The Iraq War retrospective Thread

[Occhidiangela]

Kofi Annan, as Secretary-General, declared that the war was illegal by the charter. The US did not have the Security Council's permission to declare a war of aggression, and did it anyway. The charter (to which the US is signatory) says you can't do that. What part of this am I confusing?

-Jester

The simple fact that you tend to ignore, that the UN war of 1991 wasn't finished. Failure to comply with ceasefire and UNSCR's was a commonplace starting by day ninety of the first ceasefire's expiry. You will note that the trade embargo on Iraq was an explicit UNSC action, and was to be lifted upon Saddam's government complying with the terms of the cease fire.

Who got the red arse from the usual gutless, bleeding hearts in the Greek Chorus for supporting this marvelous UN, and this rule of law, these holy UNSC sanctions? The US.

There is a similar problem in Korea, has been since 1953. No armistice. A cease fire, and that's it.

The UN, specifically the UNSC, and this an included problem of American security policy from 1991-2003 is culpable in all of its variations, lacked the political will to support UNSC decrees. This is sorta like the sheriff turining a blind eye when the coon gets lynched in Mississippi, circa 1930. Kofi Annan and Boutrous By Golly are both as useless as teats on a bull. The real players,

UK
Russia
China
France
US

likewise emulated the bull teat once the initial cease fire was agreed at Safwan. W's dad, Clinton, and their entire security apparatus let the coon get lynched. (Some of them were Sunni shortly after the war.) And the bleeding hearts played along.

The UN could not prevent NATO from attacking Serbia in 1999. How special is your UN now, Jester?

Putting one's faith in the UN is a phenomenally stupid idea: ask any Rwandan, or the folk of Darfur.

Who needs that? Israel and Iran are going to annhilate each other in a great multiethnic holocaust of nuclear fire before the year is out, at the rate things are going.

-Jester

Works for me, except for a few problems in reality.

Iran hasn't the nukes, hasn't the means to deliver them, and hasn't the air force C2 to defeat the Israeli IAD network.

Israel doesn't have enough bombs, nor missiles, to do as you suggest. See also the problem of whose airspace Israel has to go through to get to Iran.

What you suggest is a cabal between Turkey and Israel, or between Israel and the Saudis, or between the US, Jordan, and Israel, (the US still owns the airspace over Iraq, nothing Maliki can do about it) to close eyes and let the IAF fly in.

The radar networks in the Mid East are significantly more robust and sophisticated since the 1981 Osirik raid, thanks in a great part due to the US selling missiles and radars to pretty much every one there, and to the Russians selling some good missile systems to Iran.

Are you subscribing to the Conspiracy Theory that the Israeils, Jordanians and US will violate Iraqi airspace and attack Iran?

LOOK AT A MAP! One of the three under the table deals have to be cut or this IAF attack on Iran is dead in the water, and sure as hell not covert. Covert and clever is how the Osirik raid happened.

Syria recently had a problem with an IAF attack on "some building somewhere" that had none of those obstacles, as the IAF had no one else's airspace to deal with. Also, timeline for a local op is very short. Not so in this chimerical attack on Iran.

Occhi