06-06-2004, 10:17 AM
Quote:So, let me get this straight. You are of the opinion that Bush was ludicrous to go to war with a man who was a)known to have used chemical and biological agents against his enemies, having gassed the Kurds and used such muntions against the Iranians, had promised to destroy these stockpiles, and agreed to have outside inspectors verify this, which he c) refused to do. So, we have no confirmation that a man who is our enemy, who also has demonstrated the will to use WMD, has in fact complied with requirements to disarm, and had in fact never even made the claim that he did, and yet we're supposed to just assume that that's okay? Color me confused, because that sounds like the worst possibly strategy one can take when dealing with these matters. And this is without even getting past the ridiculous "WMD was the only valid argument for war" nonsense
Please don't try to convince us that Saddam is a bad guy! We all know that allready, I think that's established now. It is also good that Saddam regime ended, I think also everybody here agrees. But these things are not under discussion. The point of discussio is "the way the Iraq war was started and justified".
I mean your first point about Saddam use of chemical weapons on the Kurds. A that time the US did not have so much problems with that. They did not like the Kurds, they did not like Iran, so they did not really mind that Saddam did these things. This war crime of Saddam can not be used as a reason for starting a war 15 years later (I don't know the date, sorry for that).
Then the second point. Saddam destroyed all his weapons, there has not been the slightest indication that he didn't. He did difficult when the UN/US wanted to send inspectors. Which I can imagine (Irakis also have there sense of pride). Then there was the fact that the US used these inspection missions for espionage. (at least this is what saddam claimed, and I think he was right in that, seeing the eagerness of the US to start the war).
So finally there were (apart from the human rights violations of his regime) not so many real reasons to start a war anymore.
And that is the point of the discussion. There are a lot of countries who behave in a similar way, which could be attacked now. And I'm not talking about Iran and north korea.
I mean the US can do this because they are the most powerful country in the world, but what if it would not be like that?. Maybe belgium wants to attack the US beacuse of the possesion of huge quantities of WMDs (chemical, biological and nuclear) and the great risk of these weapons being used. What would you say about that?. :)