cnyndwllr,
re:"DavesM, you're dead wrong. Many things led to 9/11 but the last big mistake was the policy of ignoring the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and allowing the Palestinians and Sharon to run wild."
In his declaration of Jihad against Jews (Israel) and Crusaders (the United States), Bin Laden had three major complaints: 1. The continued presence of U.S. troops in the "Arabian Peninsula". 2. The United States enforcing UN Sanctions on Iraq. 3. American support of Israel, and U.S. and interference in the affairs of other States (like Egypt, the Sudan, Iraq and Saudi Arabia) - and again complains about the "crusade occupation of the (Arab) Peninsula". Note, the date was 1998.
fas.org
re:"Despite all the inferences and claims, we WANTED TO BE IN SAUDI ARABIA, regardless of Iraq. We could have based our troops elsewhere and defended the Saudi oil fields but that's wasn't our only goal.
The official Saudi position, was that U.S. troops were allowed in Saudi Arabia, to enforce the "southern no-fly zone". I don't think that it was practical to enforce the "no-fly zone" without using Saudi air bases.
re:"In addition, Saddam was an ALLY in the fight against fundamentalist terrorists."
Yes, Saddam attacked Iran, but Iranian Revolutionary/Fundamentalism - is different from Sunni Fundamentalism. OBL did not declare war against the United States, until after the first Gulf War. |
