Proof? There's no reason to believe that those contracts would not be renewed under the new government if a UN action was taken.

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"At last, we have come to find the truth to our souls. Though, the truth is not what we expected. I now fear my own soul."

You're missing the part where the US is meant to provide some sort of evidence of non-compliance with UN resolutions to an extent that justifies war.

Whatever resoluions Iraq broke were petty(smuggling oil and the like). WMD's aren't petty, only Iraq didn't break that particular UN resolution.

That remains to be seen. Whether or not we will actually find any, that is. Saddam did not fully comply with inspections.

You also have to look at the fact that those resolutions, all of them, were stipulations that were agreed to during the first Gulf War. I don't see any of them petty when I consider the facts that lives were lost the first time around. To have allowed Saddam to disregard those resolutions would have been to spit on the graves of the soldiers that gave their lives liberating Kuwait.

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Have you forgotten ...

Still waiting, Wookie.

I <3 Bewil, even if he is an amateur eugenicist.

I'm sorry. You must have asked for proof for something and I either forgot or am ignoring you. I can't remember which.

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Have you forgotten ...

We call that a concession where I come from.

Face it wookie, even fawning adoration for the republican party isn't going to bring any WMD's out.

Proof of WMD's is starting to get to be as elusive as proof of god.

Uh oh, I forsee Firefox calling you a troll in the near future...


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"At last, we have come to find the truth to our souls. Though, the truth is not what we expected. I now fear my own soul."

[This message has been edited by CaptBewil (edited March 24, 2004).]

I wouldn't call it a concession, Ictus. I honestly don't remember what it is you want proof of. I know Fox wanted some streaming video but since I'm not in the business of recording the news and uploading it in a streaming format I don't have a link for him. I could scroll back through the pages to see what it is that you want proof of but I'm terribly lazy.

Personally, I don't see the reason to debate most of this Iraq issue AGAIN anyway. It's all old. I'll readily admit that the longer we go without having something substantial in the way of WMD evidence in Iraq the worse it will be for the current administration but I fail to singularly classify this administration as lying because of EVERYONE (not literally) believed the intelligence to include American Democrats like Clinton and Kerry who made explicit cases against Saddam and his WMDs. I feel the biggest problem with the administration was allowing this conception of WMDs being the sole reason to have arisen in the first place. It was a reason but not the singular reason.

Ictus, seriously, if you care to remind me of want you want proof of, go ahead. If you want to consider my laziness as a concession that's fine, too. These debates just get tiring and I never intended to re-debate the entire Iraq War either.

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Have you forgotten ...

Not really. You fit the definition quite well in this instance.


-Fox

/me walks in thread...

I didn't quite expect this to happen.

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[="They say music can alter moods and talk to you, but can it load a gun for you and cock it too?" - Eminem=]

Massassian since: March 12, 2001

Wookie, you obviously don't have either the motivation or the capacity to discuss this topic.

Would anybody else like to defend Wookie's claim that Hussein acted in defiance of the UN within, say, the six months before the war? Maybe by finding an example of Blix's requests going unfulfilled?

You're right that I don't have the motivation because this is an old debate. I doubt many here will answer your call for the same reason. That, and because of the obvious act of futility it would be.

You see, I personally find the tone of you and others insulting. There can't just be a disagreement without snide personal comments. I have the capacity to debate the issue. I just don't have the interest to do so and I guess, due to some unwritten internet forum rule, that means I concede. Very well then.

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Have you forgotten ...

My point was that no one here has come close to trolling


You couldn't even classify what F-Body siad as a red herring, let alone trolling. So your outright attack of "Troll Calling" was uncalled for. Again, I'll reiterate, he wasn't trolling, he was giving a statistical comparison. I'm also sure that many would agree that his statement was a valid point. Rather or not you agree with it is debatable. The point is, he made a valid point that was related to the discussiosn (specifically a claim made earlier in the thread), and you bluntely attacked him. In case you weren't aware Firefox, comparrisons are used in discussions to help people get a better sense of what your talking about. There is absolutely nothing wrong with using them and it certainly cannot be considered trolling.

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"At last, we have come to find the truth to our souls. Though, the truth is not what we expected. I now fear my own soul."

[This message has been edited by CaptBewil (edited March 25, 2004).]

Note the part you missed:



Referring to abortion on a thread which has nothing to do with it is tantamount to flame bait, given the inflammatory nature of the subject.


-Fox

Nevermind, this is rediculous. Firefox, what you did was a fallacious reasoning debate tactic. No rational person is going to buy in to your flawed justification for it. If you want a more detailed reason why, you can e-mail me and we can continue this there. CaptBewil@yahoo.com

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"At last, we have come to find the truth to our souls. Though, the truth is not what we expected. I now fear my own soul."

[This message has been edited by CaptBewil (edited March 25, 2004).]

No, what F-Body did was a fallacious debate tactic. What I did was point it out.


-Fox

Wow, thanks for following instructions. Your still wrong. What F-Body did wasn't a 'tactic' at all. He had no motivation for using any type of 'tactic'. He was mearly commenting with a point to a previous point made in the thread. What part of this can you not comprehend? Or are you incapable of admiting that you are wrong?

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"At last, we have come to find the truth to our souls. Though, the truth is not what we expected. I now fear my own soul."

Hooray! I hate you all!




There, that settles it!



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Fear is here, where's the beer?

... No, you're wrong. Again. The topic of discussion was what Rumsfeld had said. F-Body proceeded to bring up abortion (a highly inflammatory topic) which has nothing to do with Rumsfeld. He's not only a troll, he's guilty of a red herring.


-Fox

I still think Kerry lieing and saying he has "foreign support" far outweighs that

Let's face it, all politicians lie.

Get the hell over it.

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RAWRRR I've read these forums for years but only posted a couple times...

Lying is one thing, telling a lie that gets a bunch of people killed is entirely different.

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Daddy, why doesn't this magnet pick up this floppy disk?

Well, since this is back on topic, Rumsfeld said something to the effect that there was no more immediate threat than Iraq. Ictus linked to the transcript earlier in the thread where he was asked about why they were an immediate threat. Rumsfeld obviously forgot that he used the terminology before because he asked for a quote and they found one. This is in no way a lie, in my opinion, and I would like to know why it is unbelievable that Saddam supported terrorist actions against us. Just on face value it would be a fair assumption that he would because he would most certainly have hated our country as much as the Islamofacists that actually flew those jets. Then when you consider the terrorist training ground found there... oh, that's right, our media didn't report that.

With regards to Kerry, I believe he is lying about having met with foreign leaders however I think just the thought that foreign leaders would be more likely to prefer him is enough reason to vote against him.

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Have you forgotten ...

Please provide evidence of this questionable terrorist training ground. And please, we don't want just photos or a short bit on how it was found. We want details as to where exactly it was found and to what terrorist organization they seem to belong to and what connection (if any) it has/had to Saddam. As to date, there have been no successful links of Saddam to any terrorist networks.

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Try not, do; or do not.

Actually, the Iraqi government, under Saddam, gave money tothe families of Palastineans who volunteered to be suicide bombers in Isreal. Not al Qaeda, but it's terrorism none the less.

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I'm not an actor. I just play one on TV.

deja vu!

You said that same thing in the last one of these threads avenger, almost down to the wording.

If you wanted to label every middle-eastern country that supported the Palestinians as "supporters of terrorism", you'd find that would be about all of them really.

There are little to no links between Al-Qaeda and Saddam, Bin Laden referred to the Baath party as "the heretics" in one of his tapes before the war. This was immediately seized upon as evidence of "collaboration" between the two entities.

Wookie's much vaunted training camps, were actually the hideout of some militia with another all too forgettable name. If anyone can tell me what nefarious deeds they got up to, I'm here to listen. It was hardly Osama's summer holiday home.

Being charitable to the families of those who blow themselves up is quite different than giving funds to those who slam commercial airliners into buildings (which Iraq was not a part of).


-Fox

This is such old news to me that it's not easy to find link, especially given the under-reported nature of the issue. Here's what I do have: http://politics.guardian.co.uk/archive/article/0,,4296646,00.html

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Have you forgotten ...

GIMMIE A 'T'!
T!
GIMMIE A 'A'!
A!
GIMMIE A 'B'!
B!
GIMMIE A 'L'!
L!
GIMMIE A 'O'!
O!
GIMMIE A 'I'!
I!
GIMMIE A 'D'!
D!

What do we have?
"DO MORE RESEARCH, WOOKIE!"



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3118262.stm

P.S.: In my search through this magical "Internet" I found out that the Guardian, once upon a time, posted an article of their own debunking the Iraq/Al-Qaeda connection. Unfortunately it appears that the article has since been deleted.

[This message has been edited by Jon`C (edited March 27, 2004).]

The way you made your previous post, I was under the impression that you may have seen these camps or ran across reports of these camps first hand. Oh well...

BTW, for someone who [has/is] serving in Iraq, you sure do seem to have a lot of free time and access to the Internet. What exactly [did you/are you] [do/doing] in Iraq?

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Try not, do; or do not.

[This message has been edited by Friend14 (edited March 27, 2004).]

I thought it was clear that I was already back from my deployment in Iraq. If it wasn't, I am. I made a very clear post last summer when I left for the country on this very forum.

I'm a little curious by your couriousity but suffice it to say I'm no simple cook or, at the other extreme, special forces operative. I'm assigned to an infantry battalion and, as such, have a bit of knowledge as to what the average grunt in Mosul, Iraq knows. I claim no more or no less.

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Have you forgotten ...

I'm not surprised by this, after your earlier claim (regarding the supposed 9/11-Iraq link) was debunked. Of course you're not as informed as, say, the joint chiefs of staff. You know only as much as what you see in the field, or what you read that the military lets you read (is Stars and Stripes still the armed services newspaper?).

I don't mean to insult you, since you are performing your duty for the United States. I do, however, wish to point out how you have backpedaled when asked to supply evidence, and I understand when you say you are merely an infantryman who has served in the field.


-Fox

I must be guilty of misrepresentation again here. I only mean to imply that I have a limited personal experience in Iraq (although infinitely more so than most here) so I'm not trying to shield any statements I make behind some sort of "I was there" facade.

I do consider myself better informed than most and much more open minded although I will be honest and say that I haven't followed current and political events as closely in the last year.

The military allows us to access whatever news sources we want. I don't like Stars and Stripes anyway. It's virtually all Associated Press stories.

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Have you forgotten ...

*Walks into the thread at page 3* Holy crap.....
And don't forget to ask him to wipe your butt too. Jesus, do you think he has CIA security clearance or something?

....that the government is letting us know of. It's all speculation for the common person. He may not have had connections. He may have. If I had to bet, I would go with the later though.

There we go. That's what palastinian suicide bombers are: terrorists(since they go after predominantly civilian targets)

Yes it is different. With giving money to the families of suicide bombers you have created opportunity for the poor and oppressed. Your family needs food? Go kill yourself and half a dozen Jews and your family will be given money. But killing yourself and others is bad right? No. You will go to heaven for fighting for Allah and you will get 72 virgins in the afterlife. That kind of funding is different, but still bad. Funding 9/11 was to get something bad done(Funding before bad act), rewarding the families of suicide bombers encourages it even moreso than it already is(Funding after bad act).

Wookie: I get the feeling that because you served in Iraq you thought your scope of expertise was bigger than it actually was. You had expertise in the small paint brush area, but not the bigger picture(had you been in MI in Iraq, no one here could say a damn word to you contrary to what you said). You also have to realize that these guys have heard what you are saying, they just want you to come up with something to base what you say off of. Whither it is because they are trying to teach you or they are just being plain arrogant, I don't know for sure.

I have a question for the anti-war people: Was getting Saddam out of power a bad thing to do? Yes or No. I don't care about the "oh but we should of done it this way" or "we shouldn't have done that". I know all of that. Just a simple Yes or No.

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Beware of music. It brings out the animosity in everyone.

What's the point? Everytime this come up someone will say something about how there is very little in the previous six months, but theythen bring up Iraq's UN violations from the mid 1990s and you convieninetly forget them or disregard them as irrelevent.

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I'm not an actor. I just play one on TV.

Avenger: That's because they are irrelevent. Why should Iraq be invaded for half-decade old violations? It was cooperating with UN inspectors in the months prior. There was never a casus belli.

Kieran: False dichotomy.

Yeah, what now?

I'm merely pointing out a track record that Iraq built for itself. There was no punishment of any kind for the first violations and the UN continued to let itself be led around on a leash. Funny that Iraq started to even comply with the UN when it was backed up with the threat of actual military action.

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I'm not an actor. I just play one on TV.

So, are you willing to go so far as to state that at the time of the invasion Iraq was in full compliance?

Kieran, I understand what you're saying about my experience in Iraq and that is why I tried to make it clear what my actual scope of knowledge dealt with. I don't believe that I made my service there a huge issue in this thread. I know I brought it up with regards to body armor and such.

Fox, I know you want proof of certain things I've said but you know the best any of us on any side of the debate can do is offer evidence supporting our opinions. If little ole me had the "proof" nobody here would be debating much.

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Have you forgotten ...

The onus isn't on us, we're not claiming they weren't in spite of a complete lack of evidence to support that view.


What you were pointing out were violations that occurred when "Ace of Base" were still cool, how about concentrating on the past couple of years.


That's the same kind of piss-poor argument from a year ago "Well, the U.S. can't actually tell Hans Blix where the WMD's are, they are actually there, just Saddam moves them! and we can't tell Hans because it might somehow endanger one of our sources(not that they're not going to be out of a job if we invade anyway........). Oh that and we think they could be invisible, or teleported into the future. Or hidden in Mordenkainen's Inter-planar Mansion."

Then why wasn't anything done at that point to prevent what is happening in the present?

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I'm not an actor. I just play one on TV.