What are we doing?!

[SirMystiq]

So it\'s sad when Americans died during 9/11 but not when Americans died for a war that has nothing to do with 9/11? It\'s sad that so many Americans died during 9/11 but not when American soldiers die? In my opinion, one death is already too many. I don\'t see how people like me make this country "weak" So we are just supposed to sit back and watch the bodies roll in?

When a soldier signs up to serve in the military they know the risks that might affect them, I agree with you on that. It just all goes back to the beginning of the war, those soldiers shouln\'t have died because of it. The war is dragging on way too long and I\'ll never, ever, just "accept" their deaths. They are dying everyday after the war was officially called to be over. It\'s not that I don\'t see that this war like any other will bring casualties, I just don\'t see why there was the war to begin with. It has brought nothing, except maybe the deep happy breaths of those paranoid about Hussain having WMD. I guess they are happy to see that he had none to begin with. This war isn\'t going to end anytime soon, I don\'t see how this is helping against terrorims. Since Osama might still be alive, terrorist are still making threats and Spain was victim to a terrorist attack also.

The memo might have not warned Bush, but as all intelligent people know, if somebody is making a plot to kill you, most people would at least try to be more careful and put their guard up. They don\'t wait until somebody shoots them in order to do something about it. The plan took years to plan, but Clinton was the one that bombed Osama\'s place, and that was the time when Osama threatened to attack the US. You ask where was Clinton\'s intelligence, well where was Bush\'s?

Originally posted by Ace
The whole region appears to be but I still have to believe the majority of people there want peace like the rest of us.

Thats the thing though. They almost all want peace, but with their own way of life. Not "western ways" Alot feel we(USA) are telling them how to live.

Not to say some dont though.

Yes and how do they want to live?  Another dictator that controls how the country\'s money is spent?  Bad idea.

History has shown man is evil in nature, the couuntries that are doing the best financially and socially are the ones that break up their government into serveral parts where no single entity holds all the power.

It\'s a sad fact but any one person having control of that much money would most likely spend way too much on themselves (ie- big statues, huge palaces with golden fixtures), while their country is dirt poor.

If you give the power to the people you start to see some progess.

That is true. But it cant seem like its forced upon them.

Personally I can\'t believe the average American is whimpering over the body count so far... our soldiers joined the military knowing they might have to go to war. The American public needs to get a backbone and be able to stomach some casualties. By the way people are whining it sounds like this is the repeat of the massacre at Little Big Horn.

But you are wrong, have you not seen South Park? It\'s called having your cake and eating it too. It was created by our founding fathers. You see, we need the people with backbones so we don\'t seem like a weak and wimpy country, but we need the protesters and people like that who show we have sympathy.


Im a little bit country, Im a little bit rock and roll

Ill be the backbone of america,  and ill be the caring soul!

[videoholic]

Aren\'t they having a civil war?

Seems like we had one too...

Funny..i remember saying the same thing vid.


We had ours, maybe they need to have theirs as well. Like so many other countries. We did what we said we would do...found nothing....then it changed to liberating ppl...we did that too. Its time to let them do their thing, no matter how long it takes.


If we arent there, they cant drag our bodies through the streets.

[Living-In-Clip]

I just want to know why America has to take the role on of big brother. They don\'t want our ways - they want their own. Let them have it. There is no reason for us to be over there and trying to change their lifestyle.

Originally posted by SirMystiq
So it\'s sad when Americans died during 9/11 but not when Americans died for a war that has nothing to do with 9/11? It\'s sad that so many Americans died during 9/11 but not when American soldiers die? In my opinion, one death is already too many. I don\'t see how people like me make this country "weak" So we are just supposed to sit back and watch the bodies roll in?

No one is saying it isn\'t sad when an American soldier dies.  The fact is that when you start a war though, you weigh the potential for the death of American soldiers and anyone else who may be involved against the benefit the war may bring in the long term and the necessity to fight it.  9/11 was more tragic because the people who died were innocent in the sense that they hadn\'t knowing put themselves in danger, where as soldiers do.  

People like you make the nation weak because you aren\'t willing to accept that loses are sometimes necessary to produce larger gains.  You aren\'t supposed to "sit back and watch the bodies roll in".  You have to accept, however, that sometimes such losses are necessary, and a time of war is one of those instances.  If you aren\'t willing to put the lives of soldiers at risk, then what\'s the point of having them at all?

When a soldier signs up to serve in the military they know the risks that might affect them, I agree with you on that. It just all goes back to the beginning of the war, those soldiers shouln\'t have died because of it. The war is dragging on way too long and I\'ll never, ever, just "accept" their deaths. They are dying everyday after the war was officially called to be over. It\'s not that I don\'t see that this war like any other will bring casualties, I just don\'t see why there was the war to begin with. It has brought nothing, except maybe the deep happy breaths of those paranoid about Hussain having WMD. I guess they are happy to see that he had none to begin with. This war isn\'t going to end anytime soon, I don\'t see how this is helping against terrorims. Since Osama might still be alive, terrorist are still making threats and Spain was victim to a terrorist attack also.

The point of the war to begin with, in a large part, was to free the Iraqi people from an opressive dictator.  In case you haven\'t noticed, that has been accomplished.  Whether you agree with that or not, you can\'t deny that we accomplished this.  If we pull out now, the anarchy and chaos that would result in Iraq would certainly cause numerous deaths and might leave the Iraqi\'s worse off than they are now.  Is that what you want?  Or maybe only American soldier\'s lives matter, and not other innocent people.  The fact is, for a war, the body count in Iraq has been very low.  Yes, there are still people dying, but their numbers are still minimal.


While I personally don\'t think we can force democracy on them or anything like that, and I was against the war in the first place, I think that pulling out now, before there is a stable government in place, would be about the worst course of action we could take for the Iraqi people.

Originally posted by shockwaves

People like you make the nation weak because you aren\'t willing to accept that loses are sometimes necessary to produce larger gains.  You aren\'t supposed to "sit back and watch the bodies roll in".  You have to accept, however, that sometimes such losses are necessary, and a time of war is one of those instances.  If you aren\'t willing to put the lives of soldiers at risk, then what\'s the point of having them at all?



 

That is scary - I thought you were quoting me for a second, but that is really you saying that.

The only thing I have to say is will get to a point where we say enough is enough - too many US soldiers have died?  I don\'t really think so because by that time I would hope that the international community would step in.

One worrisome aspect is the martyr syndrome and the open borders Iraq shares with Iran and Syria.  The results are in influx of Islamic fantatics bent on killing US soldiers - apparently there is no greater glory :rolleyes:

[clips]

Originally posted by shockwaves
No one is saying it isn\'t sad when an American soldier dies.  The fact is that when you start a war though, you weigh the potential for the death of American soldiers and anyone else who may be involved against the benefit the war may bring in the long term and the necessity to fight it.  9/11 was more tragic because the people who died were innocent in the sense that they hadn\'t knowing put themselves in danger, where as soldiers do.  

People like you make the nation weak because you aren\'t willing to accept that loses are sometimes necessary to produce larger gains.  You aren\'t supposed to "sit back and watch the bodies roll in".  You have to accept, however, that sometimes such losses are necessary, and a time of war is one of those instances.  If you aren\'t willing to put the lives of soldiers at risk, then what\'s the point of having them at all?



The point of the war to begin with, in a large part, was to free the Iraqi people from an opressive dictator.  In case you haven\'t noticed, that has been accomplished.  Whether you agree with that or not, you can\'t deny that we accomplished this.  If we pull out now, the anarchy and chaos that would result in Iraq would certainly cause numerous deaths and might leave the Iraqi\'s worse off than they are now.  Is that what you want?  Or maybe only American soldier\'s lives matter, and not other innocent people.  The fact is, for a war, the body count in Iraq has been very low.  Yes, there are still people dying, but their numbers are still minimal.


While I personally don\'t think we can force democracy on them or anything like that, and I was against the war in the first place, I think that pulling out now, before there is a stable government in place, would be about the worst course of action we could take for the Iraqi people.

i agree with everything you stated shoky except the part about freeing the iraqi people..the war was from the beginning to uncover wmd\'s..luckee said it best when the initiatives went from wmd\'s to liberating the iraqi people...even you can\'t deny how bush was acting up to the point of war...he just said f**k everybody & went it alone..now the u.s. was putting up a huge offensive front in the wake of those gruesome deaths..only to scale it back for a ceasefire..yea the u.s. bombed those area\'s heavily but they were still being met with stiff resistance..

bottom line is that even tho the u.s. will ultimately win this war..they need help..it wasn\'t long after the war started bush went right back to the u.n. for help..bush went to china, germany etc..& asked them for help (militarily) but stated they would have no-say in contracts for the country & such..what kind of proposal was that?

anyway i\'m startin\' to touch on other points on the war..i\'m not going to touch anything else you stated because i agree with you otherwise...

Originally posted by clips
i agree with everything you stated shoky except the part about freeing the iraqi people..the war was from the beginning to uncover wmd\'s..luckee said it best when the initiatives went from wmd\'s to liberating the iraqi people...even you can\'t deny how bush was acting up to the point of war...he just said f**k everybody & went it alone..now the u.s. was putting up a huge offensive front in the wake of those gruesome deaths..only to scale it back for a ceasefire..yea the u.s. bombed those area\'s heavily but they were still being met with stiff resistance..

bottom line is that even tho the u.s. will ultimately win this war..they need help..it wasn\'t long after the war started bush went right back to the u.n. for help..bush went to china, germany etc..& asked them for help (militarily) but stated they would have no-say in contracts for the country & such..what kind of proposal was that?

anyway i\'m startin\' to touch on other points on the war..i\'m not going to touch anything else you stated because i agree with you otherwise...

Ha, you don\'t have to tell me that, believe me.  I was VERY much against this war.  And yes, I know the main issue was weapons of mass destruction, however the government and the people in favor of the war often tried to use the idea of liberating the Iraqi people as another reason for war.  I mean, I pretty much agree with all you said too.  I\'m just trying to say it\'s stupid to say that absolutely nothing was accomplished here.


And Giga, sure we may usually disagree, but it doesn\'t mean I don\'t have at least a little common sense

I\'ve just read through this thread, and everybody is making really solid points.

My thoughts and opinions on this war in general have been on a rollercoaster ride. Before it began, I was for it because Saddam Hussein has always been bad news. It essentially would kill three birds with one stone: ousting a power-hungry dictator and liberating the Iraqi people, seizing WMDs, and heck I was looking forward to paying less at the pump as well. So regardless of why you believe we went to war, whether it was a personal vendetta, or just a way to capture some oil fields, you cannot ignore the fact that it was going to help a lot of innocent people.

Then the war started... Hussein lost power, and would eventually be captured... No WMDs discovered, too bad, it would have been nice, but we still accomplished many other things... What I never really thought would go so bad is our occupation and attempt to establish a stable government.

The body count and death tolls don\'t bother me, like it has been stated, in a war, people die. Its just it seems no progress is being made whatsoever and we\'re at a stalemate here. It\'s even disheartening that so many \'allies\' just sit comfortably and watch and do nothing. We went into this alone, however the job would be so much more easier with support from other countries and all this bloodshed that they\'re griping about can come to a quicker conclusion.

And finally, with Islamic fanaticism at an entirely new height, Muslims from every Middle Eastern nation are flocking to Iraq to get a chance to do what their \'god\' promises will earn them salvation, killing an American. I hope they all just gradually flood in and we can kill every one of them and weed as many out of the human race as possible.

Oh and for every moron saying this was for oil, why am I paying $2.11 to fill my tank? Idiots.

b/c OPEC who controls these things are comprising primarily of Arab countries. Most may not be against us but will not allow us use of their countries or even like us. I dont really know much about the oil game, but it seems as if they are putting the squeeze on us.


PS im rocking $1.79

Originally posted by luckee
b/c OPEC who controls these things are comprising primarily of Arab countries. Most may not be against us but will not allow us use of their countries or even like us. I dont really know much about the oil game, but it seems as if they are putting the squeeze on us.


PS im rocking $1.79

That is true, but if going into Iraq was about "cheap oil" - which was a popular anti war slogan (not by you luckee) why don\'t we just pump that oil straight to America to relieve OPEC\'s squeeze?  We can\'t because it isn\'t our oil regardless of the fact that we are the defacto rulers of Iraq.