Iraq and the Middle East
There needs to be more to politics than just being against George Bush. Here's a few questions Democrats and foreign opponents of Bush need to answer:
1) What will happen if the terrorists in Iraq win?
2) Particularly what will happen to the people of Iraq?
3) What makes you think that the killings will stop if they win?
4) Given the volume of killings that occured under Saddam Hussein's regime, do you think that the killings of Iraqis have increased or decreased since his overthrow? By how much?
5) About the Iraqi elections: the terrorist opposition have declared that they oppose them while the Iraqi people certainly went to great lengths to vote in them. Do you support the will of the people or that of the terrorists?
6) What do you think should be done to stop the terrorists from destroying Iraqi democracy?
7) About Afganistan: The Democrats are calling for a redeployment of forces from Iraq to Afganistan. How long after that event occurs do you think that the Democrats will be calling for a pullout from Afganistan, too?
Just curious if anybody who opposes the war will answer questions like these in any kind of meaningful way. My experience is that opponents seem to think that all that is necessary to understanding politics is to oppose whatever George Bush says.
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1 comments:
Hi Jack,
I will try some answers.
1) What will happen if the terrorists in Iraq win?
I have already posted about this in another post you made, but the basic argument is that there would be no terrorists there had the invasion not occurred in the first place. It is perfectly well accepted that the Bush lied about terrorists in Iraq in the first place, but using that curse of a word terror seems to close down all other arguments making everything permissible.
In any case, how can there be a victory? How would you define winning in this context? It would seem to me and a great many others that the presence of troops is only exacerbating the situation.
2) Particularly what will happen to the people of Iraq?
600,000 civilians dead since the invasion began! Can't really get much worse for them can it?
3) What makes you think that the killings will stop if they win?
I would hope that you would include a stop to killings in the term "they win" otherwise there cannot be a victory. That question just goes in circles.
4) Given the volume of killings that occured under Saddam Hussein's regime, do you think that the killings of Iraqis have increased or decreased since his overthrow? By how much?
It has increased significantly, certainly of civilians. And in any case it was us the west who provided him with the means to do all the killing in the first place and were perfectly happy to overlook it all.
5) About the Iraqi elections: the terrorist opposition have declared that they oppose them while the Iraqi people certainly went to great lengths to vote in them. Do you support the will of the people or that of the terrorists?
Democracy has to be the way forward, but what democracy can there be when all the elected officials live in the Green Zone which is cut off and effectively a different world to that of every day Iraq. And why should they be confident in the current US led democracy, after an invasion led by said country has resulted in so many of their fellow iraqi's deaths? The form of democracy must be up to them and the US must back it rather than declaring it void as in Palestine# with the democratically elected Hamas.
6) What do you think should be done to stop the terrorists from destroying Iraqi democracy?
A very difficult question to answer. One thing for sure is that the way to succeed surely isn't what they are trying now.
7) About Afganistan: The Democrats are calling for a redeployment of forces from Iraq to Afganistan. How long after that event occurs do you think that the Democrats will be calling for a pullout from Afganistan, too?
Afghanistan is an entirely different kettle of fish. In invading Iraq the US opened up a new front in the "war on terror" that they need not have. It is a legitimate war brought about by 9/11, whereas the war in Iraq was entirely illegal.
Niall
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