THE US, THE UN AND IRAQ, TENTH THREAD.

Where's the outrage?
U.S. troops have been accused of committing atrocities in Iraq. Americans should care.
By William Neikirk
Tribune senior correspondent
Published August 27, 2006


WASHINGTON -- Abeer Qassim al-Janabi is not a household name, though perhaps she should be. The 14-year-old girl was repeatedly raped, then shot to death in her home March 12. Her body was set on fire. Her mother, father and sister also were murdered.

It happened in Iraq, in the village of Mahmoudiya near Baghdad, in the so-called Triangle of Death, the most stressful, violent place in a stressful, violent country. The alleged perpetrators: American troops.

Before the incident, the soldiers allegedly downed whiskey, played cards and hit golf balls. Afterward, they dined on grilled chicken wings.

A similar act of violence here in the U.S. would have triggered overpowering outrage, non-stop TV coverage and a grave concern about our military. It might even have surpassed the wall-to-wall coverage that the arrest in the JonBenet Ramsey murder has received.

Yet no great public outcry has arisen over one of the worst atrocities of the Iraq war. People say the incident is appalling and inexcusable in one breath then in the next shrug it off as just another unfortunate example of what war can do to young soldiers.

For all its horror, the murder of al-Janabi and her family has not become another My Lai Massacre, in which U.S. forces mowed down as many as 500 people in March 1968 and turned many Americans against the war.

Instead, the murders are another horror piled on top of a series of horrors, including the killing of 24 Iraqi civilians in Haditha last year and the torture at Abu Ghraib prison.

Together, the brutalities have contributed to a desensitizing of the American public to atrocities in Iraq. As repugnant as they are, we have learned to write them off as part of the tragedy of this war.

"Almost surely, [the crimes] will be treated as another byproduct of the war," said Charles Moskos, a Northwestern University professor and a military expert. "I doubt that even the opponents of the war will make much of it as they do not want to be seen as anti-soldier.

"That the anti-war movement portrays itself as pro-soldier," Moskos added, "is the big difference from the anti-war movement of Vietnam."

Bill Taylor, an Army colonel in Vietnam and now a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said a few more atrocities like the one in Mahmoudiya could change the pro-military attitude.

"You add this one to Haditha, and then you have a spate of these, look out," he said.

Jonathan Shay, a Boston psychiatrist and author who has studied Vietnam War atrocities, said American military leaders know that "every atrocity strengthens the enemy and potentially disables the troops who were involved."

Why such atrocities occur is unclear. But experts point to the lowering of recruiting standards to fill spots in an all-volunteer army and the use of troops to police in an extremely dangerous atmosphere.

"We live in a country that has a voluntary military but which more than 95 percent of our citizens have elected not to serve," said Loren Thompson, a military analyst at the Lexington Institute, a Virginia-based think tank.

"If the mainstream of our society refuses to serve, it shouldn't be surprising that you get soldiers who are not qualified to serve," he added.

The Bush administration has brushed off the rape-murder case as an aberration, saying the majority of our troops would never do such a thing. Legislators have shied away from questions, reluctant to criticize troops.

When Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.), a decorated Vietnam veteran and a critic of the Iraq war, said U.S. troops "killed innocent civilians in cold blood" in Haditha, one of the Marines under investigation in the attack sued him for libel.

Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.), a retired Marine Corps colonel, even apologized to the Marines for appearing to suggest troops had lied and covered up the Haditha incident.

Mike Steele, a professor of literature at Pacific University in Oregon and a former anti-war activist during the Vietnam War, said some people are in denial. "Who wants to believe that the nice kid next door could do something like this?" he said. "It's difficult."

Among those charged with the rape and murder of al-Janabi is Steven Green, an Army private who has since been discharged for a personality disorder. He denies wrongdoing, but before the incident he told a Washington Post reporter, "Over here, killing people is like squashing an ant. I mean, you kill somebody and it's like, `All right, let's go get some pizza.'"

At a Baghdad hearing, a member of the same unit, Pfc. Justin Cross, said constant attacks in the Triangle of Death had put the soldiers under incredible stress. "You're just walking a death walk," he said. "It drives you nuts. You feel like every step you might get blown up."

The deaths of two soldiers before the slayings in Mahmoudiya "pretty much crushed the platoon," Cross said. To deal with the stress and the toll on their unit, he said, they turned to whiskey and painkillers.

Cycloptichorn :

I wish there was a way I could shake your hand right now.

Brilliant post.


Joe(Not afraid either)Nation

Ican

You twice mentioned that Saddam Hussein had no authority to use air power to take out Zarqawi's camp.

Quote:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_fly_zone

Northern Iraq 1992-2003
Main article: Iraqi no-fly zones
In 1992, France, the United Kingdom and the United States intervened in Kurdish-Iraqi dispute in northern Iraq by establishing a no-fly zone in which Iraqi aircraft were prevented from flying. The intent of the no-fly zone over was to prevent possible bombing and chemical attacks against the Kurdish people by the Iraqi regime. The legality of this operation is a subject of debate. Proponents claim that the no-fly zone was implicitly authorized by United Nations Security Council Resolution 688. Critics point out that Resolution 688 does not actually authorize or even mention such an operation.

Why did you also fail to mention that he was not allowed to send any troops into the area.

Because that's not true; because that's pseudology (i.e., falsities or lies). When the USA requested Saddam extradite the al-Qaeda leadership in Northeastern Iraq, we thereby gave Saddam our approval to go into Northeastern Iraq, whether he actually needed our approval or not.

Why didn't you mention that the whole Kurd area was off limits to him and he had no control over the area?

Because that's not true; because that's pseudology (i.e., falsities or lies). When the USA requested Saddam extradite the al-Qaeda leadership in Northeastern Iraq, we thereby gave Saddam our approval to go into Northeastern Iraq, whether he actually needed our approval or not.

Even Colin Powell said as much before the UN.

Colin Powell actually said the USA requested Saddam to extradite the al-Qaeda leadership in Northeastern Iraq. That in and of itself constitutes a grant of the required control (if such grant were actually needed) to extradite the al-Qaeda leadership in Northeastern Iraq.

Quote:

Now let me add one other fact. We asked a friendly security service to approach Baghdad about extraditing Zarqawi and providing information about him and his close associates. This service contacted Iraqi officials twice and we passed details that should have made it easy to find Zarqawi. The network remains in Baghdad. Zarqawi still remains at large, to come and go.

How do you explain the fact that George Bush denied permission to have Zarqawi killed? He did this three times. Bush had a much better opportunity to kill Zarqawi then Hussein did. If you use the argument that Saddam was protecting Zarqawi because he would not cooperate with the US then the same argument can be made against Bush for not killing him when he had the opportunity. If Zarqawi remained at large and could come and go as he pleased that's because he was located on a remote part of the Iran/Iraq border, an area of little or no control, especially by Iraq. Places like these are safe havens for terrorist. Look at Osama bin-Laden today.

No explanation needed; all that's not true; all that's pseudology (i.e., falsities or lies). You are confusing Clinton's rejection of three offers made to him by other states to extradite Osama bin-Laden. Actually, I believe you know all that you posted is not true. I believe you are simply revealing again that you are a pseudologist (i.e., one who falsifies or lies).

ican wrote:

Powell made much of what he claimed was a “chemical weapons site” at Khurmal in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq run by the paramilitary Islamist group Ansar al-Islam, which Powell proclaimed to be an al Qaeda front. ...

I did not post that.

But a group of Western journalists visited the site and, as the BBC’s correspondent reported, “saw no obvious evidence of chemical weapons production . . . nothing more sinister than small arms was on display.” Indeed, the site appeared primarily devoted to a radio and TV facility, lately unused.

Obviously, this alleged absence of evidence is not itself evidence of the absence of chemical weapons production before the USA invaded Iraq.

Add to that a report by the respected Human Rights Watch, which found no evidence of links between the Ansar thugs and al Qaeda — but plenty of evidence that the group is being funded and run by Iran, Saddam’s sworn enemy. And the head of Ansar subsequently gave an interview to The Guardian in which he proclaimed his hatred for Saddam and his plan to replace the secular Ba’ath regime with an Islamic state.

Quote:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansar_al-Islam

Ansar al-Islam (Arabic: انصار الاسلام, Supporters or Partisans of Islam) is a Kurdish Sunni 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 has used terrorist tactics such as suicide bombers in its conflicts with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and other Kurdish groups.

Origins
Ansar al-Islam 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. Krekar became the leader of the merged Ansar al-Islam, which opposed an agreement made between IMK and the dominant Kurdish group in the area, Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).

Ansar al-Islam fortified a number of villages along the Iranian border, with Iranian artillery support. The local villagers were subjected to harsh sharia laws; musical instruments were destroyed and singing forbidden. The only school for girls in the area was destroyed, and all pictures of women removed from merchandise labels. Sufi shrines were desecrated and members of the Kakkai (a non-Moslem Kurdish religious group) were forced to convert to Islam or flee.

Ansar al-Islam quickly initiated a number of attacks on the peshmerga (armed forces) of the PUK, on one occasion massacring 53 prisoners and beheading them. Several assassination attempts on leading PUK-politicians were also made with carbombs and snipers.

Ansar al-Islam comprised about 300 armed men, many of these veterans from the Afghan war, and a proportion being neither Kurd nor Arab. Ansar al-Islam is alleged to be connected to the al-Qaeda, and provided an entry point for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and other Afghan veterans to enter Iraq.

According to the United States, they had established facilities for the production of poisons, including ricin. The US also claimed that Ansar al-Islam had links with Saddam Hussein, thus claiming a link between Hussein and al-Qaeda. Mullah Krekar denied this claim, and declared his hostility to Saddam [1]. The Ansar al-Islam did, however, never engage Baathist forces, and local Kurds largely accept the link to Hussein.

Operations after the invasion
When the US invaded Iraq in 2003, it gave air support to a PUK-attack on the Ansar al-Islam enclave, which did not draw Iranian artillery fire. The Ansar al-Islam fighters escaped into Iran, where they were disarmed but not arrested. Many have since returned to Iraq and joined various armed groups fighting the occupation.

Ansar al-Islam detonated a suicide car bomb on March 22, 2003, killing Australian journalist Paul Moran and several others. The group is also thought to have been responsible for an September 9, 2003 attempted bombing of a United States Department of Defense office in Arbil, which killed three people.

On February 1, 2004 suicide bombings hit parallel ID-celebrations arranged by the two main Kurdish parties, PUK and KDP, in the Kurdish capital of Arbil, killing 109 and wounding more than 200 partygoers. Responsibility for this attack was claimed by the then unknown group Ansar al-Sunnah, and stated to be in support of "our brothers in Ansar al-Islam."

Ansar al-Islam is thought not to be active in Iraq at present, but has an extensive network in Europe organizing finace and support for armed attacks within Iraq. Several members of such groups have been arrested in European countries such as Germany and Sweden.

Then there was Powell’s assertion that Iraq’s support for Hamas, the Palestinian paramilitary group, constituted “proof” of its support for “terror.” Well, Hamas has offices in Lebanon, Syria and Iran — but we’re not about to declare war on those countries the last time I looked. SOURCE

Our failure to invade Lebanon, Syria, and Iran is obviously not evidence that we should not have invaded Afghanistan and Iraq.

Why do you keep parroting the lies of the Bush administration?

No explanation needed; I do not do that; your claim in your question is pseudology (i.e., falsities or lies).

Now here's a question for you: Why do you keep parroting the pseudology of the Islamo-totalitarians?

...
We disagree. I cannot prove to you my crystal ball is better than your crystal ball any more than you can prove the reverse to me. My crystal ball says the ITs (i.e., the Islamo-totalitarians) are evolving their ability to destroy America or our system of governance.

There's our choice:

Negotiate away our freedoms to the ITs over time in the false hope we can that way postpone or negotiate away confrontations;

or,

Give up some of our freedoms for a short time to enable us to completely defeat the ITs, and thereby rescue and retain all of our freedoms.

...

So, you believe that the best way to deal with a danger that transcends confrontations between nations... is to confront nations who refuse to do what we say?

No! I believe that we should confront nations that allow sanctuary to those who adhere to murderous belief systems & cultures, have declared war on us, have made war on us, are making war on us, and are repeatedly declaring their intention to establish a totalitarian regime over us as well as the rest of humanity.

That's basically the same thing as 'not doing what we say.'

That generalization is absurd! That is not "basically the samething as confronting nations "who refuse to do what we say." When there is more than one thing we want nations to do, but only demand nations do one of those things, then we are clearly not confronting nations "who refuse to do what [ever] we say." We are merely confronting nations who refuse to do that one thing we say.

Iraq was an enemy of ours. Why should they do what we say? Because they fear us? You believe that we can defeat our enemies by cowing them with fear of our might. This is a foolish belief and one that is far more likely to get us all killed than the idea that we could work together to solve problems.

Iraq's Saddam government should have done the one thing we said, because it was the right thing to do. Or, it should have done the one thing we said because we could (and did) remove it for not doing the one thing we said: do not harbor or allow sanctuary to organizations that have declared war, and have made war, against the USA (e.g.., do not harbor or allow sanctuary to the ITs) or we shall remove you.

It is identical to the position we took with the Afghanistan's Taliban government.

It doesn't matter what our conditions are, we will not win hearts and minds by engaging in offensive warfare against countries that have not attacked us! Iraq, for example: the terrorists in northern Iraq had nothing to do with the gov't of Iraq. But we attacked the entire nation anyways.

I care little for your "win hearts and minds" goal, because that is tantamount to trying to convince others to have the same value system and culture as we do. Live and let live is my moto. Let them have whatever value system and culture they want as long as it does not create a confrontation with our value system. If they chose to despise our value system and culture, it's ok with me, as long as their value system allows us to live and let live.

Because Saddam allowed the terrorists in northern Iraq sanctuary--who adhere to the die and make die value system--despite our request to him to extradite their leadership, the Saddam governent and the terrorists in northern Iraq had something quite significant to do with each. Saddam was harboring those who wanted to die making us die.

Why didn't we simply attack the training camps in northern Iraq by air, or with a force coming in through Turkey? Why go after Saddam? Because there were far more reasons for this war besides going after a group of terrorists.

The true reason for going after Saddam--regardless of what the Bush crowd said, says, will say, or thinks-- is that after we had removed the die and make die crowd from Iraq, we knew he would allow their remnant back into Iraq when we left. To stop that it was necessary, but obviously not sufficient, to remove both Saddam's government and the die and make die crowd from Iraq.

If you truly believe that what we face is a confrontation between cultures and belief systems, you would agree that the best method for ending this confrontation is to work towards a reconciliation between the belief systems.

No! I believe that the worst method for ending our confrontation with murderous belief systems & cultures "is to work towards a reconciliation" with these murderous belief systems & cultures. Reconciliation between our democratic belief systems & cultures and these murderous belief systems & cultures is too improbable. Any attempt by us to negotiate with them will lead them to believe that use of force and murder against us, or even the threat of the use of force and murder against us, will get them whatever they want each and every such negotiation.

I believe that the best method for ending our confrontation with murderous belief systems & cultures is to work towards completely defeating these murderous belief systems & cultures. I believe that is not only a possible way to end these confrontations, it is the most probable way to end these confrontations.

Reconciliation between our democratic belief systems & cultures and these murderous belief systems & cultures is too improbable.

Assertion. Why is it too improbable?

It is too improbable because a live and let live belief system and culture cannot co-exist with a die and make die belief system and culture without continuous de-evolution into a die and make die belief system and culture. To prevent and/or stop such de-evolution, the live and let live belief system and culture must completely defeat the die and make die belief system and culture. Negotiations with a die and make die belief system and culture must of necessity be a relentless path toward incremental dissolution of our liberties.

You make the continued mistake of assuming that our enemies are not human. They are, in fact, human. I know we've had this discussion before, but I maintain that humanity is a biological distinction, and not a moral one.

No! I make no assumptions about their biological humanity. Since they are obviously members of the species Homo sapiens, they are human. I merely recognize their belief systems and culture are in reality morally inhumane. A die and make die belief system and culture is deadly not only to Americans but also to the rest of humanity. In order to continue to live and let live a live and let live belief system and culture must survive. To survive it must defend itself against those who have declared war and made war on it..

The die and make die belief system and culture has in fact declared war and made war on the live and let live belief system and culture.

This is inconvienent for your argument, because it gives the enemy the capability of moderation, instead of painting him as some sort of animal, as you would see it. Terrorists and murderers are not animals, they are humans. Failure to recognize this basic truth will lead to a poor argument.

Your discussion of my argument is silly. First of all I love almost all animals. Second of all, Terrorists and murderers have made themselves inhumane by virtue of how they choose to behave. I am merely recognizing that reality. I root for them to behave humanely, and should they eventually choose to behave humanely, I will applaud them. I think they will not learn to act humanely--anymore than Hitler's followers or Pol Pot's followers did--until they are first completely defeated.

Instead you advocate killing, which only makes martyrs out of those who were formerly seen as dangerous extremists by their own society. By responding with force instead of diplomacy, by using the heavy hand instead of the light hand, we have shifted the Muslim culture further to the extreme; those who fight against America are seen as heroes, even though they kill other Muslims in the process, even though they use force against non-combatants.

The true Muslim culture will welcome the complete defeat of the IT culture. They make that clear when they vote, and when they risk death by talking/writing about the corruption of their culture by the IT culture

I think your analysis is really based on a vain hope, a naive expectation, a fantasy, a childish illusion, a psychic escape from reality. These murderous belief systems & cultures ridicule our efforts to reconcile our belief systems & cultures with theirs, and interpret our efforts of that kind as evidence to them of our weaknesses that will allow them to exterminate us. The shift, such as has occurred, of the Muslim society to murderous belief systems & cultures, occurred because many were convinced by what they perceived as our weakness, that to save themselves from their likely deadly fate if they didn't shift, they must at least pretend to shift to survive.
...
The culture of Islaam is not an inherently murderous nor terrorist culture. It wasn't a 'percieved weakness' that has shifted muslim society, but instead fear. Fear of the US, our military, our culture, and fear that we intend to destroy their society.

I agree that the culture of Islam is not inherently murderous nor terrorist culture. Their fear and our fear Of the IT are the same fear.

I have stated to you before that there is in fact little difference between those who support terrorism and those who support murdering our way out of the terrorism problem, viz, yourself. You both are extremists.

No! it is you who are the extremist. It is you who advocates a policy of extreme fantasy about a policy that fails every time it has ever been tried. Ultimately, the solution that worked is for live and let live belief systems and cultures to together motivate, via a preponderance of ordnance, die and make die belief systems and cultures into self-transformation (e.g., USSR), or to completely defeat them with a preponderance of ordnance (e.g., Nazis).

Terrorists and militant Islaamists say, 'there is no negotiating with the West.' This is no different from your position.

Terrorists and militant Islaamists say, 'we will only win by killing all of our enemies.' This is no different from your position.

Terrorists and militant Islaamists say, 'we should do whatever is neccessary to win this conflict.' This is no different from your position.

Terrorists and militant Islaamists say, 'if we don't attack them, they will attack us.' This is no different from your position.

It isn't what they say that matters! Wake up! It's what they do that matters! Sure they use the same arguments we do. But the real meaningful difference is that we would leave them alone if they would leave us alone. All they have to do is end their declaration of war against us and stop making war against us, and we will delightfully leave them alone if that is what they truly want, or seek cooperative enterprises with them if that is what they truly want.

Can you not see this? You state that the difference is that they advocate the murder of innocents, whereas you do not; yet you have stated in the past that those who live in the same block as a terrorist, who happen to be walking down the street in the same area as one, are guilty of association and deserve death if we decide to deal it. This is not exactly a morally upstanding belief. You simply seek to justify the actions of the US when we murder civilians in the name of a greater good. This is no different from the terrorists' position.

Those that tolerate/allow these ITs sanctuary in their midst are guilty of abetting, and silently witnessing what these ITs do. At the very least these abettors and silent witnesses ought to risk the same fate due ITs, when that proves necessary to completely defeat ITs.

By choosing to solve terrorism through killing, we have proven the terrorists correct in the minds of many Muslims. By killing innocents, we create far more terrorists who will fight against us. Your methods simply will not work in the long run! We cannot kill more terrorists than we create, simply because for every terrorist we kill, we create far more due to the inherent civilian casualties.

That too is a silly disregard of reality. The ITs grew faster when we tried to ignore and/or make nice with them.

To sum up, you demonize the enemy in order to do away with the possibility of negotiation. You don't want to admit that they have power as well (they do have power). I think there is a gigantic amount of both hubris AND fear in your position; fear that if we show any weakness, other countries will not respect us as the leading nation in the world. A brutal tyrant's view, that one; instead, we should be earning respect by not giving in to fear, by standing strong in the face of terror.

I don't demonize the enemy. The enemy demonizes the enemy by its behavior.

As others have pointed out, you throw around the term 'big brother' incorrectly. The Islaamic world is nothing like that proposed in 1984, and neither are they totalitarian conquerors.

I do not "throw around the term 'big brother' incorrectly." Of course murderous belief systems & cultures have not yet evolved to the totalitarian level of Big Brother, but that is exactly where they have declared they want to evolve, only they call it something different. They call it a Worldwide Caliphat. What it is they want to evolve, is far more important than what they call what they want to evolve.

The members of murderous belief systems & cultures already practice the extermination of their own kind that do not completely adhere to their beliefs. The members of murderous belief systems & cultures already practice the extermination of others that do not completely adhere to their beliefs. They do this with the modern technology they already understand and know how to employ; it is the adequate modern technology they will need to maintain "Big Brother" control once they achieve it.

The 'worldwide caliphate' is no different than the dream of worldwide Democracy. It is a competing system of thought, but it doesn't make one inherently evil to believe in it. Nor does it make one totalitarianist or 'big brother.' I am hardly the first to point out that you use this term incorrectly.

Yes, a worldwide caliphat is a competing system of thought that is inherently evil when it is pursued by the methods of the IT with the intention of establishing a totalitarian world governent, IT chooses to call a worldwide Caliphat.

You also make a huge mistake in lumping all terrorists together into a single organism, with a unified goal; nothing could be further from the truth! This is merely a tool you use to further simplify and demonize the enemy in this conflict, to avoid the complicated process of understanding the enemy's motivation and self-examination to see if their complaints have any merit, a concept you are completely unwilling to acknowledge.

The IT's endless repeated complaint, is that we exist? While various factions of the IT ay have other issues, they all agree on one issue: death or subjugation of those who adhere to the live and let live system of thought and culture.


You should recall that Christians of different sects have a long and bloody history of fighting and killing each other, as well as those of other religions, which is hardly different from what you chide Islaam for. I'm sure I don't need to provide you examples as they are so readily abundant.

I care nothing at all about the label of people who seek totalitarian control of others. No matter who cannot live and let live, they are evil. Yes, over time the human race has suffered a horrible multiplicity of the die and make die crowds operating under and corrupting various labels in efforts to establish totalitarian control over their fellow humans. That does not justify what the IT has declared it is doing and is doing.

You also discount the huge economic and governmental component of this struggle. OBL specifically complains about the actions of the US many times in his communiques, and yet no thought is given to whether or not he has a point at all, or more importantly, whether or not other Muslims believe that he has a point!

OBL has repeatedly claimed that he objects to what he calls "our occupation of his holy places." But we removed our troops from his holy places some time ago. He also complained of Israel's presence in Palestine. But removal of Israel from Palestine is non-negotiable. If we don't remove Israel he will attempt to continue his war against us. If we were so cruel and cowardly as to remove Israel, OBL will be encouraged to make additional demands.

There is no reason why Isreal and Palestine could not have a two-state solution, except for the fact that Israel does not desire for this to happen. There has never been a serious offer for one on Israel's part.

Sure there is a reason. The arabs will not accept that. They have demonstrated repeatedlythat they will not accept that. For example, back in 1948, the Jews declared the state of Israel consistent with the UN resolution to that effect. The Arabs and like thinking attempted to destroy Israel right then and there. Israel, seemingly miraculously, survived and conquered more of Palestine than they started with as a result.

Most of the Muslims in the region see Israel as a proxy for America, and as a launching point from any attack against them in the future. Exactly the way that we feel about Hezbollah, for example. And why not? It is basically true, the amount of support and monies we give them is ridiculously high and truly unexplainable.

You know nothing of what most Muslims see. You are entrapped in your own form of bigotry.

Your theory is that you cannot negoitate with the enemy, period, because it will only embolden them to attack further. This is a ridiculous theory, because negotiations have proven quite successful in the course of human history and there is no compelling reason to believe that they would not now. In order to win this conflict, we have to do something difficult: we have to convince Muslims that we are right, and the terrorists are wrong. At which point they will purge them from their societies. We will never do this through further murder and killing. Negotiation will have to occur at some point.

Negotiations will occur when the ITs are completely defeated. Repeated declarations by you and others to the contrary, will not change that reality.

I'll backtrack a bit:
...
While the IT may resort to nukes or bio-weapons, I think they can accomplish what they want to accomplish with the conventional kinds of ordnance they are using in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Lebanon. They can accomplish this in the following six stages:
Stage 1 is purchase right here in the USA free market place the ingredients and materials they need to build their ordnance;
Stage 2 store those ingredients and materials wherever they can throughout the USA;
Stage 3 assemble and produce the ordnance they need wherever they can throughout the USA;
Stage 4. store the ordnance whereever they can throughout the USA;
Stage 5 distribute the ordnance wherever they can throughout the USA;
Stage 6 use that ordnance throughout the USA to murder large gatherings of the public, to destroy our infrastructure, and to chemically (not bio-chemically) pollute to high toxic levels the air and water in highly populated areas of the USA.

Failure to completely defeat IT before they are in Stage 6, will probably lead to our demise, because after Stage 6 is underway we will no longer be able to completely defeat these murderous belief systems & cultures.

I expect Stage 6 will occur within 20 years, if we continue our highly constrained mostly reactionary rather than pro-actionary methods in the middle east and elsewhere.

This is why I have consistently maintained that defense is important. We have not secured our borders in any significant fashion, our shipping is wide open. These items are underfunded by the president you support, greatly so, partly because the war in Iraq is so damn expensive. How expensive?

Defense cannot stop this without reducing our liberties to at most the act of breathing. We must completely defeat IT at its source.

We are spending $8 billion a month in Iraq. That's $2 billion each week, $267 million each day, or $11 million each hour. For what we spend in three weeks, we could make needed improvements in order to properly secure our public transportation systems. For what we spend in five days, we could put radiation detectors in all of our ports. And for two days in Iraq, we could screen all air cargo.

For someone who is so goddamn afraid of being attacked here at home, you are demanding none of the things which could help keep us safe, you aren't complaining about the amount of monies wasted on other things at all. I don't believe you are serious about defending America in the slightest.

I don't demand the things some think will be adequate to defend us at home, because I believe they won't work, and because I believe they will turn our culture into something I do not want while we mindlessly try to make it work.

There is no conventional ordinance that can end America in the posession of terrorists. None. Even the loss of several cities would not end America. Therefore, you are doing nothing but fearmongering with statements such as this. Do you assume that we are weaklings, cowards, quislings here? That we don't truly love our freedom, that we won't try to keep going once attacked? Ridiculous! I'm tempted to start referring to you as an America-hater, because you have such a low opinion of the strength of our system and our nation that you are afraid that a small group of people could end us. They could not, not as long as the dream of freedom remains in the hearts and minds of our citizens.

You are naive to think that "there is no conventional ordinance that can end America in the posession of terrorists. None. Even the loss of several cities would not end America." I am reality mongering! It is you who are fear mongering--mongering the fear of what is really required to solve this problem!

You allow your fear of destruction (personal, national, whatever) to form your policy, namely, that we should become an aggressive murderous nation in the name of stopping aggressive murderers. I do not. I am not afraid of terrorism.

You make up stuff about what forms my policy. I am merely devoted to the survival and the means of survival of that which I treasure.

Say it with me now! Out loud, seriously!

I AM NOT AFRAID OF TERRORISM!!!!

You will think much clearer once you let go of your irrational fears and start focusing on practical solutions.

I fear fools who seek to evangelize and implement their fool's perception of reality!

...

Why would we have to negotiate away our freedoms in order to negotiate with Muslims?

Which freedoms would we have to give up in order to come to an accord with them?

First of all, we would not have to negotiate away our freedoms in order to negotiate with true Muslims. Second of all we would not have to negotiate away our freedoms in order to negotiate with ITs,
Reread "1984" with the intent of learning why!

I don't understand this tack you've taken at all. We don't have to give up a single freedom at all. Why would we? It is our freedom that makes us strong, that makes our society strong. We are stronger than repressive dictatorships because of our freedoms.

Why?

Because our freedoms make our citizens love the country, whereas their repressions make their citizens hate/not love their country.

By removing more and more freedoms in the name of 'protecting' America, we lose what America means.

Terrorism will never end. Never. Ever. No matter what we do. We have had plenty of terrorists who were born right here in the USA, and will continue to do so. Therefore, there is no endpoint to the conflict in which we would get our freedoms back.

All true negotiations require the parties to the negotiation to give up something to gain something. Why can you not understand that to negotiate an end to confrontation with the ITs we must give up some of what the ITs want us to give up? What the ITS want us to give up are our freedoms piece by piece, person by person. You see, from the moment each of us is dead each of us gives up all our freedoms.

When would the government think it's okay to stop spying on us?

When the ITs are completely defeated!

It has been proven that only a small group of dissatisfied people can committ major damage if they wish (it is certainly your argument). What are the set of conditions that will make this an impossibility, to where we could have our freedoms restored? At what point will we have 'won' the war on terror?

It has been proven that such small groups can and do murder thousands.

My guess is it will be the day after we win the war on drugs, and the day before the war on poverty. To take away freedoms until this day is to deny the true strength of America, to take them away forever, ever to return.

...

Because I'm not afraid of terrorism or terrorists. Not in the slightest. Even if it means my death, I'm not afraid. I'd rather die with rights than live with none.

You won't die with rights if those rights have been negotiated away or taken away by the ITs.

I believe what I believe because I take an objective view of the actions of America. I believe that killing people only perpetuates the cycle of violence, and should only be resorted to once every single option has been exhausted; not only for our own beliefs, but to show other nations and people that we really are the good guys that we continually claim we are.

I believe your so-called objective view is nonsense based mainly on schooled fantasy. By the time you and those you love have tried every option but complete defeat of the ITs, you and those you love--and those I love-- will probably be dead.

I believe that the surest path to the destruction and dissolution of America is by our doing it to ourselves, through fear and reactionary action. Our current crop of leadership have consistently shown that they prefer to use fear to motivate the populace, rather than logic or persuasion. In fact, every time they have tried to use logic and persusaion, they have failed, and have resorted to fear-mongering instead. Well, f*ck that, and f*ck them! I'll be damned if I will support a leadership with such a poor opinion of their constituents, who are so deeply afraid themselves that they don't have the decency to be honest.

Iraq is a disaster. We have not accomplished any strategic objective at all. By each and every single measure, we are under greater danger now from terrorism and Muslim extremism than we were before we went to war. It has cost us a tremendous amount of money, a large amount of respect worldwide, and a small amount of lives. When will it end? Not until we convince the Iraqis that ending the conflict is more important than continuing with their sectarian violence. Not until we convince them that we are not crusaders, and that we respect their right to the land and to their culture. Right now they believe none of those things, so, they will never take the steps neccessary to end the conflict. And we will keep on paying 8 billion or more a month, losing lives, losing respect, etc., until we smarten up and see that this is true.

I don't believe that an American life is worth more than any other person's life on the planet. I don't. Do you? You continually act as if you do.

I believe the lives of those who respect and honor the rights of others are worth far more than the lives of those who do not respect the rights of others.

I believe that while you are old, I am young, and will have to live with the results of this f*ckup for a long, long time. You are lucky, having had an excellent moral example of war to look back on in your youth. I will have nothing but regrets, the US will have nothing but debts and greater danger, and thousands of Iraqis will be just plain dead due to our combination of fear and hubris.

What I (this old buzzard) am trying desperately to do is help you, those you love, and those I love, live a full and honorable life, by aquainting you with the reality of the invalidity of what you currently believe.

Please, before it is too late, consider the consequences of your position! Consider the never-ending nature of terror, consider what really motivates people, and consider whether or not you think that we are prepared for defense here at home; think about these things before you so boldly claim that we will only win once all terrorists have been murdered.

My plea to you is: "Please, before it is too late, consider the consequences of your position! Consider the never-ending nature of terror, consider what really motivates people," and consider that there actually is evil in this world we must all confront with force. Further, please consider whether or not you think that we can be sufficiently prepared for defense against the ITS here at home without completely defeating the ITS abroad. Finally, please do not continue to repeat the multiple negotiation mistakes of the past expecting a different consequence from them than has previously occurred: an escalation of horror

A good day to you sir

Sir, a good and enjoyable future to you and those you love

Cycloptichorn

What the ITS want us to give up are our freedoms piece by piece, person by person.

Incorrect. What they want is for us to stop messing with their countries and societies. Can't you see that?

WASHINGTON - A new CIA assessment undercuts the White House's claim that Saddam Hussein maintained ties to al-Qaida, saying there's no conclusive evidence that the regime harbored Osama bin Laden associate Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

The CIA review, which U.S. officials said Monday was requested some months ago by Vice President Dick Cheney, is the latest assessment that calls into question one of President Bush's key justifications for last year's U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

The new assessment follows the independent Sept. 11 commission's finding that there was no "collaborative relationship" between the former Iraqi regime and bin Laden's terrorist network.

While intelligence officials cautioned that information about al-Zarqawi remains incomplete, Bush, Cheney and other top officials have publicly made al-Zarqawi the linchpin of their contention that Saddam's Iraq had ties to al-Qaida. Questions about whether the president and other officials overstated the intelligence about Iraq and omitted contradictory information and analysis are now at the center of the campaign debate over Iraq policy.

Since the Sept. 11 commission's judgment in June, Bush and Cheney have repeatedly said that al-Zarqawi was an associate of bin Laden and received safe haven from Saddam. But Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld backed away Monday from such claims, apparently as a result of the new CIA assessment.

The report didn't conclude that Saddam's regime had provided "aid, comfort and succor" to al-Zarqawi, a senior administration official said.

He added that there are now questions about earlier administration assertions that al-Zarqawi received treatment at a Baghdad hospital in May 2002.

"The evidence is that Saddam never gave Zarqawi anything," another U.S. official said.

A congressional official said members of Congress had received an intelligence report in late August containing similar findings.

The officials who described the new assessment spoke on condition of anonymity because the matter is classified and because, as one put it, "I don't want to get caught in the crossfire" between the White House and the CIA.

A CIA spokesman, Mark Mansfield, declined to comment on the subject or to confirm the existence of the new analysis.

The findings - delivered to Cheney last week - appear to put the Bush administration and the CIA on a collision course again over intelligence regarding Iraq.

Rumsfeld appeared to refer to the new assessment during a public appearance Monday at which he also backed away from the administration's broader claims that Saddam and al-Qaida were linked.

"To my knowledge, I have not seen any strong, hard evidence that links the two," Rumsfeld said during an appearance at the Council on Foreign Relations, a Washington research center.

In September 2002, before the war, Rumsfeld had said the U.S. intelligence community had "bulletproof" evidence of such links.
Apparently referring to al-Zarqawi, the defense secretary said Monday: "I just read an intelligence report recently about one person who's connected to al-Qaida who was in and out of Iraq and there's the most tortured description of why he might have had a relationship and why he might not have had a relationship."

Officials said the highly classified document on al-Zarqawi was delivered to Bush, Cheney, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and her deputy, Stephen Hadley.

There's no dispute that al-Zarqawi spent time in Iraq before the U.S. invasion, but virtually all that time was in a portion of northeastern Iraq that wasn't under Saddam's control.

The Bush administration has clashed repeatedly with the CIA and other intelligence community agencies over Iraq and terrorism.

Soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Pentagon civilians set up a small intelligence cell whose mission was to prove that there were links between al-Qaida and secular Arab regimes such as Saddam's.

The group's analysis was presented to then-CIA Director George Tenet and his analysts, who rejected it.

In recent weeks, administration partisans have sharply criticized the U.S. intelligence community for a new analysis that offers a pessimistic outlook on Iraq's future. They've attacked one of the report's authors, National Intelligence Council official Paul Pillar, by name and accused the CIA of trying to undermine the president.

Bush called the report, known as a National Intelligence Estimate, a "guess," but later amended his remarks to call it an "estimate."

Bush turned down chances to kill Zarqawi: ex-CIA spy

A former top CIA spy says the United States deliberately turned down several opportunities to kill terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in the lead-up to the Iraq war.

Mike Scheuer headed the CIA's bin Laden unit for six years before resigning in 2004.

He has told the ABC's Four Corners program the Bush administration had Zarqawi in its sights almost every day for a year.

He says a plan to destroy Zarqawi's training camp in Kurdistan was abandoned for diplomatic reasons.

"The reasons the intelligence service got for not shooting Zarqawi was simply that the President and the National Security Council decided it was more important not to give the Europeans the impression we were gunslingers," he said.

"Mr Bush had Mr Zarqawi in his sights for almost every day for a year before the invasion of Iraq and he didn't shoot because they were wining and dining the French in an effort to get them to assist us in the invasion of Iraq."

When the Americans attacked Afghanistan in 2001, Zarqawi and the remnants of his followers fled to northern Iraq (via Iran), where they set up shop with a group called Ansar Al-Islam in a remote mountain region beyond Saddam Hussein's control. Some American intelligence determined that Zarqawi and his cohorts were manufacturing crude chemical weapons there. The Pentagon developed plans to bomb the Ansar camp in 2002, but the White House withheld its approval. "He was up there, we knew where he was, and we couldn't get anybody to move on it," said a former U.S. intelligence official who had worked on the plans to take out Zarqawi, but who refused to be identified discussing military secrets. "We were told they didn't want to disrupt the war planning. It was a real opportunity lost."

Homicide Charges Rare in Iraq War
Few Troops Tried For Killing Civilians

By Josh White, Charles Lane and Julie Tate
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, August 28, 2006; Page A01

The majority of U.S. service members charged in the unlawful deaths of Iraqi civilians have been acquitted, found guilty of relatively minor offenses or given administrative punishments without trials, according to a Washington Post review of concluded military cases. Charges against some of the troops were dropped completely.

Though experts estimate that thousands of Iraqi civilians have died at the hands of U.S. forces, only 39 service members were formally accused in connection with the deaths of 20 Iraqis from 2003 to early this year. Twenty-six of the 39 troops were initially charged with murder, negligent homicide or manslaughter; 12 of them ultimately served prison time for any offense.

I haven't seen this much ass-kissing since Oprah decided to give some cars away.

McGentrix wrote:

I haven't seen this much ass-kissing since Oprah decided to give some cars away.

Yes, the ass-kissing around here was bad enough, but it's the ass-kissing Cyclops wants to promote that's more worrying.