If the war is about oil, then.....

[videoholic]

Why didn\'t we take the oil in \'91?

The biggest fear was world opinion and the destablization of the region. Our big enemy at the time was still Iran. We saved the oil in Kuwait but the political air still pointed to Iran not Iraq. We supported Saddam in the Iran Iraq war.

The Soviets(Russia) did not want to see Saddam toppled at that time and did not support that measure. The mandate was still ony to remove Saddam from Kuwait not remove him from power.

This time the stakes are different. If Saddam was such a threat why did we not support his opposition? WE left them to die at his hand. We dont need to take out the whole country to destroy Saddam. Its like Invading Panama to remove Noriega. NO, we wanted to destroy the PDF so we could keep some control of the canal zone.

So why not just send in assassins to take care of him and avoid a bloody conflict? There must be more at stake. Oh...our President is the son of a Rich Texas oil man. Sorry did not mean to say that. Wars are fought over territory and money. Not just one man.

[Titan]

I agree 100% with vid. If we wanted it, we would have had it back then. We would have gone to war with other Arab nations (which would have been a big mistake so it wasn\'t) or got it through treaties (sort of like today). But we have a lot of oil reserves and we can try and get oil from other countries. I think its ignorant when we say we go to war to get oil. Thats why Hussein went to war with Kuwait, to get control of their oil reserves.

It\'s all about the money, and oil is money.

  But on the other hand what about all the wepons that Irqu has, isn\'t this what the war is more about?

we werent in the crisis we are in now either, that might have impacted the choice.

[Titan]

But we aren\'t going to get his oil. Hussein has weapons and he will probably use them. We need to get him before he does. Except for the oil industry there, the economy isn\'t in the greatest shape either. We could do something similar to that of Japan in the 40s, set up a democracy and nuture it until they get back on their feet.

Hussein needs to be taken out. The prob there is what kind of man will take his place, Hell he could be worse then Hussein.

there was a difference there...

Japan had surrendered, and they also thought we had a third Atomic Bomb so they pretty much did what we said.  Truman was a good poker player.  We don\'t have that control over Iraq, and Bush doesn\'t have the mentality to drop nuclear weapons to get his way.

[Titan]

That is a pretty good point Hurricane but it was just funny that in Japan, they could have kept the Empire if they wanted to but they adopted democracy after thousands of years of empires and they just picked it up with no problems. I\'m just saying that Iraq might be able to do the same.

We do have oil reserves and thats what they are...reserves. Do you not believe that oil helped motivate our freeing Kuwait? Why do we have to buy so much oil from that region in the first place. Would we have gone to war for some poor country in africa with no assets?

Dont say Somalia...that was nothing more than a political show. We pulled out of there faster than a rabbit running into its hole. You cant just go into a nation and dictate to them who to remove because they are not freindly to us. But if you paint a bad enough picture of a leader you might be able to sway world opinion.

If Saddam has these weapons who can he use them against? Us, Israel? How will they deliver them. Walk them over here? We could take them out in a heartbeat. We would know were they came from and retaliate immediatly. Why not attack India or Pakistan? They also have weapons of mass destruction.


But they do not have oil.

Originally posted by The Hurricane
there was a difference there...

Japan had surrendered, and they also thought we had a third Atomic Bomb so they pretty much did what we said.  Truman was a good poker player.  We don\'t have that control over Iraq, and Bush doesn\'t have the mentality to drop nuclear weapons to get his way.

Do we realy want that kind of war, I mean it was one thing ww2, but nowit woud be a hole new thing.

[Titan]

If two countries hit eachother with nuclear missiles, bye bye world. That\'s why most countries are dismantling them or signing treaties.

not quite powerful enough to destroy the world.  We don\'t have weapons that powerful, yet!

Today Bush was talking about disarming Iraq, that sounds good and all on our part... but Iraq will get pissed, and commit acts of war on other countries, steal their resources and then we have a huge problem on our hands.

[Titan]

Your forgetting if two countries went to nuclear war with eachother, there\'s nuclear winter and radiation that will kill people. Most won\'t die from the blast, they die from cold and radiation.

Iraq is in no position to be threatening us with Nuclear Weapons.