What I find interesting is that by and large, the Iraqi people seem to agree.
Posted at 04:44PM
Posted at 09:49PM
Define “momentary”.
Well I for one will take Dogface’s apology at face value. Too many people on this board seem totally incapable of admitting they’re wrong.
Well the theory is that a country could pose a threat to the US and at the same time be controlled be a regime that rules with an iron fist. Using military might against these countries should only be used if it can be determined that more good will come then bad. Each country needs to be analyzed on a case by case basis, with all the information (accurate information) available carefully taken into account. I feel that most of the time, military would do more harm then good. Other avenues such as containment or sanctions coupled with patience are always preferred. Obviously there are times when military might is needed, but in those times the problem should be so obvious that the world should have no problem agreeing on such use. Iraq was certainly not the case here.
As far as the not having balls, some people just don’t want to watch their family tortured and have decided to not to press the issue. I don’t blame them.
I agree. I take posts at face value unless and until I have reason not to. I do hope we shall not have to see such posts from Dogface in the future.
By the same token, I believe DocCathode had not seen the apology when he posted and was referring only to earlier posts.
Ah, Red Fury we meet again.
IIRC the victims whose corpses were desecrated were not soldiers, but contractors. Possibly complicit in keeping the soldiers supplied, but civilians nonetheless.
Because this is the Pit, I’m going to take advantage of that fact and just say what I’m feeling at this moment.
Which is:
You’re right. We should just keep our noses the fuck out of everyone else’s business, let the Taliban retake Afghanistan, let another tinhorn dictator thug take over in Iraq, let religious fascists have their way wherever they can.
And guard our borders and deny entry to asylum seekers.
How about sometimes it’s good to do something, and sometimes it isn’t?
There weren’t too many people bitching about Afghanistan now were there?
I hate this stupid attitude of we either do everything or nothing. pull your head out of your ass and take a look around sometimes.
Can you explain how you interpret his post to mean that? Because I can’t see it. Maybe an explanatory diagram would help me understand it.
Correct.
Sing it, brutha.
I remember arguments I got into, right here, about the wisdom of invading Iraq, before we ever invaded. I said I didn’t much care for the idea of invading another country that had not made any kind of military move against us.
I still remember people screaming about how Saddam had bombs out the wazoo, delivery systems that could reach Mars, and did I need for Trenton, New Jersey, to become a smoking hole before I’d get off my stupid liberal butt and let The Powers That Be defend America?
Well, I’ve seen considerable evidence since then that would seem to indicate that Our President intended to go kick Saddam’s ass even before he put his hand on the Bible, long before 9/11. Maybe he was just pissed about the way his father handled things. Maybe he felt that Halliburton needed more money. Maybe he just has a small penis, and needed to compensate by calling out the Marines. I don’t know.
I do know that we haven’t found ANY WMDs yet. I also know that our boys are getting popped at like clay pigeons over there.
Y’see, I don’t know from barbarians, or Iraqis, or third worlders. I do know this, though: there are a whole lot of really pissed-off people with guns over there. They don’t even like each OTHER all that much, and they certainly don’t like us, for a variety of reasons… some of which, even I can agree with.
Our President now wants to talk about how we invaded to get rid of Saddam… and about how even if he DIDN’T have WMDs, he sure MEANT to. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Y’know what? Saddam was the only thing holding that cockeyed little country together. A big, nasty, vicious, brutal hardassed dictator who shot anyone he didn’t like. There are rebels in the village? Slaughter everyone there, then burn the village. And you know what? Saddam didn’t have a whole lot of rebellion.
We are not Saddam. And if we bomb the living shit out of the Sunni Triangle, we might as well BE Saddam. If we start rounding up people and shooting them every time there’s a roadside bombing, we might as well BE Saddam.
Saddam was a sonofabitch, sure. But he was their sonofabitch. He was Iraqi. We, on the other hand, are not. And the only way we are going to get those people to sit down and behave is by using the same methods Saddam did, I suspect.
Are we going to do that? I don’t wanna. I don’t wanna order Americans to become Nazi stormtroopers, rounding up and shooting “suspected rebels.” I don’t want us to be “the people who bombed the shit out of villages because there were rebels there.” Man, the Germans are still trying to live that shit down.
We are attempting to build American-style democracy in a place that has no tradition of it, and is suspicious of it simply because it’s ours. Furthermore, all the other strongarm Saddam wannabes have no interest in it whatsoever, and will go medieval on it the instant we’re out of the way. Hell, we’re the only thing holding those people back from a civil bloodbath that would scare Idi Amin.
Meanwhile, every day, I hear idiot politicians and nervous military leaders insist how we’re gonna bring democracy to Iraq. Sure thing, boys. For all of a year or two, maybe. As long as we stay there and die for someone else’s democracy that they don’t really want, can’t defend, and so forth. Oh, and Halliburton’s profits, of course.
All Hail Bush. Death To Kerry. Jawohl!
I think this thread belongs in great debates - the question seems to be how do we react to the atrocities occurring in Iraq as a result of Bush’s invasion. I am becoming an isolationist. Why are we (the USA) the world’s policemen? How can we be so self-righteous about democracy and believe that EVERY country has to function the way the USA does? If the Iraqi’s can’t come to terms themselves with what the hell they want, how can we force them to accept democracy? Why is up to us to convince them that this is the way to go? This latest atrocity made up my mind: get the hell out of Iraq. Let THEM fight it out, die, and stand for what they want, just as we did during our Revolutionary War. Killing civilians who are there to help is beyond the pale. (And I resent the comparison to animals – animals kill for two reasons - self-defense and food - it woud be a much better world if we were all more like animals.) Whether there were/are WMD’s there is irrevelant at this point – I don’t give a rat’s ass. Our soldiers and supporting civilians are being killed, and it’s time to get out. Let the Iraqis fight it out amongst themselves.
MWK-Thanks for taking the time to post what I would have liked to have posted. Well said. Again Thanks.
Holy Christ, I used to live around there! :eek:
Thank you. Forgiveness is extremely rare in a place inhabited by so many who are nothing but thoughtless dogmatics.
Master indeed. Outstanding post, Wang-Ka.
I agree. When I read the news on CNN this morning about this I was very mad- because the people killed were civilians contracted to rebuild Iraq. They were just there to do a job. This circle of violence sees no end. If and when we leave, there is no positive possibility that Iraq will improve. The only improvement that can be measured and assured, is that of the American Citizen.
And you can call me a yahoo or a nationalist, but killing Americans and hanging their bodies from a bridge would make me ready to take up arms against the insurgents as well.
When I saw the smoking stumps of the Twin Towers, I felt like kicking the shit out of some people, sure.
When I saw the corpses of American civilians turned into nightmare playthings by maniac barbarians, I felt like shooting some folks, sure.
But I did not. Instead, I waited until I’d cooled off.
Sure, I’m hot under the collar. On the other hand, what are we prepared to do about it? My first thought was “saturation bombing of the entire vicinity,” but would I wanna be the guy to give the order? Man, that’s nuts. That’s excessive. And furthermore… what good would it do?
We are in a no-win situation. Short of pulling a working sewer system out of our butts, running an indestructible extension cord to every power system in Iraq, and magically making food and clean water appear in the homes of every Iraqi, we are not going to win these people’s hearts and minds.
And even then, there are simply too many of them who cannot LET us win the Iraqi people’s hearts and minds. If I was there, and I was some crazy Shiite cleric with dreams of power, I would simply not let this happen, and I would equip every teenager I could con with a vestful of Kaboomite, and send him to meet his seventy virgins, as fast as I could get them in the church.
And if I were an Al-Qaida operative, and I even thought the Americans were going to succeed in this nonsense, I’d be out there setting roadside bombs day and night, shooting Iraqis who supported the Americans, cutting pipelines, blowing up water pipes, spreading rumors, and generally spreading madness and death, as hard and fast as I could.
And by bombing some town into the stone age for committing an atrocity, we’d be playing right into their hands.
And by shutting down a newspaper, for ANY reason, we played right into their hands, no matter WHAT kind of insane lying poison crap they were spewing.
We ain’t gonna win this one, short of moving in there and running the place the way we run New York: with American troops, American cops, American civil servants, American this, American that, for the next fifty years or more. To win, we’d have to shove our beneficient benevolence down their unwilling throats for, lo, unto the third or fourth fraggin’ generation!
And even then, it ain’t a sure thing. You’ll notice that a near-century of Soviet rule doesn’t seem to have made all those Serbs and Croats and so forth any friendlier with each other. So much for “hearts and minds.”
And what do we do with the bad guys we catch? We put them in jail. Yowsers. Saddam had these guys shot, if they were lucky, tortured into babbling idiocy if not. What do WE do? We lock 'em up. Yeah, I’m sure this will deter future terrorists like crazy…
…all for the sake of Iraqi Democracy. And when we finally leave, and the insurgents and Shiites and Al-Qaida and some nutty Syrians come charging in, determined to hack off a chunk of Saddamland for themselves, what is the Noble Iraqi Democracy gonna do?
Are they going to use American methods, which have already been proven ineffective? Or are they going to use the same brutal, stupid, vicious methods that George Bush says we invaded to stop Saddam from using, even though they worked?
So, someone tell me again: what the hell ARE we doing over there? And what were we hoping to accomplish, again?
I hate being relagated to nothing more than a cheerleader but all I can say is GREAT FUCKING POST MWK.
Dogface: I do not think you should have had to apologize, but if you or anyone wants my forgiveness (which I doubt anyone would) all they have to do is ASK.
Without this “logic” we would have lost WW2. I say H bomb the scums!
Have you seen the pics of these bastards celebrating dismembered, burnt corpses? What do you suggest we do zagadka?
If you mean what you said here is a link