Iraqi Children

[glenn1]

glenn1,
did you even read my reasons?

Yes, and i think every single one of them is flawed. Let's take your argument about the sanctions not being effective because food isn't being distributed effectively. That's actually two statements in one. The first one, you're indicating that the sanctions aren't effective. That's debateable, but i think that if they were ineffective then Saddam wouldn't want so desperately to have them lifted, and European business interests (French and German chief among the offenders) wouldn't be working so diligently to continue doing business under the table with Saddam in contravention to the U.N. sanctions mandate.

Second point, that the hunger problem is tied to inefficient internal food distribution within Iraq. No argument there. We've seen that time and time before, from Ethiopia and Somalia in the past, to North Korea and Zimbabwe now. The common thread in EVERY SINGLE INSTANCE is not sanctions, rather dictators who view food as either a hard currency income producing asset (the starvation of the populace be damned) or as a weapon to be used against the people to maintain and hopefully increase his level of control. Sanctions are utterly immaterial to food distribution, and you should know it.

Now if you want to argue for Western responsibility in the sense that we've so far avoided taking the necessary steps to put ourselves in harms way and remove Saddam and similar dictators, and install regimes which represent democratic POVs in keeping with the principles of the inalienable rights all human beings are endowed with by their creator, then you might have a point. But i suppose you'll instead remark how we (as the west in general, the U.S. in particular) doesn't have the right to force regime change on another nation, or that we have our own problem areas so we have no right to criticize other countries, etc etc etc. You're essentially dismissing the idea of proactive actions to remove tyrants, and then ringing your hands about what those same tyrants do and how the U.S. didn't do more to stop them, or just didn't give enough aid to them, whatever other angle you want to take. You can't have it both ways.

 

[0ops]

Originally posted by: kulki
Hi guys,
I was wondering if you guys could educate me a little on this. I am currently doing a computer project with this muslim guy from Saudi. And hes really a nice person, very decent and well mannered but has rabid anti-US feelings and hes been telling me about it. Essentially it to do with kids in Iraq. He keeps telling me how US sanctions have hurt millions of innocent Iraqi civilians. I can see his point in that sanctions dont really hurt Saddam as much as they hurt the civilians. I think US made a terrible mistake by not going after Saddam earlier. But dont u think sanctions are really cruel. This guy said something like 10 milion kids dies due to mal nourishment and lack of proper medical facilities in what was a a prosperous country before. I really would like to tell him out side of the story. But I just dont know how to justify killing so many children and innocent civilian population

Is it the fault of the united states? saddam seems to have plenty of money. He sends $10,000 to families
of suicide bombers, bribes leaders of other countries (there was a recent story about that concerning Jordan)
and secretly sneaks out oil (probably through Syria or Jordan). These kids are malnourished because he wants
them to be, it is a great propoganda tool for arabs and muslims (as you can see). You should be careful with this
guy since there were 11 people who also did not try to hide their rabid anti-US feelings (many of them were
from Saudi Arabia too) and they made big headlines about a year ago.

 

[tcsenter]

I think US made a terrible mistake by not going after Saddam earlier. But dont u think sanctions are really cruel. This guy said something like 10 milion kids dies due to mal nourishment and lack of proper medical facilities in what was a a prosperous country before. I really would like to tell him out side of the story. But I just dont know how to justify killing so many children and innocent civilian population

First, sanctions were not imposed by the "US", these sanctions were imposed upon Iraq by the United Nations Security Council, sanctions which were UNANIMOUSLY approved by all permanent member nations.

Second, like several other nations, the United States realized the sanctions were not having the intended effect on Hussein's power and proving to be unusually harsh on Iraqi civilians, which is why the United States supported the Oil-For-Food program that allows Iraq to sell oil in exchange for food, medical supplies, among other items which have no military use. Iraq sells enough oil to markedly improve the situation there for his people, but Hussein choses to spend the money on a dozen or more lavish palaces for himself and trying to rebuild his military.

Third, the director of UNICEF testified that sanctions against Iraq were only one part of reason why the Iraqi people were suffering and that lifting the sanctions would not 'reverse' their situation. She placed as much blame on Hussein for decades of failing to invest in obviously faltering infrastructures like public health and public works projects (sewers, water treatment, etc.) in order to put more money into his administration and military.

Fourth, Hussein is DELIBERATELY causing his people to suffer - the more egregious the better - because stupid people like you are falling for his obvious ploy to place blame for the suffering of the Iraqi people squarely on the shoulders of the United States, when the United States is only ONE member of the United Nations Security Council who UNANIMOUSLY imposed these sanctions to begin with.

Fifth, Hussein is buying sympathy. The US proposal for 'Smart Sanctions' would have resulted in a substantially unadulterated distribution of humanitarian aid to the people of Iraq and had the support of EVERY member nation, except Russia.

Russia used its veto power as a permanent member of the UN Security Council to block the proposal from coming to a vote. It was no coincidence that several weeks before Russia used its veto power against the US proposal, Iraq renewed a commitment to repay Russia several billion dollars Iraq still owed for prior military acquisitions, plus hammered out a really sweet deal with Russia to sell them Iraqi oil at well below market value.

Hussein will accept no other terms but to end all sanctions and military action against it without condition, which no member of the UN Security Council finds acceptable.

 

[broon]

Sanctions are very simple really. Let's imagine I have an unlimited supply of money and have built my house in a very poor neighborhood. I decide not to trade my goods with anyone in my neighborhood. Does that mean when they starve it's my fault?

Just because the US decides not to do "business" with a certain country doesn't mean it's the US's fault those people starve. Cuba is doing fine. The problem with all the poor countries with wealthy rulers is the rulers. A dictatorship cannot be successful for anyone but the dictator.

 

[alphatarget1]

it was bush sr's fault not ousting saddam in the gulf war ,as far as starving iraqi children are concerned. He decided to go after someone he doesn't like in panama instead of taking out saddam. Since we know Saddam is evil, why don't we impose democracy in Iraq? We knew Saddam will make his own people suffer, so why didn't we save the Iraqis from the tyranny? I thought we were the world police. It's George Bush's fault, can't blame anyone else for not invading baghdad when we had the perfect chance. no, Iran won't move when there are UN troops on the border of Iraq.

Saudis are sexist, so are most of the muslim nations.

 

[Nefrodite]

misplaced blame it easier to him to hate the US then saddam because saddam is arab? i dunno, somethings not right i think its a kind of denial people from that region have, its hard to deal with why the entire region is screwed up. better to go into denial and blame an outsider

maybe he should wonder why all the arab countries around iraq don't send in forces take out saddam and save the children its their backyard. oh yea... wait, they are all f*cked up in some way or another

kinda like blaming police for making a fugitives life hard even as he abuses his own children

saddams not a nice man. he's used poison gas on his own kurdish civilians. there are some graphic pictures out there.



Saddam's Bombmaker by Khidr Abd Al-Abbas Hamzah, head scientist of iraqs nuclear weapons program who escaped ofcourse

 

[Nefrodite]

you should also ask him whether he thinks the US is controlled by the jews i'd say its 50/50 he might think so

 

[Skyclad1uhm1]

Originally posted by: 0ops

Originally posted by: kulki
Hi guys,
I was wondering if you guys could educate me a little on this. I am currently doing a computer project with this muslim guy from Saudi. And hes really a nice person, very decent and well mannered but has rabid anti-US feelings and hes been telling me about it. Essentially it to do with kids in Iraq. He keeps telling me how US sanctions have hurt millions of innocent Iraqi civilians. I can see his point in that sanctions dont really hurt Saddam as much as they hurt the civilians. I think US made a terrible mistake by not going after Saddam earlier. But dont u think sanctions are really cruel. This guy said something like 10 milion kids dies due to mal nourishment and lack of proper medical facilities in what was a a prosperous country before. I really would like to tell him out side of the story. But I just dont know how to justify killing so many children and innocent civilian population

Is it the fault of the united states? saddam seems to have plenty of money. He sends $10,000 to families
of suicide bombers, bribes leaders of other countries (there was a recent story about that concerning Jordan)
and secretly sneaks out oil (probably through Syria or Jordan). These kids are malnourished because he wants
them to be, it is a great propoganda tool for arabs and muslims (as you can see). You should be careful with this
guy since there were 11 people who also did not try to hide their rabid anti-US feelings (many of them were
from Saudi Arabia too) and they made big headlines about a year ago.

Let's see, he still has a huge army there, so a land battle would be a slaughter on both sides unless one side has far superior equipment. Arabs in general do not like what he does either, but what can the average person do about it? Or Iran? Start another war in which millions of soldiers die without managing to kick him out? The US had the chance once, and didn't use it. That's what they don't like about the sanctions, it hurts the common people rather than Saddam, and the US didn't take the chance to hurt Saddam instead, which makes it look like Saddam isn't being targetted in the first place.

There are White, Christian US citizens who want to kill everyone not white and Christian too, does that mean every single US citizen thinks that way? This guy may be the nicest guy in the world, but that doesn't mean he likes a people being tortured for no reason whatsoever. The sanctions are not doing anything except cause suffering for the common people, and unless we storm in to kick Saddam's ass he isn't going to move or change his policy either.

 

[tcsenter]

it was bush sr's fault not ousting saddam in the gulf war ,as far as starving iraqi children are concerned. He decided to go after someone he doesn't like in panama instead of taking out saddam. Since we know Saddam is evil, why don't we impose democracy in iraq?

Because that was not the objective of the Gulf War. The objective was to eject Iraq from Kuwait and to neutralize Iraq's military.

The United States was part of a coalition which operated under the auspices of the United Nations. The United Nations would NEVER have given us permission to enter Iraq for the purpose of forcibly deposing Hussein and when the subject came up the United Nations preemptively warned against it. We were ill-prepared at the time to deal with the consequences of removing Hussein and we would not have gained permission from the Saudi's to use bases located there.

Further, removing Hussein from power would not have been as easy as strolling into Baghdad and arresting him. Hussein has hundreds of place to hide, uses a dozen look-a-likes to act as decoys, and we STILL to this day cannot narrow his location down to one-half square mile or less.