State of Iraq

[ACPlayer]

Glad we have found some more common ground.

[nicky g]

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I think you may be misunderstanding why I call the insurgents evil.

It is not because I view their side as "wrong" (although I do). It is rather because they are targeting and killing ANYONE they can, basically. They are killing their own countrymen, not just American soldiers; not even just government/security Iraqis, either: they are deliberately killing innocent civilian Iraqis as well. In short, they are no better than terrorists
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It is primarily their tactics to which I am objecting. The fact that they have adopted terrorist/nihilistic tactics is what makes them evil. If they were targeting only political leaders/soldiers of the other side, I would disagree with their view, and think them rather stupid for continuing to fight, but I would not think them evil. However adopting terrorist tactics crosses the moral line in a very deep way which I believe is worthy of the appellation "evil". Even more so for the al-Qaeda insurgents in Iraq who have made it their business to terrorize and behead uninvolved innocent persons. If that isn't "evil", then nothing is.


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The problem with this view is that the insurgents are not one single unified group; there are several large groups and dozens of smaller ones, split between various groups of Islamists, Baathists, adn Iraqi nationalists. Not all the groups engage in the civilian attacks; indeed there's been a lot of recent reporting on some of the bigger nationalist groups issuing threats to the people engaging in the attakcs that target civilians. A recent report also showed that 75% of inusrgency attacks target occupation troops. In terms of the number of victims however, civilians and Iraqi forces have paid the highest price as they are much much softer targets than the coalition forces.

[hetron]

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Good thing they were right on slavery, women's rights, segregation and worker's rights, huh?



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Im not sure what "workers rights" exactly means, but if you mean the modern labor movement in the U.S. it has basically decimated the working middle class in the U.S.

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Before the "modern labor movement", there was no middle class to decimate.

[adios]

The political goals of the Baathists and the radical Islamists are clear, what's not so clear are the political goals of what are referred to as the Iraqi Nationalists. Violence and destruction perpetrated against the Iraqi citizenry and Iraqi assets with no political goals is mindless and criminal. The political goals of the Baathists and radical Islamists are oppressive to say the least and evil seems an apt description to me. Nobody really can give a definitive answer on the exact makeup of the insurgency in terms of percentages. I note that attacks against U.S. troops have declined 22% since the Iraqi elections and attacks against the Iraqi citizenry and Iraqi security forces have inreased in kind. I further note that the Iraqi government has reached out to the "Nationalists" more than once with an offer of amnesty but there doesn't seem to be any movement there. I also note that the Iraqi political process gives the Kurds and Sunnis a great deal of political power. A link to the depiction of the insurgency which I think is fair:

Iraqi Insurgency

From the article:

Still, the New York Times article also references military data suggesting roughly 80 percent of violent attacks in Iraq were simply criminal in nature –e.g., ransom kidnappings and hijacking convoys- and without political motivation.

Former Regime Loyalists [FRL]
Sunni Arabs, dominated by Ba’athist and Former Regime Elements (FRE), comprise the core of the insurgency.

The loyalists of the criminal Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein represent the core of the insurgency and are continuing their criminal activities in Iraq. The radical Islamics are promoting terror and murdering innocent civiliams. The insurgency is a far cry from the likes of revolutionaries that leftist propoganda portrays them as.

[adios]

The issue is whether or not the Oil-For-Food programme indicates U.N. corruption (leading as high up as Kofi Annan) and whether or not Security Council votes were comprimised by the corruption.

You totally misrepresent how sanctions came about against Iraq in previous posts. Yes the U.S. supported sanctions but so did many other countries including the voting members of the Security Council. Bush 41 was hailed as a great statesman throughout the world for the coalition that he helped organize for the conduct of Desert Storm. Witness the participation of the Desert Storm coalition members. I agree that the sanctions imposed on Iraq hurt the Iraqi people the most and I agree that they were a very bad idea. FWIW I think U.S. made major mistakes in how it proceeded leading up to Desert Storm and after.

[nicky g]

One quick point: the US and the UK pushed for the severest sanctions, blocked by far and away the most aid and essential equipment under dual use grounds (hundreds and hundred of objections compared to handfuls from other countries, if memory serves me right) and were the biggest opponents of reforming and lightening the sanctions burden.

[[censored]]

dear nicky g,

It would be helpful if you would refrain from being reasonable and making strong arguements. I have a strict policy of dismissing all views opposite of my own and I prefer this to be as easy as possible.

Please correct your problem in all future postings.

thanks

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