BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 06 May 04 - 04:55 PM

I kept humming 'waist deep in the Big Muddy' to myself, finally did a search for the words, and found this thread too. Sheesh, you look like a bunch of Nostradomuses, things have gone as you said. A year ago many anti-bushites sounded like nuts, but, now it's the neocons that look like nuts--er---fascisti. Just thought I'd refresh so ye's could see how brilliant you were. Here's to getting out of the Big Muddy before another town and brigade of folks on both sides are killed...

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: TIA
Date: 15 Sep 03 - 10:58 AM

We must be patient with Mr. O'Reilly. Just 'cause we haven't found them doesn't mean they're not there.

Even though...

(sorry, couldn't get a clicky to work)


Iraq WMD report shelved due to lack of evidence

Sunday, 14 September , 2003, 13:53

London: After failing to get any evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the US and Britain have decided to delay indefinitely the publication of a full report on the controversial issue, media reported today.
Efforts by the Iraq Survey Group, an Anglo-American team of 1,400 scientists, military and intelligence experts, to scour Iraq for the past four months to uncover evidence of chemical or biological weapons have so far ended in failure, The Sunday Times claimed in its report.

It had been expected that a progress report would be published tomorrow but MPs on the British Parliaments security and intelligence committee have been told that even this has been delayed and no new date set.

British defence intelligence sources have confirmed that the final report, which is to be submitted by David Kay, the survey groups leader, to George Tenet, head of the CIA, had been delayed and may not necessarily even be published, the paper said.

In July, Kay suggested on US television that he had seen enough evidence to convince himself that ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had had a programme to produce weapons of mass destruction.

He expected to find "strong" evidence of missile delivery systems and "probably" evidence of biological weapons.

But last week British officials said they believed Kay had been "kite-flying" and that no hard evidence had been uncovered.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Metchosin
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 01:03 PM

something that was announced on a Canadian broadcast the other day, which I, as a Canadian, was not aware (sad to admit)....Canada has lost more people in "Peace Keeping" missions than any other nation in the world.

I suspect the Canadian body count will skyrocket, when again we are expected to do "our part" in this sorry debacle....we are already stretched to the limit trying to mop up the messes in other parts of the world, we need this like a hole in the head....Thanks Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair, so sorry you just couldn't keep it in your pants.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Ebbie
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 10:27 AM

That's where the 'rabid' part comes in, Barry.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Barry Finn
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 02:48 AM

He shouldn't have trusted him in the first place. Barry

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Ebbie
Date: 13 Sep 03 - 01:57 AM

Well, danged! as some might say, I've been waiting for the longest for a place to post this- might as well plug it in here...

Bill O'Reilly, Fox News Rabid, on Good Morning, America March 18, 2003:

"And I said on my program that if the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation and I will not trust the Bush administration again."

I can't listen to the man myself- has anyone heard him apologize? Doug? :)

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Bobert
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 07:08 PM

Yo Rush,

Well, danged! Who would have thought as downtown Baghdad as being the safest place on the planet to live? Well, if that's the case, why are we spending a billion dollars a day when there are so many other dangerous places to be?

Ahhhh, before you spin that into gold let me ask you how many millions (or is it billions) of tax dollars are being spent to spin dogsh*t into gold? Seems that your guys change their stories on a daily basis....

Ahhhhh, llike whats wrong with the danged truth? Oh yeah, that might mean that would undercut the PR campaigns and lead to more truth! Silly me?!?... Don't know what got into me....

Nevermind...

Bobert

p.s. Yo, Rush, who's buried in Grants Tomb?

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Greg F.
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 06:38 PM

Well, they could do a replay of the evacuation of Saigon- one of the finer moments in U.S. history

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 06:15 PM

The old saying "Well, I wouldn't start from here" is irrsistable here, but not helpful, because you always have to "start from here".

An announced timetable for complete withdrawal of occupying troops, and for any outside peacekeepers to be placed under control of an Iraqi government, that's an essential starting point.

And an immediate priority of getting the basic services, such as water and electricity back on line. There are people with the expertise and understanding of how that can be done, and clearly they aren't the ones being employed by the occupying forces.

During the transitional period, an administration in control which treats the killing of Iraqi civilians as being every bit as serious as the killing of members of the occupying armies.

And zero tolerance for the carpetbaggers who would try to profit from privatisation and reconstruction.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 06:00 PM

I would be interested, given the messiness of the present situation, to hear any recommendations that can be offered as to the best exit strategy. Aside from making George do it all personally.

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 05:02 PM

On the day we hear about those ten Iraqi police killed by jittery US troops, it would be timely to recall how Tony Benn saw the risk of atrocities like 911 - and for that matter how he assessed the Iraqi regime. For those whose memories need a nudge, CLICK HERE and follow the link to "audio gallery" and select sample #2. When you've listened (don't worry, it's very short) you might want to double check that this was indeed Benn speaking in the UK House of Commons in 1998.

There could hardly be a better justification for the "as predicted" bit of this thread's title.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 02:27 PM

Of course it's not just US soldiers being killed. Or even US and other occupying soldiers. News just in of ten Iraqi policeman killed by the US Army in "friendly fire", two days after other incidents in which policemen were shot and a hospital shot up by the peacekeepers.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: TIA
Date: 12 Sep 03 - 02:09 PM

7/26/03, Rush Limbaugh on The Rush Limbaugh Show

"Folks, we're getting a daily death update out of Iraq, and we're hearing slogans like, "One a day," and "Our troops are being slaughtered," from the Democrats, as their willing accomplices in the press try to concoct this notion that the casualty rate over there is outrageous and intolerable. The following statistics come from the Centers for Disease Control website: On a daily basis, on average, 10 Americans die by drowning, and nine Americans die by fire in their homes. 14 Americans die by pedestrian accidents. 27 Americans die in falls. On average, 50 Americans a day are murdered. 118 die in auto accidents, and 25 people die from A.I.D.S. every day, on average. Yesterday, two Americans died in battle in Iraq."

8/26/03, Brit Hume on Fox News:

"Two hundred seventy-seven U.S. soldiers have now died in Iraq, which means that statistically speaking U.S. soldiers have less of a chance of dying from all causes in Iraq than citizens have of being murdered in California, which is roughly the same geographical size. The most recent statistics indicate California has more than 2300 homicides each year, which means about 6.6 murders each day. Meanwhile, U.S. troops have been in Iraq for 160 days, which means they're incurring about 1.7 deaths, including illness and accidents each day."

9//12/03, TIA does his right wing fuzzy math homework and discovers that Bush and the ChickenHawks are indeed on the very front lines.


                            annual    area       murders per   murders per   Hume/Limbaugh
Site    population murders (sq mi) 100 sq.mi.    1000 people    Danger Rating

DC    572059       239         68          3502             0.4                   Iwo Jima
MD    5296486    430         12407    35                0.1                   Bull Run 3
RI      1048319      45          1545       29                0.0                   Biggest Little Slaughterhouse in the Union
CA    33871648   2079       63707    13                0.1                   I am Looging fuhr Sarah Connor
DE      783600      25          2489       10                0.0                   Yeah, but there's no income tax
Iraq*   140000      282         168754   2                   2.0                   A Walk in the Park
AK      626932      27          656425   0                   0.0                  Your Momma's Bosom

* represents numbers for US troops (+/-)

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 07 Sep 03 - 02:40 AM

In Today's Brisbane Sunday Mail (Oz) small article on Irag

The words "wounded" and "injured" are used interchangably, even referring to the same individual incident.

Looks like the 51'st state's media thought police are slipping...

Love the cartoon Bill D ...

Johhny Howard (Cheeseball Chucklehead!) and co are starting to get bogged down in their own quagmire (Iraq didn't help) - it started with "Tampa" and "Kids overboard"...


Robin

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Barry Finn
Date: 06 Sep 03 - 11:36 PM

Hey Don, I know you were in agreement & you were somewhat in jest but I did take it from elsewhere. Not only has what you're saying been sugar coated but it's been put a arms length & at a distance from us & the other untruths that they should properly be standing next to.
It's easier to see (& harder to swallow) the whole scope when all the facts & dots are connected. The media has complicity in aiding to continue this clouding of truths & half truths. As it stands now I don't think there's one politician that could speak on any topic telling the whole truth nor one news agency or mainstream correspondent that could or would report on it if a truth were to be told. All we have running this goverment are a bunch lously choices where we're only left with who's the lesser of 2 evils.


Presently we're "begging" the UN & others to help with Iraq. After we told them all to bugger off why should they or anyone else be paying a price for something they wouldn't buy in the 1st place. We don't have the policing capabilities, the man/women power, the money for just us to stay the full term, the will of the American public to continue watching the deaths of our soldiers (for, what's the reason, we seem to change this like a baby changes diapers) over a pack of lies & we never had the world or God for that matter on our side. This all has Bush's back to the wall with the elections right around the corner, he's gotta give somewhere if he even thinks he'd be a 2nd termer. In his road map to peace (he wanted a feather on this one for his Pap, sorry his hat) he forgot how fast the lanes change in the land of the drifting sands. Damn idiot couldn't make sense of a map never mind a blueprint even on his own ranch he keeps running into his own shit but he's no longer getting up & smelling like roses. Hell, he wouldn't know a short cut from a dead end much less his ass from his elbow.


There was a time when we could've been a contender. We could've been proud. We could've been seen as fair, helpful & just & above all we could've walked mighty tall if we had only taken our feet off the throats of others & given them our heart & hand instead. Where is the terror if you don't bleed other nations, if you don't starve the common people, if you don't stand by to watch death rein from the skies all for the sake of a few pennies & a few pills. Where is the terror, it's us (from Doombury, "we have just seen the enemy & it's us").


You sure got us into a mess this time Olie.
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Bill D
Date: 06 Sep 03 - 11:30 AM

the title of this thread really hit home when yesterday's Washington Post came out with this cartoon from Tom Toles

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 06 Sep 03 - 10:55 AM

Barry:

What I meant was, I wonder who drummed up the parallel to post-Hitler Germany and fed it to Rumsfeld to use as another fraudulent self-serving peace of dummy PR.

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Don Firth
Date: 06 Sep 03 - 04:45 AM

I was kidding while at the same time agreeing with you, Barry. Take a look at the link I posted and you'll see that they admit to just about everything you said, only they sugar-coat it and try to make it sound like the acts to true patriots and humanitarians. Look at the names of the people who signed the "Statement of Principles." That was written in 1997, but most of these people are now either in the Bush administration or closely associated with it.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Barry Finn
Date: 06 Sep 03 - 12:14 AM

I did but it's not any less true. I didn't get it from a site I got it in an e-mail from a friend. If you look on my past posts concerning WMD, Iraq, this present council of mighty rich & powerful jerks & the idot that's their fighead you'll see that I've been very critical of this whole scenario. How many times can one point out the coincidences? How many ways can these deceptions be exposed? I guess it'll take as long as we allow it but the pile of shit we're being fed is begining to taste very nasty & it's making so sick, it's killing me, you & ours. How will I ever sit on my sore ass again? How could these demons ever respect the people they're supposed to represent when they keep heaping the same fowl smelling trash on "We The People", privately they must be having a good laugh at our expense. I feel like they come by daily to piss on me & you & then tell us that it's in our best interest. Whose respecting who here? Barry

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 05:36 PM

Dear Gawd -- the man is a spin doctor who has succumbed to his own treatment.   Wonder who fed him this crap?

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: TIA
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 04:26 PM

I had been hearing from a local war supporter (and WWII vet - sincere thanks to him) that the supposed quagmire in Iraq is similar to the occupation of Germany after WWII. Then, several days ago, I heard Rumsfeld say the same thing. Did a little digging, and found this...the real story (?).

Does he never tire of deception and spin. It's absolutely f'in shameless.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Don Firth
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 04:09 PM

Jeez, Barry! You just plagarized that right off the Project for the New American Century web site, didn't you!?? Well, you did paraphrase a bit, I guess.

That's been the Bush administration's policy all along, and they've even said so!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Barry Finn
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 03:51 PM

We don't need no stinking UN before or now or EVER. We don't need no stinking Constitution or Bill of Rights or civil liberties any more freedoms than we already got, we don't need to be part of no stinking Human Rights Commission or World Court of Law. We don't even need follow the stupid Geneva Conventions anymore. Elections, bah, we don't need them either. We don't need no Kenneth Lay or his Enron Corporation & we don't need his world record dirty campaign contributions, our guy don't need no money & we sure don't need money or jobs. We don't need no stinking more international treaties, we have far to many that we've broken as it is. We don't need a country united we need a nation divided & conquered from the inside. And we don't need those stinking Air Traffic Controlers on the Federal payroll or those Marshalls protecting our skies. And anyone who says we could use the money at home instead of for waging war just ask the poor, the jobless, the tired, the undereducated & those sickly free booters, the elderly or the children. Ask the backwoods folk of North Carolina if they aren't happy about all the days off they're getting, hell they'd rather eat cake & hunt squirrels & possums. And we don't need to save face & beg the UN & others to help us out in Iraq when they're just a bunch of worthless commies that told us so along with the rest of the world & the stinkers that don't want the cost of mopping up our mess & paying for it to boot, don't need them either.


What we do need is a stinking Pres with a criminal record that should take more vacation days & a drunk driver to drive the country & an upstanding guy who'll go AWOL from the National Guard and desert the military during a time of war as commander in chief. We really could use a secret shadow government to protect us all from our selves. We need to continue to the new policy of attacking more nations. The only world opinion we need is that all nations fear our might & know it will be used. We really need to treat the symptoms of aids & terrorism instead of trying to overwhelm ourselves pondering about the causes & God forbid we don't need to remedy them.

And we need our troops back here on the home front where there's a new war raging instead of dying for those lying SOBs in some sand pit that don't amount to a hill of beans.
Barry

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST,pdq
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 03:40 PM

You are right, michaelr. I spent the early 1970's in the National Guard and I never expected to go anywhere except Camp Roberts! The statement was aimed at the ignorant who think we still have conscription.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST,pdq
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 03:32 PM

The U.S. is not begging anyone for help. We are trying to get the rest of the civilized world involved. Saddam was responsible for as many as 1000 deaths per week. Even the most optimistic here in the U.S. expect about five years, minimum, to develope a stabile government in Iraq. As we yanks say "either help or get out of the way".

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: michaelr
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 03:27 PM

The number of American soldiers killed since "the end of major combat operations" has now exceeded the number killed during the invasion.

Guest pdq, a large number ouf our troops in Iraq are National Guard and Army reservists. They had no idea what they were in for when they got shipped out, and they were lied to about how long they would have to stay.

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: ard mhacha
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 03:13 PM

God help your wit Guest, but you will never in your lifetime see a stable Iraq.
The US are so deep in the mire that they are now begging for UN help. France and Germany along with the Moslem nations should continue to refuse the use of their Forces, until the US clear out and leave the UN alone to try and recover the chaos left behind by a parcel of war-mongering fools. Ard Mhacha.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST,pdq
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 02:16 PM

The U.S. has not had a draft for thirty years. The young men and women we send to Iraq know what they are doing and why. Also, if the UN could have cleaned up the mess in Iraq they would have in the 13 years they had to do it. The U.S. did all the hard work and payed a large price in money and human life. We will finish the job with or without the worthless den of thieves in the UN building.

Subject: Orwell lives
From: An Pluiméir Ceolmhar
Date: 05 Sep 03 - 11:36 AM

Received by e-mail from a colleague:

"When the White House published the text of and photos from Bush's speech announcing the supposed end of the Iraq attack, the headline read: "President Bush Announces Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended." But on Tuesday, 19 Aug 2003, the Cursor website noticed that the headline had been changed to read: "President Bush Announces Major Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended." The word "major" had been added.

Apparently, with the quagmire resulting in at least one dead US soldier a day--not to mention even more injuries, dead Iraqis, and sabotage--that headline had proved incorrect. Therefore, straight out of 1984, the headline was stealthily altered to make it seem as if that's what it had always said.

We were able to recover numerous instances of the unaltered headline. At the top of the page is the original headline, as it has been preserved on the Website of Scott Long, who collects photos of politicians on aircraft carriers. Under that, you'll find the headline as it is now."

It occurred to me recently that we have napalm only it's not called napalm any more, and any day soon we'll have escalation only they won't call it escalation any more. That very evening I switched on CNN Europe (that's the real commie fellow-traveller version) and what was the headline? Escalation.

I hope that the rest of the world will tell the shrub to take a flying f*** at himself with his sudden conversion to internationalisation (i.e. keep on running the show, but get other nationalities to supply their troops as walking targets in place of more valuable Americans), but if I were an American of draft age or a parent of kids in that age group I'd be worried.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 09:00 PM

Tell you what, pixie-dust -- get a name, send me a PM, and I will be very interested to hear what your complaint is, if you care to tell me. I know it isn't what you are saying it is so far. If you won't do at least that much, then I'd rather you hold your tongue altogether.

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Don Firth
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 08:41 PM

No, just you.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 02:12 PM

BAN ALL GUESTS!!!

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Don Firth
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 01:20 PM

Don't you just admire the hell out of someone who makes snotty remarks and calls people degrading names while they hide behind anonymity? Such intellect! Such courage!
Time to call the Orkin man. We seem to have vermin about the place.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 11:27 AM

Same old playbook. Lying and name calling. Anus, you should shut up one day a week. Try Tuesdays.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 11:22 AM

Real as in what--nameless, mindless, hypercritical? No, thanks.

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 11:04 AM

Anus says the same old crap day after day after day! Blah! Blah! Blah! Get a real life!

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 09:48 AM

Not the apathy of successive US governments then Teribus? Perhaps you've forgotten that even the Shrub himself ignored "go get the oil" advice from Perle & Co, until the hysterical over-reaction to 9-11 opened a window of opportunity.

On what basis do you describe the UN inaction as "lack of resolve," when you might equally have called it "good judgment"? Contrary to your blinkered hindsight, war against Iraq was on no-one's agenda in the 1990s, except possibly yours. As far as 1441 goes, I really don't know why you cling to it, given that the US made plain, and those who voted on it accepted, that it was not a war ultimatum; and in any case you seem to think that the US had some convoluted legal basis for going it alone.

Regardless of which, the fact remains that michaelr was spot on with his title for this thread. Iraq is a quagmire, and that it would become one was very widely predicted/i>.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Teribus
Date: 19 Aug 03 - 09:05 AM

Fionn - 16 Aug 03 - 04:56 PM

" you're left depending on 1441. And I can see you might feel a twinge of uncertainty on that score."

Not in the slightest. In 1441 the Iraqi Regime under Saddam Hussein were given one last chance to comply fully with the cease-fire terms signed and agreed by themselves in 1991. They failed to do this, therefore the terms of that cease-fire agreement were broken.

The invasion of Kuwait; Desert Shield; Desert Storm; Desert Fox and the invasion of Iraq are all interconnected, they cannot be treated in isolation. The timescale of 12 years was due entirely to the apathy and lack of resolve on the part of the United Nations - nothing else.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 18 Aug 03 - 10:15 PM

Yes,ma'a'm, thank you ma'a'm. Perch and rotate, ma'a'm. Was that supercilious wiseass remark supposed to contribute something?

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 03 - 08:49 PM

Your dolt lost. Got it. Now grow up and move on.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 18 Aug 03 - 08:43 PM

While I don't even pretend to understand the nonsequitur remark of 0831, I think thae linked essay is compelling and should be paid attention to byh the Bush-in-Residency-by-Selection. IF he can read it, that is.

A

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 03 - 08:31 PM

As Art Linkletter once noted, "children say the darndest things".

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: TIA
Date: 18 Aug 03 - 08:43 AM

Thank you for that link Greg F.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Greg F.
Date: 17 Aug 03 - 09:58 AM

Worth reading-
***

In Iraq, U.S. ignores lessons of Vietnam War [excerpts]

By JAMES L. LAROCCA

... Our government called it "pacification." We called it madness. It all has come back to me while watching the news from Iraq, where we should be applying more of the lessons so painfully learned in Vietnam. Instead, we seem to be repeating our mistakes. ...

President Bush, who spent almost all of his military service out of uniform and involved in political campaigns in the South, and Vice President Dick Cheney, who never served at all (he had, in his words,
"other priorities"), would do well to consider the lessons of Vietnam.

We did not win the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people because we occupied their country while we burned down their homes and killed them and brutalized and abused them.

We will not win the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people by wrecking their towns and cities, destroying their homes, terrorizing their families and humiliating their men.

Incredibly, we have again become an occupying army, out of touch with the realities of the lives and culture of the people we are there to save. Not surprisingly, the Iraqi people are striking back....


Full article HERE

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Bobert
Date: 16 Aug 03 - 07:56 PM

There you go again, Amos. So the guy lied a little. Hey, Clinton lied about having sex with Monika, didn't he. Okay, maybe a hundred thousand Iraqis died, or the 1400 to 6000 that T says, as a result of Bush's lies. Details. There's planty of Iraqis left, ain't there?

Geeze, I don't understand the big fuss...

Hey, we got their oil, didn't we?

Plus, they did it to protect us from Osoma, didn' they?

How many times is Teribus going to have to explain this to you, Amos?

Amos? *Amos*? Yo, Amos....

Now pay attention, dangit! T is going to quiz us on this material...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Amos
Date: 16 Aug 03 - 05:09 PM

BUSH'S STATEMENTS CONTRADICTED BY FACTS

Read on to see how the Post's August 10 report picks apart Bush's claims that Iraq's nuclear program presented an imminent threat to the United States.

BUSH'S STATEMENT:
"A report came out of the . . . [International Atomic Energy Agency], that [the Iraqis] were six months away from developing a weapon. I don't know what more evidence we need." Camp David, 9/7/02

THE WASHINGTON POST SAYS...
"There was no new IAEA report... Bush cast as present evidence the contents of a report from 1996, updated in 1998 and 1999. In those accounts, the IAEA described the history of an Iraqi nuclear weapons program that arms inspectors had systematically destroyed."

BUSH'S STATEMENT:
"Iraq has made several attempts to buy high-strength aluminum tubes used to enrich uranium for a nuclear weapon." United Nations, 9/12/02

THE WASHINGTON POST SAYS...
"Gas centrifuge experts consulted by the U.S. government said repeatedly for more than a year that the aluminum tubes were not suitable or intended for uranium enrichment. By December 2002, the experts said new evidence had further undermined the government's assertion. The Bush administration portrayed the scientists as a minority and emphasized that the experts did not describe the centrifuge theory as impossible."

BUSH'S STATEMENT:
"Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof, the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud." Cincinnati OH, 10/7/02

THE WASHINGTON POST SAYS...
"What Hussein did not have was the principal requirement for a nuclear weapon, a sufficient quantity of highly enriched uranium or plutonium. And the U.S. government, authoritative intelligence officials said, had only circumstantial evidence that Iraq was trying to obtain those materials."

BUSH'S STATEMENT:
"The evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Saddam Hussein has held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, a group of his 'nuclear mujahedeen,' his nuclear holy warriors." Cincinnati OH, 10/7/02

THE WASHINGTON POST SAYS...
"Bush and others often alleged that President Hussein held numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists, but did not disclose that the known work of the scientists was largely benign. Iraq's three top gas centrifuge experts, for example, ran a copper factory, an operation to extract graphite from oil and a mechanical engineering design center."

Click the link below to read the full, devastating Washington Post report, which shows exactly how and when President Bush misled America to push the nation into a unilateral war with Iraq.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39500-2003Aug9.html

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 16 Aug 03 - 04:56 PM

Teribus, anyone reading your last post at face value might wonder why you even bother to drag in a justification for "desirable" regime change, given that it's a weak justification, and in any case, as I said in my preceding post, the "coalition" members were signed up to eschew regime change as a basis for war.

But take away regime change and you're left depending on 1441. And I can see you might feel a twinge of uncertainty on that score. No wonder. In a desperate pitch to get waverers on board, and speaking speaking with the full authority of the US government, John Negroponte on November 8 last year assured the UNSC that 1441 contained "no hidden triggers" and no "automaticity" with respect to war. It was in the light of that clarification that member states adopted 1441. Therefore it is disingenous retrospectively to accord 1441 the status of a war ultimatum.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Don Firth
Date: 15 Aug 03 - 02:53 PM

"With regard to those originally reported as being wounded who later die from wounds received, for that information I would rely on press reports. . . ."

That's the point, Teribus. The press doesn't report this. We are not told what the real casualties are.

A couple of news reports I did see left me with indelible images of this war. While watching the news one evening (CBC, delivered by cable, not any of the American news services) they did a story on Iraqi civilian casualties. There was a brief film-clip of an Iraqi boy, about eight years old, laying in a hospital bed. The stumps where his arms had been were covered with bloody bandages, and the narrator mentioned that he had also lost a leg. His dark eyes were open, unblinking, and haunted. Sitting beside the bed was his mother, a fairly young woman wearing a burkha, but no veil. As she gazed off into space, her eyes bore the same haunted look. It was easy to assume that they both might have been wondering about how the boy was going to live for the rest of his life with only one leg and no arms. And wondering "Why?" The boy, and a couple of his friends, had been kicking a soccer ball around in a school yard on what seemed like a fairly calm afternoon, when a "smart bomb" exploded a few yards away from them. In the school yard. He was the lucky one. His friends had been killed.

On another news report, again not coming from a U. S. news service, a brief film clip showed a bridge American troops had just captured. In the background there were three bodies. I couldn't tell whether they were American or Iraqi, but from the gear they were wearing (camouflage, the helmets), it looked like they were American. One lay on his back with his arms and legs splayed out and bent in unnatural ways. Another looked like he was at attention; his legs straight were straight and his arms were at his sides, but his head was turned to one side. He was laying on his stomach. The third was further off in the distance and a bit off-camera. They looked like rag dolls that some petulant child had tossed there.

These were a couple of brief peeks at what really happens during a war. But these stories were broadcast while the major portion of the fighting was going on. The CBC doesn't show anything like this anymore, and the U. S. news services never showed anything like this at all. Except, of course, for Saddam's two sons. But in the meantime, the beat goes one. Every day or two:— Humvee attacked with rocket propelled grenades, two dead, three "injured." Troops guarding building attacked with automatic weapons fire, one dead, six "injured." And so one. For how long, one wonders?

Contemplated the kind of "injuries" an exploding rocket propelled grenade might inflict.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Teribus
Date: 15 Aug 03 - 07:38 AM

Fionn - 15 Aug 03 - 06:55 AM

Point 1.
"So even if Iraq had possessed WMD, that would have been OK so long as Iraq had not signed the treaty?"

Nope - In 1990 Iraq invaded and occupied Kuwait. A UN coalition led by the USA fulfilled the terms of it's UN mandate to expell Iraqi forces from Kuwait. The ceasefire agreement signed to end hostilities, among other things, required Iraq's disarmament with regard to WMD and further required that Iraq dismantle its production facilities and research and development programmes. Among other things, Iraq failed to comply with those stipulations.

Point 2.
"In which case the war was merely about regime change - which was not OK, because those in the "coalition of the willing" (he-he) had all promised, as signatories of the UN Charter, not to go round doing that sort of thing."

Nope - Having been offered one last chance to honour its obligations to the international community, Iraq accepted the terms and conditions outlined in UNSC Resolution 1441. Warned of serious consequences resulting from any material breach of that resolution, Saddam Hussein, for reasons best known to himself, decided that Iraq would not fully comply. The United States of America and the United Kingdom held the belief that the situation left unchecked constituted a threat to themselves (indirectly) and to the interests of the region (directly). Iraq was in breach of the terms of the cease-fire signed at Saffwan in 1991. The major obstacles to the disarmament of Iraq were Saddam Hussein himself and the ruling Ba'ath Party in Iraq, therefore regime change was considered desireable.

Subject: RE: BS: As predicted: Quagmire Iraq
From: Peter K (Fionn)
Date: 15 Aug 03 - 06:55 AM

So even if Iraq had possessed WMD, that would have been OK so long as Iraq had not signed the treaty? In which case the war was merely about regime change - which was not OK, because those in the "coalition of the willing" (he-he) had all promised, as signatories of the UN Charter, not to go round doing that sort of thing.