September 11, 2003
By Keith Boykin, in politics
Thursday, September 11 2003, 9:32AM
Two years after the deadly attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, it's worth considering how we got here. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, most Americans think Saddam Hussein attacked the U.S. on September 11, 2001. Since President Bush wants to keep us in the dark, let's look at U.S. history in dealing with terrorism and Iraq. The record shows that President Reagan and the first President Bush supported Saddam Hussein for more than a decade and that the second President Bush could have done more to stop the terrorist attacks.
Before Saddam Hussein
August 1953
U.S. and Britain overthrow Iranian Prime Minister Mossadegh after he attempts to nationalize a British-owned oil company. The coup restores the Shah to power.
September 11, 1973
U.S. military helps General Augusto Pinochet overthrow the government of Chilean President Salvador Allende.
January 16, 1979
Shah of Iran deposed after 25 years in power.
The Iran-Iraq War
July 16, 1979
Iraqi President Al-Bakr resigns and is succeeded by Vice-President Saddam Hussein
September 22, 1980
Iraq attacks Iran, thus beginning the 8-year Iran-Iraq war.
February 1982
Despite objections from Congress, President Reagan removes Iraq from its list of known terrorist countries and helps the Iraqis in their war against Iran.
November 1983
Secretary of State George Schultz is given intelligence reports showing that Iraqi troops are using chemical weapons against the Iranians, but a National Security Directive states that the U.S would do "whatever was necessary and legal" to prevent Iraq from losing its war with Iran.
November 26, 1983
National Security Decision Directive (NSDD) 114 on "U.S. Policy toward the Iran-Iraq War" says the U.S. priority is to project military force in the Persian Gulf and to protect oil supplies, not to protect human rights or watch for chemical weapons.
December 20, 1983
Reagan presidential envoy Donald Rumsfeld meets with Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in Baghdad.
January 20, 1984
U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz designates Iran as sponsor of international terrorism.
July 1984
CIA begins providing Iraq intelligence necessary to organize its mustard gas attacks on Iranian troops.
June 18, 1985
At a press conference, Reagan promises the U.S. will never submit to terrorists' demands.
July 18, 1985
Reagan approves a plan to sell arms to the Iranians to help win the release of hostages held in Beirut by Iranian terrorists.
March 21, 1986
U.S. refuses to sign a U.N. Security Council statement condemning Iraq's use of chemical weapons.
May 1986
The U.S. Department of Commerce begins to license 70 biological exports to Iraq, including at least 21 batches of lethal strains of anthrax.
August 27, 1986
Reagan signs an anti-terrorism law banning arms sales to countries that support terrorism.
August 1988
Iran and Iraq reach a ceasefire in their war.
U.S. Cuts Ties With Hussein
July 25, 1990
U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie meets Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein at the presidential palace in Baghdad. According to the transcript, she said: "We have no opinion on your Arab - Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait. Secretary (of State James) Baker has directed me to emphasize the instruction, first given to Iraq in the 1960s, that the Kuwait issue is not associated with America."
August 2, 1990
Saddam Hussein's Iraqi army invades Kuwait.
January 17, 1991
U.S. launches Gulf War to drive Iraq from Kuwait.
February 2, 1991
U.S. ends Gulf War as Bush announces that Kuwait has been liberated from Iraq.
June 26, 1993
Clinton launches missile attack in retaliation against Iraqi plot to assassinate President Bush.
August 20, 1998
Clinton retaliates to embassy bombings by launching attacks on terrorist camps in Afghanistan and a Sudanese chemical plant.
August 21, 1998
House Speaker Newt Gingrich quoted in Washington Post: "I think the president did exactly the right thing. By doing this we're sending the signal there are no sanctuaries for terrorists."
October 31, 1998
Iraq cuts off work by U.N. monitors.
December 16, 1998
U.S. and British planes begin 4-day bombing campaign at Iraq in response to Hussein's ouster of U.N. weapons inspectors.
Warnings Of Terror
December 20, 2000
Clinton anti-terrorism coordinator Richard Clarke presents new anti-terrorism strategy paper. The proposal is then given to the incoming Bush Administration.
February 15, 2001
Former U.S. Senators Gary Hart and Warren Rudman issue a report warning of "mass-casualty" terrorism.
April 2001
Intelligence report says that Al Qaeda is in advanced preparation for a major attack, probably against an American or Israeli target.
July 10, 2001
FBI agent Kenneth Williams sends memo warning of Arab students at Arizona flight school
August 6, 2001
President's Daily Brief (PDB) contains information on bin Laden. CIA Director George Tenet delivers report to Bush titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S."
August 16, 2001
INS arrests Zacharias Moussaoui. The arresting agent reports Moussaoui is "the type of person who could fly something into the World Trade Center."
September 10, 2001
Attorney General Ashcroft sends budget to White House with no increase in anti-terror funding.
September 11, 2001
Terrorist attacks on New York and Washington.
September 13, 2001
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich blames Clinton for the terrorist attacks: "The lesson has to be that firing a few Tomahawks, dropping a few bombs is totally inadequate."
Hussein Becomes The Enemy
January 29, 2002
In his State of the Union speech, Bush singles out North Korea, Iraq and Iran for criticism: "States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world."
August 26, 2002
Vice President Dick Cheney, discussing Iraq, declares: "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction."
September 16, 2002
Iraq agrees to allow weapons inspectors to return to the country.
October 7, 2002
President Bush says: "The Iraqi regime possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons."
January 28, 2003
In the State of the Union, Bush says "the gravest danger facing America and the world is outlaw regimes that seek and possess nuclear, chemical and biological weapons." He also misstates the truth when he utters the now infamous 16 words about Iraq: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
February 5, 2003
Secretary of State Colin Powell tells U.N. that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction.
March 17, 2003
Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, discussing Iraq, says: "I'm saddened, saddened that this president failed so miserably at diplomacy that we're now forced to war."
March 17, 2003
President Bush issues a 48 hour ultimatum for Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq to avoid war. Bush says: "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised." Bush claims: "The United Nations Security Council has not lived up to its responsibilities, so we will rise to ours."
March 18, 2003
House Speaker Dennis Hastert attacks Tom Daschle. "Those comments may not undermine the President as he leads us into war, and they may not give comfort to our adversaries, but they come mighty close."
March 19, 2003
In a speech from the floor of the U.S. Senate at 3:45 p.m., Senator Robert Byrd says: "Today I weep for my country...We cannot convince the world of the necessity of this war for one simple reason. This is a war of choice."
March 19, 2003
At 10:15 p.m., President Bush addresses the nation from the Oval Office and announces the beginning of the Iraq war: "My fellow citizens, at this hour American and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm Iraq, to free its people and to defend the world from grave danger."
April 2003
President Bush signs a $79 billion wartime budget supplement for Iraq and Afghanistan.
May 1, 2003
Bush declares major conflict over in Iraq.
July 1, 2003
President Bush challenges those tempted to attack U.S. forces in Iraq to "bring them on."
July 5, 2003
A remote-controlled blast kills seven Iraqi police recruits at their graduation ceremony in Ramadi, 60 miles west of Baghdad.
July 15, 2003
ABC World News Tonight reports frustration among U.S. troops in Iraq. "What would you say to Donald Rumsfeld if you could speak to him right now, the reporter asked. 'If he was here,' said Pfc. Jason Punyahotra, 'I would ask him why we're still here, why we've been told so many times and it's changed.' In the back of the group, Spc. Clinton Deitz put up his hand. 'If Donald Rumsfeld was here,' he said, 'I'd ask him for his resignation'."
August 19, 2003
Truck bomb at UN headquarters in Baghdad kills 22 people including U.N. envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello
August 26, 2003
Postwar U.S. military deaths in Iraq outnumber those killed in the war itself.
September 7, 2003
After months of refusing to allow the UN to play a role in Iraq, Bush reverses course and asks for UN help. Bush also asks Congress for $87 billion to fund the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
September 11, 2003
More than four months after the Iraq war ends, no weapons of mass destruction have been found.
Comments conceal
Roger Pollard
September 11 2003, 11:31AM
The weapons of mass destruction are not in Iraq. They are in North Korea. Their own government acknowledges this. But we won't go there. History has shown us that the North Koreans fight back.
Kenneth
September 11 2003, 11:42AM
To the surprise of many I have discussed Iraq with, Sadaam Hussein was once an ally of the United States. Not only was he an ally, we supported him by providing him weapons. We gave him tools to act in our best interest. Were we oblivious to the possibliltiy that our best interest would would day not be his? If I have given you a gun to shoot my enemy, I cannot very well guarantee that you'll never use it to shoot me.
The US is like a fat, spoiled kid who got punched in a dark room (9/11) and came up swinging to hit at whatever he could hit, blaming everyone in sight. I guess everyone in sight has a motive when they've all been called members of an "axis of evil" and the Devil's spawn.
Bush's sophmoric. "cowboy," arrogance was more than enough to tilt an already teetering foregn policy response from the global community. 9/11 did not come as a total suprise to me. I heard his words and felt the world's anger, resentment, and disrespect towards the US grow with each realease of "hot-air" from wind-bag Bush.
The hypocricy is that Arab imperialism is the same as Western Imperialism. All this admonishment and so-called "disdain" for Arab brutality are merely the pot calling the kettle black and rocks thrown from a glass house.
But when these billion-dollar rocks are thrown from a house in which record poverty, enemployment, health care inaccessability, tax cuts that only favor the investment portfolios of people who don't really need the money, fading civil rights, and plenty of domestic terrorists who are pissed about all of it reside, the atrocities are right here at home.
American shot-attention span and apparent forgetfulness about history have been a major factor in Bush's successful rally for support in the war. Only now, after Americans have had the last few months to come to miss thier children sent to war, and watch the case for WMD go from clear to murky, have we started to question the war. Yet, as Keith has shown above, the case for war was questionable at best, since we have failed to find WMDs or a clear link to Saddaam Hussein and Al-Qieda or September 11, 2001.
Frank Eggers
September 12 2003, 10:42PM
Keith,
I think that part of the problem is in the media. There is not enough in-depth reporting to enable people to relate current events to history and to analyse what is happening.
People in other countries are much more critical of George II than are people in the U.S. Both the English prime minister and the Australian prime minister have lost popularity because of their support for George II.
Although I think that the first war with Iraq could be justified, I thought from the very beginning that the second war with Iraq was a very serious mistake.
The U.S. is isolating itself from the rest of the world by ignoring the U.N. and world opinion. Not that the U.S. should be guided exclusively by world opinion (world opinion can be wrong), but far too often the U.S. has engaged in foreign intrique when it should not have. That is not recent. To enable construction of the Panama Canal, the U.S. caused Panama to separate from Columbia. That was in the early 1900s, and foreign adventurism began way before then. What we are seeing now is nothing new, unfortunately.
HHanna
September 18 2003, 3:08AM
President Bush just came to Office, I think former President Clinton could do more during his 8 years in the White House, but the record will show he has done very little to stop terrorism,these are times when we all should speak or write the truth because the truth will set us free.