Now that war is assured...

[Dis]

well not that many people cared when americans lost their lives.

It is human nature to dismiss those people who you have never met who are no where near where you live.

But I don't hold it against them. I have nothing against the people who cheered when the WTC was attacked. They have the right to do that. And I do not wish for their death.

[Lincoln]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Do explain why you are clamouring for an attack on Iraq. If there wouldn't be a war, there wouldn't be bombs dropped. The root cause of civilian causalties is a trigger happy GWB administration. Please explain how this is related to the left you are trying so hard to demonise.



Please explain which bit of the post is supposed to be funny.

The funny thing is that what I said is evidently true in your case. To the other more reasonable posters on the left I was not seriously suggesting that they would gloat in civilian casualities.

And I am not "clamouring for an attack" and I never stated that I was. If you have evidence otherwise then please post it here. The root cause of civilian casualities btw is Saddam's incessent desire to put them in harms way to protect himself and his immoral dictatorship over the innocent.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Dissident
well not that many people cared when americans lost their lives.

WTC : international minute of silence. Europe-wide 3 minutes of silence. Many minutes of silence observed in private gatherings outside the US. All non-rogue governments expressing their "unconditional support" to the US war against error (such a support Bush botched very quickly, his lack of diplomatic skills are impressive )

I have yet to see an event where people worldwide cared more for the victims. You can bet no anti-war people will have minutes of silence for the Iraqi victims.

[Dis]

I think most of that was just PC nonsense. It is always politically correct to have moment of silences and such.

[Lincoln]

Everyone:

Please excuse my hasty first post on this thread. I thought it was a witty response to the thread starter who evidently wanted to start a flame war with the right. I do not seriously think that anyone here (including UR) would like to see innocent blood spilled anywhere. And I certainly take no delight in this war or any other war for any cause. I seriously weep for both the citizens of Iraq and the Americans who will lose their lives in this conflict and there is no stone that should be left unturned to prevent it before it begins.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Dissident
I think most of that was just PC nonsense. It is always politically correct to have moment of silences and such.

Agreed. However, these symbolical acts reflected how much people did care. I remember Sept. 11 very well in France : the towers collapsed at ca. 16:00, and the major channels + news networks (news networks are minor channels) only talked about this, with nearly no information coverage from the rest of the world. From 16:00 to the morning after. People talked almost only about it, I heard there was a peak in phone calls (I have been called 3 times about this, and I'm really not a phonephile).
I'm sure the commotion was the same in all the West, and was more significant than most things in other aprts of the world.

Saying people didn't care about American deaths in WTC is really false.
I agree people would care much less if they learned Gulf War 2 made 3000 American casualties. It hasn't the same symbolical force than a surprising and murderous attack on the very symbol of your power.

[Gatekeeper]

I'm sure all you folks going on about containment would be more than happy to chip in some money and contribute the requisite military personnel needed to keep the pressure on Saddam, hmm? You'd also help with the construction of facilities to house said personnel and material?

It took more than 200,000 troops sitting on Iraq's border to even get Saddam to budge a damn *inch* on *some* issues with the inspectors. You think that's cheap for the U.S. taxpayer? It sure as hell isn't, and if you like that sort of containment and its intermittent results, fork over the cold, hard cash to help pay for it. I don't mind containment — hell, the West did it for more than 40 years regarding communism — but it's time for the rest of the first world nations to shoulder, at the very least, some of the on-going financial costs of containment, if not troops.

I'm all for a Marshall Plan II as well for Afghanistan and Iraq. But I bet taxpayers — both U.S. domestic and those of our esteemed allies — won't put up with it. It would affect their retirement plans, after all.

Gatekeeper

[KrazyHorse]

I'm sure all you folks going on about containment would be more than happy to chip in some money and contribute the requisite military personnel needed to keep the pressure on Saddam, hmm? You'd also help with the construction of facilities to house said personnel and material?

How many men were you keeping in Saudi Arabia again? 5 000?

You could have kept them there for a couple of centuries for the cost of going to war.

And the rest of the world already paid for Gulf I...

[Gatekeeper]

Oh, yes, and those 5,000 personnel were just so effective at convincing Saddam to let the inspectors back in after 1998.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Dissident
well how about this?:

we made a mistake supporting Saddam Hussein in the 80's.

Now it is time to correct that mistake.

It could not have been a mistake -- the United States intelligence had to have known of Saddam's dictatorship rule, and his crimes against humanity during the 1980's, and yet United States was allied with Saddam.

There was no mistake about it -- United States willingly allied itself with a dictator.

[Guest]

Of course it did. Anything to hasten the downfall of the USSR.

However, now, they don't have that reason and so they find it morally repugnant and are about to do something about it.

And when you think about it. They are about the only ones that can do anything about their past decisions. They have both the military power and the responsibility to fix what they had to do in the past.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Gatekeeper
Oh, yes, and those 5,000 personnel were just so effective at convincing Saddam to let the inspectors back in after 1998.

Who cares?

[My Wife Hates CIV]

I'll go on the record right now before the war (if you want to call it that) starts.

There will be more freindly fire deaths (US) than real combat deaths. US forces will suffer only small numbers. Much like the first Gulf War. And even the freindly fire might not be that many. Less than 500 US deaths.

On the Iraq side... it all depends on what happens as far as will they fight. More people in Iraq will be killed by air raids/missiles than by our (US) ground troops. This because most if not all will give up - those outside of the capital. Inside the capital - those iraqi might fight, but not for long.

But this will not be a war. This is a clean up operation. It's over before it really even starts. And I'm not saying it's not a big operation... just that iraq really really military wise sucks compared to the US.

USA!!!

[Spiffor]

A "clean-up operation" which will look like this :





Bravo

[MikeH]

I can only speak about the UK but 9/11 was massive here. There was huge sympathy for the US, for weeks our firefighters were out collecting money for the families of US firefighters and the other victims and people were giving generously, I certainly did.

Everyone I know was very moved by the scale of it, the images and the stories of bravery from the rescue teams and the normal New York citizens.

Disagreeing with Bush and Blair over this war doesn't change that for me.