Has the Iraq war made the U.S. safer?

Great Debates
1

I don’t think it has. I think we were better off with Saddam in power. Let’s compare then and now:

Then: Iraq was fully under Saddam’s thumb, but we had him contained, not to mention his military was weakened by a decade’s worth of sanctions. Still, nobody operated outside of his control in Iraq - including terrorists. There is little evidence that terrorists were operating out of Iraq in any meaningful way.

Saddam wasn’t much of a threat to destabilize the region, since we were keeping a close eye on him, and his military was weak. While he had invaded neighboring countries in the past, he’d only done so having, or believing he had, our OK. There was little chance he’d try anything like that particularly soon.

We believed Saddam had biological and chemical weapons, but even if he’d had them, that isn’t the sort of thing that you can use as the backbone of a war of territorial conquest. He supposedly could have used them against nearby countries, but at high cost, and to no gain for him.

The U.S. military had a permanent force in Korea, and some minor commitments in Bosnia and elsewhere, but mostly was available for the next war, wherever it might be.

Now:

There’s no Saddam, and no WMDs, but according to our own generals, terrorists are operating in Iraq. We have 139,000 troops there, along with another ~20,000 allied troops. But that’s not enough to provide security and maintain order in a country that large, so there’s plenty of room for terrorists and criminals to operate. The chaos in Iraq could have a destabilizing effect on other governments in the region.

Meanwhile, much of our military is tied down in Iraq, leaving a greatly reduced force to respond to threats elsewhere in the world. And there are threats aplenty, most notably from North Korea, but they’re hardly the only problem.

I really can’t see how the U.S. is better off for having invaded Iraq. Can anyone enlighten me?

2

I think America is less safe now. At least 100 Americans have died for nothing, and countless amputees are now flooding the VA hospitals. A new generation of Gulf War Syndrome victims, children with birth defects, postal workers going postal, etc. All of the collateral damage of the pentagon death machine.

3

I just posted a thread with a similar take. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of enthusiasm to explain how we’re any safer or better off.

4

Sorry I missed it, errata.

5

i don’t think the USA is any safer now that Iraq has been attacked, in fact if anything it is least safer, before Iraq posed no direct threat to the USA, but now terrorists fighting to get rid of the westerners from the middle east have new reason to attack, with the amount of terrorism thats going on in the world i consider a lot of places unsafe.

6

I would say America is less safe now. The invasion of Iraq has lost them considerable Arab support - support they had actually gained after the horrors of 11 September.

The way I hear modern, educated Arabs talk about America and Bush now compared to six months ago would be horrifying for many of you. These people aren’t going to start bombing, but they’re almost certainly less likely to travel to America for holiday or business, and some are likely to avoid some American goods. Maybe not in a big way, but it’s certainly a negative.

And the less educated, more fundamentalist Arabs are now almost certainly even riper fodder for Al Qaeda and other terrorist Islamic organisations.

Iraq posed no threat to America, and had no links with Al Qaeda. It was majorly weakened by sanctions. Now, Iraqis hate and distrust Americans more than ever, and it would not surprise me to see a future Iraqi administration - which is likely to contain far more Islamic representation than the secular Ba’ath party ever did - seek out, or at least turn a blind eye to, such links in future. Witness Iran and Syria.

America has made an enemy that will one day be very powerful, and it has also alienated the surrounding region that is really its only hope of containing that country.

7

The British Joint Intelligence Committee last week released a report saying the west in general was less safe from terrorism (can’t find a feckin cite but I know it’s there) since the Iraq invasion.

8

If the war in Iraq maks us safer, it will be because it’s part of dealing with the hatred of the west, which has been fanned among many Arabs. Many terrorists are already making war on us; we need to make war on them.

We may not see the improved safety until we actually win the war on terror, which could take many years.

By comparison, it’s now clear that our fighting the Cold War ultimately made us safer. But, it wasn’t clear in the days that students were cowering under their desks, fearing a nuclear attack. It wasn’t clear when the Cuban Missile Crisis nearly led to nuclear war between the US and the USSR. In those days, it was reasonable to believe that the Cold War was reducing our safety.

Similarly, our fighting the War on Terror may appear to increase the enmity against the US, at least in some quarters. In the long run, I hope it will be as successful as the Cold War was.

9

???

december - Iraqis weren’t “terrorists.” That was Al Qaeda, remember? Terrorism is not why your president waged war on Iraq. It was due to the (as yet non-existent) WMDs, remember? Plus: Saddam’s party, despite a last ditch foray into Quranic rhetoric, was SECULAR, not even Islamist.

Iraq WASN’T making war on you. It wasn’t even threatening, unlike N Korea. (And I don’t see your president going after Kim Jong Il).

Can’t you understand that invading Iraq has fanned anti-Western hatred?

10

I’m truly grateful that december shut down his Cold War analogy before segueing into a glowing tribute to Der Ronnie, the Kremlin-Killer and chief architect of the Shining Citadel on the Hill. Frankly, any parallel between the Cold War and the “War on Terror” elude me.

Terrorists are criminals, almost by definition. The correct approach to such as this is by international cooperation and police-type procedures. Which was ours for the asking, even people who don’t much like us were conducting candle-light vigils of sympathy and condolence. We had the whole damn world on our side, eager to help. And then GeeDubya has to piss it all away being a tough guy. Godawmighty dumb.

When it comes to state on state combat, we’re number one with no serious competition. Army to army, your ass is ours. But that sort of military clout is of no real consequence when fighting fugitives and phantoms. It is useless to launch an artillery barrage against an incoming fog, you can’t fight a swarm of hornets with a sledge hammer.

Perhaps more to the point, the war on Iraq had D for diddly-squat to do with “terror”. As many times as this disconnect is pointed out, the Bushiviks repeat it with a straight face, Iraq is a battle in the “War on Terror”. It is no such thing, never was. It many very well become the focal point, but only by a ghastly mechanism of Murphy’s Law.

If we had gone about things in the right fashion in the first place, we would very likely be safer now. As the whether we are safer now than we were, it hardly matters. If we are, we most likely won’t be for long.

11

Saddam’s regime was made up of belligerant Arabs, mostly Islamic, who hated the United States, who supported some terrorists in the middle east, who gave verbal approval to al Qaeda, who had a history of amassing and using WMDs, and who had made unprovoked, ruthless attacks on three of America’s allies. Sounds like a threat to me. YMMV.

I remember that my President said all along that he had several reasons for waging war.

This is true. Nor was the War on Terror a war on the entire Islamic religion. It’s a war on people who behve in a certain (And I don’t see your president going after Kim Jong Il).
[/quote]
The President is standing up to NK’s nuclear blackmail somewhat more than Clinton or South Korea did. I agree that the US hasn’t attacked NK. It has threatened to impose a blockade on WMD exports, which would technically be an act of war.

I’m sure it did, to a degree. It also fanned pro-US love among many Iraqi citizens who appreciate being liberated. No doubt some aspects of the Cold War fanned anti-Western hatred in some quarters, but it was successful in the long run. It’s nice to be loved, but that’s not the highest priority in foreign policy.

elucidator, we spent ten years dealing with Islamic Terror using police-type procedures. The events of 9/11 showed most of us that the police-type approach wasn’t effective.

12

I don’t always agree with elucidator, but these are very very bloody wise words.

13

Decidedly not.

Sua

14

And by that logic, since the Reagan Administration gave active support to Saddam Hussein’s regime (dare I use the term “aid and comfort”?), that makes them a “threat” too. :rolleyes:

I always said Ronnie was a menace to society!

15

Well, pretty much the entire western world, and at least a majority of the third world, was behind the US in both sympathy, and post 9-11 actions. The Iraq war and its (day by day more evident) railroading imperative isolated the US and UK, and largely emasculated the UN. Whatever its reasons, it has done nothing but reinforce the negatives of stereotypes of US foreign policy. This is hardly a counterterrorism measure.

16

the iraq invasion has nothing to do with fighting terrorism or making the world safer…it is simply another step in the american oil industry’s plan to control supply and increase profits…

17

I’d say many Americans FEEL safer, and to them, that illusion is more important than any reality that you can give them.

18

Nothing like a measured, objective viewpoint to keep a debate exciting.

And that was nothing like a measured, objective viewpoint. (Thank you, tip your servers.)

19

Taking Iraq has certainly made America a safer place.

It is as simple as seeing where so many terrorists are now focusing their efforts: Iraq. (And, to a lesser extent, Afghanistan.) By siphoning off many of the hot-headed Islamists in the region, (and their money/resources), there are less hot-headed Islamists that are thinking about how swell it would be to take out the Sears Tower. We are killing terrorists as fast as we can find them. Iraq is now serving the invaluable purpose of drawing the little buggers out of the woodwork; Skimming the pond of radical Islam.

Of course, there is still a threat to the homeland. But less of a threat. And we will have to settle for ‘less’ instead of ‘none’, until we decide to take the gloves off.

20

Is there some reason we should believe this other than it sounds reasonable to you?

Alternately, it is generating more terrorists and anti-USA backlash and therefore it’s absolutely no drain at all, it’s a boon.

Jumpin jehosafat!The gloves are still on? I hesitate to think what you have in mind. Nuking Arab/Islamic countries and letting “God sort them out”, maybe?