US, the Biggest User of Chemical Weapons in History Asserts "Right To Protect" Syria | Black Agenda Report

US, the Biggest User of Chemical Weapons in History Asserts "Right To Protect" Syria

04 Sep 2013

🖨️ Print Article

A Black Agenda Radio Commentary by Bruce A. Dixon

How can the US proclamation that it intends to intervene militarily in Syria to protect civilians from chemical warfare be taken seriously, when the US has slaughtered and poisoned hundreds of thousands with chemical weapons itself, in Vietnam, Iraq and elsewhere?

US, the Biggest User of Chemical Weapons in History Asserts "Right To Protect" Syria

A Black Agenda Radio Commentary by Bruce A. Dixon

Outside the bubble of ignorance and unreality that corporate media and corporate rule impose on the US public, the world is horrified and aghast not at the alleged use of nerve gas against Syrian civilians, but at the notion that the United States claims the right to bomb Syria supposedly to “protect” its people.

From 1961 to 1972 the US military executed the biggest and deadliest chemical warfare operation in history. It was Operation Trail Dust, in which more than 20 million thousands of tons of blended dioxon and other poisons, the most famous known as Agent Orange, were sprayed across 10% of the land area of South Vietnam, along with big tracts of Laos and Cambodia.

The objective was to kill the lush triple canopy jungle in which Vietnamese fighters hid and through which they transported supplies, and to kill the animals & crops of Vietnamese peasants in areas the US and its puppets could not control, driving that population into its cities and so-called “strategic hamlets.” Many of the estimated 2 million wa r Vietnamese dead perished from the short term effects of US chemical warfare, while Vietnamese and other doctors verify that since then an estimated half million have been born with major impairments. To this day the US has never accepted any responsibility for this ghastly and ongoing atrocity.

Even if we stick only to western Asia, the US record on chemical weapons used against civilians is unprecedented.

During the 1980s Iran-Iraq war the Pentagon provided Saddam Hussein with satellite intelligence so he'd know where to fire his nerve gas at Iranian troop concentrations.

In its two Gulf Wars, the US littered Kuwait and Iraq with radioactive depleted uranium munitions which continue to poison countless civilians today. Hospitals in places like Fallujah report skyrocketing numbers of radiation-induced birth defects. And during the Obama administration the US winked at Israel's use of ghastly white phosphorus made in the USA against Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

There are treaties banning chemical weapons, but none of them authorize any nation to launch “preventive” or punitive strikes against those who do. Most Arabs, most of the world knows this history, and so do more than a few Americans, including much of the so-called left.

The foremost practicioner of chemical warfare in human history is about to bomb a country one-fifteenth its size, for its alleged use of chemical weapons. If the Bush-Cheney gang were still in power, we might see Melissa Harris-Perry and Rachel Maddow reminding us of this awful record. But there's a Democrat in the White House, so the hypocrisy detectors have been turned off and the history teachers silenced.

This is what US policy makers mean when they talk about their “right to protect” civilians in other countries.

For Black Agenda Radio I'm Bruce Dixon. Find us on the web at www.blackagendareport.com.

Bruce A. Dixon is managing editor at Black Agenda Report, and a member of the state committee of the GA Green Party. Contact him via this site's contact page, or at bruce.dixon(at)blackagendareport.com.

listen

http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20130904_bd_chemical_warfare.mp3

More Stories

Salvador Ousmane
Nigerian government unleashes massive repression after #endhunger protests
25 Sep 2024
At the beginning of August this year, tens of thousands of Nigerians rose up to denounce the government in a movement that was organised under the slogans #endbadgovernance and #endhunger. For too…
The Cradle News Desk
Israel considers plan to impose siege, expel 300,000 Palestinians from northern Gaza
25 Sep 2024
The plan is being promoted by Reserve Major General Giora Eiland, who has encouraged the spread of disease among civilians in Gaza to help Israel win the war against Hamas.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist , Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor , Garland Nixon
Hezbollah Readies War, Israel's Pager Attack Ignites Fury | Garland Nixon & Margaret Kimberley
25 Sep 2024
BAR executive Editor, Margaret Kimberley, and Garland Nixon join Danny Haiphong to break down Israel's devastating pager attack on Lebanon and what it means for the possible outbreak of war after…
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Black Agenda Radio September 20, 2024
20 Sep 2024
In this week’s segment, we learn about Aurora, Colorado, where a landlord used right-wing media to create a story of a non-existent gang crisis just as he was ordered to court to address violations…
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Dr. Butch Ware on his Green Party Vice Presidential Campaign
20 Sep 2024
Dr. Butch Ware joins us from Santa Barbara to discuss the Green Party’s campaign, why it is under a sustained attack by Democrats, and what that means for black voters.