Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

This will take a little time to read and digest. But in a nut shell is shows who ordered how much from whom. If you want to skip the world stuff, go to about page 34 for the gulf region.

http://www.csis.org/gulf/reports/tre...sexpgulfme.pdf

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

Any thoughts on what Turkey might do with its troops poised to invade?

I just heard about it on Fox News Channel or was it MSNBC?

Turkey is talking about invading Iraq now. Not good at all.

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Oh, it was strategic, that makes me feel alot better. It obviously was strategic to support Soharto while he killed a million of his population, strategic to arm and equip the Contras to kill 30,000 of their countrymen, strategic to kill a couple of mill in Indochina, strategic to topple a democratic government in Chile, strategic to train/equip Osama and his mates to kill the Russian invaders. Like, if all that was done for nothing but profit it would make a huge difference. All those strategic corpses must be feeling alot better now.

So is the invasion of Iraq about justice, liberation and threat of terrorist attack or is is just another strategic move in the never ending quest for complete US dominance?

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Are you defending the indefensible?

Askan

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">The Turks will do what they have been doing for a long time.
Kill Kurds.

Askan

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Hopefully they won't move in. The US told them doing so could result in friendly fire incidents and distract from the course of the ongoing battle. I believe the US intends to rely on Iraqi Kurdish forces in the north. They can't exactly do that if the Turks come in guns blazing.

Anyway, becasue of this Turky has withdrawn the premission to use their airspace that had been approved yesterday.

Geoschmo

[ March 21, 2003, 18:07: Message edited by: geoschmo ]

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

Okay, here's what I think:

The USA is a bunch of b*stards because they kept the whole world from becoming communist through the 60 - 80s. You don't like what they did in helping to create despots?... perhaps you'd have prefered a nuclear war instead of the cold one?? Or maybe the US and UK should have just rolled over and let the USSR have their way across the globe.
The USSR was a bunch of b*stards too, again for setting up nasty regimes in their attempt make the entire world communist. A million murders here and a million slaughters there adds up. Call me stupid, but I still think Pinoche and Saddam are the lesser of two evils when compared to world annihilation. Now that the cold war is over we can attempt to wash our hands of all the nastinesses that happened, but to Regan, Thatcher, John-Paul, and Gorbechevs (sp) credit they finally created a world that could stop with the clandenstine power/murder games.

Hind-sight is said to be 20/20, but the politicians of the era did not have the advantage of our hind-sight! They did what they thought could improve the world (to their world view) with the knowledge they had. It wasn't their fault that they were not omnicient!

In summary, I think that some people may be engaged in critisizim out of context... I think there may be just a hint of reconstructionism going on here. sure Saddam is nasty horrible bad bad bad, both now and yesterday. But can you imagine what the world would be like if the USSR had overtaken those oilfields? Can you imagine what the radiation levels across the world would be like right now if the USA and USSR got into a direct fight over the middle east instead of letting their proxy states do the fighting? As much as I hate to say it, men like Saddam had their uses at one point in history, but now we are in a new era, with a different set of problems and solutions. It's very unfair to apply todays realities to yesterday however...

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">And this is exactly why you gotta be very stupid to trust the US. Their "set of problems and solutions" might change, and today's allies might become tomorrow enemies.
And let's not talk of the long number of allies and friends that the US have abandoned:
-South Viet Nam
-Chile
-Argentine
-Iran
-Philipines
-South Africa

And don't forget the unfullfilled promises to the Republic of Russia.......

Now next in the list is Israel.

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

Turkey wants the northern Iraq oil fields. Why else act so stupidly.

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">gotta be. Maybe they think there's gonna be a reparting of Irak after the war or something.

Not a bad idea. Repart Irak between Turkey, Iran and Arabia.
But I don't think certain corporations would like something like this.

Re: [OT] Another heated discussion about the Iraq siutation, war and politics.
 

The second thing that I think:
(yeah, only two thoughts today)

The world has roundly critisized the USA (and UK) for having ulterior motives in the Iraq situation. They have been labeled Hypocrite!!, Self-Interested!!, Imperial!! And everyone wants to point out that the US helped to "create Saddam" as well. In the mean time proponents of the US action love to point out that France has some ulterior motives, to which people with anti-war leanings yell "foul! you can't hide the US motives behind they wonderful French"

I say, certainly all of those critisms are true to some degree. However, the point is not that France is bad because they sold Sadam some weapons... the point is that France is claiming the moral high road when their hands are as covered in filth as the US! For goodness sake people, the US is not the only group with self-interest at stake here... France gets oil at <$5/barrel through the food-for-oil program. They have oil contracts with Iraq ready to go as soon as the sanctions are lifted - but the contracts are with Sadam's regime. A huge percentage of the population of France is Muslim, and Chirac would really like to get re-elected. France, like many countries sells arms to developing and third world regimes. There is nothing illegal about that. Is it unethical? Yes, often it is. But name me a single country that isn't selling or buying weapons. Name me a single country that isn't selling or buying oil. Name me a single country that doesn't want to control Iraqi soil, and I'll concede to you that this is the country that is "sanitized" in this whole affair - they should be finding and executing the solution to Sadam instead of the USA.

But that nation does not exist! So I think it would be best for everyone to scrub the angry accusations of "self interest" and "ulterior motive" altogether. Everyone has self interest and ulterior motives in this affair. Once these accusations and the historical blame game (see my previous post today) are done with, we can begin to really deal with the questions:

1) should Sadam be deposed (irregardless of who should depose him)
2) how can damage to the Iraqi population and infrastructures be minimized
3) how do we "rebuild" Iraq after the war considering it multitudes of factions (ethnic and religious)
4) how do we utilize the wealth potential of Iraq to benefit the people of Iraq, not just a small elite?
5) how do we keep neighbours, such as Iran and Turkey, from gobbling up a demilitarized Iraq?

Those are, IMHO, the things that should be debated. The blame game is becoming tiresome.

Edit
Aloofi: you seem surprised or disappointed that the US does not live up to it's promises. If we step away from "shoulda coulda" however, into the mists of international politics, name me a country that does stick to it's promises! If it ain't on paper with the President's signature, it ain't a contract my friend. Dishonourable, sure! That's the way the world works though. Crying won't solve the problem, just lawyers http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

[ March 21, 2003, 19:20: Message edited by: jimbob ]