Britain chemically bombarded Iraq in 1920s

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http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2013/02/11/288491/uk-used-chemicals-on-ir aq-in-1920s/


Britain chemically bombarded Iraq in 1920s

Press TV, 11 February 2012


The use of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, over which the country was invaded by US and British forces in 2003, goes back to the early days of the twentieth century when British officials had strongly supported the use of such weaponry.

Britain started testing its chemical weapons on innocent people of Iraq in the 1920s, almost one hundred years ago, when the Arab and Kurdish people of Iraq resisted the British occupation, a move which had developed into a full scale national revolt and could have cost Britain dearly.

As the Iraqi resistance gained power, Britain resorted to increasingly repressive measures, including the use of poison gas against Iraqi tribes.

The then Marshal of the British Royal Air Force (RAF) Sir Arthur Travers Harris, commonly known as "Bomber" Harris by the press, and often within the RAF as "Butcher" Harris, said once, “The Arab and Kurd now know what real bombing means in casualties and damage. Within forty-five minutes a full-size village can be practically wiped out and a third of its inhabitants killed or injured.”

Moreover, the then Secretary for War and Air Winston Churchill wrote to Sir Hugh Montague Trenchard, the pioneer of air warfare, about the possibility of using some kind of asphyxiating bombs to control turbulent tribes in Iraq.

“I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favor of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes,” said Churchill who was in no doubt that gas could be profitably used against innocent Iraqi people.

British cabinet ministers were also reluctant to sanction the use of such weapon, despite their knowledge that it could permanently damage eyesight and could easily kill children and sick people.

Hundreds of Iraqi and Kurd people, including defenseless women and children, were slaughtered by the RAF employment of chemical weapons in the region in the 1920s.

Today in 2013, after almost a century, Iraq is still fragile as the US and Britain has invaded the country again in 2003 under the pretext of “weapons of mass destruction”.

Now after spending hundreds of billions of dollars on their war mongering policies and a decade of war crimes in the Arab country, the US and British officials announced such weapons were never found.


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From the archives:


Winston Churchill's secret poison gas memo

Global Research, 29 July 2004

http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHU407A.html


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