Neither side is totally correct.
There are decades worth of lies and blood in the histories of all parties involved, from the French indulging the Nazis, to the USA turning a blind eye to Saddam's atrocities, and making him strong to fight Iran.
Saddam Hussein is a basstarrd, and he should be killed, and if he were in my back yard and I had a gun, I'd kill him myself. I hope that statement will prevent me from offending a lot of people on this thread with what I say next.
Given the many years the USA has worked with and strengthened Hussein, you should have left him alone, or simply tried to send assassins into Iraq to take out Hussein only. The USA is so much mightier than Iraq, that their victory is assured beyond any doubt. Since victory was guaranteed whenever you wanted it, you should have just continued to keep him contained.
There he was...surrounded by troops, crippled by sanctions and his country crawling with UN agents. Where was the threat? Where was the evidence linking Hussein with 9/11? What could he do in that position? Nothing!
There was no reason not to leave Hussein like that, surrounded and weakened and occupied with the whole world watching, while evidence was collected, or more and more UN inspectors dispatched over time. He couldn't do anything, so why rush?
Bush rushed with his ultimatums because he wasn't finding the smoking guns he was looking for, and he wasn't finding the links between Iraq and the WTC. As time passed, his argument weakened as it neared failure. The world backed away from helping him not because of a poverty of "will," but because they couldn't, in good conscience, participate in the invasion of a country without just cause. And don't any of you bring up the "dictator" aspect, or a need to "liberate" the people of Iraq. The USA couldn't have cared less about what Saddam did to his own people, as long as he kept on killing Iranians.
Who is Bush to order even a dictator out of his own country? The USA used nuclear weapons on Japan when a mere demonstration of the weapons in the ocean would have sufficed. Instead, the USA vaporized and fried civillians with radiation. How does that compare to the quick death of the Kurds via nerve gas? Do you think your hands are clean? They are not. Who is Bush to point a finger over "weapons of mass destruction?"
Bush pushed forward with war because his original arguments were quickly losing ground. With the passage of time, it would have been at least a possibility that eventually he'd get what he SAID he wanted. But, he wouldn't get the prize of oil without war. Without war, the prize of oil would be fought over by the people of that area. Can anybody give me a solid argument as to why he had to rush? This is WAR, for Christ's sake! You ONLY do it as a last resort!
Bush's reckless mistake has all but ruined the UN, upset the balance of the entire world, damaged relations between former good friends (like Canada) and greatly increased the likelihood of far more terror in his own country, to say nothing of the erosion of your own civil liberties.
You don't wipe out a country that is immobilized without good reason. Do you all think that the other countries are crazy, or cowards, or that they love Hussein's evil? NO! OF COURSE NOT!
Those countries didn't decide not to send troops or vote for the proposal in the UN because they're scared...they decided not to because the idea of killing people without a good reason made them sick. We all know Saddam is evil, but invading Iraq affects the world TREMENDOUSLY, and that is something that must not be done hastily.
To vote against war, and to criticize the United States of America does not mean that we are in league with this "axis of evil" concept, or that we are "un-American." We are against war without a just cause. To say that one is "anti-war" without qualifications is stupid. The Nazis were advancing. War against them was good.
Where is the threat from Iraq? The USA was in bed with this dictator for years and years! The blood of his victims on YOUR hands, as well!
Those countries opposed to this action had the sense to know that what Bush suggested was wrong, and Bush rushed his war because he was looking more and more ridiculous with each passing day. The world's people were opposing him more and more with each passing day, and THAT is why he rushed into an act that must only be undertaken as a last resort.
Now you have about 1 billion Muslims hating you–permanently!
Me? I don't even wanna go to Wrestlemania this weekend because I'm afraid one of my favourite performers' heads are going to explode in a splatter of blood and guts, shot dead on live television by some maniac who has no other recourse, because the mega-powerful USA just DECIMATED AN ENTIRE COUNTRY FOR NO GOOD REASON! That's right---NO GOOD REASON! You loved...LOVED Hussein while he was killing Iranians. That's the kind of world Bush has made...where I can't go to Wrestlemania without worrying about a terrorist killing my favourite wrestler, where we'll all be waiting for the other shoe to drop, where you Americans won't be able to enjoy a baseball game in the sunshine without worrying that another person is gonna stand up and do something horrible.
DON'T YOU REALIZE WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO YOURSELVES AND THE WORLD???
You've increased fear and hate on Earth, you've added to the chance for MORE WAR, and made us all less safe.
None of you, myself included, are old enough to appreciate what is really happening. Don't you ever stop to wonder why you never see entrails, severed heads, and bodies that are naked, decapitated and burned to a crisp on TV? Do you all think it's like a **** cartoon, where bombed people look all blackened, but continue to walk around? You might as well, because that's all you'll ever see on the CNN 6PM news. We wouldn't want to clash with the sexy "War in Iraq" graphics and the ads for the gas-guzzling SUVs, would we, now? Just keep watching all that un-needed horsepower while the little kid kisses the camera and whispers "zoom zoom." Don't stop and wonder where all that gasoline is coming from–or why. No need to watch footage of Iraqi parents screaming with grief and horror as their children lie in chunks on the ground. No need to wonder what it might smell like as you see people walk around half-dead while their friends burn like sacks of garbage, imbedded with flaming debris and chemicals from your lazer-guided bombs.
No need to wonder because you won't see it. It's all just a big "reality" show, with sexy "scud-studs," big car commercials, fancy graphics and trumpet-laden intro music, with stupid jokes from Jay Leno to put you to sleep, and videogame designers already firing up their computers to make "gulf-war" themed games you'll play in the future.
If Saddam Hussein was found to be on videotape, laughing about and taking credit for 9/11, then I'd be behind you. That didn't happen. Hussein is one of your CHOSEN allies, who has just been acting up lately.
Remember what I said. I'd kill Hussein myself if I could.
I also love America. But this war you've brought? No. I hate it.
It is rushed; it is unnecessary; it violates international law; it squandered the strength of the UN, and has pushed the world towards chaos and peril.
And for what? Not for Iraq's people. You loved the dictator Saddam and made him strong.
For what?
For oil.
Bush is a madman.
"We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools."
–Martin Luther King Jr.
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
–Albert Einstein
http://www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/library/wonderful/index.php
http://www.idleworm.com/nws/2002/11/iraq2.shtml
P.S. I've said all I can on the subject, and won't fight back. Say what you like. But remember that this is a website about Jim Henson, and he went–with Kermit–to Russia with John Denver at the height of the Cold War, to promote peace. The pins Henson and Denver wore had the flags of Russia and the USA joined together. I'd bet that a lot of people would have been upset by that in the 1980s. I'd bet that Jim Henson wouldn't support this insane, reckless, and un-needed war. A battle between an elephant and a mouse, it is more massacare than war. Enjoy your low gas prices. Now, as an experiment, I await the way in which you treat a non-American who disagrees with you.
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Anyway, star power at protests don't impress me much. I love Susan Sarandon. She's one of the best actresses working today, but politially, she's a rebel with many causes. That side just doesn't carry any weight with me.