yeah of course you're right ican no paradox at all.
So the benchmark is set for a year from now? If there is still as much if not more violence, what are you all going to say, give it another year, 200 years? Or are you guys going to say, well, Iraq may be mired in violence and without simple electricy more hours in the day they have it but a village in Africa held elections... People are complaining, but hey at least they are allowed to complain.
The point is that if we were going to do it we should have done it right. We are simply too strong in comparison with the enemy not to have been able to get a handle on the insurgency within a two year span. It points to a lack of leadership and planning.
The actual reason for the Nazi invasion of Poland. From a search link.
"Throughout the 1930's both National Socialist Germany and the USSR were trying very hard to get the leaders of Poland to sign a mutual defense pact against the other. In other words Poland signing with Germany against the USSR or Poland signing with the USSR against Germany." It doesn't say anything about "democracy."
"The representatives of the Government of the United States and of the Government of Japan have been carrying on during the past several months informal and exploratory conversations for the purpose of arriving at a settlement if possible of questions relating to the entire Pacific area based upon the principles of peace, law and order and fair dealing among nations. These principles include the principle of inviolability of territorial integrity and sovereignty of each and all nations; the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries; the principle of equality, including equality of commercial opportunity and treatment; and the principle of reliance upon international cooperation and conciliation for the prevention and pacific settlement of controversies and for improvement of international conditions by peaceful methods and processes." I don't see anything about "for the destruction of democracy."
Steve (as 41oo) wrote:George you said
"The reserve quantity is a function of the current price."
Well I know what you mean but you've not expressed it very well. Clearly as the price goes up, more difficult oil becomes attractive to recover. But that has no bearing on the total reserve, which unless its infinite, has been decreasing since we first started tapping it.
The fact is the "easy oil" is getting scarcer. Its getting harder and harder to recover. Technological developments help, but the bald facts of life (economics and thermodynamics) dictate that ulitmately we end up putting more energy into oil extraction than the extracted oil liberates. At this point the oil has "run out" (Whatever the oil price). There is no getting away from that.
"I stand by my point - we should have forced Britain to choose between us and France. I believe the choice would have been for us, but if it went otherwise, better to learn that now than to be held back by a tenuously committed ally. "
Well perhaps, from your point of view, you should. It illustrates just what a superb politician/salesman Blair is. I don't think anyone else could have got to Bush like he did, and persuaded the Americans to press the UN for a second resolution on the use of force.
"tenuously committed ally". Thats an interesting phrase and I've said something similar myself. The twin pillars of Blair's foreign policy are membership of the EU and the "special relationship" with the US. Of the two one is solid and enduring, the other more brittle though still strong. The Iraq question forced Blair into the very position he sort to avoid, a choice between Europe and the US. It must have been a truly agonising 30 seconds. Britain's destiny is with Europe. We are part of that continent. We want to play a leading role, and are uniquely placed to do so. On the other hand the relationship with the US could be put at jeopardy by acting as a "tenuously committed ally". Better to upset the Germans and the French for now than risk a more permanent rift with the US.
The repercussions of Iraq continue. But Blair has handled an almost impossible situation with some aplomb. What a pity the US didn't fullfil their side of the bargain by delivering a stable free and democratic Iraq that the likes of Wolfowitz promised would be easy.
I concede that the world's total reserves of oil are indeed decreasing as we consume them. However, through the last 50 years or so the world's KNOWN reserves have been relatively constant. That is to say that new deposits of recoverable oil have been discovered at about the same rate at which we have consumed them. During the last twenty or so years there have also been great advances made in techniques for deep drilling, lateral drilling, undersea drilling, and advanced techniques for recovering the last 25% or so of petroleum from major deposits - something that couldn't be done a few decades ago. This has led to the defination of a new reserve quantity, dependent on price. There are numerous wells throughout the southwestern United States in what were once considered depleted oil fields, which, with advanced techniques can be returned to production but at a higher cost - hence the dependency on price. Same goes for the enormous deposits of now recoverable petroleum in shale and snad deposits in Alberta and the Great salt Basin in Utah. Bottom line is we are not likely to run out of petroleum for a couple of centuries, perhaps longer.
I agree that P.M. Blair has handled a difficult decision with great skill and persistence. I admire him greatly for it. At the same time I believe with the wisdom of retrospect, that we would have been much better off if we didn't bother with the last attampt at a Security Council resolution. We should have seen that the French would pull out all the stops to injure us and the benefit politically within the UK just wasn't worth the risk. Indeed I am surprised that Blair, after that experience, can ever conclude that France is either trustworthy or a reliable ally. Britain for centuries very successfully relied on a policy of opposing whatever powers attempted to dominate continental Europe. I find it remarkable that you would wish to change that now. Your choice of course. Sooner or later you must decisively choose.
revel wrote: So the benchmark is set for a year from now? If there is still as much if not more violence, what are you all going to say, give it another year, 200 years?
I say give Iraq about the same length of time we gave to the establishment and securing of democracies in Japan and Germany after WWII. My estimate is give it until the year 2014, that is, give it 11 years from start of the war in 2003 until 2014.
revel wrote: The point is that if we were going to do it we should have done it right. We are simply too strong in comparison with the enemy not to have been able to get a handle on the insurgency within a two year span. It points to a lack of leadership and planning.
Knowing that I don't really know how competent I would have been in leading the US to replace Saddam's regime and help the Iraqis secure a democracy of their own design, I'll assume Bush is no more a fool than I am or I would have been. In my case, when I bungled complicated but admittedly much simpler projects in the past, I just kept at it until I finally learned how to do it right.
Fortunately, my projects weren't directed at saving lives at the risk of costing lives. So as long as President Bush appears to be learning from his mistakes or blunders (call 'em what you may), I know he is handling his job better than the likes of other contestants for his job who more than demonstrated to me that not only did they not understand how to solve this problem of Iraq,
they didn't even understand the problem of Iraq... and to this day are giving me a preponderance of evidence that
they still don't understand this problem of Iraq.
cicerone imposter wrote:The actual reason for the Nazi invasion of Poland. From a search link.
"Throughout the 1930's both National Socialist Germany and the USSR were trying very hard to get the leaders of Poland to sign a mutual defense pact against the other. In other words Poland signing with Germany against the USSR or Poland signing with the USSR against Germany." It doesn't say anything about "democracy."
ican711nm wrote:When the Nazis invaded Poland, that was a war against Polish democracy.
Poland signed a mutual defense pact with France and England. It was called the Kellogg-Briand Pact, July 24, 1929. Regardless of the rationals given by Hitler for the attack, Poland was a democracy when it was attacked by the Nazis. Hitler at the time publically claimed Poland attacked Germany and he was only retaliating. You believe that too?
cicerone imposter wrote: ... "The representatives of the Government of the United States and of the Government of Japan have been carrying on during the past several months informal and exploratory conversations for the purpose of arriving at a settlement if possible of questions relating to the entire Pacific area based upon the principles of peace, law and order and fair dealing among nations. ... I don't see anything about "for the destruction of democracy."
ican711nm wrote:When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor that was a war against US democracy.
Japan on Sunday December 7, 1941 attacked the US at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The US was and is a democracy. So I infer that means the Japanese attacked a democracy on December 7, 1941. In other words, on that date there commenced a war on US democracy by Japan.
Japan did not attack because the US is a democracy. That wasn't even a issue; it was because of the trade embargo, and Japan was expanding it colonization by military force to get access to raw materials which Japan lacks.
cicerone imposter wrote:Japan did not attack because the US is a democracy. That wasn't even a issue; it was because of the trade embargo, and Japan was expanding it colonization by military force to get access to raw materials which Japan lacks.
This is correct. Japan got into World War 2 because the US stopped the trade of Scrap Steel and Oil to Japan. Japan was in a war with China needed those materials to fight so they bombed Pearl Harbor in retaliation.
Here's some good news from Iraq.
*****************************
Joao Silva for The New York Times
Americans received more than 160 Purple Hearts on Haifa Street, one of Baghdad's most dangerous areas.
There Are Signs the Tide May Be Turning on Iraq's Street of Fear
By JOHN F. BURNS
Published: March 21, 2005
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Nearly two years after American troops captured Baghdad, Haifa Street is like an arrow at the city's heart. A little more than two miles long, it runs south through a canyon of mostly abandoned high-rises and majestic date palms almost to the Assassin's Gate, the imperial-style arch that is the main portal to the Green Zone compound, the principal seat of American power.
When most roads in central Baghdad are choked with traffic, there is rarely more than a trickle of vehicles on Haifa Street. At the day's height, a handful of pedestrians scurry down empty sidewalks, ducking into covered walkways that serve as sanctuaries from gunfire - and as blinds for insurgent attacks in one of Iraq's most bitterly contested battle zones.
American soldiers call the street Purple Heart Boulevard: the First Battalion of the Ninth Cavalry, patrolling here for the past year before its recent rotation back to base at Fort Hood, Tex., received more than 160 Purple Hearts. Many patrols were on foot, to gather intelligence on neighborhoods that American officers say have been the base for brutal car bombings, kidnappings and assassinations across Baghdad.
In the first 18 months of the fighting, the insurgents mostly outmaneuvered the Americans along Haifa Street, showing they could carry the war to the capital's core with something approaching impunity.
But American officers say there have been signs that the tide may be shifting. On Haifa Street, at least, , insurgents are attacking in smaller numbers, and with less intensity; mortar attacks into the Green Zone have diminished sharply; major raids have uncovered large weapons caches; and some rebel leaders have been arrested or killed.
American military engineers, frustrated elsewhere by insurgent attacks, are moving ahead along Haifa Street with a $20 million program to improve electricity, sewer and other utilities. So far, none of the work sites have been attacked, although a local Shiite leader who vocally supported the American projects was assassinated on his doorstep in January.
But the change American commanders see as more promising than any other here is the deployment of large numbers of Iraqi troops. American commanders are eager to shift the fighting in Iraq to the country's own troops, allowing American units to pull back from the cities and, eventually, to begin drawing down their 150,000 troops. Haifa Street has become an early test of that strategy.
Last month, an Iraqi brigade with two battalions garrisoned along Haifa Street became the first homegrown unit to take operational responsibility for any combat zone in Iraq. The two battalions can muster more than 2,000 soldiers, twice the size of the American cavalry battalion that has led most fighting along the street. So far, American officers say, the Iraqis have done well, withstanding insurgent attacks and conducting aggressive patrols and raids, without deserting in large numbers or hunkering down in their garrisons.
If Haifa Street is brought under control, it will be a major step toward restoring order in this city of five million, and will send a wider message: that the insurgents can be matched, and beaten back.
Still, American commanders are wary, saying the changes are a long way from a victory. They note that the insurgents match each tactical change by the Americans and Iraqi government forces with their own.
"We know that we face a learning enemy, just as we learn from him," said Maj. Gen. Peter W. Chiarelli, who left Baghdad recently after a year commanding the First Cavalry Division, responsible for overall security in Baghdad and for the 800-member task force dedicated to Haifa Street. "But I believe we are gaining the upper hand," he said.
A Downturn in Rebel Fire
For now, the days when rebels could gather in groups as large as 150, pinning down American troops for as long as six hours at a time, have tapered off. American officers say only three Haifa Street mortars have hit the Green Zone in the past six months; in the last two weeks of September alone, 11 Haifa Street mortars hit the sprawling zone.
ican, Please do your homework before you post unfounded, nonfactual, information to make your case. It just makes you look more "stupido."
I forgot which thread I made the comment about the UN not keeping up with the times, but this article explains it pretty well.
**************
Annan to Propose Measures for Change in U.N. Structure
By WARREN HOGE
Published: March 21, 2005
UNITED NATIONS, March 20 - Secretary General Kofi Annan will propose sweeping changes to the United Nations on Monday that would expand the Security Council to reflect modern realities of global power, restructure the discredited Human Rights Commission to keep rights violators from becoming members and redefine terrorism to end any justifications of its use for national resistance.
Mr. Annan will make the recommendations in a speech to the General Assembly aimed at restoring confidence in the United Nations that lapsed after bitter divisions over the war in Iraq, charges of mismanagement and corruption in the oil-for-food program, and revelations of sexual misconduct by blue-helmeted peacekeepers.
His proposals, drawn from conclusions of an independent panel in November, will be the subject of a gathering of heads of government in September that hopes to reinvigorate the United Nations at a time when its value is being widely questioned.
The speech, while making the case for the relevance of a revised United Nations, will also be seen as a bid by Mr. Annan to shore up his stewardship. While he has maintained much of his once-vaunted reputation abroad, he has come under pointed criticism in Washington, where some members of Congress have called on him to resign before completing his term in office at the end of 2006.
"If any report has Kofi Annan's name all over it, it is this one," said Mark Malloch Brown, Mr. Annan's outspoken new chief of staff.
The measures were outlined in a 63-page report from Mr. Annan titled "In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All." The report was released Sunday after details from drafts emerged in The Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post.
Mr. Annan said the Human Rights Commission had been undermined by allowing participation by countries whose purpose was "not to strengthen human rights but to protect themselves against criticism or to criticize others." In recent years, the commission's members have included Cuba, Libya and Sudan.
"As a result," he said, "a credibility deficit has developed, which casts a shadow on the reputation of the United Nations system as a whole."
He recommended replacing the 53-nation Human Rights Commission with a smaller council, whose members would be chosen by a two-thirds vote of the 191-nation General Assembly, rather than by regional groups. "Those elected," he said, "should undertake to abide by the highest human rights standards."
Mr. Annan called for a definition of terrorism as any act "intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or noncombatants" aimed at intimidating governments, populations or international organizations. "We must convince all those who may be tempted to support terrorism that it is neither an acceptable nor an effective way to advance their cause," he said.
Regarding the Security Council, Mr. Annan left it up to the General Assembly to decide between basic ideas proposed in November, but he urged the body to reach a decision before the September meeting.
The council now has 5 veto-bearing members - Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States - and 10 members elected to two-year terms. One alternative would add 6 permanent members - likely candidates are Brazil, Germany, India, Japan, Egypt and either Nigeria or South Africa - as well as 3 two-year term members. The other would create a new tier of 8 semipermanent members chosen for renewable four-year terms and one additional two-year seat to the existing 10.
Veto power is coveted by nations seeking permanent status; they are likely to continue to press for it even though both recommendations, as now written, limit the veto to the five original permanent members.
The report also reinforces a policy of "zero tolerance" for sexual exploitation by peacekeepers. Mr. Annan urged countries furnishing troops to prosecute wrongdoers in the absence of United Nations authority to do so.
JustWonders wrote: I know about the protests. I no longer consider them to be "anti-war". The are most definitely "anti-democracy" and "anti-reconstruction".
Could you explain this a bit more, please.
Panorama
Sun 20 Mar, 10:15 pm - 11:15 pm 60mins
Iraq, the Truth and Tony
Tony Blair once said: "Most people who have dealt with me think I?m a pretty straight sort of guy and I am." He also insists he played it straight over taking Britain to war with Iraq.
Last summer, the Prime Minister made an impassioned plea to draw a line under Iraq: "No one lied. No one made up the intelligence? Everyone genuinely tried to do their best in good faith for the country in circumstances of acute difficulty.That issue of good faith should now be at an end." However, allegations that Mr Blair misled the country persist.
On the second anniversary of the Iraq war, John Ware reveals how several of the claims he made in public during the build-up to the war - and afterwards - conflict with what was going on behind the scenes, as evidenced, for instance, by Government officials and documents. These cover the Prime Minister?s statements about the quality and quantity of intelligence that he said showed beyond doubt that Saddam was continuing to make chemical and biological weapons; that he was confident of getting the explicit support of the UN Security Council for invasion; that he would be bound by the rule of international law; and that his stated objective was disarmament, not overthrowing the Iraqi regime.
Subtitles Stereo Widescreen
Website:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/panorama
cicerone imposter wrote:ican, Please do your homework before you post unfounded, nonfactual, information to make your case. It just makes you look more "stupido."
Yes and Ican, will you please use more colours? Some of your latest have been black-and-white only, very drab. Please consider the scrollers when posting.
George
The situation regarding oil is nowhere near as rosy as you suggest. Oil production follows the classic bell curve whether its from an individual well or summed over all wells. Peak oil discovery was something like 40 years ago. We are currently finding new oil at nothing like the rate we are consuming it. Further more increasing living standards in places like china and india increases demand. Google peak oil
I found this an excellent introduction. Its alarming yes you might even say alarmist. But I think we have something to be alarmed about, and so does the American government.
http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
"Indeed I am surprised that Blair, after that experience, can ever conclude that France is either trustworthy or a reliable ally. Britain for centuries very successfully relied on a policy of opposing whatever powers attempted to dominate continental Europe. I find it remarkable that you would wish to change that now. Your choice of course. Sooner or later you must decisively choose."
Well for once Blair's team at the UN failed to convince. Of course we blamed the French, we weren't going to admit that the resolution was not going to pass because a majority would vote against. In the infamous tv interview Chirac said he would veto the use of force. But he didn't rule it out for all time, he wanted the inspectors to be allowed time to finish their job and report. We jumped on that, withdrew the resolution, went to war without it and blamed the French.
The French did not in my view act dishonourably. They refused to be bounced, thats all. If the Americans and British had a fixed timetable to war that was rolling out fast, that's their problem, not France.
Your second point about Britain's historical role is more interesting. Its true that at various times we have sat back and from our island home played the great game of watching and sometimes encouraging the continental europeans fight each other. But those days are gone. Thats why the EU project is so inspirational. We realise we have much more in common than divides us. Its better to pool some sovereignty than risk a return to the old conflicts. That something most Americans just cant get their heads round.
But in fact Britains policy is to have it both ways. Blair sees believes EU/USA acting together can solve most of the worlds problems. This is why he sees an important role for this country with a foot in both camps. But there is growing anti americanism in Europe, and when they see Blair acting in concert with Bush and getting NOTHING from it except the odd slap in the face, their prejudices against american good faith are confirmed. [Latest example Bush's unilateral "appointment" of Wolfowitz to the world bank within a few days of the G8 agreement that it would be an open competition appointment]. Most Europeans, and I think I am increasingly of this view, although desperate to see much better US/EU relations, have written off any such developments as impossible under this particular US administration.
McTag
Please consider the scrollers when posting.
Hey my posts are short.
Pithy, and to-the-point. And always truthful. But sadly monochrome, I can't work the colours.
Thought for today: how weird it seems to me, the the congress and the US nation up to the president himself are getting involved with compassion and concern about one poor woman in vegetative state who may have her life-support withdrawn.
Not so about many thousands of innocent Iraqis who had their lives terminated or their bodies maimed or poisoned.
Reminds me of the old saying "Depends on whose bull is getting gored"
Quote:Well for once Blair's team at the UN failed to convince. Of course we blamed the French, we weren't going to admit that the resolution was not going to pass because a majority would vote against. In the infamous tv interview Chirac said he would veto the use of force. But he didn't rule it out for all time, he wanted the inspectors to be allowed time to finish their job and report. We jumped on that, withdrew the resolution, went to war without it and blamed the French.
This was the problem for me in a nutshell. It was like they wanted to shove that down everyone's throat so fast that it was a done deal before anyone really knew why we were going to war.
Had they said at the outset that they wanted to turn Iraq into a democracy to have as an example for the rest of the middle east an alternative way of running their country without dictators so that the rest of the world would be safer and that they couldn't do it unless they got rid of Saddam Hussein who is an evil dictator anyway who has tortured and oppressed his people for decades, then at least it would have been an honest approach and people could have made up their minds on the truth instead of sexed up half truths.
(Sorry for the long sentence)
People keep going on about those of in the United States are just so opposed to George Bush that we are against the war in Iraq. That is simply not true. Most of us was for the war in Afghanistan, at least I was and I still am and George Bush was acting President then too as well.
I would have been against the war in Iraq even if they had phrased it that way. (I do not believe treating people much less whole nations as though they are merely pawns in a world chess game.) If they went strictly for the Iraqi people and I trusted that was their interest, I would have been for it even though we were still in a war with Afghanistan that we still have not completed yet. But the way they sprung this war on us with the excuses of WMD and past crimes of Saddam Hussien which never was a direct threat to us just made me suspicious of them from the get go. I thought at the time that if others in the world who are closer to that part of the country feel like they were threatened then I would support the war, but they didn't so I didn't understand the rush.
