US foreign policy towards Saddam Husseins - Essay Example

US policy on Iraq-An Analysis One of the most controversial s in the world politics is the invasion of Iraq by United s. The invasion has resulted in considerable losses to both the countries and in fact has resulted in almost complete destruction of Iraq. Under these circumstances it would be ideal to analyze the relations United States had with Iraq before the invasion throughout the history of Iraq. This is necessary to understand the genuineness of the policies of United States. The present essay is intended to analyze the policies of US for Iraq, which finally resulted in the Invasion. The consequences of the war also would be analyzed based on these policies for interpreting the invasion based on these policies. The policy of United States over Persian Gulf is centered on the oil reserves. They also wanted to protect Israel and never had any close relations with Iraq (History of Iraq: Part III US-Iraq Relations, 2003). They always viewed Iraq with a hostile eye. During the Iran-Iraq war US sided Iraq not because they had any interest in Iraq, but they were afraid of the Iranian revolution. Thus it could be seen that relation of US with Iraq was never a smooth one. As the economy of US progressed in great pace after the World War II, oil became their priority and wanted to strengthen relations with Middle East so as to protect the oil reserves. For this purpose they maintained a good relation with Iraq and even declared that the interest of Iraq is the same as that of US (Battle, 2003). But during 1950's as Iraq became friendly with Soviets, US turned against Iraq. US had good relations with other countries in Middle East like Saudi Arabia and Iran until the Iranian revolution also called Islamic revolution. This revolution by Muslims frightened US and therefore in the war that followed between Iran and Iraq, US stood with Iraq purely because they felt that Islamic revolution could pose a big danger for them. Although there were against the brutal tactics of Saddam Hussein, they did not have a choice (Background and history on Iraq, 2009). From the above facts it could be assumed that the relation that US has with Iraq was just an opportunistic one intended to get the provision of oil and they never had any common interest. Iraq started production and use of chemical weapons from early 1980's. United States was quite aware of this situation and they had even supplied raw materials for the production of the same secretly. Although almost all of the equipments, which Iraq used against Iran, were US made and were secretly shipped to Iraq by US, this fact is still regarded as a secret. Thus US played a game with Iraq by supporting it to make chemical weapons and then suddenly changed strategies against Iraq blaming them in front of the world, for production of the same weapons (Battle, 2003). This might be the reason why they were quite sure that there were chemical weapons in Iraq even when the inspectors from UN denied this fact (Background and history on Iraq, 2009). September 11 attack fuelled rivalry of US to Iraq. With this event US wanted to destruct all the forces that might poise danger for them, especially the strongest among the Muslim countries, Iraq. Several reasons had been proposed by US for its Iraq Invasion. The most important one is that US believed that Saddam, the arrogant President of Iraq, had great storage of Weapons for Mass Destruction (WMD). On their request United Nations appointed chemical weapon inspectors and Iraq co-operated with them resulting in destruction of all the weapons they had. The continued inspection by UN was denied by Iraq. But UN inspectors had already destroyed those weapons to almost nil (Background and history on Iraq, 2009). US could have believed the results of the inspection by US. But they denied believing because they wanted to destroy that country. Another reason proposed by US was that Iraq was hosting suicide bombers of Al Queida and was encouraging terrorism. But they did not have any evidence to prove so. So this claim also was baseless and was intended to gather support of the military action they were planning for Iraq (Biased media coverage causes misconception of Iraq war, 2008). The next reason, which US declared for its invasion was that the life of the citizens of Iraq was miserable and that they were denied even the human rights (Biased media coverage causes misconception of Iraq war, 2008). But the actual fact was that those people enjoyed much freedom under the rule of Saddam Hussein. They could not accept any other ruler after the war, which was backed by US. Iraqi women were well educated and they were very active in the social life. They were active even in the field of politics. This revealed the freedom enjoyed by people in that country. The government encouraged women to be in the forefront even when it is a Muslim country. But the situation after the war is quite drastic. The women were forced to stay inside the house because of the fear of sexual assault on them by militants. Basic necessities like water, sanitation and electricity are denied to a large portion of the population. Looting has become so prevalent that people are afraid to move out into the street or even run a business. This has resulted in poverty and the people of Iraq are struggling for their survival (Al-Ali, 2003). Countries round the world urged US to withdraw its military forces and to give control of the government to United Nations, so as to establish peace, but US denied. This clearly reveals the fact that United States was not worried about the human rights of people of Iraq and the reason they proposed was actually intended to blind the public from their actual motive of wiping off that nation. Another foul play United States is playing on the ground of Iraq is in the field of politics. The majority of Iraqis are Sunni Muslims who oppose the prime minister appointed by United States. They believe that the prime minister is responsible for the death of thousands of Sunni Muslims. They also believe that the prime minister wants to protect Shiites. At the same time the army commanding officer General Petreaus is against Shiites (Moran, 2007). So from this plot one could understand that the intension of United States is to divide and rule so that they could finally demolish the nation. Thus it could be seen that the US policies before war is actually affecting the perception about their role in Iraq after war. US is still pursuing their intension of completely destroying the country. There is actually no reason for their continuance there. In the year 2007, almost 50% of the parliament members of Iraq opined that United States should step back for establishing peace in the country. Most of the countries around the world gave petition to United Nations to intervene in the matter. But United States is not ready to give any attention to this request (War In Iraq: Political Challenges After The Conflict, 2003). In fact they changed their role as 'guardian militants' and are continuing their oppression. The loss to United States in the whole affair is huge. Thousands of militants died and tens of thousands got seriously injured. When America needed funds for education and healthcare, the government is spending huge amounts in Iraq, which is against the wish of average Americans (Brown, 2008). This itself reveals that the US policy in the case of Iraq invasion was without the support of even the Americans. Thus from the consequences after the war it could be taken for granted that any action or policy which do not have a right intention would fail. Thus it could be seen that US policies on Iraq were purely based on the oil reserves and they never had a good relation with Iraq. The growth of Iraq as a strong Muslim country was viewed upon as a danger to them by United States. All the policies were intended to maintain a relation with Iraq in front of the public, but at the same time there were actually working towards the destruction of the country. In fact they have actually succeeded in their intension through Iraq invasion, although they could achieve it only after suffering a considerable loss in lives as well as money. Works Cited Al-Ali, Nadje. (2003) "Women and Social Change in Iraq" [online] Available at: http://www.islamonline.net/english/In_Depth/Iraq_Aftermath/2003/11/article_04.shtml (accessed on 5th May 2009) "Background and History on Iraq" (2009) [online] Available at: http://www.workablepeace.org/main-now-IraqHistory.html (accessed on 5th May 2009) Battle, Joyce. (2003) "Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein: The U.S. Tilts toward Iraq, 1980-1984" [online] Available at: http://www.gwu.edu/nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/ (accessed on 5th May 2009) Brown, Mathew Hay (2008) "Democrats to Bush-Change on Iraq" [online] Available at: http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/04/democrats_to_bush_change_on_ir.html (accessed on 5th May 2009) "History of Iraq: Part III US-Iraq Relations" (2003) http://www.theworld.org/node/5555 (accessed on 5th May 2009) Moran, Rick. (2007) "Big Political Changes Coming to Iraq" [online] Available at: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2007/08/big_political_changes_coming_t.html (accessed on 5th May 2009) "War In Iraq: Political Challenges After The Conflict" (2003) [online] Available at: http://www.ciaonet.org/wps/icg273/ (accessed on 5th May 2009) Read More