Which administation was deadlier for Iraqis: Clinton's or Bush's?

anonymous

[eagles]

Is President Bush guilty of crimes against humanity? Many on the left insist he is, primarily because his decision to forcibly remove Saddam Hussein has cost the lives of somewhere between eight and ten thousand Iraqi civilians----see Iraqbodycount.net. They argue that the apprehension of one man, no matter how despotic, is not worth the lives of so many innocents.

But which policy proved deadlier to the Iraqi population, the United Nation’s long-term policy of “containing” Saddam Hussein or Bush’s regime change? Regardless of your position on the war, recent media coverage would probably lead you to conclude that Bush’s decision to remove Saddam from power cost the lives of more Iraqi civilians than the United Nation’s efforts to contain him.

But that conclusion fails to take into account one important detail: the huge number of civilian casualties attributed to the sanctions against Iraq, which our former president, Bill Clinton, vigorously supported. Indeed the Clinton Administration held so firmly to its belief that the U.N. sanctions were the most effective means to weaken Saddam’s hold on power that during a 60 minutes interview on May 12, 1996 Secretary of State Madelaine Albright insisted they were justifiable, even after Leslie Stahl posed the following question: “We have heard that a half a million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. Is the price worth it? Albright responded: “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price---we think the price is worth it.”

Sadly, as history will record, the sanctions not only accomplished nothing, they didn’t end with just half a million dead Iraqi children. By the time they were finally lifted after Saddam was removed from power, UNICEF estimates that nearly 1 million civilians died, 600,000 of them children.

Yes, it’s true the sanctions were initiated during the end of Bush Senior’s Administration. It’s also possible that a second Bush term may have kept them intact, if it had won reelection. Still, much of the accountability for their abject failure to accomplish anything but human suffering must lie with the Clinton Administration which had 2 terms to assess their efficacy and lobby to rescind them once the dead bodies began piling up. Yet for 8 years the Clinton team sat on its hands while Iraqi children dropped by the thousands----and then the tens of thousands. Given that, why does the left consider Clinton’s policy of “containment” to be the wiser, more humane policy, while Bush’s policy of forcibly removing Saddam from power is considered a crime against humanity?

If this sounds like the defense of an avid Bush apologist, it is not. I’m still waiting to hear what happened to the WMD, which was the Bush camp’s justification for putting the lives of our soldiers and thousands of additional Iraqi civilians at risk. Nor am I yet buying the Bush Administration’s rationale for awarding no-bid contracts to Haliburton and its other cronies.

But it IS an appeal for some fairness and objectivity. While it remains to be seen whether or not the democracy experiment will ultimately succeed in Iraq, two things are irrefutable: Far more Iraqi civilians died as a result of the United Nation’s policy of containment than Bush’s policy of regime change, and it was Bush’s war, not Clinton’s sanctions, which ended, once and for all, the tyranny of Saddam Hussein over his own people.

As ex-UN leader Hans Von Sponeck once said, “Whether you die by bullets or by hunger and disease, you are still dead.”

At least under the current Bush Administration one can argue that those Iraqis who managed to survive the last twelve years of U.S. foreign policy now have a genuine shot at freedom.

[eagles]

To be submitted as a letter to the editor. Freepers response?

[Qwinn]

I once saw what looked like a military summary of the outcome of Operation Desert Fox, under Clinton. It did on at least several occassions include estimated body counts for certain missile strikes. I never did a total, nor did I see one offered, but I think if one were to do a comparison that -definetly- needs to be counted as well.

I had found that by a Google search, not a link from somewhere. I can't stick around long this morning or I'd try to duplicate the search that led me to find it, but it shouldn't be that hard.

Qwinn

[Fenris6]

Include a remark that those who enable tyrants are just as guilty of "war crimes". Peaceniks who "look the other way" and pretend "we know nothing about the furnaces" should be brought before the ICC. You have a duty and moral obigation to render aid.

[Bluntpoint]

More Iraqis were raped and murdered while Clinton was President.

I guess that makes Clinton's adminstration more deadly.

[rhombus]

More Iraqis were raped and murdered while Clinton was President.

I guess that makes Clinton's adminstration more deadly.

Exactly so. Frequently doing nothing can be more deadly than doing something.

[Paul_B]

Excellent angle! We don't hear anything of the "bad old days" of sanctions in the media any more, do we? Sanctions were bad then, but diplomacy, which they were a part of, is good now. Sure seems like anything the Dems do is good and anything the Pubs do is bad. Sure seem like the media is not worth listening to.

[Bluntpoint]

Trial lawyers always want to point to deaths that occured during surgery but never mention how may lives were saved but for surgery.

[Qwinn]

Oh, I'm on a website (Charlie Rose board) where in the months leading up to the war we never stopped hearing about how the evil U.S. (not U.N., of course) sanctions were. How many thousands per month were dying from it. The most often quoted figure was from UNESCO, who claimed 5,000 children per month. Just children.

So when we point out that that's 5,000 children per month no longer dying? "But Rumsfeld shook hands with Saddam in 1984!" So I post pictures of Kofi shaking hands with Saddam in the '90's. But the U.S. installed Iraq and helped them in the Iran Iraq war! So I show them that the U.S. provided perhaps 1% (in dollar value) of the weapons Iraq got in 1973-1990, while 53% from the Soviets, 13% from France and 12% from China. But the U.S. killed people in the bombing! I bring up the sanctions again... it's a never ending circle. Nothing ever gets through.

Qwinn

[marty60]

It's all according to who's dead it is. If it is Saddamn draining masrhlands to drive the natives out. or the 100's of thousands in mass graves, the gassing of Kurds or the rape rooms, that is minor co pared to the 1000 or so of dead in the drive to liberate the country.

UNTIL PEOPLE FINALLY WAKE UP AND UNDERSTAND THAT LIBERAL/SOCIALIST/FASCISTS/COMMIE/DUMOCRATS LOVE DICTATORS. If you pay attention, they love for people to suffer, homeless, starving children, no health care, but most telling is the foaming mouth Dums looking to the skys for some sort of terrorist attack. When Al-Queda says it will rival 911, the thought of more than 3000 dead sends Evil Dums into an orgasmic frenzy.

[savedbygrace]

Nothing ever gets through.

There's a huge hint right there. You're whistling into the wind, Quinn.

[Paul_B]

Appalling hypocrisy.

Even the Pope denounced the sanctions, but then went on to denounce the war. What really was he saying, that we should expect Hussein to come out for truth and light of his own accord? That diplomacy with this psychopath would work without sanctions?

The mind of the left is beyond fathoming. It is either as deep as a black hole or as shallow as a mud puddle. Or something. But in either case it's not a good thing.

p.

[Qwinn]

And if you point -that- out, then they'll scream that those on the Right are "hypocrites" for having supported someone like Pinochet in Chile. As if there's any comparison.

Qwinn

[Prime Choice]

And if you point -that- out, then they'll scream that those on the Right are "hypocrites" for having supported someone like Pinochet in Chile. As if there's any comparison.

Return fire with the Left's support of Stalin and Castro. Tit for tat.

[Prime Choice]

Excellent work. Well said.

[Qwinn]

No no, you don't understand. I mention Stalin and Castro and they -retort- with Pinochet. That's how sad they are. Like millions of dead are indistinguishable from thousands. Like the facts that Pinochet was fighting a communist insurgency fond of terrorist tacitcs, and that he wound up giving up power voluntarily, are comparable to 45 year old dictatorships that killed not thousands but millions and would rather have razed the entire population than give up control. There is no logical analysis or comparison permitted. The double standards they set up for themselves are so extreme that they can't lose.

Qwinn

[marty60]

Pinochet was 30 years ago!!!! Remember the commies, Repubs learned the rule of unintended consequences. Dums don't look any further than the next election. See:Mad aldull. She says it is better to let Saddamn kill Iraqi's by the 100's of thousands than to ruffle the UN. NO comparison. And any attempt is syple minded Dumocrat rhetoric.