The Iraq War...

old hippy · 20-03-2013 01:56PM

summerskin wrote: »

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

Me too. I think it was well over a million, some estimates have it at around 2 million.

A great day of people power - even if it didn't stop the illegal war.

seamus · 20-03-2013 02:02PM

At the end of the day I don't have an ideological problem with the US being in Iraq trying to secure some form of peaceful democracy for them.

My real problem with it is that in this case the end most certainly does not justify the means. As davet82 eloquently puts it - it was the right thing, but for the wrong reasons and done in totally the wrong way.

It started because G.W. Bush wanted to settle a grudge against Hussein for the attempt assassination on Bush Snr. This was never originally about terrorism or WMDs or even oil. It was about a fncking world leader using the massive war machine at his disposal to settle a personal grudge. For that alone he should be jailed for the rest of his life.

Then you have conspiracy of disinformation and straight up lies that his government used to justify this war to the American people and to get the support of Blair's government. More people who need to be up in front of an International Court.

After that then it just became a clusterfnck. A commander-in-chief who is a demonstrable idiot coupled with the occupation of a culture who is ideologically opposed to everything that the USA stands for. Even if they "liberated" the Iraqi people, the Islamic culture will not accept their presence. There was no opposition worth speaking of in Iraq which means that when the US tore down the security structures belong to Hussein - police & army - there was nobody there to pick it up. And the US troops were stuck with it.

At least if they'd had UN backing, then the UN could have assisted with security.

kowloon · 20-03-2013 02:16PM

Supposedly the number of civilians dying before the invasion, from treatable medical conditions rendered untreatable by the embargo, was quite high. Infant mortality being a big killer.
The Iraqi people are getting screwed from every direction.

BillyMitchel · 20-03-2013 02:17PM

Wow a lot of people saying they supported it, bit surprising TBH.

How did anyone believe the shít Bush and Blair were coming up.

Nodin · 20-03-2013 02:21PM

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.

Well he did have substance. It just wasn't the same substance people thought was there when they voted for him.

Three Seasons · 20-03-2013 02:39PM

So after all the accusations that the US were only after oil, did they actually get any oil from Iraq?

morlock_ · 20-03-2013 03:10PM

seamus wrote: »

At the end of the day I don't have an ideological problem with the US being in Iraq trying to secure some form of peaceful democracy for them.

Why do you presume that was their intentions?

It started because G.W. Bush wanted to settle a grudge against Hussein for the attempt assassination on Bush Snr. This was never originally about terrorism or WMDs or even oil. It was about a fncking world leader using the massive war machine at his disposal to settle a personal grudge. For that alone he should be jailed for the rest of his life.

Don't you think you're giving George W. Bush too much credit here?
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Philip Zelikow stated in 2002 the invasion was to protect Israel.

[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]"Why would Iraq attack America or use nuclear weapons against us? I'll tell you what I think the real threat [is] and actually has been since 1990 - it's the threat against Israel," Zelikow told a crowd at the University of Virginia on September 10, 2002, speaking on a panel of foreign policy experts assessing the impact of September 11 and the future of the war on al-Qaeda.

"And this is the threat that dare not speak its name, because the Europeans don't care deeply about that threat, I will tell you frankly. And the American government doesn't want to lean too hard on it rhetorically, because it is not a popular sell," said Zelikow.

[/FONT]Philip Zelikow was a member of President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, authored the National Security Strategy of September 2002 that provided the justification for a preemptive war against Iraq.

So now, do you really think the war was over a personal grudge?
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][/FONT]

imtdub · 20-03-2013 03:10PM

Three Seasons wrote: »

So after all the accusations that the US were only after oil, did they actually get any oil from Iraq?

Few of the assumptions the invasion was based upon have turned out to be accurate. Iraq has not become a major US ally in the Middle East, as the Bush administration believed it would. On the contrary, it is nowadays closer to Iran than the US.

Nor has Iraq become America's big oil provider. American oil companies do have important contracts in Iraq, but so do British, Russian and Chinese companies.

The biggest beneficiaries were probably two US companies: Halliburton, with which former US Vice-President Dick Cheney had had connections, and the security company Blackwater, whose reputation was challenged so often that it is now called Academi, which makes it sound entirely peaceable.

We have long known, of course, that Saddam Hussein was not the strategic threat that the British and American governments claimed in 2002 and 2003. One leading American politician says the Bush administration assured him privately that Saddam's missiles could hit the east coast of the US. The British government claimed at the time that Iraqi missiles capable of hitting British bases in Cyprus could be operational in 45 minutes

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-21829269

Zebra3 · 20-03-2013 03:16PM

kowloon wrote: »

Supposedly the number of civilians dying before the invasion, from treatable medical conditions rendered untreatable by the embargo, was quite high. Infant mortality being a big killer.
The Iraqi people are getting screwed from every direction.

Pure scum.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbIX1CP9qr4

seamus · 20-03-2013 03:17PM

morlock_ wrote: »

Why do you presume that was their intentions?

It wasn't. It is now, purely because they have no other reason for being there.

So now, do you really think the war was over a personal grudge

Yes. If anyone else but commander cuckoo-bananas had been in charge, I wouldn't.

I think you're giving far too much credit to GWB to think that he had any Israeli interests in mind.

hyperborean · 20-03-2013 03:18PM

A large-scale survey of Iraqi households by UNICEF, published in 2012, found that between 800,000 and a million Iraqi children under 18 – or about five percent of Iraqi children – have lost one or both of their parents.

Disturbing, shameful, this is what happens when right wing (libertarians and neo cons) nuts get their finger on the trigger......

Wompa1 · 20-03-2013 03:26PM

I don't believe Iraq posed an imminent threat to American shores, to US security...possibly but not certainly. A war effort in Iraq could have been pursued after stressing diplomatic actions first. Unfortunately it seems that the U.N at the time was running a fraudulent aide program with Iraq so how they could have actually discussed a compromise would be anyones guess. Sadam Hussein had not conformed to multiple U.N treaties and also then did not conform to the U.N Weapons inspections in the manner they wished to inspect.

Here would be my questions. It was established that Iraq DID have weapons at one time. There was no proof that they actually disposed of these weapons. Hussein would not provide this proof, no did he state how he disposed of the weapons. It's likely that he sold or moved them to a bordering country but he did not admit to any of that. Even when the strike was 48 hours away and he was warned, he did not come up with anything credible.

So, what happened to the weapons that he did have back in the 90's? Where did they go?

seamus · 20-03-2013 03:33PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

So, what happened to the weapons that he did have back in the 90's? Where did they go?

Some of them were probably used on internal affairs. Also a surprising amount of weaponry is perishable. Rockets especially won't just sit in a bunker for 20 years waiting to be launched, they need to be maintained and inspected at regular intervals.

The sanctions on Iraq most likely disabled Hussein's ability to maintain anything past a basic arsenal through a lack of equipment and a loss of qualified personnel. The fact that his security forces literally crumbled when the US arrived is testament to this. The insurgents who later surfaced have proven to be better armed than Hussein's security forces because they're being supplied by outside forces.

This lack of weaponry on Iraq's part was well known by the US and UK. Weapons inspectors in Iraq could find nothing. Yet the US continued to insist that he had them

morlock_ · 20-03-2013 03:34PM

seamus wrote: »

It wasn't. It is now, purely because they have no other reason for being there.
Yes. If anyone else but commander cuckoo-bananas had been in charge, I wouldn't.

I think you're giving far too much credit to GWB to think that he had any Israeli interests in mind.

I'm not giving him credit at all, I know the real reason for invading Iraq just as I know the real reason for attacking Iran, Syria, Libya and most likely Saudi Arabia at some point and it has nothing to do with a personal vendetta of George W. Bush.

A 1998 letter from PNAC to Bill Clinton encouraged him to use military force in the removal of Saddam Hussein and not a single bush signature was on that letter, only the names of men with connections to Israel and the defense industry.

The same people pushing for war in Iran are the exact same people that wanted it in Iraq but don't take my word for it, read the letter for yourself.

You can see more of the same when Bush came to power in another letter dated September 20, 2001

Funnily enough, Netanyahu said the attacks on September 11 were "good for Israel" but who knows what he meant, it's a bit vague really, I can't imagine what.

Netanyahu, the same man telling congress there was "no doubt whatsoever" Iraq had a nuclear weapons programme, it certainly a case of deja vu when he talks the same way about Iran.

hyperborean · 20-03-2013 03:35PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

Here would be my questions.

It was established that Iraq DID have weapons at one time.

Thats not a question, it a statement and has not been proven

Wompa1 wrote: »

There was no proof that they actually disposed of these weapons.

Again leading from an unproven standpoint

Wompa1 wrote: »

Hussein would not provide this proof,

He was the leader of a country, he doesnt have to answer to the USA?

Wompa1 wrote: »

no did he state how he disposed of the weapons.

Again with the imaginary theory

Wompa1 wrote: »

It's likely that he sold or moved them to a bordering country but he did not admit to any of that.

:pac: maybe the syrians have them?

Wompa1 wrote: »

Even when the strike was 48 hours away and he was warned, he did not come up with anything credible.

A violent nation with a history of murder and mayhem made these warnings, what would you do as a leader of a country

Wompa1 wrote: »

So, what happened to the weapons that he did have back in the 90's? Where did they go? .

The ones the Yanks supplied?

moon_man · 20-03-2013 03:36PM

Zebra3 wrote: »

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

no chance , if obama even supported such a move , the democrats would loose the all important independant vote in america for years , no republican president will ever support a former leader being tried in a foreign court , not going to happen while ameirca is top dog

Wompa1 · 20-03-2013 03:36PM

seamus wrote: »

Some of them were probably used on internal affairs. Also a surprising amount of weaponry is perishable. Rockets especially won't just sit in a bunker for 20 years waiting to be launched, they need to be maintained and inspected at regular intervals.

The sanctions on Iraq most likely disabled Hussein's ability to maintain anything past a basic arsenal through a lack of equipment and a loss of qualified personnel.

Unless they have been maintained. The sanctions were meant to be imposed by an entity which was corrupt. Even if perishable there should be remains of the weapons somewhere? where did they dump them?

davet82 · 20-03-2013 03:37PM

hyperborean wrote: »

:pac: maybe the syrians have them?

i'm pretty sure its the Iranians turn to hold them

Grayson · 20-03-2013 03:37PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

I don't believe Iraq posed an imminent threat to American shores, to US security...possibly but not certainly. A war effort in Iraq could have been pursued after stressing diplomatic actions first. Unfortunately it seems that the U.N at the time was running a fraudulent aide program with Iraq so how they could have actually discussed a compromise would be anyones guess. Sadam Hussein had not conformed to multiple U.N treaties and also then did not conform to the U.N Weapons inspections in the manner they wished to inspect.

Here would be my questions. It was established that Iraq DID have weapons at one time. There was no proof that they actually disposed of these weapons. Hussein would not provide this proof, no did he state how he disposed of the weapons. It's likely that he sold or moved them to a bordering country but he did not admit to any of that. Even when the strike was 48 hours away and he was warned, he did not come up with anything credible.

So, what happened to the weapons that he did have back in the 90's? Where did they go?

The weapons he had in the 90's were either destroyed or got old. Yes, old. A lot of that stuff actually degrades with age.

They never went anywhere, because they didn't exist.

seamus · 20-03-2013 03:39PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

Unless they have been maintained. The sanctions were meant to be imposed by an entity which was corrupt. Even if perishable there should be remains of the weapons somewhere? where did they dump them?

Probably sold. Or repurposed, steel melts down, fuel can be used to make weapons.

Sorry, I edited my post probably after you read it. Multiple weapons inspections in Iraq found nothing. Hussein really had nothing to disprove as there was no evidence they had WMDs.

Just because he previously had them, doesn't mean he is required to account for them later on when they can't be found.

Wompa1 · 20-03-2013 03:44PM

hyperborean wrote: »

Thats not a question, it a statement and has not been proven

Again leading from an unproven standpoint

He was the leader of a country, he doesnt have to answer to the USA?

Again with the imaginary theory

:pac: maybe the syrians have them?

A violent nation with a history of murder and mayhem made these warnings, what would you do as a leader of a country

The ones the Yanks supplied?

It was not proven that Iraq used chemical weapons on it's own citizens killings thousands?

It wasn't the USA asking the questions, it was the U.N weapon inspectors, a pretty reasonable question considering the terms of the treaties which he was under agreement with.

If I was the leader of a country which was facing an imminent attack from a superpower. I would not run and hide and leave my people to die. I would ensure everybody knew I was doing everything within my power to insure the safety of my people but then...I don't think I would ever be a dictator.

And yes the one's the Yanks supplied...great answer.

My opinion is based on information sourced via multiple documentaries, news outlets and a guy I know who was in Iraq for the Gulf War. You get smug about a differing opinion to yours (even though I think the war was a horrible event also) even though you don't know the facts any better than I. Why are your sources more reliable.

hyperborean · 20-03-2013 03:49PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

My opinion is based on information sourced via multiple documentaries, news outlets and a guy I know who was in Iraq for the Gulf War. You get smug about a differing opinion to yours (even though I think the war was a horrible event also) even though you don't know the facts any better than I. Why are your sources more reliable.

Baaaaaaaaa, baaaaaaaa, ba, baaaaaaaaa

Wompa1 · 20-03-2013 03:52PM

hyperborean wrote: »

Baaaaaaaaa, baaaaaaaa, ba, baaaaaaaaa

Don't hate the Playa! :cool:

Paramite Pie · 20-03-2013 04:16PM

davet82 wrote: »

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

And where was the US and it's Allies during the Saddam's rampaging genocide against the Kurds? When he was gassing children? They were giving him the weapons to do it as long as the oil was flowing.

We're all happy to see the end of Saddam but they didn't do it for the right reasons or at the right time. They actually put him in power (and also put Bin Ladin in power too).

Zebra3 · 20-03-2013 04:20PM

Paramite Pie wrote: »

And where was the US and it's Allies during the Saddam's rampaging genocide against the Kurds? When he was gassing children? They were giving him the weapons to do it as long as the oil was flowing.

Ironically it was Germany that supplied him with the gas.

Fratton Fred · 20-03-2013 04:38PM

Zebra3 wrote: »

Ironically it was Germany that supplied him with the gas.

And the French that built the facilities to turn it in to weapons.

the_syco · 20-03-2013 04:56PM

seamus wrote: »

This lack of weaponry on Iraq's part was well known by the US and UK. Weapons inspectors in Iraq could find nothing. Yet the US continued to insist that he had them

I think they hoped SH would give them some proof of what happened to the weapons that they had given him.

Wompa1 wrote: »

where did they dump them?

On top of the Kurds? One of the main ingredients of mustard gas was sourced from the USA, and that's only what we know they got from the USA. IMO, if you'll admit that you gave SH Thiodiglycol, you'd wonder what America gave to SH that they'd want to find before anyone else did. I'd hope they found what they were looking for, even if they didn't let the public know.

Three Seasons wrote: »

So after all the accusations that the US were only after oil, did they actually get any oil from Iraq?

I wonder have Kuwait began slant drilling again, though? Iraq is now producing about a million more barrels per day than it was on the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom. It seems Egypt has won a contract, though.

kowloon · 20-03-2013 05:26PM

seamus wrote: »

Some of them were probably used on internal affairs. Also a surprising amount of weaponry is perishable. Rockets especially won't just sit in a bunker for 20 years waiting to be launched, they need to be maintained and inspected at regular intervals.

A good example being Argentinian weaponry in the Falklands. A significant proportion of their ordnance was defective. The British would have been in for a world of hurt had Argentinian air attacks been more effective.
I think it was the Plymouth that was hit a bunch of times but none of the Argentinian bombs exploded.

As for well maintained weapons, there is still a small failure rate, but one that becomes significant when you chuck enough around. Cluster bombs are great at littering the place with unexploded ordnance for the kids to have fun with later.

Nodin · 20-03-2013 05:38PM

Wompa1 wrote: »

It was not proven that Iraq used chemical weapons on it's own citizens killings thousands?.

Pre-Gulf 1. When it was a US ally. Before sanctions.

Wompa1 wrote: »

It wasn't the USA asking the questions, it was the U.N weapon inspectors, a pretty reasonable question considering the terms of the treaties which he was under agreement with..

....yet the inspectors were there at the time essentially to supply the US with some casus belli.

We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force.

http://downingstreetmemo.com/memos.html

The notion was to threaten Saddam, and ask him to allow in Inspectors, the hope being he'd refuse, thus allowing a "justified" war.

However its important to note

It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even if the timing was not yet decided.

http://downingstreetmemo.com/memos.html

Other noble and honourable notions include -

George Bush considered provoking a war with Saddam Hussein's regime by flying a United States spyplane over Iraq bearing UN colours, enticing the Iraqis to take a shot at it, according to a leaked memo of a meeting between the US President and Tony Blair.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/bush-plotted-to-lure-saddam-into-war-with-fake-un-plane-465436.html

WakeUp · 20-03-2013 06:26PM

Nothing has changed. Is still full steam ahead with the spreading of "freedom" and "democracy" on the grounds of "humanitarianism" and doing what is "right" in the interest of humanity. Though eventually sooner rather than later somebody will say enough is enough and actually fight back its coming.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P02vjiEZyUs

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

The Iraq War...

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