Yes, to Switzerland.
Our resistance to yet another religo-racist war didn’t stop said war. Fail.
That covers me too.
I remember watching Colin Powell try to convince the UN that Al Kaeda was involved in 9/11 and tight with Saddam. I wanted to hear a convincing argument from him, since it seemed a forgone conclusion that we’d be going to war with or without the UN (and with or without a good reason, it seems) and I hoped to hear convincing arguments. I was terribly disappointed. If I were a high school teacher, I’d have awarded him a C+ or B- at best, far below the A required for the purpose. I got the impression that he didn’t even buy his rhetoric, but was towing the party line. I wasn’t surprised when he resigned.
I also remember hearing Bush promise that Iraq wouldn’t divert our attention from Afghanistan. I remember pointing at the TV and saying “LIAR!” That was about the last I heard of Afghanistan for several years. No surprise.
Yes, if only we could learn these lessons. Good luck to us with that.
Homer Simpson once toasted, “To alcohol, the cause of and solution to all of life’s problems.” American intervention plays a similar role in the Middle East.
We overthrow the democratic government of Iran in 1953 and 60 years later Iran is a backwards dictatorship and we’re told that we need a strong military presence in the Middle East to contain the threat of Iran. We get friendly with Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War and then we end up waging two major wars against Hussein’s government. We support resistance fighters in Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion and many of those same fighters become part of the Taliban and Al Queda and use the weapons we gave them against us. We station troops in Saudi Arabia and anger over that helps motivate Al Queda to attack us. Etc… etc…
Plainly American leadership is not capable of a foreign policy in the Middle East that work’s to our country’s long-term benefit. We are incapable of getting in there, accomplishing our goals, and getting out without creating some sort of consequences that provokes a worse backlash in the long run. The smart policy, then, would be one of having a minimal or no presence in the region. Of course, if our leaders actually had enough courage to take that policy, others would describe it as surrender or retreat, regardless of whether it occurred in 2001 or 2013 or 2023. But until we actually have the brains to not overreach and do stupid things in the Middle East, we’re going to continue causing trouble and making life worse for everyone.
SDMB opposed something cooked up by Republicans? You don’t say!
March 12, 2003, on the eve of war, Sam Stone pens: The Middle East Prediction Thread
Also: from July 2003 after things started to go south and some dwelled in denial, RTFirefly pens: Liberals (and other Iraq skeptics) unite: take the Krauthammer Challenge!
Before you crow about it, you should remember the SDMB was right and the Republicans were wrong.
Republicans are usually wrong, I’m more surprised that SDMB was right!
Same here.
Because of the 911 attacks, toppling the Taliban was justified under international law as our inherent right to self defense - which includes justifying our retaliation on those responsible or connected to the first strike attack of the magnitude of hitting the WTC and Pentagon.
Iraq was a different story. Nothing similar to Afghanistan justified, morally or legally or defensively, our first strike attack and ground invasion of Iraq because Iraq by March was in full cooperation toward its compliance with the UN inspection process in accordance with UN Resolution 1441.
I had doubts, but I didn’t really wise up until the first APCs rolled into Baghdad.
If Saddam had WMDs, he’d have hit his own city with them, to take out maximum numbers of US troops.
He didn’t.
After that, I knew we had been “had”.:mad:
I honestly can’t remember what I thought at the time. I mean, I know I eventually figured it out, but I don’t know if it was before or after it was obvious to everyone else.
It would be nice to have records of my thoughts that far back.
Ah, found it! War with Iraq: A simple Poll started by lightningtool on March 16th, 2003 and wrapped up by March 20th, 2003.
Results from that thread: 40% were in favor of the war, 60% opposed.
I did indeed vote “No” to oppose the war on March 16th, 2003. (whew!)
In this thread in 2006 Where do you stand now the voters in that first thread were asked how they felt about it over 3 years later. Interesting discussion then.
What were those people thinking, really? I mean, was the hysteria THAT bad? I never did understand at the time why so many people wanted to start a war with Iraq, but it’s even more baffling now.
Might also have been my poll (IIRC the polling feature was not yet available) of Feb.1 asking a yes or no about whether we should invade Iraq. Out of 125 respondents, I counted 73 nos. Didn’t count the rest but someone else earlier on counted 23 undecided, which means at most there were 30 yeses.
The predictions thread was much more interesting, IMO. Almost everyone, even the most pessimistic, underestimated everything – the time, the cost, etc.
IIRC, the best pre-invasion threads were in the Pit.
BrokenBriton, your join date says 2012. Am I missing something?
I like to think I was closest to being right. I was opposed to the war because it was one of aggression, but I was more opposed to it because I thought it was ludicrous to invade Iraq while we were in the middle of another war in Afghanistan. Even I had no idea it would drag out this long, though.
I didn’t read through all of them, but among those I did I think even sven was most on target (sorry, don’t think I read yours, so if you were closer, my apologies).
I didn’t post in that thread, as far as I can tell, but I did post in a number of related threads, such as here:
I think I nailed the “indefinite, unwinnable warfare that spawns more and more anger, terrorist groups, and general instability” angle.
I was wrong about my theory that Iran was the ultimate target. It may be that we genuinely thought we could pull it off easily, and when we realized it couldn’t we had to rethink getting mixed up with Iran. But really, I’m now pretty convinced that we are more interested in saber rattling than anything else in that regard. I was also embarrassingly off about the UN, which I’ll chalk up to having been an undergrad film major with no real political science background a the time.
Right now, I see a lot of merit to the geopolitical-based theory that we have no plan or real need to win any of these wars, and ultimately it’s about stirring the pot and keeping local power blocs from forming.
Wow, we’ve been at this war a while, haven’t we?
I think you were wrong, but in a different way than you do. I don’t think Iran was the “ultimate” target, just one of the targets. I think Syria was on the list too. If Iraq had been the predicted cakewalk, well, hell, then we’d a had a big ole army sitting there with nothing to do. I think there’s a good chance that if each country fell easily, we’d have just kept on going – just not getting too close to the Soviet border. Shit, what country over in that neighborhood doesn’t harbor terrorists? Seriously, that’s the kind of thing neocons were considering.
I think we might owe the Iraqis some thanks for putting up such a strong resistance for so long. The made it impossible for us to start maybe two or three more wars.
But that’s just my paranoid liberal subconscious talking.