Interesting how the article I mentioned does not even mention numbers of dead in the attack. It really seems like Iraqi lives are worthless.
At the end of the WWI movie The Grand Illusion, the two escaped French POWs, Maréchal and Rosenthal, are spotted by German soldiers. They raise their rifles, but, suddenly realize that the POWs have crossed the line into Switzerland. So the Germans hold their fire. They were obeying the rules of war as they existed 90 years ago.
Do these rules make sense today? Particularly when the targets have fled to a totalitarian, terrorism-supporting state of Syria, rather than the neutral Switzerland? I don’t think so – not in the real world. Syria ought to be cooperating in the war on terror. If they don’t choose to cooperate, we shouldn’t respect that decision. We shouldn’t let it stand in the way of making the world safe.
Hell, Syria’s next if only because W’s numbers are dropping.
http://apnews.excite.com/article/20030625/D7RSQ0O80.html
“President Bush basks in high approval ratings, but when potential voters are pressed about giving him a second term, the numbers drop, a reflection of worries about the struggling economy and a general wait-and-see attitude so far ahead of the election.”
If I was a Syrian life insurance salesman, I’d adjust my premium rates directly as a result of whether W’s approval numbers go up or down.
>> We shouldn’t let it stand in the way of making the world safe.
In the meanwhile, the rest of the world is scared to death of the US having appointed itself world police.
Where is the proof that killing those people made the world a safer place?
Killing people when you are not even sure who they are? Not respecting other country’s sovereignty? That’s OK?
That’s scary.
Shooting at people based on US intelligence sources might not be a great idea right now. We might hit a Canadian wedding WMD convoy filled with Nigerian uranium, or something.
I’m too lazy to dig it up, but this pretext is much worse than the one I thought the US govenment would use to invade–or launch brief incursions into–Syria. Actual Baathist fighters moving over the border shouldn’t be that hard to find. Shooting at border guards? What’s next? ‘Accidental’ bombings of the Syrian embassy in Washington? Those darn cruise missiles and their funny guidance systems…
Ah, december, so all we have to do is slap the label ‘War On Terrorism’ on it and all of America’s actions are perfectly kosher, even if they violate international law both as it existed 90 years ago and today? By that logic if French soldiers shot German POWs escaping to Switzerland, it would have been perfectly legit as well. After all, the Germans in WWI were the Hun born again, despoilers of civilization, and ate babies and crucified POWs to boot.
Of course the USA isn’t going to attack Syria.
Iran is next:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3008154.stm
**"a senior US State Department official, John Bolton, said that military action to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons had to be an option.
It was not, however, Washington’s preference and was currently far from the administration’s mind, he added."**
That’s assuming that North Korea isn’t next.
Nah, forget that - let the state department flip coins to see who’s next.
While like Bush i would love very much to see Assad Junior liquidated, USA obviously wont invade Syria…its just a keep-them-on-their-toes kind of strategy. Bush might be stupid, but not THAT stupid.
And Rummy has been making these kind of threats for quite a while so its nothing new.
Is Assad junior really that bad? When Tony Blair was there not long ago the BBC were reporting that he was a moderate trying to gently close out the powerful hardliners from government.
First of all, the “war” isn’t over. “Major combat operations” are over. We are still engaging in combat with Iraqi soldiers and irregulars every day. Remember how 6 Brits got killed just yesterday? What was that, if the war is over?
Second, of course it is not a problem if we capture Saddam. Don’t you think we could hand him over to a reconstituted Iraq judiciary on several thousand counts of murder? Remember the mass graves filled with the corpses of children they were digging up last week? Oh, and maybe torture? Why not genocide? Rape? Theft? Recieving stolen goods? Selling stolen goods? Embezzlement? Passing counterfeit money? Using marked cards? Aggravated mopery? Name a crime, any crime, and the odds are at least 50-50 that Saddam could be proven guillty of it.
I’ve often thought it would be fitting to hand him over to the Iranians, since they wouldn’t feel constrained by western notions of cruel and unusual punishment. But no, the Iraqi people themselves deserve him the most, and we owe them that. And US presence will result in an orderly and clean trial, conviction, and execution.
Does anyone really believe that if we captured Saddam Rummy and his crew would give Saddam to any one? They would stage one hell of a show trial.
Maybe so. All I’m saying is that it wouldn’t be “inconvenient” to turn up with a live Saddam Hussein, as Latro claimed. Obviously, he could be charged with any number of things, but murder–again, I bring your attention to the middens of human skulls being dug up right now in Iraq–is certainly one of them.
And why do you claim it would be a “show trial?” The fact that we are certain that Saddam has commited atrocities that Ted Bundy could only dream of doesn’t mean it would be a show trial. The fact is, Saddam has killed many people, and a trial would prove that, and he would be convicted and sentenced. He would have a genuine defense, in front of a genuine judge, with a genuine jury, charged with genuine crimes. You wouldn’t have to make up vague crap when you can pin multiple murders on the guy. How is that a “show trial”?
Or do you just mean, a widely publicized trial, ala OJ Simpson? Of course it would be a high profile trial, just like Milosevic’s trial has been. But a show trial means a trial with a predetermined outcome, a farce that only goes through the pretence of a trial. Why would we do that, when it is clear even to opponents of the war that Saddam is personally responsible for the deaths of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, a murderer as simply as Tim McVeigh was a murderer? Why wouldn’t we have a genuine trial, just like we had a genuine trial for Ted Bundy or Tim McVeigh?
Oh now I understand. Since it’s been done before, it must be alright to do it again then. :rolleyes:
War is over?, which war?, this wasn´t a war; remember it?
I haven´t seen any war declaration or anything…
move on, nothing to see here…
:dubious:
OK, some cites:
Number one
[URLhttp://www.clickonsa.com/sh/news/stories/nat-news-197596320030213-110211.html
Number two
http://carper.senate.gov/wariniraqfaqs.html
OK, so I mangled Cite Number One… 
Anyway, number two is better still, but here goes the right link anyway.
http://www.clickonsa.com/sh/news/stories/nat-news-197596320030213-110211.html
The congressional resolution authorizing the president to do whatever he wanted in Iraq is perfectly constitutional. Maybe it was unwise, but in order for a constitutional crisis to emerge, the congress would have to allege that the president usurped their authority. Since congress GAVE him that authority in the first place with the resolution there is no injured party.
If congress had changed their minds, and passed a resolution explicitly barring Bush from deploying the military to Iraq and Bush had attacked anyway, then THAT would be a constitutional crisis. But since they didn’t, it isn’t.
Just because you think we shouldn’t have attacked Iraq doesn’t make it unconstitutional. The constitution divides military power between the executive and the legislature. The president is commander in chief, but congress declares war and authorizes funding. If congress felt the president overstepped his authority, they could cut off funding for his little adventure, or refuse to authorize it. Since they DID authorize it, and they provided the money to carry it out, there is no consitutional issue. Remember, a dispute requires two viewpoints.
Did you even read the working link in your first post? There is no consitutional issue here, regardless of whether congress declared war or not.
I noticed long time ago that it was quite common for american posters to use “we” or “us” when refering to their country. It’s much rarer amongst other posters. European posters, generally spaking would tend to write things like “the UK did this or that” “our government decided…” but rarely identify with their country. “We fought in WWI” sounds quite…weird (except when said by someone who’s 105 y.o. or so).
Sorry for this second hijack, but this peculiarity seems significant to me, and I even considered opening a thread about it.
Lemur, my point was that war was not declared, just that.
I really don`t like to meddle in other countries legislative processes anyway.
why not? it obviously worked for the Bushist punitive expidition into Iraq a la 2003