Debate tonight

[Evan]

So what exactly was Serbia Mike? It cost us 80 billion, several hundred lives, we were not provoked, not in any kind of danger, and had less to do with us than Iraq.

[Mike]

So what exactly was Serbia Mike? It cost us 80 billion, several hundred lives, we were not provoked, not in any kind of danger, and had less to do with us than Iraq.

Stupid, a waste of resources. What did you think I'd call it?

[ButtDyno]

Yes actually, I was kidding 8)

Heh, sarcasm > me

As to Serbia - I'm not gonna defend it, but at least that was ostensibly for humanitarian reasons upfront, rather than us getting involved because Milosevic was going to attack the US with WMD and then after the fact "uhh, well, look at all the people we helped".

We also had more support from our allies - we had NATO, rather than a patchwork quilt of the US, the UK, and <daily show>Poland??</daily show>

One clusterfuck does not deserve another, tho

john

[Evan]

Stupid, a waste of resources. What did you think I'd call it?

Given that there was very little public or international outcry at that time, and given the similarities to current situation in Iraq, I cant help but look at the attacks on the war to be entirely politically motivated. Whether it be international politics of France, Germany and Russia wanting to protect their sweetheart oil deals, and corrupt oil for food deals, or stateside anti-republican politics by liberals and democrats.

I was never a big supporter of the war, and I think managing public relations of the war have been the current administration's stumbling point, but certainly no-one can say we arent better off without him. Certainly better off than wasting time, money and lives on that Milosevic clown.

What people need to realize now, is that even if you claim the Iraq war was a mistake, the most important thing right now is what we do with it from now on. We would create an even worse situation, akin to what happened to afghanistan when Russia pulled out, if we pull troops in 5 months like Kerry has been talking about.

[Evan]

As to Serbia - I'm not gonna defend it, but at least that was ostensibly for humanitarian reasons upfront, rather than us getting involved because Milosevic was going to attack the US with WMD and then after the fact "uhh, well, look at all the people we helped".

well that can be looked at as a PR fumble then, not an invalidation of the entire war, correct?
The humanitarian benefit of this war is at least an order of magnitude greater than serbia. (especially considering it is highly questionable if we were even on the right "side" in Serbia...which is an entirely different topic alltogether)

[Mike]

0 * x = 0

[ButtDyno]

well that can be looked at as a PR fumble then, not an invalidation of the entire war, correct?
The humanitarian benefit of this war is at least an order of magnitude greater than serbia.

A PR "fumble"?

"Sorry guys.. about that whole 'WMD', 'threat' thing.. we sent you the wrong press release. What we meant to say was, we are going to invade Iraq to free all the oppressed people there. Our bad."

If we really gave a rat's ass about the Iraqi people, we would have come up with a sanctions regime that didn't kill hundreds of thousands of them as Saddam sat back in his palaces laughing. Not exactly a great way to win the hearts and minds of the populace. The Iraqi people couldn't say "let the weapons inspectors in so we can have food and chlorine, please" but they were the victims anyway. Compare that to how many people actually died at Saddam's hands and tell me who the mass murderer is..

(that's a combined failing of the last 3 presidents, mind you.)

john

[Evan]

let me get your logic straight.
You are blaming us for Saddam not letting inspectors in?
You are blaming us for placing sanctions in lieu of military operations?
You are blaming us for Saddam witholding food from his people?
You are blaming us for the corrupt UN's handling of the oil for food program? (coincidentally the same UN that the president is supposed to get approval from..)

while at the same time, I hear arguments from the left that we should have placed more sanctions before going to war,
and we should have put more inspectors into iraq


...which is it?

[Evan]

A PR "fumble"?

"Sorry guys.. about that whole 'WMD', 'threat' thing.. we sent you the wrong press release. What we meant to say was, we are going to invade Iraq to free all the oppressed people there. Our bad."

ah but now you are changing the subject at hand.
In comparison to Serbia, which you just justified as humanitarian, since Iraq is justafiable as humanitarian 10 times over, then the end result of the war is positive.
If you want to attack the administration on how the handled it with the public, fine, but thats a shallow political attack, as you have already justified the core reason for the war as being good

[ButtDyno]

let me get your logic straight.
You are blaming us for Saddam not letting inspectors in?
You are blaming us for placing sanctions in lieu of military operations?
You are blaming us for Saddam witholding food from his people?
You are blaming us for the corrupt UN's handling of the oil for food program? (coincidentally the same UN that the president is supposed to get approval from..)

while at the same time, I hear arguments from the left that we should have placed more sanctions before going to war,
and we should have put more inspectors into iraq

Okay, well I'm not "the left", I'm just me I don't know what "the left" is and I don't speak for them.

It's not our fault Saddam doesn't care about his people.
It's not the Iraqi people's fault that Saddam doesn't care about them.
It's not the Iraqi people's fault that Saddam didn't let inspectors in.
It's not the Iraqi people's fault that Saddam decided to screw with Kuwait, or kill Kurds, or any other fucked up dictatorial thing.

Right?

But they were the ones getting killed by sanctions.. not Saddam. They didn't have a choice, because Saddam wasn't giving them that choice. At that point, their only option for survival is the actions the rest of the world takes. Given that - isn't it our responsibility to find a course of action that won't kill them?

If we put sanctions on someone who has killed 100,000 people and we kill 500,000 people doing it, is it worth it? Especially if they weren't an honest-to-god threat of killing more? And especially if we could have come up with a sanctions regime that wouldn't have killed so many people?

ah but now you are changing the subject at hand.
In comparison to Serbia, which you just justified as humanitarian, since Iraq is justafiable as humanitarian 10 times over, then the end result of the war is positive.
If you want to attack the administration on how the handled it with the public, fine, but thats a shallow political attack, as you have already justified the core reason for the war as being good

Changing the subject: (noun) 1. bringing Serbia into a discussion about Iraq

I never said "we should have gotten into Serbia"; I said a) that we went in there with humanitarian goals and we stuck to them and b) that we had something resembling international support. That's why I don't think they're analagous.

The "core reason for the war" is something that gets decided BEFOREHAND, not months later after we come up empty handed trying to find the evidence for the first "core reason".

And it's not just an issue of how they handled it with the public. They made the case to Congress that we NEEDED to go into Iraq. And they either lied, or were wrong, about "why". If you don't think it's messed up to go to war under bogus pretenses if something good comes out of it eventually, I don't think I can convince you otherwise

And you don't get to say that this was a big humanitarian "win" until they have a stable government that protects human rights, and the jury is still a bit out on that question. Let's see if they can have an election first

john

[Ryan T]

Speaking of elections, Afghanistan holds its first Democratic election in 35 years on the 9th. I think everyone has forgotten about Afghanistan.

[Mike]

Speaking of elections, Afghanistan holds its first Democratic election in 35 years on the 9th. I think everyone has forgotten about Afghanistan.

That was kind of Bushiepoo's idea... He can't find the bad guy, so he goes after one that we can get, gets him, and all is well in the eyes of the ignorant public!

[Feersty]

I would vote for another Republican because I like their policies, but I just can't see Kerry being consistent in his decisions. I also worrying about his rushing into monumental decisions and then screwing up.

[Mike]

I also worrying about his rushing into monumental decisions and then screwing up.

You worry about him doing such things? Uhhh, you might want to take a second look at the guy you plan on voting for...

[Evan]

The "core reason for the war" is something that gets decided BEFOREHAND, not months later after we come up empty handed trying to find the evidence for the first "core reason".

And it's not just an issue of how they handled it with the public. They made the case to Congress that we NEEDED to go into Iraq. And they either lied, or were wrong, about "why". If you don't think it's messed up to go to war under bogus pretenses if something good comes out of it eventually, I don't think I can convince you otherwise

I agree with you there, but the issue is that everyone is now looking at the mistakes of the war with 20/20 hindsight. If you are going to look at the mistakes and criticize the administration for not being able to see into the future, then you have to credit the good things to come out of the war too, even if their priority wasnt top on the list going in.

[damnit458]

I would vote for another Republican because I like their policies, but I just can't see Kerry being consistent in his decisions. I also worrying about his rushing into monumental decisions and then screwing up.

yeah christ feersty bush is the fucking posterchild for what you are afraid of

[Maengelito]

If we put sanctions on someone who has killed 100,000 people and we kill 500,000 people doing it, is it worth it? Especially if they weren't an honest-to-god threat of killing more? And especially if we could have come up with a sanctions regime that wouldn't have killed so many people?

actually saddam has killed millions of people and we havent even come close to killing 500k. and because there is a report that says "there were no WMD's" means either that there were no WMD's, or there wasnt enough evidence of finding such things. the american public will not stand for not getting answers, and if they had published a report that said "there might be" then most people would still wonder where they are. when the UN sits on its ass deciding what to do, that gives people plenty of time to get rid of things by selling/smuggling them to terrorists or burying them or disposing of them in general. the invasion was last year for christ's sake, the american public is so damn impatient. it took germany how long to rebuild after world war II? this is why i hate political discussions.

[JackoliciousLegs]

you (almost) always learn something from discussion maeng.

I agree with you Evan that you can't criticize the administration for not being able to see the future. I dont' think we looked long enough at the situation to determine what was going on. There was "ORANGE ALERT" all the time, and the Rep. govt officials including Bush and Cheney kept saying "imminent threat" and "ties to Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups." All of that information was false. We went in under false pretenses with ulterior motives and no international support. We shot ourselves in the foot.

[Maengelito]

you (almost) always learn something from discussion maeng.

i'll agree with this statement, but almost every internet forum has hard headed people and it just irritates me.

[Ryan T]

Just something of interest I found on cnn.com

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/10/06/iraq.wmd.report/index.html">http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/10/ ... index.html</a><!-- m -->

In fact, the long-awaited report, authored by Charles Duelfer, who advises the director of central intelligence on Iraqi weapons, says Iraq's WMD program was essentially destroyed in 1991 and Saddam ended Iraq's nuclear program after the 1991 Gulf War.

The Iraq Survey Group report, released Wednesday, is 1,200 to 1,500 pages long.

The massive report does say, however, that Iraq worked hard to cheat on United Nations-imposed sanctions and retain the capability to resume production of weapons of mass destruction at some time in the future.