Utter Nonsense

All I seem to read lately on here are posts advocating war mongering on the part of the US. The hawks point to the dictatorial regimes in power and how dangerous they are to our democracy. Anyone who disagrees is immediately some sort of supporter of terrorism or "anti-American". What garbage. What bunk.


Fact is, if these people were so dangerous to begin with, why were we supporting them not too long ago? Saddam and Bin Laden used to RECEIVE support from the US in the 1980's. Nobody said a peep about them then, though they were probably not much nicer back then either. We made a big deal out of Saddam gassing the Kurds around the time of the Persian Gulf War, but not a peep was ever heard about Turkish abuse of Kurdish civil rights (which still persists). Similarly, Bin Laden and the Mujahideen were described as "freedom fighters" in the 80's, but "terrorists" after 9/11. At the same time, little was heard about the independence movement of East Timor, until two years ago, after hundreds of thousands of East Timorese were killed by Indonesian soldiers. I wrote a resolution for a model UN conference back when I was in high school (1992) outlining a independent plebiscite vote to take place in East Timor. It passed in the "model UN" I was at, but the East Timor problem was largely ignored in the real UN because the US was too interested in exploiting Indonesia's natural resources and cheap labor for its own gain.


Such contradictions in foreign policy seem to be lost on many of the people here. But it is not necessarily lost on other people throughout the world. A lot of people worldwide disapprove of inconsistent US foreign policy, corrupt US-supported governments in their own country, and seemingly random and indiscriminate use of force worldwide. This is why eliminating terrorism through violent means alone will ultimately fail. Today, there are way too many ways to acquire either the materials or the actual weapons of mass destruction. True, you can make it harder, but the baddies will still get to them.


What really needs to be done is to support democracies and economic freedom for people in depressed regions that are hotbeds for terrorism. Something similar to the Marshall plan. However, in order for such a thing to be done, the folks in power must realize that such an action would have long term benefits that may outweigh ANY SHORT TERM COSTS. We can not have it both ways. We can not support corrupt leaders or human rights abuses in countries just because we want their oil, or whatever else they have. Those days must come to an end. The question is: will our leaders have the courage to end them?

Dude, don't you realize the NFL season is just around the corner?


natedogg

nate-web@thegrovers.com

hetr0n, you make some points, but what you must realize is that that militant Islam has already declared war upon us. This is the biggest point.


Sometimes the best defense is a good offense.


Ignoring the stark fact that war has been declared against us simply invites greater disasters as militant Islam develops greater and greater offensive weapons capabilities.

'but what you must realize is that that militant Islam has already declared war upon us.'


fact or opinion?

Bin Laden declared war on the U.S. several years ago. Unfortunately, very few people paid attention until 9/11.

>hetr0n, you make some points, but what you must >realize is that that militant Islam has already >declared war upon us. This is the biggest point.


'Militant Islam has already declared war upon us'. This is a comment I would expect from Bush and the crew, but hardly from anyone who has the rational ability to be a good poker or chess player. Such a comment is reminiscent of the cold war days, when the CIA, State, and Defense departments seemingly had carte blanche to do anything and everything, as long as it was against communism. I'm not going to rehash all the egregious abuses that took place as a result, but let's just say they were many and leave it at that for the sake of brevity.


Let's take a look at your statement about militant Islam. The only organization (AFAIK) that has openly declared itself at war with the US is Al Qaeda. I have NEVER seen any bona fide links between Saddam and Al Qaeda published anywhere. But we are going after Saddam. OTOH we have seen plenty of published links between Saudi money and various terrorist organizations, including Al Qaeda. Yet we much prefer to go after Iraq than the Saudis. Furthermore, Iraq is agreeing to go forward with the UN weapons inspections. So why do we still want to remove Saddam?


I think the reasons are more politically motivated than anything. It is much easier to go after Iraq than Saudi Arabia because the Saudis are our "allies", ie, we have a cozy economic and military situation with them. As someone on this forum once said (I believe it was Tom Haley), our economic practices have made for some strange bedfellows. Strange bedfellows, indeed. OTOH, Iraq is a country where we have no vested economic interest (but where we might have one after Saddam is removed). Saddam is a leader that the younger Bush definitely wants to get rid of, both because it will give his ratings a boost and also to finish off what his father started. In my opinion, attacking Iraq will put the US no closer to weakening Al Qaeda than it would if no invasion took place.

Taking Saddam's latest actions at face value would be foolish given his long history of delay, interference and deception. It is only now that he is convinced the 11th hour is fast approaching that he even has been willing to discuss the possibility of allowing inspectors to return. Did you read the UPI article excerpt in a thread below? Thinking that Saddam is acting in good faith here would be a very poor 'read' of him and the situation.


We can take the offense to militant Islam or we can wait for their next attacks. We can let militant Islam continue to gain in strength, popularity and military capablities or we can act now. Regardless of what you might think, militant Islam will attack again. Let's hope we can successfully intervene before we get attacked with a few nukes or something similar. Militant Islam makes no secret of their hatred of the Western free world, nor of their commitment to 'jihad' against us. Read more newspapers, do more searches on Google to find articles reporting on militant Islamic teachings and goals, and how widespread Islamic militancy has become, if you wish. When 6,000 out of Pakistans 40-45,000 madrassas (religious schools) teach outright hatred of the West, and 1/3 of the standard Saudi school child's curriculum is Wahhabism which teaches virulent anti-Westernism, that is a pretty strong indication of the breadth of the ideology we are up against--the ideology that backs the calls for jihad against the West by the many imams, muftis and mullahs in the mosques. Terrorists have shown they will indeed attack us given the opportunity. It is our imperative to curtail their opportunities as quickly as possible before things get even further out of hand.


Believe it or not, WWIII has already started and the future of Western civilization and the free world hang in the balance. Sure you can doubt this, but would you still doubt it say 5 years from now when and if nuclear explosions take out several major US cities all on the same day? This is exactly what militant Islam is striving for, and more, and is what we must prevent. Worse still, ten years from now it could potentially be far worse.

We should engage in the positive steps hetr0n mentions--along with fighting the enemies of the Western free world. One without the other will almost surely fail...and that works both ways. We cannot not fight against militant Islam, and we cannot fail to build nations too.


Seeking ONLY to build nations will fail when we get nuked out of our sweet dreams by the militants a handful of years from now.


What many don't realize is that the militants are so fanatic that they will hate us no matter what. It would be nice if they might change their minds or creeds, but they won't. And that's what we must deal with, while being willing too to help nations along the path to cannot just sit still and let the the militants attack and build for more attacks.