When They say "I hate America", what do you think They mean?

Thanks George, I appreciate that.

As you know I have been at times very critical of American actions in Iraq. And I still flip one way and the other as to whether we should have supported it. Sometimes I think absolutely not, the price (for UK) was too high. Then I think well actually we did do the right thing, the world is a better place without Saddam and his Ba'athists ruling/terrorising Iraq.

To be honest I just don't know. It will take many years before we can come to a conclusion. In the meantime I think about how we were told that Saddam's weapons of mass destruction were a "serious and current" threat to the uk, how little old ladies bought up stocks of water and tinned food, how we were deliberately frightened into voting for war, and I think, that Mr Blair, was wrong.

Most of the important decisions we make in our own lives are made without sufficient information to provide certainty that they are correct. The same is true of political leaders. What is often more important are the principals that guide those decisions and the different values they assign to errors in one direction and another.

It was the obstructionism of the UN that reduced the debate on Iraq to the WMD question. Bush made a choice that seeking UN approval was worth the candle - the price for it was reducing the fundamental and complex arguments for unseating Saddam to the relatively trivial and risky matter of WMD. We now know the consequences of that decision. The UN effort was NOT worth the cost, and the UN - even the Security Council - cannot be relied on to face difficult issues. However, we should have already known that. An organization that cannot find a way to criticize Zimbabwe or deny Lybia and Cuba membership on its Human Rights Council, cannot be relied on to squarely face serious issues.

Well, they hate us in the Middle East because we buy oil from their kings and make their kings filthy rotten rich who abandon Islam ( for themselves ) and impose it on everyone else. Islam is poverty, for the most part. But the palaces and the armies and the power do not speak much about Islam. Our corporations continue to buy the oil and the kings continue to keep the fantastic wealth to themselves, and thus keeping the general populations down and powerless.

This is an old problem on this planet, and examples go back to Egypt and beyond. The elite priesthood, the semi-divine pharaoh, the Sun King, the monarchy, it all stems from this same lack of sharing of wealth through private control of resources and energy, etc. American business where no moral considerations are necessary plays right into this ancient problem. We'll send you a fortune, and we don't care if you kill your people, so long as the oil continues to flow...

Christiantity was supposed to stop all this disdain over profits and resources, but it didn't, obviously. Capitalism still has no heart, and it's all over the planet now. Way too late to do anything about it because capitalism itself refuses even tiny steps forward, and is always seeking to turn back the clock to even less obligations and restrictions while doing business. In other words, we's losin' the war, period.

The terrorists are fighting for their freedom against their kings made rich and decadent by OUR businessmen. This is fundamental to understanding why we are hated so. We are not free of guilt here for the problems breaking out all over the planet. We are in fact, very guilty for being so damn non-Christian like we claim to be. Our businessmen are NOT Christians in the way they do business, so what's not to hate?

Also, Rome was universally hated and despised for the obvious reasons. Haiti should at least put a bug in your ear that Bush might be empire building like any good emperor would. The more people you mow over, the more the hatred for you spreads far beyond your new manicured "lawn".

What?

Please explain.

It was George Bush who reduced the argument to WMD, because he thought it was the only way to secure international approval for his bogus invasion.

It was not only the UN that opposed waging war on Iraq - it was almost all of our allies and every other nation on Earth.

Face the facts: The rest of the world knew long ago that the invasion of Iraq was a farce. It was mostly only right-wing Americans - one political group in one country - that supported the war. And, as I have pointed out before, their support was based on utter ignorance - 79% believed there was a direct link between Hussien and Sept 11th.

Further, George Bush could have, and should have, waited for the weapons inspectors to do thier job, instead of pulling them out prematurely. Iraq posed no imminent threat that required immediate action.

Also, your comment that UN obstructionism is what forced us to way is further degraded by the revelation that Bush planned the war from the momment he came into office.

George Bush and the conservative establishment were dead wrong on Iraq. Most rational, informed people knew this all along. I and others stated unequivocably three years ago that there were definitly no terrorist links and almost certainly no weapons of mass destruction. Now, because of George Bush's stupidity, and the American publics gross ignorance and gullibility, we have killed 10,000 innocent Iraqis - five times the number of Americans killed on Sept 11th. Not too mention the 500 American casualties.

Get a grip on reality and acknowledge that you, and the Bush administration, were disasterously wrong. You only discredit the enitre conservative establishment by clinging precariously onto the notion that the Iraq debacle can be justified.

To say that the UN reduced the issue to WMDs is true in a sense.

But it's also tantamount to saying that courts reduce prosecutions to the legal basis for prosecution, excluding the rest.

Or to say that laws "reduce" the available options to the legal ones.

It's a good thing until it works against you.

The only really solid legal angle for invading Iraq was the degree to which they complied with their terms of surrender after they'd illegally invaded Kuwait.

The UN didn't actively reduce it. The UN simply doesn't recognize any and all invasions as legitimate.

This necessitated a valid casus belli and WMDs were solid legal ground.

Humanitarian motivation sounds nice but there usually needs to be an ongoing humanitarian crisis.

These are standards that we uphold when we see fit as well.

So yeah the "UN" (euphemism for "the world" when one disagrees with the world's consensus) can be said to have reduced it to it's only legal footing.

This happens to be a good thing. It's the same fuction that declared Saddam's invasion illegal.

There are those who will complain when the UN does not support the invasions that they do.

But most can agree that invasions should not be fecklessly prosecuted and that criteria for legitimacy should exist.

You can't say that Saddam's invasions are illegal and ours are without differentiating criteria.

Ironically the invasion of Iraq only had a specter of legitimacy because of Saddam's illegal invasion.

Because of this the US only had WMD as solid legal ground.

So, then.....it has almost certainly be proven Iraq had no WMD. If the solid ground was shaky from the begining..........does this make the war illegal? If so, what will the ramifications be, I wonder, do you see the day when Bush will be held accountable on charges of war crimes?

Ceili, No, Bush will never pay for his crime against humanity. That's the sad part of all this agression against a country that posed no threat to the American People or anybody else. Instead of putting our efforts into finding Osama, this president side-tracked our efforts and spending that only increased the misery for everybody - including the Iraqis. They are also under the threat of terrorism now from other Arabs that they didn't have before our invasion. Osama is still free and roaming the countryside of Afghanistan and Pakistan, and our soldiers and billions are being spent on a country that didn't deserve what we gave them.

I consider it an illegal war. Many do.

But the US would veto any resolution trying to find it illegitimate . Because of the subjectivity of threat it's subject to interpretation.

The US is in a position to block anything in the UN that would criticize it.

Ultimately its legality is on murky ground, as is all legality when it comes to international law.

In a way, saying that it's illegal is nothing more than rhetoric. On the international scale there's no rule of law and nations with power do everything they can to keep it that way.

Illegal by whose standards? Is US going to judge it's own wars illegal .. I will believe it when I see it. Certainly by my standards any invasive war is 'illegal' in the sense that it is not right. What the hell is illegal or legal WAR anyway? Ok, I illegaly killed 10.000 people? Oh, my killing of 10.000 people was legal? What is the f*****g diifference?

Ah, of course. If you have standards for legal/illegal wars , you can attack people 'legally' by your own standards, and even more ironically, because they attack others illegaly. Like Serbia, Iraq (2 times), Vietnam, Korea, ....

Uh, hipocrisy, God syndrome, brutality and above all : thinking everybody else is just stupid!

I wasn't aware the US attached Serbia, this is news to me.

At last Craven has arrived at a correct description of international law.

The enactments of the UN General Assembly and Security Council are what they are - the enactments of organs of a voluntary organization which are binding on their members to the extent that they are accepted by them. They have no effect whatever on nations that are not members, and since membership is neither compulsory nor irrevocable they cannot, of themselves, be applied without the implied or explicit consent of the sovereign nation involved.

Nevertheless some people prever to describe as legal or illegal matters which comply or do not comply with UN enactments. That is their right, but their opinions do not constitute enforcable international law. Others go farther and assert that if the UN does not explicitly affirm the propriety of some action, then it must necessarily be "ilegal". This is hardly defensible even as a matter of opinion. There are many real questions and conflicts in the world that the UN does not even attempt to either mediate or regulate.

Ceili:


Well the event is significant because:

1) It was an attack of US of a European country.
2) It was an attack of US of a sovereign country, although Milosevic is thought of as a kind of Hitler, Milosevic was formally elected.
3) It didn't help. Not in any way. Except for the people, some of which I know personally, fleeing from US bombs.

http://www.eatthestate.org/03-28/BombingSerbiaNot.htm
(added)
http://www.cato.org/pubs/policy_report/v21n5/niskanen.html

Perhaps this is just the first time you have heard me say so.

I've long maintained that International Law is an illusion and long bemoaned the hawks in power who do everything they can to keep it that way.

I suspect that you see the emergence of international rule of law as a bad thing.

Any legal standard would be an equalizer, and equalizers are not popular among the powerful.

Those enamoured of America's ability to engage in whatever military pursuit that suits our fancy usually decy any move toward real international law very loudly.

NATO is not the United States.
Nobody attacked serbia but the serbians themselves and NATO was sent in to clean up the damage. I believe the actions were warranted and Milosevic is particularily nasty bastard, elected or not.

It didnt help any of the Kosovars who returned from their makeshift refugee camps in Albania and Macedonia to their hometowns?

It didn't help any of the Kosovars who were still in hiding at home or in the hills, trying to stay out of the hands of the Serbian paramilitaries that were killing and raping people, when the attacks started?

I mean, they were what that war was started over.

By spring 2000, the 90% Kosovar majority was safely back at home. In Peja and Gjakova, people had the US, NATO and EU flags hanging out. On the walls, I saw it written: "Thank you, Clinton, thank you, Blair, thank you, Schroeder". In the schoolhallways, childrens drawings showed tanks and blood and people with guns - the kids' memories of how they'd been chased out, before NATO attacked.

(Oh yes - cause it wasnt the US attacking - it was NATO. Which includes quite a lot of European countries, too.)

By ways of bonus, the intervention helped Milosevic's ouster along as well. That didn't help anyone either?

Sorry - I dont mean to go all melodramatic at you. I know that the 10% Serb minority in Kosovo/a has had a tough time since. Now many of them have been chased out. I know that post-Milosevic politics in Serbia aint been pretty, either. And I'm not saying one can't possibly argue that, on balance, things got worse (tho I personally dont see exactly how). But it didnt help? Not in any way?

It did what it set out to do - stop the murderous mass deportation of 100,000s of Kosovars. Thats the bottom line.

"NATO is not the United States."
Wrong. NATO is US, de facto. Bombers, bombs and pilots, generals, carriers, everything that bombed Serbia was US. Saying US didn't do it, NATO did, not going to make any difference.

nimh: You do not have a clear picture of the Kosovo problem. Kosovo became a problem in the eighties, long before the bombing.
It's like IRA, or any other such problem. Why didn't US attack London because of the problems with IRA? Why doesn't US attack Russia because of Cechnya? Why didn't US attack SouthAfrica because of apartheid?

I am not defending violence, as you can clearly see. Bombing Serbs in Belgrade because of violence of Serbian paramilitary against Albanians in Kosovo is just weird, and politically incorrect. It isn't right by any laws -neither US nor NATO nor UN.

The bombing was also totally unrelated to Kosovo - it served as an 'ultimatum' but its effect was just death of innocent people and millions of dollars destroyed. The killing went on, and the NATO forces physically helping Albanian Kosovo refugees was what ended that problem (then).

And interestingly
"stop the murderous mass deportation of 100,000s " is a contradiction: what is it - killing or deporting? Mass deportations are one thing, mass killings are another. What is "murderous mass deportation " I have no idea.

The Milosevic regime did not end at that time. He became more of a saint, he is making fun of Haag court for the last 5 years. His mob went on to rule the country for a long time - it still does. Just look up the facts - the prime minister Kostunica murdered, etc. Most of this was helped by the long-standing embargo which helped mafia develop (you know the effects of prohibition). And who helped Serbia after the bombing? Nobody, cause US was busy bombing somebody else.

There is a hell of a difference between deep-seated societal issues and an ongoing humanitarian crisis in which pro-active ethnic cleansing and mass murder is being waged.

nimh's picture is a hell of a lot clearer than yours.

"murderous mass deportation " might be a mouthful but it is accurate.

Ethnic cleansing is not just about death. In the case being discussed the enthic cleansing was both murderous and expulsive.

Especially if it occurs in a theater that is already being protected and the general area that had a World War originate ove same basic problems.

Craven, there is no doubt that ethnic cleansing, killing etc. is not good.

That's why bombing Belgrade wasn't good.
My picture couldn't be clearer, standing here on the edge of it. I understand that the media presented the case in such a way that most of the Americans, and perhaps a portion of Europe, has a clear conscious about it.

We all know there is murdering and raping, even as we speak, going on even in the center of the world, if you know what I mean.
I could have been a target of US bombs myself, if things went a little different.
You know, there are vast differences between people who love the knife, and people who like to read. In Kosovo, a lot of people like to kill, and so do a lot of people in New York.
There was significantly less crime in Belgrade, once, as it is in a lot of million-sized American cities. Belgrade was a city of culture. And guess what? NATO decides to bomb it.

It is just saddening to see how mislead people are about such problems. About what was right and what wasn't, and about what was really achieved.
If Serbia wanted it, the killings could go on, trust me. The war in Bosnia wasn't over in a month, and no foreign involvement with guns did make it any better.

Relative,

I will have to flat out reject two notions you proposed above.

1) the appeal to authority by way of proximity.

By all means, if the facts are wrong correct them. But as long as the facts are right you have no basis for an appeal to proximity.

2) That the difference of opinion "about what was right" is a matter of being "mislead".

The above two notions are simply a way to avoid the uncomfortable notion that your position on a *subjective* matter is not absolute.

Instead of trying to say that the people who disagree with you are "mislead" or to imply that they do not see the situation clearly why not just accept the fact that it's a subjective matter and opinions can and will differ?

Now to address the perceived inconsistency:

So what?

The point isn't that it's fair. There is incredible inconsistency in US dealings. This doesn't mean that all US intervention is wrong.

In short, US inconsistency has no bearing on whether that was a correct decision or not.

Lastly, I agree that there is death any dying everywhere. But that's still a big difference from a concerted and nation-wide campaign for ethnic cleansing.

You can't argue that the existence of misery around the world means that there is not a qualitative difference between degrees of misery.

Nation-wide ethnic cleansing is not the same as inner-city gang crime, for example.