Wednesday, July 07, 2004
CORRECTION
This just in, apparently I was wrong in my statements about U.S. involvment in Iraq and Afghanistan. I've been informed that the rumors of U.S. backing for Saddam against Iran in the Iran/Iraq conflict of the early eighties are apologist crap, along with U.S. funding of Al Queda during the Afghani-Soviet conflict. All lies I guess. I suppose Iran-Contra affair never happened either. I am so sorry. I will check my facts in the future. What source to use? The Christian Science Monitor?
This just in, apparently I was wrong in my statements about U.S. involvment in Iraq and Afghanistan. I've been informed that the rumors of U.S. backing for Saddam against Iran in the Iran/Iraq conflict of the early eighties are apologist crap, along with U.S. funding of Al Queda during the Afghani-Soviet conflict. All lies I guess. I suppose Iran-Contra affair never happened either. I am so sorry. I will check my facts in the future. What source to use? The Christian Science Monitor?
Comments:
You�re sounding more and more like Katie Couric everyday. A fatal mistake that seems to be constantly made in the crazy world of global political debate is the absence of historical context when it comes to this tired argument position. Since the Iran/Iraq war happened during our lifetime you of all people should be able to recall first hand what the political environment was like back then, what our primary interests were, what immediate objectives the U.S. had as things were back during the Soviet invasion time period. I recall all of it quite vividly. There was overwhelming bipartisan support for U.S. aid to ANYBODY willing to beat the Soviets back out of Afghanistan. This support came from all over the globe, from many free nations where popular bipartisan support existed as well.
Iran... The Iranian conflict should certainly loom large in your mind. It was the first geopolitical event that occurred in my lifetime that I followed in the papers. Again, there was overwhelming bipartisan support for backing anybody against the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. He had just made the U.S. look very weak by supporting the students taking our embassy hostage. The event ended Jimmy Carter's presidency and it marked the end of a long period of American apologism if that's even a word. Essentially, everybody in American was feeling the same way my man. There were not huge chucks of the population split along party lines calling for an end to aid to Iraq to fight the Iranains, it was quite the contrary. It was a landslide election year. A true "national mandate" before it became an over used buzzword.
I will concede this to your point, sometimes short term objectives often call for immediate action in which hasty decisions must be made especially when it comes to war. Sometimes the downside of these decisions are nil, sometimes they overcome the primary objective itself (I getthe feeling you've already called game in Iraq while I beleive that the first Qtr hasn't even ended yet). Did we know back in the eighties that Bin Laden's band of gypsies were planning a barbaric theocracy for Afghanistan? Probably not. He was nothing more than a mercenary Jihadist repulsing a Soviet advance (think of what Marx and Lenin's thoughts are on religion in society and it's a great thing to rally Jihadists with). Should we have done our homework on Saddam's newly "assumed" gov't before sending him aid against the Iranians? Probably, but it would have not dug up a huge file full of atrocities like the same inquiry would today. He simply wasn't in power long enough back then to have created enough of them yet (Uday and Qusay were just baby tyrants then). Also, you might want to do some digging into exactly what aid we did give Saddam back then. There was not a huge amount of trust there relative to some other relationships that have backfired on us in our past. Saddam got intel from our satellites, and some tank busting shoulder rockets, a customer for his oil, but not much more. If you recall, during that same time period, we supported and supplied intel to the Israeli�s who subsequently conducted an air strike that took out Saddam's first and only nuclear plant that he was building and was nearing completion. While I completely agree that we fobbed the WMD intel on Saddam's nuke capabilities in the last decade, you have to remember that he was very close to becoming a member of the nuclear nations at one time. The team that helped him almost succeed didn't just pack up and go live in Europe, they were highly paid and protected members of his regime. After the nuke plant bombing, all normalized relations with Saddam ended by his chosing. We let him off the hook when the jackass shot and exocet missile at one of our frigates patrolling the gulf, which gave U.S. intel agencies real perspective of what this guy was all about. Another often overlooked and ignored critical piece of history in that region.
I don't get the CSM everyday, but you ought to check it out from time to time. The name might scare you as it did I initially, but my journalism instructors at our mutual almost alma mater and my real alma mater recommended to all us students. I'd read it in the ole Stamp Union while blowing off classes. It is just another news rag, but it is clearly different, dare say, higher caliber type of reporting. More facts, less editorializing.
While I might throw an arrow at Bill Clinton for not getting Bin Laden when HE had the chance from time to time, I certainly can't assume that the intel briefings he was receiving at the time labeled Bin Laden such a huge risk that he warranted more attention than he got.
Maybe Larry King... Yeah, Larry King is who your sounding like. Your not bubbly or perky enough to be Katie Couric.
Peace, Love.
Iran... The Iranian conflict should certainly loom large in your mind. It was the first geopolitical event that occurred in my lifetime that I followed in the papers. Again, there was overwhelming bipartisan support for backing anybody against the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. He had just made the U.S. look very weak by supporting the students taking our embassy hostage. The event ended Jimmy Carter's presidency and it marked the end of a long period of American apologism if that's even a word. Essentially, everybody in American was feeling the same way my man. There were not huge chucks of the population split along party lines calling for an end to aid to Iraq to fight the Iranains, it was quite the contrary. It was a landslide election year. A true "national mandate" before it became an over used buzzword.
I will concede this to your point, sometimes short term objectives often call for immediate action in which hasty decisions must be made especially when it comes to war. Sometimes the downside of these decisions are nil, sometimes they overcome the primary objective itself (I getthe feeling you've already called game in Iraq while I beleive that the first Qtr hasn't even ended yet). Did we know back in the eighties that Bin Laden's band of gypsies were planning a barbaric theocracy for Afghanistan? Probably not. He was nothing more than a mercenary Jihadist repulsing a Soviet advance (think of what Marx and Lenin's thoughts are on religion in society and it's a great thing to rally Jihadists with). Should we have done our homework on Saddam's newly "assumed" gov't before sending him aid against the Iranians? Probably, but it would have not dug up a huge file full of atrocities like the same inquiry would today. He simply wasn't in power long enough back then to have created enough of them yet (Uday and Qusay were just baby tyrants then). Also, you might want to do some digging into exactly what aid we did give Saddam back then. There was not a huge amount of trust there relative to some other relationships that have backfired on us in our past. Saddam got intel from our satellites, and some tank busting shoulder rockets, a customer for his oil, but not much more. If you recall, during that same time period, we supported and supplied intel to the Israeli�s who subsequently conducted an air strike that took out Saddam's first and only nuclear plant that he was building and was nearing completion. While I completely agree that we fobbed the WMD intel on Saddam's nuke capabilities in the last decade, you have to remember that he was very close to becoming a member of the nuclear nations at one time. The team that helped him almost succeed didn't just pack up and go live in Europe, they were highly paid and protected members of his regime. After the nuke plant bombing, all normalized relations with Saddam ended by his chosing. We let him off the hook when the jackass shot and exocet missile at one of our frigates patrolling the gulf, which gave U.S. intel agencies real perspective of what this guy was all about. Another often overlooked and ignored critical piece of history in that region.
I don't get the CSM everyday, but you ought to check it out from time to time. The name might scare you as it did I initially, but my journalism instructors at our mutual almost alma mater and my real alma mater recommended to all us students. I'd read it in the ole Stamp Union while blowing off classes. It is just another news rag, but it is clearly different, dare say, higher caliber type of reporting. More facts, less editorializing.
While I might throw an arrow at Bill Clinton for not getting Bin Laden when HE had the chance from time to time, I certainly can't assume that the intel briefings he was receiving at the time labeled Bin Laden such a huge risk that he warranted more attention than he got.
Maybe Larry King... Yeah, Larry King is who your sounding like. Your not bubbly or perky enough to be Katie Couric.
Peace, Love.
Another thought... Let's see, you're critical of our brief aid to Iraq, AND critical of our aid to Iran via clandestine shoulder rocket sales to Iran as part of the the Iran-Contra affair. Let's break it down... We aided the Iraqis against a hated Iranian zealot who has set his country back 50 years, and we sold rockets to the Iranians who fired them at the new despot of the region in Iraq. I'd say it was a win, win situation in hind sight. What dare say you?
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