Albert Schweitzer

Of course you are right. This is no Vietnam war. And we are happy about it. Noone expects Iraq to become the grave of nearly 60.000 US soldiers (and please dont forget one million Vietnamese VC and the large amount of civillian casualties and after war handicaped children.) But one reason to compare these two wars remains. It is the question: "FOR WHAT?" And it is not the death poll that will determine whether IRAQ2 reminds us of Vietnam but the outcome. Lets hope we will not see the same pictures as we have seen in the last days of the fall of saigon: US soldiers leaving, and leaving behind the country AFU. And I hope we will not ask ourselves the question again: "wouldnt it have been better if the US would have never TRIED?" Reminds me of my brother trying to fix my sisters hair after he had deliberately stuck a chewing gum into it. She cried and shouted: "Dont Dont...you only make it worse!"

referring to the first Iraq-warWell, that is a sunshine perspective of Iraq-war 1. Fact is that during that time actually Saddam was your political friend and Kuweit was your business-partner. But when Saddam threatened to conquer the Kuweiti oil-fields the friendship with Saddam enden abruptly. Still I think that terorism should not be mentioned in connection with iraq. Suicide bombers do not necessarily have to be terorists (not if they target soldiers). So the war against Iraq was not a war against teror. So any resistance fighter, who figths with an AK or just a bomb-belt remains a resist-ance fighter (wether he is a loyalist or whatever). Or maybe I am wrong. Maybe anyone attacking a US soldier is considered as a terorist. So what the US is facing right now is the feed-back of what the IRAQIS think of their war against Saddam. Do they seem to be greatful? Do they welcome the troops in the same way as people did in Afghanistan? Whether this war was "help" or "delivery" must be judged by the people and not by the occupying force!

Dont blame me for this years military-fashion trends. I LIKE mud-Cammo, it hides my problem zones and gives me a slim figure  What do you mean with "loosing control". I think you underestimate the power of words. the US has to withdraw from Iraq then it will be called: giving the iraqis back their autonomy. "We promised it and we will keep our promises. Now it is on each and everyone to build the future of this country. We gave you a free country. Now dear fellow Iraqis, you will have to put seeds on it. the richness of the harvest depends on your own effort." ( images of cheering crowds waving white handkerchiefs to the withdrawing americans. A little iraqi chield with tears in its eyes sits on top of a bypassing tank. The boy wears an 101st Airborne helmet and waves a small american flag.) the US hands over the command to the UN: " We never chose to walk alone. The coalition forces moved in first. They fought the war and won the war. Now it is time for other nations to give THEIR share to the iraqi people. The US forces gives the UN something that should make each and every soldier proud. Our present for the UN-community is a free Iraq. Free of dictators.. free of surpressors...free of programs of weapons of....oh sorry someone erased that part...so I just continue with my speech a few lines below... Well and now it is on the UN to finish the job the US did (not mentioning Britain). We give you raw diomand and you gotta turn it into a precious shiny star. If the US needs to stay longer than forseen Each and everyone of us americans made promise. When we gave our vote for the war we promised that we are fighting for the Iraqi people. We promised that we will fight untill this nation is free and prosperous. And now, dear fellow americans, the world is watching us. How much is it worth an american promise? (makes a pause and looks around the audience) Well I tell you my promise is worth a lot, cause I am the president of the american people and I keep promises even if the price is high. And the price is high...we lost soldiers, many brave men died in the war against teror. But we are fighting for the freedom of the world. And we will not rest untill everyone enjoys what we enjoy in the United States of America: Freedom and prosperity.

Okay..you want a devils advocat...you can have it: Sucess of the Iraq war: 1. Stabilised oil prices (soon) 2. Dictators will have to think twice in the future. 3. Now we have a foot in the middle East which might help us to restore order in this disturbed and poor part of the world. 4. New business opportunities 5. Saddam and his two sons are dead. 6. No more money for families of palestinian suicide bombers 7. The americans have paid the war. 8. Because of the war Bush will loose the next election 9. Cool images on TV of tanks and desert Cammo 10. the UN will have to restructure and redefine its goals (necessary since already quite a while ago). 11. The kurds now have the chance to establish their own state (any turkish citizens on this forum?) 12. keep going!!!! whoever wants to add something!

If it is true...then I agree. But we dont know the circumstances.

I am not defending. But I think from a country so far away we have to be careful about the information we get, and we do not need to believe any inflowing information . There was a a time when sailors returned home and proclaime d that in Australia there are  birds with horns. Then there were two presidents that tried to cnvince us with @evidence@ that in Iraq there are no weapons of mass destruction. And now we have a lot of information material being published by arab press agencies. I am not being racist when I say that the entire arab word believes that the americans should get the hell away from islamic soil! And this general attitude might blurr the views of even the most objective journalists. (dont forget demand/supply. You give the people what they want to hear!) I am not defending I am just telling you to examine the evidence before you close the case!

That is too simple to say! The Americans are controlling baghdad, which is definetly the tougher challenge!

Usually at work when I ask people for quick answers and they pull their stupid palms I tend to give two answers: Is is fashionable nowadays to forget things and then retrieve the information from an electric device? Dont waste my time with that....just call me back when you know it okay!

4 points to take into consideration 1. indedependant press? I suppose many of the information gathered in Iraq comes from arabian correspondants/journalists. The country is not safe/stable enough for western non-war journalists to step in and assess the situation. Since we know Al Jazeera we have learned that the Arab press is seeing many things from a very "different perspective". 2. Since we know terorism we know that those slick bastards chose any possible way, brake every rule of morality and sacrifice innocent lifes to get what they want. We have had warnings already weeks ago that ambush attacks on US soldiers might be carried out by people dressed in police uniforms! 3. Shooting someone is the correct action if you have reason to believe that High explosives are wrapped around the other person's body. Adrenalin may give you a very blurred and overreactive estimation of the situation. Pulling the trigger is often not an action of agression but of anxiety. 4. Kicking someone and only causing wounds and bruises. After MINUTES OF AGRESSIVE BEATINGS you will see bones come sticking out of the skin and the person being basically braindamaged for the rest of his life (a german Nazi-hooligan didnt even need more than 30 seconds to nearly beat up a french police officer to death.) I may assume that the Iraqi could have been moving while a soldier tried to keep him on the ground. But that is pure assumption from my side as well. But as we know from the middle east, there is always 2 different truths!

Mini Nuke? Is that a new GTI version from the old Rover car. Mini Cooper Nuke SPORT 2.4 GTI DI

The last bomb blast in one of the large business towers in Jakarta nearly killed a friend of mine. Fact is he went for his coffee break (downstairs), and when he was back upstairs for not more than 30 min the thing blew off in the canteen where he had been shortly before. Akhil is still alive!

If I were him, I'd go to Sweden and rob a candy store. (Some of you will understand). But most of us wont! Short and precise .Taken by surprise? Good management is never taken by surprise => bad management!

Easy answer! TROPICO I and VIETCONG

Strange. I am always happy finishing a job and looking forward for the next one!

I ve seen most of the demo-videos. It is very arcadish (I am so lucky having remembered this term ). The sounds remind me of 80ies style video-games. Lets admit it, the only way to compete with OFP (and to beat it) is more dense vegetation, e.g. grass and bushes. AND LADIES, THAT IS what Soeldner tried. Still it is far from being a sim.

Programmes don't do it... it was weapons that we were told about John Rockefeller Democrat had to pick that up. thanks for the Ref oh and here is a simple version refering to the statistics we discussed recently

Only countries that were initially interested in helping Iraq? If you would be standing right in front of me while saying this I would ...need some serious breathing exercises to calm down my anger.... (well you got the message) Are you people not noticing that you are constantly wrong? Stop inspections, Saddam is fooling all you peace-loving nations anyway. To find the WMD is not a question of time, it is a question of determination! Then, Boom Bang US ignores basically ALL international voices, calling the entire world traitors and the UN "piece of the past" if it doesnt cooperate. French, German and russians propose to station UN troops in Iraq peacefully? Ah bullshit, that is again one of those silly lib gay and pacifist solutions. No we need a war! Our incredible great CIA has unquestionable proof of WMD and we will move in before those can be used against us. War against terror! Stupid incompetent international UN inspectors cant do the job. we know it better. The war was unbloody for the americans but definetly not for the Iraqis. DO YOU SERIOUSLY CALL THOUSANDS CIVILLIANS CASUALTIES HELP! DO YOU REALY TELL ME THAT PREVENTING A WAR MEANS THAT WE DID NOT WANT TO HELP THE IRAQIS. Now that is a very perverted mind! Not wanting a nation to suffer a war means not wanting to help them? And dont give me the silly example of WWII cause now we now that the threat of Saddam was zero to none. All you have done is removed a dictator from power so far...at what cost? The country is drowning in anarchy. Intelligent missiles prevented unecessary damage but raids later on flattened more buildings than carpet bombing could do. 2 soldiers dead per day. Yeah things are really calming down, and infrastructure is improving (still no secured water and electricity even in Bagdad). Guards surrounding the ministry of oil but not even a single guard in front of hospitals or the national museum of history (one of the most significant treasures worldwide). Initially a large amount of your troops should have been sent back to the US end of July...they will stay (oh they stay because things are actually running so well that they intend to stay for holiday in Iraq)! Â The amount of organised attacks is increasing. The US general in chief has recently admitted for the first time that his troops are actually facing organised guerilla attacks! Hell right now you are not helping a bit. Your stupid incompetent president and his unsophisticated uncultured administration has published a lot of rethorical diarrhea but failed in every concern, using Iraq as a playground in their holy bullshit crussade! So far I have never read such a useless comment from your side. It seems you are desperately trying to convince yourself that you were right. You are more and more failing! If we want to help we do it! We dont need the US to allow us to give aid to Iraq. Or is it allready considered as US teritorry? Or maybe you get me wrong. "Helping someone" in german does not mean having a second aim in mind. We can help without getting a share of your occupied oil.

Does it really matter where I put the addons? What is the difference between my Res addon folder and my normal addon folder? Would an addon made for Resistance not run if I put it into the normal addon folder? Stupid but fair to ask! So far I have never observed a difference, or??

oh no! Dont tell me we did the loop back to 9/11 discussion again. Hell, do we hang around in this forum for such a long time now that we start repeating stories (which we assume telling for the first time). So here comes my back-on-track question: What price is the american public not willing to pay. Undertaking a simple worst case scenario (being pessimistic). What would have to happen untill the americans would give a TBA a serious signal that the Iraq-campaign has to end. And what would be the way out? Retreat & pull out of Iraq? Not supportable! Let anarchy rule the streets & erect safe basecamps and stay in there untill the storm is over? Not fair! Send more troops? No, not if you want to create a Vietnam scenario part II! Demand UN troops: Would seem the only way out of the dilemma. But if the situation turns worse I doubt other nations would like to get involved. The choices dont look to good I have to admit! The only choice TBA realy has it to succeed and that success has to come quickly. Failure would mean total failure in all areas related.

what? you mean we should make YOUR face? Sorry, but I got enough to do with creating a face of Berlusconi. And then I find 1001 ways of killing .... well I should stop here!

I don´t think so. Even the silliest person knows that foreign soldiers on your territory means that war is opened. SpecOps in Iran would be the silliest thing TBA could do atm. This would open war with Iran and this time it would be an attack war without any UN backing, not even theoretically. Maybe you should think before you post. Fully agree. Politically to risky. The US tries to win back the support from the UN, aiming for further forces to be stationed in Iraq to relieve US forces.

Good question. I guess first of all I trust my EQ. I started to catalyse the entire 9/11 when I was able to read about the terorists themselves. Mohammed Atta and his past in Germany. His conections with fundamentalist groups in the area and his trip to Afghanistan. The ideology of Bin Laden, his training camps in Afghanistan and the words he spreads. The centre of 9/11 is to be found in current Arab ideologies and not in the sick mind of a political advisor (a la "wag the dog")

Does anyone still believe Iran is next? I doubt that the US still has the financial capabilities to support another battlefield. It is another proof that even the strongest economies of our times are not capable to conquer and occupy small-to-medium-size countries. The limitating factors are lack of financial resources and moral support on the home front. We seem to be reaching another turnaround of military orientation. I bet in the future military science will have to invest more time into developing the "after-war" logistics. Means that enable better supervision of occupied territory. That an old T-72 is no match to a Stealth bomber we know since quite a few years now. But that a boy with a kalaschnikov can be just as lethal as a a Delta force soldier ...well that we know since ocupation scenarios such as the Middle East conflict and the AFTER-PARTY now in Iraq!

They call me Schroeder here in Malta, cause that is the only german they know.. (uhmmm well they know another one famous during 1940ies but they wouldnt dare to call me that...I hope)

lets get back on topic. Or we risk to bring down the peace-plan. Lets stay productive, and no terorist acts in this forum anymore please! Â And yes, I do have a serious minority complex because I am NOT a moderator!