The eyes of the world are on Iraq as the crisis in that country heats up. As the drums of war are beating louder and louder, it seems that the United States is intent on going to war with Iraq in order to secure its economic and political interests.

U.S. officials' plan to carry out a regime change in Iraq is definitely an undemocratic move, despite their claims of being interested in establishing democracy in the region. For years they have propped up dictatorships all over the world and now they say that they are interested in democracy.

Where was the United States in 1991 when the Kurds of northern Iraq and the Shia of southern Iraq started an uprising to change the regime? The U.S. military and U.S. officials watched as over 250,000 people were killed, after having encouraged the uprising themselves. George Bush the elder, the U.S. president at the time, had openly called on the Iraqi people to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

Many Muslims believe that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the subsequent Persian Gulf War were part of a plot by Bush and Saddam to set back regional liberation movements and to keep the Iraqi regime in power. Nearly twelve years have passed since the war and Saddam is still in power. Also, the suppression of the 1991 uprising was a serious setback for the Iraqi opposition from which they are only now recovering.

U.S. officials claim that they seek to disarm Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction. It is not clear whether Iraq currently possesses weapons of mass destruction, but it definitely possessed chemical weapons in the past and used them during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war and during the failed uprising of 1991. The chemical attack on Halabja in Iraqi Kurdistan, which left over 5000 dead, was the most graphic and barbaric example of the Iraqi military's use of weapons of mass destruction.

However, it is well documented that U.S. and other Western companies actually provided the technology, equipment, and chemicals for the Iraqi chemical weapons program. Furthermore, in 1991 the U.S. military used depleted uranium (DU) weapons in southern Iraq. Approximately 10 percent of the U.S. soldiers who served in the 1991 Persian Gulf War are currently suffering from Gulf War syndrome, their children have higher rates of birth defects, and there are much higher rates of cancer and birth defects in southern Iraq since 1991. All of this is most probably the direct result of the use of radioactive DU weapons.

Depleted uranium is a weapon of mass destruction that harms future generations. The U.S. military has also used this weapon of mass destruction in Bosnia, Serbia, and Kosovo, and there are reports that it used DU weapons in Afghanistan, too. So, it seems that the United States plans to use weapons of mass destruction to fight weapons of mass destruction. This is an outrageous situation. It is time for the international community to stand up to the U.S. and demand that it stop its unilateral policy.

The U.S. is only looking for another dictator for Iraq, since the current dictator is no longer useful. The West found Saddam to be useful during the Iran-Iraq war because he was seen as a bulwark against the spread of Islamic revolution across the region. After the war, the West continued to use Saddam to keep regional liberation movements in check.

The West has actually been blocking efforts to establish democracy in Iraq for decades. Iraq is approximately 60 percent Shia Arab, 20 percent Sunni Kurd, and 20 percent Sunni Arab, with small communities of Turkmens and Christians. The U.S. and its allies have always feared the establishment of a truly democratic Iraq with a Parliament that is 60 percent Shia and 20 percent Kurd.

Perhaps this is why U.S. officials are discussing setting up a military occupation government in Iraq with a U.S. general as governor general. Through this neocolonialist plan they are seeking to prevent the establishment of democracy in Iraq for a few more years, although they will probably fail since the tide of history is turning.

Members of the U.S. military and coalition forces are being lied to. They are being told that they will be fighting for democracy and justice. They will be injected with untested vaccines for anthrax and other diseases and will probably be exposed to radiation from DU weapons. Pity the poor U.S. soldiers going off to die for ExxonMobil and the ruling class of the Western world.