Huh? Besides the WMD's (remember we firmly believed he had them and had no reason to believe he did not) that was exactly the reason he "sold". What dod you think it was? He said they were a gathering threat(they were) and they would not agree to diplomatically resolving the situation (they wouldn't). So what did that leave us? Say F it and let him rebuild his war machine? Could we have tried more sanctions (ignored by Eurpope) sure, but it just would have delayed the inevitable.

Cam
Most of the US found it perfectly acceptable to spank saddam until Kerry and Kennedy set about convincing them we were losing and it was another Vietnam.

You say "delayed the inevitable" - I say the inevitable was a collapse of his regime, all by itself... neither of us can be proved right or wrong ;)

There were three reasons - a gathering threat of WMD, links to terrorism (but not an involvement in 9/11) and "he's a bad man".

I, for one, would have considered it material if Bush believed (or continues to believe) that Saddam had a pivotal role in 9/11 ---> hence a statement like "the enemy attacked us" raises my eyebrows.

That's not correct - two or three months before the war the support for it was under 50% in the US. Only as it became apparent that it was going to happen did the support swing in favour of it (somewhat marginally - 65-70% from memory), and I personally put that down largely to supporting the troops and jingoism.

Just remember, we liberals have the victim mentality so you have to find another reason rather than blaming Kerry.

Saddam was regaining legitmacy all over again. Heck the French and Russians all but openly traded with him in the face of sanctions. Believe what you want, but he was not about to collapse, things were getting better for him, not worse.

As far as Bush believing this or that, I tend to go with what he says as opposed to what you think he believes. He NEVER said Sadaam attacked us.

the enemy attacked us in reply to "Does the Iraq experience make it more likely or less likely that you would take the United States into another preemptive military action?" sounds awfully close to "Saddam attacked us".

Oh fcuk I give up.

No, we did and still support the troop!
Its all been downhill since Bush jumped on to the aircraftcarrier with that stupid sign "Mission Acomplished".
Looks like Bush's father was totally right about Iraq!

To me its looks like a civil war and we are caught in the crossfire. But the rest of you lemmings are following a stubborn Bush who can't admit making a mistake.

Geoff

What pray tell great genius do you propose we do? Pull out? Say F you to the Iraqi people? Let the terrorists think we are weak and vulnerable? We went in with the best of intetions and now that it gets a little tough we give up? Doesn't sound like my America. Good points (though I disagree) exist for not going initially, but only a fool would propose pulling out now.

Cam..Your facts are good, but your rationale is slightly off. Of course, you are not here to observe personally, are you? the war was not supported initially because it was thought that Iraq had a mighty army with WMD it would not hesitate to use on our troops and other adjoining countries. It was predicted we would lose 10's of thousands of troops or more in the first few days. After it became clear that we would take the country in days with few casualties...the support was there. Now that many are convinced that it is "another Vietnam,'..many US citizens resolve has weakened and the terrorist's resolve has strengthened.

Fair enough. I'd accept that the middle part of those wavering in their support would think that way (they're obviously the crucial ones).

It pains me a little because those further towards the other end (ie, those who thought the US had no place/right invading, and those with the "you break it, you buy it" view) were the ones who were right.

I dunno - I guess since I begin from a standpoint of avoiding war at all costs, I am always going to conflict with those who see it as a necessary part of peace. I cannot believe in a peaceful society at the point of a sword. My own life doesn't work that way.

Either way, I said it a week or two back - I think you/we need more troops over there (and that means a President, whether Bush or Kerry) successfully getting meaningful contributions from other nations. The place needs to be made secure and the infrastructure built. Think like an average Iraqi - they see American troops and (for many of them) not a lot of progress. This breeds antimosity (of which a small percentage turns into insurgency).

Len - sorry. If you had rebutted again, I was going to ask to agree to disagree. I get your point but disagree. Happy to leave it at that.

Cam
We have plenty of troops on the ground...always have....just making them wait for enough trained Iraqi troops to put an Iraqi face on the final battles to take the terrorist strongholds. Samarra (last couple of days) is the model. We could easily do the same throughout the country...and will. When the boss says to.

Peace through superior firepower. It's what won the cold war, it's why we continue to invest in new ways to defend ourselves. We hope we never have to use it, but if the time comes, we'd better damn sure win.

Talking only goes so far, and when you deal with people like Saddam Hussein, Kim Jung Il, Hitler, [insert your favorite murderous dictator], they must be destroyed--not trusted.

You didn't really use it in the cold war - that's the point.

fint:

http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=59 0914&section=news

Police: The documents show that of the nearly 90,000 currently in the police force, only 8,169 have had the full eight-week academy training. Another 46,176 are listed as "untrained," and it will be July 2006 before the administration reaches its new goal of a 135,000-strong, fully trained police force.

Troops Six Army battalions have had "initial training," while 57 National Guard battalions, 896 soldiers in each, are still being recruited or "awaiting equipment." Just eight Guard battalions have reached "initial (operating) capability," and the Pentagon acknowledged the Guard's performance has been "uneven."

Training has yet to begin for the 4,800-man civil intervention force, which will help counter a deadly insurgency. And none of the 18,000 border enforcement guards have received any centralised training to date, despite earlier claims they had, according to Democrats on the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee.

They estimated that 22,700 Iraqi personnel have received enough basic training to make them "minimally effective at their tasks," in contrast to the 100,000 figure cited by Bush.

This is a pretty long timeframe. Moreover, the stronger the insurgency, the less likely that timetable is to be achieved.

Worse - I read a quote in Time magazine from a US officer in charge of training either police or army for Fallujah or Najaf or one of the other "hotspots". He said words to the effect that they had trouble with vetting the new recruits, and that a considerable number disappeared after training back into the insurgency, much better at shooting after the US training :rolleyes:. I felt VERY sorry for that guy for the magnitude of the task at hand for him.

Cam
That article is not talking about our troops..they are the best trained in the world. You would be surprised at how much action many of our troops saw during the "cold war." The article is talking about Iraqi troops. Note the quote is from "Democrats on the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee," not the US Military doing the training. Just more political propaganda...we have proven many times here that the democrats do not consider it to be a bad thing to lie about such things...as long as it might make the administration...or this nation look bad.

This seems to be a kee-jerk response, now. "any negative, which Kerry has; Bush must be said to be worse"

No doubt, the Bush team spins. . .but there is a HUGE difference.

Kerry habitually throws out the baby with the bathwater. His whole power-base comes from magnifying ANYTHING that can be spun as "US bad . .bad US, bad"

Bush is just the opposite. He looks for the good, and trys to celebrate it. When he see bad, he is terribly uncomfortable with it. (lib's leveraging this always) He wants any problems fixed immediately, so they don't cloud the possitive.

Kerry; "wrong war, wrong time, . . .they told stories of cutting off ears .. . our Iraq military weaknesses are troops without the body armor that they need. . ..10,000 out of 12,000 Humvees have no armor., bla bla bla . . ."

All such that dumb-ass suckers will conclude 'oh, tough constructive critisism . . .kerry must be the one who really cares' . . when infact, it's the one, the only, game Kerry has to play.

Kerry is disgustingly one dimensional. I would rather have the witch Hillary, than that simpleton. (that's how bad kerry is)

edit-spelling; it's getting late here.

The US Army wanted 400,000 troops before the war started so they could secure the country and have real elections. We can't just keep extending US soldiers service to try to meet our needs in Iraq. We need the UN Nations to contribute to the "Men on the ground" to stop alot of what is going on now.
Having Superior weapons means NOTHING to a young kid with a bomb strapped to him! Get real!
We do need a exit plan but we also need help to secure the country properly and provide a trained police force until the Iraqis have a trained one.
What that timeline is no one knows but the plan now is "Plan, we don't need a stinkying plan!"

Geoff

LOL good luck, what Nations to you forsee joining us if Bush is out? Ain't gonna happen. France and Germany have already said NO regardless of who our President is. The UN is a joke. By the way, "UN men on the ground" is US!!!!!! We are the VAST majority of the UN "force".

We have to finish this, we have no choice.

The extent of the UN's qualifications, based on their past experiences and failures should be this: They should be allowed to hand out sandwiches and band-aids. Nothing more.

I'm sure even giving them this limited responsibility would result in corruption of some sort; illegal sandwich vouchers, selling band-aids for higher price, going to secret swiss bank accounts, etc. I've seen it a thousand times.

Okay I read only the first post in this thread (I'll read the rest when I have more time), and it occurs to me like the kind of post that may have been written in fear. Of course, fear is the great motivator in this election, or at least the Dubya fans are hoping for the greatest overall volume of fear among Americans, since the only reason Americans might give Dubya four more years is if they are afraid to make a change while we're under attack by those Iraqi terrorists.

And I think there is some hysteria in this message as well. Some of you recognize that your "leader" has done rather poorly while playing "president" in the White House. so, he's kind of a sitting duck if we can get Americans to realize that there may be other important issues out there besides killing the BinLaden-Saddam-Iraq-Alqueda-Iraq-terrorist-9/11-Iraq-Iraq-Iraq-terrorists-Alqueda-BinLaden-Saddam-Iraq terrorists over there in Iraq.