A triangle of realpolitik: Iran, Iraq and the United States: Iran would be happy to see Saddam Hussein overthrown. But both regime officials and their

2006 : Will Israel become the new Iraq?

"When Iraq invaded Iran in 1980, Ayatollah Khomeini called Saddam Hussein 'a pro-American mercenary' and 'an infidel.' He was not a US mercenary, but he certainly received Washington's blessing and material assistance to fight the ayatollah. In 1983, three years into the Iran-Iraq fratricide, Donald Rumsfeld was chosen as a special presidential envoy to strengthen US-Iraqi relations. As Michael Dobbs of the Washington Post has recently learned, 'Declassified documents show that Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad at a time when Iraq was using chemical weapons on an `almost daily' basis in defiance of international conventions.' Today, President Bush refers to Saddam Hussein's use of chemical bombs against Iranians and Iraqi Kurds as one of the reasons for the necessity of disarming him. The irony is not lost on the peoples of Iran and Iraq, but it is doubtful that many Americans are aware of this surreal shift in the position of their government."