Did Rumsfeld & Co. Put Us In A Mess? And Why Are We Really There?

[lundy]

Quote from OPTIONAL777:



I look at it a bit differently.

Imagine a member of your family, a sister, or a daughter did something stupid. They got in trouble. Would you spend your time criticizing them, telling they were stupid, or would you help them out of the jam they are in?

I wasn't in favor of this war, I thought there were better methods to solve the problem.

However, once we committed, I felt I had to lend my full support, for the good of the country.

In my opinion, we need to do a lot of growing up as a country. We appear soft and weak to me. We are losing the respect of other countries, not because of the war, but because of the way were are handling it!

We acted like children following 911, crying and moaning, waving the flag.

Where was the simple, quiet resolve. I did nothing externally or overtly patriotic following 911. I thought it was nonsense.

I much prefer a stiff upper lip, going about our business. The British way, or at least the British way under Churchill is the greatest example of our 20th century history of how to handle adversity under pressure.

Where is the inner commitment to win no matter what.

I just wish GW would shut the hell up, and let the military do their job. Turn off all the fucking cameras, and let them do their job.

Let's show some solidarity, some backbone. Let's not live in fear of having to fight a war over there, because if we are afraid of fighting over there and how difficult it is, imagine what it would be like if we actually had to fight a war over here.

Think it can't happen? If we show the world we can't win, what message does that show? If we show these countries that we are weak, and afraid to die for what we say we believe in, what are we?

Winning isn't a choice in this case. There is no choice. We must win at any and all costs. This war, is representative of our standing in the world community. Everyone is watching how we react both at home, and abroad. I don't give a damn if the rest of the world loves us. They are going to hate us no matter what. Win or lose, they will hate us. That is the nature of being top dog. So why not just win? Why is it that the rest of the world isn't crying out at the atrocities that Saddam is committing right now with his use of civilians as human shields? Why don't they care that civilians are made to fight, under threat of murder if they don't?

The rest of the world doesn't really care about Iraqi civilians, or they would have been protesting the abusive treatment all these years by Saddam's regime. France, as long as they had a trading partner with Saddam, and nice oil contracts, didn't care about how Saddam governed his people. It is all smoke and mirrors.

We are in it now, up to our necks, that is all that matters, and our soldiers need our moral support. They are afraid, and if they see that we are afraid here at home, how are they supposed to feel? Show them support, show them confidence, show them that we have full faith in them and their cause. It is in our best interest collectively if we do.

The demonstrators, who say they love this country, don't understand how much damage they are doing at this time. There is strength in unity, and weakness in dissension. Demonstrate after the war, change policy then, but not during a time of war in which we cannot afford to retreat.

Just imagine how great leaders of the past would have handled the present situation, no matter how they were thrown into it. Imagine if Truman had not been strong, what the results might have been in Japan.

I was at the gym tonight, and a young kid was watching the war. He said that we got our butts kicked by the commies in Vietnam, and the Arabs were kicking our butts now. This wasn't an Arab American, but just a typical American kid. What message are we sending our children, in whose hands depends the freedom of this nation down the road? Are we telling them that we can't win a fight? That we don't know what we are doing?

This war is so much more than just the USA versus Iraq.

It is so much more, so much more.

Respect.

 

[KymarFye]

COMMENTARY


March 29, 2003

Behind


The media continue to wail about the U.S. being forced to change its strategy, after early setbacks in Iraq. This proposition -- which is becoming accepted over the facts through mind-numbing repetition -- is compounded from two big lies: 1. There have been setbacks. 2. There was a strategy that didn't anticipate them.

On the first point, there has been nothing resembling a setback. The U.S. and allied forces have moved backwards nowhere, under enemy fire, except in the briefest tactical manoeuvres. They are holding all their bridges and lines, and doing terrible damage to anyone who attacks them. The media have announced that the attack on Baghdad is "stalled" -- but the objective itself, and its timetable, exist only in their imagination.

On the second point, I can actually state that there was, and is, no single monolithic strategy; and if there were it would be monumentally naove. Such documents as I saw, and such briefings as I received, before the war started, suggested an extremely flexible campaign; possibly more than those for any previous modern or post-modern military assault. There are innumerable plans for innumerable contingencies. And while I have no idea what they all are -- no human being could even read them all if they were freely posted on the Internet -- I have yet to learn of a single event of a kind that was not almost certainly anticipated, at several volume levels.

The one, unified, actual "plan", which exists not in a document but in the human will, can be very simply stated. It is to annihilate the regime of Saddam Hussein, and replace it with one almost infinitely more benign -- whatever it takes; and with the minimum possible casualties to both soldiers and civilians, on both sides.

The U.S. and allies are up against a totalitarian regime that has had 30 years to embed itself in Iraq, and which is ruthless beyond the reach of the common imagination. Moreover, it is a regime that, narrowly escaping collapse in 1991 after the war for Kuwait, spent the last 12 years adapting to new principles of "asymmetrical warfare" -- in the constant expectation that, sooner or later, the U.S. and allies would ride into Baghdad. I am in a position to know that no senior member of the Bush administration was unaware of this hard fact, before launching the invasion; nor any of the eight most senior battlefield commanders. Nor did any of them ever say anything to the contrary.

The people who didn't grasp, and still haven't grasped the nature of this enemy, are the media and the Bush administration's mendacious critics. And if these latter want bad news and good quotes, there are any number of retired U.S. Army generals, whose noses were put out of joint by Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon shake-ups, who also don't grasp it, and will be happy to talk. Very selective quotation from officers and soldiers in the field will supply the necessary updates. (I know this game, I work in it; or rather, whenever possible, around it.)

Mendacity and ignorance aside, the critics fail to capture the basic two-plus-two that is revealed in present circumstances: The allies are in this BECAUSE Iraq's so dangerous. A Saddam content to fight by conventional and legitimate means, without terror connexions and international ambitions, would not have been invaded. This is no mere "live fire" exercise.

There are some allied weak points, however, as one will invariably discover upon entering the field. The worst I have seen is in the allies' communications habits, and specifically I'm sad to say, the British, whose briefings to reporters have been the opposite of terse, and claims the opposite of guarded. They are not trying to mislead; they are passing on good news they have received before it can be properly confirmed. This has unfortunately added fuel to the burning oilfires of media misinformation.

Example: I myself fell initially (though not in print) for the story of the "uprising in Basra", because it seemed plausible, given the huge uprising that occurred in Basra in 1991 after the allies retook Kuwait. It took me several hours of no further information to realize that it was instead not intrinsically plausible, for two main reasons. First, Saddam put that earlier revolt down, killing as many as 100,000 in the course of making his point. The unarmed people of Basra are hardly going to rise this time, till they see the whites in their rescuers' eyes. Second, Saddam completely rebuilt the apparatus of his repression in the Shia south, in light of what happened in 1991.

He rebuilt expressly to prevent another mass uprising from occurring, even if the country were invaded. He reorganized the daily life of Basra to provide close supervision of people, divided into smaller groups. And he can be entirely assured of the loyalty of his minders, for the same system puts each in a position where the people he minds know him personally, and will string him from a lamp-post if he relaxes his guard. The whole city is thus turned into a human minefield: and when it goes up, it goes up. If there were a general insurrection in Basra, we would not be hearing about it in unconfirmed reports: there would be blood, visibly everywhere.

The difficulty of staffing a large, mostly Shia, southern city with Saddam's mostly Sunni, central Iraqi agents -- themselves dispersed among more than a dozen rival security organizations -- makes Basra a "cakewalk" compared to Baghdad. I think the Iraqis were expecting the allies to take it quickly, which they may have been wise not to do; for I fear a nerve gas or other chemical attack may be waiting on the inhabitants once the city falls -- as a warning to Baghdadis of what their fate could be. (Yet another "contingency" I am fairly certain the Pentagon has a plan for.)

That's why no mass insurrections in Basra or elsewhere: the supervision of the general population is on such a level of detail, behind Iraqi lines, that mass action is made impossible, until the allies actually bludgeon their way into the cities. We hear this again and again from the people who' ve broken free. Insurrection became possible in Eastern Europe in 1989 only because the Communists had relaxed their grip; since 1991, and the Kurd and Shia rebellions, Saddam has been tightening his. That's why the U.S. is trying so hard to find and take out the centre of command, before marching into the cities. And why Saddam has gone to such extraordinary lengths to hide his centre -- and so many of his assets amid civilian human shields.

That's also why the U.S. has been so leisurely about getting the local allies, the networks under the umbrella of the Iraqi National Congress, directly involved in the military action. The common front with them is only now beginning to form in the Kurdish north (having been additionally delayed by the Turkish failure to let the U.S. Fourth Infantry pass through). The INC needs to conserve everything it can for the apres-guerre.

More generally, we -- not the "Pentagon planners", but outside observers -- have probably underestimated the degree to which the Saddamite regime has become allied, almost integrated with Jihad International in the time since 1991 (as should have been evident from the first World Trade Centre bombing in 1993).

The formal and informal links at the top are less important than the common pool of resources and methods. For what Saddam learned in 1991 was that his defences were almost entirely exposed to precise U.S. bombing -- in the course of having so many of them destroyed. (An attack on Baghdad then would truly have been a cakewalk.) In such burgeoning institutions as the Fedayeen Saddam, we see what he learned from the terror camps of Afghanistan, and the ones he himself hosted. He also discovered that it made more economic sense to buy weapons off the shelf through the underground arms trade -- from Russia, China, North Korea, Pakistan, France, Germany, etc. -- than to manufacture from scratch under the noses of U.N. inspectors. He has now much less traditional explosive punch, but far more, and much cheaper, variety.

To understand such things better means getting acquainted with a great volume of technical literature that is not to the current media taste; and also reading and thinking through what we learn from such independent and well-informed Iraqi authors as Kanan Makiya. It means, for a start, understanding that the schools and hospitals and mosques of Iraq are as much extensions of the Ba'athist Party as any army barracks or secret police headquarters. Saddam can pull more local levers than we can count, until we are right in the thick.

What we see may resemble a debilitating war of attrition. But what is really happening is quite out of view: the search not for the beast's manifold claws, but for its head.

To summarize: I have yet to see any threat from within Iraq that the U.S. and allies are not likely to have anticipated. The threats that worry me come, without exception, from outside Iraq.


David Warren

If you want a well-informed view of the war and its larger context, read other essays like the above at:

http://www.davidwarrenonline.com/Comment/index.shtml

 

[KymarFye]

Or try Victor Davis Hanson - his latest:

March 28, 2003 7:30 a.m.
History or Hysteria?
Our vulture pundits regurgitate rumor and buzz.


Instantly televised images are broadcast with no in-depth analysis. A national television audience sighs and cheers second-to-second — not unlike the mercurial Athenians lined up on the shore of the Great Harbor at Syracuse, who in dejection and euphoria watched their fleet lose, win, and lose in the sea battle against the Sicilians.

But rather than trying to digest and analyze the tempo of battle, our vulture pundits instead regurgitate rumor and buzz — which are usually refuted by the next minute’s events. The subtext throughout seems to be disappointment that the war so far has lasted seven rather than two days.

***

Have these people any intelligence or shame?

Casualties, POWs, and skyrocketing costs blanket the airwaves; rarely mentioned is the simple military fact that in a single week, a resolute American pincer column has driven across Iraq and is now systematically surrounding Baghdad — and with far fewer killed than were lost in a single day in Lebanon. When American soldiers move decisively against terrorists and killers in the Middle East, they have a far greater chance of surviving than they do sitting in their barracks as living targets under “rules of engagement.”

***

All these people need to calm down, take a deep breath, and read their history — computing the logistics of fighting 7,000 miles away and considering the hurdles of vast space, unpredictable weather, and enemies without uniforms. And? In just a week, the United States military has surrounded one of history’s most sadistic and nasty regimes. It has overrun 80 percent of the countryside and has daily pulverized the Republican Guard, achieving more in five days than the Iranians did in eight years.

Twenty-four hours a day, thousands of tankers and supply trucks barrel down long, vulnerable supply lines, quickly and efficiently. There is no bridge too far for these long columns. One-hundred percent air superiority is ours. There is not a single Iraqi airplane in the sky. Enemy tanks either stay put or are bombed. Kurds and Shiites really will soon start to be heard. Seven oil wells are on fire (with firefighters on the scene) — no oil slicks, no attacks on Israel. Kuwait City is not aflame. “Millions” of refugees fleeing into Syria and Jordan have not materialized. Even Peter Arnett is no longer parroting the Iraqi government claims of ten million starving and has moved on to explain why the Iraqis were equipped with chemical suits — to protect Saddam’s killers from our WMDs!

Few, if any, major bridges in Iraq have been blown; there are no mass uprisings in Saddam’s favor. The Tikrit mafia fights as the SS did in the craters of Berlin, facing as it does — and within weeks — either a mob’s noose, a firing squad, or a dungeon. Through 20,000 air sorties, no jets have been shot down; there is nothing to stop them from flying another 100,000. They fly in sand, in lightning, high, low, day, night, anywhere, anytime. Supplies are pouring in. Saddam’s regime is cut off and its weapons will not be replenished. This is not North Vietnam, with Chinese and Russian ships with daily re-supply in the harbor of Haiphong. British and Americans, with courageous Australians as well, are fighting as a team without even the petty rivalry of a Montgomery and Bradley.

Our media talks of Saddam’s thugs and terrorists as if they were some sort of Iraqi SAS. Meanwhile, the real thing — scary American, British, and Australian Special Forces — is causing havoc to Saddam’s rear guard. In short, for all the tragedy of a fragging, Iraqi atrocities, misdirected cruise missiles, and the usual cowardly antics inherent to our enemy’s way of war, the real story is not being reported: A phenomenal march against overwhelming logistical, material, and geographical odds in under seven days has reached and surrounded Saddam Hussein’s capital.

At home there have been none of the promised terrorist attacks. A supportive public — stunned by initial losses, now angered by atrocities — is growing more, not less, fervent, determined not merely to defeat but to destroy utterly the Baathists. The Arab world snickers that we cannot take casualties; the American public is instead growing impatient to inflict more of them — and is probably already well to the right of the Bush administration. We are a calm and forgiving people, but executing prisoners, fighting in civilian clothes, and using human shields will soon draw a response too terrible to contemplate.

Just as unusual has been American ad hoc logistical flexibility. Saudi Arabia caved early on — and we moved to other Gulf states. Turkey caved late — and we went ahead with a single thrust. France connived both early and late — and they are quiet. Russia, as the Soviets of old, proved duplicitous in ways that we are just learning — and it made no difference. Indeed, their night-vision equipment and GPS jammers will help Saddam no more than did the German-built bunker he was bombed in.

We should recall that in the first Gulf War we bombed for over 44 days. Critics in 1991 by day 10 were complaining because after the first few nights’ pyrotechnics, Saddam’s army had not crumbled. In turn, earlier swaggering air-advocates had promised victory in three weeks — only to be unjustly slandered that they had failed to end the war in six. Gulf War I is considered a great victory; it required 48 days of air and ground attacks by an enormous coalition to expel the Iraqi army from Kuwait. Our present attempt, with half the force, seeks to end Saddam Hussein altogether — and on day 7 already had him cut off, trapped, and besieged.

In the campaign against Belgrade, the ebullience was gone by day 10 when Milosevic remained defiant. By the fifth week, criticism was fierce and calls for an end to the bombing widespread. On day 77, Milosevic capitulated — and no critics stepped forward to confess that their gloom and doom had been misplaced. Does anyone recall the term “quagmire,” used of Afghanistan after the third week — and how prophets of doom promised enervating stasis, only days later to see a chain of Afghan cities fall? Yet no armchair doom-and-gloom generals were to be found when the Taliban ran and utterly confounded their pessimism. Our talking heads remind me of the volatility of the Athenian assembly, ready to laud or execute at a moment’s notice.

The commentators need to listen to history. By any fair standard of even the most dazzling charges in military history — the German blast through the Ardennes in spring 1940, or Patton’s romp in July — the present race to Baghdad is unprecedented in its speed and daring, and in the lightness of its causalities. We can nit-pick about the need for another armored division, pockets of irregulars, a need to mop up here and there, plenty of hard fighting ahead, this and that. But the fact remains that, so far, the campaign has been historically unprecedented in getting so many tens of thousands of soldiers so quickly to Baghdad without losses — and its logistics will be studied for decades.

Indeed, the only wrinkle is that our present military faces cultural obstacles never envisioned by an Epaminondas, Caesar, Marlborough, Sherman — or any of the other great marchers. A globally televised and therapeutic culture puts an onus on American soldiers that could never have been envisioned by any of the early captains. We treat prisoners justly; our enemy executes them. We protect Iraqi bridges, oil, and dams — from Iraqi saboteurs. We must treat Iraqi civilians better than do their own men, who are trying to kill them. Our generals and leaders take questions; theirs give taped propaganda speeches. Shock and awe — designed not to kill but to stun, and therefore to save civilians — are slurred as Hamburg and Dresden. The force needed to crush Saddam’s killers is deemed too much for the fragile surrounding human landscape. Marines who raise the Stars and Stripes are reprimanded for being too chauvinistic. And on, and on, and on.

When this is all over — and I expect it will be soon — besides a great moral accounting, I hope that there will deep introspection and sober public discussion about the peculiar ignorance and deductive pessimism on the part of our elites. In the meantime, all we can insist on is absolute and unconditional surrender — no peace process, no exit strategy, no U.N. votes, no Arab League parley, no EU expressions of concern, no French, no anything but our absolute victory and Saddam’s utter ruin. Unlike in 1991, commanders in the field must be given explicit instructions from the White House about negotiations: There are to be absolutely none — other than the acceptance of unconditional surrender.

http://www.nationalreview.com/hanson/hanson032803.asp

 

[trader556]

keymar!!! cut and paste only?

ok ok ok.... no essay, only a letter

Thank you, George Bush, the Great Leader.

First of all, may I thank you for showing all of us the danger which Saddam Hussein represents. Perhaps many of us might have forgotten that he used chemical weapons against his own people as well as against the people of Iran. Hussein is a blood-thirsty dictator, and certainly an embodiment of evil in the world today.

However, that is not the only reason why I am thanking you. In the early months of 2003, you helped show us, sir, many important things about the world, and it is for this that you have my gratitude. I was taught as child to always say "thank you" to someone who has done me a favor, and it is in that spirit that I write these words.

Thank you for showing us all that the people of Turkey and their Parliament are not for sale, not even for $26 billion dollars.

Thank you for showing us clearly the enormous abyss which exists between the decisions taken by leaders of nations and the true desires of their people. Thank you for helping us see with painful clarity that whether it is José Aznar of Spain or Tony Blair of the UK, that our so called elected leaders don’t have the slightest regard or respect for the fact that over 90% of their population are against war. Thank you for allowing us to witness the ease with whichTony Blair was able to blithely ignore the largest public protest held in England in the last 30 years.

Thank you, because your insistence on war forced Blair to go to Parliament with a plagiarized dossier which consisted of notes written ten years ago by an arab graduate student. As a result we were able to witness the unbelievable farce of Blair insisting that these notes represented “proof” gathered by the British secret service.

Thank you for making Colin Powell descend to the ridiculous by showing the UN Security Council photographs, which a week later were publicly denounced by Hans Blix, the weapons inspector responsible for verifying the disarmament of Iraq

Thank you, because your position on war resulted in the French Foreign Minister, Mr. Dominique de Villepin, in his speech against war on Iraq, being honored by a standing ovation. This is an honor which, if I am correct, has only happened once before in the history of the U.N., and that was during a presentation by Nelson Mandela.

Thank you, because due to your strenuous push for war, for the first time the Arab nations of the Gulf, usually so divided, have found a reason to unite and have recently issued a joint resolution in Cairo condemning your proposed invasion. You have brought about a unity of opinion amongst the arab nations, that they had not achieved on their own.

Thank you, because as a result of your administration’s rhetoric blasting the United Nations as “irrelevant”, even the most undecided and reluctant nations have been inspired to take a position against your country’s attack on Iraq.

Thank you for your extraordinary foreign policy. Attempts to defend your ambitions have caused British Foreign Minister Jack Straw, to attempt to argue a case for a “moral war”, and with each attempt lose more international credibility.

Thank you for attempting to divide Europe, which after a century of war and upheaval has been fighting for unity. This was a warning clearly seen by all of us, and it will not be forgotten.

Thank you for finally managing to achieve what few have managed in the past century: to unite millions of people, across the continents and give them a common cause to fight for, even if that cause is the exact opposite from yours.

Thank you for letting us feel that even if our words are not being heard, they are at least being repeated. This will give us strength in the future.

Thank you, because without your esteemed help, we wouldn’t have known the extent to which we were capable of mobilizing. Perhaps this appears useless today...but it will serve us in the future.

Thank you.

So, now that the drums of war seem to beat with unstoppable ferocity, I want to add an insight, words uttered by an ancient European King to a would-be invader:

“May your morning be glorious and May the sun shine brightly on the armor of your soldiers, because in the afternoon I will defeat you.”

Mr. Bush, thank you as well for visibly trying to stop a movement which has already begun. We will pay attention to the feelings of impotence, and the sensations it arouses within us. We will learn to deal with those emotions, and we will transform them.

In the meantime, may you enjoy your beautiful morning, and all the glory that it may bring you.

Thank you, because I know you will not listen to us, nor take us seriously. Know, however, that we have listened to you and heard you clearly, and we will not soon forget your words.

Thank you, George W. Bush, the great leader!

Nice going Georgie

 

[msfe]

America in the vice

Lives and careers are on the line in Iraq

Leader
Saturday March 29, 2003
The Guardian

A vice is slowly beginning to close on US and British political leaders who ordered or justified the launching of war on Iraq. This potentially fatal squeeze is the product of two opposed dynamics. One is the dawning realisation that the war will not be over quickly, may indeed drag on for months, and will certainly not be the "cakewalk" predicted by Kenneth Adelman of the Pentagon's infamous defence policy board. The other is the prospect of an accelerating humanitarian crisis.
Several factors, notably fierce Iraqi resistance and US miscalculations about the number of ground combat forces required, have forced a slowdown in the offensive. Around Basra, indeed, and south of Baghdad, the advance has effectively been halted for several days. A tactical reassessment is now under way against a backdrop of escalating political recriminations in Washington and increasingly, between London and the US. The top US infantry commander in Iraq, Lieutenant-General William Wallace, admits the campaign is not progressing as expected, echoing concerns expressed by retired senior generals. Whitehall defence officials are urging the sort of patient, circumspect approach adopted by British forces outside Basra. The evident fear is that any precipitate ground assault on Baghdad and a subsequent descent into street-fighting by outnumbered, fatigued and poorly supplied US troops could be disastrous.

Even the hawkish US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld, principal author of the controversial "combat lite" strategy and a man whose reputation and career are very much on the line, appears to be hesitating. The champion of the "forward-leaning" posture is now in danger of falling flat on his face. His boss, George Bush, who at Camp David this week seemed to be asleep while standing up, insists a relentless America will prevail "no matter how long it takes". Down in Tampa, that sounds like leadership. But it is actually an amazing admission that the US military behemoth no longer entirely controls the timetable or pace of a war begun at a moment and in a place of its own particular choosing.

That the Pentagon has been obliged to double its ground combat forces after only a week, and must now wait for them to deploy, is a matter for considerable political shock and awe. This military deceleration now runs directly counter to that other powerful dynamic: a quickening human tragedy. Put simply, the longer the war rages, the more acute the suffering of the Iraqi people will become. And while the regime remains undefeated, the more deeply problematic will be efforts to distribute aid and the more furious the international outcry.

The prospect of Iraqis dying in large numbers from dehydration, or malnutrition or disease is still hopefully some way off; the UN estimates a five-week food supply. But problems with refugees and tainted water supply are beginning to emerge around Basra and Nassiriya. Aid agencies, unable to enter most of the country while fighting continues, say they cannot assess the status of the population. However much money is raised, and the UN has set a $2.2bn overall target, it is useless as long as organised, safe distribution remains impractical. Last night's decision to give the UN secretary-general temporary control of a resumed oil-for-food programme and $10bn worth of uncompleted contracts will also have a merely symbolic, political importance if secure distribution routes to 45,000 outlets are not swiftly reopened.

The Iraqi regime is not helping, cynically using the plight of civilians as a propaganda tool. The US military and the US government's aid agency are not helping either by trying to direct the relief effort and thereby potentially compromising independent NGOs with far superior expertise. Yesterday's arrival of the British aid ship, Sir Galahad, at Umm Qasr, while welcome in itself, highlights another difficulty. This is Iraq's only deep-water port, the size of Dover. It will have to cope with the competing demands of military and humanitarian supplies for the duration and beyond.

Britain has earmarked £210m for humanitarian work in a total war budget of £3bn; the US $2.4bn, out of $74.7bn. Yet even with the best will in the world, aid efforts will have limited impact while the conflict continues inconclusively. This is why, with the war lengthening and slowing, Iraq's human crisis seems certain to intensify. This is the inexorably closing vice that has the power to destroy thousands of innocent lives and some very prominent political careers.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,925032,00.html

 

[KymarFye]

Quote from trader556:

keymar!!! cut and paste only?

ok ok ok.... no essay, only a letter

Thank you, George Bush, the Great Leader.

First of all, may I thank you for showing all of us the danger which Saddam Hussein represents. Perhaps many of us might have forgotten that he used chemical weapons against his own people as well as against the people of Iran. Hussein is a blood-thirsty dictator, and certainly an embodiment of evil in the world today.

Okay, let's try to make it simple: You (or the original author of the letter?) concede that Hussein is a "blood-thirsty dictator, and certainly an embodiment of evil in the world today."

Since you appear to oppose military action to remove him and his regime, what is your proposal for dealing with this "blood-thirsty... embodiment of evil"? Or do you believe that blood-thirsty embodiments of evil can or should be ignored?

 

[msfe]

The American administration is a bloodthirsty wild animal
By Harold Pinter

The article is taken from an address given by English playwright of world-renown and political activist Harold Pinter upon receiving an honorary doctorate at the University of Turin on November 27, 2002, and was first published in the London Telegraph on December 11, 2002.


Earlier this year, I had a major operation for cancer. The operation and its after effects were something of a nightmare. I felt I was a man unable to swim bobbing about under water in a deep dark endless ocean. But I did not drown and I am very glad to be alive.

However, I found that to emerge from a personal nightmare was to enter an infinitely more pervasive public nightmare - the nightmare of American hysteria, ignorance, arrogance, stupidity and belligerence; the most powerful nation the world has ever known effectively waging war against the rest of the world.

"If you are not with us, you are against us," President George W. Bush has said. He has also said: "We will not allow the world's worst weapons to remain in the hands of the world's worst leaders." Quite right. Look in the mirror, chum. That's you.

America is at this moment developing advanced systems of "weapons of mass destruction" and is prepared to use them where it sees fit. It has more of them than the rest of the world put together. It has walked away from international agreements on biological and chemical weapons, refusing to allow inspection of its own factories. The hypocrisy behind its public declarations and its own actions is almost a joke.

America believes that the 3,000 deaths in New York are the only deaths that count, the only deaths that matter. They are American deaths. Other deaths are unreal, abstract, of no consequence.

The 3,000 deaths in Afghanistan are never referred to. The hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children dead through American and British sanctions which have deprived them of essential medicines are never referred to.

The effect of depleted uranium, used by America in the Gulf war, is never referred to. Radiation levels in Iraq are appallingly high. Babies are born with no brain, no eyes, no genitals. Where they do have ears, mouths or rectums, all that issues from these orifices is blood.

The 200,000 deaths in East Timor in 1975 brought about by the Indonesian government but inspired and supported by America are never referred to. The 500,000 deaths in Guatemala, Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Uruguay, Argentina and Haiti, in actions supported and subsidised by America, are never referred to.

The millions of deaths in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are no longer referred to. The desperate plight of the Palestinian people, the central factor in world unrest, is hardly referred to.

But what a misjudgment of the present and what a misreading of history this is. People do not forget. They do not forget the death of their fellows, they do not forget torture and mutilation, they do not forget injustice, they do not forget oppression, they do not forget the terrorism of mighty powers. They not only don't forget: they also strike back.

The atrocity in New York was predictable and inevitable. It was an act of retaliation against constant and systematic manifestations of state terrorism on the part of America over many years, in all parts of the world.

In Britain, the public is now being warned to be "vigilant" in preparation for potential terrorist acts. The language is in itself preposterous. How will - or can - public vigilance be embodied? Wearing a scarf over your mouth to keep out poison gas?

However, terrorist attacks are quite likely, the inevitable result of our Prime Minister's contemptible and shameful subservience to America. Apparently a terrorist poison gas attack on the London Underground system was recently prevented.

But such an act may indeed take place. Thousands of schoolchildren travel on the Underground every day. If there is a poison gas attack from which they die, the responsibility will rest entirely on the shoulders of our Prime Minister. Needless to say, the Prime Minister does not travel on the Underground himself.

The planned war against Iraq is in fact a plan for premeditated murder of thousands of civilians in order, apparently, to rescue them from their dictator.

America and Britain are pursuing a course that can lead only to an escalation of violence throughout the world and finally to catastrophe. It is obvious, however, that America is bursting at the seams to attack Iraq.

I believe that it will do this not only to take control of Iraqi oil, but also because the American administration is now a bloodthirsty wild animal. Bombs are its only vocabulary. Many Americans, we know, are horrified by the posture of their government, but seem to be helpless.

Unless Europe finds the solidarity, intelligence, courage and will to challenge and resist American power, Europe itself will deserve Alexander Herzen's declaration - "We are not the doctors. We are the disease".

 

[trader556]

Quote from KymarFye:



Okay, let's try to make it simple: You (or the original author of the letter?) concede that Hussein is a "blood-thirsty dictator, and certainly an embodiment of evil in the world today."

Since you appear to oppose military action to remove him and his regime, what is your proposal for dealing with this "blood-thirsty... embodiment of evil"? Or do you believe that blood-thirsty embodiments of evil can or should be ignored?

---Or do you believe that blood-thirsty embodiments of evil can or should be ignored?--- that label can easily apply to us looking from the outside if you consider all our doings (the bad) to the world BUT this is another subject. He used to be addicted to nuclear weapons too, per Shrub & Co but that's not the essence of your question. Sooooo few thinks to consider first.

ok ok ok. I will ask you and the rest in this forum the following:

Go back and find the facts about world history on all the nations that we, the United States of America has been involved with. militarily, peacefully, trades, allies, enemies etc.

Get the facts both on the good we have done to this world AND the bad. Make a list(hundreds of sites)
List all the nations now out there and who rules them.
Check National Archives. Check declassified Documents. Check Presidential Orders. Go to your local library and read about war and peace.

Next: List all the heads of all these nations.

Tell me who is good and who is bad and why?

Then Prioritize them!!

Who/what nation is the greatest threat?? and WHY?

Next you will discover that many of the bad ones were put in place by us. Ask yourself why.

Few of the conclusions:

Just about all of them can be "labelled" evil or great leaders depending on what cartel benefits. Use media spin and you got what ever you want. YOU are a trader, follow the tape, follow the money trail. NOT upgrades/downgrades and fake bids/asks

Don't look at the media puffery and f%$ked up wording. DON"T show me any friggin polls supporting shrub and co by 65%

Cause if you do then you need to remember the CNN polls and Princeton studies where 2/3 of our fellow citizens believe that Iraqis were either all or some of the hijackers. And these maywell be the same ignorant people who are fat and pay more attention to freedom fries than the death and destruction we are causing.

Sadam is bad? yes we all agree on that. Is he a threat? NO! Who put him there? We did. Why? read the history. Has he done good to Iraq, yes that too. Iraq till 91 had the best educational system in the middle east second to Israel. Are the Iraqis expecting us with open arms? doesn't look like it.

How to deal with the problem?

DON'T fucking CREATE ONE TO START WITH!!!!!!!

But now he is there.

You want him removed? ( but are you sure we really do? and why?) Who's gonna replace him?? Look at Afghanistan, it's worst now than before. But back to Iraq. Fine, want him out:

Who much will all this mess going to cost us I meant the tax payers???.. cause as you know Halibarton and shrub Co, Defense, Oils will make out extremely well.

Ok let's say 500 billion when all is said and done? F%$K we are willing to pay Turks (possibly worst barbarians than Iraq) 50 billion of our tax to let us in.

Take 1/2 of 500 billion, save all the lives, avoid destabilization of the area and possible WW3, AND GIVE IT to the Iraqi people. Money talks bullshit walks. Sodom will be out in no time.

Look! inspection were working before and worked now. Blix stated: we never have declared to UN that Iraq has WMD's

When he was full of them before 91 he didn't use them and he had infinitely more capability to do so.
I read these posts and it's really sad how misinformed all the warmongers are.

I am for WAR 100% IF someone tries to invade my home. I am NOT for pre-emptive bs based on fraud and I am not for destabilization of the world.

Now I am sure that many will come and answer this, try to find a sentence, or a period missing, or attack the poster you know how it goes...

But if you are serious--I know this is chit chat--get the facts all of them or as many as you can. Open your mind to what is happening on the big picture. Take a look at our greatest nation the true beacon of democracy and values --AT LEAST IT USED TO BE-- and then tell me about this war or any war for that matter.

I don't want to turn this into a pissing and moaning contest, and I do appreciate your honest and direct questions.

Follow the real big money trail and who benefits from what. Connect the dots and it becomes clear.

Keymar, do notice the minimal usage of (^%$#%# words).. out of courtesy

 

[KymarFye]

Oh, good, an opportunity to re-argue the same arguments that we've gone over and over a thousand times over the last year or so. Prediction: msfe will not bother to attempt to justify any of the arguments in this twisted screed. He'll either just disappear from the discussion, or, at best, reply with some irrelevant and impertinent jab that never addresses either the larger argument or the ideas on which it rests.

Quote from msfe:

The American administration is a bloodthirsty wild animal

Deft and penetrating analysis there... Good thing the writer doesn't possess any biases.

America believes that the 3,000 deaths in New York are the only deaths that count, the only deaths that matter. They are American deaths. Other deaths are unreal, abstract, of no consequence.

Actually, the victims came from many different countries. The larger point isn't the 3,000 already murdered, but the ones who could be added to the total by future acts perpetrated by an implacable enemy whose ambitions in this regard appear to be unbounded.

The 3,000 deaths in Afghanistan are never referred to.

It would have been better to leave Afghanistan under the Taliban-Al Qaeda? When do we begin, for instance, to "refer to" the millions of Afghanis who were under threat of famine prior to US military action, and have been saved?

The hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children dead through American and British sanctions which have deprived them of essential medicines are never referred to.

The misappropriation of money by Hussein's regime - for building "palaces" and for maintaining military and security forces in luxury rather than for feeding and caring for the Iraqi people - is "never referred to" by peaceniks. That their preferred policy - "containment" - would have ensured an indefinite continuation of this same situation is also "never referred to." The consequences of any alternative policy are also never referred to.

I have repeatedly asked the anti-American and anti-war writers on ET to address this central issue. None has. Ever. Not once.

The effect of depleted uranium, used by America in the Gulf war, is never referred to.

The depleted uranium charge is, to be charitable, controversial and very weakly founded - especially when compared to the widely documented crimes, including genocide, ethnic cleansing, and wars of aggression, perpetrated by the Hussein Regime.

The 200,000 deaths in East Timor in 1975 brought about by the Indonesian government but inspired and supported by America are never referred to. The 500,000 deaths in Guatemala, Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Uruguay, Argentina and Haiti, in actions supported and subsidised by America, are never referred to.

The millions of deaths in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are no longer referred to. The desperate plight of the Palestinian people, the central factor in world unrest, is hardly referred to.

As compared to the tens of millions of deaths caused by Stalin, Mao, and Pol Pot, among others? On this score, by the way, implicitly blaming the Cambodian genocide (or the fighting on Central America) on the US is an obviously one-sided and, for a leftist, totally self-serving re-writing of history.

The rest of Pinter's commentary is just rhetoric all derived from the same "style" of historical analysis, suffused with presumptions of certain knowledge and moral superiority, yet offering nothing even remotely resembling a practical or effective method of dealing with the world situation.

 

[Babak]

Same tired arguments that were trotted out at the start of the Afghanistan conflict. Yawn.