There won’t be a war in Liberia. It isn’t an invasion force.
You can’t compare Liberia to Somalia. All sides in the civil war want intervention.
You can’t compare Liberia to Iraq. Stop trying to.
Really, there is no discussion here.
You both know it’s different. I guess you’re just bored.
So let’s spice it up a tad.
Is this just a front to get into Uganda? (Big Oil supplies, no refineries)
Is the US usurping the U.N.'s peacekeeping role?
I don’t know. As far as I can read, the U.S. has no plans of staying in Liberia any longer than necessary, as opposed to Iraq.
No, I didn’t mean staying in Liberia.
Bush started ‘doing’ Africa before the request. Why?
Is it just a PR stunt or is Uganda the real goal?
Um, you might want to get a map. Unless the US is also planning to invade Cote D’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon, C.A.R., and the D.R.Congo on the way.
As it’s obvious that there is a difference between several hundred thousand troops invading and occupying a place and a couple of hundred invited advisers on humanitarian intervention I am led towards 1 or 2 conclusions.
You are too stupid to realise the difference or you are trolling. Which is it, there are no other alternatives?
**1. Both interventions could be justified on humanitarian grounds. Both countries suffered from dreadful governments, although Saddam had caused a much greater number of deaths.[\b]
The humanitarian side of the Iraq invasion was only one of several stated motives, and at the time hardly the most emphasised or compelling.
The humanitarian crisis in Liberia is ongoing and persistent - 189-95,96-97, and starting up again. It is not necessarily solely a governmental issue as a recurring civil war, which has spillover effects into neighboring Sierra Leone. IIRC Saddam’s slaughters have been episodic rather than ongoing, and the US & UK have had some success in preventing more recent attempts at killing say the Kurds. (Unless we are invading as a prophylactic - we will kill thousands of civilians to possibly save tens of thousands later on) The primary ongoing humanitarian crisis in Iraq was due to UN sanctions for which invading was not the only cure. I am deliberately ignoring the day to day brutality of a paranoid police state, as there are a large number of countries who might fall into this category which no one as a matter of course demands we invade.
2. Both interventions are risky, open-ended, and potentially expensive. Iraq is likely to have a considerably greater cost.
I think it is felt that due to a much smaller area, smaller population, and the need for peace-keeping rather than invasion a force of several thousand troops would be required rather than 150,000 troops plus extensive support (which force level is still considered inadequate by some). In addition, by making it a multinational force an even smaller force of American troops might be required.
Some of the risk is mitigated by the fact that the neighboring countries are generally supportive of a Liberian intervention - our success makes their lives a little easier, a little more stable, rather than being seen as a threat. ( Flip side is that some of these countries are not exactly in great conditions themselves).
**3. Iraq was a big potential threat to much of the world, due to Saddam’s desire to acquire and use WMDs. **
Actually the case for invasion was not that he wanted WMD’s but that he already had vast quantities of WMDs and was on the verge of acquiring nukes (“We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud”). If you disregarded the nuclear part of the claim (which most anti-war folks/countries did with a fair degree of justification) then the question became how credible was his WMD threat and who could he threaten. With the missiles he had or was likely to have the possible targets were few in number - Iran, SA and gulf Arab states, Turkey, Jordan, Syria, Israel - not much of the world. (I am not trivializing the effects of a WMD attack on any of these countries, merely noting a relatively local reach). The follow-up question is “Will Saddam attack with WMD’s a country that can retaliate in kind or with superior response?” IF you believe that Hussein can be deterred or that the WMD threat is not imminent, this disappears as a casus belli.
THe second potential WMD delivery system considered terrorists. Again there is a credibility gap. If you do not view the connections made by the administration between Saddam and Al Qaeda as credible, there is again no reason to go in based on WMD’s.
**4. It was important that Iraq’s oil resources not be controlled by the evil Saddam.[\b]
But can we have the evil Charles Taylor controlling Liberia’s diamonds?
Was this a compelling reason to go to war with the Soviet Union? How about the Saudis, who pretty much by themselves can set the price of oil, and are not known for playing well with others at home? Nigeria’s government is not exactly a bastion of liberalism and human rights, and it has substantial oil reserves.
What can he do with the control? Other than make money? He can flood the market (sanctions permitting) which will collapse the price of oil, giving him little benefit. Or he can cut off oil to the market, in which case the Saudis will increase their production to maintain stability.
How is this better than the coalition of Australian, US and UK forces that went into Iraq?
French in the coalition is better than Australians in the coalition? What’chu got against the Aussies? 
Uganda does not have oil… gorillas but no oil.
Brutus my fav point of your’s was…
- It wasn’t Liberians flying those planes on 9/11!
Of course there were no Iraquis flying those planes either…
BTW-how does everyone do that quote thing? I’m new here.
Just a simple question to the peace-keeping supporters here. What “peace” are our soldiers going to be keeping in Liberia?
I am amazed at the assertion that the French are intervening in the Ivory Coast for humanitarian reasons…ha!
The fact is, there are major French investments there, which Paris wants to protect.
And, does ANYBODY remember a place called BOSNIA? The US Army has been there 8 years now…I thought that jackass Clinton saidit would be a 6 month affair…of course, Clinton sometimes lied!
or click the “quote” button bellow anyone’s post.
Hardly, since it was shock and awe which screwed it up. You don’t exactly convince people you care for them if the only good local for you is a dead local.
I’m personally against all wars- but I do see Liberia as a very different situation than Iraq.
First off, Liberia wants us to be there. That makes a pretty freaking huge difference. In this case we are not playing the lone cowboy. We are not giving a giant “fuck you” to the world at large. We are responding to a call to use our resources to create peace.
Which brings us to our next point. Iraq was at peace. We went in and made war. We started a war. That is fundamentally different than going in to a war that is already happening and turning it into peace. I believe that the US should not be in the business of starting wars, invadeing countries and overthrowing governments. But I find it hard to object to us coming in- at the countries request- and stopping a civil war long enough for some order to take place.
This would change if we were considering a long-term occupation, or a puppet government. Or if, like Iraq, we just barrelled in there without publically stating our intentions and our exit strategy. We went into Iraq without anyone knowing how long we were to be there, what our intended goals are, and how we were going to deal with the effects of our actions in the entire region. But we do seem to have a plan for Liberia. Our actions seem to have a conclusion that we are working towards, and a finite limit to how much power we intend to wield in a post-war Liberia (which seems to be little to none).
Additionally, we are not being fed a bunch of lies and bullshit about Liberia. In the months leading to Iraq, we were given countless questionable documents, unimpressive “smoking guns”, and a huge load of bullshit rhetoric that no offical could (or still can) back up. The whole thing stunk. How am I supposed to support a war when the story changes every week- and is indeed still changing. But I am not seeing that about Liberia.
But I don’t really need to tell you all this, do I?
And the point of that would be?
Please recall that the Bush Administration was justifying our invasion of Iraq in terms of the threat that Iraq, in collaboration with terrorists, represented to us. Not as a humanitarian mission. (Of course, now we’re stuck with a humanitarian mission, whether we like it or not.)
But if we go to Liberia, it will be a humanitarian intervention. And our proposed intervention there must therefore be justified, or not, on that basis. Arguments based on Liberia’s not representing a threat are therefore meaningless, unless one takes the position that the US should never militarily intervene anywhere for humanitarian reasons.
**
I am amazed that you rather resort to mudslinging than doing your homework. France was asked by both parties in the Ivory Coast conflict to act as a go-between and separate the forces. That is a wee bit a different thing than scoffing at the locals and going in there with the full intent to kill some of them.
Good morning. The US contribution on the Balkans in terms of military personnel is less than 15% of SFOR by now, and close to zero outside Bosnia. Of course, one couldn’t expect you to actually inform yourself so that you actually have an idea what you are talking about.
Amen.
BTW, I do not support any war.
I don’t think there is going to be a war in Liberia.
And if the forces do go in, I’d like to see them under the UN banner.
I’d like to see more operations under the EU banner like in the Congo. Tony! Jacques! Gerhard! Please get your act together on this and sort it out! That way, not only can we actually serve as a counterbalance to the US when they go off the rails, but in addition they won’t be able to keep reminding us that we always come crying for help to them. Which we do, it’s pathetic. It’s not like the EU doesn’t have the technology or money to do this. Just a lack of political will.