Should Canada Go To Iraq?

[CanadianCombat]

Thank you, mmarsh, but having been to Canada and stayed there for quite a while myself I was perfectly aware of the Canadian-UK ties. My questions regarded Canada's attitude with respect to French positions.
I was just curious to see how close to Paris Ottawa has been in the past 15 to 20 years. I humbly believe my questions haven't been addressed yet.

When were you in Canada? Because if you were here around 1995 you would have seen the Quebec refrendom, when the people of Quebec voted to seperate from Canada. It never happened but it was very close. There has always been problems witht the French population during and not during war time. In the Boer War, WW1, and WW2 the french never wanted to go even thought 2 of the wars were being fought in their home land. Ever heared of the Canadian Conscription Crisis during WW1. In terms of Paris-Ottawa relations we have none, we refer only to England and have no say in France, and they have no say here.

 

[Dean]

Has Canada ever partecipated in any combat operation that wasn't recognized by the UN?
Second question: Has Canada ever favored a war that the French opposed or opposed one the French were involved in?
Just asking here.

Canada was involved in the NATO action in the former Yugoslavia long before the UN finally gave itself the right to consider doing anything, and one of the reasons that the UN finally decided to do someting was because Canada was clamouring along with many other European nations to do something. (It was a civil war, so once again, the UN had to wait until enough countries said yes, we should interfere in the internal affairs of another country. In UN politics, this is very difficult.) We were there in the first wave, and we still have not left. As for your question 2, the answer is yes. We definitely opposed the British/French Suez incident, and totally ignored most of the wars that France has gotten herself involved in. French Indochina, North Africa, Algeria, Cote D'Ivoire and many others have seen French intervention over the years. We have not been involved in any of them.

Dean.

(I'm baaaaack!!!)

 

[Dean]

People forget that Bush's motivations for waging war on Iraq have always been THREE, and three reasons for wanting a military intervention had been clearly stated for months before 3/03.
1. Iraq has WMD
2.Iraq has links with terrorism- not just Al Qaeda, but with terrorism (which was true, Hamas, for instance, but Al Qaeda too if you read the 9/11 Commission Report)
3.Democracy hence peace. Bush agrees with the neocons that in order for peace to exist democracy has to be exported. He never concealed this aspect, people forget that. So many times did he present this motivation publicly before the outbreak of hostilities. So now it's not a post war strategy. It'always been that.

IG, I have always agreed with you in the past, but here there are definitely some disagreements. Now, perhaps I got information that was different from you, (other Canadians can tell me if they agree with this or not) but before the US went to war, all of the White House statements on Iraq concentrated on 2 major points, these being Iraqi WMDs and how democracy was needed in the Middle East. Did he mention terrorism? Yes he did, but it was always in the context of the WMDs. "We can't allow terrorist to receive the WMDs that we know Saddam has" was the common theme. The White House also lambasted the UN weapons inspectors as inefficient, and then sent Colin Powell to the UN to make the most embarrassing set of accusations I have ever seen. (After that speech, my admiration for Mr. Powell shot up. It was obvious that he did not believe a word he said, but he was there to conver the butt of his CIC. Admirable, although it also signalled the end of his career.) The democracy card was also played a great deal. While he (Bush) did mention that there were links between Al-Qaida (A-Q) and Iraq, it was my very strong impression that he was pushing the WMD/terrorist aspect more than anything else.

N.1 Don't you believe that the burden of the proof was on Saddam? Yes or no.

Umm, no. If you apply the common rule, he is guilty until proven innocent. If I accuse you of a crime, I have to prove it, not you. I cannot make an unfounded complaint. Luckily enough, Saddam Hussein is a monster. He was guilty of enough that in the end it did not matter that he was innocent of the 2 other charges.

On the international scene other countries, like Ukraine, South Africa, Kazakhstan, and now Lybia, have agreed to accept UN and even other countries' inspectors. They honestly showed everything they had, they opened their bunkers, their facilities. Saddam Hussein led the whole world into thinking that he had those weapons. He repeatedly said that. Even his closest advisors and top military aides thought they had those weapons. They were shocked at the eve of the war when they learned Saddam had been faking it for years.

In the months preceding the war, Iraq admitted that yes, they had no weapons, and nobody believed them except for Hans Blix, the chief of the UN weapons inspection teams. (I must admit, I also had my suspicions for quite a while). Also, the Iraqis also got very cooperative in the final months as Hussein was desperate to avoid a war that he knew he could not win. In spite of this, the White House continued to pressure Iraq, and they also continued to insinuate that the UN inspectors were inefficient. Those charges were made by Colin Powell to the UN General Assembly. Here I have a question. When he made that speech, here in Canada, most people were laughing at the poor guy. The evidence that he had was useless, and the result of that speech was, in my opinion, the end of a broad coalition as had existed in Gulf War I. What was the reaction of the American public to that speech?
But before the war, but Hussein and the UN weapons inspectors, who had been reduced to searching sites that they had previously done both claimed that he had none. The White House reaction? The UN inspectors are missing something and Saddam's lying!

If he did not have them, why didn't it open the doors and proved it? Like others had done. The burden of the proof was on him.He was just playing a game he got burned playing. Next time he won't pretend to have a matchbox in his pocket if he doesn't I tell you.

Gawd, how true! Here is the storybook definition of the boy who cried wolf. Although I still think that the burden should have been on the US. You don't go to war unless you are SURE.

N.2 Saddam had close ties with Hamas, and that is proved. About Al Qaeda-Saddam connections, my friend, we have tons of evidence. You just have to look.Saddam Hussein had close ties with Hamas (he paid 25,000 $ to the family of each suicide bomber), he gave hospitality to Abu Nidal and Abul Abbas. The first had staged a terrorist attack on Rome airport causing dozens of victims, the second was involved in the Achille Lauro's cruise ship hijacking and the murder of handicapped American citizen Leon Clinghoffer in the cruelest way.I didn't say Saddam had to do with 9/11, I say he had ties with Al Qaeda, and going to prove it.

He paid $25,000 to who... the bombers or the families? In fact, you cannot prove that any of the money actually went to making and delivering bombs. Now remember. Iraq and Israel were (are) at war. Even if Hussein was supporting Hamas, he was supporting a group that was attacking a country with which he was at war.
Abu Nidal and Abul Abbas were both Palestinian terrorists who were active while A-Q was in its anti-Soviet infancy. I do not know when they visited Iraq, but I do know that some members of his organization did go for training in Iraq. Now, here I am not sure of the time line, but if it was around 1985, again, it has nothing to do with A-Q.
Here I have to tell a little story. Once there was a group of people. These people did not agree with their government, so they acquired some guns and started fighting. As they lived in an area that is known for drug manufacturing, they started to sell drugs to pay for their war. Time went by, and their little war heated up, and before long, this group was attacking civilians and civilian installations, had started death squads, and committed other terrorist acts. Now, you would figure that the US would not have anything to do with this group, right? So would I. Except that the group was known as the Contras, and they were supported and armed by the CIA on behalf of the US government. They were fighting against the Sandinista government which was elected by the people of Guatemala. Now, if you supported the Contras directly, (in spite of the fact that you were not at war with Nicaragua, how can you say that it was wrong for Hussein to support Hamas indirectly, when they were at war with Israel? Just a thought...
Leon Klinghoffer was killed in 1985. A-Q had nothing whatsoever to do with it. At the time, Afghanistan was engulfed in a war against the Soviet Union, who had invaded Afghanistan in 1979. In 1985, A-Q was being supplied by the CIA on behalf of the US government. They were fully occupied fighting the Soviet Union, and they were active only in Afghanista and Pakistan. To have pulled the Achille Lauro job would have been very counter-productive, and they knew it. The Achille Lauro job was done by Palestinian terrorists. (PLF, if I remember correctly)

Well, it's getting late, and that was one looong post you wrote, so I'll get to the rest of it tomorrow. Good night, all.

Dean.:hide:

BTW, IG, when and where were you in Canada?

 

[Young Winston]

Great post Dean.

Please Canada stay out.

From an Aussie.

 

[Italian Guy]

IG, I have always agreed with you in the past, but here there are definitely some disagreements. Now, perhaps I got information that was different from you, (other Canadians can tell me if they agree with this or not) but before the US went to war, all of the White House statements on Iraq concentrated on 2 major points, these being Iraqi WMDs and how democracy was needed in the Middle East. Did he mention terrorism? Yes he did, but it was always in the context of the WMDs. "We can't allow terrorist to receive the WMDs that we know Saddam has" was the common theme. The White House also lambasted the UN weapons inspectors as inefficient, and then sent Colin Powell to the UN to make the most embarrassing set of accusations I have ever seen. (After that speech, my admiration for Mr. Powell shot up. It was obvious that he did not believe a word he said, but he was there to conver the butt of his CIC. Admirable, although it also signalled the end of his career.) The democracy card was also played a great deal. While he (Bush) did mention that there were links between Al-Qaida (A-Q) and Iraq, it was my very strong impression that he was pushing the WMD/terrorist aspect more than anything else.

It wasn't mine. Those were the media, my friend. The media love to pick those aspects that can draw the people's attention and alarm. That is precisely what happened there. But no, terrorism was not necessarily related to AQ in that context, and the democracy issue proves it.

Umm, no. If you apply the common rule, he is guilty until proven innocent. If I accuse you of a crime, I have to prove it, not you.

Pretty naive of you. You kind of figure the world works just like a single country does. It does not. The world does not work like Portugal or Kansas does.

In the months preceding the war, Iraq admitted that yes, they had no weapons, and nobody believed them except for Hans Blix, the chief of the UN weapons inspection teams. (I must admit, I also had my suspicions for quite a while). Also, the Iraqis also got very cooperative in the final months as Hussein was desperate to avoid a war that he knew he could not win. In spite of this, the White House continued to pressure Iraq, and they also continued to insinuate that the UN inspectors were inefficient. But before the war, but Hussein and the UN weapons inspectors, who had been reduced to searching sites they had previously done both claimed that he had none. The White House reaction? The UN inspectors are missing something and Saddam's lying!

See, the point here is I do not trust the UN nor do I trust any of its representatives, one of the wisest things the US ever did was not trusting the UN. And more and more people are starting to feel the same way around the world. You are not exactly talking to a huge UN fan.
Then please (you said: "Also, the Iraqis also got very cooperative in the final months as Hussein was desperate to avoid a war that he knew he could not win") do not forget what you hero Blix said on March 7, 2003:

Hans Blix reports to the UN Security Council. Blix said basically the same thing as he did in previous reports. Iraq has shown some progress, but has still not yet fully disarmed. Blix also filed a 173 page document with the Security Council which said that inspectors discovered an undeclared Iraqi drone, with a wingspan of 7.45 m (24 ft 5 in), suggesting an illegal range that could potentially threaten Iraq's neighbors with chemical and biological weapons.

And please remember France was sure Iraq had WMD's: On March 17, 2003 Chirac announced that his country would support U.S. troops if Iraq launched chemical weapons against U.S. forces.

Gawd, how true! Here is the storybook definition of the boy who cried wolf. Although I still think that the burden should have been on the US. You don't go to war unless you are SURE.

No, I have already stated I do not believe the world works like a national judicial system. In the international arena the burden is on the suspected country. Whether it likes it or not.

He paid $25,000 to who... the bombers or the families? In fact, you cannot prove that any of the money actually went to making and delivering bombs.

Suuuure. I guess the families proudly saying that, or the paychecks found in Baghdad, or the hundreds of speeches where Saddam stated that he funded the shahids in Palestine, well those do not count.

Now remember. Iraq and Israel were (are) at war. Even if Hussein was supporting Hamas, he was supporting a group that was attacking a country with which he was at war.

Ummm, I did not think war was about blowing buses or deliberately killing civilians. You forget war and terrorism are two separate things.

Abu Nidal and Abul Abbas were both Palestinian terrorists who were active while A-Q was in its anti-Soviet infancy. I do not know when they visited Iraq, but I do know that some members of his organization did go for training in Iraq. Now, here I am not sure of the time line, but if it was around 1985, again, it has nothing to do with A-Q.

Just like I said, they did not have to be linked to AQ, they were one of the evidences Saddam collaborated with terrorism (the rest I showed you in previous post). In fact nobody ever said the two had ties with Osama. In fact they had ties with Saddam. Well more than that, they were his guests.

Here I have to tell a little story. Once there was a group of people. These people did not agree with their government, so they acquired some guns and started fighting. As they lived in an area that is known for drug manufacturing, they started to sell drugs to pay for their war. Time went by, and their little war heated up, and before long, this group was attacking civilians and civilian installations, had started death squads, and committed other terrorist acts. Now, you would figure that the US would not have anything to do with this group, right? So would I. Except that the group was known as the Contras, and they were supported and armed by the CIA on behalf of the US government. They were fighting against the Sandinista government which was elected by the people of Guatemala. Now, if you supported the Contras directly, (in spite of the fact that you were not at war with Nicaragua, how can you say that it was wrong for Hussein to support Hamas indirectly, when they were at war with Israel? Just a thought...

Are we going to start a new thread on the Contras? And also, if you say so I believe you are explicitly recognizing the legitimacy of those US acts. Third, Dean, neither Bush nor the neocons were in power at the time. Had they been in power THAT would have never happened. :thumb: Y'know the neocons in DC would be proud of you here. P.S. You forgot to say the government the Contras fought was cruel and non-Democratic. Otherwise you make it sound like you side with the Sandinistas who were, IN FACT (recent discoveries) funded by the Soviets.

Leon Klinghoffer was killed in 1985. A-Q had nothing whatsoever to do with it. At the time, Afghanistan was engulfed in a war against the Soviet Union, who had invaded Afghanistan in 1979. In 1985, A-Q was being supplied by the CIA on behalf of the US government. They were fully occupied fighting the Soviet Union, and they were active only in Afghanista and Pakistan. To have pulled the Achille Lauro job would have been very counter-productive, and they knew it. The Achille Lauro job was done by Palestinian terrorists. (PLF, if I remember correctly)

As I stated above, the PLF had not to do with AQ of course, I just pointed out how tied Saddam was to terrorists. And terrorism (and NOT just AQ) was one of the 3 reasons to go to war.

BTW, IG, when and where were you in Canada?

I was there in 1997 and 2000, I flew into Toronto and visited AB and SK. I also enjoyed the company of a Quebecois girl before entering a serious relationship with a Saskatoonian. Great country :wink:
Go Harper :rock:

 

[Padre]

Wheather it be 1 or 1000 men Canada has don alot for this world in terms of helping in Wars or peacekeeping missions. We frigin invented peacekeeping, it was Lester Pearson's idea and he won the Noble Peace Prize for it. Heres a short list of just peacekeeping mission Canada has been involved in since 1947.

http://www.dfait-maeci.gc.ca/peacekeeping/missions-en.asp


BIG DEAL

Australia can more than rival that:

http://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/peacekeeping.htm

QUESTION IS, IN THE BIGGEST CURRENT "PEACEKEEPING" HOTSPOT ON THE PLANET, WHERE ARE THE CANADIANS ????

 

[CanadianCombat]

no offence but how does that compare.:shoothea:

 

[Damien435]

Probably because there were a lot of number between 1 and 17 in your source CC.

Plus Australia and New Zealand work together to basically police the oceanic states, not as forceful dictators, but as friends there to help those in need.

 

[CanadianCombat]

All I can say is that Australia does not rival Canada in peacekeeping, just go to the UN site and look at all the missions and count how many Canada has and still is a part of then look at Australia and see how many they are a part of, then you will see what im talking about.

And I'm not trying to flame anyone I'm just stating the facts.

 

[Padre]

If Canada does in fact have numerically more active peacekeepers than Australia, as of one hour ago, that's got more to do with us having a smaller population, and having troops taken up in Iraq. Whatever the facts are, Canada would be a great help in security and humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people, along side the US and your Commonwealth friends.

My post above was to make the point that Australia helps in lots of peacekeeping assignments but that hasn't stoped us helping the Iraqis. It shouldn't stop Canada and the help doesn't have to be troops, it could be engineeers, tradespeople, construction, whatever.

At any rate, the topic asked was "Should Canada go to Iraq." I didn't realise that the actual topic was "Should Canada go to Iraq, only post if you believe NO -other opinions not welcome."

Next time I see a topic posted by a Canadian asking a question, I'll ignore it. :bang:

 

[Dean]

After reading Italian Guy's long reponse to one of my rambling posts, I feel that there is something I have to clarify.

Are we going to start a new thread on the Contras? And also, if you say so I believe you are explicitly recognizing the legitimacy of those US acts. Third, Dean, neither Bush nor the neocons were in power at the time. Had they been in power THAT would have never happened. Y'know the neocons in DC would be proud of you here. P.S. You forgot to say the government the Contras fought was cruel and non-Democratic. Otherwise you make it sound like you side with the Sandinistas who were, IN FACT (recent discoveries) funded by the Soviets.

Now, I never thought that any of the acts that I have mentioned were right, proper or condonable. I do not for one second believe that Iraq's support of Hamas bomber's families or any other terrorist group is anything short of reprehensible. In addition, I also believe that the US support of the Contras was every bit as reprehensible, in fact more so given the fact that the US never declared war on Nicaragua. I am simply trying to illustrate certain points using both researched facts and comparisons to make my princlpe point completely clear. It seems that the final point was clear, but that the individual arguments were not. If anyone ever, at any time felt that I was supporting Iraq or Al-Qaida, I apologise. I do not. However, I do believe that Canada has very little, if any business there, and I will go one arguing that point... after I finish washing the floor! (really!!!)

Dean.

 

[Dean]

The United States is the country of the Free Press par excellence, so there is even a law, the Freedom of Information Act, that makes it mandatory for federal agencies to reply to journalists who ask for information on events or facts that are kept classified for national security reasons. It has recently happened that the Associated Press asked the Pentagon to explain why a certain Iraqi citizen is detained at Gitmo.

Par excellence is a big term. The one problem with the American Free Press is the incredible bias that I see. The US media (understandably so) is very quick to trumpet everything that the US military does as good, right, proper, and defending the American way of life. As I live north of the border, the media outlets are far less likely to be so pro-US, and as such, my attitudes are far more balanced. But if you think that there is no censorship in the US, think again. A media outlet that shows a less than rosy picture of "what our good boys are doing in I-Raq" often finds itself losing sponsors and commercial clients. Censorship does exist in the US, it is self-censorship, AKA political correctness, and it is far more insidious than someone telling you what you can or can't say. If I am wrong, why was Cindy Sheehan arrested? Why was Valerie Plame outed? Now, really, I am not a conspiracy theorist, but it does seem that both were effectively muzzled when the president was or was about to be embarrassed....

The DoD delivered to the AP a “summary of evidence” made up of all the transcripts of the prisoners interrogations.
From the summary it’s possible to learn that the Iraqi has admitted that in 1994 he was recruited in Baghdad by the Taliban, that once arrived in Afghanistan he associated himself with Al Qaeda, that he became a close aide of Osama Bin Laden and that eventually, “in the August of 1998, went to Pakistan together with an Iraqi Mukhabarat (Secret Services) man with the stated goal of attacking, with chemical bombs, the American and British embassies in Pakistan”.

This is one man. We also know that there were many Saudis who joined A-Q, as well as many Syrians, Afghans, Jordanians, Yemenis, Palestinians, etc, etc. Should we expect to see invasions of all of these countries because some of their citizens had the temerity to join A-Q? Now, apparently the Mukbarat was involved. OK, now, when I was in the intelligence business, it was drilled into me that in order to believe any information, it had to come from either an incredibly reliable source and confirmed by others if at all possible, or from at least three independent sources. This is neither. The possible story of a possible link between a possible secret agent (unnamed, of course) does not make an excuse for war. I will return to this point later.

It was not an incredible plan, given the fact that in the very same month Al Qaeda actually attacked American embassies in Eastern Africa causing 224 victims and 4 thousand wounded (The newspaper “Babel”, directed by Saddam’s son greeted Osama as an “Arab and Islamic Hero” on that very occasion).

They are allowed to have opinions that differ from yours. Still, not a reason to go to war. Besides, the Iraqis did not do the crime. A-Q did.

In that very same month, Bill Clinton accused the Iraqi regime for having provided chemical weapons to Al Qaeda.
This is just the last element of a long line of information that, contrarily to what the European (and Canadian?) newspapers say, prove the connection between Baathist Iraq and Al Qaeda.

Funny. We are now what, 9 years after the fact? There is less and less proof any such transfer of WDMs ever took place. Honestly, seeing everything that has happened since then, do you believe that A-Q has ever received chemical bombs from Iraq? I don't think so. They would have used them by now. (Many of those things don't store very well) Another tempest in a teapot was what I call the African Yellowcake incident. Never happened.

The second last is the one about an Iraqi agent who, in January 2000, arranged an operative meeting held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with one of 9/11 hijackers.
Official documentations, including the ones released by the 9/11 Commission say that there actually was a link between Al Qaeda and Iraq.
They don’t go as far as to explain how deep that connection was, but they leave zero doubts on the fact that there was a connection.
On the other hand, the reports on a Baghdad- Al Qaeda connection date back to a pre-Iraqi war era, back to 8 year before 9/11 and Bush’s election to the White House.

The 9/11 commission report makes very interesting reading. But there is one problem with it. Now, I admit that I have not read the whole thing, but I did peruse it, and I was struck by one thing. Sources. They are not mentioned. Now some of the time for obvious reasons, they cannot be, but this was not one of them. A lot of that information had to come from the White House and the CIA, both of which were tainted. The CIA itself was under fire at the time for missing the plot completely, and them for telling the media that they never said there were WMDs in Iraq. At around the same time, the husband of soon to be former CIA agent Valerie Plame told the White House that it was impossible for Iraq to have received yellowcake (partially refined uranium) from Niger. The White House was left holding the bag, and they reacted rather nastily, exposing one of their own agents and forcing the head of the CIA out. No, what does this all mean? It means that there is a very high possibility that a lot of the information in the 9/11 commission report is also tainted. if their sources were the White House or the CIA, (which is very highly probable) then much of the information contained therein is suspect. (However, I do think that a lot of the conclusions are indeed bang on.) But throughout all of this affair, the sources of information have been called more and more into question. The interrogation information above that you mentioned is terribly suspect given the source, who wants nothing more to be freed. So what does he do? Tells the biggest story he can think of, and all of a sudden, he is important to his captors. By the same token, it could be disinformation or misinformation.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3462847.stm

The first one to talk about it was Bill Clinton. In 1998 his Department of Justice, when they still believed Al Qaeda could be faced in the courts, open investigations on Bin Laden with these words: “Al Qaeda has reached an agreement with Iraq to not operate against that government, while on particular projects, which specifically include the development of weapons, Al Qaeda will cooperatively work with the government of Iraq”.
Osama himself, it was 1998, February 23, issued the fatwa launching jihad against the US making an esplicit reference not only to “the presence of troops in Saudi Arabia”, but also to the “ongoing aggression against the Iraqi people”, and to the “alliance between crusaders and sionists that inflicted heavy devastations to the Iraqi people, killing a huge number of them, more than a million”. For this, Bin Laden wrote, “it is an Islamic duty to attack the American Satan and his allies, so that they learn the lesson”.

Only an Imam can issue a fatwa. ( a religious edict) If Osama had issued one, it would have been ignored. Lately an Egyptian imam decided to issue a fatwa stating that husbands and wives should never be allowed to see each other nude, even when making love. He went on to say that in the event of lovemaking, both should wear little loinclothes that cover their genitals, and if both were in the bathroom, they must avoid looking at the other's genitals. Needless to say, it will not be taken seriously. It is the same with all fatwas. It is not important what they say, what is important is who listens to it and follows it.

(To be continued)[/QUOTE]

Yes, indeed.

Dean.

 

[Damien435]

The US media (understandably so) is very quick to trumpet everything that the US military does as good, right, proper, and defending the American way of life.

I am gonna have to throw my BS flag on this one.

 

[Dean]

I am gonna have to throw my BS flag on this one.

I can understand you doing so. But if you see things from the POV of someone sitting in another country, with access to ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX, then BBC, CBC, CTV, Global and Reuters, the BS flag would not be very quick to come out.

At all.

Dean.

(no, I'm still not.):m1:

 

[Italian Guy]

Par excellence is a big term. The one problem with the American Free Press is the incredible bias that I see. The US media (understandably so) is very quick to trumpet everything that the US military does as good, right, proper, and defending the American way of life. As I live north of the border, the media outlets are far less likely to be so pro-US, and as such, my attitudes are far more balanced. But if you think that there is no censorship in the US, think again. A media outlet that shows a less than rosy picture of "what our good boys are doing in I-Raq" often finds itself losing sponsors and commercial clients. Censorship does exist in the US, it is self-censorship, AKA political correctness, and it is far more insidious than someone telling you what you can or can't say. If I am wrong, why was Cindy Sheehan arrested? Why was Valerie Plame outed? Now, really, I am not a conspiracy theorist, but it does seem that both were effectively muzzled when the president was or was about to be embarrassed....

I did not say there is total freedom or 100% of freedom in the US. We have discussed the topic at great length on other threads here, and we came to the conclusion that there fortunately are limits to freedom in the US. But you should note how freedom elsewhere in the world is more limited than it is in the US. In everything. Run a quick comparative search in the most developed countries and you will see very few countries have a freer press than the US does. And also, do not forget that the US is the country of the freedom of information par excellence because most of the free countries in the world usually owe their own freedom to the US army. Third: I do not agree with your view of the US media. You believe they are strongly supportive of the US military. I do not. I don't remember Michael Moore or Cindy Sheehan being censored or ignored by the media (by the way you perfectly know why Sheehan was arrested, and if Bush really wanted to disqualify her position she could expose all the contradictions and lies of hers. Yet again, another widely discussed topic on the boards) And who is Ted Turner married to?
Fourth and final point I'd like to raise is political correctness, yet again talked about at great length on these boards. If the limit to total freedom of information in the US is represented by "self-imposed" political correctness, well you will find the level of p.c. to be found in the US is lower than the one you can stumble across in the rest of the free world.

This is one man. We also know that there were many Saudis who joined A-Q, as well as many Syrians, Afghans, Jordanians, Yemenis, Palestinians, etc, etc. Should we expect to see invasions of all of these countries because some of their citizens had the temerity to join A-Q? Now, apparently the Mukbarat was involved. OK, now, when I was in the intelligence business, it was drilled into me that in order to believe any information, it had to come from either an incredibly reliable source and confirmed by others if at all possible, or from at least three independent sources. This is neither. The possible story of a possible link between a possible secret agent (unnamed, of course) does not make an excuse for war. I will return to this point later.

You're surely right here, this is one case among many others. I frankly believe keeping denying the Iraqi regime-Al Qaeda ties is absurd.

They are allowed to have opinions that differ from yours. Still, not a reason to go to war. Besides, the Iraqis did not do the crime. A-Q did.

You're right. That was just to expose the fallacy of the Saddam-Hussein-was-a-laicist-guy-who-shared-nothing-with-the-religious-extremists thing. In fact, he steered towards Islam and developed connections with a radical approach to Islam since early '90's.

Funny. We are now what, 9 years after the fact? There is less and less proof any such transfer of WDMs ever took place. Honestly, seeing everything that has happened since then, do you believe that A-Q has ever received chemical bombs from Iraq? I don't think so. They would have used them by now. (Many of those things don't store very well) Another tempest in a teapot was what I call the African Yellowcake incident. Never happened.

Too many things to discuss about here. I'll be brief. One: It wasn't just 9 years ago (as if it were a century ago). Just days before the war Clinton, Berger, Kerry and a lot more Dems publicly declared they undoubtedly believed Saddam was a danger for the world because he was in possess of WMD's and had connections to international terrorism. We have a link somewhere in the boards with this video with all the Dems saying that. Secondly, as I already stated, the burden of the proof was on him. He should have opened his borders and let UN inspectors go wherever they wanted to. He should have openly and fully cooperated, which damn he never did, leading the international community into believing he had WMD's. The African Yellowcake incident was also discussed on the boards. It came out it had been completely fabricated by the French and Bush never used that information anyways. Never did he mention Niger on his famous speech. But again, there's a specific thread on this.

The 9/11 commission report makes very interesting reading. But there is one problem with it. Now, I admit that I have not read the whole thing, but I did peruse it, and I was struck by one thing. Sources. They are not mentioned. Now some of the time for obvious reasons, they cannot be, but this was not one of them. A lot of that information had to come from the White House and the CIA, both of which were tainted. The CIA itself was under fire at the time for missing the plot completely, and them for telling the media that they never said there were WMDs in Iraq. At around the same time, the husband of soon to be former CIA agent Valerie Plame told the White House that it was impossible for Iraq to have received yellowcake (partially refined uranium) from Niger. The White House was left holding the bag, and they reacted rather nastily, exposing one of their own agents and forcing the head of the CIA out. No, what does this all mean? It means that there is a very high possibility that a lot of the information in the 9/11 commission report is also tainted. if their sources were the White House or the CIA, (which is very highly probable) then much of the information contained therein is suspect. (However, I do think that a lot of the conclusions are indeed bang on.) But throughout all of this affair, the sources of information have been called more and more into question.

Yes but this is the endless game of how can you not suspect this is not fabricated or a conspiracy? Unfortunately there is a point where you have to trust some source. I trust what is called official documents and papers. Other people can freely choose not to believe them. Those are called conspirationists. Also, as far as WMD's are conerned, you can say you do not trust the CIA and the federal authorities but then you should also say you do not trust the Israeli, French, Russian and UN intelligence which all were persuaded Saddam had those weapons.

Only an Imam can issue a fatwa. If Osama issued one, it would have been ignored.

You meant a mufti. Since Islam has no centralized priestly hierarchy, there is no uniform method to determine who can issue a valid fatwa and who cannot. Some Islamic scholars complain that too many people feel qualified to issue fatwas. Although yes you're right Osama would have little title to issue a fatwa, yet he has done so many times and many times have his followers agreed and accepted it. It has happened many times indeed. He has also made use of some of his fellow muftis or imams, who did the job for him. Nothing is more volatile and less universally agreed-upon than a fatwa.

Let me thank you for your polite and respectful attitude here. It's always a pleasure to exchange opinions with people like you.

 

[Damien435]

I don't know when you are watching the news but if I turn on ABC, CBS, CNN or MSNBC I see very little support for what our military is doing in Iraq.

 

[Missileer]

I can understand you doing so. But if you see things from the POV of someone sitting in another country, with access to ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX, then BBC, CBC, CTV, Global and Reuters, the BS flag would not be very quick to come out.

At all.

Dean.

(no, I'm still not.):m1:

You're right, we should broaden our horizons.

CRIMES OF RECENT TIMES IN CANADA -Dr. Daya Hewapathirane, For Sinhalaya Worldwide

Roman Catholic and Christian religious residential school programs for the indigenous native children of Canada have existed in eight of the ten provinces of Canada for over 100 years until the 1970s. The indigenous children of these schools have been subjected to rape, beatings and emotional abuse by the Catholics and Christians who ran these schools. The children suffered and continue to suffer from the terrible effects of School abuse. The schools were run by Roman Catholic, Anglican Christian, Presbyterian Christian, and United Churches.

 

[dylan_infantry]

Ya i think that canadians should be in iraq because then if we evr get into war armerica will help us out to after all we are there allies

 

[Italian Guy]

Ya i think that canadians should be in iraq because then if we evr get into war armerica will help us out to after all we are there allies

One solid argument, there. And no sarcasm intended.

 

[dylan_infantry]

thanks

thank you for the compliment, are in the army if so witch country

dylan