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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bilow who wrote (27627)	4/28/2002 9:21:07 PM
From: BigBull	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

You are forgetting the uprising of the Kurds and Shiias. They were only too glad to see the backside of Saddam. too bad they were abandoned eh?

To: Bilow who wrote (27627)	4/28/2002 9:35:09 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

These are not only machines that we would be destroying, there are people behind those machines and they all have mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, sisters and brothers. Bilow, there is simply no reason to believe, or expect, that the US is EVER going to engage in a massive onslaught against Israqi civilians. Very few Iraqi civilians lost their lives during the most intensive bombardment of a nation since WWII (or Vietnam) and we were only using 10% smart weapons. The odds are that the US can economically cripple Iraq with little loss of non-combatant lives. We'll cut the power grid, transportation routes, and interdict any attempt by the Republican Guards to counter-attack potential internal resistance. And the Iraqi people, knowing that the US is not going to settle for anything less than Saddam's head, will likely be more than willing to deliver it to us. As for families, Saddam has been having his army oppress, torture, and kill members of their families for decades now. There are LONG-STANDING VENDETTAS only waiting for the lifting of Saddam's "boot" from their faces (ala Orwell). The family rivalries between his Takrit clan and the many other competing clans are also long-standing. Rivals know that SOMEONE will have to rule Iraq, and they will hitch their wagon to the "winning team" so as be properly positioned to take advantage of the post-Saddam government and economy. Certainly the Iraqi soldiers will recognize that they have little reason to lose their lives on behald of Saddam and his thugs, just as they realized it during Desert Storm.. There were some 80,000 POWs from the last war and you know they went home with the knowledge that Americans aren't the enemy. And they know that we had them by the "cajones" back in 1991, but we CHOSE not to directly replace the government. They know we don't want to occupy the country, only effect a regime change. And the message this sends throughout the Middle East is that the US can also effect the SAME regime change in any country in the region, whether it be Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia, or even Egypt... That's a powerful message we want to send to these two-bit self-proclaimed dictators and rulers. And if the US stay in Iraq for the long term, to effect even more change from secular totalitarianism to democracy, we will increase the footprint of democratic regimes in the region, just as Turkey has proven to be in recent decades. Edit: One other point about the importance of Iraq. Strategically speaking, it represents a wedge that effectively splits up the Islam world into two halves. Bring democratic reforms there, and it won't be Bin Laden that Saudi Arabia has to worry about... It will be us. Hawk