Pot kettle black
“The United States finds the present Iranian regime’s intransigent refusal to deviate from its avowed objective of eliminating the legitimate government of neighboring Iraq to be inconsistent with the accepted norms of behavior among nations and the moral and religious basis which it claims.”
The above quote comes from a 1984 US condemnation of chemical weapons use in the Iran-Iraq war, in response to the Ayatollah Khomeini’s refusal to agree to end hostilities until Saddam Hussein was ejected from power.
The National Security Archive at George Washington University has a series of declassified US documents detailing America’s embrace of Saddam Hussein in the early 1980’s.
The documents show that during this period of renewed U.S. support for Saddam, he had invaded his neighbor (Iran), had long-range nuclear aspirations that would “probably” include “an eventual nuclear weapon capability,” harbored known terrorists in Baghdad, abused the human rights of his citizens, and possessed and used chemical weapons on Iranians and his own people. The U.S. response was to renew ties, to provide intelligence and aid to ensure Iraq would not be defeated by Iran, and to send a high-level presidential envoy named Donald Rumsfeld to shake hands with Saddam (20 December 1983).
Above: Donald Rumsfeld has to be physically restrained from attacking Saddam after hearing of his use of weapons of mass destruction in 1983.
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