A story from WW2; bin Laden motive that Bush doesn't see

[Sava]

My grandfather recently shared his experience at his hometown of Kragujevic. He was one of 5 survivors of a massacre of 5,000 men and boys who were killed by the Nazis after being forced to dig their own graves. My grandfather told me how the whole situation came about. Serbian partisans ambushed a Nazi patrol. They cut the Nazis' heads and genitals off, and stuffed the genitals in the mouths of the heads, took pictures of it, and sent it to Hitler. Hitler, so angry, sent the Nazis to Kragujevic to kill the civilians in retribution. They shot every male between 12 and 70. My grandfather survived by hiding under dead bodies and playing dead. Nice huh?

The partisans did what they did because they wanted the Nazis to do something so horrible, it would encourage the native population to fight the Nazis. They knew what Hitler would do in response and they got what they wanted.

Anyways, the point is that this parallels OBL's motives. OBL wants the US to attack Iraq. He commits terror acts in order to enrage America so that it takes military action in that region. Even though OBL is motivated by the US's presence and ultimately wants the US gone; he's smart enough to realize that America won't run away in the face of terrorism. So he wants America to increase it's military presence. It gives him more targets that are easily accessable, as well as serves as a recruiting tool for more terrorists. He wants to enrage Muslims to encourage them to fight America.

Bush is playing right into OBL's hands in his vendetta against Saddam.

But I'm not surprised that war supporters can't connect the dots. They rarely do.

[Pekka]

I think this has been obvious for a long time when it comes to OBL. Of course he wants to get more tension with americans. That's what terrorists do.
Does this mean he should be left alone? Of course not.
OBL wants to destroy the US, he can't do that with few attacks. He needs full scale war and never ending anger and hatred in his fellow countries.

Countries have been given a chance to get rid off terrorists and fight it with our help. If they fail to do that, and even more if they are not intersted in helping, they get punished. Fair deal.

[Pekka]

And personally I don't think Iraq has not so much to do with terrorism. This is just a snack before moving on to demolishing terrorism and their harbors. Iraq just has dictator that needs to be toppled, because he is ticking time bomb.

[Kropotkin]

Well, it doesn't seem like a wild guess that an attack on Iraq might lead to at least a short time popularity boost for Osama. Particulary so if the attack becomes bloody for the iraqi side.

That's one of the lessons from history that the 'appeasement'-ranters haven't thought about. I started a thread about such thing but it faded away in the usual gibberish.

[Ecthy]

Have you just been comparing Bush to Hitler?

[Az]

"never to return" my ass.

[Ming]

Well Sava... you seem to be the one that can't connect the dots. Yeah... Bush doesn't realize that going to war in Iraq might piss off the Arab world...



Yeah right...

It is just their opinion that the pluses out weigh the minues. Your opinion is just different than theirs...

So yes, they can connect the dots, you just can't

[Kropotkin]

Both are connecting dots, it's just that Sava finds the lines to show a picture of a bunny and Bush a dragon.

[Urban Ranger]

W. completely underestimated the global resistance against his war plan.

It would have helped if he had worked the diplomatic circuits to see what various countries feel about the whole thing. A lack of experience in international relations indeed.

[Zylka]

Edited by Ming...

One more post like that Zylka, and you are toast again.

[Zylka]

...but not to be so cold, I exclude your grandfather from that generalization and am glad that he was able to escape such a horrific and brutal war crime. No one deserves to have to go through that to survive, let alone be systematically executed and thrown in a ditch. Idiocy

[Sava]

Ming, instead of missing my point and belittling me, perhaps you should read a little more into what I'm saying. I know Bush realizes that Iraq action will piss Iraq off. I don't think that he realizes that OBL wants him to attack Iraq. And if he does, I think he's overestimating how effective US military action in Iraq will be.

Sure, when Saddam has all his tanks in the desert out in the open, it's easy to blow them up. Going through the streets of Baghdad, house to house, is a lot harder. This war is going to be fought in the streets, not in the desert.

Saddam isn't a martyr... he doesn't want to be one. He's a narcissist who wants to live and remain in power. If the realization sets in the he's going to be removed... i.e. US troops at his door... he's going to set off any WoMD he has and try to take as many people with him as possible. Although Saddam's conventional capabilities might be far below what they were in 1991-92, I think that he's got WoMD in place for a last ditch suicide plot.

My point is not that Bush doesn't know that Iraq action will piss off the Arab world (but it's nice to know that you think I'm that dumb); my point is that Bush's advice is coming from over-confident military people and that he's not thinking about worst-case scenarios, and he's certainly not bothering to think about post-Saddam situations.

[Bereta_Eder]

OBL wants the US/west to increase force against muslim countries so that people will rise up.

For that he is willing to commit attrocities to the US in order to get them to fight back which will in responce make more muslim people to fight back.


It is an old trick, which was used by many red terrorist groups in Europe too.

[Bereta_Eder]

BTW Serbian partisans were tough mothers

[Arrian]

He didn't miss your point Sava.

He said that your point has been taken into consideration, but didn't convince the administration not to attack Iraq.

It may be the wrong decision (attacking Iraq, that is), but the idea that Bush & Co. have simply not considered a backlash in the Arab world is silly. Of course they've thought about it. They see it in a different light than you do, though.

Events pre- and post-invading Afganistan are probably encouraging them to think that the backlash won't be that bad. There were a lot of people worried about a massive backlash in the Arab world if we attack Afganistan and took down the Taleban. Didn't happen. That's not to say that Afganistan didn't have any effect (though the people who got most worked up over it already hated our guts), just that the benifits of getting rid of the Taleban and maybe nabbing Osama (doh, didn't pull that part off) outwayed the downside.

-Arrian