Zakaria seems to be doing well a balancing act that most US media havent. He never overcriticizes the Bush administration nor does he think Europeans and the UN are perfect. He does try to be optimistic too much sometimes… still overall very good read.
Nietzsche My sweet innocent: I’d rather kiss American ass, than get brown-nosed by some ego-tripping German and French leaders.
The last one telling the Polish Prime Minister Leszek Miller * "friendly but firmly’’ * there are no French missiles found in Iraq.
Grow up, dear.
Daisy Cutter,
Just because you choose to ignore someone else’s reasons that doesn’t make them unreasonable. Quite the opposite. If you want to wallow in ignorance that is your right but in this case your ignorance, along with that of all too many of our fellow Americans, is getting people killed. Wake up and smell the bullshit.
**gum **:
Well, to each their own I say. Kiss away.
I have no idea what you’re on about with this or how it relates to the topic at hand. Care to elaborate?
Sure. Just as soon as you get a clue, sugartits.
To hazard a guess, gum is raving on about this:
Not sure what relevence it has to anything, though.
Let us see who is lying. I say manhattan is lying
>> Iraq supported terrorists.
A) Not true to any significant extent
B) Even if true, not a justification for invading the country unless it was directly attacking the USA which it was not.
C) The USA has supported and promoted terrorism in other countries to a much greater level than Iraq ever has or could so this justification is ludicrous on its face.
>> That they were not directly involved with 9-11 and had only tangential direct relations with al Qaeda is wholly irrelevant.
I see.
>> They continued to support terrorists in Iran, Turkey, western Europe and Israel.
Not true and even if true not a justification to invade. Western Europe, Turkey and Iran never asked the US to invade Iraq and, in fact were quite opposed to the invasion so using them as a justification is ludicrous. It seems the USA has now decided to play world dictator and tell those countries what is good for them.
>> Abu Nidal was picked up living openly in a Baghdad suburb.
Abu Nidal was not a terrorist any more. He had renounced terrorism for many years and issued a statement condemming the 9/11 attacks. He had not been a terrorist since before the first Gulf war. This justification is so stupid, so ludicrous that the US government has never used it. It just shows how stupid it is. Or do you think the US government would not mention it if it were valid? You would do well to stick to defending the justifications the US government is using and not to present justifications they are not using.
>> They had a fucking press conference congratulating the 9-11 terrorists.
I say this is a lie and I challenge you to prove it. In any case, even if it were true, war and aggression are never acceptable answers to words. The thought that you can invade a country for something their government said is just appalling. Again, the US government has never mentioned this as a justification.
I missed this one earlier.
The Bush Administration has mentioned it, repeatedly. The last time I saw mention of it was on August 8, 2003:
The thing is, Abu Nidal certainly isn’t a terrorist anymore, and he certainly wasn’t “picked up living openly in a Baghdad suburb”. If for some reason to US really wanted the guy, they wouldn’t be picking him up, they’d be digging him up. Dude’s dead, and was dead well before the war started. And Wikipedia suggests that Saddam killed him.
There’s just no end to the crap that gets put forward as “justification” for the invasion.
How about those mass graves?
How about the fact that compliance with 1441 was neither “full” nore “immediate”?
How about the fact that we were already in a de facto state of war in the skies over Iraq for years?
Do those work for you?
Just like I said, there’s no end to it.
None of those reasons I gave constitute “crap” unless you consider 60 mass graves found so far a minor matter.
How does that justify invasion?
a) Quite a number of the mass graves contain bodies of Iraqi soldiers and civilians killed in the current conflict.
b) Some others contain bodies of Iraqi, Iranian and Kurdish soldiers and civilians killed in previous conflicts.
c) Some others contain the remains of people who just, you know, died.
d) I don’t doubt that some mass graves contain the bodies of people executed by Saddam.
e) Those people are dead. The invasion didn’t resurrect them.
f) If the aim of the invasion was to prevent more executions, a good way of going about that might be to, you know, present that case to the UN, and get something done about it, or at least get approval to do something about it.
The Admisistration’s post hoc rationalizations really do look like crap.
First of all, one of the most important things in war is to understand your enemy. By ignoring them and deliberately trying not to listen or understand them at the very least you are robbing yourself of a tactical advantage.
Secondly, as another person pointed out, the experience of terrorism in Northern Ireland actually says the opposite. The British government tried to contain the problem for years by killing and imprisoning the terrorists. It didn’t work. What seems to be working so far there is dialogue and discussion.
And before you ask for a cite: Efforts on Iraq Mass Graves Blasted
**e) Those people are dead. The invasion didn’t resurrect them.
**
The invasion is likely to prevent any more mass graves from being filled. Your statement would only be valid if you assume Saddam was done filling them.
**) If the aim of the invasion was to prevent more executions, a good way of going about that might be to, you know, present that case to the UN, and get something done about it, or at least get approval to do something about it.
**
Like in Rwanda and Bosnia? The US eventually had to go all “unilateral” to fix Kosovo. And today the UN let a torturer go that was in its custody, violating its own rules.
I do not consider the UN to be a solution to these kinds of problems at this time. Calling for UN solutions is a cop-out. Nothing will ever be done.
**The Admisistration’s post hoc rationalizations really do look like crap.
**
They made this case prior to the war.
As to your last cite, you won’t get much argument from me that the administration has done a poor job in the postwar.
It’s not hard to find examples of French arrogance. And many countries in Europe got quite sick of how the French and Germans purported to speak with the voice of Europe when clearly all they did was represent a small minority.
Perhaps the relevence is that forced to face a choice between American manipulation or French (and of late German) bullying most countries in Eastern Europe would choose the Yanks and day of the week – and also that most of Eastern Europe has not forgotten their freedom is largely a product of American standing firm and not of Western European negotiations.
Fortunately this is not a choice anyone have to make much anymore – as the rapidly falling star of France ensures; French influence in the EU is being diluted by the new member states (which to the French horror do not share their vision of future European policy), and the old powerful French – German axis is being challenged by new constellations (e.g. Spain, Italy, Britain). For me, this is one of the most positive things to come out of the Iraq war.
And oh, yes speak for yourself. For Denmark the Iraq war was used to reaffirm Denmark’s commitment to a strong Atlantic link. Not to go on some US hate rampage. America bashing is just so last century.
- Rune
No they didn’t. It was bundled in with the general “Saddam is a bad guy” argument, which no-one seriously disputed.
The US did not make any argument to the effect that urgent intervention was required to prevent the imminent slaughter of Iraqi civilians.
In fact, there was plenty of opposition to the invasion on the grounds that the invasion itself represented the imminent slaughter of Iraqi civilaians.
**No they didn’t. It was bundled in with the general “Saddam is a bad guy” argument, which no-one seriously disputed.
**
You sort of contradicted yourself, but I think I understand what you mean.
**The US did not make any argument to the effect that urgent intervention was required to prevent the imminent slaughter of Iraqi civilians.
**
This is true.
In fact, there was plenty of opposition to the invasion on the grounds that the invasion itself represented the imminent slaughter of Iraqi civilaians.
There was, but it was baseless, as no imaginable war short of nuclear could be as dangerous to Iraqi civilians as Saddam+sanctions+bombing for another ten years.
The human rights case was one of many. Obviously, it wasn’t the only reason, and it would not have been done at all if not for the other reasons. There has never been a war that I know of strictly because of human rights abuses, but those have always been one component motivating a drive to war. We fought Milosevic not just because of his abuses, but because he was a threat to the peace of the entire region.
I believe Manhattan was referring to Abu Abbas, who was behind the 1985 hijacking of the Achille Lauro, who was, indeed, living in Baghdag and who was arrested by U.S. personnel in Iraq and my response was, obviously, referring to Abu Abbas. Abu Abbas had renounced terrorism and had condemned the 9/11 attacks.
What is amazing is that when you debunk the reasons given officially by the government, the fanatics who just will not concede will just come up with a bunch of made up reasons which not even the government has put forward because they are so wacky. If that does not tell you how fanatical and unreasonable those people are I don’t know what does.
I have no idea what you are talking about, or why you think that Poland’s apology to France is relevant to a debate about the US image.
No problemo, and it wasn’t my intention to take you to task over this, but rather manhattan. 