Debunking the Reasons to stay in Iraq.

McGentrix wrote:

FreeDuck wrote:
McG, what do you think the US is doing there?

The US is helping the people of Iraq create a new form of government by Iraqi's, for Iraqi's. They are defending the governmental offices from daily attacks by insurgents trying to disrupt the growing government. The US is providing needed resources to recreate a failed infrastructure, rebuild the education and healthcare systems and get the nations natural resource collection and sales back online so it can support itself. The US is the defender of freedom and liberty and that is what we are providing the Iraqi citizens with. Something they have not known for many, many years.

These are all actions that the US and its military forces are currenly engaged in. What is the purpose of the adventure in Iraq?

And I'm sorry, but I was not aware that "the US is the defender of freedom and liberty....." I was under the impression that while the US supports freedom and liberty, it does not require them of the rest of the world. Unless you're planning to invade a whole lot of other countries. But I don't even see folks wanting to take a hard line on human rights in China, let alone invade.

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Brandon9000 wrote:

FreeDuck wrote:
Brandon9000 wrote:
FreeDuck wrote:
And the US has a really great track record of imposing stable, democratic governments by force.

Japan, West Germany, etc.

Vietnam, Grenada, Central America, Chile, Iran, etc.

The bottom line is that you don't give a flying **** whether Iraq has a democracy or not, and you aren't willing to sacrifice a thing to even try.

Is democracy the only form of governance under which people can be happy? I don't care about attempting to export our form of government.

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We certainly are playing our part to ensure their regeneration, ican.

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The following sentences were excerpted from Islamic Movement in Kurdistan, and from Ansar al-Islam, in Wikipedia.

The Islamic Movement in Kurdistan is an Iraqi political party.
Some more radical members joined the al-Queda aligned Ansar al-Islam.
Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Movement_in_Kurdistan

Ansar al-Islam is an Islamist group, promoting a radical interpretation of Islam and holy war.
At the beginning of the 2003 invasion of Iraq it controlled about a dozen villages and a range of peaks in northern Iraq on the Iranian border.
It was formed in December 2001 as a merger of Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), led by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i, and a splinter group from the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan led by Mullah Krekar.
Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansar_al-Islam

.........................................................................

Relevant Dates:

05/19/1996: Bin Laden leaves Sudan and returns to Afghanistan.

+ 5 years, 3 months, 23 days later
09/11/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda perpetrates terrorist attack on USA. The night of 9/11, the President broadcast to the nation that we will not distinguish between terrorists and those who harbor them.

+ 1 month, 9 days later.
10/20/2001: USA invades Afghanistan. Did the USA wait to long?

+ 2 months later.
12/20/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda establishes training base in Iraq.

+ 1 year, 3 months later.
03/20/2003: USA invades Iraq including al Qaeda’s expanded training bases in northern Iraq. Should the USA have waited longer?

.............................................................

The deadly consequences to us all of failure to exterminate malignancy (i.e., those who mass murder civilians and those who are their accomplices) are too horrible to contemplate much less endure!

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since Wikipedia is not QA'd or in any way properly vetted, and the next entry in Google that mentions a connection tween Iraq and Al Qaeda is a site that also plugs Cato Institute, and the reamining entries sound more like polls wherein they report that ("n%" Americans believe that a connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq was extant.

Im not fully convinced any more especially since almost all the other reasons to go to war were either stretches in logic or outright bogus. We also know that there was a certain amount of "cooked intelligence".

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farmerman wrote:

... Im not fully convinced any more especially since almost all the other reasons to go to war were either stretches in logic or outright bogus. We also know that there was a certain amount of "cooked intelligence".

And we also know that al Qaeda began setting up training bases in Iraq shortly after the USA invaded Afghanistan. In addition to Wikipedia, General Tommy Franks discovered via the direct observation of his troops that he was right about that. Even Colin Powell was right about that.

The absence of a link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11 is not relevant to the question of whether or not we should have invaded Iraq. Nor is the absence of ready-to-use WMD in Saddam’s Iraq relevant to the question of whether or not we should have invaded Iraq. What is relevant to whether or not we should have invaded Iraq is that which follows.

The following sentences were excerpted from Islamic Movement in Kurdistan, and from Ansar al-Islam, in Wikipedia.

The Islamic Movement in Kurdistan is an Iraqi political party.
Some more radical members joined the al-Queda aligned Ansar al-Islam.
Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Movement_in_Kurdistan

Ansar al-Islam is an Islamist group, promoting a radical interpretation of Islam and holy war.
At the beginning of the 2003 invasion of Iraq it controlled about a dozen villages and a range of peaks in northern Iraq on the Iranian border.
It was formed in December 2001 as a merger of Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), led by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i, and a splinter group from the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan led by Mullah Krekar.
Retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansar_al-Islam

……………………………………………………………………

Relevant Dates:

05/19/1996: Bin Laden leaves Sudan and returns to Afghanistan.

+ 5 years, 3 months, 23 days later
09/11/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda perpetrates terrorist attack on USA. The night of 9/11, the President broadcast to the nation that we will not distinguish between terrorists and those who harbor them.

+ 1 month, 9 days later.
10/20/2001: USA invades Afghanistan. Did the USA wait to long?

+ 2 months later.
12/20/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda establishes training base in Iraq.

+ 1 year, 3 months later.
03/20/2003: USA invades Iraq including al Qaeda’s expanded training bases in northern Iraq. Should the USA have waited longer?

…………………………………………………………………………..

The deadly consequences to us all of failure to exterminate malignancy (i.e., those who mass murder civilians and those who are their accomplices) are too horrible to contemplate much less endure!

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are you trying to be funny? Youve just posted that above and now we are going in circles.

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I played redundancy along with ican in another thread, and came to the conclusion that ican is a bot, or a person imitating a bot, which is a computer program imitating a person. Ican is a paradox.

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farmerman wrote:

are you trying to be funny? Youve just posted that above and now we are going in circles.

No, I am not trying to be funny. I am trying to engage debate on what I think is the primary justification for our invasion of Iraq. Until such debate occurs, I shall continue to repeat relevant statements.

When you posted

Quote:

since Wikipedia is not QA'd or in any way properly vetted

and

Quote:

the next entry in Google that mentions a connection tween Iraq and Al Qaeda is a site that also plugs Cato Institute

I thought you were either trying to be funny, or were unwittingly being ridiculous.

Taken at face value those statements imply that you think Wikipedia must be vetted before you will believe them. That is you will not trust Wikipedia Encyclopedia, because some organization you do not trust apparently says the same thing as Wikipedia. Rolling Eyes

Quote:

The Wikimedia Foundation Inc. is the parent organization of Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikibooks (including Wikijunior and Wikiversity), Wikisource, In Memoriam 9/11, Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies, Wikinews, and Nupedia (defunct). It is a non-profit corporation based in Saint Petersburg, Florida, USA, and organized under the laws of Florida. Its existence was officially announced by Wikia CEO and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales on June 20, 2003

Quote:

Wikipedia is managed by a non profit parent organization, The Wikimedia Foundation, which also manages the operation of Wikipedia's sister projects, including Wiktionary (a wiki dictionary), Wikibooks (free textbooks), and others, and owns all of their domain names. Previously, the site was hosted on the servers of Bomis, Inc, a company mostly owned by Jimmy Wales, who is currently the funder of part of the site's operational costs. With the announcement of the Wikimedia Foundation on June 20, 2003 the ownership of all domain names as well as the technical equipment was transferred to the Foundation. The site is run by the community of Wikipedians guided by the principles articulated by Jimmy Wales, including, for example, an adherence to a neutral point of view. [boldface added] The articles hosted on this site are released by their authors under the GNU Free Documentation License, so the articles are free content and may be reproduced freely under the same license. See Wikipedia:Copyrights and Wikipedia:Readers' FAQ for information on how you can use Wikipedia content.

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Relevant Dates:

05/19/1996: Bin Laden leaves Sudan and returns to Afghanistan.

5 years, 3 months, 23 days later
09/11/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda perpetrates terrorist attack on USA. The night of 9/11, the President broadcast to the nation that we will not distinguish between terrorists and those who harbor them.

1 month, 9 days later.
10/20/2001: USA invades Afghanistan. Did the USA wait to long?

2 months later.
12/20/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda establishes training base in Iraq.

1 year, 3 months later.
03/20/2003: USA invades Iraq including al Qaeda’s expanded training bases in northern Iraq. Should the USA have waited longer?

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Wikipedia exists, thats all youve established. They publish whatever the hell they can dress up and present. They present entire items of dubious quality as well as some good stuff. They are hassling with he old QA issue even now. Im surprised that you dont know of this.
Merely posting their flag doesnt prove a damn thing, other than theyve got some cute names.

I dont fully believe Wikipedia's threads on many subjects. They often give more time over to format than substance. I recognize your penchant to be somewhat doctrinaire so Im merely reminding you that multiple interpretations on "facts" that you present are often good to consider, especially when all the rest of the world is not fully on board with your interpretations. Thats all. Whne only Wikipedia and CAto can present the same "facts" as you and following them are entire posts about how the connections have not been convincingly proven. Its almost as if were doing the WMD thing all over .

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farmerman wrote:

Wikipedia exists, thats all youve established. They publish whatever the hell they can dress up and present. They present entire items of dubious quality as well as some good stuff. They are hassling with he old QA issue even now. Im surprised that you dont know of this. Merely posting their flag doesnt prove a damn thing, other than theyve got some cute names.

Ok farmerman! You don't believe all the following quote is true! What is it specifically about the following quote that you believe is not true and what leads you to believe it is not true?

What do you believe is true about when al Qaeda first found sanctuary in Iraq and why do you believe it?

Quote:

Relevant Dates:

05/19/1996: Bin Laden leaves Sudan and returns to Afghanistan.

5 years, 3 months, 23 days later
09/11/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda perpetrates terrorist attack on USA. The night of 9/11, the President broadcast to the nation that we will not distinguish between terrorists and those who harbor them.

1 month, 9 days later.
10/20/2001: USA invades Afghanistan. Did the USA wait to long?

2 months later.
12/20/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda establishes training base in Iraq.

1 year, 3 months later.
03/20/2003: USA invades Iraq including al Qaeda’s expanded training bases in northern Iraq. Should the USA have waited longer?

farmerman wrote:

... Whne only Wikipedia and CAto can present the same "facts" as you and following them are entire posts about how the connections have not been convincingly proven. Its almost as if were doing the WMD thing all over .

When only Wikipedia, Cato, and General Tommy Franks can present the same facts as I did:

Quote:

"American Soldier," by General Tommy Franks, 7/1/2004
"10" Regan Books, An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers,

Chapter 12

A CAMPAIGN UNLIKE ANY OTHER

CENTCOM FORWARD HEADQUARTERS
21 MARCH 2003, A DAY, page 483

The Air Picture changed once more. Now the icons were streaming toward two ridges and a steep valley in far northeastern Iraq, right on the border with Iran. These were the camps of the Ansar al-Islam terrorists, where al Qaeda leader Abu Musab Zarqawi had trained disciples in the use of chemical and biological weapons. But this strike was more than just another TLAM [Tomahawk Land Attack Missle] bashing. Soon Special Forces and SMU [Special Mission Unit] operators leading Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, would be storming the camps, collecting evidence, taking prisoners, and killing all those who resisted.

We agree that Saddam's regime had no ready-to-use WMD prior to the US invasion of Iraq.

We agree that Saddam's regime did not participate in nor were they accomplices to al Qaeda's pepetration of 9/11.

I think al Qaeda did obtain sanctuary in Iraq prior to the US invasion of Iraq.

You apparently think al Qaeda did not obtain sanctuary in Iraq prior to the US invasion of Iraq.

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Yeah, I think that as well. No more than they gained sanctuary in the US prior to 9/11; they were just working there.

Wikipedia is not a reliable source, as anyone who wants can edit any page. You could very well have inserted that text right before linking and noone would know.

And why would we trust Franks any more than other generals who have lied and decieved in the name of the 'objective?' We shouldn't.

Cycloptichorn

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Cycloptichorn wrote:

...
Wikipedia is not a reliable source ...

You, Cyclo, and farmerman seem to make the same accusation. But neither of you provide evidence to show that any specific articles in Wikipedia are unreliable.

Farmerman seems to claim that since an article published by Cato says the same thing as Wikipedia about Ansar al-Islam, and he doesn't trust Cato, then Wikipedia must be unreliable too. But here again farmerman does not provide evidence to show that any specific articles Cato has published are unreliable.

... as anyone who wants can edit any page [in Wikipedia]. You could very well have inserted that text right before linking and noone would know.

BUNK! Reading all of Wikipedia's instructions, while anyone who wants to can submit an edit of any page, the edits themselves must be vetted by Wikipedia editors or their designated referees to first determine if the edits are valid. Only if they determine that the submitted edits are valid, are they actually entered into the Wikipedia encyclopedia.

And why would we trust Franks any more than other generals who have lied and decieved in the name of the 'objective?' We shouldn't.

Here again you make accusations unsubstantiated by any evidence of examples of Franks having published any falsities in his book.

By both your and farmerman's posting behavior here, this statement applies to yourselves: "why would we trust farmerman and Cyclo any more than other opposers of our invasion of Iraq who make equally unsubstantiated statements in the name of their objective?"

Cycloptichorn

By the way, while the Saddam regime truthfully expressly denied Colin Powell's 2/5/2003 UN speech claim that they possessed any ready-to-use WMD, and that they had anything to do with 9/11, they ignored the claim by Powell in that same speech, that they ignored the US's request that the leadership of Ansar al-Islam be extradited.

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These are the facts:

05/19/1996: Bin Laden leaves Sudan and returns to Afghanistan.

5 years, 3 months, 23 days later
09/11/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda perpetrates terrorist attack on USA. The night of 9/11, the President broadcast to the nation that we will not distinguish between terrorists and those who harbor them.

1 month, 9 days later.
10/20/2001: USA invades Afghanistan.
Did the USA wait to long?

2 months later.
12/20/2001: Osama’s al Qaeda establishes training base in Iraq.

1 year, 3 months later.
03/20/2003: USA invades Iraq including al Qaeda’s expanded training bases in northern Iraq.
Should the USA have waited longer?

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Cycloptichorn wrote:

...Wikipedia is not a reliable source, as anyone who wants can edit any page. You could very well have inserted that text right before linking and noone would know.
...
Cycloptichorn

It just occurred to me this morning that you can test this hypothesis of yours quite simply. Try to edit those very sections of Wikipedia from which I have excerpted. If you succeed let me know and I will check to see for myself that you have changed it. In the event you succeed, I shall stop using Wikipedia as a source.

So go ahead and try to change the following in Wikipedia anywhichaway you want.

The following sentences were excerpted from Islamic Movement in Kurdistan, and from Ansar al-Islam, in Wikipedia.

The Islamic Movement in Kurdistan is an Iraqi political party.
Some more radical members joined the al-Queda aligned Ansar al-Islam.

These sentences were retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_Movement_in_Kurdistan

Ansar al-Islam is an Islamist group, promoting a radical interpretation of Islam and holy war.
At the beginning of the 2003 invasion of Iraq it controlled about a dozen villages and a range of peaks in northern Iraq on the Iranian border.
It was formed in December 2001 as a merger of Jund al-Islam (Soldiers of Islam), led by Abu Abdallah al-Shafi'i, and a splinter group from the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan led by Mullah Krekar.

These sentences were retrieved from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansar_al-Islam

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DrewDad wrote:

McGentrix wrote:
FreeDuck wrote:
McG, what do you think the US is doing there?

The US is helping the people of Iraq create a new form of government by Iraqi's, for Iraqi's. They are defending the governmental offices from daily attacks by insurgents trying to disrupt the growing government. The US is providing needed resources to recreate a failed infrastructure, rebuild the education and healthcare systems and get the nations natural resource collection and sales back online so it can support itself. The US is the defender of freedom and liberty and that is what we are providing the Iraqi citizens with. Something they have not known for many, many years.

These are all actions that the US and its military forces are currenly engaged in. What is the purpose of the adventure in Iraq?

And I'm sorry, but I was not aware that "the US is the defender of freedom and liberty....." I was under the impression that while the US supports freedom and liberty, it does not require them of the rest of the world. Unless you're planning to invade a whole lot of other countries. But I don't even see folks wanting to take a hard line on human rights in China, let alone invade.

The purpose is to develop a democratic government, preferrably friendly to US interests, for the people of Iraq. That should be clear.

If the US is not the defender of freedom and liberty then who is? No one? Anyone? Invasion is hardly necessary in most cases as money talks and diplomacy can accomplish most actions either through the UN or through direct negotiations.

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McGentrix wrote:

DrewDad wrote:
McGentrix wrote:
FreeDuck wrote:
McG, what do you think the US is doing there?

The US is helping the people of Iraq create a new form of government by Iraqi's, for Iraqi's. They are defending the governmental offices from daily attacks by insurgents trying to disrupt the growing government. The US is providing needed resources to recreate a failed infrastructure, rebuild the education and healthcare systems and get the nations natural resource collection and sales back online so it can support itself. The US is the defender of freedom and liberty and that is what we are providing the Iraqi citizens with. Something they have not known for many, many years.

These are all actions that the US and its military forces are currenly engaged in. What is the purpose of the adventure in Iraq?

And I'm sorry, but I was not aware that "the US is the defender of freedom and liberty....." I was under the impression that while the US supports freedom and liberty, it does not require them of the rest of the world. Unless you're planning to invade a whole lot of other countries. But I don't even see folks wanting to take a hard line on human rights in China, let alone invade.

The purpose is to develop a democratic government, preferrably friendly to US interests, for the people of Iraq. That should be clear.

Ah. While I hope this happens, I have serious doubts that it will become reality within the next 10 years or so. Or rather, that a democratic, independent government there will a) remain friendly to the US or b) be able to stand on its own two feet without a constant flow of blood and treasure from the US. IMO, there is much better uses for that blood and treasure.

McGentrix wrote:

If the US is not the defender of freedom and liberty then who is? No one? Anyone? Invasion is hardly necessary in most cases as money talks and diplomacy can accomplish most actions either through the UN or through direct negotiations.

Well, first I don't think the US needs to be the defender of freedom and liberty. It should defend the freedoms of its own citizens.

Second, I don't see much defending of freedom and liberty. If the US were truly in this role, then I'd expect to see a lot more action.

Third, why does the universe require a defender of freedom and liberty? IMO, that's something that each individual aquires for him or herself. I don't know about you, but I'm as free as I choose to be.

Anything else the US should defend, by the way? Freedom and liberty being pretty generic (and synonyms).

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If you had to pick a "Defender of Freedom and Liberty", would you choose the United States?

If the "Defender of Freedom and Liberty" is the term for the guy with the dominant military... than the US is a shoe in for the job.

But I don't think that is a very good qualification.

If "Freedom and Liberty" mean anything, their defender should be a country that has a history of defending Freedom and Liberty.

This would be a country that didn't overthrow democratically elected governments, support coups, or tacitly accept death squads to further its self interests in foreign policy.

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DrewDad wrote:

McGentrix wrote:

DrewDad wrote:
McGentrix wrote:
FreeDuck wrote:
McG, what do you think the US is doing there?

The US is helping the people of Iraq create a new form of government by Iraqi's, for Iraqi's. They are defending the governmental offices from daily attacks by insurgents trying to disrupt the growing government. The US is providing needed resources to recreate a failed infrastructure, rebuild the education and healthcare systems and get the nations natural resource collection and sales back online so it can support itself. The US is the defender of freedom and liberty and that is what we are providing the Iraqi citizens with. Something they have not known for many, many years.

These are all actions that the US and its military forces are currenly engaged in. What is the purpose of the adventure in Iraq?

And I'm sorry, but I was not aware that "the US is the defender of freedom and liberty....." I was under the impression that while the US supports freedom and liberty, it does not require them of the rest of the world. Unless you're planning to invade a whole lot of other countries. But I don't even see folks wanting to take a hard line on human rights in China, let alone invade.

The purpose is to develop a democratic government, preferrably friendly to US interests, for the people of Iraq. That should be clear.

Ah. While I hope this happens, I have serious doubts that it will become reality within the next 10 years or so. Or rather, that a democratic, independent government there will a) remain friendly to the US or b) be able to stand on its own two feet without a constant flow of blood and treasure from the US. IMO, there is much better uses for that blood and treasure.

Well, it's good to see we share a common hope. I am just less pessimistic of the outcome.

Quote:

McGentrix wrote:
If the US is not the defender of freedom and liberty then who is? No one? Anyone? Invasion is hardly necessary in most cases as money talks and diplomacy can accomplish most actions either through the UN or through direct negotiations.

Well, first I don't think the US needs to be the defender of freedom and liberty. It should defend the freedoms of its own citizens.

As long as threats to our citizens come from outside our boundaries, we must concern ourselves with those threats. If people are free, they do not need to fear the US and will be able to share in the opportunities that freedom offers them.

Quote:

Second, I don't see much defending of freedom and liberty. If the US were truly in this role, then I'd expect to see a lot more action.

You aren't looking hard enough.

Quote:

Third, why does the universe require a defender of freedom and liberty? IMO, that's something that each individual aquires for him or herself. I don't know about you, but I'm as free as I choose to be.

Why do we need a police force? To defend those unable to defend themselves. You are only as free as you are because our government protects the freedoms you enjoy. One of the benefits of living in a free country. Do you believe the people in Iraq were as free as they chose to be before the invasion?

Quote:

Anything else the US should defend, by the way? Freedom and liberty being pretty generic (and synonyms).

synonyms? Not in this context. Tell me what those terms mean to you?

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Debunking the Reasons to stay in Iraq.

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