So, how many Saddam victims are buried in mass graves?

and your point is?

 

Is it that Saddam is a bad guy?
Do I win? Do I win?

Oh man, I hope I'm the first one to get this one!

 

But why do you care?

 

To me, this just proves how much of a failure the Bush Administration is.

Saddam was/is (we don't know which tense applies right now) evil. 99 percent of Americans, Democrat and Republican, will agree on that. Dictators like Hussein, whether or not they're a threat to other countries, need to be gotten rid of for the good of humanity, and it's something that should fall within United Nations purview.

"But we can't do that for every dictator!" I hear some of you objecting. No, we can't. But we can keep each Saddam-style dictator up nights wondering: Who's next? Is it going to be me? Gee, maybe I'd better tone my act down so they'll go after the next guy and not me ... and meanwhile the next dictator is thinking the same thing.

But this can only be done if two things happen: One, there needs to be international sanction for the job. Two, there needs to be a plan for rebuilding a country if you have to go in and shoot it up to get rid of the dictator. The Bush Administration completely failed on both counts with regards to Iraq.

It should've been a simple job to assemble a coalition to get rid of Saddam Hussein. George Sr. masterfully assembled a coalition in 1990-91 to kick Saddam out of Kuwait. But George Jr. made a complete hash of the job. Instead of crafting it as a humanitarian crusade, the administration cooked up all sorts of WMD stories. Our potential allies asked for proof before sending their troops to fight and die alongside our troops. So sorry, the administration said, just take our word for it or you're pond scum, and we'll attack you instead of persuade you.

And then, of course, the Bush Administration seriously, seriously believed that all they had to do was enter Baghdad and people would literally be throwing flower petals in the streets for them. Rebuild the country? No plans there. Install a democracy where there had been none before? No problem, even though installing a democracy is not the same as installing a water heater.

So now, while the average Iraqi may not be shooting at American soldiers, he's not going to go out of his way to do anything from stopping them. And remember, this is the guy that we saved from Saddam Hussein. Except now he's out of work and having a hard time feeding his family and wondering what the hell is so great about Americans.

If there had been a plan, and international help to carry it out, that average Iraqi would be feeling a lot better about his life today. And less soldiers -- American and otherwise -- would be dying. And rebuilding Iraq wouldn't be something happening entirely on our dime.

So Bush Jr. managed to alienate our allies and actually get himself painted as the bad guy instead of Saddam. That takes some serious doing, but not in a good way.

Think about this, people: In just two years, all the goodwill the United States had from sympathy after 9/11 has been burned through like Paris Hilton going through a charge card to where now America is seen as the bad guy. And this is all thanks to George W. Bush.

 

I think you are ignoring the political situation in France. I honestly believe people like Colin Powell thought that the French, would eventually go along. Can you honestly say the administration did not try as hard as they could to persuade the French? Chirac put his own political interests in front of the interest of the world, and played into the strong anti-american sentiment in his own country. It is a shame, but I don't think all of the blame can be put on Bush.

 

France, in its Frenchness, might have been slow about joining an international coalition to remove Saddam under tcmahoney's scenario. However, you would have seen a more supportive Germany, UK populace, US populace, as well as increased likelihood of support from places like Turkey and in the Middle East (limited) and Europe. Under a more international push to remove Saddam, Russia and China would have abstained or gotten unrelated concessions to support. Frace, instead of the US, would have been the odd man out at the UN. They probabily would not have opposed a resolution, but had they NATO could have stepped in and done it (France doesn't necessarily have a vote on military matters in NATO).

Even if it had been done without a permanent alliance (NATO, UN), the US would have moved with much greater support and assistance for postwar reconstruction.

I would have pressed both issues, WMDs and human rights. That's not what the US did.

Saddam was an evil guy. But we didn't teach evil guys a lesson about committing mass murder by removing him. Compared to our handling of NK, I think we've taught evil guys to hurry up and get them nukes now so that the US won't come get you. And do it now, while the US is too tied up in Iraq to do much else around the world.

The hegimon has temporarily hogtied itself, now is the time for the rogues take as much as they can.

 

Wow. Just wow.

"Blame the negative consequences of Bush's incompetence, belligerence and lies on the French".

Maytag only wishes their washing machines could generate this amount of spin.

Look, George "You're either with us or agin us" Bush did two things to build a real coalition: jack and squat. In fact, he seemed to activively work to insult and drive away needed allies. Remember his "old Europe" crap? The French and German sure did. We even had to offer bribes to the Turks to help out. Why was this? I suspect because world leaders knew what other intelligent people knew: that the conquest of Iraq had nothing to do with justice for 9/11, the "War On Terror" or the plight of the Iraqi people, that the Bushies had no legitimate plans for what to do in Iraq once the shooting stopped and that their own people saw through Bush's lies and did not support an immediate invasion over other options.

In the end, after insults and threats didn't work and other countries refused to drink the Kool Aid, the Bushies had to bribe other countries besides our traditional little sidekick Britain to join the Coalition of the Well Paid. tcmahoney is right. While Saddam is a bad, bad man, the Bush team mismanaged the already cynical and counterproductive idea of conquering Iraq. Bush and his worshippers would do far better to accept Bush's responsibility for the mess and learn from it instead of trying to duck and dodge responsibility by blaming the French.

 

I certainly am no expert in european opinions but my gut tells me that nothing Bush could have done could have one over the Germans enough to support a war in a timeframe that would have been consistent with our military buildup. I think the administration correctly believed that maintaining such a large presense for an extended period would not have been feasible. I think the administration tried what they thought was most likely to win over the U.N. and failed, but I'm not sure if they ever had a chance.

They had decided beforehand that we were going to remove Saddam, and I'm sure France, Germany, and Russia also knew this. They made a calculated political decision that it was better to make it difficult for the U.S. instead of making it easy. I think much of "old Europe" is secretly very happy that it appears that the U.S. is being knocked down a peg by the Iraq war.

My opinion is that they are being shortsighted and the U.S. will only come out of this even stronger, and even less likely to take their concerns to heart, but I guess only time will tell.

 

Correct. Whether you are in favor or against the war, nobody beside the British would have supported a coalition in any circumstance. Nothing can change that. We all know WMD or no WMD the French, Russians, Germans etc would have just sat on the UN fence of non interference.

 

Even if this were true, and I disagree with much of it, that still doesn't excuse Bush's hamfisted incompetence and his obvious lies that made it much easier for those who did not want to join to not join. tcmahoney had a valid point in comparing the efforts of Bush I with those of Bush II. The current lot have simply done an awful job and have been rescued by the professionalism and technological superiority of our military.

Also, how is the U.S. "stronger" now because of the conquest of Iraq? We're not any safer from terrorism because of it, that's for sure. OK, we've seized Iraq's oil and we now have an excuse to keep another military base near the rest of the oil in the region. That's something, I suppose. Actually following through on our promise to rebuild a relatively free Iraq will help but Bush has really put us in a hole by lying about WMDs and distracting resources from the "War On Terrorism" to engage in this little adventure. And it's not like their management of occupied Iraq so far has inspired much confidence outside the usual circle of blind Bush worshippers.

Even if the Bush team suddenly becomes lucid and competent (Shyah, right. As if.) and the best of all possible Iraqs happens, how much of the squandered goodwill will we get back? I suspect we'd pretty much break even with the rest of the first world but that's a bad investment considering the costs.

 

Something I had not thought about was raised from TCMahoney's post.

If you are a ruthless dictator of a medium/small country and have committed human rights violations, does the state of current world affairs make you more or less convinced that the U.S. or the U.N. will unseat you from power?

It seems to me that today, if you can steer clear of al Qaeda, you're golden. Can I get an "Uzbekistan!?!"

 

And yet, when the other lies and excuses didn't work, we threw the humanitarian excuse against the wall to see if it would stick. Some neocons here are still arguing that we went in to "save the poor Iraqis".

For the sake of argument, let's say you're right and those two countries would have balked. What about the Germans? And the Turks? And a whole bunch of other countries who were only extremely reluctant and bribed members of the hilariously misnamed "Coalition of the Willing"? Are you trying to tell us all of them had too many "economic interests" in Iraq to join us in our great crusade? And how does this excuse Bush for making it so damn easy for the unwilling to remain unwilling?

Then maybe compromise and alternatives should have been considered instead of insults, threats and lies. Just a thought.

I agree. Gathering a coalition with a legitimate cause is much easier than gathering one to support your obvious aggression. Maybe the Bushies should have thought abvout that as they were making getting rid of Saddam a campaign platform.

It depends. If we'd had a plan for what to do when the shooting stopped, maybe we'd be getting much more co-operation from the Iraqi people than we've gotten which could have meant that Saddam and all his henchmen would be dead or in U.S. jails by now and the fewer Baathists remaining would have much less opportunity to strike at us. Not only that, but we possibly also wouldn't be fighting Iraqi nationalists and whoever else is fighting us as well as the Baathists.

Instead, the occupation has been horribly mismanaged and the Bush team has inexcusably made it much easier for the resistance forces by their bungling.

Leaving aside the strategic legitimacy of the conquest itself and speaking on a purely tactical level, I'd be willing to cut Bush some slack on the more complex and diffcult aspects of the build-up and occupation if he showed any signs of having put actual thought into them. But he hasn't. What irritates a lot of people, including me, is that the Bushies have totally bungled things that should have no brainers such as "Be nice to your potential allies as to give them as little reason as possible to refuse you" or "Have a plan beyond 'they'll shower us with roses just because we're us' before you go leaping in". Had the build up and occupation been handled competently, we'd still look good while France, Russia and the other countries who balked would look unreasonable or despicable in their refusal. Instead, as tcmahoney rightly pointed out, the Bush team seems to have done everything possible to make this more difficult and less successful than it should have been. That's poor leadership that should not be rewarded with another term.

 

If you are a ruthless dictator, it has also taught youn to get nukes NOW at any cost so the US won't mess with you.

Isn't that right, Mr. Kim and Mr. Musharraff?

 

Except that Iraq and al Qaeda had nothing to do with each other. Before the war, that is. Now al Qaeda is starting to infest the country.

Hey, if Iraq had been behind 9/11, I would've been all for going in and we're not having this conversation. But Iraq wasn't behind 9/11.

 

Even if you accept that the administration lied about WMD, the anti-war nations wouldn't even go along when they actually believed Iraq did have them! I see no indication that there was ever any intention on the part of the anti-war nations to support Bush no matter how much he would have begged.

It is just disengenuous to blame the lack of cooperation totally on Bush. The European politicians played the situation up to the hilt for their own domestic political purposes.

There is absolutely no comparison between the task faced by Bush I and Bush II.

Since the first day I have posted on this board I have been trying to focus on the long term benifits of a free Iraq, and all you guys keep doing is looking at the short term problems. If you can't see how replacing Saddam Hussein with a free pro-U.S. government that respects human rights and religious diversity will make our position in the world stronger, than I give up.

I know some people will think I am crazy, but I actually believe that history will show that overall the administration did an excellent job in freeing Iraq. Was it perfrect? No, but is it really reasonable to expect perfect? Before the war many people predicted flaming oil fields and massive refugees fleeing Iraq, but administration planning prevented those things from happening.

Considering the enormity of the task of bringing democracy to a country as large as Iraq, which was ruled for so many years by such an oppressive dictator, the number of lives actually lost to date by the U.S. coalition is staggeringly low.

If you had asked a military planner 30 years ago, how many lives would it cost to take Iraq I'm sure the estimate would have been in the tens of thousands.

Squandered goodwill from who?

And what the hell do we need their goodwill for anyway?

If anything the French and the German's should be asking themselves why they squandered all their goodwill with the U.S. in the cause of preventing the overthrow of the likes of Saddam.

The U.S. is and will remain the leader of the free world for the near future. Plenty of other world leaders (Italy, Japan, S. Korea etc.) realize that, and are even taking popularity hits right now by supporting us because they see where the real future lies. I'm not concerned about our position in the world, but if I were a Frenchman, I would wonder what the future holds for my country.

 

Which is why 449 young men and women didn't die in Iraq while Clinton was president. Not to mention the 10s of billions of dollars we're spending, and the lives of our allies' soldiers, and the lives of various contract workers.

 

And somehow nuclear weapons are just going to magically appear in other dictators hands? Attempting to obtain them would be like waving a red flag.

Honestly, if you were a dictator who was beneath washington's radar screen right now, quietly oppressing your people in order to enrich yourself, would you go out their and take any steps toward obtaining nuclear or chemical weapons?

 

So the end justifies the means.

Thank God that's finally settled.

Who do we invade next?

 

Is now a good time to remind people that France offered to join in with the invasion if WMD were found?

 

Don't we all do that?

The French will do that, but not in the context you like to think they do. It is never too late to finally accept the fact that, fundamentally, France and the French don't give a shit about the US.

America's apparent inability to comprehend this will never cease to amuse.