I read the book, its about marine force recon. They spearheaded the attack of Baghdad.

Their Humvees would break down on a regular basis, in battle.

Well when troops can massacre a whole village without fear of any repercussions, when contractors can rape American women (and I'm talking sick stuff that goes way beyond simple rape, one said she woke up with feces in her mouth) without even an investigation by anyone and other contractors are driving around the streets of Baghdad randomly shooting civilian cars you create a culture where even people who do have solid personal moral grounding can make horribly immoral decisions. This kind of thing seems to be far more pervasive and run far deeper than it did with the American military in Vietnam.

>> ^quantumushroom:

Power is more important to leftists than oil is to anyone else.

You are so full of shit I should be laughing my ass off.

It's not just that you're freakishly one-sided and reactionary to the point of lunacy, but you flat out lie every chance you get.

You espouse "truths" that have no basis in fact whatsoever.

You claim that "success follows success" in Iraq, but when pressed, you can't post one single solitary example.

You call Democrats and Liberals "traitors" for doing nothing more sinister than disagreeing with Bush policies.

Again, I should be laughing, but fascist reactionaries are no laughing matter.

The Baath party was secularist coalition incorporating both Sunni and Shia elements. It never let this kind of Sunni vs. Shia genocide happen. The de-baathification of Iraq has empowered religious fundamentalists and destabilized the country. Saddam was a terrible tyrant, but the ethnic cleansing that has occurred in Baghdad in the last 3 years is worse than anything Saddam ever did. But I remain agnostic about whether, in the long run, Bush's war will have been better than noninterference with Saddam's regime. Eventually the Iraqi people might have improved their own government without unsolicited help from the USA.

>> ^quantumushroom:

>>>>Saddam is gone, but...
>>>>Iraq had free elections, but...
>>>>The Surge worked, but...
Do you ever get tired of being wrong?


I dunno i only count 1 true thing in there, saddam is gone. and that was illegal.

free elections do not coexist with death threats and occupying armies.

the surge worked in what way? on TV?


dude if anyone is tireless about being wrong around here....it's...

>> ^quantumushroom:
I've never heard of a war where everything went right, much less a streetfight. Then again, I'm not comparing the real world to Utopia. Success follows success in Iraq and all the American left does is continue to pour the whine.


Where everything went right? How about where something went right. This corrupt government is taking you for a ride, exploiting your country, overcharging your military for the extra buck or simply for a stock rise and you keep thinking this is about left vs. right. Wake up! Doesn't matter what side the administration conned into voting for them, what's important is that they are running your country into the ground. Normally I wouldn't give a shit, but it's starting to affect the global economy. Get your act together and try to understand that this is bigger than your petty red vs. blue bullshit.


Power is more important to leftists than oil is to anyone else.
Oil is a valuable commodity needed to run things. It is far more useful and tangible than any Socialist Council of Do-Gooders, who are parasitic wastes of space and unnecessary for good government. Democrats, the American equivalent of Eurosnobs, are preventing the tapping of American oil, of which there is more than in the entire Middle East. Presently we get most of our oil from Canada and Mexico, and not a drop from Iraq since 2003. Indeed, it's all about the oil.

Iraqi production rates are so low because the US bombed the shit out of most production equipment and refineries. In addition, foreign oil companies are reluctant to send their people to Iraq because it's a goddamn mess and there's not a shred of security. This is a clear failure of Bush's Iraqi agenda.

Saudi Arabia alone has more proved reserves than Canada and the US combined, so I don't know where you get your utopian oil surplus from.

Oh and on that France remark: War on Terror, Drugs, Iraq, Afghanistan...How's that going? You didn't even manage to find Bin Laden, how pathetic. But then again, you don't really want to find him, do you?

Actually it came to me in a flash while I was half-shitfaced. Those are my most inspired moments.

In reply to this comment by rottenseed:
>> ^kronosposeidon:
We can carve up a major world city with 12-foot walls, yet we can't put four of them around the man who's responsible.

Did you spend all night coming up with that one?

Zut alors! Je suis le baguette!

>> ^MINK:
HAHAHAhAHAAHAHAhahhaahaHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHA

USA IS THE NEW FRANCE!!!! HAHAHAHAhhahahAHAHAHhAhhahaHHAHAHAHAHhA

AHAHHAHAHAHAhAhhahahaA
that is sooooo fucking funny. thanks man, send me the tshirt

>> ^quantumushroom:
It's a question you're trained never to really ask. All you know is Bush is a bad man who fooled the entire world with lies, and it's all about oil.
Since the left prefers the order of tyranny to the chaos of freedom and self-determination, the UN should just choose another Iraqi dictator to take over.


Wait, who supported Saddam's rise to power again? And who gave $3 BLN to Bin Laden and the Taliban? Now who messed up the entire war on Iraq? Same shit different guys. Even if you agree with all the actions of the current administration, you can't argue that they fucked them all up. They are incompetent to no end.

I guess you totally underestimate the importance of oil if you think this war was started because of anything else. In that case you're even dumber than Bush and co. Even they know that oil is the most important thing in that desert.

God, you guys cant win a war to save your lives. USA is the new France.

>> ^shadownc:
While I don't believe we should have ever invaded Iraq, this seems to be more of an Iraqi issue. They have the perfect opportunity here to do away with all the old sectarian issues and get on with rebuilding their country, and instead they choose to keep hanging on to the old hatred that has been around that part of the world forever.
Even though I now think Bush is a colossal idiot (not just because of Iraq), I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt way back when they were lying to us about WMDs. Despite the now obvious reality that invading Iraq was a complete mistake, this seems to be a 'them' issue more than an 'us' issue.


I agree. I hate Bush as much as everyone, but as far as this video goes, it doesn't really convince me that this is all Americas fault. Suddenly we're to blame for their centuries old holy war?

More atheism please.

>> ^kronosposeidon:
We can carve up a major world city with 12-foot walls, yet we can't put four of them around the man who's responsible.

Did you spend all night coming up with that one?

I have a friend from Basra, whose parents won't let him come home to visit them because they're afraid he'll be killed.

It doesn't matter if the surge is working or not, because we don't care about reconstruction. We only work with destruction and mayhem. More troops, but still no planning. This war was started on an aggressive stance, with no foresight as to the period after toppling Saddam. Sure, they had a vote and they have a President, but do they have local governments to keep order and begin rebuilding what they've lost? No. They have rival sectarian militias who Saddam kept at bay. Now they have civil war.

Baghdad has the Green Zone to protect American diplomats, while the rest of the city has nothing but a broken sewer that is left untreated, and hopelessness.

We treat our POWs with torture; what surprises us about the way we ignore the struggling of the average Iraqi citizen?

>> ^tbone8ty:
thats to bad and all but maybe if u guys woke up and stop killing each other maybe we woulndt have to come in and babysit you.


Lol, where are the US forces in assisting with the human lives being lost in:

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0904550.html

Algeria
Ivory Coast
Congo
Somalia
Sudan
Uganda

?

The only reason your troops are being sent to die in a foreign country is because of oil. How many barrels of oil do you buy with an exploded Humvee and five young dead US soldiers?

found more parts to this 3 part youtube documentary. Here's the sift post containing parts 2 and 3.
http://www.videosift.com/video/Baghdad-5-years-on-Killing-Fields-and-The-Lost-Generation

nice find lucky760. Glad you found this for me.

Thanks. I hope as many people see this as possible.

In reply to this comment by kulpims:
*promote