A Poisonous Affair: America, Iraq, and the Gassing of Halabja: Hiltermann, Joost R.: 9780521876865: Amazon.com: Books

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Joost R. Hiltermann

A Poisonous Affair: America, Iraq, and the Gassing of Halabja First Edition

by Joost R. Hiltermann (Author)

4.1 8 ratings

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In March 1988, during the Iran-Iraq war, thousands were killed in a chemical attack on a town in Iraqi Kurdistan. Both sides accused the other. Gradually it emerged that Saddam Hussein, with the tacit support of his western allies, was responsible. This book tells the story of the gassing of Halabja, and how Iraq amassed chemical weapons to target Iranian soldiers and Kurdish villagers as America looked the other way. Today, as the Middle East sinks further into turmoil, these policies are coming back to haunt the West.

ISBN-10

0521876869
ISBN-13

978-0521876865
Edition

First Edition
Publisher

Cambridge University Press
Publication date

June 18, 2007
Language

English
Dimensions

6 x 1 x 9 inches
Print length

346 pages
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4.1 out of 5

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No, uh, not in fact complicit

Reviewed in the United States on December 31, 2007

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Please to disregard N. Massjouni's agit-prop. While the US did not go far enough in condemning Iraq it lacked the power to constrain Saddam even if it had wanted to do so. In the eighties the US had far less leverage with the regime than did the Europeans and Soviets. US weapons sales to the Iraqi military were tiny compared to European and Warsaw Pact sales. The idea that the US was some kind of ally of Iraq at the time is absurd, for that you'll have to look to France and the USSR. Yes, the US provided anthrax spores to Iraq, unwisely as it turned out. But this was within the framework of medical research, the transfers being between university researchers, no different from dozens of other such international transfers. Unwise in that peculiarly naive Western way, yes, but not evidence of support for Iraqi WMD programs. US military and diplomatic support of Iraq was intended to prevent an Iranian victory, just as US and Israeli support for Iran after the invasion was intended to prevent an Iraqi one. Soulless balance-of-power realism no doubt, but the US had very little influence on either regime. People forget that for years after Halabja much progressive opinion sneered at reports of it as US propaganda.

5 people found this helpful

An Indispensable Book

Reviewed in the United States on December 4, 2007

As a journalist who has covered Iran and Iraq--and US policy towards both--for 17 years, I have always found that the story of Halabja, and the use of poison gas by the Iraqis during the 1980s Iran-Iraq war, was lost in the shadows of claim and counter-claim.

Joost Hiltermann's "A Poisonous Affair" sheds light on this critical period in a way that no other book or report ever has. Based on years of painstaking research--including access to the 18 tons of documents spirited from northern Iraq to the United States in 1991--this book is the most cogent, detailed and rigorous analysis likely to be produced about those events, and the first use of Weapons of Mass Destruction since World War II.

Made clear in this important text is Iraq's singular usage of chemical weapons and work on an array of nerve agents; the impact of poison gas on the psyche of Iraq's Kurds--and how they use that horrific experience of Halabja as a tool to claim special status today--and of the deliberate doubt sown by US officials at the time to portray Iran as equally to blame. Hiltermann deconstructs the quiet US effort that sought to indicate that Iran, too--with all evidence to the contrary--had used chemical weapons in Halabja and elsewhere along the front line.

Today, the author argues, that example of the US supporting Saddam Hussein during the war, even as it knew Iraq was using chemical weapons, and Washington's reluctance to challenge Iraq while it fought its "greater" enemy the Islamic Republic, is one reason Iran distrusts US and Western promises regarding its nuclear program.

Piecing together these historical events, which continue to resonate today with cautionary lessons learned, Hiltermann has produced an indispensable book for any reader who wants to better understand current, sometimes precipitous, policies of the US, Iraqi Kurds, and Iran.

10 people found this helpful

US was not just complicit

Reviewed in the United States on July 23, 2007

It should be made clear that the US was not only complicit in the crimes committed against the Kurds and Iranians by Iraq. They actively provided Iraq with the biological germs required to produce these weapons.

8 people found this helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Mariwany

Very Well-Researched

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 21, 2013

Verified Purchase

If you need a book that objectively tells you the story of the gassing of Halabja, then this book is what you need. The author worked very hard to include all teh different sides to the story and give us an panoramic view of the event. I absolutely recommend it to anyone researching about Iraq, Kurdistan, Saddam Husein's crimes against humanity...etc

Ahmad

Book of Fabrications

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 23, 2014

Verified Purchase

If you need a book simply to tell you the mainstream story that Iraq gassed the kurds but it you won't make a difference but if you are actually interested in in what really happened which is the fact that it was Iran who gassed them to save their troops stranded between shaman ridge and the village then you are on the right track of finding out what really happened you can start reading material from Pelletiere, Stephen C.

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