War in Iraq, is there a point?

quote:

---

And I thank God we have it and not them because whatever our faults we ARE the good guys and always have been.

---

Japanese internment camps.The Trail of Tears.200 years of slavery, lynchings, hatred and racism until the present.The KKK in the whitehouse.The School of the AmericasMaking nice with Saddam Hussein while he gassed his own people.Torture in military prisons.This message has been edited by schrafinator, 08-23-2005 09:11 AM

quote:

---

It doesn't even seem to occur to some that whereas maybe the Iraq war is not worth it for us, getting rid of Saddam could be a good thing for Iraq.

---

Yes, but is the US the world's policeman now?Is it our job to invade every country with a cruel dictator?Why aren't we invading Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, North Korea, Syria, Indonesia, Iraq, Sudan, Burundi, and a dozen other countries with cruel dictatorships or militant Islamic governments to help the people of those nations?They chop people's heads off and stone adulterous women to death in Saudi Arabia, you know.

quote:

---

Of course, if Iraqis vote in an Islamic type of government, they are just hurting themselves, and it will have been somewhat in vain, but in some ways that's not our fault.

---

Of course it will be our fault. We got rid of Hussein, who mainained a secular government in the region and suppressed the militant Islamicists. There was a power vacuum left in it's place and since we didn't think there would even be an insurgency and don't have enough troops on the ground we haven't secured the country.The military Islamicists have won the hearts and minds of the people, not us.

quote:

---

The people have to want freedom bad enough to get rid of the mullahs and their extremist rhetoric.

---

Yeah, we see how that worked for the Iranians, the Indonesians, the people who live in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of radical Islam.This message has been edited by schrafinator, 08-23-2005 09:21 AM

quote:

---

Much of the western world resents American success and power.

---

I don't think that is true.Much of the western world resents a childish bully, which is what the US has become.

quote:

---

It does seem to me that there must be a good reason for the success and power of the US, and one of the reasons is the degree of freedom that Americans have.

---

We have a lot of success and power now because of our very large size (aquired by imperialistic means, often violent), copious coastlines, and abundant natural resources and farmland. We used a lot of slave labor to produce agricultural products. Later, during the industrial age, we also took in large numbers of poor europeans to work for pennies in our factories and sweatshops (this was before the LIBERALS enacted things like child labor, minimum wage, and worker's rights laws) and which created a lot of centralised wealth. Now we have large multinational corporations which have continued the centralised wealth.

quote:

---

Many Americans, Canadians and Brits etc have died for the freedom of others. Freedom is worth fighting and dying for whether it be for our own freedom or for the freedom of others.

---

But Iraq was not a war that was forced upon us. It was purely a war of choice. There was no imminent threat to the US from Iraq.I completely supported the war in Afghanistan (as did the rest of the world, including Europe) and was dismayed that we did not finish the job there.

quote:

---

There is evidence that funding & training for the 9/11 hijackers was provided by Iraq. Meetings took place between Iraqi intelligence officials & Mohammed Atta, the training camp known as Salman Pak, southwest of Baghdad trained hijackers in the EXACT METHODS used on 9/11, & at least 5 of the hijackers trained in that camp. That is not a coincidence, that is a direct link to 9/11.

---

I did a bit of research into Salman Pak. This is what I found. FrontlineWe know that Chalabi and the INC duped us with bogus information on several other matters, so why should I believe the INC about this, especially when we have not been able to verify anything he claimed?Do you have any verification of Khodada's story?Also, what is the source of your claim above?This message has been edited by schrafinator, 08-23-2005 10:13 AM

quote:

---

The heart of the Islamist movement, its ideology, and the source of its funds and major training centres, was Afghanistan - bin laden's base - and is still other points in the islamic world.

---

While I could agree that a lot of terroist training went on in Afghanistan, the heart of radical Islam is Saudi Arabia.That is where the mullahs are who call for young Islamic men to die resisting the West.

I actually had Woodrow Wilson in mind.

quote:

---

You seem to be obtuse or incapable of comprehending the circumstances we have been forced into dealing with.

---

Gee, wasn't it you who were worried about having your intelligence called into question?Seems like you have no problem dishing it out.

quote:

---

Obviously some of you guys didn't take this course. Have any of you stopped to think what the outcome would be in the unlikely event we were to loose this war? Would like to see the women in our nation wearing burkas? Sharia laws imposed on the entire population?

---

Women in Iraq didn't have to wear burkkas when Hussein was in power.Sharia wasn't law there, because Hussein suppressed radical Islam.Now there is a real possibility that Iraq will be a fundamentalist islamic state, just like Saudi Arabia and Iran.All that because of the Iraq war.