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To: hueyone who wrote (149076)	10/22/2002 10:09:37 AM
From: Oeconomicus	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Huey, this isn't the beginning, but it's a good place to start. It shows the whole basis for GST's position, which rested on the argumentative fallacy know as "appeal to authority" because he could not produce facts to support his position and had to rely on the argument "Schwarzkopf said it and he should know." Message 18134020 You can jump straight from there to my post to you last night, which I think answers GST's challenge fairly completely, and based on facts. Message 18140992 As for what conclusions one might draw about today's situation, read my post to Victor of last night. Opponents of Bush are the ones playing "Monday morning quarterback" in an attempt to paint Saddam as no more of a threat now than then or to paint Bush's motives as being related to his father's failure to "finish the job" (or as revenge). Message 18140861 The things about 1991 that matter today are not what we should or shouldn't have done then, but rather what we have, or should have learned since then. First of all, Saddam never lived up to the requirements for a permanent cessation of Gulf War hostilities and can't be trusted to do so ever. Second, the growth in numbers, organization, financial capacity, reach and brutality of global terrorist organizations, together with Saddam's demonstrated willingness to support terror and to use WMDs, can only lead to the conclusion that Saddam's continued development and possession of WMDs poses a grave threat to the security of the United States and it's allies in the region and the world. That is the rationale behind disarming Iraq today, whether done through diplomatic pressure and inspections or done through military action. And here's where the anti-Bush crowd gets really ridiculous - claiming that Bush's real objective is not to disarm Iraq, but to - take your pick - get revenge, fix his father's mistake, distract the American public from the economy, or seize oil for his greedy Republican oil CEO buddies. The truth is that Bush's objective has always been to disarm Iraq and render Saddam harmless, but like Congress in 1998, he concluded that sanctions and inspections and voluntary compliance would never work, and regime change was the only way to accomplish the underlying objective. Regards, Bob

To: hueyone who wrote (149076)	10/22/2002 12:13:51 PM
From: GST	Respond to of 164684

The debate goes back some distance. For the past many months I have argued that the US is better off dealing with Iraq by building a coalition based on a position of "disarm or else". The policy of "regime change" which morphed into invading Iraq and getting rid of Saddam even if Iraq disarms (Cheney's version of "regime change") pretty much rules out any coalition-building (regime change now means almost nothing as Powell and Bush now define it as changing Saddam's behavior but not necessarily getting rid of Saddam). I am highly critical of Cheney's unilateral regime change approach on a variety of grounds. It certainly was poorly received in the rest of the world, and for good reason. The Administration is now seeking a UN Security Council Resolution to invade Iraq because there is currently no UN Resolution to provide a legal basis for the US to invade Iraq. Bob thinks the US could have attacked any time from 91 to the present based on existing UN Resolutions. I disagree. Without a new UN Resolution, the US would need some reason to invade Iraq and depose Saddam. We tried but failed to link Saddam to Al Qaeda and it is highly unlikely that anybody would buy the idea that we are invading Iraq to defend Kuwait -- certainly not at this point. It is a stretch to believe that the US faces any immediate threat of attack from Iraq -- but obviously if self-defense can be invoked then we have the right to defend ourselves. I do not think anybody else in the world outside of Tony Blair's inner circle is likely to buy into the idea that a US invasion of Iraq would be "self-defense". I have repeatedly pointed out that the initial articulation of the "regime change" policy (which has morphed into oblivion with recent statements by Powell and Bush) really narrowed our options with our allies -- and I think this was most unfortunate. As for the legality of an invasion -- it is pretty widely accepted that one country cannot invade another without a valid reason. That is how we convinced the rest of the world to oppose the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq. A changing of the rules to read "only the US can invade whomever the US chooses and whenever the US feels like it and capture or kill the Head of State of that country" is not likely to be a stable platform for international peace and security in future years, although there seem to be some in the current Administration that take this as the perogative of being the world's only superpower -- at least at the present time.