Screw Tibet, free Saddam!

[Toobis]

I've been getting a lot of email from Americans who claim to be "anti-war", and against Bush. You know the type. You see them on TV at anti-war rallies, or protesting WAL-MART because it carries some brand of clothing made by little kids in another country (at least they're working!). They eat granola, stick "Free Tibet" bumper stickers in their cars, and have a list of "movements" they support. They choose all of the right issues to care about so they can fit in with a crowd, and most of those issues are trivial.

"Activists" will nag you on and on for lighting up a cigarette in a restaurant, will protest entire companies because one of their departments rubbed shampoo in the eyes of a monkey (CRY ME A RIVER), and will annoy you with tales of how the Chinese occupied Tibet. They care about everything that doesn't matter, and will pretend like they are doing something about it by putting a sticker on their car and going to an anti-war rally (which are little more than an excuse to get high and hang out with friends). They claim that many "anti-war" Americans are on my side on the Iraq issue, yet, I see through the disguise. You know how I know? The leader of an entire country was ousted for something he didn't do (possessing WMD), and is right now he is being tried. Yet all these people continue to care about is stupid GARBAGE like animal rights and freeing Tibet. Screw Tibet, free Saddam!

Who cares about a bunch of mountain men wearing bathrobes when the LEADER OF AN ENTIRE COUNTRY is imprisoned and about to go on trial, all thanks to a U.S.-led war founded on LIES? We should just GIVE SADDAM HIS COUNTRY BACK AND GET OUT! It's the only logical thing to do! But these "anti-war activists" aren't protesting for Saddam's release because they want to be able to COMPLAIN about the war for years to come, while still reaping the benefits of the war they claim to have opposed! Iraq has the second largest oil reserve in the world, but you won't see these anti-war activists griping when the U.S. is reaping the benefits of whatever PLUSH TRADE AGREEMENTS the "new Iraq government" (aka puppet government) makes with the U.S. regarding that oil!

Saddam may not be the greatest guy in the world, but he's been demonized by the U.S. solely because he's sitting atop such an oil-rich country. Do you people really think his regime was the only one around that beheaded people? Visit pretty much any Muslim country for that! It's clear he doesn't have WMD, so the Bush argument, "He has WMD and hates the U.S." is diluted down to "He wishes he had WMD and hates the U.S." There are dozens of countries run by people that would love to nuke the U.S. if they could, but like Iraq, they can't! Ethnic cleansings? How about they go after Sudan, then! The U.S. needs to pick a stance and stay with it. If they are "world protector", they need to protect everyone, not just the people who "coincidentally" are sitting on 10% of the world's oil. If they are not the world's protector, they need to BUTT OUT.
This is Toobis signing out

 

[SaveFeriss]

Dunno about giving Saddam 'his' country back. The man is a coward anyway.

I pricked up on the anti-smoking thing. here in Qld there are ads on TV saying that as of Jan 1 all parks and beaches (well between the flags) are now smoke free. And I cant remember the exact terminology they use, but it's to the effect of "Now we can all live and breath in fresh air".

I thought, "You bunch of arrogant, hypocritical wonkers.

It's still ok to dreive your car to the park or beach, and it's still ok for Australia to lead the world in pollution on a per capita basis. But we can now breath easy thanks to the smoking police.

Yep, life just gets cleaner everyday round here.

 

[Qsaint]

and will annoy you with tales of how the Chinese occupied Tibet. They care about everything that doesn't matter,

Out of 6 Million Tibetians 1 million have been killed by the Chinese. Hardly trivial.

 

[Rodion]

Toobis, you're either taking the ******** or just plain stupid.

 

[Toobis]

Toobis, you're either taking the ******** or just plain stupid.

Rodion- YOU have been WHITE-WASHED by the MASS MEDIA!

 

[Rodion]

Oh no!

 

[Toobis]

Oh YES!

 

[MGREG]

Out of 6 Million Tibetians 1 million have been killed by the Chinese. Hardly trivial.

In Booby2003's eyes that would entitle the Chinese leaders to hero worship from the admitted mass murderer lover.

 

[JW Frogen]

Wether one has supports the war in Iraq or not, Saddam has hardly been demonised by the US. He ran a totalitarian, or very close to it, regime, directly based on Stalin, in fact Saddam read every book in Arabic written about the life of Stalin, he was obsessed with Stalin, visiting ever one of Stalin's homes on a "pilgramidge" former Soviet Union.

This is a man who killed hundreds of thousands of his own people, started two wars that killed perhaps a million in the region, immediately broke his 1991 cease fire agreement (which alone justifies war) and violated UN resolutions for over 12 years.

True, the US has often used him, that is another subject, but one cannot claim the US has exaggerated the atrocious nature of his regime.

 

[RogerC]

I'm entirely with Toobis regarding the 'boutique' protesters - not necessarily what he says regarding the causes themselves, which I think are mostly entirely worthy - but with the whole idea of protesting things without either committing to or understanding them.

I don't necessarily agree that everything a government does is bad, but I do strongly believe that everything a government does ought to be scrutinised. Corruption will inevitably flourish in conditions which allow it to, which is why there needs to be checks and balances in any governmental system.

Which brings us to the US and Iraq. Those with better than short-term memories will recall the reasons we were given for the urgency to invade Iraq. The only arguments with enough weight to demand invasion were WMDs and the link to Al Qaeda. Neither seemed totally credible at the time (we were asked to believe that a country which had been decimated in 1991, and under strong sanctions since, had the capacity to build a WMD program that could threaten the US; and no proof beyond a couple of far-fetched rumours were given for the Al Qaeda link), and they are espcially threadbare now.

The likelihood, it seems, is that the US knew this. The evidence, as presented, was spotty, incomplete and far-fetched. Resolution 1441 provided a justification for invasion, but nothing like a call to arms. And, as you will recall, inspectors had been handed more-or-less open access at the time the invasion was announced.

Now, I know it makes us all warm and fuzzy to think that the US would commit incredible resources and defy the UN and the bulk of Europe simply because Saddam is a bad man. But considering they had just recently been the victim of the highest profile terrorist attack yet, and were officially on the trail of Al Qaeda, invasion of Iraq seems an amazing diversion.

So why were they there? Perhaps this will give you a clue:

http://www.trinicenter.com/oops/iraqeuro.html

Given that what is in the article is accurate, the question would then remain as to whether what the US has decided to do is correct or not. They're in a horrible bind.

 

[Toobis]

Man I'm ********ed. Do people really think forcing Iraq to become a democracy will work? In the future do you think anyone over there is going to be proud of their country? "Our country was founded when some other country made up some lies to convince its people to go to war with us, and then captured our capital and ousted our leader in like 2 months, God bless Iraq!" They'll probably just fall right back into a new dictatorship within a few decades. Every country has a different "culture", or mindset, and some cultures are just not ready for democracy. If the morons living over there really wanted freedom they should have had to fight for it anyways, LIKE EVERY OTHER DEMOCRACY IN THE WORLD HAD TO. Unless the new U.S. policy is to liberate every NON-DEMOCRACY in the world? Like I said before, the U.S. needs to get a policy and stick with it, instead of picking and choosing based upon what suits their economic desires.

Check out a quote of Saddam's from an article:
"You know that this is all a theater by Bush, the criminal, to help him with his campaign"
If third-rate dictator can figure it out, why can't so many Americans? Screw this trial, and screw anti-war "activists" who are only anti-war to be cool. FREE SADDAM!

 

[JW Frogen]

A couple of general points, while any observant person would state that the Bush adminstration had polyanna assumptions on the amount of force needed and planning for occupation of Iraq, and transition to democracy, this does not negate the fact that democracy can work in Iraq, nor the geo-political benefits if it does.

Secondly, the proposition that America was lying about WMD cannot be claimed on the available evidence, almost every intel agency in the Western world believed WMD were in Iraq. The last full UN report on the subject in 1998 stated Iraq DID possess such weapons. Iraqs behavior, even intially under 1441 showed they were continuing to violate UN resolutions and were hiding WMD.

The intel agencies were wrong, but they were not lying.

As to this being a war simply on economic motives, once again the evidence does not support that. While oil is a crucial factor in not only America's economy, but the entire worlds, their were other, less dangerous ways for America to secure Iraqs supply. First they could have just lifted the sanctions and allowed Saddam to sell it. There is nothing more the latter would have liked to do, and as oil is not traded in bi-lateral trade agreements, but rather sold on a world commidies market, he could not control where such oil went, nor was he inclined to do so. The problem is he would have re-armed with the proceedes and ten years down the line or so, we would have been left with his openly stated ambition (even stated at his first pre-trial hearing) to re-take Kuwait.

Or the US could have just removed Saddam and placed a pro US strong man over Iraq, using the existing Iraqi army, and made a deal for increased oil production.

That they did not, is because oil was not their sole concern. They were worried about WMD, and they did have an idealistic program to democratise Iraq, as their continuing commitment to that process proves.

Finally, there is plenty of evidence that America often acts for reasons other than it's direct economic benifit. There was no ecnomic benifit for America in Vietnam (in fact it contributed to American hyperinflation) Korea (Japan was the real economic winner there) Kosovo or Somalia.

America was acting either in it's geopolitcal interests which included preventing the expansion of totalitarian tyranny, or simply in humanitarin interest as in Kosovo and Somalia.

 

[jim boy]

Well I see another fish swallowed hook, line and sinker

Intelligence agencies wrong?

Of course they were wrong. From the very start they had a mission to show that Iraq had WMD, not whether they had WMD. From way before the invasion there were complaints from former CIA staffers saying that the WMD team was not operating objectively, that whenever something cropped up, then use it as an example of WMD, regardless of whether there are alternative things that it may be used for. Rumsfeld has done this before. He got the intelligence community to go over long-range missile threats and rejected the results the first two times when they didn't say what he wanted to say.

Don't blame the intelligence agencies, they only delivered what the political masters wanted.

Economic benefit? The US stands to gain immensely from this, firstly through the direct connections between certain members of the administration and Haliburton and also through the control of oil. Iraq's oil interests were very much tied up with French and Russian iterests and there was a good likelihood that they may switch dealings over to Euros. Now the oil is well and truly in America's hands.

They certainly didn't invade Iraq out of concern for WMDs.

 

[RogerC]

Sorry JW, that's just not very convincing. You may be correct for all I know, but what you just wrote doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

The WMD issue has been thrashed out on this board quite a few times - and I'm sure we could debate the ins and outs of resolution 1441 and a 1998 UN report for days - but it doesn't alter the one central fact relating to this war.

And that is that as soon as Saddam gave full and free access to weapons inspectors, the US jacked up its rhetoric and gave more urgency to its demands that Iraq must be invaded. That is not the action of a country that is solely concerned with the removal of WMDs.

Just about every major Republican with an interest in the Middle East is on record as stating that the US knew Iraq had WMDs and that the US knew where they were. The second half of that statement is a clear lie.

And further to this, here's a quote from Colin Powell in February 2001: "[Saddam] has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors. So in effect, our policies have strengthened the security of the neighbors of Iraq." Any evidence of a resurgent WMD capability in Iraq would have had to have come from fresh and compelling evidence after Feb 2001, not from a 1998 UN report.

As far as oil is concerned, I suggest you read the article I linked above. The biggest current danger to the US is Middle Eastern oil being traded in Euros. If the Euro becomes the default international currency, there is nothing left to prop up the US economy and keep it from collapsing. Simple as that.

Lifting sanctions and allowing Saddam to sell it won't solve that problem. And arranging a coup in Iraq using the Iraqi army might have worked if it were possible. I'm sure they considered it. But after 12 years of crippling sanctions - which hurt the Iraqi people far more than the ruling elite - the US may have had trouble drumming up support.

 

[MightyFighting]

Looks like we have a right-wing Crocodileman.