Political Views,

Saddam’s crimes DWARFED by Coalition carnage 

SADDAM HUSSEIN is on trial in Baghdad but his awful crimes PALE when compared to those of the UK-US-led Coalition countries in Iraq under Sanctions and Occupation.  In short, by 1990 “under-5 infant deaths per 1,000 births” reached a MINIMUM of 50 in oil-rich Iraq under Saddam Hussein as compared to 44 in its neighbour, resource-poor Syria (from catastrophic high values of about 170-200 in the immediately post-colonial era). However Western-imposed Sanctions immediately reversed this trend, leading to doubled infant mortality and avoidable mortality for a dozen years; ultimate US-led invasion and occupation further increased mortality. According to UNICEF (2006) (see: here ) in 2004 “under-5 infant deaths per 1,000 births” had reached 125 in UK-US-occupied Iraq as compared to 16 in Syria.

The latest United Nations Childrens’ Fund (UNICEF) data (see: here ) ALSO show that in 1990 the “under-1 infant mortality rate”  expressed as  “under-1 infant deaths per 1,000 births” was 40 in Iraq under the brutal dictator Saddam Hussein, this comparing favourably with a value of 35 in neighbouring Syria; however by 2004 after 16 years of violent Western impositions this was 102 in Occupied Iraq as compared to 15 in Syria.

The Ba’athist régimes in both Iraq and Syria (for all their authoritarian faults) had been quite successful in reducing the “under-1 infant mortality rate” which had been 150 (post-colonial Iraq, 1950-1955) and 144 (post-colonial Syria, 1950-1955) according to Web-accessible data from the UN Population Division (see: here ). In 1950-1955 the “under-5 infant mortality rate” was 197 in Iraq and 167 in Syria, these countries having only recently emerged from the almost genocidal rigours of occupation by the British and French, respectively.

However the return of Western armies to Iraq in 1990 with the application of Sanctions (and thence war, sustained bombing and sustained Sanctions-induced privations) interrupted this trend to lower infant mortality – “under-5 infant mortality rate”  immediately INCREASED ENORMOUSLY and continued to rise in oil-rich Iraq, from a value of  50 in 1990 to 125 in 2004. In contrast, “under-5 infant mortality rate” in impoverished, neighbouring Syria continued to FALL from 44 in 1990 to 16 in 2004.  

To put these “under-5 infant mortality rate” figures into a wider context, the current “125” value for oil-rich Occupied Iraq is similar to that found in wretchedly impoverished countries in the world in South Asia (e.g. Pakistan, 101) and sub-Saharan Africa (e.g. Zimbabwe, 129); “16” is around the value found in the “best” countries in the Developing World (e.g. Sri Lanka, 14); and, of course, infant mortality inevitably occurs even in peaceful, prosperous First World countries (e.g. Australia, 6). 

The UN Population Division reports estimations of death rate, population, birth rate, infant mortality rate, population age distribution and other demographic data for essentially all countries of the world in 5-year periods (pentades) since 1950. Saddam Hussein has been widely and justly condemned for his brutality but we can use UN data on “under-1 infant mortality” over the last 55 years to put his régime in a more objective perspective in comparison with the Occupying UK-US Coalition.  

The "under-1 infant mortality rate" (under-1 infant deaths per 1000 births) in Iraq was  150 (1950-1955, under the post-British colonial royalist régime), fell to 113 (1960-1965, around the time of the Ba'athist accession to power), fell further to 97 (1965-1970, around the time of  Saddam Hussein’s accession to power) and then halved over the next 20 years to 48 (1985-1990, just prior to the return of Western forces and Sanctions); under UK-US-imposed Sanctions, bombing and war this parameter successively INCREASED to 73 (1990-1995), 94 (1995-2000) and 94 (2000-2005). The corresponding estimates of “under-5 infant mortality rate” for Iraq can be estimated by multiplying by a factor of 1.3 and it can be estimated that about 90% of this infant mortality was “avoidable” (using Australia as a top standard of excellence).

However “infant mortality” is not the only source of “avoidable mortality” in a society. The “avoidable mortality” (technically, “excess mortality”) of a country is the difference between the “actual deaths” and the deaths “expected” in a peaceful, decently-run country with same demographics. This can be determined for successive pentades for all countries in the world if you know the “actual death rate”, the population and can estimate a baseline value for the “expected death rate”. This latter process is complicated, but suffice it to say that in the case of oil-rich Iraq a conservative baseline mortality rate corresponds to the death rate in its impoverished but demographically similar neighbours Syria and Jordan (see: here ). A simpler, approximate method suitable for busy laypersons is to divide the “under-5 infant mortality” for “bad outcome” Third World countries by 0.7 to get a rough estimate of the “avoidable mortality”  (see MWC News ).

The post-1990, Coalition-complicit “avoidable mortality” and ”under-5 infant mortality” for Iraq total 2.2 million and 1.6 million, respectively. The post-invasion “avoidable mortality” and ”under-5 infant mortality” for Iraq total 0.5 million and 0.4 million, respectively, and are unambiguously due to failure of the Coalition to provide life-preserving requisites as demanded by the Geneva Conventions. In 2004 about 122,000 under-5 year old infants died in Occupied Iraq (population 28,057,000) as compared to 8,000 in Syria (population 18,582,000). Using Syria as a baseline we can readily estimate that the annual “avoidable under-5 infant mortality” in Occupied Iraq totals about 106,000.

The Geneva Conventions state that Occupiers are obliged to do everything in their power to preserve the health and life of conquered civilians (see: here ). The Geneva Conventions have clearly been grossly flouted by the Coalition both during the post-invasion occupation period (2003 to the present) and during the pre-invasion period after the imposition of the Sanctions that produced such horrendous under-5 infant mortality and avoidable mortality. Some may argue that Saddam Hussein was the Ruler in the period 1990-2003 and that elevated mortality was “his fault” for responding to the US “green light” and invading Kuwait. However it is absolutely clear that (a) it was Western-imposed Sanctions that directly caused the post-1990 mortality catastrophe and (b) that  Saddam Hussein’s pre-1990 2-decade record was one of dramatically REDUCING infant mortality and avoidable mortality in Iraq, as further emphasized below by comparisons with the performance of other régimes in the same general region.     

Saddam Hussein’s relatively good record and the devastating effect of the West post-1990 is clearly shown by comparing Saddam Hussein’s record in REDUCING infant mortality in the 2 decades prior to the return of Western forces in 1990 with the performance of the governments of a swathe of similar-latitude Developing Countries from Syria to Bangladesh - and then seeing what happened AFTER Western intervention in 1990. Using UN Population Division data it is useful to compare “under-1 infant deaths per 1,000 births” in the pentades 1965-1970, 1985-1990 and 2000-2005 (i.e. 1965-1970 -> 1985-1990 -> 2000-2005)  for the following countries (from West to East): 

Syria: 102 (1965-1970) -> 40 (1985-1990) -> 18 (2000-2005)   

IRAQ:  97 (1965-1970) ->  48 (1985-1990) -> 94 (2000-2005)  

Iran:   133 (1965-1970) ->  69 (1985-1990) -> 34 (2000-2005)  

Afghanistan: 191 (1965-1970) -> 155 (1985-1990) -> 149 (2000-2005)  

Pakistan: 138 (1965-1970) -> 99 (1985-1990) -> 79 (2000-2005)  

India: 145 (1965-1970) -> 95 (1985-1990) -> 68 (2000-2005)  

Bangladesh: 159 (1965-1970) -> 104 (1985-1990) -> 59 (2000-2005)  

Sri Lanka: 68 (1965-1970) -> 27 (1985-1990) -> 17 (2000-2005).  

Iraq’s pre-1990 performance under Saddam Hussein is comparable to that of its neighbours Syria and Iran - and of Sri Lanka - in that it halved infant mortality. However the major South Asian countries - including the “World’s Greatest Democracy” India – performed very badly in comparison over the same period.