Bush?

[Napoleon]

In response to all the talk of the "evidence" that powell presented. A few notes:

1. None of this evidence has or even CAN be independantly coroborated by an independant source.

2. All of this evidence is highly circumstantial, it wouldnt be enough to convinct anyone in a court of law, so is it really enough to justify a multibillion dollar campaign that will leave half a million+ dead?

3. If shrubo and company were going to fake evidence, this is the EXACT sort of evidence they would provide. Stuff that is easily faked (which this is, most of the stuff they presented I could have made and made seem realistic) and completely impossible to either confirm or adequately deny. Just food for thought, im not saying definitely that it is faked, just that had they wanted to fake it, this stuff would have been the result.

On other notes:
1. Anyone who believes that Oil isnt a very large part of this should just curl up and die from sheer ignorance and blindness.

2. Anyone who thinks that we have the right to attack countries now because we think they MIGHT in the far far far far future have the possibility of attacking us (all we got about iraq, considering that basically their army cannot find their car keys, and they have about enough military might to loose to the island of figi in a straight fight) Is saying that both North Korea and Iraq have the RIGHT and would be on the side of all that is good, if they launched pre-emptive strikes on the US. They both have decent reason to think we will attack them, and thus under bush's logic they have the right and in fact would be the force of good against the evil people (us), to attack us, to nuke DC and NYC, to poison gas everything, etc.
(once again just food for thought)

3. About those who claim our beef with iraq is cuz they MIGHT not be following UN sanctions, there is another middle eastern country that has repeatedly failed to follow un sanctions/burned the sanctions and pissed on them. That nation is Israel, the US's best friend in the whole world. If we were attacking people because they failed to do what the UN told them to (not something for us to enforce, something for the UN to decide whether or not it is enforced) then Israel would have to be blown up first. The reasons for attacking the iraqs are no where near having anything to do with the old UN orders.

 

[Aries]

Originally posted by Napoleon
1. None of this evidence has or even CAN be independantly coroborated by an independant source.

so if nobody else knows about it, it isn't true, huh?

2. All of this evidence is highly circumstantial, it wouldnt be enough to convinct anyone in a court of law, so is it really enough to justify a multibillion dollar campaign that will leave half a million+ dead?

Iraq ain't in a court, and where do you gets these numbers that you keep bringing up? and anyway, all the evidence that pointed to 9/11 was highly circumstantial and wouldn't be able to convict anyone. does that mean 9/11 didn't happen?

3. If shrubo and company were going to fake evidence, this is the EXACT sort of evidence they would provide. Stuff that is easily faked (which this is, most of the stuff they presented I could have made and made seem realistic) and completely impossible to either confirm or adequately deny. Just food for thought, im not saying definitely that it is faked, just that had they wanted to fake it, this stuff would have been the result.

i don't know what to say other than pull your head out of your ass and think. with the press nowadays, damn near everything will get out sooner or later, and when it does, there will be hell to pay. and also, if they didn't want to fake evidence and just wanted to present their case to the UN with stuff they know, this is exactly the kind of stuff they would have given.

1. Anyone who believes that Oil isnt a very large part of this should just curl up and die from sheer ignorance and blindness.

so, where is your omniscent source that gives you all this info. Where is YOUR proof that this is just about oil?

2. Anyone who thinks that we have the right to attack countries now because we think they MIGHT in the far far far far future have the possibility of attacking us (all we got about iraq, considering that basically their army cannot find their car keys, and they have about enough military might to loose to the island of figi in a straight fight) Is saying that both North Korea and Iraq have the RIGHT and would be on the side of all that is good, if they launched pre-emptive strikes on the US. They both have decent reason to think we will attack them, and thus under bush's logic they have the right and in fact would be the force of good against the evil people (us), to attack us, to nuke DC and NYC, to poison gas everything, etc.

if your so convinced that the US is the evil empire, why the fuck don't you move to North Korea or Iraq? you sure you want to be here with all us 'evil people' ?

3. About those who claim our beef with iraq is cuz they MIGHT not be following UN sanctions, there is another middle eastern country that has repeatedly failed to follow un sanctions/burned the sanctions and pissed on them. That nation is Israel, the US's best friend in the whole world. If we were attacking people because they failed to do what the UN told them to (not something for us to enforce, something for the UN to decide whether or not it is enforced) then Israel would have to be blown up first. The reasons for attacking the iraqs are no where near having anything to do with the old UN orders.

what the fuck do you mean iraq MIGHT not be following UN sanctions. they arn't, simple as that. and are you really that naive to think that we would attack one of the only allies we have in that region?

 

[junior]

Originally posted by Napoleon
3. About those who claim our beef with iraq is cuz they MIGHT not be following UN sanctions, there is another middle eastern country that has repeatedly failed to follow un sanctions/burned the sanctions and pissed on them. That nation is Israel, the US's best friend in the whole world. If we were attacking people because they failed to do what the UN told them to (not something for us to enforce, something for the UN to decide whether or not it is enforced) then Israel would have to be blown up first. The reasons for attacking the iraqs are no where near having anything to do with the old UN orders.

The difference between Iraq and Israel is that we've never fought a war with Israel that ended with a peace treaty that stipulates that Israel agree to a set of conditions that its not adhering to.
We fought a war with Iraq.
Iraq lost.
As a result of said war, Iraq agreed to a set of conditions.
Just in case you're somehow missing the import of this, this basically means that Iraq agreed to perform certain actions, and allow other actions to take place, as a condition for peace with the US and other nations.
The fact that Iraq has NOT performed certain actions, and allowed other actions to take place, basically means that right now, a state of war technically exists between the US and Iraq.
That is as it stands AT THIS MOMENT!
Now everyone chooses to ignore this right now, and that's probably for the better, as it offers the slim chance that the peace agreements might be adhered to. But its been over a decade, and Saddam should have quit playing games long ago.

Now the difference with Israel is this -
Israel wins its wars.
The peace treaties at the end of the Israeli wars stipulated that negotiations over various pieces of land would take place. The stipulations were also vague enough that both sides have never entirely agreed on what the treaties referred to.
And Israel has negotiated over nearly every section of land that it has acquired from 1967 onward, with the noteable exception of East Jerusalem.
The negotiations haven't always been successful, but the reasons for such are probably fodder for an entirely different thread.

The evidence against Saddam is largely circumstancial, but it probably is enough to convict in a criminal trial in the US. The vast majority of criminal cases are decided on purely circumstancial evidence.

And for those who continue to insist that Saddam has never had Weapons of Mass Destruction, please keep in mind that this is simply not true. He's used them on his own people in the past, and this is a well documented, solid piece of fact.

Part of the problem that the inspectors are having is that some of these weapons that everyone already knew Saddam had have simply vanished into thin air. The Iraqis are acting as if they never existed in the first place.

Also of note is that I suspect Germany may never come around on the issue no matter what the inspectors find. Its current attitude toward the issue, as stated here:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/842500.asp?vts=020820031035&cp1=1

is that military action should not be taken even if the UN passes a resolution allowing such (scroll down the page until you find the chart labeled "Broad Range of Views" and click on the country of your choice).

And as for claims that the evidence is of dubious authenticity, well...
Just keep in mind a couple of things. While its hard to prove or disprove a recorded phone conversation, the same does not necessarily apply to satellite photos. All you need to do is have a single satellite photo of the same area that demonstrates that the US photos were doctored. I find it unlikely that the US is the only nation that has been remotely monitoring these sites, and if any nation had photos that conflicted with the ones the US provided, I'm sure they would have made them available by now.
Secondly, the information that Powell provided did not come just from the US. IIRC, the intelligence resources of multiple nations have been made available to the US in order to assist in making his case. Its merely that as the main supporter of renewed military action, it fell to the US to assemble the entire thing into a cohesive whole.

 

[Lynx]

Originally posted by Aries
so if nobody else knows about it, it isn't true, huh?

Yeah, but it would help to get rid of the sayer that Shrub wants Iraq's oil

Originally posted by Aries
i don't know what to say other than pull your head out of your ass and think. with the press nowadays, damn near everything will get out sooner or later, and when it does, there will be hell to pay. and also, if they didn't want to fake evidence and just wanted to present their case to the UN with stuff they know, this is exactly the kind of stuff they would have given.

Right, they would find out. They did.

In the last war, US gov used fake satellite photos to inform others. They played down the civillian losses.
There was a story about horrible war crimes of the iraqi army told by a woman. This particular story was fake, and the teller miraculously turned out to be the daughter of the US ambassador there.
The Iraquis were said to have caused a major oil spill to slow down the US army or something like that. They showed nice little photos of a Cormoran sea bird full of oil to prove it. Too bad that Cormorans have never lived in this country. But who knows that?
This is one of the reasons why some countries are reluctant to support the US. Don't try to argue about this because IT'S PROVEN.


Saddam has commited horrible crimes, he deserves to be put away, so why this fake evidence? No, wait that can't be true! The US gov is always honest and tells the truth, yeah?

BTW the british intelligence report about Saddam's WMD's turned out to be copied from a twelve year old students report about Iraq. They even copied the grammar mistakes and didn't notic until yesterday- funny, isn't it?

 

[Phillip Tanaka]

If it's evidence you're looking for, then how about this Iraqi officer.

"Nerve agents. Stop talking about it. They are listening to us. Don't give any evidence that we have these horrible agents."

Napoleon, you think that maybe America is faking the evidence? Well, let's suppose for a minute you are right. My feelings towards it are this. No one has the fucking right to fucking create fucking false fucking evidence that'll fucking start a fucking war. Not even the fucking U fucking S fucking of fucking A or fucking Great fucking Britain. If they are lying about the evidence then impeech the cunts in power, get rid of them. But I would think that someone would come forward if they were lying. You can't keep things covered up.

 

[Quarto]

You can't keep things covered up? It's pretty obvious that you can. Faking evidence, news reports and events has been a part of American foreign policy for so long that it's practically tradition. Iraq, Kosovo... these cover ups have been proven, but most people don't know about them anyway. The information is out there, but because the media doesn't talk about it, nobody cares. When someone talks about the coverups, other people's reaction is that it's just another crazy conspiracy theory. After all, if there was any truth to it, the media would talk about it... right?

 

[Ghost]

The CIA made various cover-ops and other *naughty* things in South America in the 60s-70s, bet that the average USA citizen doesn´t know that.

 

[Phillip Tanaka]

Maybe five or ten years ago you could cover something up. But it would be hoped that people would be smart enough to know when something doesn't add up.

While we're on the subject, does anyone remember what Saddam's reaction was to the claims America made against him?

 

[Quarto]

What exactly has changed since Kosovo? Why should it be any harder to cover things up now than it was then? If anything, a cover up right now would be even easier, because the consolidation of media ownership has progressed, not regressed.

Saddam Hussein's reaction? It's interesting you should ask, because I don't think anybody ever tried to find out what his reaction was - only one side of the story was looked at. Not that it would have mattered. He would have, quite naturally, denied the false allegations. And the US would have, quite naturally, used his denial as further evidence of his guilt. After all, the lack of WMDs in Iraq right now is being used as evidence of Iraq's duplicity.

 

[Aries]

Originally posted by Quarto
these cover ups have been proven, but most people don't know about them anyway.

well, if the cover ups have been proven, it means they have come out. just cause most people don't know about them doesn't mean they haven't come out

He would have, quite naturally, denied the false allegations.

and he would've, quite naturally, denied the allegations if they were true, which they are.

And the US would have, quite naturally, used his denial as further evidence of his guilt.

cause he is guilty

After all, the lack of WMDs in Iraq right now is being used as evidence of Iraq's duplicity.

it means that Iraq is hiding the WMDs. they have them, the inspectors just haven't found them yet.

 

[Quarto]

Originally posted by Aries
well, if the cover ups have been proven, it means they have come out. just cause most people don't know about them doesn't mean they haven't come out

Err, no. This is a case where knowledge doesn't necessarily mean anything. The evidence proving a cover-up may be available to the public, but if the public doesn't actually access that knowledge, the cover-up remains covered up.

and he would've, quite naturally, denied the allegations if they were true, which they are.

Of course he would have. But you're confused, because we're not talking about whether or not he possesses weapons of mass destruction, but whether the atrocities the US accused him of during Desert Storm actually took place. They didn't. The US lied. More to the point, pretty much the only atrocity that took place during that war was when the US slaughtered a retreating column of Iraqi troops.

cause he is guilty

Wow. Thank you, dear Aries, for so perfectly proving my point.

it means that Iraq is hiding the WMDs. they have them, the inspectors just haven't found them yet.

This is certainly a possibility, and all things considered, quite a likely one. But answer this - have you ever considered the other possibility? If we suppose for a moment that Iraq actually has no WMDs, but the lack of UN findings is nontheless being used as proof of Iraqi duplicity, then is there anything that Iraq could do to actually get out of this without war? In other words, what would it take to convince you that the UN is finding nothing not because Iraq is hiding something but because Iraq has nothing to hide?

 

[Aries]

Originally posted by Quarto
Err, no. This is a case where knowledge doesn't necessarily mean anything. The evidence proving a cover-up may be available to the public, but if the public doesn't actually access that knowledge, the cover-up remains covered up.

yes, if people don't know about it, it is covered up. but my point is that sooner or later, people WILL be able to access that knowledge.

This is certainly a possibility, and all things considered, quite a likely one. But answer this - have you ever considered the other possibility? If we suppose for a moment that Iraq actually has no WMDs, but the lack of UN findings is nontheless being used as proof of Iraqi duplicity, then is there anything that Iraq could do to actually get out of this without war?

sure i've considered it, and i dismissed because when someone like saddam gets the 'ultimate weapon', he ain't gonna give it up. and Iraq sure as hell can get out of this without war. all they got to do is comply fully with the UN resolutions, which, according to UN weapons inspector Hans Blix (sp?) IIRC, they haven't

In other words, what would it take to convince you that the UN is finding nothing not because Iraq is hiding something but because Iraq has nothing to hide?

an act of god, cause if they have nothing to hide, why the hell haven't they complied with the UN resolutions

 

[Quarto]

Originally posted by Aries
yes, if people don't know about it, it is covered up. but my point is that sooner or later, people WILL be able to access that knowledge.

By then, it won't matter. The war will be over, and nobody will care about the lies that persuaded everybody to support it, because the public debate will have shifted to another topic.

sure i've considered it, and i dismissed because when someone like saddam gets the 'ultimate weapon', he ain't gonna give it up. and Iraq sure as hell can get out of this without war. all they got to do is comply fully with the UN resolutions, which, according to UN weapons inspector Hans Blix (sp?) IIRC, they haven't

So, let me get this straight. You think Saddam Hussain has weapons of mas destruction based on your belief that if he ever had weapons of mass destruction, he would never give them up. That's really sensible... in a parallel universe.
And you're putting Hans Blix' words out of context. After all, Blix is far more critical of the US' refusal to cooperate in the search for Iraqi weapons than of Iraq's stance. And surely, you must understand why the rest of the world finds it suspicious that the US a) claims to know where Iraq is hiding its weapons, b) is the country most interested in finding these weapons, and yet... c) refuses to offer any useful assistance in the search for these weapons. Something in there doesn't seem to add up.

an act of god, cause if they have nothing to hide, why the hell haven't they complied with the UN resolutions

On that same logic, the US army is full of war criminals, because the US refuses to join the ICC treaty. What could they possibly be afraid of?

 

[Napoleon]

Quarto: Ive decided it is pointless to argue with the people like aries, they are as bad as YECs, you can show them any amount of evidence and logic to show that their possition is full of holes, immoral, wrong, and plain silly, but they will keep on thinking what they did, and then they will call you a traitor, or some such, and they will feel so superior for insulting the evil people trying to change their minds with evidence and logic rather than "i believe" and "i think" and "i feel" statements. Which are about all that kind of person understands.

Maybe we would have more luck with him if we said "I have faith that I believe that Saddam seems like a nice guy, and I feel that he cannot have anything to hide, because I think he seems like a decent fellow"



(Note that last sentence was full of rather extremely super duper extra large amounts of sarcasm)

 

[Dominator]

Originally posted by Quarto

On that same logic, the US army is full of war criminals, because the US refuses to join the ICC treaty. What could they possibly be afraid of?

They are afraid of some leftist european judges who misinterpretate concepts of justice, law and order and who think that every soldier is potential war criminal.

 

[Napoleon]

Originally posted by Dominator
They are afraid of some leftist european judges who misinterpretate concepts of justice, law and order and who think that every soldier is potential war criminal.

First off, EVERY SOLDIER IS A POTENTIAL WAR CRIMINAL>

its kinda obvious any soldier can rape and murder just as easily as any other.

And leftist judges, so basically anyone who looks at the basic declarations as to what is a warcrime, set down primarily by nuremberg (i trial the US prosecuted and had a judge on) and by the geneva conventions (which the US has ratified), and sees if they have been broken.

Bsaically, If the courts are good enough and an excelent idea for the US's enemies and a good judge of justice for them, why arent they good enough for the US? because we want to be able to rape, murder, steal, genocide, and commit warcrimes up the wazoo without being held accountable.

 

[Phillip Tanaka]

Is that so? And where. prey tell, do you hear that soldiers want to be war criminals?

 

[junior]

Originally posted by Quarto
If we suppose for a moment that Iraq actually has no WMDs, but the lack of UN findings is nontheless being used as proof of Iraqi duplicity, then is there anything that Iraq could do to actually get out of this without war? In other words, what would it take to convince you that the UN is finding nothing not because Iraq is hiding something but because Iraq has nothing to hide?

Unfortunately, that overlooks one important thing. Iraq has had and has used WMDs in the past, against the Kurds, and iirc against the Iranians (during the war in the early '80s). So there's no dispute over whether or not Iraq has had WMDs. The question is whether or not they have any now.
So the inspectors go to Iraq to look around and find out what the state of Hussein's weapons program is like. They want to know two things. First, they want to know what he's been up to lately. Second, they want to know what he did with all of the toys he already had.
Now its entirely possible that with the first, absolutely nothing might have happened. Hussein might have decided at some point following the Gulf War (and after he finally kicked out the inspectors a few years back) that WMD programs were a waste of time, and that he was better served by not developing any more. In this scenario, maybe he's decided to become a peace activist, or maybe he's decided to just wait until the sanctions are revoked, or maybe its somewhere in between. The specifics don't really matter.
The problem is the second. THOSE weapons existed. They were used. The entire world saw the results that those weapons had, and knew about them long before the Gulf War.
So what happened to them?
The Iraqis claimed they were destroyed.
Might be true, but you'd expect a little documentation or other evidence to back that up. You know, the names of truck drivers who transported this stuff, written orders specifying the stuff was supposed to be destroyed and what was to be destroyed when and where, and similar bits of evidence.

Here are Mr. Powell's comments on how all of this relates to Iraq's known stockpile of Anthrax.

First, you will recall that it took UNSCOM four long and frustrating years to pry--to pry--an admission out of Iraq that it had biological weapons.

Second, when Iraq finally admitted having these weapons in 1995, the quantities were vast. Less than a teaspoon of dry anthrax, a little bit about this amount--this is just about the amount of a teaspoon--less than a teaspoon full of dry anthrax in an envelope shutdown the United States Senate in the fall of 2001. This forced several hundred people to undergo emergency medical treatment and killed two postal workers just from an amount just about this quantity that was inside of an envelope.

POWELL: Iraq declared 8,500 liters of anthrax, but UNSCOM estimates that Saddam Hussein could have produced 25,000 liters. If concentrated into this dry form, this amount would be enough to fill tens upon tens upon tens of thousands of teaspoons. And Saddam Hussein has not verifiably accounted for even one teaspoon-full of this deadly material.

And that is my third point. And it is key. The Iraqis have never accounted for all of the biological weapons they admitted they had and we know they had. They have never accounted for all the organic material used to make them. And they have not accounted for many of the weapons filled with these agents such as there are 400 bombs. This is evidence, not conjecture. This is true. This is all well-documented.

Why is it so hard for Iraq to produce any details on the Anthrax?

 

[Lynx]

Originally posted by Phillip Tanaka
Is that so? And where. prey tell, do you hear that soldiers want to be war criminals?

No one said they want to be war criminals. The little word was POTENTIONAL .

If an US soldier commits such crimes, why shouldn't he be punished by the international court whose creation they initiated?

 

[Phillip Tanaka]

Originally posted by Napoleon
Bsaically, If the courts are good enough and an excelent idea for the US's enemies and a good judge of justice for them, why arent they good enough for the US? because we want to be able to rape, murder, steal, genocide, and commit warcrimes up the wazoo without being held accountable.

Ergo, this claim says they want to be war criminals, or at least commit war crimes.