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Politics : Foreign Policy Discussion Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: E. T. who wrote (4355)	2/19/2003 10:26:33 AM
From: zonder	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15987

If I do business with someone I know is a genocidal despot, then I support that despot. Same as France is doing NOW with its oil business You mean like US did while knowing full well that Saddam was a "genocidal despot" using chemical weapons? Officers Say U.S. Aided Iraq in War Despite Use of Gas The Pentagon "wasn't so horrified by Iraq's use of gas," said one veteran of the program. "It was just another way of killing people — whether with a bullet or phosgene, it didn't make any difference," he said. nytimes.com Thus, on Nov. 1, 1983, a senior State Department official, Jonathan T. Howe, told Secretary of State George P. Shultz that intelligence reports showed that Iraqi troops were resorting to "almost daily use of CW" against the Iranians. But the Reagan administration had already committed itself to a large-scale diplomatic and political overture to Baghdad, culminating in several visits by the president's recently appointed special envoy to the Middle East, Donald H. Rumsfeld. Secret talking points prepared for the first Rumsfeld visit to Baghdad enshrined some of the language from NSDD 114, including the statement that the United States would regard "any major reversal of Iraq's fortunes as a strategic defeat for the West." When Rumsfeld finally met with Hussein on Dec. 20, he told the Iraqi leader that Washington was ready for a resumption of full diplomatic relations, according to a State Department report of the conversation. Iraqi leaders later described themselves as "extremely pleased" with the Rumsfeld visit, which had "elevated U.S.-Iraqi relations to a new level." washingtonpost.com