be in what some (or one) may think God told them.
It may reside in this one fragment of thought indicating a glimmer of appreciation and consideration for others as well as one’s self: “Because it could happen to you.”
Updates
9/8/2013
At the German Bundestag Parliament in Bonn, then- German opposition leader Rudolf Dessler told CNN radio that German firms circumvented the ban on Germany exporting such lethal substances through a loophole allowed German firms to establish subsidiaries in the US, in an arrangement that operated with the full consent of the German government.
These firms worked on contractual arrangements with clearance and confidentiality agreements signed with the US Department of Defense.
The truth always comes out, always makes sense or, technically, proves robust, fitting ever more tightly with other pieces of knowledge.
Kenneth R. Timmerman – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
From 1987 to 1993, Timmerman published the Middle East Defense News and was international correspondent for Defense Electronics. He also wrote monographs for the Simon Wiesenthal Center on efforts by Iraq , Syria and Libya to acquire weapons of mass destruction.
Iran, Syria and Libya Amassing Huge Arsenals, New Report Says | Jewish Telegraphic Agency 8/2/1992:
Named in the current report are 300 firms in 36 countries, which have supplied Iran, Syria and Libya with “dual-use” technology — materiel and equipment ostensibly for civilian uses but easily diverted to military purposes.
Germany led the list with 100 companies, followed by the United States, France and Britain. Timmerman noted, however, that Germany has recently enacted tough new laws to “prevent German companies from creating another Iraq.”
Additional Reference
Other Fast Reference
Keep Us in the Loop – By Jeffrey Lewis | Foreign Policy:
What the United States has not done is provide the evidence itself — the satellite images, communications intercepts, and other data that would allow a fair-minded observer to reach the same conclusion on more than blind faith in the competence and integrity of our political leaders and intelligence services.
Behind the walls of Iran’s Evin Prison | World | DW.DE | 27.05.2013
Iran–Iraq War – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Anne Applebaum: Syria and Obama’s mixed messages – The Washington Post 9/4/2013
Obituary: Saddam Hussein | World news | theguardian.com
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