Ok, this next bit is

Ok, this next bit is perplexing me a bit. I want to publish it, but
I’m afraid I will jeopardize a dear friend’s standing in his
community by doing so. I don’t want to make myself out to be Ben
Bradlee or anyone like that, but for the first time in my life I can
honestly understand the conundrums editors face when deciding whether
or not to publish something. It’s relatively big. And that’s the
problem. This is not a big website: it’s just me here, spouting off,
but it seems as if an offhand inquiry about a story I linked to last
week has produced something really rather remarkable. And it’s
informative. And it’s making the hairs on the back of my neck rise.
I’m not an editor; I’m not a reporter. I’m just someone with a
webpage and the inclination to write stuff down and shoot it out into
that vast void known as the World Wide Web.
Sigh. I am making a mountain out of a molehill again. I’m going to
obscure the people involved: the dear friend has also given permission
to print his email, so technically, I shouldn’t be fretting. I will
also give you some history as to the correspondent who produced this
and let you make your own judgment about it. That’s all I really can
do, isn’t it? I’m trusting you to be responsible people about this.
I want this out there because I think it shows some seriously
remarkable things we haven’t heard anything about. Ok, Catholic
crisis of conscience over with. Time to give you some history about the
correspondent. A. is someone the husband has known for going on five
years now. They have a tumultuous history, but he’s a pretty good guy
on the whole. I’ve mentioned before that the husband spent a goodly
amount of time in Kuwait in the past. He was in Kuwait for almost six
months, working on an IT consulting project for an Islamic finance
house (bank). A. was the man who brought the husband to Kuwait. They
had a year long falling out as a result of unpaid bills and slurs
dropped on the husband’s doorstep, but amazingly enough, 9/11 did
bring some good about. The husband and A., while business partners, had
also formed a very tight friendship that had suffered as a result of
the nastiness. 9/11 brought phone calls and emails from Kuwait;
messages that conveyed how very sorry A. was that this had happened to
our country; that he felt for us; that if there was anything he could
do to please let him know. The friendship between A. and the husband
became a solid entity again, and for that we were glad: it’s good to
know that something good can come out of something so horrible. It
should be mentioned that A. holds a doctorate, is a devout Muslim, has
a lovely family, and on the whole is a very good man. He was also taken
captive during the early days of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and was
held prisoner for the duration of the war. He has no love for Saddam
Hussein and was very glad that the coalition came in to rid the
Kuwaitis of this problem once and for all. We may not have thought much
about the fact Saddam rolled right over that border once, and might do
it again: westerners seemed to dismiss that possibility. However, the
Kuwaitis never did. They knew
it could happen again and it worried them. They were thankful that they
had the strong arms of America to provide deterrence. Whenever I
worried about the husband---a white American male---living in the
Middle East, he always dismissed my concerns with a “The Kuwaitis
love Americans, Kath. Don’t worry. There’s no reason to.” And the
husband meant it: he wasn’t downplaying the threat or
exaggerating the support of the average Kuwaiti: there was no threat
because the Kuwaitis really were grateful---and had no reservations
about showing it. A. is one of those Kuwaitis. He loves his country,
but he is also grateful the US came and beat Saddam back.
A rudimentary, non-textbook comparative government lesson is somewhat
in order to understand why some of this is big news. Kuwait is a small
country and according to A. is ruled by five families, and the Al
Sabah’s---the Emir and his sons---aren’t one of them. They’re
dictated to by the five families---sort of the way the New York mafia
families laid down the law back in the day before the RICO statutes.
Politicians don’t work their way up: they’re placed strategically,
like pawns on a chessboard. Everything’s done under the table, while
the shisha smokes on in the background: they barely know the meaning of
the word “transparency”. While Kuwait is better than some other
Gulf countries as far as the liberalness of its policies, it’s still
very much the same in some regards. A. knows this and works the system
in his favor, but he has mentioned to the husband that he would like
the system to change as he’s no great fan of it: he knows it could be
better. Last week, when we saw the Hindustan Times article (the link
is dead, I’ll reprint the article below), and because it was so vague
I asked the husband, “I wonder if A. has any more information about
this?” The husband asked, and sure enough A. did: he’s very well
connected. Little did I know, though, when we asked, that A. would take
supper with a governmental official, present the Hindustan Times article to the official and have it confirmed
for us. He also found out some very interesting information that while
I have no way of confirming it, I suspect, just by knowing A., that
it’s also true. Some of it is very disturbing. Here’s the article
that started it all off: Kuwait foils smuggling of chemicals, bio warheads from Iraq
Associated Press
Kuwait City, October 2 Kuwaiti security authorities have foiled an
attempt to smuggle $60 million worth of chemical weapons and biological
warheads from Iraq to an unnamed European country, a Kuwaiti newspaper
said on Wednesday. The pro-Government Al-Siyassah, quoting an unnamed
security source, said the suspects had been watched by security since
they arrived in Kuwait and were arrested "in due time." It did not say
when or how the smugglers entered Kuwait or when they were arrested.
The paper said the smugglers might have had accomplices inside Kuwait.
It said Interior Minister Sheik Nawwaf Al Ahmed Al Sabah would hand
over the smuggled weapons to an FBI agent at a news conference, but did
not say when.
Government officials could not be immediately reached for comment.
Iraqi Interior Minister Nouri Al-Badran met on Tuesday with Sheik
Nawwaf and discussed cooperation between the two countries in security
matters. His visit is the first by an Iraqi interior minister to
Kuwait.
Without further ado, here’s the e-mail that A. sent the husband. Keep
in mind when reading it, that while A. is a very bright man, he’s not
a native English speaker, so there are idiomatic, spelling and grammar
errors, but he does manage to get the overall point across, even if he
is overly fond of exclamation points. “Bottom line I presented the newspaper clip (printed it out of
the web). And to my astonishment he acknowledged it!! And not only had
that he gone further than that by telling me some details that
instantaneously rose my body hair! Goodness what's going on to this
poor world of ours! Let me give you a kind of fish-eye look to what's
going on behind the scene and tightly monitored and controlled by the
major league players (governments those are!): I. Kuwait territory: a.
Ever since Saddam troops were kicked outside of Kuwait 1991, there have
been so many discoveries of stocks of chemical weapons here and there
but mostly in the desert. Most were professionally stored and packed in
a way that they would not be self-destroyed by any chance including
extreme weather conditions. Approximately 70% was found, fetched out,
and dealt with. Yet, there are still some places undiscovered due to
some Iraqi documents found during the liberation period and numerous
documents found during the fall out of the Iraqi regime. Most of those
documentations were stating amounts, quantities and territorial
coverage, but not actual storage locations nor they pin point there
stocking procedures! I.e. underground dirt cover, bunker cover, water
snuck, not even residential or commercial storages. (All those
mentioned above were locations that were mostly discovered accidentally
by civilians!)
b. After the liberation of Kuwait, the US forces (in particular) used
the northern area of Kuwait as a waste land for their depleted uranium
shells! And there were some unused Coalition counter-chemical warfare
artilleries that need to be destroyed before they erode their
containers or expire beyond their usage period. Guess where would be
the place "politically" that would be considered as ideal location
where you would "dump" such material with a very strict hush-hush
policy from a government that would do anything in return of the favor
of restoring it back in power?
c. one of the amazing untold stories is that the Iraqis indeed used
chemical weapons against allied forces in 1990/1991, as well as against
northern part of Kuwaiti city of Jahra!! But the unprecedented heavy
rain during that period of usage eliminated any direct casualties from
such attack! Yet this does not mean the northern part is not
contaminated! Indeed it is suffering now from all sorts of "illnesses"
environmentally the least to say. including medical reports have shown
that in the past 10 years reflected serious escalation in birth defects
and miss carriages along with a scary %700 higher than Central and
south Kuwait areas in cancer cases!
d. it turns to be the northern part of Kuwait (adjacent to Iraqi
boarders) is an actual dump site for radio active, hazardous chemical,
dangerous biochemical, and other dangerous materials. All due a
specific clause in the agreement between the US and Kuwaiti governments
as one of the major conditions to allow the US to "help" and lead the
coalitions to liberate Kuwait (as per any contractual agreement!). Of
course there is a strict level of security clearance and political
rendezvous!
e. the situation with the Iraqi boarders after the fall of the Saddam
"empire" was and still is nether less than chaotic! No control what so
ever on the borders where you see a daily smugglers of all kinds
starting from smuggling people to some actual smuggling of Iraqi T-70
tanks as collectables (for God knows who!). The only thing that is
really effectively controlling this smuggling is the size of Kuwait
geographical area. This pushed Kuwait Government to quadruple the
national security budget. this action resulted in having an aerial
surveillance choppers, muscle dirt police cars, high speed boats all
with a serious fire power along with each unit having its own
self-assessment control on fire-on-well ability!. All limited to the
northern area beyond Jahra city. Those activities are never in the
front cover page because of the strict orders of "NO SHOW OFF!" scheme
that is imposed. To me they have done an outstanding job in keeping
Kuwait territory almost to pre-1990 level in crime rate, yet the normal
Kuwait city resident is barely noticing it! Amazing efforts to
knowledge that is uplifting my pride. Yet, such measures are still to
be perfected once we know that there are so many opportunities that are
waiting to take the advantage of anything even if it is a war head to
be traded with. Hence, its an international problem---not only in
Kuwait--- so I take it for granted that what ever was mentioned on that
article is fact that is applicable anywhere.
f. Kuwait EPA is facing a tremendous pressure just to ease on its
environmental "watch dog" like operations. All due to the real damage
that the coalition had made to the natural habitat to the environment
by following the political mandates of the coalition lead (US) and by
the other secret treaties that were signed without any trace other that
the after math! That is allowing such damages happens "politically"
under the magical wand of "National Security Priorities"
II. outside Kuwait territory:
a. I personally was seriously totally taken off guard by so many
statements that almost made me convinced that this "extremely highly
educated", from a very seriously involved in politics family as a
lineage, very involved in almost every agency in Kuwait, and a pro
Kuwaiti-nationalism hard-liner, he seemed to me like a Bin Laden
Advocate!!!!!!
So, let’s take this point by point. a. This confirms what the US, UK
and even that most beloved of organizations, the UN, have said all
along. If the rough estimate is they’ve found 70%, there are still
30% out there: we will find them. But as A. said, most of what they
have found was due to civilians tripping over them. Time is what’s
needed here…and some roaming around in the desert, as well. b. Not
really all that surprising, although, it is important to note the
status of a government that would allow such a thing…just to get back
in power. c. I’m honestly willing to take A.’s word on this one. I
did some searching and came up with zip. NY Times, London Times, Washington Post, the Telegraph, CNN.
I checked the big dogs and I couldn’t find anything about this.
Although, I did do a Google search for “Jafra and Chemical
Weapons,” and…wow. A lot of links to service people’s testimony
to Congress regarding Gulf War Syndrome popped up. I think we can add 2
and 2 and successfully come up with 4. If the cancer rates are that
high, and it bears out that the US Government stonewalled on this one,
well. Let’s just say that whoever’s in power at that point in time
will have issues…serious issues. I’m not an expert by any means on Gulf War Syndrome, but it seems fishy to me.

d. If nothing else, that ought to keep the Iraqis from going over the border again, shouldn’t it?

e. A quadrupling
of the Kuwaiti national security budget? Crikeys. That’s a lot of
cash. No cheapola Russian made dune buggies for the Kuwaitis: I
guarantee Mercedes or Hummer made them. This is actually quite
disturbing and I think A.’s trying to keep a sense of national pride
here, actually, and puts a positive spin on the matter. I can’t
really blame him: if people were so bold as to bust through the
Minnesota borders and haul a shipment of tanks right up I-35 to Duluth
(our only port) so they could ship them overseas, I’d want to put a
positive spin on it, too. Look at what we’re spending; look at who we’ve actually caught,
when he fully admits that the only thing that’s keeping somewhat of a
wrap on the smuggling is Kuwait’s size, yet the average Kuwait City
citizen is barely noticing it. f. The Kuwaiti EPA will, undoubtedly,
keep its collective mouth shut. But for how long? All of these points
have raised my eyebrows, but it signals me to look to the big picture
of Kuwaiti attitudes. I think the Kuwaitis have just about had it with
the US. If the US, like A. claims, is dumping depleted uranium shells,
counter chemical warfare agents and the like in the northern
desert---an area that has the potential to be more than just a DMZ in
the coming years---with the full-fledged approval of a puppet
government, who is rearming itself to deal with the current smuggling
problems, and if IIa is true---that a major Kuwaiti governmental
official sounded to A. like a Bin Laden advocate---the US’s close
friendship with the country of Kuwait might be coming to a close. The
beneficial relationship is in the waning stages. Kuwait and the US have
been using one another for years now. I believe the US may have crossed
a line, though, that it will very hard to pull its big toe back from.
In other words, the US might be taking more than it’s giving and it
will give the Kuwaitis a justification for ending the friendship. I
honestly don’t know: it’s all relative. While I would argue that
Kuwait has benefited more from US protection than it has been harmed,
some would probably argue there was never a debt to be repaid in the
first place. The husband has said in the past that while it never hit
the papers, he heard rumors while he was in Kuwait---from very well
connected friends---that, after the dust had settled, the US was handed
a check from the Kuwaiti government for the cost of Operation Desert
Storm. Thanks for saving our behinds, and this should cover it. However, this notion belies the fact that the US doesn’t really need
Kuwaiti money. They can finance operations out of their own budget:
debts of the non-fiscal type are the more important chits to hold.
But Saddam is gone now. The paradigm has shifted, the chit has lost
value, and for the US government to turn a blind eye, to assume that
Kuwait will forever and always be one of their closest allies in the
Gulf, for me at least, is reminiscent to Iran in 1979: a powder keg
that’s just waiting to blow. Let me explain. While Kuwait is a
moderate Islamic country, and most Kuwaitis natives are highly educated
and hold more liberal attitudes than those in neighboring states,
Kuwaitis are now outnumbered by foreigners in their own land. The
majority of the population is made up of immigrant workers from such
places as Egypt, Iran, Pakistan, Palestine, the Philippines, and other,
poorer, Gulf states such as Oman and Yemen: the places we all know and
love as a breeding ground for Islamic terrorism. They run the shops;
they clean the offices; they act as security guards; they drive the
taxis; they keep the service industries going. And all because the
average native Kuwaiti is too well-educated to do this type of work.
While they do the work, and, for the most part, are happy to have it,
they also see the corruption in the government. They see the rich
driving their Rollers, Mercedes, Bentleys and the like down the street,
while it’s obvious they will never have the opportunity to earn such
a fabulous car because of who they are. They see the fancy yachts
parked at the local mall. And, most importantly, they are sneered and
jibed at by Kuwaitis, who see them as beneath them. I laugh heartily
whenever I see some idiotic commentator on TV state that because people
are Islamic, they will rise up and support their Islamic brethren, no
matter what their nationality, whenever a massive offence is committed
or might be. Nothing could be further than the truth: think of an
Irishman and an Italian: are they united under the same brotherhood
simply because they’re both Catholic? Not hardly. The Gulf Arabs are
snobs, to put it simply, and Kuwaitis are no exception to this rule.
They look down their noses at anyone---even someone who follows Allah
as they do-- who is not from the Gulf. It’s particularly ironic when
you take into account how many the Gulf states bleat on about the
treatment of the Palestinians at the hands of the
Israelis---particularly using this as an effective dodge to keep their
own people distracted from the fact they have no democratic
rights---when they wouldn’t even allow most Palestinians in their own
countries because they think of them as dirty peasants. This is nothing
new, obviously, but in Kuwait, where the numbers of non-nationals
outstrip the nationals, it’s still has a wee bit of shock value if
for no other reason than it seems as if anti-US sentiment is gaining
favor. Could it be, perhaps, that Kuwaitis are paying more attention to
their coffee bearers’ opinions than those of the government? Could
attitudes be shifting to a point where the more conservative and,
ironically, radical teachings of Islam might gain favor amongst the
westernized Kuwaitis? After all, if what A. says is true, the US
doesn’t seem to be earning any brownie points right about now,
leaving a swing to the right still in the realm of possibilities for
Kuwait. Iran, after all, had plenty of foreign workers before 1979;
plenty of them were just as instrumental in bringing the Shah down as
the native sons and daughters were. I don’t know. You can’t find a
more liberalized Gulf nation than Kuwait. Women are not obliged to veil
themselves, but most do anyway. It’s not unusual to see teenage girls
there wearing a shirt that shows off their bellies, while still
covering their head with a chador as they listen to Britney Spears on
their Walkmans. Yet the country stands still, five times a day, when
the muezzin sounds, calling the faithful to worship. Kuwait is a highly
interesting mix of the secular swirling with the faithful. But some
would have said that about Iran, too, in the years preceding the
revolution. The bottom line where Kuwait is concerned is that you have
a government with dubious prospects in power; a government that is
rearming itself to pre-1990 standards and who is grumbling at its best
friend and biggest patron because it no longer needs their patronage; a
dissatisfied populace, who would like more of a say in what is going
on; a population where non-nationals outnumber natives; where the
non-natives are treated with disfavor and favor the type of Islam that
means serious business. It seems to me that you have a powder keg with
a very long fuse attached to it.
When someone will strike a match and attach it to the fuse is
anybody’s guess.