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Today a remarkable landmark was passed
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
Today the 20th of August 2003 is the 120th day the coalition troops have been looking for WMDs in Iraq.
Exactly the same 120 days the UN inspectors were allowed to look for them before the Axis of Murderers accused them of incompetence for not finding all those WMDs, pushed them aside and bombed a sovereign nation to pieces.
Of course, the coalition troops have the advantage of total freedom of movement and full access to any site they want. Which you could say it equals about 400 days of UN inspections.
Can we look forward to hearing a full apology to the UN and of course to Mr Blix by mass murderers Bush and Blair any time soon?
Exactly the same 120 days the UN inspectors were allowed to look for them before the Axis of Murderers accused them of incompetence for not finding all those WMDs, pushed them aside and bombed a sovereign nation to pieces.
Of course, the coalition troops have the advantage of total freedom of movement and full access to any site they want. Which you could say it equals about 400 days of UN inspections.
Can we look forward to hearing a full apology to the UN and of course to Mr Blix by mass murderers Bush and Blair any time soon?
Beep boop. I'm a bot.
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Comments
Don't be silly Tony's in Barbados playing Christian folksongs with Cliff Richard while Iraqi families search for enough food and water for their dinner. Dubya probably can't even spell apology let alone issue a full text.
I do find what's emerging from the Hutton Inquiry more and more disturbing, it now seems that Saddam had no motive to use WMDs or posed an imminent threat to his nearest neighbours let alone members of the "coalition" who removed him from power. Also now apparent is that the trail for the release of Dr Kelly's name now goes all the way back to our esteemed Prime Minister despite every attempt of his government to distance him from it. I hope to see us entering 2004 with a new Prime Minister.
Get it to that stage and the repercussions may well reverberate back across the Atlantic to put the real architects of this ongoing crisis in the docket as well!
Or maybe something will be planted and then suddenly discovered. If they have said that the case for war was to liberate Iraq's people then maybe people would have a bit more respect for them.
Weapons, Gulf War 1 aside, what does everyone think other countries should do if (if anything) to deal with a brutal dictator (not necessary Saddam)? Is it right to invade or is it OK to just sit back & let things like this happen in the day & age?
on the other sit back and let them get on and dictate
I find it had to sit back and watch peoples human rights being abused but I think there are better ways than bombing etc. the work of AI for example, uniting people and tirelessly campaigning against the abuse of human rights.
maybe there is no answer to the selfishness of some people and all we can do is provide safety and sanctuary to those affected.
Clan you seriously expect the Hutton Inquiry to prosecute Blair? Won't happen, the worst he can do is say the fault for Dr Kelly's death lay solely with the government and especially Number 10 but that's highly unlikely - government inquiries are designed to spread out the blame everywhere so no-one really knows who was responsible. :rolleyes:
All we can hope for is that Hutton's judgement contains enough of a damnation of the government to start causing resignations - although rumours are that Alastair Campbell and Geoff Hoon will both resign after the Inquiry reports in order to protect Blair. What we can hope is that once the resignations start there is a snowball effect and the calls for Blair to go eventually prove too much, especially with a stormy Labour Party conference coming up in October....
The Hutton inquiry is not really looking into such issues. Everybody knows that the dossier was highly misleading and that the 45 minutes claim was inserted even though it was false. The inquiry only seeks to find who did this and who leaked Kelly's name to the press in order to settle a war of words between Downing St. and the BBC.
A far better purpose would be served by examining the close relationship between the British and the US administration (not one known to tell the truth very often) and demanding to know why the British government lied to the UN, British parliament and public, presented false and doctored information as accurate, ignored international law and ultimately waged an illegal and unnecessary war of occupation that cost the lives of tens of thousands.
Those charges are serious enough to force the Prime Minister out of office, even into jail, but we all know the chances there are of anyone looking into them.
Surely the British public should want more by way of punishment for ALL involved than to simply accept some resignations. Perhaps not.
There are some people who at least demand his resignation, but there are in the minority.
We don't even have a Freedom of Information Act so by the time government documents are made public we will all be dead or very old, and as usual no-one will be punished.
Its enough to make one despair!
We do, its just that I wouldnt wipe my arse with it its so worthless.
OPersonally I think Dubya and Blaire should do the sit-down dance in one of those swanky new Texan prisons that Bush built, but like thats ever gonna happen :rolleyes: Best thing would be for Blairs plane to crash on the way back from Barbados.
Suggesting that only the Govt are at fault here.
Again, you seem to forget the role played by the BBC which the evidence suggests was none to good. Hell even the Today programme are suggesting that Gilligan was in the wrong... :eek:
As for the WMD, you know my opinion on this as the reason for war. I still think that Saddam himself and his regime was enough...
With regard to the WMDs, it's fair enough that you believe what you believe. But crucially the government didn't. The excuse given for going to war was the "immediate and real" threat Saddam's WMDs posed and the need to remove them.
More crucially, we were told that there was no doubt of the existence of the WMDS and the threat Saddam posed, and that's why Britain and the US could not give any more time to the UN inspectors.
Lies, damned lies and murdering idiots.
I've spoken to a medic who was looking after some of the torture victims (including a Kuwaiti who'd been there since GW1) and to be honest I still really don't care if we ever find WMD. That these people are no longer being systematically tortured is enough for me.
As you say we seem to get away from the real issues, and the WMD aspect is just another of those, IMHO. It makes no difference is Saddam had or didn't. What matters is that his regime was horrific and we could do something about that.
And before you suggest that the UK/US Govts are as bad, you can do something about that too. You'll get your chance at the ballot box...
It is certainly not for any nation to pick up a country at random, claim they're going to liberate its people from oppression and bomb the said country to pieces and conquer it. We all know that the US couldn't give a flying toss about the well-being of the Iraqis. People should not fall into Bush's trap and say "so what if the Americans did it for their own reasons? Something good has come out of it".
Especially when Bush's new friends includes the man who boils people alive and sends 5-year-olds to forced labour working the cotton fields.
And if the UN doesn't approve, should we sit back and watch?
What do you think of the following regimes:
Idi Amin
Pol Pot/Khmer Rouge
Mugabe
Bush/Republicans
???
But isn't that a very valid question?
WW2 was persecuted for our own reasons but the liberation of France. Holland, Belguim etc came out of it...
Must have missed something, who is that?
MoK no-one's saying that it isn't a good thing that Iraqis aren't being tortured anymore. However, there are regimes torturing their civilian populations all over the world and I don't see Bush and Blair moving on to liberate those people such as in Zimbabwe. Therefore, I don't think we can say that it was a point of principle by the British and American governments to liberate those being tortured by their governments.
We knew about Saddam torturing people well back into the 1980s and probably before. So I don't believe that saying "they're not being tortured anymore so it's all okay" is a good enough reason to excuse the war and the loss of life it caused to Iraqis and our forces alike. The government said earlier this year that we were going to war to remove weapons of mass destruction which posed an imminent threat to Saddam's neighbours (which was a lie) and that he had a motive to use them (which also was a lie).
The reason most people supported the war was because they believed what Downing Street said about Saddam posing an imminent threat - that has been proved to be a lie and so the government lied to us about the reasons we went to war. That is the real issue, the government wilfully decieved parliament and the public so satisfy Blair's vanity and Bush's bloodlust.
The BBC did make mistakes, but they are minor compared to the mistakes the government made. The biggest mistake the BBC made was to reveal Dr Kelly's identity after his death. The biggest mistake the government made was to take this country to war under false pretences - there's no comparison.
State vigilantism is as unacceptable as street vigilantism.
Meet President Karimov of Uzbekistan.
* Sorry, understand the point of the images but can't link directly through to them from here.
Another link
If the UN doesnt agree then its not for one nation to unilaterally decide to play almighty universal judge and jury, thats democracy (if we truly subscribe to the democratic principles we claim) as messy and inconvenient as that might be to our sensibilities.
There are always other ways of resolving conflicts, invasion is an admission of failure or a demonstration (as in this instance) of other actual interests at stake than those proclaimed so vociferously by Washington and London.
What do I think of the following:
Idi Amin - Was fully funded, armed and supported by Washington (now dead).
Pol Pot/Khmer Rouge - was put into power by the CIA and backed by successive administrations through back channels whilst being verbally condemened for the television cameras.
Mugabe - yes, and what is being done? Nothing much obviously. He doesnt have strategic or economic assets of interest to the US or UK. In the end humanism is insufficient to prompt the powers to act.
Bush/Republicans - backward looking, self serving, criminal, unaccountable corporate backed pirates.
Can't say it is a valid question unless you prefer to live in a world where might makes right. Such a wish, for those who indeed do subscribe to this way of thinking, is a double edged sword which could just as easily put our countries on the receiving end of some future power's malcontent.
You also conveniently forget, in your repeated use of the WWII analogy, that it was a WORLD war against a regime which was actively conquering surrounding countries. The effort to stop Hitler and his war machine was thus legitimized by his preceding disregard for the sovereignty of other nations and international law.
Iraq was not invading anyone nor posing any legitimate threat either to its neighbours nor, more importantly, the West as was claimed as the justification for invasion and conquest.
and in the meantime?
But surely there comes a point when people have to act, even if it is outside the law. Especially when those laws seem to protect the worst aspects of society.
A nation's border should not be an obstacle to law... which is what the current charter allows.
Thank you.
Not directly they aren't. They are just suggesting that the method used was incorrect.
And they would happily have sat back and let things continue.
And we just sat and watched, I know. Hell we even supported him at that time.
Does that mean that we shouldn't have acted? Hell no.
If freedom from oppression is not something worth fighting for, then nothing is.
Oh, and Iraqi lives were already being lost, but there was no benefit coming from that.
So they lied. Millions of people are now free from oppression.
Would you prefer that they had told the Truth and millions were still being oppressed?
Seriously, I have not and will not defend the Govt for naming Dr Kelly, or for lying to the public.
But I will not excuse the BBC from misreporting. As I have said several times, the story which has created all this furore was a bad one and it is that story which is clouding the real issues that you seek...
So the answer is that we should allow oppression?
So why do we then condemn the US when it doesn't act?
So, in each of these cases why hasn't/didn't the UN act?
So where is the difference, invasion of Iran and Kuwait an irrelevance then?
At the end of the day the situation in Iraq wasn't new, nor were the human rights abuses of the last 2 years more serious than in previous years. If anything, Saddam's human rights record was far worse 15 years ago. So why the big hurry?
Going back to Dr Kelly for a moment, below is something that is going to go down well with conspiracy theorists everywhere. And I must say I have my doubts myself about his death. Sadly I believe this government would be perfectly capable to bump someone off in order to protect themselves.
Dr. Kelly thought he was a dead man.
Do you believe that concensus is possible?
Big hurry? 30 years is a long time to sit back, wouldn't you say?
I agree 15 years ago his actions were worse, so why didn't we (or the UN) act then?
Surely each of those regimes (and yes I include the human rights abusing US Govt in that) is just proof that the UN cannot and does not act when it should. Wasn't their role originally to uphold human rights?
Sorry, but I assumed from that article that he was suggesting that he would be bumped off by Iraq for lying to them?
Then after the first Gulf War we supported a popular uprising against Saddam but then betrayed it.
While we were supposedly enforcing the no fly zone, supposedly protecting the Kurds during the 90's, we were actually bombing sheperds, women and children and turning a blind eye when the Turkish airforce bombed Kurdish villages under the guise of anti-terrorist operations against the PPK.
During the sanctions on Iraq in the 90's, we denied them basic medical equipment and drugs. We were responsible for the deaths of half a million children.
Scott Ritter (ex UN arms inspector) has been quoted as saying that Saddam had complied with disarmament.
Exactly who is the oppresive regime here?
No, the answer is to avoid unilateral invasion and conquest under the pretext of giving a toss about a situation which our governments previously funded and supported without any twinge of conscience whatsoever.
I would rather my country acted within the confines of international law to which it previously committed itself by ratifying the UN charter. There is no clause contained therein that says, when a world power cant plunder what it wants or pursue the personal grudge policies of its leader at any given moment it may disregard its binding committment to multilateral solution building and do as it pleases.
This thinking (to which you obviously subscribe) as I said above is a recipe for future powers to do exactly the same to us should we become the focus of their self proclaimed sense of justice.
Those who clamour about "not acting" do so mostly when US governments do seek to adhere to international law and find multilateral solutions to difficult situations.
It isnt toppling Saddam that is being objected to, its the presumption that we had the right to conquer (for regardless of what you wish to believe, this IS a conquest, not a liberation) Iraq as the only means of achieving that end.
We could well have more legitimately provided backing for the indigenous insurgents so they could have accomplished it on their own without sending our own foreign troops where they have no business being. We didnt because, quite simply, what is wanted by Washington and London is a western designed puppet regime and not a theocracy which the majority of Iraqis may well prefer.
Its a case of claiming we have liberated them only to dictate to them what we will allow them to have as a political system of governance and that is NOT democracy in any way shape or form.
Thus even the ends do not justify the means.
Because, like now, the US dictated how such matters would be handled. Being behind these regimes it was not about to let the UN or international law stand in its way.
If anything this is a wake up call for the UN to be afforded more authority and control over the actions of its constituent nations, not less.
I shouldnt have to explain this to you, but if you insist...
Iraq invaded Iran and Kuwait over a decade ago (the former being at the direct behest of the US and UK and the latter a situation which was manipulated by the Washington to gull him into attacking so as to justify attacking Iraq). The military response to that invasion was made. Its remit was clear and limited and accomplished thus (regardless of what our former soldier boys wished to believe) that issue was over, finished, end of story.
The subsequent UN resolutions referred solely to disarmament of Bio/Chem weapons and had a strictly mandated regime for containing Saddam and dealing with his armaments. It did NOT extend the previous military remit in any way shape or form, nor did it sanction invasion.
At the time then of this second invasion, on grounds now proven to be a blatant lie, Saddam was not invading Iran/Kuwait nor was he any longer in possession of more than the bare bones of his once "4th largest military".
WWII was being fought against a regime actively and continuously expanding its territorial ambitions by force.
Sorry MoK, the WWII analogy is rubbish.
I see that the US government now wants help from other nations to keep the peace in Iraq. But they refuse to hand over military control, or even share it.
Surely if the US' interest was to restore peace and order in Iraq and to let the Iraqis govern themselves they would not object to an international military peace-keeping force working under the UN colours? So why do they refuse point blank to hand over or even share military control?
Why, when it is so clear that good at making war as the Americans might be, they haven't the foggiest idea about public relations or peace keeping.
Why, when it is also obvious that the mightiest military machine in the world is utterly incapable of stopping guerrilla attacks.
Surely nothing to do with wanting to interfere with the political process in Iraq or the control of the oil.
The US government couldn't possibly do such a thing!
Get your priorites straight.
The BBCs coverage of the war was purile , the license fee should be abolished.
The BBC continues to view the world through the lens of the soft left , it beleives that terrorists should be 'understood' and maintains a distaste for America , Israel and the west in general , and any belief which unites them such as Christianity.
Sadly the Hutton Inquiry will result in a few slapped wrists on all sides , the BBC should be a completly impartial organisation , its the least we deserve after it takes 116 pounds off of every household a year for the right to watch television , even if we do not watch the BBC.
The government should level the playing field.