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I believe Helga is referring to the Iraq's Faw offensive in 1988. For the last few years of the Iraq-Iran war, Iraq pretty much lost all the Iranian territory it captured in the early 80's. For most people in the middle east and for the US, the prospect of an Iraqi defeat to the Iranian "fundamentalists" was a very scary proposition. The US and the west in general conveniently ignored the fact that it was Iraq that started the war. It did not matter, afterall, secular Iraq was fighting the islamic fundamentalists in Iran. As a child growing up in Kuwait, we accepted that this was a "necessary" war. Likewise, we (and the US) did not really care that the Kurds were gassed in Halabja. Saddam was in effect given carte blanche by the world and the US to "do what was necessary" to win the war. Likewise, the gas attacks on Iran's soldiers was considered acceptable. The use of WMD and genocide was apparently acceptable so long as it was in the name of fighting fundamentalism, but can be conveniently redefined as such, some 20 years later. India which was heavily involved in setting up and training Iraq's airforce, pulled out all its staff from Iraq at the start of the war in 1979 in order to maintain its strict policy of neutrality. Several of my classmate's friends whose families were posted or due to be posted in Iraq by the Indian Air force had their Iraq assignments cancelled. Conversely, there has been much speculation that the US stepped in to provide Iraq intelligence information when things began to look bad for Iraq. In 1988, when it seemed that Iran was on the verge of capturing Iraq's Faw peninsula and thus cutting of Iraq's ocean access, the Iraqies launched a sudden surprisingly well planned counter offensive that routed the Iranians and pushed them back deep into Iranian territory. Iraq's victory was stunning. It is believed that US intelligence and satellite imagery helped Iraq win this crucial battle. Within months of this victory, Iran agreed to a cease fire. Until this defeat, Iran did not accept any ceasefire and was aiming for absolute victory and the overthrow of Saddam. US aid for Iraq in the gulf war was also prevalent in other ways. Due to the bad shape of Iraq's ports, much of Iraq's oil was implcitly re-exported via Kuwait, which in turn was secured by the US navy. The US navy's role was to protect Kuwait's tankers from Iran' navy and sea bourne mines. It is amazing how time changes alliances. Your phony friend of today become your phony enemy tomorrow, thanks to a phony war on terror. Marlon > >From: "Helga do Rosario Gomes" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > >Fred, in 2005 I am going to call you Wiki ! > >And another journalist friend (Stacey) told me that > they were mulling over > >relocating the displaced Jews to Alaska? > >Oddly, post 9/11 we used to read a lot of articles > on the role played by > >the west in bring this 'evil man' Sadaam to power > and once the NYT had a > >small article about how the CIA had supplied > satellite imagery to Sadaam > >showing the movements of the Iranian troops as they > approached and probably > >were poised to take over the small coast that Iraq > possesses. For Iraq, > >losing that would have spelt doom or so the article > said. The images gave > >him the exact location of the troops and then he > gassed them and of course > >they retreated.
