Twenty-two years ago this month I traveled to Iraq for two weeks on the 4th delegation of Voices in the Wilderness: A campaign to end the sanctions against the people of Iraq. I witnessed first hand some of the results of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, an unnecessary war. 1/
Here is fresh-faced 24 year old me with @voiceinwild Kathy Kelly, the founder of Voices, shortly before my departure. in 1990-1991 Kathy organized the Gulf Peace Team, 72 peace activists from 18 countries who interposed themselves between the US and Iraqi forces. 2/ 
During the 1991 Persian Gulf War US forces killed an unknown number of Iraqi soldiers and civilians. Here's one estimate: pbs.org/wgbh/pages/fro…. US forces pursued a bombing strategy targeting civilian infrastructure, wiping out power, roads, sewage, water treatment plants. 3/
At the same time, the UN passed the harshest economic sanctions in history, barring Iraq from importing a huge range of materials, including medicines of all kinds, pencils, medical journals, spare parts, chlorine, and any "dual use" items that might be used by the military. 4/
The sanctions, which the Bush Administration kept in place after the war to pressure the regime to eliminate alleged chemical and biological weapons, had a devastating impact on the civilian population, by preventing the government from rebuilding civilian infrastructure. 5/
In December 1995 the British medical journal The Lancet published a report by two researchers working for the UN FAO estimating that up to 576,000 children had died as a result of malnutrition and preventable disease caused by sanctions: nytimes.com/1995/12/01/wor…. 6/
The Bush Administration fought to keep the sanctions in place despite knowledge of their enormous human costs, as did the Clinton Administration which followed. Perhaps 1.5 million Iraqis died in total. Joy Gordon describes it all here: hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?is… 7/
When I went in December 1996 the effects of the war and five years of sanctions were everywhere to be found. Here is the Amiriyah shelter, a civilian air raid shelter that two B-117 Stealth bombers attacked on the night of Feb. 13, 1991, killing at least 408 civilians 8/
The f-117s each dropped a 2000 lb GBU-27 laser guided bomb. The first cut a hold through ten feet of reinforced concrete, before detonating on a timed fuse. The second followed through this hole. The bombs incinerated everyone inside, burning the images of some into the walls. 9/
This is Umm Greyda. She lost her entire family of eight in the Amiriyah shelter massacre. Bereft and driven nearly mad by grief, she moved into the shelter and created a memorial to its victims. Bush Admin officials lied and said the shelter was a military command post. 10/
US bombing in 1991 shattered the health infrastructure of Iraq and prevented its hospitals from importing virtually anything. Iraqi hospitals were once the best in the region, and Baghdad Children's Hospital had a renowned program for treating childhood cancer. 11/
This matters because during the 1991 Gulf War the US utilized highly radioactive depleted uranium munitions for the first time in combat, to penetrate Iraqi tank armor. After the war they littered southern Iraq, causing an explosion in cancer rates. thenation.com/article/pentag… 12/
In Southern Iraq, where most DU munitions were fired, doctors we met with reported a 600% increase in pediatric leukemia and lymphoma. US vets exposed to DU had children with horrible birth defects. The VA denied any link bandepleteduranium.org/en/depleted-ur… 13/
This is one of many, many children I met in Baghdad Children's Hospital in 1996. She was dying of Lymphoma, and sanctions barred the import of the medicine she needed. The largest children's hospital in the Middle East in 1996 had a pharmacy the size of a dorm room fridge. 14/
In Basra - the second largest city in Iraq, large parts of the city had still not been rebuilt after 1991. US backed sanctions barred the import of spare parts to repair sewage treatment plants, so in many neighborhoods untreated sewage 6"-12" deep flooded the streets. 15/
Because the sanctions barred the import of chlorine, water treatment facilities could not treat water, with the result that water borne diseases were among the leading causes of childhood mortality. 16/
Malnutrition compounded the health effects of the sanctions, which utterly devastated the economy and destroyed a once thriving middle class. I met many children dying of malnutrition in the hospitals of Baghdad and Basra. One died in front of me as her mother held her. 17/
In the Baghdad Children's Hospital there was one working incubator, no antibiotics, intermittent power, and almost no medicine, so that the slightest infection could become a death sentence. Iraqi doctors, many trained in the US and UK, were despondent. 18/
The US media, aided by the Pentagon's sophisticated propaganda apparatus, so demonized the people of Iraq, and was so uninterested in the aftermath of the 1991 war that virtually no one in the US knew about the devastating impact of sanctions. 19/
This was George HW Bush's legacy in Iraq. As a historian, I can appreciate Bush's role in helping to peacefully wind down the Cold War, but we must lift our gaze beyond Europe, pay attention to the victims of US policy in Panama, Iraq, etc., and refuse hagiography. 20/END
@sahouraxo, @stephenkinzer you may be interested in this
