Eat this Saddam lovers

[HershOstropoler]

Originally posted by TCO


Feel free. Start with Roland's Stalingrad thread at Counterglow. And note that I had to hunt him down to acknowledge he was wrong. He was more interested in argument-winning or the appearance of it than admitting error.

Yes, you're such a biggie.

And we all know by now why the battle for Baghdad didn't materialise.

[TCO]

Becuase the chickenhawks were right and Roland was wrong? You didn't even list the battle not happening as an option. And if it had "happened", then I suspect there were possibilities of us being able to press the fight in different areas in a way that the Germans could not do in 1940s. Also suspect that Saddam's forcdes were not well configured to defend either.

Seriously...you were so damn sure that we were in a pickle.

[Q Classic]

It depends on what you mean by imminent. Certainly he had a history of

1. Invading his neighbors,
2. developling WOMD.
3. Usind WOMD.
4. Hiding weapons development from inspectors (we know that he did this to Blix in the late 80s).
5. Of not following agreements (most importantly those from the 1991 war) unless held to it with a gun.

he was an imminent threat to his neighbors, perhaps. not to us. i don't buy the argument that he could have given womd to terrorists to strike out at the us--there's no proof, and no psychological analyses have suggested anything of that nature in his personality.

But there were no "rockets on the launcher" threats. We didn't want to wait for them.

at least you're big enough to admit that it was preemptive, unlike some of the right's posterboys, like hannity.

The rationale for the war (at least for me) was much more strategic than tactical. I suspect the same is true for the Bush administration.

i think it was strategic as well--to provide a base from which we could easily exert power over the strategically important middle east, thus side-stepping the issue of projection being blocked by water.

Yet both those on the right and the left want to talk about imminent threats. Was Hitler an imminent threat in 1936? No. But you gotta take care of a bully eventually.

oh, i'm not debating whether or not we'd've had to take care of him. i'm questioning whether or not we had to do it at that critical juncture, with the doings in afghanistan still not completely done, while pissing off the un and the world's opinion.

[SlowwHand]

I say nuke them. Nuke,nuke,nuke.

[GePap]

Originally posted by TCO
But there were no "rockets on the launcher" threats. We didn't want to wait for them. The rationale for the war (at least for me) was much more strategic than tactical. I suspect the same is true for the Bush administration. Yet both those on the right and the left want to talk about imminent threats. Was Hitler an imminent threat in 1936? No. But you gotta take care of a bully eventually.

The Hilter analogy is incorrect:

Germany was the largest state in Central Europe, second in Europe, and the largest economy.

2 of Iraqs neighbors are much bigger (Iran and Turkey), and the US would not care if he attacked one, and by treaty would have to defend the second, though the balance of forces is so far in Turkey's favor that it would not do much. Syria is about as powerfull, and we would not care if Saddam attacked them either. The only neighbors we worried about him attacking were SA, Kuwait andJOrdan, and we had our troops in SA and Kuwait, pls, Saddam was contained fully,unlike Hitler at any time.

yes, this war was strtegic and the bushies knew that as you claim, but the attck was not to remove a possible fture threat, but to eliminate an irritant and begin a "democratic domino theory": create a working democracy in Iraq, and all the autocratic Arab regimes that are the swamp which breeds terrorism will fall. Only problem there is that for suh a theory to work, commitment goes up after the military phase is over, not down, and this amdin. never admitted that to itself.

[TCO]

Originally posted by HershOstropoler


Yes, you're such a biggie.

And this is actually the problem. It's not about bigness. You hate to admit wrongness. Colon even said this about you. You will take an untenable position and twist to defend it. Heck, that is why it is so tedious to stake down your positions. To prevent the "I didn't mean THAT" defense. It's just tedious. That's why lately I just fire counter-trolls at your one-liners.

[TCO]

but 1936 was not a "critical juncture" either.

[Q Classic]

1936? i have to admit, my knowledge about the specifics of european history is considerably weaker. '36 was definitely critical in the east; wasn't it around this time, however, that hitler allied himself with tojo?

i suppose i could look it up, but i'm on dialup, so.

however, i believe that it would have been very possible to gather more support worldwide had we held our horses for a mere matter of months, to give the un some time to prove what we knew they couldn't.
there's nothing wrong with acting like the big man here, because that's what we would have been doing by cleaning iraq out.

instead, we acted like a bunch of arrogant prickish brutes--and thus lost out on a huge amount of potential support.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by TCO
The military never claimed that they could make sure all bombs land on target. Show me the specific statement from the military that is incorrect.

In practically every pentagon briefing they inevetably end up talking about how precise their weapons are, how they make surgical strikes, yaddah yaddah. They blatantly go out there and try to make them selves look like infallible gods before the public's eye. Then when they do blow up a civilian building, they do nothing but deny they did it, and when it becomes impossible for them to deny it, they shrug it off and say "whoops. next question please."

This is what I was geting at in that argument.. what, 2 years ago? that you can't seem to drop. Must of really pissed you off.

I never claimed that the USA could do bombing campaigns and damage only their targets, I claimed that they pretend they can and don't give a **** about the so-called 'collateral damage'.

[TCO]

Originally posted by Osweld


In practically every pentagon briefing they inevetably end up talking about how precise their weapons are, how they make surgical strikes, yaddah yaddah. They blatantly go out there and try to make them selves look like infallible gods before the public's eye. Then when they do blow up a civilian building, they do nothing but deny they did it, and when it becomes impossible for them to deny it, they shrug it off and say "whoops. next question please."

This is what I was geting at in that argument.. what, 2 years ago? that you can't seem to drop. Must of really pissed you off.

I never claimed that the USA could do bombing campaigns and damage only their targets, I claimed that they pretend they can and don't give a **** about the so-called 'collateral damage'.

They are only pretending it in your mind. Sure they brag about the weapons. They're significantly better than what we had before. You need to get over your visceral reactions to Pentagon briefings. If there is a specific claim, please cite it. You are just building up a strawman to hate.

[SlowwHand]

Precise is a relative term.
Bombs aren't precise like scalpels, you know.

[TCO]

Originally posted by Q Cubed
1936? i have to admit, my knowledge about the specifics of european history is considerably weaker. '36 was definitely critical in the east; wasn't it around this time, however, that hitler allied himself with tojo?

i suppose i could look it up, but i'm on dialup, so.

however, i believe that it would have been very possible to gather more support worldwide had we held our horses for a mere matter of months, to give the un some time to prove what we knew they couldn't.
there's nothing wrong with acting like the big man here, because that's what we would have been doing by cleaning iraq out.

instead, we acted like a bunch of arrogant prickish brutes--and thus lost out on a huge amount of potential support.

We DID spend several months trying to get support.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by TCO


They are only pretending it in your mind. Sure they brag about the weapons. They're significantly better than what we had before. You need to get over your visceral reactions to Pentagon briefings. If there is a specific claim, please cite it. You are just building up a strawman to hate.

Sorry guy, I'm not building the strawman, Rumsfield is.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Precise is a relative term.
Bombs aren't precise like scalpels, you know.

Which is why they like to use the term "surgical strike", right?

[Q Classic]

We DID spend several months trying to get support.

i don't think we spent long enough, trying to sell it to the rest of the world, anyway.