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Forums - The lounge
Subject: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 ... 17
Original Message Date: 11-Aug-02 @ 12:49 PM - [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
I think the USA should definitely invade Iraq at the
earliest possible opportunity. They threaten the US's
control of this vital oil producing region. If the US has no
access to this oil, the economy will crumble and people
will starve. let's keep the starving where they belong. In
the thrid world!
What's the point of being the world's greatest power if
you can't excercise that power in your own interests?
The whinging liberals can leave the country as far as I
am concerned. The US should use its military, political
and economic power to assure it's safe future. Any
other course of action is mere self delusion. Do you
think that another country with the same power as the
US would act any differently?
Anyone, like bin laden, or arafat, who dares to attack
the US or its interests must be first humiliated and then
destroyed. This may cause resentment in other nations,
but what the hell are they going to do about it? Invade
America?
Anyone who threatens the viability of US corporates
must be taught a lesson. The US controls the IMF, the
World Bank, etc etc. The US should NOT be afraid to
use this leverage to further its own ends.
The time has come for the world to realise that we are
not beholden to any organisation, legal body or treaty,
whether or not we signed it sometime in the past.
Times, as they say, change.
earliest possible opportunity. They threaten the US's
control of this vital oil producing region. If the US has no
access to this oil, the economy will crumble and people
will starve. let's keep the starving where they belong. In
the thrid world!
What's the point of being the world's greatest power if
you can't excercise that power in your own interests?
The whinging liberals can leave the country as far as I
am concerned. The US should use its military, political
and economic power to assure it's safe future. Any
other course of action is mere self delusion. Do you
think that another country with the same power as the
US would act any differently?
Anyone, like bin laden, or arafat, who dares to attack
the US or its interests must be first humiliated and then
destroyed. This may cause resentment in other nations,
but what the hell are they going to do about it? Invade
America?
Anyone who threatens the viability of US corporates
must be taught a lesson. The US controls the IMF, the
World Bank, etc etc. The US should NOT be afraid to
use this leverage to further its own ends.
The time has come for the world to realise that we are
not beholden to any organisation, legal body or treaty,
whether or not we signed it sometime in the past.
Times, as they say, change.
Message 41/168 12-Aug-02 @ 01:12 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
I'm not sure yet as to where I stand on the Iraq issue. I would like to hear the actual evidence that we have against them, before an invasion occurs. As someone stated before, ideally we should end our (USA) dependency on foriegn oil by finding better fuel/energy sources.
Message 43/168 12-Aug-02 @ 01:26 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
Ah yes rt...definitely use that distract the american people with war thing. I must have missed the last year and a half where the economy has slowly declined. Must be all that war I've been hearing about in the news. THat's such a bullshit argument it turns my stomach.
Message 44/168 12-Aug-02 @ 01:29 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
US Iraq Campaign Has Its First Engagement
DEBKAfileSpecial Military Analysis
10 August: America’s offensive against Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq has begun as an exercise in gradualism rather than a D-Day drama. DEBKAfile ’s military sources report that tens of thousands of US, British, French, Netherlands, Australian troops may take part in the campaign, openly or covertly, but not in massive waves that fling themselves telegenically on Baghdad.
The fact of the matter is that American military concentrations are already unobtrusively present in northern and southern Iraq. The US campaign to oust Saddam is therefore unfolding already, albeit in salami-fashion, slice by slice, under clouds of disinformation and diversionary ruses – like the latest statements by President George W. Bush (No date set yet for the offensive) and British premier Tony Blair (Plenty of time before the war begins), or the grave reservations issuing from the Russian, French and German leaders. The peasoup of deception is further thickened by utterances in the last 48 hours from Turkish prime minister Bulent Ecevit, King Abdullah of Jordan, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and the Saudi crown prince Abdullah. They warn Washington that attacking Iraq would be a terrible mistake, one which they want no part of.
DEBKAfile’s military sources attempt here to pierce some of the thickets of confusion with a few facts on the ground:
A. Special US forces entered the Kurdish regions of north Iraq towards the end of March nearly four months ago, to set up local Kurdish militias and train them for battle.
B. At around the same time, Turkish special forces went into northern Iraq in waves that continued through April, fetching up in Turkmen regions around the big oil towns of Mosul and Kirkuk.
C. Meanwhile, the Americans threw a ring of bases – using existing facilities and adding new ones – around Iraq. They have since been pouring into those bases US armored ground units, tanks, air, navy and missile forces, as well as combat medical units and special contingents for anti-nuclear, biological and chemical warfare. According to our sources, the noose around Iraq extends from Georgia and Turkey in the north, Israel, Egypt and Jordan to the west, Eritrea and Kenya in the southwest, and Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain to the south.
Furthermore, a large US armada, including aircraft carriers, has assembled at three points: the eastern Mediterranean, the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.
D. Since June, American and Turkish construction engineers have been working in northern Iraq, building and expanding airfields and air strips to make them fit for military use.
(Details of this operation appear in an earlier report on this page.)
First US Military Steps
In the past week, once those preparations were in place, the United States carried out two military operations:
1. Tuesday August 6, at 0800 hours Middle East time, US and British air bombers went into action and destroyed the Iraqi air command and control center at al-Nukhaib in the desert between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The center contained advanced fiber optic networks recently installed by Chinese companies. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military sources say the raid made military history. For the first time, the US air force used new precision-guided bombs capable of locating and destroying fiber optic systems. The existence of such weaponry was hitherto unknown.
Following the destruction of the facility, about 260 miles (415 kilometers), southwest of Baghdad, waves of US warplanes swept in from the Prince Sultan air base in Saudi Arabia and from US aircraft carriers in the Gulf and flew over the Iraqi capital.
The Iraqi air force and anti-aircraft system held their fire on orders from above. This deep air penetration told the Americans that the early warning radar system protecting Baghdad and its environs from intrusion by enemy aircraft and missiles was inactive.
2. Two days later, on Wednesday night, August 8, Turkey executed its first major military assault inside Iraq. DEBKAfile’s military sources learn from Turkish and Kurdish informants that helicopters under US, British and Turkish warplane escort flew Turkish commandos to an operation for seizing the critical Bamerni airport in northern Iraq. This airport, just outside the Kurdish region, lies 50 miles north of the big Iraqi oil cities of the north, Kirkuk and Mosul. With the Turkish commandos was a group of US special forces officers and men. Bamerni airport was captured after a brief battle in which a unit of Iraqi armored defenders was destroyed, opening the airport for giant American and Turkish transports to deliver engineering units, heavy machinery and electronic support equipment, which were put to work at once on enlarging the field and widening its landing strips.
The American unit, reinforced, went on to capture two small Iraqi military airfields nearby.
The Turkish expeditionary force in northern Iraq now numbers some 5,000 men, in addition to Turkish air force contingents.
DEBKAfile’s military experts explain that with Bamerni airport and the two additional airfields the Americans have acquired full control of the skies over the two oil cities of Mosul and Kirkuk, as well as over the Syrian-Iraqi railroad, which they can now cut off by aerial bombardment. A prime strategic asset, this railroad is Saddam’s back door for taking delivery of his illegal overseas arms purchases, which are ferried from Syrian ports to Baghdad by the Syrian-Iraqi railway. On the return journey, the same railway carries illegal Iraqi oil exports, over and above the quantities allowed under UN sanctions, out to market. The Iraqi war effort and the Syrian treasury depend heavily on the revenues accruing from these smuggled oil sales.
The battle over this airfield was in fact the first important face-to-face engagement between a US-led invasion force and Iraqi troops. It was carried out seven hours before the Iraqi ruler delivered his televised speech to the nation, on the 14th anniversary of the bloody eight-year Iraq-Iran war. In that speech, Saddam threatened American troops going to war against Iraq that they would return home in coffins.
Next Steps
Just before the Saddam address, US spy satellites and planes detected unusual movements by elite Republic Guard units in the capital. They appeared to be digging positions below ground on the banks of the Tigris. Some military commentators were convinced the Iraqi ruler had decided to bury himself and his key associates in fortified bunker-type positions. He was said to be counting on American reluctance to engage in urban warfare in Iraqi towns for fear of large-scale-casualties that would force them to withdraw.
DEBKAfile’s military experts see little sign of this tactic – aside from the initial report. In fact, the bulk of the Iraqi army is concentrated in three regions outside Baghdad - the Kurdish regions of the north, the H-3 and al Baghdadi air bases opposite the Jordanian border in the center, and along the Saudi and Kuwaiti frontiers, in the south.
In the north, the Iraqi armored divisions, which are massed opposite the Turkish border along the Little and Big Zeb Rivers, show now sign of movement in response to US-Turkish activity.
Iraqi concentrations in the center and south have been augmented somewhat but not substantially.
Iraq’s military passivity in the face of US-led advances and strikes is beginning to worry the American, Turkish and Israeli high commands. They suspect that Saddam is playing the same fog-of-war game as Washington, so as to put them to sleep and then catch them unawares.
Such sudden action could take the form of an Iraqi missile or bomber attack on Israel using warheads loaded with radioactive, chemical or biological materials, a combined missile-terrorist strike to sabotage Saudi oil fields, or a mass terrorist attack in the United States.
The sharpest alert to a threat to Iraq’s southern neighbors came not from military intelligence but from international oil dealers, who warned that Saddam Hussein if attacked may well decide to set fire to Saudi and Kuwaiti oil fields, sending oil prices skyrocketing above US$ 40 per barrel.
Israel’s Concerns
Israel faces three threats, all of them in the realm of the unknown:
a. An Iraqi missile attack, when the size of Saddam’s arsenal has not been reliably established.
DEBKAfile ’s military experts dispute the assessment heard this week from retired Israeli military leaders that the Iraqis have only a few missiles. The truth is that no one outside Iraq knows how many Saddam has cached or what advanced missile technologies he has secretly developed. According to one estimate, Iraq may have accumulated between 70 and 150 warheads, or maybe more.
b. A WMD threat, when no one knows what Saddam has up his sleeve – whether radiological bombs with a limited radius, or a more highly developed type. The same questions apply to Saddam’s biological and chemical warfare capabilities.
c. Notwithstanding the presence of US forces in Jordan and the strategic-defense relationship developed between Jordan and Israel, the possibility of the old Eastern Arab Front coming back to life against Israel, though unlikely, cannot be entirely ruled out.
The gloomiest scenario envisages Iraqi units surging through Jordan to attack Israeli from the east concurrently with a Syrian-Hizballah strike from the north – a combined assault that may sweep King Abdullah into the fray against Israel.
The Jordanian king is an unknown quantity, untried in war situations. Therefore the odds on his executing an about-face as radical as this cannot be estimated with certainty. Israeli war planners, however, are not ignoring this possible peril, however improbable.
______________________________________
DEBKAfileSpecial Military Analysis
10 August: America’s offensive against Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq has begun as an exercise in gradualism rather than a D-Day drama. DEBKAfile ’s military sources report that tens of thousands of US, British, French, Netherlands, Australian troops may take part in the campaign, openly or covertly, but not in massive waves that fling themselves telegenically on Baghdad.
The fact of the matter is that American military concentrations are already unobtrusively present in northern and southern Iraq. The US campaign to oust Saddam is therefore unfolding already, albeit in salami-fashion, slice by slice, under clouds of disinformation and diversionary ruses – like the latest statements by President George W. Bush (No date set yet for the offensive) and British premier Tony Blair (Plenty of time before the war begins), or the grave reservations issuing from the Russian, French and German leaders. The peasoup of deception is further thickened by utterances in the last 48 hours from Turkish prime minister Bulent Ecevit, King Abdullah of Jordan, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and the Saudi crown prince Abdullah. They warn Washington that attacking Iraq would be a terrible mistake, one which they want no part of.
DEBKAfile’s military sources attempt here to pierce some of the thickets of confusion with a few facts on the ground:
A. Special US forces entered the Kurdish regions of north Iraq towards the end of March nearly four months ago, to set up local Kurdish militias and train them for battle.
B. At around the same time, Turkish special forces went into northern Iraq in waves that continued through April, fetching up in Turkmen regions around the big oil towns of Mosul and Kirkuk.
C. Meanwhile, the Americans threw a ring of bases – using existing facilities and adding new ones – around Iraq. They have since been pouring into those bases US armored ground units, tanks, air, navy and missile forces, as well as combat medical units and special contingents for anti-nuclear, biological and chemical warfare. According to our sources, the noose around Iraq extends from Georgia and Turkey in the north, Israel, Egypt and Jordan to the west, Eritrea and Kenya in the southwest, and Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain to the south.
Furthermore, a large US armada, including aircraft carriers, has assembled at three points: the eastern Mediterranean, the Red Sea and the Persian Gulf.
D. Since June, American and Turkish construction engineers have been working in northern Iraq, building and expanding airfields and air strips to make them fit for military use.
(Details of this operation appear in an earlier report on this page.)
First US Military Steps
In the past week, once those preparations were in place, the United States carried out two military operations:
1. Tuesday August 6, at 0800 hours Middle East time, US and British air bombers went into action and destroyed the Iraqi air command and control center at al-Nukhaib in the desert between Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The center contained advanced fiber optic networks recently installed by Chinese companies. DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military sources say the raid made military history. For the first time, the US air force used new precision-guided bombs capable of locating and destroying fiber optic systems. The existence of such weaponry was hitherto unknown.
Following the destruction of the facility, about 260 miles (415 kilometers), southwest of Baghdad, waves of US warplanes swept in from the Prince Sultan air base in Saudi Arabia and from US aircraft carriers in the Gulf and flew over the Iraqi capital.
The Iraqi air force and anti-aircraft system held their fire on orders from above. This deep air penetration told the Americans that the early warning radar system protecting Baghdad and its environs from intrusion by enemy aircraft and missiles was inactive.
2. Two days later, on Wednesday night, August 8, Turkey executed its first major military assault inside Iraq. DEBKAfile’s military sources learn from Turkish and Kurdish informants that helicopters under US, British and Turkish warplane escort flew Turkish commandos to an operation for seizing the critical Bamerni airport in northern Iraq. This airport, just outside the Kurdish region, lies 50 miles north of the big Iraqi oil cities of the north, Kirkuk and Mosul. With the Turkish commandos was a group of US special forces officers and men. Bamerni airport was captured after a brief battle in which a unit of Iraqi armored defenders was destroyed, opening the airport for giant American and Turkish transports to deliver engineering units, heavy machinery and electronic support equipment, which were put to work at once on enlarging the field and widening its landing strips.
The American unit, reinforced, went on to capture two small Iraqi military airfields nearby.
The Turkish expeditionary force in northern Iraq now numbers some 5,000 men, in addition to Turkish air force contingents.
DEBKAfile’s military experts explain that with Bamerni airport and the two additional airfields the Americans have acquired full control of the skies over the two oil cities of Mosul and Kirkuk, as well as over the Syrian-Iraqi railroad, which they can now cut off by aerial bombardment. A prime strategic asset, this railroad is Saddam’s back door for taking delivery of his illegal overseas arms purchases, which are ferried from Syrian ports to Baghdad by the Syrian-Iraqi railway. On the return journey, the same railway carries illegal Iraqi oil exports, over and above the quantities allowed under UN sanctions, out to market. The Iraqi war effort and the Syrian treasury depend heavily on the revenues accruing from these smuggled oil sales.
The battle over this airfield was in fact the first important face-to-face engagement between a US-led invasion force and Iraqi troops. It was carried out seven hours before the Iraqi ruler delivered his televised speech to the nation, on the 14th anniversary of the bloody eight-year Iraq-Iran war. In that speech, Saddam threatened American troops going to war against Iraq that they would return home in coffins.
Next Steps
Just before the Saddam address, US spy satellites and planes detected unusual movements by elite Republic Guard units in the capital. They appeared to be digging positions below ground on the banks of the Tigris. Some military commentators were convinced the Iraqi ruler had decided to bury himself and his key associates in fortified bunker-type positions. He was said to be counting on American reluctance to engage in urban warfare in Iraqi towns for fear of large-scale-casualties that would force them to withdraw.
DEBKAfile’s military experts see little sign of this tactic – aside from the initial report. In fact, the bulk of the Iraqi army is concentrated in three regions outside Baghdad - the Kurdish regions of the north, the H-3 and al Baghdadi air bases opposite the Jordanian border in the center, and along the Saudi and Kuwaiti frontiers, in the south.
In the north, the Iraqi armored divisions, which are massed opposite the Turkish border along the Little and Big Zeb Rivers, show now sign of movement in response to US-Turkish activity.
Iraqi concentrations in the center and south have been augmented somewhat but not substantially.
Iraq’s military passivity in the face of US-led advances and strikes is beginning to worry the American, Turkish and Israeli high commands. They suspect that Saddam is playing the same fog-of-war game as Washington, so as to put them to sleep and then catch them unawares.
Such sudden action could take the form of an Iraqi missile or bomber attack on Israel using warheads loaded with radioactive, chemical or biological materials, a combined missile-terrorist strike to sabotage Saudi oil fields, or a mass terrorist attack in the United States.
The sharpest alert to a threat to Iraq’s southern neighbors came not from military intelligence but from international oil dealers, who warned that Saddam Hussein if attacked may well decide to set fire to Saudi and Kuwaiti oil fields, sending oil prices skyrocketing above US$ 40 per barrel.
Israel’s Concerns
Israel faces three threats, all of them in the realm of the unknown:
a. An Iraqi missile attack, when the size of Saddam’s arsenal has not been reliably established.
DEBKAfile ’s military experts dispute the assessment heard this week from retired Israeli military leaders that the Iraqis have only a few missiles. The truth is that no one outside Iraq knows how many Saddam has cached or what advanced missile technologies he has secretly developed. According to one estimate, Iraq may have accumulated between 70 and 150 warheads, or maybe more.
b. A WMD threat, when no one knows what Saddam has up his sleeve – whether radiological bombs with a limited radius, or a more highly developed type. The same questions apply to Saddam’s biological and chemical warfare capabilities.
c. Notwithstanding the presence of US forces in Jordan and the strategic-defense relationship developed between Jordan and Israel, the possibility of the old Eastern Arab Front coming back to life against Israel, though unlikely, cannot be entirely ruled out.
The gloomiest scenario envisages Iraqi units surging through Jordan to attack Israeli from the east concurrently with a Syrian-Hizballah strike from the north – a combined assault that may sweep King Abdullah into the fray against Israel.
The Jordanian king is an unknown quantity, untried in war situations. Therefore the odds on his executing an about-face as radical as this cannot be estimated with certainty. Israeli war planners, however, are not ignoring this possible peril, however improbable.
______________________________________
Message 45/168 12-Aug-02 @ 01:47 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
ummmmm,
Slowly?! More like, "not since The Great Depression..." I imagine the Great Republican Tax Cut, along with massive military expenditure and billions thrown away on illusory security, destruction of the public school systems, blowing up EPA's management, attempting multiple times to rape Alaska's wilderness, exposing people's private medical information to massive fraud and abuse by the pharmaceutical industry are all what you'd call enlightened policy? I don't imagine any of that has influenced the economic disaster we're in right now, has it?
What makes me sick is the immediate reversion to ad hominem attacks the Republicans always engage in when they know they're about to lose, big-time.
Watch for it this coming election season; it will be widespread.
rt
Slowly?! More like, "not since The Great Depression..."
What makes me sick is the immediate reversion to ad hominem attacks the Republicans always engage in when they know they're about to lose, big-time.
Watch for it this coming election season; it will be widespread.
rt
Message 46/168 12-Aug-02 @ 02:23 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
Sorry, i am not voicing any anti-british sentimate. I am however voicing negativity toward those here who continue to try and depict us as the aggressor in the middle east. Our actions have always been reactionary. It's the same misinformative crap Sadam and other arab leaders feed their people to create anti american sentiment abroad. I am saying that peolpe in britian should not criticize our actions when they themselves are often in similar circumstances and we never try and color it in a negative way.
Message 47/168 12-Aug-02 @ 02:42 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
i think what will really suprise people is that iraq is just a stepping stone to get to the saudis who finance more terror than all the other nations combined.
for all of you europeans, would you like saddam launching dirty bombs on your soil? he can do it and probably already has nukes. you guys are much closer than we are.
as for the saudis, they finance more terror than iraq is even capable of. don't be suprised if the saudis go from friend to foe quickly and end up being manipulated or new govnt or something quickly if the us does attack iraq.
if the saudis were shut down, probably 80% of the worlds terror operations would shut down as well (statistics pulled out of my rear)
notice the us is building a nice large base in the middle east that is *not* in arabia?
the thing that scares me isn't when middle eastern nations get nukes, its when the north koreans and chinese get them. its hard to do anything against billions of poor chinese with nothing to do (needless to say not enough women cuz of the infanticide that happens there) and if they have nukes that makes them even more pesky.
you guys all talking about the 'reasons' america will go to war is silly.
the socialists/liberals amongst us say its all tied to money and oil and its a big conspiricy
the conservatives all say its to save lives down the road
in reality it probably covers several hundred reasons that none of us even know about... not *everything* is leaked to the press. comon!
anyway, iraqis sitting off the coast with sam based nukes etc doesn't appeal to me. lets at least look at evidence before jumping to conclusions.
and the guy who posted the fact that we "kill 5000 children a month because of sanctions" thats utter bull. please provide a link to a statistic to back that up. 60,000 children a year do no die because of 'sanctions' when the sanctions don't even work. its lies...
jamey
for all of you europeans, would you like saddam launching dirty bombs on your soil? he can do it and probably already has nukes. you guys are much closer than we are.
as for the saudis, they finance more terror than iraq is even capable of. don't be suprised if the saudis go from friend to foe quickly and end up being manipulated or new govnt or something quickly if the us does attack iraq.
if the saudis were shut down, probably 80% of the worlds terror operations would shut down as well (statistics pulled out of my rear)
notice the us is building a nice large base in the middle east that is *not* in arabia?
the thing that scares me isn't when middle eastern nations get nukes, its when the north koreans and chinese get them. its hard to do anything against billions of poor chinese with nothing to do (needless to say not enough women cuz of the infanticide that happens there) and if they have nukes that makes them even more pesky.
you guys all talking about the 'reasons' america will go to war is silly.
the socialists/liberals amongst us say its all tied to money and oil and its a big conspiricy
the conservatives all say its to save lives down the road
in reality it probably covers several hundred reasons that none of us even know about... not *everything* is leaked to the press. comon!
anyway, iraqis sitting off the coast with sam based nukes etc doesn't appeal to me. lets at least look at evidence before jumping to conclusions.
and the guy who posted the fact that we "kill 5000 children a month because of sanctions" thats utter bull. please provide a link to a statistic to back that up. 60,000 children a year do no die because of 'sanctions' when the sanctions don't even work. its lies...
jamey
Message 48/168 12-Aug-02 @ 02:56 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
oh btw... on the topic of 5000 children a month....
it was based on one womans claim and was picked up by unicief and all the other relief groups etc and was widely reported back in the early 90s...
1) the sanctions do not include medicine and food.... if the people are not getting these items the *only* reason is because the iraqi government doesn't want them to...
2) if iraq is truely too poor to buy medicine and food for children (which isn't the case, no one heeds the embargo except the usa basically) then relief organizations should certainly be able to fill the gap and probably have done so (i will try to dig up more on this fact)
3) i would say that whenever the lady was in that made that 'soundbite' was in iraq, saddam had plenty of propeganda going on about how many children die because of the evil usa etc... the same lady said that the same thing would happen in yugoslavia. well its strange but she was wrong... so the emphesis should be placed on iraq, not the usa.
its just like when there was famine in africa in the 80s, it wasn't that there was no food to be had, it was just that the people in power made bad decisions.
so if iraq spends its money trying to get nukes instead of medicine and food, how is that a USA policy problem?
jamey
it was based on one womans claim and was picked up by unicief and all the other relief groups etc and was widely reported back in the early 90s...
1) the sanctions do not include medicine and food.... if the people are not getting these items the *only* reason is because the iraqi government doesn't want them to...
2) if iraq is truely too poor to buy medicine and food for children (which isn't the case, no one heeds the embargo except the usa basically) then relief organizations should certainly be able to fill the gap and probably have done so (i will try to dig up more on this fact)
3) i would say that whenever the lady was in that made that 'soundbite' was in iraq, saddam had plenty of propeganda going on about how many children die because of the evil usa etc... the same lady said that the same thing would happen in yugoslavia. well its strange but she was wrong... so the emphesis should be placed on iraq, not the usa.
its just like when there was famine in africa in the 80s, it wasn't that there was no food to be had, it was just that the people in power made bad decisions.
so if iraq spends its money trying to get nukes instead of medicine and food, how is that a USA policy problem?
jamey
Message 49/168 12-Aug-02 @ 05:11 AM - .
BJT
Posts: 90
Link?: No link
File?: No file
Calling Brett a tool is doing f*ck all good!
Yes Al Queda are rich but the soldier's aren't, that's why they are such nutters! I'm saying its FA to do with religion its economy, sanction's and the like. The Nazi party was rich but Germany was poor!
Anyway, the problem for average American Citizens is that it is very difficult to get information on what has occured in the middle east. News presentation by CNN and NBC is very biased. Especially with respect to the Palestinian conflict, it's sometimes outrightly immoral.
I do think that within the US, freedom of speech does play a good role in the political system, its just that for a country so entwind in world politics, their average citizen does not get enough information on the decisions their leaders are making externally.
Brett you have to agree with me.
But, as shown, its not just the US, pretty much all of the western world is agreeing behind closed doors.
Anyway, what sh*ts me here in Australia, we are not allowing refugee seekers into Australia, infact we are locking them up and pretty much treating them as criminals, crushing their wills so they will go home. Many are afghans, we have an opportunity to do some thing positive for the region and we are blowing it!
Yes Al Queda are rich but the soldier's aren't, that's why they are such nutters! I'm saying its FA to do with religion its economy, sanction's and the like. The Nazi party was rich but Germany was poor!
Anyway, the problem for average American Citizens is that it is very difficult to get information on what has occured in the middle east. News presentation by CNN and NBC is very biased. Especially with respect to the Palestinian conflict, it's sometimes outrightly immoral.
I do think that within the US, freedom of speech does play a good role in the political system, its just that for a country so entwind in world politics, their average citizen does not get enough information on the decisions their leaders are making externally.
Brett you have to agree with me.
But, as shown, its not just the US, pretty much all of the western world is agreeing behind closed doors.
Anyway, what sh*ts me here in Australia, we are not allowing refugee seekers into Australia, infact we are locking them up and pretty much treating them as criminals, crushing their wills so they will go home. Many are afghans, we have an opportunity to do some thing positive for the region and we are blowing it!
Message 50/168 12-Aug-02 @ 06:59 AM - RE: [ot] Should the US invade Iraq?
true. how informed can we be if the news doesn't tell us straight? But there are many journalist who do shoot straight. But,Look at the primetime news shows locally. They spoon feed the news to people on a 5th grade level. It's appauling, and i can't even watch them. we here have microscopes up the butts of every public oficial making our society a very small power distance structure.
I think people reach a point where it interfears with their ability to go to work and get things done if they are distracted by the fears of all this. They just tune it out and enjoy the bliss of ignorance.
True -suadi's are neck deep in this, and jamie you pretty much summed up alot of what i was thinking.
and James, I know I am tool, it's why i am handy to have around. I get things done!!!!!
I think people reach a point where it interfears with their ability to go to work and get things done if they are distracted by the fears of all this. They just tune it out and enjoy the bliss of ignorance.
True -suadi's are neck deep in this, and jamie you pretty much summed up alot of what i was thinking.
and James, I know I am tool, it's why i am handy to have around. I get things done!!!!!
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