The NYT tells us what we knew already regarding the President’s attempt to take down Saddam Hussein. In this breathtaking example of overhype:
In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush’s public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war.
But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair’s top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times.
“Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning,” David Manning, Mr. Blair’s chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides.
Sigh. Why is this news? The history of Saddam Hussein’s intent to deceive not just the UN but the entire international community was well known, so it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand why the President felt that war with Iraq was inevitable.
As usual, however, one has to read much farther into this document in order to get the context of the meeting. By January 31, Bush and Blair had already forced Saddam to allow Hans Blix back in the country for more weapons inspections, the purpose of which was to get the Iraqis to produce proof that they had destroyed their WMD stocks and equipment. That intermediate step came at the insistence of France, which wanted to delay consideration of the so-called “second resolution” wanted by Britain as political cover.
By the time Bush met Blair at the White House, Hans Blix had reported that the Iraqis would not cooperate with the inspections, only paying lip service to the inspectors. Now, thanks to captured notes of Iraqi meetings, we know that Saddam remained confident that his bribery of France and Russia (as well as their well-known economic interest in maintaining their contracts with the Saddam regime) would result in a stalemate at the Security Council over any resolution opening military force as a consequence of failure. That may be why France practically begged Blair at that moment not to pursue a “second resolution” (actually a 17th); they assured both the US and the UK that the previous sixteen resolutions gave plenty of cause for action, but that France would find it politically impossible to vote for explicit military action against Iraq.
By this time, had the US not had a plan for military action against Iraq, it would have been almost criminally neglectful. Why should it surprise anyone that two nations that faced war with Saddam Hussein would discuss the military strategy involved in that war?
[...]
In short, the Times presents us with a memo that shows the US and UK understanding that Saddam would not cooperate with the UN nor voluntarily disarm or step aside; history proved them correct on all those assertions. Given those as reality, the two nations prepared for war. If the Times finds this surprising, it demonstrates their cluelessness all the more.
Yep.
As usual, the NYT is all about sound and fury, signifying — well, here I go repeating myself.
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Nothing in life is inevitable unless you believe that all things are pre-determined. And if you believe in predestination or fate, you might as well lie down because you have no choice except to accept that which is already predetermined to happen to you. There goes free will. bush wanted the war in Iraq and said so in a 1999 interview. Peace
Comment by steve @ 3/27/2006 - 10:34 am
Don’t aim a gun, unless you are ready and willing to pull the trigger. Do NOT threaten war, without the intent to follow through with said threat.
Bush did what he said he would do…he gave Sdaam plenty of chances to not get ” shot” …and Sadaam blew it.
Comment by Fat Tone @ 3/27/2006 - 10:50 am
I would hope we even have a contingency plan on the shelf somewhere for an invasion of Canada. To be working on plans for an obvious hot spot, like anywhere in the middle east, is well…obvious.
Comment by Purple Avenger @ 3/27/2006 - 11:32 am
Hey Steve(FN) are you going to live forever and try not paying your taxes? Using your own words a persons life is not pre-determined I agree so the choices and avenues you take throughout your life put you right where you are, is that not right? If that is correct a person as an individual makes choices right or wrong good or bad is that not true also? So why do you liberals think (That’s and oxymoron) it is others responsibility to support (Through taxes) people who make as an individuals bad decisions thru out their life and continue to make bad decisions? And don’t give me the US Constitution says “The general welfare” because it says “To promote the general welfare”two different meanings. Also Steve(FN) put a link to that interview with Bush up so we can all read it,. and I don’t want what some left wing demagogues interpretation of what Bush said.
Comment by Jim M @ 3/27/2006 - 11:59 am
I think you may have missed a point or two. Didn’t the pres say war would be a last resort? didn’t he say he hadn’t made up his mind on going to war? Didn’t he say that Saddam had WMD? Didn’t he say all these things after the date of this memo? Doesn’t that imply that he lied to us, the congress, the world? Where in your political viewpoint is it ok for the POTUS to flat out lie?
You seem to think this is old news. It may be old in the sense that some have been saying it for a while. It may also be old in that many on the right have called this kind of talk treasonous and looney. But it’s never been real news because of the lack of evidence. Now there’s evidence and you say “old news.” You act like all of us, the people, the congress, knew we were going to war all along. We didn’t but he DID!
Comment by MrGone @ 3/27/2006 - 12:48 pm
Sister Toldjah writes:
“The history of Saddam Hussein’s intent to deceive not just the UN but the entire international community was well known, so it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand why the President felt that war with Iraq was inevitable.”
But the issue is not that the president felt war with Iraq was inevitable. The issue is that, at a time when Bush was telling the American public and the world that he was seriously and in good faith pursuing diplomatic alternatives to war, he had already decided to invade Iraq no matter what Saddam’s response was. If Bush felt that even Saddam’s acceptance of the U.S. conditions for avoiding war could not be trusted, then why did he offer the conditions at all, and present them as a genuine alternative to war? The answer is: He offered those conditions as a sop to public opinion and international pressure. But did Bush actually SAY: “These conditions for avoiding war are only a formality; it doesn’t matter how Saddam Hussein responds to our diplomatic conditions; we are going to invade Iraq regardless of what he says or does?” Of course he didn’t, because he wanted the world to believe he was pursuing a diplomatic solution in good faith.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/27/2006 - 2:23 pm
So small of a point Kathy.
Yes. At some point you have little faith that dimplomatic solutions will suddenly work. The buildup of military hardware in another part of the world takes time. Short of removing himself from leadership and/or showing us the evidence we were asking for (didn’t happen therefore your point is small) the war was going to happen. Yes. Pretty much was inevitable. Because of Saddam’s inaction on meeting the UN’s demands….. That’s why.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/27/2006 - 2:35 pm
Anyone who didn’t know that war was inevitable is too dense or too much of a pollyanna to survive without adult supervision.
Once again, the hand wringers, teary eyed leftists, and oh so sensitive liberals are going to go ape over this “revelation” like it actually means anything. “BUSH LIED” they whine, wringing their hands, yet again.
Here’s one for you, WHO CARES? War was the only way Saddam was going to be forced to do what was required, so having someone who knew that, and was prepared to drop the hammer, says nothing but good things about Bush. Cowboys have several advantages over diplomats, and doing what you say you’re going to do is one of them.
Comment by Severian @ 3/27/2006 - 2:40 pm
Amen.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/27/2006 - 2:46 pm
I second that “Amen”.
Comment by Jim M @ 3/27/2006 - 2:58 pm
“the hand wringers, teary eyed leftists, and oh so sensitive liberals are going to go ape over this “revelation” like it actually means anything. “BUSH LIED” they whine”
You are sadly mistaken my friends. I am not against the war. I am however against having a liar as a president. In retrospect, the war is exactly what should have happened but it wasn’t about WMD - there weren’t any. It wasn’t about AQ - they weren’t there. It wasn’t about Saddam being a threat to the US - he wasn’t. It was and clearly still is about oil and the US having control over the second largest proven reserves. In the grand scheme of things, we can do without a lot of WTC’s but not our “precious.”
Comment by MrGone @ 3/27/2006 - 3:12 pm
The war in Iraq was stupid and unnecessary. JimM,Baklava and Severian are wrong to think that war was the only way to remove Saddam. The CIA installed him and they could have seen him out. As a matter of fact, Saddam volunteered to go to another country before the first bomb was dropped. bush, had a different plan because the Republicans have never bought a weapons system that they didn’t eventually use. The Left is for charity, and that means giving until it hurts. Peace
Comment by steve @ 3/27/2006 - 3:27 pm
wow this war is not going very well and here we are still arguing about Saddam? The fact of the matter is the 43 admin really didn’t care very much about a post Saddam Iraq and or believed only the rosiest predictions from the neo-con wing, had Gen Franks draw up a battle plan which included too few troops and here we are now with a corrupt,undisciplened,fragmented new Iraqi Security forces who care about their clerics not national unity. Oh and freaking lunatics streaming out of madrassas looking for 72 virgins. Soooooooo……………… if that’s success well I don’t want to see what failure looks like.
Comment by tommy in nyc @ 3/27/2006 - 3:37 pm
What is Tommy’s evidence for saying, “The fact of the matter is the 43 admin really didn’t care very much about a post Saddam Iraq
It seems Bush cares alot about a post Saddam Iraq from where I stand because he is making the case consistently of getting the job done as opposed to leaving early. How would leaving early be caring about a post Saddam Iraq Tommy? The rest of your post is incoherent.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/27/2006 - 3:49 pm
“It seems Bush cares alot about a post Saddam Iraq from where I stand because he is making the case consistently of getting the job done as opposed to leaving early. ” - That’s the only good thing he can now do about Iraq. If he doesn’t clear up the mess, I’m sure some people will go out and lynch his ass. I don’t believe in withdrawal of troops at this point but justice has to be done one day through a democratic process.
Comment by Raj @ 3/27/2006 - 4:46 pm
The way out of Iraq is through Iran. We should immediately re-establish full diplomatic relations with Iran. Peace
Comment by steve @ 3/27/2006 - 7:44 pm
So small of a point Kathy.
I’m sorry, but lies are not a “small point.” To me, it matters if the President of the United States told America he had not made up his mind about going to war when he absolutely had made up his mind. To me, it matters that the President of the United States told Americans that if Saddam met U.S. demands, war would not happen — when in reality the President of the United States knew that war was going to happen no matter what Saddam said or did.
Truth matters. If the president felt that war was inevitable; if he knew he was going to order the invasion of Iraq regardless of how Saddam responded to U.S. demands, he should have told us that. He didn’t tell us that. He didn’t trust the American people to support him if he told us, “I’m invading Iraq no matter what, and the diplomacy doesn’t matter even if Saddam agrees to everything we are demanding.” And he was right to expect that Americans would not support war under those conditions. That’s why he lied. And the fact that he lied matters.
Here’s one for you, WHO CARES? War was the only way Saddam was going to be forced to do what was required, so having someone who knew that, and was prepared to drop the hammer, says nothing but good things about Bush. Cowboys have several advantages over diplomats, and doing what you say you’re going to do is one of them.
Yeah? So if the cowboy tells the farmer, “Stop putting up fences across my cattle ranges or I’ll shoot you,” and the farmer stops putting up fences and takes all the fences down, the cowboy should still shoot him because he said he would?
And here’s the answer to your question: WHO CARES? The fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, friends and neighbors of the approx. 2,400 American men and women who have died for a war started under false pretenses might care. The soldiers who came home but will live with nightmares and traumatic memories for the rest of their lives, and/or who come home with one less arm or leg than they had before might care.
And most important, the families and friends of the 34,000 to 38,000 Iraqi children, women, and men who were killed in this war, either by U.S. bombers or soldiers, or by insurgent violence caused by the U.S. invasion, very much care that the war was a preemptive, aggressive attack on a nation that had done nothing to harm a hair on any American’s head and that was no threat to the U.S. at all. The five children who were in the family car with their parents and saw their parents killed by a hail of bullets fired by U.S. soldiers at a checkpoint might care. If you can look at this, and still ask, WHO CARES? then nothing will make you care.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/28/2006 - 1:17 am
One correction to what I wrote above:
The 34,000 to 38,000 Iraqi war-related deaths I mentioned above are of CONFIRMED Iraqi CIVILIANS ONLY. The total number of Iraqis killed is of course much higher, and that number certainly includes many who were noncombatants but whose civilian status could not be confirmed by Iraqi Body Count’s rigorous standards.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/28/2006 - 1:30 am
Kathy said: I’m sorry, but lies are not a “small point.”
You must have had a real problem with Bill Clinton. But I’ll bet that was not the case it was just about sex, it wasn’t that he lied to a grand jury was it? There is reason to be skeptical of this article in the NYT as their tract record has not been very reliable when it comes to publishing their gotcha articles. Have you read the entire article here’s a paragraph for you:
The January 2003 memo is the latest in a series of secret memos produced by top aides to Mr. Blair that summarize private discussions between the president and the prime minister. Another group of British memos, including the so-called Downing Street memo written in July 2002, showed that some senior British officials had been concerned that the United States was determined to invade Iraq, and that the “intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy” by the Bush administration to fit its desire to go to war.
Here’s the definition of “So Called”: adj : doubtful or suspect; “these so-called experts are no help”.
Our military is all voluntary everyone knows they may have to go in harms way and Kathy our military isn’t here to play meals on wheels as the Clinton Administration use them for. So don’t give me that you liberals care about them as some have volunteered to back over to Iraq three times. Your kind has not changed since the Vietnam era where our solders returning from Vietnam were spit on, things thrown at them and booed.
Kathy also said: insurgent violence caused by the U.S. invasion
There you go there was no problem in Iraq until the US invaded its back to the same old thing with you liberals the US is to blame for all the ills in the world. You come across as a hysterical female using your feelings instead of logical thought process. That and I also see you are an English Teacher in a Government (Indoctrination Center) School we don’t need to go into how lousy the school system is in this country.
Comment by Jim M @ 3/28/2006 - 8:00 am
Kathy, you have to demonstrate that lies really upset you by not relying on the lies of the left, the lies of the anti-americans, and the lies of the media to form the opinions you spout. When you come out from behind the lies you shield yourself with, then we can talk.
Comment by PCD @ 3/28/2006 - 9:08 am
There is little use for the being whose tepid soul knows nothing of the great and generous emotion, of the high pride, the stern belief, the lofty enthusiasm, of the men who quell the storm and ride the thunder.
Theodore Roosevelt
Comment by Jim M @ 3/28/2006 - 10:00 am
Maybe I missed something, but this didn’t make any sense to me:
Kathy says, “Yeah? So if the cowboy tells the farmer, “Stop putting up fences across my cattle ranges or I’ll shoot you,” and the farmer stops putting up fences and takes all the fences down, the cowboy should still shoot him because he said he would?”
If he took down the fences and stopped putting them up, why would the cowboy still shoot him? You do not make any sense in this statement.
In your statement you say, “Stop putting up fences across my cattle ranges or I’ll shoot you”, Emphasis on the OR, so you have an action that will happen if you do not comply, and sense the farmer complied why would the cowboy still shoot him?
Again, you make no sense with this analogy.
Comment by sanity @ 3/28/2006 - 10:18 am
sense = since
Should have proof read a bit more, missed that, sorry.
Comment by sanity @ 3/28/2006 - 10:22 am
JimM, because of your mindset you believe that, that Roosevelt quote is about making war. It ain’t, it’s about surfing. Peace
Comment by steve @ 3/28/2006 - 3:51 pm
You must have had a real problem with Bill Clinton.
Yes, actually, I did. But as you have accurately pointed out, Bill Clinton’s lies were about sex, not war. Lying to a grand jury about sex is not as bad as lying to the American people about whether and why you’re starting a war. Bill Clinton’s lies about Monica Lewinsky did not kill thousands of people. Clinton is still a smarmy opportunist, but he’s not an accomplice to murder.
Our military is all voluntary everyone knows they may have to go in harms way…
Absolutely true, and that’s why my outrage at the tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians who have died in this war is stronger than my outrage at the Americans who have died. Those Americans chose to go to Iraq to make war; Iraqis did not choose to have their country invaded.
That said, just because our military is all-volunteer and is trained to go into harm’s way does not mean they should be sent into harm’s way when there is no good reason to send them into harm’s way. I object to American men and women being asked to risk and sacrifice their lives to fight a war in which the reasons and justifications given for the war were lies. Are you really saying, as you seem to be saying, that because we have an all-volunteer army and their job is to fight wars, that it doesn’t matter if the war we’re sending them to is justified or not?
Kathy also said: insurgent violence caused by the U.S. invasion
There you go there was no problem in Iraq until the US invaded its back to the same old thing with you liberals the US is to blame for all the ills in the world. You come across as a hysterical female using your feelings instead of logical thought process.
I said there was no insurgent violence in Iraq before the U.S. invaded. I did not say there were no “problems” in Iraq before the U.S. invaded. The roadside bombs, suicide bombings, death squads, insurgent and sectarian violence in Iraq is all directly related to the U.S. invasion. That is simply a fact.
And as for logical thought processes, there is no logic or rational thought involved in starting a war against a country that did not attack us, did not threaten to attack us, and did not have the capacity to attack us even if they wanted to.
I don’t see much attempt at rational argument in your responses to my arguments. It seems to me the hysteria is on your side, not mine.
Maybe I missed something, but this didn’t make any sense to me:
Kathy says, “Yeah? So if the cowboy tells the farmer, “Stop putting up fences across my cattle ranges or I’ll shoot you,” and the farmer stops putting up fences and takes all the fences down, the cowboy should still shoot him because he said he would?”
If he took down the fences and stopped putting them up, why would the cowboy still shoot him? You do not make any sense in this statement.
You are correct in saying that you missed something. My analogy was in response to this comment:
Anyone who didn’t know that war was inevitable is too dense or too much of a pollyanna to survive without adult supervision.
Once again, the hand wringers, teary eyed leftists, and oh so sensitive liberals are going to go ape over this “revelation” like it actually means anything. “BUSH LIED” they whine, wringing their hands, yet again.
Here’s one for you, WHO CARES? War was the only way Saddam was going to be forced to do what was required, so having someone who knew that, and was prepared to drop the hammer, says nothing but good things about Bush. Cowboys have several advantages over diplomats, and doing what you say you’re going to do is one of them.
This commenter was arguing that it didn’t matter if Pres. Bush had firm plans to invade Iraq even if Saddam met all his conditions for there not being a war. To illustrate his opinion, he said that the advantage of a cowboy over a diplomat is that a cowboy does what he says he is going to do (By implication: even if the person he is going to do it to meets the cowboy’s demands)
Why should a cowboy shoot a farmer if the farmer complies with the conditions the cowboy has stipulated to avoid the shooting? Why should Pres. Bush have made a firm, irrevocable decision to invade Iraq even if Saddam Hussein complied with all the conditions Bush had stipulated to avoid an invasion?
Kathy, you have to demonstrate that lies really upset you by not relying on the lies of the left, the lies of the anti-americans, and the lies of the media to form the opinions you spout. When you come out from behind the lies you shield yourself with, then we can talk.
What about the lies of the right? You have to demonstrate that you can form opinions without relying on the Bush administration’s lies to decide what you believe.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/28/2006 - 4:47 pm
Kathy wrote, “I’m sorry, but lies are not a “small point.”
uhuh. So why do you do it?
Kathy wrote, “then nothing will make you care.
We care kathy. It doesn’t do anything for the argument/debate if you act like you care and we don’t. We care. We know that lives have been saved by giving Iraqi’s freedom from the tyrant who made mass graves of over 300,000 of his own people. Force is necessary sometimes. This country had a civil war where many people died. You obsession with a certain number dying may be the problem. The end result and the process is important. It was important that we freed the slaves in this country. It was important that Iraq was freed from Saddam. YOU SIMPLY DISAGREE it seems and think Saddam should’ve remained in power. But to utilize the disagreement as an opportunity to tell us all here that we don’t care is so….. liberal of you.
I concur with PCD’s 9:08 post.
Please let us know of the left’s lies that you are unhappy about. Show consistency
Comment by Baklava @ 3/28/2006 - 4:52 pm
Kathy lied by saying, “Bill Clinton’s lies were about sex”
No. It was about Paula Jone’s civil rights. During that trial Clinton lied. And … that’s in the past. I just wanted to point out your lie.
Kathy laughingly wrote, “I said there was no insurgent violence in Iraq before the U.S. invaded.
No. It was all Baathist killing, raping, maimings, gasing. I guess that’s ok… Now Syrians, Iranians, and former Baathists do not want Democracy and kill and you blame that on us. Great. Way to give aid and comfort to the enemy with your irresponsible words.
We see you are on a 3 year old argument as you said, “there is no logic or rational thought involved in starting a war against a country that did not attack us. Move forward kathy. We have already made that decision with a lot of Democrat Congress people. That invasion happened and your disagreement with having disposed of the Iraqi government is not grounded in here and now. What do we do moving forward. Leave quickly? Let the Baathists, Iranians, Syrians install a tyrannical government? After we removed Japan and Germany’s government we spent 7 and 10 years rebuilding and helping them implant a democratic form of government. Do you want to deny Iraqi’s that now? Would you like to see the blood bath happen that would happen if we left quickly? What is your argument? Nobody knows other than you HATED the decision that was made 3 years ago. You are stuck on the past. Move forward.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/28/2006 - 5:00 pm
I meant to say perjury during Paula Jones civil rights case. She was harmed directly by Clinton.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/28/2006 - 5:05 pm
Must have a problem with the whole political scene then, since all of them lie.
Comment by sanity @ 3/28/2006 - 5:08 pm
It was important that Iraq was freed from Saddam. YOU SIMPLY DISAGREE it seems and think Saddam should’ve remained in power. But to utilize the disagreement as an opportunity to tell us all here that we don’t care is so….. liberal of you.
I told one particular person here that he didn’t care — and I told him that because he said he didn’t care. He typed “WHO CARES” about Pres. Bush having decided to invade Iraq no matter what, at a time when he was telling Americans he had not made a final decision. You would have known this if you had gone back and looked at the comment I was responding to. I pasted the comment into my response, so there’s no excuse for saying I told everyone here they don’t care, when in fact I was addressing that comment to one person only.
It was all Baathist killing, raping, maimings, gasing. I guess that’s ok… Now Syrians, Iranians, and former Baathists do not want Democracy and kill and you blame that on us. Great. Way to give aid and comfort to the enemy with your irresponsible words.
Your implied assumption that if Baathist killing, raping, etc., was not okay; then anything that replaces that is better. That’s not an okay assumption — not when what has replaced Baathist killing and raping is Sunni and Shiite killing, raping, torture, death squads, summary executions, kidnappings, beheadings, and on and on. And that was all brought on by the U.S. invasion, because Bush only knew he wanted Saddam gone, but he had no plan for what would replace him. He had no plan for a post-invasion insurgency, because he and Rumsfeld and Cheney completely dismissed even the tiniest possibility that there would BE an insurgency.
War is too horrible to be justifiable if what comes after it is just as bad, or even worse, than what came before.
Move forward kathy. We have already made that decision with a lot of Democrat Congress people. That invasion happened and your disagreement with having disposed of the Iraqi government is not grounded in here and now. What do we do moving forward.
That is fair and reasonable. The truth is, I don’t know what can be done moving forward that will make things better. Pulling all our troops out immediately is not a good idea, because right now our troops may be all that’s standing between a localized civil war and complete regional conflagration — World War III, in other words.
But staying there is also a terrible option, because our presence is a constant provocation to Iraqis that can only make things worse.
At this point, there IS no good solution. Every option is absolutely horrible. If saying that means I’m stuck in the past, then so be it. I don’t think anything can help us move forward until this administration acknowledges that the invasion was a huge mistake, that the war in Iraq has destabilized the entire region and turned Iraq into a cauldron of terrorism; a huge petrie dish for cultivating terrorists.
Every 12-step program takes as its guiding principle the idea that a person has to admit they have a problem before change or progress can occur. It’s similar with the war in Iraq. No progress or positive change can happen if Pres. Bush continues to insist that the war was justified, that it’s been a grand success, that Iraq is moving toward democracy. AAny fool should be able to see Iraq is a disaster. Admit that it’s a disaster, and move on from there.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/28/2006 - 9:23 pm
I see the nihilists are alive and well. Nothing’s going right, everything is horrible, the sky is falling, yadda, yadda, yadda. Sorry, Kathy, but toppling a brutal tyrant was a good thing, and if the terrorists have found a way to take advantage of the (quite normal) post-war instability, perhaps you ought to, you know, blame the terrorists for not wanting to play nice. But what am I thinking? We should all know by now that Bush is supposed to have a crystal ball with which he can see the future, and that anything bad that happens anywhere in the world is (say it with me, everybody) all America’s fault.
Comment by CavalierX @ 3/28/2006 - 10:02 pm
Sorry, Kathy, but toppling a brutal tyrant was a good thing, and if the terrorists have found a way to take advantage of the (quite normal) post-war instability, perhaps you ought to, you know, blame the terrorists for not wanting to play nice.
Iraqis are still living under brutal tyranny — it’s just the tyranny of violence, terror, and foreign occupation instead of tyranny from one man and his government.
Furthermore, the American public would never have supported a war to topple a brutal dictator if the dictator and his country were no threat to us. Support for Bush’s war from the American public sprang from the belief, deliberately fostered by Bush and co., that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, an active nuclear weapons program, and chemical and biological weapons; plus the ability to deliver those weapons and use them to attack the United States within 45 minutes of a direct order from Saddam Hussein. THAT was a lie — and without that lie, Americans would not have supported invading another country just to overthrow its leader.
I do blame those on the Iraqi side who kill innocent women, children, and men –as I blame Americans for the same. But I don’t blame Iraqis for fighting against the invasion. Resistance to invasion is quite normal. Your apparent expectation that the U.S. could invade another country — which is an act of violence that involves killing many people — and not encounter violent resistance in return — is ludicrous. On what planet is the preemptive invasion of another country greeted with the entire population of that country “playing nice”? If you’re going to bomb, invade, and occupy Iraq, then expect resistance. That’s common sense. A crystal ball is not required.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/29/2006 - 11:48 am
Kathy,
Thanks for coming around a little bit.
The main point I see in liberals like yourself is that you disagreed with the invasion with the first place. There must’ve been 12 liberals before you that I’ve repeated that that was a decision 3 years ago and you have to think about what we do now.
To harp on a decision made 3 years ago by many politicians not just Bush and have no understanding that the Pentagon carries out the war and drew up the war plans years ago (Presidents don’t draw them up they are simply given all sorts of options and plans that were drawn up by the Pentagon) and act like Bush is responsible for the way the war was carried out is so unintelligent for liberals. If you logic it out without emotion you see some irresponsible words coming from liberals. Attacks and accusations galore. Simply because they didn’t agree with the decision.
OK. Moving forward 3 years later. You cannot tell me that you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that your 30,000 number is absolutely true. Additionally, even if it is close, Americans ARE NOT responsible for those numbers as the insurgents from Syria, Iran, and past Baathists are responsible for the majority of those deaths. To the contrary. We are responsible for saving many lives. We are in the heat of a struggle that insurgents from foreign countries are showing they don’t like what Iraq is turning into. They cannot stand not just us being there but what Iraq can turn into.
While I recognize your feelings where you state that there is no good solution moving forward… I disagree. It’s like saying that we will never succeed and that is what people on our side talk about liberals being. Defeatists. Defeatism gives aid and comfort to the enemy and takes hope away from the Iraqi people.
We’ve completed over 140 water projects there. We’ve completed countless electricity projects. Schools (with girls attending), hospitals, roads, etc. All you talk about is the complete misery as if you’ve been there. There is other sources of information that talk about the difficulties yes but that the LEGACY media is not painting the complete picture. That is a valid set of feelings too I believe. There are mil bloggers and folks who have visited who are telling a part of the picture that the legacy media are not.
You can continue with the defeatism but I doubt you will as I’ve seen movement in your attitude a little.
Thanks for continuting to write.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/29/2006 - 12:53 pm
Kathy said: War is too horrible to be justifiable if what comes after it is just as bad, or even worse, than what came before.
So you are saying that there is not any justification for War anytime or any where? Even after Germany was defeated there were NAZI sympathizers that were killing the occupiers (US, British and Russian solders also German citizens) so because Germany was in disarray and people were still being killed we should have not gone to war with Germany? So what happens when diplomacy breaks down, and we know how well sanctions work (NOT) and the history of treaties between nations isn’t very good either what would be the next logical step? Our war on terror was not just confined to Afghanistan if you think that Al Qaeda are going to stay in one country and wear uniforms so we know who they are you are crazy. I also have news for you we are in WWIII with Islamic terrorists and have been for many years as far as they are concerned, we just treated it as a criminal action. These Islamic Terrorist would not give it a second thought if they could kill more Americans Liberal or Conservative Male Female adult or child in this country and mark my words they have and will try again.
Kathy also said: At this point, there IS no good solution.
Yes there is a good solution we have to kill them all of them that keep using terror to get what they want and what they want is to dominate they want to be oppressive and if you do not follow them they will kill you. The wonderful peaceful religion of Islam just look at all the conflicts going on in the world 96% involves Muslims what other religions are trying to take over the world? You have 3 choices convert be subservient or be killed and even that is up to Muslims.
I am really getting tired of Liberals and the MSM playing Monday morning quarterback with what Bush should or shouldn’t have done PERIOD. He had to make a decision and that decision was based on the information he had at that point in time and Congress had the same information that is why the vote went the way it did. Now you have liberal Democrats saying if I knew then what I know now I would not have voted to go to war that’s a load of crap they still know more than the general public knows. If you want to stick your head in the sand and wish everything bad would go away or as some would have us cut and run that is not feasible as history has taught us some of us have to remain in reality and deal with the hand we were dealt. The Bush lied is also a pile of crap if Bush lied then Tony Blair believed him and so did John Howard and many other heads of state including some Arab countries that make up the coalition fighting as well as using their land as bases. These people all swallowed Bush’s lie WOW everyone must be stupid except liberals that is, and we are suppose to swallow Bush lied? I think not!!!
Comment by Jim M @ 3/29/2006 - 1:26 pm
still living under brutal tyranny — it’s
>just the tyranny of violence, terror,
Those are brought by the terrorists, the old Saddamists and the nuts who simply refuse to accept democracy. I don’t suppose you have an unkind word to say about them, however. Bad things are always All America’s Fault.
>and foreign occupation
By this I assume you mean us. How dare you lump all three of your complaints together. The Iraqis have a constitution and are forming a government of their own. They have an Iraqi military growing more capable by the day. Occupations do not generally give government and military power to the occupied. Gee whiz, we’re all so sorry they can’t reverse thirty years of tyranny fast enough to suit you.
>the American public would never have
>supported a war to topple a brutal
>dictator if the dictator and his country
>were no threat to us
Yes, I remember how strongly you Liberals protested the removal of Slobodan Milosevic from power. Please stop thinking you speak for or can even understand the American people. Stop trying to speak for the Iraqi people, for that matter.
>the belief, deliberately fostered by
>Bush and co.
By “and co.” I assume you mean nearly ever member of Congress on both sides of the aisle, the previous President, the United Nations, UNMOVIC, UNSCOM, the CIA and the intelligence services of pretty much every country on Earth. Man, that’s a big group of people to accuse of lying just to start a war. No wonder you Liberals boil it down to one man “and co.”
>within 45 minutes of a direct order from
>Saddam Hussein
A Lieutenant Colonel is the Mukhabarat (I believe) risked his life to bring that information to the attention of British Intelligence. That was the information he had been given. Please explain how “Bush lied” about disinformation deliberately sown by Saddam. Oh, my bad… I forgot about that crystal ball Bush has tucked away in the White House, which tells him the truths no one else knows.
>On what planet is the preemptive
>invasion of another country greeted with
>the entire population of that
>country “playing nice”?
Madam, you are the one complaining about the violence from the terorists and Saddam adherents. We are the ones saying that it’s perfectly natural for the overthrow of a dictator to be accompanied by violence on the part of his supporters. I’ll bet you never even heard of the Nazi “Werwolfs” who plagued the Allies in Germany for years after the end of WWII.
Comment by CavalierX @ 3/29/2006 - 2:06 pm
>If you logic it out without emotion
I believe you are asking what would be two impossible tasks for any Liberal.
Comment by CavalierX @ 3/29/2006 - 2:09 pm
Cav wrote, “Man, that’s a big group of people to accuse of lying
Yes. On this I’ll never understand liberals. We’ve detailed exactly the similar beliefs and statments of the other countries intelligence agencies, Clinton, Gore, Albright, and Kerry and still the accusations of lying us into war when Bush was simply saying the same things and showing us the intelligence that was gathered not by him but by the intelligence professionals.
Cav wrote, “I believe you are asking what would be two impossible tasks for any Liberal.
I still try to appeal to thought processes that could occur.
Comment by Baklava @ 3/29/2006 - 3:00 pm
500,000 this is the number of bodies found in mass graves thus far. Do we need to say ANYTHING else??? What kind of low down scum sucking assnine fool would continue bitching about this war. It was a good thing. Any other reason “true or false” is unimportant. Have some compassion liberals. Iraqi’s are now breathing the air of freedom, why would you deny them this?? - Lorica
Comment by Lorica @ 3/29/2006 - 7:37 pm
First, Baklava, because your response to my last writing was the only one that was at all civil or rational.
Thanks for coming around a little bit.
You’re welcome, but I don’t view it as “coming around” because I don’t see keeping U.S. troops in Iraq as a solution. I just see it as the option that is likely, for now, to have the least awful consequences. U.S. troops are not a force for good in Iraq; they are only a physical bulwark between civil war and even worse civil war. Our troops are the fingers in the dike, that’s all.
The main point I see in liberals like yourself is that you disagreed with the invasion with the first place.
Yes, of course I disagreed with the invasion in the first place, and everything that has happened since has confirmed that the invasion was as disastrous as we “liberals” were saying it would be. Everything that opponents of the invasion predicted would happen if Bush invaded HAS happened. And what’s worse, Bush has now gotten the U.S. into an impossible situation where both staying and leaving are equally untenable; and where whether we stay or leave — either way — the world is still left with the explosion in terrorist groups and terrorist activity that the war caused.
You cannot tell me that you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that your 30,000 number is absolutely true. Additionally, even if it is close, Americans ARE NOT responsible for those numbers as the insurgents from Syria, Iran, and past Baathists are responsible for the majority of those deaths.
No one knows anything beyond the shadow of a doubt when it comes to civilian casualties in Iraq — and the U.S. has made it clear that it has no interest in coming up with an accurate figure for how many civilians have died. But if anything, 34,000 to 38,000 range is conservative. The real number could easily be 100,000, or more. No one will ever know.
As for who is responsible for those civilian deaths, the numbers at Iraqi Body Count are all civilian deaths that occurred as a result of the U.S. invasion. As of two years ago, when the maximum total of civilian casualties recorded at IBC was 10,079, a maximum of 7,356 of those civilian casualties occurred during the initial U.S. invasion up to and including May 1, the day that Pres. Bush announced that major combat operations were over. The rest of the 10,079 were also caused by U.S. military operations, but they occurred after May 1. Here is a link to what I have just written. Again, keep in mind that this page on IBC was compiled in February, 2004. The numbers are much higher now.
While I recognize your feelings where you state that there is no good solution moving forward… I disagree. It’s like saying that we will never succeed and that is what people on our side talk about liberals being. Defeatists. Defeatism gives aid and comfort to the enemy and takes hope away from the Iraqi people.
What you call defeatism I call reality. And no one has given more aid and comfort to the enemy (by which I assume you mean Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations) than Pres. Bush and his closest associates have. The invasion of Iraq was an absolute dream come true for Osama bin Laden, Zarqawi, and others of their ilk. Their recruiting numbers would be the envy of Army recruiters here in the States. Al Qaeda probably wishes U.S. presidents could serve more than two terms.
Also, I think it’s very patronizing to say that criticism of the Bush administration’s foreign policies by Americans are more destructive to Iraqis’ hopes than the evidence of their own senses every time they step outside. Iraqis are not small children, you know. Of course, some Iraqis are small children, but there are adults living in Iraq, too. And adult Iraqis do not place more importance on what Americans are saying about Iraq than on what they can see for themselves is happening in Iraq.
To harp on a decision made 3 years ago by many politicians not just Bush and have no understanding that the Pentagon carries out the war and drew up the war plans years ago (Presidents don’t draw them up they are simply given all sorts of options and plans that were drawn up by the Pentagon) and act like Bush is responsible for the way the war was carried out is so unintelligent for liberals.
With all due respect, that does not make any sense at all. Of course the Pentagon draws up different war plans. The president is still the Commander-in-Chief. The president does not have to accept any plan he doesn’t like. He can tell the Pentagon their war plan has no worst-case scenario planning, no postinvasion planning, no contingency planning for armed insurgency. Everybody knows by now that Pres. Bush wanted to topple Saddam Hussein since BEFORE 9/11. After 9/11, he was itching to invade Iraq FIRST, before Afghanistan. Tony Blair had to talk him out of that one. Pres. Bush has made it abundantly clear that, as the president, he can do anything he damn well pleases, whether it’s legal or not, and regardless of anyone’s objections. Bush does not accept any limitations at all on his power. Please don’t ask me to believe that everything that has gone wrong with this war because of the appallingly bad planning is the fault of the Pentagon, and that Bush had nothing to do with it. That’s absurd.
I will now respond to a few of the comments made by others.
Kathy said: War is too horrible to be justifiable if what comes after it is just as bad, or even worse, than what came before.
So you are saying that there is not any justification for War anytime or any where?
No, I am saying there is no justification for war when what comes after war is worse, or just as bad, as what came before.
Even after Germany was defeated there were NAZI sympathizers that were killing the occupiers (US, British and Russian solders also German citizens) so because Germany was in disarray and people were still being killed we should have not gone to war with Germany?
Germany after WWII was nothing like Iraq after the U.S. invasion. Germany was completely crushed by the end of WWII. In fact, it was clear for at least two years before the official end of the war that the Allies would win. There was no significant resistance of any kind, no insurgency, nothing like what’s going on in Iraq.
I am really getting tired of Liberals and the MSM playing Monday morning quarterback with what Bush should or shouldn’t have done PERIOD. He had to make a decision and that decision was based on the information he had at that point in time and Congress had the same information that is why the vote went the way it did.
Everything you say here is totally false. First, Pres. Bush was fully aware that the intelligence he had did not support the conclusion that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction at the time of the invasion. He was fully aware that much of the intelligence he used to justify the invasion to the public was disputed, unconfirmed, or came from questionable sources. He was fully aware that there was credible intelligence indicating that Iraq did not have WMDs, did not have connections with Al Qaeda, was not a threat to the U.S. He simply chose to ignore that intelligence and not share it with the public.
Second, Congress most certainly did NOT have the same information that the president had, and THAT is why the vote went the way it did. They did not by any stretch have access to the same intelligence, or to all the intelligence, that the president had. That is a fact. Congress did NOT see everything the president saw.
How dare you lump all three of your complaints together.
Because it’s true. Because they should be lumped together. Because a foreign military occupation is a foreign military occupation, and regardless of which foreign military it is, the country being occupied hates being occupied and resents the occupiers.
The Iraqis have a constitution and are forming a government of their own. They have an Iraqi military growing more capable by the day. Occupations do not generally give government and military power to the occupied.
The Iraqis have a constitution that was pushed through under extreme pressure from Washington, that ignored the concerns of a significant segment of the Iraqi population, and that privileges Islamic sharia law over the rights of women.
And Iraqis are currently not forming a government of their own, because the interim government decided to cancel the attempt to form a government as a result of the extreme sectarian violence, verging on civil war, that is going on in Iraq right now.
Also, occupations do frequently give government to occupied peoples, but they are governments selected to be amenable to the occupying country’s interests. It’s called self-rule. The country has its own government but it’s not a sovereign government that reflects their priorities as opposed to the occupying country’s priorities.
The U.S. didn’t have to “give” Iraq a military. Iraq already had a military. The Coalition Authority disbanded the military along with the government after Saddam was overthrown.
Madam, you are the one complaining about the violence from the terorists and Saddam adherents. We are the ones saying that it’s perfectly natural for the overthrow of a dictator to be accompanied by violence on the part of his supporters.
Then why did the Bush administration fail to anticipate or plan for that violence? And it hasn’t been all on the part of Saddam Hussein’s supporters. There are many Iraqis who hated Saddam Hussein but at the same time do not wish their country to be invaded, bombed, and occupied by the United States. Not all of the insurgency is former Baathists.
What kind of low down scum sucking assnine fool would continue bitching about this war. It was a good thing. Any other reason “true or false” is unimportant. Have some compassion liberals. Iraqi’s are now breathing the air of freedom, why would you deny them this??
Maybe because they are NOT breathing the air of freedom. It may be that constant daily violence, kidnappings, disappearances, torture, executions, death squads, bombings, house break-ins, etc., sound like freedom to you, but they don’t to me, and in fact they are not.
Furthermore, only someone whose daily life is spent in a country where there is no war, no extrajudicial executions, no death squads, no beheadings or kidnappings, or horrendous torture, no bombings, no fear of leaving your home to buy food because you might be abducted or killed, no fear of sending your children to school because they might never make it there, could say that the war was or is “a good thing.” How dare you say that the war was a good thing? Go and live amidst that good thing and bring your children to live amongst that good thing, and then come back and tell me what a good thing the war in Iraq is.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/29/2006 - 11:33 pm
Kathy all that you mentioned was going on prior to this war. Take the blinders off for God’s sake. Deposing Sadamn was a good thing, sadly it took a war, but none the less the outcome was a good thing. Perhaps you like the idea that Sadamn’s sons could rape and murder your 12 year old daughter. Perhaps you enjoy seeing whole villages gassed, because they didn’t want to live under a tyrant. How dare you keep these people under such repression. 500,000 people, that’s our best estimate. But you people still align yourselves with the old regime and continue to blah blah blah about this war. I hate this war, but I hate Sadamn and his sympathizers even more.
NOW tell me Kathy how were we going to get rid of Sadamn so that these people could be free without war??? What exactly should of been done??? War WAS INEVITABLE, because that’s what Sadamn wanted. He thought he had paid enough people off that he could get away with it, WRONG. This war has shined light into a very dark place, and many in this world have much to answer too. It is time to have those answers.
When you can tell me how we were going to depose Sadamn without a war, then I might actually care for the lefts bitching. Until then it is nothing more than the same blah blah blah that comes out of the mouth of John Kerry. - Lorica
Comment by Lorica @ 3/30/2006 - 10:17 am
Kathy all that you mentioned was going on prior to this war.
And it’s still going on now, including the rape and murder of young girls, or women of any age. The only difference between now and before the U.S. invasion is now things are even worse. In addition to having to fear being raped on the way to school or a friend’s or relative’s house or to buy groceries, Iraqis now also have to fear death squads, being abducted, tortured, and executed, having their children kidnapped and held for ransom, being in the wrong place at the wrong time when a bomb goes off, having their homes broken into by trigger-happy U.S. and Iraqi troops, being shot at checkpoints, being shot at in their cars while they’re driving, etc.
THIS is the outcome that you call a “good thing.” I could just as easily say to you, How dare YOU subject the Iraqi people to such terror and horror, when the outcome is just as bad, or worse, than before?
I hate this war, but I hate Sadamn and his sympathizers even more.
Okay, then you should be able to understand this: Iraqis (most of them) hated Saddam Hussein passionately, but they hate the Americans and the U.S. occupation just as much, if not more at this point. And the longer the U.S. stays in Iraq, the more that hatred will grow, and the more terrorism there will be. Somebody here wrote that he wants to kill all the terrorists who use violence to get what they want. Aren’t WE using violence to get what WE want? If Iraqis who hated the invasion and occupation had not turned to violence and had demonstrated against the Americans peacefully instead, would the U.S. have listened and left Iraq? Come to think of it, Iraqis did have anti-American rallies after the invasion, and the Bush people cooed, “Oh look, isn’t that nice; Iraqis are free now to demonstrate against the United States!” and the U.S. stayed right where it was. So what nonviolent methods COULD Iraqis have used to get what they wanted (which was the U.S. out of Iraq)?
NOW tell me Kathy how were we going to get rid of Sadamn so that these people could be free without war??? What exactly should of been done??? War WAS INEVITABLE, because that’s what Sadamn wanted. He thought he had paid enough people off that he could get away with it, WRONG. This war has shined light into a very dark place, and many in this world have much to answer too. It is time to have those answers.
Number one: The war did not free Iraqis. The Iraqi people are NOT free. Their country is either on the verge of or in the midst of civil war, and is occupied by a foreign power that has flatly stated it will not leave anytime in the near future, if ever. That is not freedom.
Number two: You are assuming that the U.S. had the right to decide for the Iraqis that invasion, war, and occupation was the right way to liberate them. No one asked the Iraqi people for their opinion. The Iraqi people did not want and do not want a foreign country “freeing” them and “giving them democracy.” They want to do it themselves, just as WE did it ourselves 200 plus years ago.
Number three: This war has not shined light into a very dark place. This war has made a very dark place even darker.
Number four: Many in this world DO have much to answer for. I agree with that. Saddam Hussein is one of those people. But George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and many others in the Bush administration, AND Tony Blair, also have a lot to answer for. They all should be tried for gross violations of international law and domestic law.
Number five: War was not inevitable. War was a choice, and Bush made that choice. What Saddam Hussein wanted or didn’t want is irrelevant.
Number six: When you say, “how were we going to get rid of Sadamn so that these people could be free without war???” are you suggesting that violence was the only way the United States could get what it wanted with regard to Iraq? And if so, why is it all right for the United States to use violence to get what it wants, but not all right for Iraqi insurgents to use violence to get what they want?
When you can tell me how we were going to depose Sadamn without a war, then I might actually care for the lefts bitching.
We couldn’t have deposed Saddamn without a war, obviously. But you are assuming that we needed to depose Saddam, that we should have deposed Saddam, that there was no alternative course of action toward Iraq but to depose Saddam. That assumption is way off base. Why do you feel there was some sort of imperative to depose Saddam Hussein? If it’s because he was a brutal dictator who subjugated, oppressed, repressed, and terrorized his people, then one would have to assume that the same imperative to depose exists in the cases of North Korea, of Indonesia, of Pakistan. Pakistan is a horrendous military dictatorship. Women in Pakistan are raped with impunity, denied the most basic rights, and subjugated every bit as much as women in Afghanistan. In fact, the position of women in Iraq before this war and the Persian Gulf War and the sanctions was actually quite advanced in comparison with the position of women anywhere else in the Middle East, except for Israel. If we HAD to depose Saddam Hussein because he was such a brutal dictator, we would HAVE to depose the leaders of MOST of the countries in this world. The number of countries that do not brutally subjugate and oppress their people is far exceeded by the number of countries that do.
The fact is, we did not have to depose Saddam. And in fact, we had no right to depose Saddam Hussein, given what we had to do to depose him, because the U.S. invasion, war, and occupation have killed thousands upon thousands upon thousands of innocent Iraqis, and Saddam Hussein is still alive. That’s not my idea of justice.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/30/2006 - 6:55 pm
Okay, then you should be able to understand this: Iraqis (most of them) hated Saddam Hussein passionately, but they hate the Americans and the U.S. occupation just as much, if not more at this point.
Please provide proof, because soldier reports differ from your accounts especially since they have been working side by side with Iraqis for awhile, and though there are some like you describe, a vast majority do not ascribe to what you mention.
If Iraqis who hated the invasion and occupation had not turned to violence and had demonstrated against the Americans peacefully instead, would the U.S. have listened and left Iraq?
Again you mistaken very few Iraqis (mostly Baathist or Batthist sympathizers) who have joined with Terrorists from Syria and Iran to disrupt and kill thier own people.
Number one: The war did not free Iraqis. The Iraqi people are NOT free. Their country is either on the verge of or in the midst of civil war, and is occupied by a foreign power that has flatly stated it will not leave anytime in the near future, if ever. That is not freedom.
I think you need ot look up Freedom.
Iraqis come and go as they please, I really think if that if they were not free they would have lost how they live. Many go about thier business same as before, except now they have expanded and more business have opened up that never could or would under Saddam.
I think we will have to say that is not oppression, and I can show you if you want what oppression really looks like if you need to see it.
So what nonviolent methods COULD Iraqis have used to get what they wanted (which was the U.S. out of Iraq)?
Is this before or AFTER thier elected government asked us to stay to help them, train them THEN leave (which has been the plan all along)?
You are assuming that the U.S. had the right to decide for the Iraqis that invasion, war, and occupation was the right way to liberate them. No one asked the Iraqi people for their opinion. The Iraqi people did not want and do not want a foreign country “freeing” them and “giving them democracy.” They want to do it themselves, just as WE did it ourselves 200 plus years ago.
Kathy again, you will have ot provide proof of this since it was a well known FACT that the Iraqis asked our help back in the fist engagement with Saddam when he invaded Kuwait, they wanted him removed with our help, and when we stoppedand left after promising so, Saddam went on a killing spree murderering those who stood up to him (those that stood up hoping the US would help).
It is not a wonder the Iraqis have been wary of the US, they keep expecting the US to cut and run like we did the first time.
As for them ‘doing it themselves’, there was no way they were going to be able ot do that. Or do you think 500,000 people in mass graves, rapes, torture, family members suddenly disappearing forever, and all the assorted sadistic things Saddam and his sons did to thier own people was enjoyable to the Iraqi people?
War was not inevitable. War was a choice, and Bush made that choice. What Saddam Hussein wanted or didn’t want is irrelevant.
Again, this is incorrect, Saddam had 12 years to comply. 12 years he flaunted the UN, thumbed his nose at the rest of the world, while killing his own people.
I suppose we should just sit around and say please can the inspectors come back? Please will you comply? Please?
There is more and more information being translated from Saddams Documents, and we are ’shining a light’ into a very dark scary place, and finding out things that the left still are in denial even when confronted with these things, and this is only the tip of the documents being translated. I think the scary parts were the russian involvement personally.
Saddam Hussein is still alive. That’s not my idea of justice.
For the moment…..
Comment by sanity @ 3/30/2006 - 8:03 pm
/sigh See no matter what I say you will continue with this blindness. Is North Korea murdering 500,000 of it’s own people??? 500,000 in over 250 mass graves, in 1 mass grave we found over 15,000 bodies. All gassed by Sadamn, and buried using a bulldozer. This is the last time I will post to this thread, as your Bush hatered is blinding you. If you think that the American Military is raping, abducting and murdering Iraqis then I really don’t have anything further to say.
Let us also not forget that this war was a resumption of Desert Storm 1. After 16 UN resolutions, 12 years of diplomacy, half a dozen weapons inspectors, constant challenges to the surrender agreement, an attempted assasination of a former US President, ties to Hamas, training camps for terrorists, bribes to heads of state, The President of the United States made a very hard decision.
Also Germany and Japan both spent more than 60 years with us as “occupiers”, they seem to be doing pretty well under that air of freedom.
And finally “we” did not break the shackles of bondage off by ourselves. We had a great deal of help from the French, and several different Indian Nations.
I am sorry Kathy, but you are wrong, and the future, and a free Iraq will prove this. Stop listening to the “live” hotel roof top reporting from the Main Stream Media. They are not telling you the whole story. This isn’t Vietnam. It was the opinion of those here in America that turned the tide in favor of North Vietnam. Let’s not make the same mistake here. The blame America game really does grow tiresome. - Lorica
Comment by Lorica @ 3/30/2006 - 8:10 pm
Please provide proof, because soldier reports differ from your accounts especially since they have been working side by side with Iraqis for awhile, and though there are some like you describe, a vast majority do not ascribe to what you mention.
First, many (U.S.) soldiers do conclude from their interactions with Iraqis that Iraqis are happy to have Americans in Iraq and think Americans are there to help them. Not all soldiers have come to this conclusion. Although I don’t know many soldiers personally, I did talk to one former marine who had done several tours of duty in Iraq, and although he was strongly pro-war, he also said that most Iraqis hated Americans being in Iraq. I even expressed surprise that he would say that, since I knew he supported the war. He answered me, “I’ve been in Iraq; I know how Iraqis feel about Americans.” Now mind you, he may believe Iraqis are wrong in their opinions of U.S. troops — I didn’t ask him that — but he DOES say that the anger and resentment is there.
And second, even though I am sure there ARE some Iraqis who act friendly toward Americans — and some of those may really feel that way — I don’t think that necessarily means even those Iraqis really like Americans. Maybe they do, but then again it’s not to their advantage to show anger toward Americans, especially if they are part of the Iraqi military and have to work closely with U.S. troops. American soldiers in Iraq feel very threatened by the slightest hint of hostility from any Iraqi — understandably so — and it’s probably the better part of discretion not to piss off a U.S. soldier. After all, the Americans are occupying Iraq; THEY are the authorities there; they are the powers that be; they are the ones with the tanks and guns and bombs. It’s not an equal relationship. Blacks in the South before the civil rights era were very deferential and respectful to whites; they had to be if they wanted to live. That was not a reflection of their real feelings.
Again you mistaken very few Iraqis (mostly Baathist or Batthist sympathizers) who have joined with Terrorists from Syria and Iran to disrupt and kill thier own people.
I’m sure it’s comforting to believe that, but it doesn’t reflect what Iraqis themselves have said in a number of polls. Even the most recent poll, at the end of 2005, which found that most Iraqis are optimistic about their own lives, also found that when asked whether the U.S.-led invasion had been a good idea or not, almost half of Iraqis polled said it had been a bad idea. Polls have also consistently shown that Iraqis have very little confidence in the competence or desire of U.S. troops to better the security situation.
I think you need ot look up Freedom.
Iraqis come and go as they please, I really think if that if they were not free they would have lost how they live.
But they don’t come and go as they please; that’s precisely the point. There’ve been a ton of articles and coverage from Iraq about how Iraqis are absolutely terrified to leave their homes — especially in Baghdad and other cities where violence has been bad. Many Iraqis in Baghdad never leave their homes anymore at all, unless they have absolutely no choice — like if there is no food at all in the house, or if there is a life-threatening emergency.
Also, media reports and Iraqis themselves have talked about how anyone who can afford to leave Iraq is leaving, or has already left. Riverbend at Baghdad Burning has talked about this. Almost no one who has the economic means to leave the country is still there. Iraq is losing its entire professional class.
You say it’s not “oppression,” and maybe if you define “oppression” very narrowly to mean one individual brutal man oppressing his people, then it’s not oppression; but if I had to live with the constant fear of being grabbed off the streets by gangs of paramilitaries, or hunted down by death squads; if I knew that stepping out my door could very likely mean I’d disappear forever, be tortured for days or weeks and then bound, blindfolded, shot in the head and dumped in the river or in an alley somewhere, I would find that kind of terror quite oppressive. Maybe you would not.
Is this before or AFTER thier elected government asked us to stay to help them, train them THEN leave (which has been the plan all along)?
Sanity, their “elected” government was hand-picked by the Bush administration. Of course they “asked” us to stay. Allawi is a former CIA agent, for goodness sake. The Soviets also used to say that the countries they invaded “asked them” to come in and liberate them. When Hitler invaded Poland, he too said that Poland had asked for Germany’s help. The Bush administration made sure that Iraq’s “elected leaders” would do as they were told, and then they said that Iraq had asked for us to stay.
Kathy again, you will have ot provide proof of this since it was a well known FACT that the Iraqis asked our help back in the fist engagement with Saddam when he invaded Kuwait, they wanted him removed with our help, and when we stoppedand left after promising so, Saddam went on a killing spree murderering those who stood up to him (those that stood up hoping the US would help).
Why would Iraqis have asked for U.S. help to get Saddam out of Kuwait? And where is your proof of this “fact”? Even if it were true, what does Kuwait almost 15 years ago have to do with your claim that the Iraqi people asked the U.S. to invade their country in March 2003?
You’re right about Saddam murdering the Shiites who stood up to him after the Persian Gulf War, after the U.S. had encouraged them to rebel against Saddam and promised them support if they did, then reneged on that promise and allowed them to be massacred. And you’re also right that that betrayal is a big part of the reason why Shiite Iraqis, at least, are very suspicious of U.S. sincerity anymore. That still does not explain why Iraqis should be happy to have the U.S. aggressively and preemptively invade their country in March 2003.
As for them ‘doing it themselves’, there was no way they were going to be able ot do that.
Really? Why not? The people of East Timor won their almost 25-year struggle for liberation from Indonesia, which invaded and occupied East Timor in 1975 and ruled it with the utmost brutality until 1999, when the East Timorese people achieved independence not only without any help from the United States, but with the United States’s active support for the Indonesian government. Over the more than two decades that Indonesia ruled East Timor, they (the Indonesians) slaughtered a third of the original population. It did not keep the East Timorese people from fighting for and winning their own freedom. It took a long time, certainly — but they did it. And might have done it sooner if we had not supported their oppressors with guns and money.
Saddam had 12 years to comply. 12 years he flaunted the UN, thumbed his nose at the rest of the world, while killing his own people.
But that was not why the U.S. invaded Iraq in march 2003. That was just one of the many cover lines. There was no reason or need to start World War III over the UN resolutions. The fact is, Saddam did not have WMDs anymore in 2003, and he was not a threat to the U.S. Sanctions accomplished that, and sanctions combined with inspections would have continued to keep him boxed in without an invasion.
Saddam’s “thumbing his nose” at the UN and at the world (really, at the US; that’s what angered Bush) clearly would not have offended Bush enough to invade Iraq. The Bush administration violated international law itself, in invading Iraq, and has been “thumbing its nose” at the United Nations and the entire body of international treaties and conventions on human rights ever since. The U.S. has violated the Geneva Conventions and our own laws guaranteeing humane treatment of prisoners. Why on earth should Saddam’s violation of international law anger Bush enough to invade iraq?
Now Lorica…
See no matter what I say you will continue with this blindness. Is North Korea murdering 500,000 of it’s own people???
I don’t even know where you get that 500,000 number, but if half a million is the magic number for you, U.S. sanctions against Iraq from 1991 to 2003 killed 500,000 Iraqi children alone.
As for North Korea, it is easily the most totalitarian society in the world. It is the most secretive, the most closed off from the rest of the world. It’s a brutal one-man dictatorship. The country is one huge prison camp. The U.S. Committee for Human Rights in North Korea has a report on its website documenting a gulag-like system of prison labor camps where hundreds of thousands of slave laborers live in the most inhumane conditions imaginable. There have been numerous reports of torture and infanticide. Kim Jong II, the president of North Korea, starves his own people. The country has been through years of famine and food shortages; at least a million people died of starvation during the 1990s, and the government’s indifference to North Koreans’ suffering is largely to blame for that.
You don’t think this makes North Korea at least as oppressive and savage a country, *if not more so*, than Iraq?
Also Germany and Japan both spent more than 60 years with us as “occupiers”, they seem to be doing pretty well under that air of freedom.
There is absolutely no comparison between Germany and Japan after World War II and Iraq after the U.S. invasion. None. There isn’t a shred of similarity. For one thing, the Allies spent about $13 billion (in 1947 dollars) on rebuilding Germany and the rest of war-ravaged Europe after WWII. There actually was a plan. The participating European states met in July 1947 and developed, in detail, a plan to reconstruct Europe. It was called the Marshall Plan. Where is the Marshall Plan for Iraq?
Additionally, World War II was a defensive war against an aggressor nation, Nazi Germany, that also happened to be a genocidal fascist state. Germany invaded almost every country in Europe. Germany started the war. When the war was over, the U.S. was seen as Europe’s saviors, as the good guys, as the guys who if you saw them, you knew you were safe. That’s not how the U.S. is viewed in Iraq, for the simple reason that in the case of Iraq the United States was the aggressor nation, the one that started the war. Bush’s war is a war of aggression. It’s a “preemptive” not a defensive war. And even further, the U.S. actually had Allies — true Allies — in World War II, who all worked together to rebuild Europe.
World War II and Iraq have nothing in common at all.
I am sorry Kathy, but you are wrong, and the future, and a free Iraq will prove this.
In your opinion, of course. The future, and the free Iraq you refer to have not come to pass. Maybe at some point you will be able to convince me and others that a free Iraq has come to pass. But it hasn’t yet, so you have proved nothing.
Comment by Kathy @ 3/31/2006 - 12:00 am
Polish Troops
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Sarin Gas artillary shell IED
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Sarin Gas found in Fallujah (click over to 2nd picture)
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Mass Graves
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More Mass Graves found
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