Re: The Admirable Hitchens

Jr@Ease wrote:
Once Upon a Midnight Dreary (actually, it was on Wed, 21 Mar 2007
22:11:39 -0500), while ian Pondered, Weak and Weary:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Once again, Iraq had NOTHING to do with the 9/11 attack. Nothing, not a thing. Invading Afghanistan was an adequate military response to 9/11. The rest should have been a police action, as argued by some here back then.

, and b) at least
some acknowledgement that their wisdom (and sickening self-righteousness in many cases) is the product purely of the blinding light of hindsight,
You conveniently forget that the Bush Administration, not getting the desired intel product from the CIA nor the State Dept, set up its own operation and cherry-picked the data needed to create their marketing plan, and as a result either fooled themselves or lied us into an unnecessary war. We were denied the true factual basis on which to make our own decision on whether the war was a good idea, and sold a pup by a bunch of marketeers.

So, hindsight includes recognising that we were deceived, advertently or inadvertently.


I'm still a little confused about what would have happened if we
didn't attack Iraq and depose Saddam. The implication from Jane, and
Mique, is that if we didn't attack Iraq, we'd look weak and
ineffective, and then he would have ratcheted up the (non-existent)
threat, to a point where we would have had to do something. I'm not so
sure. It's possible that we would have contained him in a sort of
stasis until he died, was deposed or killed by frustrated Iraqis. The
an orderly or non-orderly transition would have taken place.

The other side of this is that perhaps Iran would not be so hellbent
on acquiring nuclear weapons had they not seen what we so cavalierly
did to their next door neighbor. From their viewpoint, it's America
that appears unstable. If I was Iran, and looking westward, I'd feel a
strong urge to have nuclear weapons in my pocket, too. Perhaps,
without the chaos we started in Iraq, diplomacy would have worked to
keep Iran in line.

Just because Saddam violated UN resolutions doesn't mean that he got
away with it, requiring us to invade. We had him bottled up. Time
*could* have resolved the matter. He was no threat to us in the
position he was in in early 2003, no matter how hard the Bushies tried
to paint 9/11 all over him.

The real problem now, however, is that Bush has opened Pandora's box,
and he can't get the lid closed again, much less restrained what's
come out.

John P

Agree completely. Apropo Iran, I don't know why we are so bent out of shape. Musharaff is looking as if he will be gone soon, and then we'll have a Pakistan we helped arm that may well not be our friend anymore. Why do we think its OK to expand the nuclear weapons of our current 'friends', when we know from history that they will not be our friends at some future date?

I can see 20 years down the road Iran being our big buddy in the Middle East, while we pick out some other country as our enemy-du-jour, so to speak.

Iran is behaving rationally, and we can, by continuing our efforts, eventually curb their behavior, because it will make rational sense for them to do so.

And all this is without even looking at the arrogance that believes the world should be carved in our image. Its not, and it won't be.

Ian



.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: The Admirable Hitchens
    ... didn't attack Iraq and depose Saddam. ... The other side of this is that perhaps Iran would not be so hellbent ... strong urge to have nuclear weapons in my pocket, ... *could* have resolved the matter. ...
    (rec.arts.mystery)
  • Re: Use the oil weapon against Iranian nukes
    ... There was no evidence that the United States had nuclear weapons until ... > Iran is ... >> from foreign refineries! ... >> companies investing in the energy industry in those nations*) have lead ...
    (alt.politics.bush)
  • Re: Until Freedom Rings
    ... They will be soundly defeated by Israel. ... Nuke Iran, Blame the Jews ... The current conflict may escalate to ... will be the first use of nuclear weapons in war since Nagasaki. ...
    (soc.culture.iraq)
  • Re: Use the oil weapon against Iranian nukes
    ... > There was no evidence that the United States had nuclear weapons until ... >> Iran is ... >>> power the ability to use an oil weapon against Iran in order to stop ... >>> from foreign refineries! ...
    (alt.politics.bush)
  • NIE Report: Iran Shelved Nuke Weapons Program Years Ago
    ... Iran Shelved Nuke Weapons Program Years Ago ... shelved it's nuclear weapons program over four years ago. ... "We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, ...
    (sci.military.naval)