Posted on 05/29/2003 9:33:31 AM PDT by Brian S
No, it actually reinforces my assertion. This is exactly why the U.S. was willing to wage war against a nation whose "weapons program" consists of a few mobile labs and old protective suits, but calls for "multi-lateral discussions" with a nation that has a weapons program that represents a legitimate threat.
A third-rate dictator of a country like Iraq is called a "rogue leader" and a "modern Hitler," and he wears a black beret and a military uniform. When this same guy truly becomes the threat that he was made out to be, he wears a $3,000 Armani suit and his country becomes a "most favored nation" for trade with the U.S.
Frankly, I think you have a fair point here. It's clear to me that one reason for selecting Iraq as a target was that it was politically feasible using the "UN resolutions / WMDs" angle. But that doesn't mean that the US was wrong to assert that Iraq was in violation of the resolutions, possessed WMDs, etc. And it doesn't mean the critics are correct to say that the US was wrong to enforce the resolutions or that absence of evidence (of WMDs) is evidence of absence (which is what the critics seem to be saying, and pretending that they believe).
For civilians in the U.S., Iraq was never the biggest threat from such an attack.
Please pass along the elaborate methodology and mathematical equations by which you have calculated this Threatness-Level thing which you seem to think you have precisely measured for Iraq and all other nations.
So when some militant Islamic jackass from Yemen or Pakistan claims that the Mossad was behind the 9/11 attacks on the U.S., you'r telling me that the burden is on Israel to prove that they were not?
Red herring. There is no UN resolution requiring Israel to document lack of involvement in 9/11, which I'm aware of anyway. (You never know with the UN ;-)
You can't complain about "phony rules" in this context, since they were put in place at the behest of the U.S. after the first Gulf War.
First of all, I can complain about anything I want ;-) Second, I don't necessarily agree with the US's approach to things in 1991, which is what you seem to be talking about (setting up the sanctions regime, etc). Third, just because some rules were put in place "at the behest of" the US does not mean they weren't undermined, exploited, etc by countries like France. Fourth, the "phony rules" I was actually talking about were not from '91 in the first place, but specifically, last year's Resolution 1441 which passed unanimously based on the votes of countries like France which never had any intention whatsoever of enforcing it (that's what I meant by "phony"). and, so on.
The most current version of the events surrpounding the first Gulf War was that President Bush essentially laid out to Iraq all the elements of a U.S. response to a WMD attack ..
Ok so if I read you correctly you're agreeing with me that it was silly of you to claim the US would never put troops in proximity to a nation which it knew to have WMDs, since you seem to admit that they did so in '91. And by the way, don't you think the US issued the exact same kind of warning to Iraq in this war? So, your claimed reason for pretending to believe that Iraq had no WMDs ("the US wouldn't have put troops there if they did") is demolished.
[child molester example] You certainly don't let your children play there, but do you burn the guy's house to the ground? Maybe you do -- But if I were so certain that this was necessary, I'd be burning the police station to the ground, too.
Good idea! (In this context "police station" = UN, right?)
This might be a valid point, but it will hold absolutely no water with me until Bill Clinton is spending the rest of his life in Leavenworth for dereliction of duty. If what you have said is true, then Bill Clinton was a bigger threat to this country than Saddam Hussein was.
For crying out loud -- the same nation that considered it such a "moral imperative" to topple Saddam Hussein can't even muster the outrage to take this f#cker's pension away from him.
Ah. You are looking for an excuse to do nothing.
I never found anyone willing to accept their end of a proposed bet on this issue. Curious...
If you were wrong about Iraq having WMDs, then you'd SURELY have no problem accepting the mission of cleaning up the consequences of a WMD attack against the United States...
...without protective gear of any sort.
Congratulations on your elastic use of facts. This was your claim:
Anyone who truly believes that the United States government would have placed thousands of U.S. military personnal in close proximity to Iraq if there was any chance in hell that Iraq possessed "weapons of mass destruction" is naive.
And when presented with a fact that hosed that point, you shifted to this:
s exactly why the U.S. was willing to wage war against a nation whose "weapons program" consists of a few mobile labs and old protective suits, but calls for "multi-lateral discussions" with a nation that has a weapons program that represents a legitimate threat.
Sorry, but for your original point to be true, the United States would be removing all troops from Korea.
Since you obviously aren't the least bit interested in honest debate, I won't bother with you any more.
The accusations have been made by the UN since 1991. The US and UK have acted on behalf of the UN. It was a UN member state, Iraq, who obfuscated, obstructed, and disobeyed the UN for 12 years, not the US or UK. And, since the weapons have most likely been hidden in neighboring Arab countries, that's where we should look.
Looks like all sides of the argument are on this thread!
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Well, then maybe we shouldn't have given Saddam 12 years to hide the weapons. In any case, he had the weapons in 1991, and since signing the Gulf War cease fire, openly agreed to disarm, and did not -- for 12 years. 16 UN resolutions accused him of failing to disarm, not just the UN and Britain, which acted on the UN's behalf. (Remember the 15-0 vote on Res. 1441?)
Yes, I suppose we should have been able to surveil the entire span of Iraq's borders for 12 years as he moved and/or hid the weapons from the UN and allied forces.
I'm not even arguing that point. My whole rationale here is that the U.S. not only must make a legitimate case about these facts (which we did, at least to my satisfaction), but that a very compelling case must be made that military action resulting in the overthrow of a government is the only means of dealing with the issue. The fact that this government felt a need to resort to such PR tactics to sell the public on the war tells me that they couldn't make a compelling case on the facts alone.
Please pass along the elaborate methodology and mathematical equations by which you have calculated this Threatness-Level thing which you seem to think you have precisely measured for Iraq and all other nations.
Those anthrax letters were mailed right here in the U.S., and the anthrax could just as easily have been produced here as anywhere else in the world. And the Tokyo sarin gas attack that was mentioned in another post (and prompted my response) involved a chemical agent that could have been produced anywhere, too.
And by the way, don't you think the US issued the exact same kind of warning to Iraq in this war? So, your claimed reason for pretending to believe that Iraq had no WMDs ("the US wouldn't have put troops there if they did") is demolished.
That's really my point. If the U.S. could issue this kind of ultimatum to Iraq to keep them from using WMDs on our troops, then the U.S. could have issued the same ultimatum to allow unfettered access to U.S. weapons inspectors without putting all those soldiers and ships over there. If Tom Clancy wrote a novel with a story line like this, he'd be out of business tomorrow.
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