eldar1011

It sickens you if someone just questions the actions of the military?

Damn, that's intolerant.

Surely you don't mean that, you're just heated up by the exchange in this thread.

donaldkilroy

There's questioning the military and then there's questioning the military. One form is logical with the other is irrational. It's the irrational that I take issue with.

eldar1011

Then what's so illogical about asking if the Hussein boys were taken alive, wouldn't they be able to yield some intelligence? I mean, maybe not as much as one would hope for, but certainly more than what you'd get from dead men.

I understand that you are confident that they would have been tight lipped and revealed nothing. There may be something to that, we'll never know.

Personally, I think that resisting interrogation requires strength of character and will. These two bastards were decadent, spoiled and sadistic. However, I'm willing to bet that they would have cracked.

Morat

Not to mention, of course, that a nice public trial and execution (Iraqi law isn't even as kind as American law) would have laid to rest many of the worries of the average Iraqi about whether we killed the "Real deal" and would have done quite a bit towards our credibility over there.

And, you know, we could really use a PR boost among the Iraqis.

Intel possibilities aside, even the Romans knew it was better to parade the "former leaders" through the streets as captives than to kill them. Killed in a 4 hour gun battle against 50 to 1 odds is a hell of a lot more mythic than "captured by a SWAT team, tried in public, then hung for crimes against the Iraqi people".

BDS

Right on, eldar. I bet they'd have cracked, too (although, according to kilroy I'm a "naive fool").

Also, soldiers are often called upon to sacrifice their lives. Although we might have been able to take Uday and Qasai with no casualties, it is also possible that their capture would have been WORTH some casualties (if, for example, the intelligence derived from it prevented considerably MORE casualties).

Also, donaldkilroy, Uday and Qusai were not "bastards". They were the sons of Saddam's first wife, and fully legitimate.

I'm not so sure about you, though.

Jacey

I can't believe it's even questioned. Capturing them alive is so much better than having them dead.

From what I understand about the situation, there was minimal risk to our troops.

donald- So you won't ever question my actions, right? Or will you just question my actions?

ComestibleVenom

Come on Bill, criticism of the war is legitimate, but remaking the middle east via Iraq is an administrative goal that predates Bush. Merely because you don't like the war is no cause to join in with the Bush administration in painting a dangerously simplistic picture of what's going on.

ComestibleVenom

I totally agree. Yes, ultimately they should die, but I think it would have been well worth the effort to lay seige to the house and take it's occupants prisoners if at all possible.

That being said, I was not there. I have no idea of the situation, and it might well have been exceedingly difficult to avoid shooting up the place.

donaldkilroy

Based on what? What makes you so certain they would crack!?! Taking the totality of their lives, what they've done, their mentality, religious and self-centered fanaticism, etc. I'm confident they would not!

With a high probability they'd never talk, how would it be worth it?

Words have more than one meaning you dullard.

eldar1011

Based on what? I'm confident they'd crack based on the totality of their lives, what they've done, their mentality, etc.