Toronto Sun: West has bloodied hands

Columnist: Eric Margolis:

"The Halabja atrocity remains murky. The CIA's former Iraq desk chief claims Kurds who died at Halabja were killed by cyanide gas, not nerve gas, as is generally believed.
At the time, Iraq and Iran were locked in the ferocious last battles of their eight-year war. Halabja was caught between the two armies that were exchanging salvos of regular and chemical munitions. Only Iran had cyanide gas. If the CIA official is correct, the Kurds were accidentally killed by Iran, not Iraq.
But it's also possible al-Majid ordered an attack. Kurds in that region had rebelled against Iraq and opened the way for invading Iranian forces.
What's the difference between the U.S. destroying the rebellious Iraqi city of Fallujah and Saddam destroying rebellious Halabja? What difference does it make if you're killed by poison gas, artillery or 2,000-pound bombs?"

This piece is from 2004. I'vew been looking for another article I read around that time that talks about the CIA admitting (to the Italian press, I think) that Saddam didn't have the kind of chemical weapon that was used on the Kurds. This is of particular importance now that the US has admitted to using White Phosphorus in Iraq.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with chemical weapons, white phosphorus is worse than napalm. Napalm sticks and burns, literally melting human skin. White phosphorus burns right down to the bone and through. This is a horrid, vicious thing to do under any circumstances. To do it against a civilian population who never threatened an American who wasn't trying to do them harm is not only immoral, but illegal to the point that it is nothing short of a war crime.

You'll recall that we overthrew Saddam because he supposedly used poison gas on his own people. Our CIA believes it was Iran, not Saddam. We have now used chemicals Saddam has never been proven even to have possessed, let alone used.

Roughly 1 Billion of your tax dollars will be spent this week to support forces that are dropping burning chemicals on civilians who never posed a threat to us. And another Billion next week. And the week after that.

We need to get out of Iraq NOW, not later. No permanent bases. No occupying forces. Bring them home now.