Well, the thing about pre-emptive strikes is that you don’t need to argue them, any more than saying, “I feel threatened because something might occur”. That’s especially true when you act unilaterally, because you don’t even need to convince your allies or cobeligerants.
I’m not shedding any tears over Saddam. The guy is a pretty horrible person, and Iraq is a threat. But it’s dangerous to establish a precedent saying the US will attack anyone they want when they feel like it.
bloomingpouf, if all you have to back up your assertion is the 7-year old rumor mill of some oil execs, I’d suggest trying to open your mind a bit before making posts like your last one. Before 9/11, CinC Central Command, like his counterparts for Europe and South America and the Pacific, had many war plans involving US troops in his theater. Part of the job of his staff is to imagine possible scenarios where we’d be militarily involved. Then you write a plan for that involvement. Then you wargame that plan.
That way, if bad country X decides to invade good country Y, you have a well-thought-out plan on the shelf which addresses this.
We didn’t have such a plan on the shelf for what we did in Afghanistan. We had to make one up. Much of it was made up on the fly. It doesn’t matter what oil companies were thinking. And I don’t profess to know what gov’t leaders were thinking. But I can tell you that militarily, we were never thinking or planning about rolling US troops into Kabul and Qandahar before last year. This means CinCCENT never received any guidance from Rumsfeld or the President to plan for it until after 9/11.
I think George W. Bush lives inside a Texas Ranger / Frontier Lawman fantasy. According to that code, if someone speaks of doing you harm, or if someone disparages you, or impugns your honor, you immediately seek out and confront that person. You know, the showdown-in-the-street-at-high-noon-with-sixguns-ablazing kind of thing. That mindset might be okay if it were Bush Versus Some-Bad-Guy, mano a mano. Instead, though, his six-gun will be our armed forces and Some-Bad-Guy will be whomever Bush says it is. I think he watched too many John Wayne movies as a kid.
I can’t help thinking about the movie “Minority Report” with Tom Cruice here
I haven’t seen it yet, but I know the story
My Dear FlyBoy
Before you start labeling me as a rumour monger - Why Not Check Out who was dealing with the Taliban and negotiating the Trans Afghan Pipeline deal that The Taliban Threw out. – It would never have been a Multinational which is based in the USA by any chance? I know who it was - and I’m sure you will want to find out!
You may want to have a look at the Published Foreign Policy aims of The US Government over many years. Under a Reagan a Bush a Clinton and a Shrub one stated and consistent aim has been the establishment of an Afghan regime that could “Realise” the value of A Trans Afghan Pipeline to allow The Worlds LARGEST oil reserves in Kazakhstan to be exploited and exported.
Uhmmmm … why do you think the Russians invaded Afghanistan - cos the Afghan Government wouldn’t accept Lenin Burgers or The Bolshevik version of Disney Land? The One thing that Russia lacked was a Warm water Port for Oil Exports and the best option for the USSR War machine was Pakistan. That was Why Ollie North and others were dealing in drugs to give guns to the Taliban and others in Afghanistan. The US Government was never interested in Afghanistan from any other view than Oil and Pipelines. Blocking The USSR in annexing Pakistan was the best way to stop Russia – destroy it’s economy and bring about the fall of the Kremlin and Communism. If you are not aware of How American Foreign Policy works over time and many countries I can see that you’ll be no good at chess!
Bin Laden and others are being wise and using the desires of The American Government, Corporations and People against themselves - and the great free market economy won’t stand for that! America is telling the world that it has to be allowed to run it’s economy as it wants – but the rest of the world has to comply with international trade treaties.
Many Countries are aware that America operates gross double standards when it comes to Economics, Trade and international law – and many see America now telling the world that it gets it’s own way or else!!! Well perhaps it’s the world war some have feared - and why would America need a Missile Shield - who has the nukes that could reach the USA now ( Britain - France - Russia - China and there is no chance that they could become enemies of the USA is there???)
Wars are not only waged with bullets and bombs but bank balances too! The great warrior Sun Tzu made it clear that a warrior does not need to fight – he just has to convince his enemies that they can not win! Colin Powell a professed disciple of Sun Tsu also admits that Warfare and economics go hand in hand!
If you think the war only started on 9/11 you are far less informed than I thought – and potentially more arrogant!
I like a good conspiracy as much as the next fellow, but you are just being stupid.
How the flipping fuck were the Soviets going to move oil through Pakistan, a country that has skirmished with Soviet forces in Afghanistan?
Pakistan was not in any way, shape, or form friendly to the Soviets. But in your fucked-up ‘oil companies rule the world!’ mind, that probably doesn’t matter much.
Huh? What the fuck? How the fuck was it safer on an American base than on the front lines?
Why were the Russians messing with the Brits over India in the 19th century?
More servicemen (and women) died here in the USA during ‘Desert Shield/Storm’ then died in the Persian Gulf, including combat and noncombat losses.
This is generally attributed to no alchohol and a more regimented lifestyle for those in the deployement.
Oh for fuck’s SAKE!!!
Let’s just all go to war with one another then, mmmkay?
That is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever read on this board.
And I’ve read a LOT of stupid things on this board.
:rolleyes:
You can claim anything you want. Whether or not you can convince a jury that your action was reasonable is another matter. The “self defense” defense does not require that the other guy swings first. If you feel threatened, you are entitled to use reasonable force to protect yourself. (of course defining reasonable becomes a sticky point, there must be some reasonable proportionality between the perceived threat and the response you make to it)
Say your neighbor has threatened you and others in the past, and you know he has a bad temper, and he has been known to act violently, he has a criminal record, and he is known to cary a gun. One day you are in your yard raking leaves and you look up and see crazy neighbor dude running at you with his hand reaching into his jacket. You think he is going for a gun. Fearing for your own safety, you grab your own gun and shoot crazy neighbor pre-emptively. Chances are you will stand a good chance of being acquitted, even if it turns out later that CND was actually reaching for his cell phone.
So, this is a little different from your hypothetical, that a person may in the future be dangerous does not mean we can shoot them today. However, when dealing with states, and in particular states with WMD and possible ties to terroism, I am not sure that the analogy holds. Perhaps with states the threatened violence need not be as immediate to still justify the pre-emptive attack, given that the consequences of the attack, if it comes, are likely to be far more severe.
Maybe we’ll get lucky and it’ll be a game of 3rd Edition D&D, then!
“Woo hoo, I rolled initiative! Okay, I shoot my +2 Wand of Automatic Missile Fire at the Iraqi Republican Guardsman. What’s his Armor Class?”
have you read he news at all? we had plans in the works for an october 01 attack on afghanistan back in like march of 01. Not only were they thinking about it we already toldour allies and others that we would be invading afghanistan in october. Sept 11th didn’t evn throw off the timetable. It
made a convenient excuse for our attack however
Brutus, how 'bout a stat on that, like how many per hundred died in Iraq versus the States? Not saying I necessarily doubt you but that’d be an easy figure to spin. It could be like saying that fewer people died in Rwanda from auto accidents than in the States so driving in Rwanda must be safer, which ignores that there are far fewer cars in Rwanda.
Bloomingpouf, think about this: if the U.S. had gone into Afghanistan solely to build a pipeline, or for some other oil related venture, do you think declaring war on the country is a good way to go about it? How long would the pipeline have to be and how many people would you have to have to guard it? The people against the current government had a decent shot of killing Karzai recently, and that was in an area that is arguably under control. Many of the areas the pipeline would have to go through are far more chaotic. It is a coincidence that oil companies want to build a pipeline through Afghanistan and the U.S. went to war against the Taliban, and I’ll bet you it’ll be a long time, if ever, before a pipeline is built in Afghanistan.
On to the main points of the thread, I actually think that removing Saddam from power is a good idea, because let’s face it, he’s an asshole (political and moral arguments were distilled down to this basic conclusion)
However, having said that I don’t think we should be going into Iraq. That’s because everyone and their mother is against it. Going into Iraq will engender further anti-Americanism overseas and will likely piss off radical Muslims even more and likely push more moderate Muslims (and others) over into radical status. Going into Iraq is like stirring up a hornets nest.
And before anyone brings up the argument of preemption think about this: it’s in Saddam’s best interests not to do anything towards the U.S., especially in a post 9-11 light because it’d be like unclogging a toilet from below. He’d get shit all over, and he knows this. Yeah, maybe he’s still crazy enough to do it, but that’s the world we live in and quite frankly there doesn’t seem to be too much evidence that he’s a coprophiliac. If there is some sort of evidence that Iraq has a WMD plan that has a serious potential to be harmful to U.S. interests, or any other plan against the U.S., why hasn’t the evidence been presented?
I also don’t buy that this evidence may be top secret. If Iraq has some plan or method of causing harm to the U.S. it would be in the U.S.'s best interests to expose this to the world to garner as much support as possible for its case. Why wouldn’t we at least present it to Chretien (who rejected going into Iraq), the leader of one our most longtime allies, and I’m sure in spite of whatever failings he might have be able to keep a secret? Any sources that might be harmed would, in my opinion, be a necessary casualty.
And one other note, in spite of everything I’ve said against going into Iraq, I have no doubt that the U.S. and U.K. would demolish the Iraqi army with minimum casualties on our side. I’m more worried about the fallout from such an action.
And on preview, Rhapsody, unless you want your credibility to drop to an abysmal low you better provide some cites.
My Dear Boy
If you go back to your own national Archives and what the president of the US of A said at the time - He was rather worried about Pakistan being the next target! So I’m so glad that I keep such august company in conspiracy theories as The President of The United States of America!
As for you comments about Pakistan and how the Russians were to get a pipeline across it - I think that the Russians did not care about the feeling and views of the Afghans - so why would they be bothered about the views and feelings of the Pakistani nation??? You seem to think that they would have been consulted before being invaded.
Perhaps you need to look at the bigger picture.
If you want to claim that America only supported the Afghani/Taliban fighters out of some Humanistic attitude to the oppressed under a Russian Invasion - why then have the American Government not done the same with the poor people of Southern Iraq where there has been at least 500,000 murdered - and that is called genocide. The Russians were never accused of Genocide in Afghanistan - so the military support to the Taliban by the USA must have had some other remit! Either that , or the USA is operating a gross double standard???
Perhaps you need to look at the world of Politics and apply it Globally - not just to the comfort zone of CNN which does tend to have a slightly nationalistic bias and a biased audience too!
Access to Warm Water Ports and Raw Materials!
From there access to Africa! One other aspect was the military option of attacking on two fronts by use of land and navy even in winter!
Who said the pipe line was planned for next week – perhaps you need to start looking at the bigger picture and bigger time scales.
Just when do you think the USA wants the Kazaki Oil reserves online and being pumped… next week… next year… next decade… next generation???
Perhaps your forgetting that it takes a generation to bring about substantial change and stability after a war Civil or other Wise. I think that the American Government may have figured this one out and so are making strategic decision that your missing because of your short term vision and appreciation of things. I think your not much of a chess player!
The US government has admitted that they had plans to invade Afghanistan before 9/11 … and why was that. Oh yes regime change wasn’t it… to get the girls out from under their Burkas and to stop the boys threatening the Girls in such an Un American way. CRAP. The stated policy of the US Government has been to have a regime in Afghanistan that could realise the Value of a pipeline to access the Kazakhs Oil Reserves. That has been a Strategic Goal since the Oil Reserves were discovered and that is before The Russians Invaded Afghanistan!
Take the short view of take the world view – stop thinking CNN sound bite and think strategy and get rid of the time limits too. The whole world does not revolve around the American 4 Year Political Cycle – and shocking as it may seem – Neither does the American Government!
Who’s “we,” Rhapsody? Your friends and neighbors? It is remarkable to me that:
During my many months working for Central Command in Tampa during Operation Enduring Freedom, I never once heard of any of this nor saw any documentation to support it.
I witnessed, with my own eyes, the creation, submission, modification, and resubmission of OEF warplans to POTUS via CINCCENT after 9/11, indicating there were no pre-existing plans regarding Afghanistan.
While working for the Naval Component Command for Central Command (NAVCENT) around the time period you mention, I never heard a whisper of what you’re claiming.
Please tell me you aren’t getting your info from here. And, if you plan on backing up your claim, please do it with something from the US Government itself, not from articles about someone in India or Pakistan who says the US told him something or other.
bloomingpouf,
I’m hesitant to argue with you until the question of your sanity is cleared up. If you have anything to do with this site, then I really can’t argue with you, because it’s totally insane. And please, stop talking about chess. You’re sounding like a broken record as well as an ass.
If it wasn’t classified, I could show you a whole chain of Warning Orders, Planning Orders, Opertional Orders, Deployment Orders, and Execute Orders verifying that yes, indeed, Operation Enduring Freedom began after 9/11.
What you said about Sun Tzu is true… it is the cornerstone of what we call Information Operations in the military. But you imply (actually, state is more like it) that there was a war going on before 9/11. I’m not sure what kind of war you’re talking about. Can you show me a definition of war which does not include force or armed conflict? Even Information Operations are not typically used unless they are part of a military campaign.
The rest of your posts, IMO, is fluff. I cannot wrap my brain around the idea that there is some overarching plan amongst presidents and ex-presidents or that Bush was somehow pre-ordained/scheduled to win the presidency on behalf of the oil companies or gov’t leaders.
But we know all, we see all, and we know how to fix it. Thank goodness our country is not run by the Dopers. Can you even imagine that?
It’s only logical that you DO NOT turn over national secrets to the people, can you imagine what some nuts would do with that kind of information? We sit on this board and think that the whole world is as logical and sensible as we are, that they can see the world through our rosey red glasses. Well guess what? Nope, sorry, doesn’t happen, never gonna happen. We can debate all we want, read all the newspapers, books, listen to the news, and we still only have a very little inkling about what really goes on the world of politics.
I’m not qualified to run this country, I do vote, but sometimes I wonder if I’m voting right or for the best of the country. I read these posts and I know most on here aren’t qualified either. I read some of these posts and I realize how easy it is to sit back and judge and comment and make the world a better place and degrade this one and build up that one.
I’m not as smart as a lot of people on this board, I know that off the top. No I wouldn’t want war with Iraq, no I don’t want to see another young man or woman leave the American soil for the sake of war. But I put myself in the place of others from different countries and I see how Americans talk about their own, it’s sad. I know this is a message board, but I sure hope that the majority of Americans don’t tear into this country like we do.
I do know that if Iraq has the chance, like many other countries, they would destroy the USA in a heartbeat. Can they do it? I don’t know. I’m not in a position to actually know what they have or what they don’t have, but I know it’s scary. We can be, and probably will be, hit again on American soil. This is a big country, and you can’t cover every angle or opening. Sometime, somewhere someone is going to do it again.
But hey, let’s wait and see.
[Classic bit]
“Where’re the Cheetohs?”
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