Talk:International sanctions against Iraq

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please do not simply disappear relevant text without detailed explanation (in particular, of discussion of chlorination Iraqi water supply during sanctions)

TheTimesAreChanging simply disappeared text discussing Iraqi water treatment vulnerabilities because it did not suit the argument he wished to advance. Additions and edits are not exercises in polemics; this aims to be an encyclopedia, so do not do not simply disappear relevant text without detailed explanation.

Simply passingly calling disappeared passages (without even having the courtesy of identifying them) "unreliable" is lazy scurrilousness, in this case with obviously tendentious aims: to replace what had been presented with a view that suited TheTimesAreChanging.

This is the source cited as unreliable--a statement from David Sole, President of the Sanitary Chemists & Technicians Association-UAW Local. 2334 at the Detroit Water & Sewerage Department, here: https://web.archive.org/web/20081203113830/http://www.iacenter.org/iraqchallenge/water.htm.

We can await with suspense what TheTimesAreChanging (or someone else, if not a sockpuppet) will come up with to discredit this source.

Further, the opposing view (along with further deletion of the fact that the need for chorline, whose importation had been banned by the relevant sanctions) ignored the relevant point. The basic point did not concern money. It concerned materials needed for the sterilization of the water supply. Importation of those materials was banned by sanctions. If you do not have any understanding of the fundamental issues pertaining to an article, please do try to be clever, disappearing text and substantive issues, substituting tendentious sources, etc.

Although the blockquote (and article) by Rubin nowhere addresses the relevant point, the article that TheTimesAreChanging cites will nonetheless be retained after undoing disappeared text. TheTimesAreChanging's attempt to editorialize that the Rubin article selected "eviscerates" a point that that article does not even address just makes him look silly. (The point being the import bans on materials that the sanctions imposed, not $$ spent by Saddam Hussein, mention of which--including "presidential palaces," "smuggling," are just transparent polemics directed by Rubin at Iraq pre-2003, and which aren't relevant to the main point that they they take issue with. Mention of the Intifada is moreover totally unrelated, and makes drive-by removal of relevant text and its replacement with irrelevant bashing of Saddam Hussein look still more idiotic and transparently motivated.)

To anyone who sees this bullet item, please watch this article to ensure that these relevant materials are retained for comprehensiveness and accuracy Alfred Nemours (talk) 06:02, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, but your sources—FAIR, GlobalSecurity.org, ThirdWorldTraveler, and, yes, the primary source Sanitary Chemists & Technicians Association—really are completely unreliable, should not be allowed to stay, and if we have to go to WP:RSN that is exactly what you will be told. Also, as you probably know since your actual edit does not make this claim, chlorine was not "banned"; rather, the importation of chemicals that could be used for WMD was tightly controlled, requiring the Iraqi government to explain exactly how they would be used. Moreover, as Rubin states, water quality was extremely good in both Northern and Central Iraq, though it deteriorated in the South, and the Oil-for-Food programme "spent more than $1 billion in water and sanitation projects in Iraq." Can you really not find any better sources than FAIR, GlobalSecurity.org, ThirdWorldTraveler, and the primary source Sanitary Chemists & Technicians Association?TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 15:21, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

There you go again.

First, Third World Traveler was not provided as a source, and if you read the quoted material that you impugn, you know this. Third World Traveler is a website that reprinted an article published in the Progressive magazine. Please do not distort or exaggerate to distract from relevant issues at play. Second, before throwing mud at a source for being unreliable (here, "completely unreliable")--particularly in the case of simply disappearing text without explanation--provide some reason for doing so. Anticipating the kind of "reason" you might provide in advance, empty political labels used to stain a source's reputation are not mainly what I have in mind. What I have in mind more relates to the quality of the testimony provided. Third, the irony in this case is your complaint given the source you have added. Invoking the opinion of Michael Rubin to weigh in on the humanitarian impact of sanctions on Iraqi society is like invoking the opinion of Carlos the Jackal (i) on recommendations as to the golden parachutes suggested by Goldman Sachs to one of its client or (ii) on the likelihood of a Sarah Palin run for the Republican party presidential nomination in 2024, or, perhaps more to the point, like invoking the opinion of George Gaines or another appointee of the Andrew Jackson administration to establish that the epidemiological effects of the Trail of Tears on the Cherokee population were minimal (would that be remotely credible?). Rubin has proved a tireless advocate for regime change in Iraq, worked for the Pentagon during an administration that maintained the sanctions, and his argument does not even address the relevant issues concerned, namely the import restrictions (you take issue with the word banned, but the point is the same) placed on Iraq, but instead distracts by invoking transparently polemical references to "presidential palaces," "smuggling," and the character of Saddam Hussein, and the Palestinian Intifada (?). Moreover, Rubin provides no evidence for his innuendo or for anything else he suggests. Nonetheless, I have retained the Rubin's discussion because I don't simply disappear sources that I don't agree with, and because his arguments (if his empty competitive posturing to throw mud on villains that distract from the issue at hand can be called arguments) are answered by those of other sources. If you would like more documentation about assessments of Iraqi public health after several years of sanctions, that would be a very reasonable thing to want for this article, although from your actions so far I suspect you want to minimize such a thing. Say what you'd like about Leslie Stahl, but it's difficult to argue that her question posed to Albright was motivated by partisanship or that she was either an exponent of Pentagon or Saddamist policy. Fourth, how is a President of the Sanitary Chemists & Technicians Association unreliable or incompetent to speak on issues relating to water treatment and sanitation?? (Again, here I'm totally flummoxed. Are you at all serious in suggesting otherwise? You replaced his testimony with that of a Pentagon neocon working for an administration that maintained the hold of sanctions. The second figure is less of a dispassionate observer than the first?)

Please be advised that this seems to be nothing but trolling. Nothing you have said or imported into the article shows the slightest concern for the Iraqi people under the sanctions, which is the topic at issue in the relevant portion of the article. There is no problem if you do not care about this issue, but disappearing text and sources which you replace with discussion from Pentagon ideologues seems to me a waste of all of our energy in developing content for this encyclopedia. Please seek out entries to which you can contribute and make contributions there, rather than find entries from which to sneakily censor (vandalize) content. Alfred Nemours (talk) 20:03, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

Content of BMJ article gets distorted

The user SeriousSam11 has four times in approximately 30 minutes done the following revert[1] which introduces WP:WEASEL and WP:OR (the study "suggests" instead of "has shown", and the study "admits" something) to text that cites a BMJ study. The editor provides as reasons the following:

• A single conspirational-style article, which bases itself on many assumptions by the author, should not be stated as *the* absolute authority. It should be stated as "a recent study suggests X", and not in the absolute terms of "has shown"
• BMJ is not the direct source, but Tim Dyson. BMJ a journal that publishes articles by submitters. The author is unknown, has no experience or work with the Iraq sanctions, and the article leans into tactics oft used in Holocaust denial.
• The BMJ article is not a proper survey or study. It an article by an economics professor which skews data and itself contains holes and conspiracy-level claims, and it should not be treated as an absolute source.

The aforementioned rationales are ill-founded. Furthermore, the BMJ study declares in no uncertain terms that "the rigging of the 1999 Unicef survey was an especially masterful fraud. That it was a deception is beyond doubt". The BMJ study furthermore reviews existing studies that support the conclusion. This language does not get into a journal article in a journal with an impact factor of 20+ unless it's accurate. The study does not "admit" anything that requires the type of hedging language or qualifications that the editor tries to introduce. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:00, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

The journal BMJ Global Health is a reliable source and the content is directly on point. Sam, it is completely inappropriate and offensive for you to call this academic article a "conspiracy" or liken it to "Holocaust denial." Neutrality^talk 03:59, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Snooganssnoogans and Neutrality. It is worth noting that even if the BMJ was not a first-rate academic source—which it most definitely is—the article in question is only summarizing existing research, and can easily be replicated. Anyone can compare the results of the three post-invasion UN surveys (or, indeed, UNICEF's data from the independent Kurdish region during the period of the sanctions) to the infant mortality rate claimed by the former Iraqi government to see the same howling discrepancy—and draw the appropriate conclusions.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 08:26, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

As a published researcher myself during my former graduate studies, and having read 1000s of published papers, I can accurately say that it's very easy and straight-forward for questionable research and even further questionable conclusions to get published in even the most reputed publications, such as IEEE-sponsored journals, Nature, AER, Science, etc. It's well-known by any researcher that the claims and conclusions made in many papers just do not add up. "It's in BMJ" is a poor defense.

Nowhere on the article is there a denoted impact factor, so this appears to be a contrived claim. Also it is vital to repeat that any journal does not create the content listed in its publications. It simply is a platform for contributors. It is fallacy to claim that an expert council of British medical professionals representing BMJ had put it together. Rather, the contribution is attributed to an unknown and unabashedly biased economics teacher.

As previously stated, the article is a collection of cherry-picking and distortions. For example, one such distortion is "However, when the UN realised its mistake it led to a sudden and large upward revision of its estimate of life expectation in Iraq during 2000–2005, from 57 to 70 years." The UN publishes a World Population Prospects revision every year. Because populations and demographic points (such as fertility rate, life expectancy, etc) change all the time, the UN publishes this every year. Evidently, the life expectancy during the 2000s was higher than in the 1990s, but the authors misinterpreted or distorted this as being something entirely different.

The authors at one point clearly contradict themselves, quoting "Eventually, however, one close observer of the situation was able to comment that ‘[s]ince March 1998 the oil for food programme has greatly increased access to essential supplies and the mortality rate [of children under 5] has surely declined.’" Here, they quote a study that says yes, many children were dying, just that since 1998, there weren't as many dying due to the oil-for-food program. Evidently, the authors did not read their sources, as they used a source which directly contradicts their claims. The authors were under the presumption that fewer people dying since 1998 somehow proves that point that no one died at any point, despite the quote and the study it comes from clearly stating the direct opposite. They attempted to twist a quote which directly contradicts their premises to actually supporting them. This is clearly disingenuous and is another example of the cherry-picking and distortions I noted earlier.

Then of course, there is the rather astonishing claim the authors make that because maybe fewer people died than originally stated, therefore no one died. This is an unsubstantiated extreme. One of the preceding occasions a major famine and humanitarian crisis such as that in Iraq had happened in the 20th century, about 10 million Ukrainians died. Of course, I noted earlier this is a popular Holocaust denial tactic, which is why I pointed it out. Estimates of the dead in the Holocaust reach as low as 4 million, which those who subscribe to Holocaust denial use to claim that no one actually died since it isn't as high as the commonly cited 6 million figure. Here, Dyson uses the same exact tactic. Perhaps fewer than 576,000 children died in the first 5 years of sanctions, and according to the authors, as a result this means that no one died. This is a clearly disingenuous conclusion, especially since some of the sources either contradict the article as a whole, or misrepresented conclusions are drawn. It would have been absolutely acceptable if the authors' conclusion had been that the degree of death was exaggerated by some margin. Rather, they claim no death happened at all.

It is wholly incorrect to state that it is "summarizing" existing research, especially after having read all the cited information. It is cherry-picking, distorting, and misrepresenting information, and even irresponsibly contradicting itself with studies and research clearly contrary to the authors' claims. If it what summarizing existing research, it wouldn't contradict its own claims by citing research that is to the contrary. Capped off by a radical conclusion that no one died, despite contradicting information and one of the greatest humanitarian crises of the last century, it certainly is a poorly written piece. Of course, this is not to include the possibility of political motivations, which is often used to excuse culpability in such things (eg. Turkish refusal to acknowledge the Armenian genocide). Nor is any explanation given as to why the US government very freely accepted, acknowledged, and confirmed the mass death in Iraq, but as politics would go, blamed it on the Iraqi government. SeriousSam11 (talk) 10:06, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

and there's this https://www.gicj.org/positions-opinons/gicj-positions-and-opinions/1188-razing-the-truth-about-sanctions-against-iraq 199.188.192.194 (talk) 07:55, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

2020 renewed edit-warring

An editor has restored an argumentative non-npov version of the lead that attacks the aforementioned BMJ study. The sources that the editor is edit-warring into the lead don't appear to directly relate to the subject (the don't even mention "sanctions"). Snooganssnoogans (talk) 19:27, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

adding criticism found vs 2003 and later studies regarding child mortality rates + Oil for Foods edit

As already mentioned, the CATO source says "the 'corrected' numbers still imply a death toll that may reach into the six figures" and directly refers to "Changing views on child mortality and economic sanctions in Iraq" in an end note for that sentence. Also, the entire GICJ article is a criticism of "Changing Views." I did not see in the Wikipedia policy pages that a .org cannot refute academic specialists (but if it is there, please link). Both the CATO and GICJ articles have endnotes included (GICJ relies on Sponeck's A Different Kind of War: The UN Sanctions Regime in Iraq; Sponeck was UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Iraq).

There is another source I found last night which criticizes the idea that "there was no major rise in child mortality in Iraq after 1990 and during the period of the sanctions": Tim Dyson's paper "Child Mortality in Iraq since 1990." Dyson looks at the census studies conducted in 1997 vs the UNICEF study of 1999, concluding that the UNICEF study was the more accurate (focussing specifically on child mortality, they went out of their way to ensure the data was good quality as they knew full well the controversy on the topic, and the questionnaire asked questions regarding number of children the women they interviewed had borne prior to asking for detailed birth history), and, if anything, gave a lower estimate (their findings say the number was in the neighbourhood of 668,000 to 878,000 excess deaths). Dyson's conjecture is that Iraqi women weren't properly reporting mortality rates for the 1997 census because their children's names were included in the rationing system (and reporting such a death meant their family got less food). The census also wasn't specifically looking at child mortality rates; that was included in a suite of questions.

I also do not understand why my last edits were completely undone, as I also included a separate edit to the Oil for Food section, which mentioned the Iraqi government did not have control of the money (it was held in escrow in NY and the UN Security Council approved or rejected Iraqi buys with it). This was referenced from the book Iraq Under Siege: The Deadly Impact of Sanctions and War, with specific page number reference. Skosoris (talk) 17:31, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

References

(I) GICJ are not experts and are not notable. We don't just add random analyses to Wikipedia articles, and we particularly do not use those analyses to rebut peer-reviewed research. (II) I cannot understand why we should include a CATO source which off-handedly refers to the findings of the BMJ study (why not just rely on the BMJ study?), (III) Dyson authored the BMJ study, so it's bizarre to use an outdated 2006 study from Dyson to contradict his up-to-date recent BMJ study, (IV) the book by Arnove is not peer-reviewed and is not by a recognized expert. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 17:46, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

The more recent BMJ study has issues. It references the 2006 study as fact for the deception within the UNICEF study (it is the endnote for "It is now known, however, that the ICMMS results for the centre/south of Iraq were a deception"). But the 2006 study did not say that at all (I've read both). The BMJ study looks at the different surveys and concludes unequivocally that the UNICEF study was rigged without offering any other analysis (as the earlier 2006 study did). And while the BMJ study may also call the numbers into question, it still finds that child mortality was still the highest in the region during that time (child mortality was "roughly twice that of other countries").

So to say that "there was no major rise in child mortality in Iraq after 1990 and during the period of the sanctions" is misleading, even from the BMJ study, as child mortality rates were still higher during this time.

If you're not willing to accept the criticisms that I have found, I propose that the BMJ study should be removed from being quoted in the lede, and the description of "masterful fraud" later in the page. The study appears to me to be flawed and biased, particularly in its language; Wikipedia articles are supposed to be neutral. It is my opinion that this whole section should be removed:

A 2017 study in the British Medical Journal described "the rigging of the 1999 Unicef survey" as "an especially masterful fraud".[12] The three comprehensive surveys conducted since 2003 all found that the child mortality rate in the period 1995-2000 was approximately 40 per 1000, which means that there was no major rise in child mortality in Iraq after sanctions were implemented.

Saying "A 1999 UNICEF report found that 500,000 children died as a result of sanctions,[41] but comprehensive surveys after 2003 failed to find such child mortality rates.[12]" is more than enough.

Also, it's not okay that I listed the book in regards to the account/money, but it's okay that someone else did? It's already listed in the page as footnote 53. The book has essays by experts such as Denis Halliday and Phyllis Bennis. What else is needed to make it a recognized expert? Most books aren't peer-reviewed. Skosoris (talk) 18:53, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

"The more recent BMJ study has issues. ... If you're not willing to accept the criticisms that I have found, ... " In other words, you are engaged in your own original research to "refute" peer-reviewed academic scholarship. If you can get your criticisms published in a reputable journal, then they will become relevant to Wikipedia, but they have no bearing at present. (As an aside, they are also ill-founded: The endnotes for "It is now known, however, that the ICMMS results for the centre/south of Iraq were a deception" are actually Spagat 2010 and Dyson 2009, contrary to your statement above, while Dyson and Cetorelli 2017 is clear that under-5 mortality in Iraq under the sanctions regime was not "unusually high compared to the 1980s" and that "There has been no substantial reduction in child mortality in the period since 2003.") Finally, if Arnove 2000 is cited in the article, it probably shouldn't be, as it is an outdated and overtly politicized work from South End Press, a now-defunct publisher of political activism with a veneer of scholarship.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 21:55, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

No, that's not what I meant. I apologize for the way that was worded (and yes, you're right, that's my mistake; I read the (similar) title and author but missed the date because I was getting too worked up about all of this). I feel that I did find criticisms, but as has already been said, they are not peer reviewed (and I did not realize that was a requirement for WIkipedia? Again, I'm sorry, this is only my second attempt to edit something on Wikipedia). So I was hoping that we could work together to make this part of the page a little more neutral sounding, as that's what I thought Wikipedia pages are supposed to be? (I saw it listed in the Wikipedia policies). Skosoris (talk) 22:59, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

I don't see a neutrality issue with the "masterful fraud" quote because it is in quotation marks and attributed to the source (itself a peer-reviewed journal), not stated in wikivoice. While Wikipedia articles are supposed to maintain a neutral point of view, there is no requirement that all of our sources have to use neutral language.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 17:18, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Ba'athist?

In the lede, I changed "Ba'athist Iraq" into Iraq[2], which was revered by TheTimesAreAChanging[3]. But the reasons for change still stand. First of all, "Ba'athist Iraq" does not appear in the text at all, so cannot be introduced in the WP:LEDE (and afterwards be forgotten). And being not in the text at all is most reasonable: the specification "Ba'athist Iraq" is not a formal name of the state (never been), nor was it mentioned in UNSC resolutions (like 660), so the opening sentence "embargo imposed by the UNSC on Ba'athist Iraq" is incorrect. The qualifier is not sourced or clarified in this article, nor in the link target. As a nickname is it not desired per WP:ASTONISH nor by WP:COMMONNAME (the nickname is new to me, too; cannot remember it being named as such at all). Then, the nickname itself is imprecise and probably POV: the "regime" specifier could be used in political speech (again, even this is unsourced) ie being politcally motivated. Anyway, apparently the "Ba'athist Iraq" era started in 1968, while the sanctions only started in 1990 so again there is no relation to the Ba'athist regime being targeted. Easy enough: it is way more clarifying if the period is specified in the first sentence, like: "sanctions imposed on Iraq from 1990 to 2003": issue solved -DePiep (talk) 07:12, 31 March 2022 (UTC)

A.) Contrary to your post above, the Ba'th Party is mentioned and/or wikilinked more than once in the body of the article. If the article does not go out of its way to emphasize Iraq's ruling party, that is most likely because it was written from the assumption that the average reader would have minimal background knowledge of Iraq. B.) "'Ba'athist Iraq' is not a formal name of the state (never been) ..." You are free to propose moving Ba'athist Iraq to "Republic of Iraq" (and Nazi Germany to "German Reich," etc.) but unless or until the community consensus regarding the WP:COMMONNAME of the state changes, denigrating the long-stable consensus title as a mere "nickname" is a tedious waste of time. C.) "Anyway, apparently the 'Ba'athist Iraq' era started in 1968, while the sanctions only started in 1990 so again there is no relation to the Ba'athist regime being targeted." The relation is that the then-Ba'thist government of Iraq—not contemporary Iraq, nor the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, etc.—invaded and annexed Kuwait.

Anyway, we don't need to explicitly say "Ba'thist" in the lede. Since tinkering with extremely minor aspects of the lede is all that you seem to care about, and I have trimmed the lede accordingly, hopefully now you can take your concern for minutiae elsewhere. Regards,TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 08:35, 31 March 2022 (UTC)

Why the superiority attitude towards me? DePiep (talk) 09:12, 31 March 2022 (UTC)