we bomb weapon caches, terrorist hideouts...etc. The extent of collateral damage is although a factor it is limited. We do not wipe out square blocks of civilians last time i checked... We have smart bombs that are meant to destroy their target. We use more Infantry then anything to comb through cities even more reducing civilian casualties.

that point is honestly irrelevant, not one of those civilians today was a threat to the radical Islamist way of life yet, the very terrorists we are trying to stop are a threat to not only us but their very own religion as well since it typecasts more and more people of it everyday, making terrorists absolute scum in my eyes.

Rofl, I love it.

Is it so hard to believe? I mean, there are McDonalds in every major city in the world and them some. They have them in China and India, North and South America, Europe, Asia. The arches are everywhere. And when you consider over half the world isn't Christain, it's not far fetched at all.

oS, it will never go away. it's not so much to do with oil as it is to do with money. "money is power."
and it's not so much bush as it is the leader of the country. you have to watch all of them.

Even if their was training camps in Iraq, it doesn't mean that the Ba'ath party were supporting or funding it. Iraq is a big country and it is quite possible that they were training there secretly, like they were in Pakistan. The Ba'ath party doesn't have the resources or the technology to keep every inch of their country under control, but the US does. If the US had satellite photos of those camps, then they could have tried to co-operate with Iraq to take them out. If Iraq actively refused, then yes it would appear that they support them.
That's pretty much exactly what happened with Afganistan. But not Iraq. There were no sattelite photos, there was no evidence. This is all nothing more than speculation, and speculation is not the 'smoking gun' that warrants war.

It was in a documentary. The guy showed some kids a picture of Jesus (or the most commonly accepted picture) and then a picture of the Wendy's lady. Only one girl recognized the picture of Jesus, but all of them recognized the Wendy's lady.

I suggest you stop dismissing our claims when we actually have a credible source.

Not one bit. It's not like we can just go to the country of Al Qaeda and destroy them. Hopefully this attack will inspire continued vigilance. If you look at 9/11 as the biggest and most successful terrorist strike and the fact that they haven't yet been able to duplicate one of that magnitude then their capability must have been diminished. Let's not forget that Europe in general has a very open immigration policy and that Muslims have been moving there in droves. Most likely the vast majority are looking for the freedom the West offers but undoubtedly some are Ilamic extremists who believe in the ways of Al Qaeda. You can't find all of these guys. That's why the Middle East has to be transformed. That is what is happening, slowly, and is why you see the same terrorists who would gut anyone of us in the street inflicting their evil on Iraqi civilians and those who are fighting to make themselves a better country.



Fixed.

I don't know what a Wendy's girl looks like. Maybe in North America that holds true, but not a cat's chance in a cat concentration camp in the R.O.W.*

*Rest Of World

A documentary where a guy shows some kids some pictures doesn't seem to be a credible source for the point that these fast food symbols are more globally recognizable than Christian symbols. Maybe to fat American kids but to draw conclusions much larger than that is infintile.

That is the point...they're more recognizable to American kids. And none of them were fat, fyi.

But it's true that fast food symbols are far more recognizable in America, though I don't know about the rest of the world.

you neglected to mention that Zarqawi and his al Qaeda buddies didnt show up in Iraq until AFTER the US invaded.

PS - anyone heard from maeve?

Not yet

JB has texted her though, so hopefully she'll at least get in touch with him.

Who did, me? Why wouldn't they show up? And which one was the guy that fled Afghanistan when we attacked and received surgery in Baghdad. I know I could easily look it up. I just don't remember because all these dumb terrorist names start to blend together after awhile.

Edit: like anyone gives a ****

You underestimate his internal intelligence agency. In fact, that's one reason Iraq lost the war. All their intelligence was focused inside of themselves, constantly routing out possible dissenters, traitors, etc that their intelligence for the outside was almost nothing and we could easily deceive them multiple ways which was one of the factors in the Coalition military rolling over the Iraqi military. And it is well known that Saddam supported the Palestinian terrorists who attack one of his enemies, why wouldn't he do that with another group that was attacking(or training to attack) his enemies? Btw, there are images of the terrorist camps in Iraq, which is one of the things he describes in his book. Now, is it possible he didn't know about the camps? Yep. But I wouldn't bet on it. I'd put my money on him knowing they were there, but since they were training to fight the West, he looked the other way or even possibly gave them some aid to help them train.

That quote from the book about the intelligence? That was before the war started.

OMFG. You call that a credible source? HA! Seriously., that is laughable. Come back when you have some kind of REAL EXPERIMENT. Documentaries that were released in theaters are hardly trustworthly. Just look at Bowling for columbine etc. And I don't know how a few kids represents the American public but whatever. Seriously, I can't believe you havbe the audacity to say I shouldn't dismiss claims with credible sources, when you have THAT to offer up as your "credible source"

Keiran, your source is not credible because he's an American. You could use an Iraqi as a reference but if he's a defector then whatever he says probably isn't credible either. Unless you can get someone like Michael Moore to back up your claims you should just leave the debate.

Edit: still not worth it

Awww, come on Tenshu.

Here are a couple of PDFs I've uploaded to my webspace further citing connections between Iraq and Al Qaeda:

page 1
page 2

That article is too partisan to be credible. I mean, just take a look at the title, the ridiculous first sentence, and the rest of the article has that smug "my political party is better than yours" undertone.

Kieran: Ansar al Islam was a Kurdish seperatist group located in northern Iraq (outside Hussein's control) because it opposed his regime. It was also a domestic, not international, terrorist group. Somehow I doubt the Iraqi government was giving money to a violent terrorist organization dedicated to taking over a significant portion of its territory.

Nothing is credible enough for some people.

If the sources were blatantly partisan, I would agree. However, instead of attacking the credibility of the person who compiled the information, attack the credibility of his/her sources.

Amazing. A couple members of Al-Qaeda went there in 2000, Zarqawi went to a Baghdad hospital, Bin Laden met with an official in 1996, etc. I especially love the

Great evidence there! Should we invade every other country on that list?

Honestly, the "intelligence" showing links between Iraq and Al-Qaeda is brought to you by the same people that failed to see 9-11 coming, the same people that told us about all those "weapons of mass destruction" that Iraq had. As I recall you were pretty sure about those too Wookie.. still believe they're there? We'll find them any day now huh!

No.. he thinks they were removed from the country when we invaded.

Yeah what a farfetched idea!

Seriously, why do you think they wouldn't allow UN weapon inspectors to enter the country for weeks? You think maybe they were trying to hide their illegal weapons? Noo couldn't be thats just right wing propaganda from bush loving hicks.

Are you ****ing serious?

Who are the same people that failed to see 9/11 and believed there to be WMDs in Iraq? Are you referring to President Bush, President Clinton, the US Senate, the US House of Representatives, the UN, Brittish Intelligence, French Intelligence, German Intelligence, and pretty much the rest of the world, except Iraq, of course? Are those the people who mistakingly believed Iraq to have WMDs? As I recall, my support for the liberation of Iraq was not primarily due to the potential WMD threat. And I'm glad you concede the overwhelming connection Iraq has to Al Qaeda. There is hope. And I don't believe we need to invade every country on the list as they are not all state sponsors of terrorism.

What does it even matter if they have them or not? Lots of countries do. Should we invade them? OMFG! France has nukes! Let's invade!

Wow, that's totally irrelevent!

Do you know anything about what happened after the first Gulf War? How the UN placed sanctions on Iraq stating that Iraq could not have WMDs? How Iraq had to allow UN inspectors full access to all sites in the country at any time (which didn't happen, by the way)? The assassination plot on Bush Sr. that was uncovered? I love how people completely dismiss these things as if they don't matter.

And it was the U.N. who tried fruitlessly to cool the heels of the United States before it did anything brash.

Except Iraq was no different from any of the other countries on that list.

Yes, Iraq was a dictatorship, but it was nothing special. Unless you plan on 'liberating' every single dictatorship in the world, then invading Iraq was hypocrisy.

Iraq cooperated fully with the inspectors after they reentered the country in late 2002. Every demand was met and every site was accessible. Blix said as much in both addresses to the UN.

Wookie: Your source is completely untrustworthy, and you're full of it.

Your source, quoting one of the Commission's staff statements:
The actual statement, with the parts missing from the above quote bolded:

It was not just the U.S. that believed in WMDs in Iraq, all the countries that Wookie stated also believed that they existed. So in that sense, yes Iraq was different because WMDs in the hands of a dictator is a dangerous thing.

Done. By the fabulous Ictus, of course.

Not really, he proved it was partisan but didn't prove it lied.

Not in the mid nineties, and it went completely unpunished.

Um, what? Yes he did.



What are you trying to say? That's justification for war a decade later?

Um what? No he didn't. He showed parts of a quote were omitted.