Saddam's chemical weapons use: The world was silent.

Just in case you forget, Iraq's use of chemical weapons against its own citizens and Iran was ignored:

WORLD SILENT ON IRAQ'S CHEMICAL WAR.
Albany Times Union August 28, 1988

By Michael Reisman (Reisman teaches international law at Yale Law School.)

On Aug. 1 an independent team of experts appointed by the United Nations issued a report condemning Iraq for using chemical bombs containing mustard gas and other substances against Iran. Utilization was "repeated" and had "become more intense and frequent." ...

The evidence suggests that Iraq was losing the war that it had started against Iran until it began to use chemical weapons...

The ultimate sanction for the protocol, as for all international law, rests on the expectation that the world community will respond harshly and unequivocally to violations...

In the case of Iraq the system did not work, but not for lack of information. The United Nations on Tuesday issued another report charging Iraq with the use of mustard gas against Iranian civilians in early August. The increasing accumulation of evidence of violations, including previous U.N. reports, was printed, but without significant condemnation.

In July, Iraqi Foreign Minister Tarik Aziz said openly and without apology at a press conference in Bonn that his government was using chemical weapons. No reaction. The New York Times didn't even headline the final U.N. report; it tucked it into a story on Javier Perez de Cuellar's negotiation efforts.

The big international players who should have been shrieking were content to let Iranians suffer and Iraq benefit from the use of chemical weapons. The United States, a tacit ally of Iraq in the late stages of the war, never used its considerable influence on Baghdad, or on the Arab governments that it's financially dependent on, to stop using the weapons. Of course, there were ceremonial slaps on the wrist. In May the Security Council called for the strict observance of the protocol by both parties. The message was clear to Saddam Hussein.

The fact that Iraq has been neither condemned nor sanctioned by the international community for its use of chemical weapons has grave implications for arms control and, more generally, for the way we can expect future wars to be fought. Security specialists everywhere must conclude that adversaries will produce these weapons and use them with impunity. Hence they will insist that their governments produce and stockpile the same weapons.

Comments

[Mark Pyruz]

I remember those dark days, Cyrus. It was very dificult to obtain news related to the Iran-Iraq War. The media coverage was below minimal, making it impossible to follow on a regular basis. A more complete history of the war has only appeared in Western print over the past few years.