ZAMBIA AND IRAN AND ME
This
anecdotal account is about the interconnectedness of the above.
Mike,
my husband and I arrived on the Zambian North Bank Power Scheme in
1972. Our news, the Observer newspaper, arrived by post every week.
Our
friends, Hamish and Monica, left Zambia to work on another dam in the
Shah's Iran. There was an earthquake in Iran. Soon after the Shah was
replaced by a revolution. They didn't stay.
ZAMBIA AND IRAQ AND ME
It
was the Cold War. Zambia was punished by apartheid South Africa and
Smith's UDI Rhodesia for its support for African freedom. Oil
supplies were a big problem. Iraq provided oil by tanker – a
pipeline from east Africa was built. Dundiza Chidiza Crescent became
Saddam Hussein Boulevard.
There
was a war between Iran and Iraq in which the west were involved on
one side or the other or on both. It was a moot point as to which was
the worse regime for its people and for its women.
ZAMBIA AND IRAN AND KATE
Kate,
a US diplomat, who had served in Zambia and acted in Lusaka
Playhouse, was one of those imprisoned in the US embassy in Iran.
The
Zambian president, Kenneth Kaunda, was vilified by the Western press
for his friendship with Saddam. He was supposed to have become a
billionaire and personally owned an oil tanker. Saddam was developing
weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). There was a connection with
Israel, Holland and apartheid South Africa and the Big Gun designed
to deliver the WMDs. Lusaka was a key airport on route for these
deals which may or may not have happened. It was bar talk in Lusaka.
ZAMBIA AND IRAQ AND DAPHNE
Saddam
arrested an Observer journalist in Iraq who was investigating the
WMDs story. He was executed. That journalist's British friend,
Daphne, was put in solitary confinement. Kaunda arranged her freedom
and she was released to Zambia and the British High Commission.
KUWAIT
Saddam
invaded Kuwait. Many of us believed that this was the start of the
Third World War. It was the first Iraq war. The West defeated Iraq
but the war was unfinished. From this point onwards the West
continued to bomb Iraq ostensibly in support of the Marsh Arabs.
Iraqi civilians also died but Saddam often used hostages to defend
military sites.
AFGHANISTAN
The
Afghan War continued in its myriad convolutions. Fundamentalist forms
of conflicted and divided Islam had been recruiting in Africa for
decades but now in the Middle East they had developed into Al Qaeda
and ISIL.
9/11
On
9/11, a brilliantly conceived and successful attack on New York, the
commercial capital city of the USA, took place.
IRAQ AND BLAIR
2003
Bush and Blair decided to finalise the war with Iraq and remove
Saddam Hussein. It seems likely that the WMDs used as the excuse were
no longer in Iraq as a weakened Saddam had handed them to Bashir
Assad of Syria who later used chemical weapons against his own
civilians.
SYRIA AND BRITAIN AND BREXIT
2013
Britain voted not to take action against Assad in support of his
people. The resultant tragedy in Syria caused the huge migrant crisis
which helped an anti-immigrant Britain vote Brexit and may lead to
the breakup of the European Union.
BLAIR
In
2016 The Chilcot Inquiry reported. Tony Blair was apparently entirely
and solely the most responsible for the war and all the deaths that
resulted from the American/British intervention in Iraq over the
whole period. He is the single scapegoat in an extraordinarily
complex situation. Is that just?
The
security of Britain, Europe, the USA, the Middle East and the
Mediterranean areas are closely bound together now and have been for
over a century. Today British and American troops continue to operate
in Iraq.
Please
explain to me why, in this complicated and interwoven scenario that
has gone on for so long, Tony Blair is singled out as the one and
only bad person?
Should
his intelligent and patriotic concerns about Brexit be therefore
disregarded?
