Judgment at Baghdad...American Complicity In Saddam's War Crimes

[NNN0LHI]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/thenation/20050310/cm_thenation/132252&cid=2281&ncid=1501

Everyone agrees that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and his henchmen, if tried properly, should be found guilty of crimes against humanity. But a long list of human rights groups and international law experts doubt if the tyrant and his deputies will receive the due process and fair trials promised by US and Iraqi authorities.

Legal observers are "concerned about the decision to use the death penalty, unclear rules of evidence and what they see as the accused's inadequate access to their lawyers," the Los Angeles Times wrote on Sunday. "They also see an overall lack of transparency in the proceedings and question whether the Iraqi judges have the expertise to handle such far-reaching cases." Last week insurgents assassinated a judge and lawyer for the special tribunal a day after the first charges were announced. snip

Then there's the question of US complicity. The American government supplied Saddam with landmines for his war against Iran, and American companies, with the government's approval, sold the chemical agents used against Iranian troops and Iraq's own Kurdish population. A trial under American occupation likely won't force Donald Rumsfeld to describe his meetings with Saddam in 1983 and 1984, after the US knew he was deploying chemical weapons. Or ask George Bush I why he issued a national security directive in October 1989 calling for normal diplomatic relations between the US and Iraq. Or why Colin Powell and Dick Cheney encouraged the Kurds in the North and Shiites in the South to revolt, and then did nothing when Saddam brutally suppressed the uprisings, leading to thousands of mass graves.

"We want Saddam to talk," Alan Zangaga of the US-based Kurdish Human Rights Watch told Inter Press Service. "We want to know from Saddam which weapons he used and where he got them...We need this information established in a court of law." Once public, the Kurds and other groups targeted by Saddam could sue American companies for damages, similar to how Holocaust survivors targeted Swiss banks.

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[jburton]

1. kick nt

[Octafish]

2. Henry Gonzalez PEGGED Arming Iraq to the BFEE

Then the great US Representative from Texas got sick and died -- but not before he got the TRUTH into the Congressional Record:

United States Armed Iraq through Banco Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL)

http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/congress/1992/h920428g.htm

[Octafish]

3. Ironically, the BFEE-NYT turd Saffire pegged Bush to Iraq-gate...

From the Congressional Record (public domain)...

THE ADMINISTRATION'S IRAQ GATE SCANDAL

(BY WILLIAM SAFIRE)
(Extension of Remarks - May 19, 1992)

Washington: Americans now know that the war in the Persian Gulf was brought about by a colossal foreign-policy blunder: George Bush's decision, after the Iran-Iraq war ended, to entrust regional security to Saddam Hussein.

What is not yet widely understood is how that benighted policy led to the Bush Administration's fraudulent use of public funds, its sustained deception of Congress and its obstruction of justice.

As the Saudi Ambassador, Prince Bandar, was urging Mr. Bush and Mr. Baker to buy the friendship of the Iraqi dictator in August 1989, the F.B.I. uncovered a huge scam at the Atlanta branch of the Lavoro Bank to finance the buildup of Iraq's war machine by diverting U.S.-guaranteed grain loans.

Instead of pressing the investigation or curbing the appeasement, the President turned a blind eye to lawbreaking and directed another billion dollars to Iraq. Our State and Agriculture Department's complicity in Iraq's duplicity transformed what could have been dealt with as `Saddam's Lavoro scandal' into George Bush's Iraqgate.

The first element of corruption is the wrongful application of U.S. credit guarantees. Neither the Commodity Credit Corporation nor the Export-Import Bank runs a foreign-aid program; their purpose is to stimulate U.S. exports. High-risk loan guarantees to achieve foreign-policy goals unlawful endanger that purpose.

Yet we now know that George Bush personally leaned on Ex-Im to subvert its charter--not to promote our exports but to promote relations with the dictator. And we have evidence that James Baker overrode worries in Agriculture and O.M.B. that the law was being perverted: Mr. Baker's closest aid, Robert Kimmett, wrote triumphantly, `your call to . . . Yeutter . . . paid off.' Former Agriculture Secretary Clayton Yeutter is now under White House protection.

Second element of corruption is the misleading of Congress. When the charge was made two years ago in this space that State was improperly intervening in this case, Mr. Baker's top Middle East aide denied it to Senate Foreign Relations; meanwhile, Yeutter aides deceived Senator Leahy's Agriculture Committee about the real foreign-policy purpose of the C.C.C. guarantees. To carry out Mr. Bush's infamous National Security Directive 26, lawful oversight was systematically blinded.

Third area of Iraqgate corruption is the obstruction of justice. Atlanta's assistant U.S. Attorney Gail McKenzie, long blamed here for foot-dragging, would not withhold from a grand jury what she has already told friends: that indictment of Lavoro officials was held up for nearly a year by the Bush Criminal Division. The long delay in prosecution enabled James Baker to shake credits for Saddam out of malfeasant Agriculture appointees.

When House Banking Chairman Henry Gonzalez gathered documents marked `secret' showing this pattern of corruption, he put them in the Congressional Record. Two months later, as the media awakened, Mr. Bush gave the familiar `gate' order; stonewall.

`Public disclosure of classified information harms the national security,' Attorney General William Barr instructed the House Banking Committee last week. `. . . in light of your recent disclosures, the executive branch will not provide any more classified information'--unless the wrongdoing is kept secret.

`Your threat to withhold documents,' responded Chairman Gonzalez, `has all the earmarks of a classic effort to obstruct a proper and legitimate investigation . . . none of the documents compromise, in any fashion whatsoever, the national security or intelligence sources and methods.'

Mr. Barr, in personal jeopardy, has flung down the gauntlet. Chairman Gonzalez tells me he plans to present his obstruction case this week to House Judiciary Chairman Jack Brooks, probably flanked by Representatives Charles Schumer and Barney Frank, members of both committees.

`I will recommend that Judiciary consider requiring the appointment of an independent counsel,' says Mr. Gonzalez, who has been given reason to believe that Judiciary--capable of triggering the Ethics in Government Act--will be persuaded to act.

Policy blunders are not crimes. But perverting the purpose of appropriated funds is a crime; lying to Congress compounds that crime; and obstructing justice to cover up the original crime is a criminal conspiracy.

# # #

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4278.htm

Question: Why DID Clinton let Bush go on arming Iraq? On BNL? On BCCI? On and on and on...

[FreedomAngel82]

4. I wish we could get them

So bad. *sigh* If Hussein goes down he shouldn't go down alone. Everybody knows that Bush41 gave them weapons and helped with that. Bush senior and everybody involved then should go along with him.

[Octafish]

5. Where is Rep. Henry Gonzalez when WE need him! God Bless His Soul!

From the Old DU, a contribution from the Archives:

white_rider (523 posts) Feb-27-03, 00:29 AM (ET)

Where is Rep. Henry Gonzalez when WE need him! God Bless His Soul!

Henry's article of impeachment against George I:

Quoted from:
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/Ramares010403/ramares010403.html

As Rep. Henry B. Gonzalez explained on the floor of the House in 1991, his articles charged the elder Bush with:

1) Violating the Equal Protection Clause by having minorities and poor whites, who were the majority of the soldiers in the Middle East, "fight a war for oil to preserve the lifestyles of the wealthy."

2) Violating "the Constitution, Federal law, and the UN Charter by bribing, intimidating, and threatening others, including the members of the UN Security Council, to support belligerent acts against Iraq."

3) Violating the Nuremberg principles by conspiring to engage in a massive war against Iraq that would cause tens of thousands of civilian deaths.

4) Committing "the United States to acts of war without congressional consent and contrary to the UN Charter and international law." (This refers to the lack of a formal declaration of war, as required by the Constitution).

5) Committing crimes against the peace by leading the United States into aggressive war against Iraq, in violation of Article 24 of the UN Charter, the Nuremberg Charter, other international instruments and treaties, and the Constitution of the United States.

Henry (if ya reading this): We need you NOW!!!!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/cgi-bin/duforum/duboard.cgi?az=show_thread&om=41203&forum=DCForumID60&archive=

[Wilms]

6. Kick n/t