Activity 19, The Baby Milk Factory
Over the past month, the United States and its allies, along with the Zionist entity, which has taken part in the aggression from the beginning, launched savage and destructive raids on the Iraqi people, on their economic, scientific, cultural and service property, and also on their religious centers and sites of ancient civilizations in Iraq.
These raids are unprecedented in history in terms of the enormous firepower used and in terms of the means of killing and destruction used in a manner that contravenes the United Nations Charter, the false international legitimacy, and the new world order, which they wanted to use as an order for U.S.-Atlantic hegemony over the world.
The United States and the partners in the evil alliance, the planes that fire missiles from a distance, and the long-range missiles, have dropped huge quantities of bombs and explosives on women, children, and old people in all Iraq's cities and villages, and even on the nomad bedouins in the desert.
They struck in a premeditated manner mosques, churches, schools, hospitals, civilian factories, bridges, main roads, telephone, electricity, and water centers, irrigation dams, cultural centers and sites in the country. They hit targets that have no connection any way whatsoever with the military effort or the military confrontation arena of which they have spoken.
Their latest crime was the ugly and dirty crime of the premeditated bombardment of a civilian shelter. They killed and burned hundreds of women, children, and old people. The aim of this unjust aggression was very clear, namely to proceed with the process of destruction that they desire and to punish the proud, free, and struggling Iraqi people, because they have chosen the road of freedom, independence, and glory, and have rejected humiliation, disgrace, and submission to the will of imperialism and Zionism.
Source: Revolutionary Command Council, Baghdad Radio Address of February 15, 1991.
© Micah Sifry and Christopher Cerf, eds., The Gulf War Reader: History, Documents,
Opinions. New York: Times Books, Random House, 1991, p. 339-340.
As we crossed an overpass in the industrial agricultural complex at Abu Garib I saw in the distance the remains of a sizeable building. The small signpost at the entrance bore a crudely lettered sign, "Baby Milk Plant," in English and Arabic. The structure was barely recognizable as a building. The sheet aluminum walls and roof had been ripped off and scattered across the yard, reflecting the noonday sun harshly into our eyes. The steel roof girders were twisted and blackened. The machinery underneath was a tangled, molten pile.
Ala'a introduced me to several officials as the World Television News cameraman, Mohammed, and his producer, Michael Haj, moved freely around the wreckage. The officials claimed that the factory produced twenty tons of infant formula powder each day, and had been destroyed in raids the previous Sunday and Monday. They pointed to the ruins of what they said had been large drying towers. They showed me the plastic spoon-making machines with the output strewn by the thousands on the floor. There were iron wagons packed with milk powder along the wall. I saw carbonized incinerated packets . . . A barbed wire fence circled the grounds. A solitary wooden guard tower sat at one corner. It looked like an innocent production plant to me. I gathered up an armful of powder packages to distribute to the children back at the hotel because they were complaining there was no milk.
At 8:30 that night, January 23, I broadcast my first report on the factory's destruction. I gave details of what I had seen and quoted officials as saying it was the only source of infant formula for Iraqi children. I had seen no evidence that the factory had been used for any other purpose. CNN anchor Patrick Emory asked me no questions about the story.
Source: Adapted from Peter Arnett, Live from the Battlefield; From Vietnam to Baghdad, 35
Years in the World's War Zones. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994, p. 385-386.
When CNN correspondent Peter Arnett reported that the United States had bombed a baby formula factory, White House Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater sharply rebuked Arnett and stated flatly, "Disinformation. That factory is, in fact, a production facility for biological weapons."
CNN correspondent Peter Arnett reported that there were two things untouched by the bombing--a newly painted sign, both in English and Arabic, that said "Baby Milk Plant" and a large painting of Saddam comforting a distressed child. The curious survival of these two items amidst the "twisted and blackened remains of the plant" was a clear message to all viewers that the Iraqis were engaging in heavy-handed propaganda.
Source: Washington Journalism Review, 1991.
Peter Arnett stated, "I think it was a mistaken bombing. It seems to me that it was an unlikely
place of a chemical plant. It was beside a main highway with no security fences around it. I see a
lot of other installations around here that are probably less important than a facility of that nature,
and the security is incredible. I just cannot conceive (of the Iraqis having) the limited kind of
security that they had if it was such a secret installation. I mean, it's Iraq, why pretend: they can
build it underground, they can put it anywhere."
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