I'm not saying that Saddam Hussein is a nice bloke, simply that a US led war on Iraq - with the aim to displace Hussein as the leader of that country - will likely do far more harm than good.

Firstly, the guy that the US have in line to replace Saddam Husein (so far as I understand it) is on trial in Denmark on some fairly serious murder charges, and secondly, further US interventionalist tactics in the Islamic Middle-East can only lead to more unrest and - as I said before - a greater chance of an event such as September 11 happening again.

What Saddam Hussein did in Kuwait in 1991 was undeniably wrong and deserved international intervention, yet to bomb his country - making the people, rather than Hussein himself ,suffer - is beyond justification. It is the innocent who will suffer in such and attack (especially seeing as support for Saddam Hussein in Iraq outweighs the antipathy towards him - a true measure of the democratic ideals the US are seeking to propogate) and I see little benefit arising from it. If for no other reason, the US should not attack Iraq simply because doing so will lead to a greater antipathy towards the US in the Middle East, and - as I have said - will increase the chances of terrorist attacks on US soil.

The US has no right to dictate its own morality on the international community, and I can only hope that the leaders of other countries hold firm in their lack of commitment towards the war on Iraq.

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Originally posted by Izzy Yet i have heard no real sound arguements as to why not to attack iraq, other then the civilians who will get killed and the collateral damage

And you're trying to say that the death of innocent civilians isn't enough of a reason to reconsider?

Isn't that what the US made it's entire case on for the "War on Terror" to begin with? That the death of innocents somehow gave them the right to bomb the Afghanistan country side into dust?

If you're saying innocent civilian deaths aren't a consideration then I don't see how you could justify American retaliation either...

I don't even want to think of the ethics of someone who doesn't think the possibility of civilian casualties as being important...but that does seem to at least be the US media stance...I recall distinctly during the Gulf War reports from AP would *never* mention anything about Iraqi deaths or so-called "collateral damage", and went ballistic every time a single American soldier was killed. I don't think most Americans today have *any* idea (or sadly, even care) how many innocent Iraqis died in the Gulf War (and of starvation from the subsequent sanctions) or in the Afghanistan bombing campaign.

And I additionally take offence to this notion that the rest of the world doesn't have the right to choose it's own form of government. I've heard more crap to the effect that "representative" democracy is the only reasonable solution for government lately. Maybe for some people it is, but I'm willing to keep my options open. In many areas that have traditionally had dicatatorships democracy does nothing more than throw the country into chaos.

One needs only look at how much democracy has helped Russia out...once a world super power, now a split state, largely controlled at the local level by the Russian mafia...I fail to see how that's better than the system that was in place in the 80's...

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If you're saying innocent civilian deaths aren't a consideration then I don't see how you could justify American retaliation either...

Exactly.

US justification for the war on Iraq ultimately boils down to avoiding terrorist attacks on US soil (i.e., if Saddam Hussein has biological weapons, we should all be concerned about him using them against the west) and thus avoiding civilian casualties. However, a war on Iraq will doubtless lead to civilian casuaties, and similarly will probably lead to more casualties than Iraq could ever hope to inflict upon the west, should they be stupid enough to try a pre-emptive attack of their own (and I think the assumption that Iraq is likely to spear-head a war against the west - in any capcity - is insulting the intelligence of Hussein himself. No state would be stupid enough to try that).

Thus, what it boils down to, is that civilian casualties sutained in in Iraq are perceived as being less important than those sutained in the west. If you disagree, then explain to me why civilian casualties in Iraq can be seen as viable, whereas those in western countries are not.

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Originally posted by Renegade ... and secondly, further US interventionalist tactics in the Islamic Middle-East can only lead to more unrest and - as I said before - a greater chance of an event such as September 11 happening again.

this is where you and I may differ in opinion, but i feel that in the arab world, regardless of an america attack, there will be hateful resentment towards the US, there will still be plans to make another 9/11. true that if america attacks there might be even more resentment however you can also look at the other side... maybe after iraq is democraticaly 'liberated' the people in the region may enjoy new freedoms never before experienced and this may cause even greater changes in the region around... one note is that all the arab countries are dictatoriships and they fear losing power over the people. if one country in the region were to become one the other leaders would fear that the same would happen to their own. that is one reason the arab governments makes israel look so 'evil'

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What Saddam Hussein did in Kuwait in 1991 was undeniably wrong and deserved international intervention,

you and me can probably agree on that fact that Saddam hasnt changed his personallity. that said why wont this happen agian, why must we wait for him to make the first move? i am in full support of a 'pre-emptive' plan of action saving a potential disaster in the future.

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(especially seeing as support for Saddam Hussein in Iraq outweighs the antipathy towards him )

you may have learned about mass brain washing, i could not give you a better example... but for real even in afghanistan the majority was supporting the taliban just for the shear fact that if they were caught having views agianst it their lives would be in danger. the iraqi civilians do not know of the better life that exsists outside their repressed lives. they have no contact with the outside world other then what saddam deems appropriate and filters through his controlled media. i think that the iraqi people will deeply thank america once saddam is out of power

___________________
If God is the answer, it must have been a very stupid question.

Last edited by Izzy on Sep-06-2002 at 21:05

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Originally posted by CortexBomb And you're trying to say that the death of innocent civilians isn't enough of a reason to reconsider?

guys, i answered that with my opening statement!!! ahhh
in my opinion there will be greater loss of life and suffering of innocent civilian life (western AND iraqi) if saddam were to stay in power in the current status rather then a quick military operation with the purpose of a regiem change.

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And I additionally take offence to this notion that the rest of the world doesn't have the right to choose it's own form of government.

Churchill once said: "democracy sucks but its the best thing we have"
and i completely agree with him

i dare you to name two democratic countries in the entire history of the world that have declared war agianst each other...

democracy represents the will of the people
people desire peace and security
(if you agree with me up till now, continue reading)
Hence therefore:
democracy represents peace and security

___________________
If God is the answer, it must have been a very stupid question.

Last edited by Izzy on Sep-06-2002 at 19:24

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Originally posted by Renegade The US is beyond reproach, and seems to be ignoring its own propoganda. It has the temerity to suggest that democracy - the will of the people - is the only way forward (and it has been spreading this rhetoric for the past 50 years) yet it consistently ignores international will in all of its external decisions. Either the US politicians learn that they have no right to dictate their will upon the rest of the world, or they must learn to accept that events such as those on 11/09 will continue to happen so long as they adopt the xenophobic policies they do now.

Three simple notes in regard to this; MOST countries in the world are NOT FREE DEMOCRACIES therefore they do not repersent the will of the people. If the USA decideds to ignore the voice of these countries it is of its own sovergnithy and ability to do so.

Second of all "USA Propoganda" for creating democracies has an extremly favorable factual backgroundm so its not all hype, but actually true! America turns many countries into democracies by force! Many of its "conquests" have become free, democractic market based countries most notablly in the case of the former Axis powers of WWII. It seems to be doing a good job with Afghanistan as well, and time will tell.

Thirdly, the USA acts like every other soverign entity in this world - It does what is in its own interest! The USA had its go at doing things in other nations interest and it worked out to horrible consequences; everytime it has worked in its interest the outcomes have been favorable. Just because Bush says he is doing it, and not being hypocritical using some proxy cause to say he agree or disagree with ideas in the international realm.

That's all... lets try to keep those notes in mind.

Just a few comments:

First of all, it is pacifist like 'you' that cause war. By undermining your own deterence to such threats of mass destruction via terrorist or state warefare you welcome it, and encourage it to happen. Shall the USA not attack, it will prove its in-ability for resolution, unity, and action and will undermine its authority throughout the world more greatly then if it were to act.

Shall the USA not respond with a cure to this no-brainer illment, it will suffer the bitter consequence of the illment.

Second, a governments formost responsability is to the security and saftey of it's OWN CITIZENS! Governments (the theory goes) were formed to protect humans from violent conflict amongst themselves over legal disputes; And latter to protect themselves against other groups of people (governments) of which they had no recourse legally.

It's the United States responsability to prevent its citizens from being killed. It is the resposnability of Iraq to prevent its citizens from being killed. Geneva convention was written as a contractuall obligation between warring parties so both governments could better meet this obligation. They are not binded to it unconditionally, and if the convention is in violation, one side is not obliged to withhold to it.

This said, perhaps from a legal standpoint the USA has no obligation towards Iraqi citizens, altought it still holds a humanitarian one as I am sure the USA will try and operate to aviod as many civilian casualities as is humanly possible during warfare.

Final note, the USA has a just cause for war against Iraq do to the treaties it has not withheld. Not doing anything reciprical retaliation to this, is like not arrest a murder when hes right in front of you.

i am not getting into another debate...

but all i gotta say is that if we dont take out Huseein soon then America will have a great threat from Iraq in the future...we are trying to prevent what will happen.....

maybe if out last president Clinton had any balls he would of taken out Osama bin Laden when he had the chance...then who knows maybe 9.11 would not of happend...so Bush is putting America best interest at hand before we suffer a greater loss then 9.11.

___________________
Bring back 1994 NYC clubbing nights, cus the sh*t today is filled with junk parties and DJs that play sh*t House.....Zabiela, Sander, or Howells and all the rest suck and couldnt throw a night like it was in the early 90s in NYC!!!...Screw Twilo - give me Limelight circa 1993!!!

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Originally posted by Izzy guys, i answered that with my opening statement!!! ahhh in my opinion there will be greater loss of life and suffering of innocent civilian life (western AND iraqi) if saddam were to stay in power in the current status rather then a quick military operation with the purpose of a regiem change.

I don't know where you've gotten the impression that the military operation would be "quick" but I'd venture to say that you're mistaken on that part.

Iraq has been told, in no uncertain terms, that the purpose of an invasion would be to topple their government; which means they're going to be employing any and all tactics possible to protract the war, and win.

George Bush, Sr. didn't pursue Baghdad because he knew what an ugly operation it would turn into, and how difficult it would be (and how many american lives it would cost) to topple the government.

Experts in foreign affairs *from* the Bush Sr. administration have even been quoted as saying that invading Iraq would be a serious mistake at this point from a stabilization stance, as well as from a political one.

And once you're given that the war is going to be long, you're also given that the body count will be high. Again, the US press seems to have a habit of not mentioning how many people on the other side are being killed, but the death total in both military and civilian terms for the upcoming war will certainly eclipse the Gulf War, which was none too pretty itself.

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Churchill once said: "democracy sucks but its the best thing we have" and i completely agree with him

And just because you agree with him, and the US government agrees with him, that makes it their right to topple a sovereign government?

It's situations like these that make me wish another super-power would come into being sometime in the near future, just to check the US ability to do what it wants, when it wants.

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i dare you to name two democratic countries in the entire history of the world that have declared war agianst each other...

Well, you know the German people *did* elect the Nazi party in 1932...and that Hitler guy got to power because of that...don't you? And though they weren't democratic at the time of WWII, it was the people's mandate that put the party into control to begin with.

I'd additionally bring up the point that it'd be unthinkable from a political standpoint, for the US (or others) to attack a democractic society, because democractic societies (as defined by the US) have open markets, and are free to be exploited by business interests, which is the main interest of the democratic capitalist systems anyhoo.

Not to mention the fact that your overall sample size is tiny...democracy has only existed about 200 years, and certainly wasn't the "norm" at the beginning. I fail to see how democracies not fighting democracies often proves *anything* since it obscures the obvious fact that democracies are still getting into, and causing wars for their own, often selfish ends, just like dictatorships. Do you honestly think that if the entire world was a democracy that there wouldn't be any war? And people accused the Soviets of plotting for world domination....

Enough said on that...

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democracy represents the will of the people people desire peace and security (if you agree with me up till now, continue reading) Hence therefore: democracy represents peace and security

Those are the *ideals* of democracy, and as any student of history can tell you, ideals seldom match practice.

Just as many wars have been fought in the modern "democratic" era as were fought in the supposed backward monarchy dominated one.

And just because *people* desire peace and security *does not* mean that it's in the government's best interest, and hence, doesn't mean that that will be the case.

I don't doubt the good intentions of the system, and I applaud the concept. I just think that democracy combined with capitalism is *far* *far* from the "perfect" solution for government; because capitalism, without appropriate checks, encourages mass exploitation with *no* regard for the people and environment that you're consuming along the way.

To me that's just as inhumane that living in an authoritarian system, if not more so because of the global scale of the destruction you're wrecking.

Anyway, enough on this from me, in reading this, and previous threads it's clear that the views on US foreign policy since Bush took office can easily be summed up as the Americans by and large support it, while the rest of the world by and large vehemently disagrees with it. We can all discuss, philosophize, and argue all we like about it, but it seems that the same two camps develop, and the gulf between the base viewpoints is so radically different that actually making headway toward a middle ground becomes an exercise in futility.

I think I've made my stance clear on this, so unless something new comes up I'll leave this conversation on this post. Good day all...

Last edited by CortexBomb on Sep-07-2002 at 00:17

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Originally posted by CortexBomb I don't know where you've gotten the impression that the military operation would be "quick" but I'd venture to say that you're mistaken on that part.

Their is no reason to think either that this conflict will be prolonged. The greatest threat to the solution to this problem is the general enemy of the western world - islamic fundamentalist. Just like in Afghanistan the operation will be quick, however, you will still have terrorist in constant effort trying to sabatoge the infrastructure. The success to deter those efforts is better in Iraq then Afghanistan, as they have a full infrastructure and order for a professional military - so creating one will not be as hard.

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Iraq has been told, in no uncertain terms, that the purpose of an invasion would be to topple their government;

Ya, I'm sure the world would love it if the USA just toppled Saddam without warning - I'm sure that would go under wonderfully. It would have avoided MANY complications though.

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George Bush, Sr. didn't pursue Baghdad because he knew what an ugly operation it would turn into, and how difficult it would be (and how many american lives it would cost) to topple the government.

Oh is that the reason? I thought the USA was expecting something like 50,000+ casualties from just the liberation of Kuwait. Since the USA didn't suffer even slightly close to that number of casualites and was expecting to we should not believe that was the reason they chose

In addition the fact that the US left Saddam's Republican gaurd to retreat freely back to Bahgdad while they were in their trigger locks must be explained by the stricted fear from the mass causulties ungaurded tanks would inflict on American air power right?

The argument you make that say's Bush Sr. chose to leave Baghdad alone because he FEARED the remants of a wash-tag-group of professional surrenderies that make the french look bad, is just plain wrong.

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Experts in foreign affairs *from* the Bush Sr. administration have even been quoted as saying that invading Iraq would be a serious mistake at this point from a stabilization stance

Oh, we should be so glad that the region is just in such perfect harmony and such a stabilized region that such an attack would turn this all around. These "Experts" are the same ones that feared the professional Iraqi rag-tags as you call an army, which they were sure to influct horrible ammounts of US casualties if they would advance to Baghdad right?... I'm sorry, where you living in the same world as I during the Gulf War?

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And just because you agree with him, and the US government agrees with him, that makes it their right to topple a sovereign government?

America has a legal right to defend itself, if the toppling of a sovereign government is part of that defense, then that makes it right. Furthermore on the international law scale the USA has a just cause for war due to the violations of contract that Iraq has done (expelling inspectors, producing weapons most notably). On the local level the USA has given the president with the post-September 11th decleration passed by congress on the 14th of September I belive the right to declare war on all who support/harbor and fund terrorist with the descretion of selecting who falls into that category going to the Commander and Chief - the President.

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It's situations like these that make me wish another super-power would come into being sometime in the near future, just to check the US ability to do what it wants, when it wants.

Again, all countries do things in their own interests - the Russians did thing in their interest, the Europeans do thing in their interest. The USA also does it, just because they are more powerful and say they are doing it in their interest as opposed to the others, makes it hard for me to see why the world would want another super-power who might be less benevolent who would do things in its own interest as well. - And speaking about lots of casualties a fallout between two super powers will be much more costly in human life then anything we could comprehend if there were to be one.

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Well, you know the German people *did* elect the Nazi party in 1932...and that Hitler guy got to power because of that...don't you? Enough said on that...

Dammit man where did you go to school?

Hitler was neither elected into office, nor came to it by force (yet he did use his storm-troppers to assinate all his rivals). He was appointed to Chancellor by the King (Kaizer), at a time which the Nazi party had actually lost all of its mass-popularity for the people feared it would actually take control.

Please, get your facts right. The Nazi party was elected in 1932 BUT Hitler did not get power because of that!

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Those are the *ideals* of democracy, and as any student of history can tell you, ideals seldom match practice.

So stop being an idealist!

Bah

i'll be back on monday. i wonder how many innocent people will die this weekend while people sit here and arm chair philosophize.