the original question was about revenge, an eye for an eye Clearly the US didnt go into Afghanistan for revenge - even the most surgical airstrikes will kill innocent people. (you hardly hear about the 4 Canadian soldiers killed and several maimed as a result of US 'friendly fire') but vastly more Afghans died during the war with Russia and vastly more died between wars among the warlords. How many were executed in the soccer stadium? They went in to eliminate the Al Qaeda bases, and the Taliban leadership (that were essentially co-opted by AlQaeda). THe biggest mistake in the campaign was personalizing the war. (its virtually impossible to go into war with an individual, which feeds into the terrorists propaganda war anyway) The second mistake was the AXis of Evil crap.

re: US policy, under BUSH jr. they were becoming isolationist, the attacks on Sept 11 forced the US out of its isolation. (at the time, one of my friends said we (Canada and the US) should isolate ourselves even more, which is totally unrealistic, as its not possible to do that in this day and age. 911 was a wake up call to the US, to let them know that they are part of the world, and its a dangerous place.

the question to ask is: which is more dangerous? a world with a tinpot dictators, or tinpot dictators with nukes. (nukes that can be handed over to some terrorist group with grudge and let them do the dirty work)

and one that may end up controlling the majority of the worlds oil supply. Because Saddam with nukes can go back into Kuwait and theres nothing anybody can do about it.

despite all the talk about alternate & clean energy sources,( I for one am all for them) most of us still drive cars and use electricity without thinking about it.

I remember a goofy scat song that some guy did 10 years ago.... Saddam is at 'em again,, uncle Sam thought he had em, but Saddam is at em again..

skiddly Dubai, skiddly Dubai Abyssinia, Abyssinia. (thats all I can remember, great tune though)

petr