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Mickey Z
Cool Observer
the Department of Homeland Security.
Sunday, January 22, 2006
"We think the price is worth it"
Sir Peter Ustinov sez: “Terrorism is the war of the poor, and war is the terrorism of the rich.”
It was fifteen years ago today...
At the behest of the United States, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions on Iraq four days after its invasion of Kuwait. Journalist Thomas J. Nagy has explained how a U.S. document, dated January 22, 1991, entitled, “Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities,” details “how sanctions will prevent Iraq from supplying clean water to its citizens.”
“In cold language,” Nagy says, “the document spells out what is in store.” Clearly, the U.S. had an idea what war and sanctions could lead to. The document reads, in part: “Iraq depends on importing specialized equipment and some chemicals to purify its water supply, most of which is heavily mineralized and frequently brackish to saline. With no domestic sources of both water treatment replacement parts and some essential chemicals, Iraq will continue attempts to circumvent United Nations Sanctions to import these vital commodities. Failing to secure supplies will result in a shortage of pure drinking water for much of the population. This could lead to increased incidences, if not epidemics, of disease. Iraq will suffer increasing shortages of purified water because of the lack of required chemicals and desalination membranes. Incidences of disease, including possible epidemics, will become probable unless the population were careful to boil water.”
One year after the ostensible end of the first Gulf War, those same sanctions were killing 300 Iraqi children a day. On the May 12, 1996 edition of 60 Minutes, then U.S. Ambassador to the UN Madeleine Albright had the following exchange about the effects of U.S.-enforced sanctions on Iraq:
Leslie Stahl: “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And-and you know, is the price worth it?”
Madeleine Albright: “I think this is a very hard choice but the price—we think the price is worth it.”
Shortly afterwards, Albright was named U.S. Secretary of State.
As they say in South Florida:
Excerpted from The Seven Deadly Spins. For more about the spinning of war propaganda, please click “more” below to read, uh...well, more. So, go ahead and…
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