Madeleine Albright’s Iraq Legacy
How the former Secretary of State and UN Ambassador, who died this week, failed the test of history
In May 1996, on CBS’ 60 Minutes, Leslie Stahl asked then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright about the ongoing economic sanctions that the United Nations, led by the US, had imposed on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq in response to his illegal invasion of Kuwait in 1990. The sanctions banned nearly all trade with Iraq until it rid itself permanently and unconditionally of all nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons capabilities and allowed inspectors full access to verify and monitor compliance. At the time of the interview, it was widely believed that the child mortality rate in Iraq had soared due to the sanctions, leading to the following exchange between Stahl and Albright:
Stahl: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?
Albright: I think this is a very hard choice, but the price — we think the price is worth it….It is a moral question, but the moral question is even a larger one. Don’t we owe to the American people, and to the American military and to other countries in the region that this man not be a threat?
Stahl: Even with the starvation and…
