Clarification/Follow-up by Choux on 02/01/05 3:42 pm:
Elliot:: These are the *tangible root causes*. For heaven's sake, lose the nit-picking. Blah!!
We can't change what people think, dude.
Clarification/Follow-up by ETWolverine on 02/01/05 5:20 pm:
Chou,
>>>These are the *tangible root causes*. For heaven's sake, lose the nit-picking. Blah!!<<<
I'm generally not a nitpicker. But in this case, the difference is important. The philosophy of the Muslim Fundamentalists predates their being poor and oppressed. They felt this way when the Ottoman mpire ruled most of the world, and they were the richest people in the world. They felt this way when they were the most scientifically advanced people on the planet. It is not lack of education, oppression, or being poor that makes them follow this philosophy.
What the lack of education, lack of money and lack of basic human rights does is create a sort of petrie dish in which little suicide bombers are cultivated. But absent that petrie dish, the philosophy would still exist.
Until you make that distiction, you cannot truly understand the enemy. You will assume that once they are rich and elect their own leaders, their philosophy will change and they will automatically become friends. If you have that expectation, you are doomed to failure for lack of understanding of your enemy.
Creating democracy in the area creates a different sort of petrie dish, one in which people are willing to risk their lives for freedom instead of oppression. THAT is our goal here, a different sort of petrie dish.
It's not nitpicking. It is a fundamental difference, and it is the difference between knowing your enemy and not knowing him. That is why I pointed it out to you. Sorry I didn't make it clear sooner.
>>>We can't change what people think, dude. <<<
Yes we can. Not individuals, but whole groups. And not in the short term. But in the long term, definitely. If Hitler could change an entire nation to accept genocide and a national goal, then we can, with enough time and effort and patience, change an entire region to REJECT genocide as a goal.
Elliot
Clarification/Follow-up by ETWolverine on 02/02/05 8:27 am:
Excon,
>>>Just show me the "money".<<<
I'll show you more than the money. I'll show you a picture of the al-qaeda
training facility in Salman Pak, Iraq, funded and supported by Saddam.
And here's some more info:
27-4-2003
The proof that Saddam worked with bin Laden Inigo Gilmore
The proof that Saddam worked with bin Laden
By Inigo Gilmore
(Filed: 27/04/2003)
Iraqi intelligence documents discovered in Baghdad by The Telegraph have provided the first evidence of a direct link between Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'eda terrorist network and Saddam Hussein's regime.
Papers found yesterday in the bombed headquarters of the Mukhabarat, Iraq's intelligence service, reveal that an al-Qa'eda envoy was invited clandestinely to Baghdad in March 1998.
The documents show that the purpose of the meeting was to establish a relationship between Baghdad and al-Qa'eda based on their mutual hatred of America and Saudi Arabia. The meeting apparently went so well that it was extended by a week and ended with arrangements being discussed for bin Laden to visit Baghdad.
The papers will be seized on by Washington as the first proof of what the United States has long alleged - that, despite denials by both sides, Saddam's regime had a close relationship with al-Qa'eda. The Telegraph found the file on bin Laden inside a folder lying in the rubble of one of the rooms of the destroyed intelligence HQ. There are three pages, stapled together; two are on paper headed with the insignia and lettering of the Mukhabarat.
They show correspondence between Mukhabarat agencies over preparations for the visit of al-Qa'eda's envoy, who travelled to Iraq from Sudan, where bin Laden had been based until 1996. They disclose what Baghdad hopes to achieve from the meeting, which took place less than five months before bin Laden was placed at the top of America's most wanted list following the bombing of two US embassies in east Africa.
Perhaps aware of the sensitivities of the subject matter, Iraqi agents at some point clumsily attempted to mask out all references to bin Laden, using white correcting fluid. The dried fluid was removed to reveal the clearly legible name three times in the documents.One paper is marked "Top Secret and Urgent". It is signed "MDA", a codename believed to be the director of one of the intelligence sections within the Mukhabarat, and dated February 19, 1998. It refers to the planned trip from Sudan by bin Laden's unnamed envoy and refers to the arrangements for his visit.A letter with this document says the envoy is a trusted confidant of bin Laden. It adds: "According to the above, we suggest permission to call the Khartoum station [Iraq's intelligence office in Sudan] to facilitate the travel arrangements for the above-mentioned person to Iraq. And that our body carry all the travel and hotel costs inside Iraq to gain the knowledge of the message from bin Laden and to convey to his envoy an oral message from us to bin Laden."
The letter refers to al-Qa'eda's leader as an opponent of the Saudi Arabian regime and says that the message to convey to him through the envoy "would relate to the future of our relationship with him, bin Laden, and to achieve a direct meeting with him."
According to handwritten notes at the bottom of the page, the letter was passed on through another director in the Mukhabarat and on to the deputy director general of the intelligence service.
It recommends that "the deputy director general bring the envoy to Iraq because we may find in this envoy a way to maintain contacts with bin Laden". The deputy director general has signed the document. All of the signatories use codenames.The other documents then confirm that the envoy travelled from Khartoum to Baghdad in March 1998, staying at al-Mansour Melia, a first-class hotel. It mentions that his visit was extended by a week. In the notes in a margin, a name "Mohammed F. Mohammed Ahmed" is mentioned, but it is not clear whether this is the the envoy or an agent.
Intriguingly, the Iraqis talk about sending back an oral message to bin Laden, perhaps aware of the risk of a written message being intercepted. However, the documents do not mention if any meeting took place between bin Laden and Iraqi officials. The file contradicts the claims of Baghdad, bin Laden and many critics of the coalition that there was no link between the Iraqi regime and al-Qa'eda. One Western intelligence official contacted last night described the file as "sensational", adding: "Baghdad clearly sought out the meeting. The regime would have wanted it to happen in the capital as it's only there they would feel safe from surveillance by Western intelligence."
Over the past three weeks, The Telegraph has discovered various other intelligence files in the wrecked Mukhabarat building, including documents revealing how Russia passed on to Iraq details of private conversations between Tony Blair and Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, and how Germany held clandestine meetings with the regime.
A Downing Street spokesman said last night: "Since Saddam's fall a series of documents have come to light which will have to be fully assessed by the proper authorities over a period of time. We will certainly want to study these documents as part of that process to see if they shed new light on the relationship between Saddam's regime and al-Qa'eda.
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2003
Clarification/Follow-up by paraclete on 02/02/05 2:38 pm:
Elliott
"I have seen your posts about the nature of Islam, and I know that you see the danger we face from Islam."
Yes, I know the dangers of militant Islam, but it doesn't give anyone the right to attack Islamic nations on a hunch or more of the flawed intelligence we have seen in the last decade.
"Yet you continue to slam the one guy on earth doing anything about it. You continue to talk about how the intelligence was "wrong", but you have no proof of that."
Elliott, do we believe the CIA whn it says Iraq has WMD or do we believe them when they say they were wrong and Iraq didn't have WMD. "? What proof do you want? the flawed intelligence of yesterday, or the political reality of today.
"The only thing you have proof of is the WMDs have not YET been found. W know that he had them... he used them against Iran and against the Kurds. We know they are unaccounted for,"
The reality is we don't know what is fact and what is Iraqi dissident fiction. I think WMD was a Saddam Scam to siphon Millions off from the Iraqi Treasury and as a big stick to keep Iran and America at bay.. A foolish ploy, but let's face it, Saddam wasn't that smart.
Yes, at one time he had some form of WMD, a rocket program and a Nuclear program, However I think there is considerable doubt as to quantity and quality.
"We know that several convoys moved between Iraq and Syria in the weeks before the war. What makes you think that the intelligence was truly faulty and that no WMDs exist?
Why should this intelligence be any more reliable that any of the "intelligence" of the time. If it is considered reliable, why hasn't US acted? Could it be they can't chew gum and spit at the same time?
"Preemtive action is the ONLY way to defeat terorism and terrorist-supporting regimes."
No. preemptive action hasn't been demonstrated to defeat the terrorists. It has given them a rallying point. One way to defeat terrorist supporting regimes is massive sanctions. I don't believe in gunboat diplomacy.
"I guess US civilians don't rate as high on your list as tyranical, terrorist governments".
Civilians everywhere rate higher on my list than adventurist governmental action by a cowboy president with a Wyatt Earp complex.
so long pardner......
Clarification/Follow-up by tomder55 on 02/04/05 8:13 am:
yeee hawwww ;yessiree ! We cowboys would like to share freedom with others instead of claiming to stand in solidarity with the oppressed and then do nothing about it .Luke 10 30-37
Clarification/Follow-up by ETWolverine on 02/04/05 1:10 pm:
>>>One way to defeat terrorist supporting regimes is massive sanctions. <<<
Paraclete, can you show me a single case in history where "massive sanctions" have done ANYTHING to destabalize or eliminate a terrorist-supporting regime? Just one case will do.
We're still sanctioning Cuba, and after 40 years they are no worse off than they were before the sanction started. We sanctioned Saddam for 12 years before going to war with him. Did those sanction inconvenience Saddam in the least? Hell, how many palaces did he build during those 12 years? How much money did he give to terrorist organizations and to the families of suicide bombers in the PA? Talk about an ineffective policy.
Sanctions don't work. The reason they don't work is that you can't lay seige to an entire country in a way that will destabalize that government. All you end up doing is hurting the innocent people that you claim to be concerned about.
Better a short, quick, decisive war. Fewer people end up dead, and the suffering lasts for a lot less time.
The reason that you don't believe in "gunboat diplomacy" is that you have absolutely no understanding of world history or politics, and the place of the military in that historical and political picture. You see the military as "evil" sometimes a necessary evil, but still evil. People with a REAL understanding of history know that true peace and diplomacy has never been acheived anywhere in the world without massive military support. It is the strength of one's military that makes diplomacy possible at all. The military is not evil... it is the driving force of diplomacy.
Elliot
