[ExI] The Death Toll Imbalance in the Mideast War

[Fred C. Moulton]

On Thu, 2009-06-11 at 19:32 +0200, painlord2k at libero.it wrote:

> But Saddam was never a US supported dictator.

False.

Just some ordinary research would have found this item in the Washington
Post:
http://discuss.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/zforum/03/sp_world_battle022703.htm
Where there is this link
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/
This is National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 82 and
discusses the transition of the US position toward Saddam Hussein and
the Iraq government following the revolution in Iran and the outbreak of
the Iran-Iraq war.

Just to quote on passage from NSAEBB82:
"Prolonging the war was phenomenally expensive. Iraq received massive
external financial support from the Gulf states, and assistance through
loan programs from the U.S. The White House and State Department
pressured the Export-Import Bank to provide Iraq with financing, to
enhance its credit standing and enable it to obtain loans from other
international financial institutions. The U.S. Agriculture Department
provided taxpayer-guaranteed loans for purchases of American
commodities, to the satisfaction of U.S. grain exporters."