Liverpool FC Forum

by **Big Niall** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:25 pm

Why is the world better? Saddam was a :censored:

who killed about 3,000 people a year (I think) but was no threat outside his boarder. Now 100,000 have been killed, Al queda have the greatest recruitment incentive ever, fundamentalists and anti-west parties will win any FAIR election. Billions of pounds of property has been destroyed and the world has become more polarised.

BTW - can't remember why Saddam was worse than all the dictators in Africa and central America many of whom USA&its allies support. any idea?

by **JBG** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:28 pm

taff wrote:What the answer is God knows, but at some point we have to stop contributing as individuals to the hate

I agree taff, and Judge's comments (and history of comments) add to the hate.

I'm sorry, but heros are single mothers that put their kids through college, people that beat cancer or people who volunteer to go to less fortunate countries and work in hospitals. Heros aren't grunts who drive around the desert in a state of the art combat vehicle, shooting at everything that moves, while $40billion of airpower over head drops cluster bombs on schools and hospitals. I used to be in favour of the war in Iraq to topple Saddam, but I'm telling you, the war in Iraq is the opening shot in a new chapter of national tragedy in that country, mark my words.

by **dawson99** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:28 pm

saddam killed 3000 a year so that was an ok number?
what about the 100,000s that were raped and children in slave labour?
the war was a very good thing.

now it has to happen in every country where this thing happens.

by **JBG** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:30 pm

woof woof ! wrote:On a more serious note , perhaps I'm getting blind in my old age but re reading the thread I can't find anything that suggetsts the Judge should receive a PUBLIC flogging , this isn't the middle east after all.
Have I become politically insensitive ? .

Ha ha, no flies on woof.

Maybe Judge should be more truthful and tell us what he really thinks?

by **JBG** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:33 pm

dawson99 wrote:the war was a very good thing.

Dawson.....you cannot possibly believe that?

The country is in chaos. The US will eventually abandon it and it will collapse into civil war and genocide. Its a tragedy happening over there.

A friend of my girlfriend's brother is in the US army and is stationed in Baghdad. He said morale is desperate and he has seen stuff carried on over there that disgusts him, and once his tour is up, he is quiting the service after more than a decade.

by **dawson99** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:37 pm

i dunno what i mean, but the way things were going it couldnt be left alone. usa has just got to follow through now and complete what it started. all im saying is i know people who were there before, and it was alot lot worse then... just that now it looks like its gonna revert back to how it was before.
women were stoned for looking at another man, and things like that just isnt right. you cant deny that the guy needed to be stopped

by **woof woof !** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:40 pm

Will somebody please quote what it is in THIS thread that the Judge has posted which has caused so much dissension.
I'm not being funny , I can't find it and it does help to know exactly what it is we're debating .

by **dawson99** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:42 pm

we're debating the formula one in usa, isnt it obvious

ps - i like nascar, its narly

by **Big Niall** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:46 pm

dawson99 wrote:i dunno what i mean, but the way things were going it couldnt be left alone. usa has just got to follow through now and complete what it started. all im saying is i know people who were there before, and it was alot lot worse then... just that now it looks like its gonna revert back to how it was before.
women were stoned for looking at another man, and things like that just isnt right. you cant deny that the guy needed to be stopped

Most countries in the world are not democracies, democracy is a European ideal. Why should we force it on the world? When Winston Churchill started off in politics - the poor and women couldn't vote, if a country like that exists now (I assume they do) should we all go to war with them for not changing as we changed?

Why is Saudi the west's ally. A woman is much morel likely to be stoned in Saudi than secular Iraq under Saddam. Are you sure you are not lumping all muslim countries together?

Plus it isn't feasible economically or military for America to wage war after war.

by **dawson99** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:48 pm

im not mr pro war. but the whole country was suffering terribly under saddam. we went about it the wrong way, but im glad hes out. im glad his army has been stopped, and im glad that the country ahs now got its own desicions to make. im glad women arent raped, and children arent treated as bad as they were. im glad that the mass graves wont continue.

by **stmichael** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:50 pm

the way i look at it, democracy at the moment is quite simply being allowed to vote for the candidate you dislike least.

by **taff** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 5:53 pm

The War has not been managed correctly and Im afraid that the Americans again dont have a clue or perception about World feelings.

Funnily enough an American showed me stories from US Servicemen that they try to censor and there is a web site I cant remember its name, but something like USservicemen tales or something like that.

After 9/11 I had a moment of optimism where I envisaged the middle east being forced to negotiate and compromise, but as usual we revert to type and balls up the whole thing.

But I also have mates in the Army and support them and obviously dont want them killed.

I went to a work dinner a couple of years ago where the ex head of the SAS and UN was talking. Basically he said as learned from Northern Ireland it has to be talking and compromise and peace keeping with a soft touch. Otherwise you will not resolve the situation. You cannot have security and freedom as they contradict themsleves. Freedom being the preferred option.

What worried him was that the Americans rely upon technology, which let them down, looking for a bloke in a cave from space for example. Also education of the troops who have to deal with an extremely tricky situation, this requires sensitivity and new skills. We do after all train them to beat the enemy by killing them, then we get upset when they go a bit far with prisoners etc. Well how many of them were trained to deal with this situation.

I could easily support the war if you could plainly see progress and a plan to improve the country and leave it to the people of Iraq to choose their own destiny. But is this the case. No.

What makes me and I suppose a lot of people uneasy is we have just gone in with force without any idea about what to do next.

I do however feel sympathy with the troops. If I spent my day in fear for my life for something I dont really understand I would probably not be best behaved. Read up on the money being made by businesses out there in the name of development. Theres a lot of things going on there we are not privy to and it stinks to be honest.

Still when Oil companies release profits to their shareholders and someone from you town returns in a coffin in the name of the Queen, makes you proud eh

by **JBG** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 6:07 pm

dawson99 wrote:i dunno what i mean, but the way things were going it couldnt be left alone. usa has just got to follow through now and complete what it started. all im saying is i know people who were there before, and it was alot lot worse then... just that now it looks like its gonna revert back to how it was before.
women were stoned for looking at another man, and things like that just isnt right. you cant deny that the guy needed to be stopped

Women stoned in Iraq? I'm not so sure whether that was widespread in Saddam's time. Women were allowed to wear make up and wear lipstick. Its now that things are getting far stricter, I've heard of a lot of stonings now.

Saddam was a monster, and I had no sympathy in him going, but look at the three grounds the US and Britain gave for Guklf War II.

1. Saddam flouted international law by not co-operating with the UN after 1991 in disposing of his weapons of mass destruction and facilitating the inspection of same by UN weapons inspectors. Saddam also flouted the no fly zones imposed on him. It was argued that you cannot have a world in which a country so blatently ignored the rules and in doing so, he was undermining the whole notion of international law and order.

2. Saddam was in possession of weapons of mass destruction which were potentially a danger to his neighbours, and most importantly, to the US and her allies. In a post cold war and especially post 9/11 world, this was not acceptable to the US on the grounds of national security. Very early in 2003 the US made a half hearted claim that Saddam might even provide the likes with Al Quadia with WMDs, but I don't think this was serious other than being propoganda but the claim was blown out of proportion by the European press. It is well known that Saddam and Bin Laden were sworn enemies, and indeed, probably the main reason for 9/11 was the House of Saad rejecting Bin Laden's offer to fight Saddam in 1990 and 1991 and instead, inviting US forces onto Saudi soil.

3. Saddam was a nasty man, who murdered loads of his own, used gas on Kurds etc.

Now look at it from this point of view.

1. The biggest violator of international law is the US. Not only does it break international law more than any other country on earth, it has now decided that it will only sign up for those international laws which suit it. It has rejected the International Criminal Court and it won't ratify the Kyoto agreement......despite even Russia signing up for it. OK, Saddam broke international law, and he deserved to be punished, but only under due procees of law. What the US did was the equivalent of Tony Soprano beating to death a 14 year old kid who stole sweets from another kid.

2. It can now be fairly assumed that there are no WMDs. My own view is that Saddam never had as many as he claimed he had, disposed of them all, but tried to play power politics by pretending he still had them so as to scare Iran from intervening in his country after 1991 and also gambled that if the US thought he had chemical weapons, they would not invade Iraq. He gambled....and it worked for 12 years. Ultimately it backfired spectacularly.

Saddam had no links to Al Qaidya - they are poles apart - and the closest proven terrorist link was an attempt by Iraqi agents to kill former President Bush senior in a visit to Kuwait in the early 1990s (not actually terrorism as assasination has been around since the dawn of war), his grant of a safe haven to a guerilla group in norther Iraq who carried out attacks against Iranian and Kurdish militia in northern Iraq and north western Iran. Saddam also offered $20,000 to the family of every Palestinain suicide bomber. Thats a fair cop, but the irony is now, instead of whiping out the Al Quadya threat, the war in Iraq provided the ripest of breeding grounds for new terrorists. And in doing that, it has increased the danger to America's national security by many fold.

3. The US cannot take the high morale ground. It (with the UK) bombed Dresden into the ground at the end of WWII, a criminal attrocity of the highest order given that Dresden had relatively little military value and the war was effectively won (the Allies had crossed the Rhine at this point and the USSR was on the Oder). They then went on to kill millions either directly or by proxy in Asia, with countless still dying from cancer in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia from the effects of American chemical weapons. Its meddling and instigation of wars in Central America in the 1980s led to millions dying. Its ruling class has now neglected the working class so much in its own country that if any European was to take a down town ride in most American cities they would be astounded and shocked by the poverty.

There is no happy solution to Iraq. It will be a long drawn out trauma which the world will forget about when the US and the UK pull out, a national tragedy that will continue for decades while we are focussed on the US' next victim.

by **woof woof !** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 6:23 pm

Big Niall wrote:Forgot to ask why is it ok for USA, UK, France, India, Pakistan, China and Israel to have nucleur weapons especially considering USA is only country to use it on a civilian population.

Firstly it's not ok for any nation to have nuclear weapons but the bottom line is that some, as you have listed already do have them , The situation now is one of stopping other nations ,not just Islamic one's from developing these weapons .

Second point . It's fairly common knowledge that after the suicidal defense by the Japanese in the pacific islands during WW2 that the allies estimated an invaison of the Japanese mainland would result in at least 800,000 allied casualties . They decided instead to intimidate the Japanese into surrender by dropping two atomic bombs .
What would you have done ?

by **JBG** » Wed Jun 22, 2005 6:36 pm

woof woof ! wrote:
Big Niall wrote:Forgot to ask why is it ok for USA, UK, France, India, Pakistan, China and Israel to have nucleur weapons especially considering USA is only country to use it on a civilian population.

Firstly it's not ok for any nation to have nuclear weapons but the bottom line is that some, as you have listed already do have them , The situation now is one of stopping other nations ,not just Islamic one's from developing these weapons .

Second point . It's fairly common knowledge that after the suicidal defense by the Japanese in the pacific islands during WW2 that the allies estimated an invaison of the Japanese mainland would result in at least 800,000 allied casualties . They decided instead to intimidate the Japanese into surrender by dropping two atomic bombs .
What would you have done ?

Nuclear weapons were, for a while, a "god send" during the cold war as their deterrent effect prevented the two big boys going toe to toe, and also probably deterred a full scale Sino-Soviet war in the late 1960s.

The technology was kept among the big boys and those who had them were alligned, one way or the other, with the two main powers.

Since so many countries were alligned either to east and west it was relatively easy for the super powers to keep manners on the smaller militray powers. However, since the fall of the Soviet Union many of the countries that were alligned with Russia now went their own way. Some got scared, as they could no longer rely on the Soviet nuclear umbrella to protect them by what they saw as a hostile US and its allies. For example, the US backed Israel and the USSR backed the Arabl countries in the various conflicts in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The US prevented Israel from collapsing (I think) in the 1973 war by ferrying in loads of weapons at short notice and also providing it with transport aircraft. Israel beat the Arab countries but the defeat did not turn into a rout as the USSR would not have tolerated Israel marching on Damascus and Cairo: the Israelies knew that if they tried it, they would have met with Russian intervention.

Now that the USSR is gone, the Arab countries have either quickly alligned themselves with the US (Saudi Arabia and Egypt) or seek to protect themselves through nuclear programes. I don't believe that Iran's nuclear problem is offensive in nature, but instead defensive. It knows that if it attacks Israel or any US allies with nuclear weapons it will be annihilated. It learned the lesson of reckless military adventurism in the 1980-88 war and it won't make that mistake again. However, to the US a potentially hostile nuclear power in the Middle East simply cannot be tolerated as it complicates its power game down there. I'm sure if Iran develops nuclear weapons we'll hear a lot of sabre rattling and talk of attrocities from the US, before the inevitable cruise missile up the jacksie for the Ayllotah and say, ooh, a couple hundred thousand of his people.

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