Continue to protest while Iraqi's dance in the streets?

Great Debates
21

L_C:

I knew. I also knew it wasn’t the only motive. Frankly I don’t care. If Saddam’s tyrannical bloody, brutal regime is toppled and replaced with one of the Iraqi people’s choosing, then as far as I am concerned, it is justified and in fact would represent one of the great accomplishments the World has witnessed.

A hundred years from now they may not ask why we invaded Iraq, but why a country with so much wealth, so much power, might sit idly by while a brutal regime killed, gassed and tortured it’s own people.

Do I know this? Of course not. Time will tell, there is a lot of work to be done. I have no moral qualms about this war, and believe the moral “correctness” of this war outweighs any other cynical objections about oil, power, etc.

Naturally, that is my humblest of opinions.

22

I’m sorry, but… umm… cite? Tens of thounsands? The largest figures I’ve seen were in the hundreds.

Jeff

23

I presume you felt the same way during the NATO bombing of Serbia.

24

**

I certainly did.

25

I’ll be happy that some good can come of this war, if it does. Although, if there are many who hate the US presence, they’re not likely to demonstrate that just now. No one ever doubted the military victory, whether the support for the new government will grow is still open to question.

Of course the fact that the US’s interests will be served mightily by this war is completely irrelevant. A mere accident of fate. It was all about helping the Iraqi people. :rolleyes: ahem… especially since he didn’t use any WMD when he had the chance.

If Saddam had remained friendly to the US government, and not attacked one of our allies, he’d still be in power. He gassed the Kurds long before he invaded Kuwait, but the Reagan/Bush administrations didn’t give a hoot.

26

Let me say that I’m a little politically naive. Not so naive that I believe removing ‘evil regimes’ is a US goal–compare Africa to the Middle-East. Only regimes of consequence to the US.

But I remember a political cartoon that struck me many years ago:

The cartoon depicted Western and Eastern Europe as a single rowhouse building taking up a city block.

The Western Europeans were sauntering out of their end of the block (umbrellas and wine bottles/cheese in hand) looking down at the other end of the block [rubble–the Balkans–Bosnia et al] and saying:

“When are the Americans going to do something about this?”

Okay, one political cartoonist’s take.

This is where I’m naive–it’s OK for NATO (~US air power) to bomb Milosevic [sic?] out of power, but against Iraq it’s not.

Did France and Germany and Russia object to NATO bombing of that as strenously [sic] as they objected to war on Iraq?

Explain why.

In terms as one as naive as I can understand.

I think there are many motives hidden behind the retohric of all sides involved.

27

I would like to ask for a cite as to where you got the tens of thousands of Iraqi civilian casualties claim. Please dont offer up quotes from the Iraqi Information minister as a cite. He didnt show up for work today and can you please subtract the number of Iraqi civilians that were hurt by Saddams forces…

28

[Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf] That is not true! I was at work today! In fact, I appeared to audiences worldwide by satellite. I will show you the tape in two days’ time. I was just delayed by an American tank convoy, uh, I mean, an Iraqi Victory Parade which was celebrating our glorious victory over the dog-pee infidels. [/Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf]

29

Can we all offer a brief prayer for the saftey of Baghdad Bob? If not, I have a feeling that we will all commit suicide in the desert, and will be struck down with fire and rockets…

ANSWER has (had?) a rally planned for April 12. We’ll see if they go through with it. My guess is, even they are not so incredibly stupid. But the bongo-mashers never fail to amaze me, so…

30

I just visited the IAC and ANSWER websites, it’s as if nothing unusual as happened. The US war of aggression against the civilian population of Iraq continues and intensifies, or something. :dubious:

31

Okay, for all of you who think this was a ‘rotten’ war. I have one question:

If you could roll back the last month and stop the war, would you?

If not, doesn’t that mean you were wrong?

If so, how would you explain that decision to the millions of Iraqis who would still be living under Saddam’s thumb?

32

According to this site, which, I would venture to say is decidedly anti-war, the actual number is less than 1,200. By no means an insignificant number, but a far cry from “tens of thousands”.

33

I should like to add to what Cervaise posted. It is more likely I shall be J. Lo’s next boytoy.

The Iraqi’s aren’t the only ones dancing in the streets. Osama bin Laden is probably breaking out in giggling fits, every time somebody phones in the latest count from the Jihad Recruiting Drive.

The relative freedom of the Iraqi people is a darn good thing. It is also a very, very good thing that this adventure hasn’t cost us nearly what it might have, and very well may yet. Fearless Leader put our collective asses in the pot to draw to an inside straight flush. He did, and that is good news. The man is an unimaginative, stubborn, self-righteous fool. But at least he’s lucky.

We’d best hope we are equally lucky. On the other hand, how many of us were born rich?

34

The word “casualties” encompasses not only those civilians who have died, but also those who have been wounded. Clearly, an accurate total cannot be determined at this time, nor can one clearly identify which civilian casualties were caused by US and British forces, and which were caused by Iraqi forces. But I did hear several reports that hospitals in Basra and Baghdad were admitting civilian casualties at the rate of over 100 per hour (that is PER hospital.) That will add up to tens of thousands of casualties fairly quickly.

35

From CNN, April 9:

36

I disagree completely. A BIG factor in recruiting for al-Qaida was the notion that they could win. The perception in the Middle East was that America was a paper tiger. Many Islamic nutbars honestly believed that all they had to do was bloody America’s nose a little, and the hollow shell of the imperialists would collapse from their own weakness and they would turn tail and run home. The conventional wisdom, even among many in the west, was that America had no stomach for casualties, and was unable to do hard things. It fought from the air, not on the ground. That sort of thing.

And there was some justification for this thinking. When the Beirut barracks were bombed, the U.S. response was to pack up and leave. When dead U.S. soldiers were dragged through the streets of Somalia, the U.S. response was to pack up and leave. Events like this had a lot to do with inflaming Islamist terror. This war is going to cause a lot of re-thinking about that perception.

One of Bin Laden’s favorite recruiting statements was, “When people see a weak horse and a strong horse, they will naturally choose the strong horse”. That this phrase resonated with the people in the Middle East indicated that they saw the U.S. as the weak horse. The smashing of the Iraq army and the obliteration of all Fedayeen who dared to attack them have shown people who’s the strongest horse on the block.

But even if more individuals decide to take up arms against America, a lot of governments that have supported them are going to be doing a lot of hard thinking over the next little while.

And then there’s the direct benefit of removing Saddam’s support for terror, which was not insubstantial. There are about 700 Ansar al-Islam terrorists dead in the north now, their training camps and recruitment centers smashed. Palestinian terrorists will no longer get training In Iraq, and their families will no longer get $25,000 in blood money from Saddam.

Saddam was a hero to many of these terrorists. The Palestinians loved him. Bin Laden fought for him (read his first fatwa). Terrorist supporters saw Iraq as a state that could magnify their power and offer asylum if the heat got too high. Iraq was a lightning rod.

And now there are millions of Iraqis who, if the U.S. plays the reconstruction right, will be very moderate. Add that to the increasing moderation of Iran, Jordan, and some other Arab countries, and history may show this as a turning point, the start of the era of modernization and democratization in the Middle East.

And there is one more HUGE effect from this war - intelligence. The U.S. now possesses the records of a government at the center of the terror universe. Totalitarian governments are obsessive bookkeepers, as everyone covers their ass. Iraq is an absolute treasure trove of intelligence. From now on in, when the U.S. negotiates with Syria, or Yemen, or Pakistan, or Iran, or Libya, or the PLO, the people across the table will have to wonder what do they know???. And the answer will be ‘a LOT’.

The war on terror just got a lot easier to fight.

37

Sam – I’m pretty sure OBL loathed Saddam later on (in recent times) because he saw Saddam as a bad Muslim - I think OBL tried to kill Saddam (at least) twice.

On your wider point, I agree with the historical context (of Beirut, etc) but I’m not sure I can with your conclusion. There is nothing we’ve seen in the past 3 weeks that suggests the US is any more willing to take home body bags; the military has taken Iraq with fewer than 100 deaths – that’s a hell of a lot fewer than in the Beirut barracks bombing. In that light, 100 US deaths doesn’t tell them very much.

Thus, in my view, the US has only demonstrated superior technology in a conventional combat environment and I’m not sure how that matters to asymmetric ‘terrorist’ organisations.

So I don’t think recent events have made very much difference to any side, actually. I worry, however, that the peace can be both won and lost (where ‘lost’ is an increase in support and recruitment of terrorist foot soldiers) and I particularly worry the peace can be lost in the way Bush lost world sympathy post 9/11 – that I really don’t want to happen.

I think Bush has learned a lot through this past six months. I hope.

38

I’d say that this is some pretty creative accounting, walloon. Not only have you not tallied civilian casualties as others have pointed out but you haven’t added military ones. It doesn’t sound like “exceptionally light force” was used against the Republican Guard by any stretch of the imagination…And, while these people were in the service of a horrible regime, they are still people with families, many of them I would presume serving against their wills. (Of course, I understand that in war, such combatants are “fair game” but it is this whole thing about the rules of war that makes some of us think of it only as a very last resort.)

Of course, time will tell how free the Iraqis are and how this whole thing works out for them. I do hope for the best for these long-suffering people. I can’t claim to know all the answers. But, I am at least capable of considering both sides of the equation which you don’t seem to be.

[Another thing…While the fact that chemical weapons were not used is a good thing, it does lead to an obvious question: Why not? I.e., were we really able to disrupt Saddam’s regime so badly and rapidly that they were unable to carry out the plans to use them…Or, did he use much more restraint than we give him credit for in the ultimate “nothing to lose” situation? And, if the latter is true, what does it say about our justifications for this war? Again, I don’t know the answer. But, I think these are questions that need to be asked in an open democratic society that is willing to question its actions and strive to constantly improve its process for making life and death decisions affecting millions of people.]

I was taught that if one is talking about a guy being used by women then he is a “toy-boy” and if it is a woman being used by men she is a “boy-toy”. Doesn’t that make more sense?

39

I’ve always heard it the other way around. As in “John is Jane’s boy-toy”.

Women who are used by men for sex are just women I guess. :smiley:

40

Back to the OP, what will the protesters’ signs say:

“Stop the Liberation” “Restore Saddam” “Reopen the Torture Chambers”?