"Our attack on Saddam was wrong, deceitful and illegal."
The first is a matter of opinion. The latter two you have failed to establish.
"We were the aggressor in a war."
If taking the offensive makes one the "aggressor", fine, call us the aggressor. So what?
"Even though Saddam was a big creep, we helped him in his rise to power and throughout his administration."
We've been over this. Perhaps you missed where you were shown to be wrong. We did not help him in his rise to power. The CIA made brief and unsuccessful use of him in 1959. We also did not help him "throughout his administration" (funny that you don't use the word "regime" here). We help him in the 1980s when he was fighting Iran. He was our enemy for more than half his time in power.
Do you think repeating the same disproven notions will make them true?
"It is questionable whether he actually gassed the Kurds."
Oh, yeah. Saddam insists it was the Iranians. I guess you'd believe him over our own government, and in spite of the fact that the Kurds were cooperating with Iran against Saddam.
"In any event, Saddam did not consider the Kurds his own people."
So, that makes it OK? LOL.
"Bush was always saying "He gassed his own people." This was an attempt to demonize Saddam ... Another lie on Bush's part."
Oh, so now it's not just that "there are other plausible suspects" - now you KNOW he didn't do it. LOL.
Oh, I forgot - they weren't "his own people", so it's the "his own people" part you consider a lie. Who are "his own people", madam, if not the citizens of the country he ruled? You toss out the word "lie" so easily - perhaps you are projecting.
"We support dictators all over the world who are just as bad when it is in our strategic interest to do so."
We've established that the US gov't has supported some pretty bad characters. No one is arguing that point. The question is, so what? Like I asked before, how does supporting a dictator in the past preclude opposing him later?
"So for me the four-decade support of Saddam by the CIA..."
You're lying again. OK, maybe you just can't count. We supported him for much of the 1980s. Then there's a few months when he was a bit player in a 1959 CIA plot. I'll be generous and call it a decade, all in. Ah, but what's 30 years off when you just feel something?
"makes our policy towards Iraq today hypocritical, at best."
Oh, were back to the "we're as bad as them, so who are we to criticize or take action?" argument. Who's demonizing whom, now, grainne?
And on a related, if redundant, note - how does supporting a dictator in the past preclude opposing him later? We are disqualified from opposing him because "we're as bad as him"? LOL.
"What should we have done the last several years in Iraq? We had Saddam cornered. We should have just waited it out."
First of all, the policy of "regime change" originated in the Clinton administration (notice I didn't call it a "regime"). The only difference under Bush is that, after 9/11, he decided it was time to actually act on that policy.
Second, since Saddam kicked the inspectors out (1998, I think - same year as formulation of Clinton's regime change policy, BTW), he had been gradually gaining support for lifting of UN sanctions (on humanitarian and "he's no threat to anyone" grounds, but coincidentally coming from countries selling him arms and wanting to sell him more. oh, and don't forget the oil-for-food bribery.)
Third, documents found since his fall show that he stood ready to restart his WMD programs as soon as he managed to get sanctions lifted.
He was not cornered and it was he who was doing the "waiting it out."
"has harmed the security of the entire planet."
Unsubstantiated bunk. How has the overthrowing of Saddam "harmed the security of the entire planet"? Please be specific.
BTW, you hear about the high voter turnout today in Iraq? Great day for the world's march toward democracy. Hope that doesn't depress you too much. |
