[Peace-discuss] iraq sanctions

[E. Wayne Johnson]

(See main article below.)

Lesley Stahl:  "We have heard that half a million children have died. I 
mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the 
price worth it?"

Madeline (Bad Hat) Albright:  "We think the price is worth it."

*

 From Wikipaedia -
Estimates of excess deaths during [Iraq] sanctions vary depending on the 
source. The estimates vary ^[24] 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-unicef99-23> 
^[30] 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-atrocities1997-29> due 
to differences in methodologies, and specific time-frames covered.^[31] 
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-30> A short 
listing of estimates follows:

    * Unicef <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicef>: 500,000 children
      (including sanctions, collateral effects of war). "[As of 1999]
      [c]hildren under 5 years of age are dying at more than twice the
      rate they were ten years ago."^[24]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-unicef99-23> ^[32]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-31>
    * Former U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq Denis Halliday
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denis_Halliday>: "Two hundred
      thirty-nine thousand children 5 years old and under" as of
      1998.^[6]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-Michael_Powell_1998-5>

    * Iraqi Baathist <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baathist> government:
      1.5 million.^[22]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-Welch2002-21>
    * Iraqi Cultural Minister Hammadi: 1.7 million (includes sanctions,
      bombs and other weapons, depleted uranium poisoning) ^[33]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-32>
    * "probably ... 170,000 children", Project on Defense Alternatives,
      "The Wages of War", 20. October 2003^[34]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-33>
    * 350,000 excess deaths among children "even using conservative
      estimates", Slate Explainer, "Are 1 Million Children Dying in
      Iraq?", 9. October 2001.^[35]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-34>
    * "Richard Garfield
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Garfield_%28nursing_professor%29>,
      a Columbia University
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbia_University> nursing
      professor ... cited the figures 345,000-530,000 for the entire
      1990-2002 period"^[36]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-ds03-35>
      for sanctions-related excess deaths.^[37]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-NP02-36>
    * Zaidi, S. and Fawzi, M. C. S., The Lancet
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lancet> (1995, estimate
      withdrawn in 1997):567,000 children.^[9]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-Spagat-8>
    * Editor (then "associate editor and media columnist") Matt Welch
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matt_Welch>,^[38]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-37> Reason
      Magazine <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reason_Magazine>, 2002: "It
      seems awfully hard not to conclude that the embargo on Iraq has
      ... contributed to more than 100,000 deaths since 1990."^[22]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-Welch2002-21>
      ^[37] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-NP02-36>
    * Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramsey_Clark>: 1.5 million (includes
      sanctions, bombs and other weapons, depleted uranium
      poisoning).^[39]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-38>
    * British Member of Parliament George Galloway
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Galloway>: "a million Iraqis,
      most of them children."^[40]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-39>
    * Economist Michael Spagat: "very likely to be [less than] than half
      a million children."^[9]
      <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_sanctions#cite_note-Spagat-8>


*
U.S. responsible for human toll of Iraq sanctions

JOY GORDON | Fairfield University philosophy professor | Posted: 
Wednesday, December 22, 2010 9:00 am

http://host.madison.com/ct/news/opinion/column/article_444bba62-911a-58a4-b9b6-3c7caa21027d.html*
*

Last week the U.N. Security Council voted to lift the sanctions that it 
imposed on Iraq 20 years ago. Vice President Joe Biden hailed the 
occasion as "an end to the burdensome remnants of the dark era of Saddam 
Hussein."

What he did not say was that the sanctions were more than burdensome. 
They triggered a humanitarian crisis that resulted in the deaths of 
hundreds of thousands of children, and the collapse of every system 
necessary to sustain human life in a modern society. And he certainly 
did not mention that among all the nations on the Security Council, it 
was the U.S. -- and the U.S. alone -- that ensured that this human 
damage would be massive and indiscriminate.

All of this took place within an obscure committee of the Security 
Council, known as the 661 Committee. Few have heard of it. But it was 
this committee that determined whether Iraqis would have clean water, 
electricity in their homes, or fuel for cars and trucks.

It was a committee that met behind closed doors, and never made its 
records public. Within it, the U.S. had a unique role. As the 
humanitarian situation in Iraq deteriorated, support for the sanctions 
on the Security Council began to erode. When other members of the 
council sought to allow critical humanitarian goods into Iraq, the U.S. 
vetoed them. For the first eight months of the sanctions, the U.S. would 
not even allow Iraq to import food. Once the committee decided to allow 
food, the U.S. then objected to trucks needed to deliver food and other 
goods, as well as irrigation equipment to increase agriculture.

The U.S. policies were extreme and relentless. The U.S. blocked 
refrigeration for medicines, on the grounds that refrigerators might be 
used to store agents for biological weapons. The U.S. blocked things as 
innocuous as plywood, fabric, glue and glass on the grounds that they 
were "inputs to industry," which might be used to rebuild Iraq's military.

The U.S. blocked child vaccines and yogurt-making equipment on the 
grounds that the Iraqi government might use them to make weapons of mass 
destruction. When Iraq tried to increase the number of small animals for 
meat, cheese and milk, the U.S. blocked goat and sheep vaccines, 
claiming that Iraq might use them as biological weapons.

The U.S. prevented Iraq from importing water tankers during a period of 
drought, while there were epidemic levels of sickness from drinking 
water unfit for human consumption. And water pipes for irrigation. And 
light switches, and telephones, and ambulance radios, and fire trucks, 
claiming that they might be used by Iraq's military.

At one point, a U.S. official came before the 661 Committee with a vial 
of cat litter, and informed the members, in all seriousness: "This could 
be used to stabilize anthrax."

No one else found the U.S. justifications to be plausible. UNMOVIC, the 
U.N.'s weapons inspectors, disputed many of the U.S. justifications for 
blocking humanitarian goods. Even Britain, the U.S.' closest ally on the 
Security Council, did not share the views of the U.S. Still, the U.S. 
rarely relented.

The U.S. insisted that these policies were aimed at Saddam Hussein. But 
it was obvious that they had little to do with him. Iraq's political and 
military leadership, and the wealthy elite, were insulated from the 
hardship. But the population as a whole was not.

To destroy a country's infrastructure, to reduce a nation to a 
pre-industrial condition and then keep it in that state, means precisely 
that it will be unfit to sustain human life. The reports of U.N. 
agencies and international organizations such as the Red Cross ensured 
that U.S. officials knew, with certainty, exactly what harm was being 
caused by U.S. policies.

While Vice President Biden tells the world that the end of the sanctions 
means that Iraq can now move forward to a bright future, what he does 
not say is that in fact there was damage that was irreversible, 
including child deaths and stunted growth from years of malnutrition. 
What he also does not say is that the rest of the damage -- the collapse 
of the infrastructure, the terrible deterioration in industry, 
agriculture, electricity, health and education -- was not just due to 
Saddam Hussein's indifference. However much harm Saddam did to the Iraqi 
people, the U.S., for over a decade, made it far, far worse.

/Joy Gordon, Ph.D., is a philosophy professor at Fairfield University. 
She is the author of "Invisible War: The United States and the Iraq 
Sanctions" (Harvard University Press)./

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.chambana.net/pipermail/peace-discuss/attachments/20101228/10db1f69/attachment.html>