Lizzie, are you "still waiting for WMD?" I highly recommend the two-part "Saddam" series running on the History Channel for anyone who's intellectually honest enough to admit the possibility they were wrong about Saddam being "contained and harmless." If you aren't absolutely sickened, horrified, and thankful for Messrs. Bush and Blair on the Iraq issue alone after seeing this two-hour special, check your own pulse.
As for WMD, would you consider an atomic bomb a WMD? How about the one dropped on Hiroshima? I would, if only because of the "mass" casualties. It immediately killed about 50,000 people and at least that many over the next 10-20 years due to the delayed effects of radiation. The city itself did not achieve its pre-bomb industrial output until 13 years later in 1958.
Likewise, the Allied incendiary bombings of Dresden directly cost the lives of as many as 200-300 (or more) thousand people. Stalin starved and executed at least 20 million. Mao may have directly caused the deaths of 50-100 million Chinese during his career. And then there's that Hitler guy who, along with Stalin and the Mafia, was a personal, technical, and psychological inspiration to Saddam.
According to the reports, statistics and news arriving almost daily from Iraq, Sadam Hussein was HIMSELF a weapon of mass destruction. One million casualties in the 8-year war with Iran, five thousand gassed Kurds but another 180,000 "missing" and believed burned or buried in mass graves, thousands tortured and executed (according to Saddam's own records)...it goes on and on, if you've got the stomach for it.
Did Iraq have a weapon of mass destruction? Yes. It was Saddam, his sons and the sick Ba'athist regime that devastated Iraq, its citizens, neighbors and the world for 30 years. Good riddance.
Thank you President Bush and Prime Minister Blair for having the courage and leadership to do what a paralyzed world was unwilling to do--MK-- |
