From: Kirk Steele (ksteele42@yahoo.com)
Date: Thu Aug 01 2002 - 14:15:49 MDT
Mind if I tease along.....
Hermit wrote:
[Joe Dees 1] Members of that organization have already vaporized thousands of our citizens in a skyscraper.
[Joe Dees 1] The rest of them have pledged to kill as many of us as possible as long as they shall live.
[Joe Dees 1] We know where some of them are, and that they are planning to launch further attacks against us. The land in which they are preparing is unwilling, or unable, to stop them.
[Joe Dees 1] WE STOP THEM. It is what is NECESSARY to protect our citizens.
[Hermit 2] I'm think I'm confused. Which "land" are you talking about?None of the terrorists came from Aghanistan - or Iraq. They came from Saudi Arabia and other US sponsored totalitarian regimes, via a number of European countries - and Canada to the US. I don't recall the US bombing any of those countries - although we did bomb a number of Canadians. But I'm not sure which part of law you are arguing about here?
[Joe Dees 3] Fifteen of the nineteen were indeed Saudi, but the major funders and planners were holed up in Afghanistan, which refused to relinquish them, and had been for years. It is also from there that they sent word that they planned to launch future attacks.
[Hermit 4] So killing Afghans, despite the fact that this was a breach of International law, was justified?
[Joe Dees 3] Iraq's claims to infamy are:
[Joe Dees 3] 1) the production of chemical and biological weapons, some of which they used against a neighbor (Iran) and some of which they used against an oppressed minority, the Kurds, within their own borders.
[Hermit 4] You forget that the US (and Germany) supplied if not the weapons, then the precursors and technology to produce them for use against Iran. This is proven by a court case in Germany and the fact that analysis of samples taken at the scene proved to have come from a lab located in the Midwest. In addition, the US has just scuppered the treaty which this would have been illegal under, and had the director of the UN investigation unit fired for saying so... A case of the pot calling the kettle names.
[Joe Dees 3] 2) their invasion and occupation of (and attempt to annex) Kuwait, a sovereign nation.
[Hermit 4] Do you recall how the US ended up with a number of possessions and territory? Perhaps not. But as you have previously acknowledged, that sovereign nation was doing them vast harm (slant drilling). Surely they merely engaged in preemptive defense, just as you have advocated the US do? In addition, Kuwait was created from a single nation by the British without a referendum or diuscussion and with no historic precedent. They were simply reintegrating Kuwait into their historic territory - and you have suggested that this is legitimate in the case of Israel. Besides, Kuwait is a non-democratic country applying Sharia law. And Iraq, no matter how offensive you find it, is a democratic state applying secular law. You seem to be confused. Again. Or still.
[Joe Dees 3] 3) their plot to assassinate former president Bush during a visit he made to Saudi Arabia, for which seventeen, I think, were beheaded.
[Hermit 4] I'm not sure what the number beheaded has to do with it? In any case, the US has attempted to assassinate many world leaders. Indeed, President Bush rescinded the orders which made this ilegal under US law, despite the fact that it remains a grave breach of International Law. Are you suggesting that President Bush should be a legitimate target for, say, Fidel Castro, who survived many (inept) attempts on his life by the US Government?
[Joe Dees 3]4) Iraq's flauting of UN inspections and their expulsion of the inspectors.
[Hermit 4] But did they? Several heads of missions have stated this was not the case, although the US blocked attempts by the UN to get to the bottom of the story. Yes, Iraq did force one mission to withdraw, asserting (subsequently confirmed) that the mission was engaging in espionage and reporting information directly to the US. Were they justified? Certainly the US has refused entry to UN inspections.
[Joe Dees 3]5) their willingness to provide safe have to terrorists of all stripes, providing their targets include Israel and the US.
[Hermit 4] Al Qu'aeda is as much of a threat to Iraq as to the US. And the US not only provides a safe haven for, but has also trained, more terrorists than any other nation. Indeed, the US stands condemned by the UN for engaging in terrorism, Iraq does not.
[Joe Dees 3]The reason that Israel bombed iraq's nuclear facility is that Saddam hussein had made clear his intention to use nukes built with the aid of that facility on Israel, which would have provoked a response from the Israeli Dimona nuclear arsenal, and likely, in those
cold-war times, precipitating a wider war.
[Hermit 4] I'm not sure what this has to do with the cas, but as I recall, the US was one of the first countries to condemn Israel (at least publically) for her "precipitate and illegal" action. The US even suspended arms sales and deliveries to Israel because of it. So how does what was "precipitate and illegal" when Israel did it in the 70s become "considered and legitimate" when you advocate this course of action only a quarted century later?
[Hermit 4] If Everything is equal, it appears to me that you are asserting that the US claims to infamy are at least as good as those of Iraq. So why are you attempting to justify war against Iraq?
[Hermit 2] What happens if a member of a Canadian English "Free Quebec from the French" group, which had declared themselves prepared to sacrifice their lives against the French (for dumping Frenchmen in Canada), happened to train with the "patriots" on the West Coast, and then were to blow up the Eiffel Tower, killing thousands of Parisians. Would such an action entitle the French to bomb the US, or Canada, or both, if the Americans or Canadians couldn't track down other members of the group?
[Joe Dees 3] If the Canadians didn't try, or were outgunned (neither likely), and refused to allow the French to help pursue the perpetrators, yes, the french would have the right to bomb pinpointed locations of the "FQFTF" bases, and even send in troops to apprehend them, but of course, the likelihood of 1) such a group committing such an act and 2) the canadian government refusing to either apprehend them themselves or allow the french to help them do so, is slightly less likely than the odds that there are dwarves fellating unicorns beneath the mountains of the moon.
[Hermit 4] So you are asserting that e.g. Cuba would have a legitimate reason to attack the US to arrest those involved in highjacking and other acts of terrorism who are beng sheltered in the US, many of them in Florida?
[Hermit 4] How about other erstwhile South American allies wanted for crimes against humanity which the US refuses to arrest and deport? Are those states also entitled to attack the US? What about those who fled the fall of the peacock throne and are still sought by Iran for torture and murder on a brutal scale?
[Hermit 4] Or is America different for some reason? If so, what is that reason?
---- This message was posted by Hermit to the Virus 2002 board on Church of Virus BBS. --------------------------------- Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
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