Thanks. It sure was an experience. I know you visited there during the wild days too.
Yes, Saddam was horrible. I heard personal accounts from people that chilled me to the bone.
And I think it was around early 2006 that Iraqis finally started expressing opinions without looking furtively around before saying anything.
My trip to Kurdistan with the Gold Star parents in 2006 was like a field trip. Erbil was very peaceful back then. Heavily armed and protected but peaceful.
I only saw one bad guy--in a village during a day trip. He was in an alley, wearing all black and had a beard. His dark eyes were smoldering with murderous hate when this America spotted him before he ducked out of sight.
But the Kurds had control then. The terror attacks there came later after Obama took office.
The planet is full of horrible peoples, horrible leaders, savage, disgusting customs, and many more evils.
But we are not the government of the world. The testimony of aliens about their problems has gotten us into untold misery, for many years, and, in the case of Ukraine, may yet get our beautiful land ruined and a lot of us killed.
Iraq never attacked the United States, unlike its closest neighbors Iran and Saudi Arabia.
If we had backed Saddam in his war with Iran, if we had gotten out of his way in 1991 and encouraged him to go to Riyadh and root out the Wahabi evil, the world would be a much more stable and less dangerous place.