Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Optional · 05-05-2003, 10:55 AM

Oh, and for me, there is no fall-back position. My position has ALREADY been proven.

There were ONLY two possible valid reasons for WAR.

1) Iraq represents a clear and present danger to the people of the USA. This is so because he has lots and lots and lots of chems/bios and he is JUST CRAZY ENOUGH to USE the fuckers at the DROP OF A HAT!!!

Well, it's already been proven that he was NOT crazy enough to use em at the drop of a hat because he DIDN'T use them in the final defense of his regime. What's more, it's looking like if he DID have any, he certainly didn't have lots and lots and lots of em, or we would have found SOMETHING by now. Even if l&l&l are later found hidden in some cavern or something, the fact that he was NOT crazy enough to use em is ALREADY proof enough that no WAR was justified.

2) Saddam was the mastermind or at least a knowing partner of the terrorists who created 9/11.

Even this is a little iffy, it's a revenge based war... Understandable, but possibly not justifiable. But still... It's specifically CURRENT ties to AL QA'EDA we're looking for here, not 5 year old meetings and not any other group.

What's already been proven is that PRIOR TO THE START OF THE WAR, we had absolutely NO evidence tieing saddam to bin laden, and the opinion of our own intelligence services was that any tie was very unlikely.

If we find ties later, even if we discover a diary that says 'I blew up the WTC today, woo-hoo go me!' ... You cannot RETROACTIVELY justify a war. That would just open up WAY too many worm-filled cans.

So... My position is solid, already proven, I need no fallback thankyouverymuch.

-me

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 01:07 PM

Partial post:

Quote:

1) Iraq represents a clear and present danger to the people of the USA. This is so because he has lots and lots and lots of chems/bios and he is JUST CRAZY ENOUGH to USE the fuckers at the DROP OF A HAT!!!

What????! You aren't even willing to defend our NATO allies (not to mention some allies closer to Iraq like Israel which was hit by several SCUDs in Gulf War I)?????? This puts you in a radically isolationist camp. No Pax Americana for you! It's Fortress America or bust!!! Sorry but those days are over (for most of us). Killed on December 7th 1941. Nail in coffin on Sept 11th 2001. Those days are NOT coming back.

Quote:

2) Saddam was the mastermind or at least a knowing partner of the terrorists who created 9/11.

Even this is a little iffy, it's a revenge based war...[...]

Not necessarily. It could be just to avoid FURTHER terrorist actions to which Saddam would be a mastermind or a willing partner.

Cheers!

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 01:11 PM

Partial post:

Quote:

Originally posted by leonarde
That tells me what I want to know: you, and I suspect many others here, would have opposed military action even if the WMD programs were a universally recognized fact. Based on some concept of 'equality among nations' (If the US/UK can have nukes so can nation X!).
As I pointed out many weeks ago on one or more of these threads such a position is the death knell of even the potential for nuclear non-proliferation. And nuclear non-proliferation USED to be a dear concern of the left. Which is ONE of the reasons that most Americans regard the left as utterly impractical on matters of national security/foreign affairs.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

See, what you did there was shift the discussion from 'weapons of mass destruction' to 'nukes'. They are not the same thing. WMDs are chems bios AND nukes.

But the PRINCIPLE (of equality of nations) is the SAME: if country X can have "it" (chemical, biological, nuclear weapon) then country Y can have it too!!! And country X is in no position to object, let alone take preemptive military action. If not, why not???

Cheers!

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 01:16 PM

Partial post:

Quote:

Which of course did not even adress my question!

I answered your question in the very first line of my post:

Quote:

Partial post by TealVeal:
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And tell me, leonarde, if WMDs are never found (anthrax, VX, for instance) when will you change your tune? Or do you, like so many, have a fall back position?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For me, it's not really a fall-back position. I told (on one message board or another) people before the invasion that for me ANY ONE of the following was ample justification for military action:[...]

The rest of my post was merely a further explication of what MY pre-war criteria were for launching military action. Those criteria were concurrent ones (any of the three would justify the war). I've been for military action again Iraq for about six years.

Cheers!

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 01:25 PM

Partial post by TealVeal:

Quote:

When your position is "we will find WMD" and WMD still have not been found then you by definition must go to a fall back position.

That's not a "position"; it's a prediction. SOME people who have expected to find WMDs all along have been AGAINST military action. Their position is thereby different than mine even though their PREDICTION is the same.

Cheers!

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 01:35 PM

Partial post by TealVeal:[QUOTE]3) continued existence of WMD programs. They were part of the ceasefire agreement of 1991 so again violation here is a de facto act of war.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wait? Didn't you say later on in your post that

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Number 3 seemed (and to me still seems) LIKELY.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So what is it? You can either have "they had WMD" or "they likely had WMD." You are equivocating. Pick one.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

No, you misread what I wrote: in the one instance I was talking about PROGRAMS: WMD PROGRAMS. That is a certainty. That's why what was expected to be a 1 to 3 month inspection operation by UNSCOM in 1991 turned into a 11 to 12 year treasure hunt by UNSCOM, UNMOVIC, and the International Atomic Energy Agency: they WOULDN'T GIVE UP THE nuclear, biological and chemical PROGRAMS. A program is not a weapon, a stockpile of weapons, X liters of a toxic agent. It's a whole panoply of elements organized to PRODUCE usable weapons.

Whether Iraq has this or that chemical OR biological agent NOW,
after months of warnings and weeks of war, is a BIT more doubtful. But the PROGRAMS remained. Even the French and Germans knew/know that.

Cheers!

TealVeal · 05-05-2003, 01:40 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by leonarde
Whether Iraq has this or that chemical OR biological agent is NOW
after months of warnings and weeks of war, is a BIT more doubtful. But the PROGRAMS remained.

So the programs remained, yet there are no WMD! Imagine how that would work in the real world: "Hey Mr VP of software developement, we have this project going on to make a new OS....Oh you mean results? Well we actually have nothing to show, no source code, no binaries, no nothing, sorry. But honestly we are developing them." Riiiiiiiight.

Where is the evidence of WMD? Nowhere. Nowhere at all. Forgeries and lies leonarde, forgeries lies and equivocation. And you have bite them, swallowed them whole. Nobody will think less of you (well I certainly won't) when you realise the truth is different from the lies you have been eating.

How long will it take for you to admit you were misled? Another month of searching with no results? Another year? Are you ever going to answer this question?

leonarde · 05-05-2003, 02:00 PM

Partial post:

Quote:

Originally posted by leonarde
Whether Iraq has this or that chemical OR biological agent is NOW after months of warnings and weeks of war, is a BIT more doubtful. But the PROGRAMS remained.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So the programs remained, yet there are no WMD! Imagine how that would work in the real world: "Hey Mr VP of software developement, we have this project going on to make a new OS....Oh you mean results? Well we actually have nothing to show, no source code, no binaries, no nothing, sorry. But honestly we are developing them." Riiiiiiiight.

And how many years did the Manhattan Project last before there was a USABLE bomb???

Besides, we know they produced chemical weapons in the past:
they killed thousands of Kurds and Iranians with them. To reconstitute that program would be relatively easy. And since the precusors are DUAL USE, if you are about to be invaded: send all the precursors to the fertilizer/insecticide/other chemical
plant. Voila: no sign of a WMD (unless you find the documents).

Quote:

Where is the evidence of WMD? Nowhere. Nowhere at all. Forgeries and lies leonarde, forgeries lies and equivocation[...]

Okaaay, have a nice life, TealVeal!

Cheers!

John Hancock · 05-05-2003, 02:04 PM

"I cannot tell a lie I chopped.." whoppes wrong George! :banghead:

Martin

Optional · 05-05-2003, 02:10 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by leonarde
What????! You aren't even willing to defend our NATO allies (not to mention some allies closer to Iraq like Israel which was hit by several SCUDs in Gulf War I)?????? This puts you in a radically isolationist camp. No Pax Americana for you! It's Fortress America or bust!!! Sorry but those days are over (for most of us). Killed on December 7th 1941. Nail in coffin on Sept 11th 2001. Those days are NOT coming back.

Of course I'd be willing to defend our NATO allies. And if Iraq had attacked one of our NATO allies, I'd be the first to urge coming to their defence. If one of our NATO allies had felt like they were ABOUT to be attacked by Iraq, and they could prove it to the satisfaction of not just the US but the rest of NATO as well, I'd be all for helping out.

I'd even go so far as to say I'd be behind defending ANY country that is being attacked by its neighbor, unless we had treaties with that neighbor of course. I think that the world we should be attempting to build is one in which conquering your neighbor is simply no longer an option. One in which any invaded countries are ALWAYS liberated. This is why I supported GW I... Iraq decided that it would be easier to solve its problems with Kuwait by invading Kuwait than by diplomacy. They needed to be kicked back out, and we did it. The fact that we gave a tacit approval to the affair, and there is SOME sketchy evidence that we may have been pushing Kuwait into making trouble in the first place is the subject of a whole different discussion.

None of those things happened, in this case. In point of fact, most of our NATO allies were AGAINST us doing anything. *WE* decided to go to war, *WE* invaded, and *WE* are occupying, for our *OWN* reasons.

Pax Americana? NO THANKYOU. Any time I am tempted to believe it might not be such a bad thing, I just remember how the Pax Romana ended, and I'm cured of that particular diseased thought.

Fortress America? Similarly, no thanks. Isolationism has been proven many times over the past century to be a BAD IDEA in the modern world.

The thing is, this is not a binary solution set. There are gradients between complete domination and complete protectionism. And there are also paths branching completely off that gradient... Working to erase nationalism world-wide for one thing. There are others.

-me

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

05-05-2003, 10:55 AM	#111
Optional Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: Chicago, IL, USA Posts: 1,049	Oh, and for me, there is no fall-back position. My position has ALREADY been proven. There were ONLY two possible valid reasons for WAR. 1) Iraq represents a clear and present danger to the people of the USA. This is so because he has lots and lots and lots of chems/bios and he is JUST CRAZY ENOUGH to USE the fuckers at the DROP OF A HAT!!! Well, it's already been proven that he was NOT crazy enough to use em at the drop of a hat because he DIDN'T use them in the final defense of his regime. What's more, it's looking like if he DID have any, he certainly didn't have lots and lots and lots of em, or we would have found SOMETHING by now. Even if l&l&l are later found hidden in some cavern or something, the fact that he was NOT crazy enough to use em is ALREADY proof enough that no WAR was justified. 2) Saddam was the mastermind or at least a knowing partner of the terrorists who created 9/11. Even this is a little iffy, it's a revenge based war... Understandable, but possibly not justifiable. But still... It's specifically CURRENT ties to AL QA'EDA we're looking for here, not 5 year old meetings and not any other group. What's already been proven is that PRIOR TO THE START OF THE WAR, we had absolutely NO evidence tieing saddam to bin laden, and the opinion of our own intelligence services was that any tie was very unlikely. If we find ties later, even if we discover a diary that says 'I blew up the WTC today, woo-hoo go me!' ... You cannot RETROACTIVELY justify a war. That would just open up WAY too many worm-filled cans. So... My position is solid, already proven, I need no fallback thankyouverymuch. -me

05-05-2003, 01:35 PM	#116
leonarde Veteran Member Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: North America Posts: 1,603	Partial post by TealVeal:[QUOTE]3) continued existence of WMD programs. They were part of the ceasefire agreement of 1991 so again violation here is a de facto act of war. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Wait? Didn't you say later on in your post that quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Number 3 seemed (and to me still seems) LIKELY. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So what is it? You can either have "they had WMD" or "they likely had WMD." You are equivocating. Pick one. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- No, you misread what I wrote: in the one instance I was talking about PROGRAMS: WMD PROGRAMS. That is a certainty. That's why what was expected to be a 1 to 3 month inspection operation by UNSCOM in 1991 turned into a 11 to 12 year treasure hunt by UNSCOM, UNMOVIC, and the International Atomic Energy Agency: they WOULDN'T GIVE UP THE nuclear, biological and chemical PROGRAMS. A program is not a weapon, a stockpile of weapons, X liters of a toxic agent. It's a whole panoply of elements organized to PRODUCE usable weapons. Whether Iraq has this or that chemical OR biological agent NOW, after months of warnings and weeks of war, is a BIT more doubtful. But the PROGRAMS remained. Even the French and Germans knew/know that. Cheers!

05-05-2003, 02:04 PM	#119
John Hancock Banned Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: Mars Posts: 2,231	"I cannot tell a lie I chopped.." whoppes wrong George! :banghead: Martin

Freethought & Rationalism Archive

The archives are read only.