Really? Specifically, the prevention of potential future Baathist murders was cited? Certainly, past state murders in Iraq were cited as a reason why Saddam was a bad person, but I don't remember future potential murders being cited as a justification prior to March 2003. If you do, please quote your sources.

(Certainly, the Blair administration over here never said a dickie bird about this.)

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/20...0020322-10.html



Yes he is speaking about past actions, but in context he is stating that he will not allow it to happen again. Note the word willing.


http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/20...20021007-8.html

Yes a policy that involves millions of people's lives...and one that hopes to influence, change and direct exactly what they ought to do in their lives. Policies like these do not come devoid of the human factor...and you can't claim it matters in the negative sense but not in the positive because it matters in both.

What we do..as Americans is but one piece of it all...because the Iraqis and what the Iraqis do counts for something..doesn't it? Even if Americans were predominately successful in all their campaigns in Iraq it could still lead to failure..even if Iraqi civilians deaths had been kept at a far lower figure ..failure could still be the outcome. Last time Iraq fell away from Western desires...hardly any blood was shed at all.


First you did not answer my question...I know not every insurgent is a Baathist..but some are. How have you eliminated the Baathist regime as a "state actor" to lay blame with? I would think Iraqis have a pretty fair understanding of which groups operate where and to whom they are loyal to.
The German insurgency in WWII varied in intensity but who cares..I was not highlighting the actions of the Werewolves in DE I was highlighting America and her allies large use of force and indiscriminate military might on the German populace as a whole(the firebombings) Or we can even look to Japan with Hiroshima. Why did not each of these policies and the means in which they were implemented not lead to failure for America and her allies?


Well Iraq is now a part of the GWOT..yes? And whether we all agree on how and when the stage was set for this war in Iraq matters little. What matters is those who support terrorism as a weapon against America and her allies all share a view of the western world ...one that is not limited by their nationality. So if we must concern ourselves with the hatred, anger and contempt our campaigns in Iraq feed..why not how it effects other people of the world too? From what I have seen and read it is not all that difficult to take your anger, contempt and self to Iraq.

I don't think I ever made this statement in positive or negative sense. I am merely stating that it is good statecraft to define what your going to do, how you're going to do it, how long it'll take, how you'll know that you've done it and whether or not it was successful. Laying out the failure modes is part of calculation as well. If you lay out no criteria by which to evaluate whether or not you've achieved your goals, then you'll not know whether or not you're achieving those goals when following the plan. Moreover, if you don't have some mechanism by which to evaluate whether or not you're on the road to success or failure, then you can't know whether or not you should modify the course you're on. This is how one ought to run a business and how one ought to run a policy.


Sure, Iraqis must be part of the calculation as well. All this must be laid out. I guess I don't understand what you're trying to say here.


Yes, some Iraqi insurgents are Ba'athists. Of course, some Iraqi police/soldiers (working for the US) are Ba'athists as well. The state actor calculation is murky at best. Quite unlike post-WWII Germany.


I believe you are predicating an assumption that the insurgency is composed mostly of terrorists. While I agree that there are some terrorists in Iraq, most insurgents appear composed of "nationalists" and opportunists. One day, those insurgents may become terrorists but that day is not today. Actually, I'm a little confused as to what you're trying to say here. Perhaps you could state your position in a different way so that I can give you a proper response.

Right and yet we still have the unpredictable nature of humans..something you can not plan for, define or regulate by calculating. Are you saying that the US has no plan in Iraq? Are all those deaths a result of just accidental, random, undefined, unplanned occurences? The ugly reality is they are not..civilian death happens in war. Our gov is very much aware of this factor and I am sure has already evaluated it and modified as a result of it. I think you greatly underestimate exactly how our military operates. You may not like the plan (altho I am curious how you got your hands on it)..but that does not mean a plan does not exist.


I asked if you felt the civilian deaths in Iraq were a precursor to failure in Iraq. You said yes. I just don't understand how you can determine this. You said it was basic human nature ..that the result I guess is some kind of scientific chemical reaction all humans have. Yet that is why I brought up WWII to show that high civilian casualties does not always equate to failure of the war plan. Also you claim the insurgency will only increase..the Iraqi people will only die more and that terror, pain and death will just further reign in Iraq. Yet I think this prediction forsakes the Iraqi people themselves..will not the Iraqis stop spectating at some point and participate in their nation's reconstruction? Will they not tire of the insurgency violence that kills more Iraqis then it does Americans and their allies? This is why I asked you why the people of Iraq appear to have no significance in your future of Iraq. Or at the least seem to remain as voiceless, immobile victims in their own country ..void of freedom..void of political discourse..and void of any attempt of change except through anguished revenge. Don't you think perhaps they just may realize that they have other options afforded to them then just blowing their own people to pieces?


I have to GREATLY disagree with you on this. I think Iraqi people know who caused their pain, who instigated violence and who reigned terror on their neighborhoods. I think they understand varying levels of involvement with the state and I think they are able to differentiate. Not every German Nazi party member went to the Hague...many just made that simple transition of survival like they did when the Nazis demanded it of them before..same thing happened and will happen in Iraq. You are the one to use the words"state actor"..I had imagined that implied someone/s who acted on behalf of the state compared to those who act within the state.


I'm just reiterating what our own gov. claims is justification for war on Iraq..whether it be true or not..it is the reason they give. The question asked was if this was a worthwhile price. Well that is what this admin believes is the end result, what we must sacrifice for....success in the GWOT. Iraq is just one country..there are many more with many people who feel much the same about America even tho she has not killed or bombed their neighbors, daughters, uncles. Humans are emotional like that..and have varying causes and reasons for their emotions...and often do not have a easily followed path of reason.

I have no idea what you mean here. You can't plan for human behavior? In so far that humans are not clockwork, deterministic mechanisms, one cannot outline the precise algorithm by which a person will do something. I suppose I don't know what else to say.


Essentially, yes. This is what I am saying. Or rather what I'm saying is that the "plan" didn't consist of the items I have stated on numerous occassions.


I have no idea where you're going here. I agree with what you're saying but you seem to be making an accusation.


I am not underestimating the military (or at least I believe I am not). I am taking a position with regard to the political stuggle happening right now in Iraq. The insurgency is not a military campaign; it is a political campaign. I think the US military understands this. However, there are insufficient troops to quell the growing insurgency. This means that blunt hammers like "precision bombings" are all that's left. If you bomb, you may get the insurgents but civilians will die. If you don't bomb, the insurgents get away. This is similar to why police are highly trained to not just go in shooting: you may kill innocents. However, you may have little choice but to shoot in which case you may kill innocents.


I don't think I said this and if I did, I didn't understand the question you were asking given your interpretation. Civilian deaths are not in and of themselves a failure mode. No, the failure mode is the reason behind why there have been so many civilian deaths: insurgency suppression, specifically, the types of insurgency suppression which ends up killing alot of civilians. Dead civilians foster chaos, anger, resentment and war. A successful insurgency campaign absolutely requires these conditions in order to florish.


Quite the contrary, I believe the Iraqi people are hugely significant in Iraq. What are your options though when you have little food, no sanitation, no power, no safety, when your family members are kidnapped for ransom, when bullets are flying and bombs kill your neighbors or your children, when opportunists offer "protection", when police are corrupt, when US soldiers may or may not shoot you at a checkpoint? An Iraqi looks at the ravaging of her nation and can recall that while Saddam may have been evil at least there was food, some measure of security and stability.


I agree that Iraqis know that without the insurgency there would not be pain. They also know that without the invasion there would be no insurgency. Finally, they know that without the US counter-insurgency, more civilians would be alive.


Well, shhh...don't tell anyone but I think our government was being just a wee-bit, just a tad disingenuous. The insurgents are not solely composed of terrorists; the terrorists are a small percentage of insurgents.

We never should have been in Iraq to begin with. there are not any weapons in Iraq. 100,000 people dead for a war that shouldn't have been started to begin with. This is ridiculous.

Is 100,000 civilian deaths (and climbing) an acceptable figure to gain whatever it is we wanted from the war?
Apparently it is acceptable since no-one in the administration has expressed any opinion other than that the numbers are wrong.

From a practical standpoint, if we accept the administration stance that Iraq is part of the WOT, then it is totally unacceptable in that I expect we've created at least one terrorist for each of those 100,000 deaths, an angry brother, a son, a father etc.

Is 100,000 Iraqi lives a fair trade for the 3,000 lives we lost on 9/11?
Since by the administrations own admission Iraq was not connected to 9/11 then it isn't a trade, fair or otherwise. Since we exceeded 3000 civilian deaths in Afghanistan prior to invading Iraq, any such "debt" should have been already paid in full.

How exactly are you aware of what the plan consists of? I mean my husband has to undergo regular interviews..polygraphs, and have his family and friends investigated in order to handle the information he handles for the US Army. Somehow I think it is probably a wee bit more strict when it comes to actual war plans. How do you know this? It is just speculation..there is nothing you can claim as proof.



What military campaign triumphs without a clear political objective..or even better yet have military campaigns ever coexisted without a political campaign?
I think it is inaccurate to compare basic state security..like policing with the actions taking place in Iraq. Our men and women are not being sent in to bust a few drug runners or prostitutes. We haven't even gotten to that level of state control yet...unfortunately.
I think our own casualty rate is considered in deciding how to deal with situations in Iraq too.


As does lack of electricity and apparently phone service. I feel the Iraqi insurgency have chosen to make civilians the back drop of their campaign...not state services, food supplies, communication lines etc. The bulk of the insurgent attacks are meant to draw large numbers of civilian deaths from American retaliation. And all the communication lines are left so the msg can be carried to the audience they have in mind.
I don't like what America is doing in Iraq and I haven't for over 13 yrs now. Yet i still have no problem distinguishing the bad guys from the good guys.


Well that all depends on the Iraqi ..as many did not have food, security, sanitation or power during the Saddam regime either.

While it is true that I don't hold the military plans in my hands, I do believe I can make some abductive and inductive statements about how the situation in Iraq is unfolding. In particular, I've read numerous sources indicating that the Pentagon believes the troop number to be insufficient for the role they have been placed in. I've read that the insurgency despite earlier claims is not composed mainly of terrorists and instead composed of "nationalists" and opportunists. The number of successful insurgency strikes is increasing and US popularity is decreasing. The evidence suggests that the number of insurgents is growing as well. If these are not signals of a problem, then I suppose we will just have to disagree. And to be fair, if these things were not occurring, I would not be taking the position I have now.


I think you're splitting hairs here. A military campaign has a concrete objective; it's about territory and zones of control. An insurgency campaign is about chaos and loss of resolve.


Hmm...well, I just have to disagree here. The insurgency is composed of many, many factions. There are no clear sides like during the initial invasion. The objective is an ambiguous "quell the insurgency" and avoid killing innocents. The territory has been acquired; the zones of control have been defined. What remains is pacifying the populace. This is by definition a policing operation.


I agree with everything you've stated except for the last sentence. You "know" who the good guys are because: (1) you are biased towards the US; (2) you are not in Iraq living the hell that it is; (3) you are not choosing sides when insurgents and the US have both killed your family members and friends. Finally, you may know who the "good" guys are but the "bad" guys are just a label. Distinguishing the "bad" guys from the innocents is, shall we say, a non-trivial exercise.


Do you really believe that the state of Iraqi infrastructure and services post-invasion is equivalent to what was pre-invasion?

I must say that these boards are a relief after being subject to the AOL message boards. Great to be there. Forgive me if it takes me a bit of time to recover from the stupidity of those other boards....

Anway, there have been 100,000 civilian deaths in Iraq. This is an important statistic, but there are things other than statisitics. Civilians are losing friends and family. How will this dictate their opinions on the war? What mistakes have been made to cause this huge death count and what can we do to improve it? These are all important questions that we need to answer, and I hope that we can have an open discussion about it.

I believe that 10,000 civilian were killed in the first bombing raid on "intended targets." If I am wrong, please correct me, but this is what I have heard. The number has grown tremendously since then.

In order to improve conditions in Iraq, we must win over the hearts of the people. It is difficult to do this when so many civilians are being killed. However, to solve the problem, we must ask how many Iraqi's are being killed by the insurents, by getting caught in unpredictable fire fights, by weapons that have been improperly guarded, and by accident. When we answer this question, we will better be able to access the sitution. Right now civlians are being gunned down in fire fights; men, women, and children. We must fix this, which will take brains and action.

Any ideas on how to do this? How will keep civilians safe in this war zone? Is it at all possible? How would we go about doing this?

Is 100,000 civilian deaths (and climbing) an acceptable figure to gain whatever it is we wanted from the war?

You're asking me? Sure. Why not? 100,000 Iraqi lives don't really affect me one way or another. If you want an answer that is more relevant, ask the Iraqi insurgents if 100,000 Iraqi lives are worth what they are fighting for. Ask us both again when the number hits 500,000. Then 1,000,000. I can tell you who gives in first.

Is 100,000 Iraqi lives a fair trade for the 3,000 lives we lost on 9/11?

??? This is a non-question. We aren't trading anything. We aren't even retaliating. What we are doing is another question, but we are going to accomplish it whatever it is regardless of the cost for both sides. Do you know why?

Because, if we quit, it will show Al-Quaida, and every other terrorist organization that exists, that killing a few Americans using guerilla warfare will sway American public opinion, cause political upheaval, and cause the Americans to quit. If it works once, it will work again.

This may be faulty reasoning, but I believe the overall accomplishment we will make is to better the way of life for the Iraqi people. (At least those that we don't kill). So maybe you should ask the Iraqi insurgents what they are trading their lives for?

Oh, I think it's even simpler than that. It's the Pottery Barn rule: "You broke it; you bought it."

If the casualties of all sides were taken into serious consideration by all sides, there would be fewer wars. As it is, a life holds different value to those who are willing to expend them while attacking soft, non-military targets. But life is still very precious to the mothers in Iraq, just as precious as they are to the mothers here in the United States.

I can imagine how grief-stricken and embittered Iraqi women must feel at the deaths of their children.

While we contributed to the hellish circumstances in Iraq, there are many factions within Iraq that are perpetuating it. I am not certain that a continuing U.S. presence in Iraq is going to do anything to ameliorate the situation. This conflict is among the Arabs themselves, and it just might be easier for Iraqis to resolve when Americans and other non-Muslim groups remove themselves from the situation. It might actually be the best thing we can do.

Did England do much to intervene during the American Civil War? Nope. It was something that the North and South had to fight out for themselves. Foreign intervention would serve to prolong the period before the civil war was resolved.

The longer I look at this situation, the more I suspect that this is an Iraqi problem that the United States cannot resolve for them. Self-determination is just that: self-determination. We were wrong to ever think we could realistically make decisions for the Iraqis. If they want democracy, the work will have to be theirs.

Perhaps we are currently seeing the Iraqi "answer" to our actions in Iraq? No guerilla movement can be successful without popular support(think Che Guevara out of Cuba) and there are plenty of images of Iraqi civilian war dead on the internet. I would post a few, but a few people might not like that. I honestly doubt the parents of blown up children view the deaths of their children as being "worth it" since they weren't the ones to decide whether or not they should depose Saddam, or continue to live their lives. Since we started the war, we chose to not consult them, thus violating the principle of the statement quoted above. With Iraq currently in a state of martial law, Iraqi police men fighting it out, and then being summarily executed in Samara, as well as international aid groups pulling out of Iraq-we should realize that our actions(such as destroying a hospital) is creating a karma like effect that puts our soldiers at great risk. Yes, there are now terrorists in Iraq, but we lose hearts and minds when people's homes and family members are killed, or tortured as a result of western actions.



Excellent point here, but the colonists themselves decided to engage in a struggle against the British, not an enterprising foreign power. It was an organic, popular movement that slowly gained acceptance. The colonists would not have accepted the French or any other power for that matter, coming onto their land and running things for them and arrogantly pronouncing to them, how things would be run.



Of all your statements, this one is the most valid. Number crunchers put the deaths at over 600,000 including 1000 Kurds in one day in a systematic effort to wipe out the Kurds as best he could. You could tack on another 500,000 if you consider the Iran-Iraq war, but that is a different matter all together. It is generally accepted that he was an evil and vile man, the question becomes-how best to have dealt with him?.




I find that this conflicts with your earlier statement that the Iraqis must decide this issue themselves. People die everyday of cancer and other diseases that they don't have a choice about. Rather than support democratic movements with money and perhaps weapons so that Iraqis themselves could decide whether or not the battle would be worth it, we are in our present endeavor where more than 3,000 have died. A farmer's family killed because of this war didn't have a say in the matter at all, and that is perhaps the saddest thing about this whole conflict. Until we learn that you can't fight other people's battles for them, we will continue to breed resistance and stumble on and "stay the course" paved in the blood of people whom we claim to represent, but pay no attention to.




Excellent point here as well-there is a difference. At the same time, deaths in our society due to negligent drivers or people who drink(they didn't mean to wreck the car after all) is punished and most generally frowned upon. While the punishment is less severe due to intent, it is still a punishable offense in every civilized nation.

Oh come now just the size of the "retaking" of Fallujah's campaign should give you some kind of indication that not all the territory has been acquired. A lot more than just pacification is going to have to happen.


Again this is why I gave the WWII examples...but you insist on continuing to claim that a successful insurgency campaign or basic failure on our part will be born of these civilians deaths..then how did Hiroshima ever succeed?


Of course I am biased towards the US/UK..but I still feel there is often a clear distinction..I had no trouble identifying the Abu Ghraib torturers as bad guys...I think as a human myself it is an easy distinction to be made.

Yet I am not the one passing personal judgement on the issue we are discussing..I see no reason to and even less to offer it as debate. Mostly I am concerned with what objectives our govt. has. I am not an Iraqi, no need to remind me, so I honestly don't feel my own personal feelings on the issue matter much. And I will continue to back my statements I think the majority of Iraqis have a good feeling about who is there to do good in their country and who is not..and they too have biases but I think that in the end their biases will not inflict their judgement.


As a whole no. Yet there are areas of Iraq that were greatly neglected under the Saddam regime that are in better shape now then they were before.

Is 100,000 civilian deaths (and climbing) an acceptable figure to gain whatever it is we wanted from the war?

In France, we have a saying that fits the situation somehow : "Whoever wants an omelette must break eggs". In other words, casualties are bound to happen when you wage war. Now, is this moral?

Is 100,000 Iraqi lives a fair trade for the 3,000 lives we lost on 9/11?

I'm appalled to hear that. I never thought the Americans actually went to Iraq to seek vengence, but rather to bring freedom to Iraqis. Your question actually implies that there is some kind of payback that you must get from Iraqis... this is simply sickening! I'm sorry but there is no 'cause-to-effect' relation between the death of Iraqis under American bombs, rockets and bullets and the destruction of the WTC by Saudi terrorists!!!

I understand your reaction, Horyok. We Americans were aware of that attitude, though, and the idea of bringing freedom to Iraqis gained prominence only when the piles of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Saddam Hussein's alleged attempt to procure "yellowcake" uranium from Niger were found to be nonexistent and bogus, respectively. Then our leader came up with the altruistic reason.

Our President appealed to the baser qualities (desire for revenge) and the ignorance (trying to tie Iraq to the 9/11/2001 attacks) of Americans, and he succeeded. To this day there are many Americans who still believe that Iraq was connected to the World Trade Center murders and yet, who (if anybody) is calling for accountability from the Saudi Arabians for their countrymen's complicity in the matter! This reveals the utter uselessness of the news media in standing up to the Bush administration and the moral bankruptcy of an administration willing to perpetuate a lie for the sake of advancing its own international agenda.

The deaths of so many Iraqis are appalling. We would not tolerate that kind of loss due to any other nation here in America, and yet we expect the citizens of Iraq to maintain a sense of perspective amidst the losses of their loved ones, their homes, and their social structure? The Iraqis aren't stupid, and we are making more enemies than friends by continuing the occupation.

I certainly couldn't say much more than has alreay been said in this thread, and above in PE's post.

Is 100,000 civilian deaths (and climbing) an acceptable figure to gain whatever it is we wanted from the war?

The question that really must be asked is over 100,000 deaths later, what have we gained? What have we as a society, the human race, or even just the American people gained from the wholesale slaughter of Iraqi's? Sure we can justify their deaths with the omelette anology, we can justify just about anything, but that doesn't mean we can prove that we have done any good. Saddam has been out of power for quite a while, obviously the removal of Saddam wasn't the answer. The democracy that we are installing is only accepted by a fraction of the people, and anyways democracy does not equal freedom (Just look at Israel, a theocratic democracy). So Freedom For Iraqi's shouldn't be our marching slogan.

The only thing we've gained is measurable by economics... and that is a terrible reason to kill people.



Is 100,000 Iraqi lives a fair trade for the 3,000 lives we lost on 9/11?

That would assume that Iraq had something to do with 9/11, which it didn't.
And even if it did: "an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"

Violence only begs for more violence.

I spit on this country, and I mourn the dead who didn't have to die