Iraq!

Iraq has become one of the defining subjects of our time, like Bosnia, Vietnam or Suez. There are two questions, really. Was it right to go in like that? And, quite separately, what should we do about it now?

See TGA's Guardian columns on the subject.

 
saddam statue

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brendan murphy, U.K.

Phil in Seattle
I think you're spending too much time on this website. Your tone is confrontational and bullying, and you insult those who don't agree with you. A little bit like the present government of your country, and the prime minister of mine, in fact.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

"Ash" wrote: "You are quick to demonised people that you feel offend the state of Israel but your racism towards Palastinians appears to be quite sickening."
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On the contrary, I'm not "racist" toward Arabs or Muslims. I have no problem with peace-loving people whatsoever, regardless of what religion they choose to worship or choose to not worship. I do, however, have a major problem with people who glorify suicide and homicide. I have a major problem with people who commit terrorist acts against helpless, innocent, unarmed civilians. I have a major problem with people who bomb school buses full of innocent kids, who bomb pizza parlours and murder 18-year old girls, who murder elderly people at prayer, who slaughter familieswho were in the middle of celebrating a Bar Mitzvah. I have a big problem with those people. And no amount of attempts at justifying such behavior is ever going to succeed in disguising the fact that the people who commit such heinous, horrific acts are not "heroes", they are Mass Murderers. And the last time I looked, the majority of people committing those heinous acts were, and still are, Palestinians or other, fellow Arabs and/or Muslims. There is no difference between the Murderers who bomb public markets in Israel, and the Murderers who slaughtered nearly 3,000 innocents at the World Trade Center in New York City.
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"Ash" wrote: "Your narrow minded view of Arab-Israeli history is factually incorrect. Israel was actually built on land stolen from the indigenous Arab population."
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Rubbish and Lies, as usual. Israel was never "built on land stolen from the indigenous Arab population". If you had bothered to read the history of the Middle East, you would have learned that Jews ARE the indigenous people. They've been there longer than anyone -- before the birth of Jesus (who, incidentally, was born a Jew and who celebrated Passover before his death), before the birth of Mohammad, before the very existence of either Christianity or Islam. And they never left. They have always been there. At the time of Israel's founding, the area had a substantial Jewish population -- perhaps even an outright majority.
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It is your own claims that are ludicrously incorrect. Your racism against Jews and against Israel in particular is what is Sickening. When you can understand once and for all that Israel's existence is not a "temporary abherration" to be "remedied" by its destruction, perhaps then we will have something to talk about. Until then, you need to spend some time learning the realities of the history of the Middle East, and not simply and mindlessly mouth your hateful anti-Israel propaganda and Lies. THIS JEWISH STATE STAYS PUT. Deal with it.
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"Ash" wrote: "As for democracy, America has always historically put self interest before human rights. This is evident in Latin America, the Middle east and Asia". We're putting Democracy at the top of the list now. And Iraq will have a democratically elected government -- which, incidentally, is how the Iraqi people appear to want it. Israel already has a democratically elected government. And they'll keep it, too. Israel is here to stay. The sooner you and the Arabs realize and accept that Fact, the sooner there can be real and constructive steps toward peace.
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Ash wrote: "I do wish you start detaching myth from reality and stop indoctrinating us about your view of Middle Eastern history."
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I suggest that you stop mindlessly spreading propaganda and anti-Israel Lies, and start learning the facts and reality of the Middle East. I'm going to keep right on speaking the truth about the origins of the Middle East conflict. It's not my "views" I am speaking, it's the Facts. I'm not going to stop, either. If you have a problem with that, kindly go somewhere else.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "That´s one of the main problems of the Iraq war: the US, including its administration, just didn´t understand the fact that they were dealing with a completely foreign culture. They still have trouble understanding that."
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Please explain what you feel is so "completely foreign" about Iraq's culture that we supposedly cannot understand it. Iraq has long been a predominantly Sunni Muslim country with a great deal of experience in interaction with the rest of the Arab world and with Europe. They (Iraqis) are religious and Muslim, but generally not fanatically so. That's what made them different during the 1980s from the Iranians, who really were fanatics. Millions of Iraqis braved terrorist threats and went to the polls to elect their first democratic government in generations. This strongly indicates that Iraqis are not so "completely foreign" a culture that they cannot or do not wish to adopt democracy and peacefully choose their own government in ways that are the best 'fit' for their culture.
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For years, even decades, Western liberal apologists for dictatorship have patiently promulgated the baffle-gab notion that Muslim, Arab and/or Third World nations are "too culturally different from Western capitalist consumerist societies", that "their customs and traditions are antithetical to our 'supposedly superior' democratic ideals", that we "have no right to ask Third World, Arab or Muslim nations to adopt democracy or impose Western democratic systems upon" these countries and that we "shouldn't try to do so". Such notions are infuriating, untruthful and reek of pandering to cultural racism.
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At best, such attitudes serve to further entrench dictatorships in the Third World by promoting the false idea that "cultural differences" render it "impossible" for people in the Third World to ever actually want or aspire to the same or similar democratic processes that we in Western countries take for granted.... a notion which Iraqi citizens have already died to discredit, having braved terrorist attacks while endeavoring to register to vote.
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At worst, such notions are belittling, and insult Third World countries by suggesting implicitly that Third World countries and people are "too backward" to "appreciate, understandor administer" democracy, and that "nothing better" than Dictatorship can therefore "ever be expected of" Third World countries.

Susan Starke, USA

To Mr. Bastian:
There will be no military draft in the US unless there is another 9-11-type attack on US soil. The bill would never get through Congress.
I am sorry that I did not mention the French contribution to Gulf War I. I would never characterize any volunteer military in the service of a democracy as "perfidious, cowardly bad guys."
Yes, it is true that Americans frequently do not understand authoritarian, collectivist, or corrupt cultures. They have no feel for such places.

Michel Bastian, France

To Mr. Bastian:
> There will be no military draft in the US unless there is another 9-11-type attack on US soil. The bill would never get through Congress.
Don´t know, that would depend on what kind of war we are talking about. Given that congress is firmly in republican hands right now, I wouldn´t rule it out.
> I am sorry that I did not mention the French contribution to Gulf War I. I would never characterize any volunteer military in the service of a democracy as "perfidious, cowardly bad guys."
Thank you.
> Yes, it is true that Americans frequently do not understand authoritarian, collectivist, or corrupt cultures. They have no feel for such places.
That´s not what I meant. I meant that Iraq has a culture that´s completely different from our western democratic culture. They don´t have the same concept of government and they have a completely different set of basic values. So it won´t do to simply "transplant" western values, ideas, democratic principles and ways of life there. The Bush administration doesn´t seem to realise that.

Michel Bastian, France

To Phil Karasick:
> Please explain what you feel is so "completely foreign" about Iraq's culture that we supposedly cannot understand it.
You´re forgetting (or deliberately ignoring) that many of these people (even many of those that went to vote) do not think the way a westerner thinks. They´ve been a predominantly muslim culture since the middle-ages and in many ways they didn´t change. They refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies out of mostly religious reasons that they have lived with for hundreds of years (even if they´re not all as extreme as some of the Iranians). Many of them don´t agree that a person should be free because they think that freedom is dangerous and humans are bound to make the wrong choices given half a chance. In their eyes, god is the only one that has the right to make decisions for them, and mullahs are the mouthpieces of god. They don´t want democracy. They want to be ruled by religious leaders.
Also, there are a thousand little things, cultural things that the americans don´t get because nobody told them (and frankly, the Bush administration doesn´t make sufficient efforts to change that). It´s a bit like cats and dogs: cats dislike dogs because a dog that wants to play will growl, wag its tail and lower its ears. To a cat, that means danger because a cat growling, wagging its tail and lowering its ears only does so when threatened and about to attack. The dog on the other hand thinks everything is ok, since the cat is growling, wagging its tail and lowering its ears. It´s when the cat strikes that the dog is completely surprised by the attack, because it only wanted to play.
Now I know the analogy is a bit crude, but essentially, that´s what´s happening between many Iraqis and the Americans at the moment.

> For years, even decades, Western liberal apologists for dictatorship have patiently promulgated the baffle-gab notion that Muslim, Arab and/or Third World nations are "too culturally different from Western capitalist consumerist societies", that "their customs and traditions are antithetical to our 'supposedly superior' democratic ideals", that we "have no right to ask Third World, Arab or Muslim nations to adopt democracy or impose Western democratic systems upon" these countries and that we "shouldn't try to do so". Such notions are infuriating, untruthful and reek of pandering to cultural racism.
Is that so? Well the problem with trying to impose democracy on someone is that the act itself is already antidemocratic. How are the Iraqis to be convinced that democracy is a better system if they are being forced into it at gunpoint? Worse, what are they to make of Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay etc.? How do you think they will react if they see the americans don´t even practise what they preach?
> At best, such attitudes serve to further entrench dictatorships in the Third World by promoting the false idea that "cultural differences" render it "impossible" for people in the Third World to ever actually want or aspire to the same or similar democratic processes that we in Western countries take for granted.... a notion which Iraqi citizens have already died to discredit, having braved terrorist attacks while endeavoring to register to vote.
No Phil, these attitudes do not imply that it´s impossible for those countries to want or aspire to democratic processes. They imply that it is entirely possible, but that "wanting democracy" is not the same as "being forced into democracy".

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

WOOD: RESCUE SHOWS (IRAQ) POLICY IS WORKING
www.cnn.com

Mike, London

Phil Karasick wrote:
"...objectives were and are irrelevent, results are what matter. The stated objectives of the invasion of Nazi Germany were to overthrow Adolph Hitler and end the Second World War successfully on Allied terms -- not save the remnants of Europe's Jews from the Holocaust. So what -- they were saved from the Holocaust anyway."
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The stated objectives of the Nazi invasions of it's neighbours were to provide living space for the German people, to create a new empire and reverse perceived injustices of the Treaty of Versailles. The Holocaust was a result- not an objective of the Nazis.
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That example aside- I'm sure you don't seriously think your leaders have no obligation to provide prior justifications for invading a country. Unless you are happy to live in a dictatorship.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Brendan Murphy in U.K. wrote: "I think you're spending too much time on this website".
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I think it's entirely my decision as to how I choose to spend my time, thanks. But thanks for sharing.
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Brendan Murphy in U.K. wrote: "Your tone is confrontational and bullying, and you insult those who don't agree with you."
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I regard my 'tone' as being direct and forthright, thanks. And I insult the argument (because they deserve insulting), not the individual.
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Brendan Murphy in U.K. wrote: "....A little bit like the present government of your country, and the prime minister of mine, in fact."
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You're more than welcome to your opinion. However, given that both the current President of my country and the current Prime Minister of your country both won their re-election contests decisively, it appears to me that you're in the "unhappy and losing minority" category.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "You´re forgetting (or deliberately ignoring) that many of these people (even many of those that went to vote) do not think the way a westerner thinks."
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Oh, so you personally went to Iraq and interviewed them yourself and independently determined that, huh? No? Then how would you have the sligtest idea how "many of these people (even many of those that went to vote)" think? You don't. You don't have any factual knowledge on which to base your statement. What you have, rather, is an "assumption".
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Michel Bastian wrote: "They´ve been a predominantly Muslim culture since the middle-ages and in many ways they didn´t change."
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So what? What does that have to do with anything?
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Michel Bastian wrote: "They refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies out of mostly religious reasons that they have lived with for hundreds of years (even if they´re not all as extreme as some of the Iranians)".
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Again, kindly present "proof" of your statements, or else please acknowledge that what you are promoting is not "facts" but rather simply "assumptions".
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The most basic concept of our democratic societies is the concept of "one man, one vote" and of deciding who should govern through use of democratic delections. More than 14 million Iraqi people registered to vote in their first election since Saddam Hussein was toppled from power. Of those, an estimated 8 million people ˜ 60 percent of eligible voters ˜ braved violence and calls for a boycott to vote in Iraq. The Iraqi people clearly "get" the basic concept of democracy. Your claim that Iraqis "refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies" is therefore shown to be unfounded, with roughly 8 million individual Iraqi examples that directly contradict your statement.
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For further, direct evidence of this, see the following:
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"Women in black abayas whispered prayers at the sound of a nearby explosion as they waited to vote at one Baghdad polling station. But the mood for many was upbeat: Civilians and policemen danced with joy at one of the five polling stations where photographers were allowed, and some streets were packed with voters walking shoulder-to-shoulder to vote. The elderly made their way, hobbling on canes or riding wheelchairs; one elderly woman was pushed along on a wooden cart, another man carried a disabled 80-year-old on his back.
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"This is democracy," said Karfia Abbasi, holding up a thumb stained with purple ink to prove she had voted.
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,145825,00.html
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Michel Bastian wrote: "Many of them don´t agree that a person should be free because they think that freedom is dangerous and humans are bound to make the wrong choices given half a chance. In their eyes, God is the only one that has the right to make decisions for them, and mullahs are the mouthpieces of God."
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Again, please provide Evidence to explain what qualifies you to presume to "know" what "many of them" agree or do not agree on, and what entitles you to presume to authoritatively define what "many of them" do or do not believe.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "They don´t want democracy."
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On the contrary, they clearly do want democracy. That's why roughly 14 million Iraqis registered to vote. Roughly 8 million Iraqis individually chose to go to the polls and directly refute your statement by voting in democratic elections to choose their leader. I think your statement has been pretty decisively shown to be factually incorrect and merely an "assumption" on your part. (Perhaps it was wishful thinking on your part).
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Michel Bastian wrote: "They want to be ruled by religious leaders."
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No, they do not. They may choose to vote for political parties that are religious or religious-leaning, but they clearly want to choose their own political leaders. The Iraqi Shi'ite Ayatolluh Sistani and the mullahs declared that voting is a religious duty. But they did not "tell" Iraqi voters specifically who to vote for, or "direct" them to vote for a particular political party.
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Kindly stop presuming to "tell" the Iraqi people what they "want". They have clearly shown that they are quite capable of figuring that out by themselves.
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Also, unless you have been recently elected to the Iraqi Parliament, kindly stop presuming to "tell" this board what the Iraqi people supposedly "want". They haven't elected you as their official spokesperson or mouthpiece.
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They haven't elected me, either. However, the very fact that they so proudly and overwhelmingly participated in their first democratic elections, validates my statements.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

I had previously written: For years, even decades, Western liberal apologists for dictatorship have patiently promulgated the baffle-gab notion that Muslim, Arab and/or Third World nations are "too culturally different from Western capitalist consumerist societies", that "their customs and traditions are antithetical to our 'supposedly superior' democratic ideals", that we "have no right to ask Third World, Arab or Muslim nations to adopt democracy or impose Western democratic systems upon" these countries and that we "shouldn't try to do so". Such notions are infuriating, untruthful and reek of pandering to cultural racism.
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Michel Bastian responded: "Is that so?"
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Yes, Michel. Yes, it is. It is So.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "Well the problem with trying to impose democracy on someone is that the act itself is already antidemocratic."
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Well, I am sure you would have personally preferred to wait until the Iraqi people were so at the end of their proverbial rope under Saddam's horrific rule that they "rose up, revolted and threw out Saddam" on their own. I'm sure that's the only situation in which you would have (probably grudgingly) acknowledged that the Iraqi people really, actually weren't "happy little Dictator-loving loyal servants of Saddam".
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Of course, such an "uprising" would have had no chance at all of succeeding. (It's been tried before). And, of course, such an "uprising" would quite obviously have resulted in a mass bloodbath, since it was Saddam's forces (a minority within Iraq's population) who held control of all the Soviet-made T-55 and T-72 tanks, the artillery pieces, the heavy machine guns, the attack helicopters, the secret police, the levers of power in Iraq and the instruments of torture.
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And, of course, if such an uprising were attempted and then predictably failed and resulted in a bloodbath, I am sure you would then "conclude" that this "actually meant that Saddam had the support of most of the people, else he would have been deposed". (The Fact that in a Dictatorship, the bloodthirsty gun-toting minority are the ones who make and impose "the Rules" on the Majority, is something that you appear to have some difficulty wrapping your mind around).
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And, I am sure, of course (well, perhaps not "of course".. maybe "I think it more than likely") that if the Iraqi people (rather sensibly) declined to commit mass suicide by engaging in an uprising that had no chance of success, you would then "therefore conclude" that this meant that the Iraq people "were quite happy living under their Dictator's rule", that they "didn't want and really don't want Democracy", that they "actually like their Dictator" and that "therefore we shouldn't presume to interfere" by giving them the opportunity to choose someone else for their leader, because the Iraqi people "would do it themselves if they really wanted to".
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Well, let's hear your answer, Michel. Am I correct?

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "How are the Iraqis to be convinced that democracy is a better system if they are being forced into it at gunpoint?".
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Since democracy was never "imposed upon them at gunpoint" in the first place, your question is meaningless. No one "forced" the Iraqis at gunpoint to go to the polls and choose whom to vote for. On the contrary, it was the Terrorist insurgents who tried to prevent the Iraqi people from going to the polls and exercising their newfound right to Vote.
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Setting up a democratic basis for Iraqi society does not equate to "telling the Iraqis who to vote for". It merely establishes the undergirding democratic framework that will allow the Iraqi people to decide for themselves who to vote for. In fact, were he not in jail and facing trial for crimes against humanity, Saddam Hussein himself could probably have run for office as a candidate.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "No Phil, these attitudes do not imply that it´s impossible for those countries to want or aspire to democratic processes. They imply that it is entirely possible, but that "wanting democracy" is not the same as "being forced into democracy"."
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That's precisely the problem, Michel. That's why those ideas and attitudes are so terribly, tragically wrong. You see, Michel, "Wanting democracy" IS THE SAME AS "being given democracy via a military overthrow of the existing regime", when the existing regime is a tyrannical dictatorship that does not allow its citizens to "want" or "choose" democracy of their own volition.
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That's precisely why the attitudes of Western liberal apologists for Third World dictatorships are so criminally immoral and wrong. That's why those in the West who have patiently promulgated the baffle-gab notion that Muslim, Arab and/or Third World nations are "too culturally different from Western capitalist consumerist societies", who claim that "their customs and traditions are antithetical to our 'supposedly superior' democratic ideals", that we "have no right to ask Third World, Arab or Muslim nations to adopt democracy or impose Western democratic systems upon" these countries and that we "shouldn't try to do so", are so horrifically wrong. They are promoting nothing less than pandering to cultural racism.
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You see, Michel, you claim that "these attitudes do not imply that it´s impossible for those countries to want or aspire to democratic processes", that "They imply that it is entirely possible, but that 'wanting democracy' is not the same as 'being forced into democracy' ".
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The tragic mistake is that such attitudes, and the people promulgating them, fail (or actually refuse) to draw any distinction between "citizens happily Endorsing life under a Dictator", and "citizens reluctantly declining to commit mass suicide by launching doomed uprisings against a Dictatorship that has both the Means and the Will to genocidally slaughter its opponents".
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As I have said before: had it been left up to "a broad front of public opinion", Saddam Hussein would still be cheerfully banging one of his many mistresses, shuttling between one of his 57 or so Presidential Palaces, looting the U.N. "Oil-For-Palaces" program and having his opponents murdered. He would still be in power. And that's not acceptable. Not acceptable at all.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Americans skeptical about claims on insurgents.
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Most support staying in Iraq, though, poll finds.
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As President Bush prepares to address the nation about Iraq tonight, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds that most Americans do not believe the administration's claims that impressive gains are being made against the insurgency, but a clear majority is willing to keep U.S. forces there for an extended time to stabilize the country.
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The survey found that only one in eight Americans currently favors an immediate pullout of U.S. forces, while a solid majority continues to agree with Bush that the United States must remain in Iraq until civil order is restored -- a goal that most of those surveyed acknowledge is, at best, several years away.
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Amid broad skepticism about Bush's credibility and whether the war was worth the cost, there were some encouraging signs for the president. A narrow majority -- 52 percent -- currently believe that the war has contributed to the long-term security of the United States, a five-point increase from earlier this month.
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Despite public misgivings about elements of the policy, there remains an underlying reservoir of support for the war and continued unwillingness by the public to abandon Iraqis to their fate. Despite the almost daily suicide bombings and mounting casualty rates, a majority of Americans -- 53 percent -- now say they are optimistic about the situation in Iraq, up seven points from December.
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There were other findings suggesting that negatives views of the conflict are easing somewhat. Currently 51 percent believe that the war has contributed to the long-term stability of the Middle East, up nine points from a year ago. And the proportion who said the conflict damaged the United States' image with the rest of the world fell to 67 percent, down nine points since last June.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Mike in London wrote: "The stated objectives of the Nazi invasions of it's neighbours were to provide living space for the German people, to create a new empire and reverse perceived injustices of the Treaty of Versailles."
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I'm not sure I understand what the point is that you were trying to make. The stated objectives of the Allied liberation of Europe were to defeat the Nazis, overthrow Adolph Hitler, destroy the Nazi regime and end the Second World War successfully on Allied terms. The fact that we also saved thousands of Jews and political opponents of the Nazis from the gas chambers was an added bonus. And, as I mentioned, results -- not reasons, not motives -- are what matter.
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Of the Nazi objectives which you mentioned, the first two were not used by the Nazis to publicly justify their actions, because they were the hidden, actual objectives as defined by Hitler in "Mein Kampf" . The third one -- to "reverse perceived injustices of the Treaty of Versailles" -- was never an actual objective, merely an excuse used for public consumption to illicit sympathy for the Nazis' actions from gullible foreigners.
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Mike in London wrote: "The Holocaust was a result- not an objective of the Nazis."
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False. The Holocaust was an Objective that was nearly realized. Whether directly and/or publicly stated or not, the Holocaust was always the ultimate objective of the Nazis. It was always the objective of the Nazis to eliminate all Jews from the European continent, and in fact was stated as such in "Mein Kampf".
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The Holocaust was not an "event", but rather a highly detailed and complex "process" that was years in the making. Long before the Second World War began, the preparation-work for the Holocaust was already being done. The first concentration camp (Dachau near Munich) was opened in March 1933, less than two months after Hitler first came to power. With each year and each new restriction on Jews (1933 - Jews excluded from the arts & from owning land; 1934 - Jews banned from the legal profession and from having health insurance; 1935 - German Jews stripped of their citizenship), the Nazis moved further along in their carefully planned process of reducing Jews and other opponents to "un-persons" who could be "disposed of". The crematoriums of Auschwitz were merely the final step in the process.
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Here are some resources that can help you to understand the process that was the Holocaust:
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http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/timeline.html#camps
http://motlc.wiesenthal.com/resources/education/timeline/
http://history1900s.about.com/library/holocaust/bltimeline3.htm
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The detailed planning of the Nazis' organized annihilation of European Jews was begun at what would become known as the Wannsee Conference, on January 20, 1942. Here are some resources to help you understand the horrifying, mind-numbing, mechanical, dumanising process of genocide that became known as "the banality of evil".
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http://auschwitz.dk/Wannsee.htm
http://www.wsg-hist.uni-linz.ac.at/Auschwitz/HTML/Wannsee.html#top
http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/wannsee.htm
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I think what disturbs me most about your comments, Mike, is not what you "don't know", but rather what you "think" you know that simply isn't true.

Mike, London

To Phil Karasick:
We were arguing over whether it is important for a government to fully state it's reasons and motives for war beforehand. I say it is, you say it is irrelevant and only the results of said war matter. My point in giving the example of the Nazis was that the murder of Jews was not the STATED aim of the invasions undertaken by Hitler: the point being that Hitler undertook the various invasions under several justifications, and the Holocaust was a result. For instance, Russia was invaded under a publicised doctrine of pre-emptive attack against the Red Army- the murder of Jews was not the justification given to the German people.
I can‚t be bothered to get into a potentially endless argument about how Hitler represented his motives for invasion, as you would argue 2+2=5 if I said it was 4, and really it is irrelevant to the discussion we were having- let‚s just agree to differ- it‚s all in the history books anyway.
It was rather irritating when you said:
„I think what disturbs me most about your comments, Mike, is not what you don't know", but rather what you "think" you know that simply isn't true.‰
All the facts are all readily available- I studied the rise to power of Hitler extensively whilst in education, and since your comment I thought I might brush up on them. Unsurprisingly, I found the facts have not changed in the years since I studied European history at university. It‚s easy Phil: just look them up.
Incidentally, I‚ve just realised there seem to be hundreds of websites comparing Hitler to Bush. I think that‚s going a bit far, but the implementation of rhetoric in pursuit of power is an art that doesn‚t change much.
http://www.antiwar.com/article.php?articleid=1490
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0901-03.htm
http://www.georgewbush.org/forum/lofiversion/index.php?t2136.html
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You wrote to Michel of the Iraqis:
„the very fact that they so proudly and overwhelmingly participated in their first democratic elections, validates my statements.‰
Either that or they are keen to get the invaders the hell out of their country so they can begin to rebuild it.
By the way, there were elections in Iraq under Saddam- it‚s just that their choice of who to vote for was severely limited by the imposition of those in power- just like it was after Saddam, under the USA.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

I guess I need to reconsider my view of the French. It turns out that not only have the French been the U.S.'s most reliable partner in the War On Terrorism, THEY'VE ALSO BEEN HOLDING TERROR SUSPECTS INDEFINITELY, JUST LIKE WE DO AT GUANTANAMO BAY, CUBA.
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Congratulations, Michel Bastian. I salute the French for their wisdom in agreeing with us that terror suspects must be incarcerated indefinitely and not released, 'legal rights' notwithstanding.
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HELP FROM FRANCE KEY IN COVERT OPERATIONS
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PARIS'S SHADOWY 'ALLIANCE BASE' AIDS U.S. IN TERROR FIGHT
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PARIS - When Christian Ganczarski, a German convert to Islam, boarded an Air France flight from Riyadh on June 3, 2003, he knew only that the Saudi government had put him under house arrest for an expired pilgrim visa and had given his family one-way tickets back to Germany, with a change of planes in Paris.
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He had no idea that he was being secretly escorted by an undercover officer sitting behind him, or that a senior CIA officer was waiting at the end of the jetway as French authorities gently separated him from his family and swept Ganczarski into French custody, WHERE HE REMAINS TODAY ON SUSPICION OF ASSOCIATING WITH TERRORISTS. (*In plain English, Michel Bastian, this means that the terrorist suspect has been held in custody continuously for more than two years, without being either charged or released*).
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Ganczarski is among the most important European al Qaeda figures alive, according to U.S. and French law enforcement and intelligence officials. The operation that ensnared him was put together at a top secret center in Paris, code-named Alliance Base, that was set up by the CIA and French intelligence services in 2002, according to U.S. and European intelligence sources. Its existence has not been previously disclosed.
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Funded largely by the CIA's Counterterrorist Center, Alliance Base analyzes the transnational movement of terrorist suspects and develops operations to catch or spy on them.
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Alliance Base demonstrates how most counterterrorism operations actually take place: through secretive alliances between the CIA and other countries' intelligence services. This is not the work of large army formations, or even small special forces teams, but of handfuls of U.S. intelligence case officers working with handfuls of foreign operatives, often in tentative arrangements.
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Such joint intelligence work has been responsible for identifying, tracking and capturing or killing the vast majority of committed jihadists who have been targeted outside Iraq and Afghanistan since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, according to terrorism experts.
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The CIA declined to comment on Alliance Base, as did a spokesman for the French Embassy in Washington.
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Most French officials and other intelligence veterans would talk about the partnership only if their names were withheld because the specifics are classified and the politics are sensitive. John E. McLaughlin, the former acting CIA director who retired recently after a 32-year career, described the relationship between the CIA and its French counterparts as "one of the best in the world. What they are willing to contribute is extraordinarily valuable."
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The rarely discussed Langley-Paris connection also belies the public portrayal of acrimony between the two countries that erupted over the invasion of Iraq. Within the Bush administration, the discord was amplified by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who has claimed the lead role in the administration's "global war on terrorism" and has sought to give the military more of a part in it.
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But even as Rumsfeld was criticizing France in early 2003 for not doing its share in fighting terrorism, his U.S. Special Operations Command was finalizing a secret arrangement to put 200 French special forces under U.S. command in Afghanistan. Beginning in July 2003, its commanders have worked side by side there with U.S. commanders and CIA and National Security Agency representatives.
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Alliance Base, headed by a French general assigned to France's equivalent of the CIA ˜ the General Directorate for External Security (DGSE) ˜ was described by six U.S. and foreign intelligence specialists with involvement in its activities. The base is unique in the world because it is multinational and actually plans operations instead of sharing information among countries, they said. It has case officers from Britain, France, Germany, Canada, Australia and the United States.
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The Ganczarski operation was one of at least 12 major cases the base worked on during its first years, according to one person familiar with its operations.
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"It's really an effort to come up with innovative ideas and deal with some of the cooperation issues," said one CIA officer familiar with the base. "I don't know of anything like it."
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Factions within the intelligence services of several countries opposed a multinational approach, according to current and former U.S. and European government officials who described its inception. The CIA's Counterterrorist Center did not want to lose control over all counterterrorism operations; the British service did not want to dilute its unique ties to Washington; Germany was not keen to become involved in more operations.
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And no country wanted to be perceived as taking direction from the CIA, whose practice of extraordinary renditions ˜ secretly apprehending suspected terrorists and transferring them to other countries without any judicial review ˜ has become highly controversial in Europe. In Italy, 13 alleged CIA operatives are accused of kidnapping a radical Egyptian cleric off the streets of Milan in 2003.
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To play down the U.S. role, the center's working language is French, sources said. The base selects its cases carefully, chooses a lead country for each operation, and that country's service runs the operation.
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The base also provides a way for German case officers to read information from their own country's law enforcement authorities, sources said. German law bars criminal authorities from sharing certain information directly with their intelligence agencies.
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French law, by contrast, encourages intelligence sharing among its police and security services. In fact, since the Napoleonic Code was adopted in 1804, French magistrates have had broad powers over civil society. Today, magistrates in the French Justice Department's anti-terrorism unit have authority to detain people suspected of "conspiracy in relation to terrorism" while evidence is gathered against them.
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The top anti-terrorism magistrate, Judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere, has said that in the past decade, he has ordered the arrests of more than 500 suspects, some with the help of U.S. authorities. "I have good connections with the CIA and FBI," Bruguiere said in a recent interview.
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In France, which has a Muslim population reaching 8 percent ˜ the largest in Europe ˜ U.S. and French terrorism experts are desperate to take terrorist-group recruiters and new recruits off the streets, and have been willing to put their own anti-terrorism laws into the service of allies to lure suspects such as Ganczarski from abroad.
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"Yes, without a doubt there are some cases where we participate that way," one senior French intelligence official said.
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France sent its interrogators to Guantanamo Bay to gather evidence that could be used in French court against the French detainees the United States was holding there. France is the only one of six European nations that continues to imprison detainees returned to it from the U.S. military facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
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The broader cooperation between the United States and French plays to the strengths of each side, according to current and former French and U.S. officials. The CIA brings money from its classified and ever-growing "foreign liaison" account ˜ it has paid to transport some of France's suspects from abroad into Paris for legal imprisonment ˜ and its global eavesdropping capabilities and worldwide intelligence service ties. France brings its harsh laws, surveillance of radical Muslim groups and their networks in Arab states and its intelligence links to its former colonies.

Michel Bastian, France

 

To Phil Karasick:
>Since democracy was never "imposed upon them at gunpoint" in the first place, your question is meaningless. No one "forced" the Iraqis at gunpoint to go to the polls and choose whom to vote for. On the contrary, it was the Terrorist insurgents who tried to prevent the Iraqi people from going to the polls and exercising their newfound right to Vote.
So invading their country, setting up a provisional government nobody elected and implying that there´ll be elections "or else" is not forcing them? Or do you think they´ll be allowed to change their mode of government just like they please? What if they do the same thing as in Iran and elect a radical muslim who wants to set up a god state? Are the US going to tolerate that? I should think not.
> Setting up a democratic basis for Iraqi society does not equate to "telling the Iraqis who to vote for". It merely establishes the undergirding democratic framework that will allow the Iraqi people to decide for themselves who to vote for. In fact, were he not in jail and facing trial for crimes against humanity, Saddam Hussein himself could probably have run for office as a candidate.
Yeah, but what if the Iraqis had wanted to reject that democratic framework? That´s what I mean: they didn´t have the option to. The democratic system, as good and proper as it may be, was forced upon them, and that inevitably builds resentment against the US and, consequently, against the concept of democracy itself.
> That's precisely the problem, Michel. That's why those ideas and attitudes are so terribly, tragically wrong. You see, Michel, "Wanting democracy" IS THE SAME AS "being given democracy via a military overthrow of the existing regime", when the existing regime is a tyrannical dictatorship that does not allow its citizens to "want" or "choose" democracy of their own volition.
Yes, but that´s not what happened. The Iraqis didn´t get invaded and then given a choice of whether to accept democracy or build their own system. Basically the Bush administration said: you´re going to have a democracy, whether you want it or not. That act in itself is anti-democratic because it preempts the right of the Iraqi people to choose their own system of government.
> That's precisely why the attitudes of Western liberal apologists for Third World dictatorships are so criminally immoral and wrong. That's why those in the West who have patiently promulgated the baffle-gab notion that Muslim, Arab and/or Third World nations are "too culturally different from Western capitalist consumerist societies", who claim that "their customs and traditions are antithetical to our 'supposedly superior' democratic ideals", that we "have no right to ask Third World, Arab or Muslim nations to adopt democracy or impose Western democratic systems upon" these countries and that we "shouldn't try to do so", are so horrifically wrong. They are promoting nothing less than pandering to cultural racism.
What the heck is "cultural racism", Phil? And we do not have a right to impose democracy on anybody, not because "their customs and traditions" are so great, but because the act itself is antithetical to everything that democracy stands for. What happened in Iraq is that a bloody dictator got ousted. Fine, I applaud that. But if Bush had really been democratic, he would have had to leave it at that. The Iraqis themselves would have had to decide what kind of state they want. That´s not what Bush did because that´s something he could not do. He couldn´t take the risk that some radical mullah or other turned Iraq into another Iran, because that would have touched american and european security interests indeed (by giving the islamic fanatics new breeding grounds). So he had to be antidemocratic about it. He couldn´t do it any other way. That´s exactly my point: this whole grand scheme of "bringing the light of democracy to Iraq" by military means was doomed to failure right from the start. The only thing that Bush (and the rest of us) can hope for now is that he gets lucky and that the situation stabilizes all by itself in the next few years. However, considering the fact that the insurgency is getting stronger every day and the Bush administration is insisting on the stupidity that is Abu Ghraib, Guantamo Bay etc., that´s unfortunately less and less likely.

John, USA

This war has thus far been a massive strategic failure. Aside from the debate about whether or not we should have started it, I see a multitude of ways it could have been fought better. For those who support this war: start holding the Bush Administration accountable for it's failures, and then perhaps we might see progress.
It's a shame to see so many Iraqi war supporters spending so much time fighting with those who do not agree, and never will agree, with this war. These supporters need to take a step back and refocus their energy. Their arguments are honed, their criticisms sharp, and yet they do nothing. I say to them: build a bridge in Iraq, teach english in Afghanistan; do something positive for your country instead of further strengthening certain stereotypes about us; listen to the world and the world will listen to you.
For those who claim the Iraqi elections signal a watershed peace for the country: South Vietnam had elections in 1968 and the turnout was well-over 80%. In a striking coincidence we lost that war and killed an awful lot of civilians in the process.
The Iraqi elections was a good sign. So too, the recent focus on transfering power and re-building infrastructure in the country. I only ask two things: will the focus continue? and, what on earth took so long?
I do not place too much trust in polls, and from what I see, there is an increased feeling of patience running thin in America.
Though I never supported the US decision to go into Iraq, I feel it would be an even greater humanitarian and strategic mistake to pull out now. What I would suggest is that at least the semblance of competency is restored by the American people demanding the removal of certain higher-ups responsible for our warplan (Rumsfeld, Cheney et al), or (more preferable in my opnion) impeach Bush and bring in a president who can commit the resources and get the job done.
I think the Bush Administration has been given quite enough time to show their skills, and they have woefully underperformed.
It is miraculously easy to start a war, the real test is in winning one.
I am born and raised American, and I do love my country a great deal. The damage 9-11 (and the subsequent crisis of the west) has done to my perspective of humanity has been nearly irreparable. I have therefore given my life to the defence of this country, and to make it a place of integrity, introspection, and wisdom. Respect, I feel, is essential to this process: America respecting the international community and the international community respecting America.
This case is made hard by the tendency of humans to lack understanding and be selfish. In this way it isn't a problem with America or China or France or Israel, but of humankind in general. And in particular, it has been rendered remarkably indefensible by America's lack of patience in entering Iraq, our lack of action once we were inside, and certain shameful debacles like Abu Graib.
America must not lose its tremendous will and desire to change the world for the better, but we must also not lose sight of what that change is for. It requires the opening of our perceptions, the task of understanding other cultures and countries, and the desire for compromise.
I hope Americans and the rest of the world's citizens learn to embrace the plurality of peoples and opinions, and come to know the true meaning of liberty, transparency and freedom. I hope too, that more people read Free World. It's a tremendous book with a tremendous vision.
We are all on this rock together.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

The Anticipated Attack
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Don't blame Iraq for the bombings.
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By Christopher Hitchens
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My son flew in from London at the weekend, and we were discussing, as we have several times before, why it hadn't happened yet. "It" was the jihadist attack on the city, for which the British security forces have been braced ever since the bombings in Madrid. When the telephone rang in the small hours of this morning, I was pretty sure it was the call I had been waiting for. And as I snapped on the TV I could see, from the drawn expression and halting speech of Tony Blair, that he was reacting not so much with shock as from a sense of inevitability.
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Perhaps this partly explains the stoicism and insouciance of those Brits interviewed on the streets, all of whom seemed to know that a certain sang-froid was expected of them. The concrete barriers around the Houses of Parliament have been up for some time. There are estimated to be over 4 million surveillance cameras in the United Kingdom today, but of course it had to be the Underground˜"the tube"˜and the good old symbolic red London bus. Timed for the rush hour, and at transit stations that serve outlying and East London neighborhoods, the bombs are nearly certain to have killed a number of British Muslims. None of this, of course, has stopped George Galloway and his ilk from rushing to the microphone and demanding that the British people be removed "from harm's way" by an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. (Since the Islamists also demand a withdrawal from Afghanistan, it surprises me that he doesn't oblige them in this way as well, but perhaps that will come in time.)
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Looking for possible timings or pretexts, one of course comes up against the meeting of the G8 powers in Edinburgh and perhaps the imminent British spot in the rotating chair of the European Union. (It can't have been the Olympic announcement on such short notice, but the contrast with the happy, multiethnic crowds in Trafalgar Square yesterday could hardly be starker, and it certainly wasn't enough to get the murderers to call it off.) Another possibility is the impending trial of Abu Hamza al Mazri, a one-eyed and hook-handed mullah who isn't as nice as he looks and who preaches Bin-Ladenism from a shabby mosque in North London. He is currently awaiting extradition to the United States, and his supporters might have wanted to make a loving gesture in his favor.
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This would mean that the cell or gang was homegrown, rather than smuggled in from North Africa or elsewhere. Or it could mean coordination between the two. In any event, there are two considerations here. The first is Britain's role as a leading member of the "Coalition" in Iraq and Afghanistan. The second is its role as a host to a large and growing Muslim minority. The first British citizens to be killed in Afghanistan were fighting for the Taliban, which is proof in itself that the Iraq war is not the original motivating force. Last year, two British Muslims pulled off a suicide attack at an Israeli beach resort. In many British cities, there are now demands for sexual segregation in schools and for separate sharia courts to try Muslim defendants. The electoral strength of Muslims is great enough to encourage pandering from all three parties: The most egregious pandering of all has come from Blair himself, who has promised legislation that would outlaw any speech that could be construed as offensive to Islam. Since most British Muslims are of Asian descent, a faint sense exists that criticism of their religion is somehow racist: In practice this weak-mindedness leads to the extension of an antiquated law on blasphemy that ought long ago to have been repealed but is now to cover the wounded feelings of Muslims as well as Christians.
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During the last election the Conservatives, who have chosen to go soft on the Iraq war, mutated their lost hawkishness into a campaign against "illegal immigrants" and "bogus asylum seekers"˜easy code words for an enemy within. So, there is another form of pandering at work as well. In the main, though, London is a highly successful and thriving melting pot, and I would be very much surprised as well as appalled if there were any vengeance pursued against individual Muslims or mosques.
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Older Londoners are of course raised on memories of the Nazi blitzkrieg, and a younger generation remembers living through a long campaign of bombings by the Provisional IRA. This latest challenge is far more insidious, however, because the ambitions of the killers are non-negotiable, and because their methods so exactly match their aims. It will be easy in the short term for Blair to rally national and international support, as always happens in moments such as this, but over time these gestural moments lose their force and become subject to diminishing returns. If, as one must suspect, these bombs are only the first, then Britain will start to undergo the same tensions˜between a retreat to insularity and clannishness of the sort recently seen in France and Holland, and the self-segregation of the Muslim minority in both those countries˜that will start to infect other European countries as well. It is ludicrous to try and reduce this to Iraq. Europe is steadily becoming a part of the civil war that is roiling the Islamic world, and it will require all our cultural ingenuity to ensure that the criminals who shattered London's peace at rush hour this morning are not the ones who dictate the pace and rhythm of events from now on.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA


text: Michel Bastian wrote (of the Iraqi people): "They refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies (*like, voting).... They don´t want democracy. They want to be ruled by religious leaders."
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Yup, we see the same facts and the same picture but somehow you manage to completely ignore the facts to suit your view of the world. There are facts and there is opinion, Michel. Opinions can vary, facts can´t.
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Out of the roughly 14 million Iraqis who were eligible to vote in their country's first elections since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, roughly 8 million defied boycott calls and threats of terrorist violence, and went to polling places to democratically choose their elected government. That's called a FACT, Michel.
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Your claims that Iraqis "don't want democracy" are not "facts". They are merely your OPINION.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "Sorry, I forgot I was talking to the king of prejudice."
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Moi? Mais non. I'm not the one who claimed that "mad cow disease was Britain's sole contribution to European agriculture", who said that "We can't trust people who have such bad food" or that "only Finland had worse food in Europe". That was your Fearless Leader, Jacques Chirac.
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Surprisingly enough, some of the English press were actually sympathetic and understanding. The Daily Telegraph said Chirac's bad temper was understandable, after French voters overwhelmingly rejected a new constitution for the European Union.
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"After all, he has just been kicked in the teeth by his own people's resounding 'non' to his dreams of a European superstate," the Telegraph commented in an editorial.
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As for me, I'm not at all surprised about the little Kerfuffle-In-A-Crepe-Suzette. It's par for the course. No matter how many times Chirac tries to insist that "we are all Europeans, dwelling in a Common European Home", he just can't seem to pass up any opportunity to prove to the world that the French are still... well.... French.

jacob, poland

phil,
do you have a website of your own? i have actually learnt a great deal from your arguments and through following them up elsewhere. I assure you i'm not being sarcastic

alex, miami/usa

to the seattle dude
stop being such an apologist for imperialism and zionism.every one on earth know very well that the invasion of iraq was not only illegal and immoral but an attempt by a racist regime that is trying to impose it,s agenda all over the world and especially in the middle east.
Dubya,s agenda has already been flushed down the toilette and the ranting and barking by zionists like you are not going to help.
It is amazing that people like you refer to the holocaust and the suffering of european jewery and yet use and abuse this terrible and shameful crime against humanity as a tool to demonize and villify the palestinian people who are the victims of the new nazis of our time named zionists.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

 

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

 

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

 

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Mike in London wrote: "My point in giving the example of the Nazis was that the murder of Jews was not the STATED aim of the invasions undertaken by Hitler: the point being that Hitler undertook the various invasions under several justifications, and the Holocaust was a result."
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And once again, you chose to deliberately ignore the facts presented, because they conflicted with your world view.
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The murder of the Jews of Europe WAS one of the STATED AIMS listed in "Mein Kampff". The Holocaust was not the 'result' of the various invasions which Hitler undertook. The Holocaust was not the 'result' of the Second World War having started. The Holocaust was the result of Hitler's desire to cause the Holocaust to happen, his insane zeal to eliminate all Jews from Europe (as envisioned and explained in elaborate detail in "Mein Kampff"), and the detailed and thorough planning which Hitler and his understudies undertook in order to make the Holocaust a reality.
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Mike in London wrote: "All the facts are all readily available- I studied the rise to power of Hitler extensively whilst in education, and since your comment I thought I might brush up on them. Unsurprisingly, I found the facts have not changed in the years since I studied European history at university. It∫s easy Phil: just look them up."
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I did just that, Mike. I also posted the sources of my information. Please go look them up yourself.
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Mike in London wrote: "
Incidentally, I∫ve just realised there seem to be hundreds of websites comparing Hitler to Bush."
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Yes, that's the usual desperation tactic of last resort of leftists everywhere when they're defeated at the polls -- accuse their political opponent(s) of allegedly being "Nazis" or "fascists". That's the wonder of the Internet, anyone can post anything accusing anyone of anything.
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It's a very old tactic, too. They made the same accusations (smear campaigns) against Pres. Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, and pretty much for the same reasons, too. He drove the European Left absolutely insane, because he had the gall to actually stand up and oppose Marxism-Leninism head-on, and because no matter how much they hated him and his policies, he wouldn't bend. They campaigned against him, thinking no one would ever vote for him, and instead he won by a landslide. And they hated him for it.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Mike in London wrote: "By the way, there were elections in Iraq under Saddam- it∫s just that their choice of who to vote for was severely limited by the imposition of those in power- just like it was after Saddam, under the USA."
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Perhaps your definition of "limited" needs to be looked at and expanded, Mike. In the Iraqi elections held on 30 January 2005, roughly 120 separate and distinct political parties participated in an election to elect candidates for the new national assembly. Each party presented a list of candidates with at least 12 names and no more than 275. One-third of the candidates on the list had to be women.
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All Iraqis 18 years of age or older on Jan. 1, 2005, were allowed to vote, an estimated 12 million people. Because the election was on such a tight schedule, a proper census of the country's estimated 26 million people could not be conducted.
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Instead, the electoral roll was based on lists the Saddam Hussein regime used for the UN "Oil for Food" program. Iraqis holding a valid ration card from this program were eligible to vote.
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As well, Iraqi citizens in 14 countries were allowed to vote in ballots authorized by Iraqi election officials, including an estimated 25,000 eligible voters in Canada.
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The Canadian voters list was compiled from Jan. 17-25 at five voting stations across the country: three in Toronto and one each in Ottawa and Calgary. Voters had to register in person and return to the station for the vote between Jan. 28 and 30.
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Now, Mike, does that sound like "their choice of who to vote for was severely limited by the imposition of those in power"? It sure doesn't sound that way to me. And the U.S. had nothing to say about who those political partiesand/or candidates were. That was entirely up to the Iraqi people.
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I would be very interested in seeing any documentation you could provide concerning any elections that were allowed to take place during Saddam's rule. What is quite clear and apparent is that whatever elections took place in Iraq during Saddam's murderous rule, did not allow for the possibility of any actual leader other than Saddam and/or members of Saddam's Tikriti tribe. Thus any elections that took place during Saddam's reign were only tolerated so long as the results of those elections were inconsequential and did not pose any true threat to Saddam's rule. For this reason, Iraqis who could have posed a true alternative to Saddam's rule had a tendency to "disappear".
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Here are some resources that can help you to better understand the wonderful reality that was the Iraqi elections.
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http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/iraq/election_faq.html
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http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/419B4412-839C-4926-A599-22C99D4E8509.htm
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http://iraqelect.com/
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http://www.mapsofworld.com/elections/iraq-elections-2005.html
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Here are some resources to help you to better understand Saddam's ruthless rise to power, and the murderous nature of the regime he created:
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http://reference.allrefer.com/country-guide-study/iraq/iraq19.html
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http://www.iraqitruthproject.com/

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "So invading their country, setting up a provisional government nobody elected and implying that there´ll be elections "or else" is not forcing them?"
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That's correct. It is NOT 'forcing them'. It is ALLOWING them the chance to choose their own representative government. It's no different than when we Liberated Germany from the Nazis and Liberated Japan from the Japanese military imperialists. After overthrowing the ruling dictatorship, we set up a temporary and provisional government to coordinate the enormous task of rebuilding the country. The provisional government was set up precisely because there needed to be some form of national interim political authority to govern the country and fill the power vacuum in the wake of the collapse of the previous ruling regime. And the provisional government was intended to be a temporary, interim body precisely so that the transition to home rule could occur as soon as possible and feasible.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "Or do you think they´ll be allowed to change their mode of government just like they please?"
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Of course they will be allowed to change their mode of government, if they decide that's what they want to do. The only caveat will be that any change to their form of government will be decided by the Iraqi people themselves in a democratic manner. It won't be decided by a ruthless and murderous minority going "WHAAAAA!! We want 'our' Dictator back, WHAAAAA!! We don't want give up power, WHAAAAA!! You better give us back 'our' Dictator and accept being Ruled by us, or WE'LL KILL you! WHAAAA!!!".
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Michel Bastian wrote: "What if they do the same thing as in Iran and elect a radical muslim who wants to set up a god state? Are the US going to tolerate that? I should think not."
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Of course we would tolerate it. It's a decision for the Iraqi people themselves to make. But I personally doubt that we'll ever have to worry about that possibility. And my reason for feeling this way is that even the mullahs are generally being pragmatic and reasonable. The Sunni imams and mullahs are starting to realize that they're a minority in Iraqi society, and they won't be able to shoot, kidnap or car-bomb their way back into power. If the Shi'ites ever decide to stop holding back, if they decide to attack the Sunnis in retaliation for Sunni attacks on them, the Sunnis' position could quickly become very unhealthy, because they're a minority. And the Shi'ite mullahs (like Grand Ayatolluh Ali Sistani) are realizing, very sagely and wisely, that being the new ruling majority in Iraq cannot mean running roughshod over the minorities or launching retribution attacks against the Sunnis... not unless they want to ignite a civil war.
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So, the Iraqi Shi'ites and the Iraqi Sunnis are starting to learn how to do things like... negotiate... compromise... reach a consensus... share. There's a wonderful name for this process, Michel. It's called Democracy.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "Yeah, but what if the Iraqis had wanted to reject that democratic framework? The democratic system, as good and proper as it may be, was forced upon them, and that inevitably builds resentment against the US and, consequently, against the concept of democracy itself."
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"Reject that democratic framework" in favor of what? "All Power to the Supreme Soviet"? "Glory to God and Power to the Mullahs"? There's no indication or evidence that the majority of Iraqis wanted to reject that democratic framework. The only group (a minority group) that rejected the democratic framework was the Sunni Muslim community. And the reason they rejected it was plainly obvious -- they had been the priveleged and ruling minority when Saddam Hussein was in power, and they brutalized all the other groups in Iraq when they still could. Of course they were resentful, they didn't want to get kicked out of power. They would have been resentful of any change that took away their unearned power and undeserved priveleges.
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Michel Bastian wrote: "Yes, but that´s not what happened. The Iraqis didn´t get invaded and then given a choice of whether to accept democracy or build their own system. Basically the Bush administration said: you´re going to have a democracy, whether you want it or not. That act in itself is anti-democratic because it preempts the right of the Iraqi people to choose their own system of government."
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Iraq does not have any former monarchy to restore to power. The Iraqi Communist Party is tiny, has been repressed for decades and can only benefit from democracy. Of course the Iraqis can always be asked to choose between democracy and some variation of Islam-ocracy. The Shi'ites will close ranks among themselves and vote for an Ayatolluh, the Sunnis will try to reimpose Saddam Hussein upon everyone else, and the Kurds, Turkmen and all the other Iraqi minorities will be left to twist in the wind. Then the civil war can start.
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The Iraqi people did have and do have the right to choose their own system of government, and they exercised that choice. They had the opportunity to choose from political parties representing a variety of visions of what form Iraq's government could become, including Islamic fundamentalist parties. They can still choose to change their own system of government as soon as their government is far enough along to be able to stand on its own and has the capability to exercise full sovereignty.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Michel Bastian wrote: "What the heck is 'cultural racism', Phil?"
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Here are some places for you to look for the answer to that question.
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"The Theory of Cultural Racism"
http://www.mdcbowen.org/p2/rm/theory/blaut.htm
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Today's world is rapidly and increasingly becoming interlinked through such things as jet travel, the rise of the Internet, and the increasing prevalence and use of a common language (English) among other factors.
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In such an increasingly interconnected world, the assertion that certain specific groups, countries or cultures (Muslims, for example) are somehow "unable" or "incapable" of understanding or accepting basic democratic concepts (voting; peaceful democratic transition of power, etc.) smacks highly of cultural racism, in my opinion. It basically insinuates or asserts that the designated group is too "culturally backward", "stuck in the 11th century", etc. to be "capable of understanding democratic concepts". And that's belittling and insulting. It implies that "nothing more than a crude dictatorship can be expected of 'such people' ".
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And THAT is cultural racism.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Mike in London wrote: "All the facts are all readily available- I studied the rise to power of Hitler extensively whilst in education, and since your comment I thought I might brush up on them. Unsurprisingly, I found the facts have not changed in the years since I studied European history at university. It∫s easy Phil: just look them up."
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I did look them up, Mike. That's how I found the extensive documentation of how many of Hitler's followers were believers in the occult and mysticism. Since those beliefs are directly contradictory to and diametrically opposed to organized religion (particularly Christianity), it should be a simple enough matter for you to understand that these Nazis could not believe in the occult and mysticism and yet still claim to call themselves "Christians".
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I presented the documentation of this to you at least once already, but apparently you chose to ignore that, because it contradicted what you wish to believe and the "point" which you are clumsily trying to make.
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Since you chose to overlook that evidence the last time around, I will present it to you again here, complete with quotes from high-ranking Nazis. These direct quotes amply demonstrate that the Nazis considered themselves to be "anything BUT" Christians.
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NAZI MYSTICISM
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from Esoteric Hitlerism)
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Nazi mysticism is a term used to describe a quasi-religious undercurrent of Nazism; it denotes the combination of Nazism with occultism, esotericism, cryptohistory, and/or the paranormal.
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In some cases it ascribes a religious significance to the person of Adolf Hitler and his doctrine.
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Modern examples include Ariosophy, Armanism, Theozoology, Armanenorden, Artgemeinschaft, and Esoteric Hitlerism.
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Other related modern theories involve Hitler having escaped to the Antarctic, where he joined with a subterranean dinosauroid master race, with whom he now travels inside UFOs underground, generally beneath the South Pole or throughout the center of the hollow earth, but sometimes to a Nazi moon base as well. (See Miguel Serrano, below.)
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"The Führer is deeply religious, though completely anti-Christian; he views Christianity as a symptom of decay. Rightly so. It is a branch of the Jewish race."
- Joseph Goebbels, in his diary, December 28, 1939.
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"Christianity is the prototype of Bolshevism: the mobilisation by the Jew of the masses of slaves with the object of undermining society."
- Hitler, 1941
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esoteric_Hitlerism

Michel Bastian, France

To Phil Karasick:
>Oh, so you personally went to Iraq and interviewed them yourself and independently determined that, huh? No? Then how would you have the sligtest idea how "many of these people (even many of those that went to vote)" think? You don't. You don't have any factual knowledge on which to base your statement. What you have, rather, is an "assumption".
Well, I have an assumption based on information I got from a lot of different sources (several newspapers, military strategy websites, books and articles by middle-east scholars etc.). You, on the other hand, seem to get your assumptions (because I´m pretty sure you haven´t interviewed any Iraqis personally either) straight from the White House website.
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>Michel Bastian wrote: "They´ve been a predominantly Muslim culture since the middle-ages and in many ways they didn´t change."
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>So what? What does that have to do with anything?
Well, everything, actually, which is what everybody else has been trying to explain to Bush since the beginning of this sorry affair.
> Michel Bastian wrote: "They refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies out of mostly religious reasons that they have lived with for hundreds of years (even if they´re not all as extreme as some of the Iranians)".
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> Again, kindly present "proof" of your statements, or else please acknowledge that what you are promoting is not "facts" but rather simply "assumptions".
Well, since you seem to take the elections as "proof" for your assumptions, I´ll take the insurrection as "proof" for mine.
> The most basic concept of our democratic societies is the concept of "one man, one vote" and of deciding who should govern through use of democratic delections. More than 14 million Iraqi people registered to vote in their first election since Saddam Hussein was toppled from power. Of those, an estimated 8 million people - 60 percent of eligible voters - braved violence and calls for a boycott to vote in Iraq. The Iraqi people clearly "get" the basic concept of democracy. Your claim that Iraqis "refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies" is therefore shown to be unfounded, with roughly 8 million individual Iraqi examples that directly contradict your statement.
I didn´t say or imply that all Iraqis are unfit for democracy somehow. I´m just saying that a lot of them (not the majority, hopefully, though nobody can really verify this) just cannot grasp the concept. I´m saying that it´ll take a long, long time until it catches on in Iraq, if ever. > Michel Bastian wrote: "Many of them don´t agree that a person should be free because they think that freedom is dangerous and humans are bound to make the wrong choices given half a chance. In their eyes, God is the only one that has the right to make decisions for them, and mullahs are the mouthpieces of God."
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> Again, please provide Evidence to explain what qualifies you to presume to "know" what "many of them" agree or do not agree on, and what entitles you to presume to authoritatively define what "many of them" do or do not believe.
Well, my evidence is mostly things going "boom" all the time in the streets of Baghdad.> Michel Bastian wrote: "They don´t want democracy."
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> On the contrary, they clearly do want democracy. That's why roughly 14 million Iraqis registered to vote. Roughly 8 million Iraqis individually chose to go to the polls and directly refute your statement by voting in democratic elections to choose their leader. I think your statement has been pretty decisively shown to be factually incorrect and merely an "assumption" on your part. (Perhaps it was wishful thinking on your part).
Nope, wishful thinking on my part is my (unfounded) hope that the situation in Iraq will steady down in time. I hope it will, but I don´t believe it will. Don´t assume that I´m just saying that to gloat. I´m saying that because we need to face the facts if we ever want to get out of this nightmare. Bush´s mantra of "mission accomplished" will not do in this respect. The americans will have to adapt to the Iraqi way of thinking in order to move things along there. >Michel Bastian wrote: "They want to be ruled by religious leaders."
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>No, they do not. They may choose to vote for political parties that are religious or religious-leaning, but they clearly want to choose their own political leaders. The Iraqi Shi'ite Ayatolluh Sistani and the mullahs declared that voting is a religious duty. But they did not "tell" Iraqi voters specifically who to vote for, or "direct" them to vote for a particular political party.
Like I said, Phil: read my posts before replying. I didn´t say or imply that all Iraqis want to be ruled by religious leaders. I´m just saying that many of them (especially the older generations) want that because they haven´t known anything else since the day they were born.
> Kindly stop presuming to "tell" the Iraqi people what they "want". They have clearly shown that they are quite capable of figuring that out by themselves.
Yes, that´s quite true, and I´m not telling the Iraqis anything. I´m just argueing that the Bush administration should open their eyes to the realities of Iraq.
> Also, unless you have been recently elected to the Iraqi Parliament, kindly stop presuming to "tell" this board what the Iraqi people supposedly "want". They haven't elected you as their official spokesperson or mouthpiece.
Polemics, Phil. Uninteresting and irrelevant. > They haven't elected me, either. However, the very fact that they so proudly and overwhelmingly participated in their first democratic elections, validates my statements.
Like I said: elections vs. insurrection.

Michel Bastian, France

To Phil Karasick:
> I guess I need to reconsider my view of the French.
It turns out that not only have the French been the U.S.'s most reliable partner in the War On Terrorism, THEY'VE ALSO BEEN HOLDING TERROR SUSPECTS INDEFINITELY, JUST LIKE WE DO AT GUANTANAMO BAY, CUBA.
No, they haven´t. It has nothing to do with what´s being done at Guantanamo. I´ll explain a few paragraphs onwards.
> Congratulations, Michel Bastian. I salute the French for their wisdom in agreeing with us that terror suspects must be incarcerated indefinitely and not released, 'legal rights' notwithstanding.
They definitely don´t agree to that. What they have done is to successfully demonstrate how you can wage a war on terror without breaking the law.
> HELP FROM FRANCE KEY IN COVERT OPERATIONS
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> PARIS'S SHADOWY 'ALLIANCE BASE' AIDS U.S. IN TERROR > FIGHT
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> PARIS - When Christian Ganczarski, a German convert to Islam, boarded an Air France flight from Riyadh on June 3, 2003, he knew only that the Saudi government had put him under house arrest for an expired pilgrim visa and had given his family one-way tickets back to Germany, with a change of planes in Paris.
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> He had no idea that he was being secretly escorted by an undercover officer sitting behind him, or that a senior CIA officer was waiting at the end of the jetway as French authorities gently separated him from his family and swept Ganczarski into French custody, WHERE HE REMAINS TODAY ON SUSPICION OF ASSOCIATING WITH TERRORISTS. (*In plain English, Michel Bastian, this means that the terrorist suspect has been held in custody continuously for more than two years, without being either charged or released*).
No, Phil, in plain english it means that the suspect has been held in custody continuously for the duration of the ongoing investigation, as ordered by a proper instruction judge, according to the proper procedural statutes of french penal law. It also means that, during the investigation, the suspect has the same rights as any other suspect and when the investigation will be finished, he´ll be put before a proper non-military court and also be given the same procedural rights as any other suspect. Not quite the same as in Guantanamo. People like Bruguière (who is actually a "juge d´instruction", which is more like an american DA than a judge), the spanish judge Garzón or the german federal attorney general Kai Nehm have shown that you can use legal means and still get results. You don´t have to resort to torture and illegal imprisonment.
> Ganczarski is among the most important European al Qaeda figures alive, according to U.S. and French law enforcement and intelligence officials. <....>
> French law, by contrast, encourages intelligence sharing among its police and security services. In fact, since the Napoleonic Code was adopted in 1804, French magistrates have had broad powers over civil society. Today, magistrates in the French Justice Department's anti-terrorism unit have authority to detain people suspected of "conspiracy in relation to terrorism" while evidence is gathered against them.See what I mean, Phil?> The top anti-terrorism magistrate, Judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere, has said that in the past decade, he has ordered the arrests of more than 500 suspects, some with the help of U.S. authorities. "I have good connections with the CIA and FBI," Bruguiere said in a recent interview.
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> In France, which has a Muslim population reaching 8 percent - the largest in Europe - U.S. and French terrorism experts are desperate to take terrorist-group recruiters and new recruits off the streets, and have been willing to put their own anti-terrorism laws into the service of allies to lure suspects such as Ganczarski from abroad.
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> "Yes, without a doubt there are some cases where we participate that way," one senior French intelligence official said.
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> France sent its interrogators to Guantanamo Bay to gather evidence that could be used in French court against the French detainees the United States was holding there. France is the only one of six European nations that continues to imprison detainees returned to it from the U.S. military facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
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> The broader cooperation between the United States and French plays to the strengths of each side, according to current and former French and U.S. officials. The CIA brings money from its classified and ever-growing "foreign liaison" account - it has paid to transport some of France's suspects from abroad into Paris for legal imprisonment - and its global eavesdropping capabilities and worldwide intelligence service ties. France brings its harsh laws, surveillance of radical Muslim groups and their networks in Arab states and its intelligence links to its former colonies.
Thanks, Phil, for an extremely interesting article (and I´m not being sarcastic here). So much for "old Europe" not helping in the war on terrorism. In fact, besides a radical change in european and american foreign policy towards the third world (actively combatting poverty, creating infrastructure etc.), this is the only way we are ever going to win this war. Forget about grandstanding politicians starting wars in the middle east. It´s international intelligence operations like these that are going to bring Al Quaida to task. I´m pretty sure Bin Laden is much more afraid of these kinds of operations than of enormous armies invading the middle-east. And if we ever catch him in person, it´s going to be thanks to these kinds of intelligence outfits.
Incidentally, cooperation between the american, british and "old" european military and intelligence agencies is much more extensive than you might think given the public rows between Schröder, Chirac, Blair and Bush. As an example, have a look at this article: http://www.global-defence.com/2005/Utilities/news.php?cmd=View&id=759

Michel Bastian, France

To Phil Karasick:
text: Michel Bastian wrote (of the Iraqi people): "They refuse basic concepts of our democratic societies (*like, voting).... They don´t want democracy. They want to be ruled by religious leaders."
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Yup, we see the same facts and the same picture but somehow you manage to completely ignore the facts to suit your view of the world. There are facts and there is opinion, Michel. Opinions can vary, facts can´t.
Oh, come on, Phil, surely you can do better than just repeat my posts.
> Out of the roughly 14 million Iraqis who were eligible to vote in their country's first elections since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, roughly 8 million defied boycott calls and threats of terrorist violence, and went to polling places to democratically choose their elected government. That's called a FACT, Michel.
Your claims that Iraqis "don't want democracy" are not "facts". They are merely your OPINION.
You want facts? I´ll give you facts: roughly 2.000 american servicemen and -women dead in Iraq, most of them by insurgent attacks; bomb attacks by iraqi insurgents almost every second day, mostly with between 20 to 50 victims; members of the iraqi provisional governments have been killed by terrorist attacks and all members of the current iraqi administration (yes Phil, the ones that were voted on in the last election) are under constant threat of attacks by muslim militants; the number of insurgents is massively increasing instead of decreasing as it should if Bush was right, and I could go on for ages like that. Tell me about facts, Phil. > Michel Bastian wrote: "Sorry, I forgot I was talking to the king of prejudice."
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> Moi? Mais non. I'm not the one who claimed that "mad cow disease was Britain's sole contribution to European agriculture", who said that "We can't trust people who have such bad food" or that "only Finland had worse food in Europe". That was your Fearless Leader, Jacques Chirac.
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> Surprisingly enough, some of the English press were actually sympathetic and understanding. The Daily Telegraph said Chirac's bad temper was understandable, after French voters overwhelmingly rejected a new constitution for the European Union.
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> "After all, he has just been kicked in the teeth by his own people's resounding 'non' to his dreams of a European superstate," the Telegraph commented in an editorial.
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> As for me, I'm not at all surprised about the little Kerfuffle-In-A-Crepe-Suzette. It's par for the course. No matter how many times Chirac tries to insist that "we are all Europeans, dwelling in a Common European Home", he just can't seem to pass up any opportunity to prove to the world that the French are still... well.... French.
Tell you what, Phil. I won´t equate George W. Bush to all of America and you won´t equate Jacques Chirac to the whole of France, would that be ok? Sure this was a stupid and insulting thing to say (actually I could have kicked him for that remark; he got quite a lot of flak from the french press as well), but Chirac is not France.

Susan Starke, USA

To John, USA:
Your post was very thoughtful. I supported the Iraq war initially, unlike you, and I probably have a more positive view of the competence of the US military and government than you do. However, what discourages me is the growing evidence that Americans are the only ones in the world who believe in Jeffersonian democracy as an absolute value. I am beginining to believe that there is no reason to spend American blood and treasure to implant democracy outside of North America because there is no demand for it elsewhere. I am not in favor of an immediate pullout in Iraq, but I do not want to see America policing the place for the next fifty years. It's not worth it. Europe was not worth it either.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

Alex in Miami wrote: "to the seattle dude:
stop being such an apologist for imperialism and zionism."
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Dear Alex: Kindly go pound sand. I make no "apologies" whatsoever for supporting Israel's unalienable Right To Exist as a nation. And I'm proud that we Liberated Iraq. And I'm going to keep supporting our intervention there. I'm not going to stop. If you have a problem with that, that's "your, Individual" problem.
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Alex in Miami wrote: "every one on earth know very well that the invasion of iraq was not only illegal and immoral but an attempt by a racist regime that is trying to impose it,s agenda all over the world and especially in the middle east."
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Rubbish. Typical left-wing anti-semitic anti-Israel BS and Lies, as usual. Your rant is nothing more than the usual and thinly-disguised "Jews control the American Government and want to Take Over The World" Nazi-babble bilge that usually emanates from right-wing hate groups and wingnuts like the KKK and Pat Buchanan. Congratulations for tacitly proving true the very thing that leftist pigs like you have long denied: For all your supposed "disagreements" with right-wingers, you lunatic leftist pigs agree with the lunatic right-wing wingnuts on the issues that really matter to you; namely, you despise Jews and Israel. Get this through your head: THIS ISRAELI STATE STAYS EXACTLY WHERE IT IS, PERMANENTLY.
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Alex in Miami wrote: "Dubya,s agenda has already been flushed down the toilette and the ranting and barking by zionists like you are not going to help."
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Dubya's agenda is to successfully remake the Middle East by bringing Democracy to a region infested with Dictatorships. And it's working. Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan: all these nations are now beginning to allowing their citizens to exercise Democracy in one form or another. We are Winning. Funny, I don't see you making any protests against the numerous Dictatorships in the Middle East that refuse to grant their people Freedom. Your comments "only" seem to be directed against the Only country in the Middle East that provides citizenship and voting rights to Christians, Jews and Muslims alike: Israel. Gee, I "wonder" why.
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Alex in Miami wrote: "It is amazing that people like you refer to the holocaust and the suffering of european jewery and yet use and abuse this terrible and shameful crime against humanity as a tool to demonize and villify the palestinian people who are the victims of the new nazis of our time named zionists."
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It is amazing that people like you refer to the Holocaust and the suffering of European Jewry and yet hurl the hateful and lying claim of "Nazi" against a nation of concentration camp survivors, while hero-worshipping the very same so-called "Palestinian" mass murderers who openly sided with and supported the Nazis in their quest to exterminate all Jews on Earth. The so-called "Palestinians"goal has never changed. They don't want a Middle East peace settlement. They don't want a "two-state solution". What they want is a Middle East in which Israel no longer exists and in which Jews have been ethnically cleansed from THEIR LAND. That's not acceptable, Alex. Not one little bit.
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The Arabs supported the Nazis, Alex. They hoped the Nazis would win. They wanted the Nazis to succeed in murdering all Jews on Earth, including those in the Middle East. They sided with the Nazis against the British. They volunteered in droves and fought for the Nazis because they supported the Nazis' goal of wiping Jews from the face of the Earth.
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If you (a) had a clue of what you were talking about, of course (b) you would have known this already. But (a) you don't; and (b) you didn't.

Phil Karasick, Seattle, Washington, USA

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8679662/site/newsweek/

Antti Vainio, Finland

To Phil in Seattle:Your president has found his best friend again:a bottle of Whiskey. His smartest advisor Karl is going to a jail (if he doesn't open his purse). Everybody around Bush is corrupted, we Europeans are not beating around it. Fuck you Phil, you had your chance and you blew it but we whiny Europeans said in the beginning:If you start a war have enough water and teabags. I don't feel good because I was right.

 

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