Iraq Situation is Bullshit
POSTED BY: Succatash
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 10, 2024 22:11
VIEWED: 28270
PAGE 5 of 17
GIno- I guess what you're asking is: Is the presence of the USA military a stablizing or a destabilizing force? If it's a destabilizing force, then the harder we try to "fix" things, the worse things will get.
Sure won't hear bad news from USA media! But lack of good news is just as informative.
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Interesting animation. Sometimes it makes me wonder just what planet some folks are living on these days.
The first and most fundamental civil right there is, is the right not to get blown up. It appears that a lot of folks don't get that. We are still debating whether we are at war or not, even after 2 years since the towers fell.
I don't know about you, but if someone tries to kill you, you got the right to kill them right back. And I see no reason to suspect that the jihadis and Saddam dead enders make any distinction between people who ain't them. Heck New York city and state voted heavily for Gore. It did not stop them from being attacked.
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The deal was that you sign up for miltary service, meaning going to war if necessary, and then the military fulfills its agreement to fund college.
You break your side of the agreement, then yes, the military will put you in jail. I don't see how the military is doing anything wrong in this case. It was the guy who decided to break his agreement first.
Making voluntary contractual obligation legally binding is a bad idea?
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"Would you also fault semi socialistic systems in say Sweden, Canada, or France as inferior to the one in the U.S. or just different ?"
I have to say yes. None of these countries seem to be doing as well as the US economically, and that has a large part to do with the socialist systems they have employed. Technically, militarily, or politically, none of these countries are doing as well as the US, despite in the case of France, being far older, Sweden, of having a more culturally homogenous population, and Canada, being so much like America in geography.
Once you control the economy of a population, you control almost every other aspect of the life of the individual. Some ideas work in the real world better than others, and some simply don't work. Centralized economic control does not work nearly as well as individual freedom. It is different, but is not working nearly as good as the US system.
"Other countries which have used extreme policys to hold things together are Saudi Arabia and Egypt... while these are more aligned to the U.S. are they not deserving of the same criticism"
This is more tactical than anything else. We know that 15 of the 19 hijackers on 9-11 were Sauds. But attacking Sauds directly would have turned this into a war on Islam, with all the attendent problems that would cause. Which is why Saddam had to go first. In the case of Saudi Arabia, they, or at least a large portion of the ruling family, are far more deserving of criticism.
"What attempts to undermine ?"
It is not generally considered politically correct to note this, but from the 30's on, Soviets were trying to infiltrate US government, unions and Hollywood, in an attempt to undermine the American political structure and bring about one that more closely resembles the one they had. This has been born out by the release of KGB archives, and the Verona transcripts (of coded messages from the Soviets)
"But should using force to protect yourself, extend to protecting your economic interests in other countrys ? And if so how far can the other side go in order the fight that ?"
Okay, I need to object to the word "should". It refers to some standard to base a judgement on, and not knowing what that standard is, I am not sure what you are getting at here.
In an ideal world, one "should" never have to defend themselves, using force or not. 9-11 "should" never happen, nor dictators like Saddam or the Taliban should never arrise. But they do, and you have to deal with the situation as it is, rather than how you wish it were.
In these cases, like I said before, it comes down to a choice between two evils, and one has to go to the lesser one. Its a catch-22, damned if we protect our economic interests and that means some rather nasty regimes, and damned if we replace those governments. Well, there are none so free as the damned....
As for how far the other side "should" go, well, again, ideally, we should not even be having a war at all. But we are, so should does not play into it. I will say that deliberately targeting civilians is a bad idea. Blowing up the UN mission, who was there only to help the Iraqi people, they "should" not have done that.
It looks like we are going to have to agree to disagree on the Israeli-Palistinian problem. It is difficult to find out just how much real support Hamas has in the territories, as Arafat's is running a thugocracy and diversity of opinions will get one lynched in the streets. It is the suicide bombers who are in power there, and until they are removed, peace is not going to happen.
For the betterment of both sides, the jihadis are going to have to go away. There has to be a mutually satisfactory solution, which means a two state solution where neither state is blowing up the other one. As long as one side sees their goal as annilating the other, such a solution will not happen.
I will also note that again you have a democracy in a war against a totalitarian regime. And in that case, at first cut, I have to side with the Israelis. More brains on the job and all that.
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I do read history, just not the Chomskyite version of it. The half truths and some quite big lies about the past.
There are two central problems with this thesis. First off, that this was different in nature from things that were done by any other nation, such as the Soviets. Or was worse than things any other nation did.
The second is the concept of "group guilt". That the actions of the government of a democracy justifies attacks on the civilians of that government, even if those civilians did not vote for the administration. That the sins of any past administration 'roll over' to the present population. If you have no control over the events, then you cannot be held accountable for the outcome. And if the events happened before you were born, and even if you try to rectify them, too bad.
So even if you were right in your historical analysis, the fundamental structure of your argument is troublesome.
Lets cut through the all the bull and follow your argument out to its logical conclusion. What you are essentially saying is that Al-Qaeda was justified in mudering innocent civilians on 9-11 and the US has no right to self defense. Because of things that were done in the past, in some cases the long distant past, we should simply go off somewhere and die. Sorry, you want to kill me, if you think you have the right to kill me, then I am assuming the right to kill you right back.
And when one looks at what the Taliban did to Afghanistan, it is hard to see these guys as "freedom fighters" That they would do things different, let alone better.
Look, we can go around and around on historical debates till the end of the world. Some will always see the glass as half empty, some will ignore any and all good the US has done. And in the end, none of it means a thing.
Whether we like it or not, we are in a war for survival. And to be frank, none of these excuses really amount to a hill of beans. Bin Ladan does not like the Saud family and thinks he'd make a better defender of Mecca and Medina. Saddam wants to unite first the entire Arab world and then the rest of us, under his thumb. We would prefer things were different, that we were not the scapegoat of all those failed thugocracies. But we are, and that is what we have to deal with.
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"Maybe I'm a pestimist, but I see bad times ahead"
Its hard not to be, and even tougher to see whom to believe. I have been reading e-mail from our troops on the front lines, (see Sragent Stryker's blog as one example) and they are reporting about 95 percent approval by the Iraqi people. But then an armed guy with a gun is not a good poll taker, especially considering Iraq's recent past.
But I have faith in the selfish desires of human beings. Once the Iraqis see the (selfish) advantages of freedom and liberal democracy (defined by me as majority rule with respect for minority rights, essentially everybody plays by the same rules) see how much happier they can be, how much wealthier they can be without a thugocracy, then things will work out.
I did check out Zinni's article, and he does note the possiblity for disaster. He makes a good point that this could end up a mess. But then again, we could end up with a free, democratic Iraq that leads to democracy throughout the region. A graveyard for all the jihadis in the rest of the world, which would make all of us, American and European, Israeli and Arab, better off.
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"We would prefer things were different, that we were not the scapegoat of all those failed thugocracies. But we are, and that is what we have to deal with"
I'm not trying to justify al Qaida's terrorism, I'm trying to UNjustify ours! (Help! Find me a better word! 
)
It seems that every time we mess someone up, we always have a good reason, or at least a good rationalization- it's for peace, or democracy, or anti-communism, or something. Of course, it would never do for our leaders to say that we supported Pinochet because he'd give us "our" copper mines back. So I think many people believe that our motives are purer than al Qaida's, but then why do we almost always wind up on the side of oligarchs and tyrants? Did you know, for instance, that Kissinger vowed to support Suharto just before he (Suharto) massacred 100,000 East Timorese- with American weapons, I might add? Kissinger's only proviso was "Just wait until I leave before you start".
http://www.etan.org/et2002a/february/01-09/09ksngr.htm
There are times it is necessary to go to war. This was not one of those times. Saddam did NOT have WMD. He did NOT pose an imminent threat to either us or his immediate neighbors. He was NOT involved in terrorist acts against the USA. We were NOT "fighting for our survival" when we invaded Iraq, and you can be sure that our fearless leaders really didn't give a cr*p about internal repression- after all, we've set up some of the worst dictaroships in the world!
The big rush to inavde was because France, Germany, and Russia had just signed big contracts with Saddam. Iraq sits on the second-largest oil reserve in the WORLD. The neocons slavered over that, hoping to get a hold of the oil as a springboard to "remake" the Middle East and at the same time displace Saudi Arabia as a driving force in OPEC.
If we were really concerned about Iraqi stabilization, we'd declare victory and go home. Our mere presence seems to be inciting the very actions that we wanted to eliminate. But all of that oil.... sigh.... that's why we're there.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Succatash:
Great headline today, the US has announced long term plans to rotate U.S. troops each year in Iraq. This sucks, whatever happened to a quick operation and the discovery of weapons? The actions of my country are extremely wrong and personally embarassing to me.
U.S. soldiers are now in rotation for a 2 day vacation at a "Rest Camp in Iraq," meanwhile Georgie just left for his "month long vacation." WTF?
We need to get the hell out of Iraq and bring our soldiers home. I have many friends without Dad's and little babies being born without parents and this is bullshit, no one is protecting me from Freedom, this is just meddling bullshit in other countries and inspiring more terrorism and world wide hatred against the United States FOR NO GOD DAMN GOOD REASON.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030813/ap_on_re_mi
_ea/iraq_us_troops&cid=540&ncid=716
'tash, I've been mostly lurking on here for a while, and only occasionally do I throw my .02 into the pot, but I've just got to respond to this post, especially now that I'm over here.
For those of you that don't know me, I'm a civilian contractor for the military, currently in Kuwait (just down the road from Iraq). I work with soldier every day, and it goes without saying that they would rather be home than here.
But I can also tell you without a doubt that EVERYONE here believes in why they're here. It may have started out as a way to pay for college, or just a way to "see the world", but now that they're here, and they see the way this part of the world lives, they are all doing their jobs, and proud of the jobs they're doing.
In addition to the soldiers, I also deal with the locals. They are still recovering from Saddam's occupation, and are thankful of the job the US is doing for them. You may hear other accounts, and as always: opinions are like assholes...
The topic of whether or not we SHOULD be here is no longer "beating a dead horse"... it's jumping up and down on the greasy spot that USED to be a horse... fact of the matter is we're here, and there's a job to do. There is NO one else in the world that is able and willing to make some changes ... and believe me, the changes needed to be made. I have no doubts that Saddam was perfectly capable of using the biggest weapon he could get his hands on against any target he wanted. Would you have wanted it to get to that point?
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Mal: You are very much lacking in imagination.
Zoe: I imagine that's so, sir.
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"...and they see the way this part of the world lives..."
We didn't bomb Iraq for humanitarian reasons, we went to remove weapons that don't exist.
You say every soldier supports the invasion of Iraq? I don't believe you.
Now Bush is asking for $87 billion because of the "unexpectedly violent Iraq occupation." What a dick!
Bush to Double Iraq Spending
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/washpost/20030908/ts_wa
shpost/a39838_2003sep7
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Alright kids, if I have to pull over this car to separate you, I'm sure as hell not buying anyone ice cream at MCdonalds! 
Some of you are making some blanket statements about soldiers reasons for being in the military, and thus the war. I am certain that their reasons are various, and that they support what they are doing to varying degrees. It seems foolish to think otherwise. (I know a little bit. My brother is an AF doctor in Turkey, and I hear from him daily.)
It looks like most of ya have been watching the news. So, I can say some things here, and confidently believe that you know the issues. Regardless of why we got into Iraq, we are there now, let's look to the future instead of the past. What would be the best thing for us to do for them now? Would it be better to leave the Iraqi's in the middle of the disarray, or help them sort it out? I think it's better to help them sort it out. Even though blah blah this and blah blah that happened in the past. They are a screwed country now. It would be like genocide to leave them to their incomplete devices just yet.
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Who's winning?
I can't really tell, they don't seem to be playing by any civilized rules that I know.
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