So now that the Muslims BEHEADED someone, you still think we're the badguys?

Drop the 9-11 bit, please, that excuse is OLD. You didn't liberate a country...you terrorized them. You bomb the shit out of them, and THAT'S liberation?
And your *incident* DOES make you the bad guy. It makes you a pussy.
THE POOR GUY WHO GOT HIS HEAD CHOPPED OFF?!?!?!?!?!?! What about the Iraqi soldiers, eh? Ah...THAT doesn't matter...THEY aren't American. The soldiers who were drug out in public? What about the Iraqi soldiers who were ridiculed...tortured...beaten....and THEN photographed through the whole thing?
NO...it doesn't matter....YOU are the bad guy. YOU are the problem.

 

So some poor activist gets beheaded by a bunch of hooded guys. The victim was already a thorn in the side of the W team. Who says those hooded guys were anyone other than CIA? Seems like a pretty convenient media stunt to me, plus they got rid of one annoyance in the process.

 

The legality is at the very least extremely questionable, more so now that the assertions used to justify the war have proved to be mistaken.

No WMD stockpiles or evidence of active programs have been found.

Please quote your source regarding the link between Afghani terrorist training camps and deception of the UN inspectors in Iraq. Why would Islamic fundamentalists in Afghanistan be interested in hiding Iraqi WMDs from the UN? You do know these are different countries, don't you?

There is absolutely no evidence that Salman Pak was a "terrorist training camp" other than the assertions of those in whose interests it is to say so. Evidence indicates this was a military facility for Iraqi special forces, possibly used for counter-terrorist training during the 1980s - with the support of British MI6 (this was when Iraq was on "our" side). There is no evidence of a link between the Baath Party and al-Qaeda - two ideologically opposed groups. If Salman Pak were what you suggest, the Bush administration would be yelling it from the rooftops. They aren't, because they would be laughed out of town. There's no valid evidence.

If it was him (doubts remain) and he is an al-Qaeda operative now fighting Americans in Iraq, he is doing so with impunity because Saddam Hussein's regime, an enemy of al-Qaeda, is no longer in power - al-Qaeda are now free to operate in Iraq as a direct result of the war.

No, there are no "hard facts" for any of that. That's precisely why Bush and Blair are in such hot water over the whole affair - hadn't you noticed?

 

It is truly astounding how some refuse to let go of the spin and the lies regardless of how many retractions are made by those who roginated the falsehoods.

Iraq was a secular state, completely anathema to religious extremism and most assuredly at odds with Osama.

The only case of verfied extremist activity was in the Northern "Kurdish" region which (those who continue to regurgitate the long debunked myths would do well to take note) was under US control.

 

Sorry, I messed up, they found the manuals in Iraq.

 

It's well documented that the Iraqis were less than forthcoming to UNSCOM. Despite this, UNSCOM and subsequently UNMOVIC did a very impressive job of disarming Saddam of materials proscribed under resolution 687 - this much was clear before the war if you read Blix's reports. It appears they might well have completed the task entirely.

 

A point to be remembered, UN Resolution 687 called for the deweaponisation of the entire REGION (that includes Israel) but we havent seen any effort in that regard since the resolution was first passed.

 

Interesting point, liquorice - I will have to go back to the original text of 687 again. I was recently trying to find out what the legal status of Israel's nuclear arsenal is, since Israel is not a signatory to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. This might just be the proof that Israel's nuclear weapons are illegal.

In the meantime, if anyone actually knows the facts of the the legality of Israel's WMD, I'd really like to know. Don't want to start an argument about whether they have the "right" to them, just what the technical legal situation is. Thanks

 

Uh--excuse me Maverick, there were no weapons in the first place. They did not have a manual and find ways to keep them hidden, there were no weapons of mass destruction!

When the "war" began the first thing US troops were ordered to protect were oil rigs? Coincidence? Absolutely not.

This war is meaningless and we're losing human beings not "Americans", human beings of all type to a war that makes no sense in the first place.

I've read a bunch of posts about people defending the war, a lot of news reports about Bush and his "decisions" but i haven't heard one good reason why we're in this war... at least not one reason that can't be disproven.

It's about time people started thinking for themselves and stop following what's said in the news. We live in the world, not America.

 

Just to clarify, Madness, Iraq did have WMD during the 1980s; this is proven. However, these were very effectively destroyed by the allies during the first Gulf War and in the subsequent inspection process by UNSCOM and UNMOVIC.

Just want to clear that up because extremist right-wingers and Bush apologists will jump on something like that!

You're right to state that there were NO stockpiles of WMD by the time the build up to the second Gulf War started in 2002.

 

A point to be remembered, UN Resolution 687 called for the deweaponisation of the entire REGION (that includes Israel) but we havent seen any effort in that regard since the resolution was first passed.

I don't recall seeing that in the Resolution.

From the resolution (a small part):

• Concerned by the reports in the hands of Member States that Iraq has attempted to acquire materials for a nuclear-weapons programme contrary to its obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons of 1 July 1968,
• Recalling the objective of the establishment of a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the region of the Middle East,
• Conscious of the threat that all weapons of mass destruction pose to peace and security in the area and of the need to work towards the establishment in the Middle East of a zone free of such weapons,

Then it goes on to what actions are required from the resolution. Maybe I missed it, but nowhere that I can see does it tell other states to remove its nuclear weapons.

 

It does ring a bell, although it might have been a clause about a "hope" for the region to be free of WMD. I'll go through it with a tooth-comb and report back...

 

From the preamble...

From Art. C Subpara 14:

In other words, the steps imposed upon Iraq serve as the precedent for the broader deweaponisation of the region.

 

Beheading someone is 'just' another way of killing people, and the americans have killed more iraqis than the other way round. How can people use the excuse that they're liberating a people who are suppressed and tortured, and then go on to do EXACTLY THE SAME THING?
A lot of Iraqis have said that the only difference between Sadam and the americans is that they can complain about it.
I'm not making excuses for chopping a persons head off, but it's not intirely amazing that someone would react like this to a country invading their country. Don't complain about the deaths of people who joined an army where they knew very well that they might die and they had a choice to do that, when they are killing people who are caught in the middle of an illegal war on their country.

 

How can war be classified illegal it seems like such a oxymoron to me.
You choose an enemy whoever that may be .
then you make it yuor peragitive to go and destroy that enemy.
So then this would be legal how?
I call it murder whoever you are. No man has the right to take the life of another man.
Self defense is one thing but you makle a choice like that.How could it be legal? well maybe on PAPER!

 

It isn't an official war; they didn't declare it, (and they're signed up to the Geneva Convention). That means that they can't declare an end to the war. The 'detainees' don't have any rights because they're not technically POWs. You could even class it as terrorism if you like(i don't personally), but that depends on how you define terrorism.

 

I agree with that. But the person was trying to say that the americans were the good guys, or weren't the bad guys, or worst guys or something.

 

That is pretty much the basic assumption of international law set up after the end of WWII - declaring war on another country is outlawed. Only in very special circumstances authorised by the UN is military action for the purposes of defence or in the interests of humanity "permitted". The USA gets round this quite neatly by never actually declaring war - they haven't done so since 1942 but have been pretty much constantly at war since then.

Anyway it is useful to say that unless a war is *specifically* authorised by the UN as justifiable military action, then it is illegal. This is the problem of Iraq - does resolution 678's 1990 authorisation of war to liberate Kuwait permit invasion and regime change in Iraq? No. But that was the legal basis on which Blair and Bush went to war. The Iraq invasion was almost certainly illegal.

 

That was my point all war is illegal. To say that this one is is only stating the obvious.

 

Well, it might have been legal if Iraq was DOING SOMETHING that required, according to international law, military action. Not only was Iraq complying with weapons inspections, there was no evidence that it was planning to attack anyone, threatening anyone, or doing anything that the REST of the oppressive regimes in the middle east, Africa, asia, south america, etc. have been doing for years.