Why Won't the US Give Peace a Chance?

I understand completely. Imagine how Cerb and I feel in regard to the Skripal story. The world is tragic at the present.

 

By the way,Malaysia uses gold coin too. Why US don't attack Malaysia? And use of the golden dinar was announced by ISIS in 2014. I bet thats why US started aggression against ISIS?

 

I don't have a theory. I tend to go with the obvious unless there is real evidence of an alternate explanation. I don't see that regarding the Iraq war.

 

Well ... for centuries, the Muslims in the region do not clash, simply because for centuries as the Osmansiche Empire had the say and oppressed something like that. Thanks to us in the West and the USSR, Madhouse ME popped really high as everyone began to support his local dictators, who in turn oppressed the people. Then, when Israel was founded and later the US-backed and CIA-backed Shah was overthrown in Iran, another force emerged ...
On the other hand, we have not been much better in the West in the last few centuries as far as the relationship between us and Christians is concerned.

What is interesting about your post is that you leave out the Hezbollah and the HAMAS on the outside, but let you in on the rather Sunni Terorists. Funny ... maybe you measure here with two dimensions what the evil is concerned?

 

????They never fought against each other. And all of Saddams loyalist rushed to join AlQaeda when he was removed.

 

I'd be interested in knowing what you regard as the obvious in this case?

Meanwhile, there is real evidence of an "alternate explanation" - although you have chosen to ignore it - I suspect because of how you personally define "evidence" - although we can discuss that definition till thew cow's come home and never agree on it.

As you know I have posted several papers/articles by highly credible experts who specialise in the oil industry (Prof. Peter Dale Scott, William Engdahl and William R Clark of John Hopkins University who all say that the war was about oil and the US need to sustain the Petrodollar at a time many middle eastern nations (Iraq and Iran being two) had chosen to switch to Euro denominated sales.

There are many other observers who openly state that the war was exclusively for US to continue to control middle eastern oil flows, not just because the US was/is a net importer of that commodity, but because the US use control of ME oil to "influence" their friends and allies due to their ability to throttle oil deliveries if they so wish to.

The one thing we do know if that it wasn't for the reasons cited by Bush and Tony Blair, i.e., WMD and Saddam's friendship with al-Qaeda.

 

The sentence in bold does not make much sense as written but I know what yo are trying to get at.

YES - there are fundamental differences between Al Qaeda/ISIS (and these other groups) and Hamas.

Hamas is not running around the world killing people. They are not trying to turn Israel into a strict sharia theocracy. They are fighting an foreign invader - one that is attacking the Palestinians and taking their land ... land that is not "Israeli land" a per the agreement by which Israel was allowed to exist.

While there are some similarities conflating Hamas with Al Qaeda is silliness on many levels. "Hamas" is not a threat to the US homeland or any other nation in the world (san's their oppressor - Israel)

 

China did not fight against Al Qaeda either ... this does not make China complicit in 911.

The reason Iraq turned into a Jihadist wonderland was because we made war on Iraq and put in a Shia regime.

The Congressional committee found no link between Saddam and 911. On the other hand, there was a direct link between El Saud and Al Qaeda ... why did we not attack Saudi Arabia ? The cradle of Islamist extremist ideology that plagues the world today.

 

Strange ... but for your information, before you even give the HAMAS a halo ...

Hamas, Arabic for eagerness, also an acronym from Ḥarakat al-muqāwama al-islāmiyya for "Islamic resistance movement") is a Sunni-Islamist Palestinian terrorist organization. It was founded in 1987 as a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, including Ahmad Yasin. It consists of the paramilitary Kassam Brigades, a relief organization and a political party.

Among other things, Hamas aims to eliminate the state of Israel by military means and to establish an Islamic state. In its founding charter, which is still valid today, Hamas refers to the world's most influential anti-Semitic conspiracy theory, "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion." Her military arm has been conducting suicide bombing and other attacks since 1993, mostly targeting Israeli civilians and soldiers. It is legally classified as a terrorist organization by the European Union, the United States, Israel and other states, including Arab Muslim countries.

Since its electoral victory in 2006 and the civil war-like battle for Gaza in June 2007, which has been widely perceived internationally as a Hamas coup against the PLO, Hamas is putting the government in the Gaza Strip.

So no terrorists? Ehm ... seriously?

 

All you have done here is ignore the central premise (that there is significant differences between Hamas and Al Qaeda/ISIS and their ilk) and you did not address any of the points made that illustrate this difference.

Then you build a big strawman by claiming I have some love for Hamas ... when it is stated clearly in my post that both Israel and Hamas are guilty of bad things.

You go rambling on about how Hamas is both Islamic - and bad. I do not deny this.

What you don't do is address the central premise (and points made in support of that premise) which is that there is a big difference between Hamas and Al Qaeda.

 

So if I am wrong, then explain me why you are making such differences in matter of HAMAS is only a local Problem and so lesser important etc.?
What is about Hezbollah?

 

You are wrong that Hamas and Al Qaeda are not significantly different.

I have explained some major difference between Hamas and Al Qaeda ... you avoided discussion of those differences ... basically talking over the central premise.

The fact that Hamas is a local problem is a major difference (although this is only one of the differences discussed) as this relates to the threat to the homeland - national security and so on.

Then you bring up Hezbollah. What is the point of this as Hamas/Hezbollah are the same in relation to the topic.

Hezbollah is actually fighting Al Qaeda/ISIS/ Islamist extremists.

Israel on the other hand is supporting Al Qaeda/Al Nusra.

 

The obvious reason for Saddam's overthrow was that the US has allies, commitments, and interests in the region and Saddam posed an unacceptable threat to them. The major interest was, as you have mentioned, the ME oil supply. This was not only an American interest. Nobody in their right mind wanted to see a mad dog like Saddam in control of most of the world's oil supply.The reasons why he was considered a threat were these: he was very angry with the US and all the oil producing states around the Gulf over oil prices. He wanted higher prices and he believed the other Arab producers were cooperating with the US to keep them low.
He annexed Kuwait and had to be driven out of there.
He was believed to have WMD, first because western countries and Russia had sold him the components, and second because of his refusal to cooperate with the UN arms inspectors. And he had already used WMD.

All of these concerns existed before the Bush43 administration. Clinton bombed Iraq on two separate occasions, passed sanctions against Iraq, and signed into law the Iraqi Liberation Act which called for Saddams ouster. This was all done because of the above concerns. Then 911 happened.

After 911 he was considered a direct threat to the US. Remember, he had threatened Arab attacks on US soil even before Kuwait. He may not have had anything to do with 911, but nobody wanted to wait for another much worse attack using WMD supplied by Saddam.

 

Might I point out here that what you regard as obvious requires evidence as I and others might not consider this quite as obvious as you do.

For example:

The US was a very good friend of Saddam before suddenly determining he was a monster and had to be regime changed. There used to be some very friendly photo's of James Baker III and Saddam around on the internet, but they've all gone now. As you'll see below with the BNL story, the US during those days was providing Saddam with billions of dollars in soft loans, notionally for farm equipment, but actually to buy weapons.

I know for a fact that the UK, even during the air war phase of Desert Storm approved the delivery of thousands of 125mm sabot-discarding anti-tank shells to Saddam using the Jordan package as a fig-leaf. This when the British 7th Armoured Brigade was massing on the Saudi border ready to invade (this was all clearly set out in the Arms to Iraq Report by Judge Sir Richard Scott). In a similar vein, two CIA officers were covertly trying to sell Saddam shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, when US aircraft were penetrating Iraqi airspace and bombing Baghdad in Shock & Awe.

Saddam was believed to have WMD because the West knew they had actually supplied them. The US, UK, Germany and a few other European nations provided them to him HERE.

However, as you'll probably remember, senior UNSCOM weapons inspector, Scott Ritter, stated that just prior to Gulf War 2 being launched that Saddam had negligible quantities of WMD (most had been destroyed after Gulf War 1). Ritter's objection were ignored because the US had already made a strategic decision to invade Iraq - all they needed was a public justification.

Meanwhile, the Independent story HERE reveals that the Bush/Blair claims in that regard were knowingly factual distortions and fabrications to create a public mood of approval for the US, UK et al to go to war in Iraq a second time, in order to further their aim of controlling ME oil supplies.

I would also point out that the West supported Saddam because he was a counter-point in the ME to Iran. Indeed, both nations had gone to war in the 1980's and the West supplied both parties. My bank helped finance that. This whole story also factors in to the BNL (Banca Nazionale del Lavoro) scandal HERE.

So, in the last analysis, I don't think it is at all clear that the reasons you give were, or are, obvious. In fact, my working hypothesis is that governments rarely, if ever, tell their citizens the true reasons for their decisions - because they are aware that the citizens would object. The reality only ever filters out into public awareness post facto, when it is too late to change anything (HERE).

On the matter of his invasion of Kuwait you must surely be aware f the continuing controversy about what April Glaspie personally told Saddam and her avoidance (purposeful in the eyes of many) of giving a clear deterrent warning to him, thereby green-lighting his decision to invade that nation (HERE). If we combine this with George Bush's known preference to invade Iraq months before 9/11 (HERE).

When we add all this to the fact that a number of ME nations had chosen to sell their oil for Euro's thus damaging the hegemony of the Petrodollar with the likelihood that other oil nations would soon follow suit (Opec even floated the idea), then we can, at least, see a number of reasons combining that would make an invasion attractive to Dubya - but not for the reasons publicly cited. God forbid ever that...

[/QUOTE]

 

No, it means that Alqaeda isn't Chinas blood enemy. Just as Alqaeda wasn't Saddams blood enemy.

 

The reason is simple...neocons.

They do more harm to America then all the terrorist organizations of the world could ever realistically dream of doing.

 

Nonsense. Tariq Aziz was in that meeting.

Q: In April, what was your assessment of what the Americans would do--what was April Glaspie saying?

Aziz: She didn't tell us anything strange. She didn't tell us in the sense that we concluded that the Americans will not retaliate. That was nonsense you see. It was nonsense to think that the Americans would not attack us. In the early hours of the 2nd of August, the whole apparatus of the leadership took precautions for an American speedy immediate retaliation.
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gulf/oral/aziz/1.html

Amazing, how once the propaganda is put out, for many it becomes their reality. The US didn't have any position over Iraq and Kuwaits border dispute. A dispute at the time that questioned the precise location of the border, NOT the borders existence or non existence.

 

Spare me the logical fallacy. You are just blubbering out nonsense because you can not deal with the fact that Al Qaeda hates secularism as an ideological imperative.

 

Well, I was primarily disputing your claims regarding Saddams view of Alqaeda. I see you've switched to arguing about AlQaedas views of Saddam

 

Obviously - as in "the sky is blue obvious" - Saddam was well aware of Al Qaeda's ideology.

It is you that is bobbing and weaving by talking over/ignoring facts which contradict your perspective.

Not only were you told that the congressional committee which investigated this exact subject found no evidence that Saddam had a hand in 911, I have gone further and explained to you specifically why Saddam is an anathema to the ideology of Al Qaeda.

Then you completely avoid the fact those making the "Saddam claims" were proven to be liars, creators of false narratives, and willfully ignored good intelligence that contradicted their narratives.

In addition - you avoid the fact that it was El Saud that was supporting Al Qaeda.

This is getting into propaganda induced denial land - akin to the denial/avoidance response of a religious zealot when coming across information that conflicts with religious dogma.

The last point - and perhaps the most important - is that if Al Qaeda is our number 1 enemy then, why did we arm and support them (in conjunction with Saud, Qatar and others) in Syria and why do we fight on the same side of them in Yemen ?

Can you not see the mind boggling hypocrisy here ? Suppose Saddam did give support to Al Qaeda how does this justify the death of 5000 of our soldiers - and wounding tens of thousands , and the expenditure of trillions of dollars when we support them as well ? Riddle me that one por favor.

 

Can we just stop with "The US was there to steal there oil!!!"

It is such a ridiculous statement to make especially now htat because of shale the US is about to become the #1 producer of oil in the global market.

Screaming that line just makes you look like a radical Anti-American

 

Actually nonsense right back. Tariq Aziz was proved terribly incorrect just shortly afterwards. The US did invade.

The fact remains that a great many observers regard that meeting as fundamentally misleading and if it was not a de facto green-light it was an shocking display of the most incompetent diplomacy possible. Diplomats are trained to speak and use use words and phrases with the greatest care and accuracy is paramount, and Glaspie's words almost certainly were a green-light to Saddam and the fact remains that Saddam read it that way and invaded. So in that regard reality stands well above theories.

But it wasn't only Glaspie sending the most profoundly disturbing messages given what then followed.

Two days Iraq invaded Kuwait, John Kelly, Asst. Sec. of State for Near Eastern Affairs testified before Congress and stated that "the United States has no commitment to defend Kuwait and the US has no intention of defending Kuwait if it is attacked by Iraq."

If that also wasn't a green-light to Saddam then green-lights have never existed.

The we have this exchange:

"At a Washington press conference called the next day (July 26, 1990), US State Department spokesperson Margaret Tutweiler was asked by journalists:

"Has the United States sent any type of diplomatic message to the Iraqis about putting 30,000 troops on the border with Kuwait? Has there been any type of protest communicated from the United States government?"

To which Tutweiler responded

"I’m entirely unaware of any such protest." (HERE).

But perhaps there was a US strategy to all of this very curious diplomatic smoke and mirrors:

"One month later in Baghdad, British journalists obtained the tape and transcript of the Saddam Hussein-April Glaspie meeting on July 25, 1990. In order to verify this astounding information, they attempted to confront Ms Glaspie as she was leaving the US embassy in Baghdad.

Journalist 1:

"Are the transcripts (holding them up) correct, Madam Ambassador?"

(Ambassador Glaspie does not respond)

Journalist 2:

"You knew Saddam was going to invade (Kuwait), but you didn’t warn him not to. You didn’t tell him America would defend Kuwait. You told him the opposite - that America was not associated with Kuwait."

Journalist 1:

"You encouraged this aggression - his invasion. What were you thinking?"

US Ambassador Glaspie:

"Obviously, I didn’t think, and nobody else did, that the Iraqis were going to take all of Kuwait."

Journalist 1:

"You thought he was just going to take SOME of it? But how COULD YOU?! Saddam told you that, if negotiations failed, he would give up his Iran (Shatt al Arab Waterway) goal for the ‘WHOLE of Iraq, in the shape we wish it to be.’ You KNOW that includes Kuwait, which the Iraqis have always viewed as a historic part of their country!"

(Ambassador Glaspie says nothing, pushing past the two journalists to leave)

"America green-lighted the invasion. At a minimum, you admit signalling Saddam that some aggression was okay - that the US would not oppose a grab of the al-Rumalya oil field, the disputed border strip and the Gulf Islands (including Bubiyan) - territories claimed by Iraq?"

(Again, Ambassador Glaspie says nothing as a limousine door closes behind her and the car drives off.)" Ditto.

So, the Brit jounralist concluded the only thing possible to conclude from his questions and answers with Glaspie, that the US were open for Saddam to a execute partial invasion of Kuwait but not a full one. If that is a correct deduction then the words "inept" and "confused" jumps to mind.

Not least, the full transcript of the Iraqi meeting document with Glapsie was published by the NYT and is available on their archive. It's well worth reading in full for what Saddam says to Glaspie before her artful response. (HERE).

Saddam had good reason to distrust the USA and Kuwait. The former had already begun circling study papers with provocative titles like "Who Will Replace Saddam Hussein" and "They began to contact gulf states to make them fear Iraq, to persuade them not to give Iraq economic aid. And we have evidence of these activities," Saddam told Glaspie.

So in summation, I simply cannot accept a nursery tale of good Mother Hubbard from you about a nation that has fundamentally adopted a foreign policy of inciting and creating overseas war since WWII. The real world is far more cynical than you want people to believe. My take is you... "want to keep em all dumb" and keep pumping out your usual propaganda.

 

Funny thing is that this is precisely what Mussolini said about a fascist state.

 

The fact that Saddam was radical Islam's biggest enemy is why traitor Bush and his allies got rid of him. This insured the rise of further Islamic radicalism thereby insuring more war and war profits for the wealthy elites who pull the traitor's puppet strings.

 

When was it that Saddam added Allah Akbar to the Iraqi Flag? Saddam said in 1991 to the US ambassador-

"If you use pressure, we will deploy pressure and force. We know that you can harm us although we do not threaten you. But we too can harm you. Everyone can cause harm according to their ability and their size. We cannot come all the way to you in the United States, but individual Arabs may reach you."

Then in 1993
"The moment of confrontation had come. President Bush warned Saddam Hussein that if he continued to interfere with United Nations weapons inspectors and to shoot at American warplanes over Iraq, he would have to pay the consequences. So Islamic radicals from all over the Middle East, Africa and Asia converged on Baghdad to show their solidarity with Iraq in the face of American aggression. Chechens in Persian-lamb hats, Moroccans in caftans, delegates who hailed “from Jakarta to Dakar,” as one Senegalese put it, poured into Baghdad’s Rashid Hotel, where Saddam’s minions urged them to embrace jihad as “the one gate to Paradise.” And the greatest holy warrior of all? “The mujahed Saddam Hussein, who is leading this nation against the nonbelievers,” they were told. “Everyone has a task to do, which is to go against the American state,” declared Saddam’s deputy Ezzat Ibrahim. The Americans had colonized Lebanon; they had colonized Saudi Arabia. But the line against them would be drawn in Iraq. Believers would triumph, said Ibrahim: “Our stand now can lead us to final victory, to Paradise.”
That was in January 1993. I was there, and every time I hear diplomats and politicians, whether in Washington or the capitals of Europe, declare that Saddam Hussein is a "secular Baathist ideologue" who has nothing to do with Islamists or with terrorist calls to jihad, I think of that afternoon and I wonder what they're talking about. If that was not a fledgling Qaeda itself at the Rashid convention, it sure was Saddam's version of it.
http://www.newsweek.com/seeing-evil-front-us-144757

And a few weeks later in February of 93 an Iraqi bombmaker and Ramzi Youssef, traveling with Iraqi passports detonate a bomb in the basement of WTC, and flee to Iraq. Ramzi Youssef, the Nephew of Kalid Sheik Muhammad who organized the 9/11 attacks.

In 1998, Clinton threatened to attack Iraq in a speech at the Pentagon,

http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1998/02/17/transcripts/clinton.iraq/

and 5 days later, like a puppet on a string-

"1998
World Islamic Front Statement
23 February 1998
Shaykh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin

...No one argues today about three facts that are known to everyone; we will list them, in order to remind everyone:

First, for over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, ...The best proof of this is the Americans' continuing aggression against the Iraqi people

Second, despite the great devastation inflicted on the Iraqi people by the crusader-Zionist alliance, ... the Americans are once against trying to repeat the horrific massacres, ...

Third, if the Americans' aims behind these wars are religious and economic, the aim is also to serve the Jews' petty state ....The best proof of this is their eagerness to destroy Iraq, ...

On that basis, and in compliance with Allah's order, we issue the following fatwa to all Muslims:
The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies -- civilians and military -- is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque [Mecca] from their grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of Islam, defeated and unable to threaten any Muslim."
http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/980223-fatwa.htm

They were allies in their war against the US