U.S. in violation of Geneva convention?

[Jim Dixon]

On Thu, 18 Dec 2003, BillyGOTO wrote:

> On Thu, Dec 18, 2003 at 07:18:04PM +0000, Jim Dixon wrote:
> > Relevant numbers from the Times today, quoting Air Force Monthly, January
> > 2003:  from 1980 to 1990 Iraq imported 28.9 billion pounds worth of
> > weapons.  19% by value were from France; 57% from the Soviet Union (ie
> > Russia), East Germany, and Czechoslovakia; 8% from China.  Sales from the
> > United States were inconsequential and did not make the list.  From
> > earlier articles in other publications I believe that in fact US sales
> > were a small fraction of 1%.
>
> I smell statistical acrobatics by the USAF...
> Do we really measure weapons in pounds?

In the UK we measure sales in pounds sterling.  One pound = $1.75 and
rising.

> I'd rather see a listing of weapons imports from JUST the period of
> the Iran-Iraq war than a listing of weapons imports from 1980-1990.

One is included in the other.  From memory, total US military sales
to Iraq in the decade were $3 million.  As we all know, in Washington DC
"a billion dollars here, a billion dollars there -- pretty soon you are
talking real money".  Three million dollars will buy you a few coffee
pots and a monkey wrench for your AWACS aircraft.

--
Jim Dixon  jdd at dixons.org   tel +44 117 982 0786  mobile +44 797 373 7881
http://jxcl.sourceforge.net                       Java unit test coverage
http://xlattice.sourceforge.net         p2p communications infrastructure