Bush's Iraqi Platitudes

[Ziggurat]

100,000 dead civilians. I guess they don't get recorded in the polls.

I thought we've been over this already.

1) The 100,000 figure from the Lancet study is NOT civilians (the editors lied about that, but the actual study makes this clear). It is TOTAL deaths due to the invasion, including military, civilian, terrorist, and even victims of increased crime from Saddam letting loose criminals. It's EVERYTHING.

2) The Lancet study has enormous error bars and MAJOR sampling problems which make it extremely unreliable. Their arbitrary procedure for pairing provinces and only sampling from one of the pair destroys the randomness of the sampling procedure. Their figure is close to useless.

3) The UNDP released a later study, with something like an order of magnitude larger sample size and none of the weird sampling problems, which arrived at a number closer to 30,000 deaths, and a much smaller error bar on that number (but still, it can be noted, well within the huge error bars of the Lancet study). There is simply no valid reason to prefer an earlier, smaller study with huge error bars to the later, more extensive study with much better statistics. Note again, though, that this is still a death total which includes military and terrorist deaths, not simply civilians.

You knew this, Mark, because I've brought it up before in a thread where you attacked Skeptic for challenging that number.

http://206.225.95.123/forumlive/showthread.php?t=43130&highlight=Lancet

I already pointed all this stuff out to you in that thread, and you even said at the time, to try to defend yourself, that "I never used the 100,000 figure in the first place, for the simple reason that there is no way to know for certain." In other words, you claimed back then that you never thought the 100,000 number was reliable enough to stand behind even before the criticism I raised. But now, AFTER having all those problems exposed in that previous thread, you decide that you DO want to stand behind the 100,000 number. Not only that, you perpetuate the lie that the 100,000 number refers to civilians, even after that notion was also shown to be false in the previous thread. Sorry, Mark, but you've been caught. Will you retract your claim?

 

[Year Zero]

Let's examine the evidence in detail then:

On 16 March 1988, the Iranians attacked Halabja. I am going to type a passage from a report on fighting a war against Iraq compiled by Stephen Pelletiere, LTC Douglas V. Johnson, and Leif Rosenberger, published by the Amry War College Stategic Studies Institute in 1990. The report goes into Halabja in detail. Here is some of Pelletiere's more recent quotes on the subject.

This much about the gassings at Halabja we undoubtedly know; it came about in course of a battle between Iraqis and Iranians. Iraq used chemical weapons to try and kill Iranians who had seized the town. The Kurdish civilians who died had the misfortune to be caught up in that exchange. But they were not Iraq's main target.

The story gets murkier. Immediately after the battle, the US Defense Intelligence Agency investigated and produced a classified report, which it circulated within the intelligence community on a need-to-know basis. That study asserted that it was Iranian gas that killed the Kurds, not Iraqi gas.

The agency did find that each side used gas against each other in the battle around Halabja. The condition of the dead Kurds' bodies, however, indicated that they had been killed with a blood agent - that is a cyanide-based gas - which Iran was known to use. The Iraqis, who are thought to have used Mustard Gas in the battle, are not known to have possessed blood agents at the time.

These facts have long been in the public domain but, extraordinarily, as often as the Halabja affair is cited, they are rarely mentioned. A much-discussed article in the New Yorker in March 2002 did not make reference to the DIA report, or consider that Iranian gas might have killed the Kurds. On the rare occasions the report is being brought up, there is usually speculation, with no proof, that it was skewed out of American political favoritism for Iraq in its war against Iran.

I am not trying to rehabilitate the character of Saddam Hussein... But accusing him of gassing his own people at Halabja as an act of genocide is not correct, because as far as the information we have goes, all of the cases where gas was used involved battles. These were tragedies of war. There may be justification for invading Iraq, but Halabja is not one of them. "



Other things to consider:

James Baker, meeting deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz in Geneva in 1990, told Aziz that he did not believe the story of Iraq gassing Kurds.

Mohammed al-Obaidi, a professor in the UK was born and educated in Baghdad. al-Obaidi's brother was a Colonel in the Iraqi army(later a general) in 1988, and was sent to Halabja when it became apparent that an attack by the Iranians was about to happen. Keep in mind that al-Obaidi, and his brother are Shiites. The brother never heard of any gas being used around Halabja at all when his regiment arrived in the town two days after the attack had been driven off.

General Nezar al-Khazraji was the Deputy Chief of Staff for the Iraqi army, who met with al-Obaidi's brother in Halabja when he arrived there. Al-Khazraji later fell out of favor with Saddam and snuck out of the country, with the help of the Kurds. The general settled in Denmark, and a Danish court raised an issue over the gassings of Kurds at Halabja. Al-Khazraji invited the court to contact leaders of the Kurdish parties who had hosted him for a time during his evacuation from Iraq, and ask them if he was guilty. On the contrary, the Kurds who were contacted confirmed his innocence, and the court dropped the charges.


How many times did Iraq use gas?

An October 2002 CIA report cites 10 documented cases of Iraqi use of chemical weapons, most against the Iranians, with three against Kurds and Iranians, but always within the context of the war.


About claims of gas attacks in the Anfal campaign AFTER Halabja.
What about refugees?

Turkish doctors asked by the reporters to confirm the claims of gas said there was no sign of gassing.

The UN High Commission for Refugees(UNCHR)m which had representatives in the area, confirmed this view, as did the Red Cross and Red Crescent.

Use of gas in that terrain would have been extremely problematic, and based on the first documented use of gas by Iraq in similar terrain they would not be so stupid as to make the same mistake again. Using gas at Halabja would have meant Iraqi forces, in pursuit of a smaller Iranian force, would be spraying gas in their own path.

The Arab League agreed that America lacked proof of its allegations in this matter.

 

[Year Zero]

The Iraqis don't think things are far worse, and you don't even need to look up opinion polls to know that either. Just look at refugee flows. People fled Iraq in large numbers under Saddam. More people have returned to Iraq than have left it since we began our invasion.

So I'm curious: by what metric are things "far worse" in Iraq now than they were under Saddam?

Yes people that wanted their share of the spoils of war ARE flooding into Iraq. However, it still remains a fact that the civil infrastructure and standard of living was better in Iraq under Saddam, even under sanctions, the main cause of the refugee flood.

 

[Mark]

I thought we've been over this already.

1) The 100,000 figure from the Lancet study is NOT civilians (the editors lied about that, but the actual study makes this clear). It is TOTAL deaths due to the invasion, including military, civilian, terrorist, and even victims of increased crime from Saddam letting loose criminals. It's EVERYTHING.

2) The Lancet study has enormous error bars and MAJOR sampling problems which make it extremely unreliable. Their arbitrary procedure for pairing provinces and only sampling from one of the pair destroys the randomness of the sampling procedure. Their figure is close to useless.

3) The UNDP released a later study, with something like an order of magnitude larger sample size and none of the weird sampling problems, which arrived at a number closer to 30,000 deaths, and a much smaller error bar on that number (but still, it can be noted, well within the huge error bars of the Lancet study). There is simply no valid reason to prefer an earlier, smaller study with huge error bars to the later, more extensive study with much better statistics. Note again, though, that this is still a death total which includes military and terrorist deaths, not simply civilians.

You knew this, Mark, because I've brought it up before in a thread where you attacked Skeptic for challenging that number.

http://206.225.95.123/forumlive/showthread.php?t=43130&highlight=Lancet

I already pointed all this stuff out to you in that thread, and you even said at the time, to try to defend yourself, that "I never used the 100,000 figure in the first place, for the simple reason that there is no way to know for certain." In other words, you claimed back then that you never thought the 100,000 number was reliable enough to stand behind even before the criticism I raised. But now, AFTER having all those problems exposed in that previous thread, you decide that you DO want to stand behind the 100,000 number. Not only that, you perpetuate the lie that the 100,000 number refers to civilians, even after that notion was also shown to be false in the previous thread. Sorry, Mark, but you've been caught. Will you retract your claim?

What claim? That estimates for Iraqi dead are as high as 100,000? No. Some estimates are that high...that's just a fact. Especially when (from the Boston Globe):

Even as news organizations cobbled together credible numbers of Iraqi civilians killed by U.S. forces, the head of statistics of the Iraqi health ministry said she was told to stop counting civilian casualties under pressure from the health minister and the Coalition Provisional Authority. The authority and the health minister denied the suppression, but the same ministry had issued preliminary numbers months earlier.

In April 2004, Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt was asked about the images on Iraqi television of civilians being killed in Falluja by American forces. His answer was, "Change the channel.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/12/20/opinion/edjackson.php

 

[Ziggurat]

Yes people that wanted their share of the spoils of war ARE flooding into Iraq.

I'm not talking about Chalabi and his ilk. I'm talking about things like Iraqis squatting in Iranian refugee camps - Iraqis who aren't going to get any "spoils of war" unless those spoils are getting into the hands of pretty much everyone.

However, it still remains a fact that the civil infrastructure and standard of living was better in Iraq under Saddam, even under sanctions, the main cause of the refugee flood.

By what metric was the standard of living better under Saddam? Since large numbers of refugees DID flow out of Iraq under Saddam, both during the sanctions and even before, but are NOT flowing out now, doesn't that suggest that the standard of living, in terms that the Iraqis themselves actually care about, has gotten better?

 

[Year Zero]

I'm not talking about Chalabi and his ilk. I'm talking about things like Iraqis squatting in Iranian refugee camps - Iraqis who aren't going to get any "spoils of war" unless those spoils are getting into the hands of pretty much everyone.



By what metric was the standard of living better under Saddam? Since large numbers of refugees DID flow out of Iraq under Saddam, both during the sanctions and even before, but are NOT flowing out now, doesn't that suggest that the standard of living, in terms that the Iraqis themselves actually care about, has gotten better?

First of all, people that CAN leave Iraq are, so let's not pretend that the refugee flow is entirely reversed. Second, Iraq before the sanctions, even after the Iraq war, had an excellent standard of living if we look at religious rights, GDP per capita income, unemployment, literacy, the usual.

The main complaint about post-invasion Iraq is about the civilian infrastructure, namely power, water, sewage, and health care.

 

[Ziggurat]

What claim? That estimates for Iraqi dead are as high as 100,000? No. Some estimates are that high...that's just a fact.

I was willing to cut you some slack for possibly having forgotten what went on in an earlier thread. But now you're lying about what you said in THIS thread. Yes, some estimates for the death total have been as high as 100,000. But that's not what you said. I asked by what metric were things worse now, and you said:

100,000 dead civilians. I guess they don't get recorded in the polls.

So now you're defending this by saying that since the statistic exists, then despite the fact that it may be wrong, your statement is acceptable. That ignores the fact that you presented this statistic as being reliable (after all, if you're merely reporting on statistics, why bother with only this one? Why not quote the huge error bars?) or at least the best available, when it is clearly not. But even more disturbingly, your quote EXPLICITLY perpetuates the lie that this number refers to civilian deaths. That is not a statistic which exists AT ALL, and you cannot defend yourself by claiming to be simply reporting on a statistic. You have been called on it, and the best you can do in your defense is to try to change the subject away from your actual claim? Sorry, Mark, that's simply not good enough. When you repeat a lie, and are called on it, I expect a little more in response than that. I expect a retraction. And I'm disappointed you didn't have the honesty to retract the lie when I first called you on it.

 

[Mark]

I was willing to cut you some slack for possibly having forgotten what went on in an earlier thread. But now you're lying about what you said in THIS thread. Yes, some estimates for the death total have been as high as 100,000. But that's not what you said. I asked by what metric were things worse now, and you said:



So now you're defending this by saying that since the statistic exists, then despite the fact that it may be wrong, your statement is acceptable. That ignores the fact that you presented this statistic as being reliable (after all, if you're merely reporting on statistics, why bother with only this one? Why not quote the huge error bars?) or at least the best available, when it is clearly not. But even more disturbingly, your quote EXPLICITLY perpetuates the lie that this number refers to civilian deaths. That is not a statistic which exists AT ALL, and you cannot defend yourself by claiming to be simply reporting on a statistic. You have been called on it, and the best you can do in your defense is to try to change the subject away from your actual claim? Sorry, Mark, that's simply not good enough. When you repeat a lie, and are called on it, I expect a little more in response than that. I expect a retraction. And I'm disappointed you didn't have the honesty to retract the lie when I first called you on it.

You know for a fact it is a lie? I don't. It may be high, it may not...especially since the Iraqi Health Ministry is claiming they are being told not to count them.

 

[Ziggurat]

First of all, people that CAN leave Iraq are, so let's not pretend that the refugee flow is entirely reversed.

If refugees want to flee across the border, unlike under Saddam, nobody is waiting to kill them. It's easier to leave Iraq now than it was under Saddam, and yet there's no major exodus. Doesn't that tell you something?

Second, Iraq before the sanctions, even after the Iraq war, had an excellent standard of living if we look at religious rights, GDP per capita income, unemployment, literacy, the usual.

But the comparison isn't with Iraq before the sanctions, is it? The best argument against toppling him was precisely that the sanctions kept him in check - lift those and you remove that security argument. So let's look at these factors for before and after the war, since simply lifting sanctions isn't one of the courses of action being debated here.

Literacy rates are actually kind of low for the region, and they do NOT change quickly in ANY direction (particularly down) within a few years, anywhere, under any conditions. So we can't really use that.

GDP was SHRINKING in 2001 (around -6%), before our invasion. It shrank faster in the immediate aftermath of the war (-21% in 2003), but has grown spectacularly since then (+54% in 2004, an estimated +34% in 2005), surpassing pre-war levels.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/iraq.html

Unemployment is still bad, but getting better. It was also bad under Saddam. I don't think there are any good figures for pre-war unemployment rates, though.

As for religious rights, the Shia were prevented from celebrating many of their religious holidays. There essentially WERE no religious rights: there were the things Saddam cracked down on, and the things he didn't care about and chose to ignore, but none of that constituted rights.

The main complaint about post-invasion Iraq is about the civilian infrastructure, namely power, water, sewage, and health care.

Which were ALL bad pre-war - we just never heard the complaints, because you never do in an oppressive dictatorship like Saddam's Iraq. Power was better in Baghdad, but only at the expense of being much worse to the south. Health care was horrific. Saddam spent on the order of $0.60 per person per year on medical care. It's not great now, but it's already much better.

 

[Ziggurat]

You know for a fact it is a lie?

It is not the number which is a lie (that is only inaccurate), but the statement that the number represents civilian deaths which is the lie.

The 100,000 number comes from the Lancet study:
http://www.topsy.org/mortalityIraq.pdf

If your number comes from anywhere else, you better pony up with a source. I've looked at the Lancet report (and you can too), and I know (for a fact) that the 100,000 figure from that report is rather explicitly NOT a total for civilians, but a total for all categories, with no distinctions made. I have made this fact plainly clear to you. Therefore, to continue to pretend that this number represents civilians, when you now know it does not, constitutes a lie on your part. A lie which you have not yet retracted. I'm still waiting.

 

[Mephisto]

I don't think this effort possible without mistakes or loss of life. Could the life have been mitigated? Certainly. Does that mean that there could have been an invasion with zero loss of life? No.

Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, etc. made mistakes that cost people their lives.

If you believe the effort worthless then I can see how you come to your POV. I don't believe it worthless and therefore I don't share your conclusions.

But that's the biggest problem, RF - this entire effort was a mistake from the beginning. Certainly no one expects to invade a country without casualties, but consider the amount of casualties incurred after Bush declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq. THAT should have been the flag to everyone (including apologists) that this administration didn't know what they were doing.

Granted many Presidents have made mistakes that cost lives, but I don't think anyone can claim that any of the Presidents you mentioned lost those lives on a whim OR because they invaded a country completely UNRELATED to an attack on the U.S. Also, those Presidents likely had far more credible experience in foreign affairs (with the possible exception of Lincoln) than Bush.

Only time will tell if the venture is worthless. Would you still consider it a worthwhile venture if we incubate Democracy in Iraq only to have them democratically demand our withdrawal - even from the military bases we're planning on occupying for decades?

What if Iraq's democratic majority is hostile to Western governments? What if all that oil (and Halliburton's interests) are denied us and the Iraqi people decide to just call it Even-Steven? A good trade? Are we willing to tell Iraq - "We'll forget all you owe us for liberating you if you'll promise not to nail us to the wall for all the things we've done wrong (illegal invasion, human-rights abuses, the death of thousands of innocents, torture, secret prisons, etc)?

 

[Mephisto]

Just look at refugee flows. People fled Iraq in large numbers under Saddam. More people have returned to Iraq than have left it since we began our invasion.

You're right, Zig, but those "refugees" are bringing small arms, explosives, expertise and the willingness to fight coalition forces into Iraq with them. Another "miscalculation" on the part of our Commander in Thief.

The word behind the scenes is that we don't have enough men to cover the borders of Iraq - but too many high-ranking military officers are more concerned with protecting their retirement benefits and their careers than they are with telling the truth to a President who sees disagreement as disloyalty.

Now, even you have to admit that had our military been large enough, and had the "coalition of the willing" been more than the "coalition of the obscure" we could have better sealed Iraq's borders to cut off the supply of seemingly endless insurgent traffic, and dealt with the problems within the country instead of "staying the course" which really means - our troops leave the green zone to drive around, get shot at, get blown up and then return to do it all over again the next day.

 

[Ziggurat]

The word behind the scenes is that we don't have enough men to cover the borders of Iraq - but too many high-ranking military officers are more concerned with protecting their retirement benefits and their careers than they are with telling the truth to a President who sees disagreement as disloyalty.

I've heard this charge before, and I don't buy it. I simply don't believe that every one of those generals is more interested in their bank account than in protecting the lives of the men they command. That would make every one of them a failure as a commander, and I do not believe that they're all so craven. I have seen no evidence to that effect either, and the argument for it basically just revolves around the idea that that's just the way the world works. Well, sorry, but I don't buy it.

Now, even you have to admit that had our military been large enough, and had the "coalition of the willing" been more than the "coalition of the obscure"

I wouldn't call England an "obscure" military power. They're the most capable country in Europe at projecting military power, by a good margin. The objection to who WASN'T there seems to focus largely around France and Germany. Other than them, who actually had significant numbers of troops that even COULD have participated in the invasion?

we could have better sealed Iraq's borders to cut off the supply of seemingly endless insurgent traffic,

A lot of things could have been done better, yes. But this is a strange argument. Is the insurgency primarily Iraqis, or primarily foreigners? If it's the former, then sealing the borders isn't the primary issue. If it's the later, then yes, that would be a major mistake, but it would also give lie to a central pillar of the argument against Bush: that Iraqis want us out and are willing to kill and die to accomplish that goal. So which is it? My sense is that the foreigners are a small, though disproportionately bloody, part of the insurgency. Yes, it would have been better to clamp down on border infiltration sooner and more completely than we have. But I don't see that as the make or break decision in this fight.

and dealt with the problems within the country instead of "staying the course" which really means - our troops leave the green zone to drive around, get shot at, get blown up and then return to do it all over again the next day.

No, that's really not what "stay the course" means. If you think that's all they've been doing, then the problem is you don't know what course they've actually BEEN on. To get a better taste of that, I suggest some excellent first-hand reporting:
http://www.michaelyon.blogspot.com/
browse around through the archived posts on the right side to see what our fine soldiers have really been doing: it's a lot more than just getting shot at.

 

[Year Zero]

I've heard this charge before, and I don't buy it. I simply don't believe that every one of those generals is more interested in their bank account than in protecting the lives of the men they command. That would make every one of them a failure as a commander, and I do not believe that they're all so craven. I have seen no evidence to that effect either, and the argument for it basically just revolves around the idea that that's just the way the world works. Well, sorry, but I don't buy it.

Where's the evidence? The evidence is in the fact that the borders haven't been secured. I have no doubt that there are checkpoints and other measures on the major avenues of approach into the country but that is clearly not enough.

It's not that the generals don't want to secure the borders, many of them(like General Shinseki) believed this was crucial. However, the reality is that the US military simply doesn't have the ability to do that.

I wouldn't call England an "obscure" military power. They're the most capable country in Europe at projecting military power, by a good margin. The objection to who WASN'T there seems to focus largely around France and Germany. Other than them, who actually had significant numbers of troops that even COULD have participated in the invasion?

The question is why the US sees the need to bludgeon a Third World nation(made Third World thanks to US-backed sanctions) with a "coalition" in the first place. The fact that England would be a willing participant in imperialism is not surprising, they DO have a bit of a prior record in that field. England is probably one of the worst allies we could have got; Arabs see England as untrustworthy former occupiers.

A lot of things could have been done better, yes. But this is a strange argument.

The only thing that could have gone better was the US not invading that country and reevaluating its foreign policy that causes it to be a pariah in the Islamic world.

Is the insurgency primarily Iraqis, or primarily foreigners? If it's the former, then sealing the borders isn't the primary issue. If it's the later, then yes, that would be a major mistake, but it would also give lie to a central pillar of the argument against Bush: that Iraqis want us out and are willing to kill and die to accomplish that goal. So which is it?

According to the Pentagon, it is overwhelmingly domestic. Remember that at one time we were also facing Shiite insurgents. Now that they have a political route to power, they are nice and happy. But if we obstruct their plans to bring more Iranian influence into the region we will have an even bigger problem on our hands.

My sense is that the foreigners are a small, though disproportionately bloody, part of the insurgency. Yes, it would have been better to clamp down on border infiltration sooner and more completely than we have. But I don't see that as the make or break decision in this fight.

The fight was lost from the beginning because it violates the principles of war, even going one step further than Von Clauswitz in the sense that the very reason for the war is still being argued about. Let's remember the real reason given for invading Iraq: Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction, which it was planning to use in the near future unless there was a military intervention. Inspectors needed to leave... etc.

No, that's really not what "stay the course" means. If you think that's all they've been doing, then the problem is you don't know what course they've actually BEEN on. To get a better taste of that, I suggest some excellent first-hand reporting:
http://www.michaelyon.blogspot.com/
browse around through the archived posts on the right side to see what our fine soldiers have really been doing: it's a lot more than just getting shot at.

You should see what our fine soldiers did in South Vietnam. Good public services in the cities, entertainment, prostitutes, etc. South Vietnam had an already established government with an armed forces of over 1 million men. How did that work out? If failed because the war and that government were based on false pretenses, albeit not as blatantly insane as those of this war.

Look at it this way, we can lose this war with about 2100 dead or we can lose it with 100,000 if people prefer. Either way, fighting a war against historical and military realities doesn't work out well for most countries.

 

[Melendwyr]

I've heard this charge before, and I don't buy it. I simply don't believe that every one of those generals is more interested in their bank account than in protecting the lives of the men they command. That would make every one of them a failure as a commander, and I do not believe that they're all so craven. I have seen no evidence to that effect either, and the argument for it basically just revolves around the idea that that's just the way the world works. Well, sorry, but I don't buy it.

There are other possible motivations. Colin Powell did what he was told to do, and gave the UN a whole lot of garbage testimony that he knew was nonsense. All indications suggest he deeply disagreed with what the CIC wanted him to do, but he didn't resign immediately - he did it.

Why do you think that was?

 

[Ziggurat]

The question is why the US sees the need to bludgeon a Third World nation(made Third World thanks to US-backed sanctions) with a "coalition" in the first place. The fact that England would be a willing participant in imperialism is not surprising, they DO have a bit of a prior record in that field. England is probably one of the worst allies we could have got; Arabs see England as untrustworthy former occupiers.

Can you suggest a better ally? Nobody has proposed one to me, I've asked before. All I get in response is that we should have had more allies but never a mention of which allies we should have had.

The only thing that could have gone better was the US not invading that country and reevaluating its foreign policy that causes it to be a pariah in the Islamic world.

Funny, but from where I'm sitting, that's EXACTLY what we're doing: radially departing from a past foreign policy of "realism" which promoted as its goal a fake stability over long-term interests like democracy and human rights. We've taken the first major step, by any country EVER, to promoting those goals in the middle east. Seems like a pretty big reevaluation to me.

According to the Pentagon, it is overwhelmingly domestic.

In which case securing the border isn't the make-or-break issue that was suggested.

Remember that at one time we were also facing Shiite insurgents. Now that they have a political route to power, they are nice and happy. But if we obstruct their plans to bring more Iranian influence into the region we will have an even bigger problem on our hands.

Whose plans? Mooky's? Yes. Sistani's? No. Who would you bet on between the two?

The fight was lost from the beginning because it violates the principles of war, even going one step further than Von Clauswitz in the sense that the very reason for the war is still being argued about. Let's remember the real reason given for invading Iraq: Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction, which it was planning to use in the near future unless there was a military intervention. Inspectors needed to leave... etc.

Let's remember the truth: there was a long list of reasons, included rather explicitly in the congressional authorization, and that list included much more than Iraq's current stockpile.

You should see what our fine soldiers did in South Vietnam.

Stuck in a time warp, I see. Your politics are as 60's as your military understanding.

Look at it this way, we can lose this war with about 2100 dead or we can lose it with 100,000 if people prefer.

At this rate that'll take, what, 70 more years or so to hit that total? Probably longer given that 2005 casualties are lower than 2004.

Either way, fighting a war against historical and military realities doesn't work out well for most countries.

What "realities" would those be? South Vietnam fell to North Vietnamese regulars, not to insurgents. Who is going to play that role in your imaginary repeat drama?

 

[Year Zero]

Can you suggest a better ally? Nobody has proposed one to me, I've asked before. All I get in response is that we should have had more allies but never a mention of which allies we should have had.

I can suggest NOT GOING TO WAR ON A COUNTRY THAT NEVER ATTACKED US. How's that? The fact that we could not find many willing industrial nations to participate in what would otherwise be considered a criminal act actually speaks well of the international situation today.

Funny, but from where I'm sitting, that's EXACTLY what we're doing: radially departing from a past foreign policy of "realism" which promoted as its goal a fake stability over long-term interests like democracy and human rights.

Words like democracy and human rights are meaningless. Democracy means the will of the people, and the diverse peoples of Iraq don't all share the same ideas about what freedoms or human rights people should have.

We've taken the first major step, by any country EVER, to promoting those goals in the middle east. Seems like a pretty big reevaluation to me.

That shows a massive ignorance of history. For one thing, the nations of the Middle East, with a few exceptions, are basically fake. The borders were redrawn after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. What we call Iraq today was formed in 1920 out of the provinces of Mosul, Baghdad, and Basra. And remember that the Turks had to deal with uprisings themselves.

Do you realize how much money this country spends to ensure that the democratic will of the Arab peoples is suppressed? Egypt gets about three billion dollars every year, same as we give Israel, to maintain the Mubarak dictatorship. We back repressive monarchies all over Arabia and then complain about the "lack of democracy".

In which case securing the border isn't the make-or-break issue that was suggested.

True, true.

Whose plans? Mooky's? Yes. Sistani's? No. Who would you bet on between the two?

It's impossible to tell at this point. We need to see exactly how much power this government has, and what it will do once it gets armed forces. The make-up of the armed forces will have far-reaching consequences when one considers the Turkish question.

Let's remember the truth: there was a long list of reasons, included rather explicitly in the congressional authorization, and that list included much more than Iraq's current stockpile.

There was one major reason: Iraq had the weapons and "did not disarm"; and he was going to use those weapons against the United States. These statements about the threat to the United States have been recorded on video by numerous sources. Not to mention the President's quote(which I saw personally) on his address right before the beginning of the war:

"The security of the world depends on disarming Saddam Hussein now."

Really? Why?

Stuck in a time warp, I see. Your politics are as 60's as your military understanding.

Guess what, our officers still religiously use the nine principles of war developed by Von Clauswitz despite the fact that he was stuck in the 1800's. H. John Poole, William S. Lind, and Samuel B. Griffith among other military tacticians have also recognized that Sun Tzu's Art of War, despite dating back to the 4th century BC, are not only still applicable but played a vital role in our failures in Korea and Vietnam.

At this rate that'll take, what, 70 more years or so to hit that total? Probably longer given that 2005 casualties are lower than 2004.

That assumes that the rate of casulties never changes in any direction. The fact that one year's casulties are lower than that of the current year also says nothing. It is every bit as plausible for a massive offensive to break out on 1 January 2006 where in the space of another month, we lose as many people as we did in 2005.

The point is, you can't predict these things like that. The best thing is to avoid doing it.

What "realities" would those be? South Vietnam fell to North Vietnamese regulars, not to insurgents. Who is going to play that role in your imaginary repeat drama?

South Vietnam fell primarily because of an insurgency. Despite the fact that this insurgency suffered massive strategic setbacks in 1968, it continued to exist. Despite the fact that they were regular army troops, the NVA fought as guerillas, so this is just semantics.

 

[billydkid]

I respect your opinion. There is certainly ample evidence as a basis for that conclusion.

Ok, so what happened to the RandFan that jumped down people's throats for holding the wrong opinion? Are you a body snatcher?

 

[RandFan]

Let's examine the evidence in detail then:

On 16 March 1988, the Iranians attacked Halabja. I am going to type a passage from a report on fighting a war against Iraq compiled by Stephen Pelletiere, LTC Douglas V. Johnson, and Leif Rosenberger, published by the Amry War College Stategic Studies Institute in 1990. The report goes into Halabja in detail. Here is some of Pelletiere's more recent quotes on the subject.

Thanks. It's customary to provide links.

DID SADDAM "GAS HIS OWN PEOPLE"?

I think the information important and I'm willing to give it, it's due. I'm certiain this is what I looked at before. I'll have to see if there is anything to rebut it and of course time will tell if the video taped and audio taped evidence proves that Saddam did in fact gas his people.

Keep in mind that the evidence that I pointed out was discovered after this article. I would say that the jury is not in on this. And of course there is a lot of other information yet to come out.

Again, thanks.

 

[RandFan]

Ok, so what happened to the RandFan that jumped down people's throats for holding the wrong opinion? Are you a body snatcher?

Huh? When did I jump down someones throat for holding the wrong opinion?