Has the US Made the World Less Secure?

[opensoul7]

I believe that he believed that Saddam possessed WMDs

Did you read the CNN article on the link I provided ? The CIA did not think so and told the president as such before the invasion.

 

[Polaris]

Did you read the CNN article on the link I provided ? The CIA did not think so and told the president as such before the invasion.

Yeah I read it. While it may be a hit against the credibility of Bush, I still believe that Bush believed that Iraq possessed WMDs. The CIA is not the only intelligence agency around, and its possible that the ex-CIA director may have simply been trying to cover himself. We simply don't know exactly what occurred and what all information was presented to the president.

Either way, Iraq gave us plenty of reason to believe that they had or were close to obtaining WMDs due to their refusal to adhere to any of the UN resolutions. I have a hard time believing that our world would be safer with Iraq in possession of WMDs. Something had to be done.

 

[opensoul7]

http://www.bushlies.net/homeliesatoz/iraqlies.html
This has more information
We can agree to disagree , nothing wrong with that . your opinion is different than mine but they are both opinions.

 

[Quiddity]

The world? No
The US? Yes

 

[YmirGF]

The world? No
The US? Yes

Imho, half correct.

The world? No
The US? No

The simple fact is that those who wish to see America brought to her knees existed prior to the Bush administration and will likely remain after it is long gone. It is not possible to reason with extremists or fanatics of any sort. They will always insist that their way is the ONLY way and will cheerfully blow themselves up for their stunted vision of god to make their points. Some point, eh. Btw: What exactly IS their point? My guess it is to prove they are serious fanatics who are insecure in their own faith and want to “share the wealth” of their magnificent understanding. How arrogant is that, eh?

It is for this reason that simply having religious leaders issue heartfelt condemnations is, in essence, meaningless. In effect, it really is the very least they could do. Pity they don't wish to do more. The “terrorists” or “freedom fighters” are not interested in the opinions of others and need a much more direct “in your face” approach. If the Americans can be faulted for anything it is perhaps because they do not have the political will to end the tenure of these radicals.

There is what I call a “Nintendo/Xbox” mentality that exists currently in our world. People want a quick fix and simply do not have the patience to see things through. Public opinion is very fickle and the masses are easily led on both sides of the issues. This is something that the “terrorists” or “freedom fighters” understand very well. That is why they hide in their little rat holes, taking pot shots, a nip at a time, slowly, but surely eroding the resolve of those who oppose them. It’s all just a matter of time.

 

[Quiddity]

Imho, half correct.

The world? No
The US? No

The simple fact is that those who wish to see America brought to her knees existed prior to the Bush administration and will likely remain after it is long gone. It is not possible to reason with extremists or fanatics of any sort. They will always insist that their way is the ONLY way and will cheerfully blow themselves up for their stunted vision of god to make their points. Some point, eh. Btw: What exactly IS their point? My guess it is to prove they are serious fanatics who are insecure in their own faith and want to “share the wealth” of their magnificent understanding. How arrogant is that, eh?

It is for this reason that simply having religious leaders issue heartfelt condemnations is, in essence, meaningless. In effect, it really is the very least they could do. Pity they don't wish to do more. The “terrorists” or “freedom fighters” are not interested in the opinions of others and need a much more direct “in your face” approach. If the Americans can be faulted for anything it is perhaps because they do not have the political will to end the tenure of these radicals.

There is what I call a “Nintendo/Xbox” mentality that exists currently in our world. People want a quick fix and simply do not have the patience to see things through. Public opinion is very fickle and the masses are easily led on both sides of the issues. This is something that the “terrorists” or “freedom fighters” understand very well. That is why they hide in their little rat holes, taking pot shots, a nip at a time, slowly, but surely eroding the resolve of those who oppose them. It’s all just a matter of time.

There really is no wiggle room on whether the US is safer. What actions have been taken against us since 9/11? Whether it's killed off the ideology is another topic.

 

[kiwimac]

Is the world safer? Hell no, but I guess as long as you Americans feel safer thats all that matters. Who cares that ten or hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis have had to die so you can be seen to be an empire, certainly not you lot!

 

[Radio Frequency X]

They've made the world immeasurably less safe, particularly for Americans but to some extent for all of us.

The world is much safer for Americans. Countries are making deal with us. Democracy is spreading (for good or ill). Nations have realized the cost of messing with us. The cost is catastrophic. The down side for Americans is that we have to go through the one thing we detest the most, which is sending our men and women to die overseas. When we lost 1,000 people, we were up in arms, talking about needing to get out. You don't hear the terrorists complaining about the number of terrorists that have gotten killed, because they don't care. Americans also seem to care more about American blood than they do about the cost of the war. Just over 3,000 service men and women dead and trillions invested. But its the dead you hear the most about. Americans hate war. In order to actually get us to go to war, you've got to really make us angry. We dealt with years of terrorism by turning a blind eye to it. 9/11 simply was enough. But now, we want out of war. We don't want to have to keep fighting. Problem is, we have to, because the enemy doesn't care how many of their people die. All they care about is defeating the West, pluralism, and secular democracy. So we have to fight. The longer we fight overseas, the longer we'll have peace on our homeland.

 

[FatMan]

Is the world safer? Hell no, but I guess as long as you Americans feel safer thats all that matters. Who cares that ten or hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis have had to die so you can be seen to be an empire, certainly not you lot!

What is that supposed to mean??? So this year it is Iraqis who are unsafer. In prior years, it was other peoples, whether they be Somalians, Afghans, or a country with a Civil War.

Seeing that Iraquis make up such a small percentage of the World's Population, how does making them less safe IN A WAR NONETHELESS, mean the rest of the world in unsafe?

The logic escapes me.

 

[greatcalgarian]

The world? No
The US? Yes

I am thinking exactly the opposite.

Look at travelling US by air, and travelling by air in the rest of the world (other than UK). Most air travellers will tell you they feel safer flying to and from destiny other than US and UK.:yes:

 

[greatcalgarian]

The longer we fight overseas, the longer we'll have peace on our homeland.

That is neo con foreign policy. That is what has brought the 9/11 to the US because of the long history of US fighting oversea.

If US did not fight overseas, do you think those '19 crazy Arabs' will bother to fly into Twin Towers and Pentagon?

I believe you have the logic exactly reversed.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Has the United States, and specificially the Bush Administration, made the world less secure by its actions over the past six years?

More secure from what?

 

[sandy whitelinger]

That is neo con foreign policy. That is what has brought the 9/11 to the US because of the long history of US fighting oversea.

That is a very limited view of the motivation behind Middle Eastern, state-sponsored terrorism.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Is the world safer? Hell no, but I guess as long as you Americans feel safer thats all that matters. Who cares that ten or hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis have had to die so you can be seen to be an empire, certainly not you lot!

I believe that it is our view that it is better the Iraqi than Americans. Wonder why that would be our view?

 

[greatcalgarian]

That is a very limited view of the motivation behind Middle Eastern, state-sponsored terrorism.

Why is it narrow? Of course there are others such as the oil etc. Where does this state-sponsored terrorism come from? What are the objectives and purposes of those states that sponsored terrorism? Is it the reason that Neo con G Bush stated repeatedly, they are jealous of American democracy? Or perhaps they (those Muslim) are simply born to be evil?

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Why is it narrow? Of course there are others such as the oil etc. Where does this state-sponsored terrorism come from? What are the objectives and purposes of those states that sponsored terrorism? Is it the reason that Neo con G Bush stated repeatedly, they are jealous of American democracy? Or perhaps they (those Muslim) are simply born to be evil?

The Middle East has been smarting over it's loss of world influence since the fall of the Ottoman Empire post WWI. There have been a number of failed unification movements in the intervening century.

They thought that having oil would make them accepted by the rest of the world. It didn't. They thought going nuclear would make them accepted. It didn't. They tried cutting off oil to be come accepted. It didn't. They tried state-sponsored terrorism. That has backfired horrendously in the overthrow of two governments. Yet it may have been effective.

I'm of the opinion that the only reason the rest of the Muslim world allowed the United States into Afghanistan and Iraq was that they hoped we would eradicate the extremist governments so they would not be seen as fighting amongst themselves. The goal of this is to put an acceptable, moderate face on Middle Eastern politics that will ultimately lead to them getting a place at the table of world politics. Their leverage is going to be oil profits.

Eventually they will run out of oil and they really have nothing else to offer. Their money will be their future salvation. If you believe Bible prophecy then it is clear that Babylon (Iraq) will be a major player in world commerce. It would make sense that the way into this is to use their money to gain an in through banking.

If you want to have some fun, research how much Arab money is behind banking in the United Sates. I believe that this is the trade off with the moderate Middle Eastern Governments that allowed us into Iraq and Afghanistan. We clean up their image and we allow them into the world banking system. In all I'd say state-sponsored terrorism worked. It looks like everything we are doing only makes the Middle East more stable at our expense.

 

[greatcalgarian]

The Middle East has been smarting over it's loss of world influence since the fall of the Ottoman Empire post WWI. There have been a number of failed unification movements in the intervening century.

They thought that having oil would make them accepted by the rest of the world. It didn't. They thought going nuclear would make them accepted. It didn't. They tried cutting off oil to be come accepted. It didn't. They tried state-sponsored terrorism. That has backfired horrendously in the overthrow of two governments. Yet it may have been effective.

I'm of the opinion that the only reason the rest of the Muslim world allowed the United States into Afghanistan and Iraq was that they hoped we would eradicate the extremist governments so they would not be seen as fighting amongst themselves. The goal of this is to put an acceptable, moderate face on Middle Eastern politics that will ultimately lead to them getting a place at the table of world politics. Their leverage is going to be oil profits.

Eventually they will run out of oil and they really have nothing else to offer. Their money will be their future salvation. If you believe Bible prophecy then it is clear that Babylon (Iraq) will be a major player in world commerce. It would make sense that the way into this is to use their money to gain an in through banking.

If you want to have some fun, research how much Arab money is behind banking in the United Sates. I believe that this is the trade off with the moderate Middle Eastern Governments that allowed us into Iraq and Afghanistan. We clean up their image and we allow them into the world banking system. In all I'd say state-sponsored terrorism worked. It looks like everything we are doing only makes the Middle East more stable at our expense.

Middle East has never had any control or influence over the world affair for the past hundred years or so. Even into Ottoman empire time, it is not the middle east!!

Since the Ottoman has been defeated by the west through crafty means by promising the Arabs (for example the Palestinian, poor fellows, helped the British and end up being driven out of their land) this and that. The West has conquered both politically and ecomically the whole Middle East. Over the years, young Middle East people after receiving education from the West started to realise how the West has been exploiting their land and riches by allowing those few greedy leaders to become filty rich and sold out their national interest to the West. Slowly these young educated people started various ways to fight to get back their nations independency and right, to be free from Western dominance and control, without any success. The Islam fundamentalists then see their opportunity, and started to become politically involved in determining their nation future. This was demonstrated first by the Shah being overthrown, and secondly the Russian being driven out of Afghanistan (in this case with the US CIA help, US has been sleeping with the enemy all the time for the Afghanistan affair). Then you have a relatively smart and ruthless leader like Sadam who thought he has out-foxed the US by growing to be too strong to be attacked by the US, or to be indispensable, and will not be attacked by US since he is the only secular leader there preventing the Iran from spreading the Islamic rule throughout the middle east. Well Sadam met a mad US President who did not play by the rule of book, and prefer to act on neocon concept of flexing muscles, and speak with guns instead of pens. That is the situation of the middle east, not a bit like what you portray.:angel2:

You think those middle east people did not realize the oil is depleting fast? That is why they revolted against their spineless leaders in order to be able to put more control back to the countries, and can use the oil money effectively to build up the countries infra structure, industry etc so that when the oil is run out, they will still live comfortably. This was not allowed by the West, especially the US, who has the only agenda of drawing out all the middle east oil at the lowest investment, and using the money for US own development such as weapon development etc. That is the reason why Arab people are fighting the US. Of course there are those filthy rich Arab leaders who have no nationalistic feeling or spine, who only looked towards their own self personal short term interest. Those leaders have their money made in collaboration with the west, and stash away all these money in the west, knowing that one day, when their own country oil has run out, they will still have a large sum of money in the west allowing them to live their luxury life perhaps for two or three generations. These are not the Arabs who consider middle east as their own nations, and proud of their nations, and will rather live and die in the Middle east.

 

[greatcalgarian]

Do you know why the Middle East nations failed to gain true independence and free from control of the West?

Because the West has so cunningly installed the Zionist state of Israel there, and let the greedy leaders there fooled their citizen by creating tension and war with Israel since 1948. I do not think any ordinary Arab people have any interest in wiping Israel off the map. Ordinary Arab people would prefer to have all foreigners to leave their land, and let them handle their oil in their own way.

 

[greatcalgarian]

Do you think the Sunnis hate the ****tes more than they hate the American?
Or the ****tes hate the Sunnis more than they hate the American?

No they don't, if US has not planted CIA agent among them to create hatred and created the inter-fraction war in Iraq since US occupied Iraq.

 

[sandy whitelinger]

Middle East has never had any control or influence over the world affair for the past hundred years or so. Even into Ottoman empire time, it is not the middle east!!

Since the Ottoman has been defeated by the west through crafty means by promising the Arabs (for example the Palestinian, poor fellows, helped the British and end up being driven out of their land) this and that. The West has conquered both politically and ecomically the whole Middle East. Over the years, young Middle East people after receiving education from the West started to realise how the West has been exploiting their land and riches by allowing those few greedy leaders to become filty rich and sold out their national interest to the West. Slowly these young educated people started various ways to fight to get back their nations independency and right, to be free from Western dominance and control, without any success. The Islam fundamentalists then see their opportunity, and started to become politically involved in determining their nation future. This was demonstrated first by the Shah being overthrown, and secondly the Russian being driven out of Afghanistan (in this case with the US CIA help, US has been sleeping with the enemy all the time for the Afghanistan affair). Then you have a relatively smart and ruthless leader like Sadam who thought he has out-foxed the US by growing to be too strong to be attacked by the US, or to be indispensable, and will not be attacked by US since he is the only secular leader there preventing the Iran from spreading the Islamic rule throughout the middle east. Well Sadam met a mad US President who did not play by the rule of book, and prefer to act on neocon concept of flexing muscles, and speak with guns instead of pens. That is the situation of the middle east, not a bit like what you portray.:angel2:

You think those middle east people did not realize the oil is depleting fast? That is why they revolted against their spineless leaders in order to be able to put more control back to the countries, and can use the oil money effectively to build up the countries infra structure, industry etc so that when the oil is run out, they will still live comfortably. This was not allowed by the West, especially the US, who has the only agenda of drawing out all the middle east oil at the lowest investment, and using the money for US own development such as weapon development etc. That is the reason why Arab people are fighting the US. Of course there are those filthy rich Arab leaders who have no nationalistic feeling or spine, who only looked towards their own self personal short term interest. Those leaders have their money made in collaboration with the west, and stash away all these money in the west, knowing that one day, when their own country oil has run out, they will still have a large sum of money in the west allowing them to live their luxury life perhaps for two or three generations. These are not the Arabs who consider middle east as their own nations, and proud of their nations, and will rather live and die in the Middle east.

At least you elucidated your thoughts this time. I just disagree with them now.