Quote:
Originally Posted by Trumanator
Uh, the majority of the militants in Iraq were actually foreigners, and after the Sunni Awakening it became even more drastically so. As to the civilian casualties, nearly all of them were killed by militants, not US troops. Another point is that while here in the US the people dying would be innocents, the soldiers in Iraq volunteered to be part of the military. Iraq has almost finished Al Quaeda. Afghanistan might have hurt them, but the losses they took in Iraq to no discernable result killed most of their support and destroyed a large portion of their leadership. If we can convince the Pakistani's to help us take care of them in the tribal regions, they really will be finished.
|
So you are saying that most (or at least a significant percentage) of the people fighting in Iraq would be actively attempting to stream into the US to commit acts of terrorism? I find that extremely hard to believe- that many people don't become terrorists out of nowhere, if US wasn't under siege by them before 9/11 they weren't all going to suddenly come to the US afterwards.
And aside from that, I find it a little chilling how easily nationalism clouds the way casualty figures are read. I mean, regardless of if the war is an ultimately a 'success', hundreds of thousands of died. It is difficult to imagine that _not_ having the Iraq war would have had even vaguely comparable numbers in total human deaths. I realize the inevitable comeback here is 'But saddam killed people', but it is exceedingly doubtful he would have wracked up even close to the death count by being in power the last few years.
And this is really getting on a tangent here but it's my rant and so be it
: It really bothers me in general people's horror at suffering in their own country as opposed to the rest of the world. The epitome of this to me is charities... the idea of giving to charity to help some kids softball team instead of starving people is almost unimaginable, yet it's a choice people make on a daily basis.
Bottom line, even assuming not invading Iraq would have caused more terrorist attacks (which I have a hard time believing), I don't think I could say that the Iraqi dead are worth any less than those theoretical American victims.