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| quote: | Originally posted by stringfelowhawk
The truth of the matter is that we don't know... and I really don't feel like finding out what someone with a track record like his will do if he did develop nukes. It's scary enough what he has done with chemical weapons, but nuclear weapons are a totally different thing. Realistically, he could roam over the Middle East doing whatever he pleases. |
The truth of the matter is, he wouldn’t be stupid enough to attack any western country. As nasty a character as he is, I’ll give him his due, he’s not a complete fool. Unless he has a big enough nuclear arsenal to wipe out major targets in every western country and the traditional military power to fight remaining troops he has absolutely NO CHANCE against the west. Simple, I know this, he knows this and the military strategists know this. Hell, everyone with a few brain cells knows this. If you realistically think that Saddam has the resources to defeat the west combined then you are truly misguided.
So that rules out a full-scale nuclear attack. What about an odd aggression strike, a strike of anger to kill some civilians and destroy a few major cities? Again this is a terrible tactical move. Yes he’d have the satisfaction of the destruction of one or more cities but he’ll not be able to cope with the reaction. If that happened Iraq would be wiped from the map. Literally. The retaliatory strike would be so powerful that the Saddam regime would be destroyed overnight. Either that or it triggers a full-scale world wide nuclear war. And everyone knows the outcome of that. No one wins, not Saddam or anyone.
So what is the most viable option for Saddam? Use the few nukes he could develop to rise to power in the Middle East or in anger, strike at the West, knowing full well that it would result either in the complete destruction of him and his regime or plunge the world into a nuclear war? And I do not accept “But Saddam is an Evil Mad Man dictator, of course he’ll want to get back at the West. Even if it means his destruction!” as a valid argument. People need to get out of the mind set that we are up against the James Bond Villains who sit in their secret lair and plot the demise and destruction of the world because they think it’s fun or have a chip on their shoulder. Sure there are loads of unscrupulous people but all they are interested in power. Pure and simple. Gaining control of the Middle East will grand Saddam power, an anger strike at the west will not.
| quote: | | They said the same thing about Hitler when he remilitarized all of Germany even though it was striclty forbidden in the Treaty of Versailles. Everyone said the same thing when he took the Rheinland back. They still said he was harmless as long as we gave him the Sudetenland. He was still a good guy after he invaded Czechoslovakia. I mean what's wrong with a little Lebensraum? Not before the UK and France finally decided to put their foot down after he took Poland, did people really realize how dangerous he was. I think you can draw the parallels for yourself. |
If you know so much bout the history of World War II as you claim to do then you will know that the history of Europe and the history of the Middle East are not as easily comparable as you would like them to be. Hitler plain and simple had a grudge, and the power to back that grudge up. The allied nations, particularly France, had imposed such strict sanctions on Germany thought the Treaty of Versailles that the nation was falling apart. It was crippling them. For f**ks sake, if the Treaty of Versailles was still in place GERMANY AND HER PEOPLE WOULD STILL BE PAYING THE REPARATIONS TO THIS VERY DAY. In fact, they’d still be a very long way off paying them. The terms of the Treaty of Versailles were totally unfair, and had they been more balanced, latter history would be vastly different. However, I’m not here to discuss the fairness of the treaty, we can do that in another thread if anyone wishes. Anyway, the UK and France did not “finally decide to put their foot down” - in actual fact their military forces were vastly weak and would have been unable to stop Hitler in his initial stages even if they wanted to. People DID NOT know how dangerous he was. He kept telling the world and the German people that after he had taken back what had been stripped from them under the treaty he would stop. Now, in no way am I suggesting that they should have trusted Hitler and taken him at his word, but what I am saying is that it’s easy to read history backwards. Oh sure Hitler wanted to storm across the world and have a thousand year Reich. Sure, the people in Russia were bound to revolt against Tsar Nicholas, everything points to it. Sure, Saddam wants to invade the west and have dominion over us most of the word just like the Romans did. I think you can draw the parallels for yourself. From what you’ve said it would seem you would have supported a pre-emptive strike on Germany? That would have done more harm that good I can assure you. Even if we had the ability to do so, which we did not, it would have compounded the situation. Sure you might have brought us some time but in the end the same thing would have happened, most probably worse than it actually did.
| quote: | | In this era, the first move could wipe out an entire country, so the burden is put on those who have the power... to prevent that sort of strike from ever happening. |
Yes, the burden is put on those that have the power to prevent a horrific tragedy happening (incidentally the UN not gung ho US or any individual nation) but that does not mean we should tear up the world pointing the finger in a witch hunt under the moral pretence of a “war against terror”. Only when we have explored every other non-violent method to it’s fullest, we are saving people form needless death and we are totally confident that it is the correct moral route to take should this kind of action be followed. I am not convinced at all this is the right course of action in Iraq’s situation and no amount of prefabricated, circumstantial evidence, spin and propaganda by war mongers will have me change my mind. I want cold hard clean facts.
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