Where Iraq Purchased Weapons 1973-2002
[ I told you Denmark supplied more arms to Saddam than the US did. ]
The purpose of this post is to address one of the many mythical claims about the United States popularized by some Leftists who would have us believe that the United States is the cause of most of what is wrong with the world. The myth under examination here is the claim that the United States played an important role in arming Saddam Hussein. The data comes from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in the form of a table of the value of arms imported by Iraq from 1973 through 2002. (PDF format)
Figures are trend-indicator values expressed in US $m. at constant (1990) prices.
Note: The SIPRI data on arms transfers refer to actual deliveries of major conventional weapons. To permit comparison between the data on such deliveries of different weapons and identification of general trends, SIPRI uses a trend-indicator value. The SIPRI values are therefore only an indicator of the volume of international arms transfers and not of the actual financial values of such transfers. Thus they are not comparable to economic statistics such as gross domestic product or export/import figures.
...
Imported weapons to Iraq (IRQ) in 1973-2002
| Country | $MM USD 1990 | % Total | | USSR | 25145 | 57.26 | | France | 5595 | 12.74 | | China | 5192 | 11.82 | | Czechoslovakia | 2880 | 6.56 | | Poland | 1681 | 3.83 | | Brazil | 724 | 1.65 | | Egypt | 568 | 1.29 | | Romania | 524 | 1.19 | | Denmark | 226 | 0.51 | | Libya | 200 | 0.46 | | USA | 200 | 0.46 | | South Africa | 192 | 0.44 | | Austria | 190 | 0.43 | | Switzerland | 151 | 0.34 | | Yugoslavia | 107 | 0.24 | | Germany (FRG) | 84 | 0.19 | | Italy | 84 | 0.19 | | UK | 79 | 0.18 | | Hungary | 30 | 0.07 | | Spain | 29 | 0.07 | | East Germany (GDR) | 25 | 0.06 | | Canada | 7 | 0.02 | | Jordan | 2 | 0.005 | | Total | 43915 | 100.0 |
I made my own percentage calculations. Also, the original PDF document has the amounts by year but I extracted out only the final total column. Note that post-1990 sales listed under "USSR" probably refers to Russia or perhaps Russia plus former USSR states.
Given the US's position as largest arms merchant in the world the fact that it ties Libya for 9th place with only 0.46% of Iraq's total arms imports makes it obvious that the United States was not an important source of arms for Saddam's regime, that the US didn't even seriously try to be, and that US arms sales gave the US little or no leverage over Saddam.
In a report published in 1998 Anthony Cordesman places an even lower estimate on US arms exports to Iraq. See page 22 of this PDF which shows the US selling Iraq $5 million in arms in the late 1980s. Cordesman's report has many charts which also show just how far Iraq's economy fell during the war with Iran and afterward.
- Iraq seemed to be on the edge of sustained economic development in 1979. It was a nation of 12.8 million people with a per capita income well in excess of $10,000 in constant $US 1994. However, its economy was dependent on oil wealth and construction and infrastructure oriented with massive distortions in the state and agricultural sector.
- By 1986, the worst year of the Iran-Iraq War in economic terms, Iraq’s per capita income was down to $2,174, and its population was up to 16.2 million.
- By 1991, the last year for which we have hard data on the Iraqi economy in market terms, Iraq’s per capita income was down to $705, and its population was up to 17.9 million. Iraq’s GNP in constant $1994 had dropped from $48.3 billion in 1984 to $16.3 billion.
- Iraq’s current per capita income is probably under $1,000. The World Bank estimates that its population will climb from 21.0 million in 1995 to 24.5 million in 2000, 28.4 million in 2005, and 32.5 million in 2010.
US policy in the 1980s favored a stalemate in the Iran-Iraq war. But the US role in ensuring that outcome was very small as compared to the roles played by the USSR, France, China, and other countries in making sure Saddam's regime was not overrun. What intelligence and other assistance the US provided to prevent Iranian victory pales in comparison to the roles played by several other countries.
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