Documents: Rumsfeld Made Iraq Overture in 1984 Despite Chemical Raids By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS, NYTimes

As a special envoy for the Reagan administration in 1984, Donald H. Rumsfeld, now the defense secretary, traveled to Iraq to persuade officials there that the United States was eager to improve ties with President Saddam Hussein despite his use of chemical weapons, newly declassified documents show.

Mr. Rumsfeld, who ran a pharmaceutical company at the time, was tapped by Secretary of State George P. Shultz to reinforce a message that a recent move to condemn Iraq’s use of chemical weapons was strictly in principle and that America’s priority was to prevent an Iranian victory in the Iran-Iraq war and to improve bilateral ties.

During that war, the United States secretly provided Iraq with combat planning assistance, even after Mr. Hussein’s use of chemical weapons was widely known. …

Mr. Rumsfeld’s trip was his second visit to Iraq. On his first visit, in late December 1983, he had a cordial meeting with Mr. Hussein, and photographs and a report of that encounter have been widely published. …

The American relationship with Iraq during its crippling war with Iran was rife with such ambiguities. Though the United States was outwardly neutral, it tilted toward Iraq and even monitored talks toward the sale of military equipment by private American contractors.

Tom Blanton, executive director of the National Security Archive, said: “Saddam had chemical weapons in the 1980’s, and it didn’t make any difference to U.S. policy.”

Mr. Blanton suggested that the United States was now paying the price for earlier indulgence. “The embrace of Saddam in the 1980’s and what it emboldened him to do should caution us as Americans that we have to look closely at all our murky alliances,” he said. “Shaking hands with dictators today can turn them into Saddams tomorrow.”