Something I don't understand about those opposed to the war..

[Saffron]

Originally posted by Jeff in BigD
I'd like to make some points about the WWII points...

Actually most the UK & Neville Chamberlin thought a treaty in '38 with Hitler would keep peace between the countries. This was a fatal error. It was in '39 that they learned that Hitler had no intention of honoring the agreement (much like Saddam & the ceasefire of '91).

In the mid-30s Hitler was touted the world round for being able to turn Germany completely around. The Graf Zeppelins were touring the world & part of the Nazi PR machine. Berlin hosted the '36 Olympics & while a few of Hitler's anti-semetic views made it outside of Germany, most of the world thought he was Germany's savior. It wasn't until way into the war that most of the world learned how truly mad he was.

True, but the US was the only force that was regularly fighting them on both fronts full force. IOW, the UK wasn't being attacked by Japan & south Asian countries weren't dealing with the Germans. The UK was helping in the Pacific, but it was mostly US & Australian forces.
You'll get no argument from me on this point.

Actually this isn't quite true. We knew that the Nazis were rounding people up, but the Allied soldiers were shocked & horrified to see what was really happening. Many of the Germans were forced to see the camps because they didn't even really know what was truly going on in the camps.
Actually, it is true. Like caitycaity has pointed out, the average citizen may not have known about the atrocities, but our government did and we did not intervene until we were attacked. I imagine we/our allies where shocked and horrified. Whether we/they knew for a fact, or just heard rumors about the situation, going into something like a concentration camp would be sickening.

Also not quite accurate. We were busy heavily supplying the UK with arms. Though we were officially not in the war, we were certainly doing something. The country was very much in the grip of the great depression & spending money on a war was the last thing the average American was concerned with. It was a completely different story when we were attacked. That's when we officially joined the war effort, but we were already in it in indirect ways.
You are right Jeff, the USA was selling arms to the UK. I should have made myself clearer I guess. I was talking about the atrocities, the killing of innocents, that our government knew about. We did nothing about that even though we (the government) knew what was going on, until we were attacked.

Actually at the time, Hawaii wasn't even a state, so it would've been like an attack on military ships in Puerto Rico. I wonder if that happened today if the massive effort would have come forward. Actually we have had attacks on our military stations & embassies & the average American just shrugged & thought it was a shame, but didn't call for action. That's how bin Laden was able to work to set up 9/11.
You're right, it wasn't a state, I apologize. I should have said our military, not our soil.

And yet we realized that Hitler, though he didn't attack us directly, was the greater threat & thus focused on taking Berlin first. It was a good thing we did too, because Germany was mere months away from developing rockets & jets. Sound like anyone else? Just switch "rockets & jets" with nuclear weapons.
If you're talking about Korea and nuclear weapons, I agree. If you're talking about Iraq and nuclear capabilities, I disagree. Our government has said that Iraq does not have nuclear weapons. They are looking for and want to find chemical and biological weapons, they are not looking for nuclear weapons, they know Iraq does not have nuclear weapons.

Again, that wasn't well known until after the fact.
Again, as caitycaity said, and you yourself said, maybe not known by the average citizen, but known by our government.

True, but while we were worried about more attacks from Japan, we still realized that Germany was the greater threat.
Again, no argument from me. I agree.

I think that we're very much in this to win & Saddam is definitely going down.
I agree. I also think when the USA enters a war, we should be there to win, or not go in at all. People of this country just don't always agree when or why we should enter a war or a conflict. Actually, I think everyone agrees when we enter a war. It's the military conflicts or operations that people usually don't agree on.

Jeff, don't ask me for any links, I'm not going to get them for you. I just finished taking three history courses. One about the years prior to the American Civil War, one on the Great Depression through WWII, one on the Vietnam Era. I don't have links, I only have notes. I don't feel like going out to the shed and digging through boxes of notes. I'm too lazy.

lisalg - I'll answer your questions.

I said this:

I have to answer that question with other questions. Are we going to step into other countries with other brutal dictators and stop them? Where/when do we stop intervening? If we only go into Iraq, is that fair to all the other people in the world that will be tortured and killed by the heads of their country? It happens everyday. Is it right not to do anything about those other countries?

And you asked this:

I know we cannot police the entire planet. But, don't we have a right to speak up when we see such atrocities? What if you had moved here from Iraq and left family behind? Would you want them tortured?

My answers are: We ALL absolutely have the right, some would even argue an obligation, to speak out. No matter what it's about, whether it's your stand on this conflict, the atrocities in the world, the boycotts, the price of fish at the supermarket or whether or not you can use CBR refillable mugs at the Grand Floridian , without the fear of being labled or told you're wrong or your opinion means nothing. We all don't have to agree. I can't imagine agreeing with anyone on everything. We're all individuals.

If I had moved here from another country, of course I wouldn't want to see my family tortured!! I can't imagine a person with a heart or soul that would want that to happen? I would never want that to happen to my own family, nor to anyone else's! I have yet to hear one person on these boards or in my cirlce of friends or family who feel that SH isn't anything but evil or that he should remain in power? What I do hear is people disagreeing about how and what should be done to get him out of power.

 

[lisajl]

Saffron,

Thanks for the clarification on those points.

You know, I just wish this whole thing were over with.
I hope and pray that it ends quickly and SH and his sons are taken out.

I think that is one thing we can all agree on!

Lisajl

 

[Jeff in BigD]

Originally posted by Saffron
And yet we realized that Hitler, though he didn't attack us directly, was the greater threat & thus focused on taking Berlin first. It was a good thing we did too, because Germany was mere months away from developing rockets & jets. Sound like anyone else? Just switch "rockets & jets" with nuclear weapons.
If you're talking about Korea and nuclear weapons, I agree. If you're talking about Iraq and nuclear capabilities, I disagree. Our government has said that Iraq does not have nuclear weapons. They are looking for and want to find chemical and biological weapons, they are not looking for nuclear weapons, they know Iraq does not have nuclear weapons.

Actually my point was not that Iraq has them, but the White House believes that Iraq might be months away from becoming a nuclear power. The thought of having to deal a Saddam in posession of nukes is extremely disturbing.


Dealing with N Korea is another ball of wax IMO. So far there has been a lot of tough talk, but until their current administration shows a predilection for military aggression towards allies, tough talk is just that. Right now the White House believes this can be resolved diplomatically. The spyplane incident with China could have quickly escilated, but it didn't.


I pray that we're making the right moves in every instance, though sometimes only hindsight tells us if we chose wisely.

 

[betz]

Originally posted by Jeff in BigD
Actually my point was not that Iraq has them, but the White House believes that Iraq might be months away from becoming a nuclear power. The thought of having to deal a Saddam in posession of nukes is extremely disturbing.

Is this why you think the 'White House' believes that Iraq might be months away from becoming a nuclear power?:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9011-2003Mar22.html

CIA officials now say they communicated significant doubts to the administration about the evidence backing up charges that Iraq tried to purchase uranium from Africa for nuclear weapons, charges that found their way into President Bush's State of the Union address, a State Department "fact sheet" and public remarks by numerous senior officials.
That evidence was dismissed as a forgery early this month by United Nations officials investigating Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. The Bush administration does not dispute this conclusion.

Or is there some other evidence that Iraq is months away from becoming a nuclear power?

 

[nativetxn]

I hope this doesn't become a full fledged debate, I would hate to have to move it to the debate board.