The War Thread

[bluevorlon]

Hi Ironhammer, to state japan as the shining result of US foreign intervention and regime change is pretty damn rich when you have dictators and regimes in Iran, Vietnam, Panama, Argentina, East Timor, and Afghanistan all sponsored by the US, not to mention the funding of Mr Hussein himself.

There have been successes as well as failures k.

[IronHammer]

Yes but they were not occupied by the US, those countries were a half measure, and who were diplomatically played off against others.

There not the same thing Blue.

Let me quote myself then.


Say what you like about this, but the reason Iraq will be our friends in the future is because we were 100% charitable. Just like we were with Japan, and them having their last Shogun Macarthur. Was that country not stabilized? Its pritty domned rich now for a country that size I think.

What I mean is that countries we conquerd and restuctured, or have ben liberated by the US, have ben entirely for the US, what I'm refurrin to now is current Afghanistan, and Japan as an example of what were going to be doing.

All those except Vietnam and Panama I think

[bluevorlon]

It's about the installation of governments for US interests, not the interests of the natives of those countries.

And I'm sorry, but even if they were, as you so delightfully put it, 'half-measures' they managed to accrue quite a death toll between them didn't they?

Maybe the US should occupy every country, just to be safe.

[Starfisher]

Know what blue? Why not? MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAA!

[EchoEffect]

Because they probably wouldn't be able to find half of them.

According to A British Army spokesman who is talking on newsnight right now, he says the uprising in Basra is quite small at the moment, and poeple shouldn't expect it to turn into a full scale rebellion any time soon.

[Bonnet]

you have dictators and regimes in Iran, Vietnam, Panama, Argentina, East Timor, and Afghanistan all sponsored by the US
well blue that was a ignorant statment. Thier is a democratic goverment in Afghanistan, Argerntina, and Panama. The Vietnam war was fought so that dictator did not get in to power. Iran is not sponsored by the US and we are on very bad terms. (never heard of East Timor so i can't commit)

[bluevorlon]

Hi, the US, (The CIA more specifically) sponsored Coups in East Timor, Argentina, Iran and I belive Panama, to set up puppet governments and or dictators. Augusto Pinochet amongst them.

There is also evidence that the US supported the overthrow of the democratically elected president Hugo Chavez of Venezuela recently.

The US presence in Vietnam stopped democratic elections from taking place, elections to give the vietnamese people independence for the first time in the history of their nation. Elections that would have almost certainly seen the south vietnamese vote to join the North as an independent state, the US set up the ineffective, unrepresentative, and US-Friendly government of Diem. Not quite fighting against dictatorship, more setting one up, I feel.

[Martian]

zbobet please go see bowling for columbine, then come back

[IronHammer]

Well blue, the US had a military dictator in Japan for a while, to help rebuild that country. As for Vietnam if we had won that war, you would not be able to talk about half measures. If you want to get into the reasons why we lost, and why things were shit afterwords, but then thats another descussion.

But if you want to go into what I belive were gonna do in Iraq, think about it this way, we with a coalition, will give Iraq as much freedom as the rest of Europe had after WWII.

I wish poeple would stop being so US centric in there attacks, I man really, its not just the US thats fighting and dieing in that country. How could we have Imperialistic designs when this country is not being liberated by just the US?

I should note also, that there is a big differance from supporting one faction out of many, like chosing the lesser of two evils, and occupying and rebuilding from the ground up, which is always the harder choice to begin with.

[Bonnet]

Blue please provide me with a source.

[Mac_Bug]

zbobet2012 please provide me with a source.

[Martian]

A few examples from this (http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/DailyNews/regime_changes021203.html) source, wich is ABCnews, so no whining about anti-American sources ktnx.



Iran, 1953 — U.S. manipulation helped lay the groundwork for the overthrow of elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadeq, historians say, though the CIA claims documents related to the operation were subsequently destroyed. Mossadeq had incurred the wrath of Britain by nationalizing the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, and U.S. President Eisenhower reportedly feared Iran was unstable and its oil might fall under the Soviet Union's sphere of influence. In Mossadeq's place, the pro-American Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi installed a puppet prime minister, reasserted his power and effectively ruled for decades. However, his regime was so brutal and unpopular that it is seen as a prime reason for Iran's vehemently anti-American Islamic revolution in 1979. Iran had shown signs of softening its anti-Americanism, but in January President Bush labeled it part of an "axis of evil" that also included Iraq and North Korea.

Guatemala, 1954 — A CIA-supported coup by Guatemalan exiles invaded from a base in Honduras and overthrew the democratically elected, but leftist regime of President Jacobo Arbenz, who was engaged in controversial land reform measures that transferred corporate land to farmers. Until Arbenz resigned during the coup, code named "Operation Success" by U.S. intelligence, CIA plots to assassinate him and other Guatemalan officials were under consideration, published reports on declassified government records say. U.S.-backed Col. Carlos Castillo Armas replaced Arbenz as president, but a decades-long civil war ensued, causing an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 deaths or disappearances during the rule of strongmen friendly to the United States.

South Vietnam, 1963 — President Ngo Dinh Diem and secret police chief Ngo Dinh Nuh, his brother and chief adviser, were assassinated while trying to escape the country during what historians believe was a U.S.-sanctioned coup. The assassinations led to a series of South Vietnamese leaders ineffective in the war against North Vietnam, which many believe drew the United States deeper into the Vietnam War.

Chile, 1973 — The Nixon administration provided covert funding and the CIA conducted operations to weaken democratically elected, socialist government of Chilean President Salvador Allende and pave the way for a military coup, according to reports on U.S. government documents declassified during the Clinton administration. Thousands of people died or disappeared under the subsequent 17-year rule of Allende's successor, Gen. Augusto Pinochet.

Oh, yes, not trusting the USA is evil, naturally.

[SvK]

Don't forget Germany and Japan.

[Martian]

What, is it so hard to click that link and get them yourself?

Oh well.


Germany, 1945 — World War II's allied powers continued to run Germany for years after its surrender on May 8, 1945. The Soviet Union eventually converted its sphere of influence into the Communist satellite state of East Germany. But amid continuing economic and organizational aid, the United States, Britain and France created a functioning democracy in West Germany, also known as the Federal Republic of Germany. The country gained limited self-government in 1949, and later full autonomy and NATO membership. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, East and West Germany reunited in 1990.

Japan, 1945 — Japan surrendered to World War II's allied powers on Sept. 2, 1945, and soon was placed under allied control administered by U.S. Gen. Douglas MacArthur. According to the U.S. State Department's Internet site, "U.S. objectives were to ensure that Japan would become a peaceful nation and to establish democratic self-government supported by the freely expressed will of the people." A new constitution took effect in 1947 and Japan — now a U.S. ally described by the State Department as "a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government" — gained full sovereignty in 1952.

[bluevorlon]

I would like it noted that a) I am not making a US centric attack. Ironhammer was stating some things about US Foreign policy that I believed were wrong, I was refuting those claims in the whole spirit of 'debate' type thing.

and b) I meant chile when I said argentina in my earlier post. Cheers Tina. <3

:D

blu

[Harmanoff]

Originally posted by IronHammer
I wish poeple would stop being so US centric in there attacks, I man really, its not just the US thats fighting and dieing in that country. How could we have Imperialistic designs when this country is not being liberated by just the US?

Because having an ally does not mean you automagically become immune to being imperialists. Sorry.

[RBA-Wintrow]

"In a speech earlier today President Bush said if Iraq gets rid of Saddam Hussein, he will help the Iraqi people with food, medicine, supplies, housing, education – anything that's needed. Isn't that amazing? He finally comes up with a domestic agenda – and it's for Iraq. Maybe we could bring that here if it works out." —Jay Leno

[Ammon Ra]

:rofl:
good one. although laphter doesn't fit with war, it is an effeftive method to divert stored energies, frustration and stress.

and anyways, about the CIA, it "suposedly" put forth information that it had proof that sadam had WOMD. However, a week or two later they admitted or some1 found out that all the information that the CIA had put forth against saddam was completly false. the only "evidence" tat hasn't been confered to be fake is the voice recordings. the CIA did similar things in Bush senior's time during desert storm. or shield...or whateverr the operation was called.

Any one heard of eric lauraint? i do, and his newest book sounds EXTREEMLY interesting :)

[frstkor13]

The next time a post in this thread is made that is not directly related to the war, I will lock this thread. No other war threads will follow.

This is not another thread for all the regular US bashers and US lovers to come play their weekly game in.

mmmk?

[RBA-Wintrow]

I was wondering how long the people there think the war will take.
From what I can tell what remains of the Iraqi army will be isolated within a few days. From there it'll (hopefully) be a matter of keeping small pockets of resistance isolated and wearing them down while the rest of the country rebuilds.

Taking Basra and Baghdad will take more time, but the rest of the nation needn't suffer from that.

Last I heard there is already talk of bringing water and food into that port city (can't find the name).

Also, I've heard the Coalition is using trained dolphinis to find mines. :) Can't hide from a dolphin. :)

[IronHammer]

Hay look at this guys
USA Today 7th Cavalry inflicts hevy casualties in running battle (http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2003-03-25-war-zone_x.htm)

The thing im beginning to notice about many members of our armed forces, is that they must all have had interasting childhoods, if you read the article you'll eventually see a Pfc. Randall Duke Newcomb. :D

[Retroboy]

Good eye!

PLEASE tell me he's buff and has a yellow crewcut! :D

Hey, anyone here ever been in a sandstorm? They look like they'd be absolute hell on the U.S. troops, and a decided home turf advantage.

-- Retro

[Starfisher]

Considering that no one, Iraqi or US, can see very far, it would seem to be less of an advantage for the Iraqis and more of an impediment for all... which I suppose would be an advantage for the Iraqis.. right.

[EchoEffect]

blue beiing British probably means he hasn't watched dateline, or 60 mins....whatever they are (assuming US tv progs here).

Frst: What post was unrelated to the war? Isnt the US and allies past in reconstructing countries, and their interference in countries a central issue in this war?

I think this war is goign to be much much harder than most people think. People seem to think that wars are now done electronicaly, that we are safe because we have sattalites and cool jets and fast missiles. In the end we are going to have to fight our way into Basra, and into Baghdad. I think that is very dangerous. I hope they dont have to fight their way in, but if they do, it is going to be horribly bloody for everyone. And the occupying force is never going to be able to rest.

Its easy enough to take the desert off the Iraqi's, they dont stand much chance against the Americans and British in that respect. But the towns and cities are much harder. Tanks arent so useful there, if you want to avoid killing civilians.

I am worried that hit and run attacks in the cities will get so bad that the Americans and British armies will be less concerned about savinf civilians lives, and just shoot anyone who looks a bit dodgy. Like in Vietnam.

[Vaarok]

The thing that struck me is that despite all the tech, we've still got eighteen year old no-college needed-three-k-to-soup-up-their-car gomers running half this stuff.

And yet through our technology, we're so far ahead of the iraqis they almost cannot compete. I mean, this war has had something like thirty allied casualties so far, and most of that in urban streetfighting.

[ÜberJumper]

I'm immensely impressed with how this conflict is proceeding so far.

From reports, the battlefield conduct of the coalition forces has been exemplary while the battlefield conduct of the Iraqis has been crafty (Anti tank infantry ambushes of US armoured recce), in some cases expected (raiding/ambushing supply columns), and in some cases disgusting (feigning surrender, possible execution of POWs, execution of civilians that wave to Coalition troops, hiding in civilian population).

Oh, and one thing I'd like to point out... the media seems to be reporting a lot of RPG hits disabling vehicles... I think you'll find that there are more instances of Anti-tank guided missles disabling armour than RPGs doing so.

[Starfisher]

I think you'll find that the embedded reporters both exaggerate and understate constantly. The exaggerate greatly the danger that they are in. I'm sure they're understating something, but as of yet, it all seems exaggerated.

[EchoEffect]

I havent heard any journalists overstating the danger are in. Infact i have been impressed at how they seem so calm in such a dangerous sitation. Especialy the reporters that are in Baghdad, it must be pretty scary to be living in that city right now.

Maybe its just because of the different channels or something.

I dont really know whether this is going well or not. I'm not in any way a military expert or anything. It seems to be going ok, but not as good as they led everyone to belive it would be. I will assume Uber knows what he is talkign about when he says it is going well.

[Retroboy]

I did get a kick out of how the CBC interviewed three on-site reporters.

There was no video feed and the voices were filled with really loud microphone-in-the-wind sounds - the reporters had obviously stepped outside to get interviewed in order to go for the"Gee whiz, I'm in a sandstorm!" sound effects. :D

Now that's what I call gritty reporting!

-- Retro

[Stealth]

Yea, they also don the military uniforms, complete with radios, vests, chest packs, and all sorts of other things that we wonder "what is in that?"

[Starfisher]

Echo: If you get CNN, and you saw Wolf Blitzer say, "We have heard explosions in Bagdhad!" when a car horn beeped, then you know what I mean. Of course, the various feeds CNN stole from BBC have shown the awesome might of british reporting to be well... awesome.

[Genetic Bryy]

Anyone see the news last night? It was on Fox (2, not the craptastic news channel).

Seems that we've used the long awaited Electromagnetic Bomb. Funny, because there was no speculation to such a device would of been used in this war. This must of been how people felt when they heard that we had dropped an Atomic Bomb- you know, except for all of the sorrow over the loss of life we cause, because.... well, the E-Bomb speaks for itself.

TV stations were the first to go, assumedly to get rid of their side of propoganda if the bomb didn't work as planned, but then Baghdad itself went black, sector by sector.

The government has won back major brownie points in my book for using such a non-lethal but powerful weapon.

[Rincewind]

Er, no? No such thing as an EMP bomb, and besides Baghdad went black several times during GW 1... you only need to bomb the power stations to do that.

[Genetic Bryy]

It was a response to Starfisher's post, albeit more elaborate on how much the media sucketh.

[Mac_Bug]

maybe they'll just drop neutron bombs and kill all the iraqi held up while leaving the buildings in tact. ALl they have to do is contract someone to clean up the bodies instead of rebuilding the city.

[Stealth]

Yea there is Rincewind. It's still in development, and is rather unpredictable, and only has a range of a few hundred yards.

[Starfisher]

And deal with 5 million radioactive corpses...

[Vaarok]

Actually, the current CNN headline on the radio has been about a column of "one thousand iraqi armored vehicles leaving bagdad and heading south toward coalition forces."

Then, two hours later, the official pentagon report says it's about two hundred light armored vehicles.

Personally, I think the news coverage is a joke. "we see sand, sun, and lots of sand" seems to be all the reporters can say, and my local news channel (WUTR-20) did a horrendous piece on vehicles of the war, explaining what the american things looked like. Hideous spinning-on-an-off-centre-axis poorly-textured 3d models, with the freakin weatherman trying to explain what an Abrams tank was for.

They didn't even mention the A-10, either.

[Genetic Bryy]

I think this has been our dumbest news coverage war yet.

[Retroboy]

Least propaganda-ized, maybe.

Hard to control the press when they own their own satellites.

-- Retro

[Nova]

It's called revoking your broadcast license, Retro. It's not hard to keep the media in line when you need to.

The news coverage isn't necessarally the dumbest, it's just completely unfounded rumour mongering that gets every in a panic. This is the first war that's ever been covered in thes manner there is bound to be a few screwed up facts being released by the media and the then corrected by the White House later.

[ASnogard]

A EMP type weapon has been developed but from the statements made by the press the Coalition are not intending to disrupt services like electricity as was the case in first war.

I am more concerned with the tactics used at the moment, one specialist interviewed indicated (at the time) there had been 5 days without substantial Iraqi resistance, 5 days to study the Coalition movements. I will go out on a limb and say that the Coalition forces are maybe a bit too confident, and have stretched their supply lines in a effort to get to Baghdad. I’ll like to point out the attacks on the supply line and the fact they can’t move so fast and have little to no armor.

Another point is what would the impact on the Coalition home support be if the Iraqi’s manage a successful raid on the supply line and inflict a lot of casualties on Coalition forces?

One must admit having overwhelming technological and resources in a war breed overconfidence, and overconfidence can lead to disaster.

As far as the media coverage is concerned you must remember that the media is being used as propaganda, by both sides. If the media were to show the true horror of war on live television there would be a massive protest that would cripple the war effort.

[Bonnet]

The supply line may be long however that doesnt always mean its weak. That no armor thing i very untrue they have at leat something like 3,000 tanks with them so you might be a little off. As they advance they tend to shorten the supply line as well when they take airports.

[ASnogard]

I meant the supply vehicles themselves have little to no armor, there may be tanks present but they are not effective defence against guerilla tactics in a desert condition, tanks are more suited to attack and assualt than defence imo.

I was watching the BBC coverage when one of the reporters on site reported a attack with RPG and AK during the night, sounded like a quick probing raid from what he describes.

[Bonnet]

There arent really guerilla attacks in the dessert as thier is no place to hide from our heat sensors and nightvision...

[ASnogard]

Heat sensors don't work so well because in the day as the sand is heated by the sun to quiet a surprising temperature, and nightvision equipment is crippled by sand particles thrown up by the wind.

Though I must admit I am not a expert on this :)

You must admit the Iraqi people have a lot more experience in desert conditions than any of the Coalition forces and know quiet a few tricks to hide.

[Vaarok]

I was under the impression that a large portion of convoy escort was air support. Land vehicles provide skirmish capability while they scramble Super Cobras and airstrikes.

[Starfisher]

The 'attacks' are mostly from irrgeular, un-trained fanatics. The only reason its even in the news is because of the total media saturation of the units involved. More units are moving into the region to start securing the supply lines from such attacks.

The whole idea of this was to get to Bagdhad as quick as possible even if it means absorbing some punishment. Once the street fighting starts there, things will slow down considerably and units entering the region can start to pull security for the supply line.

[EchoEffect]

Starfisher: I cant get CNN, or any American news channels. I only have the 4 terrestrial British Channels (two of which are BBC). So Its hard to find out the difference. I would imagine that the US ones were more, er, American. I suppose more "into it" than the British ones. That might reflect the difference in cultures, or it might also reflect the fact that there is more support for the war in the US than here. I can read the American news websites though, and i imagine they reflect the same style as their TV coverage does. I prefere the style of the BBC myself. I trust them more than i do CNN or ABC, or Fox. This will mean nothing to non British people, but Channel 4 news is also very good, very professional. Not to fond of ITV news, its a bit to trivial sometimes. A bit to much like the Sun newspaper *spit*.

I am hoping that the Desert Rats have experience fighting in the desert, otherwise, their name is a bit stupid.

[Retroboy]

This just in: the war is no longer the #1 news story here in Canada.

SARS (that respiratory ailment) has replaced Iraq as the lead-in story on our cross-Canada news TV show "The National".

-- Retro

[Nova]

What right does the media have to deprive me of my coverage of people being slaughtered on the other side of the planet, now I have to read about this plague that is causing chaos in hospitals across Toronto, I guess we didn't have enough fun with that damn Norwalk virus a few weeks ago.

Oh well, aside from this people are in an snit about some comments the U.S. Ambassador made about our support in the war on Iraq. Who needs This Hour Has 22 Minutes when you can watch the House of Commons on CPAC.

[Liberator]

Originally posted by Martian
Yes. But the rest of the US' track record, proving that humanitary reasons are of no concern to the US (or, for that matter, for any other country) raises a big question: why?

And that question has not been answered by the US' government except by forged documents, unfounded accusations, and pure lies.

Now don't come tell me that Saddam is an evil man; i KNOW that. My question is, with the above-mentioned track record in mind, wich clearly shows that his evilness does not matter: why? and why NOW? Why not in 6 months, after the inspections got a real chance?

I'm sorry, I know the thread has moved on, but I had to reply to this and I won't post here again.

Track Record...Schmack Record. U.S. leadership changes drastically every eight years.

The President either consciously, like G.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan, or unconsciously, like Bubba, sets the general tone of society with his leadership style or lack thereof.

For eight years we had one of the most conniving, amoral SOBs ever conceived by mortal flesh running our country. It's a good thing he wasn't too bright.

Dubya, on the other hand, is an example of a true Leader. He will stick to his guns and do his job till the end. France, Germany or the UN be damned. It is his responsibility as the Leader of the most powerful country on Earth to safeguard his people from harm where he may find it.

I now return control of the thread to it's rightful posters and will not return.

[Martian]

Maybe you forget so easily about your track record (except if its positive, like WWII, ofcourse), the rest of the world, and especially the Iraqi people who have some bad memories about the uprising in 1991, doesn't. If you think they do, you're a bit naive. Sorry.

[Harmanoff]

It is his responsibility as the Leader of the most powerful country on Earth to safeguard his people from harm where he may find it.

That's quite amusing. You're trying to make me believe the most powerful country on earth cannot safeguard it's people from harm without bullying an already disarmed and impoverished nation? Give me a break. This whole thing wont make the world even slightly safer for anyone, least of all the average kind spirited Joe sitting in his TV couch in the mid west, enjoying an immensly low risk of being the target of a terrorist attack.

[Starfisher]

For eight years we had one of the most conniving, amoral SOBs ever conceived by mortal flesh running our country. It's a good thing he wasn't too bright.

Dubya, on the other hand, is an example of a true Leader. He will stick to his guns and do his job till the end. France, Germany or the UN be damned. It is his responsibility as the Leader of the most powerful country on Earth to safeguard his people from harm where he may find it.

Sorry, I just had to post that again for sheer hilarity value.

Heh, you capitalize 'leader'. You make him sound like the 'Leader' in some weird cult. Although I guess you could call American politics a cult...

[EchoEffect]

a good thing he wasn't too bright.

Yes god fobid the President be clever. Much better to have a complete moron in charge.

I read today that the US has given the contract to run the Port at Umm Qasr to an American company. Whereas the British want to give the running of it back to the man who ran it before the allies moved in. Which seems like a much more sensible idea.

[Stealth]

I'd say at this point in time, it would be unwise to return control to the Iraqi people "yet". It would almost be as if we went and beat up the bully who was beating up the little guy, and just walked away without helping the little guy up.

The real issue is more of which company is best, and why british/australian/etc companies have been granted few contracts, while U.S. companies have received most.

[Bonnet]

Stealth the reason may be because they are the most capable or their arent that many british/austalian/etc companies that do that. Martian what track record, are we the evil because we saved millons of lives by droping a nuke on Japan (actually two).

[EchoEffect]

are we the evil because we saved millons of lives by droping a nuke on Japan

what

the

fu*k.

[IronHammer]

Not necessarily evil actually, a war-torn Japan having ben invaded by the US and Russia, would have looked alot differant then it does now.
I believe the Japanise had massed quite a number of its cavilian population in its southern area's, and armed them with hand to hand weapons to fend off troops, in any case an invasion of Japan by troops, would have ben far more horrific then dropping two nuclear bombs.

But this is off topic.

[Noir]

Originally posted by IronHammer

I believe the Japanise had massed quite a number of its cavilian population in its southern area's, and armed them with hand to hand weapons to fend off troops, in any case an invasion of Japan by troops, would have ben far more horrific then dropping two nuclear bombs.


Actually the Japanese Government mobilized THE ENTIRE population of Japan,estimates of losses of US forces had they invaded Japan was estimated at 1 million,and we may have had to commit genocide or near genocide on the entire Japanese population.

[IronHammer]

Well yeah they were rather fanatical for their God Emporer. I was not sure if the numbers were th entire pop though.

[Stealth]

And back to the topic...

Zbob, I assure you, the United States isn't the only industrialized country on the planet. It's not that we are "more capable" than any other European nation, just that we aren't sharing the wealth with our allies.

Not that I really care anyways :)

[IronHammer]

Not that we should share as you say, in the manner of a "redistrebution", as I think your implying. We made that money and no way in hell is it going anyware, it was made by trade, and it will be lost by trade, if it gets lost that is.

Back on Topic plz, this is turning into a bash the US thread again.

[EchoEffect]

Yeah screw the starving people in Africa. Its our money.

[IronHammer]

Oh really, why dont you pay?

perhaps I sould edit my statment. I believe it is not that we should have to pay period. That it would be a kind thing to fund other countries yes it would, but we cannot fund the would, why should the burden of the world bank be upon the US population?

[Bonnet]

:offtopic: The US pays something like 90% of the worlds aid most of whitch goes into the hands of warlords and not the people.
Now back on topic. The war is going well and thier as of so far seem to be less than 100 civillan deaths, not that im discounting but compared to 1.5 million its not to bad.

[Stealth]

A missile hit a mall in Kuwait city. Only a few injuries I believe.

[Bonnet]

Yeah but they think it was a Iraqi missle that missfired.

[Harmanoff]

Let me see now, the U.S pays 90% of the worlds aid? And there have been less than 100 civilian deaths in the current hobby war? Riiight.

[Vaarok]

Anyone else see that thing on NBC about american prisoners? They found shreds of bloody american uniform in an abandoned hospital/HQ/prison, and several cells with strap-down tables with electric leads connected to car batteries. Blood on the tables...

These people not nice. We let them surrender even when they shoot at us afterwards.

[Starfisher]

They've been saying for a while now that the Iraqis most likely executed those first prisoners taken from the maintenence divsion. Especially since the video of the dead soldiers aired showed several of them with bullet wounds in their foreheads.

Anyone else see the 'die-in' in New York today on TV? I wonder if they are imatating the Kurds or the inhabitants of Bagdhad when they decide to block traffic. It sure makes a statement for the anti-war cause when you slow up an ambulance, stop people from going to work and have your leader say on pulbic TV that "Saddam is not benefiting from these protests."

And of course the riots in other cities. Break some windows and save Saddam!

Gah. Protest the old fashioned way, with signs and slogans. Protesting is what made America, but now these people through their 'patriotic' demonstrations have created something different. It's almost saying "We want to change things, but instead of making a thought provoking statement, we're going to make you think we're idiots."

[IronHammer]

Hay guys I hear there's a four to six day stop in the ground assault, must be changing plans or doin somthing important in those 4-6 days. hmmm

Perhaps since Bahgdad isnt going anyware anytime soon, they may be securing the rest of the country before a final assault. Or atleast my midnight speculation machine says so. I'll see what it says in the morning.

yep, their stopped, maybe because the Guard Units keep comeing out to attack them, so maybe there waiting for Saddam to commit all his reaserves, perhaps to the point that bahgdad will be easy to take.

[Bonnet]

Harmanoff check this http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa065.htmllink and this http://netec.wustl.edu/WoPEc/data/Papers/hhsiiessp0600.html (download the doc) or this http://www.globalissues.org/TradeRelated/Debt/USAid.asp?so=p&Print=True for the foreign aid. So clearly youre statement is luadable.
On the war aspect there are only 14 teen deaths clamed so far by the Iraqis and those ones are questionable. If there had been more i assure they would have told us (the iraqis).

[Earth-Command]

It is horriable the reports of what the Iraqies are doing to the allied prisoners of war.

But.........................

I watched a report on the ABC 6 months ago about how alot of captured Taliban prisoners were all locked up in prisons in the middle of no where. A load of prisoners on the way to the already full prisons simply dissapeared of the face of the Earth.

The investigating reporter found evidence of mass graves at the site near where the trucks carrying the 2000+ prisoners were ordered to stop and dissapear.

Being pro war I am under no illusion that the Allies have their own methods of extracting information from Iraqies with sensetive information.

I guess what goes around comes around.

When the stakes are so high, the rule book is thrown out the window.

[Harmanoff]

Originally posted by zbobet2012
Harmanoff check this http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa065.htmllink and this http://netec.wustl.edu/WoPEc/data/Papers/hhsiiessp0600.html (download the doc) or this http://www.globalissues.org/TradeRelated/Debt/USAid.asp?so=p&Print=True for the foreign aid. So clearly youre statement is luadable.
On the war aspect there are only 14 teen deaths clamed so far by the Iraqis and those ones are questionable. If there had been more i assure they would have told us (the iraqis).

This is slightly confusing.

To start of your first link is broken, i suspect it should be http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa065.html. No need to thank me.
Secondly, what do you mean by saying my statement is clearly 'luadable'?

Dictionary.com suggest you meant laudable. They say it means the following:
laud·a·ble
adj.
Deserving commendation; praiseworthy.

I assume you might have meant my comment was laughable. In both cases your statement becomes rather puzzling given that the links you provide completely destroys your former (silly)argument:
The US pays something like 90% of the worlds aid most of whitch goes into the hands of warlords and not the people. Now back on topic

All those three sites are laden with evidence that the U.S does in fact not provide something like 90% of the worlds aid. Instead they show how the glorious aid programmes have failed miserably and that the U.S gives the lowest percentage of it's GNP to aid of 'all the industrialised nations in the world'. gg

There are a few good quotes:

From globalissues.org: As shown throughout this web site (and hundreds of others) one of the root causes of poverty lies in the powerful nations that have formulated most of the trade and aid policies today, which are more to do with maintaining dependencies on industrialized nations, providing sources of cheap labor and cheaper goods for populations back home and increasing personal wealth, and maintaining power over others in various ways.

from cato.org: Our foreign aid has made life more pleasant and entertaining for government bureaucrats in poor countries. However, it has done little to promote the production of wealth, or to breed political responsibility, or to encourage people to help themselves. American foreign aid usually only strengthens oppressive regimes, allows governments to avoid correcting their mistakes, and bails out bankrupt state-owned enterprises around the world.
Now for your second statement:

The war is going well and thier as of so far seem to be less than 100 civillan deaths, not that im discounting but compared to 1.5 million its not to bad.
A bit more than 100 i'm afraid. Check out http://www.iraqbodycount.net/bodycount.htm. It has an impressive list of sources. The Red Cross says the can only vouch for 14 dead civilians, iraqi health minister says there were 350 dead in one attack. I'm pretty sure the number lies somewhere in between and i'm sure as hell it's more than 100.

So.. i guess the point of this almost MajorFreak-esque post is that i have two questions:
1. What did you mean, Laudable or laughable?
2. In light of all the sources you and I have provided, how is my previous statement either laudable or laughable?

Finally i'm very grateful that you showed me cato.org. It's a great site. I particulary like these two: http://www.cato.org/dailys/03-29-03.html <|> http://www.cato.org/pubs/fpbriefs/fpb-050es.html

[IronHammer]

Oh wait, some of those sources of bodies eventually come from bahgdad, and wait if those numbers are acurate were still about, mabey 1% of the total Saddam has killed in a most brutal fashion.

And wait, but were <purposefuly targeting civilians> Well then we sure as hell are doing a shitty job of killing as many Iraqis regardless, we should just turn the place into glass and be done with it. We do have WMD and its not something you can be squimish in using, otherwise the threat of it is worthless.
About the News, some things you have to read between the lines, they are out for the most part, to get a story wharever it is, those body counts may or may not be acurate, because it comes from Saddam and Bahgdad in some cases, and who wants to infuse the US or war haters with ammo. IMO there just cheap shots really, you cannot fight a bloodless war, there is no such thing.

[EchoEffect]

There is a bit of a cufuffle over here about the PMs statement that two British soldiers were executed. Apparently the army told their familes that they died in combat. So now the PM looks a bit foolish, and looks like he was trying to score propaganda points out of the deaths of Two people. Although if he is wrong, its more likely that he was just that, wrong, rather than deliberatly trying to mislead people.

It must be terrible for the familes of those soldiers, as well as for hte familes of the soldiers that are missing or have been captured. I hope the Red Cross at least is allowed to visit them or something, but maybe I am being to optermistic.

Sort of must be like how the British familes of those held in Camp X ray must feel.

edit: the idea of a bloodless war has been partialy created by the allies, especialy the US, with all the talk of high tech weapons and precision bombs. People seemed to foget that for all the technology of the US and Britain, soldiers still haev to fight on the ground. It seems like everyone reacts with shock when a soldier dies, as if they never expected it. Or as if they never expected the Iraqi's to fight back, as if that is somehow rude of them.

[IronHammer]

Echo, anyone who calls a war "bloodless" while talking of weapons and bombs in the same breath, should not be considerd an expert on the subject.

[Starfisher]

Echo, that's a human defense mechanism. We subconciously do not allow ourselves to contemplate the true horror of war, even when we should know better. Like after WWII, when all the soldiers who had their faces shot off tried to go into public. People would get angry at them, saying that they should stay out of public. No one wants the reality of war shoved on them, especially when they can grasp rosier misconceptions.

[Stewart Ramses]

When a mod tells you not to post in a thread again, and you do, this is what happens. All the time you spent writing your replies... wasted.

[Vaarok]

I'm really kinda nervous regarding the whole arabic world going berserk about this war. Our militaries are starting to get wedged between provoking neighboring nations, and winning the combat part of the war.

By the time we get to Bagdad, the islamic world might very well have done something more than riot and protest our involvement in this war (as they see it, despite lack of proof). This is mostly because so long as the iraqi regime refrains from use of such weapons, they garner support. But when we do get to Bagdad, the war is lost for them, and it's quite likely Saddam with do a Nero Directive and finally use his CNBW capabilities.

The question begged is- if other nations involve themselves, will they break off if he does use those weapons, and how much chaos will they have caused our flanks before we provoke Saddam into his last-stand contingency, which would also be a violent and damning admission of guilt.

Scary stuff, no?

[Stewart Ramses]

deleted

[IronHammer]

I also think the US is kinda taking advantege of the media bais, for the purposes of ephesis on one area of the war, while ignoring other (really important to know if your the enemy) stuff. Think about it, the military has always had problems with media coverage; therfore, they are probably factoring certain things they know the media will do into their master plan.


ya know Stewert, the military never has enugh troops to cover every square inch of ground, this has always ben a problem in military planning from the beginning of warfare, so I think they know how to plan with scarce resources, since admitedly they are the "experts."

What I really think, is that there are weels within weels in this war.

[Stewart Ramses]

deleted

[Bonnet]

The media's only goal is to make money which people tend to forget. All they do is appeal to the masses wether or not it is acurate. ( i meant laughable)

[Harmanoff]

Right. That answers one.

So how was my statement laughable then? I mean, you proved yourself wrong with those links. How am i laughable when you provide faulty numbers and then show everybody you're wrong?

[Stealth]

Ramses, there are plenty of troops. Over 250,000 vs Saddam's few thousand republican guards. The government has said from the start that "this won't be a short and simple war" and "it's closer to the beginning than the end" etc.

And...

During the Gulf War, they thought 500,000 would be enough as well, even though they were going up against the 4th largest (I believe) army in the world. And afterwards, most of the army surrendered, or was blown up. We lost around 200 soldiers I believe, which is .0004% of total troops. Not bad.

[IronHammer]

Hay guy's if your looking for some moderate positive news check out The NYPost, (http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/33106.htm) this is fairly uplifting news from a retired military officer and novelist.

[SvK]

I don't see why Muslims would be offended by the US attacking Saddam. The US isn't attacking because he's Muslim (is he even Muslim?), it's attacking because he's a mean guys with nasty weapons. Where does religion come into this?

[Stealth]

Doesn't matter SvK, the seeds laid by the U.S. as far back as the Harding administration (early 1920's) have caused much hatred to be directed to it from the Middle East (and thus, many extremist Muslims).

Of course i'm talking about the post-WWI era in which the Middle East was divided up by the world to suit it's needs--Arab residents didn't like that too much. After that it was Israel (post-WW2), where the United States and the U.N. established a refuge for displaced Jews--again, something the Arabs did not like. And ever since, the United States's support of Israel, causing even more anti-U.S. sentiment.

[EchoEffect]

to them we are imperialistic invaders. We might say we are not, we might not be. But when the United States, and Britain, invade somewhere, we aren't going to have huge sympathy.

[SvK]

So once again all our troubles go back to the Treaty of Versailles.

[Vaarok]

As far back as Harding? Try Pope Innocent III...

[M37]

Here's someting a little nuts
Reuters has a story saying that Slovenia was acidently named a member of the coalition of the willing. they deny it and say they just gave the coalition the right to use thier airspace to fly aid planes throgh.

Call me nuts but what are they going to do? Fly somone up to do a visual check - yep that cargo plane has food.

[IronHammer]

You could tell what kinda plan it is from the ground; actually many US planes have a quite distinct profile.

[Stealth]

Innocent III? The U.S. wasn't around then :)

[Martian]

M37: maybe they are friendly enough to trust that the USA does not abuse their friendlyness. :rolleyes:

[Vaarok]

Hey, on the POW thing- they found shallow graves they're moderately sure contain those troopers that they captured and tortured.

Lovely.

[Retroboy]

So now the Iraqi government is paying off the families of civilian Iraqis that pull off suicide attacks against the Coalition forces. A hero to the country, a martyr, AND fame and good fortune for your surviving kin.

What this means is that the Coalition forces are going to have to be incredibly cautious and slow when distibuting humanitarian aid or assisting Iraqi citizens. It's also a wonderful propaganda spin for Iraq.

Suicide attacks from civilians + army people disguised as civilians
leads to
Coalition forces crippled in their attempts to act humanely
leads to
Iraqi people suffering more visibly
leads to
Iraq leaders blaming coalition forces for not treating Iraqis right.

Holy cow. I'm so glad that this war is so far away from me. A state that sponsors, promotes, and rewards the suicide of its citizens... *shudder*.

How do you fight that kind of tactic without performing heinous acts yourself? Precision-bomb the relatives' houses, after clearing them out, to send a message to other people contemplating doing the same thing? Iraq would simply not report on the story.

-- Retro

[EchoEffect]

You can't fight that sort of fight with tanks and jets. As is shown by the trouble in Israel. The Israeli army is so much more advanced than anything the palastinians have, yet they can't stop the suicide attacks.

I fear that any occupying army is going to have to contend with simmilar things. I also fear thatw our armies are going to end up doing bad things because they don't know who is good and who is bad.

The only source of comfort is that the British army has some recent experience with street type battles in Northern Ireland. But at least there they had a bit of support from the people. More than it seems they will in Basra.

[Starfisher]

Britian is saying they captured a Republican Guard general near Basra. Interesting.

[Retroboy]

There's an amusing and somewhat tragic story on the cover of Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper. A couple journalists in their press jeep pulled over to take some snapshots of a Hussein posterm, when two Iraqi young men start walking over with their hands in the classic "we surrender" pose - these poor guys thought the reporters were soldiers and wanted to give themselves up. One was 17, the other 20.

Apparently, the two were rounded up and press-ganged into the Iraq army about two weeks before. They were given four days of training, uniforms, and a rusty Kalishnykov (sp?) rifle that's prone to jamming, then dropped off at the front lines and told to defend their country.

They did something very sensible IMO - they ran, and hid in an abandoned tenement for a week or so, stealing some civilian clothes and begging for food and brackish water. They were quite happy to see the journalists, although they were extremely surprised to find out they weren't part of the army.

The kids had nothing good to say about Saddam, and hoped that the war would see him replaced quickly. (I'd have the same attitude if I were press-ganged into the military!) They were so scared after seeing so many of their fellow soldiers die, they didn't really care how much jailtime they had to spend, as long as they could be safe.

The press guys didn't have a clue about what to do with the poor fellows. so they dropped them off at a British POW camp after the Americans refused to take them in, and the British said they'd be looked after.

First time I ever heard of anyone surrendering to a reporter! :D

-- Retro

[IronHammer]

That regime is truely not worth any Iraqis lives. I agree what those soldiers did was good, but the really sad thing about it though, is that they were lucky ones, who were lucky enough, to be able to escape the clutches of that horrible man.

Except that this time Echo they will not be receiving funds from Iraq, and the people of Iraq will probably like the coalition forces just much if not more then the Kuwaitti's do. This is just my prediction from the news im getting and watching.

[Stealth]

Troops surrendered to reporters in the Gulf War Retro. Entire batallions at times would lay down their arms to a convoy of journalists.

[Vaarok]

There's also many reports of families being held hostage/and or tortured as leverage to create suicide troopers of the men of the household. Unfortunately, there are no objectively documented cases, only claims from captured soldiers and third parties.

And since when were Automat Kalashnikovs prone to jamming? Musta been a reeeeally crappy AK...

Anybody see the latest episode of This Week on ABC? George Will is probably the cleverest and wisest person on TV.

[EchoEffect]

"Friendly Fire" anger (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2901515.stm)

I understand accidents. But I dont get how a pilot can't recognise a British Flag, on the second pass.

sigh.

[Harmanoff]

Oh that's just the price you have to pay when you liberate people.

Speaking of accidents, how many choppers have crashed now? 3 or 4 or so? Is that really normal?

[Starfisher]

Helicopters crash all the time. They fly so often, and in such crappy conditions, that its really no surprise.

Vaarok: Leave an AK in a bunker and let it rust for ten years, and it might have some problems loading a round. :)

[Vaarok]

That's why AKs are typically immersed in grease and sealed in a plastic bag before being stored.

Still, sand plays hell on mechanical bits.

[IronHammer]

Hay guys check out this image for an Idea how differant things are now.
http://www.foxnews.com/images/86324/13_26_040103_baghdad.jpg
This image is from Fox News

Echo, that pilot is obviously a bumbass who will probably end up courtmartialed, and eventually jailed.
However I think this is not to unfamiliar, because it did happen many times in the golf war, and even in WWII there was plenty friendly fire giong around, its a problem that crops up easily in this type of war, when the front keeps advancing, that doesint make it excusable,(in my opinion the pilot is a dumbass) just not really a huge surprise. In fact, the surprise might really be whare we have not had so much friendly fire, if considerd from a military historical perspective.

My condolences to those brave Tank men, and I am thruly sorry of there loss,:( but even more to the family of Lance Corporal of Horse Matty Hull, 25, of The Blues and Royals, Household Cavalry Regiment, who was killed by one of ours. The only thing I can offer for him and his family, are my prayer's which I give freely.:(

[Vaarok]

I was watching nightline yesterday, and they had frontline footage of house-to-house infantry advances. Very impressive, especially since we computer gamers sometimes make shortcuts when we do the same thing simulated.

They also showed RPG dings on bradleys and abrams tanks. Like a friend of mine said "it's just a grenade on a rocket. It's not like it's a real antitank weapon, it's just a really fast grenade!"

[JargonFilter]

i haven't payed too much attention to the war, i mean i hear the update or two every once a week, maybe so i honestly couldn't give a crap. I just hope this war doesn't drag out.

ps its gulf war not golf.

[Ammon Ra]

hehe..the golf war! :D

wonder how many holes the us has to make until it's satisfied that it has made more than 18 holes :D

[Vaarok]

Hey, turns out on friday not only did we sink almost the entire Iraqi navy, but we also sunk Saddam's private twenty-five-million-dollar yacht !

[Martian]

What was their navy, 2 minelayers and a rowing boat?

[IronHammer]

Yeah, but we got Flipper on our side, so I would not worried.
You know, you can really tell who the good guy's are; Because, WE GOT FLIPPER!!

Sings*
They call him Flipper, Flipper.
Faster then lightning.
No one you see, is smarter than heee....


Remember kids, you can use your powers for good, or for awsome!

[EchoEffect]

do we have skippy on our side to?

edit: just read this (http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/04/02/sprj.irq.minnesota.protesters/index.html) . Its sort of war related, but if the mods want to move it then do. This is very dodgy. For people who dont want to read it. A Republican Governer wants to make people pay for getting arressted if they are protesting.

So if you are on an anti-war protest. And you get arressted, yo u have to pay for it. Not as the punishment, but just for being arressted.

..isn't it just a slipperly slope to a police state. *rolls eyes*.

[Martian]

I do not underestimate the impact of the mines, but I find it a bit strange that a citizen of the most powerful nation in the word boasts of the fact that they sank the "entire navy" of a desert state with 1 port.

hence my remark :)

[Starfisher]

I think it was more of a sarcastic awe: "We sank their ENTIRE navy!(sarcastic)"

I love how France and Germany are toning down their rhetoric since no really big "I told you so" anti-war situations have developed. Hopefully I won't be prophetic, but a nagging worry tells me they should have waited for Bagdhad.

[IronHammer]

Echo, thats an incorrect conclusion to draw from that link, especially considering that it was even able to be reported and posted on the web, or the fact that the legislation itself is against protesters who were "already" arrested, one would wonder just what that "protester" did to get arrested in the first place.

This is nothing new, someone could put a comme "China" spin lable to parking fines, and some might also call this country a "police state", but they would look rediculus for doing so. By your logic, we should also call England a police state, as well as every single government in Europe.

Your right Echo, this should have ben in another discussion for an entirly differant subject. Perhaps another critique?

[Mac_Bug]

I still remember how Afghanistan was supposed to be the new Vietnam.

Perhaps Saddam will try to pull a Bloody April.

[EchoEffect]

It doesn't matter what the protester did to get arressted, you shouldn't get a fine for simply being arressted. It would lead to cash strapped police authorites arressting people so they could not go broke. The reason I thought this was war related was that the proposed legislation seems targeted at anti-war protesters.

It is worrying how much the anti-war voice is being shut out. By being called trators, and un-patriotic, and appeasers. Its dangerous.

But back to the war proper.

I think everyone thinks that the allies are going to win the war. But I am worried that the US will lose interest after the war is won, and foget about it. the peace is more important than the war itself. How Iraq is re-built will have a major impact on the region and its perception of the West.

[Retroboy]

Rumor and conjecture post: I heard that Israel is indicating that Saddam is not in Baghdad, if at all in the country.

Considering the incredible efficacy of their intelligence machine, it bears logical consideration. It also fits his profile as a very intelligent coward and bully.

If so, isn't it an absolute tragedy that Iraqis are continuing to lay down their life for this guy, when he's not even there?

-- Retro

[Harmanoff]

Actually they're laying down their life to defend their country, not for Saddam. There's nothing that unites people like a common foe and the coalition is an invading force, no matter what ever illusions they have about bringing peace through force.

[GuaRRand]

Not wanting to start a new thread bout this...

Is it Osama bin laden or Usama bin laden?

http://www.fbi.gov/mostwant/topten/fugitives/laden.htm

Just wondered because i always thought he was called Osama :dolt:

[Retroboy]

Osama.

And now, back on topic. ;)

-- Retro

[Starfisher]

And now US troops walked into a town to cheers. Ironic how its closer to Bagdhad, and ostensibly more fearful of Saddam, yet people thronged the streets and pointed out Republican Guard positions.

And the regular Iraqi army seems to have been forced to fight. Coalition units report an Iraqi position will fire a few shots and then run, and then a minute later they run into a Republican Guard outpost. Fight or we shoot ya. Good way to keep up morale.

[Artoo]

It doesn't stop to amase me how different are the views of each side on the recent developments (seing it yet AGAIN as I write this post)

[[bulletproof]]

anyone play the Battlefield mod Desert Combat? figure this is a decent thread to ask you guys. http://www.desertcombat.com/
not sure if any of you hw fans are into first persons, or if any of you even play any other games, but neverthelesss, try out battlefield. lots of strategy, tons of veh-- ok i wont preach.

[Stealth]

Gah, the Iraqi's aren't fighting to defend their country. It is only those who are fanatically loyal to Saddam (some few thousand out of a population of 22 million) who are sticking guns at the backs of a squad of soldiers telling them to fight or be executed.

Has it been mentioned that at a recently captured political prison a torture chamber was found? Yea, I would love to defend a place like that.

[EchoEffect]

You can love your country without loving your leaders.

I mean, I am quite fond of England, but i'm not overly thrilled about New Labour.

[IronHammer]

Yes but those who love their country are fighting against Saddam.

See link.

UK The Sunday Telegraph: Iraqis launch campaign of sabotage and defiance to undermine Saddam (http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/03/16/wirq16.xml&sSheet=/news/2003/03/16/ixnewstop.html)

[Vaarok]

Our armored cav divisions are being impeded by the iraqi army- so many surrendering they can't advance at pace!

[IronHammer]

British Marines handed there hat by Iraqis in Basra!! (http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/dj/Qiraq-war-britain.RrMb_DA3.html)

A rematch was demanded. I wonder who will win.

from another source this is too much to be easly believed.

British marines under the kosh from local Iraqi's (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20030403/od_afp/iraq_war_britain_030403202551)

in other news Iraqi Family Risks It All To Save American POW Jessica Lynch (http://www.defendamerica.mil/articles/apr2003/a040303d.html)

[Earth-Command]

I see the Iraqie Hirachey are still claiming victory and the Allied forces are pinned down no where near Bahgdad.

Wonder if they will be around next week to make the same claims.

See a lot of the Human Shields have done a runner as well. Whats the go there. Anyone seen an interview with them saying why they did the bolt?

[SvK]

I think the Iraqi Information Minister is hiralious! "Evil American planes fly low over holy sites, hoping to destroy them with vibrations!" You can't make this stuff up!

[Retroboy]

Earth-command, the Coalition forces had already taken the Iraqi airport, less than 20km from Baghdad, before you'd posted your comment. I wouldn't say they're pinned down - rather, the Iraqi's are.

SvK, yeah, I find the Iraqi press briefings to be rather entertaining, particularly when you put this fellow up against Rumsfeld's statesmanlike appearance. You gotta give the guy credit though - I doubt he writes this stuff, but he manages to deliver it with a straight face, and in English too. I'd wonder how much fear he's experiencing as soon as he gets off the podium.

-- Retro

[Rincewind]

The Iraqi Airport? There's more than one, you know...

But yeah, they got Saddam International. Hmm, I wonder who's the poor bastard that has to re-name just about everything in the country from "Saddam -this und that" to something else?

[Vaarok]

On a related vein, that POW chick of ours (the one we rescued and shipped to germany) is pretty good lookin.

[Rincewind]

Mmmm. Redheads.

[Shalishaska]

It's bloody hilarius how much crap both the amaricans and iraqies are spreading.

[[bulletproof]]

wow, i love how everyone responded to my post. god, just like high school.

[Stealth]

There was an interesting article that OMO pointed out on their website. Written by ArabNews.com.

Link (http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24481)



When we finally made it to Safwan, Iraq, what we saw was utter chaos. Iraqi men, women and children were playing it up for the TV cameras, chanting: “With our blood, with our souls, we will die for you Saddam.”

I took a young Iraqi man, 19, away from the cameras and asked him why they were all chanting that particular slogan, especially when humanitarian aid trucks marked with the insignia of the Kuwaiti Red Crescent Society, were distributing some much-needed food.

His answer shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did.

He said: “There are people from Baath here reporting everything that goes on. There are cameras here recording our faces. If the Americans were to withdraw and everything were to return to the way it was before, we want to make sure that we survive the massacre that would follow as Baath go house to house killing anyone who voiced opposition to Saddam. In public, we always pledge our allegiance to Saddam, but in our hearts we feel something else.”

Different versions of that very quote, but with a common theme, I would come to hear several times over the next three days I spent in Iraq.

The people of Iraq are terrified of Saddam Hussein.

[Earth-Command]

Sorry Retro, I was iluding to the fact that we are in the foyer of bahgdad and still the Iraqie leaders claim we are pinned down no where near Bahgdad. (must be Aussie sarcasim that illudes you) :dolt:

But thought it was nice to watch the poms play a game of soccer against the Iraq's and lose 4 the moral of the Iraqie people.

Also note that the discussions are going on to who is going to Run Iraq in the short term, the Yanks or the UN.

Some suggest that the Iraqie people will rebel agaist this idea and the place will turn into another Israel v Palestein.

Only problem with this idea is that the People of Iraq never stood up to Saddam so what makes anyone think they will stand up to the States.

[Earth-Command]

I noted that prior to the commencement of the war polls conducted on the war were very against war. Just wondering if that has changed since the war started, as is the case with Polls in America, UK and here in Australia.

May be a mod may approve such a pole.
The case for it would be that current polls in the US, UK and Australia are all countries involved in the WAR, have not seen any poles from any other countries and as we have a good representation here on the boards of the World we could find if support has changed.

Just an idea, since alot of the war debate has dissappered from this thread. Have those anti-war people packed up their kit backs and resigned to the fact that it is a hopeless argument now and not coming back to this thread, or have their ideas changed.

[EchoEffect]

I think there are still large numbers of people against this war. But people are either afraid of saying they are, or don't want to appear un-patriotic.

They don't want to be seen as wanting our troops to die, or wanting us to lose the war.

but in my view, if you were against this war before it started, then I dont see why that would change just because it has begun. The reasons I was agaisnt this war before, are still valid now it has begun. Being against this war up until it starts, and then supporting it, is a bit like being a vegetarian inbetween meals.

[Starfisher]

Well, not necessarily. It is possible that as the dire pre-war anti-war prediction of thousands upon thousands of Iraqi dead in a carpet bombed Bagdhad have not materialized, and there actually have been cities and towns where the coalition is met with cheers, some anti-war type have reconsidered their position.

Those who think that the liberation of Iraq is not balanced by the chaos it will cause, obviously will not change their position unless that chaos does not materialize.

Those that think the US is just using this as an excuse to turn Iraq into an American buisness protectorate have disturbing evidence in their favor. In particular, the recent House declaration that non-coalition countries will be blocked out of any possible rebuilding contracts. We'll use your hospitals, Germany, but you're and evil country that wouldn't support us. :dolt:

[Vaarok]

That's because France has a long and sordid history of selling things to the saddam government of iraq, and has good ties with them, one of the major reasons they did not want us to break up a nation that owes them several billion dollars for a nuclear reactor and many weapons.

And Germany is not "evil." Infuriatingly recalcitrant, but still a major outpost for american forces abroad. We've got cold-war-era enclaves miles across in germany that are technically under our soveriegn control...

[Rincewind]

This has been pointed out before, but imagine the reaction if someone travelled 60 years into the past and said one day the U.S. and Britain would be pissed off at germany for being pacifistic...

[Martian]

The USA also has a history of selling weapons to Saddam. Mustard gas, to be precise. it is silly to whine about the French selling a Nuclear reactor to Baghdad. He who is without sin, casts the first stone....

And I am still 'against' this war in the sense that I think this war should never have started, and that it will cause a lot more trouble than it will solve. But since it is now too late to pull out, I hope the coalition wins quickly and with as few deaths as possible. But afterwards, I still think everything I feared for before the war will come true.

[Starfisher]

Interesting. The regular Iraqi army doesn't fight very hard, but a marine unit just had an intense firefight and captured some Syrian, Jordinian and egyptian fighters who traveled to Iraq for 'jihad'.

The Iraqi's want Saddam out... but apparently the average joe in the region sees him as a hero for gassing his own people and flouting the US. What a screwed up region.

[Harmanoff]

One thing is for sure, this war wont make things safer for one single person in the world. So yeah, i agree on it causing more trouble than it will solve.

[edit] The average joe sees him as a hero for standing up to the U.S(like anyone gave him a choise), not for gassing people. Alot of people like egyptians and iranians hate saddam's guts but they hate U.S intervention even more.

[Martian]

See starfisher, that is the entire problem. This war seeds so much hate in the region that is going to haunt the USA for a long, long time. And I don't like that at all, seeing the average American response to non-coorperation.

[Starfisher]

The region is, and was already a boiling cauldron of hatred. The governments of all those countries add fuel to the fire and stir with their propaganda in order to divert attention from the fact that they are all oppressive regimes. Its not all the Isreal problem.

So we can just let it sit there and fester, since all the aid that pours into the region goes to fattening the despotic rulers, or take action. Action that has the potential to make us suffer, but also has the potential to move the situation out of a null-change hell-hole.

[Harmanoff]

Yeah that's great. Instead of a null-change hell-hole you make matters even worse by invading, pissing everyone of even more and cutting of oil for food which 60% of the people were dependant on. Way to go. I bet the situation will improve like.. lots!

[Starfisher]

In the short run, yes the situation is going to get worse. The idea though, is along the lines of WWII. France was devastated by the allies moving through it. But then they got rebuilt by aid, and a generation later you have to admit the french are better of than when they were under hitler.

So. We devastate Iraq, the Iraqi's endure 6monthes to a year of shortages, and hopefully by that time international aid and peacekeepers will have improved the situation in the coutnry enough for it to flourish.

It's funny to see how short-sighted we've become. People are calling this war a 'slog'. Its been going on for two weeks, and people think its long and hard? Talk about instant gratification coming back to bite everyone in the ass.

[Harmanoff]

Shortsighted? Well forgive me, i have given the wrong impression then. If there's one thing i'm worried about it's that this war will have very serious consequences that will drag on for ever. So far you've managed to not only piss of a region of the world that was already negative to the U.S but also to piss of large chunks of your so called allies. Up until now Europe has always been behind the U.S. Bush managed to ruin that in 3 months. This is far more serious than one friggin war.

Oh and you might be aware that france was occupied by germany during WWII, a fact that actually gave some merit to the usage of such a word as 'liberate'. Last i checked Iraq was not occupied by any other foreign power, it just happened to be ruled by a dictator that the U.S apparently can decide wether he's evil or not. Like it or not, may saddam be evil or not, in this case you come of as the attacker, not the protector. It's vastly different from WWII.

[RobbSLS]

Harmanoff: You miss the reality and basic fact that Iraq is in violation of over 20 UN regulations, none of which are being enforced by the UN. The violator of these regulations is a ruthless dictator that kills his own people whilst thinking nothing of it. This is a man who has weapons of mass destruction and will sell these weapons readily to terrorists.

The fact that Europe is not behind the US on its mission to take Sadaam Hussein from power and rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction is in my mind its own shortcoming.

I just dont believe people are complaining about this War sometimes. In essence what the US is doing is going into Iraq ridding it of this ruthless dictator and his regime then repairing all the damage in the country, rebuilding it, and giving humanitarian aid ti Iraq's people. this sounds like a terrible deal to me.

The fact that the US has come out as the attacker in this conflict is unavoidable beacuse it is the attacker. The problem is that that entire region is saturated with Anti-US propoganda and attitudes..

Some times the right thing to do is not the popular thing to do.

[EchoEffect]

As i will continue to point out. Iraq is not France. This is not 1940, and Baghdad is NOT Paris.

I have to say that the nightmare scenario I feared in Iraq has not happend, so far. And I am very very very happy it hasn't. Meaning there have not been huge civiliant deaths etc (so far).

But the underlying problems of this war remain. Hatred for the the US has increased vastly due to this war, it will substantialy increase terrorism, the very thing we are tryign to stop. Not only that but the reputation of Britain has rapidly gone down the toilet, and now the rest of the world thinks that we are nothing but America's bitch. When infact the US is only slightly more popular here than it is in the rest of Europe. It is just our government that is.

[Genetic Bryy]

Originally posted by RobbSLS
The fact that Europe is not behind the US on its mission to take Sadaam Hussein from power and rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction is in my mind its own shortcoming.

Yeah, they'll:

1) Definetely be getting crap when we take over the oil fields. And we will. Why? Halliburton is now in charge of the Oil Rebuilding part of the Let's Clean Up Iraq After This deal. Who was the CEO before the election? Dick Cheney.

2) Have to deal with a public relations nightmare (France will, that is) when its all said and done.

[RobbSLS]

Bryy: those are minor and insignificant details in the scheme of things.

If a country is freed then who gives a damn about a public relations nightmare in France.

[Genetic Bryy]

I was talking about in the years to come. France looks to be isolated, because of either them not helping and thus getting the boot, or them having their name changed to "Freedom" and have huge anti-French sentiment strewn about.

And how are the oil fields minor details? That's a huge bonus for us going in and taking control of Iraq for a bit. And even after we leave, I think we'll still try to nab the oil.

[Harmanoff]

Well Robb, i just don't believe that people buy the Bush/Blair war rethorics sometimes. Ridding iraq of a ruthless dictator and then rebuilding the country? You mean that i'm supposed to believe that the coalition drop tons and tons of tnt over Iraq because it means to help people? That is a lie and you know it. Humanitarian aid? Iraq has been suffering under sanctions for 12 years and this invasion made matters even worse. It's laughable how some people actually expected a rebellion against the regime in Basra when the city has hardly any water or food due to invading forces and when the shi'ite population has already been betrayed by the west once.

And don't bring up UN regulations here please. The security council voted no to an attack on Iraq exactly according to the rules of the UN, rules which the U.S and Britain are obliged to follow. Israel is in violation of countless of resolutions and yet nothing is done about them. What about Burma, this loveable fascist state that employs slave labour en masse? It's hipocracy at it's pinnacle.

And then the weapons of mass destruction. For being a mad, evil and psychotic dictator i must say that Saddam is showing remarkable restraint in using these weapons, even in the face of a provocation of astronomical proportion. Does anyone seriously believe that Bush would keep his nukes neatly packed in their silos if anyone bombed New York or Washington? Forgive me if i chuckle.

[Vaarok]

That's silly. If Saddam uses CNBW, he's suddenly the villain and the US is righteous. If he refrains, he's got an ace card, and the US is the villain, and Al-Jazeera TV can squawk at the muslim world that an arab nation under benign arab rule is being invaded and laid waste to by the godless Americans, and everyone should volunteer for Jihad against this unprovoked attack.

And on a different tack-

It's not good manners to make a megapost, but here's a summation of a compound reason france might not have wanted us to interfere:


[1]French total trade with Iraq under the oil-for-food program is the third largest, totaling $3.1 billion since 1996, according to the United Nations.
.
[2] In 2001 France became Iraqs largest European trading partner. Roughly 60 French companies do an estimated $1.5 billion in trade with Baghdad annually under the U.N. oil-for-food program.
.
[3] Frances largest oil company, Total Fina Elf, has negotiated a deal to develop the Majnoon field in western Iraq. The Majnoon field purportedly contains up to 30 billion barrels of oil.
.
[4] Total Fina Elf also negotiated a deal for future oil exploration in Iraqs Nahr Umar field. Both the Majnoon and Nahr Umar fields are estimated to contain as much as 25 percent of the countrys reserves.
.
[5] Frances Alcatel company, a major telecom firm, is negotiating a $76 million contract to rehabilitate Iraqs telephone system.



Got this from the CIA factbook thing on their site.

[Starfisher]

We are making the Arab world hate us.
- They already hated us. They would continue to hate us as
long as we continue to say that suicide bombers in Isreal are suicide bombers and not martyrs. This war has the potential to actually help Iraq. That bull about the sanctions hurting the people: Saddam simply took the money and built palaces. Don't blame sanctions when billions were funnelled away from the people by Saddam.

Dropping bombs won't help anyone.
- Violence never solves anything until it becomes your only option. Saddam made it the only option. If you truly think that 300 inspectors would have been able to stop Saddam from brutalizing his people when that wasn't even their mission, you need to take another look at things.

I really don't get it. Everyone agrees that Saddam is bad and needs to be removed, but no one is willing to do anything about it. And as soon as the US and Britian do something about him and his organization, all the bad things Saddam's regime did go out the window. Its fine for Saddam to torture and kill people, but if we accidently kill some people in the process of freeing a larger body, its the worst thing that ever happened.

As to Iraq becoming a US protectorate - please think that through. The entire world is watching. Despite what Bush may thing, the US cannot do everything alone. If he tries to annex Iraq or do anything that looks like taking over Iraqi resources, the wrath of the world comes crashing down. Not militarily, but what do you think higher taxes imposed on American imports would do to the already regressing economy?

[SvK]

So, uhh, how about the US mechanized Infantry and Cavalry? CNN (http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/05/sprj.irq.lyle/index.html) reports that Bradleys and Abrams took on dug-in T-72s, and desptire 2-1 odds, destroyed about 20 tanks and took no losses. If this was a video game, the US would soooo get nerfed in the next patch.

[frstkor13]

pacifists that defend saddam make me laugh. go be a human shield for the dictator please. asap.

[Stealth]

You mean that i'm supposed to believe that the coalition drop tons and tons of tnt over Iraq because it means to help people?

Yes. In one bombing run over Tokyo in WWII, there were 90,000 people, many of which civilian, lying dead. Lets not forget the two nukes, Berlin, all of western Russia, London, etc. These weapons are targeting military facilities, not civilian facilities. They are ousting the regime as quickly, efficiently, and civilian-minimzingly as possible.


It's laughable how some people actually expected a rebellion against the regime in Basra when the city has hardly any water or food due to invading forces and when the shi'ite population has already been betrayed by the west once.

Please check out this link (http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24481). Very interesting.


Up until now Europe has always been behind the U.S. Bush managed to ruin that in 3 months.

Germany has recently pledged that it will remain a strong ally to the United States. :murph:

[HIGHWINDER]

U.S tanks/troops have just started to enter and bombard bahgdad ground targets, According to CNN reporters! I have a bad hunch that the worst is yet to come :(

[Earth-Command]

British troops found a military shed full of bodies yesterday. (all dead prior to the conflict with documents dating back to 1985)

Doesn't sound to me like France and Germany have the best interest of the World or the people of Iraq in mind. May be just their own self fulfilling interests. (guess if you hide behind the UN though that would make it all acceptable)

I wonder what the death toll would have been with another ten years of Saddam and UN sanctions.

Acceptable to some but not to others.

[Harmanoff]

Starfisher, you are aware that lots and lots of people in the middle east hates the west and yet you endorse the kind of action that can make that hate grow even stronger. I just don't get it. The same interventionist politics have been followed for 50 years now and things have gotten worse and worse. Why oh why would it be different this time?

And once again, please go away with the WWII references. Tokoy and Berlin are not Baghdad. In WWII there were a clear agressor and the war was fought in self-defence by the allies. Even gulf war 1 was fought in self-defence allthough it was doublestandards letting Iraq go at Iran for a decade without lifting a finger and then getting all pissed of about Kuwait.

That link (http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=24481) is interesting indeed but it doesn't really show any love for the coalition does it? It just tells us what we already knew. I don't understand how people think that because Saddam is a murderer the people of Iraq will be all thrilled about having a foreign power marching over their country.

frst, where did anyone defend Saddam? Where are the pascifists? Please to be pointing out k thx

[Starfisher]

So harm: are you against this war because you feel for the Iraqi people, or because your afraid that there will be more terrorism in the west?

How do you reduce terrorism when the entire region supports it? When major religious leaders with huge followings declare suicide bombers martyrs?

Well we can adress the root cause of all this: disparity in the standard of living. Lets give the third world 20% of our incomes in an attempt to even it out.

Oh wait.. that would mean changing western culture from a materialistic greed orgy into some charity organization. Human nature effectively blocks that.

Or.. lets get rid of the most openly oppressive of the oppressive regimes in the middle east, and with the whole world scrutinizing our actions help it rebuild and become a democracy. If it works, which it may, we have another democractic country. Iraq only has 75% urbanized population, a strong middle class and a plethora of natural resources. All they need is international help to become a strong country.

If it doesn't work, then it will be because of international squabbling over contracts and the existing terrorist structure. Keep in mind that coalition forces are finding more resistance from non-Iraqi soldiers than they are from Iraqis. A trickle of arabs brainwashed by their governments and extremist religious leaders are the ones who threaten a future Iraq, not crazed Iraqis.

How do you get rid of Saddam without a war? How do you put actions to words and actually help the people escape from an Orwellian nightmare?

Disclaimer: I am fully aware that the US and British goverments could care less about the people of Iraq. Luckily, public opinion is such a powerful force that by extenstion they must take care to preserve civilian life and actually follow through on their lofty rhetoric.

[frstkor13]

i think you are. and, after years of watching you, i think you just bitch about everything that the united states does because it's the united states doing it. now pretty much i just laugh as i predict correctly all of the regular anti-anything-the-us-does dolts appearing in any thread that involves politics.

things like this:


One thing is for sure, this war wont make things safer for one single person in the world.

make me wonder how you are even smart enough to be able to turn on irc. that has got to be the single most stupid thing i have ever seen you type. im sure the people that were dragged into the torture chambers(that wont be anymore) would disagree.

predicting the future is cool though. do it some more.

[Harmanoff]

My apologies for making that come of as a generally accepted fact. To rephrase: it is my personal belief that this war wont make things safer for one single person in the world. I believe that the people you save from the dungeons may be better of for now but that the situation wont improve over time. You obviously think otherwise and i would love it if you could provide some reason why this should work. Once again, out of nearly 50 years of superpower interventions in the world, has things gotten in any way safer?

Thanks for making broad generalisations though. I can't seem to remember bitching about anything else than the U.S foreign policy ie an aspect of the U.S that, given that the U.S is the most powerful nation on earth, does concern me as well as you. So what if i don't agree with your politics?

[EchoEffect]

Ok.

Invading Iraq will get rid of all terrorism and save the world for humanity, democracy, and vanquish evil to the very end of the universe.

Thats predicting the future.

Thats the basic messege of the "pro-war" camp.

This is all about predicting the future. You can't tell Harm not to predict bad things if the people he disagrees with predict good things.

I would not call Harmanoff stupid. He is by far one of the most intelligent poster's that I can think of on these boards. Disagreeing with you doesn't make him stupid. I disagree with most of what the current US government stands for, but i do not think they are stupid.

You have to understand that the reason people always cmment on the actions of the US isn't because of some deliberate plot to gang up on America. Its beacause as the most powerful country in the world its actions affect us all. The government of the US has a huge impact on the lives of all of us outside. We do not comment on the policies of say, Switzerland, because their actions do not have such an affect.

For example. If Switzerland does not sign Kyoto (they may not have, i dont know) then people would be annoyed, but it wouldn't be a huge disaster. But The US not signing it is very very damaging. Politicaly as well as enviromentaly.

Like it or not, the priviliages that come with being the richest most powerful country on the planet come with responsabilities. Deal with it.

Having said that. A lot of the people who are anti-war, are not anti-war because they are anti-US whatever. They are anti-war because they think it will make the situation worse for the US.

[Martian]

Why do people keep saying that the Arab governments spread anti-American propaganda? They are not. The Egyptian and Jordanian government, for example, and even more the Saoudi-Arabian government, have good reasons to keep a friendly relation with the USA. Their problem is their population: the average Arab citizen (gogo generalisation) is very, very anti-USA. So in order not to piss their own population off too much they sometimes take a half-heartedly anti-USA stance. They have to, or they'd have an uprising within weeks. And that might happen in Saoudi-Arabia anyway.

[Retroboy]

Echoeffect, that is not the basic message of the "pro war" camp. That's an absurd exaggeration.

The responsibilities of the richest most powerful country on the planet are to its citizens. Privilege has nothing to do with it.

Your last paragraph is true for anti-war U.S. citizens, tho.

-- Retro

[Martian]

uhm if we start saying that the USA only has responsibilities to its citizens, then things are becoming really dangerous for the rest of the world. And it gives the rest of the world good reasons to be anti-USA. Because it would mean that they should nuke the rest of the world if that would make life safer/better for Americans.

Exaggeration, ofcourse. But it is very scary. Being the superpower that it is, the USA has a responsibility for the entire world.
It's primary responsibility is their own citizens, ofcourse. As goes for any country. But since they have alot of influence in the rest of the world, they also have responsibilities for the rest of the world.

[EchoEffect]

The basic argument of much (not all) but most of the pro-war camp is exactly that. That we are good, they are evil. That destroying Saddam (not matter how good a thing that would be) will help in the fight against terrorism. And listening to some of the jingoistic, nationalistic, and religious words that come from the US President, I dont think my first statement is a compelte exageration.

People have a responsibility to each other. The more selfish someone becomes, the more they will be disliked. This applies to individuals, as well as groups of people, and also entire countries.

Its not just true of US anti-war people. Its true of lots of world wide anti-war people. Belive it or not, not everyone in the world is out to kill you. not everyone in the world hates you. Not everyone on this planet is secretly a terrorist.

But by proceding to inflame opinion throughout the world, and especialy in the Arab world; more people are likely to turn that hatred into something more, something more, pro-active.

I find it rediculous when people say "they hate us anyway, so it wont matter what we do". Do people really think that people are born hating America, or hating Britain. People don't dislike us because they suddenly thought "hmm...i'll hate someone today" they do because of things they think we have done to them, or to their people. Whether we have or not, it doesn't matter.

We aren't hated because we are "free" or because we are democracies. I cringe everytime i hear some idiot say that. They couldn't care less how we run our own governments. Do you care that much how New Zealand runs their government? Its because of things they think we have done to them . Also remeber that the rising anti-American feeling in Europe can not be based on any idea that they hate American freedoms, or American Democracy, or even American religion. Europeans are free, are democracies, and the most religious people are christian, same as in the US.

[IronHammer]

Do you guy's think then that this issue of successful peace in the mideast will not work because of the "Opinions and beliefs" of persons who will blame the US for defending itself?

Well first I'd like to ask that I thought Islam was a peacfull religion...

And second.



DO YOU THINK THAT WOLD HAVE BEN AN ISSUE IF ALL THE WORLD STOOD AGANST TERROR????

IMO, The fault does not lie with the US. This could have ben over way sooner if people would have stopped the anti-US rhetoric, especially after sept 11. And went united aganst Saddam. It was, the vague hope of the support some showed in protestations that made him dither, and ubsturct. It made it impossible for inspections to work. It made it impossible for him to realize his world is fading. He would have abdecated, or his own heads would have killed him. "If" the world was truely supportive of its own security; or maybe even just its own good friends.

The terrorists will now set their entire sights on the US as their main enemy. This is clear, but they would have anyway. We now have taken in another, to ensure this form of radical anti-westernism doesn't destroy everything. Harmenoff you should stop making demands on my government, like you were its citizen. Clearly we are not the only government in the world, you should look to your own country to feed the world. To set every one free, to make the sacrifice of saying, "this is my blood I shed it for your freedom."
For that is exactly what is going on. The youth of my country is dieing in its defense, because others would not support it. They are not just dieing for their own country ether, their dieng for those people in the gristmill of that man. Do you really think these people will hate the US for that?

Did the German Jews hate the Allies for liberating them from the holocost?

Even Saudia Arabia lowerd its gas price in support of this war. They are stopping all support for terrorism, unless, you believe that Islam is a religion of imperialistic war. If you did that, you just accused the Saudis of being impious to their own faith.

No, clearly these terrorists are from the root of seculer greed. Therfore, remove the need, and no more terrorism.

We will make Iraq a free country then, and not a breeding ground for terrorism. which is precisely what it (soon to be was) is Btw.

US resposibility to the world, is to not let it become its bread basket. Do you think this population could, or would, stomach others after that? Its not going to turn around and become the feeder slave, for the end result, of much of the Europian colonialism-imperialism. Such an action would bankrupt the US, and send its own people down into poverty. In the end we would have destroyed all semblince of the US people as a "happy" free nation. It would make us mad, thats it.

Oh and Matian, as for the Nuking the rest of the world bit. If the US has nothing to fear then we have nothing to nuke. Do you think we have something to fear from the entire world?

[Harmanoff]

Harmenoff you should stop making demands on my government, like you were its citizen. Clearly we are not the only government in the world, you should look to your own country to feed the world. To set every one free, to make the sacrifice of saying, "this is my blood I shed it for your freedom."

What the U.S government decide is their foreign policy affects the entire world tremendously so it is certainly in my right to complain. Also, if you only have a say about the administration in the country you live in the U.S definately does not have any right to complain about Iraq. It's not your country, stay the hell out. Do you guys live by that? Enough with the hipocricy please.

Oh and about Islam, it's about as calm and peaceful as christianity. Crusades, witchburnings, inquisition, imperialism in the name of God. Christian colonists in africa gladly massacred natives there because so what; they had no soul.

[frstkor13]

Invading Iraq will get rid of all terrorism and save the world for humanity, democracy, and vanquish evil to the very end of the universe.

Thats predicting the future.

Thats the basic messege of the "pro-war" camp.

See. This. This is the type of stupid crap I'm talking about.

That was a very stupid thing to say.

I'm in this "pro-war" camp, and I don't parallel with what you just spewed. I know many other people who are in the "pro-war" camp with me, and they don't believe that either.

I'll give you 2 more upchucks to try and hit the right answer though. Try hard. Assume as far into left field as possible please.

And martain, you hit the nail on the head. The U.S. is fulfilling its responsibility, unlike the french and the german pacifists/hippies.

[IronHammer]

Many in Africa were already christians and muslims.

Oh wait last time I checked we were the good guys. unless you think that freeing millions, as well as not nuking the mideast after september 11, was a signs of an out of control country.

Maybe I should deam much of the Europian countries as "out of control" because they dont support their allies even the very best and most powerful of allies. So not the ones that defended Europe, and who still continue too, despite their bloody history, and terrible banterings about how we are the ones using them. And everyone else.

We are in an us vrs them fight I see. You will not listen to the facts, you are denying them. Its so much more fun to target the US, Maby Martian is right, maybe it is an "us vrs them" situation. And we should "nuke the world."

This is stupid, terrorism is a threat, do you consider the US to be one?
If it is,(which I really doubt) it would be because of what you people have ben saying now. No we are defending ourselves aganst terrorism, not aganst France, Gemany, Europe, or the rest of world. If it was aganst the world I might (despite the facts) be aganst it.

[bluevorlon]

See frst, you make a good point about generalising the pro-war camp, and then you call all of us opposed to the war: "french and german pacifist/hippies"

Which is surely just as big of a generalisation.

Ironhammer, you amaze me when you cite 'not nuking the mideast' as somehow an example of tolerance. You see your dear ally Tony Blair sending nukes over to northern ireland? You seem to smear an entire region because of some fucking, nutters who happen to be islamic and fundamental? That's the same logic of firebombing all christian churches because of the KKK, and for the state of Oklahomah to kill everyone who shared ahometown with Timothy McVeigh.

And I swear to god the next person to cite World War Two as somehow a debt of allegiance that Europe somehow 'owes' to America, some blind slavish agreement that we must have to you, whether we believe or not that what you are doing is wrong. To so strongly accentuate one aspect of history, and ignore so many others when stuff like this goes wrong. You can't ignore the aspects of history that disagree with you and cite the ones that do!

Do I see terrorism a threat? Yes. Do I see the US a threat? Yes. It has the biggest military in the world, an arsenal of nukes and WMD's unparalleled by anyother nation, of course it's a fucking threat. Every nation with a nuclear missile, or an army, is a threat. If I walk down into London with an M16, I am arrested because I AM A THREAT. If I walk into london with a big stick, people look at me funny.

Of course you're a threat, so is everything and everyone with power over someone else. That's the nature of things.

[frstkor13]

blue, show me where I called everyone who was opposed to the war a "french and german pacifist/hippie". thanks.

[Rincewind]

Dmille, when I can build a mosque in vatican city you can complain about no mosques/synagogues in Saudi Arabia :D

[Martian]

IronHammer, you cannot really be this stupid. What I said was that the USA also has a responsibility to the rest of the world, and not only to their own citizens. I did not say they were going to nuke the world. I posted this as an hugely exaggerated example of what would happen if the USA would only think about itself.

[Martian]

Originally posted by dmille
Blu, I'd like to move beyond World War II. France would like to forget that it happened, so I propose we let them - and move on to how we saved their city from flying the Soviet flag during the Cold War.

So? I owe my parents the fact that I live, yet when they walk into the street and start beating up a random kid, I am gonna try to stop them. Am I ungrateful now?


I remind you that in Saudi Arabia there exists no seperation between church (well, seeing as they're banned and it's illegal for Jews to enter the country, Mosque) and state, royal family sponsered religious institutions continue to preach anti-American and anti-Jewish sentiment just as virulently as they did two years ago. The Saudi government has also obstructed numerous criminal investigations within the United States (by issuing a Saudi citizen a second passport so she could leave the country prior to the date on which she was supposed to testify before a grand jury) and abroad (see numerous Washington Post articles).


Yet, the Saoudi government (hated by its own population) is your closest ally in the region, even though they do all these things you hate so much. And even though Osama himself, was born and bred here. Gogo hipocrisy. Come again and tell me its not all about oil.


United States private companies sold items that could be used for chemical weapons or for legitimate research to Iraq before those items were restricted for overseas distribution. The French government, in a deal negotiated by now Prime Minister Chirac and one of his deputies, arranged for the transaction that allowed Iraq to have the capacity to develop nuclear weapons. There exists a signifigant difference that you are apparently unable - or unwilling - to grasp.

A nuclear reactor can also be used for legitimate research and just for power. Your private companys (with full knowledge of your government, no doubt) sold them items that gave them the capability to create horrible weapons that have caused the tremedous suffering of thousands of innocent Kurdish women and children. I didn't see a nuke with 'made in France' on it detonate in a Kurdish village. And that is what matters. Also, may I remind you that Saddam wasn't seen as a threat at the time. The USA fully supported the man, so what France did wasn't any more stupid than what your 'private company's' did. The USA only cared about money, just as France did, and apperently you are unable -or unwilling- to grasp that.


A biochemical weapon attack in an American city would seed a lot of death, a matter much more serious than a lot of hate (seeing as which, the fabled "Arab street" has once again failed to erupt - crying wolf, anyone?) to an government which takes its prime responsibility, the protection of American citizens lives and interests, very seriously.

True. But let me say this for the 156783th time: we think that this war is NOT going to stop such an attack from happening. We think this war increases the change of such an attack, BECAUSE of all the hate you are causing. And apperently, you are either unwilling or unable to grasp that [/sarcasm], because we already said it hundreds of time. We don't want such an attack either. Don't be silly, please.

[Rincewind]

Eeep! Meeep! Personal insult alert!

[Starfisher]

This boils down to fear. People are afraid that the war will increase the chances of terrorism at home. I fail to see how, really. Its not like the mid-east isn't willing to kill Americans already, and we can't do much more to protect ourselves at home.

Its a disgusting twist of media-controlled human nature that the several hundred dead Iraqi civilians totally offset the thousands of cheering Iraqi's that are emerging from their homes. It is good that we have such a low threshold for the loss of human life, but are we no longer capable of rational thought? Had we not acted, Saddam would have ruled for another five, maybe ten years. And then one of his sons would have taken over. For maybe thirty years. Then when he died there would be no authority and this generation's children would have to go to Iraq to stop chaos that would kill a hundred times more Iraqi's than this war will. After 40 years of continued existence in an place where your family might just disappear at night.

So: Is it better that we accidently kill some Iraqi's now in order to assure that thousands more do not have to suffer for the next forty year?

The world has a responsibility to take action when such a problem presents itself. So we do.

[bluevorlon]

Sorry Frst, I thought you referring to the French and German's as Pacifist hippies applied to all of us.
Apologies.

Dmille, you loveable humourless leprechaun you. I didn't condemn anyone in my original post, yes I think France's dealings with mugabe were wrong, yes I think a lot of the UK's dealings with mugabe were wrong also, but that's not what I was originally talking about!

Nnnghr. Stop bringing everything down to how the French and Germans, and all other european nations owe you, this somehow equating that we give you carte blanche to do whatever the hell you like. How about we call in our debts that you use our language? I was just making a point about being sick and tired of inaccurate and false WWII comparisons.

[EchoEffect]

France has not foggoten what it owes the allies. Just a couple of days ago the French President wrote a personal letter of apology to the Queen, saying how sorry he was about a desecration of a War grave in France.

Quote From French Government minister:


"This violation of a burial place - scandalous in itself - is an attack on the memory of the sacrifice made by the British and American soldiers who contributed to the liberation of our soil,"


But France does not owe America, or Britain undying loyalty in every situation because of this. We fought for their freedom, and they are exercising that freedom. That is the point. Remeber that if we were sticking to this rediculous notion that they should now do what we tell them because we saved them in WW2 then how about this.

We would not have won without Russia. Therefore France owes an equal debt to Russia. Infact, so do we, seeing as without them Britain and the US probably would not have won, or at least, would not have won for a very very long time. And Britain probably would have been invaded, even if the US wasn't.

and this.

France helped America in its war of independence, so the US owes France. America should do what France tells them because of this.

So please, stop this nonsense about France "owing" us. they should remeber the sacrifices made. They should remeber the people that died for them, for their freedom. They should remeber it by exercising that freedom.

Dont you just hate it when democracies work! damnit

Frst: yeah ok, was a bit of a generalisation. I'll admit. But, that is what your President is "Spewing".

oh and errr, your stupid as well. hah! personal insults, woo. :wtf:

[frstkor13]

echoeffect, I did not call you stupid. the ugly generalisation you wrote was stupid. i think there is a difference between the two.

furthermore, Bush does not campaign this war on Iraq will have those effects either. Everyone knows there are plenty of ugly places on this planet, and Saddam's regime was in control of just one of them.

how can you say that people have a responsibility to each other and then oppose the coalition going in to get rid of saddam and his terror police? his torture chambers? his gas and bio weapons?

as to the nuclear reactor that was destroyed in Iraq. The head scientist involved with it's construction, who defected to the west, clarified that the reactor was not to be used for science. it was there to make nuclear weapons.

sigh. on to page 16 plz. im starting to get into this.

[Starfisher]

Some one please demonstrate why we should avoid liberating and by all accounts winning the loyallty of the Iraqis in order to avoid slightly worse state and religious backed hatred of the US.

[Rincewind]

I thought the guy shipping weapons to Iraq in the 80's was none other than Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy to the middle east. That would constitute "awareness" by the US government in my book...

Dmille, I wasn't aware that jews are not allowed in Saudi Arabia. I do know that non-muslims aren't allowed in Mecca, but no jews in the entire country? Sheesh, the buggers give the rest of us a bad name.

[EchoEffect]

This war isn't about liberating the Iraqi people. The "humanitarian" reason wasn't talked about until about a week before the war began. It is a possibly fortunate side effect, but it isn't the reason. And never was.

where does it stop? Are we invading Iran next? and then Syria? and then Saudia Arabia and then Jordan and then Kuwait and then North Korea and then China? And on and on until we have have re-modeld the world into an Anglo/American one? with our belifes and our values imposed on everyone else? Sweeping away all forms of international law and all international bodies who dare to critisise us. And condem any country who disagrees with us as friends of terrorists, or friends of evil....and then invade them too, because we can.

dmille: wait...so you think the French should have kept their autocratic monarchy? A dictatorship. So dictatorships are ok if they help you? I am confsued by what you mean.

[Rincewind]

dmille, that's not a belief system. It's not the religion, it's what Saddam and his cronies do.

And it's Rincewind, not Racewind...

[Rincewind]

My previous post, first sentence. Echo's post, second paragraph. Dmille's post, third paragraph. Sure looks like you're talking about more than Ba'athism.

[EchoEffect]

dmille, you didn't answer my question about the French Monarchy...

I see British Troops are effectivly in control of Basra now. I'm very happy that it appears to have happend without to much bloodshed. Lets hope it goes as well elsewhere in the country.

[IronHammer]

If you can point out anyware in the costitution, bill of rights, or decleration of independance, that says that the US is responsible to/for, the rest of the world. Please point it out to me Martian. Otherwise, dont make stupid statments you can't back up.

The only international resposibility the US has is to its friends. And its freinds are against Saddam Hussein. Should the US pull out of this fight, just to satisfy the demmands, of so called freinds, who dont care about her security and defense?

NO, and besides that Think about what would happen if we did leave. Even ignoreig the vary real fact that Saddam will target the US with his "Terrorist budies," we would still be left with an insane dictator who pledged to reconqur Isreal.(our ally) Or even the real dangers to the rest of Europe, who will eventually be targeted, by the very terrorism that he greatly endorses.

As I have said before. The US is going in because the humanitarian mission, coincides with its defensive, military, actions. It is so strange that you guy's can't see that the only legitimate use of military power, is to protect.
The use of military defensivly is valid here in this war. Why, because the conditions make it the only correct action. Were dealing with an unelected, tyrranical regime that supports, and endorses, terrorism.

The US's broadest mission is its defense against it. One suggestion, or strategy, is that the US remove the conditions that breed terrorism. Well some have made the claim that because the US is the richest country, and the fact that the ones that support terrorism are the poorest countries. Therfore, it would be logical to fund them, and build there economy up to a certan point, correct?

The hinderance to this is a thing called reality. In reality, these countries are controlled by dictators, and in reality they are not all (in much respect) poor ether.

This means ether two things. One, these dictators areenslaving their own people, and combined with certan reports, they are blameing the US, and the west, for not doing anything, or for their vary enslavement. Some will accept this, and go on to be suicide bombers.

Two, We see countries with vast reasources, but they are still supporting terrorism; flying in the vary face, of current events, and stimulations not to. Well some might say there is just not enugh stimulus.
But in any case the question conscerning this is why? And its only answer is greed.

Well now my country has taken to defending itself, but were still talking about how now, right? Well then, how can a humanitarian mission get to Iraq, and how can a proper response be made to the rest, to sufficiantly warn them not to do this shit again.

Iraq poses as the perfect solution to this. One because militaraly we have every right because he broke his word. Two, because humanitaraly it is the only way to rescue those people from tyrrany. And three, because it also proves to any others we are serious.

Saddams regime is totally corrupt, and well worth the effert put in its removel; it funds terrorism, it neglects its people, it is/was a major industrial country, and its actions totally warrent the end of it.

For referances, watch the news, and stop listening to idiots who havent.

If you want to talk about obligations, or resposibility, what about the simple resposibility as friends?

Lets just take away all prior history then. Do you people in Europe care or consider friendship so lightly, that you dont even care what happends to the US? No wonder Europe got invoulved in so many wars, geesh.

[RobbSLS]

It makes me sad how a good thing such as liberating the Iraqi people is made out to be a US quest for oil, power and money.
I mean why does everyone have to hate the US so much. What has the US government done to you?

As i read this thread i see US bash after US bash then defended and usually reversed by someone like Dmille frst or myself.

oh and btw, if you arent a US citizen or resident why do you care if we may spark more hate for the US in the Middle East by invading Iraq , kicking Sadaam out and taking all of their WOMD?

PS- ty to frst and dmille for defending my country.

[edit] Someone should lock this thread. It has turned into yet again another US bash.

[IronHammer]

No; it has wonderd off topic into pettyness, plz dont lock it. Lets just forget the rest, and continue talking about whats going on.

[EchoEffect]

I'm not a US citizen, and as far as i know i dont have any relations in America, or any friends. (apart from ones i know from the internet). But i do care a great deal about what happens to the US. I care because I dont want another sept 11th. Or something worse. the night of September the 11th was one of the scariest evenings of my life that i can remeber, And i live thousands of miles away from New York and Washington. So please understand that I do not voice opinions that conflict with the policy of the US government out of some random hatred for all thigns American. I like a lot of things about the US. I just do not like many of the policies of its current government, because i think some of them damage other people around the world. And because I think they will damage the prospects for keeping everyone safe, including Americans. Actions like the intervention in WW2 (even if it was a bit late) was a good action by the US. The establishment of the worlds first (i think) written constitution protecting the rights of its people is a good thing. I like most Americans that I have met over the internet, and the few I have met in real life as well.

I do not have strong resevations about this war because I hate the USA. I would have strong reservations if it were Russia proposing it, or France, or Sweden. Its not who is doing it. Its why , and the possible results of it.

I would like to say though, that no one would complain about an thread bashing the government of Iraq. Which this is just as much, I know there is no comparison. But people have to be prepared to listen to critisism, if they are to learn, and to understand other people. If you blinker your reading and listening to just things that agree with you, whats the point?

[Vaarok]

How does conquering Iraq get oil for the US? They're still going to sell it on the world market, and that means at world market price.

Honestly, they're so far in debt to France, Germany, and Russia that even if their entire profits from oil were soley directed at paying off the debt, rather than buying food and desalination equipment, they'd be paying for seven to nine years.

[Retroboy]

Well, they've now stormed Saddam's presidential palace.

I wonder how long that poor military adviser guy will keep trying to convince Iraq that Baghdad has not been invaded? Would hate to have HIS job...

-- Retro

[Harmanoff]

Actually, the invading forces are bringing in food and water to assist the population (specifically in Um Cassr at this point) and replace the supplies destroyed by the Iraqi military. U.S. soldiers are handing out chocolate and bottled water to Iraqi civilians... Iraqi soldiers are shooting and hanging Iraqis who so much as wave at coalition troops. Yes, poor Iraqis, they're being invaded by people who are going out of their way to clothe, feed, and hydrate them.

Food and clothing? Oh you mean you're now finally providing them with what, a very modest fraction of the supplies they got from the oil for food program which they are in desperate need of? Way to go. Really, it's an honorable notion but right now you've made their lives shittier than ever. Don't kid yourself.

I'll forgive you for the current situation though. In all honesty, if your long-term goals were fulfilled it would've been worth it. Here's the catch though, the catch which is the source of my problems with the war. Turning iraq around will take an enourmous amount of investments, investments that somebody wants to pay off. I'm terribly sorry but given the way our history looks i have very serious problems in believing that 9/11 somehow turned the U.S and British administrations into good samaritans that gladly plow trillions into a country on the other side of the planet just because they thought, 'Hey, let's do something good for the middle east today'.

So far history has not provided one example of intervention in the middle east that has resulted in increased safety anywhere. I've asked it before and i'll ask it again. Why should it work this time? Please show me what's unique about this intervention.

ps, what do you mean that the U.S owes the french monarchy? In case you've forgotten it was not the monarchy that sacrificed their lives to help you. It was french soldiers. You owe as much to the french people as they do to you.

[IronHammer]

Well dmille, I was actually requesting that this could be a non bash US thread, if people were willing to drop their crap and forget it but.....

[Harmanoff]

I do agree it was brilliant, especially when the allies, the majority of which happened to consist of todays coalition, had the chance to stop him but decided they'd soften him and his country up for twelve years and instead imposed sanctions that made such a crap program necessary if the world was not to go ballistic.

And i certainly did not mean it to come of like i thought oil for food was brilliant. What i meant was that even by the low standars that program offered to the people, the war has now made their situation even worse. I was pointing to the fact that i'm not actually against what you're doing now but that i don't believe this will have any long-term positive effects.

I keep asking for you to somehow reveal the secret that makes this whole thing special and bound to work while all other interventions have failed. Does no one know? Don't tell me this is all based on a hunch that it'll work out.

And again, explain what you meant about the french monarchy. I'm very curious to see how you justify that comment.

[bluevorlon]

I would prefer it wasn't a US bash either, despite some people trying to do so, and others seemngly determined to bash the french and germans. So I'd request we avoid bashing any particular nation and try and wrench this ungainly beast back to iraq....

[IronHammer]

Popular uprisings reported Citizens said to be attacking Saddam's fighters in Baghdad, Basra (http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=31910)

Guy's, I think its safe to say, that even the people are aganst this man.

[Stealth]

Knew that would happen once the death squads were killed/arrested/ran off.

[frstkor13]

No Ironhammer, according to Harm they hate us and want us all to die. We are evil for trying to help them. The US is satan and we should burn in hell.

[Bonnet]

So far history has not provided one example of intervention in the middle east that has resulted in increased safety anywhere.
The Afghan campaign.
The rebulding of Iraq well come from Iraqs oil Haramnoff and Bushes repayment for this will be a safer US.
The war made will make thier lives worse for a few thousand citizens while the remainder gets dinkable water for the first time in 12 yeas...

[IronHammer]

Well tachnically Zbobet thats in Asia, but I think Harminoff was refuring to Islamic nations.

this could all be mute agan too, since saddam may be dead. If your watching TV right now, Saddam was quite possibly, just taken out right now.

[Bonnet]

AHmmmmmmm technically all of the middle east is in Asia... (except for a few African ones like sudan and ethiopia)

[Stealth]

Not just Saddam might be dead, but also two of his top advisors.

"Extremely reliable intelligence" told of the meeting, but they aren't quite sure if he had left the meeting before the bombs hit. If he was still at the meeting, though, he was very likely killed.

Of course they thought they got him early in the campaign, but I guess that was wrong.

[IronHammer]

Yes technically your right, and the mideast is a region of the Asian contenent.

oops better put something in here or this thread will get locked uh... Hay those bombs were BIG!! uh werrent they, and Um, Hay, look at this link (http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2003160695,00.html), from the UK Sun.

And look at this, Nerve agents detected in Iraq (http://www.jsonline.com/news/gen/apr03/131713.asp)

[SvK]

I want the Iraqi information minister to be the last guy captured. His speeches are great! Jay Leno has nothing on this guy.

[Bonnet]

Did you hear why it had taken a few days to confirm this? "the body was not in a readily identifiable state" when asked for clearification "well we haad a hard time finding all the body parts"

[Rincewind]

And if Saddam wasn't there, coalition forces just dropped 4x 2000 pound bombs on a residental complex full of civillians. Yay.

There was news that the Coalition had seiged the Al-Rashid hotel, which puts them less than 500 meters from our house.

[Bonnet]

I doubt they was civillans in the building Rincewind, and im not sure if thats good or bad news that they are 500 meters from youre house. :offtopic: whats your name mean?

[IronHammer]

Hay guy's look at this: UPI How the media has changed (http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20030408-071952-7876r).

[Rincewind]

Well, 9 people died in the attack on the residential complex, no word about Saddam.

500-1000 meters from our house, which is a bad thing. My father has been building our new house for 2 years, he earlier said that "if those bloody yanks bomb it now, I'm gonna sue!".

Rincewind: Cowardly Wiz(z)ard from the Discworld series.

[Vaarok]

Anybody see the ABC special with whasisname last night? The line in response to the Info Minister saying they still had the airport: "Well, I'm here, and I'm sure not alone."

And the description of the guys walking out into the desert with a folding beach chair with a hole cut out of the seat...

Plus, they showed some Spec-ops guys in a toyota. Anyone wearing knee and shoulder pads, ray-bans and a backwards baseball cap, acting calm as can be as tanks pass in the other lane, in the middle of a warzone, is cool by me.

Honestly, I don't think there's much fighting left to do. We've been sending patrols into the city whenever we feel like it, the army is almost powerless to even slow our forces, and the special-forces troops are doing whatever they want within the few pockets of enemy-held territory.

[EchoEffect]

I'm not sure that the US government is really that concerned about getting a fair peace in the middle east. If they were wouldn't they be more involved in the Israel/Palastine issue. It seems like Blair had to force that announcement about the road map out of Bush, so Blair didn't get comepletly 0wned at home.

Lol i wouldn't site The Sun as a good source of information. It is the most despicable paper in the British press, with the possibl exeption of the Daily Mail...

...and you haven't seen utter nationalistic, idiotic, and jingoistic reporting until you have read the British Tabloids. Example, the headline of the Sun when the RN sunk a Argantine ship in the falklands war was "GOTCHA".

gah, three more journalists have been killed in Iraq. There appears to be strong fighting in Baghdad still, but i think the US forces are still in control of it. Did anyone else see the TV imgaes of Iraqi soldiers running accross the river bank being shot at by US marines, was very scarily real.

[Rincewind]

Echo, what was it when the Argentinians sank the RN ships?

[Harmanoff]

Harm, see my comments about the realization of this administation.

Had to go to bed so i've kind of lost track of this now. Anyway, did you mean that as an answer to my question about why this intervention should work? If so i'm having trouble finding an answer in any of your posts in this thread.

frst you generalisationengine you, i never said that but anyway, i don't think you're evil because you try to help, quite the contrary. I do not however think the actual intentions of the coalition admnistration are that helpful. Like Echo said the goal of freeing iraq wasn't there until a few weeks before the campaign when no womd were found(oops, let's go to plan B then).

I also find it.. well, not evil but slightly unbelievable that the U.S and Britain would leave Iraq to it's destiny only to suddenly realise they've done wrong and shall now make it all up. But like i've said i'm ready to be proven wrong. Enlighten me why this is unlike any of the other times the middle east has been screwed.

[Stealth]

Eh... when no weapons of mass destruction were found? Who was looking for them? The inspectors?

The inspectors investigated very little before the war, and they wouldn't of found anything even now because they were only investigating a few sites a day in a country the size of California.

[EchoEffect]

Dmille: Yeah I just saw that on the news, very sad. Very bad of the Iraqi snipers to use a hotel used by journalists for sniping from if thats true. Although, i suppose Journalists have to accept the dangers of war when they chose to go. And the Iraqi's are defending their capital, whether that is right or not. But anyway, very sad.

Rincewind: I'm not sure. The "Gotcha" headline is famous over here. Mainly because the sinking of that particular ship (The Belgrano) was very contentious. As it was sailing away from the exclusion zone that the RN had placed around the Falklands. Have to say I am in rare agreement with The then PM Tatcher on her decision, because the ship could have returend later and blown up a RN vessel. If that had happend she would have been lambasted for not destroying it when she had the chance. I imagine the sinking of RN ships, that did happen. Would have been greeted with headlines along the lines of "gutless bastards murder our brave boys", or some such thing...ahem, back to Iraq.

on a side note, can anyone tell me anythign about the writer/journalist Robert Kagan. I am reading a book by him, and i wondered if anyone here knew what his political stance is. Just so i know how to take certain things he says. i.e, whether he is baised against a certain view.

edit: have read some things he has written for the washington post, have realised I dont really like him very much. The book is still very interesting though.

[dmille]

Harm, I posted this above in response to you and your questions about differing motives and the absolute need for short and long term sucess in this intervention: this administation realizes that a "hey, let's do something good for the Middle East today" policy is the most efficient longterm way to make people in the Middle East have a "hey, let's do something bad to New York City today" policy.

Notice now the heavy involvement of Kurdish fighters (60+ thousand under coalition command), the "Free Iraqi Forces" and other local groups. The US is also discussing plans for Iraqi based (Iraqi judges, etc) war crimes commissions to deal with what happened under Saddam's regime.

On another note, I wanted to add this here to see a reaction.
During a discussion about the war in one of my classes today I was asked whether the deaths of the thousand or so Republican Guard troops killed during the US ground probes into Baghdad sadden me, and I realized that I was unable to answer in the affirmative. The Republican Guard, Special Republican Guard and other paramilitary / loyalist forces are groups that have chosen to follow in the tradition of, and to even sometimes surpass the deeds of the likes of the Japanese army at Nanking. I cannot thus truly feel any sadness at the termination of their activities, and if I feel any remorse at all it is because of the fact that they were killed in combat and not after trial and conviction by an Iraqi war crimes commission. I should hope that whatever your view on the war might be you can agree with that sentiment - that Saddam's "elite" forces are war criminals whose actions cannot be excluded from a catalog of the worst crimes of this century, if not all of recorded history. The fact that they did not kill on the same scale as the Japanese army in Korea and China or the Nazi German military in Europe during World War II (or the forces of Stalinist Russia) was not for lack of effort or zeal but because of limited opportunity. The permanant end of actions of their members has left the world in a better state.

[EchoEffect]

Yeah I would agree that they are probably "bad" people, although i dont like that term. But I would say that they have committed horrible crimes, and deserve some form of punishment. If they are killed in battle then it is sad, because they are people, but i guess its unavoidable. But if they are captured, there is no way in hell they should be executed. I know this isnt a death penelty thread. But we are supposed to be civilised and better than Saddam. His regime killed people, and killed prisinors. we shouldn't stoop to his level.

On further investigation into this book, i really do not like this man very much. Seems to see Europe as "old", outdated, and useless. But then, I am biased, being European ;).

[dmille]

He writes for the Weekly Standard (http://www.weeklystandard.com) sometimes, and the Standard isn't your type of magazine. It's for neocons like myself and Secretary Rumsfeld. He does, however, like England.

[Harmanoff]

I don't like them being killed anymore than i like americans getting killed. Or anyone for that matter. I would of course not label them as innocent, they're not, but i can't really judge 60 000 people to be worthless enough to die. What i can agree to however is that it's unavoidable if you're to invade Iraq. My opinion on wether or not it was unavoidable to invade Iraq is another matter...

[Bonnet]

They are armed combatants and the majority of them have raped, pillaged, tortured, and killed thousands. Thier deaths with out a trial after thier captured for war crimes would need a trial but I am all the happier to se them die on the battlefield. They where given the chance to surrender or walk away so it was their idea.
(those where some of the best books i ever read cant believe i forgot that Rincewind)

[Martian]

Originally posted by zbobet2012
They are armed combatants and the majority of them have raped, pillaged, tortured, and killed thousands. Funny. Proof?

(not that I really care, but I hate unfounded accusations. And I see alot of them in this war.)

[Starfisher]

What zoe should have said was "All of them are voluntarily fighting for Saddam, and are his enforcers. As such, the blame for many of the various atrocities laid at Saddam's doorstep can be also be partially shifted to theirs."

No one has yet explained how to get rid of Saddam without using force. Yet we all agree that he needs to be removed. The people of Iraq want him to be removed, as has been shown in the past few days. So... how do you remove Saddam without a war?

[IronHammer]

I would agree that in many cases they are responsible; except, that there is the this possible fact; that it was sometimes a "fight for Saddam or see your entire family killed in the most brutal of fashions" thing.
And for some this sad fact will be true. so are you going to condemn them all just because so many have done these things, yet others were forced?

IMO it would be better that they were tried by the Iraqis people after. That kind of blood should not be on the hands of the US for the possible dangerous after affects of that type of action. However, that would depend greatly, in a US held trial, on how they would intend to go about deciding who is to be accused, and who is not to be, and let free. IMO if it came to a US or allied run war trial, I think allot of the grunt soldiers would be set free.
It would be holding a double standard not too, if looked at from a historical perspective.

Also, that excuse I stated above, is probably going to be used allot by the innocent and the guilty, which will make dispensing proper justice after, a really hard ordeal. This is why I think it would be better, if the Iraqis people tried them themselves. It would give them a step up in there chances to run themselves, and would increase the legitimacy of the verdicts, in the eyes of the Arab world.

No, this man and his regime I think has ben such a nightmare,(however I am no expert and do not claim to be) that some of the people and soldiers, may have a hard time accepting he has lost most of his power. Remember his "secret police" are still at large around some of the countryside, with the authority to dispense "Saddams justice" as they see fit.

this is all of course pure speculation. I don't really know whats going to happen, but i'll take a shot at guessing.

On the other hand I read things like this, and I wonder if any innocence is left in the people who serve that man.
Jailed Iraqi children run free as marines roll into Baghdad suburbs (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20030408/wl_mideast_afp/iraq_war_marines_prison_030408163048)

[SvK]

I just think it rocks that the US has non-explosive bombs had out of concrete.

[Bonnet]

Yes the Kinetic energy weapons should be a great help in are quest to avoid civillan casualties. (Martian for sources do you even watch the news?)

[Martian]

Yea. I watch Dutch news almost every day, and watch BBC regularly. It never told me anything about such crimes carried out by the majority of the Republican Guard.

[GuaRRand]

Originally posted by Martian
Yea. I watch Dutch news almost every day, and watch BBC regularly. It never told me anything about such crimes carried out by the majority of the Republican Guard.

I think he means CNN tina...u know...the all knowing, always correct, never faltering CNN

*cough*

[Rincewind]

You mean Propaganda News Network?

[Ammon Ra]

lol! the PNN!!! anyways i agre with you Martian. no NORMAL human will accept information and opinion if they are given w/o concrete proof. no not those bombs, im talking about lots of proof and verifiability. i.e. on CNN they dont give certain information that are given out immediatly on other channels esp german channels.

Cnn and many us, ans some uk channels, the big powerfull chanels tend to distort the "truth", or what is seen and reported fromt he journalists.

for example, the head of Fox news, and the fox channel, is extreemly republican and that side of politicds, conserative, i tihnk. anyways,m he is tied strongly to the bush administration and the network is extreemly pro-war, pro-death, pro-deathpenelty, pro-anti-iraqi, pro-killing all iriaqis...ect..ect...

ect..no i dont have any hard proof to justify that, but i guess that the ppl in these forums who have been outside the us and are not monoglots, will atleast say that the fox network is very prowar, and maybe to a certain extent brainwashed.

in sny case, its a case of mass media distortion; MMD :tongue:

[bluevorlon]

Is the news director of FOX still Bush's cousin?

[Starfisher]

Well Bagdhad is cheering and happy. All on live TV. I wonder how Al-Jazeera is going to turn this into a propaganda victory for radical Islamists? Seems you can't do anything over there without it either being overlooked or spit upon.

And, of course, there is looting. I'd be grabbing posters of Saddam. Then I'd wait for a few years, and sell 'em on ebay.

[Ezikel]

Heh, i find it amusing that Iraq's 'Information Ministor' (quite ironic, seeing as Information is what hes lacking) trys to tell everyone how Iraq is crushing the American and British forces.

.
.
.

While an Abrams is rolling around just a few streets away.... you can even hear tanks and gunfire while hes saying "Yes we have killed three quarter of them" .... um no, not quite.


Then theres the Journalists killed in the hotel, i would have thought it was fairly obvious that if you all stay in the same hotel, in the middle of city that has been bombed for 2 weeks and is now being invaded. Your proberbly going to get shot at, by both sides at one time or another. It used to be in war zone 1 or 2 reporters + crew from each station, now its hundreds...

Some of them are wondering around in the desert aswell with NO protection, and everyone is so shocked when they get hurt/killed, yes its sad people died, but its stupid, because they shouldn't have died. They shouldn't be wondering around in their Toyota 4X4 with TV taped on the hood, thinking that its acctually going to work as a bullet deterant.

All in all 12 Journalists/Reporters dead and 2 missing. Stupid.

[AcolyteOfDeath]

I just thought you should see this. Article dated March 26.

Yet More Proof of the Rise of Totalitarianism in the USA (http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/3174/1/152/)


WASHINGTON – Nobel Peace Prize winners and Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish leaders knelt in front of the White House and were arrested, March 26, protesting George W. Bush’s war on Iraq as a “crime against the peace.”

“This action is a protest of the war against Iraq, a war that leaders from Pope John Paul II to the Dalai Lama have called immoral and unjust,” said a statement released by the Catholic peace group Pax Christi as the religious leaders, numbering about 70, were arrested.

Among them were Nobel Peace Prize laureates Mairead Corrigan Maguire, honored in 1976 for her struggle for peace in Northern Ireland, and Jody Williams, who received the prize in 1997 for her work in the struggle to ban land mines. Others included Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit; United Methodist Bishop C. Joseph Sprague; Rabbi Arthur Waskow, director of the Shalom Center; Fr. Roy Bourgeois, founder of the School of the Americas Watch; Marie Dennis, director of the Maryknoll Office of Global Concerns; Patricia Clark, director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation; and Eric LeCompte, Pax Christi USA, national council chair.

They were the most prominent of an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 who have engaged in nonviolent civil disobedience and been arrested in opposition to the war on Iraq. Gordon Clark, coordinator of Iraq Pledge of Resistance, told the World the arrests in at least 52 cities and towns are unprecedented, with people sitting down at military recruiting stations, district offices of U.S. senators and representatives, and the corporate headquarters of Pentagon contractors.

“If Mr. Bush thought that the American public or world community would simply lie down and accept this war once he started it, he is clearly learning otherwise,” Clark said. “Our active nonviolent resistance will continue as long as this war does and then we will begin our resistance against the equally ill-conceived and potentially disastrous military occupation of Iraq.”

The biggest civil disobedience protest virtually closed down San Francisco hours after Bush ordered the attack on Iraq. More than 1,400 people were arrested in the sit-downs targeted against the city’s financial district.

Three dozen anti-war demonstrators were arrested on the U.S. Capitol Grounds, on March 17, demanding that Congress break its silence. “I’m here today representing September 11 Families for Peaceful Tomorrows,” Rita Lasar told this reporter. “My brother, Abe Zelamanowitz, died in the attack on the North Tower of the World Trade Center. We demand that Congress withdraw the blank check they gave the President for war.”

Lasar said her brother, a Blue Cross/Blue Shield worker, died because he would not leave behind a friend confined to a wheelchair. “He gave up his own life trying to save another person’s life,” she said. “Today, I am following his example, trying to save the lives of thousands of Iraqis and Americans.”

She then stepped across a line on the West Lawn of the Capitol. Police bound her wrists with plastic handcuffs and led her away.

About 1,000 peaceful protesters in downtown Chicago were arrested March 20 despite their best efforts to avoid it. Writing in the 5th Congressional District Neighbors for Peace website www.beyondtoday.com, Julie Peterson said, “We were not given the option to disperse. The police surrounded the crowd early and closed the circle. People chanted, ‘Let us go home!’ The police laughed. Then they arrested 1,000 of us. There were 217 women in my group alone.”

Police, some with their badges taped over, did not inform them of the charges or inform them of their rights. Peterson said she was released on $100 bond at 2 o’clock the next afternoon. The web site provides an online petition addressed to Rep. Rahm Emmanuel urging him to join Chicago-area Reps., Jan Schakowsky, Danny Davis, and Jesse Jackson Jr. in support of HJR 20 that repeals the authorization for use of military force against Iraq.

HJR 20 was introduced on Feb. 5 by Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) with 29 co-sponsors including Julia Butler Hansen (D-Ind.) and John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.).

[Artoo]

A statue of Saddam is being brought down as I write this... thats pretty significant as a symbol. Quite a lot of people are participating in this event.

and BOOOM there it goes.

the Iraquis are really expresing their anger on Saddam now (at least some of them)


edit: I just noticed that dmille has mentioned the same event 2 minutes earlier... I've been watching the whole thing live on CNN for over an hour now.

[IronHammer]

Effigy eh, nothin topples like an effigy. :up: