[Thermodyne]

Originally posted by primitive:
Alpha:
You are right of course.
Allthough I was/am very much against the war, now that it is started, I wish for it to have a speedy conclusion. The fact that US forces can drive tanks through the suburbs of Bagdad is encoraging, but they stll have to get out of the tanks to apprehend Saddam (or whoever is in charge). It will all come down to how many Iraqis will be willing to fight in that Last battle.

The pictures shown on BBC yesterday of (British) special forces apprehending suspected supporters of Saddam, and giving them the Al Queada treatment (masks over their heads, hands bound on their back, and generally kicking them around), was a major propaganda blunder. It will only increase the fear of what to come and therefore the willingness to fight off those who have supported Saddam (Republican guard, Bath party members, people of his tribe).

North Korea:
I was not talking about nukes. I was talking about missiles with the potential to deliver chemichal and biological payloads. Of course the west will not accept that every 3rd rate nation is getting such weapons, and we will use our "foreign aid" money to buy them off. Current policy have just created a big new opportunity for ****headed dictators (plenty of them still around) to blackmail us. The winners here will be the companies producing such necessities as private jets and luxury cars, the loosers will be the ordinary people who should have benefitted from those grants.

Thermo:
If you can't see the double standards in your posting, then there are no use in discussing with you.

Its not a double standard, it a lack of any standard at all. That is the whole problem. If we aregoing to have standards, we need to establish basic human rights first. And this begins with self determination and freely elected governments. Something that is with one exception, totally lacking in the region. And the exception has been tiptoeing on the line for years. Not that anyone went out of their way to give them the opportunity to moderate their position.