US equipped Saddam with chemical arms in Iran war

US equipped Saddam with chemical arms in Iran war
Fri Sep 13, 2013 21:11:42

A retired US military officer says Washington provided chemical and biological weapons to executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein during the eight-year war against Iran.

In an interview with Voice of Russia published on Thursday, Karen Kwiantowski elaborated on America’s use of chemical weapons, saying that Washington gave Saddam Hussein chemical weapons to to be used against Iran during the eight-year Iraqi imposed war on the Islamic Republic of Iran in the 1980s.

“So, yeah, we've done it. It's old news how we took sides in the Iraq-Iran war ...we did provide chemical weapons and biological weapons to Saddam Hussein as he was fighting in that long war with Iran. And we did this, it's been well publicized,” she said.

According to a recent report published by the Foreign Policy magazine in late August, the Iraqi military attacked Iran several times during the eight-year war using mustard gas and lethal nerve agent of sarin, with the help of satellite imagery, maps and other intelligence provided by the US government.

The report also revealed that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agents conveyed the location of the Iranian troops to Iraq, fully aware that Saddam’s military would attack with chemical arms.

According to reports, the use of chemical weapons by Iraq has incurred over 100,000 casualties on the Iranian side, with many others dying as a result of the chemicals on a daily basis. Around 20,000 soldiers were killed instantly by nerve gas.

Kwiatkowski went on to say that the US will not renounce the use of cluster bombs, which could disperse chemical weapons, despite their known dangerous impacts on civilians.

“We will not swear off cluster bombs, we use cluster bombs, and, of course, they have terrible impact on non-combatants, they are dangerous for many, many years even after we've launched them,” she said.

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