Terrorism in London

If I perceived the screwing up as such, I might. But I don't think mr Blair thinks he screwed up, at least not that badly. And he may also think that staying on after having been re-elected recently is the decent thing to do, even if the going gets tough. After all, he was re-elected after the Iraq/WMD debate, so apparently the majority of the British people think he's still worthy of a third term in office.

Although I do agree that militant Islamic fundamentalism is an issue that needs to be addressed (in some cases with violent military force), and indeed there are some nations with ties to that movement... Iraq was not one of them. Saddam Hussein was specifically supported by western powers because he was seen as standing up to them. Indeed, despite all of his horrific faults one of the things he was doing well was keeping militant Islamic fundamentalism out of Iraq.That's why this was one of the worst times to kick him out of power. That would come AFTER removing the militant Islamic threat, so they would not have a new nation from which to work. Uhhhh... Pakistan is listed as an ally in the war on terror. What I find interesting is that you list Khan's being removed yet not jailed or anything as some great thing, after he had already handed out the tech and the damage was done.When of course the whole argument against Iraq, which you continue to defend, is that Saddam MIGHT do that thing and so we must attack before he does. Remember, Colin Powell said one of the great things is that now it is sure that dissemination of that tech will not come from him... too bad it had already been done by Khan!This had nothing to do with Iraq until we invaded and allowed militant Islam a new base from which to operate and deal body blows to more innocent people as well as our troops.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

EU? Do you mean the Europian Union or the United Nations?

After the invasion of Iraq to make things safer... his argument and for which his credibility is placed on the line... Britain receives its worst terrorist attack in history.That is pretty damn bad, doubly so when it is at a time when he is hosting the world's leaders at an important conference.In any case, you are likely right that he won't recognize what he did was a screw up, and rationalize some reason that success and failure for Britain is all dependent on himself. In that light it is important for the nation that he not be seen to admit failure, and so he must stay in office.That is of course because he is not a good nor decent leader. He is like Bush and Berlusconi and Balkenende and Jong-Il and Hussein who can only view their nations as to how they themselves are percieved. Cult of personality problem.If he was decent he'd step down.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

I believe my post largely answers your points. But i'll reiterate some here in response.No, Iraq was not an islamist state. But hussein was, as i said, playing the enemy of my enemy is my friend game. he was involved in much terror. But that is less important than that America had to show the Arab and islamic world that it would no longer support tryannies, and that, instead, it would offer democracy. There were many reasons justifying Hussein's removal, which made his nation a good entry point for democracy.Hussein, though, was not supported by western powers because he kept the islamists in check - at least, not after the war with iran ended. Rather, the US and britian opposed him. germany, france and Russia supported him because of the truly wicked and utterly cynical oil and and huge business deals arrnaged and pre-arranged for when sanctions failed - due to these same nations undermining them in collusion with hussein.Kahn was still dessiminating nuclear tech. One reason Libya renounced its nuclear weapons program after he was removed, was that it could no longer work with him anyhow. Regardless of that, obviously it is more than important that an islamist was removed from pakistan's nuclear button.You say I justify Hussein's removal based on what he might do. That's partially true. But it's based on what he has done: Invade other nations; gas thousands of his own people; run rape rooms and human grinders, etc. It's obvious what a power-hungry, meglomaniac psychopath will do whenh empowered, especially when he already has exactly that track record.Yes. we drew islamists to iraq as a result of the war. That is good, as it concentrates them in a tighter region where they are easier to defeat.

That is wrong on a number of levels.a) The best you can say is that a majority of those who voted thought he was worthy of such.b) Since the election of a Prime Minister is integrally linked to the election of local MPs all it really shows is that the majority of those who voted wanted to retain a Labour government.c) Given the percieved likelihood of Gordon Brown taking up the position of Prime Minister, subsequent to Tony Blair's stepping down, there is not much basis for representing the victory of the Labour government as any sort of personal mandate for Blair.TTFN,WK

http://www.seanphillips.co.uk/p1.jpghttp://www.seanphillips.co.uk/p2.jpg

" Consider the incredible brashness of attacking the US, when it is so much more powerful than they. "Clearly the US is not more powerful than the Arab Nations otherwise they would surely take action against the true perpetrators of the suicide bombings. I do belive that the main nationality of the 9/11 bombers was NOT Iraqi. Therefore the war on terror is a fallacy. They are waging a war on Iraq whose main connection with said terror is as a victim.As it is Saudis etc are much to powerful in the oil stakes for George to even shake a stick at. Weapons are not the only form of power.

Hello, and welcome back, CanadianSteve.

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Arab intellectuals are no longer afraid to talk about democracy.

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I guess I don't know what you mean here. Arab intellectuals have had a longer history of speaking out against their non-democratic governments. The reason that we have rarely heard of them in the past is that these intellectuals have also been inconveniently critical of Israel, as well as US foreign policy in general. In fact, Al-Jazeera originated as a way to provide uncensored news to the Arab world -- it has consistently broadcast criticisms of Arab regimes and provoked criticisms by these regimes.In fact, intellectuals face grave danger of secular allies of the US like Egypt.So, what evidence do you have that Arab intellectuals face less fear than before? I know from our previous discussions that you don't like providing evidence for your opinions, but are there more pro-democractic article and speeches by Arabs than before? Are fewer intellectuals in jail than before? Was there a poll showing that intellectuals are less afraid? Or are you again going by a few unsupported comments by people like Daniel Pipes?

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There have been no terrorist attacks on the US, in part because the Islamists have concentrated their resources in Iraq.

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I don't understand the reasoning here. The "concentration" of resources didn't prevent the attacks in London, nor the attacks in Spain last year. Why do you think that the lack of attacks in the US can be attributed to this "concentration of resources"?

What was wrong with what we did in Afghanistan, I mean like why would it have been bad to finish the job in Afghanistan first, before looking at other nations to topple an reinvent?My next logical question is if stopping Islamic fundemantalism and WMD proliferation and totalitarianism was the most important criteria on selecting a target, why not start with Pakistan that is a military dictatorship who was disseminating the technology and supported both AQ and the Taliban? Indeed it is believed OBL is using borders with Pakistan to hide.Why would it make sense at all to attack Iraq whose only criteria would be that it was a dictatorship? Get a better news service, US companies are tied to this and whole national govts are not. Yes, so why did we allow him to get away with it scott free? You realize the damage we were trying to prevent Hussein from doing, which in fact he couldn't, had already been done by Kahn? And all he got was a slap on the wrist! Yeah that'll teach people not to mess with us. Ahem, we just got done invading another nation on just as flimsy a pretext and are currently running prison operations which have tortured and killed people. I might add that we had helped Hussein gas his people, and condoned his torture just as we are doing now with Egyptian and Saudi torture. Its a practice called rendering or rendition. You can't be this dumb. We did not lure and then confine a limited number of terrorists to Iraq where they can more easily be defeated. What we did was open the door to a new nation they were previously locked out of and so gave terrorists a broader field of play and indeed trapped our own troops (as well as the Iraqi people) in a veritable shooting gallery.In addition, this does not affect at all their capacity to engage other operations outside of Iraq at will. That is what the London tragedy has just shown. The dream that we pinned down terrorists in Iraq has been quite dramatically shattered.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

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We did not lure and then confine a limited number of terrorists to Iraq where they can more easily be defeated.

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Why does this remind me of Comrade Stalin's brilliant plan of luring the German army deep into Soviet territory where they could be easily defeated?

You can’t be this dumb Holmes, to think that poor little Iraq was just an ordinary dictatorship. Blair didn’t screw up, shouldn’t apologize, and shouldn’t resign. He was wholly justified in his support for the war on terror and the campaign in Iraq and Afghanistan. I find it disgusting that you compare Blair and Bush to Hussein and Jong-Il. It is your kind of rhetoric that helps the terrorists and their cause. Did you know about the London attack ahead of time? Exactly Holmes. We needed to attack before Saddam had a chance to do some terrible things. It was common knowledge that Saddam was going to reconstitute his WMD program. To deny this is to close a blind eye to the reality of the situation.

Getting way OT. Please do not reply to this message

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I find it disgusting that you compare Blair and Bush to Hussein and Jong-Il.

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I agree. Jong Il has never invaded a country without provocation.This message has been edited by AdminJar, 07-08-2005 01:32 PM

Yes, i did mean the UN. However, given that prominent members of the EU, France and Germany, were doing likewise, and france was the main reason the UN did, it almost amounts to the same thing.