NationStates Jolt Archive

No particular reason for posting this. I'm just interested in reactions.

Dammit, you opened the seal to hell again.

Dammit, you opened the seal to hell again.
I like doing that. I like to see what stupid responses come my way. I actually am getting spoiled, considering that not everyone I ever talk to will be as unreasonable as many NSers.

i wish to hell i knew

I’m sure it’s some sort of grand strategy for the mid-east. A strategy I likely don’t agree with, but whatever.

I like doing that. I like to see what stupid responses come my way. I actually am getting spoiled, considering that not everyone I ever talk to will be as unreasonable as many NSers.

You know this is the first thread I have actually felt like spamming with furries just to get it locked. Really. That's bad.

You know this is the first thread I have actually felt like spamming with furries just to get it locked. Really. That's bad.
This thread may yet get locked because of actions I commit. Or maybe I'll be deleted for this. In any case, I don't care. This is the internet. There are a million different forums out there just like this one.
Edit
I take your feedback as a complement. Thank you.

I suspect that the Iraq war occured for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, the Bush grand strategy for the region is to attempt to change it. How he plans to change it, I don't entirely know. I doubt PNAC is the dominant force behind his GS, but it might play a role of some sort. Perhaps Iranian containment of some sort or another. I'm not his strategist, go talk to his strategist. Why contain Iran you ask, why not contain Iraq and invade Iran? Or North Korea? Simple, Iraq was the weakest target.

Beyond that, I believe that Bush saw a level of importance in being able to control Iraq. I'd suspect a concern about what would happen should Hussein lose power without someone to catch the Iraqi fall was also a factor (read: Iranian occupation of Iraq.) And let's face it, the reason for this concern is because if Iran got Iraq, then, well, the west could say goodbye to an awful lot of oil. So you've got oil in there.

The revenge thing is utter bull. Sorry, I cannot buy that one.

I'm not sure, but it should be a Grand STrategy for the Middle East. CONQUER IT ALL! TAKE BACK THE HOLY LAAAND!!!!

Or maybe I'm drunk ;)

Dammit, you opened the seal to hell again.

Thanks for the heads up, pal. I'll go get my copy of The Necrocomicon. ;)

Because Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait! That is, unless you're referring to the second one :D

Regardless of one's opinion on it, the most likely reason

Is a Grand Strategy for the Middle East with some other reasons (commonly believed WMD stockpiles, sense of an unfinished job after the 1991 War)


I most likely agree with this strategy, and I very much hope we achieve clear victory in Iraq and that the strategy will bear fruit, considering the price that has been paid.


-By the way, I agree, with this thread you've opened the gateway to the bowels of Hell...I'm curious to see how far this thread goes.

Because Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait! That is, unless you're referring to the second one :D

Nice 2 see you've still got your sense of humour. Maybe you won't start flaming again in this thread.

No particular reason for posting this. I'm just interested in reactions.
Oil, but there were other motives.

I might as well offer my opinion, but please, don't focus solely on me. Anyhow, there was a GS all along, but it just conflicted with other things. The neocons believe that if Iraq is properly reformed, then the Middle East will transform into a democratic free market zone with a softer Islam (and perhaps softer Judaism) and no oil dependency for the Middle East. That will neutralize any major threat from that area, at least physically. Whether it creates a moral threat later on, as a reconstructed Western Europe does today, remains to be seen.
In any case, I disagree that Iraq was the weakest in the Middle East. The Gulf states and Syria are far weaker. Instead, Iraq was a.) an enemy, b.) cosmopolitan enough to affect the whole region, c.) a distraction for our enemies, and d.) easiest. The last one may not sound true, but it is. For one, imagine if this were Iran. What would be needed to passify the country? It's far larger than Iraq, more populous, and far more diverse. I suspect an insurgency there would make Iraq seem like a Christmas dinner.
Iraq also has oil to help fund it, and a fairly large middle class. Already, we saw economic growth of 50% last year, and while it stalled this year, it is a glimpse at Iraq's potential. What will it be like ten years from now? Will I live to the day where I can fly a major airliner into Baghdad, frolick at the Ritz-Carlton there, and see the ruins of Babylon when I park in a nearby parking lot? Can I expect only to lock my car door as a security measure? Will I ever be able to cruise the Tigris or Eurphrates? Will we see products that have a tag stating "Made in Iraq"? How about "Made in Kurdistan" or "Made in Sunnitopia" (or whatever they call it)?

I'm not sure, but it should be a Grand STrategy for the Middle East. CONQUER IT ALL! TAKE BACK THE HOLY LAAAND!!!!

After going to the states and touring the American West I believe that the American military is one of the driving forces of the U.S. economy, providing jobs to both soldiers and military contractors and valuable training to the people it employs. Simply, if the United States didn't get into a war once in awhile, there would be no need for a military. I think that now, instead of Vietnam, they're choosing their wars alot more carefully. Occupation of Iraq provides them with oil hegemony. (I don't believe all this crap about Bush being evil and going on some power trip to rule the world, it is his job to protect American interests) Also Bush is ultimatly creating a U.S. ally in the region, removing a brutal dictator who opressed his people and funded anti-semite terrorist organizations and providing higher living conditions for people living in Iraq.

I see the problems of insurgency and terrorism in Iraq as a serious one, but one that has a cause. While people claim the American Empire or Imperialist foreign policy to be the cause of the majority of terrorism in the country, I can only speculate living here that Iraqis have come to resent the occupation because it has brought decreased living conditions due in part to the war and the strategic bombing of war factories, water purification systems and other vital components to the Iraqi infrastructure. American business should in fact be playing a larger role in rebuilding Iraq. This will create Iraqi jobs, an increased standard of living and hopefully help to stem the Insurgency.

Ultimatly I agree with the United States "pull-out" plan. Train Iraqi soldiers to combat terrorism, uphold the law and protect the country from internal and external forces. Work to build democratic institutions and allow Iraqis to have a free, open and personally empowering government system and walk away from Iraq with both sides benefiting.

Okay, you can lock this thread now.

In order for a hierarchical society to exsist. Ignorance and poverty is needed. There are many reasons why they would choose Iraq, but the reason they are fighting is to keep society as it is. A war can draw the people's attention, the people now care less about the problems that affect their daily lives. The people willingly (or not) give up some of their power to support the war. The people lowest down sacrifice their power and the top is then ensured their power will last that much longer.

I imagine it involved communists and Jews somehow...

I’m sure it’s some sort of grand strategy for the mid-east. A strategy I likely don’t agree with, but whatever.

Grand strategy was my choice, although really I would have had to choose about 6 options.

1) Saddam's defiance of UN inspectors
2) Violation of Gulf war 1 surrender rules
3) His gross violations of human rights
4) Support of Terrorism
5) Links to the original Trade center bombing
6) We need a new base to park our Mid east troops in after we leave Saudi arabia, and Iraq is a good place to be. (I hope so)
7) Osama Bin laden put his bets on Saddam "defeating the imperialist Americans", that meant we had to prove him wrong and make him owe his goat some betting money.

In order for a hierarchical society to exsist. Ignorance and poverty is needed. There are many reasons why they would choose Iraq, but the reason they are fighting is to keep society as it is. A war can draw the people's attention, the people now care less about the problems that affect their daily lives. The people willingly (or not) give up some of their power to support the war. The people lowest down sacrifice their power and the top is then ensured their power will last that much longer.
Actually, they are doing the opposite. I see an American public going out of their way to try to end a war that they don't understand. Granted, the Bush administration didin't explain it thouroughly, but neither did the American people make an effort to find out. All they care about are the American coffins that come home, and could care less that their own lives may have been in danger if it weren't for those coffins. It's a bit like Nazi Germany, where you fight harder for someone else than you did for your own damn life or rights.

Grand strategy was my choice, although really I would have had to choose about 6 options.

1) Saddam's defiance of UN inspectors
2) Violation of Gulf war 1 surrender rules
3) His gross violations of human rights
4) Support of Terrorism
5) Links to the original Trade center bombing
6) We need a new base to park our Mid east troops in after we leave Saudi arabia, and Iraq is a good place to be. (I hope so)
7) Osama Bin laden put his bets on Saddam "defeating the imperialist Americans", that meant we had to prove him wrong and make him owe his goat some betting money.

/signed

I think that President Bush did have a desire to stick a US finger in the Iraqi pie, and the opportunity presented by 9/11 (the fear, anger, and desire for vengence of the US citizenary, and the international sympathy) was just too good of a chance to pass off.

Basically I think Bush grabbed the 9/11 football and made a run for the line....what kind of a leader trades off the death of his own citizens and intentionally drives up the fear and anger of the populice in order to manipulate those people into supporting his pre-concieved goal of attacking another nation state? The kind sitting in the Whitehouse right now.

Probably one of the more perverse aspects of Bush's reign is that when he used his alledged 'christian values' to gain re-election points, this actually appeared to gain him support from christians, rather than condemnation for bringing their religion into disrepute for personal gain.

In case you are wondering about what I said, it is not the raving of a lunatic. Look.
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20050817-2018-ca-peacemom.html
The scariest thing of all was that protests of Vietnam didn't even start this early, and look at what happened then. I wonder how soon it will be when we actually see Kent State 2.0. Only except the protest won't be just in Kent State, or Lafeyette Park. It will be in every school, house, nursing home, and military base in America. Even the nationalistic heartland will grumble once the fervor of quick victory dies down.

Oil, with other motives.

I think that President Bush did have a desire to stick a US finger in the Iraqi pie, and the opportunity presented by 9/11 (the fear, anger, and desire for vengence of the US citizenary, and the international sympathy) was just too good of a chance to pass off.

Basically I think Bush grabbed the 9/11 football and made a run for the line....what kind of a leader trades off the death of his own citizens and intentionally drives up the fear and anger of the populice in order to manipulate those people into supporting his pre-concieved goal of attacking another nation state? The kind sitting in the Whitehouse right now.

Probably one of the more perverse aspects of Bush's reign is that when he used his alledged 'christian values' to gain re-election points, this actually appeared to gain him support from christians, rather than condemnation for bringing their religion into disrepute for personal gain.
I deeply suspect that everything you mentioned is true. I also feel that the biggest conspiracy against the people has been to convince the majority that Iraq was somehow implicated in the Sept. 11 attacks.
Didn't Saddam send an operative to assasinate Bush Sr.? If so, it's at least partially an opportunistic play at enacting revenge (so I chose the vendetta option, plus other things).

I shouldn't do this but I will anyway.
I will post some of my thoughts on it as if any of you cared what
my thoughts are.

Here is what I believe occured and a general idea of why I think it occured.
Obviously there are various levels of detail you can go into and in anything
short of a scholarly treatise anyone is going to be leaving a lot out.
I am of course including what I believe to be most important.
Always a question about exactly where one should start but I will choose
to start at the point after Iraqi troops were driven out of Kuwait, with no comment or reference to

anything that came before that.


At that point, 1991
aware that Iraq has chemical and biological weapons
and despite the rout of the Iraqi army it could be considered a credible
threat to its neighbours and possibly Israel should it be allowed
to retain those WMD and missiles with sufficient range to reach Israel
and worried that Iraq while not yet nuclear capable, has at that time
a nuclear weapons program.
The UN adopts a resolution part of which states
8. Decides that Iraq shall unconditionally accept the destruction, removal, or rendering harmless, under

international supervision, of:

(a) All chemical and biological weapons and all stocks of agents and all related subsystems and components

and all research, development, support and manufacturing facilities;

(b) All ballistic missiles with a range greater than 150 kilometres and related major parts, and repair

and production facilities

To ensure there is some good reason to comply with this, a sanctions
regime is put in place to last until the UN can determine that the
conditions have been complied with.

Immediately afterwards the US declare that regardless of compliance
the sanctions will remain in place until Saddam is no longer in power.

This strikes many people as being a distinct disincentive to Saddam to comply.
Most people would also take this to mean that America does not have a problem with the
type of government in Iraq just so long as it doesn't have Saddam.

The weapons inspections go much as you would expect with much reluctance
from the Iraqis and the occasional face off by the Iraqis who one would
imagine are trying to rescue some shreds of pride.

This continued until 1998, when the weapons inspectors were withdrawn
and Baghdad was bombed due to the "regime's" lack of compliance.
The bombing was done by the US without reference to the UN and in fact
they only told their principal ally the UK as the bombs began to fall.

According to the American weapons inspectors in their final report of their
investigations since the invasion, the job of the UN weapons inspectors
had in fact been pretty much done by 1996.

Skip forward now to 2000 but only briefly as it is in 2000 that Iraq
receives permission fromt the UN to accept euro's in payment for its oil
rather than dollars

Now we enter 2001 and early in that year 24 Feb 2001 Colin Powell states at a press conference
that sanctions have worked and that Saddam "has not developed any significant capability with
respect to weapons of mass destruction." and
also that "He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbor"

Not really surprising bearing in mind that US and UK planes have
been bombing areas of Iraq weekly for the last 10 years and had that big fireworks show in 1998.

Sep 11th comes along and according to many, the Bush administration immediately wants to lay the blame on

Iraq.
No one is really sure why, except perhaps the thought that we are hurting them and have been for
a long time, if anyone has a reason to attack us it'd be them.
Or maybe they are just disturbed that there is a country selling oil in a currency other than dollars.
If the rest of OPEC followed then the US economy would implode.

For whatever reason anyway nothing comes of it at this point as there is absolutely nothing to link
it to Iraq and it is declared that Al Qaeda are responsible and that Osama Bin Laden is the
brains behind the outfit and that he is living in Afghanistan.


The US demands that the Taliban, the de facto government of Afghanistan hand him over to them
as well as making other demands to close all terrorist training camps and allow American
soldiers into their country to verify that these are closed.

The Taliban refuse to speak directly to Bush but make statements via their embassy in Pakistan
and request evidence in relation to the claims about Osama and offer to try him in an Islamic court
if it can be provided.
The US refuses point blank.
The Taliban suggest extraditing him to a neutral country rather than to the US
(actually my memory was that they asked America to at least sit down with them and discuss the issue)
whichever it was, it was also rejected.

Most Europeans note the oddity that if Osama had been in any European country that they would by law
also have to refuse to hand Osama over to the US as we cannot do that where the person being
extradited may be executed.

On October 7th the invasion of Afghanistan begins with UN sanction.
People like me believe that basically Afghanistan was a gimme,
it was basically entirely unjustified for it to be attacked but America was going to attack someone
and no one much liked the Taliban.


2002 arrives, suddenly the American administration decides that Iraq has WMD that the sanctions
that was estimated to have brought about the death of half a million Iraqi children have not worked
and that It desperately needs to be stopped and stopped right now.

The rest of the world is rather less than convinced but while the US claims to have evidence
they also tell everyone that they cannot show it to them.

The UK persuades the US to at least try to look like they have some respect for international law
the US agrees to do so but also loudly states that if the UN doesn't support them they'll just go
to war anyway.
The US and UK put forward a resolution which the UN security council vote in favour of that
weapons inspectors be allowed back into Iraq and allowed to go absolutely anywhere they choose.
Apparently the UK government at least has forgotten that the weapons inspectors were withdrawn
and are caught referring to saddam having kicked them out.
When pulled up on this, they respond saying its the same thing really.

Many people at the time believe that the US believes that Saddam will reject it out of hand.

Saddam accepts it.
UN weapons inspectors return to Iraq and begin their search.
After about a couple of weeks they start publicly stating that the US who is claiming
to have evidence and know where the WMD are, aren't providing them with any information as
to where to look, and they haven't found any yet.

America says it will provide them with information but they never asked before.

Time goes by

No WMD found
More time and many inspections go by

No WMD found

America starts saying how big Iraq is and how hard it is to find something in a country the size of texas.

Iraq hands over a rather hefty dossier as demanded by the UN supposedly detailing everything
about their WMD and what happened to them.
America censors the entire document before allowing anyone else to see it and then says
it did not provide full information.
No one else can really back that up as no one else has seen it.

American regime leaders start saying that not finding wmd doesn't mean they don't exist.
Many people agree that not finding anything doesn't prove there isn't anything but also note
that not finding anything could just be because there isn't anything to find.

UK and US try to get UN to give them a resolution explicitly authorising war.
France says that the weapons inspectors should be allowed more time and if any resolution is
tabled to allow the attack at this stage they will veto it.
America rather disingenously says that just one country should not be able to determine
security council resolutions - (given that the US has vetoed far more resolutions than any
other country)
Despite UK nice guy persuasion and US threats, they cannot get even a majority of the security council
to go along with them and finally give up on getting a UN resolution.

Finally we are about to have the war start,
in the final 24 hours
the US abandoning all pretence that there are WMD advises that war can be averted if Saddam leaves the country or is killed.

It is actually a bit hard to believe that the US would have actually backed off at that stage anyway and the idea of having full control over
an oil producing country right in the middle of all the other oil producing
middle eastern countries,
where they might just build military bases and have some kind
of government in Iraq that they can control must have had most of the oil
aware members of the administration drooling.
Saddam doesn't leave, his regime members don't kill him
The war begins

After going to the states and touring the American West I believe that the American military is one of the driving forces of the U.S. economy, providing jobs to both soldiers and military contractors and valuable training to the people it employs. Simply, if the United States didn't get into a war once in awhile, there would be no need for a military.

Once, that may have been true. Not anymore. Since the end of the Cold War, defense spending has been reduced to a token figure. the military contracted sharply, and the West is left with far fewer bases. In addition, the military first moved in when the West had no economy of its own. Now that it does, the military is marginal.
In any case, that's not like that throughout the US. I live in Rochester, NY. There are a few National Guard armories and VA clinics here and there, but that's about it. The nearest base to me is Niagara Falls. The nearest major base, Ft. Drumm, is three hours away from me. I know that back in WWII, the University of Rochester was used in the Manhattan Project, and had several measures to protect the campus from attack. I'm hard pressed to find a project like that nowadays, or even leftover from recently.

Ooops I left out the presentation Colin Powell made to the UN
in Feb 2003


Just a couple of lines of his should be enough
given that Americas own weapons inspectors after the invasion
declared that Iraq since 1991 had not continued producing any WMD
of any kind and the WMD that they did have previously,
were pretty effectively disposed of by 1996

"What you will see is an accumulation of facts and disturbing patterns of behavior. The facts on Iraqis' behavior--Iraq's behavior demonstrate that Saddam Hussein and his regime have made no effort--no effort--to disarm as required by the international community. Indeed, the facts and Iraq's behavior show that Saddam Hussein and his regime are concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction"

"We also have satellite photos that indicate that banned materials have recently been moved from a number of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction facilities. "

I imagine it involved communists and Jews somehow...

Yeah, it seems they're responsible for all sorts of bad deeds these days... :rolleyes:

(I think Rotovia is joking. I hope Rotovia is joking.)

Now, I had a random little thought. While I support the war, I never believed the WMD crap. Unless Saddam Hussein hid them in a bunker in the earth's outer core, I believe none are likely to be found, and I bet the Clinton and Bush Admin. both knew this. So, why did they tell us this? Was it because they were afraid that the American people wouldn't accept the truth? I think yes. Quite honestly, I don't blame them. Anyone I've talked to can't take the truth.

Oil, but there were other motives.
I'm glad you said that. I was waiting for someone to go with the majority of global (and American) opinion. Of course, no one wants to admit Hussein's price fixation of oil, nor how he treated it. 2.5 million bpd is not a lot for oil reserves of that size. Geographically, much more is possible. Notice, of course, that the oil industry was nationalized. In many respects, it still is.

Now, I had a random little thought. While I support the war, I never believed the WMD crap. Unless Saddam Hussein hid them in a bunker in the earth's outer core, I believe none are likely to be found, and I bet the Clinton and Bush Admin. both knew this. So, why did they tell us this? Was it because they were afraid that the American people wouldn't accept the truth? I think yes. Quite honestly, I don't blame them. Anyone I've talked to can't take the truth.

*bangs fist on table*

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH!

[Sorry, had to :D ]

Once, that may have been true. Not anymore. Since the end of the Cold War, defense spending has been reduced to a token figure.

The present-day Pentagon budget, adjusted for inflation, is 12 percent larger than the average defense budget of the Cold War era.
According to the Pentagon's announced long-range plans, by 2009 its budget will exceed the Cold War average by 23 percent

Quoting from an article titled The Normalization of War
by Andrew J. Bacevich

Andrew J. Bacevich is Professor of International Relations and Director of the Center for International Relations at Boston University. A graduate of West Point and a Vietnam veteran, he has a doctorate in history from Princeton and was a Bush Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin. He is the author of several books, including the just published The New American Militarism, How Americans Are Seduced by War.

Shoot I'll never make a scholar
The quotes and the description of Professor Bacevich were taken from
http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=2334

Now, I had a random little thought. While I support the war, I never believed the WMD crap. Unless Saddam Hussein hid them in a bunker in the earth's outer core, I believe none are likely to be found, and I bet the Clinton and Bush Admin. both knew this. So, why did they tell us this? Was it because they were afraid that the American people wouldn't accept the truth? I think yes. Quite honestly, I don't blame them. Anyone I've talked to can't take the truth.
I take it you dont much care for democracy, you know that little thing where people are able to make an informed choice about their government and vote accordingly for people to represent them, and where those people are entrusted to make informed choices such as voting funding for a war...you know that system that entirely breaks down and simply cannot work if no one can make an informed choice because the President lies to voters and to their representives so he can go wage a war, apparently because he's bored or something...?

Relative Power, your post appears quite comprehensive and accords well with my memory of events apart from one possible exception. I understood (although I may be mistaken) that the Teliban had not ruled out handing Osama over to the US itself, but had insisted that there be some undertaking that Osama would be given a fair trial and not subjected to torture.....an undertaking the US itself would demand prior to extradicting a criminal to a country they have extradition treaty with.

Relative Power, your post appears quite comprehensive and accords well with my memory of events apart from one possible exception. I understood (although I may be mistaken) that the Teliban had not ruled out handing Osama over to the US itself, but had insisted that there be some undertaking that Osama would be given a fair trial and not subjected to torture.....an undertaking the US itself would demand prior to extradicting a criminal to a country they have extradition treaty with.

I think elements of the Taliban higher officials were attempting such negotiations but they would have had to sell any such deal to their leader
if it had gotten anywhere with the U.S.

But I don't actually remember that at all - I got that from my research tonight.

I think elements of the Taliban higher officials were attempting such negotiations but they would have had to sell any such deal to their leader
if it had gotten anywhere with the U.S.

But I don't actually remember that at all - I got that from my research tonight.
Cheers for that clarification.

I think the main reason was to contain Iran. We had two potential chaotic power vacuums in Iraq and Afghanistan, vacuums which Iran was sure to exploit. We decided to change things now, rather than wait until it was too late to have any true influence over the situation.

Granted, I think oil and a personal vendetta by Bush also had something to do with it, but overall I think the main strategy was to try and contain Iran.

Personally, I think it would have been much better to go after North Korea first. It would allow reunification of Korea, and allow Japan to rest easy. China would have been a tricky obstacle, but considering that you can't have a religious based insurgency in NoKo, I think the effort would have been worth it, and it would have been a much better first option than Iraq was.

[/minihijack]

:eek: Obviously it was to stop OPEC from adopting the Euro and to destroy the EU so America could increase their cultural imperialist hegemony over the earth. That is why a "new" Europe was named, so that America could control it and put in puppet governments! Also there were some dealings with the New World Order, the Illuminati, and the Free Masons, and the Reptilian Aliens and Red China. And some other people.

you can't have a religious based insurgency in NoKo,
Want to bet? From my limited collection of knowledge NoKo's glorious leader has created a cult based around himself (Children sing songs of how great he is, etc.). Some of it may just be not wanting the Secret Police on your doorstep at the middle of the night, but a certain amount of the brain washign would probably stick in some of the population.

I think the main reason was to contain Iran. We had two potential chaotic power vacuums in Iraq and Afghanistan, vacuums which Iran was sure to exploit. We decided to change things now, rather than wait until it was too late to have any true influence over the situation.

[/minihijack]

Not a theory I've ever considered.
It has some level of credibility although my feeling is that it
is probably more of a convenient and welcome side effect rather
than the principle reason.

Primarily as there wasn't really a power vacuum or particular instability
in Iraq until the invasion.

Did I forget the Knights Templar? Them too. Of course the cyborgs are well represented by the vice president!

I say there's another reason for Iraq: US forces in Afaghistan got tired of blowing up donkey trains full of 80's war surplus military stuff.

:D

:eek: Obviously it was to stop OPEC from adopting the Euro...
I’ve actually heard people say this part was the reason.

According to Wolfowitz, the reason for invading Iraq was to have a better place to keep our troops in the Middle East.

It makes sense when you think about it. Since the end of the Cold War our Middle East forces were deployed in Saudi Arabia, which was a major problem. If you've ever listened to a Bin Laden speech, you'll notice he won't stop citing the American presence in the Islamic Holy Land as justification for 9/11. Most of the attackers themselves were Saudis, undoubtedly acting from similar motivations. So it was that America learned that its foreign policy was pissing too many people off and would have to be changed.

But given the strategic importance of the region (oil), it's not like we could just pull out and not have any muscle there. So we needed another nation to establish a presence in, preferably with pre-built bases. Like Iraq, whose ass we'd already whooped before, and who we mistakenly believed to be suffering from a lack of nationalism and to therefore be incapable of putting up a fight. There were plenty of excuses to invade, and Saddam had very few friends, so it must have seemed like a win-win situation.

The attentive ones probably noticed that within days of occupying Iraq we pulled virtually all of our troops out of Saudi Arabia. The withdrawal was permanent, so they aren't coming back. Problem solved, no more Saudi support for Al Quaeda.

Of course now we can't pull troops out of Iraq or we're screwed. And it turns out they weren't pushovers after all. We solved one problem but created another.

:eek: Obviously it was to stop OPEC from adopting the Euro <snip> .
The snipped portion contained insane suggestions that would seem
to be thrown in to imply the first part is as insane as lizard people.

I’ve actually heard people say this part was the reason.

I don't think it was the primary reason
but there is no doubt that if oil was sold in a currency other than the
dollar then the U.S. economy would be in serious trouble.
So, I wouldn't rule out the possibility that it was a consideration
and possibly a major one.

Want to bet? From my limited collection of knowledge NoKo's glorious leader has created a cult based around himself (Children sing songs of how great he is, etc.). Some of it may just be not wanting the Secret Police on your doorstep at the middle of the night, but a certain amount of the brain washign would probably stick in some of the population.

Refugees flee the country and go to China quite often, not that they have any other options...the conditions for the general populace in NoKo are known to be absolutely horrid, something that wasn't the case in Iraq

...are you telling me the welcome wouldn't be warmer than Iraq?

How many North Koreans would strap bombs to themselves and die for their "great leader"?

A guerilla based insurgency would spring up, certainly, but it would be a much more "conventional" guerilla effort, and one that we could probably deal with, provided we found a way to keep China out of the picture.

Refugees flee the country and go to China quite often, not that they have any other options...the conditions for the general populace in NoKo are known to be absolutely horrid, something that wasn't the case in Iraq

...are you telling me the welcome wouldn't be warmer than Iraq?

How many North Koreans would strap bombs to themselves and die for their "great leader"?

A guerilla based insurgency would spring up, certainly, but it would be a much more "conventional" guerilla effort, and one that we could probably deal with, provided we found a way to keep China out of the picture.


But North Korea has nuclear weapons apparently
and I think the belief is they would use them
and while it does claim to have oil it doesn't even begin to
match Iraq and is completely undeveloped as currently they
import any oil they need.

Cheeny told him too. Because Bush isn't smart enough to plan the War in the first place. And Cheeny works in the oil business. I personally believe Bush is nothing more than a puppet.

We're fighting for the prime volleyball real-estate they have.

I take it you dont much care for democracy, you know that little thing where people are able to make an informed choice about their government and vote accordingly for people to represent them, and where those people are entrusted to make informed choices such as voting funding for a war...you know that system that entirely breaks down and simply cannot work if no one can make an informed choice because the President lies to voters and to their representives so he can go wage a war, apparently because he's bored or something...?

I have nothing against democracy. In fact, I think it's great. I do, however, have a lot against the mob rule that we see in the US. I have many complaints against the President, but one praise above all: that he doesn't submit to the mob mentality rampaging through the US.

:eek: Obviously it was to stop OPEC from adopting the Euro and to destroy the EU so America could increase their cultural imperialist hegemony over the earth. That is why a "new" Europe was named, so that America could control it and put in puppet governments! Also there were some dealings with the New World Order, the Illuminati, and the Free Masons, and the Reptilian Aliens and Red China. And some other people.
Unfortunatly, some may find that true.

Cheeny told him too. Because Bush isn't smart enough to plan the War in the first place. And Cheeny works in the oil business. I personally believe Bush is nothing more than a puppet.
Here's a tip: all politicians are puppets, even the ones that are perfectly capable of running there own show. They spend too much time campaigning for themselves or for someone else, and not enough on policy. That's for his staff. I'm not fond of it myself. But hey, that's Washington. In fact, that's America these days: we keep the substance hidden as no one wants to bother with it. Instead, we get this glossy sheen to look at.

According to Wolfowitz, the reason for invading Iraq was to have a better place to keep our troops in the Middle East.

It makes sense when you think about it. Since the end of the Cold War our Middle East forces were deployed in Saudi Arabia, which was a major problem. If you've ever listened to a Bin Laden speech, you'll notice he won't stop citing the American presence in the Islamic Holy Land as justification for 9/11. Most of the attackers themselves were Saudis, undoubtedly acting from similar motivations. So it was that America learned that its foreign policy was pissing too many people off and would have to be changed.

But given the strategic importance of the region (oil), it's not like we could just pull out and not have any muscle there. So we needed another nation to establish a presence in, preferably with pre-built bases. Like Iraq, whose ass we'd already whooped before, and who we mistakenly believed to be suffering from a lack of nationalism and to therefore be incapable of putting up a fight. There were plenty of excuses to invade, and Saddam had very few friends, so it must have seemed like a win-win situation.

The attentive ones probably noticed that within days of occupying Iraq we pulled virtually all of our troops out of Saudi Arabia. The withdrawal was permanent, so they aren't coming back. Problem solved, no more Saudi support for Al Quaeda.

Of course now we can't pull troops out of Iraq or we're screwed. And it turns out they weren't pushovers after all. We solved one problem but created another.

It's a good idea, and pretty original from the other drivel that I hear. Of course, I must ask you this: if the Bush Admin. wanted to move troops outta Saudi Arabia, why not move to Qatar? Indeed, most of the troops in Saudi Arabia moved to Qatar, which doesn't nearly have as much ideaological baggage with it. I have yet to hear of an attack on thhe military on Qatar that is remotely akin to what happens in Iraq,, or even Khobar.

I just wanted to say that I am glad no one chose oil as a single issue. I thought it'd be a clear majority.

IMO, it's a whole melting pot of reasons, with oil and Bush vendetta as the top two issues on why Iraq was invaded.

I have a question for you and everybody who believes it about "the oil" . Why didn't the US just invade Venezuala during their troubles instead, it would have been easier and cheaper?


Oil, but there were other motives.

I have a question for you and everybody who believes it about "the oil" . Why didn't the US just invade Venezuala during their troubles instead, it would have been easier and cheaper?

With the major selling factor of action being needed that of Arab terrorism?
The fallback position being that the leader of the country is an unelected
dictator who tortures and mass murders his own people?
Don't quite see how they could have sold either in relation to
Chavez and Venezuela.

Well the US didn't invade but most do rather suspect its administration
supported the coup and may have helped to instigate it.

The U.S. certainly was the only country to recognize the coup leaders
as the legitimate government of the country within the 72* hour period
that the coup lasted for, which would be rather rushed by any normal
standards.

Plus it is not the expected response from a democratic country to the ousting
of a democratically elected government by undemocratic means
especially when the first act is to suspend the constitution.

The middle east is still the prize when it comes to oil anyway,
Iraq doesn't just give control of Iraqi oil it also allows the projection
of power into all the other oil rich countries.
Along witht the stark lesson that if America does turn against them
no one is going to stop them.


Venezuela can always be harassed by Colombia when the time is deemed
right, a little border incursion here, destruction of a village accidentally
with some dubious excuse such as it being used by drug dealers or shipping
arms to FARC, and OH were we over the border and in your country,
the Venezuelans will have to meet the incursion militarily
causing an incident that the US can then become very "concerned" about.


All in the interests of preserving democracy and rule of law of course.


* I keep saying 72 hours but it seems it was actually 48 hours
my bad
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/documentaries/storyville/chavez.shtml

The present-day Pentagon budget, adjusted for inflation, is 12 percent larger than the average defense budget of the Cold War era.
According to the Pentagon's announced long-range plans, by 2009 its budget will exceed the Cold War average by 23 percent


And yet it takes up less of a portion of our economy than it did during the cold war.

Cheeny told him too. Because Bush isn't smart enough to plan the War in the first place. And Cheeny works in the oil business. I personally believe Bush is nothing more than a puppet.
*cough* Cheney is how you spell it *cough*

Once, that may have been true. Not anymore. Since the end of the Cold War, defense spending has been reduced to a token figure.


The present-day Pentagon budget, adjusted for inflation, is 12 percent larger than the average defense budget of the Cold War era.
According to the Pentagon's announced long-range plans, by 2009 its budget will exceed the Cold War average by 23 percent.

And yet it takes up less of a portion of our economy than it did during the cold war.

Which would still leave it a long way from being a token figure.

Well, I voted other because I believe the Grand Strategy for the Middle East (this includes the oil issue) and the Vendetta are the core reasons for the invasion.
I don't think Bush is a total idiot (no on an intellectual scale) so I believe he figured out that there were no WMDs in Iraq and that there were WMDs being built in North Korea (even Clinton found out about that). Therefore, the notion that Iraq was invaded to "protect America" is false.

Which would still leave it a long way from being a token figure.
I'm not saying it is a token figure, but I am saying that your figures are misleading. Compare the current economy with the economy of the eighties and a clearer picture appears. The military spends more, yet has less of an impact.

I'm not saying it is a token figure, but I am saying that your figures are misleading. Compare the current economy with the economy of the eighties and a clearer picture appears. The military spends more, yet has less of an impact.

How are the figures misleading, they are exactly what they say they are.

Which is an increase in real terms over the average spending during the
cold war and therefore not token by any remote stretch of the imagination.

How are the figures misleading, they are exactly what they say they are.

Which is an increase in real terms over the average spending during the
cold war and therefore not token by any remote stretch of the imagination.
It was misleading in the fact that it seemed to convey an impression that the spending increases were uncalled for and much too large. They were in reality in line with (in fact, a little slower than) the growth of the economy, as is to be expected.

All the same, I get the feeling that we're talking about something completely different. And I'm going to lay off the threadjacking now.

It's a good idea, and pretty original from the other drivel that I hear. Of course, I must ask you this: if the Bush Admin. wanted to move troops outta Saudi Arabia, why not move to Qatar? Indeed, most of the troops in Saudi Arabia moved to Qatar, which doesn't nearly have as much ideaological baggage with it. I have yet to hear of an attack on thhe military on Qatar that is remotely akin to what happens in Iraq,, or even Khobar.

Yeah that's the one part of it that doesn't make a lot of sense. Also, why would we have stationed troops in Saudi Arabia in the first place with those other friendly nations next door? I can only speculate that perhaps the barracks and related facilities to station tens of thousands of troops are extremely expensive to build.

Anyways, pulling out of Saudi Arabia was the explanation given by Wolfowitz in an interview, and he's known for having loose lips and a poor sense of public relations. So I figured if anyone in the administration would utter the truth it would be him.

I might as well offer my opinion, but please, don't focus solely on me. Anyhow, there was a GS all along, but it just conflicted with other things. The neocons believe that if Iraq is properly reformed, then the Middle East will transform into a democratic free market zone with a softer Islam (and perhaps softer Judaism) and no oil dependency for the Middle East. That will neutralize any major threat from that area, at least physically. Whether it creates a moral threat later on, as a reconstructed Western Europe does today, remains to be seen.
In any case, I disagree that Iraq was the weakest in the Middle East. The Gulf states and Syria are far weaker. Instead, Iraq was a.) an enemy, b.) cosmopolitan enough to affect the whole region, c.) a distraction for our enemies, and d.) easiest. The last one may not sound true, but it is. For one, imagine if this were Iran. What would be needed to passify the country? It's far larger than Iraq, more populous, and far more diverse. I suspect an insurgency there would make Iraq seem like a Christmas dinner.
Iraq also has oil to help fund it, and a fairly large middle class. Already, we saw economic growth of 50% last year, and while it stalled this year, it is a glimpse at Iraq's potential. What will it be like ten years from now? Will I live to the day where I can fly a major airliner into Baghdad, frolick at the Ritz-Carlton there, and see the ruins of Babylon when I park in a nearby parking lot? Can I expect only to lock my car door as a security measure? Will I ever be able to cruise the Tigris or Eurphrates? Will we see products that have a tag stating "Made in Iraq"? How about "Made in Kurdistan" or "Made in Sunnitopia" (or whatever they call it)?

I think it's more likely to be an economically failing socialist hellhole in 10 years by the looks of their constitution.

I think it's more likely to be an economically failing socialist hellhole in 10 years by the looks of their constitution.


I think it is reasonably safe to say that in 10 yrs it will be an occupied
country with an elected government that can do anything except
make decisions that would affect US interests.
Hardly socialist either considering that Bremer privatized
two hundred state owned enterprises,
legalised the 100% ownership of Iraqi business by foreign corporations,
mandated unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds of foreign corporations who can send unlimited amounts of funds to their offshore accounts
and granted US corporations forty year ownership licenses for all of their Iraqi investments.

Gosh now, who can figure why there is resistance to US occupation in Iraq

It could have been anything, but since no one tells the truth anymore we might as well write all the possibilities down, put them on a board and throw a dart blindfolded. Which ever one the dart hits, that is what we stick with.

It could have been anything, but since no one tells the truth anymore we might as well write all the possibilities down, put them on a board and throw a dart blindfolded. Which ever one the dart hits, that is what we stick with.

That assumes that it is impossible to look at what was done
and when and what is being done now and logically arrive
at a conclusion as to what the intentions were.

If for example a man is accused of shooting a shopkeeper in the course
of a robbery and he claims self defence
but you know he bought a gun,
dressed in a manner to avoid identification,
waited outside the shop until there were no customers
then went in and was found later to have fired the gun
and the bullets fired by the gun were in the dead shopkeeper
and in his pockets was the money missing from the till.

It doesn't really matter how many lies he or his family and girlfriend tell,
you should be able to come to some reasonable conclusion about what his intentions were.

That assumes that it is impossible to look at what was done
and when and what is being done now and logically arrive
at a conclusion as to what the intentions were.

If for example a man is accused of shooting a shopkeeper in the course
of a robbery and he claims self defence
but you know he bought a gun,
dressed in a manner to avoid identification,
waited outside the shop until there were no customers
then went in and was found later to have fired the gun
and the bullets fired by the gun were in the dead shopkeeper
and in his pockets was the money missing from the till.

It doesn't really matter how many lies he or his family and girlfriend tell,
you should be able to come to some reasonable conclusion about what his intentions were.

Just about all of the evidence we as a public recieve comes from the media. Whether it be internet, fox news *shivers*, or a news paper. I'm not going to run around screaming that The War in Iraq was for children feed just because a website said it. I'd rather see a higher authority take action and present viable physical evidence on George W's motives. Until then I'll sit here and shake my fist at the white house, which is about 700 miles away.

But North Korea has nuclear weapons apparently
and I think the belief is they would use them
and while it does claim to have oil it doesn't even begin to
match Iraq and is completely undeveloped as currently they
import any oil they need.


You must understand that the North Korean Military in addition to being quite large as a rather good deterent against US attack. The South Korean capital of Seoul, whose metropolitan area contains 8 million civilians is roughly 37 miles from DMZ border. The DPRK has literally thousands of rapid firing artillery pieces in place that have Seoul well within their range. The opening barrage would kill many thousands within a few minutes, as well as inflict massive casualties on the US Army units near the DMZ and the ROK military. Essentially if we launched a strike against Kim Jong's nuclear facilities, he could level Seoul before we could even engage the artillery via airpower. A bit more of a danger than lobbing a few SCUDS at Kuwait.

You must understand that the North Korean Military in addition to being quite large as a rather good deterent against US attack. The South Korean capital of Seoul, whose metropolitan area contains 8 million civilians is roughly 37 miles from DMZ border. The DPRK has literally thousands of rapid firing artillery pieces in place that have Seoul well within their range. The opening barrage would kill many thousands within a few minutes, as well as inflict massive casualties on the US Army units near the DMZ and the ROK military. Essentially if we launched a strike against Kim Jong's nuclear facilities, he could level Seoul before we could even engage the artillery via airpower. A bit more of a danger than lobbing a few SCUDS at Kuwait.


Whichever way you look at it N Korea not the easy target that Iraq was

You must understand that the North Korean Military in addition to being quite large as a rather good deterent against US attack. The South Korean capital of Seoul, whose metropolitan area contains 8 million civilians is roughly 37 miles from DMZ border. The DPRK has literally thousands of rapid firing artillery pieces in place that have Seoul well within their range. The opening barrage would kill many thousands within a few minutes, as well as inflict massive casualties on the US Army units near the DMZ and the ROK military. Essentially if we launched a strike against Kim Jong's nuclear facilities, he could level Seoul before we could even engage the artillery via airpower. A bit more of a danger than lobbing a few SCUDS at Kuwait.
Please read the bold part again.

Please read the bold part again.

what point are you trying to make

that both the quote your referring to and my own are saying
that Iraq was considerably less dangerous to go to war with than
N. Korea would be

I already know that.

If you think your actually pointing out that I'm somehow mistaken
and there are two non consistent views being expressed then you
will need to make it plain, in your own words please

The idea that the Iraq war was fought for oil is ridiculous. Most people just think it's a bit too convenient given Bush's background, but if we were really interested in kicking people's asses for oil we'd probably have started somewhere else [Venezuela, Saudi Arabia] and we wouldn't be at a standstill like we are in Iraq.

I'd have to check the figures, but I'm not entirely certain we as a nation are seeing any particularly special increase in crude imports; most of the Iraqi oil fields were destroyed or sabotaged anyway. Furthermore, as far as Middle Eastern nations go, Iraq is hardly the fattest cat on the block as far as oil is concerned.

The real reason I think we went to war was simply because Bush felt it was the right thing to do. I don't agree with him in the slightest of course, but I'm not prepared to rule out the possibility that he really does think he's doing the right thing. A number of factors led to this decision , most of which are probably bullshit. Israel probably had something to do with it too. If Iraq [i]had developed WMDs, Israel was probably a more likely target than the continental United States.

The idea that the Iraq war was fought for oil is ridiculous. Most people just think it's a bit too convenient given Bush's background, but if we were really interested in kicking people's asses for oil we'd probably have started somewhere else [Venezuela, Saudi Arabia] and we wouldn't be at a standstill like we are in Iraq.



Saudi is a friendly government but with an unfriendly population.
Nothing major to currently be gained by making any changes there.
Venezuela requires a good deal more propaganda before US can move
too directly on it. It is lowgrade noise in the background at the moment
but it can be turned up anytime they like.

US never expected to be at the standstill that they are at in Iraq,
It was thought it would be a cakewalk as Saddam's military
did not stand a chance against American military might.

In the midst of the al qa'eda, arab moslem hysteria
the US was able to pretend to have reason to attack and occupy
assuming they would always stay one or more lies ahead of everyone on it.
That part has worked quite successfully, most people are aware that they
are lying but there are some like yourself,
although that is mostly though not solely limited to US citizens
who simply find it unthinkable regardless of everything that has
been shown to be lies.

You guys are all wrong. It was to guarantee a Constitutioanl Amendment banning Gay Marriage.

Actually, it was to divert media attention away from his own intern scandal. You didn't hear about that? See, it worked!

Simple. Iraq was doable.

What does a bully do when somebody throws a stone at him from behind and he could not catch the one who threw the stone?

He takes out the nearest weakling to establish authority.

Iraq was the perfect country. An already demonised leader, Saddam. No need to start from scratch, just use Osama and Saddam often enough together (Saddama! ;) ). Exclusive contracts of reconstruction to buddy buddy companies. Good money there. Takes out an enemy of Israel and reduces reliance on KSA to provide bases. Neighbor to Iran, a country to be watched and intimidated. Can suck in the jihadis in the area nicely so that they are pre-occupied trying to kill the GIs nearby rather than plotting to attack the homeland. The oil. Iraq was not invaded because it had WMD's , it was invaded because it did not have them.

Like I said, Iraq was the perfect country.

The idea that the Iraq war was fought for oil is ridiculous. Most people just think it's a bit too convenient given Bush's background, but if we were really interested in kicking people's asses for oil we'd probably have started somewhere else [Venezuela, Saudi Arabia] and we wouldn't be at a standstill like we are in Iraq.Well, the chance of Bush getting away with an invasion of either of the two you mentioned would have been unlikely, considering how happy the international community was about the invasion of a rogue state that had no real friends anywhere.
The idea that the US invaded Iraq to be able to use Iraqi oil is lunacy, as you will agree, but that doesn't mean oil was the primary motive. Among others, it's American companies rebuilding Iraq and it's oil infrastructure, so that's a lot of money that Bush is feeding directly from the budget to American companies under the pretense of fighting a war. The idea of controlling the Middle East is also a key factor to the invasion. The ME is a very influential region, the three most important nations probably being Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. This is those countries have vast oil reserves. If this wasn't the case, they'd be as popular as Timor Leste when it came to international politics. The US is already present in Saudi Arabia. It took control of Iraq (physically) and by doing that it sent a sign to Iran (though the intended message seems to have gotten "distorted" by the fact that Iraq didn't just peacefully accept American soldiers on it's soil the way Bush had hoped).
So, the oil in Iraq is not the reason for the invasion, but oil most certainly is.

Actually, it was to divert media attention away from his own intern scandal. You didn't hear about that? See, it worked!No it didn't. (http://www.eulenspiegel-zeitschrift.de/Eulenspiegel/Hintergrundbilder/Prakt1024/prakt1024.html) ;)

Simple. Iraq was doable.

What does a bully do when somebody throws a stone at him from behind and he could not catch the one who threw the stone?

He takes out the nearest weakling to establish authority.

Iraq was the perfect country. An already demonised leader, Saddam. No need to start from scratch, just use Osama and Saddam often enough together (Saddama! ;) ). Exclusive contracts of reconstruction to buddy buddy companies. Good money there. Takes out an enemy of Israel and reduces reliance on KSA to provide bases. Neighbor to Iran, a country to be watched and intimidated. Can suck in the jihadis in the area nicely so that they are pre-occupied trying to kill the GIs nearby rather than plotting to attack the homeland. The oil. Iraq was not invaded because it had WMD's , it was invaded because it did not have them.

Like I said, Iraq was the perfect country.

Exactly. Only I don't think the oil thing was a reason. We knew Saddam would try to burn Iraqi oil feilds, so as to leave nothing of any real importance to an economy left. If he can't win, I think he wanted to make sure no one would.

All of the given reasons are so awe-inspiringly stupid and 100% spin. The only logical explanation I have is that the real reasons will come to light years from now a la deepthroat. "Democracy in the Middle East" is so obviously bullshit because we support Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The oil explanation makes no sense because Iraq doesn't actually have that much oil compared to other countries in the region and we were already getting a lot of their oil in the oil-for-food program. The WMD reasoning is simply ludicrous. It would have taken a truly historic ignoring of intelligence on the part of the administration for them to believe without reservation that Saddam had WMDs.

The only explanation I can think of is that the Bushies were itchin' for a war and Iraq was the best target. Maybe I'm just naive, but I have a hard time believing even an administration as reckless and cavalier about the rule of law and human life would do something so... for lack of a better word... retarded.

Exactly. Only I don't think the oil thing was a reason. We knew Saddam would try to burn Iraqi oil feilds, so as to leave nothing of any real importance to an economy left. If he can't win, I think he wanted to make sure no one would.The military took that into consideration. They planned for taking those things as quickly as possible to prevent that and to have units ready to deal with the situation as quickly as possible should it happen.

Only I don't think the oil thing was a reason.

No, not the "cheap oil from Iraq" thing.

Holding the key to energy security of developing countries like India and China gives tremendous leverage to the US. A huge chunk of these two countries' oil comes thru the straits of Hormuz. Sometime ago I posted an article on how US has gained control over the CAR countries with energy resources, with the help of the color-coded revolution and soft coups.

http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=429104

Oil was not the primary reason. But control of energy resources and routes is a significant factor in invading Iraq and pretty much most of US foreign policy.

Yeah that's the one part of it that doesn't make a lot of sense. Also, why would we have stationed troops in Saudi Arabia in the first place with those other friendly nations next door? I can only speculate that perhaps the barracks and related facilities to station tens of thousands of troops are extremely expensive to build.

Anyways, pulling out of Saudi Arabia was the explanation given by Wolfowitz in an interview, and he's known for having loose lips and a poor sense of public relations. So I figured if anyone in the administration would utter the truth it would be him.
I actually had a sense why, I just didn't want to reveal it. If I stated my opinion, the focus is shifted to me and away from the issue at hand. I guess I wasn't asking so much as trying to stimulate thought.

Saudi is a friendly government but with an unfriendly population.
Nothing major to currently be gained by making any changes there.
Venezuela requires a good deal more propaganda before US can move
too directly on it. It is lowgrade noise in the background at the moment
but it can be turned up anytime they like.

US never expected to be at the standstill that they are at in Iraq,
It was thought it would be a cakewalk as Saddam's military
did not stand a chance against American military might.

In the midst of the al qa'eda, arab moslem hysteria
the US was able to pretend to have reason to attack and occupy
assuming they would always stay one or more lies ahead of everyone on it.
That part has worked quite successfully, most people are aware that they
are lying but there are some like yourself,
although that is mostly though not solely limited to US citizens
who simply find it unthinkable regardless of everything that has
been shown to be lies.
That was like a poem.

I think it's more likely to be an economically failing socialist hellhole in 10 years by the looks of their constitution.
The first constitution never works out. IIn a sense, this is simply a very long interim coonstitution, for I'm sure they will right a better one in the next decade or so. Not even the US, remember, had one constitution. The Articles of Confederation were probably the sorriest excuse of a constitution if there ever was one. But the second one was pure genius. That's my hope.

I'm thinking he's interested in a general invasion of the middle east, and he personally wants to take a crap on top of that meteorite in Mecca. But otherwise, it's for control of the oil resources and to stabilize the region for American Business.

Israel probably had something to do with it too. If Iraq had developed WMDs, Israel was probably a more likely target than the continental United States.
Israel has worked miracles for the world. Now before anyone says anything, don't assume that the region was hunky dory before Israel showed up, because it wasn't. It was arguably worse. That being said, Israel was what prevented the Middle East from becoming a Soviet playground. The least the US can do is ensure its safety.

What I want to know is this... if we went to war for oil, where the hell is it? Gas prices sure as hell aren't going down.

The first constitution never works out. IIn a sense, this is simply a very long interim coonstitution, for I'm sure they will right a better one in the next decade or so. Not even the US, remember, had one constitution. The Articles of Confederation were probably the sorriest excuse of a constitution if there ever was one. But the second one was pure genius. That's my hope.The German constitution is the same since it was first adopted in 1949 (if you don't count ammendments).

Israel has worked miracles for the world. Now before anyone says anything, don't assume that the region was hunky dory before Israel showed up, because it wasn't. It was arguably worse. That being said, Israel was what prevented the Middle East from becoming a Soviet playground. The least the US can do is ensure its safety.


I'd argue the exact opposite. Israeli pressure forced the neighboring countries to join ranks with the Soviets. The bullying of their superior military, along with their zionist ambitions are what demonized them and America in the Muslim world, probably resulting in the attacks of 9/11, and naturally the cause of the thousands of deaths in the region and the forced refugee camps of millions of suffering Palestinians. The Soviets were not particularly interested in Arabia, they have their own oil and gas resources in the Caspian. Saudi Arabia was allied with us from the beginning, and before America sided with the Israelis, the Iraqis were also on our side. Jordan was much more helpful, the Israelis are inconsequential to the fight against the Reds. Moreover, they are troublemakers within their own borders and among their neighbors, helping to keep two dictatorships firmly propped up through defense needs (Syria and Egypt).

What I want to know is this... if we went to war for oil, where the hell is it? Gas prices sure as hell aren't going down.Not enough refineries. Oil != gas.

The German constitution is the same since it was first adopted in 1949 (if you don't count ammendments).
Probably because it was written so good, and probably because there was more outside intervention in writing it. There is minimal outside intervention in Iraq, as is plain to see. As a result, they are writiing crap. But crappy constitutions don't last long.

Getting to the oil fields in Iraq has never meant lower prices for you to drive around in your SUV. Why would it? The oil prices are up and we're taking it without too much complaint. It's like if they raised the price to five dollars a slice at my favorite pizza place. Yes, I'd hold out. But they know I'll be back. They know I need that fucking pizza.
There are other reasons for getting to that oil. Russia's economy for one.
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/03/28/1048653860186.html?oneclick=true

For another:
"The latest plan, obtained by Newsnight from the US State Department was, we learned, drafted with the help of American oil industry consultants."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/4354269.stm

Another:
"What if it is toppled by a domestic coup? The expected friendliness of the succeeding regime with Washington would not automatically translate into cancellation of contracts with the petroleum corporations of France, Russia, China, India, Canada, Spain, the Netherlands, Vietnam and many others. The alternative is, of course, an invasion by the United States or by a US-led coalition, resulting in the defeat and toppling of Saddam's regime."
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20021230&s=hiro20021216

I don't feel that oil was the only reason for going to Iraq. But it is one reason. No, it doesn't mean that you get cheap gas now. It never meant that. It does mean grabbing hold of a gigantic supply of oil of which many experts believe is limited. It also means having other nations come to us if their supplies run low. Like to drive your Mercedes, Putin? Sign this.

Probably because it was written so good, and probably because there was more outside intervention in writing it. There is minimal outside intervention in Iraq, as is plain to see. As a result, they are writiing crap. But crappy constitutions don't last long.
Nope, no intervention in the German constitution. If at all, it required an Allied ok, but I don't recall them turning the design down or being involved in writing it.
There may be a difference in Iraq because of a lack of democratic examples in the culture or region, but "first constitutions" never making it is a wrong thing to say.

I'd argue the exact opposite. Israeli pressure forced the neighboring countries to join ranks with the Soviets. The bullying of their superior military, along with their zionist ambitions are what demonized them and America in the Muslim world, probably resulting in the attacks of 9/11, and naturally the cause of the thousands of deaths in the region and the forced refugee camps of millions of suffering Palestinians. The Soviets were not particularly interested in Arabia, they have their own oil and gas resources in the Caspian. Saudi Arabia was allied with us from the beginning, and before America sided with the Israelis, the Iraqis were also on our side. Jordan was much more helpful, the Israelis are inconsequential to the fight against the Reds. Moreover, they are troublemakers within their own borders and among their neighbors, helping to keep two dictatorships firmly propped up through defense needs (Syria and Egypt).
And those two dictatorships have prevented far worse from happening. They probably aren't necessary now, but they were during the Cold War.
In any case, any slightly socialist country was in Israel's interest to stop. Socialism was a tenet of Arab Nationalism, threatening to Israel for obvious reasons. It was also what the Soviets could relate to on ideaological grounds. Israel did a lot to destroy any nationalist government that may threaten them, such as Hussein's in the eighties. And in that culture, power is respected. The more power one can gain, the more his ideaology will be followed.

Nope, no intervention in the German constitution. If at all, it required an Allied ok, but I don't recall them turning the design down or being involved in writing it.
There may be a difference in Iraq because of a lack of democratic examples in the culture or region, but "first constitutions" never making it is a wrong thing to say.
Then I apologize for my speech lapse.

Then I apologize for my speech lapse.You are forgiven. Live and learn ;)

Look...! quick...! Rotovia's spamming over there ------>

You are forgiven. Live and learn ;)
That's what I do. Humans are good at things when they learn the hard way, instead of covering their asses all the time.

I have nothing against democracy. In fact, I think it's great. I do, however, have a lot against the mob rule that we see in the US. I have many complaints against the President, but one praise above all: that he doesn't submit to the mob mentality rampaging through the US.
You have nothing against the will of the majority when it is called the demos, but are completely against is when it is called the mob.... :confused:

As for Bush not submitting to the 'mob mentality', of course he doesnt submit to it, he creates it and whips it into a fury for his own personal gain...

Either you support a nation being led according to the rule of the majority or you do not. Substituting 'mob rule' for will of the people is a fairly disingenius way of making it clear that your 'support' for democracy does not go beyond lip-service...perhaps you should run for President.

You have nothing against the will of the majority when it is called the demos, but are completely against is when it is called the mob.... :confused:

As for Bush not submitting to the 'mob mentality', of course he doesnt submit to it, he creates it and whips it into a fury for his own personal gain...

Either you support a nation being led according to the rule of the majority or you do not. Substituting 'mob rule' for will of the people is a fairly disingenius way of making it clear that your 'support' for democracy does not go beyond lip-service...perhaps you should run for President.
I see the two as different. Democracy is simply people deciding. It's not necessarily good or bad, but as I see it, is merely a method to an end. Mob rule, on the other hand, is groupthink. It is hard for me to explain what this is, or for anyone really. But if more people actually thought for themselves, rather than listen to the first guy with an idea, we wouldn't have this. I wouldn't like it if people, for example, took me at face value. A bunch of clones advocating the same thing as I am would weaken my ideaology. Same goes for any others. That is why democracy should consist of individuals acting on their own free thinking, and not substitute it with some media dittohead's or big boobed celebrity (who are often men and women of the mob themselves). In fact, as far as I see it, mob rule is not democracy, but tyranny.
As for Bush, his mob whipper upper lasts only so long. It broke down early for some reason. Now, he is alone. This nation isn't divided. It is united against him. But it was united for him not too long ago. And if Bush declares war on some other poor little nation, his popularity will swing back up. Because in the public eye, everything is valuable except what they really think.

I see the two as different.
I cannot help but suspect that to you democracy is when the majority want something that you want, and it happens, however mob rule is when the majority want something you dont and it happens...

Democracy is simply people deciding. It's not necessarily good or bad, but as I see it, is merely a method to an end. Mob rule, on the other hand, is groupthink.
aha, would that be like when the majority of Americans all insisted that any dissenters to the war were traiters who didnt support the troops, despite the illogic of claiming wanting to keep soldiers at home and out of an unnecessary war that many of them would be killed or injured in, is non supportive of those who's lives they wanted to ensure...

It is hard for me to explain what this is, or for anyone really. But if more people actually thought for themselves, rather than listen to the first guy with an idea, we wouldn't have this.
You are right, we wouldnt have had Bush back a second time, and there would have incredibly strong opposition to the war if people didnt believe the first pack of lies out of the first person that happened along and lied. Instead group think dictated that the President of the US would never risk democracy by lying to get the country into an unnecessary war, and then when it was clear he lied, group think dictated that 'well what choice did he have given how stupid the mob (ie the demos he was elected to represent) are? Well I dont think they are stupid, just reactive, easily led, and partisan to the point where any mental gymnastics that can allow them to ignore reality, will be enthusiastically employed, that includes saying they support democracy but when it is convinient calling the demos a mob and saying they are too stupid to deserve the truth.

I wouldn't like it if people, for example, took me at face value. A bunch of clones advocating the same thing as I am would weaken my ideaology. Same goes for any others. That is why democracy should consist of individuals acting on their own free thinking, and not substitute it with some media dittohead's or big boobed celebrity (who are often men and women of the mob themselves). In fact, as far as I see it, mob rule is not democracy, but tyranny.
No kidding, but mob rule can be minimised by having honest Presidents who do not lie to the country, whip the country into a frenzy of fear, and anger, and then lie to that countries other representitives to whip up a mob mentality because that's the only way they can have their unnecessary war.

As for Bush, his mob whipper upper lasts only so long. It broke down early for some reason. Now, he is alone. This nation isn't divided. It is united against him. But it was united for him not too long ago. And if Bush declares war on some other poor little nation, his popularity will swing back up. Because in the public eye, everything is valuable except what they really think.
Can you explain why this is a good reason to congradulate your President for lying? I frankly see it as all the more reason to condem him....unless you like unnecessary wars of course. :rolleyes:

He did win a second election after it became clear he was an opportunistic lier who used the deaths of 9/11 and the trauma it caused the country, to bang through laws that remove freedom for security's sake, while stating that even if there were no WMDs in Iraq, the lack of security in Iraq (caused by the war) was worth it for freedom....Only a mob mentality would believe that, and that's why Bush lied. Not because people are too stupid to handle the truth, but because they can if the situation is stressful enough, be manipulated into becoming a mob who will swallow whatever nonsense the mob leader dishes out, provided that leader is dab-hand at lying.

I cannot help but suspect that to you democracy is when the majority want something that you want, and it happens, however mob rule is when the majority want something you dont and it happens...
Maybe. I've never been in the majority before.

aha, would that be like when the majority of Americans all insisted that any dissenters to the war were traiters who didnt support the troops, despite the illogic of claiming wanting to keep soldiers at home and out of an unnecessary war that many of them would be killed or injured in, is non supportive of those who's lives they wanted to ensure...

Sure. It is at the root cause of Americans' own moral insecurities, and they wish to ensure themselves that someone else's life is more important than their own. Thus, they pick a life to protect that is the easiest morally to defend, being the troops. In a way, I can't blame them. I do, however, think that the self sacrificing they attach to troop support is dangerous.
You are right, we wouldnt have had Bush back a second time, and there would have incredibly strong opposition to the war if people didnt believe the first pack of lies out of the first person that happened along and lied. Instead group think dictated that the President of the US would never risk democracy by lying to get the country into an unnecessary war, and then when it was clear he lied, group think dictated that 'well what choice did he have given how stupid the mob (ie the demos he was elected to represent) are? Well I dont think they are stupid, just reactive, easily led, and partisan to the point where any mental gymnastics that can allow them to ignore reality, will be enthusiastically employed, that includes saying they support democracy but when it is convinient calling the demos a mob and saying they are too stupid to deserve the truth.

Let me clarify: nothing is purely a lie. Every word uttered by someone is, in his own mind, a truth. You can't claim that George Bush went into Iraq to be mean, or Emperor Qin Shi Huangdai from enslaving China just to be mean. They each had their reasons. All a mob person is is a person that accepts a truth because they have no idea what to accept. It changes every day.
I understand that you are enraged by the actions of the Bush Admin. I am, too, but for a different reason than you. You see, I believe you are angry because you find war, violence, military, and any associate word to be an evil in of itself. I see it in a Darwinian fashion, being a process of rebirth. No one really understands that. Did the Bush Admin. even understand that war can be a very beautiful thing? I don't know, I don't work there. What I do know is that something paralyzed the Admin with fear of sharing the truth. It is a noble truth, as I regard it, but one that can not be taken in bite sized information packets, one that cannot be accepted in two seconds. Because of the self-sacrificing nature of people, they could never accept that it could never be good for themselves. Rather, they could only accept that it was bad for someone else, even if that someone else relished it.
The American people, or any people, are not stupid. But all Americans, myself included, live in a moral fantasy land, which prevents anyone from thought, or even transmitting ideas. Instead, the only ideas transferred are fickle talking points.


No kidding, but mob rule can be minimised by having honest Presidents who do not lie to the country, whip the country into a frenzy of fear, and anger, and then lie to that countries other representitives to whip up a mob mentality because that's the only way they can have their unnecessary war.

I'll just say this: you hold it true that this war was wrong. I don't. Which one is the more objective opinion? I don't know, maybe time will tell. What I can tell you is that I do not live other's lives. I live my own. I know what is best for humanity, and I could care less if someone thinks otherwise. You'd have to make a damn impressive arguement to convince me, and not just on circumstancial grounds. The same does not apply for many Americans, or most in the world, for that matter.

He did win a second election after it became clear he was an opportunistic lier who used the deaths of 9/11 and the trauma it caused the country, to bang through laws that remove freedom for security's sake, while stating that even if there were no WMDs in Iraq, the lack of security in Iraq (caused by the war) was worth it for freedom....Only a mob mentality would believe that, and that's why Bush lied. Not because people are too stupid to handle the truth, but because they can if the situation is stressful enough, be manipulated into becoming a mob who will swallow whatever nonsense the mob leader dishes out, provided that leader is dab-hand at lying.
And here is what the crux of your arguement is. If you want me to address only this, fine. Don't read what I've written above. But you may miss out on some insight.
Your crux is this: You have trouble seeing how anything is related, save for the actions of the Bush Admin. It's fine if you don't. But I have to ask you something. Why did this all happen? It's not mob mentality. We think we know that the White House is immune to it. It may have been the simple fact that Bush was trying to serve himself. But in the mob world, his interests naturally conflict with his interests, ei getting reelected. The war in of itself, I believe, had a different cause. It was the result of several different trajectories beyond our control. The baggage, being the protests, the political ups and downs, and possibly even the insurgency, had a separate cause. That was that the American people, or any people, are afraid to hear a truth longer than five seconds. And Bush was afraid of telling it. Perhaps he didn't want to face the truth, either.

I have done my best to treat you as an equal when I reply. Give me half-assed questions again, and I will give you half-assed answers. Here, you have heard my sincere thoughts.

Reasons for War with Iraq:

1: Ten years of patrolling the no fly zones, with sparodic missile firings at alliance service members.
2: Iraq’s violations of U.N. resolutions,
3: Saddam’s refusal to allow weapons inspectors in.
4: To liberate Iraq from a dictator that refused to meet the requirement that would allow the U.N> to lift the sanctions.
5: Saddam was a self-proclaimed enemy of America, taking up allied resources because they were required to be guarding against him and his illegal actions, not allowing their use elsewhere in the world for the war on Terror.
6: To belatedly fulfill the implied promise of helping the Kurds and Shiite after failing them in the aftermath of the first Gulf War.


How the war could have been avoided.

One simple and fast way of avoiding the war: Saddam could have pulled a Kadafi and stopped assuming he would win. Saddam thought he could win because half of the U.N. was accepting his under the table bribes (including security council members) via the food for oil fiasco where half of the companies involved have now been shown to have to pay bribes to the people in charge of it at the U.N. implicating French, German, Russian and many other countries as well. (is it any wonder that these countries voted against removing Saddam from power? I think not.)

Reasons for War with Iraq:

1: Ten years of patrolling the no fly zones, with sparodic missile firings at alliance service members. Not supported by UN
2: Iraq’s violations of U.N. resolutions, Included in Resolution 1441 (Read it)
3: Saddam’s refusal to allow weapons inspectors in. Not true.
4: To liberate Iraq from a dictator that refused to meet the requirement that would allow the U.N> to lift the sanctions. Congress voted on the threat, not regime change.
5: Saddam was a self-proclaimed enemy of America, taking up allied resources because they were required to be guarding against him and his illegal actions, not allowing their use elsewhere in the world for the war on Terror. Huh??
6: To belatedly fulfill the implied promise of helping the Kurds and Shiite after failing them in the aftermath of the first Gulf War.Not acceptable


How the war could have been avoided.

One simple and fast way of avoiding the war: Saddam could have pulled a Kadafi and stopped assuming he would win. Saddam thought he could win because half of the U.N. was accepting his under the table bribes (including security council members) via the food for oil fiasco where half of the companies involved have now been shown to have to pay bribes to the people in charge of it at the U.N. implicating French, German, Russian and many other countries as well. (is it any wonder that these countries voted against removing Saddam from power? I think not.)

Please note my replies in red.

How the war could have been avoided? The US shouldn't have invaded Iraq. Iraq was not a threat to the US. Allowed the UN inspectors to finish their job of looking for WMD that did not exist.

Maybe. I've never been in the majority before.
Sure. It is at the root cause of Americans' own moral insecurities, and they wish to ensure themselves that someone else's life is more important than their own. Thus, they pick a life to protect that is the easiest morally to defend, being the troops. In a way, I can't blame them. I do, however, think that the self sacrificing they attach to troop support is dangerous.
That's good, I honestly couldnt believe the outright lack of logic many pro-war commentators displayed with their 'if you dont want to send troops to die in an unnecessary war, you dont support troops' mentality...

Let me clarify: nothing is purely a lie. Every word uttered by someone is, in his own mind, a truth.
Nonesense. People knowingly and intentionally tell lies regularly, some will even admit it if you can catch them out, but some continue to lie in the face of all evidence. I have no idea why you think people do not lie. :confused:

You can't claim that George Bush went into Iraq to be mean, or Emperor Qin Shi Huangdai from enslaving China just to be mean. They each had their reasons.
Those reasons could be simple meaness, (although I am not claiming that is the case). I dont doubt serial murderers believe that they have reasons for what they are doing. It sure as heck doesnt make me feel any better about what they do.

All a mob person is is a person that accepts a truth because they have no idea what to accept. It changes every day.
So why did Bush need to lie? Surely if he said 'there really are no WMD's but we should go to war anyhow', if the mob were as you describe, they would have accepted that.

I understand that you are enraged by the actions of the Bush Admin. I am, too, but for a different reason than you. You see, I believe you are angry because you find war, violence, military, and any associate word to be an evil in of itself.
Then you would be entirely wrong.

I see it in a Darwinian fashion, being a process of rebirth. No one really understands that. Did the Bush Admin. even understand that war can be a very beautiful thing? I don't know, I don't work there. What I do know is that something paralyzed the Admin with fear of sharing the truth. It is a noble truth, as I regard it, but one that can not be taken in bite sized information packets, one that cannot be accepted in two seconds. Because of the self-sacrificing nature of people, they could never accept that it could never be good for themselves. Rather, they could only accept that it was bad for someone else, even if that someone else relished it.
Hang on, I thought the mob would believe anything simply because they dont know what to believe. On the one hand a mob will believe anything, on the other hand it is necessary to lie to the mob to get them to believe something...how can the mob be so stupid they will accept anything old thing, but so stupid they wont accept any old thing?

The American people, or any people, are not stupid. But all Americans, myself included, live in a moral fantasy land, which prevents anyone from thought, or even transmitting ideas. Instead, the only ideas transferred are fickle talking points.
Right, in that case why not dispense with the unnecessary lies and just have a totilitarian dictatorship. What is the point of people having a vote if they cant tell reality from fantasy anyway. Just cancel votes and tell them they did vote. Since lying is non-existent and since the mob will believe whatever from one moment to the next, why bother with the expensive and inefficient charade?

I'll just say this: you hold it true that this war was wrong. I don't. Which one is the more objective opinion?
I hold that in the circumstances the Bush adminstration's conduct in regard to the war was entirely wrong. Whether or not a war with Iraq was necessary or desirable, I cannot say absolutely because of all the lies, because if there are good reasons, they have never been given. The fact that instead of the truth the world was handed lies, suggests that those who initiated this war, didnt think the truth justified their actions, and since they are the ones who know the truth about why they wanted the war, I can only conclude that even those who wanted the war, believed it wasnt justified.

I don't know, maybe time will tell. What I can tell you is that I do not live other's lives. I live my own. I know what is best for humanity, and I could care less if someone thinks otherwise. You'd have to make a damn impressive arguement to convince me, and not just on circumstancial grounds. The same does not apply for many Americans, or most in the world, for that matter.
Convince you of what? You accede no WMDs and state you never believed it. I have no idea why you think this war was desirable (ie what you believe it would achieve that makes the cost worthwhile).

And here is what the crux of your arguement is. If you want me to address only this, fine. Don't read what I've written above. But you may miss out on some insight.
Your crux is this: You have trouble seeing how anything is related, save for the actions of the Bush Admin. It's fine if you don't. But I have to ask you something. Why did this all happen? It's not mob mentality. We think we know that the White House is immune to it. It may have been the simple fact that Bush was trying to serve himself. But in the mob world, his interests naturally conflict with his interests, ei getting reelected. The war in of itself, I believe, had a different cause. It was the result of several different trajectories beyond our control. The baggage, being the protests, the political ups and downs, and possibly even the insurgency, had a separate cause. That was that the American people, or any people, are afraid to hear a truth longer than five seconds. And Bush was afraid of telling it. Perhaps he didn't want to face the truth, either.
I dont believe I do have trouble seeing how things are related. I also dont believe that mob mentality didnt enable the Bush administration to act as outrageously as they did. Let me put it this way, did they try any of this crap before the incident that allowed the US populice to be turned to a mob occured? Of course not. 9/11 allowed placed the kind of stress on the population that can be manipulated into bringing out a mob mentality, and that is why the administration were able to go through with the war. Prior to 9/11 the large majority were not so easy to manipulate, and now the shock has worn down somewhat, slowly the mob is dissapating. Whether the war was necessary or desirable, I cannot see that without the mob mentality whipped into shape and manipulated by the Bush administration, it just would not have been possible.

I have done my best to treat you as an equal when I reply. Give me half-assed questions again, and I will give you half-assed answers. Here, you have heard my sincere thoughts.
I have no idea what you mean by this. I treat other people as I would hope to be treated. What half assed questions? :confused:

Congress voted on the threat, not regime change. We couldn't just leave Iraq as it was, to go fight in Afghanistan or elsewhere, leaving Saddam free to do whatever he wanted to actively oppose us. Voted against the threat of Iraq meant, voting against the current regime, what else in the world could it have meant? Everyone, everyone knew that Saddam was the target, Bush even said so three days before going in, if Saddam and his family leaves, we won't go in. Nobody in congress was complaining about that, even though no one expected him to do it, there was the chance that Saddam would have taken a note from Noriega in Panama and tried to avoid the invasion entirely.


How the war could have been avoided? The US shouldn't have invaded Iraq. Iraq was not a threat to the US. Allowed the UN inspectors to finish their job of looking for WMD that did not exist.

Saddam kept the inspectors out for many years during the Clinton administration as well, it's not like this all started with GWB. Selective memory on you part I think.


p.s., it has now (in hindsight of the events, things not known then) been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the U.N. was compromised in this matter. Incapable to vote with a clear conscious or impartial of objective in regards to Saddam. Their collective opinion (from that time period) is irrelevant.

<snip>
You see, I believe you are angry because you find war, violence, military, and any associate word to be an evil in of itself. I see it in a Darwinian fashion, being a process of rebirth. No one really understands that. Did the Bush Admin. even understand that war can be a very beautiful thing?
<snip>

Quoting from an article By Nicolas J S Davies - Online Journal Contributing Writer
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/123104Davies/123104davies.html

the Nuremberg Judgment included the following statement:

"The charges in the indictment that the defendants planned and waged aggressive wars are charges of the utmost gravity. War is essentially an evil thing. Its consequences are not confined to the belligerent states alone, but affect the whole world. To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

The treaty which outlawed the waging of aggressive war was the General Treaty for the Renunciation of War, otherwise known as the Kellogg-Briand Pact or the Pact of Paris. It was named for U.S. Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg and the French statesman Aristide Briand, and it was signed by President Coolidge in 1928 and duly ratified by the U.S. Senate. It was the result of a decade of negotiations and lesser diplomatic achievements to prevent war that were motivated by the horror and tragedy of the First World War. In 1932, the new Secretary of State, Henry L. Stimson, made the following statement regarding its significance:

"War between nations was renounced by the signatories of the Kellogg-Briand Treaty. This means that it has become throughout practically the entire world . . . an illegal thing. Hereafter, when engaged in armed conflict, either one or both of them must be termed violators of this general treaty law . . . We denounce them as law breakers."[3]

The convictions of German leaders at Nuremberg for the crime of waging aggressive war were based entirely upon the Kellogg-Briand Pact and the history of lesser treaties that led up to its signing. Once again, I quote from the Nuremberg Judgment:

"The question is, what was the legal effect of this pact? The nations who signed the pact or adhered to it unconditionally condemned recourse to war for the future as an instrument of policy, and expressly renounced it. After the signing of the pact, any nation resorting to war as an instrument of national policy breaks the pact. In the opinion of the Tribunal, the solemn renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy necessarily involves the proposition that such a war is illegal in international law; and that those who plan and wage such a war, with its inevitable and terrible consequences, are committing a crime in so doing."

In 1945, the United Nations Charter, Article 2 Clause 4, reiterated the principles of the Kellogg-Briand Pact, stating simply, "All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state." Article 39 established the authority of the Security Council to "determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression" and to "decide what measures shall be taken."

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Aggressive war is a crime and has been recognized as such by all members
of the U.N. including the US government.

You may find it a "beautiful thing" , but it does not change the fact
that it is barbaric, cruel and illegal.

It is on the basis of its international recognition as a crime that many
of the nazi leadership were punished for their part in WW2

For you to praise your idiot boy president and his oil company minders
for causing the deaths of so many people I can only take as the sign
of a deranged mind.

I'm both assuming and hoping that you are a US citizen living in the US.
I further hope that you remain there as your views are the kind that
one might expect from a serial killer and not the ones of a supporter
of democracy.


<shudders>

. Voted against the threat of Iraq meant, voting against the current regime, what else in the world could it have meant?

Everyone, everyone knew that Saddam was the target, Bush even said so three days before going in, if Saddam and his family leaves, we won't go in. Nobody in congress was complaining about that, even though no one expected him to do it, there was the chance that Saddam would have taken a note from Noriega in Panama and tried to avoid the invasion entirely.

Saddam kept the inspectors out for many years during the Clinton administration as well, it's not like this all started with GWB. Selective memory on you part I think.


So the threat was the then current regime, the Ba'ath party led by Saddam
and not the WMD which is what was being sold as being why
Saddam could be a threat of anykind to anyone.

Why? was there a fear that other countries were going to join Iraq
in some kind of coalition with them?
Perhaps Kuwait and Iran?

Yes everyone did know that Saddam was the target but of course
in no official vote or resolution was that ever the official policy.
As that was quite clearly illegal.

Saddam never kept the inspectors out.
The inspectors were in and doing their job with occasional hassle from
the Iraqis to save some face
The inspectors were withdrawn by the US under Clinton in 1998
which we now know is 2 years after their job had been completed
and which should have meant the sanctions regime should have been lifted.

No inspectors in Iraq to declare that Iraq now in compliance with UN resolutions
meant no lifting of the sanctions so the US could continue
with its policy of having Saddam displaced as undemocratic ruler of Iraq by
another Ba'ath party official as undemocratic ruler of Iraq.
In the meantime thousands of Iraqi children dying on a weekly even daily basis
as a result of the implementation of the sanctions regime.

pbs
The member nations of the UN all have their own interests and designs
The question of who is compromised can only correctly be answered by
looking to who follows the rules laid down in the UN charter

If they follow them they are not compromised if they breach them then
those nations are clearly not acting in accordance with the treaties
they have ratified

We couldn't just leave Iraq as it was, to go fight in Afghanistan or elsewhere, leaving Saddam free to do whatever he wanted to actively oppose us.
That's true, although the reason it is true, is simply because Saddam was in no position to do whatever he wanted, therefore whether he was left alone or not, he wasnt going to do whatever he wanted.

Voted against the threat of Iraq meant, voting against the current regime, what else in the world could it have meant?
It meant voting against the threat. What kind of a petty and evil nation invades an entire country just to 'oust' some guy for the sake of it? Who only knows? Congress voted to oust Saddam because they believed he was a thread, not because they were a bunch of evil knobs who just didnt like him and didnt care who got hurt getting rid of him. They voted in favour of the war because they were mislead into believing he was a direct threat to the US. If you really believe that without believing he was a threat, they would still have voted to attack Iraq just to get rid of them, you clearly think worse of the US's leaders than I do.

Everyone, everyone knew that Saddam was the target, Bush even said so three days before going in, if Saddam and his family leaves, we won't go in. Nobody in congress was complaining about that, even though no one expected him to do it, there was the chance that Saddam would have taken a note from Noriega in Panama and tried to avoid the invasion entirely.
They were not complaining because number 1, the Bush admin had whipped the populice up into a mob, so that reasonable dissent was dangerous, and more importantly because the reason Saddam having WMD was considered so dangerous was because it was believed that aside from having WMD, he might, without provocation, use them. It was not just because 'we dont like him', it was because he was considered the kind of person that would be a danger did he have the military and weapons capability that US leaders outside the Bush administration were mislead into believing he had.

Saddam kept the inspectors out for many years during the Clinton administration as well, it's not like this all started with GWB. Selective memory on you part I think.
No, it's just utterly irrelevent.

p.s., it has now (in hindsight of the events, things not known then) been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the U.N. was compromised in this matter. Incapable to vote with a clear conscious or impartial of objective in regards to Saddam. Their collective opinion (from that time period) is irrelevant.
Er, no, what has been proven is that those who didnt believe Iraq had the WMD Bush and co claimed he had, were in fact completely correct, their fears of an unjustified war being waged for reasons known only to a select few who lied to everyone else about those reasons, were completely founded and entirely justified. It now turns out that those who opposed the war were in fact correct. Bush and co were lying (or so damm stupid it's amazing their brains dont collapse under the stress of having to direct normal bodily functions such as breathing), the reasons they gave were red herrings, and we still to this day do not know why so many people have lost their lives and limbs, why the Middle East has been destablised, why terrorist organisations have been handed such a perfect propaganda/recruitment tool, and why the Bush administration felt the real reasons wouldnt fly...

*snip*

Anti War arguments before the war revolved around the idea of containment over preventive war. The United States faced a clear choice on Iraq they used to say. President Bush insisted that containment had failed and we must prepare for war. The anti-war side said that war is not necessary. Containment has worked in the past and could continue to work, even with someone like Saddam (of course, now in hindsight, it has been revealed that the sanctions were doing nothing to hurt Saddam because the illegal and underhanded payoff through the U.N. channels and the oil-for-food program and utterly failed, but neither the hawks nor the doves were aware of that then).

And you try to pretend that Saddam was not willing to forgo 100 billion in trade for the mere purpose of keeping inspectors out. Sure, in hindsight, it turns out that he didn't want inspectors in to prove to the world that he didn't have any WMD or any other way to defend himself (making himself vulnerable to another war with Iran, for example), but Saddam made this bet because he believed that the US wouldn't do it without the UN and he knew the UN wouldn't do it because they were his illegal allies in accepting bribes in the Oil-For-Food scandal...

Anti War arguments before the war revolved around the idea of containment over preventive war.
Anti-war arguments revolved around the fact that the war was not necessary to avoid the threat Bush and co claimed Saddam and his WMD's presented, and that this was should have been obvious to anyone with even the slightest interest in the truth. The anti-war argument after the war is that a war was not necessary to avoid the threat Bush and co claimed Saddam and his WMD's presented, and that this should have been obvious to anyone with even the slightest interest in the truth...

As for the arguments for the war, they would take longer to list since they change more often than a supermodel at a runway show.

<snip>

And you try to pretend that Saddam was not willing to forgo 100 billion in trade for the mere purpose of keeping inspectors out. Sure, in hindsight, it turns out that he didn't want inspectors in to prove he didn't have anyway to defend himself (making himself vulnerable to another war with Iran, for example), but Saddam made this bet because he believed that the US wouldn't do it without the UN and he knew the UN wouldn't do it because they were his illegal allies in accepting bribes in the Oil-For-Food scandal...

For the last time, because I simply have to assume you cannot see
certain words if you return to the same line again.

Saddam Hussein did not put the weapons inspectors out of Iraq
or stop them coming back in.

The US got them out and then bombed Baghdad on the basis that Saddam
was not allowing the weapons inspectors to do their job.

That happened in 1998

US administrations own weapons inspectors after 2 years
advised that the job the un weapons inspectors had been sent to do
had pretty much been done by 1996,
the same thing that members
of the UN weapons inspections team had been telling us in 2002
that when they were withdrawn all that was unaccounted for
was a small percentage of chemicals that probably never could
be accounted for by anyone.

When Saddam was required to admit Weapons Inspectors again,
they were allowed in, which seemed to come as a shock to Bush and Blair
who apparently had begun to believe their own lies that Saddam had kicked
them out in the first place.

Blair was pulled up on this statement in a television interview and fell
back on the remarkably intellectual argument
that being withdrawn or being kicked out was really the same thing.

Nobody, but you apparently, bought this particular excuse.

For the last time, because I simply have to assume you cannot see
certain words if you return to the same line again.

Saddam Hussein did not put the weapons inspectors out of Iraq
or stop them coming back in.



:rolleyes:

11/28/2001

IRAQ dismissed President Bush's demand to re-admit international weapons inspectors yesterday, saying it was not intimidated by the threat of military strikes.
"Iraq will defend itself and will not be terrified by any arrogant party," said an Iraqi spokesman quoted by the official Iraqi news agency. With a series of tough warnings against Iraq, Mr Bush has raised speculation that Saddam Hussein could be next in America's sights in the war against terrorism.
On Monday, Mr Bush said Saddam had to allow arms inspectors back into the country "to prove to the world he's not ...

http://www.highbeam.com/library/doc0.asp?docid=1G1:80359592&refid=ink_tptd_np&skeyword=&teaser=

I have a possible theory:

(other)
After terrorists hit America with 9/11 we were in a lot of danger from terror attacks. He then wanted to take the war to the terrorists instead of letting them attack our civilians (obviously, troops are better equiped to handle terrorists). We mopped the floor with them in Afghanistan but we still had threats. Bush took it to Iraq.

The oil theory has one flaw:
There is plenty of oil. The problem is that restrictions for environment is dramatically increased the cost of refining the oil. Many refineries went out of bussiness. We have plenty of oil but the refineries are having a hard time refining enough due to the cost to refine it. Getting more oil wouldn't help.

We couldn't just leave Iraq as it was, to go fight in Afghanistan or elsewhere, leaving Saddam free to do whatever he wanted to actively oppose us. Voted against the threat of Iraq meant, voting against the current regime, what else in the world could it have meant? Everyone, everyone knew that Saddam was the target, Bush even said so three days before going in, if Saddam and his family leaves, we won't go in. Nobody in congress was complaining about that, even though no one expected him to do it, there was the chance that Saddam would have taken a note from Noriega in Panama and tried to avoid the invasion entirely.
What exactly did the Congress give as direction with their vote? If I am not mistaken, Congress gave Bush the power but he was supposed to exhaust all other means at his disposal first?

KERRY: It was a threat. That's not the issue. The issue is what you do about it. Bush said he was going to build a true coalition, exhaust the remedies of the UN and go to war as a last resort. Those words really have to mean something. And, unfortunately, he didn't go to war as a last resort. Now we have this incredible mess in Iraq-$200 billion. It's not what the American people thought they were getting when they voted.

Saddam kept the inspectors out for many years during the Clinton administration as well, it's not like this all started with GWB. Selective memory on you part I think.
It wasn’t Saddam or the Iraqi government who gave the boot to weapons inspectors from the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM). Rather, it was the United States.


p.s., it has now (in hindsight of the events, things not known then) been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the U.N. was compromised in this matter. Incapable to vote with a clear conscious or impartial of objective in regards to Saddam. Their collective opinion (from that time period) is irrelevant.
Most of the world wanted the UN inspectors to finish their job and fulfil the intent of the UN Charter, whereby use of force was the last means available to effect compliance. Since Iraq was not threatening anybody, and the UN inspectors were in Iraq not finding any WMD, the world was willing to wait it out.

:rolleyes:

11/28/2001

IRAQ dismissed President Bush's demand to re-admit international weapons inspectors yesterday, saying it was not intimidated by the threat of military strikes.
"Iraq will defend itself and will not be terrified by any arrogant party," said an Iraqi spokesman quoted by the official Iraqi news agency. With a series of tough warnings against Iraq, Mr Bush has raised speculation that Saddam Hussein could be next in America's sights in the war against terrorism.
On Monday, Mr Bush said Saddam had to allow arms inspectors back into the country "to prove to the world he's not ...

http://www.highbeam.com/library/doc0.asp?docid=1G1:80359592&refid=ink_tptd_np&skeyword=&teaser=

So you are absolutely right and I have to admit I had completely forgotten
if I had ever been aware that he had refused and so I apologise for that
lapse.


19 days after saudi born terrorists flew planes into the twin towers
Your president demanded that Iraq allow weapons inspectors back in.

The new UN team, named UNMOVIC had been set up in late 1999.
Resolution 1284 had required them to be admitted

So Saddam did refuse twice at least

However I think it is important to place it all in some reasonable context

I still feel that Saddam was only able to refuse at all because
1 the initial weapons inspectors had been withdrawn in the first place
2 the withdrawal of the first teams had been followed by 70 hours of bombings
3 although the rest of the world were not aware; Saddam would have been
it was 2 yrs after they had eliminated all his WMD and the means
to produce them
4 the US had made it quite clear that as far as they were concerned the sanctions would remain in place until Saddam was no longer leader in Iraq regardless of whether Saddam complied or not.



And in your reference to corruption allegations,
I should point out that in 2000
French Foreign Minister Hubert Vedrine
told a UN news conference in early September that France
continued to believe that the UN embargo on Iraq should be lifted.

So it seems they weren't all that keen to keep sanctions going to make
money from bribery and corruption, which is not to say that there was not
corruption merely that the French at least wished to do away with the situation rather than to keep it going.

But let none of that distract from the fact that I was wrong in saying
that Saddam had never refused entry to weapons inspectors.
He did and on more than one occasion.

He was first required to allow re-entry of weapons inspectors in late 1999
and weapons inspectors did not get Iraqi permission to re-enter until late 2002

Does anyone know if the US made any such demand before september 2001?

Finally some intelligent discussion on the topic.

I

The oil theory has one flaw:
There is plenty of oil. The problem is that restrictions for environment is dramatically increased the cost of refining the oil. Many refineries went out of bussiness. We have plenty of oil but the refineries are having a hard time refining enough due to the cost to refine it. Getting more oil wouldn't help.


Most of the middle eastern countries are at their maximum production levels.
Oil production in the middle east is expected to peak in approximately 10 yrs
The demand for Oil in the established western countries alone rises year on year.
Less developed nations are now beginning to use more oil, places like
China finally beginning to take up more uses for it.

The control of oil is going to be the key issue of the 21st century.
Oil is not as plentiful as you seem to believe

http://www.energybulletin.net/997.html

http://www.iags.org/futureofoil.html

http://www.oilcrisis.com/summary.htm

http://sepwww.stanford.edu/sep/jon/world-oil.dir/lynch/worldoil.html

all 4 links are fairly randomly selected and I cannot advise
that any or all of them should be taken as being accurate or reliable
- more sources should be sought

but I'm off to bed for now

1 last one

http://www.peakoil.net/CC4April2005OilGas.html

Iraq had nothing to do with oil. And before you, my readers, assume me to be one of those idiots who thinks it was about WMD's, keep reading.

In a capitalist world, it is beneficial for companies to find sources of cheap labor. In the equatorial regions of the world, where most of the world's population is, is where most wars, conflicts, instability, and poverty can be found, in proportion to the higher regions of the world. Iraq was about the further destabilization of the Equatorial Region, and the implimentation of American rule, and corporate predominance. Haliburton has quite an established presence now in the region.

I'm sure those of you with adequate intelligence see where I'm heading with this.

Iraq had nothing to do with oil. And before you, my readers, assume me to be one of those idiots who thinks it was about WMD's, keep reading.

In a capitalist world, it is beneficial for companies to find sources of cheap labor. In the equatorial regions of the world, where most of the world's population is, is where most wars, conflicts, instability, and poverty can be found, in proportion to the higher regions of the world. Iraq was about the further destabilization of the Equatorial Region, and the implimentation of American rule, and corporate predominance. Haliburton has quite an established presence now in the region.

I'm sure those of you with adequate intelligence see where I'm heading with this.

The world is full of cheap labour.
Haliburtons business is oil.

The world is full of cheap labour.
Haliburtons business is oil.

Halliburton also managed not just oil, but provisions for American troops in Iraq, and provided other infrastructurial services. There are other companies/organizations leeching Iraq, not just Halliburton.

The world's cheap labor primarily resides in the regions around the equator.

I put "other"
I think Bush wanted a scapegoat for 911. He had declared a war on terror, and he felt like he needed to show some results, so he went after Saddam. Even though experts all agreed he had nothing to do with it.

For all you folks that answered "oil" or "oil and other", who has benefitted from the Iraqi oil production so far? The U.S. certainly hasn't. It's not clear that the Iraqis are back to pre-war production levels, either. So why did you choose an "oily" answer?

I think the war was to keep the people happy and stay in power.

It seemed like a good idea at the time? :rolleyes:

it was fought for those hot middle eastern women who no how do to do "it" soooooo kinky...

For all you folks that answered "oil" or "oil and other", who has benefitted from the Iraqi oil production so far? The U.S. certainly hasn't. It's not clear that the Iraqis are back to pre-war production levels, either. So why did you choose an "oily" answer?


The resistance to the occupation is much more intense than
the US expected, one of their prime targets has been damaging
the United States ability to get oil production up to the levels Iraq
is capable of.

Iraq has over 10% of the worlds proven oil reserves.

World oil production is set to peak and begin its decline in this century
although there is disagreement about exactly when the peak point will
be reached with some putting it as early as within the next 10 years.

The worlds demand for oil is increasing , with China and India's
demand increasing by much greater percentage each year than the
developed western nations.
With the size of their populations it is likely their demand will continue
to increase at high levels for the forseeable future.

Declining oil reserves + Increasing Demand makes control
of oil the key issue of the 21st century.

The world will become much more dependent on Middle Eastern Oil in particular and purely coincidentally the US is now sitting in an excellent
position to "project power" throught that oil producing region.

Gosh your right theres no reason to think its anything to do with oil at all

The war in Iraq is fought because Sadam wouldnt say if he had any weapons of mass destruction.So America felt threatened thats why the war in Iraq is happening

Nonesense. People knowingly and intentionally tell lies regularly, some will even admit it if you can catch them out, but some continue to lie in the face of all evidence. I have no idea why you think people do not lie. :confused:

Which I cannot believe. I'm sory.

So why did Bush need to lie? Surely if he said 'there really are no WMD's but we should go to war anyhow', if the mob were as you describe, they would have accepted that.

Why did they feel they needed to lie? Beats the hell outta me. Did they even think they were lying? I have no idea. But as I said, few people can handle truths that require them to think. That's fine, until it iis something big.

Hang on, I thought the mob would believe anything simply because they dont know what to believe. On the one hand a mob will believe anything, on the other hand it is necessary to lie to the mob to get them to believe something...how can the mob be so stupid they will accept anything old thing, but so stupid they wont accept any old thing?

They accept slogans, not thought processes. The most successful ideaologies in humanity can be expressed with one liners. But they aren't the best.
Right, in that case why not dispense with the unnecessary lies and just have a totilitarian dictatorship. What is the point of people having a vote if they cant tell reality from fantasy anyway. Just cancel votes and tell them they did vote. Since lying is non-existent and since the mob will believe whatever from one moment to the next, why bother with the expensive and inefficient charade?
Simple: recessitation is possible. I have done it, and so can everyone else.

I hold that in the circumstances the Bush adminstration's conduct in regard to the war was entirely wrong. Whether or not a war with Iraq was necessary or desirable, I cannot say absolutely because of all the lies, because if there are good reasons, they have never been given. The fact that instead of the truth the world was handed lies, suggests that those who initiated this war, didnt think the truth justified their actions, and since they are the ones who know the truth about why they wanted the war, I can only conclude that even those who wanted the war, believed it wasnt justified.

So, you are saying you don't know why a war in Iraq was fought? Excellent. I do. But can you handle a long explanation from me?
Convince you of what?
That I'm wrong. You seem to be trying to attack my world.

I dont believe I do have trouble seeing how things are related. I also dont believe that mob mentality didnt enable the Bush administration to act as outrageously as they did. Let me put it this way, did they try any of this crap before the incident that allowed the US populice to be turned to a mob occured? Of course not. 9/11 allowed placed the kind of stress on the population that can be manipulated into bringing out a mob mentality, and that is why the administration were able to go through with the war. Prior to 9/11 the large majority were not so easy to manipulate, and now the shock has worn down somewhat, slowly the mob is dissapating. Whether the war was necessary or desirable, I cannot see that without the mob mentality whipped into shape and manipulated by the Bush administration, it just would not have been possible.

The Bush Admin. did a helluvalot right after 9/11. The problem was they waited for anything else. What control they had was gone. They did not threaten democracy. They epitomized it: saying slogans to get reelected, all while avoiding what no one wanted to hear. They did it, but barely. I'm glad that they pulled it off, but only for the sake of protecting the war effort. In this situation, the ends outweigh the means for me. That is not a tautology.

Quoting from an article By Nicolas J S Davies - Online Journal Contributing Writer
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/123104Davies/123104davies.html

the Nuremberg Judgment included the following statement:

"The charges in the indictment that the defendants planned and waged aggressive wars are charges of the utmost gravity. War is essentially an evil thing. Its consequences are not confined to the belligerent states alone, but affect the whole world. To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

The treaty which outlawed the waging of aggressive war was the General Treaty for the Renunciation of War, otherwise known as the Kellogg-Briand Pact or the Pact of Paris. It was named for U.S. Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg and the French statesman Aristide Briand, and it was signed by President Coolidge in 1928 and duly ratified by the U.S. Senate. It was the result of a decade of negotiations and lesser diplomatic achievements to prevent war that were motivated by the horror and tragedy of the First World War. In 1932, the new Secretary of State, Henry L. Stimson, made the following statement regarding its significance:

"War between nations was renounced by the signatories of the Kellogg-Briand Treaty. This means that it has become throughout practically the entire world . . . an illegal thing. Hereafter, when engaged in armed conflict, either one or both of them must be termed violators of this general treaty law . . . We denounce them as law breakers."[3]

The convictions of German leaders at Nuremberg for the crime of waging aggressive war were based entirely upon the Kellogg-Briand Pact and the history of lesser treaties that led up to its signing. Once again, I quote from the Nuremberg Judgment:

"The question is, what was the legal effect of this pact? The nations who signed the pact or adhered to it unconditionally condemned recourse to war for the future as an instrument of policy, and expressly renounced it. After the signing of the pact, any nation resorting to war as an instrument of national policy breaks the pact. In the opinion of the Tribunal, the solemn renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy necessarily involves the proposition that such a war is illegal in international law; and that those who plan and wage such a war, with its inevitable and terrible consequences, are committing a crime in so doing."

In 1945, the United Nations Charter, Article 2 Clause 4, reiterated the principles of the Kellogg-Briand Pact, stating simply, "All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state." Article 39 established the authority of the Security Council to "determine the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression" and to "decide what measures shall be taken."

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Aggressive war is a crime and has been recognized as such by all members
of the U.N. including the US government.

You may find it a "beautiful thing" , but it does not change the fact
that it is barbaric, cruel and illegal.

It is on the basis of its international recognition as a crime that many
of the nazi leadership were punished for their part in WW2

For you to praise your idiot boy president and his oil company minders
for causing the deaths of so many people I can only take as the sign
of a deranged mind.

I'm both assuming and hoping that you are a US citizen living in the US.
I further hope that you remain there as your views are the kind that
one might expect from a serial killer and not the ones of a supporter
of democracy.


<shudders>
Does it matter where I live? All that matters is that I think. I think these thoughts, and someone must agree with me, even if it is just one person. And I can almost gurantee that this someone isn't American.
P.S. Yes, I am an American. But I will not stay here. My war of words will be launched anywhere there is a person who will listen.

Gosh your right theres no reason to think its anything to do with oil at all
Gosh, even us crackers can recognize sarcasm. Only we call it leg-pullin'.

But if Bush wanted to use oil as a tool for political gain, wouldn't he release oil from the national reserves, as was done in the Clinton administration? I hope he is sitting on it so that the price WILL rise. That would make it economically attractive to develop alternatives to fossil fuels. That's what we really need for future stability.

If someone would require me to give a one word answer for this complex subject... this would be it.


PNAC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PNAC)

If someone would require me to give a one word answer for this complex subject... this would be it.


PNAC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PNAC)
PNAC has a few very good ideas. I support fully thhe use of resources by the free world to expand its borders. However, they seem to have no notion of how to maintain a free society. And they need a catchier acronym.

Actually what they really need is to be treated like the imperialist fascists they are.

Actually what they really need is to be treated like the imperialist fascists they are.
Why are they fascists?

....what kind of a leader trades off the death of his own citizens and intentionally drives up the fear and anger of the populice in order to manipulate those people into supporting his pre-concieved goal of attacking another nation state? The kind sitting in the Whitehouse right now.

Maybe we should get Clinton back in the office... He only invaded Serbia to deflect attention at home from the fact that he had an intern blowing him in the Oval Office.

Maybe we should get Clinton back in the office... He only invaded Serbia to deflect attention at home from the fact that he had an intern blowing him in the Oval Office.
Why would you suggest we get Clinton back then, especially since such a thing is not currently even legally possible? :confused:

Do you view the above as good or necessary qualities in a President, or just not as bad as what's there now?

Why are they fascists?
Their political views are in conformity with extreme authoritarian, and totalitarian fascist right wing.

The invasion of the soverign nation of Iraq was totally justified. We needed to get a brutal dictator who wanted to attack the entire Western world, and heck, maybe even some countries in the East just because he felt like it, out of power even though we already attacked him. It is easily justified. We simply kill ~25,000 (and counting) people to eliminate a possible killing of an unknown number of people. Totally justified. It'd be like if North Korea preemptively strikes America because they think we might attack them. Oh wait, America would never attack North Korea because that country's actually a threat, my bad!

We're currently under an administration that:
A: Has no clue wtf it's doing
B: Corrupt assclowns
C: A and B
D: Absolutely brilliant and 20 years from now there will be global peace.
E: Should have a slogan that says Should have choosen Gore when you had the chance!

The invasion of the soverign nation of Iraq was totally justified. We needed to get a brutal dictator who wanted to attack the entire Western world, and heck, maybe even some countries in the East just because he felt like it, out of power even though we already attacked him. It is easily justified. We simply kill ~25,000 (and counting) people to eliminate a possible killing of an unknown number of people. Totally justified. It'd be like if North Korea preemptively strikes America because they think we might attack them. Oh wait, America would never attack North Korea because that country's actually a threat, my bad!Bingo!

You never fail to impress me Achtung 45. :D

We're currently under an administration that:
A: Has no clue wtf it's doing
B: Corrupt assclowns
C: A and B
D: Absolutely brilliant and 20 years from now there will be global peace.
E: Should have a slogan that says Should have choosen Gore when you had the chance!D: LOL?
E: Actually they did choose Gore while they had the chance. But then something else happened.

Their political views are in conformity with extreme authoritarian, and totalitarian fascist right wing.
Honey, if there was ever a contradiction, it's between democracy and fascism. I mean, c'mon. Do they advocate racial purity? Do they promote the collective above the individual? Who's their cult figure?

Honey, if there was ever a contradiction, it's between democracy and fascism. I mean, c'mon. Do they advocate racial purity? Do they promote the collective above the individual? Who's their cult figure?Many fascists regimes never had any of that. They aren't purely fascist and they don't have to be for me to acknowledge them as a dangerous group of individuals, that are damaging the US in some aspects beyond repair.

Many fascists regimes never had any of that. They aren't purely fascist and they don't have to be for me to acknowledge them as a dangerous group of individuals, that are damaging the US in some aspects beyond repair.
Mislabelling ideaologies is a dangerous game. They are neoconservative. A neoconservative, as you know, believes in spreading democracy and free markets by the means available to society, including force if necessary. Its ultimate roots are probably in Roman Republicanism, which believed in spreading "civilization" to their empire. Modern neoconservatism came from the 19th century. Thomas Jefferson may have been one, as he called on the US to build "an empire of liberty". It was a popular idea in Victorian England, and one that led to the British Empire. It was also practiced, to an extent, by Woodrow Wilson, who believed strongly in self determination, and wanted the League of Nations to enforce this. It didn't reemerge until shortly after the Cold War.
You knew this, of course. But here's the reason why I reiterate this: fascism followed a different trajectory in history. I don't mind if you call neocons dangerous. I do mind if you call them something they aren't. It's like labelling a jellyfish as a banana.

Lotus Puppy, although what you describe could be defined as fascist, none of the elements you mention need be present for something to be correctly described as fascist.

Lotus Puppy, although what you describe could be defined as fascist, none of the elements you mention need be present for something to be correctly described as fascist.
Great! Why stick with something sensible when we can get sidetracked? You are just like those people who label other nations as fascist that aren't, such as the old USSR, which was clearly not fascist.

Sep 11th comes along and according to many, the Bush administration immediately wants to lay the blame on...Iraq.

No one is really sure why, except perhaps the thought that we are hurting them and have been for
a long time, if anyone has a reason to attack us it'd be them.
Or maybe they are just disturbed that there is a country selling oil in a currency other than dollars.
If the rest of OPEC followed then the US economy would implode.

For whatever reason anyway nothing comes of it at this point as there is absolutely nothing to link
it to Iraq and it is declared that Al Qaeda are responsible and that Osama Bin Laden is the
brains behind the outfit and that he is living in Afghanistan.


The US demands that the Taliban, the de facto government of Afghanistan hand him over to them
as well as making other demands to close all terrorist training camps and allow American
soldiers into their country to verify that these are closed.

The Taliban refuse to speak directly to Bush but make statements via their embassy in Pakistan
and request evidence in relation to the claims about Osama and offer to try him in an Islamic court
if it can be provided.
The US refuses point blank.
The Taliban suggest extraditing him to a neutral country rather than to the US
(actually my memory was that they asked America to at least sit down with them and discuss the issue)
whichever it was, it was also rejected.

Most Europeans note the oddity that if Osama had been in any European country that they would by law
also have to refuse to hand Osama over to the US as we cannot do that where the person being
extradited may be executed.

On October 7th the invasion of Afghanistan begins with UN sanction.
People like me believe that basically Afghanistan was a gimme,
it was basically entirely unjustified for it to be attacked but America was going to attack someone
and no one much liked the Taliban.


2002 arrives, suddenly the American administration decides that Iraq has WMD that the sanctions
that was estimated to have brought about the death of half a million Iraqi children have not worked
and that It desperately needs to be stopped and stopped right now.

The rest of the world is rather less than convinced but while the US claims to have evidence
they also tell everyone that they cannot show it to them.

The UK persuades the US to at least try to look like they have some respect for international law
the US agrees to do so but also loudly states that if the UN doesn't support them they'll just go
to war anyway.
The US and UK put forward a resolution which the UN security council vote in favour of that
weapons inspectors be allowed back into Iraq and allowed to go absolutely anywhere they choose.
Apparently the UK government at least has forgotten that the weapons inspectors were withdrawn
and are caught referring to saddam having kicked them out.
When pulled up on this, they respond saying its the same thing really.

Many people at the time believe that the US believes that Saddam will reject it out of hand.

Saddam accepts it.
UN weapons inspectors return to Iraq and begin their search.
After about a couple of weeks they start publicly stating that the US who is claiming
to have evidence and know where the WMD are, aren't providing them with any information as
to where to look, and they haven't found any yet.

America says it will provide them with information but they never asked before.

Time goes by

No WMD found
More time and many inspections go by

No WMD found

America starts saying how big Iraq is and how hard it is to find something in a country the size of texas.

Iraq hands over a rather hefty dossier as demanded by the UN supposedly detailing everything
about their WMD and what happened to them.
America censors the entire document before allowing anyone else to see it and then says
it did not provide full information.
No one else can really back that up as no one else has seen it.

American regime leaders start saying that not finding wmd doesn't mean they don't exist.
Many people agree that not finding anything doesn't prove there isn't anything but also note
that not finding anything could just be because there isn't anything to find.

UK and US try to get UN to give them a resolution explicitly authorising war.
France says that the weapons inspectors should be allowed more time and if any resolution is
tabled to allow the attack at this stage they will veto it.
America rather disingenously says that just one country should not be able to determine
security council resolutions - (given that the US has vetoed far more resolutions than any
other country)
Despite UK nice guy persuasion and US threats, they cannot get even a majority of the security council
to go along with them and finally give up on getting a UN resolution.

Finally we are about to have the war start,
in the final 24 hours
the US abandoning all pretence that there are WMD advises that war can be averted if Saddam leaves the country or is killed.

It is actually a bit hard to believe that the US would have actually backed off at that stage anyway and the idea of having full control over
an oil producing country right in the middle of all the other oil producing
middle eastern countries,
where they might just build military bases and have some kind
of government in Iraq that they can control must have had most of the oil
aware members of the administration drooling.
Saddam doesn't leave, his regime members don't kill him
The war begins
At one point Saddam offered to step down and leave the Country, even if he was sure to be arrested and Court martialed...

At that point The US gov responded that...Saddam arrest was not enough...his 2 sons also had to be made prisoners...Saddam did not accept that.

Does it matter where I live? All that matters is that I think. I think these thoughts, and someone must agree with me, even if it is just one person. And I can almost gurantee that this someone isn't American.

*Waves hand wildly* Oooh! Oooh! I agree with you, and I'm not American! Now what do I win? :p

*Waves hand wildly* Oooh! Oooh! I agree with you, and I'm not American! Now what do I win? :p
Moral support? I don't know. I was trying to say that the US is a mere 5% of the world's population. And there are 6 billion total out there. It's probable that someone agrees with me, and probably not in the US. We are all hardwired not to think these thoughts.

Great! Why stick with something sensible when we can get sidetracked?
If you are suggesting that it is not something worth quibbling about, then why did you start the quibbling by objecting to someone else's entirely proper use of the word? :confused:

You are just like those people who label other nations as fascist that aren't, such as the old USSR, which was clearly not fascist.
Er why? Because I chose to point out that your correction of someone's already correct description was errant? :confused:

Money from government contracts for Halliburton.

Being able to keep gas prices high through Iraqi Oil Regime instability (Insurgents bombing the pipelines)

Installing a jury-rigged "democracy" in the heart of the middle-east...Even if they don't get a passable "democracy", the chaos from the inevitable pullout will cause a prepared CIA-trained local asset to take power in the midst of the vaccuum of anarchy....They wanted to replace Saddam with someone more friendly, after their lapdog turned on them in 1991...


All this and more, brought you the Iraq War...


Enjoy...

Why? In one word:
Wargasm.

Er why? Because I chose to point out that your correction of someone's already correct description was errant? :confused:
Well, I can say that you are an egalitarian capitalist. I don't know if you are or if you aren't. I'm just saying that because of your psycho wacko pinko commie atheio junkie views, you are an egalitarian capitaliist. Don't like it? Tough. That's what you're doing by mislabelling ideaologies.

I don't buy into any one theory, but I think a whole range of Issues could be brought together to make Iraq happen...sure opening up Iraqs Oil would be good of the USA, so would just getting rid of Saddam, having troops in the middle-East, I'm sure there are many other reason...however to get the people of America to support the war the first thing the government had to do was scare the people into supporting the war. WMD's did the trick...the thing is I think when a country goes to war the people have to believe what they are doing is right. WMD's helped that.

Slowly over time the American people will realise that they have been fed rubbish and will see the war for what it is...a big mistake.

Well, I can say that you are an egalitarian capitalist. I don't know if you are or if you aren't. I'm just saying that because of your psycho wacko pinko commie atheio junkie views, you are an egalitarian capitaliist. Don't like it? Tough. That's what you're doing by mislabelling ideaologies.
Perhaps you are confused. Someone used the word fascist, you in error stated that their use was incorrect because that which they were applying it to did not include certain traits (none of which are necessary for the term to be correctly applicable). You then suggested that it is 'sidetracking' to consider and point out the proper use of the term (to which I can only wonder why you bothered initiating such commentary).

If you think pointing out the correct use of a word is sidetracking, why did you initiate such commentary, and how does knowing a word's correct applications make someone any of the things you have called me?

To be honest at this point your postings are looking like nothing other than trantrums. You attempted to correct someone else, but object to being corrected yourself. You could save yourself this trouble by actually finding out what a word means before you start dictating to others how they ought to use that word.

Perhaps you are confused. Someone used the word fascist, you in error stated that their use was incorrect because that which they were applying it to did not include certain traits (none of which are necessary for the term to be correctly applicable). You then suggested that it is 'sidetracking' to consider and point out the proper use of the term (to which I can only wonder why you bothered initiating such commentary).

If you think pointing out the correct use of a word is sidetracking, why did you initiate such commentary, and how does knowing a word's correct applications make someone any of the things you have called me?

They don't. I just called you something you aren't to show you how it feels.