“Unlike some, I actually try to state facts. I believe in facts. I believe in a fact-based reality and a fact-based politics. I don’t believe in just making stuff up. I think you should actually say to people what’s true.”
Barack Obama — Las Vegas (October 22 2018)
December 28 2020 — In his book, the former US President writes that the Soviets supplied Iran with chemical weapons during the 8 years long war with Iraq. This is totally untrue. And yet, no one in the US media had the moral courage to denounce it. Why on earth not? Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY
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This past year has been defined by the Covid-19 virus which is affecting both of our worlds: the real world as well as the cyber-world.
2020 has been an exceptionally difficult year. According to Merriam-Webster, a single word came immediately to the fore as they examined the data that determines their Word of the Year: Pandemic.
Pandemic is defined as an outbreak of a disease that occurs over a wide geographic area (such as multiple countries or continents) and typically affects a significant proportion of the population.
History teaches that Fake News spread very efficiently during a pandemic. And this pandemic was no exception.
While the Covid-19 virus wreaked havoc the planet, another pandemic was infecting the cyber-world: Fake News.
The Covid-19 pandemic has generated an avalanche of Fake News. Here is just a small sample of the nonsense that spread over the internet in recent months.
Bill Gates has financed the creation of Covid-19 in order to sell vaccines. Some of these vaccines will turn humans into monkeys. Western governments are using the virus as an excuse to turn Democracies into Autocracies. And, perhaps the most absurd of all these conspiracy theories, 5G is responsible for the spread of the coronavirus.
Obviously, there is no lack of contenders for the Top Fake News of the Year 2020.
And yet, I have chosen this story for three reasons. Firstly, this lie is particularly odious. Secondly, I believe that the former US President has finally revealed his true colors. And thirdly, I find it sickening that the US media have lacked the moral courage to expose this fraud and correct the story. “Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.”
No stranger to big lies
Barack Obama is no stranger to big lies. On May 26 2008, Obama actually told a crowd that his uncle was among the American soldiers who liberated the Jewish people held in Auschwitz.
“I had an uncle … who was part of the first American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps.”
That is of course utter nonsense. The Auschwitz survivors were liberated by the Soviet troops on January 27 1945.
Well, the worst is never certain. In his book, Obama manages to get a much bigger lie in print for all the idiots out there to read and appreciate.
The Soviets never supplied Iran with chemical weapons. On the other end, US companies did supply Iraq with chemical precursors that Saddam used against the Kurds at Halabja on March 16 1988.
“You will remember that for many years, Iraqi used chemical warfare against Iranians. And we never retaliated because we abide by our Islamic principles. And this is a principle that we always abide by. We act upon our own Islamic principles, which to some extent covered international regulations. ”
Mohammad Jaafar Mahallati, Iran’s Ambassador at the United Nations (July 4 1988)
The Halabja chemical attack
On March 16 1988, Iraqi military killed several thousands people when it used mustard gas in an attack at Halabja, a Kurdish city located in an Iranian-held section of Iraq.
Saddam Hussein was not charged for the events related to the Halabja attacks at the Iraqi Special Tribunal. There is circumstantial evidence that Saddam had personally authorized the use of chemical weapons against the Kurds.
It is estimated that 30,000 Kurds died from these weapons during the 8 years long war. Ali Hasan al-Majid, better known as Chemical Ali, also escaped the charge of crime against humanity for his direct role in the chemical attacks of Halabja. Why on earth?
As the Reagan administration had removed Iraq from the State Department list of State Sponsors of Terrorism, US companies were allowed to export chemical precursors to the Saddam regime.
For instance, US Companies Alcolac International and Philips provided Thiodiglycol, a precursor of mustard gaz.
On March 12 2008, the Iraqi government announced that it would take legal actions against the suppliers of chemical used in the Halabja attacks. Both Alcolac International and Philips were reorganized.
The origin of the lie
In the immediate aftermath of the incident, the U.S. State Department — quoting a US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) study — took the official position that Iran was responsible for the attack.
This erroneous assessment was used subsequently by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for much of the early 1990s.
The UK National Archives
On July 24 2018, the National Archives released files from the Prime Minister’s Office and Cabinet Office predominantly covering the year of 1993.
Richard Norton-Taylor quickly pointed out that many entire files have been retained, some temporarily, most indefinitely.
Even more curiously, four files relating to the Scott arms-to-Iraq inquiry have been retained.
The judge-led public inquiry that was bitterly opposed by ministers who had been involved in supplying Saddam Hussein with equipment he used for his weapons of mass destruction programme, heard devastating evidence.
It included the Thatcher government’s secret decision to supply Saddam with equipment that could be used to manufacture weapons after he shelled the Kurdish town of Halabja in March 1988 with gas bombs, killing an estimated 5,000 civilians and maiming thousands more.
The TEREX Affair
On January 25 1992, Seymour M. Hersh published an article in the NYT headlined “U.S. Linked to Iraq Scud Launchers”. [1]
Hersh reported that a Congressional subcommittee was investigating allegations against the Terex Corporation made by Dr. Fuisz.
In Sept. 1987, Dr Fuisz was given a tour of the main Terex plant in Motherwell, Scotland. The Terex Corporation is a subsidiary of KCS of Westport, Connecticut.
“I had noticed two large armor-plated vehicles painted in desert camouflage with specially attached steel backs.”
“I asked the plant manager, Art Rowe, about them and was told they were missile launchers for the Iraqi military,” Fuisz said in an affidavit taken for a US Congressional subcommittee investigating the matter.
“These shipments were all requested by the C.I.A. with the cooperation of the British intelligence people,” David J. Langevin, the vice president of Terex, told Fuisz according to his deposition.
John J. Clements was named a Terex vice president in 1987.
“One of Terex’s pressing needs when I joined the company was to borrow money for the purchase of the truck plant in Scotland,” Clements said.
Clements added that he had repeatedly heard Randolph W. Lenz, the president of Terex, tell potential investors:
“We’ve got a purchase order from Iraq for 90 to 100 units. It’s great business.”
“I knew there was business in Iraq,” Clements told NYT journalist Seymour Hersh in 1992.
Terex successfully sued Fuisz for libel and the NYT apologized for the story in 1995. [2]
The gist of the article could be read to charge Terex with supplying Scud missile launchers to Iraq before the Persian Gulf War, a charge neither The Times nor Mr. Hersh intended.
This resulted from an inaccurate headline, erroneous changes made to the content and emphasis of the article in the course of the editorial process, and the inclusion of information supplied by Dr. Fuisz that Terex asserts is false.
Terex vigorously denied the charge and instituted a libel suit against Mr. Hersh and Dr. Fuisz.
The article should not have suggested that Terex has ever supplied Scud missile launchers to Iraq, and The Times regrets any damage that may have resulted to Terex from any false impression the article may have created.
On February 23 2003, the Sunday Herald published a story headlined “Revealed: 17 British Firms Armed Saddam with his Weapons”.
The Terex Corporation is listed as a UK company having provided rocket technology to Iraq. To my knowledge, Terex never sued the Herald for libel. [3]
PS — Dreaming of a Pulitzer Prize?
In his piece ‘The intelligence coup of the century” published by the Washington Post on February 11 2020, Greg Miller ‘revealed’ that Crypto AG was actually owned by the CIA.
Maybe, just maybe, the time has come for a brave journalist to investigate who really owned TEREX at the time it illegally supplied Iraq with weapons. Is this clue too subtle?
REFERENCES
The Halabja chemical attack — Wikipedia
1. “U.S. Linked to Iraqi Scud Launchers,” Jan. 26, 1992.
2. “Editors’ Note,” Dec. 7, 1995.
3. “Revealed: 17 British Firms Armed Saddam with his Weapons” — Feb. 23, 2003.
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Fake News — Obama Tells One Whopper Of A Lie [Halabja chemical attack — March 16 1988]
TOP 2020 Fake News — Obama Writes One Whopper Of A Lie [Halabja chemical attack — March 16 1988]
Intel Today 
A good proofreader would have eliminated this error. If I were to write a book, and it isn’t fact checked before it is published, it would most likely contain a few falsehoods. And I guess this blog is also not error free. But if you don’t like Obama, it becomes a ‘whopper of a lie’ that the media ignore. It all happened before Obama was President. So what would he gain by doing this?
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