You're right. We had close to 7 years of inspections, during which Saddam and his underlings sought to send the inspectors on wild goose chases and denying them access to the places they suspected the weapons to be stored.
Then they kicked them out. Iraq then spent 4 years building new facilities to house the weapons. They would've kept building and hiding, but the UN wanted back in. But Saddam wasn't going to let them in.
It was not until the US began mobilizing troops in the area that Saddam had a change of heart. The threat of force, along with the unified stance of the UN on resolution 1441, was enough to get inspectors back in.
However, a threat of force is only effective when you are willing to back it up. Otherwise, it's merely a well-played bluff. Saddam knew this. After 2 months of giving the inspectors access to some of the decommissioned sites, while denying them access to the sites that we now suspected the weapons to be stored in, we went to flex the muscle again - Once again, using the threat of force as coersion.
Unfortunately, this is where the shite hit the fan. France, Russia, and other nations folded - They layed their cards out, and said they oppose force.
Game set match. Saddam then believed that it had been a bluff, and went about jerking the inspectors around, destroying a few toy missiles here and there to continue buying time while gaining coverage of the world press, who would no doubt show everyone he was cooperating.
The United States isn't stupid. It knows how to play poker, and it layed down the line. In not so few words it declared, "We weren't f*cking around. Disarm or we go in." Once again, Saddam guessed bluff. He didn't believe we were willing to wage a war without the approval or backing of a majority of the UN nationstates.
But when we play, we play to win. "You have 48 hours." It must be a bluff, yes?
Bam.
We're going to find WMD. We're going to find shite we weren't even expecting to find. We're going to get back whatever POWs haven't been executed against the explicit rules of the Geneva convetion. We're going to turn Iraq into an example for other Middle Eastern nations ruled by despots.
And we're going to make f*cktarded bipeds like Chirac, Cretien, Flavio, Morph, and their wily band of uninformed, ignorant scallywags look like the Short Bus rejects.
LunarRay
Diamond Member
- Mar 2, 2003
- 9,993
- 1
- 76
We could have helped him by inserting a bug in the chemical and bio weapons we gave them during the the '80's. Well.. we did find some during the '91 skermish, blew em up and poisoned some of our own.. and France could have done the same as well as Russia and Germany.... But... no. We simply said we have intel that they are there.. our bills of sale as some have said. Of course I don't believe a word of it. Well.. we may have given them some but we assumed they'd screw up and poison themselves and save us the trouble of invading. So I guess we do owe Dr. Blix an I'm sorry well.. we are a bit sorry.
The whole problem is that the US claimed that they had a lot of evidence yet they have found as much as Hans Blix has. Blix had the excuse that he had a limited amount of inspectors and could have been misguided by the Iraqi's. What excuse does the US have? They have free reign on Iraq and according to Colon Powell and his presentation which included countless satellite images, they should easily spot one little wmd and show it to the world. Just find one thing to prove the world wrong. Its not too hard.
frugal1 - Are you purposely spreading bullsh!t or are you just ignorant?
Inspectors are also engaged in examining Iraq's programs for remotely piloted vehicles. A number of sites have been inspected with data being collected to assess their range and other capabilities of the various models found, and inspections are continuing in this area. Blix's report to the UN on March 7
Did it ever occur to you that perhaps the American PsyOp campaign was effective in deterring Iraqis from using chemical weapons? Anyone doing so was threatened with a war crimes trial.
Bowfinger
Lifer
- Nov 17, 2002
- 15,776
- 392
- 126
Very well said. I still don't think war was the right answer, but you make a persuasive case.
The part that bothers me is what gives us the right to unilaterally attack "bad" countries? Saddam was a bad man - absolutely - but a lot of countries are ruled by bad men, at least from a U.S. perspective. Do we attack them all? Are we the 21st century Roman Empire, imposing our civilization on the barbarians in the rest of the world?
How do we claim the moral high ground when the U.S. supports many of these bad men? Many years ago, we supported Saddam because it was convenient for us; we looked the other way as he killed his people and attacked his neighbor. Where is our moral authority when we are hypocrites? Is it "might makes right", or do we have a more civilized set of rules we follow?
Much of the world thinks we are "ruled" by a bad man; is it OK for them to attack us? After all, how many hundred people did GWB kill as governor of Texas? For much of the world, that is more like Saddam than it is different. So, where do we draw the line? What objective measure do we use to distinguish us from the "bad" countries?
----
I agree that military force is appropriate in self-defense against a real attack on this country or our allies. Note: real attack, not some theoretical, well they may pose a threat someday, ever-changing story-of-the-week BS Bush gave for this war. Iraq invaded Kuwait; we responded - clear cut, real attack, justified response to defend Kuwait.
In my opinion, any other use of force needs to be done under the banner of the U.N. or a similar world authority. In the example of this war, your reasoning makes sense to me as long as the United Nations agreed to proceed along this path. When the U.N. said to continue inspections, however, we were obligated to follow their lead as a supposedly law-abiding member of the world community. There was no clear and immediate danger that justified our use of unilateral force. Our cowboy disregard for the U.N. makes us an outlaw, and it gives other countries an excuse to ignore the U.N. whenever they want. In short, we undermine the U.N. in its role of promoting civilized cooperation among the countries of the world.
Yes, I acknowledge that the U.N. has not been effective in many cases, that it is too unwilling to act when action is needed. However, we don't help by setting a bad example. If the U.N. is to work effectively, then the world powers like the U.S. need to take the lead in demonstrating support and showing a willingness to follow its decisions, even when we don't like them. Again, there was no clear and immediate danger that justified our taking the law into our own hands.
Finally, on a much more pragmatic level, I oppose the war because of the financial cost and the increased risk of terrorism directed against the U.S. By going it alone, we lose hundreds of billions we can't afford, and we made ourselves a target for thousands of new Osama wanna-be's. I fear we'll be tallying the cost of this war for many, many years.
Second person in this thread who mentioned that.
Link
There was only 1 plane. It was made of balsa wood and held together with screws and duct tape. It was the size of a model airplane, was guided by a remote control from a person on the ground who's looking at it, and had a range of 5 miles. They also declared it, but said it was 14.5 feet instead of 24.4 feet. It was obviously not made for carrying chemical weapons.
Pic
He doesn't need anyone to make excuses. It was in Blix's report. He simply didn't mention it in his speech. Why not? Because he hadn't fully investigated it yet to see how serious it was. As it turns out, it wasn't serious, and it was a good thing that he didn't push a panic button prematurely. That practice is called investigating and verifying your facts. Something his detractors in this instance could learn from, with their forged reports and unsubstantiated accusations.
What does your link have to do with anything. It appears to be a link to an opinion site that criticizes something CNN did. I don't see anything about Blix on there, nor do I see a connection between CNN and Blix.
I don't see anything about Blix on there, nor do I see a connection between CNN and Blix.
Read much?
How CNN edited Blix's transcript (UPDATED)
Read much?
How CNN edited Blix's transcript (UPDATED)
- Here's CNN's transcript of the Blix report on Friday. And here's the BBC transcript.
I read it throughly. Unless you're saying that Blix told CNN to edit it, and you have some proof, this has no connection to the argument currently at hand. The argument is Blix's credibility. If you want to discuss CNN's credibility, I'll do that in another thread. This is a separate argument which I believe you brought in to distract from the fact that your allegations of Blix hiding inportant information are incorrect. Please respond to that part of my last post, which is the only relevant part, and which you seem to have abandoned in order to argue about CNN.
I don't want to discuss too many things at once, since YOU'RE the one who seems to get confused! You want to make excuses for Blix, and CNN covers up parts of his reports. Facts are facts. Blix opted to leave out this info in his oral report. We can only guess why. I'm not guessing, I'm just stating that he did! This puts his credibility in question. CNN's credibility...
Originally posted by: Ornery
I don't want to discuss too many things at once, since YOU'RE the one who seems to get confused! You want to make excuses for Blix, and CNN covers up parts of his reports. Facts are facts. Blix opted to leave out this info in his oral report. We can only guess why. I'm not guessing, I'm just stating that he did! This puts his credibility in question. CNN's credibility...
Okay, you haven't furnished any evidence that CNN and Blix were in collusion on anything, so I won't mention CNN in this thread again. Blix only needs someone to make excuses for him if someone shows he did something wrong. No one's shown that, so no one's making excuses. I did answer the question as to why he left it out of his report earlier.
At the time of the oral report, they hadn't yet investigated the plane to see if it was a violation of resolutions, exactly what it was capable of, or to see why it didn't appear to be reported.
Upon investigation, it was seen that it was reported, as a typo it was listed 10 feet too short, it wasn't capable of much, and it wasn't in violation of the resolutions.
What Blix did was the correct thing to do. List it as a question to be answered, then investigate, and then make a report as to how serious it is. What do you think would have been a better solution? Talk about it in his oral report as if it was a clear violation, even though he didn't know much about it yet? There was nothing to say because it hadn't been investigated yet. Anything negative he said in his oral report about it would have been later shown to be false. He recognized this as a possibility, and hence, did not make any declarations he couldn't back up. The only responsible and smart thing to do.
If that's your best argument of Blix doing a bad job, it's a poor argument.
It's a FACT. Trying to explain it away, doesn't change it.
US to Blix: Why bury key facts on weapons?
Perhaps CNN can answer themselves, why they omit sections of Blix' reports. We can only wonder...
US to Blix: Why bury key facts on weapons?
- Asked if America feared that Dr Blix deliberately buried the incriminating data, Mr Fleischer said: 'There are outstanding questions, and all members of the Security Council, I think it is safe to say, look forward to hearing the answers.'
A Western diplomat at the UN even implied that the inspector's omission was not accidental, reported London's Telegraph.
'This was an attempt, for whatever reason, to bury absolutely key information about Iraq's arsenal,' he said.
'We want answers from Iraq, but also from Dr Blix.'
British and American officials were furious, the newspaper said, that the chief weapons inspector had failed to mention Iraq's 'Project 101' when he addressed the Security Council last Friday.
Perhaps CNN can answer themselves, why they omit sections of Blix' reports. We can only wonder...
LunarRay
Diamond Member
- Mar 2, 2003
- 9,993
- 1
- 76
Quote
The whole problem is that the US claimed that they had a lot of evidence yet they have found as much as Hans Blix has. Blix had the excuse that he had a limited amount of inspectors and could have been misguided by the Iraqi's. What excuse does the US have? They have free reign on Iraq and according to Colon Powell and his presentation which included countless satellite images, they should easily spot one little wmd and show it to the world. Just find one thing to prove the world wrong. Its not too hard.[/quote]
The fellow who recently turned himself in... number 55 on the most wanted list (7 of diamonds) said to the press that Iraq had no such WMD anymore and he spoke in english. It would seem either they actually destroyed them or moved them out of country.
The whole problem is that the US claimed that they had a lot of evidence yet they have found as much as Hans Blix has. Blix had the excuse that he had a limited amount of inspectors and could have been misguided by the Iraqi's. What excuse does the US have? They have free reign on Iraq and according to Colon Powell and his presentation which included countless satellite images, they should easily spot one little wmd and show it to the world. Just find one thing to prove the world wrong. Its not too hard.[/quote]
The fellow who recently turned himself in... number 55 on the most wanted list (7 of diamonds) said to the press that Iraq had no such WMD anymore and he spoke in english. It would seem either they actually destroyed them or moved them out of country.
"It would seem either they actually destroyed them or moved them out of country."
'CHEMICAL SHELLS FOUND'
'CHEMICAL SHELLS FOUND'
- "I have not found any that I have absolutely satisfied myself are...weapon of mass destruction materials," Coalition commander General Tommy Franks told reporters.
"But you're talking about 2,000, 3,000 perhaps, places in this country where we know we're going to go and investigate each one of them.
"We may have...somewhere between five and 10 and 15 site exploitations ongoing in a 24-hour period of time."
In some of these cases the testing could take up to three weeks or more, he added.
LunarRay
Diamond Member
- Mar 2, 2003
- 9,993
- 1
- 76
I , no doubt, expect "we" will find the odd bits and pieces of WMD and perhaps even live shells and etc. My point is; to have WMD and not use them is for the intended purpose seems a bit inconsistant with the mind set of the former Saddamites. If they had them and moved them elsewhere (out of country) it would account for their non use of them and be the smart play. I fear what "We" may have done is forced Saddamists to provide WMD to the folks most likely to use them. If, however, we find a large cache of WMD I will be most pleased... not because it validates anything but, rather, because they will cease to exist... hopefully.
you americans really amuse me... its fascinating how you repeat the polemic sh*t your media drum into your head...
yeah, probalby your troops are going to find some illegal weapons, and if they don't, they will probably just take some of your own illegal chemical weapons (which are at the moment being produced under the excuse of being "nonlethal" (which is not true, because its just a question of the dose, and the necessary missiles to make the dose lethal are being developed as well)) and place them there
yeah, probalby your troops are going to find some illegal weapons, and if they don't, they will probably just take some of your own illegal chemical weapons (which are at the moment being produced under the excuse of being "nonlethal" (which is not true, because its just a question of the dose, and the necessary missiles to make the dose lethal are being developed as well)) and place them there
freakflag
Diamond Member
- Mar 22, 2001
- 3,951
- 1
- 71
Originally posted by: Cyberian89
you americans really amuse me... its fascinating how you repeat the polemic sh*t your media drum into your head...
yeah, probalby your troops are going to find some illegal weapons, and if they don't, they will probably just take some of your own illegal chemical weapons (which are at the moment being produced under the excuse of being "nonlethal" (which is not true, because its just a question of the dose, and the necessary missiles to make the dose lethal are being developed as well)) and place them there
Stop posting. Please do not reproduce.
yeah, i can imagine that you'd like that... too bad that im not listening to people who use this picture as their avatar
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