US urges Iraqis not to revolt
2003-03-25 23:34
Washington - US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's advice to Iraqis on Tuesday not to rise up against Saddam Hussein's rule until US or British troops can help them reflects a bitter lesson learned 12 years ago.
During the 1991 Gulf War, then President George Bush, father of the present White House incumbent, urged Shi'ite Muslims in the south and Kurds in the north of Iraq to rise up against Saddam.
Then he stood by and watched the Iraqi president slaughter tens of thousands of them.
Amid reports of a popular Shi'ite uprising in the port city of Basra, Rumsfeld said on Tuesday: "I am very careful about encouraging people to rise up. I mean, we know there are people in those cities ready to shoot them if they try to rise up."
He said he was reluctant to urge any uprising until he was sure that British or US troops could come in and deal with the various militias and organisations loyal to Saddam.
"Unless you're ready to deal with that, then I am very reluctant to run around the world encouraging people to rise up.
People will rise up. But let there be no doubt, these are repressed people.
But I hope and pray they'll do it at a time when there are sufficient forces nearby to be helpful to them rather than at a time when it simply costs their life, and it's a wasted life," said Rumsfeld.
In February 1991, while the first Gulf War was still raging, the elder Bush called on the Iraqi people and military to "take matters into their own hands".
The rebellion erupted in dozens of towns in the north and south the following month as Iraqi resistance collapsed and US troops crossed into Iraqi territory.
"The words of the president were followed by leaflets and broadcasts.
People believed it. And when they rose up, they expected to get help and assistance from allied forces in the region," Ahmed Chalabi of the opposition Iraqi National Congress later said.
Rebels abandoned
But the rebels found themselves fighting alone.
As part of the cease-fire agreement negotiated by General Norman Schwarzkopf, the United States military agreed to let Iraq fly its own helicopters.
Iraq claimed they were needed to transport their leaders. Instead, they were used as gun ships against the rebels.
Then National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft later said he had wanted to reverse Schwarzkopf's decision, but was overruled by then Defence Secretary Dick Cheney, now the vice-president, and then chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell, now the secretary of state.
"They said it would be a serious thing to do. It would undermine his (Schwarzkopf's) command over his forces and so on - so I didn't pursue it," said Scowcroft.
"It was a mistake...If we had taken it to the president, I would have been very strongly opposed to letting them continue to fly."
As the revolt spread, the United States worried that Iraq would split into three pieces, causing more instability in the region.
They particularly worried that the Shi'ites in the south would ally themselves with their co-religionists in Iran. Saddam's troops were allowed to penetrate US lines in the south to crush the revolt.
Although estimates are unclear, between 30 000 and 60 000 people are thought to have been killed as Saddam put down the uprisings.
In the north, 1.5 million Kurds fled across the mountains into Iran and Turkey creating a humanitarian disaster that forced the United States and other countries to air-drop millions of aid packages to the refugees.