The Iraq War...

davet82 · 20-03-2013 11:40AM #1

10 years today believe it or not was the start of the conflict, time flys!

Anyways glad to see they found the weapons of mass destruction and the people of Iraq don't have to live with the threat of violence anymore and the world is now a safer place...

:rolleyes:

admiralofthefleet · 20-03-2013 11:49AM

America's shame

FatherLen · 20-03-2013 11:51AM

here are some of the death toll stats.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casualties_of_the_Iraq_War

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar · 20-03-2013 11:53AM

yeah, iraqis would have been so much better off if saddam had been left in power

**** you bush

sink · 20-03-2013 11:54AM

Kurds and Shia are largely better off, especially the Kurds. The Sunnis are the big losers.

iDave · 20-03-2013 11:57AM

Wow 10 years. Remember it was my 18th birthday in the pub seeing the green and black grainy images of Baghdad on the TV screen with explosions happening here and there. I'm 28 today and Iraq is still a mess.

davet82 · 20-03-2013 11:57AM

Sir Digby Chicken Caesar wrote: »

yeah, iraqis would have been so much better off if saddam had been left in power

**** you bush

1,033,000 deaths as a result of the conflict March 2003 to August 2007

I wonder how many saddam would have notched up in that period, it would make you think?

Duggy747 · 20-03-2013 12:00PM

Fùck, 10 years? That would mean 10 years ago today was when I flew out of New York.

Was the same day an American asked me had I ever heard of a game called golf in Ireland (along with electricity in some parts of the country). I was heading home, and I said I'd have the craìc with him.

Told him I never heard of this "Golf?" and that I only came over to send McDonalds hamburgers back home to my family.

Still, I remember seeing the footage of the war kicking off when I was at the airport.

mccarthy37 · 20-03-2013 12:06PM

Saddam was a monster who slaughtered his own people regularly even when he was a friend of the west. There was no conflict of interest when the US were supplying him with arms in the Iran Iraq war which is estimated up to one million people died. I don't mourn his loss but Iraq is still far from a safe place to live in. Oil was the real reason why the Nato forces invaded Iraq with oil production back in full swing. Pity the same cannot be said about the economy.

nelly17 · 20-03-2013 12:06PM

Interestingly since the invasion of Kuwait - more US Service Personell have taken their own lifethan have been killed in the combioned conflicts.

Its thought that this is down to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder & depression etc caused by the cocktail of medication that the troops are given in the field to treat the individual symptoms of PTSD.

So I guess in the end no-one wins - except Haliburton

simon360 · 20-03-2013 12:13PM

Yeah! MURICA!!!!!

danniemcq · 20-03-2013 12:18PM

I was watching the news that night and sat up to maybe 2 or 3 in the morning watching shock and awe play out live on BBC news.

The then next day I nearly getting expelled from secondary school for wearing a white armband in protest to the start of it,

HUGE fight between me and the Principal about it, eventually he backed down after he claimed the school wasn't political and i countered with i wasn't the school, i was political.

Guess he feared reprisals if i was suspended/expelled so he let me be.

My construction teacher though i wish i could meet him again on this matter. He was convinced that the US was right in the invasion and that it had nothing to do with oil and was all about freedom and wmd's.

Spunge · 20-03-2013 12:20PM

i skipped school to protest at the dáil. ended up in finglas coz didnt know where the dáil was. got suspended

crockholm · 20-03-2013 12:30PM

I supported it at the time.

I think I have been proven wrong.

I no longer care about the Arab world,whether they have dictators or not, just steer a wide berth,no intervention anywhere there,let them sort their own problems themselves.Screw this whole white mans burden crap.

summerskin · 20-03-2013 12:31PM

I marched through London with over a million others to protest. Not just America's shame...

sink · 20-03-2013 12:31PM

At the time, I took them at their word about WMD's etc,. How naive I was.

mccarthy37 · 20-03-2013 12:36PM

nelly17 wrote: »

Interestingly since the invasion of Kuwait - more US Service Personell have taken their own lifethan have been killed in the combioned conflicts.

Its thought that this is down to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder & depression etc caused by the cocktail of medication that the troops are given in the field to treat the individual symptoms of PTSD.

So I guess in the end no-one wins - except Haliburton

Dick Cheney done well out of Halliburton. Its amazing how many of those who were involved in the planning of this operation have major regrets now. It was clear after a very short space of time to most sane people that their was no WMD. Tony Blair was very big disappointment I really taught there was more substance to him, I wonder deep down does he have any regrets.

Chuck Stone · 20-03-2013 12:37PM

summerskin wrote: »

I marched through London with over a million others to protest. Not just America's shame...

In fairness, the people of the UK were very much against - more like Tony Blair and Co's shame than the UK's. Robert Fisk wrote that Iraq 2003 was referred to as 'Tony Blair's War' by British Soldiers who were sent out there.

Fratton Fred · 20-03-2013 12:52PM

Chuck Stone wrote: »

In fairness, the people of the UK were very much against - more like Tony Blair and Co's shame than the UK's. Robert Fisk wrote that Iraq 2003 was referred to as 'Tony Blair's War' by British Soldiers who were sent out there.

It's not just that, if you read Sniper One, which is about a sniper in the Princess of Wales Royal Regiment, he was amazed by how little press coverage they received.

The war quickly became an embarrassment, so the amount of sheer hell the troops were going through was swept under the carpet by the Blair spin doctors.

Like many, I supported the war initially, but it soon became obvious it was little more than one man's personal crusade and ego that took a nation to war.

It would have happened without the UK's involvement, but I wish to good it didn't happen at all.

Grayson · 20-03-2013 12:55PM

davet82 wrote: »

I wonder how many saddam would have notched up in that period, it would make you think?

In the years before the war an average of 5000 people were killed or disappeared every year.

Saddam was a cnut. There's no denying that. But they turned Iraq into a hell hole afterwards.

Seedy Arling · 20-03-2013 01:04PM

There was a dude on Moncrieff there a while back talking about a squad of British troops, similar to the SAS, who were sent in to Iraq to take control of over one hundred thousand Iraqi troops who were supposed to be surrendering.

The squad arrived over, but surprise surprise, the Iraqi battalion didnt want to surrender. Somehow the British squad got out alive but when they returned home, they were derided in the national press as cowards, even though it was poor intelligence and strategic tom foolery that got them into the mess. Just goes to show how well the press was being manipulated by the government.

I can't remember the name of the book, but it sounded like an interesting read. Professionally speaking it destroyed the soldiers involved through no fault of their own.

the_syco · 20-03-2013 01:05PM

I was pretty sure America was right about the WMD's, as they had supplied them during the Iraq-Iran war. I wasn't surprised that they were all hidden away, esp when I found out that fcuking civilians were trying to persuade Saddams army to give up before the "war" kicked off. There was no shock and awe; the Iraqis knew the Americans were coming, and they were prepared for it.

morlock_ · 20-03-2013 01:06PM

On tenth anniversary, Israel partisans behind Iraq War still at large

G Power · 20-03-2013 01:07PM

sink wrote: »

At the time, I took them at their word about WMD's etc,. How naive I was.

and now people are taking politicians and their ilk at their word that they can fix the financial system too, christ on a bike!!!!!!!

G Power · 20-03-2013 01:11PM

mccarthy37 wrote: »

Dick Cheney done well out of Halliburton. Its amazing how many of those who were involved in the planning of this operation have major regrets now. It was clear after a very short space of time to most sane people that their was no WMD. Tony Blair was very big disappointment I really taught there was more substance to him, I wonder deep down does he have any regrets.

he was quoted very recently that after 10 years he has given up trying to convince people that he was right to get involved in the war in Iraq!! him and his co-conspirators deserve to be hung like Saddam was!!

davet82 · 20-03-2013 01:12PM

Grayson wrote: »

In the years before the war an average of 5000 people were killed or disappeared every year.

Saddam was a cnut. There's no denying that. But they turned Iraq into a hell hole afterwards.

Not denying saddam was an evil bastard at all. It was probably the right thing to do, for the wrong reasons, too late in the day.

Grayson · 20-03-2013 01:19PM

davet82 wrote: »

Not denying saddam was an evil bastard at all. It was probably the right thing to do, for the wrong reasons, too late in the day.

And done in completely the wrong way.

morlock_ · 20-03-2013 01:24PM

The whole build up to invading Iraq reminds me of the push for war against Iran by the exact same people mentioned in the previous article I linked. This is also a haunting reminder.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpQdg4D78Jc

Just replace Iraq with Iran and you have the same bloody outcome.

davet82 · 20-03-2013 01:46PM

Spunge wrote: »

i skipped school to protest at the dáil. ended up in finglas coz didnt know where the dáil was

so you wanted to protest about a warzone and then ended up in one, how ironic

Zebra3 · 20-03-2013 01:50PM

Hopefully one day Bush and Blair end up in the Hague.

nelly17 · 20-03-2013 01:53PM

Personally I always found this whole story to be a bit fishy

The Iraq War...

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