Administration’s Aid to Iraq
The United States was doing more than providing Iraq with “a leg up” during the Iran-Iraq war; we were supporting a ruthless dictator who started the war by attacking Iran and who ignited one of the most destructive wars since World War I. Let’s not forget that over 1 million people were killed in that eight-year war, and at least twice as many more were injured or permanently displaced as a result.
However, the destruction didn’t end there. During the Gulf War Bush openly encouraged the Iraqi Shiites to rebel against Saddam, and then he abandoned them to be massacred by Iraqi troops in southern Iraq.
The Bush Administration tries to whitewash its despicable actions in the Gulf region as an attempt to stop the spread of Islamic fundamentalism, but the irony is that the same countries that supported Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war ended up going to war against Iraq, the region is now even more fertile for anti-American Islamic fundamentalists, and Saddam is still very much in power. The greater irony is that the war exposed Bush’s “new world order” as nothing more than the usual: covert actions and dirty politics.
The Desert Storm, which we once so proudly supported with our simple-minded patriotic bumper stickers and flag-waving, has turned out to be a Desert Farce.
D.C. HENDERSHOT
Irvine
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