Path: ccsf.homeunix.org!ccsf.homeunix.org!news1.wakwak.com!nf1.xephion.ne.jp!onion.ish.org!onodera-news!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.fjserv.net!skynet.be!skynet.be!130.133.1.3.MISMATCH!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!202.215.53.66!not-for-mail From: Declan Murphy Newsgroups: fj.life.in-japan Subject: Re: Larry Flynt is a praying man Date: Thu, 07 Aug 2003 01:54:33 +0900 Lines: 81 Message-ID: <3F3132C9.9070105@hotmail.com> References: <3F30AF89.8050308@hotmail.com> Reply-To: declan_murphy@hotmail.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 202.215.53.66 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: news.uni-berlin.de 1060188785 27296820 202.215.53.66 (16 [139419]) User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.0rc2) Gecko/20020510 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en Xref: ccsf.homeunix.org fj.life.in-japan:4095 Brett Robson wrote: > On Wed, 06 Aug 2003 16:34:33 +0900, Declan Murphy ... > >>Monsieur mtfester@netscape.net wrote: >> >>>Monsieur Brett Robson wrote: >>> >>>>On Tue, 5 Aug 2003 12:31:42 -0400, Monsieur Kevin Gowen ... >>> >>>>>From 1973 to 2002, the warmongering USA sold $200 million in arms to Iraq, >>>> >>>>>accounting for 1% of Iraqi arms imports for that period. During the same >>>>>period, peace-loving UN Security Council members Russia, France, and China >>>>>sold $25.145 billion (57%), $5.595 billion (13%), and $5.192 billion (12%) >>>>>in arms to Iraq, respectively. >>>>>Source: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute >>>>>(Figures are trend-indicator values expressed in US dollars at constant >>>>>(1990) prices) >>>> >>>>URL please. >>> >>That would be >> >>http://projects.sipri.se/armstrade/Trnd_Ind_IRQ_Imps_73-02.pdf >> >>with the background data at >> >>http://projects.sipri.se/armstrade/atirq_data.html >> >>For some reason Denmark sold more by value, but when you dig around it >>turns out to be one (landing) ship. Apart from the Danes and the French, >>all weapons sales of a value higher than the US were from communist bloc >>and satellites with the exception of Brazil - exports of light armoured >>vehicles. All of the US sales (aviation) took place during a 5 year >>period during the Reagan admin. >> >>What Kevin didn't mention was that the figures from 1991-2002 are zero > > He also forgets to mention a little war in the area 1980-89(?) and that when the September 1980 to around August 1988. http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/iraniraq.htm seems to be an interesting summary. > USSR stopped supplying arms to Iraq for the first 18months because of Iraqi > aggression, the US sold them aircraft (amongst other things). Iran had American > weapons including F-14 Tomcats, much of which came via Israel, which were used > to attack neutral merchant vessels. My understanding is that the F-14s (and other weapons systems) were mostly sold to Iran prior to the 1979 revolution when Iran was still under the rule of the Shah. - hence the whole arms for hostages "Iran/Contra" bruhaha when the US supplied much needed electronics and other components for the F14s (etc) in the hope that Iran would wield whatever influence it may have had in Lebanon and elsewhere regarding the release of hostages. I'm not familiar with any Israeli role. >>Also interesting is >>that the French armaments industry has zero sales to the USA/UK & Australia. > > The US wouldn't let us buy some of the clearly superior French weapons. The Mirage purchases predate the period given in the quote. Compatibility issues may be a major reason, but I can't think of any major defence purchases since the late 80's in which French contractors have been competing for the tender. Any examples? -- "As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead, trying to kill me. They do not feel any enmity against me as an individual, nor I against them. They are "only doing their duty", as the saying goes. Most of them, I have no doubt, are kind-hearted law-abiding men who would never dream of committing murder in private life. On the other hand, if one of them succeeds in blowing me to pieces with a well-placed bomb, he will never sleep any the worse for it. He is serving his country, which has the power to absolve him from evil" - George Orwell, England Your England, 1941