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I agree. It gave me chills when I heard Bush say that Saddam had tried to "kill my daddy". That is hardly the basis for foreign policy. Unless Bush does something soon about the imminent threat to our security, our open borders, then nothing else is going to matter very much. Bush has an obsession with Saddam that blinds him to every other problem the US faces right now. Our military is already stretched thin, our economy is teetering, the rest of the world is against a war, and conquering Iraq will mean occupying it for years and years. We need to protect our interests closer to home.
Hell that settles it then. We surrender.
By the way, any of you oh-so-much-more-intelligent-than-the-rest-of-us naysayers want to comment ON THIS???
I guess you think these maggots are patriots, huh?
In other words it's Americas fault that the jihadists have been killing Americans for the past thirty years with impunity.
& further destabilize an already volatile region
LOL, if we destabilize a destablized ME, perhaps it will stabilze, eh?
especially if Israel(which doesnt see Iraq as an imminent threat)gets involved in it.
A blatant lie.
As John Gielgud said to Dudley Moore in "Arthur"...I'll alert the media.
The reason I am for military action is that I believe the administration knows something more than they are telling us. I wish they would tell us, and I wonder why they can't/won't: is it to avoid panic or is it to protect the source?
I really don't think that "He tried to get mah Daddy!" would have been enough to turn Blair around, especially when you see the heat he is taking for his support back home. There is something to this that we don't know.
Many intelligence sources beyond our own have documented that Saddam Hussein has had contacts and cooperation with the most notorious terrorists. The Czechs still stand by their assertion that the head of Iraqi intelligence met with Mohammed Atta in Prague during the year before 9/11/01. I am sure that you recall that Abu Nidal (the world poster-boy for terrorists before being dwarfed by bin Laden) died recently in Baghdad with multiple gunshots to the head, intelligence sources say that the "scuttlebut" over there is that he refused to help Saddam train more terrorists. It is also known that Saddam has a Boeing 707 parked out next to a deserted airstrip that has been used as a training ground for terrorists, most notably for teaching how to storm a cockpit. He also attempted to assassinate former President Bush in Kuwait. That is just the background on that murderous bastard...
So, the way that I see it, there are just a few basic issues to consider:
1) Is Saddam Hussein attempting to produce WMDs? 2) Is he also attempting to produce/procure nuclear weapons? 3) If he is successful in producing such weapons, and felt that he could use a third party (namely terrorists who feel that they have a common enemy in the United States) to smuggle a nuke or bio weapon into the US and felt that he could do so without a traceable trail back to him would he do it?
As far as #1 is concerned, even the most ardent detractors from the Bush doctrine admit that he has and continues to produce WMDs. No one seriously suggests that he is not producing such weapons. That takes us to #2, and there is compelling evidence of his desire to get The Bomb, from his acquisition of high speed centrifuges to his known attempts to shop for uranium in African countries. That leaves us with the sole question of #3... given that he has used WMDs in war, more specifically against his own people, I feel that the only thing that would prevent him from using such a weapon against us is that we could trace it back to him and unleash immeasurable horrors in retaliation. But, if he could clandestinely give it to some martyrdom-hungry terrorist group to use against us, I believe that he would do so in a New York second.
I challenge you to make a compelling argument to the contrary. It all comes down to whether he would allow terrorists to deliver his weapon... are you willing to bet aginst that? So if you buy that he has them AND that he would use them if he could do so without a trail leading back to him, then you must admit that the president has a clear and compelling requirement to act preemptively to take out the threat.
I left this for last because this has not been pursued enough, I think that one day we will realize that both West Nile and the Anthrax "attacks" came directly or indirectly from Saddam's bioweapons program; this is not provable at this stage but I think that one day it will be proven. Many disease specialists are *astounded* at how quickly West Nile spread (from just NYC in 1999 to nationwide in 3 years), and an Iraqi defector claimed *before* that outbreak that Saddam had been working on it.
Given that the president has far more intelligence data on these issues, does it not concern you how seriously he is taking this?
Dude, that is so [17]80's.
The Dims say we need to "Concentrate on 'finding Osama' and find a resolution to the Israeli/Palestinian question, first", but, how, may I ask, is that a logical solution when the funding & support pipelines all trace back to IRAQ?
Like the World Wars? Are you suggesting that we should not have entered those since Germany was not a "clear and present danger" to the US?
I don[']t favor Saddam Hussein at all but neither do I buy Bush's rational[e] for invading Iraq[,] which is still a sovereign country[.] [I]t[']s NOT our place to dictate to its people who their leaders should be
We aren't. We are telling them who their leaders CANNOT be, which is certainly apropriate in this case. Many worry about the precedent we are setting here, but I would suggest that any 1) military dictator 2) whose first job was as an assassin, 3) who has twice launched surprise invasions on his unsuspecting neighbors, 4) who organizes rallies where the people chant "Death to Israel! Death to America! Death to ________!", 5) who is actively and openly ignoring more than a dozen UN resolutions and peace treaty promises, 6) who is continually firing at peace-keeping troops, 7) who is agreesively pursuing nuclear weapons and other WMD's, 8) who is pursuing these weapons at the expense of food and medicine for his people, 9) who has used chemical and/or biological weapons against foreign soldiers AND HIS OWN PEOPLE, and 10) who is just that butt-ugly...
... taking out ANY leader who meets those 10 requirements SHOULD be removed, by request, or, failing that, by international accord, or, failing that, by the power of our own hands... THAT'S a decent precedent to set.
nor are we to go abroad in search of monsters to destroy as the founding fathers put it way back when.
They have this cute little way of inevitably coming to us... ever hear of Pearl Harbor, The World Trade Center, and a few dozen other bombings of American citizens personnel, and property from the last 60 years?
The case hasn[']t been made to justify or warrant such a perilous course despite Bush's hollow claims & saber rattling which sounds more like a personal vendetta of his than legitimate national security concerns.
Uh, read the above paragraphs...
To me[,] it[,]s more likely to finish what his father started[,] or over oil[,] & both Bushes seem to want Saddam[']s head on a platter just to settle old scores.
Just because there are personal reasons to despise the guy does not mean that he has not earned the butt-kicking that he is about to receive.
Going down this ominous path on such dubious grounds will only incite more anti[-]American sentiments
Moronic rhetoric straight from Teddy Kennedy's mouth. They've been attacking us for years, and you want to put about possibly inciting more IF WE START DEFENDING OURSELVES AND RETALIATING?!?!? You would actually prefer we sit back and take it and hope they stop? That's not the kind of leadership you learned in the military, is it?
& further destabilize an already volatile region
ROFL, exactly how could that area be any more unstable? Open warfare would at least be moderately predictable, understandable, would have defined sides, and a defined ending with a cease-fire peace treaty, also known as a "peace process" (that will actually work).
especially if Israel[ ](which doesn[']t see Iraq as an imminent threat)[ ]gets involved in it.
The lies get deeper here...
If having weapons of mass destruction is the Bush standard for such aggressive action then why not go into China,[ ]N.Korea[,] etc[.,] who do pose a credible & real threat to US?
See the list above for the real criteria. North Korea is on our "terrorist-list", by the way, and China gets a special exemption, because, like Russia (from 1950-80), open war with them would easily mirror WWII in severity, death tolls, and world-wide theaters of warfare. Iraq and the Muslim cowards who surrrender to camera crews do not have the stomach for that kind of fight.
For US to pick on Iraq is like a heavyweight boxer bullying a lightweight.
So every little punk nation can attack our citizens, and you will cower away from retribution?
There is NO clear & present danger to US & if there is let Congress declare war as the Constitution mandates
The resolution to use force against Iraq was passed by Congress in 1998. Try and catch up.
We the People surely DON[']T need UN approval to defend our nation but Congress should not just rollover & rubber stamp the pending war resolution either.
They already did. Sorry to take the rug out from under you... not!
Let them hear from you now.
They have. I've sent them a letter of support, and I'm sure many other FReepers have, too.
May cooler & more prudent heads prevail to rein in the warmongerers
Apparently you weren't around the US (and FR in particular) after 9-11-01. Most of us were FAR more eager to bomb the Middle East further back into the Stone Ages, and a calm President Bush refused to cave in to our rage.
before this comes back to bite & haunt US like 9/11.
If we do NOT go after Saddam before this summer, he WILL have operational nuclear weapons. He will use the first on Israel to become a mythic legend in Islam for all eternity. He will use the rest on the US, the UK, and any who refuse to follow his rule. Cowardice like that which you suggest will do nothing but encourage him in the exactr same way that Clinton's ignorance and cowardice encouraged the biggest escalation of terrorist attacks against American lives and property in our history.
I hope that helps.
Let's see, from the "Quick and Dirty Guide" raysol used: "There's No Reason to Bomb Saddam", "Keep Moving That Goalpost", "War For Oil", "We'll Destabilize the Middle-East", and "Remember Who the Real Enemies Are". And, SBeck provided us with a continuous "Tell Those 'Chickenhawks' What For" argument.
Raysol and SBeck: I suggest you check out the link that Long Cut provided in post #13. I think it could help you. At the very least it would provide you with more ammo, because you omitted several of the "Quick and Dirty" points. You forgot: "Show Me Osama's Corpse", "It's About the Ordinary People", "Insist That We Give Inspections a Chance", etc., etc., ad nauseam.
I'm just trying to help, you know. That's me. Helpful.
I can hear your knees knockin' from here.
