I’ve got people on other threads claiming that Iraq could turn out just like Japan…without giving nod to what it took to make Japan turn out like Japan.
Meanwhile, Iraq has apparently been screening “The Untouchables.” “They pull a knife, you pull a gun. They send one of yours to the hospital, you send one of theirs to the morgue. That’s the Chicago Way, and that’s how you get Capone.”
We tortured and tormented their soldiers in a prison camp.
Their response is to cut off the head of a civilian and crow about it on videotape.
So they want to go the Chicago Way? Americans want Iraq to turn out like Japan?
Okay. So we come back with not just the Chicago Way, but the “Aliens” way. We stop screwing around. We pull out all our troops and nuke them from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure, right? As soon as the last of our people are out of range, we give Iraq dawn at night. If people on both sides are going to toss aside rules, regulations and humanity in favor of one culture dominating another, it’s time to stop pussyfooting around, right? Truman dropped Fatman and Little Boy in order to save the lives of thousands of American soldiers from an extended land war. So why are American lives now any less valuable?
Right? Am I right?
Someone tell me, because I really don’t know.
PAD
• 
I thought calling the soldiers who did this “sadists” made it clear where I stood on them.
On the soldiers, yes. On what should be done about it, no.
Lines like “while the world clutches its chest and gets a case of the vapors over prisoners sexually abused in prisons (which sure never happens in MOST prisons!) ” certainly suggest that you consider this No Big Deal In The Big Picture. I don’t know if that’s scorning concern per se, but it’s sure the message I got from it. (That’s also one of the lines that led to my “posturing and bluster” remark, since you asked about it.)
Or are you seriously suggesting that the acts of the US soldiers, heinous as they were, even approach the creative use of paper shredders that will be providing fans of snuff videos with entertainment for many years to come?
No, not remotely. I would only point out that (a) it really is different when the “good guys” are committing the atrocities, and (b) we’ve been given real indications that what’s been released is just the tip of a very ugly iceberg. As such, I’m going to reserve judgement.
Appropriate response? Well, jail time at a minimum, perhaps in Iraq where I’m sure they will receive the very best of care.
And for the leadership? If evidence surfaced that orders to “soften ’em up for the interrogators” led to this? What should happen to them?
My point about the UN was simply that I don’t see where they are in any position to judge us.
And my point is that that should not be our concern right now. When I apologize for an action, it’s not because I think someone’s in a position to judge me — it’s because I’ve judged those actions MYSELF and decided they were the wrong thing to have done. I consider that a basic staple of ethical behavior — if our country’s leadership does not, I consider that an exceptionally black mark against them.
I don’t have confidence in the UN’s ability to make things right.
Perhaps not — but frankly, they’re the best option available. Pax Americana sure as hëll ain’t it.
If the actions of some American soldiers tar us all than I guess the recent massacre in Kosovo performed by a UN policeman makes them unsuitable to judge. (http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/004/024rjfgr.asp) It isn’t only bad when a US administration makes mistakes.
Sigh. And if you can point out someplace where I actually said the last sentence or a similar approximation to it, I’ll be happy to buy you a pizza.
If a UN official was complicit in a massacre, there should be strong consequences for that as well. I’m not looking to blame just the US here, Bill — it’s just that my putative country is the one that got us into this, so their actions tend to draw more attention.
Straw man arguments do not become you. I haven’t claimed the UN is perfect, nor have I claimed that we need to apologize to them. I think our nation and our leaders should be apologizing for the sake of our own consciences. If you can’t see that, then I’m sorry for a whole host of reasons.
TWL
Ray says
“As for the rest of your post, I don’t know of any case where Iraqis practice clitorectomies, so I have no idea where you’re going with that argument. There are a lot of cultures on this planet. Stop being afraid of them.”
Kurt was talking about Islamists, I believe, though his statement that “They” hate us was not specific as to who They were. I believe that much of the hatred toward the United States is due to our having so much and so many of the Islamic countries having so little. However I also believe that one of the main reasons for that disparity is due to the way many of the Islamic culture write off half their population–a guaranteed one way ticket to backwaterville. The Clitorectomies are mostly an African problem but indicative of the low status of the girl-child in too many Islamic cultures. (Incidentally, my reading of the Koran revealed nothing that would make this a necessary part of any Islamic culture).
“And so what if others judge us? You think they don’t know? What are you afraid of? Being a part of the world”
But we AREa part of the world. The part that people come running to. Another reason for our success.
Mr. Mulligan wrote:
“But how do we know what a majority wants? It’s doubtful that we would be dealing with a democracy.”
To be honest, I don’t have a solid answer to that one. It does occur to me, however, that people will always find a way. A better question might be how do we interpret the information sent to us? Again, I don’t know.
“Do we do a poll? Mail a survey? And what if a majority is supporting a genocidal dictatorship? If 51% of the German population had been shown to be in favor of turning Jews into lampshades that would not be a good excuse for the world to have sat back and done nothing.”
I agree with you on this. However, as indicated in prior posts regarding the Congo, isn’t that what is happening now? Isn’t the world standing by in while those in the Congo are living in just that type of horrendous situation? I only learned of it by reading about it here. Shouldn’t we be offering aid to the Congo as I described above?
“I’m not picking on you–I like your scenario. Kind of us in the Klattu role from DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL. Swoop in, seriously dìçk around with the locals with our heap big technological juju, and swoop off with a well-delivered carrot/stick speech. Some Bernard Herrmann music would be great too.”
I regret that I am not terribly familiar with the reference, but I do believe I get the gist of it. (I swear… the word “Gist” sounds like some kind of carbonated citrus drink) What I regret more, thought, is that I have conveyed my ideas so poorly that you are left with that impression.
Salutations,
Mitch Evans, because one Mitch is never enough.
P.S.
Mr. Mulligan, if you are picking on me, well, then have at it. I actually enjoy a good ribbing.
“Straw man arguments do not become you. I haven’t claimed the UN is perfect, nor have I claimed that we need to apologize to them. I think our nation and our leaders should be apologizing for the sake of our own consciences. If you can’t see that, then I’m sorry for a whole host of reasons.”
Sigh. Tim, look, the thing that set me off was the following:
“How do we clean this up? How do we restore our rep to the world? We let the world decide. And we accept their judgement. If that means they judge Bush, Rumsfield, ME, to be a war criminal, so be it. We screwed this one up, big time. We have to sincerely apologize to the world, regardless of the price of that apology. Any other decision will only cement our reputation as an arrogant, uncaring people.”
And I’m sorry, but to me that’s just plain goofy. Maybe I misunderstood. I took it to mean that Ray seriously meant that if the world (by which I assumed he meant the UN since how else are we supposed to get the “world’s” opinion?) claimed that Bush, Rummy, Ray etc were “war criminals” the we’d have to accept the penalties. Which would be, I guess, Bush, Rummy and maybe even Ray (what the hëll did HE do?) being strung up like Alfred Jodl. THAT’S what I was commenting on.
I’m GLAD we apologized to the Iraqi people, though words are cheap and I would hope that the punishment of the soldiers who did it will be more effective. As for the higher up–time will tell. I know the creeps who posed for the pictures are guilty. I will require some evidence of guilt before I start thinking about what to do with the higher up (“softening up” prisoners seems like a very dangerously open ended order, ripe for abuse).
“Lines like “while the world clutches its chest and gets a case of the vapors over prisoners sexually abused in prisons (which sure never happens in MOST prisons!) ” certainly suggest that you consider this No Big Deal In The Big Picture. I don’t know if that’s scorning concern per se, but it’s sure the message I got from it. (That’s also one of the lines that led to my “posturing and bluster” remark, since you asked about it.)”
But I LOVED that line! My point, besides the visual that, sorry, makes me smile, is that the prison story, while major, ISN’T even the biggest story in Iraq. I understand why Americans sodomizing prisoners is a bigger story than Palestinian terrorists shooting pregnent women and children but it does make it harder to take the condemnation of some countries with the level of gravity that perhaps you feel I should.
“Sigh. And if you can point out someplace where I actually said the last sentence or a similar approximation to it, I’ll be happy to buy you a pizza.”
That wasn’t meant to be taken as my statement of your beliefs. I was just thinking that if the criminal actions of American soldiers make people believe that we should cut and run then there is no reason to think that the exact samething won’t happen if and when the UN applies their golden touch.
“I see no indication that Peter edited any of his posts. If you have any evidence to the contrary, I’d love to see it. Otherwise, we’ll just have to assume you make things up in order to try and win an argument.”
What he’s referring to, Glenn, is on a different thread when I did a posting, then realized that I spent half of it falling into the rhetorical trap of defending, not something I said, but what people had claimed I said. So I deleted that section of the post.
In Ken’s world, focusing a response somehow equates to losing an argument.
PAD
Bill,
Sigh. Tim, look, the thing that set me off was the following:
“How do we clean this up? How do we restore our rep to the world? We let the world decide. And we accept their judgement. If that means they judge Bush, Rumsfield, ME, to be a war criminal, so be it. We screwed this one up, big time. We have to sincerely apologize to the world, regardless of the price of that apology. Any other decision will only cement our reputation as an arrogant, uncaring people.”
And I’m sorry, but to me that’s just plain goofy. Maybe I misunderstood.
I wouldn’t say you misunderstood it, but I do think you’re taking it substantially more literally than it was meant. (Ray, feel free to jump in here.) I completely agree with the sense of Ray’s quote above — the way to make amends is to be honestly contrite and willing to listen to what others think of us, not to issue the sort of “I’m sorry you made me do this” that annoying 12-year-old brothers the world over are famous for.
I didn’t take it as Ray volunteering himself (or Bush) for the gallows. If that’s how you took it, then I do at least understand your point a bit better. I’d take issue with some of his phrasing, I guess, but not the point overall. I’m honestly having trouble telling whether your issues with the phrasing are getting in the way of some basic agreement here.
I’m GLAD we apologized to the Iraqi people, though words are cheap and I would hope that the punishment of the soldiers who did it will be more effective.
I’d certainly agree with both halves of that.
As for the higher up–time will tell. I know the creeps who posed for the pictures are guilty. I will require some evidence of guilt before I start thinking about what to do with the higher up (“softening up” prisoners seems like a very dangerously open ended order, ripe for abuse).
I agree, which is why I think it’s probably pretty crucial in this case to find out exactly what the orders were.
My point, besides the visual that, sorry, makes me smile, is that the prison story, while major, ISN’T even the biggest story in Iraq.
Right at this second I think it is, though I agree it certainly shouldn’t be over the long term.
What I think gives this story special resonance (apart from the visuals, which naturally give it a huge kick) is that it’s suggesting a basic hypocrisy on America’s part. We talk big about human rights, democracy, etc. — but we also close down newspapers and abuse prisoners in the name of “liberating” them. It may be unfair to tar the whole occupation for the actions of (I hope) a few, but it’s going to happen. It’s already happening, and it’s making anything else we want to do in Iraq or in the region that much harder. For solely practical reasons if nothing else, we need to pay attention to how we’re viewed and see what we can do to improve it.
(I also think that as a generalization, liberals tend to care a lot more about what other countries think of the U.S. than conservatives do. I don’t think the stereotypes are true, (liberals as whiners who always want to kowtow to the U.N., conservatives as barrel-chested he-men who think that as long as we have military supremacy “we’re number one!”), mind you, but I do think the overall generalization has at least a germ of truth in it.)
“Sigh. And if you can point out someplace where I actually said the last sentence or a similar approximation to it, I’ll be happy to buy you a pizza.”
That wasn’t meant to be taken as my statement of your beliefs.
Sorry. Kinda looked that way.
I was just thinking that if the criminal actions of American soldiers make people believe that we should cut and run then there is no reason to think that the exact samething won’t happen if and when the UN applies their golden touch.
I’d agree with that — I don’t think anyone’s saying that bringing in the UN is going to make things perfect and flawless. I think any occupying force — us, the UN, the Organians — needs to make its own actions as transparent and accountable as possible. I don’t think we’ve done a very good job of that so far, but you’re right that it’s just as possible for the UN to screw it up too.
TWL
Darin: I also think that the decapitation of the American hostage can be blamed, at least in part, on CBS. They are the ones who let the world see the pictures. There was no need to do that, except to support their partisan agenda in this election year.
Will: You know the world is doomed when a television network showing news is deemed “partisan.”
That’s no different than blaming Israel for the Palestinian suicide bombers and blaming US troops in Saudi Arabia for 9/11. CBS is not to blame. Terrorists are responsible for their actions. They are not willing to negotiate (unless you count the phrase “full withdrawl” a “negotiation”), so the only alternatives are to stand and take the abuse, or fight back.
“We tortured and tormented their soldiers in a prison camp.
Their response is to cut off the head of a civilian and crow about it on videotape.
PAD”
And it’s this type of response that shows the kind of people we are dealing with. These people will kill any person, man/woman/child to support their cause.
I have mixed emotions when I hear of them being tortured. I don’t believe it’s right to torture anyone per se, but you have to look at what these people are capable of doing to others before you make a decision on whether it was right or wrong to torture them.
If you have to torture them to get information that will save people’s lives, then get to it already. If they are being tortured just for revenge, then it’s not OK.
Good gravy…there are a LOT of problems with dropping a nuke on certain portions or Iraq, not the least important being that it’d shut down Halliburton’s investment.
The thing with nuking is that it’s a big stick, and that it’ll invite retaliation. The only, ONLY sure way we could do that would be to bomb the Iraqi cities where the resistance is located with a hydrogen bomb to make sure there were no survivors, while simultaneously bombing North Korea, who I think would rightfully go berserk and I think wouldn’t hesitate to use their bombs on us. After that, we’d have to eliminate the last vestige of resistance in Iraq, even if it meant turning the country into a graveyard, because one thing I am aware of is that the Middle East culture has a very fine-tuned sense of revenge. So there would be that.
Afterwards, the president would have to take ever-more extreme steps to insure that someone didn’t to the same to us. A fellow poster talked about the Pax Americana, and I think that’s an apt phrase. We would have to become the big brother of the nations, because I don’t think any countries would actually support us after that. I’m also pretty confident that martial law would be imposed on the US, because the protests would be tremendous, and the administration would probably worry about some dissidents overthrowing them.
Of course, it’s entirely possible that this could be a worst-case scenario. The thing is, nuclear weapons change everything. Period. They are weapons whose very right to existence has been debated, and unlike guns, they serve no other purpose than to kill people and make the land unlivable.
It can be argued that the Middle East was one giant rickety scaffold, ever in danger of tipping, and that Bush went up and gave it a good solid kick. Regardless of the outcome, things will not be the same in the Middle East. Using atomic weapons would be similar, but on a global instead of a regional scale.
Chris
“We tortured and tormented their soldiers in a prison camp.
Their response is to cut off the head of a civilian and crow about it on videotape.
PAD”
Novafan:
>And it’s this type of response that shows the kind of people we are dealing with. These people will kill any person, man/woman/child to support their cause.
You’re kidding, right? These are extremists either responding to a situation that, in their culture, is viewed as more heinous than physical torture or simply exploiting the assinine actions of the morons who perpetrated this crap.
>I have mixed emotions when I hear of them being tortured. I don’t believe it’s right to torture anyone per se, but you have to look at what these people are capable of doing to others before you make a decision on whether it was right or wrong to torture them.
Yer kiddin, right? Right or wrong to torture? Firstly, the world governments agreed it was wrong as handed down by the Geneva convention. The only defense that I’ve seen sadly thrown out is that these were “detainees” and not POW’s, not covered by thee protections. *sigh*
>If you have to torture them to get information that will save people’s lives, then get to it already. If they are being tortured just for revenge, then it’s not OK.
What information are ou talking about? A vast percentage of prisoners are being held without charges…. and what revenge?
“Ken–nice try. Answer the question.
PAD”
Okay, here are the questions and my answers:
“So they want to go the Chicago Way?
They have always gone this way. It is not something new and they would have done this at some point in any situation.
“Americans want Iraq to turn out like Japan?”
In that we oversaw the re-building and occupied the nation for years and we maintain a presence there that has good for both our countries and the rest of the world in general, yes.
“It’s the only way to be sure, right?”
No. Definitely not to that point and hopefully we never will be.
“If people on both sides are going to toss aside rules, regulations and humanity in favor of one culture dominating another, it’s time to stop pussyfooting around, right?”
Again, no. Even if what you said was an accurate description of what is happening, the answer would still be no.
“So why are American lives now any less valuable?”
They aren’t. But your suggestion, which I realize is based in sarcasm, lends us to believe that you are suggesting that human life holds no value.
Killing those you are there to help would be more of defeat than remaining and rebuilding.
“Right?”
No. Not by any means.
“Am I right?”
No. You twist facts and the words of others too much to be right. You built this whole thread on the post of someone who was talking about our occupation of Japan and made him out to be talking about us nuking a country. Nothing right about that.
The first mistake was lying to the american people to justify going in. The second mistake was going in. The worst mistake was when a majority of the American people let themselves be conned into this disaster. But the worst mistake would be nukes. When you are doing God’s work like our illustrious president mass murder is not the way. The fact that the iraqi people had as much to do with Al Qadea[sp] as daffodils do with the GNP. And too many misinformed americans think that they do. If there was an easy answer the idiot in chief would have coppied from someone else’s paper just like he did at harvard and yale. I just wish it was over. And make sure you register to vote so this will end sooner rather than later.
A question I wanted to ask, we had a debate here last night on the subject
“This House Believes British soldiers accused of torturing Iraqi citizens should be tried in Iraq”
Replace the British with American if you want, it’s the same idea… what are your guys’s thoughts about it? Do you think it’s something that will help relations? Do you think it’s an abandoment of the rules of war? Do you think its even feasible?
Go on, lets see what can be said.
(And control your tongues ladies and gentlemen! Don’t get snipey at each other because you don’t all agree, personally I think such differences are the best gift the world’s got in it.)
“You’re kidding, right?”
If torturing an individual will save lives by getting important information out of someone, then it should be done. I know that people like Saddam have important information that they won’t give up without the proper motivation. Are we supposed to baby him and ask him to tell his secrets?
Maybe torture is the wrong word to use. How do we define torture? There could be varied degrees of this right?
“The first mistake was lying to the american people to justify going in. “
He didn’t lie to us. He proceeded based on intelligence information he received.
“If there was an easy answer the idiot in chief would have coppied from someone else’s paper just like he did at harvard and yale.”
Ok, now you’re accusing Bush of cheating at school. Where’s the proof?
Bill:
My understanding is that clitoridectomies take place in African cultures that are not necessarily Muslim, but I have no further comment than that.
And you’re right. The US is a place where people can experience some degree of religous and political freedom. And if we want to continue to hold that reputation, we need to accept the world’s judgement on the Iraqi war. What are we going to say otherwise? “We’re really a great place…except for that whole Iraqi mess.”
We’re not a perfect people. Look at our history- slavery, Japanese interment camps, Matthew Shepherd, and lots more. What makes us a great people is our willingness to apologize and change. And we need to do that right now. And if that requires submitting to the cries for justice, then that’s what it means.
I’m proud of this country. I’m proud to be an American. I’m dámņ fortunate to live in this country, participating in the wonderful experiment of democracy. But it’s that- an experiment. And sometimes we screw up. The continuation of that experiment rests in our ability to recognize when we screw up and take corrective action.
Oh, and Tim:
I didn’t take it as Ray volunteering himself (or Bush) for the gallows. If that’s how you took it, then I do at least understand your point a bit better.
Well, I’m not volunteering myself or Bush. But look at what we’ve done. We’ve invaded a country for NO GOOD REASON. Hey, Hussein’s a bášŧárd and a half, but even that wasn’t a good reason. When you invade a country for no good reason, it’s conceivable that war crime charges could result. What’s so outrageous about that?
“9/11 was a tragedy, an atrocious act but in a way, something the US had coming for a long time. ”
Coming to this debate late, I can only add that I find this comment offensive in the extreme. Perhaps we should just walk up to the families of the 9/11 victims on the street and tell them, “Well, you know… your family members deserved to die. Each of them personally is responsible for America’s actions as a nation, and the fact that they were all civilians doesn’t excuse them. They deserved it.”
I am shocked that anyone could possibly think that way.
Hey, Novafan:
If torturing an individual will save lives by getting important information out of someone, then it should be done.
===
I have it on good authority that you know where Osama Bin Laden is right now. Get over here in five minutes; the hot tongs will be waiting.
Hey, it’s no more silly than linking Osama to Iraq, and the administration already pulled that card.
By the way, I’ll freely admit this- if you could have told me where Osama Bin Laden was after 9/11, I would have ripped your colon out with my bare hands. That’s my human instinct- the guy orchestrated the murder of thousands of people in numerous incidents. And not one person on the planet, not even a PETA-protesting, tree-worshipping, whale-hugging hippie would stop me. (I’m liberal; if you’re one of these, please accept the apology.)
But it’s not a moral stand, and if I was the president, I would have to keep myself and my troops from giving in to that urge. It’s what leadership is all about.
On a bit of a side note, Ray’s response just above about torture and Osama is pretty close to the response I’ve wished Dukakis had given in ’88 to that “how would you feel about the death penalty if your wife were raped and murdered?’ question.
“Of course I’d want to see the person who did it dead. I’d want to strangle him myself. But our justice system is not about sanctioning vengeance.”
Sorry. Total sidebar — Ray’s comment just reminded me of that full force.
TWL
Congo: Oil And Gas Industry
Not sure how accurate the info is, but I found this site doing a google search. Just click on the above link.
I don’t blame them for their hatred of the United States. I do blame them for continuing the cycle – they are as responsible as we are. We’re all wrong in this one. All of us.
Blow it out your ear.
I blame them for their hatred. It’s not simply the “cycle”. If we changed our practices in most any ways they’d still hate us, our country, our fathers, grandfathers, children, and ideas.
It’s religion. If it’s their doctrine to kill the infidels, then the true believers will follow that doctrine and the Muslims “extremists” will do their best to kill us, to end the infidels. The only other option available for them is to accept our surrender and that’s one where we live under them as something worse than second-class citizens.
We either change ourselves into something that is antithetical to our beliefs as free people. Then they’ll stop.
Or we fight back. We continue the cycle. Not them. So here’s a question… do we go the distance and attempt to end them? Or do we give up and let them peck away at us and/or believe we can be driven off?
Best to destroy the true believers and the clerics and let the ambivalent and the agnostics to decide another way.
CJA
This was never a war we had to get into, it was one we chose to go into.
The rationale was flawed, and now because of combinations of incompetence, misunderstanding, cultural ignorance (on both sides) and lots, lots more that has contributed to make current events untenable, we’re supposed to throw a hissy-fit that things aren’t going our way and obliterate a people, a region, and thousands of years of evolution of relations between nation-states and (ostensibly) civilization?
Aside from the intrinsic insanity of the argument, can you spell p-a-r-i-a-h?
What I think gives this story special resonance (apart from the visuals, which naturally give it a huge kick) is that it’s suggesting a basic hypocrisy on America’s part. We talk big about human rights, democracy, etc. — but we also close down newspapers and abuse prisoners in the name of “liberating” them. It may be unfair to tar the whole occupation for the actions of (I hope) a few, but it’s going to happen. It’s already happening, and it’s making anything else we want to do in Iraq or in the region that much harder. For solely practical reasons if nothing else, we need to pay attention to how we’re viewed and see what we can do to improve it.
Really.
What a lot of people seem to miss about Iraq (including some members of the Administration, it seems), is that it is not just a military operation…it’s a diplomatic and political one, as well. Hearts and minds, and all that. And not only do you try not to keep each of the separate goals from getting in each other’s way, YOU TAKE ACTIVE STEPS TO INSURE THAT.
That is what infuriates me so much about this. The planning from the top down was sloppy. It focussed solely on the military and assumed everything else flowed from that. It substituted ideology for clear thinking, and wishful thinking for contingency planning. It just wreaks of incompetence and stupidity…and the most horrifying thing about it is that I have a sinking feeling a lot of Americans will give the Administration a pass on it for the sake of politics.
I know that in war both sides loss life. I’m not sure that I could defend the position that this war compares to WWII. Yes live is just a valuable but what would the result of such an action be in the world? How many more lives would it cost to defend our position?
I’ve only skimmed through everyone else’s comments so forgive me if I repeat something that was already said.
PAD, I’m sure that you know the answer to your questions and really just asked them as a way to get the debate going on the issue. However, since you asked, here are my thoughts on it.
Putting aside the atrocity that would be the use of nuclear weapons, the fact is that doing it would be useless simply because Iraq isn’t Japan.
The reason why Hiroshima and Nagasaki succeeded in ending WWII is that the enemy, aka Japan’s leadership (most specifically Emperor Hirohito), actually cared for the well being of the general population, and knew that the cost of pressing on the fight would be too great to bear.
On the other hand, the enemy in Iraq isn’t a person or government but rather an extremist terrorist resistance which doesn’t really care if other Iraqis are caught in the crossfire (as evidenced by the fact that they’ve had no calms at attacking purely Iraqi targets, as well as by their willingness to use suicide bombers whom are often barely past their teens, if that). What does this mean? Simply that if we started dropping nuclear bombs there we’d probably kill many insurgents, along with scores more of innocent people, but we’d never get them all and those terrorists that remained would just milk their “righteous indignation” to keep on fighting. But wait, you might say that we could still win, all we’d need is the resolve to nuke every last square inch of Iraq until there’s no one left there, right? Unfortunately no, because terrorists aren’t confined by borders and would just attack us somewhere else. And should we then move on to the next country… well, I guess everyone can see where we’d end.
The situation above may be extreme, but it also applies on the smaller scale of what’s going on right now, which is why I feel that the War on Terrorism can’t be won simply by invading countries; terrorists must be fought on a personal level, going after specific people and/or groups and, most importantly, by providing proper education and a sense of entitlement to those who may otherwise become future recruits in the terrorists armies. Basically, exactly what we are NOT doing right now.
Raphy
Gabriel wrote:
“…9/11 was a tragedy, an atrocious act but in a way, something the US had coming for a long time.
The US has been spreading terror and destruction for decades in the name of democracy. Unfortunately, the world is fighting back stooping to their level.”
Osama is that you posting here? I knew you’d come out of that cave sooner or later! Now just sit still for a bit and spew your hatred… and oh, don’t mind that ever increasing whistling noise coming closer and closer…
Ken: “No. You twist facts and the words of others too much to be right. You built this whole thread on the post of someone who was talking about our occupation of Japan and made him out to be talking about us nuking a country. Nothing right about that.”
Well, to be honest, if you’re going to be talking about Japan, you kinda have to mention the nuking.
The japanese people surrendered entirely to the US, and more or less co-operated. There wasn’t a huge battle royal for power as there is currently in Iraq.
In addition, if this becomes a cycle of ever increasing violence, PAD is just asking “why not cut to the chase, and pull the ultimate Trump card, then?” Which, if that’s where this thing is going, makes a certain amount of logical sense. In practice, it wouldn’t work out so well, but logically, it’s somewhat ound.
He’s not saying that such a statement was the absolute truth, and even at the end of the post he says clearly
“Right? Am I right?
Someone tell me, because I really don’t know.”
I’ve seen much more evidence of you, Ken, twisting someone’s words, then I have of PAD.
An Eye For An Eye
I’m still trying to sort something out, so maybe someone can help me. The ICRC has indicated in its own…
An Eye For An Eye
I’m still trying to sort something out, so maybe someone can help me. The ICRC has indicated in its own…
John said, “Well, let’s check the facts. “
Yes, lets. The
Darin, I assume you can actually give me a source that they only tortured guilty people at the prison, and you’re not just making things up. And Dee, get your medication changed.
They(CBS) hate Bush and that was all the motivation they needed during this election year.
And you know this how?
Gee, and I thought that the “Mission Accomplished” over in Iraq.
I guess I shouldn’t believe everything I hear…..
……or read on Aircraft Carriers.
I don’t have to give a source. Did John give a source? No, he didn’t. You didn’t have a problem with that. But, just so you know I’m NOT pulling this out of my butt, it was on C-SPAN in both Rumsfeld’s hearing and in a read statement from Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba during his statement yesterday. This was also discussed on the Sean Hannity Show yesterday.
“Gee, and I thought that the “Mission Accomplished” over in Iraq.”
It’s a common miscoception that the libs love to use. The message “mission accomplished” referred to the mission of the aircraft carrier Bush was on, which had just completed the longest carrier mission in US Navy history. But nevermind about context, right?
I was so sickened yesterday by the beheading and the incessant broadcasting of the news that I turned the radio off and considered weeping myself into dehydration. I feel so bad for that man’s parents and family.
Yeah, I wondered if there was a study going on for the energy potential of radioactive oil, but I know that’s not the way to deal with this.
CNN didn’t report on things in Iraq to save their reporter’s skins under Saddam’s reign; the same ethics should be applied to saving the lives of military and civilian contractors. The prisoner abuse was being dealt with by the military. Reporting it was wrong. It could be held for after the war. AMERICA is in a war, not just us conservatives or the Republicans, but ALL of us. We need to start thinking in those terms.
The military should deal with the abuse (and we don’t know enough about the whole situation yet to draw any conclusions). If the Army itself was involved in war crimes, as opposed to individual rogue soldiers, then the world would have a right to deal with us, but that’s not the case.
Something I’ve been wondering about: why aren’t our people over there tagged with a transponding chip so we always know where the individuals are? I find it hard to believe that we couldn’t take over one of their holding facilities if we knew where they were.
The answer is to hunt down the extremists and kill them. Forget the Chicago way. If your mindset is stuck in terror, you will be terminated.
A greater emphasis should be placed on getting the Iraqi people involved with policing their country.
Those are my answers, pitiful though they are.
The funny thing, Darin, is that you’re proving my point: the problem isn’t the torture of prisoners, because stuff like this occurs during wartime. The problem is the missionless war itself.
Dee: PAD was so upset about the beheaded man that he thought about nuking Iraq. Just what more are you looking for?
Heck, want to have some real Bush-bashing fun? The guy was over in Iraq looking for a job. Why didn’t he stay at home and look? Because, of course, there aren’t any jobs! Why? Because of Bush’s handling of the economy!
There. Now Bush has the guy’s blood on his hands. How’s that for outrage?
And that, my folks, is sarcasm. I’m not putting his blood on Bush, at least not for the bad economy. I do find the story a bit curious; I mean, I’ve been unemployed recently, and I took a job about 40 miles from my home. But I wasn’t about to go to a warzone to find work! There’s something about this story that stinks, and I think we’ll find out what it is in a few years.
I do hope that the killers are found and put to justice. That’s a horrible, horrible way to die, and to videotape the killing only makes it worse for the family. (When his father found out about the tape, he collapsed on his lawn.)
Here
“They(CBS) hate Bush and that was all the motivation they needed during this election year.”
If that was the case, why wasn’t it on the main “60 Minutes” which has much higher viewership instead of “60 Minutes 2?”
I’m kind of curious: Are you implying that, if you were running CBS, and you received graphic evidence of what was indisputably a news story, you would not have run it? You would have sat on it? If so, do you feel that’s good reporting?
Let’s go for a further notion: Let’s say the prison story never happened. Clean slate. Now let’s say Fox News acquired graphic art of men directly under John Kerry’s command beating and tormenting Vietnamese POWS from thirty years ago. Since Fox is as conservative leaning as you claim CBS is liberal leaning, would you be as outraged at Fox over running those pictures? Would you feel they shouldn’t be running them because “They hate Kerry and that’s all the motivation they need”?
PAD
By the way, I was wrong about Berg. He wasn’t looking for work per se; he owned his own company. I misread an article. My fault.
“Heck, want to have some real Bush-bashing fun? The guy was over in Iraq looking for a job. Why didn’t he stay at home and look? Because, of course, there aren’t any jobs! Why? Because of Bush’s handling of the economy!
“There. Now Bush has the guy’s blood on his hands. How’s that for outrage?
“And that, my folks, is sarcasm. I’m not putting his blood on Bush, at least not for the bad economy”
If one wanted to put the blood of Nick Berg on Bush, there’s two ways. First, the obvious: If Bush hadn’t launched the Needless War, Berg would never have been over there and would still be alive.
Second, the less obvious: The utter disregard for civil rights and the routine detaining of citizens that has become SOP under the Bush administration enabled Federal authorities to detain Berg illegally while he was in Iraq. Suspicious of his reasons for being there, they locked him up for thirteen days until their investigation was satisfied. His plane home was March 30. He was held until early April. Thanks to his unwarranted detainment, he missed his plane and had to return to Baghdad to try and arrange for safe passage out of the country.
Obviously, he never made it.
Had his rights as a US citizen been honored, as the Constitution requires–the Constitution that Bush swore to upheld and hasn’t–he would still be alive.
PAD
“Posted by Darin at May 12, 2004 09:14 AM
“Gee, and I thought that the “Mission Accomplished” over in Iraq.”
It’s a common miscoception that the libs love to use. The message “mission accomplished” referred to the mission of the aircraft carrier Bush was on, which had just completed the longest carrier mission in US Navy history. But nevermind about context, right?”
Darin, I am about as conservative as you can get. I think we should club baby seals for oil. I read Peter David’s uber-left wing commentary on this board just so I can kick my ulcers into high gear.
And even I think that one sounds a little fishy, bud.
Darin, firstly, I’ve lived in or near Navy towns my whole life, with the exception of the stint I spent in the Air Force (stuck in Omaha then), and I have never – *never* – seen a ship come in from an operation, of any sort, with a “Mission Accomplished” banner. It’s assumed that, had the ship not accomplished its mission, it wouldn’t be coming home.
Second, while standing in front of that infamous banner, Bush declared that “…major combat operations in Iraq are over!”
Tell that to the Marines in Fallujah. You’ll need a Ouija board to reach some of them, of course…
The problem of pronouns.
Who is ‘they’? The Shi’ites, Sunnis, Al-Quaida, Iraqis, Kurds or any of the other divisive factions over there?
That’s the primary difference between Japan and Iraq…or even Vietnam and Iraq. There is no single person or faction to negotiate with. There are dozens of factions within the country–several that won’t trust anyone else to rule. The only reason why Saddam was able to hold it together was that he ruled by fear.
I’m not saying that’s how we should rule it. I’m not even happy that we’re there. Don’t get me wrong, I firmly believe that the removal of Saddam was a benefit to humanity…but we seemed to do that without any though of “what happens then?”
It’s been stated that one reason why Saddam couldn’t be overthrown from within is that none of the factions were individually strong enough to do it on their own, and none were willing to ally with another.
Attacking Japan in the way we did worked because there was a central ruler with enough power to say “enough.” We don’t have that sort of person or organization here.
PAD,
It isn’t bad reporting; it’s ethical reporting. Stories that would harm national security were spiked regularly in WWI and II. Show them when the war is over? Fine. During? No.
The 5th Estate is supposed to be “independant” I realize, but dividing the country and reporting the bad without a word to the good is not just independant, it’s destructive.
I think that some of the people here may have forgotten that there were pictures of Iraqi prisoners beaten to death and plastic-wrapped for shipment in that bunch of photos. If you want to make the case that Abu Ghraib was nothing but some “abuse” while Berg’s death was a horrific crime and they’re not even comparable, you might stand a chance convincing me, but I kinda doubt that any Iraqis are going to buy it. And at this point, what I think is irrelevant, it’s what the Iraqis think.
Hmmm.
I wonder what Micah Wright thinks of this?
HAHAHAHAHBWAAHAHAHHAHHAHHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“I am feeling more than outraged. Why is anyone being allowed to go to work in Iraq??? Have u seen it PAD? Has anyone here watched the horror? Wheres the outcry from our gov????? Wheres the outrage from Kerry eh? Where’s the outrage from fellow Americans? or, is everyone so politcally correct in this country they are afraid to show their anger???”
Dude, I opened up a discussion in which I, in all seriousness (no, I wasn’t being ironic) was asking people to tell me why we shouldn’t just (as one person put it) cut to the chase and nuke the dámņëd country, because that’s sure what I felt like was an appropriate response and the only way this is ever going to end. If that doesn’t register on your “Outrage Meter,” then I’m not sure what does.
PAD
“It isn’t bad reporting; it’s ethical reporting. Stories that would harm national security were spiked regularly in WWI and II. Show them when the war is over? Fine. During? No.
“The 5th Estate is supposed to be “independant” I realize, but dividing the country and reporting the bad without a word to the good is not just independant, it’s destructive.”
First of all, torture in a prison camp is hardly a matter of national security. You won’t find me defending, for instance, Geraldo Rivera’s revelations of exact troop movements to his home viewing audience. That was just dumb. But I think you’ll find that the vast majority of Americans believe that this country should and does stand for a moral higher ground. So if people representing America have deserted that ground…if they have taken up the reviled practices of the man Americans died to get out of power…if, as Pogo said, We have met the enemy and he is us…then the public has a right to know it’s happening. And they have a right to know just how far up the chain of command this thing goes.
Furthermore, the reportage hasn’t divided the country at all. Instead, if polls can be trusted, the country is becoming united in its revulsion. The only thing this affair has been “destructive” to is the Bush administration’s ongoing endeavors to conduct absolutely everything they do under a veil of secrecy more pervasive than just about any presidency in this country’s history.
Ethical reporting? To know of practices undertaken by American soldiers that are in direct contravention of the Geneva convention and not report it would be UNethical.
And by the way, the press is referred to as the Fourth Estate.
PAD
A few more thoughts:
Drudgereport has vidcaps from the beheading video. I stupidly gave in to my curiosity. ugh. Seriously, do yourself a favor and just don’t look. It’s awful. He’s dead. You don’t need to know much more than that.
Whatreallyhappened.com, a REALLY liberal/leftwing site, feels that it’s possible that the beheading was actually done by US to sidetrack discussion of the torture story. Even I don’t believe that. And I’m a loony liberal!
Apparently, CBS is under fire- not for releasing the torture footage, but for actually keeping it under wraps until the New Yorker broke the story. That’s rather interesting; CBS is under fire from conservatives for undermining the war effort, while liberals are blasting the Big Eye for holding the information to help the Bushies out. Can’t win over there.
“Second, while standing in front of that infamous banner, Bush declared that “…major combat operations in Iraq are over!”
Well, the fact still remains that the banner referred to the Abraham Lincoln’s mission, which was what the President was there to celebrate, and did not refer to the liberation of Iraq. The fact that he chose that venue to make his declaration doesn’t mean that the two statements meant the same thing, as indeed they didn’t. Ask anyone who was serving on that carrier, as I have, and they’ll confirm that.
And major combat operations HAVE been over in Iraq since that declaration. The invasion was over and it was now time to begin the occupying/searching phase. Bush didn’t say that the fighting was over, just that the major combat operations were over. At that point, it was time for the support personnel to be brought it and the country was to be held and occupied. Even when Marines were brought in to attack Fallujha (sp?), it was reported as “the biggest offensive since major combat operations ended in Iraq.”