A History of Torture

[panasonic]

troops overseas means nothing. most first world countries have troops overseas for peacekeeping and other reasons. canada sent many troops overseas, but were just peacekeeping and giving aid to civilians. this is another reason why people are wondering what the us troops are still doing in iraq

[sima]

i'me not american, do not live in u.s.a, so do not get me wrong..
i don't hate your nation, but i have a serious problem with
your goverment, and i'm not talking about your jets over my head
in 1999 bombing civilian buildings..
do you honestly think that your gov. is bombing people for
humanitarian reasons while using radioactive bombs like they did
here in belgrade - and we are not muslims, do not have "weapons of
mass destruction" (didn't have the money to buy it from your gov.)
bombing only made things worse and brought your troops to kosovo,
5 years later over 30 orthodox monasteries were burned under your
supervision - so much for humanitarian work..
i'm sorry if this was to emotional, i'm not a religious fanatic (religion is just
another way to manipulate people)
if i can realize after all this that it's not the american people doing this
but you gov. and the corporations running it.., than i hope that you will to..

sorry, if this is not the place to post this..

[ucrzymofo87]

I thought this was interesting. It is Labour MP Ann Clwyd's speech on what she saw in Iraqi mass graves source

"There was a machine designed for shredding plastic. Men were dropped into it and we were again made to watch. Sometimes they went in head first and died quickly.

Sometimes they went in feet first and died screaming. It was horrible. I saw 30 people die like this. Their remains would be placed in plastic bags and we were told they would be used as fish food...on one occasion, I saw Qusay personally supervise these murders."

This is one of the many witness statements that were taken by researchers from Indict -the organisation I chair -to provide evidence for legal cases against specific Iraqi individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

This account was taken in the past two weeks.

Another witness told us about practices of the security services towards women: "Women were suspended by their hair as their families watched; men were forced to watch as their wives were raped...women were suspended by their legs while they were menstruating until their periods were over, a procedure designed to cause humiliation."

The accounts Indict has heard over the past six years are disgusting and horrifying. Our task is not merely passively to record what we are told but to challenge it as well, so that the evidence we produce is of the highest quality.

All witnesses swear that their statements are true and sign them.

For these humanitarian reasons alone, it is essential to liberate the people of Iraq from the regime of Saddam. The 17 UN resolutions passed since 1991 on Iraq include Resolution 688, which calls for an end to repression of Iraqi civilians.

It has been ignored. Torture, execution and ethnic-cleansing are everyday life in Saddam's Iraq.

Were it not for the no-fly zones in the south and north of Iraq -which some people still claim are illegal -the Kurds and the Shia would no doubt still be attacked by Iraqi helicopter gunships.

For more than 20 years, senior Iraqi officials have committed genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. This list includes far more than the gassing of 5,000 in Halabja and other villages in 1988. It includes serial war crimes during the Iran-Iraq war; the genocidal Anfal campaign against the Iraqi Kurds in 1987 88; the invasion of Kuwait and the killing of more than 1,000 Kuwaiti civilians; the violent suppression, which I witnessed, of the 1991 Kurdish uprising that led to 30,000 or more civilian deaths; the draining of the Southern Marshes during the 1990s, which ethnically cleansed thousands of Shias; and the summary executions of thousands of political opponents.

Many Iraqis wonder why the world applauded the military intervention that eventually rescued the Cambodians from Pol Pot and the Ugandans from Idi Amin when these took place without UN help. They ask why the world has ignored the crimes against them?

All these crimes have been recorded in detail by the UN, the US, Kuwaiti, British, Iranian and other Governments and groups such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty and Indict. Yet the Security Council has failed to set up a war crimes tribunal on Iraq because of opposition from France, China and Russia. As a result, no Iraqi official has ever been indicted for some of the worst crimes of the 20th century.

I have said incessantly that I would have preferred such a tribunal to war. But the time for offering Saddam incentives and more time is over.

I do not have a monopoly on wisdom or morality. But I know one thing. This evil, fascist regime must come to an end. With or without the help of the Security Council, and with or without the backing of the Labour Party in the House of Commons tonight.

Also, these are some rather revealing websites:
article 1
article 2

[Killfile]

You're beating a dead horse. No one disputes that Saddam was a monster. What you're glossing over is that he was our [the United States'] monster, armed by us, financed by us, and kept in power by us. The United States looked the other way as Saddam murdered thousands with the very weapons we gave him because he was friendly to the West. We needed someone to hld Iran back and Saddam, despite being a despotic murderer, fit the bill. [source (United Press International)]

While we're on the topic - lets remember that after we put this whack-job in power, we then armed him to the teath with every nasty little plague and poison we could lay hand on. Just because the US had stopped bio-weapons and chemical weapons development in the 1970s, doesn't mean that we can't help our allies do it.

In 1985 (five years after the Iraq-Iran war started) and succeeding years, said the [May 25, 1994, Senate Banking Committee] report, ''pathogenic (meaning ''disease producing''), toxigenic (meaning ''poisonous'') and other biological research materials were exported to Iraq, pursuant to application and licensing by the U.S. Department of Commerce.'' It added: ''These exported biological materials were not attenuated or weakened and were capable of reproduction.''

The report then details 70 shipments (including anthrax bacillus) from the United States to Iraqi government agencies over three years, concluding, ''It was later learned that these microorganisms exported by the United States were identical to those the United Nations inspectors found and recovered from the Iraqi biological warfare program [after the 1991 gulf war].''

[source]

So lets be very clear on this.

1 - Saddam was a monster.
2 - The United States put him in power
3 - The United States provided him with chemical and biological weapons as well as sophisticated air and ground weapons.
4 - Saddam used these weapons to kill civilians in his own country
5 - After we learned of this, we continued to supply him with weapons.

Is the world a better place without Saddam? Sure - but lets not pretend that the United States entered the country as the nobel liberators. The blood of these people is on our hands as well.

Genocide, by the way, has a very specific definition under international law which may or may not apply to Saddam's actions.

[Shaka Zulu]

"Oh my God ucrzymofo87, you have not only won the oscars for dodging every single point in this debate, but also an instant lifetime acheivement award for marvellously potraying as someone who can debate even a little bit. But even galantly acting like you know the meaning of the word. Much greater accomplishment then Jim Cavaziel speaking a dead language in a natural way.Congratulations!"



Killfile,this is a first for me,and proberly many people.But I must say its an honour for me to read your posts

Not that the facts arent well known and that I dont know them(sadly enough I know them to well. Since they are recent and crucial parts of our world now. But granted, dont know as much as you), how can one miss them? But the fact that you have patience enough(I know I would have lost patience with this kind stupidity quite quickly) to debate with this guy who is doesn't even know the meaning of that simple word, and the way you do it too. Kudos for your Buddha like patience with this grade A bullshitter. He is actually denying or avoiding simple and recent facts that are known to most people,if not everyone(The even if you put serve them to him as you did with the 1-5 list).

[ucrzymofo87]

No one disputes that Saddam was a monster. What you're glossing over is that he was our [the United States'] monster, armed by us, financed by us, and kept in power by us.

Actually, he was not "armed" by us.

Myth vs. Fact

Name one weapon in the Iraqi arsenal that was made in the United States.

I have offered that challenge to dozens of so-called anti-war activists who claim that the U.S. armed Iraq. According to these protesters for "peace," George Bush Sr. and Ronald Reagan supplied Iraq with tons of weapons.

None have been able to name the specific weapon – missile, bomb, fighter, tank or shell – that is U.S.-made or has U.S. equipment installed in it. None have been able to name any specific weapon system.

All of them have failed the challenge, providing no more than allegations that U.S. parts are in Iraqi missiles or U.S. electronics are being used by the Iraqi military. One protester even claimed that Iraq was armed with U.S.-made trucks.

Since when is a truck a weapon? Are the Iraqis going to drive backwards, fuel tank first, into the U.S. Army?

Time to separate the myth from the reality. The propaganda spun by the far left is false. The facts show that Iraq is armed with a wide range of weapons – none of which came from the U.S.

Iraqi Air Force

The Iraqi air force does not fly Falcons or Eagles. The majority of the Iraqi air force is made in Russia. The Russian MiG and Sukhoi design bureaus supplied Iraq with hundreds of advanced strike-fighters and the Mach 3 Foxbat interceptor.

Saddam could field a force of advanced MiG-29 Fulcrum fighters if they had not chickened out of combat during the Gulf War, flying to Iran for asylum. The Iranians, who love Saddam even less than we do, never returned the MiGs.

The remainder of the Iraqi air force comes from France and China. The Chinese supplied Saddam with the Chengdu F-7, a copy of the Russian MiG-21. The F-7 can fly from unimproved runways and is known to be a vicious in-close dog fighter.

However, the French Mirage F-1 is reportedly the best jet fighter in Iraqi hands. You can view an Iraqi F-1 in action on the State Department Web site, testing a chemical spraying system.

If you still believe that the Iraqis have no chemical weapons, think again. Iraq did not modify its best multimillion-dollar fighter jet to spray for fruit flies.

Anyone with half of a brain knows that you cannot keep a modern jet fighter in the air without spare parts. Thus the Russian, Chinese and French jets should be museum pieces after 12 years of a so-called U.N. ban on weapons sales to Iraq. Yet somehow Saddam has his air force flying over 1,000 sorties a month.

Thanks to excellent reporting by Bill Gertz we now know that France has been supplying spare parts for Saddam's Mirage fighters. The French spare parts arrived in Baghdad not 20 years ago during the Cold War but last year, just in time to face our forces today.

Merci! With friends like, that who needs enemies?

Iraqi Missiles

Perhaps the Iraqi missile force has some U.S.-made weapons? Not. The primary Iraqi missile is the Russian-made Scud. Other missiles include the FROG-7 from Russia, the Exocet from France and the Silkworm from China.

The Iraqi air defense has plenty of missiles ... from Russia, China and France. The SA-2 Guideline, SA-3 Goa and SA-6 Gainful SAM missiles are all of Russian or Chinese manufacture. The French also supplied Baghdad with a number of Roland air defense missile systems.

Even the missile parts are from Chinese, German and French sources. Israeli authorities know full well what is inside Iraqi-made Scud missiles since many of them fell on Tel Aviv during the Gulf War. The Israelis found that the Scud warhead electronics were made in Germany – not the U.S.A.

In addition, William Safire recently wrote a column noting that a Chinese chemical company had supplied rocket fuel to Iraq through a French front company. Safire identified the fuel, the companies and the Iraqi missile facility where it was mixed into new Iraqi rockets. Again, the missile fuel sale was made within the last year, just in time to make new Iraqi missiles pointed at Kuwait, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Saddam sends his love to Paris and Beijing. Without your help he certainly could not threaten his neighbors with nerve gas and anthrax.


Iraqi Army

Okay, if not jet fighters and missiles, then how about tanks? Certainly the biggest weapons seller in the world, the U.S.A., sold tanks to Iraq.

The Iraqi armor force is made up of Chinese and Russian models familiar to any "cold" warrior. The Iraqi T-72 and T-55 tanks are all of Russian manufacture. The Iraqis also have a large number of Type-59 Chinese tanks and Russian-made BMP armored troop carriers. No M-1 Abrams here.

How about attack helicopters? The Iraqis have a number of choppers they used against the Kurds and Shiites.

So sorry, the Iraqi attack chopper force is Russian and French. The Russians supplied Iraq with a large number of the Mil-24 Hind attack helicopters, armed to the teeth with cannon, missiles and even chemical weapon sprayers.

The French supplied Saddam with a large number of Gazelle attack helicopters. The same French also managed to keep Saddam's attack helicopter force flying today with spare parts.

Guns, then? Surely the U.S. supplied Saddam with guns?

Nope. The main Iraqi artillery is the French 155mm howitzer. The remainder of Iraq's artillery is 122mm Russian-made cannons and Russian-made short-range rocket launchers. Even the Iraqi foot soldier is armed with the venerable AK-47 of Russian and Chinese make.

Iran-Iraq War

The facts are that during the Iran-Iraq war the U.S. supplied Iraq with something much more valuable than guns: satellite information on when and where the Iranians were going to attack.

Of course, current anti-war activists seize this piece of information without putting it into historical context. The information was supplied during the height of the Cold War. The main threat to America was the Soviet Union and the biggest fear in the Gulf was the Ayatollah Khomeini.

You remember the chant "death to America"? It almost seems that the ayatollah invented it. Ironically, the Ayatollah made his way to Tehran from his home in exile – Paris.

The Reagan administration, aware that the Iranian ayatollah had threatened to turn the Gulf into a sea of fire, assisted Saddam so that he would not lose the war. The assistance stopped short of helping Saddam win the war.

In fact, when it appeared the Iraqis were on the verge of victory, the Reagan administration transferred real weapons to the Iranians. The infamous Iran-Contra scandal involved a large number of badly needed U.S. TOW anti-tank missiles that were sold to Iran.

The U.S. missiles proved to be critical to the Iranian defense against Iraq's superior Russian tank force. The result was a stalemate and the war ended.

France/Russia/China

The fact is that Saddam owes billions to France, Russia and China for weapons purchases. Clearly, Iraq is buying more weapons from Paris and Beijing despite a U.N. arms embargo. Perhaps one reason why Paris, Moscow and Beijing oppose a war in Iraq is because they would lose their best customer.

The propaganda spun by the far left that the U.S. armed Iraq is false and backed by no facts. The so-called anti-war types are more interested in slamming Bush than stopping a war. None have been able to name one American-made weapon in the Iraqi arsenal.

More importantly, none of them can give one good reason why Saddam should stay in power.

source

1 - Saddam was a monster.

And you would have left him in power

2 - The United States put him in power

By all accounts it seems he was elected "President" of Iraq.

3 - The United States provided him with chemical and biological weapons as well as sophisticated air and ground weapons.

Haha, oh man. The French, Russians, and Chinese actually supplied most of those.

4 - Saddam used these weapons to kill civilians in his own country

He also used them to kill Iranians and Kuwaitis, which violates international law.

Genocide, by the way, has a very specific definition under international law which may or may not apply to Saddam's actions.

He is still going to be tried, convicted, and hung like he deserves.

[Shaka Zulu]

BWHAHAHAHA.

Wait,not only did you deny(what a source that is ) the US aided Iraq against Iran in every way while you have no problem saying the Russians,french and chinese did it too(in their interests,as it was for the US).....this is the kicker.....you actually SAID Saddam was elected president? Bwhahahaha....

Do you know a thing called the CIA? Do you know a simple undisputed fact that the CIA helped him kill the Iraqi PM(By actually pinpointing his whereabouts and movements in detail) and financed his military coup,because Saddam was a potential loyal puppet while the previous one was sane enough to want his country free to decide for itself.Just as they did in basically every part of the world in the cold war(few years before,killing Irani PM Mossadheq because he didnt want to give away oil for free,and giving the power to royal family who had the same interest as the US and the brits).

You are an utter disgrace for the art form that is revisionism.One is supposed to educate oneself of the truth,and then change it Occordanly.Not be ignorant and oblivious of it,and make it up as you go(who lives in fantasy land again?),highly risking the chance of simple facts beating the crap out of you.

[Killfile]

*Rant from ucrymofo87 snipped*

You mean no one on the left was able to turn up information like this?

Sure, other countries were the primary suppliers, but....

In 1983 the US Sold $21,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.
In 1984 the US Sold $6,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.
In 1985 the US Sold $9,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.
In 1986 the US Sold $9,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.
In 1987 the US Sold $30,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.
In 1988 the US Sold $125,000,000 worth of weapons and weaponizeable equipment to Iraq.

Lets not forget that "From 1985 to 1989, an Atlanta branch of Italy's largest bank, Banca Nazionale del Lavoro, relying partially on U.S. taxpayer-guaranteed loans, funneled $5 billion to Iraq. A 1989 indictment charged branch manager Christopher Drogoul with illegal loans to Iraq, some of which, according to the indictment, were used to purchase arms and weapons technology. In the same year the Financial Times began a series of articles which alleged that BNL, relying heavily on U.S. government-guaranteed loans, was funding Iraqi chemical and nuclear weapons work. The newspaper also alleged that militarily useful technology had been passed to Iraq by Hewlett-Packard, Tektronix, and by Matrix Churchill, through its Ohio branch."

Source for all of the above

Also, just because the weapons came from France, the UK, etc - doesn't mean that the United States had no part in it. In fact, this Washington Post article (which requires soul sucking registration and payment to view their archives -- sorry) indicates that the United States actively observed and coordinated 3rd party arms sales to Iraq to make sure the regime was well armed.

[ucrzymofo87]

*refutation with facts by ucrzymofo87*

According to your source, it was the SOVIET UNION, FRANCE, and CHINA that supplied Iraq with most of its weapons. So, when you say we armed Saddam that is not accurate in its entirety. According to your source, the United States contributed a meager .45% of overall Iraqi arms, yes not even 1%. The Soviet Union/Russia contributed 68.92%, China contributed 11.8%, France contributed 12.7%, Egypt gave 1.3%, and sources listed as other contributed 4.8%.

Also, France, Russia and China were so vehemently opposed to the war precisely because they were profiting from illegal arms sales to Iraq. The United States and Great Britain could have chosen to profit via the corporations and businesses that were supplying weapons to Iraq. However, they undertook the right action by removing this evil, madman dictator from power.

The citation of American-Iraqi deals is all smoke and mirrors when it comes down to the main point of why they cite such deals. The Left is attempting to say in effect that since we supplied Saddam with weapons, it is our fault that he killed and murdered people. However, if this logic is applied correctly, then France is also responsible for the killings. Russia is also responsible for the killings. China is responsible for the killings. Egypt is responsible for the killings. Czechoslovakia is responsible for the killings. Everyone except the man who actually killed Iranians, Kurds, Iraqis, and Kuwaitis – Saddam – is to blame.

[Killfile]

"The Left" as you characterize it, isn't claiming anything of the sort - and I think if you read over my post again you'll note that I never said anything like it.

All I'm pointing out is that "The Right's" characterization of this as a "just war" is flawed. The United States doesn't get to claim the moral high ground in this. We participated in these crimes.

Now we didn't participate to the same degree that France, Russia/The USSR, China etc did, but we participated. The separation is only a matter of degree.

It is also worth noting that the statistics I quote are only relevant to conventional weapons sales. They do not address the US's willingness to provide cultures of pathogens and reagents for the creation of powerful chemical weapons, nor do they address the US providing consultation services from Los Alamos National Laboratories.

I think we all know what LANL made during the Cold War.

You asserted that no one on the Left had provided any specifics of weapons or weapons aid that the US had given/sold to Iraq. I provided those specifics.

History will judge us harshly in this. Maybe not within your lifetime, but it will happen.

I also note that you chose not to dispute the following points.
1 - The United States played a key roll in installing Saddam in power
2 - The United States supplied biological and chemical weapons components to the Iraq Regime
3 - The United States continued to provide aid to Saddam after collecting intelligence demonstrating his use of those chemical weapons upon civilian populations

You'll also note that, in every single one of my posts, when I refer to the crimes of Saddams regime, not once do I state explicitly or implicitly that Saddam is not directly responsible for those actions. That said, the United States shares some of the blame.

My position, and I'll make this as clear as I can, is this - The Iraq war was not about WMDs, because there obviously were none. The Iraq war was not about Human Rights because we didn't care for 20 years and we don't care in every other country in the world. The Iraq war was not about "spreading democracy" because we are all to willing to support puppet dictators as long as they do what we want.

The Iraq war was and is a dirty little war over oil, and for all the flag waving, U-S-A chanting, star-spangled-banner singing, patriotic cheerleading the Right does - it has become appallingly clear that the agenda of this administration does not include liberty, justice, or freedom - certainly not at the expense of profit, expansion, and power.

The topic of this discussion centered around the US resuming Soviet style interrogations under the Bush Administration - a point that you have yet to refute in any meaningful fashion. I raised that point to drive home the argument I raise in the preceding paragraph - that words like "freedom" and "human rights" are little more than tools, used by this administration to line the pockets of CEOs, investors, and corporations.

[psi29a]

"I'm gonna liberate me some oil.... to preserve it's freedom." -- my thoughts about Bush and the War on Terror.

Yeah, I'm for the war in Iraq... whatever fills my tank with Chevron Premium Grade with Techron(tm).

Just so happens we get to 'install' a democracy, kill our troops, remove a dictator from power, lift economic sanctions/no fly zones, and happen to have another 'friendly' government in a hotspot.

Take the good with the bad, we can't go back now. The least we can do is own up to our actions.

Bottom line: we are greedy rat bastards, but at least we are not alone.

[ucrzymofo87]

I also note that you chose not to dispute the following points.
1 - The United States played a key roll in installing Saddam in power
2 - The United States supplied biological and chemical weapons components to the Iraq Regime
3 - The United States continued to provide aid to Saddam after collecting intelligence demonstrating his use of those chemical weapons upon civilian populations

Note to Killfile - read first post on top of page

2 - The United States supplied biological and chemical weapons components to the Iraq Regime

and then you say

The Iraq [war] was not about WMDs, because there obviously were none.

Hmmm...interesting

The Iraq war was and is a dirty little war over oil, and for all the flag waving, U-S-A chanting, star-spangled-banner singing, patriotic cheerleading the Right does

This quote shows the unparalleled hatred you have in your heart for your fellow countrymen. How sad.

The topic of this discussion centered around the US resuming Soviet style interrogations under the Bush Administration - a point that you have yet to refute in any meaningful fashion.

I think a better question to ask is "What is your alternative to protecting this country?" Let us say for example that the United States has a terrorist in custody.

This terrorist directly and unmistakably knows where a nuclear device is going to go off. You can save 100,000 or 200,000 lives by getting this information out of him. Do you torture him? The new bill proposed by Senator McCain makes “extreme measures” illegal, but with an expectation that the law can be broken with impunity. McCain said it this way, “Should[an interrogator engage in coercion] and thereby save an American city or prevent another 9/11, authorities and the public would surely take this into account when judging his actions and recognize the extremely dire situation which he confronted.”

The whole purpose of McCain’s bill is to promote the perception that torture does not work. However, he places a caveat by saying if torture saves American lives, then it is acceptable.

Torture is not a policy, it is a last resort. The real reason this torture production is occurring is because certain individuals want to rein in the people who are fighting the war on terror. Certain individuals want to cripple our armed forces and intelligence operators by regulating and litigating them so they cannot do their job, which is to win the war on terrorism. The left in America and elsewhere wants to United States to lose the war in Iraq, the best way to do that is to undermine our armed forces and servicemen. Too many Americans live in the abstract, because freedom is abstract. We simply are not well prepared to defend our freedom if it comes under attack by enemies who are threatened by our existence – i.e. militant Islamic terrorists.

[Shaka Zulu]

"I'm gonna liberate me some oil.... to preserve it's freedom." -- my thoughts about Bush and the War on Terror.

Yeah, I'm for the war in Iraq... whatever fills my tank with Chevron Premium Grade with Techron(tm).

Just so happens we get to 'install' a democracy, kill our troops, remove a dictator from power, lift economic sanctions/no fly zones, and happen to have another 'friendly' government in a hotspot.

Take the good with the bad, we can't go back now. The least we can do is own up to our actions.

Bottom line: we are greedy rat bastards, but at least we are not alone.

Very well said. Welcome to humanity Or you were in that already, but one has to admit to that(as you just did ). What I mean is the US is taking the two-faced bullshit of being the saviours, taking the moral high ground in every single conflict,potraying as the heroes,that spread peace and democracy.Not most people buy it(sadly there still a few that buy it,the poster above me being one),but it oughta be more straight to cut the bull and hypocracy, and dont hide the fact that one is after its interests(as some other major rollers in international politics do.Which is why no one is questioning France or Russia.We know what they are about,and they dont try to sugarcoat it.).

[sima]

ucrzymofo87 - what you are doing is called a complete denial -
just take a look on how your gov. is treating veterans of the gulf war..
did you even wonder why most of them are sick of some unknown
illness, unknown symptoms and why aren't they getting no medical
attention but being ignored..
your gov. did experiments on your own army..
your gov. made sadam
your gov. made bin laden
(who was a friend of the bush family for a long time before 9/11)

[ucrzymofo87]

your gov. made sadam
your gov. made bin laden

With all due respect, I'll give their parents credit for "making" them.

[Killfile]

Sima's first language isn't English - I can definitely respect anyone brave enough to post in a 2nd language.

That said, the United States had quite a hand in creating its own problems in the mid-east. Our policy towards Afghanistan and the Iran Iraq war in the 1980s was short sighted.

Al Qaeda is effective and dangerous because we trained them to fight the Soviets. History is full of ironies, some of them more unfortunate than others.

Saddam was brought to power thanks to support by the United States intelligence apparatus and military industrial complex.

At the time, the Soviet Union was the big bad evil on the block and we did what we felt we had to do to fight them. It would be anachronistic of me to look back on that and suggest that we should have foreseen the consequences of those actions. Even so, we do have to live with those consequences - and denying that we've done things that have legitimately angered much of the world will only serve to deepen our problems.

The US needs to face up to what we've done. In hindsight, maybe arming and training Bin Laden to fight the Soviets wasn't such a hot idea. Mistakes are things that human being make. Maybe supporting Saddam wasn't a great idea either - and maybe we were party to some really awful things because we supported him.

You want to win the "war on terror?" Quit acting like the United States is infallible. Fess up to the mistakes we made and start listening to the people who we're hurting. Blowing people up isn't a good way to make your point - but maybe we really haven't been all that impartial and fair in our dealings with Israel and Palestine. Maybe we ought to consider the tension created by our having troops on the ground in Saudi Arabia. Maybe we should start thinking about how we treat Africa in comparison to Europe and how we view the middle east.

I hate to say it, but a lot of these people have legitimate grievances against the United States. They have no redress for these grievances, and a small minority feel moved to acts of violence. Clearly we can't tolerate those acts of violence - but for every one that straps a bomb to his chest there are no doubt thousands who sympathize with his plight if not his means of redressing it.

A critical reexamination of our foreign policy would fundamentally go much further to eliminating terrorist threats. Certainly the rogue wack-jobs would still exist - and appropriate means would still be necessary to deal with them. Even so, organized militant organizations with world wide span and multi-million dollar state supported budgets don't spring into being without a reason. You can chalk up the actions of the Timothy McVeighs and the Unibomber and Shoe Bomber to just being crazy - but the international terrorist organizations that this war is about exist for well defined political reasons.

Not everyone has a country to speak for them.

I'm not suggesting that we knuckle under to the demands of terrorists everywhere - but that we simply realize that we can no longer act with impunity around the world. Actions have consequences - and one of those consequences it that people may grow to hate you, and some of those people will have access to high explosives, knives, guns, etc.

I refer, of course, to actions like this (video).

The United States should defend itself - no doubt about that. But we would do well to be careful who we piss off.


PS - I'll respond to ucrymofo's prevous post later. I just thought Sima had some good points that might need some expansion.

[3rdbloodage]

Killfile & ucrzymofo87
will u pls stop your blah blah already
u just repeating what was the media says After & before the war
WMP? hey wake up they did not find anyafter a 14year of search & stop the investigate
but all the world know usa use a forbidden weapons in iraq since 91
that hurt even their own soldiers
US Made Saddam ? ... is this a urban legend .. well i know usa made those clowns that appear in trash cans like allawy & that Stricted Islamic Hakem ...also that fat assed joke , ofcourse i'm talking the current president talbany .. a real bunch of weirdos ... better start their hip-hop band

& u speak as Terror is only in east .... what happened to the klux kluk klan , The Kahana , McFly ??? , ETA

Killfile & ucrzymofo87 .... which agency u working for ? & how much they pay u for spearding all that Copy/Paste crap

[psi29a]

3rdbloodage: At least use complete sentences and full typographical words and not their abbreviations if you want to have any say in the matter. Otherwise, you come off as an uninformed and partially illiterate fool.

[Killfile]

3rdbloodage:

Either you are functionally illiterate or English is your second language. In either case, I don't expect you to fully grasp the significance of the discussion you're bitching about.

Our "blah blah" is the time honored tradition of Democratic Self Determination at work. If English is your second language, perhaps you come from a country which does not enjoy the faits of democracy. If you are simply an uneducated simpleton (as I suspect given the subtle particulars of your writing style), perhaps expecting you to recognize civilized debate is asking too much.

If you genuinely believe that we are "repeating what... the media says [a]fter [and] before [a] war" and don't want to read it.... DON'T. This thread is an open discussion between two ideologies. Others have chimed in, and their opinions are valued.

Given your attitude about the spirit of this thread, your post and opinion are neither wanted nor needed in this discussion. You seem to have nothing to contribute save the stream of unintelligable babble you posted above. If you can not be bothered to spell out the word "you" nor work out where the period is on your keyboard, then I can not be bothered to pay any heed to what you have to say.

As to the "forbidden weapons" in Iraq since 1991 - no credible evidence has emerged to suggest that this is the case. The use of depleted uranium is neither forbidden nor dangerous to US troops. The use of white phosphorus shells is also neither forbidden nor dangerous to US troops (though it's pretty despicable).

As to your "urban legend"


The guy on the left is Donald Rumsfeld in 1983.

[ucrzymofo87]

3rdbloodage: I suggest you read this:

A Good Read

[panasonic]

lol . try to make your argument clearer next time....

[Shisho]

We're the United States of America. We don't do shit like that.

WRONG!

We do, and what we do is do it on the down-low so people like yourself can pretend we don't and live up to hypocritical ideals from a country founded on genocide and extermination. Guess it's convenient to pretend like our country didn't eradicate the Native Americans to take their land and make it our own.

Hell, I shouldn't even say "WE". I don't control society or serve a function in facilitating it. I don't participate in it, I just live under it as best I can. It's a THEM. America is them. If they drop a bomb on someone it wasn't "US", it was "THEM". I didn't agree to it.

If this countery (or "we") didn't do the insane shit that it has done we simply wouldn't exist anymore. If someone builds good weapons with the intent of killing "us" then you better go to whatever lengths necessary to build better weapons, otherwise all this bullshit you believe in will mean nothing if you don't survive to proliferate it. (This will stem into an issue of immense length if I continue here. I won't though, I'll keep this brief.)

Laws, Ideals, and Rights are all just a new age religion. It's how social animals organize and bring order and control to as many people as possible. It's an agreement amongst people to preserve our lifestyles and ideology in a general.

Happy thoughts.

Can you imagine that poor fucker that got lobotimized. I imagine they did worse shit than that.

[Sortep]

i'm in agreement with killfile... and i just learned a very valued lesson... NEVER argue with killfile... thats systematic theory deconstruction there... scared of em

[Killfile]

Ha! You're wrong and....

Wait.....


Damn.....

[vtwahoo]

Genocide, by the way, has a very specific definition under international law which may or may not apply to Saddam's actions.

I'm bored. This seems interesting so I thought I'd resurrect it. Forgive the necromancy.

For the record, Saddam's actions qualify as "crimes against humanity" rather than "genocide." For more information on that read the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

Going back further to the discussion regarding the powers of the federal government during wartime. Killfile is right---the Court has upheld expanded federal authority only during times of DECLARED war. What he didn't do is cite case law. As it turns out, I can do that.

The Court has upheld expanded emergency powers in times of war (The Prize Cases regarding the Civil War and the Korematsu Case regarding actions against Japanese-Americans during World War II---which, incidentally, upheld the evacuation of Japanese-Americans from the West Coast but did NOT in fact address the issue of internment as that was outside of the scope of the case). However, the Court has been VERY quick to slap the federal government, specifically the President for overstepping his Constitutional authority during (a) times of peace or (b) times of undeclared war or (c) in ways that venture too far into the domestic realm. Examples include: the Ex Parte Milligan case (the Civil War), the Youngstown Steel Case (the Korean "War"), and the Pentagon Papers case (the Vietnam "War"). The upshot (and I can provide briefs of any of these cases if you're REALLY interested) is that while the federal government has passed laws and executive orders to expand its powers relative to national security both during war and peace times, the Courts have historically ONLY upheld those expansions in cases of DECLARED war.

Finally, I want to quote the following post from sima. I don't know if it was just lost in the shuffle but it's important and I think we should give it the attention it's due. Therefore, I will put this back out there and hope that someone (killfile???) takes the bait.

i'me not american, do not live in u.s.a, so do not get me wrong..
i don't hate your nation, but i have a serious problem with
your goverment, and i'm not talking about your jets over my head in 1999 bombing civilian buildings..
do you honestly think that your gov. is bombing people for
humanitarian reasons while using radioactive bombs like they did
here in belgrade - and we are not muslims, do not have "weapons of mass destruction" (didn't have the money to buy it from your gov.) bombing only made things worse and brought your troops to kosovo, 5 years later over 30 orthodox monasteries were burned under your supervision - so much for humanitarian work..i'm sorry if this was to emotional, i'm not a religious fanatic (religion is just another way to manipulate people) if i can realize after all this that it's not the american people doing this but you gov. and the corporations running it.., than i hope that you will to..