Todays events in Washington

Everclearules20 · Post by **Everclearules20** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 12:53 pm

Originally posted by Sojourner
That doesn't mean we should lose our heads and go after a regime based on a personal vendetta.

Nor does it mean wait untill we are dead to fight back, It will be a little to late then. We must prepare for the worst, but then again, how do you prepare for an oil crisis, a plane flying into a sky scraper, or chemical weapons?

Sojourner · Post by **Sojourner** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 1:47 pm

Originally posted by Everclearules20
Nor does it mean wait untill we are dead to fight back, It will be a little to late then. We must prepare for the worst, but then again, how do you prepare for an oil crisis, a plane flying into a sky scraper, or chemical weapons?

Markets are good at anticipating shortages - a tightening of the oil supply has already been indicated. How do we make ourselves less vulnerable? Find alternatives, stockpile. Making war worsens oil supply, not the opposite.

By the recent reports - we did have warning of those attacks - but intelligence dropped the ball. It has not been proven in any way that Iraq was involved with 9-11 - so if we're going to war for that reason - we're going after the wrong target.

We should be more worried about determined fanatics using chemical weapons and the like - as has been so amply demonstrated with the Anthrax scare, the Unibomber, and the Saran attack in Japan.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 3:18 pm

Unfortunitly, the way I see this war is from the usual American gouvernment ideal: "If you aren't singing the same song as us, you are singing the wrong song".

Everclearules20 · Post by **Everclearules20** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 3:50 pm

Originally posted by Sojourner
Markets are good at anticipating shortages - a tightening of the oil supply has already been indicated. How do we make ourselves less vulnerable? Find alternatives, stockpile. Making war worsens oil supply, not the opposite.

Perhaps you missed what I had said earlier, If Iraq decides to take over oil exporting countries in the middle east, simply raising prices will not fix the problem. As for stockpiling, If Iraq controls most of the worlds oil, I dont think they will be willing to share it... Stockpiling takes time, time we might not have. Who's to say a war wont break out tommorow, and who's to say it won't break out 10 years from now?

Originally posted by Sojourner
By the recent reports - we did have warning of those attacks - but intelligence dropped the ball. It has not been proven in any way that Iraq was involved with 9-11 - so if we're going to war for that reason - we're going after the wrong target.

True, we did have reports, but it was only things such as "there will be a terrorist attack". But think about how many Americans say stuff like this just for the fun of it... Which makes determining where, when, and how a terrorst will attack, amazingly hard.

Originally posted by Sojourner
We should be more worried about determined fanatics using chemical weapons and the like - as has been so amply demonstrated with the Anthrax scare, the Unibomber, and the Saran attack in Japan.

Yes, we should be worried about it, in fact, many are. But the question is, how do you get millions of Americans to know how to act if someone decides to attack us with these types of weapons?

Originally posted by Gaxx_Firkraag
Unfortunitly, the way I see this war is from the usual American gouvernment ideal: "If you aren't singing the same song as us, you are singing the wrong song".

If only we had enough information to know what song to sing...

fable · Post by **fable** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 4:57 pm

Originally posted by Everclearules20
Perhaps you missed what I had said earlier, If Iraq decides to take over oil exporting countries in the middle east, simply raising prices will not fix the problem.

But with due respect, that argument is based on a perception of Hussein as a power-mad, egotistical dictator, with a lust to conquer. The record doesn't demonstrate this. When he initially attacked, he did so only after acquiring what he thought was US Ambassador April Glaspie's voiced approval: remember the screams of outrage when her last taped conference with Hussein were made available? (It's still available on the Web. You can find it here.)

Hussein was our puppet, too, once upon a time: we paid him to antagonize people we didn't like, and to harbor freedom fighters--in other words, what other people, on some other side, would call terrorists. He did what we asked. He was conscientious, and highly valued. He was no megalomaniac, such as Zaire's Mobutu Sese Seko, for whom the term "kleptocracy" was coined. Nor does Hussein have the bloated self-image of Uzbekistan's Islam Karimov--now, one of our allies--whose faux democracy included having his ostensible presidential opponent in the last "election" campaign for him, and who ordered his "congress" recently to change the days of the week to reflect the names of Uzbek heroes; which naturally included both himself and his mother.

Hussein failed in his bid to take over Kuwait, losing his army and suffering the deaths of tens of thousands of his citizens in his process. His kind of despotism may be passe in both Europe and North America, but there is no evidence based on past records that he'd be foolish, or unrealistic enough to try again. Unless, of course, he's goaded into doing so, by fear of being attacked the next moment by the sole remaining superpower in the world.

frogus · Post by **frogus** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 5:13 pm

In my correspondence with an Iraqi Kurd I have received the impression that the Iraqi army is not at all ready for a war. He says that if the Americans march in, the Iraqis will have no choice but to throw down their arms. Of course he is biased, but I thought you might like a little opinion 'from the ground'...

I am only worried that when attacks do start to take place (as I am now certain they will), public panic will rise again. In the unstable circumstances which bombing Iraq will produce, worldwide, and especially the USA's hysteria will provide Bush with moral justification for just going on and reducing the Muslim world to nothing. In the heat of the moment, people cannot think clearly, but people with cynical agendas can acheive their financial and political) goals in a way which will seem awfully blatant and perverse in the future...

Lazarus · Post by **Lazarus** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 5:41 pm

Originally posted by fable
But with due respect, that argument is based on a perception of Hussein as a power-mad, egotistical dictator, with a lust to conquer. The record doesn't demonstrate this. When he initially attacked, he did so only after acquiring what he thought was US Ambassador April Glaspie's voiced approval: remember the screams of outrage when her last taped conference with Hussein were made available? (It's still available on the Web. You can find it here.) ...

@fable: the link you provide states that the reliability of the transcript cannot be confirmed - ? So is this another case of that Julius Ceasar quote that flew around the internet not so long ago?

Also, stating that Saddam acquired "what he thought was (US) voiced approval" is making an attempt to read into Saddam's mind at the time of invasion. I don't think you can do that. I don't think any of us know what Saddam was thinking. And (to my knowledge) Saddam has never come out and said: "But they said I could!"

Finally, the transcript you provide (even if it can be taken at face value) says that Glaspie stated: "We have no opinion on your Arab - Arab conflicts, such as your dispute with Kuwait." This statement is NOT equivalent in any way with: you may act with impunity within the Gulf region, and invade whomever you see fit.

The idea that the US would sit back and watch someone (anyone, even if they were our puppet - and Saddam supposedly was) take over a good portion of oil production in the middle east is just not sensible.

RandomThug · Post by **RandomThug** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 5:56 pm

Talk

It can be fought back and forth, the thought that Hussein can, cant, doesnt want to, is going to... etc. Attack anyone using anything that would cause the world to turn thier head and say "No." Inspecting his entire arsonel and ripping open what he has is what must be done, and at the first sign of weapons capable of doing mass damage we should forcefully intervein.

Fable you have posted (and many times before I have read) about hussiens passive non megeolomaniacness. Which is obvius, and I believe your correct he is not a man to fear as which we do. BUT it is my concern of a forieng power with resentment towards a country (US) and the "ability" to have any weapons capable of doing considerable damage should be heavly evaulated and picked out for reasons obviuos. IT only took two of our planes to cause so much damage, what if these terrorists were able to purcahse such goods of mass destruction from iraq, or north korea or japan etc etc. It is the fear of those few fanatics we must address.

And as with Osoma it is not something we can do by going after them alone. Sadam is either aiding them or not, we need to know. Just like the rest of the world. I do not want to wake up EVER again to learn that some small group of fanatics killed more of my fellow Americans, exspecially if it is people I know of course...

The only way to prevent these small factions is to route out all the tyrants who control large amounts of resources. Sure EVIL is a very contraversal term now adays but non the less Sadam has shown signs of villiany that give me enough curiosity to ask myself... What if. and yes it is that What if that costs lives.

We claim to be the strongest (might, wisdom, political influence... Im not sure) and damn well we better make sure we let the rest (world) know we are. If war breaks out with Iraq I hope its because we found just one, just ONE weapon they could make a couple bucks off by selling to a possible threatning group (against us)... Unfortunetly I believe we will act proir to that.

Is that a horrible act against humanity, perhaps. But perhaps in this day and age.. we are not as civilized as we would like to pretend, perhaps it is he with the heaviest stick who will live in the end. Darwinism I guess... Im not sure, all I know is that I might hold a bit of ignorance in my heart for caring more of the deaths of my countrymen than the deaths of others fighting for thier cause, I respect them for what they do (fighting for patrioism, religuos beliefs etc etc.) for that is something we should do RESPECT but not agree, and not be weakend by the fact we may not be 100% in the right. You never make an omelet... well you know.

Thug

fable · Post by **fable** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 6:27 pm

Originally posted by Lazarus
@fable: the link you provide states that the reliability of the transcript cannot be confirmed - ?

Not so. What it states is that the reliability of the source cannot be confirmed. The information is not under question. The transcript was published shortly after the invasion, and I remember it being aired on several news services. Neither Glaspie nor the US government ever denied its accuracy.

The idea that the US would sit back and watch someone (anyone, even if they were our puppet - and Saddam supposedly was) take over a good portion of oil production in the middle east is just not sensible.

Do I need to point out that you're doing exactly what you accused me of doing--determining what Hussein was thinking before the Kuwait invasion?

Only in my case, I can at least present a recorded transcript that might appear to offer permission to Hussein to do what he did.

Weasel · Post by **Weasel** » Fri Oct 04, 2002 6:40 pm

Here is another angle on Ambassador April Glaspie.

Rogue States and Nuclear Outlaws

Sojourner · Post by **Sojourner** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 2:24 am

Originally posted by Everclearules20
Perhaps you missed what I had said earlier, If Iraq decides to take over oil exporting countries in the middle east, simply raising prices will not fix the problem. As for stockpiling, If Iraq controls most of the worlds oil, I dont think they will be willing to share it... Stockpiling takes time, time we might not have. Who's to say a war wont break out tommorow, and who's to say it won't break out 10 years from now?

However, that is a very big if. If Hussein were indeed to attempt rolling into his neigboring countries again, there are quite a few countries who will act to stop it. However, this is also not the reason that Bush is putting forth for a war with Iraq - but an impending threat to the US is (still not proven).

Originally posted by Everclearules20
True, we did have reports, but it was only things such as "there will be a terrorist attack". But think about how many Americans say stuff like this just for the fun of it... Which makes determining where, when, and how a terrorst will attack, amazingly hard.

Actually, we had a lot more than that. Go here and click on Timeline: Who Knew What and When?

Originally posted by Everclearules20
Yes, we should be worried about it, in fact, many are. But the question is, how do you get millions of Americans to know how to act if someone decides to attack us with these types of weapons?

The usual way - education. True, there is a limit, but how is a war with Iraq going to prevent any more of these attacks? None of those who flew the planes were Iraqi. Those recently arrested were, for the most part, US CITIZENS, including one recently arrested in Germany.

fable · Post by **fable** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 5:44 am

Re: Talk

Originally posted by RandomThug
what if these terrorists were able to purcahse such goods of mass destruction from iraq, or north korea or japan etc etc. It is the fear of those few fanatics we must address.

But consider where this road goes, @RandomThug. Pakistan, a nuclear power, has long been accused by its neighbor, India, of harboring and sponsoring terrorists. Should India launch a preemptive first strike against Pakistan? Does every nation in the world that has suffered from major terrorist attacks--and there have been many (as the US tends to forget) before 9/11--have the right to invade a suspected sponsoring nation?

A doctrine of preemptive strike, in the hands of the world's leading superpower, would easily become a tool to improve the political fortunes of any country. Claiming (as some have) that it won't happen is flat out wrong; when the US declared "war on terrorism" (and why not "war on fanaticism?" or is fanaticism good when its whipped up by your own nation?), Russia quickly used it as an excuse for the further brutal suppression of Chechnya. The Israeli government claimed it as a phrase for its own policy of invading Palestinian settlements to "search" (ie, kill whatever moves) for terrorists. Lately I've heard commentators on Chinese radio use the phrase "terrorists" in describing people living in Tibet, a foreign nation that government's devoted a ton of resources and manpower to literally wiping off the face of the earth.

And as with Osoma it is not something we can do by going after them alone. Sadam is either aiding them or not, we need to know.

Shortly after 9/11, when it was mooted about that Iraq was involved in supporting bin Ladan, the US government stated that this wasn't the case. Since then, the Bush administration has changed its tune, but hasn't produced a shred of evidence to back its claim. I'd like to think that Bush is doing this for some reason other than a midterm boost to the chances of his party or to install a puppet regime in an oil-rich nation, but as of yet, I've seen and heard everything but facts backing the administration viewpoint. Cheney has said publically that Hussein is dangerous because he's dangerous, and Bush has claimed publically in the last few days that he "tried to kill my daddy." This whole mounted campaign on Hussein seems to consist of smoke screens and bizarre appeals to emotion without substance, and I grow more and more suspicious every time a government spokesperson repeats the same line without offering corroborative evidence. I can't speak for anybody else, but I don't think an argument from an official source becomes sound the louder and more self-righteously it's screamed.

Minerva · Post by **Minerva** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:31 am

Re: Talk

Originally posted by RandomThug
what if these terrorists were able to purcahse such goods of mass destruction from iraq, or north korea or japan etc etc.

Japan??

fable · Post by **fable** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:34 am

Re: Re: Talk

Originally posted by Minerva
Japan??

I suspect he meant Iran.

HighLordDave · Post by **HighLordDave** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:41 am

Re: Re: Talk

Originally posted by Minerva
Japan??

Or he's thinking of Aum Shinrikyo, the cult that used the sarin nerve gas in Tokyo in 1995.

fable · Post by **fable** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:45 am

Re: Re: Re: Talk

Originally posted by HighLordDave
Or he's thinking of Aum Shinrikyo, the cult that used the sarin nerve gas in Tokyo in 1995.

True. Really, when you look closely, there's hardly a nation around that hasn't at least knowingly housed terrorists; and every major power (including the US) has sponsored terrorists. This is not a defense of either terrorism or the obscenity that was 9/11; but it is a fact, nonetheless.

HighLordDave · Post by **HighLordDave** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 8:05 am

We must also remember that there is a fine line between being a "terrorist" and being a "freedom fighter".

The founding fathers of the United States were nothing more than insurgents in the eyes of King George III. French partisans who fought the Nazis were terrorists as were the Viet Cong, however, they viewed themselves as fighting for freedom against oppressive armies of occupation.

If we were to invade Iraq, that is the type of response that we can expect from the Iraqi people. Remember that Saddam Hussein controls all of the media outlets in Iraq. When people are starving in the streets, he tells them it is the fault of the United States. When we bomb a hospital that has a surface-to-air missile battery on the roof, the people are told that the US is aggressively targeting the Iraqi people. And they believe him because they have no choice and no other source for information.

Remember how we felt when someone bombed New York and Washington? "Kill all the bastards" was the response of many Americans. Now imagine your country being bombed on an almost daily basis and you see how the Iraqi people feel. They think that we are trying to keep them down.

When American tanks roll into Iraqi villages and cities, they will not welcome us as liberators, but they will revile us as conquerors. They will take up arms and wage their own guerilla war against us in the same way the Mujihadeen fought the Soviets in Afghanistan. Militant Muslims from around the world will travel to Iraq to fight of the western invaders just as Jews went to Israel in 1948 to fight in the Israeli War for Independence.

Everything we have done since 11 September of last year has made the world safer for Americans--in the short term. Al-Qaeda is disrupted, its supply chains destroyed, its resources scattered, its leaders killed, captured or in hiding. But what we have failed to do is get to the root cause of the problem: the people who bombed New York and Washington don't hate the US any less, and if anything they hate us more.

Terrorism will never go away so long as there are haves and have nots in the world. We must accept this. However, there are things we can do to diffuse the hate and not give the bad guys any more reasons not to like us. Dubya and his cronies believe that they can use fear and intimidation to keep people from striking out against us, and on some level he is right. People who value their own lives can be deterred by strongarm tactics. However, people who have nothing to lose, or who have been told that they will go straight to Heaven/Valhalla/Stovokor if they kill Americans will not be dissuaded by this. Fanaticism cannot be deterred by force; it can only be fed.

Nightmare · Post by **Nightmare** » Sat Oct 05, 2002 7:29 pm

If the US, and any other countries (like my own, Canada

) attack Iraq, I will fail to see which gouvernment is the terrorist anymore.