The Iraq Thread 2

[Postduifje 0]

Quote[/b] ]December 14, 2003

Thank God Saddam is finally back in American hands! He must have really missed us. Man, he sure looked bad! But, at least he got a free dental exam today. That's something most Americans can't get.

America used to like Saddam. We LOVED Saddam. We funded him. We armed him. We helped him gas Iranian troops.

But then he screwed up. He invaded the dictatorship of Kuwait and, in doing so, did the worst thing imaginable -- he threatened an even BETTER friend of ours: the dictatorship of Saudi Arabia, and its vast oil reserves. The Bushes and the Saudi royal family were and are close business partners, and Saddam, back in 1990, committed a royal blunder by getting a little too close to their wealthy holdings. Things went downhill for Saddam from there.

But it wasn't always that way. Saddam was our good friend and ally. We supported his regime. It wasn’t the first time we had helped a murderer. We liked playing Dr. Frankenstein. We created a lot of monsters -- the Shah of Iran, Somoza of Nicaragua, Pinochet of Chile -- and then we expressed ignorance or shock when they ran amok and massacred people. We liked Saddam because he was willing to fight the Ayatollah. So we made sure that he got billions of dollars to purchase weapons. Weapons of mass destruction. That's right, he had them. We should know -- we gave them to him!

We allowed and encouraged American corporations to do business with Saddam in the 1980s. That's how he got chemical and biological agents so he could use them in chemical and biological weapons. Here's the list of some of the stuff we sent him (according to a 1994 U.S. Senate report):

* Bacillus Anthracis, cause of anthrax.

* Clostridium Botulinum, a source of botulinum toxin.

* Histoplasma Capsulatam, cause of a disease attacking lungs, brain, spinal cord, and heart.

* Brucella Melitensis, a bacteria that can damage major organs.

* Clostridium Perfringens, a highly toxic bacteria causing systemic illness.

* Clostridium tetani, a highly toxigenic substance.

And here are some of the American corporations who helped to prop Saddam up by doing business with him: AT&T, Bechtel, Caterpillar, Dow Chemical, Dupont, Kodak, Hewlett-Packard, and IBM.

We were so cozy with dear old Saddam that we decided to feed him satellite images so he could locate where the Iranian troops were. We pretty much knew how he would use the information, and sure enough, as soon as we sent him the spy photos, he gassed those troops. And we kept quiet. Because he was our friend, and the Iranians were the "enemy." A year after he first gassed the Iranians, we reestablished full diplomatic relations with him!

Later he gassed his own people, the Kurds. You would think that would force us to disassociate ourselves from him. Congress tried to impose economic sanctions on Saddam, but the Reagan White House quickly rejected that idea -- they wouldn’t let anything derail their good buddy Saddam. We had a virtual love fest with this Frankenstein whom we (in part) created.

And, just like the mythical Frankenstein, Saddam eventually spun out of control. He would no longer do what he was told by his master. Saddam had to be caught. And now that he has been brought back from the wilderness, perhaps he will have something to say about his creators. Maybe we can learn something... interesting. Maybe Don Rumsfeld could smile and shake Saddam's hand again. Just like he did when he went to see him in 1983

Maybe we never would have been in the situation we're in if Rumsfeld, Bush, Sr., and company hadn't been so excited back in the 80s about their friendly monster in the desert.

Meanwhile, anybody know where the guy is who killed 3,000 people on 9/11? Our other Frankenstein?? Maybe he's in a mouse hole.

So many of our little monsters, so little time before the next election.

Stay strong, Democratic candidates. Quit sounding like a bunch of wusses. These bastards sent us to war on a lie, the killing will not stop, the Arab world hates us with a passion, and we will pay for this out of our pockets for years to come. Nothing that happened today (or in the past 9 months) has made us ONE BIT safer in our post-9/11 world. Saddam was never a threat to our national security.

Only our desire to play Dr. Frankenstein dooms us all.

Yours,

Michael Moore

mmflint@aol.com

www.michaelmoore.com

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

The thing about arming Saddam though - only about 5% of his conventional weapons came from the US. The rest was European/Soviet.

Don't know much about the WOMDS tough.

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]The thing about arming Saddam though - only about 5% of his conventional weapons came from the US. The rest was European/Soviet.

Including the Exocets (France,*cough, cough*). Not to mention the Russian Hinds, and that his favorite methods for delivering those warheads came from Russia too .

[WhoCares 0]

Quote[/b] ]December 14, 2003

...

And now that he has been brought back from the wilderness, perhaps he will have something to say about his creators. Maybe we can learn something... interesting. Maybe Don Rumsfeld could smile and shake Saddam's hand again. Just like he did when he went to see him in 1983

...

This is the sad part in this. I wished they would give him a life sentence and from time to time have some reporters interview him. This man has a lot of interresting stories he might tell... I guess, there are many out there, that welcome a death sentence not just because of the cruel things he is resposible for...

[Postduifje 0]

Quote[/b] ]December 14, 2003

...

And now that he has been brought back from the wilderness, perhaps he will have something to say about his creators. Maybe we can learn something... interesting. Maybe Don Rumsfeld could smile and shake Saddam's hand again. Just like he did when he went to see him in 1983

...

This is the sad part in this. I wished they would give him a life sentence and from time to time have some reporters interview him. This man has a lot of interresting stories he might tell... I guess, there are many out there, that welcome a death sentence not just because of the cruel things he is resposible for...

There was a picture with that:

[WhoCares 0]

Oh, I'm sure he could tell a lot of other stories that are not already covered by the press... You know, the businesses in the background, where there were no cameras. The really interesting stuff...

[Gollum1 0]

Quote[/b] ]The thing about arming Saddam though - only about 5% of his conventional weapons came from the US. The rest was European/Soviet.

Not to mention the Russian Hinds, and that his favorite methods for delivering those warheads came from Russia too .

They came from the Soviet Union, so there's not much use blaming present Russia for that, IMO.

[Badgerboy 0]

China supplied quite a lot of equipment as well.

I have the full list somewhere. (For Air Force inventory)

A lot of the Soviet hardware came through client states as well though.

[python3 0]

The thing about arming Saddam though - only about 5% of his conventional weapons came from the US. The rest was European/Soviet.

Don't know much about the WOMDS tough.

i know for a fact that Egypt sold a lot of equipment to the Iraqi's for use against Iran, but to the best of my knowledge, the US funded most of it. Iraq would have no way of paying for all the weapons it purchased. The war was devastating to the economy.

[Acecombat 0]

Does anyone have any old news clips oor links of detailed US and UK trades with Iraq on these mlitary and chemical artifacts deals ?

[ran 0]

Quote[/b] ]The thing about arming Saddam though - only about 5% of his conventional weapons came from the US. The rest was European/Soviet.

Including the Exocets (France,*cough, cough*). Not to mention the Russian Hinds, and that his favorite methods for delivering those warheads came from Russia too .

Exocets , Rolands , Crotales , AU F1's , AMX's , mirages (III and F1) Pumas , Frelons , handgrenades , 155 guns , 105 guns , mortars (120 and 81) etc etc etc .......

well , business is business , you don't let down a good customer

[walker 0]

Hi all

Most countries supplied conventional weapons to Iraq that is a given and nobody can question it unless they are a pacifist.

The important bit is who gave Sadam WMD.

Then who continued to support him after he used WMD against his own people and against the Iranians.

We all know TBA did.

Here is a complete list of suppliers with what they supplied

http://www.thememoryhole.org/corp/iraq-suppliers.htm

Thoughly checked and sourced

In digestable form here is a report.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/03/02/IN123519.DTL

It is interesting to see how much work present members of TBA did to protect Sadam and prevent international sanctions to stop him; while he was gassing and torturing people.

Funny thought could members of TBA be brought before a court for helping Sadam while he was gassing and torturing people?

Kind Regards Walker

[Crazysheep 1]

Funny thought could members of TBA be brought before a court for helping Sadam while he was gassing and torturing people?

Kind Regards Walker

lol that would be an interesting turn around.

[Baron von Beer 0]

Yeah, I think it's very funny that you don't know the difference between Kosovo and Bosnia

Denoir, ever heard when you are the only one laughing, it isn't funny?

Those deployments are from *JUNE 1999*, IE, operations in and around Kosovo. (several years after doing similar for Bosnia.)

Your statement is true, so long as you reverse it.

[denoir 0]

Yeah, I think it's very funny that you don't know the difference between Kosovo and Bosnia

Denoir, ever heard when you are the only one laughing, it isn't funny?

Those deployments are from *JUNE 1999*, IE, operations in and around Kosovo.

Your statement is true, so long as you reverse it.

Let's retrace the question shall we?

toadlife: What about Bosnia? We intervened so the muslims would not be slaughtered.

me: You didn't intervene in Bosnia and the muslims were slaughtered.

you: Yeah right [starts listing Kosovo deployments]

me: That's Kosovo, not Bosnia.

Bottom line, there was no military intervention in Bosnia. There were three peace keeping missions under UNPROFOR, IFOR and last SFOR. The military intervention came in Kosovo, in 1999, 8 years after the war in ex-Yugoslavia broke out.

As for Bosnia, peace was reached after '95 when the Croats kicked the Serbs out of Croatia and they were in position to defeat them in Bosnia as well. Then Milosevic started negotiating and it culminated in the Dayton accord in late 1995, which effectivly became the final peace solution for Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The Kosovo crisis started in 1998 and culminated in a NATO military intervention ("Operation Allied Force") in early 1999. The enforcing of the seize-fire agreement was and is still done by KFOR. And KFOR is a follow-up to a military intervention - it's not a military intervention - just like IFOR and SFOR (where you among servicemen from 30 other nations had US troops under UN command). I was with KFOR for six months in 2001 and I can guarantee you that Sweden never went to war with Yugoslavia

[ralphwiggum 6]

and I can guarantee you that Sweden never went to war with Yugoslavia

sure. where did the 'libereation' extend too?

don't act so innocent. sooner or later, when IKEA gets into Yugoslavia, you'll be back there.

speaking of Herzegovina,

http://www.cbs.com/latenig....s.shtml

look for 'Biff Henderson's Tour of Eagle Base in Bosnia'

back ontopic.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/12/16/sprj.irq.main/index.html

Quote[/b] ]TIKRIT, Iraq (CNN) -- U.S. troops captured what the military calls a "high-value target" and 73 other Iraqis during a massive raid early Tuesday in the north-central Iraqi town of Samarra, coalition officials said.

Officials said the high-value target was captured at his home, where he was apparently having a meeting. All 74 Iraqis were captured at the house in Samarra, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) south of Tikrit, officials said. The suspects were young men of military age, and no women were present, officials said.

Coalition officials described the top man as a midlevel official, a member of the paramilitary group Fedayeen Saddam and a financier of attacks on coalition troops. Officials said they believe he can lead them to some insurgents involved in the attacks.

Coalition officials also said they found 135 pounds of explosives, several mortar rounds, 15 AK-47s, 200 blasting caps and other ammunition and paraphernalia similar to those used in attacks against coalition troops.

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

Quote[/b] ]We Finally Got Our Frankenstein... and He Was In a Spider Hole! -- by Michael Moore

December 14, 2003

Thank God Saddam is finally back in American hands! He must have really missed us. Man, he sure looked bad! But, at least he got a free dental exam today. That's something most Americans can't get.

America used to like Saddam. We LOVED Saddam. We funded him. We armed him. We helped him gas Iranian troops.

But then he screwed up. He invaded the dictatorship of Kuwait and, in doing so, did the worst thing imaginable -- he threatened an even BETTER friend of ours: the dictatorship of Saudi Arabia, and its vast oil reserves.  The Bushes and the Saudi royal family were and are close business partners, and Saddam, back in 1990, committed a royal blunder by getting a little too close to their wealthy holdings. Things went downhill for Saddam from there.

But it wasn't always that way. Saddam was our good friend and ally. We supported his regime. It wasn’t the first time we had helped a murderer. We liked playing Dr. Frankenstein. We created a lot of monsters -- the Shah of Iran, Somoza of Nicaragua, Pinochet of Chile -- and then we expressed ignorance or shock when they ran amok and massacred people. We liked Saddam because he was willing to fight the Ayatollah. So we made sure that he got billions of dollars to purchase weapons. Weapons of mass destruction. That's right, he had them. We should know -- we gave them to him!

We allowed and encouraged American corporations to do business with Saddam in the 1980s. That's how he got chemical and biological agents so he could use them in chemical and biological weapons. Here's the list of some of the stuff we sent him (according to a 1994 U.S. Senate report):

* Bacillus Anthracis, cause of anthrax.

* Clostridium Botulinum, a source of botulinum toxin.

* Histoplasma Capsulatam, cause of a disease attacking lungs, brain, spinal cord, and heart.

* Brucella Melitensis, a bacteria that can damage major organs.

* Clostridium Perfringens, a highly toxic bacteria causing systemic illness.

* Clostridium tetani, a highly toxigenic substance.

And here are some of the American corporations who helped to prop Saddam up by doing business with him: AT&T, Bechtel, Caterpillar, Dow Chemical, Dupont, Kodak, Hewlett-Packard, and IBM (for a full list of companies and descriptions of how they helped Saddam, go here).

We were so cozy with dear old Saddam that we decided to feed him satellite images so he could locate where the Iranian troops were. We pretty much knew how he would use the information, and sure enough, as soon as we sent him the spy photos, he gassed those troops. And we kept quiet. Because he was our friend, and the Iranians were the "enemy." A year after he first gassed the Iranians, we reestablished full diplomatic relations with him!

Later he gassed his own people, the Kurds. You would think that would force us to disassociate ourselves from him. Congress tried to impose economic sanctions on Saddam, but the Reagan White House quickly rejected that idea -- they wouldn’t let anything derail their good buddy Saddam. We had a virtual love fest with this Frankenstein whom we (in part) created.

And, just like the mythical Frankenstein, Saddam eventually spun out of control. He would no longer do what he was told by his master. Saddam had to be caught. And now that he has been brought back from the wilderness, perhaps he will have something to say about his creators. Maybe we can learn something... interesting. Maybe Don Rumsfeld could smile and shake Saddam's hand again. Just like he did when he went to see him in 1983 (see the photo here).

Maybe we never would have been in the situation we're in if Rumsfeld, Bush, Sr., and company hadn't been so excited back in the 80s about their friendly monster in the desert.

Meanwhile, anybody know where the guy is who killed 3,000 people on 9/11? Our other Frankenstein?? Maybe he's in a mouse hole.

So many of our little monsters, so little time before the next election.

Stay strong, Democratic candidates. Quit sounding like a bunch of wusses. These bastards sent us to war on a lie, the killing will not stop, the Arab world hates us with a passion, and we will pay for this out of our pockets for years to come. Nothing that happened today (or in the past 9 months) has made us ONE BIT safer in our post-9/11 world. Saddam was never a threat to our national security.

Only our desire to play Dr. Frankenstein dooms us all.

Yours,

Michael Moore

It is all showbusiness. Even Saddam is only a tool of the election, for the republicans as well as for the democrats.

[Baron von Beer 0]

Ok, a simple reorganizing of my statement (read, pulling my head out of my ass for a moment, and re-reading properly )

There were substantial forces deployed then as well. Peacekeeping was the "name", military intervention was laregely the method. (Again, large scale airstrikes, etc). This by NATO (including large numbers of US) aircraft. I still don't see how this equates to the US doing "nothing". Nothing being done would have meant that the US would have at the least, gave no mention to what was going on, or at the most, sent maybee a letter saying "Sorry about your luck, hope things take a turn for the better". However, CVN battlegroups, combat aircraft, and ground units were sent instead. Still a far cry from nothing.

[Crazysheep 1]

Funny thought could members of TBA be brought before a court for helping Sadam while he was gassing and torturing people?

Kind Regards Walker

lol that would be an interesting turn around.  

Hmm, just read this.

BBC article on how Saddams trial could be embarrassing for western leaders

Should be interesting when it comes round at any rate.

[Apollo 0]

Well ,the Kosovo war was maybe not been tottaly well planned before they went in.Remember this: Just before the Kosovo war ,clinton had sent an ultimatum to Serbia ,that was comply or face war.However Clinton was not preparred for this war ,he had thought that this ultimatum would surely mean that milosovic would give in ,but milosovic was to all of Europe's and U.S suprize preparred to face war.

A big mistake they made in the Kosovo war: they only did airraid's ,and no ground offensive.Meanwhile ,in the war the Serbian ground trops were killing Albanian's in Kosovo itself.The airraids effectivly destroyed a lot of the Serbian infrastructure (wich makes it an economic armpit now) ,but it failed to prevent the killing of Albanian's in Kosovo while a quick ground offensive would have done more to protect these people ,and remember that with these people the Casius Belli of the war lies.Instead ,the Nato ground troops stayed in their Macedonian base just waiting for more and more Albanian's to flock over the border making a humanitaran disaster.

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]A big mistake they made in the Kosovo war: they only did airraid's ,and no ground offensive.

General Wesley Clark directed those airraids, didn't he?. Those raids where "brave" American pilots dropped bombs on civvies while flying around high in the sky .

[ralphwiggum 6]

kso what are we talking about? Iraq or Kosovo?

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

Well ,the Kosovo war was maybe not been tottaly well planned before they went in.Remember this: Just before the Kosovo war ,clinton had sent an ultimatum to Serbia ,that was comply or face war.However Clinton was not preparred for this war ,he had thought that this ultimatum would surely mean that milosovic would give in ,but milosovic was to all of Europe's and U.S suprize preparred to face war.

A big mistake they made in the Kosovo war: they only did airraid's ,and no ground offensive.Meanwhile ,in the war the Serbian ground trops were killing Albanian's in Kosovo itself.The airraids effectivly destroyed a lot of the Serbian infrastructure (wich makes it an economic armpit now) ,but it failed to prevent the killing of Albanian's in Kosovo while a quick ground offensive would have done more to protect these people ,and remember that with these people the Casius Belli of the war lies.Instead ,the Nato ground troops stayed in their Macedonian base just waiting for more and more Albanian's to flock over the border making a humanitaran disaster.

this was a strategy based on Iraq War 1 experience. The lesson was learned after Kosovo. Now it is easy to complain!  

[Apollo 0]

Quote[/b] ]kso what are we talking about? Iraq or Kosovo?

We are taking kosovo into discussion because it's relevant to compare the Kosovo war with the Iraq war on the level of legality and execution.It is important to make conclusion's if the current (neo-conservative) ideoligy of the U.S goverment has some factual merrit in the reality of the world.

This Neo-conservative ideoligy embodies the though that the U.S should project it's power in the World to establish a more peacefull and democratic world.

[m21man 0]

Quote[/b] ]This Neo-conservative ideoligy embodies the though that the U.S should project it's power in the World to establish a more peacefull and democratic world.

Define "neo-conservative". What's the difference between a "conservative" and a "neo-conservative"?