Strike on Iraq

According to CNN and various other news sources, Iraq is now under attack by the US. Here is a link to the current story running at CNN right now, but there's really not much except that it has started. CT Cruise missiles launched against "Target of Opportunity". The full assault has not begun. CT The attack was specifically intended to take out Saddam. CT Saddam appeared on iraqi TV to condemn the US, and Iraqi missiles have been fired at Kuwait.

WRONG!

See, that's the great thing about America and democracy in general: we can disagree with our government and people in power, call them names, and still have every right to stay here. THAT'S what makes America (and Canada, and the UK, and France, and Germany, and...) great. Annoying, ain't it?

Re:WRONG!

People in Iraq can't say "we are ashamed to call ourselves Iraqis." Soon they will have that freedom.

Re:WRONG!

No one inside Iraq is for war (note I said war not a change of regime), no human being in his right mind will ask you to give him the beating of his life, unless you are a member of fight club that is, and if you do hear Iraqi (in Iraq, not expat) saying "come on bomb us" it is the exasperation and 10 years of sanctions and hardship talking. There is no person inside Iraq (and this is a bold, blinking and underlined inside) who will be jumping up and down asking for the bombs to drop. We are not suicidal you know, not all of us in any case.

That sounds like someone who's got the freedom to speak his mind. Wonder where lives... Hm, Baghdad perhaps? [blogspot.com]

Face it: Bush has engineered the situation to justify a war.

Re:WRONG!

Sorry bad link, for some reason Slashcode filters an underscore from the link. You'll have to copy paste to get there manually. Here it is:

http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/

Re:WRONG!

Hey, you left a few out and you included some pretty spurious examples.

But if you want to play it that way, let's have the full, accurate list shall we? And let's just see where these countries are today...

France 1942-45 Republic
Germany 1942-45 Federal republic
Belgium 1942-45 Parliamentary democracy
Netherlands - 1944-45 Free
Italy 1943-45 Republic
Japan 1942-45 constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary government
China 1945-46 Free from Japanese, conquered by communist dicatorship.
Korea 1950-53 Republic, see South Korea
China 1950-53 Communist tyranny
Guatemala 1954 Constitutional republic
Indonesia 1958 Republic
Cuba 1959-60 NO BOMBS community tyrants take over
Guatemala 1960 Constitutional republic
Congo 1964 Thank the Belgians
Peru 1965 Constitutional republic
Laos 1964-73 Communist tyrany
Vietnam 1961-73 Communist tyranny, and how about them French?
Cambodge 1969-70 Multi-party democracy
Guatemala 1967-69 Constitutional republic
Grenade 1983 Constitutional monarchy with Westminster-style parliament
Lybia 1986 - Dictatorship
El Salvador 1980s - Republic
Nicaragua 1980s -Republic
Panama 1989 - Republic
Iraq 1991-99 - Give us time
Sudan 1998 - Authoritarian regime
Afghanistan 1997-2002 - Republic

It's a pretty great list. In fact, it looks like getting bombed by the U.S. is a great way to end up with a free country.

Re:WRONG!

> The UN tossed itself in the dustbin

Possibly. Then again, perhaps so did the US. Until now the US were careful never to piss off more nations than they could handle. But this time it seems the whole world is pissed. The so-called coalition of the willing consists of three types of nations: those run by right-wing administrations (Italy, Spain, Denmark), those bought off with US money or influence (eastern Europe), plus the UK and Australia, who have yet to defy the US. None of these administrations have popular support at home. For this "war" that won't matter, but after the respective next elections, W will have much fewer friends in the world.

Re:WRONG!

What makes America great is that they aren't afraid to do the right thing,

Well thats easy when your definition of what is right is whatever it is your doing at the time.

even when their "allies" capitulate in the face of danger.

Wha... you think france is opposed to this because they are afraid of iraq. you think canada is afraid of iraq. you think germany is afraid of iraq. if they aren't fighting the big bad iraq it must be because they don't see it as the face of danger or they aren't afraid if it is. capitulate to what.

and remember these are countries (except canada) that have had their fair share of terrorist action over the years. so its not as if they don't understand the potential threat.

Re:WRONG!

No, it is America that tossed the UN into the dustbin. America went to the Security Council to prosecute Iraq for having WMDs and seeking justification to use force againt Iraq. The SC agreed that Iraq must be disarmed, but did not see the use of force justified in this case. Instead they ordered inspections to make sure Iraq did not posses any forbidden weapons.

Well the prosecutor, US, was not happy with that, so they simply decided to ignore the ruling and pass their own judgement. And in doing so made the UN irrelevant. I can't fathom how the US can call it self a justice state, when they blatantly ingnore the ruling of the highest authority in international justice. Just imagine if in a criminal court the prosecutor was not happy with the jury having dismissed the charges and went ahead and executed the defendant anyway. Is that justice?

Bush had made up his mind to attack Iraq long before he ever went to the UN to seek approval. I don't need to remind you that we had put inspectors in Iraq, they we doing their job, Iraq was dismentaling missiles the inspectors had said were illegal and Iraq was all the time delivering new information about its weapons programs to the inspectors. Granted this was largely due to the pressure put on Iraq by the US forces, but that doesn't change that fact that the system was working and there is absolutely no justification for the use of military force at the momen as France, Germany, Russia, China and others have pointed out. America at the same time ignored all the positive results coming from Iraq and failed to give the World any credible evidence to back up their own claims that Iraq possesses WMDs.

Most people, myself included, agree that Saddam is a cruel dictator, but the way US has gone about this 'trial' is completely against every shred of international law. Maybe this just highlights Bush's total lack of knowledge and experience about international politics.

Re:WRONG!-- And

We can even vote for regime change when we don't like our current government, as I expect us to do in 2004... (for those in the US ;-)

There is a real issue here though. Personally I am deeply opposed to this war, and I think that if the Bush Administration could make any more real diplomatic blunders.... well, thank god this isn't the cold war. This could get far more ugly than many people think if diplomacy is further botched (say if Turkey moves troops into Northern Iraq).

However, now that it has started, I think the focus needs to be on the Iraqi people. This means that I am willing to reserve my judgement until I see the Bush Administration backing down on his promises he has made to the Iraqi people. Any time these promises are not upheld, I will be the first to criticize the government. But it will be far worse for everyone (Europe, US, Iraq, etc.) if we abort the war right now and don't fulfill these promises. Of course it will be even worse if we in the military war, but face deep insurgencies by the people. That is the worst way things could go.

Re:WRONG!-- And

> Any time these promises are not upheld, I will
> be the first to criticize the government.

Then you can start with Afghanistan. Remember those grandiose promises of democracy and rebuilding? Well, last week Bush sent Karzai home mostly empty-handed. And it seems we're only hanging around Afghanistan in the hope of catching some more of Bin Laden's thugs. I don't see much rebuilding of any kind going on, and certainly no financial aid that would do the original promises any justice. What reason is there to think that Iraq will be any different?

Re:And today

? what good does insulting either side do? Bottom line is that Saddam isn't a good man. Most people agree with this and if you don't agree with it, then you never will. don't waste your time reading anymore :)

So if you agree that he isn't a nice guy and that he also probly has some "bad weapons" then the next thing to decide is what to do about it. If the threat is imminent and the consequences for delaying are worse than an immediate attack, then a strike is prudent. If the threat isn't immediate and there is a good chance that more time and inspections will be more useful, then we should wait.

I do not know the intimate details going on in reality right now. I don't know what plans the "greedy" US oil tycoons have. I don't know what multi-million or billion dollar deals that france, germany, russia, or other countries stand to lose if there is a regime change. I don't know what weapons Iraq has or if he would be able to hide them from inspectors if he had them. I don't know if inspections would work since Saddam has continually eluded them for sooo many years.

I don't know the details. I don't know which conspiracy theory is the correct one. I don't agree with anti-war tactics since they are often very uninformed and embarassingly trendy. (as if its' cool to be against war). I also don't appreciate people who immediately flock to war like it's going to be fun. But those are the extremes here, folks. Sit back and really think about the situation... NO ONE IN THIS ENTIRE WORLD IS FREE FROM FAULT. it just so happens that Iraq hasn't complied with some UN resolutions and the US believes it's time to pay up. Is this correct? who is to say for sure? It's so easy to criticize the US since they have a hand in soooo many aspects of the world.

I suppose the bottom line is that some see this action as unfortunate, but we don't know what the truth is. And I agree, just because you disagree, you shouldn't have to leave. But saying you are ashamed to be american? Come on! Do you honestly believe that Bush is the anti-christ who simply sees a war as dollar signs and a rise in the polls? I admit, I would have liked to see the UN flood Iraq with inspectors... thousands of them, with armed UN escorts. I think that would have been the best solution. But no one in the UN could agree. Is war the correct action? Perhaps... only time will tell. In the meantime, let's hope for the well-being of all the troops over there.

Sincerely,

John

Re:And today

Not an idiot. Maybe a little confused.

There has not been a military action in all of history that has been perfectly deplorable or perfectly justifiable.

I have, as a patriotic American, struggled to perform my responsibilty - make the politicians aware of my opinions and try to exact change. In this particular incident I have failed, but that doesn't make me ashamed to be an American.

I'm not going to discuss the specific political history behind the attacks, and why I find them, on balance, unjustified, as you clearly have at least some background, and an opinion that you are willing to defend with nasty words.

Regardless of the validity of your ideas, the right word to respond to another's shame is never "idiot".

Re:And today

No, I'm pretty sure that he's ashamed to be a citizen of a country that sees no problem in waging agressive war (This being a war crime) and killing innocent civilians. I'm pretty sure he's ashamed that our country supported Saddam when we knew he did all those things.

Re:And today

Do you really think this is an innocent man?

He had help [washingtonpost.com].

I really wish the US would admit to its own involvement in the atrocities we are supposedly invading over. The air of moral superiority makes me wanna puke. As a US citizen, I'll root for the guys stuck fighting this "war" for us, but I think the proclaimed reason to invade is a sham.

If the sole reason to remove Saddam comes from his posession and use of WMD, we should have removed him from power 2 decades ago. If Iraq's support of terrorism is our reason, there are at least a dozen other countries we should have hit already.

There are lots of reasons to attack Iraq and remove Saddam, but if we're attacking just because of some chemical weapons and ties to terrorism, we are ignoring both US history and current world events by focusing just on Iraq.

Re:And today

" It's just horrible, a totally unjustified war."

You call violation of 18 resolutions to be unjustified?