Republicans and Iraq - role playing

Here ya go, Its kinda a wasted search though you guys won't believe it anyways... <_< :blink: :mellow:

September 19, 2003, 9:00 a.m.
No Question About It
Saddam and the terrorists.

Then President Bush stated that "we've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the September 11th" attacks, his liberal critics quickly spun this into "Saddam Hussein had no links to terrorism." This was despite the fact that in the same breath the president had said, "there's no question that Saddam Hussein had al Qaeda ties." According to Editor & Publisher, the story got little play, though it is certain to come back to haunt the president during the election campaign when Democrats seek to wedge the Iraq and al Qaeda issues. Thus, it is useful to review the bidding on the known facts of the relationship between the two.

While it is still debatable to what degree Saddam Hussein supported the global terrorist network, it is becoming increasingly clear that Iraq provided terror groups with some forms of logistical, intelligence, transportation, training, weapons, and other support. The emerging evidence points to the conclusion that al Qaeda had a cooperative relationship — that is, a strategic alliance — with Iraq.http://www.nationalreview.com/robbins/robbins091903.asp

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/polit...dam_quotes.html


Clinton:
http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_...of_two_sto.html

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Publ...04/934woeja.asp

Intresting readL
http://www.jimbovard.com/FYP%20Intro%20chapter.htm

http://www.geocities.com/capitolhill/8514/

http://www.probe.org/content/view/668/88/

http://www.newsmax.com/articles/?a=2000/10/31/153802

 

Well, yeah, that was working out nicely until Iraq got shoved down our throats. Now our millitary is so distracted there that not only did OBL sneak away, but now the Taliban is enjoying a resurgence in Afghanistan, with plenty of opporunity for training and target practice with our boys and girls.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dragonfly @ Sep 4 2006, 10:02 PM) [snapback]314296[/snapback]</div>

Its plain and simple ragonfly if you think the sky is purple & somone comes along and says no it blue provides you with proof your still goning to try and pick it a part and your final answer is going to be its purple.. :huh:

You're going to have to give me something better than this! ROFL!!!!

Theres no proving any amount of writen or verbal proof your just blinded by your party & your beliefs.
We believe what we believe & you believe what you believe.....And nothing is going to change that....
(note thrown in for effect : We just happen to be right, & your wrong)

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(priusguy04 @ Sep 5 2006, 05:56 AM) [snapback]314439[/snapback]</div>

WOW, this is deep

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dragonfly @ Aug 11 2006, 03:53 PM) [snapback]301669[/snapback]</div>

Here is the real question that must be ansered. If US forces "redeploy" from Iraq, what do you think the landscape will look like in Iraq 6 months to one year after we leave?

 

I might ask the same thing about if we stay. It's not pretty either way, but there's hard proof that things have been getting worse while we've been there. I'm 100% for helping Iraq become stable, but I question whether our presence there helps stabilization or hurts it.

I hope the generals on the ground there have [a] enough understanding of the Iraqi people to know the difference, and a voice that can be heard by our government, over their own or their friends' interests.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ichabod @ Sep 5 2006, 09:33 AM) [snapback]314470[/snapback]</div>

Actually according to the NY Times the war in Iraq is going much better - fewer casualties all around.

I personally think if we leave, the mess that will create now would be a disaster for them and for us. The only party to win, and win real big, would be Iran and terror groups world wide.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Sep 5 2006, 08:37 AM) [snapback]314472[/snapback]</div>

But what's the measure? Over the weekend the number of soldiers dead in the "war against terrorism" reached the same amount of dead on 9/11. Does that prove that this is an inefficient way to wage this "war"?

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/09/03/death.toll/

 

Not to be argumentative, but here's what I found in the NY Times Re: casualty numbers:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/02/world/mi...02military.html

I guess if you're looking for a silver lining in that article, it's there for you to find if you ignore the big numbers. It has taken a commitment of more troops though. I just don't see an end, given that it's not "insurgents" or "terrorists" we're fighting there.. it's the divided Iraqi people now, and I sincerely hope they can work it out. Does Iraq have to split into 2 countries to make it work?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Dragonfly @ Aug 11 2006, 03:53 PM) [snapback]301669[/snapback]</div>

I would double the number of troops we have there, and crack down hard on the insurgents. We're trying to be politically correct about fighting a war - just like in Vietnam - and all its doing is demoralizing our boys and getting them killed. You didn't see us worried about this kind of crap during WW2... we knew what our goal was, and we did what we needed to do to achieve that goal. We didn't try to half-nice person our fighting, or only let our troops attack if they were fired upon, or send half the troops we needed... We went all-out and beat the hell out of our enemies - and accepted nothing but total surrender.

Unfortunately, the reality is that we've bumbled the occupation so badly that we cannot possibly pull out now. We were so concerned with being PC and with convincing the public that we had a valid reason to go to war that we refused to see the reality of what would happen once we deposed the government.

As such, "since the end of major combat operations", we have lost the lives of scores of soldiers (not only American ones) that probably would have not been lost if we had executed the occupation properly. Unfortunately, our government deemed it was better to mislead the American people and delude themselves about the reality of the post-war operations instead of being honest and forthright about the reality of the situation we would face. Now we are paying the price for this incompetence.

Before the "Bush Lied" crowd gets all excited, I will point out that I feel it is inappropriate to accuse the Administration of lying about the presence and danger of WMDs, because nobody (except Saddam and others involved) knows if the intelligence they supposedly had was based in reality or not... However, that being said, it is appropriate to accuse the Administration of lying about our reasons for invading Iraq after the fact... by that I mean that before the war, we were told that Iraq had reconstituted a WMD program and was an immediate danger to America. After we got there and found no WMDs, we were then told that the WMD threat was only ONE of the reasons we had gone to war... with some of the other reasons being that he was mean to his people, and he had a bad haircut. That is a bald-faced lie.

I would have had a huge amount of respect for this President and this Administration if he had said, "Well, the intelligence said the WMDs were there and were a threat, but it turns out that our intelligence was wrong. But, Saddam was a meanie and he did have a stupid haircut. So, we're here now, and I'd ask you to all stand behind me as we finish the job we started." But instead of acting like a man and owning up to his mistake, he acted like a little girl and lied to our faces.

Now, before the "Bush is Jesus reincarnated, how dare you criticize him" crowd gets all excited, I will point out that I also lost all respect for Clinton when he lied to us all, too. I would have much preferred him to have said things like, "It's none of your god-damned business if I smoked pot in college. The only thing that matters is that I don't anymore." and "No, Senator, I will not tell you if I had sexual relations with that woman, because that's none of your damn business."

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(SteveS @ Sep 5 2006, 10:17 AM) [snapback]314490[/snapback]</div>

Agree with you almost entirely - but especially on dumping this PC way to fight a war - we must go in and just do it.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Alric @ Sep 5 2006, 10:00 AM) [snapback]314482[/snapback]</div>

we are off topic here.

yes it is inefficient in that this is a new type of war we are fighting - there is a learning curve -part of that learning curve is placing our own values of life and how we conduct warfare against an enemy that is guided by totally different rules and values. ultimately this is a good thing in that Magruders Law comes into play - that combat is defined by the lowest common denominator. The way the Japanese beheaded American POW's in the pacific was followed by our forces doing the same to theirs, etc, etc... Better we learn this lesson now over there since we have not learned it here from our losses over the past two + decades.

In absolute terms the # of American casualties is very low for any war of three + years duration - and I am not minimizing any soldier who has sacrificed all or some in this war. We lost this many troops in hours of previous wars when our population was a small fraction of what it is today.

Anyhow, please go back to my topic above. We leave Iraq - what does the landscape there look like in 6 - 12 months?

 

Don't tell our soldiers that we're not "just doing it" already, or you run the risk of seriously demoralizing them. I mean, if they knew that things were so badly planned, as you say, they might lose morale.

Actually, I don't think soldiers' morale is a major issue yet. I think our military is too well trained for that. I think they're doing and will continue to do a brilliant job at what they're told to do. Let's just get the right orders to them FFS!

Personally I think that's an affront to the thousands of our soldiers who have died, and their families, not to mention the countless thousand innocents dead in Iraq. Don't contribute to the idea that this war is small potatoes and it would be easy to double our troops and have done with it. I'd ask again, who would our doubled-up troops attack? It's an ideology that's spreading, and killing more people is like fanning a fire in an attempt to blow it out.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Ichabod @ Sep 5 2006, 10:16 AM) [snapback]314489[/snapback]</div>

Of course we are fighting terrorists there - over one third of those captured or killed are not Iraqi's; significant support from iran in terms of technology and weapons (here is the real battle if you can see through the fog of it all). There is also sectarian violence - although Sunni retribution has been minimal. And the numbers are not that big. Would you have abandoned D-Day after the first four hours? How about Gettysburg after the first day? Battle of the Buldge - you would have surrendered? etc, etc.

I think we should commit more forces there and put clamps on the situation instead of fighting this thing in a PC way.

The Iraqi people have always been divided. Just that minority ruled the majority with terror and mass murder for the past thirty years - they are luck the majority is not coming down on them with an iron fist at this point.

And if you were going to split iraq, it would be into thirds with the kurds getting the north - something turykey will never accept. i believe the kurds are the largest volume of people without a country btw.

my question was simple - the answer i think is simple too. we leave iraq and iran is a huge winner and will provide us with bigger and badder headaches in the near future - including nuclear weapons - something we must never let happen.

 

Maybe we should split the USA into 50 coutries for a trial period, say 5 years, and give people here a taste of having to get along with their neighbors. I think Utah and Idaho would combine into one country, and overthrow Wyoming (which would just involve walking into Wyoming since there's hardly anyone there to contest it)