As I read the article, I don't see any suggestion or evidence that the US was directly involved in the scandal. No where does it say that the US was a direct beneficiary of, or a collaborator in, this scam. The most damning evidence is this:
"However, FT/Il Sole have evidence that US and UK missions to the UN were informed of the smuggling while it was happening and that they reported it to their respective governments, to no avail. Oil traders were told informally that the US let the tankers go because Amman needed oil to build up its strategic reserves in expectation of the Iraq war."Understand that at the time (January and February of 2003), this was a plausible explanation by two countries who were preparing to go to war with a defiant dictator who was not complying with UN sanctions - or perhaps he was. In some ways, Saddam was the biggest pawn in this game. Don't get me wrong, he is an evil an ruthless dictator who deserves everything he gets and more. But he was hearing from one side of the UN (the US, UK and other allies) that he must comply with sanctions or will face the consequences. On the other side (Annan, the French, Germans, Russians, etc) that he shouldn't worry (wink-wink). The UN will protect him as long as the oil flows (I admit this is an assumption, but based on the audit reports, pretty likely). No one believed that the US and others would actually keep their word. No one believed that the sanctions would ever be enforced. These things just don't happen. At least not under the previous administration.
The evidence uncovered and presented in this article, that the US knew about illegal shipments and did nothing about them is a sham. It's possible that US may not have followed the UN's policy or international process of reporting these shipments. No. They decided to end them by enforcing the larger sanctions and removing the dictator from his throne.
So, yes. I guess the US didn't care. We didn't care to play by the UN's rules. I can live with that.
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