Within two weeks every major city in Southern Iraq was controlled by Shiite rebels, while Kurdish fighters captured all but one city in the north. As Saddam's regime appeared ready to fall, The United States suddenly withdrew support for the rebellion. On March 6, the US State Department issued the following statement:
"We don't think that outside powers should be interfering in the internal affairs of Iraq." The truth was, the United States wanted Saddam's regime to survive as a bulwark against Iran. So the US ignored all pleas for help from the rebels, and turned a blind eye as Saddam ruthlessly put down the insurrection.
Most of Saddam's elite Republican Guard formations survived the war. These loyal units, backed by helicopter gunships, began indiscriminately slaughtering insurgents and civilians in contested areas. An estimated 100,000 Shias and Kurds were killed, while the United States, with an army of a half million men on the Kuwaiti border, did nothing.
George Bush the Second 's invasion has killed at least another half million people. The United States did not invade Iraq to liberate the country or even to topple Saddam. We have illegally occupied Iraq for the same reason we've carried out all our machinations in the Middle East, to control the oil.
The nation of Iraq was a modern fiction, created after World War One when the colonial powers divided up the Middle East. The US occupation created an insurgency that pitted Sunnis against Shias. The ensuing civil war and ethnic cleansing have finally destroyed Iraq.
Iranians, and the Shia Muslims of Iraq are actually one people, Persians. Many of them hate the United States of America, and they have every right to. They have endured non stop oppression, war, and poverty since we betrayed their democracy in 1953.
And what exactly has Iran ever done to us?
It's true the hostage crisis was sweet revenge for the Iranian people. One of the hostage-takers proclaimed to the chief US diplomat held at the embassy: "You have no right to complain, because you took our whole country hostage in 1953.� �� �
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