more cracks from europe.

[Ted Striker]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
Spain
Poland

now, everyone else please follow suit and leave and let the US clean up it's own mess.

Europe

Cool.

I think the US should have left Europe to clean up its mess for say, oh, the entire last century.

Maybe Europe could have pushed the death toll to 500 million.

You're welcome.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Q Cubed
why are we happy about poland possibly pulling out early?

that means more americans will have to die instead.

Why should be happy for them to stay. That means it's just some poles dying, when it could be americans.


Wouldn't want that!

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Ned
Hold on there, Saint Marcus. Kerry want to dump it in your laps. He insists that if he is elected, we can pull a lot of our forces out of Iraq and replace them with European troops.

Is he a fool?

Nope. Marcus isn't representative of European views, especially not of European governments' views. There can be a strong European commitment in Iraq, but the transfer of authority to the UN is seen as a necessity.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Spiffor

Nope. Marcus isn't representative of European views, especially not of European governments' views. There can be a strong European commitment in Iraq, but the transfer of authority to the UN is seen as a necessity.

I think we would all appreciate European support. We just don't trust you to actually send troops or money if we turn matters over to the UN.

What might be a good compromise would be to gradually turn areas over to the UN. We pull out Coalition troops under US command to be replaced by UN troops. The first "UN Troops" could be the Brits and the Poles and the other forces operating under them.

In the end, I suspect the UN will not do much and will leave the bulk of the operation to the US.

[Harovan]

Germany wouldn't send troops no matter what, not only because it doesn't wish to, but also because it doesn't have them, to begin with. Mind you that we quietly replaced US troops whereever they had to leave while preparing for the invasion of Iraq, be it in Kosovo or Afghanistan. This and the granting of passage rights (which were denied you by other countries, by the way) was our way to help. The rantings and insults by your nutjobs in power are thus not very appreciated and have lead to an increasing anti-american stance hereabouts. Our army isn't very big and was restricted over decades to nerf its mobility and ability to act autonomous. This was changed by the return of full sovereignty in the 90's, but the necessary reforms will take a while.

[Ned]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Germany wouldn't send troops no matter what, not only because it doesn't wish to, but also because it doesn't have them, to begin with. Mind you that we quietly replaced US troops whereever they had to leave while preparing for the invasion of Iraq, be it in Kosovo or Afghanistan. This and the granting of passage rights (which were denied you by other countries, by the way) was our way to help. The rantings and insults by your nutjobs in power are thus not very appreciated and have lead to an increasing anti-american stance hereabouts. Our army isn't very big and was restricted over decades to nerf its mobility and ability to act autonomous. This was changed by the return of full sovereignty in the 90's, but the necessary reforms will take a while.

Thanks for the information on your support. It is not well known here for some reason. There is no doubt that if Germany's support were better known, there would be an instantaneous upwelling of pro-German feeling here.

[The Mad Monk]

Originally posted by Spiffor

Nope. Marcus isn't representative of European views, especially not of European governments' views. There can be a strong European commitment in Iraq, but the transfer of authority to the UN is seen as a necessity.

You want to transfer authority to these people?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Azazel
Afghanistan isn't a fair comparison. It has NOTHING. absolutely NOTHING. It will certainly take a LOT of time to build it. I actually think that the US' grade on Afghanistan is fair.

Cambodia isn't that better off than Afghanistan, either. There was a civil war, some sort of reign of terror, then some Vietnamese invasion. Other than having better land than the Afganis, I reckon their initial conditions were more or less on the same level.

[Cruddy]

Originally posted by Saint Marcus
Spain
Poland

now, everyone else please follow suit and leave and let the US clean up it's own mess.

Europe

How is Iraq solely the responsibility of the US?

Saddam Hussein was very much a product of the West, aping Western ideas like Stalinism (Western from his point of view), paid for by huge loans from France, Germany, the US and (shame!) the UK.

In fact, Israel was do dischuffed by the whole lot of us paying for the butchery and death they bombed the crap out of the nuclear reactors the French (?) had recently "sold" him. (Hey! We'll lend you money if you spend it on our products!"

Your view is narrow, your knowledge of recent history is almost immeasurably small, and you seem happy to blame anyone for what is without doubt a problem of COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY. Oh yes, I see you list "US bashing" as a hobby.

Now go and look up how many torture implements have been exported by Western countries to other places, and work out how many Saddam's there are...

And WHY should you? Because the bottom line that the REASON for a lot of these inhuman brutalities is...

ROYAL DUTCH SHELL! : : :

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Pekka
To call them traitors and weak is STUPID. That's how you turn your friends against you. It's only logical. WMDs -> let's roll. No WMDs? Let's get out.

What happened to you? You are being reasonable, Pekka.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Cruddy
How is Iraq solely the responsibility of the US?

Looks like to me a case of "you made the mess, you clean it up."

Originally posted by Cruddy
Saddam Hussein was very much a product of the West, aping Western ideas like Stalinism (Western from his point of view), paid for by huge loans from France, Germany, the US and (shame!) the UK.

The CIA had a hand in helping the Ba'ath Party to rise to power, and the US helped Saddam in the war against Iran. Rummy shaked hand with Saddam, and he got anthrax and other fun stuff from the CDC.

Saddam had been a murderous bastard all along. The difference is, of course, he was US's murderous bastard.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Agathon

You must be joking. They still gloat about handing you your asses.

Are they gloating about the 20+ to 1 kill ratio too?

[Sikander]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

You can't say that for sure. We can't even say what the probabilty is. There is every chance it could have ended up as poor and messed up as Indonesia or the Philippines. Especially after the massive damage to the countryside from the bombing and spraying.

Which we obviously wouldn't have done had they been on our side.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Sikander
Are they gloating about the 20+ to 1 kill ration too?

Hot damn. A lot of civilians got killed.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger

Hot damn. A lot of civilians got killed.

You just don't lead them as much.