Kurds Reach New Oil Deals, Straining Ties With Baghdad

The NY Times:

The Kurdish regional government has reached four new oil-exploration deals, further straining relations with many Iraqi leaders in Baghdad, who want to maintain a more centralized control over the country’s enormous oil reserves.

The new deals are the latest in an effort by the Kurds to build their own oil industry while national oil legislation languishes in Parliament. A similar agreement reached last month with the Hunt Oil Company of Dallas was criticized as illegal by the Iraqi oil minister, Hussain al-Shahristani.

Kurdish officials, who have said they want to bring about a major increase in oil production, say the deals are consistent with the Iraqi Constitution.

But many in Parliament object to the Kurdish interpretation, and it is unclear how the Kurds’ own regional oil law, passed in August, will conform with whatever might ultimately be approved by the central government.

Many Sunni Arab leaders object to the production-sharing agreements being negotiated by the Kurds, which call for companies to invest large sums for finding and producing oil and to be awarded a portion of the profits generated by the new fields.

Any federal oil law would have to take account of Kurdish and Shiite concerns that provincial governments be given substantial autonomy to carry out their own development plans and of the desire of Sunni Arabs for strong central control to assure that they receive a fair share of the revenues, even though there is little oil in their provinces.

So far, these problems have proved insurmountable, and the oil law, one of President Bush’s benchmarks of progress in Iraq, has stalled.

The Kurds’ new contracts were signed with Heritage Oil Corp., a publicly traded Canadian concern, and Perenco S.A., a privately held French company. Two other deals with “experienced international companies” are to be announced soon. The total initial amount invested is expected to be $500 million, the regional government said.

If the exploration leads to oil production, Kurdish officials said that in rough terms the deals call for the companies to recover their costs and split profits, with 15 percent going to the companies and 85 percent to the government. A Kurdish official said it would take three to five years before any production could start.

In Baghdad, a spokesman for the Iraqi Oil Ministry denounced the new oil-exploration contracts and warned companies not to sign deals without the blessing of the national government.

“Any contracts signed before the approval of the oil law will be ignored or considered illegal,” said the spokesman, Assim Jihad.

A senior State Department official in Baghdad has also criticized the oil contracts as having “needlessly elevated tensions” between the Kurds and Baghdad.

A Kurdish official defended the deals, saying that the revenue would be shared with all Iraqi regions and that delays in signing exploration pacts only postponed the delivery of much needed cash to the treasury. “We can start now to look for exploration, and by the time we need the money the cash flow will be coming into the country,” the official said.

A Western executive involved in negotiations with the Kurds said the regional government seemed to be trying to “create a fait accompli” by signing so many deals with foreign companies that the central government eventually had to accept the provisions sought by the Kurds in any final version of the oil law.

An official at another oil company said the burst of deals reflected the Kurds’ concerns that their oil development was delayed during the time of Saddam Hussein and that they lagged in production compared with Shiite-dominated southern Iraq.

“I just think they know instinctively that they are behind the curve, and they have to move or they will never get their resources out of the ground,” said this official, who was not authorized to speak publicly. “The Kurds might be playing catch-up in the petroleum business, but they are doing a good job.”

Interview: Iraq Kurd Leader on Oil Law

UPI reports:
To Iraq's Kurdish leadership, the issue of how to apportion the third-largest pools of oil in the world is "a make-or-break deal" for the country as a whole, a top official told United Press International.

"The oil issue for us is a red line. It will signify our participation in Iraq or not," Qubad Talabani, son of Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and the Kurdistan Regional Government's representative to the United States, said in an interview from his Washington office.

The KRG and the central Iraqi government reached a deal in February on the hydrocarbons framework -- though not on other key companion bills -- and a self-imposed deadline of late May seemed possible to meet.

But the Iraqi Oil Ministry, at a meeting it set up last month in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, with other Iraqi oil experts and politicians, unveiled the annexes to the hydrocarbons law -- its list distributing control of oil fields between central and KRG control -- and a law re-establishing the Iraq National Oil Co., which Kurdish leadership automatically rejected.

"This sets us back to square one, a point that's unacceptable to us. We're trying to modernize Iraq, build a new Iraq, built on new foundations, new policies. The symbol of this new Iraq will be how it manages its oil infrastructure," Talabani said. "And if people want to revert back to Saddam-era policies of a state-controlled oil sector with no accountability, with no accountability to the Parliament or the people of the country, with no oversight except from by one or two, then I'm sorry, that is not the Iraq that the Kurds bought into. That is not the Iraq that the Kurds would want to be part of."

"If a centralized oil regime is imposed on us, we will not participate in the state of Iraq," Talabani said. "And we have to make it absolutely clear to our friends in Washington, to our brothers in Baghdad, this is a make-or-break deal for Iraq."

He said Iraq needs to embrace the free market and break free from the nationalized mindset. Numerous oil and Iraqi experts as well as key Iraq oil union leaders have told UPI that Iraqis see nationalized oil with pride. And opponents of the oil law also say it gives too much to foreign companies.

The Kurds, however, have little to show from the Saddam Hussein era, aside from persecution, death and little investment in its economy or oil sector. They gained autonomy in 1991 and, governing an autonomous three-province region now, are prospering. Airplanes fly internationally from the airport in Irbil, Iraqi Kurdistan's capital. Violence in the region is relatively nil compared with the rest of the country, though the first major attack in more than four years killed 14 people in Irbil Wednesday. Despite lacking the law, the KRG has signed multiple deals with foreign companies to develop its oil and natural-gas sector.

Iraq only produces about 2 million barrels per day. With investment -- domestic or foreign -- Iraq's 115 billion barrels in reserves could handle much higher output.

Many of the arguments over the law are related to the 2005 constitution. It was written vaguely to garner support. Now there is a dispute as to which oil fields are to be governed by the central government and which by the regions.

Tariq Shafiq, an Iraq oil expert now living in Amman, Jordan, and drafter of the original law last summer, said the Iraq National Oil Co. should be independent of the Oil Ministry, and regions could choose the company's board of directors. (Shafiq has since come out against the law, saying it has been altered too much in negotiations.) He said Iraq needs a central strategy for the best management of the country's oil.

Talabani said the KRG favors an INOC limited in scope and open to foreign investment, and says the current law gives INOC control over 93 percent of Iraq's oil. "This will hamper needed investment," he said.

"It's only by bringing in the biggest and the best from the international community, to partner with, not to steal, but to partner with the Iraqi government, can we develop Iraq's oil accordingly," Talabani said. "And there's a worrying unwillingness to act under a free-market-style concept here. It won't go through. It won't go through the Parliament this way. There will be too many people opposed to it."

Other bills needing to be passed include a reorganization of the Oil Ministry and the revenue-sharing law. Talabani said there were lingering fears Kurds will again be deprived of funds and investment.

"We want to create an automatic payment mechanism where it doesn't rely on the goodwill of the finance minister or the oil minister for the regions to get their fair share," he said.

"Trust is lacking in Iraq, and unfortunately it's been Iraq's miserable history that has created this system, this society that mistrusts each other, which is why something as critical as oil can be a trust-building measure," Talabani said. "By putting in place mechanisms and institutions that can ensure that I will not get robbed again, that my resources will not be used against me again, will eventually over time build my trust."

Foreign Oil Projects Stall In Wait For Iraqi Permits

The WSJ reports:

After building a 42 kilometer pipeline and sending out a flurry of optimistic news releases over the past three years, Det Norske Oljeselskap, a small Norwegian oil company, is still waiting for permission to open the taps on what could be post-Saddam Hussein Iraq's first foreign-developed oil field.

The holdup: Iraqi politicians in Baghdad, a nine-hour drive south of here, have yet to approve a hydrocarbon law laying down the legal framework for foreign investment in the country's sensitive oil industry. Lawmakers could vote on a version of the law in May, but the legislation has already missed a series of deadlines since the American-led invasion four years ago.
DNO's plight in this remote Kurdish town in northern Iraq underscores one of the thorniest obstacles to jump-starting Iraq's creaky petroleum industry. Most of the oil-rich country is wracked with political, ethnic and religious violence, making it almost impossible for big international oil companies to work here.

But even in this peaceful, semiautonomous Kurdish enclave, a number of small foreign companies like DNO are still waiting for their operations to be officially sanctioned by Iraq's central government. DNO was one of the first to sign development deals with the Kurdish government back in 2004 and has spent millions drilling wells and building transportation and storage infrastructure.

But DNO needs an export license to sell its crude to global markets, and a decision to grant one won't come until after the Iraqi Parliament passes a petroleum law. And even after the law is approved there is no certainty as to when the export license will be granted. DNO had originally planned to start pumping oil for global-oil markets earlier this year.

"We have heard so much about DNO's oil coming on stream, and yet the production-start date remains uncertain. It says a lot about the political and legal challenges of working in Iraq," says Alex Munton, an analyst based in Edinburgh, Scotland, for consultant Wood Mackenzie.

Kurdish politicians enthusiastically support DNO's project. A booming oil industry here could boost economic activity and further underpin Kurdish aspirations for more autonomy from Baghdad or even formal independence.

DNO says it is ready to pump crude as soon as it gets the green light from Baghdad. Its almost-finished pipeline snakes over this region's rolling hillsides to an existing export line, which runs to the Mediterranean port of Ceyhan in Turkey.

Iraq's oil legislation has been stalled most recently over differences between Kurds on one side and Sunni and Shiite politicians and oil ministry officials on the other. The Kurds want authority to sign deals like the one they have with DNO. Baghdad officials have so far insisted on federal oversight.

Iraqi officials have said they expect a prolonged parliamentary debate on the issue. Executives from some of the world's biggest international oil companies, meanwhile, say many crucial details aren't addressed in current drafts, making any decision on foreign exports even more remote.

The delays have frustrated DNO shareholders. Back in June 2004, DNO shares soared when the company announced it had signed a contract with Kurdish officials. DNO shares have gyrated since, climbing to a record a year ago when the company said it had made a sizable find at the Tawke oil field here.

In Oslo, DNO shares currently trade at around 12 kroner, or about $2, down 29% from a stock-split adjusted record of 16.94 kroner hit a year ago. The current level is still about eight times the price of shares in 2004 before the Kurdish deal was announced and when global oil prices were much lower.

DNO Chief Executive Helge Eide is taking the legal uncertainty in stride. "We're currently awaiting the outcome of the ongoing process," Mr. Eide said recently, referring to the oil law.

Mr. Eide is sanguine on the impact of near-term delays on cash flow, although analysts caution that delays of several months would begin to hurt. "Our cash balance at the end of 2006 was about $70 million, and we expect that our cash flow from operations will increase in 2007 on the back of increased production," Mr. Eide said.

DNO and Kurdish officials tinkered with some provisions of their contract late last year to ensure it met requirements laid out in drafts of the current petroleum law. Mr. Eide and Kurdish oil minister Ashti Hawrami both say they don't expect to have to amend their deal further.

DNO, which operates in Norway, Africa and the Middle East, is hoping production from its operations here will start at around 5,000 barrels a day or so in the early stages and ramp up to 25,000 barrels a day, or double the company's current total output, by the end of the year.

These are drops in the ocean of the 85 million barrel-per-day global oil market, but significant to DNO, whose output has struggled to break out of a 13,000 to 15,000 barrels-per-day range the past three years.

Kurds to Block Iraq Oil Law

AINA.org reports:

Iraq's Kurdish region has said it will try to block a draft oil law in parliament, raising the stakes in a row with the central government.

The Kurdistan autonomous region backed the draft law in February but has disputed annexes to it that would give control of oilfields to a new state-run oil company.
Ashti Hawrami, minister of natural resources in Kurdistan, said: "These annexes are unconstitutional and will not be supported by the Kurdish regional government in the federal parliament."

The Kurdistan autonomous region could be on a collision course with Baghdad over the US-backed draft.

The threat to fight the bill in Iraq's national parliament comes just days after the oil ministry in Baghdad warned regions against signing contracts until the law was passed.

'Old regime'

Officials from the Iraqi government and Kurdistan have clashed over the annexes, raising the prospect of delays that have already dogged the lengthy drafting of the legislation.

Hawrami repeated a threat that his oil-rich region would implement its own oil laws if no agreement was reached on the dispute over the annexes.

And Kurdish officials have already signed deals with foreign oil companies.

"The annexes must recognise that the Kurdish regional government has already allocated exploration and development blocks in the Kurdistan region under Production Sharing Agreements pursuant to the Iraq Constitution," he said.

In a reference to Saddam Hussein, Hawrami said the newly created Iraq National Oil Company (INOC) would be a return to "old regime methods".

"The concentration of power in the hands of INOC will represent a return to method of petroleum management of previous Iraqi regimes.

"Where centralised oil power was ... used to fund violent campaigns by elites against neighbouring countries and against our own Iraqi citizens," he said.

Officials from the central government and Kurdish regional officials have said they would meet to settle the disputes, but Hawrami said sending a delegation to Baghdad was "futile".

A US government official in Baghdad said on Sunday Washington was confident the law would pass.

"I think that the government is committed to getting the oil law through. I know various bodies have expressed concern about the hydrocarbon law given the stakes involved," the official said.

"The government has a majority in parliament."

Turkish Army Demands Incursion Into Iraq

The Independent reports:
Turkey's military chief asked the government yesterday to approve an incursion into Iraq, increasing pressure on the US and Iraq to fight Kurdish guerrillas.

But military action was likely to be used only as a last resort: it would strain ties with Washington and could spark a mutiny from Kurdish lawmakers within Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's own party ahead of elections in November, analysts said.

"An operation into Iraq is necessary," General Yasar Buyukanit said, adding that his forces were fighting more than 2,000 guerrillas in the border region operating from within Turkey.

Ankara has been battling separatist Kurdish rebels in southeastern Turkey since 1984. The Turkish military recently reinforced its troops in the predominantly Kurdish southeast.

Turkey is aware of the consequences a military incursion into Iraq could have.

"There is no way that our American friends would welcome such a move by Turkey," said Ilter Turan, of Istanbul's Bilgi University. "The idea is to persuade the Americans to address the problem more urgently than they have been."

In Washington, the State Department said Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fried had expressed US concerns directly to Turkish authorities.

"The way we suggest it be dealt with is to have the Iraqis and Turkish governments working together to try to eliminate this threat," spokesman Sean McCormack said.

Ankara fears Iraqi Kurds are seeking an independent Kurdish state that could encourage separatist Kurds inside Turkey. Relations with Iraqi Kurds deteriorated further this week when Masoud Barzani, leader of the autonomous Kurdish region in Iraq, said Iraqi Kurds would retaliate for any Turkish interference by stirring up trouble in Turkey's southeast.

On Monday, Ankara demanded action against the Iraq-based guerrillas, vowing to do the job itself if Iraq was not able to. Turkey is a key trade partner of Iraqi Kurds and it could shut down the Habur border and stop electricity supplies to try and force the Iraqi Kurds into action

Kurdistan's Oil Under The Control Of Foreign Companies?

The publication last month of the draft of the Kurdistan Regional Government’s oil law was intended to mark the region’s assertion of control over the development of natural resources. However, it seems that as quickly as it wins its economic autonomy from Baghdad, the KRG wants to surrender it to foreign companies.

Niqash reports:
International oil companies were certainly pleased. "Congratulations and our compliments, this is a modern petroleum law that covers all relevant points," said an e-mail from one company to the KRG’s Natural Resources Minister, Dr Ashti Hawrami.

Dr Hawrami is no doubt keen to attract investment quickly to the region. Having been starved of investment for decades, the Kurdish political parties see greater economic independence - particularly in the oil sector - as a necessary element of federalism. The question is: At what cost does this investment come?

In the consultation on the draft law, some respondents criticised the proposed role for foreign companies, and the type of contract to be signed with them, for giving too much away. Bizarrely, Dr Hawrami characterises such criticisms as “anti-Kurdish” or “anti-federalism”.

The centrepiece of the draft Act is the decision to sign production sharing contracts of up to 32 years with international oil companies. These would give the companies effective control over oil production, as well as a significant share of the revenue from it.

Alarmingly, the draft Act makes no provision for parliamentary approval of such contracts. It is normal practice around the world for parliaments to be given the ultimate right of approval of production sharing contracts, given their profound effect on a country’s economy, politics and even sovereignty.

On the other hand, one positive feature of the Act is that it requires that such contracts be made available for public scrutiny (albeit only after they have been signed) – something the KRG pointedly refused to do with the four production sharing contracts it has already signed since 2003.

The KRG has made at least some efforts to limit the extent of foreign companies’ power, although in practice, it is not clear how effective these would be. For example, any oilfield development would be overseen by a management committee containing equal representatives of both companies and government.

However, both sides would be given an effective right of veto over the most important decisions – which would make it difficult to regulate the rate of production, in particular in relation to future OPEC quotas. This problem has been consistently experienced by Algeria and Nigeria, two OPEC countries with major foreign involvement in their oil industries.

Meanwhile, any disagreements between the KRG and the foreign companies would be arbitrated not in the courts of Kurdistan or Iraq, but in secretive investment courts in London or Washington, DC – courts that consider only the enforcement of the commercial terms of the contract. In a ‘model’ contract published alongside the draft Act, and intended to form the basis for any actual contract negotiations, it further specifies that any such arbitration would take place in the English language, and under the law of England.

But it is when combined with the decentralisation of authority for signing contracts that the cost of the policy starts to escalate. And while the KRG really insists on such decentralisation, the Oil Ministry in Baghdad is totally opposed. Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salih recently told Reuters that the drafting of the federal oil law has been delayed because of disagreements on this issue.

Part of the goal of the publication of the draft KRG petroleum act is to influence policy Iraq-wide. Indeed, the KRG also drafted an act for the whole of the country, which it has presented to the Ministry of Oil, although not made public.

One of the most striking elements of the KRG’s draft law, and presumably of its proposed federal law, is that it assigns control over oil in disputed territories such as Kirkuk to the KRG, with immediate effect, only offering to return such control to the federal government if the planned December 2007 referendum does not choose Kirkuk to be part of Kurdistan. Such an approach would seem to put the cart before the horses.

It is difficult to see any chance of this being accepted – most likely it is included as a negotiating position, which can be dropped in exchange for keeping the other contentious aspects of the KRG’s policy, with the Kirkuk issues to be resolved after the referendum.

But the dispute over decentralisation of responsibility for contracts is not simply a power struggle – it will have a bearing on the economics of oil production as a whole.

The precise terms of any contract – and in particular how the revenues are shared between state and private company – are determined by negotiation. They thus depend on the relative bargaining power of the two sides.

If the decentralisation arguments are taken to their logical conclusion, each region and province would be encouraged to pursue its own policies and strategies, and carry out its own negotiations, to attract investment. Unrestricted competition for investment could hamper coordination in Iraq’s economy and infrastructure, and could sow the seeds of fracturing the country.

Furthermore, it could create a race to the bottom, where each region or province tries to offer more generous terms to attract companies. Multinational companies would conversely have an opportunity to play different regions off against each other, forcing ever greater concessions – at the expense of the Iraqi people.

The KRG has opted for a major role for foreign companies precisely because the KRG itself does not have sufficient expertise to run its own industry, in contrast to the Oil Ministry and the state-owned operating companies.

But this may be a mistake. It seems to be commonly assumed that if there is a lack of technical capacity, the solution is simply to allow foreign companies to make the investment. What this assumption misses is that the investment must be managed – from negotiation, to regulation, to monitoring. And given the scale – hundreds of millions of dollars or more – this too requires institutional capacity.

It is helpful here to recall the early history of Iraq’s oil industry. In the 1920s, Iraq did not have the capacity to develop its own oil; it had to rely on foreign companies. But by signing very long-term contracts with them, the government remained powerless to adapt to the new circumstances as Iraq built up its indigenous skills.

Now, for Kurdistan, there are two other options: work with Iraq’s experts, or take time to build up expertise in Kurdistan. It seems both options have been rejected.

In fact, the KRG seems even more impatient to sign away its resource wealth than some figures in the Iraqi Oil Ministry. In comments last week, Dr Hawrami announced that the KRG was already negotiating with more companies, aiming to sign contracts soon after the draft Petroleum Act is approved by the Kurdish Parliament in September.

This timing can be expected to get the worst possible deal for Kurdistan.

The issue of whether contract-signing authority should be decentralised to the regions is highly contentious, and federal Oil Minister Husayn al-Shahristani has clearly stated that only Baghdad should have that authority.

For a company to sign with the KRG before a federal oil law has been passed, and before the constitutional review is complete, carries enormous risks that the KRG’s Act will later be found legally invalid. As such, any company will expect very high profits to justify that risk. The two possible outcomes are either chaos if the contract is over-ruled, or the giveaway of a large share of revenue if it survives. These terms, despite reflecting the risk at the time of signing, will persist for 32 years.

The citizens of the Kurdish region have a right to see investment in their economy – something which has been denied them through decades of repression. But to seek economic independence from Baghdad, through complete reliance on foreign capital, may constitute a leap from the frying pan into the fire.

Iraq: Declassified Documents of U.S. Support for Hussein

Joyce Battle, Middle East analyst at the National Security Archive at George Washington University, on the series of declassified U.S. documents detailing U.S. support of Saddam Hussein in the early 1980’s:

The National Security Archive at George Washington University has published a series of declassified U.S. documents detailing the U.S. embrace of Saddam Hussein in the early 1980’s. The collection of documents, published on the Web, include briefing materials, diplomatic reports of two Rumsfeld trips to Baghdad, reports on Iraqi chemical weapons use during the Reagan administration and presidential directives that ensure U.S. access to the region's oil and military expansion.The transcript follows:

washingtonpost.com: Hi Joyce. Welcome. Before we could begin maybe you could give our readers a little background about Donald Rumsfeld's visits to Iraq in 1983 and 1984. What was he doing and why is this information relevant today?

Joyce Battle: Hello. I'm very pleased to have this opportunity to discuss some of the historical background to the U.S.'s present policy toward Iraq.

Donald Rumsfeld was sent to the Middle East as a special envoy for President Reagan in December 1983 and March 1984. At the time, he was a private citizen, but had been a high-ranking official with several Republican administrations. He had a number of items on his agenda, including conflict in Lebanon. However, one of his main objectives was to establish direct contact between President Reagan and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein -- he carried a letter from Reagan to Saddam to further this process.

His trip, and other overtures by the U.S., were necessary because the Reagan administration had decided to assist Iraq in its war against Iran in order to prevent an Iranian victory, which the administration saw as contrary to U.S. interests. But until the early 1980s, U.S.-Iraqi relations had been frosty -- Iraq broke off formal diplomatic relations in 1967. So in order to enable the U.S. to set up the mechanisms needed to provide Iraq with various forms of assistance, contacts had to be established, Iraq had to be removed from the State Department's list of countries supporting terrorism, and diplomatic relations needed to be re-established (which occurred in November 1984.)

Derwood, Md.: Who cares what these documents say? Iraq is the enemy of the day and needs to be dealt with.

Joyce Battle: I respectfully disagree with your point of view. In a democracy, citizens are expected to be informed about decisions that affect their own lives and that of their neighbors. If the U.S. goes to war with Iraq, many people will be put in harm's way, and I think that we all should seek some understanding of earlier developments and policies that led us to the current situation.

Wheaton, Md.: I hear pro-Saddam activists often claim that Reagan supplied Hussein with chemical weapons. I've seen no evidence to support these claims. Is there any truth to this?

Joyce Battle: I have not personally seen documents that indicate that the Reagan administration supplied Iraq with chemical weapons. However, the documents we recently posted on the Internet demonstrate that the administration had U.S. intelligence reports indicating that Iraq was using chemical weapons, both against Iran and against Iraqi Kurdish insurgents, in the early 1980s, at the same time that it decided to support Iraq in the war. So U.S. awareness of Iraq's chemical warfare did not deter it from initiating the policy of providing intelligence and military assistance to Iraq. There were shipments of chemical weapons precursors from several U.S. companies to Iraq during the 1980s, but the U.S. government would deny that it was aware that these exports were intended to be used in the production of chemical weapons.

Chicago, Ill.: Greetings, This might be slightly off point but I'll submit it for discussion.

The current administration has made a point of keeping all information that it can close to the vest. Not just secret information (which is understandable), but also material this is simply unflattering.

Examples: Energy documents from Cheney's summits; instructing DoJ to find reasons to reject even the most legit FOIA requests

Does a pattern of Secretizing Everything result in greater public skepticism when the administration pulls the "Trust Me" card in its discussions of the potential war in Iraq?

Joyce Battle: I agree with you. Strangely, one of the earliest responses of the current Bush administration to the events of September 11 was to begin efforts to vastly augment the ability of the government to limit the availability of information about its activities to the public. In particular, it attempted to impede the release of documents from the Reagan and Bush administrations, which were to be declassified under existing guidelines for making historical documents available. I considered this suspicious, since at that time questions were being raised as to the extent to which U.S. support for Islamist militants, in Afghanistan and elsewhere, had helped in creating the infrastructure used by al-Qaeda. I believe that government efforts to control and/or conceal information contribute not only to skepticism but to paranoia on the part of those who see contradictions between government rhetoric and policy.

Maryland: The Sun in London recently published a photo of Chirac shaking hands with Saddam in 1984. Do the archives have any photos of current US officials shaking hands with Saddam?

Joyce Battle: Our website displays an image of current Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam during this 1983 visit. You can also view a short video (silent) clip of Rumsfeld's meeting with Saddam. To locate our website, just use a search engine to find "national security archive."

Arlington, Va.: Ms. Battle,
Do the declassified documents you've seen reveal much detail of the U.S. policy toward Iran, and the extent to which Saudi influence and an Arabist-heavy State Dept. caused us to take sides in a Sunni-Shiite, Arab-Persian conflict? It seems that our willingness to accept Saudi influence with regard to two policy areas during the 80s (supporting Afghan resistance against the Russians, supporting Saddam against Iran) has caused enormous "blowback" today.

Joyce Battle: Based on the documents I have seen, I don't believe that Saudi Arabia was the tail that wagged the American dog. The U.S. and Saudi Arabia have had mutually supportive relations for some 70 years, and particularly since World War II. For decades, the U.S. believed that it was in its interest to support Saudi Arabia and other conservative Gulf monarchies. Despite their differences with the U.S. over issues like the Arab-Israeli dispute, these monarchies have on the whole been very supportive of U.S. political and economic interests. The U.S. was as fearful of the possible consequences of the expansion of revolutionary ideas from Iran as the Saudis were.

The U.S., for many years, held the view that promoting Islamist beliefs would effectively counter the spread of communist ideology in the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa, and was not at all opposed to Saudi support for conservative Islamist movements. In return, the U.S. presence in various military facilities in Saudi Arabia is widely viewed as the ultimate guarantor of the Saudi royal family's continuing rule. Again, these two countries' policies have always been based on mutual self-interest.

Cumberland, Md.: Do you believe that the US should have stayed neutral in the Iran-Iraq war thereby allowing Iran and the Ayatollahs to win thereby enlarging their influence in the region?

Joyce Battle: It is obviously very difficult to second-guess history, and I won't attempt to do so. I believe that when the U.S. became aware of Iraq's chemical weapons use it should have used what influence it had to stop it. Doing so was actually incumbent upon the U.S. under international law. I believe the U.S. should have used its international influence, which is enormous, to do everything it could to end this war. It was an atrocity, resulting in hundreds of thousands of casualties. Too many countries had ulterior motives and did not do enough to cut off arms shipments to the two combattants. I think that U.S. support for Iraq, despite its public condemnation of chemical warfare, encouraged Saddam Hussein to believe that the U.S. did not really believe, or act on, its public posture.

Ocean Pines, Md.: We often hear that Saddam Hussein gassed his own people in 1988. It is reported by Stephen Pelletiere that most of the civilians killed at that time were killed by Iranian poison gas. Do you know anything about this?

Joyce Battle: I have seen one analysis that makes this claim. Most of the government documents I have seen from this time period (1987-1989) indicate that the U.S. believed that Iraq had used chemical weapons against the Kurds. This was part of a series of measures undertaken by Iraq to punish Kurdish insurgents for allying with Iran during the war.

Alexandria, Va.: Are you arguing that the policies of the early 80's were correct? Or that they were mistaken? Or just that we need to know? Personally, while I would wish that the policies of the early 80's had turned out differently, the goal appears to have been to establish a working relationship with Iraq. That goal obviously was not reached, and Saddam took the wrong message, that we were not bothered by his use of chemical weapons.

Times change; it could be argued that the current Bush administration is being more realistic than were the Reagan and Bush 1 administrations.

Joyce Battle: Mostly, I think that we need to know. We try to make documents available to the public to help them reach their own conclusions. Before making the decision as to whether they support or oppose war with Iraq, people should learn as much as they can about the issues and about the history of our relations with that country. The Bush administration, in attempting to persuade the public to support the war, presents an overly simplistic case. The problems of the Middle East are enormously complex. The Reagan administration's policies toward the Iran-Iraq war show that international relations are conducted not in black-and-white but in shades of gray.

Joyce Battle: It's time for me to go -- thank you all very much for your questions and for your interest in this very important topic.