@Ozone27:
@F_alk:
Something happening without a catalyst will happen faster with a catalyst.
Just like to point out I’ve heard this argument many times before in the last few months and it is completely bogus. Essentially it runs,“We better not do anything to pi$$ the terrorists off, 'cuz that might lead to more terrorism.” If we do nothing to anger the terrorists for fear of their terrorism, we are doing exactly what they want & justifying terrorism.
That is not exactly what i say:
The difference is between fighting terrorism, and fighting others where terrorists see themselves affirmed in the “rightfulness” of their deeds and therefore have the possibility to gain support from “their” people.
Fighting terrorism as a whole needs fighting the actual terrorists and fighitng the circumstances that let others become terrorists, if you forget the second, you will fight forever.
Now, that doesn’t mean the answer to terrorism is to invade every terrorist-sponsoring nation. Israel attacks every time they are hit by a terrorist act & its done nothing to improve the situation. So I am against that. But if we can mend a few fences, while cracking down on the terror networks–that is the way to go: IF it can be done…
agreed
…I argue that of the three available options–return Iraq fully to “normalized” relations to the outside world; continue w/ inspections & sanctions; and war, that war was the best out of 3 pretty lousy options.
…The UN sanctions were a joke, serving only to strengthen Hussein’s regime at the expense of his people (like the US sanctions against Cuba). Except the UN sanctions were weakening due to steady whittling away at their effectiveness … Since the whole world wants to get its hands on Iraq’s “black gold”–not just the USA–it was only a matter of time before the world started selling the guy weapons & again we would return to square 1–hell, there is evidence other countries were already selling Hussein weapons DURING the so-called embargo.
Hmm, i have heard that even US companies sold weapons during the embargo.
One thing that you didn’t mention in the above reasoning was inspections (wether combined with threat of force or not). And still, we are lacking any proof for the WMDs that Saddam Hussein should have. (btw, if there was proof that he has them, why is it then so difficult to locate them, once the existance is “proven”? Why were the UN-inspectors so utterly disappointed by the material given from the US agencies (leading to two or three “minor” hits on Iraqs weaponry in general)?)
So, taking this into account, i do not see more than two reasons why the invasion had to be done: humanitarian action and oil.
For cooperations selling weapons during the embargo: You know that i am no friend of capitalism, and this is just purest capitalism: The embargo promised huge profits, well illegal, but huge…. Can you blame people just for “overdoing” something good like capitalism ;)? With the “trickle-down”-effect, some of that money should have reached the lower levels, and everyone should be happy ;) :)?
Therefore I argue that eventually, unless the world decided to put up with Hussein’s shenanigans ad infinitum, all roads led to war as the “least poor” of the three poor options. The big regret is that the two sides in the big UN tussle could not come to some kind of agreement so as to present a united front. With the whole industrialized world behind us, there would be few outside the Islamic world for Hussein to spread his foolish propaganda to. As it is it falls on fertile ground…
Even with the whole industrialized world the ground would be as fertile i fear. And as you might have noticed, i disagree strongly with the automatism towards war. It is a poor sign though, that the one side who was about to “lose” in the UN didn’t try harder (beforehand) to convince (not with sugar and whip) members of the other side, but once the “defeat” was inevitable took action, stubbornly claiming they were “right”….