>> ^bcglorf:

>> ^marbles:
>> ^bcglorf:
I think there is a lot of grieved and disgruntled young Arab people who want freedom who are being manipulated and used by geopolitical forces outside their country.
You are insulting and demeaning those young Arab people. Who is using who among the Libyan rebels? As much as the UN is using the rebels, the rebels are equally using the UN sanctioned air support.
Much akin the the Kurd's while Saddam still ruled(presumably what you consider the good old days). As much as America used them to undermine Saddam, the Kurds equally used America's support to.... what for it.... undermine Saddam.
When two groups have the same goal and work together to achieve it, it is NOT the same as the smaller group being some helpless proxy puppet of the larger.
Let's be more open here Marbles, if the people of Iran and Syria actually DO want regime change, do you still vehemently oppose that happening solely because America shares that goal and offers assistance?

Yeah, much akin to the Kurds. Where did that get them? We encouraged them to support us in Desert Storm and then let hundreds of thousands get slaughtered after we pulled out. Saddam was our puppet. WE DID THAT. We armed Saddam with chemical weapons to fight Iran. We told Saddam to invade Kuwait after Kuwait was slant drilling and stealing oil. We told Saddam we would back him up. And then we get on our high horse and bitch slap Saddam around. WTF It's all bullshit, it always has been.
So now we're in Libya on a humanitarian mission? We're bombing civilians in Tripoli for humanitarian purposes? The groups that we're "working together" with in Libya is al-Qaeda linked rebels. Libya was a world leader in Al Qaeda suicide bomber recruitment during the Iraq war and North-eastern Libya has one of the greatest concentrations of jihadi terrorists anywhere in the world. Obama's humanitarian mission to protect "civilians" is a complete farce. He's aiding a rebel force of jihadi terrorists, the same terrorists that were killing US troops in Iraq.

That IS disgusting. We do know who is killing them. The refugees that have succeeded in fleeing to Turkey are telling us it was Assad's troops killing them. The SAME Assad that kicked out all journalists that didn't work directly for him. Defectors who've fled to Turkey have similarly reported witnessing first hand that Assad's secret service executed Syrian soldiers that refused orders to fire upon unarmed civilians.
We KNOW who is killing who. Your refusal to acknowledge it is sick.
---------

Your a piece of work. You understand nothing of the regions actual history. Instead, you've invented a fantasy built upon every single shred of anti-american propaganda being true and every shred of anything decent being said about them by anyone is utterly and blatantly false.
Go try following Al-Jazeera for awhile, you need some pro-western grounding to the perspective you've invented for yourself. I don't say that in jest either, I follow Al Jazeera more closely than any other news source, and the 'facts' you believe are 100% at odds and in contradiction to Al Jazeera's reporting on the region's activity.


Sorry, your support for foreign-funded sedition is disgusting. Of course they're blaming Assad, that's what foreign-funded activists are paid to say.

BTW, Al Jazeera is state owned by Qatar, the same government sending weapons to Libya's Benghazi rebels (al-Qeada) which is in direct violation of their own contrived UN Security resolution in 1973.

>> ^marbles:

>> ^bcglorf:
I think there is a lot of grieved and disgruntled young Arab people who want freedom who are being manipulated and used by geopolitical forces outside their country.
You are insulting and demeaning those young Arab people. Who is using who among the Libyan rebels? As much as the UN is using the rebels, the rebels are equally using the UN sanctioned air support.
Much akin the the Kurd's while Saddam still ruled(presumably what you consider the good old days). As much as America used them to undermine Saddam, the Kurds equally used America's support to.... what for it.... undermine Saddam.
When two groups have the same goal and work together to achieve it, it is NOT the same as the smaller group being some helpless proxy puppet of the larger.
Let's be more open here Marbles, if the people of Iran and Syria actually DO want regime change, do you still vehemently oppose that happening solely because America shares that goal and offers assistance?

Yeah, much akin to the Kurds. Where did that get them? We encouraged them to support us in Desert Storm and then let hundreds of thousands get slaughtered after we pulled out. Saddam was our puppet. WE DID THAT. We armed Saddam with chemical weapons to fight Iran. We told Saddam to invade Kuwait after Kuwait was slant drilling and stealing oil. We told Saddam we would back him up. And then we get on our high horse and bitch slap Saddam around. WTF It's all bullshit, it always has been.
So now we're in Libya on a humanitarian mission? We're bombing civilians in Tripoli for humanitarian purposes? The groups that we're "working together" with in Libya is al-Qaeda linked rebels. Libya was a world leader in Al Qaeda suicide bomber recruitment during the Iraq war and North-eastern Libya has one of the greatest concentrations of jihadi terrorists anywhere in the world. Obama's humanitarian mission to protect "civilians" is a complete farce. He's aiding a rebel force of jihadi terrorists, the same terrorists that were killing US troops in Iraq.


Your a piece of work. You understand nothing of the regions actual history. Instead, you've invented a fantasy built upon every single shred of anti-american propaganda being true and every shred of anything decent being said about them by anyone is utterly and blatantly false.

Go try following Al-Jazeera for awhile, you need some pro-western grounding to the perspective you've invented for yourself. I don't say that in jest either, I follow Al Jazeera more closely than any other news source, and the 'facts' you believe are 100% at odds and in contradiction to Al Jazeera's reporting on the region's activity.

>> ^bcglorf:

I think there is a lot of grieved and disgruntled young Arab people who want freedom who are being manipulated and used by geopolitical forces outside their country.
You are insulting and demeaning those young Arab people. Who is using who among the Libyan rebels? As much as the UN is using the rebels, the rebels are equally using the UN sanctioned air support.
Much akin the the Kurd's while Saddam still ruled(presumably what you consider the good old days). As much as America used them to undermine Saddam, the Kurds equally used America's support to.... what for it.... undermine Saddam.
When two groups have the same goal and work together to achieve it, it is NOT the same as the smaller group being some helpless proxy puppet of the larger.
Let's be more open here Marbles, if the people of Iran and Syria actually DO want regime change, do you still vehemently oppose that happening solely because America shares that goal and offers assistance?

Yeah, much akin to the Kurds. Where did that get them? We encouraged them to support us in Desert Storm and then let hundreds of thousands get slaughtered after we pulled out. Saddam was our puppet. WE DID THAT. We armed Saddam with chemical weapons to fight Iran. We told Saddam to invade Kuwait after Kuwait was slant drilling and stealing oil. We told Saddam we would back him up. And then we get on our high horse and bitch slap Saddam around. WTF It's all bullshit, it always has been.


So now we're in Libya on a humanitarian mission? We're bombing civilians in Tripoli for humanitarian purposes? The groups that we're "working together" with in Libya is al-Qaeda linked rebels. Libya was a world leader in Al Qaeda suicide bomber recruitment during the Iraq war and North-eastern Libya has one of the greatest concentrations of jihadi terrorists anywhere in the world. Obama's humanitarian mission to protect "civilians" is a complete farce. He's aiding a rebel force of jihadi terrorists, the same terrorists that were killing US troops in Iraq.

I think there is a lot of grieved and disgruntled young Arab people who want freedom who are being manipulated and used by geopolitical forces outside their country.

You are insulting and demeaning those young Arab people. Who is using who among the Libyan rebels? As much as the UN is using the rebels, the rebels are equally using the UN sanctioned air support.

Much akin the the Kurd's while Saddam still ruled(presumably what you consider the good old days). As much as America used them to undermine Saddam, the Kurds equally used America's support to.... what for it.... undermine Saddam.

When two groups have the same goal and work together to achieve it, it is NOT the same as the smaller group being some helpless proxy puppet of the larger.

Let's be more open here Marbles, if the people of Iran and Syria actually DO want regime change, do you still vehemently oppose that happening solely because America shares that goal and offers assistance?

Believe me I'm not arguing that Saddam nor Gaddafi were nice guys. I making the distinction between a country being run by a corrupt leader, and destroying a country because of their corrupt leader. In my opinion Gaddafi didn't suddenly become more of a threat after his speech. In fact, he did what almost EVERY country on the face of the planet would do when faced with an armed uprising (this includes the US and the UK). There are other issues at play here also, such as why Burmese, Rwandan, Ivory Coast, Kenyan, North Korean, Saudi, Bahraini leaders deserve more respect than Iraqi and Libyan (oil rich) leaders.

By UN estimates the US killed 100,000 Iraqis (civilians and soldiers)in the first Gulf War. Other estimates show countless thousands died due to the sanctions in the 90s, and god knows how many in the last Iraq War disaster. The entire infrastructure of the Iraqi state has been in shambles for 20 years. In fact, they went from the most modern, secular, arab state to a destroyed wreck of a country. I strongly feel that a 70 year old Saddam Hussein was less of a threat to the Iraqi people than the US war was. In my opinion time would have been a much kinder ally to the Iraqis than the US was. Though I understand your point about the Kurds, realistically anything said about Iraq could easily be said about Turkey, one of our biggest allies.

"As for other Gulf States, would you really prefer Libya was left to Gaddafi's mercy just because that's exactly what's happening elsewhere?" I guess my answer to you is yes. Foreign policy consistency across the board would go a long way towards stopping dictators from betting that they will get away with human-rights crimes. Inconsistency is not going to help anyone.

Thanks for you civil and informed answer. Just so you know, I probably won't have the time to respond again any time soon.
>> ^bcglorf:

>> ^vaporlock:
Truthfully, I never did pay much attention to Libya. Partially because I figured a nutjob like Gadhafi had to be on the US payroll (which, apparently until recently he was (banking, oil, etc).
Anyway, thanks for the quote. I've been hearing about it for weeks now and never knew where it came from. No offense meant, but like most of the media hyped quotes from Saddam Hussein, it is probably either a bad translation, out of context, a cultural/religious way of saying things that westerners don't get, or a combination of these. Without too much analysis, I can say that the part about going "house by house" to get rid of a rebellion/uprising is pretty SOP (see Iraq).
I have many more suspicions after reading the AlJazeera blog than I had before I read it (ie. why are so many protester signs in English?), but I don't have time to get into it now. Starting a bombing campaign based on a "speech" is ridiculous to begin with and Gadhafi's actions are not too far from what all of the Arab Gulf States have been doing in recent weeks.
>> ^bcglorf:
>> ^vaporlock:
I'm interested in finding out where he said this. Have you ever found an actual statement by Gadhafi saying this? It isn't something I can imagine him (an arab socialist) saying.
Wearing silk pajamas with a funny hat, yes. "I'm going to commit genocide", no.
This statement has the reak of pre Desert Storm propaganda. Most of which was proven false (ie. Iraqi troops emptying Kuwaiti baby incubators in the hospitals). >> ^bcglorf:
"Gadhafi would currently be finishing off the genocide he promised to commit against the opposition"


Are you at all familiar with Gaddafi? His speech from Feb 22 he threatened to "cleanse the nation, house by house", and warned that just as the world never came to help the victims of Tiananmen square no one was coming to help you(the opposition). Don't take my word for it. Don't take the word of any anti-Arab biased western media. Go read Al Jazeera's live blog from the day that speech was delivered.


like most of the media hyped quotes from Saddam Hussein, it is probably either a bad translation, out of context
Slow down before you dismiss Gaddafi's statements on genocide because they resemble Saddam's speechs. Nobody, and I mean nobody(Arab,Palestinian,Iraqi) denies Saddam's record on mass killings.
In his Anfal campaign against the Kurds there estimates higher than 200k murdered by Saddam. Half of the dead are from military operations against civilians including the use of chemical weapons, while the other half are mass executions complete with bulldozers to dig large enough graves on site.
The estimates of his crushing of the Shia uprisings at the end of the first gulf war exceed 100k dead as well, with gunships and tanks being used to lower the number of 'unruly' civilians to something more 'manageable'.
You are right about the similarities between Gaddafi and Saddam. It's a reason to take his threats regarding genocide of those opposing him as deadly serious.
Starting a bombing campaign based on a "speech" is ridiculous to begin with and Gadhafi's actions are not too far from what all of the Arab Gulf States have been doing in recent weeks.
It wasn't just a "speech". He followed the speech up by mobilizing his army and marching across the country killing anyone even suspected of being with the opposition. He was within a single city of having taken back full control of the country and being able to "secure" his gains. I hate having to point that "secure" in this case means systematically hunting down killing as many supporters of the opposition as it takes to be certain no-one will ever consider doing it again. Whether that can be done with 100 or 100 thousand doesn't matter to a dictator, it's just a means to an end.
As for other Gulf States, would you really prefer Libya was left to Gaddafi's mercy just because that's exactly what's happening elsewhere?

>> ^vaporlock:

Truthfully, I never did pay much attention to Libya. Partially because I figured a nutjob like Gadhafi had to be on the US payroll (which, apparently until recently he was (banking, oil, etc).
Anyway, thanks for the quote. I've been hearing about it for weeks now and never knew where it came from. No offense meant, but like most of the media hyped quotes from Saddam Hussein, it is probably either a bad translation, out of context, a cultural/religious way of saying things that westerners don't get, or a combination of these. Without too much analysis, I can say that the part about going "house by house" to get rid of a rebellion/uprising is pretty SOP (see Iraq).
I have many more suspicions after reading the AlJazeera blog than I had before I read it (ie. why are so many protester signs in English?), but I don't have time to get into it now. Starting a bombing campaign based on a "speech" is ridiculous to begin with and Gadhafi's actions are not too far from what all of the Arab Gulf States have been doing in recent weeks.
>> ^bcglorf:
>> ^vaporlock:
I'm interested in finding out where he said this. Have you ever found an actual statement by Gadhafi saying this? It isn't something I can imagine him (an arab socialist) saying.
Wearing silk pajamas with a funny hat, yes. "I'm going to commit genocide", no.
This statement has the reak of pre Desert Storm propaganda. Most of which was proven false (ie. Iraqi troops emptying Kuwaiti baby incubators in the hospitals). >> ^bcglorf:
"Gadhafi would currently be finishing off the genocide he promised to commit against the opposition"


Are you at all familiar with Gaddafi? His speech from Feb 22 he threatened to "cleanse the nation, house by house", and warned that just as the world never came to help the victims of Tiananmen square no one was coming to help you(the opposition). Don't take my word for it. Don't take the word of any anti-Arab biased western media. Go read Al Jazeera's live blog from the day that speech was delivered.



like most of the media hyped quotes from Saddam Hussein, it is probably either a bad translation, out of context

Slow down before you dismiss Gaddafi's statements on genocide because they resemble Saddam's speechs. Nobody, and I mean nobody(Arab,Palestinian,Iraqi) denies Saddam's record on mass killings.

In his Anfal campaign against the Kurds there estimates higher than 200k murdered by Saddam. Half of the dead are from military operations against civilians including the use of chemical weapons, while the other half are mass executions complete with bulldozers to dig large enough graves on site.

The estimates of his crushing of the Shia uprisings at the end of the first gulf war exceed 100k dead as well, with gunships and tanks being used to lower the number of 'unruly' civilians to something more 'manageable'.

You are right about the similarities between Gaddafi and Saddam. It's a reason to take his threats regarding genocide of those opposing him as deadly serious.

Starting a bombing campaign based on a "speech" is ridiculous to begin with and Gadhafi's actions are not too far from what all of the Arab Gulf States have been doing in recent weeks.

It wasn't just a "speech". He followed the speech up by mobilizing his army and marching across the country killing anyone even suspected of being with the opposition. He was within a single city of having taken back full control of the country and being able to "secure" his gains. I hate having to point that "secure" in this case means systematically hunting down killing as many supporters of the opposition as it takes to be certain no-one will ever consider doing it again. Whether that can be done with 100 or 100 thousand doesn't matter to a dictator, it's just a means to an end.

As for other Gulf States, would you really prefer Libya was left to Gaddafi's mercy just because that's exactly what's happening elsewhere?

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:

Sorry to interrupt your sanctimonious wank session, but there is a huge difference between the citizens of Libya revolting against their dictator and Bush invading Iraq. There was no revolution in Iraq. You do realize that. Right?


Not in 2003. There were two former revolutions in Iraq though. One with the the Kurds, that ended with them being mass murdered by Saddam. Later, the Shia had a revolution, seized several cities, and were mass murdered by Saddam. We just watched those unfold and waited a few years before doing anything about it...

>> ^enoch:

then you misunderstood my answer.
ii was not attempting to conclude nor answer the impetus of possible conspiracy of either terrorists of muslim origin or a homegrown attack from within our own government.
i left that to you and duckman to argue.
my conclusion can be based on either scenario with the exact same outcome.
and in the context of those scenarios:
1.muslim attack by plane destroying the towers=government uses this time of fear and grief to enact the never-ending and vague "war on terror".
2.a government planned attack on its own people by demolition.using planes as a cover.which in turn the government uses this time of fear and grief to enact said "war on terror".
now this is where the argument and debate resides but the outcome is always the same.
along with the 'profit" and "gain" question.
maybe i am misunderstanding your question but history has shown that governments/kings and dictators have gone to elaborate lengths to confuse and exploit times of fear and grief to punch through unpleasant legislation.
lets remember that even by 2005 35% of america believed that iraq had something to do with 9/11 even though by that time the evidence clearly indicated that was not the case.
again i refer to history as my guide.


I think I understand your answer just fine, it just doesn't seem you were trying to answer my main question... Let me try and phrase it again and explain it more clearly.

I'm not asking why an inside entity would want to make the attacks, or where their profit in it would be. I repeat, that is not what I'm asking.

I am asking why any entity would choose the METHOD that the conspiracy crowd is proposing. I am asking where is the profit in pre-planting explosives in all three buildings AND later hijacking planes and crashing them into the same buildings? Where is the profit in that method?

I can't see any benefit, reason or rational explanation for why any entity would benefit from pursuing both causes. It is not a situation where one can act as 'insurance' against the other. They both can accomplish the goal all alone, and pursuing both just doubles the costs and risks of exposure or being caught.


35% of america believed that iraq had something to do with 9/11
I don't wanna perpetuate a tangent, but you may want to choose more specific language. Iraq wasn't directly responsible or even aware of planning for 9/11. Saddam did however actively support terrorists, including offering safe haven to the man that mixed the chemicals for the 1st WTC bombings, and al qaeda linked extermists interested in killing the Kurds. Not coincidentally those extremists are now Al Qaeda's arm in Iraq.

Saddam Hussein maintained control over most of his country in spite of the no-fly zones imposed after Gulf War I. The northern no-fly zone helped the Kurds a lot, but the southern no-fly zone didn't stop Saddam from brutalizing his people in the south. There was also a no-fly zone in Bosnia during the Yugoslav war, but that didn't stop the massacre at Srebenica, or many other atrocities. So I have my doubts about the effectiveness of a no-fly zone in Libya.

And speaking as an American, I don't really feeling like getting my country into a third war. I wish the Libyan people the greatest success, but I don't know if we're really in a position to help them militarily.

The army's happy to do something, anything really, to look good after years of having their ass handed to them by a bunch of Kurd hillbillies.

Wait, this can't be right...this fellow is talking about WMDs which, according to our friends on the left, never, ever existed (saddam gassed the Kurds with itching powder from Greg Brady's stash).

Nothing to see here, folks, this is business-as-usual. Celebrate diversity! Let these upright citizens of the world build a conquering mosque community center near Ground Zero.

We should all instead be outraged by a tiny church threatening to burn the quran, which is these vermins' Chicken Soup for the Terrorist's Soul.

Rougy said:you're just a warmonger piece of shit and you always have been.

Crawl back into your hole.

It's unfortunate you lash out everytime it's pointed out that the horrors of war can exist without the benefit of war as long as one side is too weak to put up a fight. Call me a war monger if you like, but that doesn't defend the countless atrocities that have occurred when your advise of non-intervention was followed.

blankfist said:Come join the dark side of peace, dear statist.

Our positions are much closer than you might think.

You understand the horrific cost of military intervention and war, and reject it. I was there for 20+ years. The next step is quite simply forcing yourself to look at the cost of non-intervention. The UN had several thousand troops on the ground in Rwanda to ensure a tenuous peace was kept. The policy of non-intervention saw them removed immediately in the face of violence and war, and 800,000 died as a result. I was being derisive in calling that 'peace', it is nothing of the sort, it is merely cowardice and selfishness.

You can try and claim innocence by blaming only those that did the killing, I can't so easily absolve those who turned a willful blind eye to such genocide. Similarly, I hate America far more for it's efforts to ignore and deny Saddam's genocide of the Kurd's than for the casaulties of their incompetent removal of him.

I'm just worried that without some sort of guiding body of law about how you sort the innocent from the guilty, and what sorts of consequences are appropriate for which kind of violation, it can easily wind up being just a handy casus belli to tell people whenever you feel like conquering some new territory.
I share your concern over that, but in practice that kind of system simply does not exist at an international level. The UN is supposed to be an attempt at it, but it is completely and utterly ineffectual in that capacity. Of all the wars and atrocities committed since the UN was founded, how many has it actually opposed by placing soldiers on the ground? In the absence of a good solution(an effective UN), we are left with the alternative of unilateral action against tyrants and atrocities, with all the enormous misgivings that come with that.

Maybe if there had been some sort of Holocaust-level sort of abuses going on I'd have been able to agree with it, but then if there had been, the UN probably would have gone along with it too, and it would've been the whole world working to stop it.
But when Saddam was committing Holocaust-level abuses, the UN did nothing(in part thanks to American vetos if I recall). When a million were killed in Rwanda not only did the UN do nothing, they actively withdrew all but 400 of the troops they already had in the country. Korea, Vietnam, East Timor, Cambodia, the whole of Africa and South America, all victims of horrific wars and atrocities that the UN could not or would not prevent or stop.

After the first gulf war, the sole thing that stopped Saddam from repeating his campaign against the Kurds was the unilateral, illegal act of war that was the American enforced no-fly zone over northern Iraq. Saddam's first campaign against the Kurds saw him execute an estimated 2-300 thousand people and destroy 90% of all Kurdish villages. Every single Kurd he could capture was placed in a concentration camp. The women, children and elderly were regularly beaten and malnourished to the point that virtually every last child under the age of 3 died. The men were, without exception, hauled off to pre-dug mass graves to be executed and buried by bulldozer. The concentration camps also had rape rooms, not for the amusement of the guards or humiliation of the prisoners, but with the goal of impregnating the Kurdish women with half arab children in order to breed the Kurdish people out of existence.

Saddam committed holocaust level atrocities and 'illegal' unilateral American intervention prevented him from repeating those acts a second time. In spite of the misgivings I have about unilateral wars, I support the Iraq war on the largest level, in spite of the many lies, mistakes and tragedies that came with it the alternatives were worse.



In reply to this comment by NetRunner:

I would go further and say it's almost impossible NOT to screw up with American nation building. My point on Iraq is not that nation building there was sure to work. If anything, it was almost certainly doomed to the horrific failures we've been watching over the last years. My point was that spending those same years under Saddam's rule would've been worse, more and more as each year goes by. The majority of the problems in Iraq regarding infrastructure and the economy didn't start with the American invasion, but with Saddam's continuing construction of new palaces while sanctions starved the rest of the country. The reason the riots and mis-content America faced from the public hadn't boiled out when Saddam was in power was entirely a testament to the fear he had sown in people. If you were suspected of questioning Saddam, you might find the police knocking on the door the next day and handing you a video of your daughter being raped by them.


I'm also more than a little concerned that the country is going to dissolve about 15 minutes after the last troops leave.


Me too, but I'm confident that at least the Kurdish region will make out alright. I'm also hopeful the interest they show in working with the rest of the country will help keep it stable. In either event though I find it hard to imagine an Iraq that is worse than it was under Saddam.


To a large extent I think America needs to rethink the way it uses military power in modern times. Specifically, this idea that any trouble spot in the world should be dealt with by invasion and US-led regime change.
...
I definitely think going through the UN for problems of that scale is a good idea


I agree that America needs to be extremely careful with it's use of it's power. I also feel though that if America is never willing to use that power, then many nations are going to start acting that way. Look how many instances there are of nations that ignore all UN warnings, condemnations and rebukes over human rights violations and atrocities, content in the knowledge that it is all bark. For every wrong step America has made with military action you can point to an atrocity that went unchecked by inaction as well. In the line that needs to be walked between when to act and when not to, Iraq is an example of a fight that was put off too long, rather than jumped into too soon.


In reply to this comment by NetRunner:
I think we ended up getting lucky with Iraq. I don't think it's a testament to how it's somehow impossible to screw up with American nation building, I think it's a testament to how expensive in terms of both money and lives it can be, even when the country is theoretically low-hanging fruit in terms of nation building.

I'm also more than a little concerned that the country is going to dissolve about 15 minutes after the last troops leave.

I do want us more active in Sudan, but not militarily. I still think the fix for Sudan is for America to use its diplomatic ties to encourage China to stop supporting the Sudanese massacre.

I'm less certain of what to do about Congo. I certainly don't want us to roll in there with troops and tanks and tell them we're going to "help" them establish a stable government.

To a large extent I think America needs to rethink the way it uses military power in modern times. Specifically, this idea that any trouble spot in the world should be dealt with by invasion and US-led regime change. I didn't like us doing that during the Cold War, and I like it even less now.

I definitely think going through the UN for problems of that scale is a good idea. I don't think that means giving the UN a veto over US actions, but I definitely think we should be extremely careful about when and where we "go it alone."

For the moment, I think America's plate is past full. If the world comes to us begging for help, we should help, but I don't think we should be shopping for new places to invade, we should be getting disentangled from the countries we're currently in.

In reply to this comment by bcglorf:
I find the argument of 'why not country x' to be completely lacking in relevance. I'm not arguing that America chose to remove Saddam because it made the world a better place, especially for Iraqi's. I'm arguing that for whatever unknowable reasons America really chose to remove Saddam, that an Iraq free of Saddam is better for the region and the Iraqi people. So much better in fact that you'd be hard pressed to screw such a war up badly enough to make things worse when you were done. Now the Bush admin certainly tried very hard to screw it up, but thanks in large part to the Kurds the situation in Iraq today IS much brighter than it would have been with Saddam still in power.

Would it be 'better' if America had put the same effort into Sudan or the DR Congo? Maybe, the atrocities in the Congo shock the conscience, but it would also be harder to stabilize than even post-Saddam Iraq. I find it hard to use that as an argument against what America did in Iraq. To play that argument out in a fair way, I would point the finger at the whole 1st world and blame them all for doing nothing to help the people of Sudan and the DR Congo. I would give a slight nod to the Americans though in understanding that they were tied up in Iraq and that their actions there had at least helped a different humanitarian disaster.

I think we ended up getting lucky with Iraq. I don't think it's a testament to how it's somehow impossible to screw up with American nation building, I think it's a testament to how expensive in terms of both money and lives it can be, even when the country is theoretically low-hanging fruit in terms of nation building.

I'm also more than a little concerned that the country is going to dissolve about 15 minutes after the last troops leave.

I do want us more active in Sudan, but not militarily. I still think the fix for Sudan is for America to use its diplomatic ties to encourage China to stop supporting the Sudanese massacre.

I'm less certain of what to do about Congo. I certainly don't want us to roll in there with troops and tanks and tell them we're going to "help" them establish a stable government.

To a large extent I think America needs to rethink the way it uses military power in modern times. Specifically, this idea that any trouble spot in the world should be dealt with by invasion and US-led regime change. I didn't like us doing that during the Cold War, and I like it even less now.

I definitely think going through the UN for problems of that scale is a good idea. I don't think that means giving the UN a veto over US actions, but I definitely think we should be extremely careful about when and where we "go it alone."

For the moment, I think America's plate is past full. If the world comes to us begging for help, we should help, but I don't think we should be shopping for new places to invade, we should be getting disentangled from the countries we're currently in.

In reply to this comment by bcglorf:
I find the argument of 'why not country x' to be completely lacking in relevance. I'm not arguing that America chose to remove Saddam because it made the world a better place, especially for Iraqi's. I'm arguing that for whatever unknowable reasons America really chose to remove Saddam, that an Iraq free of Saddam is better for the region and the Iraqi people. So much better in fact that you'd be hard pressed to screw such a war up badly enough to make things worse when you were done. Now the Bush admin certainly tried very hard to screw it up, but thanks in large part to the Kurds the situation in Iraq today IS much brighter than it would have been with Saddam still in power.

Would it be 'better' if America had put the same effort into Sudan or the DR Congo? Maybe, the atrocities in the Congo shock the conscience, but it would also be harder to stabilize than even post-Saddam Iraq. I find it hard to use that as an argument against what America did in Iraq. To play that argument out in a fair way, I would point the finger at the whole 1st world and blame them all for doing nothing to help the people of Sudan and the DR Congo. I would give a slight nod to the Americans though in understanding that they were tied up in Iraq and that their actions there had at least helped a different humanitarian disaster.