Iraq War -- Illegal? Legal?

Should the Iraq war be considered legally justified?

  • yes

    Votes: 17 22.7%
  • no

    Votes: 58 77.3%

  • Total voters
    75
Censport said:
Another example of tongue-in-cheek. In that instance, it was an angry tongue, I'll grant you that, but not offered as seriously as Pat Robertson's comments at that time.

Tongue in cheek or not, any joke about wiping a major religion with over a billion followers off the face of the planet is something any decent person should find offensive. It is at the same level as neo nazi "jokes" about ridding the world of jews and like them she deserves to be condemned for it.
 
Fair enough. Her humor on that was in poor taste. Still, I don't think you'd want to spend a lot of time on here defending everything Moore, Franken & co. have said.

Now, it's back to the action....

sabro said:
Is it rational then to invade and disarm this country pro-actively? I think a pre-emptive strike by third world nations against the United States could be justified by this post 9/11 logic.
So 9/11 was what then, a diplomatic mission?
 
9/11 was a tragedy. It was an attack beyond comprehension for which we should be angry. It was mass murder on a large scale, that should be condemned in the strongest language. It will have political repercussions for the next century.

I hope 9/11 wasn't some jingoistic wake-up call for the last remaining super power to swagger around and keep those third world countries in line. I hope it isn't a carte blanch to invade whomever seems threatening and impose whatever order we feel fit.

And it is this post 9/11 logic that I said justifies any third world country attacking the United States. (Since we have WMD's and a history of invading foreign nations...). I think we need to distance ourselves from this thinking.
 
The legality of it all

I think we need to understand the traditional role that the U.S. has played over the last quarter of a century, and no I will not go into great detail.

basically, this War has its place for the purpose of opening up the middle east, I mean, in terms of fostering Democracy in Iraq. It has nothing to do with the betterment of the U.S. whatsoever. Consequently, the U.S. will never see the light at the other end of the tunnel in Iraq. This war like so many other wars have benefited the beneficiary ONLY. This war will never have anything to do with fighting terror nor will it ever have positive residual affect for me or any other American. The negative residual affect is Bush reneging on his tax cuts. And as far as seeking retribution for 911, it's absolutely absurd to even concede that Iraq was somehow remotely responsible given the report by the 911 commission. There is simply not enough facts to warrant an invasion of Iraq because of its suspected role in 911. This action shows a lack of maturity within our government.
 
I am late to this thread, apologies... Good news... The Iraqis voted today!!! They may reject the Constitution, that is their democratic right, but they VOTED!

Question... from me, an ignorant tourist...
Can a war be illegal, and totally immoral, yet somehow ... thank God, thank somebody, thank Bush & Company maybe, for doing SOMETHING in a disaster situation!

Iraq was a CATASTROPHE, before Gulf 1 and 2! It was a plague!!!!
I hate war. I get ill thinking about all the death and destruction and damage to world public opinion that has resulted from our management of this horror show.

But there was also a daily nightmare called Saddam Hussein. Why did America harp on about WMDs? Possibly did ... ahem... someone GIVE THEM TO HIM?!?

My WMD is crystal clear... the "Oil for Food Money", the 10 Billion dollar cash fund that Saddam had, that can buy you shiploads of WMDs... oh yes they can! In my opinion, Saddam was financing terror in other countries, namely Israel/Palestine, probably North Korea, probably Syria, etc.

Do I think Bush has done a good job? Frankly no. Not good at all!

But I think history is going to look at this whole tragedy in an amazing new way...

Reverse Don-Quixote.... try-try-try, then fail, then succeed in failure!

"Select Corporate America entities invade Iraq, get rid of Sicko Hussein, and try the "Don Quixote effort" for the media... You know, the mantra..."Pie-in-the-sky", "Camel in every pot", "Freedom and Democracy", etc. etc.

The Iraqi people will eventually say... "Thank you very much Mr. America, now how fast can you leave?".

Then the tribal interests within Iraq will restore to the way they were before we came in... with the Shia's in charge this time... and in 20 years they will beg for us to come back in, as tourists." Everybody loses in the war, everybody wins in the Peace.

But the world, and that region of the world will be a much better place for all the tragedy and sacrifice of American troops and Iraqi citizens, and Afghan citizens.

What did Osama Bin Laden try to do? Unite the Arabs and Persians and Palestinians and Egyptians and Muslims, against the Infidel West?

And what has been the result, but the EXACT OPPOSITE? You even have Zarqawi inciting Sunnis to kill Shia! You have Russian goons killing elementary school children. You have Bali fundamentalists killing Aussie tourists... that makes a lot of PR sense! What rotten scum these people are...

Bush... love him or hate him... (and we have done so much wrong, I know... I think our conduct has been horrible at times, brilliant at times, catastrophic at times, heroic at times), the end result is a world talking to each other more, trying like hell to understand each other more, be more tolerant of each other.

And lets get the HELL OFF OIL! Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, Mazda, Nissan... you are the new creative geniuses... give us a 200 mile per gallon of hydrogen, car!
 
EdZiomek said:
I am late to this thread, apologies... Good news... The Iraqis voted today!!! They may reject the Constitution, that is their democratic right, but they VOTED!

Question... from me, an ignorant tourist...
Can a war be illegal, and totally immoral, yet somehow ... thank God, thank somebody, thank Bush & Company maybe, for doing SOMETHING in a disaster situation!

Iraq was a CATASTROPHE, before Gulf 1 and 2! It was a plague!!!!

Iraq was a catastrophe before the war, but what is clear is that all the invasion has served to do is make a bad situation worse.

edziomek said:
But there was also a daily nightmare called Saddam Hussein. Why did America harp on about WMDs? Possibly did ... ahem... someone GIVE THEM TO HIM?!?

My WMD is crystal clear... the "Oil for Food Money", the 10 Billion dollar cash fund that Saddam had, that can buy you shiploads of WMDs... oh yes they can!

Er...how? There were inspectors in the country until 1998 destroying what weapons he had and a complete embargo on the country to prevent weapons from being imported for the rest of the time. Plus of course the fact that there WEREN'T ANY WEAPONS FOUND after the invasion, which kind of takes the wind out of the sails of that argument.

ed said:
In my opinion, Saddam was financing terror in other countries, namely Israel/Palestine, probably North Korea, probably Syria, etc

Your opinion based on what? The question of whether Saddam was financing terrorists is a factual one, not a matter of opinion. The only financial support he gave to terrorists was to the mothers of Palestinian suicide bombers. Its hard to see what scenario there would be in which Saddam would have financed North Korean "terrorists", I'd be interested to know what you are talking about there.
 
Last edited:
"Pre-emtive self-defence" = hostile invasion's dressed up to look friendly.

I was against the war to start with, i was against it as it happened, but were there now, i dunno wether its because of an actual smidget of decency and common sense or wether bush just doesnt got a clue what to do now but at least the coalition is sticking in and trying to keep the country together.

Still, it never really excuses the fact that it was an illegal invasion lead by a war-happy ordaned by god type US president.

It would be nice if a coalition leader could just step up and say "hey, it was illegal, i know that, everyone knows this, and for that i can only apologise, and we've made iraq an unstable hotbed thats an even bigger concern to global security stability and the supression of terrorism then it ever was under saddam, and i also know that it wasnt done for the good of the iraqi people, and more on a political whim and possibly oil.
Saying that, saddam was a bad man and now we've done what we've done, theres not a chance in hell of replacing saddam and his regime, were in for the long haul and we cannot and will not leave until iraq is stable enough to look after itself or the country falls irreparably into civil war and chaos."

Man, the day i see a competent, honest, realist, ethical human being politician, i will vote for him, i will get to a voting booth, even if i must crawl there without legs, and an advanced terminal illness, i would vote for him.



Anyway, moving on, i voted for No. :cool:

I am late to this thread, apologies... Good news... The Iraqis voted today!!! They may reject the Constitution, that is their democratic right, but they VOTED!
I saw a bit on the news last night about that and for the first time in a lnog while, i actually felt their might be hope for iraq, just the short interviews with iraqi people on their way to or from voting, not looknig scared of scuicide bombers or anything, looknig happy and excercising their democratic right, and they wernt picking up AK's and shouting jihad or looking for a civil war, they were happy normal people, the silent majority in iraq, voting....it was beautiful.
 
senseiman said:
mothers of Palestinian suicide bombers

Just a side note to this....the reason why that money is offered to suicide bombers by Saudi Arabia (and probably by Saddam) is that when the suicide bombers blow themselves up (and this is almost always without the knowledge or consent of the persons family) the Israeli government comes in with bulldozers and demolishes their house even though they had nothing to do with the crime.
 
Thank you all for your comments.

I have one more... and this is a hypothetical message to Osama and his buddies, if he is listening... (and why would he, I know, I know!)

The verdict is not in yet, but in my mind, the Iraqi elections demonstrated the one thing that OBL never had, nor did many of his fellow Arabs ever had...

A CHANCE TO VOTE, maybe even... A CHANCE TO STEAL THE VOTE!

OBL I think craves the opportunity to have himself as a political candidate for "King of Saudi Arabia", or "King of a United Arab Front"... or something like that.

As the 40th son of the ruler, and a person who basically lost his inheritance (in my un-educated view), he might EVEN BE ELECTED IF THERE WAS A VOTE CAPABILITY!

But it might never happen in such a country as Saudi Arabia, but why couldn't it happen?

So I have TRE-MENDOUS positive vibes by all this success within Iraq. We have given them the opportunity to VOTE ... to vote for a Shia-dominated, or Sunni dominated, or tri-power sharing government, or whatever government they want, even whatever nightmare they want, that is their right.

And the hypothetical question... if real elections were held in Saudi Arabia, with pro-ruling family candidates, and opposition candidates like OBL, tragic killer that he has become... would he give up his worldwide terror instigations?

Would he give women more equal rights? Would he negotiate with the Shia and the Persians and the Palestinians? Or would he continue in his terror ways, even as elected King of Saudi Arabia?

Am I now a heretic for asking?... please vent if you wish... I deserve it.

This Iraqi vote, whether for approval or not of the constitution, seems to be wonderful for all of the Middle East. Who else can we sincerely, sincerely thank than the very very imperfect Bush team?

Maybe the reverse Don Quisxote has changed the world?
 
U seem to be forgetting the price the iraqi population is paying, in lives that is. Every victim angers more the locals there. Furthermore the strenous effort of US forces and resources there is severely damaging the US economically. Morever, the image of america as this beacon and pillar of freedom and democracy has been tarnished so seriously that it will take years to amend.


The war in Iraq is bringing about more radicalisation of islamic fundemantalists and is turning more people in the middle east against the western world. Gasoline prices are mounting and in an economy that is based on oil this produces undwanted consequences. I don't see the relation between obl and iraq. Iraq during sadamm was in fact a threat to Saudi Arabia... and Iraq was a secular country despite that it was a dictatorship, but now muslim fundamentalism has been introduced there as well.


Also it seems to me that US forces are not very capable to maintain the peace in Iraq as compared to the british or italian contigent or maybe it's just there is more animosity towards them... who knows... of course having 19 yr old marines out there paniked by daily road bomb attacks surely doesn't help their morale or trust between them and the population and vice versa. I'll never forget this image that i saw on tv when sm american troops forced a family outside their home and the kids were terrorized crying the father feeling very insulted and what not and the troops screaming at them in english. Those kids there will probaply have a deep anger and resentment towards America.. even though the objective that the US may have is good in the long run.

The problem is that the US is not beeing seen as liberators but as invaders. Certainly securing the oil ministry right away and letting all other civilian instutions at the free will of the people didn't help much to disprove this image. So no matter how good the system the US is trying to put there it will seem as something foreign and imposed and they local population will resist it.

you are right bout one thing though.. the world has changed.. but not for the better in my view...
 
:blush: I'm sorry,but - as though from time of Soviet propoganda...?
9/11 - tipical exampel of this...believe me... :blush: :wave:
 
The problem is that people, especially Americans, want simple answers to complex problems. We mouth clich?s like “Tax the Rich” without understanding the economics of taxation and “Exit Strategy” without understanding the intricacies of Middle Eastern politics while pretending these and similar catch phrases have some sort of mystical power to change reality. They don’t.

The fact is this is not the time to ask if we belong in Iraq regardless of if you agree with our presence there or not. I’m not saying this for jingoistic reasons as I’m not prone to spouting platitudes like “America: Love it or leave it.” In fact I loathe that kind of unthinking commitment to any cause. However due to the overwhelmingly complex nature of the Middle East and it’s history the time to have asked this question was – before – we went in. At the time both sides of the aisle said, “yes” but now we’re starting to second-guess ourselves. This is not a good idea in any situation but this is especially true in dealing with the Middle East. Not only that but it completely screws our global reputation. We don’t want the rest of the world to say, “The US will start something but when it gets tough they’ll scomper off.” Vietnam did enough damage to our credibility we don’t need to compound it by following it up with half-measures in Iraq. It is entirely inconceivable how bad it would be to leave at this point. Essentially we’ve committed ourselves to open heart surgery and half way through the procedure we’re getting “cold feet” and want to quit. This is bad for the doctor, bad for the patient, and bad for everyone involved. As much as I hate loosing soldiers the effects of leaving would result in far more deaths in a far shorter period of time. Remember we’ve lost around 2,000 men in the years since we invaded Iraq while we lost over 3,000 people in a single day on September 11, 2001. If loosing a couple hundred people a year trying to rehabilitate the Middle East saves thousands, hundreds-of-thousands, or even millions of lives in the long run then I think it is a cause that warrants our support.

The thing I love about this Iraq situation is that people in the US, much less around the world, are silly enough to think we had a choice once we got the intelligence that they were trying to build a nuke. Now I'm not a big fan of Baby Bush but you try playing president under the following circumstance:

1. 9/11/01 just happened

2. You get intelligence that Iraq is trying to purchase fissionable material that can be used in the construction of a nuclear device. (This turned out to be false but Bush didn’t know this until after we invaded – he didn’t lie – we were duped - to be honest I’m not sure which is worse).

3. You know that Uncle Ronny and Daddy Bush (idiots) sold technology to make chemical and biological weapons to Iraq back in the 80’s and Saddam used them in the Iran / Iraq war (we know they had WOMD’s because – we’re - the ones that gave them to them in the first place).

4. Iraqi reports to the UN demonstrate that even by their own estimates thousands of gallons of chemical and biological agents are unaccounted for (these likely ended up being accidentally / intentionally dumped into the local water supply via the Tigris / Euphrates rivers which explains elevated levels of birth defects found down stream from these depots).

5. Saddam is putting out speeches about (paraphrase) the "heroes of 9/11" that this is "Only the beginning" and other inflammatory rhetoric designed to stoke Islamic hatred.

6. UN weapons inspectors found hundreds of shells filled with mustard gas that Iraq denied having. Tests on these shells indicated the weapons were still over 90% effective even though they were vintage shells stockpiled since World War II.

7. How any of you can want such an evil man like Saddam in power to stop "anarchy" is beyond me. Saddam is the worst type of person, he killed close to a million people. He didn't just rule with an iron fist, he killed people who were innocent. His all-time favorite idol was Joseph Stalin, as if that is anything of a suprise.

Some of you say that there is a high amount of Iraq casuality in Iraq, but the truth is it doesn't come near to the amount of people Saddam killed and the many more people he would have killed if he was still in power.

He has been killing ever since he was a kid. He killed if first man when he 10 years old believe it or not. The more you study Saddam the more you see this guy was as worse as Hitler and Stalin! Yes he did not kill as much people, but that is because he did not have the area of land that the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany have. If he did he would have had as much killing IMHO. And unlike Stalin and Hitler, he actually witnessed many of the crimes he committed and almost enjoyed watching the death, sorrow, and destruction.

Right now the US is facing vile evil that is trying to threaten the peace of the Iraqis but when it is all set and done Iraq will live in peace as a democracy. It will take time but if we give up now or never tried at all many more people would have been killed under the radicals threatening or even worse, Saddam!

This is only a fraction of the situation but it will suffice. So with all this in mind and even more than I’ve outlined Bush is faced with two options:

1. Invade and make sure the WOMD’s are secured and if they don’t exist he gets egg on his face.

2. Not invade but if Baby Bush ignores all of this and Iraq walks a nuke across our exceedingly porous (essentially unpatrolled) Southern boarder and turns LA, Chicago, or some other city or cities into radioactive craters it would be what we in science call “bad.”

So he didn’t have a choice. I would have made the same call, as would anyone with a measurable IQ, so it didn’t matter who was in the White House – it had to happen. Bush, Gore, Kerry, Hilary Clinton or even Teddy F’ing Kennedy would have had to do the exact same thing and gotten the exact same egg on their face. If we’re going to kick Bush for something let’s kick him for something he actually has some control over like his F’d up domestic policies or that fact that he ignores the illegal immigration problem. Iraq is a nonsequitur.

In the scheme of things freeing the Iraqi people from Saddam is really unimportant. “Operation Iraqi Freedom” is nothing but an excuse after the fact in an attempt to reduce the size of the omelet cooking on Baby Bush’s face due to the lack of WOMD’s. Now here’s the kicker. If Bush had advisors with two brain cells in their heads they would tell him to quit squirming around trying to minimize the blame and take a page out of Truman’s book by stepping up and saying, “The Buck Stops Here.” Every time he opens his mouth about Iraq he sound like a kid making excuses for getting bad grades on his report card. He needs to get that stupid smirk off of his face and talk clearly, plainly, and sincerely about the Middle East as a whole and our future in that region. We – can’t – get out of Iraq, much less the Middle East because – they won’t let us. Until someone points out this incredibly salient fact then the debate about “getting out” will continue as if it has some importance while in reality it is entirely pointless. We went in and now we’re stuck. In fact, we’ve been stuck with this since the Britt’s promised the Jews their own homeland in the Middle East after World War I and our debt has only grown since then because we’ve kept putting off the inevitable but no one has either the intelligence or intestinal fortitude to point this out so people think the superficial issues the talking heads keep yammering about are important when they’re simply a canard.

Before someone brings up “US greed for Oil” it has nothing to do with “US greed for Oil.” We get around 10% of our oil from the Middle East and we could easily cover this loss using domestic sources (around 50% of US oil consumption) or with imports from Canada and Latin America (around 30% of US oil consumption). On the other hand Europe gets around 35% of its oil from the Middle East while Japan gets around 75% (maybe more) of it’s oil from the Middle East. Now for those not keeping up on current events Japan and Germany make up the second and third largest economies on Earth. What happens if these economies loose access to oil on such a grand scale? Here’s a clue: Global Economic Disaster. So it isn’t just the US that benefits from stability in the Middle East. Is it “altruism” that leads the US to take a stand? Nope. Just a healthy dose of self-interest since we’re the ones that are going to have to pull everyone’s fat out of the fire after the fact if we allow things to fall into the crapper. It appears that World War II finally taught the US that it is better to take a proactive approach than a reactive one. Thank the Supreme Being, whoever he (she?) is. If Europe doesn’t like it, screw them. The last intelligent idea that came out of Europe predates Constantine (with the notable exception of England electing Churchill Prime Minster – see they can make a good decision). This isn’t a case of “Manifest Destiny.” The US doesn’t want Iraq we just want to send a message to the Islamic nutters that every time you F with us we’re going to invade a Muslim nation and turn the Mosques into McDonalds. If they want to fight a cultural war we’re going to win because our culture is more appealing and they know it, which is why they hate us so much. Give a kid the choice between a pair of loose fit Blue Jeans and a Burqua the answer is guaranteed 99.99% of the time with the other .01% representing the suicide bomber demographic. The war on terror isn’t going to be won with weapons; it is going to be won by indoctrinating them into the global socioeconomic culture that is currently run by Europe and the US. Why do you think Osama chose the World Trade Center? Do you think he’s is an idiot? He may be a fanatic but he’s a damned smart fanatic. Never underestimate the enemy.

For those that want to pull out of Iraq the fact is that we can’t without making the situation worse. All it will do is embolden the terrorist fringe by giving them a “victory.” The only way we can win in Iraq is to turn it into a paradise that other countries in the region aspire to duplicate while also sending a clear message to the region that when you kick the US we’ll cut off your head and maybe someone else’s while we’re at it. Two Islamic centers of power were crushed after 9/11. What do you think Osama’s opinions are on the matter? Do you think he feels better or worse? Sure he dealt a blow to the “Great Satan” but the “Great Satan” evicted the Taliban from control of Afghanistan and installed a friendly government as well as getting rid of Saddam and enforcing our influence on Iraq while just about every other nation in the region is doing Olympic level political gymnastics to make us happy. He did far more to damage fundamentalist Islamic control in the Middle East by initiating 9/11 than he did to the US by blowing up a couple of buildings. Did anyone see Yasser Arafat on 9/12? He looked like someone had kicked him in the nads. He’s also one of the few Islamic leaders that admonished his people not to celebrate the attack. Guess why? Because he knew what was coming. He spent his entire life kicking the crap out of Israel while tying the hands of the US in a Gordian knot in the UN and Osama showed up and cut through all his work in a single stroke. The Israeli’s should build a shrine to him. As long as the Muslims were blowing up inside of Israel the US and the rest of the world really didn’t care but once 9/11 happened it gave the US Carte Blanch to do whatever we damn well pleased. Yasser didn’t want the Palestinians to be part of the collateral damage but it was too late. By removing US pressure on Israel not to retaliate in force when some Palestinian suicide bomber blew up it gave the Israeli’s an excuse to invade Palestine (which is why Yasser spent the last months of his life hiding under a desk with Israeli tanks surrounding his compound), build the “Great Wall of Judea”, and pretty much justify anything they want to do in the name of “security against terrorist action.” The “funny” thing will be if these Islamic nutters actually do manage to do something substantive such as setting off a nuke somewhere. At that point it will galvanize the world to such a point that just about any counter atrocity will be justified. What happens after that? I’m thinking pretty much every flavor of bad there is.

As to World War II, Churchill was worried about the Germans until the US got into the war which is why he spent a great deal of time from 1939 to 1941 pestering Roosevelt to come up with an excuse – any excuse – to get into the war. As it was even Churchill said it was a near thing and he was happy to see Hitler attack Russia rather than crossing the channel. While you can point to many lucky breaks we got over the course of the war, one of the biggest was Hitler abandoning Sea Lion and initiating Barbarosa. If you don’t agree all you need to do is come up with a source that would be considered better informed about the British situation than Winston Churchill. Strangely, I can’t think of anyone that I would consider more authoritative in regard to that particular topic.

If the Russians had decided to put an end to the Allies in Western Europe things would have been bad. In the short term Russia likely could have overwhelmed Allied forces in Continental Europe but I don’t think they could have taken out England since they didn’t have a navy worth discussing and the allied air force was far superior to anything Russia could have mustered. Meanwhile the US was out producing the rest of the world combined and only had a fraction of the number of men under arms that we could have put on the field. I think we had something like 16 million men under arms by the end of the war (most of which never saw action) but under duress I see no reason that the US couldn’t have conscripted multiples of this number if they were needed. By the time Russia became a problem we were already mopping up the Japanese so they wouldn’t have been a concern. However the US supplying China with weapons would certainly have been very bad news for the Russians (I’m also wondering what it would have done to the internal struggle against Mao’s communists? Who knows what the world would look like if that had happened?). It seems likely to me that if the Russians had proven to be a serious threat rather than testing Little Boy on Hiroshima, Moscow would have been the preferred target. I leave it to you to decide what this would have done to Russian morale but I’m thinking the loss of the capital along with Joey Stalin in addition to their inability to defend against such an attack while lacking such a devastating weapon in their own arsenal would have put an end to any expansionistic aspirations the Red Army might have held. It is quite possible that if Stalin had made this decision that it would have resulted in the defeat of Communism in the Soviet Union and / or the strengthening of the Democratic government in China thus preventing Mao from taking control. I wonder what the world would look like in such an alternate reality? One can only wonder.
 
Silverbackman said:
The problem is that people, especially Americans, want simple answers to complex problems. We mouth clich?s like ?gTax the Rich?h without understanding the economics of taxation and ?gExit Strategy?h without understanding the intricacies of Middle Eastern politics while pretending these and similar catch phrases have some sort of mystical power to change reality. They don?ft.

I find the Bush administration's continued use of catch phrases like "stay the course" to be much the same, made even worse when you consider the status of the person making it.

silverbackman said:
The fact is this is not the time to ask if we belong in Iraq regardless of if you agree with our presence there or not.


ER...so when American troops are in Iraq is not the time to ask if American troops should be in Iraq? When would be the appropriate time then? When American troops are in Sweden?

silverbackman said:
However due to the overwhelmingly complex nature of the Middle East and it?fs history the time to have asked this question was – before – we went in. At the time both sides of the aisle said, ?gyes?h but now we?fre starting to second-guess ourselves. This is not a good idea in any situation but this is especially true in dealing with the Middle East.

I disagree with this completely. When it becomes apparant that you have made a collosal error in judgment second guessing yourself (or to use a less loaded phrase, 're-thinking your position') makes perfect sense. If your thinking was wrong in the past, then why just stubbornly stick to the same course of action without questioning whether, given the unexpected change in situation, it makes sense to do so anymore?

Silberbackman said:
Not only that but it completely screws our global reputation.

Not to be rude, but America's global reputation got flushed down the crapper a long time ago.

Silverbackman said:
Vietnam did enough damage to our credibility we don?ft need to compound it by following it up with half-measures in Iraq.

If that were even remotely true then you would expect that the old 'domino theory' would have been actualized. But it wasn't, the biggest damage to American credibility in Vietnam was its stubborn insistence on drawing out the conflict years after it had become apparent it was a loosing cause.

Silverbackman said:
It is entirely inconceivable how bad it would be to leave at this point. Essentially we?fve committed ourselves to open heart surgery and half way through the procedure we?fre getting ?gcold feet?h and want to quit. This is bad for the doctor, bad for the patient, and bad for everyone involved.

Yes, but if the doctor is using infected instruments that not only aren't improving the condition of the patient but risk making his condition much worse, then what good is being done?

silverbackman said:
As much as I hate loosing soldiers the effects of leaving would result in far more deaths in a far shorter period of time. Remember we?fve lost around 2,000 men in the years since we invaded Iraq while we lost over 3,000 people in a single day on September 11, 2001. If loosing a couple hundred people a year trying to rehabilitate the Middle East saves thousands, hundreds-of-thousands, or even millions of lives in the long run then I think it is a cause that warrants our support.

yes, but that is all hypothesizing and there isn't much reason to believe that the violence Iraqis will suffer from an American withdrawal is going to be any worse than the violence Iraqis will suffer from America staying in Iraq.

silverbackman said:
1. 9/11/01 just happened

A year and a half previous and in no way related to Iraq.

Silverbackman said:
2. You get intelligence that Iraq is trying to purchase fissionable material that can be used in the construction of a nuclear device. (This turned out to be false but Bush didn?ft know this until after we invaded – he didn?ft lie – we were duped - to be honest I?fm not sure which is worse).

Only they didn't "get" intelligence, they just looked through the same old intelligence they'd had lying around for years and cherry-picked the stuff that made Iraq look dangerous while ignoring the much more convincing intelligence that suggested Iraq posed no threat. That is as good as lying by any objective standard.


Silverbackman said:
4. Iraqi reports to the UN demonstrate that even by their own estimates thousands of gallons of chemical and biological agents are unaccounted for (these likely ended up being accidentally / intentionally dumped into the local water supply via the Tigris / Euphrates rivers which explains elevated levels of birth defects found down stream from these depots).

Pretty big leap to say that because they can't be accounted for they must not only still exist but also pose a threat to the US. Especially when you've got convincing reasons to believe that A) most of them have in fact been disposed of and B) Even if some haven't you KNOW that Saddam has absolutely no way of using them against you or his neighbors to his advantage.

silverbackman said:
5. Saddam is putting out speeches about (paraphrase) the "heroes of 9/11" that this is "Only the beginning" and other inflammatory rhetoric designed to stoke Islamic hatred.

Empty rhetoric spews out of people's mouths everyday, it is hardly a reasonable excuse for starting a war.

Silverbackman said:
6. UN weapons inspectors found hundreds of shells filled with mustard gas that Iraq denied having. Tests on these shells indicated the weapons were still over 90% effective even though they were vintage shells stockpiled since World War II.

Thus proving the effectiveness of the UN weapons inspectors the Bush administration was so eager to displace in favor of war.

Silverbackman said:
7. How any of you can want such an evil man like Saddam in power to stop "anarchy" is beyond me. Saddam is the worst type of person, he killed close to a million people. He didn't just rule with an iron fist, he killed people who were innocent. His all-time favorite idol was Joseph Stalin, as if that is anything of a suprise.

Some of you say that there is a high amount of Iraq casuality in Iraq, but the truth is it doesn't come near to the amount of people Saddam killed and the many more people he would have killed if he was still in power.

This ignores a lot. Saddam killed lots of people, but the last time he had done (or been in a position to do) anything overly horrendous was over a decade before the invasion. IN 2003 he wasn't commiting massacres nor was there any ground or fear to believe that he could or would do so anytime soon. True, he was killing political opponents and torturing people, but not on a level that would have differentiated him from any other regime in that region. If the humanitarian excuse for the war is to have any validity, you must be able to show that the situation now in Iraq is probably better than it would have been had Saddam stayed in power. The tens of thousands of Iraqis killed in this was are way more than any reasonable estimate of what Saddam's vicims would have numbered over the same period- and that isn't counting the future victims as the number of Iraqis killed in violence continues to spiral upwards.


Silverbackman said:
1. Invade and make sure the WOMD?fs are secured and if they don?ft exist he gets egg on his face.

2. Not invade but if Baby Bush ignores all of this and Iraq walks a nuke across our exceedingly porous (essentially unpatrolled) Southern boarder and turns LA, Chicago, or some other city or cities into radioactive craters it would be what we in science call ?gbad.?h

There is just absolutely ZERO basis in reality for this scenario. The logic fails on so many levels. Lets ignore for the moment the fact that Saddam didn't have any WMDs. THe fact remains that its not easy to make nukes and there wasn't any real danger that he would produce them after 1991. The process would have taken years (probably decades), required technical skills and facilities Iraq didn't have, required resources Iraq didn't have and would have no way of acquiring and would have had to be undetectable to 24 hour US surveillance. Then the bomb would have to be somehow smuggled out of Iraq - no easy task -and into the US -again no easy task.

But even that isn't the end of the ludicrousness of the scenario. What the hell would Saddam have to gain by doing this? NOTHING, and the only foreseeable consequence would be his instant annhiliation by US retaliation. Then there is the even further point that even in the one in a billion chance that Saddam ever were able to produce a nuclear weapon the only possible situation in which he would use it would be if the US invaded, so how the hell invasion can be justified along the lines of preventing an Iraqi attack just confounds me.

silverbackman said:
So he didn?ft have a choice. I would have made the same call, as would anyone with a measurable IQ, so it didn?ft matter who was in the White House – it had to happen. Bush, Gore, Kerry, Hilary Clinton or even Teddy F?fing Kennedy would have had to do the exact same thing and gotten the exact same egg on their face. If we?fre going to kick Bush for something let?fs kick him for something he actually has some control over like his F?fd up domestic policies or that fact that he ignores the illegal immigration problem. Iraq is a nonsequitur.

Like hell he didn't have a choice. He had a choice, he made it and now people are paying the consequences. He isn't going to get off the hook on that one.


Silverbackman said:
Before someone brings up ?gUS greed for Oil?h it has nothing to do with ?gUS greed for Oil.?h We get around 10% of our oil from the Middle East and we could easily cover this loss using domestic sources (around 50% of US oil consumption) or with imports from Canada and Latin America (around 30% of US oil consumption). On the other hand Europe gets around 35% of its oil from the Middle East while Japan gets around 75% (maybe more) of it?fs oil from the Middle East. Now for those not keeping up on current events Japan and Germany make up the second and third largest economies on Earth. What happens if these economies loose access to oil on such a grand scale? Here?fs a clue: Global Economic Disaster.

Of course its the oil, for reasons you've just explained but failed to notice. The US doesn't need middle east oil but the rest of the world does, making control of the middle east undoubtedly the largest focus of American foreign policy for the past 50 years. The political and economic power American dominance of the region creates is immense and would be greatly enhanced by the permanent establishment of US military facilities in Iraq, which is one of the planners of the war's main objectives.
 
Silverbackman said:
The US doesn?ft want Iraq we just want to send a message to the Islamic nutters that every time you F with us we?fre going to invade a Muslim nation and turn the Mosques into McDonalds. If they want to fight a cultural war we?fre going to win because our culture is more appealing and they know it, which is why they hate us so much.

Turning mosques into McDonalds? This is going to be America's contribution to the "Cultural war"?

silverback said:
Give a kid the choice between a pair of loose fit Blue Jeans and a Burqua the answer is guaranteed 99.99% of the time with the other .01% representing the suicide bomber demographic.

Our clothes are better than theirs? What are you, 10,11 years old?

silverbackman said:
For those that want to pull out of Iraq the fact is that we can?ft without making the situation worse.

Maybe, but there has also been a trend that has seen the violence increase the longer US troops remain and there isn't much reason to think that trend is going to reverse itself anytime soon.

Silverbackman said:
All it will do is embolden the terrorist fringe by giving them a ?gvictory.?h

Every time they blow up another humvee they get a victory. Its way too late to be worrying about denying them the wins, every day they get dozens.


Silverbackman said:
The only way we can win in Iraq is to turn it into a paradise that other countries in the region aspire to duplicate while also sending a clear message to the region that when you kick the US we?fll cut off your head and maybe someone else?fs while we?fre at it.

Well the war has already been a complete and utter failure on that count. Even in the highly unlikely event that the US does turn Iraq into a "Paradise" as you put it, the fact that it will have taken years of bloody mayhem, tens (probably hundreds by the time its over) of thousands of lives and economic devastation that will take an entire generation to overcome to get there will be more than enough to dissuade anyone from trying to follow the Iraqi 'example".

silverbackman said:
Two Islamic centers of power were crushed after 9/11.

1. Iraq had a secular, not Islamic government. 2. Afghanistan is one of the poorest, weakest countries in the world and by no stretch of anyone's imagination counts as a "Center of power".
 
Silverbackman said:
What do you think Osama?fs opinions are on the matter? Do you think he feels better or worse? Sure he dealt a blow to the ?gGreat Satan?h but the ?gGreat Satan?h evicted the Taliban from control of Afghanistan and installed a friendly government as well as getting rid of Saddam and enforcing our influence on Iraq while just about every other nation in the region is doing Olympic level political gymnastics to make us happy.

Which countries exactly are doing olympic gymnastics to make America happy? Now that the US military is hopelessly bogged down in Iraq they know that the Americans won't be invading their countries anytime soon, so I think they would breathe a lot easier. Iran especially. They are the ones who have the most influence in Iraq today, now that the Shi'ite look set to dominate the country. Thats a pretty big ace up their sleeve for the Iranians when dealing with the US, as they can make things a lot more difficult in Iraq anytime they want.

Silverbackman said:
He did far more to damage fundamentalist Islamic control in the Middle East by initiating 9/11 than he did to the US by blowing up a couple of buildings.

I agree with you here but would add that Bush has done more to advance Islamic radicalism and damage American prestige by invading Iraq than anything any Islamic radical could dream of doing.

Silverbackman said:
Did anyone see Yasser Arafat on 9/12? He looked like someone had kicked him in the nads. He?fs also one of the few Islamic leaders that admonished his people not to celebrate the attack.

The fact that Arafat was a Muslim does not make him an "Islamic leader" anymore than, say, Tony Blair's being a Christian makes him a "Christian leader". The PLO is a secular organization that includes Christians and has fought some bloody battles with the Islamic radicals.


silberbackman said:
The ?gfunny?h thing will be if these Islamic nutters actually do manage to do something substantive such as setting off a nuke somewhere. At that point it will galvanize the world to such a point that just about any counter atrocity will be justified.

I fail to see the humor.
 
senseiman said:
The US doesn't need middle east oil but the rest of the world does, making control of the middle east undoubtedly the largest focus of American foreign policy for the past 50 years

And you, sir, hit the nail on the head with that one.
 
P.S.-2:blush: Carelessness - the reason of many misunderstanding...:blush:
I have written 9/11 - and only...It could be and date and simple figures...
The Conscious innuendo...For a polysemy...
But "someone" has replaced my smailies...:box::blush:
If people could more attentive to Saddam Hussein he not receive in due time the chemical weapon and world be another today...
So,that now about it to speak...
The reasons give to consequences...
And the fear kills soul...
It is our world...:blush:
 
End in sight?

I hope we are seeing "the light at the end of the tunnel".

The Iraqi Parliament has voted for America to state a timetable for withdrawel.

The Pentagon has hinted at a probable major withdrawel of troops, starting after the December 15 election.

Representative Murtha, Democratic Party from Pennsylvania, has tabled the proposition that America withdraw its troops, starting within 6 months. A Republican proposal for an IMMEDIATE, unconditional withdrawel, was voted down...??? 97 to 3 however.

Ex-President Bill Clinton has admitted to an Arab audience that invading Iraq was wrong, ill-advised.

I think the world is voting overwhelmingly... America must set a timetable for withdrawel, then leave.

So was it legal or illegal, with a tyrant in place like Saddam Hussein, I voted it was probably "Legal" based on the information we thought we knew and the mass-killer that Saddam was, but now it is time to wind down and leave.

Will it be the end of wars in the middle east, or the world?

Nobody believes that. But do I praise American troops who fought based on bad information, and bad political decisions, yes, I absolutely do, if their conduct was with integrity.

Is America safer now because of their sacrifice? Yes, I believe it is.

Could Iraq also be safer, if they "agree to agree"?

Yes, I believe it is.
 
there is no end. if not iraq something else or someplace else....

war will go on long after were just a memory...
 

This thread has been viewed 94297 times.

Back
Top