The UN, US and Iraq IV

Maybe Timber is right and we don't have anything to fear because we be the baddest bully on the block and no body but no body is going to invade our borders. If we sense any such thing we just pre empt their ass!

Beside that we have our 'coalition of the willing but militarily and monetarily challenged' to help us out.
As Alfred E Neuman would say .......

The rest of the story



"A recent Pentagon report on China's military stated that Chinese war games "increasingly focus on the United States as an adversary and on preparing for combined arms and joint operations under more-realistic conditions.
"Over the past few years, Beijing's military training exercises have taken on an increasingly real-world focus, emphasizing rigorous practice and operational capabilities, and improving incrementally the military's actual ability to use force," the report said. "These actions are aimed not only at Taiwan, but also at increasing the risk to U.S. forces and to the United States itself in any future Taiwan contingency." "

Gels, I wonder if the remainder of my life can be lived in "peace?" 15 - 20 more yeras?

from http://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/RRiraqWar.html




There are some interesting things out there if you do a search with keywords IRAQ CURRENCY OIL EURO etc

I am probably wrong again but i do believe in the original context of the Bush "plan" the costs for the Iraq escapade was to be paid for by the sale of oil and this was factored into the plan.

sofia

If the war was to save Iraqi children, why didn't bush give this as a reason for invading the country? It would have been very popular and attacted a lot of support. Far more than tales of mythical WMD. After all we've all seen the pitiful state of the children on tv no?

Because saving children can never be a reason to go to war. We'd be at war all over the globe.

It was a wonderful by-product of the war, IMO. And, it is evidence that while the war was awful in that it killed innocent people--those innocent people were already dying in larger numbers at the hands of Saddam and Co.

Removing Saddam was worth the battle, by many standards. IMO.

Sofia, A noble idea, but hardly realistic. The majority of the children of this world are suffering from lack of shelter and food. What other country do you think deserves our preemtive strike on the leadership of a country to save their children?

Canada has a 21.3% child proverty rate

India would be a good target, because women kill their girl infants by the millions every year.

I dunno c.i., ... California meets some of the criteria meriting pre-emptive intervention. Fortunately, they're as yet fairly well contained, though. Still, we oughtta keep an eye on 'em, lest their bizarre politico-economic and social engineering practices begin to spread

This site could give a couple more possible targets:Children in statistics

Actually Sofia, believe it or not, I agree with you that the humanitarian benefits of removing Saddam are something to strive for. The problem is that we have not removed Saddam (he's still around causing trouble), we have not secured the borders, there is no security in Iraq, complete anarchy threatens, we are not even pumping the damn oil - and all because neocons such as Rumsfeld thought regime change in Iraq was going to be a piece of cake.

....As Henry Liu has written vividly in the online Asian Times (4/11/02),

"World trade is now a game in which the US produces dollars and the rest of the world produces things that dollars can buy. The world's interlinked economies no longer trade to capture a comparative advantage; they compete in exports to capture needed dollars to service dollar-denominated foreign debts and to accumulate dollar reserves to sustain the exchange value of their domestic currencies. To prevent speculative and manipulative attacks on their currencies, the world's central banks must acquire and hold dollar reserves in corresponding amounts to their currencies in circulation. The higher the market pressure to devalue a particular currency, the more dollar reserves its central bank must hold. This creates a built-in support for a strong dollar that in turn forces the world's central banks to acquire and hold more dollar reserves, making it stronger. This phenomenon is known as dollar hegemony, which is created by the geopolitically constructed peculiarity that critical commodities, most notably oil, are denominated in dollars. Everyone accepts dollars because dollars can buy oil. The recycling of petro-dollars is the price the US has extracted from oil-producing countries for US tolerance of the oil-exporting cartel since 1973.

"By definition, dollar reserves must be invested in US assets, creating a capital-accounts surplus for the US economy. Even after a year of sharp correction, US stock valuation is still at a 25-year high and trading at a 56 percent premium compared with emerging markets."

The evisceration of Colin Powell is complete.

On "60 Minutes II" this evening, Greg Theilmann, the man responsible for analyzing the Iraqi weapons threat for the Secretary of State, said:



Ex-Aide: Powell misled Americans

And on and on it goes; the lies, the dying, the myopia of those who will continue to post of the glory of the liberation of the Iraqi people...

PDiddie, I think what upsets me most about all of the WMD stuff is that the administration wants 600M$ to continue the search. This is to weep over. This is so pitiful, horrendously so, and so outrageous in that no one is objecting.

Kara, I couldn't agree with you more. What a waste at a time when our economy is hurting, and we have children in this country doing without the basics of food, shelter and medical care. Something is drastically wrong when nobody speaks up to this kind of waste.

c.i., not just in this country! Think about what could be done in Iraq with that 600 Mil?????

What is wrong with this country that no one is talking about this?

Hey Kara, The question about the additional 600 mil came up (there was 300 mil asked for and granted in the last request) in one of Rummy's press conferences. Rummy looked at the officer helping him with the conference, the officer looked at Rummy, Rummy turned and said 'that was in the classified section of the request' where did you hear about it? On the internet was the reply. The question went unanswered.

Thanks, D. I had not heard that interview.

Yeh - the UN is out to have Saddam supporters take over Iraq ... either that, or it opposes the US resolution because:

"Washington [..] wil not cede any share in the military command and it will not cede political oversight - of either security or the political process - to the United Nations. Without these concessions, however, there is no reason why the UN should return in strength to Iraq and no reason whatever why other countries should expose their nationals to risk. President George Bush, it seems, still wants to have it both ways: a war on his own terms that is paid for and cleared up by others"

(Great quote, Steve).

You want us to send our soldiers out to risk their lives, and to send our money too - but you dont want to give us a say in the command over those soldiers, nor over how that money's spend - and neither do you want to let the Iraqis decide.

Now why should we oppose that idea?