Soldiers Protect Civilians. Cowards Hide

there is no single reason for the states to invade iraq -- reality is never so neatly compartmentalized. single bullet theories are for fools, those who believe lee harvey oswald is the only person repsonsible for JFK's death. So i don't think you're doing yourself any favours with the "the only reason that X did Y is because of Z" approach.

I'm afraid soopaman's comment is all too accurate. too big a topic to get into, but...yeah.

Also, being "anti-terrorist" may sound good on the surface, but remember that americans who fought for and won independence from the brits were branded with the same label. The term is so ideologically charged as to be nearly useless for rational discourse. Persuasive communication aimed at the masses is a different story.

I echo birdy's comment about the unfair use of the term 'anti-semite'...the fact is that the guilt and horror and shame and rage and pain of the holocaust has tainted public debate about israel in unparalleled fashion. it prevents valid criticism of israel, and valid criticism is the lifeblood of public life -- it prevents the oppressed from becoming the oppressor. ironically, israel could learn a lot from modern german society.

its a similar phenomenon that shields Japan from the much-deserved criticism they deserve for their actions in WW2 - and which few dare to raise because of hiroshima and nagasaki......

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Originally posted by Birdy+27 April 2003 - 18:16--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Birdy @ 27 April 2003 - 18:16)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin--soopaman@14 April 2003 - 09:03
Last time I checked I lived in a Democracy, where the Government is elected to serve the populations best interests. If that population wants to continue to maintain the same standard of living, then the Government is duty bound to make our "wishes" happen. We need oil to make petroleum, paint, plastics, solvents, etc. We need these things to maintain our standard of living, so if our Government has to acquire these materials by questionable methods - so be it. It is a harsh reality of history that if a population wants something badly enough it&#39;ll find a way of getting it by fair means or foul. This&#39;ll probably get flamed but I don&#39;t mean to implicate any specific country in this argument - it applies to all of them&#33;&#33;

Also, with all this bleeting about injured children in Iraq at what age do they come off your "love list"???

Take it easy. :)

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It is because bin-Laden can point to people like you and convince others that this is what Americans generally think that people support him and are prepared to die for his cause.


Also, for the benefit of a lot of Americans, no doubt including yourself I would like to point out that the president of America has a mandate from the American people (well, in this case even that is doubtful), to run America. He does NOT have a mandate to run the world. If the president of the USA wants to run the whole planet then the whole planet should get a vote when he is elected.

Successive presidents of the USA, whether Democrat or Republican, have been democrats at home but abroad are simply dictators and terrorists on a par with Saddam Hussein, Stalin, bin-Laden etc. etc..

To say so is usually sneered at as being "anti-American." This is the same tactic Sharon uses when he dismisses critics as "anti-jewish" if they dare to question his murder of children for throwing stones. I am not "anti-American" I am anti-terrorist and anti-dictatorship and anti the people who support those things. By the way, Hitler used to use the "anti-German" label for his opponents too. [/b][/quote]


I hate to disappoint you but I&#39;M NOT AMERICAN&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;

Also, comparing ANY American President with Stalin is way off the mark. I can&#39;t recall all the details but didn&#39;t Stalin kill more of his own people than Hitler did?? Which US President did anything like that?? No US President has ever purged the intellectual population to the extent of Stalinist Russia, although the Communist Witch hunts in the film industry came close.

I was just pointing out that historically a ruling government does what it has to do to keep it&#39;s citizens content. Whether for good or bad only history will be able to judge&#33;&#33;

Birdy...............................you suck. :P

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Originally posted by soopaman@29 April 2003 - 09:04
Also, comparing ANY American President with Stalin is way off the mark. I can&#39;t recall all the details but didn&#39;t Stalin kill more of his own people than Hitler did??

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You seem to have not read my post. I clearly stated that American presidents are democrats AT HOME and dictators ABROAD. They don&#39;t kill their own people. They kill foreigners who they clearly see as being of less significance, perhaps because they can&#39;t vote them out of office.

American leaders have supported genocide and terrorism throughout the world. They backed Pol Pot, whose main henchman, Thiounn Prasith, now lives happily in Mount Vernon, New York.They backed Suharto who exterminated a third of the population of East Timor with American and British weapons. The list goes on, and on, it is way too long to type out here.

Forget Osama bin-Laden&#39;s terrorist training camps, they are kindergartens compared to Fort Benning in Georgia. 40% of cabinet members in the genocidal regimes of Garcia, Montt and Victores in Guatamala were trained at Fort Benning. 2/3 of the army officers who commited the worst atrocities in El Salvador, (when the US was helping the fascist dictatorship murder anyone who dared call for democracy) were graduates of Fort Benning, as was the leader of the death squads.

Fort Benning gradutes trained the Contra terrorists who murdered 30000 civilians in their attempt to overthrow the democratically elected government in Nicaragua in the 80s and impose fascism. The democratically elected governments economic policies were not to the liking of the US. (They failed, though the US succeeded, years later, in buying the election with massive financial support for their chosen canditate and, of course, the knowledge that the terrorism would continue if the people did not vote the way the US wanted them to)

In Chile, where democracy had been overthrown by the CIA once they realised that the economic policies of the democratically chosen leader did not suit the US, Fort Benning graduates ran Pinochet&#39;s secret police and 3 main concentration camps.

When the Shah of Iran was overthrown CIA training videos in torture techniques were found. In 1996 the US governments was forced to release copies of the schools training manuals. They recommended blackmail, torture, execution and the arrest of witnesses relatives.



Here is a quote from George Monbiot writing in the UK newspaper "The Guardian" a little while ago, which I think is pretty spot on:


"Given that the evidence linking the school to continuing atrocities in Latin America is rather stronger than the evidence linking al-Qua&#39;ida training camps to the attack on New York, what should we do about the &#39;evil doers&#39; in Fort Benning, Georgia?. Well we could urge our governments to apply full diplomatic pressure and seek extradition of the school&#39;s commmanders for trial on charges of complicity in crimes against humanity.

Alternatively we could demand that our governments attack the United States, bombing its military installations, cities and airports in the hope of overthrowing its unelected government and replacing it with a new administration administered by the UN.

In case this proposal proves unpopular with the American people we could win their hearts and minds by dropping naan bread and dried curry in plastic bags stamped with the Afghan flag"

Almost every dictatorial genocidal regime in the world is a client of the US. I will grant you that the US does get rid of those few that do not bow to its will, or, like Saddam, were ex-clients who slipped the leash.

The US likes to claim the moral high ground and say that they are "promoting democracy"when the country they want to attack HAPPENS to be a dictatorship. Whether Iraq becomes a democracy or not will depend entirely on whether they vote for someone who is friendly towards the US (and, of course, Israel). If they vote for someone who decides to nationalise the oil industry and take back the rebuilding contracts and hand them to Iraqi companies, or indeed, any companies not chosen by the US, then the graduates of Fort Benning terrorist training camp will be back, and the Iraqis will get a new Saddam.

the latest edition of harper&#39;s has a good article on how the US, IMF and World Bank (allegedly) impose control on the developing world. Essentially, they loan desperately needed money with conditions that favour the economies of the west, above all the US, not the debtor state, justified on the notion of free trade. Fundamentally challenges the notion that free trade is good for all. I don&#39;t know enough about macro-economics to make any independent judgement of the article, but I get the impression the interpretation is merely controversial, not flamingly marxist.

the article, by the way, is what i would call "good bias" -- ideologically slanted, but well-researched and presenting a reasonable argument. as opposed to something bill o&#39;reilly would say.

Economics-Of-Empire May03 Harpers, Finnegan

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Originally posted by Birdy+29 April 2003 - 10:39--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Birdy @ 29 April 2003 - 10:39)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteBegin--soopaman@29 April 2003 - 09:04
Also, comparing ANY American President with Stalin is way off the mark. I can&#39;t recall all the details but didn&#39;t Stalin kill more of his own people than Hitler did??

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You seem to have not read my post. I clearly stated that American presidents are democrats AT HOME and dictators ABROAD. They don&#39;t kill their own people. They kill foreigners who they clearly see as being of less significance, perhaps because they can&#39;t vote them out of office.

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[/b][/quote]
Unforunately, this is a very sobering and intelligent post. It can help the objective American to understand how other countries can be anti-American, as we sit over here thinking we are the good guys.

We just don&#39;t see or care how our country exploits other nations in pursuit of American ends.

I like the discussion of Fort Benning.

We call it training freedom fighters to liberate their country from oppression. The other side sees it as terrorist training. All about perspective.

This is just a quick 2 minute post, really just to give credit to an objective post which might broaden the world view of the willing. Great opening paragraph.

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Originally posted by soopaman@29 April 2003 - 02:04
No US President has ever purged the intellectual population to the extent of Stalinist Russia, although the Communist Witch hunts in the film industry came close.

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As shameful as the McCarthy era was, to compare it to Stalin&#39;s actions is ludicrous.

Stalin "purged" millions.

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Originally posted by clocker+30 April 2003 - 15:21--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (clocker @ 30 April 2003 - 15:21)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin--soopaman@29 April 2003 - 02:04
No US President has ever purged the intellectual population to the extent of Stalinist Russia, although the Communist Witch hunts in the film industry came close.

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As shameful as the McCarthy era was, to compare it to Stalin&#39;s actions is ludicrous.

Stalin "purged" millions. [/b][/quote]


Sorry if I didn&#39;t make myself clear. I meant the McCarthy Witchhunts could&#39;ve been the first step on a long and unpleasant road. I don&#39;t think I did a very good job of pointing that out.

Cheers. :D

Well, I find myself being guilty of apathy now.

Thanks for the post about Fort Benning.

Its information that most Americans who survived the 70&#39;s are aware of, but have pushed to the backs of our minds.

Many of the war and post-war movies of the 80&#39;s and 90&#39;s have some reference to the training there and what resulted from that training.

Joseph Mengale&#39; didn&#39;t hold a candle to what those men could do to a man to extract information.

And of our presence now in Iraq...Who was it that wrote,

"This last transgression is mans greatest treason:
To do the right deed,
for the wrong reason".

I may get yelled at for saying this, but it&#39;s really lame when people start whining and crying because we of all the people we lost in Iraq. WTF&#33; Im not saying that our soldiers are unimportant, or disregarding the pain felt by thier families, but the amount of people we have lost is nothing to the amount of people that we kill, or are killed by others. We made such a big deal over those POWs that got back to the USA. It was like six freakin guys, and they wernt even hurt&#33;&#33;&#33; They were on the news for over a week. What about all those Iraqis that got bombed? Why are they any less important than Americans? It makes me sick. ;)

They certainly were, to the Americans. Funny thing with war is that the world reverts into black and white. There is no room for gray, because if there are varying shades, popular support takes a nosedive.

:ninja: