Brownshirt Betty,
You might be interested in this post, made in 1998, from one of the three gentlemen falsely arrested. He, four years ago on a University of Missouri website, eloquently made a case for going after Saddam.
Read, learn, and work on your prejudices.
From:
http://www.students.missouri.edu/lists/muslim-l/0117.html
As-salam-alekum. I think it's a great idea to be peaceful about
this entire thing, but here's the problem in this case:
Unfortunately, it is extremely necessary to stop Saddam Hussein,
and there is a long history behind this attack which everyone on the list
may not be aware of. I think it is extremely important to have a good
knowlege of what's going on in order to look at and analyze this whole
thing farily and intelligently.
The UN decided to force Iraq to comply, not the United States.
The thing is, only America (and Brittain and a few other nations) have the
money, manpower, etc to do it. So, it is at the approval...will,
rather...of the UN that this is going on.
The United Nations does these inspections for weapons in ALL
countries to keep track of what's going on and what each country is
building, their plans, etc. (After all, can you imagine having a country
making tons of this nuclear machinery and keeping it a secret? I'd be
scared...as would most of the world.) I mean, these are no petty weapons.
This is enough machinery to cause mass destruction, not to mention many
many deaths.
But with these inspections, there is a common knowledge of what's
going on so in case there is trouble, it isn't too unexpected.
Saddam Hussein has used chemical warfare repeatedly in the past,
(Iran is a strong example). There are numerous gases that, when exposed
in the air, are colorless and even odorless. Anyone who takes a few
breaths of it will die a horribly painful and drawn out death..not
instant. Iraq has produced and used these types of gases along with other
powerful chemical warfare.
Lately, there has been evidence uncovered that huge amounts of
money and manpower in Iraq is being put into the development and
construction of such weapons.
The question the UN asked is, "Why? Why spend such time, effort,
and money on these weapons?" Iraq's economy is near rock bottom, people
are leading miserable lives, their aren't enough goods for the population,
etc...yet instead of putting money into improving people's lives, the
country is focusing only on the military and weaponry. And most
importantly, "Why all of a sudden?" Obviously, if a country, who is
already producing a large amount of weaponry, starts all of a sudden,
producing even greater amounts, it calls for attention from the entire
world.
Keep in mind, that this is all coming from a country that has
developed much of this type of equipment in the past, used it, and killed
thousands of innocent people in the process. And it is also a country
that has proven to be troublesome and harrassing to other countries as
well (Gulf War and Kuwait...where this equipment was also used by Iraq).
The UN simply said, at first, "Let us inspect what you've got and
see some plans as to why you're making it and where you intend to use
it...because if you were doing it simply for research...you wouldn't be
making such massive amounts of it."
Iraq refused. They were asked again repeatedly and very clearly
told that these are routine inspections and the UN has these rights for
the wellfare of the world. Again, and repeatedly, Iraq refused.
Recently, it was found out that plans, equipment, etc were
destroyed or removed in order to keep them from being inspected by the UN.
(This was all going on while the UN kept asking and Iraq kept
refusing...it bought them time.)
So, the UN decided to use force to get Saddam to comply. But each
time there is a gap and some time for Iraq to act, the machiner, weapons,
documents, plans, etc are being moved out or hidden.
So, this entire attack was plannd to not allow spare time to
Saddam.
Yes, it is EXTREMELY unfortunate that there will be casualties,
but it is also unfortunate that that is one of the gruesome realities of
war. In all wars throughout histroy, although it hasn't been the
intention...innocent people have been killed.
Of course, that is not the intention of the United Nations...their
targets are not innocent people...their targets are military bases and
other specific places of interest in terms of military equipment. This is
to beat down Iraq's supply of nuclear weapons and to get Saddam to comply
with the United Nations' demands.
The target is essentially not Iraq and it's people, it is Saddam
and his large supply of nuclear weapons.
Yes, some people will undoubtedly and unintentionally be killed.
But that can never be helped...in ANY war. And if Saddam is not
controlled now and:
1. forced to stop making large amounts of weapons
2. forced to let the UN do it's inspections of his warfare.
or 2. Both of the above,
there will definitely be more death and war in the future than
there will be at this point. It is because of this that this attack was
launched and because of this history and these reasons that it is
unfortunate, but necessary.
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"Life Is Goooooood!"
-Omer J. Choudhary
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