Iran and Iraq had been in war since 1980 and Iran had used chemical weapons in the war since 1984 against enemy soldiers but in 1988 something even worse happened – chemical weapons were used against civilians. This was a difficult time for Western countries who were allies with Iraq because using chemical weapons was considered illegal by international rules but not by Iraq – and allies chose to close one eye. In this essay I am going to discuss when and where were chemical weapons used, by and against whom and how did Western countries react.
One of the darkest chapters of the war was the Al-Anfal campaign which culminated in 1988. It was a genocidal campaign against the Kurds of northern Iraq after fighting for years with the peshmerga insurgents who were fighting for their independence which was unacceptable for Iraqi leaders because Kurdish lands were very rich with oil. The most powerful man in the area was Ali Hassan al-Majid, a cousin of President Saddam Hussein who was
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Many Western countries had been backing Saddam’s Iraq during the war with arms and financing like Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands. Iraq even managed to convince the Reagan administration that Iran was behind all this but it did not take long for others to see the truth. What makes the truth even worse is that Americans provided Iraqis with intelligence about Iranian troops and their location although CIA knew Saddam’s forces were going to act with chemical weapons on it. They calculated coldly that using chemical weapons was better than Iraq losing the war to post-revolution Islamic Iran.
One of the biggest crimes against humanity of recent decades has been talked about far too little and much of that is because many Western countries were linked to it. Saddam’s Iraq used chemical weapons against Kurdish civilians during the Al-Anfal campaign and in attacking the city of Halabja killing thousands and crippling even
Weapons of mass destruction are ‘weapons that can devastate large areas and kill huge numbers of people’. There are 3 types of WMD’s; Nuclear Weapons, Biological Weapons and Chemical Weapons. In the world there are only 8 counties that own nuclear weapons and these include USA, Russia, UK, China, France, India and Pakistan and unofficially Israel. In this essay I will be looking at whether or not Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD’s) can be justified, we can link this to the just war theory. I will also be looking at the 1945 Atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima and whether or not it can be justified.
The Iranians had been claiming that Saddam was using chemical weapons against them since the beginning of the war in 1980, but these accusations were not taken seriously. After the war U.S. officials would point to 1982 as Iraq’s the initial use of chemical weapons, which would continue on throughout the war. Regrades of when they were first used however, uses of chemical weapons became more apparent and in May of 1984, the UN was forced to issue an official condemnation of their use. Officially, Ayatollah Khomeini objected to the use of chemical weapons, but there is evidence from multiple sources that’s subjects that the Iranians did retaliate in kind, just not to as great of a degree. Chemical Weapons historian Eric Croddy reported that with captured Iraqi stockpiles, “Iran began using chemical weapons ofencivly between 1984 and 1985, and went on to use indigenously produced chemical weapons, including mustard and phosphine gas, between 1987 and
Frist of all, in the Second Battle of Ypres, the Germans introduced the first use of poisonous gas. When poison gas first introduced it was a popular weapon choice and would be the weapon to change the outcome of the war. The Germans surprisingly attack the Allies, where the used lethal chloride gas against them. The gas was deadly and killed over one thousand soldiers. (1) It also allowed a significant advanced for the Germans in the war. The gas usage continued to grow throughout the war. In the end, many Allied countries started chemical weapons research. Gas warfare became common but effective actions were used to protect the troops. After World War 1, poison was use for a while but in today’s war it is no longer allowed. Instead of poisonous gas, chemical warfare is used. Chemical weapons come in a variety of forms and are used for several different techniques.
United States policy towards the Iran-Iraq war was interesting to say the least. While the United States claimed to be a neutral party, they supported Iraq for the majority of the war, supported Iran for a brief period, then went back to only supporting Iraq. Both sides committed numerous atrocities and war crimes, and for the most part received little to no American condemnation. Through this essay, I will explore the reasons for the US involvement, and their responses to a number of war crimes, particularly Iraq’s use of chemical weapons throughout the war.
Armies started to use gas in WWI. Two of the most common gases were chlorine and mustard. Many were killed using these gases. Chemical weapons were extremely effective during WWI. By the end of WWI, 1,250,000 gas casualties occurred. Of these, 91,000 were fatalities. Chemical technology continued to be used in WWII, which killed even more. It killed so many people that chemical war was banned and considered inhumane. In 1968, the Chemical Warfare Convention occurred, banning the use of gas and stockpiling chemical weapons. Even though they were banned, the early ideas of gas technology and chemical warfare were advanced and were recently used in the Middle East. Chemical weapons were used by the Syrian government against the Syrian population. This presents another example of the impact of WWI technology on modern times. Despite being widely recognized as horrific, efficient chemical weapons remain a temptation to some governments
At the beginning of World War I, the use of chemical weapons was still very much taboo. Not only did mankind have a universal aversion to the use of poison but there was also the 1899 Hague Convention Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land that prohibited "poison or poisoned weapons" as permissible in war (#Tucker, 2006).
The Iraqi War This is a discursive essay for the argument against America going to war with Iraq. In this essay, I will briefly include a summary about Iraq and go on to give evidence about previous incidents and other significant points that finally led to the war. Iraq is a dictatorship that was under the rule of the tyrant Saddam Hussein until the coalition forces invaded and toppled the Iraqi regime. Saddam Hussein officially became a dictator in the year 1979.
Some groups who use chemical and biological weapons is the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq or ISIS and other terrorist groups have carried out attacks in the middle east. According to the Syrian government the
Iraq posed a threat to Saudi Arabia, which was the world largest oil producer and exporter.(https://www.britanica.com/evem/persian-gulf-war/) The United States began building an alliance with countries against Iraq. The purpose for this was to force Iraq to leave Kuwait immediately. The U.S. and allies began to rush troops to Saudi Arabia to avoid an attack. The joining of these countries was the first part of the plan they called "Operation Desert Shield." In November of 1990, it had been authorized to use force if Iraq didn't leave Kuwait. By January, the alliance was 700,000 troops strong, 540,000 of these troops was U.S. personnel.(https://www.britanica.com/evem/persian-gulf-war/) Hussein refused to withdraw from Kuwait. On January 16, 1991, the U.S. led an aerial strike, Operation Desert Shield had began and continued on for the next several weeks.(https://www.britanica.com/evem/persian-gulf-war/) They targeted military related sites in Iraq and Kuwait. When the air strikes had ended is when the ground fighting began. It did not last long however, Iraqi soldiers either surrendered or fled within a few days and the Iraqi army was forced out of Kuwait. Military operations was
The Iraq War, better known as the Second Gulf War was the war that saw Saddam Hussain toppled from power. It began on March 20th 2003 and finished 18 December 2011. It was a huge issue at the time and the contribution of Australia to the war was highly successful and acknowledged. In 1990 Iraq invaded Kuwait, a country south east of Iraq which led to the start of the First Gulf War.
Sadam Hussein used Sarin and Mustard gas against his own Kurdish people and during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980’s (Laub, 2014, para. 23). Aum Shinrikyo carried out an attack using Sarin in 1995 (Fletcher, 2012, para. 1). Sarin was used on the Syrian people in an attack in 2013 (BBC.Com, 2013). Just this month, in the past two weeks, ISIS has become a suspect for carrying out a chemical attack against Kurdish forces (Wagner, 2015, para. 3).
The US Officials didn't need to bother about the ayatollah, the Shiite religious leader Iran, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi (Blight 55), as President Jimmy Carter said, "Iran, because of the great leadership of the shah, is an island of stability." The United States had lots of support to Iran, which were financial aid, military weapons and nuclear technologies. In return, Iran promised to the US that it would not surrender to communism (Delviscio). By contrast, US-Iraqi relations wobbled before 1979. Iraq pursued neutralism in the Cold War and displayed its anti-US tendencies. It considered the United States was complicit in its enemies in Six Day War and Kurdish rebels. Therefore, Iraq chose the Soviet Union as its ally to develop its oil capacity and military force
The justification was the need to overthrow the regime of Saddam Hussein, accused of developing weapons of mass destruction and links with Al Qaeda. Preventive action was justified by the degree of danger and unpredictability of a one-man dictatorship, with a history of aggression against neighboring countries (Iran and Kuwait), and use of chemical weapons against internal (Kurdish) and external enemies (Iran). Tests on the links with terrorism and weapons of mass destruction were upheld on intelligence reports, especially the
In 1991, a series of uprisings in Iraq turned into multiple rebellions in Northern and Southern Iraq started the “Kurdish War”. Millions of men,women and children were killed by the war. This was a genocide because this behavior resulted in torture devices, chemical
As of recent, there is an ongoing debate over the response of the Obama administration related to the events occurring in Syria and the potential violation by the Syrian government of customary international law and relevant treaties and conventions in the use of chemical weapons against its own people. The conflict itself has history which is required to be thoroughly examined before conclusions can be placed and actions are to be carried out. The Syrian Civil War has not only affected the lives of Syria’s citizens but has becoming a pressing issue in direct international relations between countries like Russia and the United States. Obama’s administration has their own response to the crisis at hand and believes that a military strike is a fully legal move to make given the situation present at hand. According to the evidence, it would seem possible that a violation has not occurred and that the threat by Obama’s administration to use force in the Syrian crisis stands on illegitimate grounds because the proceedings are done by Syrian government on their own grounds. However the atrocious actions committed by the Assad regime could in fact provide legality to military intervention by the United States. Finally, the focus will be to determine whether chemical weapons are in fact the sole factor for international intervention.