# Saddam Gets Death **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 5, 2006, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170 "2006-11-05T09:10:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/61 "2006-11-06T20:05:21Z")
[When All Else Fails…](http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/2006_11_01_riverbendblog_archive.html#116274961239136314) > [@](#): > > … Execute the dictator. It’s that simple. When American troops are being killed by the dozen, when the country you are occupying is threatening to break up into smaller countries, when you have militias and death squads roaming the streets and you’ve put a group of Mullahs in power- execute the dictator. > > Everyone expected this verdict from the very first day of the trial. There was a brief interlude when, with the first judge, it was thought that it might actually be a coherent trial where Iraqis could hear explanations and see what happened. That was soon over with the prosecution’s first false witness. Events that followed were so ridiculous; it’s difficult to believe them even now. > > The sound would suddenly disappear when the defense or one of the defendants got up to speak. We would hear the witnesses but no one could see them- hidden behind a curtain, their voices were changed. People who were supposed to have been dead in the Dujail incident were found to be very alive. > > Judge after judge was brought in because the ones in court were seen as too fair. They didn’t instantly condemn the defendants (even if only for the sake of the media). **The piece de resistance was the final judge they brought in. His reputation vies only that of Chalabi- a well-known thief and murderer who ran away to Iran to escape not political condemnation, but his father’s wrath after he stole from the restaurant his father ran.** > > \ > > Iraq has not been this bad in decades. The occupation is a failure. The various pro-American, pro-Iranian Iraqi governments are failures. The new Iraqi army is a deadly joke. Is it really time to turn Saddam into a martyr? Things are so bad that even pro-occupation Iraqis are going back on their initial ‘WE LOVE AMERICA’ frenzy. Bolding mine. Stupidity all **Ryan Liam’s**. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/62 "2006-11-06T20:11:54Z")
[QUOTE=Giraffe] Sure, if by “valid” you mean “really stupid”. WWII was not fought solely as a humanitarian mission, Germany was in fact a real threat to the security of our European allies if not the U.S. itself, and more than “a few thousand” people were sent to the death camps. [/QUOTE] We also did not fight the Civil War to free the slaves. We fought it to preserve the Union. Slavery was a separate issue, and in fact resolved while the war was still ongoing. And yeah, 6 billion != a few thousand. ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/63 "2006-11-06T20:32:17Z")
[QUOTE=Giraffe] Incidentally, does anyone know how many people Saddam’s government killed in the decade or so before the invasion, i.e. once he was under the sanctions? [/quote] [Compare and contrast](http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism/view.php?StoryID=20061011-025250-1055r): > [@](#): > > The 654,000 estimate of deaths caused by the invasion and resultant insurgency was made by a team of public health statisticians based at Johns Hopkins University. The figure is actually the midpoint in a statistical projection of “excess” deaths – the number of people who have died as a result of increased mortality rates since March 2003. > > The projection says that number of excess deaths can be said, with 95 percent confidence, to range between 393,000 and 943,000. It said that 92 percent of the excess deaths were from violence, mainly gunfire, but also explosions. In those instances where respondents allocated > > **By way of comparison, Human Rights Watch has estimated Saddam Hussein’s regime killed 250,000 to 290,000 people over 20 years.** Wonder how long it’ll take for some wingnut to call me a “Saddam lover” or some such bullshit? Point being, facts are facts. And said facts demonstrate that the American invasion has been far deadlier and generally devastating (infrastructure/living conditions) to Iraqis than was the Saddam regime. ---
**Author:** ![Giraffe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giraffe/32/129_2.png) [@Giraffe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giraffe)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/64 "2006-11-06T20:42:33Z")
**RedFury** , note that I’m asking for figures which don’t include the massacres of the 80’s/early 90’s, but rather something which gives us an idea of how many people Saddam’s regime was killing once they were under the sanctions and U.S. surveillance. This seems like it would give a much better idea of how many people we could have expected them to kill had we not invaded, which is really the relevant figure when calculating the cost of the invasion to the Iraqi people. ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/65 "2006-11-06T20:57:37Z")
[QUOTE=Giraffe] **RedFury** , note that I’m asking for figures which don’t include the massacres of the 80’s/early 90’s, but rather something which gives us an idea of how many people Saddam’s regime was killing once they were under the sanctions and U.S. surveillance. This seems like it would give a much better idea of how many people we could have expected them to kill had we not invaded, which is really the relevant figure when calculating the cost of the invasion to the Iraqi people. [/QUOTE] Understood from the start, **Giraffe** , but that is the best my Google-fu could come up with. But if we can both agree that somewhere between 85/95 % of his murders were done prior to and immediately after GW-I, I think some simple arithmetic would lead to a figure of roughly 20/30,000 in that timespan. Horrific no doubt. But then what do we call the past three and a half years? ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/66 "2006-11-06T21:05:13Z")
[QUOTE=RedFury] But then what do we call the past three and a half years? [/QUOTE] “Mission accomplished”? ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/67 "2006-11-06T22:36:39Z")
> [@](#): > > No asshole, not even close. As per usual, you little fascist bigot, you make about about as much sense as tits on a bull. > > Point being, monkey-boy, that the death rate and living conditions in Iraq were a thousand times better prior to your murderous, immoral and illegal Bushit invasion. Sorry Redfury, but _I_ didn’t invade Iraq. I don’t get off on the slogans you shoot at me anymore. > [@](#): > > I mean, where the fuck do you get off comparing Saddam to Hitler in terms of the threat each one posed? A Third-world dictator with a decimated military, no air force nor navy, compared to the the unbridled power of The Third Reich? Iraq couldn’t threaten Haiti for fuck’s sake! Jesus H Christ on a pogo-stick…you get dumber by the post. Decimated military my ass, he invaded Iran and Kuwait, for ten years he was in a state of constant warfare with his neighbours. Something which you take into account when determining whether or not a regime is a threat to it’s neighbours. > [@](#): > > One load your Momma should have swallowed. And your mothers cunt was one too early for me to kick you dumb piece of shit. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/68 "2006-11-06T22:41:55Z")
[QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] Decimated military my ass, he invaded Iran and Kuwait, for ten years he was in a state of constant warfare with his neighbours. Something which you take into account when determining whether or not a regime is a threat to it’s neighbours. [/QUOTE] I am, as always when faced with this line of argument, mildly curious about which nation we shall invade next. If the mere fact of a country’s leader being dangerous to his own citizens or his country’s neighbors is enough to justify a U.S. invasion, I should think there are a whole slew of nations on the list. When do we invade Zimbabwe? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/69 "2006-11-06T23:00:23Z")
[QUOTE=Scylla] How about the new math of morality? [/quote] That was kinda the point, dude. > [@](#): > > So, if you’re an evil dictator as long as you’re keeping your rate of murder and oppression at a rate below the human cost of removing you, you should be safe from removal and this is the **only** consideration that should be made in regard to this decision. No, but if your motives are supposedly humanitarian at least in part (which they were), then whether you’re going to reduce or increase the misery in the world by your proposed course of action should be an important factor in your decision to proceed. I’d hope that’s obvious. > [@](#): > > I’ll wager the civil war killed people at a rate orders of magnitude above the rate that slavery was killing people. According to your “calculus of death” then this war should not have happened, the slaves should not have been freed. It says nothing right now, one way or the other. You haven’t even bothered to produce back-of-the-envelope calculations, just a ‘wager’. Does the level of bloodshed in the Civil War trouble me? Enormously. One of the things I appreciate about Catton’s Army of the Potomac trilogy is that he doesn’t sugarcoat the carnage with visions of glory. War should always be a last option because war, quite simply, kills people. > [@](#): > > In fact, is not your entire “calculus of death” argument nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt to defend slavery? (just kidding, couldn’t resist) Even kiddingly, all you’ve put behind this facetious claim is your ‘wager.’ ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/70 "2006-11-06T23:01:58Z")
[QUOTE=Rilchiam] We also did not fight the Civil War to free the slaves. We fought it to preserve the Union. Slavery was a separate issue, and in fact resolved while the war was still ongoing. [/QUOTE] The country was breaking up _over_ slavery, you verminous idiot. No slavery, no secession, no war. [QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] Sorry Redfury, but _I_ didn’t invade Iraq. I don’t get off on the slogans you shoot at me anymore. [/quote] You have consistantly supported it, which makes you murderous scum, an enemy of humanity. [QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] Decimated military my ass, he invaded Iran and Kuwait, for ten years he was in a state of constant warfare with his neighbours. Something which you take into account when determining whether or not a regime is a threat to it’s neighbours. [/quote] And he lost, and his military was crippled _long_ before we invaded. That’s one of the reason we invaded; being bullies, Americans only attack people who can’t fight back. [QUOTE=Frank] I am, as always when faced with this line of argument, mildly curious about which nation we shall invade next. If the mere fact of a country’s leader being dangerous to his own citizens or his country’s neighbors is enough to justify a U.S. invasion, I should think there are a whole slew of nations on the list. When do we invade Zimbabwe? [/QUOTE] Why go that far ? By that logic, we should invade ourselves. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/71 "2006-11-06T23:09:10Z")
[QUOTE=Rilchiam] Slavery was a separate issue, and in fact resolved while the war was still ongoing. [/QUOTE] In fact, it was not. The Emancipation Proclamation only applied to the states of the C.S.A. While at least one state (Maryland) abolished slavery during the course of the war, it was the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in December, 1865 that put paid to slavery. ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/72 "2006-11-06T23:09:23Z")
[QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] Decimated military my ass, he invaded Iran and Kuwait, for ten years he was in a state of constant warfare with his neighbours. Something which you take into account when determining whether or not a regime is a threat to it’s neighbours. [/quote] This is correct and would be a valid argument for the '90/'91 Persian Gulf War (this is when he attempted to absorb Kuwait). We’ll ignore the fact we supported Iraq both politically and militarily as a counterbalance to Iran during the Cold War. What does it have to do for the 2002 argument? This is the time in dicussion, when his country was gutted by two [no fly zones](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Iraq_NO_FLY_ZONES.PNG), had no WMDs, no respectable army, and was contained. Was he going to hurt our feelings with his anti-US speeches? ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/73 "2006-11-06T23:20:17Z")
[QUOTE=Frank] If the mere fact of a country’s leader being dangerous to his own citizens or his country’s neighbors is enough to justify a U.S. invasion, I should think there are a whole slew of nations on the list. When do we invade Zimbabwe? [/QUOTE] I suggest we do it by alphabetical order, in which case Ireland is next in line. A box will be placed on a table by the door. Please drop in a slip of paper listing potential reasons why and we’ll pick one of them. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/74 "2006-11-06T23:41:27Z")
[QUOTE=Ryan\_Liam] Sorry Redfury, but _I_ didn’t invade Iraq. I don’t get off on the slogans you shoot at me anymore. [/quote] Oh, not to worry. I’m quite sure we are all well aware by now that you do all your cheerleading from mommies’ basement. > [@](#): > > Decimated military my ass, he invaded Iran and Kuwait, for ten years he was in a state of constant warfare with his neighbours. Something which you take into account when determining whether or not a regime is a threat to it’s neighbours. Trust your ass was decimated by choice. But let’s move on. I’m not interested in The State Of Your Anus. OTOH, you delusional fuck, want to guess when the Iraqi Armed Forces were at the peak of their power? If you say “during the Iraq/Iran war and prior to the Kuwait invasion when the US fully supported them” you’d be right for…well, the _first_ time ever on these boards. And you want to know what kind of “resistance” the Iraqi forces put up during GW-I? Not to worry, I’ll tell you anyway: [**OVERWHELMING FORCE**](http://www.polyconomics.com/sy.html) > [@](#): > > **The Iraqis offered only disorganized and ragged opposition to the American invasion, in February of 1991, and the much feared ground war quickly turned into a bloody rout, with many of the retreating Iraqi units, including the elite Republican Guard, being pounded by American aircraft, artillery, and tanks as they fled north in panic along a six-lane road from Kuwait City to Basra, the major military stronghold in southern Iraq. The road became littered with blackened tanks, trucks, and bodies; the news media called it the “highway of death.” The devastation, which was televised around the world, became a symbol of the extent of the Iraqi defeat – and of American military superiority – and it was publicly cited as a factor in President George Bush’s decision, on February 28th, to declare a cessation of hostilities, ending the killing, and to call for peace talks.** Now then, we all know ('cept for you it appears) what happened afterwards. Namely crippling sanctions, constant harassment by way of illegal fly-overs, random bombings and inspections up the kazoo. Yet you have the yarbles to write, and I quote: “a state of constant warfare with his neighbours.” Cite or get off the sauce, kid. Like I said, if Iraq’s military couldn’t do shit at the height of its powers, where do you get this stuff that it was “threatening” anyone since? Iran, Syria, Turkey, Saudi Arabia…all of them neighbors, all of them could have kicked Saddam’s **dilapidated** army’s ass in no time. And then you go on believing fairy tales such as the infamous “Iraq is a grave and gathering danger.” To the **US of A** no less! The mightiest force the world has ever seen! Pull my fucking finger, pencildick. > [@](#): > > And your mothers cunt was one too early for me to kick you dumb piece of shit. Besides the fact that the above sentence makes no sense whatsoever, you’d need to be a necrophiliac to get near my Mother as she died earlier this year. Mind you, not that it would surprise me coming from such a scumbag as yourself. ---
**Author:** ![yojimbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yojimbo/32/232_2.png) [@yojimbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yojimbo)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2006, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/75 "2006-11-06T23:53:49Z")
Go easy on the poor chap **Red**. He is a person who thinks that without military involvement Hitler would have sent a “few thousand people to the death camps”. He also seems to think that the death camps are the reason for the war and not defence due to aggressive acts. Imagine a Brit thinking such things. Ignorance on that level should be pitied not attacked 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2006, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/76 "2006-11-07T00:25:10Z")
“How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing” ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2006, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/77 "2006-11-07T00:54:45Z")
[QUOTE=yojimbo] Go easy on the poor chap **Red**. He is a person who thinks that without military involvement Hitler would have sent a “few thousand people to the death camps”. He also seems to think that the death camps are the reason for the war and not defence due to aggressive acts. Imagine a Brit thinking such things. Ignorance on that level should be pitied not attacked 😉 [/QUOTE] Bah! Right you are, a waste of time it is. Just gets my blood boiling when I see little **Scyllas** , **duffers** and **Sam Stones** popping out of the woodworks. I can’t imagine what kind of world we’ll have if they ever become a majority. Luckily, I doubt I’ll see it happen in my lifetime – guess there have to be some advantages to being decrepit 🙂 * * * [QUOTE=Captain Amazing] How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas-masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing [/quote] WTF is it with Godwinising this thread? I mean, seriously, I realize the neocon school of foreign politics has fallen flat on its arse, but this Hitler = Saddam shit is simply deranged and reeks of desperateness. As is the assumption that Dubya is some sort of Churchill to Gore/Kerry’s Chamberlain. Is that really all you’ve got left? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2006, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/78 "2006-11-07T02:05:28Z")
[QUOTE=RedFury] Bah! Right you are, a waste of time it is. Just gets my blood boiling when I see little **Scyllas** , **duffers** and **Sam Stones** popping out of the woodworks. [/quote] I’m thinking of that scene in Forest Gump where that Pinko beats up Jenny and then blames it on how angry he is at Nixon. Do you remember that scene? ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2006, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/79 "2006-11-07T02:10:59Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] Even kiddingly, all you’ve put behind this facetious claim is your ‘wager.’ [/QUOTE] Untrue, and rather disingenuous of you to so state. The wager itself is moot. I am pointing out the ridiculousness of measuring the just or unjust nature of the civil war based strictly on suffering caused versus suffering avoided. It’s disingenuous in the extreme because I provided other examples to illustrate my point. For you to ignore those and claim that I have not provided enough to support my reasoning is not a particularly resounding show of good faith you brunetticidal dictator, you. ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2006, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170/80 "2006-11-07T23:17:54Z")
**Scylla** , I happened upon [this post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=7939910&postcount=18) of yours in GD. As hot-blooded as I can and tend to be, I’m also not much in the “holding grudges” department. If you’re sincere in what you wrote – and I can’t think why you wouldn’t be. This is not a game we’re playing – that’s good enough for me. Because, ultimately, I believe we both want the same thing: a better world, if not for us, for our children. And I kid you not when I say that 2nite’s results are rather crucial for the near future; I shudder to think what an unbridled BushCo could do in the next two years. Honestly, I think that WW-III wouldn’t be out of the question should an unprovoked attack on Iran happen. Truce. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/saddam-gets-death/379170.md?page=5)