"It has never happened in history that a nation that has won a
war has been held accountable for atrocities committed in preparing
for and waging that war. We intend to make this one different. What
took place was the use of technological material to destroy a
defenseless country. From 125,000 to 300,000 people were killed...
We recognize our role in history is to bring the transgressors to
justice." Ramsey Clark
Ramsey Clark served as U.S.
Attorney General in the administration of Lyndon Johnson. He is
the convener of the Commission of Inquiry and a human rights
lawyer of world-wide respect. This report was given in New York,
May 11, 1991.
"It has never happened in history that a nation that has won a
war has been held accountable for atrocities committed in preparing
for and waging that war. We intend to make this one different. What
took place was the use of technological material to destroy a
defenseless country. From 125,000 to 300,000 people were killed...
We recognize our role in history is to bring the transgressors to
justice." Ramsey Clark
Ramsey Clark served as U.S.
Attorney General in the administration of Lyndon Johnson. He is
the convener of the Commission of Inquiry and a human rights
lawyer of world-wide respect. This report was given in New York,
May 11, 1991.
WAR CRIMES
A Report on United States War Crimes Against Iraq to the
Commission of Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal
by Ramsey Clark and Others
Preface
The material in
this book
was compiled by the Commission of
Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal. Most of the
material in the first part of the book was originally presented at
the first hearings of the Commission of Inquiry in New York City on
May 11, 1991. More than 1,000 people attended the hearings held at
Stuyvesant Auditorium. Since the announcement of the formation of
the Commission of Inquiry, organizations world-wide have come
foreward to participate and to offer evidence and testimony. A few
selections of this additional testimony from other Commission
hearings have been included where space permits. Commissions of
Inquiry have been established in fifteen countries around the world,
and public hearings where new testimony was presented were held in
twenty-eight cities in the U.S. Obviously a great deal of this
valuable material could not be presented in the short confines of
this book.
At the May 11, 1991
hearing in New York, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark
outlined
the
19-point indictment of
the U.S. government's conduct in the Gulf War that served as the
basis of the Commission's work. For seven hours eyewitnesses who had
traveled to Iraq during and following the war presented evidence on
the extensive and deliberate destruction of Iraq's infrastructure.
Compelling video
testimony was shown. Images of destroyed neighborhoods, shrapnel and
burn victims, dehydrated and undernourished children in hospitals
lacking electricity and necessary drugs were diplayed in the photo
exhibit. Some of these photos are also included in this book.
The Commission of
Inquiry for an International War Crimes Tribunal was initiated by
Ramsey Clark and the Coalition to Stop U.S. Intervention in the
Middle East following Mr. Clark's February trip to Iraq. Accompanied
by a video filmmaker and a photgrapher, Mr. Clark traveled 2,000
miles through Iraq during a time when the U.S. was running up to
3,000 bombing sorties a day. He first documented the systematic
destruction of the civilian infrastructure, a view later confirmed
by a number of other delegations and even by the United Nation's own
team of investigators.
The Commission of Inquiry was established to gather
testimony and evidence on an international basis and to present the
testimony in a series of public hearings. Evidence gathered at all
these hearings is to be presented to an International Tribunal of
Judges on February 27, 2, and 29, 1992 in New York--the one-year
anniversary of the war.
International War Crimes Tribunal
United States War Crimes Against Iraq
Initial Complaint
Charging
George Bush, J. Danforth Quayle, James
Baker,
Richard Cheney, William Webster, Colin Powell,
Norman Schwarzkopf and Others to be named
With
Crimes Against Peace, War Crimes, Crimes Against
Humanity and Other Criminal Acts and High Crimes in
Violation of the Charter of the United Nations,
International Law, the Constitution of the United States
and Laws made in Pursuance Thereof.
These charges have been prepared prior to the first hearing of
the Commission of Inquiry by its staff. They are based on direct
and circumstantial evidence from public and private documents;
official statements and admissions by the persons charged and
others; eyewitness accounts; Commission investigations and
witness interviews in Iraq, the Middle East and elsewhere during
and after the bombing; photographs and video tape; expert
analyses; commentary and interviews; media coverage, published
reports and accounts gathered between December 1990 and May
l991. Commission of Inquiry hearings will be held in key cities
where evidence is available supporting, expanding, adding,
contradicting, disproving or explaining these, or similar
charges against the accused and others of whatever nationality.
When evidence sufficient to sustain convictions of the accused
or others is obtained and after demanding the production of
documents from the U.S. government, and others, and requesting
testimony from the accused, offering them a full opportunity to
present any defense personally, or by counsel, the evidence will
be presented to an International War Crimes Tribunal. The
Tribunal will consider the evidence gathered, seek and examine
whatever additional evidence it chooses and render its judgment
on the charges, the evidence, and the law.
Since World War I, the United Kingdom, France, and the United
States have dominated the Arabian Peninsula and Gulf region and
its oil resources. This has been accomplished by military
conquest and coercion, economic control and exploitation, and
through surrogate governments and their military forces. Thus,
from 1953 to 1979 in the post World War II era, control over the
region was exercised primarily through U.S. influence and
control over the Gulf sheikdoms of Saudi Arabia and through the
Shah of Iran. From 1953 to 1979 the Shah of Iran acted as a
Pentagon/CIA surrogate to police the region. After the fall of
the Shah and the seizure of U.S. Embassy hostages in Teheran,
the U.S. provided military aid and assistance to Iraq, as did
the USSR, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and most of the Emirates, in its
war with Iran. U.S. policy during that tragic eight year war,
1980 - 1988, is probably best summed up by the phrase, "we hope
they kill each other."
Throughout the seventy-five year period from Britain's
invasion of Iraq early in World War I to the destruction of Iraq
in 1991 by U.S. air power, the United States and the United
Kingdom demonstrated no concern for democratic values, human
rights, social justice, or political and cultural integrity in
the region, nor for stopping military aggression there. The U.S.
supported the Shah of Iran for 25 years, selling him more than
$20 billion of advanced military equipment between 1972 and 1978
alone. Throughout this period the Shah and his brutal secret
police called SAVAK had one of the worst human rights records in
the world. Then in the 1980s, the U.S. supported Iraq in its
wrongful aggression against Iran, ignoring Iraq's own poor human
rights record.
When the Iraqi government nationalized the Iraqi Petroleum
Company in 1972, the Nixon Administration embarked on a campaign
to destabilize the Iraqi government. It was in the 1970s that
the U.S. first armed and then abandoned the Kurdish people,
costing tens of thousands of Kurdish lives. The U.S. manipulated
the Kurds through CIA and other agencies to attack Iraq,
intending to harass Iraq while maintaining Iranian supremacy at
the cost of Kurdish lives without intending any benefit to the
Kurdish people or an autonomous Kurdistan.
The U.S. with close oil and other economic ties to Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait has fully supported both governments despite
the total absence of democratic institutions, their pervasive
human rights violations and the infliction of cruel, inhuman and
degrading punishments such as stoning to death for adultery and
amputation of a hand for property offenses.
The U.S., sometimes alone among nations, supported Israel
when it defied scores of UN resolutions concerning Palestinian
rights, when it invaded Lebanon in a war which took tens of
thousands of lives, and during its continuing occupation of
southern Lebanon, the Golan Heights, the West Bank and Gaza.
The United States itself engaged in recent aggressions in
violation of international law by invading Grenada in 1983,
bombing Tripoli and Benghazi in Libya in 1986, financing the
contra in Nicaragua, UNITA in southern Africa and
supporting military dictatorships in Liberia, Chile, E1
Salvador, Guatemala, the Philippines, and many other places.
The U.S. invasion of Panama in December 1989 involved the
same and additional violations of international law that apply
to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. The U.S. invasion took between
1,000 and 4,000 Panamanian lives. The United States government
is still covering up the death toll. U.S. aggression caused
massive property destruction throughout Panama.
[3]
According to U.S. and international human rights organization
estimates, Kuwait's casualties from Iraq's invasion and the
ensuing months of occupation were in the "hundreds" - between
300 and 600.[4]
Reports from
Kuwait list 628 Palestinians killed by Kuwaiti death
squads since the Sabah royal family regained control over
Kuwait.
The United States changed its military plans for protecting
its control over oil and other interests in the Arabian
Peninsula in the late 1980s when it became clear that economic
problems in the USSR were debilitating its military capacity and
Soviet forces withdrew from Afghanistan. Thereafter, direct
military domination within the region became the U.S. strategy.
With the decline in U.S. oil production through 1989, experts
predicted U.S. oil imports from the Gulf would rise from 10%
that year to 25% by the year 2000. Japanese and European
dependency is much greater.
1. The United States engaged in a pattern
of conduct beginning in or before 1989 intended to lead Iraq
into provocations justifying U.S. military action against
Iraq and permanent U.S. military domination of the Gulf.
In 1989, General Colin Powell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, and General Norman Schwarzkopf, Commander in Chief of the
Central Command, completely revised U.S. military operations and
plans for the Persian Gulf to prepare to intervene in a regional
conflict against Iraq. The CIA assisted and directed Kuwait in
its actions. At the time, Kuwait was violating OPEC oil
production agreements, extracting excessive amounts of oil from
pools shared with Iraq and demanding repayment of loans it made
to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war. Kuwait broke off negotiations
with Iraq over these disputes. The U.S. intended to provoke Iraq
into actions against Kuwait that would justify U.S.
intervention.
In 1989, CIA Director William Webster testified before the
Congress about the alarming increase in U.S. importation of Gulf
oil, citing U.S. rise in use from 5% in 1973 to 10% in 1989 and
predicting 25% of all U.S. oil consumption would come from the
region by 2000.
[6]
In early 1990, General
Schwarzkopf informed the Senate Armed Services Committee of the
new military strategy in the Gulf designed to protect U.S.
access to and control over Gulf oil in the event of regional
conflicts.
In July 1990, General Schwarzkopf and his staff ran
elaborate, computerized war games pitting about 100,000 U.S.
troops against Iraqi armored divisions.
The U.S. showed no opposition to Iraq's increasing threats
against Kuwait. U.S. companies sought major contracts in Iraq.
The Congress approved agricultural loan subsidies to Iraq of
hundreds of millions of dollars to benefit U.S. farmers.
However, loans for food deliveries of rice, corn, wheat and
other essentials bought almost exclusively from the U.S. were
cut off in the spring of 1990 to cause shortages. Arms were sold
to Iraq by U.S. manufacturers. When Saddam Hussein requested
U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie to explain State Department
testimony in Congress about lraq's threats against Kuwait, she
assured him the U.S. considered the dispute a regional concern,
and it would not intervene. By these acts, the U.S. intended to
lead Iraq into a provocation justifying war.
On August 2, 1990, Iraq occupied Kuwait without significant
resistance.
On August 3, 1990, without any evidence of a threat to Saudi
Arabia, and King Fahd believed Iraq had no intention of invading
his country, President Bush vowed to defend Saudi Arabia. He
sent Secretary Cheney, General Powell, and General Schwarzkopf
almost immediately to Saudi Arabia where on August 6, General
Schwarzkopf told King Fahd the U.S. thought Saddam Hussein could
attack Saudi Arabia in as little as 48 hours. The efforts toward
an Arab solution of the crisis were destroyed. Iraq never
attacked Saudi Arabia and waited over five months while the U.S.
slowly built a force of more than 500,000 soldiers and began the
systematic destruction by aircraft and missiles of Iraq and its
military, both defenseless against U.S. and coalition
technology. In October 1990, General Powell referred to the new
military plan developed in 1989. After the war, General
Schwarzkopf referred to eighteen months of planning for the
campaign.
The U.S. retains troops in Iraq as of May 1991 and throughout
the region and has announced its intention to maintain a
permanent military presence.
2. President Bush from August 2, 1990,
intended and acted to prevent any interference with his plan
to destroy Iraq economically and militarily.
Without consultation or communication with Congress, President
Bush ordered 40,000 U.S. military personnel to advance the U.S.
buildup in Saudi Arabia in the first week of August 1990. He
exacted a request from Saudi Arabia for U.S. military assistance
and on August 8, 1990, assured the world his acts were "wholly
defensive." He waited until after the November 1990 elections to
announce his earlier order sending more than 200,000 additional
military personnel, clearly an assault force, again without
advising Congress. As late as January 9, 1991, he insisted he
had the constitutional authority to attack Iraq without
Congressional approval.
While concealing his intention, President Bush continued the
military build up of U.S. forces unabated from August into
January 1991, intending to attack and destroy Iraq. He pressed
the military to expedite preparation and to commence the assault
before military considerations were optimum. When Air Force
Chief of Staff General Michael J. Dugan mentioned plans to
destroy the Iraqi civilian economy to the press on September 16,
1990, he was removed from office.
President Bush coerced the United Nations Security Council
into an unprecedented series of resolutions, finally securing
authority for any nation in its absolute discretion by all
necessary means to enforce the resolutions. To secure votes the
U.S. paid multi-billion dollar bribes, offered arms for regional
wars, threatened and carried out economic retaliation, forgave
multi-billion dollar loans (including a $7 billion loan to Egypt
for arms), offered diplomatic relations despite human rights
violations and in other ways corruptly exacted votes, creating
the appearance of near universal international approval of U.S.
policies toward Iraq. A country which opposed the U.S., as Yemen
did, lost millions of dollars in aid, as promised, the costliest
vote it ever cast.
President Bush consistently rejected and ridiculed Iraq's
efforts to negotiate a peaceful resolution, beginning with
Iraq's August 12, 1990, proposal, largely ignored, and ending
with its mid-February 1991 peace offer which he called a "cruel
hoax." For his part, President Bush consistently insisted there
would be no negotiation, no compromise, no face saving, no
reward for aggression. Simultaneously, he accused Saddam Hussein
of rejecting diplomatic solutions.
President Bush led a sophisticated campaign to demonize
Saddam Hussein, calling him a Hitler, repeatedly citing reports
- which he knew were false - of the murder of hundreds of
incubator babies, accusing Iraq of using chemical weapons on his
own people and on the Iranians knowing U.S intelligence believed
the reports untrue.
After subverting every effort for peace, President Bush began
the destruction of Iraq answering his own question, "Why not
wait? . . . The world could wait no longer." The course of
conduct constitutes a
3. President Bush ordered the destruction
of facilities essential to civilian life and economic
productivity throughout Iraq.
Systematic aerial and missile bombardment of Iraq was ordered to
begin at 6:30 p.m. EST January 16, 1991, eighteen and one-half
hours after the deadline set on the insistence of President
Bush, in order to be reported on television evening news in the
U.S. The bombing continued for forty-two days. It met no
resistance from Iraqi aircraft and no effective anti-aircraft or
anti-missile ground fire. Iraq was defenseless.
The United States reports it flew 110,000 air sorties against
Iraq, dropping 88,000 tons of bombs, nearly seven times the
equivalent of the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. 93% of
the bombs were free falling bombs, most dropped from higher than
30,000 feet. Of the remaining 7% of the bombs with
electronically guided systems, more than 25% missed their
targets, nearly all caused damage primarily beyond any
identifiable target. Most of the targets were civilian
facilities.
The intention and effort of the bombing of civilian life and
facilities was to systematically destroy Iraq's infrastructure
leaving it in a preindustrial condition. Iraq's civilian
population was dependent on industrial capacities. The U.S.
assault left Iraq in a near apocalyptic condition as reported by
the first United Nations observers after the war.
[8]
Among the facilities targeted and destroyed were:
electric power generation, relay and transmission;
water treatment, pumping and distribution systems and
reservoirs;
telephone and radio exchanges, relay stations, towers
and transmission facilities;
food processing, storage and distribution facilities and
markets, infant milk formula and beverage plants, animal
vaccination facilities and irrigation sites;
railroad transportation facilities, bus depots, bridges,
highway overpasses, highways, highway repair stations,
trains, buses and other public transportation vehicles,
commercial and private vehicles;
oil wells and pumps, pipelines, refineries, oil storage
tanks, gasoline filling stations and fuel delivery tank cars
and trucks, and kerosene storage tanks;
sewage treatment and disposal systems;
factories engaged in civilian production, e.g., textile
and automobile assembly; and
historical markers and ancient sites.
As a direct, intentional and foreseeable result of this
destruction, tens of thousands of people have died from
dehydration, dysentery and diseases caused by impure water,
inability to obtain effective medical assistance and
debilitation from hunger, shock, cold and stress. More will die
until potable water, sanitary living conditions, adequate food
supplies and other necessities are provided. There is a high
risk of epidemics of cholera, typhoid, hepatitis and other
diseases as well as starvation and malnutrition through the
summer of 1991 and until food supplies are adequate and
essential services are restored.
Only the United States could have carried out this
destruction of Iraq, and the war was conducted almost
exclusively by the United States. This conduct violated the
4. The United States intentionally bombed
and destroyed civilian life, commercial and business
districts, schools, hospitals, mosques, churches, shelters,
residential areas, historical sites, private vehicles and
civilian government offices.
The destruction of civilian facilities left the entire civilian
population without heat, cooking fuel, refrigeration, potable
water, telephones, power for radio or TV reception, public
transportation and fuel for private automobiles. It also limited
food supplies, closed schools, created massive unemployment,
severely limited economic activity and caused hospitals and
medical services to shut down. In addition, residential areas of
every major city and most towns and villages were targeted and
destroyed. Isolated Bedouin camps were attacked by U.S.
aircraft. In addition to deaths and injuries, the aerial assault
destroyed 10 - 20,000 homes, apartments and other dwellings.
Commercial centers with shops, retail stores, offices, hotels,
restaurants and other public accommodations were targeted and
thousands were destroyed. Scores of schools, hospitals, mosques
and churches were damaged or destroyed. Thousands of civilian
vehicles on highways, roads and parked on streets and in garages
were targeted and destroyed. These included public buses,
private vans and mini-buses, trucks, tractor trailers, lorries,
taxi cabs and private cars. The purpose of this bombing was to
terrorize the entire country, kill people, destroy property,
prevent movement, demoralize the people and force the overthrow
of the government.
As a result of the bombing of facilities essential to
civilian life, residential and other civilian buildings and
areas, at least 125,000 men, women and children were killed. The
Red Crescent Society of Jordan estimated 113,000 civilian dead,
60% children, the week before the end of the war.
5. The United States intentionally bombed
indiscriminately throughout Iraq.
In aerial attacks, including strafing, over cities, towns, the
countryside and highways, U.S. aircraft bombed and strafed
indiscriminately. In every city and town bombs fell by chance
far from any conceivable target, whether a civilian facility,
military installation or military target. In the countryside
random attacks were made on travelers, villagers, even Bedouins.
The purpose of the attacks was to destroy life, property and
terrorize the civilian population. On the highways, civilian
vehicles including public buses taxicabs and passenger cars were
bombed and strafed at random to frighten civilians from flight,
from seeking food or medical care, finding relatives or other
uses of highways. The effect was summary execution and corporal
punishment indiscriminately of men, women and children, young
and old, rich and poor, all nationalities including the large
immigrant populations even Americans, all ethnic groups,
including many Kurds and Assyrians, all religions including Shia
and Sunni Moslems, Chaldeans and other Christians, and Jews.
U.S. deliberate indifference to civilian and military casualties
in Iraq, or their nature, is exemplified by General Colin
Powell's response to a press inquiry about the number dead from
the air and ground campaigns: "It's really not a number I'm
terribly interested in."[9]
6. The United States intentionally bombed
and destroyed Iraqi military personnel, used excessive
force, killed soldiers seeking to surrender and in
disorganized individual flight, often unarmed and far from
any combat zones and randomly and wantonly killed Iraqi
soldiers and destroyed materiel after the cease fire.
In the first hours of the aerial and missile bombardment, the
United States destroyed most military communications and began
the systematic killing of soldiers who were incapable of defense
or escape and the destruction of military equipment. Over a
period of forty-two days, U.S bombing killed tens of thousands
of defenseless soldiers, cut off most of their food, water and
other supplies and left them in desperate and helpless disarray.
Without significant risk to its own personnel, the U.S. led in
the killing of at least 100,000 Iraqi soldiers at a cost of 148
U.S. combat casualties, according to the U.S. government. When
it was determined that the civilian economy and the military
were sufficiently destroyed, the U.S. ground forces moved into
Kuwait and Iraq attacking disoriented disorganized, fleeing
Iraqi forces wherever they could be found, killing thousands
more and destroying any equipment found. The slaughter continued
after the cease fire. For example, on March 2, 1991, U.S. 24th
Division Forces engaged in a four-hour assault against Iraqis
just west of Basra. More than 750 vehicles were destroyed,
thousands were killed without U.S. casualties. A U.S. commander
said, "We really waxed them." It was called a "Turkey Shoot."
One Apache helicopter crew member yelled "Say hello to Allah" as
he launched a laser-guided Hellfire missile.[10]
The intention was not to remove Iraq's presence from Kuwait.
It was to destroy Iraq. In the process there was great
destruction of property in Kuwait. The disproportion in death
and destruction inflicted on a defenseless enemy exceeded 1,000
to one.
General Thomas Kelly commented on February 23, 1991, that by
the time the ground war begins "there won't be many of them
left." General Norman Schwarzkopf placed Iraqi military
casualties at over 100,000. The intention was to destroy all
military facilities and equipment wherever located and to so
decimate the military age male population that Iraq could not
raise a substantial force for half a generation.
7. The United States used prohibited
weapons capable of mass destruction and inflicting
indiscriminate death and unnecessary suffering against both
military and civilian targets.
Among the known illegal weapons and illegal uses of weapons
employed by the United States are the following:
fuel air explosives capable of widespread incineration
and death;
napalm;
cluster and anti-personnel fragmentation bombs; and
"superbombs," 2.5 ton devices, intended for
assassination of government leaders.
Fuel air explosives were used against troops-in-place, civilian
areas, oil fields and fleeing civilians and soldiers on two
stretches of highway between Kuwait and Iraq. Included in fuel
air weapons used was the BLU-82, a 15,000-pound device capable
of incinerating everything within hundreds of yards.
One seven mile stretch called the "Highway of Death" was
littered with hundreds of vehicles and thousands of dead. All
were fleeing to Iraq for their lives. Thousands were civilians
of all ages, including Kuwaitis, Iraqis, Palestinians,
Jordanians and other nationalities. Another 60-mile stretch of
road to the east was strewn with the remnants of tanks, armored
cars, trucks, ambulances and thousands of bodies following an
attack on convoys on the night of February 25, 1991. The press
reported that no survivors are known or likely. One flatbed
truck contained nine bodies, their hair and clothes were burned
off, skin incinerated by heat so intense it melted the
windshield onto the dashboard.
Napalm was used against civilians, military personnel and to
start fires. Oil well fires in both Iraq and Kuwait were
intentionally started by U.S. aircraft dropping napalm and other
heat intensive devices.
Cluster and anti-personnel fragmentation bombs were used in
Basra and other cities, and towns, against the convoys described
above and against military units. The CBU-75 carries 1,800
bomblets called Sadeyes. One type of Sadeyes can explode before
hitting the ground, on impact, or be timed to explode at
different times after impact. Each bomblet contains 600 razor
sharp steel fragments lethal up to 40 feet. The 1,800 bomblets
from one CBU-75 can cover an area equal to 157 football fields
with deadly shrapnel. "Superbombs" were dropped on hardened
shelters, at least two in the last days of the assault, with the
intention of assassinating President Saddam Hussein. One was
misdirected. It was not the first time the Pentagon targeted a
head of state. In April 1986, the U.S. attempted to assassinate
Col. Muammar Qaddafi by laser directed bombs in its attack on
Tripoli, Libya.
Illegal weapons killed thousands of civilians and soldiers.
8. The United States intentionally attacked
installations in Iraq containing dangerous substances and
forces.
Despite the fact that Iraq used no nuclear or chemical weapons
and in the face of UN resolutions limiting the authorized means
of removing Iraqi forces from Kuwait, the U.S. intentionally
bombed alleged nuclear sites, chemical plants, dams and other
dangerous forces. The U.S. knew such attacks could cause the
release of dangerous forces from such installations and
consequent severe losses among the civilian population. While
some civilians were killed in such attacks, there are no
reported cases of consequent severe losses presumably because
lethal nuclear materials and dangerous chemical and biological
warfare substances were not present at the sites bombed.
9. President Bush ordered U.S. forces to
invade Panama, resulting in the deaths of 1,000 to 4,000
Panamanians and the destruction of thousands of private
dwellings, public buildings, and commercial structures.
On December 20, 1989, President Bush ordered a military assault
on Panama using aircraft, artillery, helicopter gunships and
experimenting with new weapons, including the Stealth bomber.
The attack was a surprise assault targeting civilian and
non-combatant government structures. In the E1 Chorillo district
of Panama City alone, hundreds of civilians were killed and
between 15,000 and 30,000 made homeless. U.S. soldiers buried
dead Panamanians in mass graves, often without identification.
The head of state, Manuel Noriega, who was systematically
demonized by the U.S. government and press, ultimately
surrendered to U.S. forces and was brought to Miami, Florida, on
extra-territorial U.S. criminal charges.
The U.S. invasion of Panama violated all the international
laws Iraq violated when it invaded Kuwait and more. Many more
Panamanians were killed by U.S. forces than Iraq killed
Kuwaitis.
10. President Bush obstructed justice and
corrupted United Nations functions as a means of securing
power to commit
crimes against peace and war crimes.
President Bush caused the United Nations to completely bypass
Chapter VI provisions of its Charter
for the Pacific Settlement of Disputes. This was done in order
to obtain Security Council resolutions authorizing the use of
all necessary means, in the absolute discretion of any nation,
to fulfill UN resolutions directed against Iraq and which were
used to destroy Iraq. To obtain Security Council votes, the U.S.
corruptly paid member nations billions of dollars, provided them
arms to conduct regional wars, forgave billions in debts,
withdrew opposition to a World Bank loan, agreed to diplomatic
relations despite human rights violations and threatened
economic and political reprisals. A nation which voted against
the United States, Yemen, was immediately punished by the loss
of millions of dollars in aid. The U.S. paid the UN $187 million
to reduce the amount of dues it owed to the UN to avoid
criticism of its coercive activities. The United Nations,
created to end the scourge of war, became an instrument of war
and condoned war
crimes.
11. President Bush usurped the
Constitutional power of Congress as a means of securing
power to commit crimes against peace, war crimes, and other
high crimes.
President Bush intentionally usurped Congressional power,
ignored its authority, and failed and refused to consult with
the Congress. He deliberately misled, deceived, concealed and
made false representations to the Congress to prevent its free
deliberation and informed exercise of legislature power.
President Bush individually ordered a naval blockade against
Iraq, itself an act of war. He switched U.S. forces from a
wholly defensive position and capability to an offensive
capacity for aggression against Iraq without consultation with
and contrary to assurances given to the Congress. He secured
legislation approving enforcement of UN resolutions vesting
absolute discretion in any nation, providing no guidelines and
requiring no reporting to the UN, knowing he intended to destroy
the ammed forces and civilian economy of Iraq. Those acts were
undertaken to enable him to commit crimes against peace and war
crimes.
The conduct violates the
Constitution and laws of the United States,
all committed to engage in the other impeachable offenses set
forth in this Complaint.
12. The United States waged war on the
environment.
Pollution from the detonation of 88,000 tons of bombs,
innumerable missiles, rockets, artillery and small arms with the
combustion and fires they caused and by 110,000 air sorties at a
rate of nearly two per minute for six weeks has caused enormous
injury to life and the ecology. Attacks by U.S. aircraft caused
much if not all of the worst oil spills in the Gulf. Aircraft
and helicopters dropping napalm and fuel-air explosives on oil
wells, storage tanks and refineries caused oil fires throughout
Iraq and many, if not most, of the oil well fires in Iraq and
Kuwait. The intentional destruction of municipal water systems,
waste material treatment and sewage disposal systems constitutes
a direct and continuing assault on life and health throughout
Iraq.
13. President Bush encouraged and aided
Shiite Muslims and Kurds to rebel against the government of
Iraq causing fratricidal violence, emigration, exposure,
hunger and sickness and thousands of deaths. After the
rebellion failed, the U.S. invaded and occupied parts of
Iraq without authority in order to increase division and
hostility within Iraq.
Without authority from the Congress or the UN, President Bush
continued his imperious military actions after the cease fire.
He encouraged and aided rebellion against Iraq, failed to
protect the warring parties, encouraged migration of whole
populations, placing them in jeopardy from the elements, hunger,
and disease. After much suffering and many deaths, President
Bush then without authority used U.S. military forces to
distribute aid at and near the Turkish border, ignoring the
often greater suffering among refugees in Iran. He then
arbitrarily set up bantustan-like settlements for Kurds in Iraq
and demanded Iraq pay for U.S. costs. When Kurds chose to return
to their homes in Iraq, he moved U.S. troops further into
northern Iraq against the will of the government and without
authority.
14. President Bush intentionally deprived
the Iraqi people of essential medicines, potable water,
food, and other necessities.
A major component of the assault on Iraq was the systematic
deprivation of essential human needs and services. To break the
will of the people, destroy their economic capability, reduce
their numbers and weaken their health, the United States:
imposed and enforced embargoes preventing the shipment
of needed medicines, water purifiers, infant milk formula,
food and other supplies;
individually, without congressional authority, ordered a
U.S. naval blockade of Iraq, an act of war, to deprive the
Iraqi people of needed supplies;
froze funds of Iraq and forced other nations to do so,
depriving Iraq of the ability to purchase needed medicines,
food and other supplies;
controlled information about the urgent need for such
supplies to prevent sickness, death and threatened epidemic,
endangering the whole society;
prevented international organizations, governments and
relief agencies from providing needed supplies and obtaining
information concerning needs;
failed to assist or meet urgent needs of huge refugee
populations including Egyptians, Indians, Pakistanis,
Yemenis, Sudanese, Jordanians, Palestinians, Sri Lankans,
Filipinos, and interfered with efforts of others to do so;
consistently diverted attention from health and epidemic
threats within Iraq caused by the U.S. even after
advertising the plight of Kurdish people on the Turkish
border;
deliberately bombed the electrical grids causing the
closure of hospitals and laboratories, loss of medicine and
essential fluids and blood; and
deliberately bombed food storage, fertilizer, and seed
storage facilities.
As a result of these acts, thousands of people died, many more
suffered illness and permanent injury. As a single illustration,
Iraq consumed infant milk formula at a rate of 2,500 tons per
month during the first seven months of 1990. From November 1,
1990, to February 7, 1991, Iraq was able to import only 17 tons.
Its own productive capacity was destroyed. Many Iraqis believed
that President Bush intended that their infants die because he
targeted their food supply. The Red Crescent Society of Iraq
estimated 3,000 infant deaths as of February 7, 1991, resulting
from infant milk formula and infant medication shortages.
15. The United States continued its
assault on Iraq after the cease fire, invading and occupying
areas at will.
The United States has acted with dictatorial authority over Iraq
and its external relations since the end of the military
conflict. It has shot and killed Iraqi military personnel,
destroyed aircraft and materiel at will, occupied vast areas of
Iraq in the north and south and consistently threatened use of
force against Iraq.
This conduct violates the sovereignty of a nation, exceeds
authority in UN resolutions, is unauthorized by the
16. The United States has violated and
condoned violations of human rights, civil liberties and the
U.S. Bill of Rights in the United States, in Kuwait, Saudi
Arabia and elsewhere to achieve its purpose of military
domination.
Among the many violations committed or condoned by the U.S.
government are the following:
illegal surveillance, arrest, interrogation and
harassment of Arab-American, Iraqi-American, and U.S.
resident Arabs;
illegal detention, interrogation and treatment of Iraqi
prisoners of war;
aiding and condoning Kuwaiti summary executions,
assaults, torture and illegal detention of Palestinians and
other residents in Kuwait after the U.S. occupation; and
unwarranted, discriminatory, and excessive prosecution
and punishment of U.S. military personnel who refused to
serve in the Gulf, sought conscientious objector status or
protested U.S. policies.
Persons were killed, assaulted, tortured, illegally detained and
prosecuted, harassed and humiliated as a result of these
policies.
17. The United States, having destroyed
Iraq's economic base, demands reparations which will
permanently impoverish Iraq and threaten its people with
famine and epidemic.
Having destroyed lives, property and essential civilian
facilities in Iraq which the U.S. concedes will require $50
billion to replace (estimated at $200 billion by Iraq, killed at
least 125,000 people by bombing and many thousands more by
sickness and hunger, the U.S. now seeks to control Iraq
economically even as its people face famine and epidemic.[l1]
Damages, including casualties in Iraq,
systematically inflicted by the U.S. exceed all damages,
casualties and costs of all
other parties to the conflict combined many times over.
Reparations under these conditions are an exaction of tribute
for the conqueror from a desperately needy country. The United
States seeks to force Iraq to pay for damage to Kuwait largely
caused by the U.S. and even to pay U.S. costs for its violations
of Iraqi sovereignty in occupying northern Iraq to further
manipulate the Kurdish population there. Such reparations are a
neocolonial means of expropriating Iraq's oil, natural
resources, and human labor.
18. President Bush systematically
manipulated, controlled, directed, misinformed and
restricted press and media coverage to obtain constant
support in the media for his military and political goals.
The Bush Administration achieved a five-month-long commercial
for militarism and individual weapons systems. The American
people were seduced into the celebration of a slaughter by
controlled propaganda demonizing Iraq, assuring the world no
harm would come to Iraqi civilians, deliberately spreading false
stories of atrocities including chemical warfare threats, deaths
of incubator babies and threats to the entire region by a new
Hitler.
The press received virtually all its information from or by
permission of the Pentagon. Efforts were made to prevent any
adverse information or opposition views from being heard. CNN's
limited presence in Baghdad was described as Iraqi propaganda.
Independent observers, eyewitnesses' photos, and video tapes
with information about the effects of the U.S. bombing were
excluded from the media. Television network ownership,
advertizers, newspaper ownership, elite columnists and
commentators intimidated and instructed reporters and selected
interviewees. They formed a near-single voice of praise for U.S.
militarism, often exceeding the Pentagon in bellicosity.
The American people and their democratic institutions were
deprived of information essential to sound judgment and were
regimented, despite profound concem, to support a major
neocolonial intervention and war of aggression. The principal
purpose of the First Amendment to the United States was to
assure the press and the people the right to criticize their
government with impunity. This purpose has been effectively
destroyed in relation to U.S. military aggression since the
press was denied access to assaults on Grenada, Libya, Panama
and, now on a much greater scale, against Iraq.
19. The United States has by force secured
a permanent military presence in the Gulf, the control of
its oil resources and geopolitical domination of the Arabian
Peninsula and Gulf region.
The U.S. has committed the acts described in this complaint to
create a permanent U.S. military presence in the Persian Gulf,
to dominate its oil resources until depleted and to maintain
geopolitical domination over the region.
The Commission of Inquiry will focus on U.S. criminal conduct
because of its destruction of Iraq, killing at least 125,000
persons directly by its bombing while proclaiming its own combat
losses as 148, because it destroyed the economic base of Iraq
and because its acts are still inflicting consequential deaths
that may reach hundreds of thousands. The Commission of Inquiry
will seek and accept evidence of criminal acts by any person or
government, related to the Gulf conflict, because it believes
international law must be applied uniformly. It believes that
"victors' justice" is not law, but the extension of war by force
of the prevailing party. The U.S. Senate, European Community
foreign ministers, and the western press, even former Nuremberg
prosecutors, have overwhelmingly called for war crimes trials
for Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi leadership alone. Even Mrs.
Barbara Bush has said she would like to see Saddam Hussein
hanged, albeit without mentioning a trial. Comprehensive efforts
to gather and evaluate evidence, objectively judge all the
conduct that constitutes crimes against peace and war crimes and
to present these facts for judgment to the court of world
opinion requires that at least one major effort focus on the
United States. The Commission of Inquiry believes its focus on
U.S. criminal acts is important, proper, and the only way to
bring the whole truth, a balanced perspective and impartiality
in application of legal process to this great human tragedy.
Rick Atkinson, "U.S. to Rely on
Air Strikes if War Erupts," Washington Post,
September 16, 1990: Al + . Eric Schmitt, "Ousted General
Gets A Break," New York Times, November 7,
1991: Al9.
Joint WHO / UNICEF Team Report: A
Visit to Iraq (New York: United Nations, 1991).
A report to the Secretary General, dated March 20, 1991
by representatives of the U.N. Secretariat, UNICEF, UNDP,
UNDRO, UNHCR, FAO and WHO.
Patrick E. Tyler, "Powell Says
U.S. Will Stay In Iraq," New York Times, March
23, 1991: Al + .
Patrick J. Sloyan, "Massive Battle
After Cease Fire," New York Newsday, May 8,
1991: A4+.
