Why did the US government chose to depose Hussein?

[lfairban]

For some reason I have this compulsion to find out the reason or reasons why we got into the war in Iraq and why we are still stuck there. Not the justifications that were given to the public, but the real reasons. The more I think about it the less simple I believe it is.

1) Oil. Keeping gasoline prices low can help insure politicians get re-elected. Geo-political considerations compel the US to control the supply of a vast quantity of low sulfur crude oil.

2) Saddam Hussein's Scud missile attacks on Israel during the Persian Gulf war and his anti-Israel rhetoric.

3) Saudi Arabia's interest in preserving the balance of power in Iraq between the Sunni and Shiite factions. The most recent episode of "Washington Week" clarified this issue.

There is probably a lot more such as the enrichment of Halliburton or military contractors, but I have been contemplating the triangulation of these three aspects as the best explanation of the governments actions since I saw WWR last night.

I don't think there is much argument that the administration is closely aligned with both Israel and Saudi Arabia. Thus their strategy from the beginning was to remove Saddam Hussein (2), gain control of the oil (1), and install a pro-American government that would retain the balance of power (3). After this was accomplished, they planned to move on to the next country, Iran. With child like naivete, they believed that this could be accomplished in a few months.

To oversimplify, we got into this mess to pander to the Israelis, and now we can't leave because a Sunni massacre by the Shiites would upset the Saudis.

Does this make sense or am I way off base here?

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. One other point

I believe Saddam was ready to trade his oil in Euros rather than dollars. I believe this was a major factor in going to war to topple him. I think what it did was make more oil producers decide to go with the Euro rather than the dollar. In other words, they were hoist with their own petard.

[Bitwit1234]

2. You know it is oil

because the major US oil companies are in the process of finalizing the contracts to deliver Iraqi oil.

[Esra Star]

3. The main question I have is:- Why did they keep him alive?

It would have been very easy to find a reason to terminate when they found him.
Is he being kept alive as some sort of insurance?
and the big question.... Is he the only person who can stabilise Iraq in the forseeable future?
Just thinking out loud.

[Union Thug]

4. dollars vs. euros, control of resources, n/t

[peacetalksforall]

5. OIL!. ISRAEL!. Water. Bases. Euro. The entire Middle East. .And mostly

all imaginable and manageable opportunities to make money for corporate friends. Grand theft of billions. Then, you can add test new toys, test new war theories, give soldiers live practice. Provide Jr with a legacy. Use terror to create fear and advance agenda of war to control us by spying on us and making us poor from the debt. Advance right wing nominees for key control purposes. Population control for known environmentnal dangers. Delay the need to restrict corporations from pollution.

Evrything coming out of their mouths is rhetoric - empty stinking lying rhetoric. You can take that to the bank.

[stillcool]

6. One of my favorite articles on why...

our government does the things it does...

A Timeline of CIA Atrocities
By Steve Kangas
The following timeline describes just a few of the hundreds of atrocities and crimes committed by the CIA. (1)
CIA operations follow the same recurring script. First, American business interests abroad are threatened by a popular or democratically elected leader. The people support their leader because he intends to conduct land reform, strengthen unions, redistribute wealth, nationalize foreign-owned industry, and regulate business to protect workers, consumers and the environment. So, on behalf of American business, and often with their help, the CIA mobilizes the opposition. First it identifies right-wing groups within the country (usually the military), and offers them a deal: "We'll put you in power if you maintain a favorable business climate for us." The Agency then hires, trains and works with them to overthrow the existing government (usually a democracy). It uses every trick in the book: propaganda, stuffed ballot boxes, purchased elections, extortion, blackmail, sexual intrigue, false stories about opponents in the local media, infiltration and disruption of opposing political parties, kidnapping, beating, torture, intimidation, economic sabotage, death squads and even assassination. These efforts culminate in a military coup, which installs a right-wing dictator. The CIA trains the dictator’s security apparatus to crack down on the traditional enemies of big business, using interrogation, torture and murder. The victims are said to be "communists," but almost always they are just peasants, liberals, moderates, labor union leaders, political opponents and advocates of free speech and democracy. Widespread human rights abuses follow.

This scenario has been repeated so many times that the CIA actually teaches it in a special school, the notorious "School of the Americas." (It opened in Panama but later moved to Fort Benning, Georgia.) Critics have nicknamed it the "School of the Dictators" and "School of the Assassins." Here, the CIA trains Latin American military officers how to conduct coups, including the use of interrogation, torture and murder.

The Association for Responsible Dissent estimates that by 1987, 6 million people had died as a result of CIA covert operations. (2) Former State Department official William Blum correctly calls this an "American Holocaust.
"http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/CIAtimeline.html

My very favorite place to find info on global issues is here:
http://www.globalpolicy.org/
and here are some favorites...check out the dates on these articles...

Uncle Sam's Crude Solution: Our Expensive,
Deadly Role as Global Oil Police
By James Ridgeway
Village Voice
October 23, 2002

If Al Qaeda is serious about recent threats to strike at U.S. Economic interests, we could end up waging war on two--or even three--fronts, from the Middle East and Asia all the way to Latin America. That's because, in our government's view, U.S. interests start and end with oil.

Already, we have spent billions upon billions of dollars, and sacrificed no small number of lives, protecting supplies of crude in remote corners of the world. Though we lean heavily on stable sources like Canada, our biggest supplier, we're also dependent on several volatile nations. Saudi Arabia tops that list, followed by Venezuela and Mexico. West Africa is a growing exporter, with Nigeria now our No. 5 provider. Despite continued sanctions, Iraq remains our sixth- biggest supplier.
--------------------------------

When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and threatened our flow of petroleum, we launched Desert Storm. Not counting the aftermath of personnel sickened by uranium-tipped missiles or the continued flyovers and bombing, that campaign cost $61.1 billion, of which U.S. taxpayers paid $23 billion.

With the war in Afghanistan--a nation key to the dream of Central Asian pipelines--winding down, U.S. troops are now stationed in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Georgia, at a price of something like $80,000 per soldier, per year. That expense comes on top of the $12.6 billion we spent getting rid of the Taliban and opening the way for oil to move through.

One figure, from the Sydney Morning Herald, tallies U.S. expenditures on troops and advisers in Central Asia at $200 billion. The real aim is to secure the region for more pipelines. American companies are involved in an enormous venture with the Chinese to build a pipeline more than 3000 miles long, stretching from the Caspian Sea to Shanghai; a second consortium would open a pipe from the Caspian to a Turkish port. The U.S. also has an interest in Russian oil rigs and pipelines. The war in Chechnya has left the Russians facing a constant specter of terrorists blowing up any network. Thus U.S. Special Forces stand by protectively in the former Soviet republics, while the meter runs.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/natres/oil/2002/1029uncle.htm

Oil in Iraq: the heart of the Crisis
James A. Paul
Global Policy Forum
December, 2002
Oil is at the heart of the crisis that leads towards a US war against Iraq. For more than a hundred years, major powers have battled to control this enormous source of wealth and strategic power. The major international oil companies, headquartered in the United States and the United Kingdom, are keen to regain control over Iraq’s oil, lost with the nationalization in 1972. Few outside the industry understand just how high the stakes in Iraq really are and how much the history of the world oil industry is a history of power, national rivalry and military force.
Competition among the Multinational Oil Companies

Five companies dominate the international oil industry, four of them based in the US and the UK. The largest, US-based Exxon Mobil, was the world’s most profitable company in 2001 ($15 billion in profits) and the largest industrial company in terms of revenue. The three other companies in order of size are: BP Amoco (UK), Royal Dutch Shell (UK), and Chevron Texaco (US). France’s TotalElfFina ranks in fifth place. Predecessors of these firms controlled nearly all of the Iraq Petroleum Company from the discovery of oil in the late 1920s until nationalization in 1972. The British firms held half of the company, reflecting the dominant colonial position of the UK at that time in the region.

After nationalization, the Iraqis sought to gain greater control of their oil resources. They shunned the UK and US companies, while developing working relationships with French companies and the (Soviet) Russian government.. Just before the Gulf War (1990-91), Japanese companies negotiated for production-sharing contracts in Iraq and were said to have concluded a deal for the Majnoun field, but that deal collapsed due to the US-led war and the subsequent sanctions. During the 1990s, various firms negotiated with the Iraqis in hopes of gaining access to Iraqi oil once the sanctions were lifted. Shell, and possibly other US-UK companies held secret talks that did not succeed. In 1997 TotalFinaElf, China National Oil Company, and Lukoil of Russia signed agreements with the Iraqis for deals worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Lukoil’s deal concerned development of the West Qurna field, while TotalFinaElf obtained rights to Majnoun and China Nations to North Rumailah (the latter is the huge field that lies astride the border with Kuwait). A number of smaller companies, mostly Russian but also from Malaysia and other countries, got contracts at about this time. http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/oil/2002/12heart.htm

Bush's Mideast Plan:
Conquer and Divide
By Eric Margolis
Toronto Sun
December 8, 2002
Arms inspections are a "hoax," said Tariq Aziz, Iraq's deputy prime minister, in a forthright and chilling interview with ABC News last week. "War is inevitable."
Aziz is the smartest, most credible member of President Saddam Hussein's otherwise sinister regime - my view after covering Iraq since 1976.
What the U.S. wants is not "regime change" in Iraq but rather "region change," charged Aziz. He tersely summed up the Bush administration's reasons for war against Iraq: "Oil and Israel."
-----------------------
--Iraq will be broken up into three semi-autonomous regions: Kurdish north; Sunni centre; Shia south. Iraq's oil will be exploited by U.S. and British firms. Iraq will become a major customer for U.S. arms. Turkey may get a slice of northern Iraq around the Kirkuk and Mosul oil fields. U.S. forces will repress any attempts by Kurds to set up an independent state. A military dictatorship or kingdom will eventually be created.
----------------------------------
Iran will be severely pressured to dismantle its nuclear and missile programs or face attack by U.S. forces. Israel's rightist Likud party, which guides much of the Bush administration's Mideast thinking, sees Iran, not demolished Iraq, as its principal foe and threat, and is pressing Washington to attack Iran once Iraq is finished off. At minimum, the U.S. will encourage an uprising against Iran's Islamic regime, replacing it with either a royalist government or one drawn from U.S.-based Iranian exiles.

Saudi Arabia will be allowed to keep the royal family in power, but compelled to become more responsive to U.S. demands and to clamp down on its increasingly anti-American population. If this fails, the CIA is reportedly cultivating senior Saudi air force officers who could overthrow the royal family and bring in a compliant military regime like that of Gen. Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan. Or, partition Saudi Arabia, making the oil-rich eastern portion an American protectorate.

The most important Arab nation, Egypt - with 40% of all Arabs - will remain a bastion of U.S. influence. The U.S. controls 50% of Egypt's food supply, 85% of its arms and spare parts, and keeps the military regime of Gen. Hosni Mubarak in power. Once leader of the Arab world, Egypt is keeping a very low profile in the Iraq crisis, meekly co-operating with American war plans.
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/attack/2002/1208divide.htm