I want the US to lose the war in Iraq

Oh for all those who didn't read the resolutions in full either and didn't get what the reference to "all necessary means" was about, you can read up in a debate Scrat and I had over this issue back in March - starting at this post of Scrat's on page 21, you can skip through the thread following her and my intermittent posts through to page 28 ...

She gave good game, is the expression I think. Good debate, had to bow out in the end. Not as good as Joe's stuff is, but still - its not like we havent gone through this before. Hell, in one of the posts I reproduce part of a muchos shorter debate about the same thing again that a couple of us had with Trespassers Will, almost two years ago now ...

Oh the link is also interesting just for re-reading how McGentrix back then claimed "France was helping Saddam move his WMD's to Syria while stonewalling the US proposed resolution in the UN".

i understand what you're saying. in some ways, "we lost" the iraq war before it even started. it's going to take a hell of a long time to shake off the stigma of imperialism that the world now associates with america.

that said, america, the country, no matter who sits in the white house has to act responsibly (even if not at the outset of this stuff ) and clean up it's mess. failure to do so will only add more weight to what is being said about us now.

i don't believe the iraq elections are going to do much, but i really want to see them held this month. then, the goal is accomplished, iraqis are free with "an elected" government (by whom, we can't say), and defense military that is about as well trained as they will ever be.

good luck, baghdad. c-ya.

Nimh. That analogy was purely to show the possibility that vigilantism could be a good thing. Yours amply demonstrates that it could be a bad thing. In fact, it may, and probably is, usually be a bad thing... but that doesn't mean it's always a bad thing. As far as accuracy in Iraq, mine wasn't intended to be... and yours ignores the fact that the cops wouldn't be doing any of that stuff if the four guys weren't holding him for them. They had been ignoring the guy's crimes for years. Plus, they weren't compensating the 4 guys for holding the guy, while expecting them to hold him for as long as they wished. :wink: ).

Revel: as usual, I'm behind and haven't read your post yet, but I will.

That's the problem with analogies; they eventually break if you poke at 'em too much.

Yep, fair 'nuff. You can add all that to the analogy. (Just so long you also add the bit about how those 4 men were ignoring the guy's crimes as much as anyone - hell, were still lending him obscene amounts of money - back when he was out gassing black folks (->Kurds) for fun.)

Even if you add all that to the analogy, tho, it still wouldnt make the vigilantism in it OK in my book tho. So if your point was that vigilantism hypothetically can be a good thing, sure, I'm with ya. Hypothetically. But the vigilantism that was showcased by the Americans here - for that, I guess, then, we agree it was - however was not, imo. See the analogy, even with your addendi mixed in.

joefromchicago wrote:


Tico wrote:


Odd outcome simply to maintain the purity of definition. "Patriot" now refers to something quite evil.

Here's an old clipping from an earlier war:


Stauffenberg, like Rommel, wanted Hitler killed so that the war could be prosecuted more effectively towards victory, holding (reasonably) that Hitler's decisions were likely to result in Germany losing the war.

Two questions arise from this example. Was Stauffenberg acting as a 'patriot' seeking victory for Germany?

Second, what if Stauffenberg's intent had been to kill Hitler, assume power, and then end a war that was surely heading towards defeat, thus saving many German lives? Would that be a patriotic act?

Revel, you must have missed the part about taking the politics out. Consider my example completely absent any consideration of Iraq, and you should be able to see that my "The Accused" example illustrates MY point perfectly.
That is only to help you understand MY reasoning. You don't have to agree with me to understand me. :wink:

Also, just a fun fact, Law and Order must have it wrong. In the United States a Parole officer is a hell of a lot more powerful than you realize. If he merely believes that a parolee is violating the terms of his parole he can order an arrest warrant without any cause whatsoever. Furthermore, to throw a parolee back in the slammer he only needs to demonstrate that a single condition of parole was violated. The parolee is NOT entitled to another day in court and it doesn't matter if he's committed another crime. :wink:

Nimh: I'm not copping to that amended analogy either! :wink:

Stauffenberg would've been a traitor to the Nazi regime in either case, and a despot in the second case if he did it to assume the power for his own ascendancy. If he did it in order to restore Germany to hold elections again as they had prior to Hitler's ascendancy, perhaps he would be more of a patriot than a traitor, but held accountable for his own previous traitorous acts... Was he a traitor or a patriot to Germany in the first case? Hm... Wasn't he a Nazi? Didn't that override nationality at the time? He would have been a traitor to his party if he had succeeded in killing in such a manner. Arrest and try Hitler, perhaps then he would be a patriot to the party, but clandestine murder is a sneaky traitorous act... Jmo, fwiw.

Ok, I might of missed a little with my own analogy I sort of confused a person in jail with a person out of jail.

In any event, (pressing on ) if the porale officer ordered an arrest warrant, would he then be able to turn judge and jurry on his own and put the poralee into jail witout any kind of due process? I don't think he could therefore it is still exactly like the case of George Bush and UN resolutions. Even if felt that those there were deciding on the poralee's guilt were not carrying out the process adequately; he still could not on his own put the poralee behind bars. Even if he felt that those that were deciding on his guilt were just standing around and letting him get away with violating his porale, he still has no authority to take matters into his own hands and become judge and jurry of not only the poralee but the people judging the poralee. And this is how it is still not like that movie of accused regardless of politics, we are talking about rules and processes and laws here and we always have been.

I've been attempted to post this since a coule of times.

von Stauffenberg and the others have been prosecuted by the Volksgerichtshof as traitors.

Unfortunately, even nowadays, there are still some right-wing nuts, who call them un-patriotic.

Walter, I believe the problem has more to do with ignorance of the details concerning an Army resistance movement that went back to Bloomberg and Beck and culminated with Stauffenberg and his cohort, and a somewhat theoretical dispute over the meaning of words, than it does with calling the bomb plotters traitors.

For those of you who still believe that Saddam had no connections to Islamist terrorists, and that he was, and would remain well-contained by the sanctions regime in place in 2001.

Saddam Invitees Believed Behind Insurgency

By SCHEHEREZADE FARAMARZI, Associated Press Writer

LONDON - Internationally isolated and fearful of losing power, Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) made an astonishing move in the last years of his secular rule: He invited into Iraq (news - web sites) clerics who preached an austere form of Islam that's prevalent in Saudi Arabia.

He also let extremely religious Iraqis join his ruling Baath Socialist Party. Saddam's bid to win over devout Muslims planted the seeds of the insurgency behind some of the deadliest attacks against U.S. and Iraqi forces today, say Saudi dissidents and U.S. officials.

"Saddam invited Muslim scholars and preachers to Iraq for his own survival," said Saad Fagih, a London-based Saudi dissident. "He convinced them that Shiites are the danger."

Shiite Muslims make up about 60 percent of Iraq's 26 million people and they strongly support planned Jan. 30 elections, hoping to reverse the longtime domination of Iraq's Sunni minority. The insurgency is thought to be run mostly by Sunnis who fear losing power.

Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi ?- or Salafi ?- brand of Sunni Islam began trickling into Iraq in the mid-1990s, at the height of punishing international sanctions for Saddam's invasion of Kuwait. They came from Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries, including some returning Iraqis who adopted the Salafi ideology in exile.

A Wahhabi mosque was even built in the Shiite holy city of Karbala at a time when Shiites were banned from worshipping their religion freely. Signs of strict Islamic codes also began appearing, such as a growing number of women wearing veils.

The words "God is great" were added to the Iraqi flag after Saddam's defeat in the 1991 U.S.-led Gulf War (news - web sites). He closed bars and nightclubs to appease Muslims.

Around the same time, several militant Islamic groups, including Jund al-Islam (Islam's Soldier), started taking root in the mountains of northern Iraq along the Iranian border.

After the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, these Salafi groups reorganized under Ansar al-Islam, which had ties with Osama bin Laden (news - web sites)'s al-Qaida and with Jordanian militant leader Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, a leader of the current insurgency.

Ansar al-Islam, which adhered to a rigid Salafi ideology, seems to have been destroyed during the initial days of the U.S.-led invasion when its bases were attacked by American forces in March 2003. Hundreds of fighters were killed or scattered, many reportedly fleeing to Iran.

But the Ansar al-Sunnah Army ?- believed to be an outgrowth of Ansar al-Islam ?- then surfaced. The group recently claimed responsibility for the December suicide bombing at a U.S. base in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, killing 22 people, mostly American troops. Thought to be the deadliest Iraqi-run group, it also has been behind a string of beheadings and the twin suicide bombings of Kurdish party headquarters in Irbil last February.


Al-Zarqawi formed his own group, which is suspected of being behind a campaign of beheadings, kidnappings, mortar attacks and car bombings, including one that hit the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad in August 2003, killing 22 people.

On Tuesday, al-Zarqawi's group claimed responsibility for assassinating the governor of Baghdad province and six of his bodyguards.

Al-Zarqawi recently announced he was merging his Tawhid and Jihad group with al-Qaida, and changed its name to al-Qaida in Iraq. Bin Laden may have taken him up on the offer, according to an audiotape broadcast in December in which a speaker the CIA (news - web sites) believes was bin Laden called al-Zarqawi his lieutenant in Iraq and said Muslims there should "listen to him."

"Thanks to American propaganda, this group has achieved the glory and fame that it lacked and always strived for," said Yasir al-Sirri, an Egyptian and strict Muslim in London.

But he dismissed American claims that al-Qaida and Saddam were linked.

"From the start, al-Zarqawi wasn't part of al-Qaida. Not everyone who was in Afghanistan (news - web sites) was affiliated to al-Qaida," said al-Sirri, who supports the Iraqi insurgency.

There's no question, however, that Saddam invited Islamic extremists into Iraq.

The core insurgency is Iraqi Sunni Muslims ?- a volatile mix of groups and freelancers who include loyalists of the former Baath Party, Fedayeen militiamen, former Republican Guard and intelligence agents, Islamic extremists, paid common criminals and disaffected Iraqis.

The Sunni resistance at first wanted to use al-Zarqawi as a tool to draw support for their cause, according to Fagih, who maintains contacts in Saudi Arabia.

"Foreigners came and were ready to kill themselves," he said, but the Sunni resistance discovered it couldn't control al-Zarqawi. "He's like an unguided missile."

Now, U.S. officials say it is local insurgents ?- essentially former regime elements and Islamic extremists, and not foreign fighters ?- who are proving difficult to defeat.

"If in Iraq there were only al-Zarqawi or al-Qaida, the situation would be manageable," a U.S. government official based in Iraq said on condition of anonymity. "It would be just like any country with terrorist problems. Al-Zarqawi and al-Qaida wouldn't have the effect of what we are seeing now."

He said most of the suicide car bombings, which usually kill Iraqi civilians, police and national guardsmen, are carried out by foreign fighters, while the former regime elements have been largely involved in planting bombs to attack U.S. convoys.

The Iraqi extremists who joined the Baath Party under Saddam and are now engaged in the insurgency are not necessarily tied to al-Qaida, the U.S. official said.

"Exactly who they are tied to or what ?- like other international terrorists ?- is very fluid," the official said. "Foreign fighters have ties to al-Qaida. They all help each other one way or another ?- whether it's financial, logistical planning. ... They share training camps used by differing groups at different times."

The camps, the official alleged, were financed mostly by rich former Baathists who fled to Syria just before the war ?- charges the Syrian government has denied.

Iraq's Sunni neighbors such as Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan were against the war that toppled Saddam ?- partly because they feared it could result in Shiite domination.

"They didn't want the Sunni hegemony uprooted. They wanted to keep the status quo," said Hamza al-Hassan, a Shiite Saudi dissident writer in London. "Now, some Arab fighters might be joining the insurgency to protect Sunni power."

You mean a country that saw itself under threat of invasion actually prepared to fight back?

Say it ain't so!

You are evading the point. OK by me, but don't pretend otherwise.

No, I made a different point.

Can I then conclude that you opposed not only the war, but also the sanctions regime that was billed as the alternative to it?

No.

Can I then conclude that you will continue to attempt putting words in my mouth?

whatever it takes.

What if someone's definition of "lose," as it pertains to the war in Iraq, is "withdraw all American troops immediately and take whatever steps necessary to repair or mitigate the damage done by the war?" If that person favored "losing" under that definition could he still be a patriot?


If that's the case, then why would anyone want to be a "patriot?"

Here's something else that McG wrote in that thread: "I am sure the government has people much more educated in international law than us working on this. If it were indeed illegal, it would have come out long before now."

Well, at least there's something to be said for consistency.