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Reading through some notes of Dr James Thring I found a reference to the US
Army College and a report it made into the gassing at Halabja, and
remembered the question to CASI of Ahmed M. Jiyad. A search via Google came
up with a number of references of which the following were the most
informative. Has anyone actually seen a copy of the mentioned source, Iraqi
Power & US Security in the Middle East, US Army War College, February
1990?
Neil Sammonds
Mariam Appeal
Re: question re halabja and the UN Security Council, Ahmed M. Jiyad
1) Newsweek and David Ignatius
"In April, 1990, Congress voted to impose economic sanctions on Iraq,
largely because of Saddam's supposed chemical attack on the Kurds in Halabja
the previous month, despite a U.S. Army War College report that Iran was
more likely responsible for this attack and that sanctions against Iraq
would be a provocative and dangerous mistake."
http://www.geocities.com/mdmorrissey/saddam1.htm
2) Joe Vialls
"The most memorable (and successful) of the ploys used was to turn President
Hussein into the man who `gassed his own Kurds' at Halabja. The same
devastating images of dead women and children lying in the streets were
shown thousands of times on all western television channels, placing
President Hussein well beyond western `rehabilitation' under any
circumstances.
Unfortunately the entire exercise was a complete lie. The CIA knew
very well that a February 1990 US Army War College report concluded Iraq was
not responsible for the Halabja attack, stating it was the Iranian
bombardment that had actually killed the Kurds.' The War College findings
were hardly surprising: the Kurdish people of Halabja were killed by a war
gas known as "Phosgene" used by the Iranians but not the Iraqis. Though Iraq
did use war gas on the battlefield it was "Mustard", an entirely different
chemical which causes death in a visibly different way, enabling US Army
chemical warfare experts to easily identify the attack as Iranian in
origin."
http://crude.homestead.com/
reference to Halabja, Gas Attack. Iraqi Power & US Security in the Middle
East, US Army War College, February 1990. New York Times, Wines,
M, 28 April 1991, p.13.
3) Serge Thion The World as a Magical Gas Chamber
It is consequently not a waste of time to recall a study which was
declassified and made public during the summer of 1990, entitled "Iraqi
power and US Security in the Middle East", and written before the invasion
of Kuwait, in which three analysts of the US Army War College examined very
closely the behaviour of the Iraqi army during the hostilities with Iran.
They wrote: "The statements according to which they [the Iraqis] won simply
by using large quantities of chemical weapons are baseless." As concerns the
use of gas against the Kurds during the same period, the authors concluded:
"Having taken into consideration all the facts which are at our disposal, we
judge it impossible to confirm the declaration by the State Department that
gas was used in this case." And they added: "To begin with, no victim has
ever been brought forth." All this can be found in the International Herald
Tribune, 19 December 1990.
http://codoh.com/newsdesk/990111.html
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