Unilateral attacks

[tw]

The administration clearly has not learned from history AND has got to be insane. The United States loses every war that it starts unilaterally. Furthermore, it is fundamentally corrupt - against the very fabric of the US - to unilaterally attack another nation only because our President does not like their leader.

We have no beef with this nation other than the personal biases of George Jr. All makes this NY Times article of 27 April 2002 is scary for every decent American. It does suggest how unrealistic this adminstration is and why military attacks against China, about a year ago, were too probable:
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/28/in...st/28MILI.html

Note: the NY Times requiresd registration before accessing their articles. Registration is free.

[verbatim]

Damn registration. Could someone please post the text? Im lazy

[tw]

The Bush administration, in developing a potential approach for toppling President Saddam Hussein of Iraq, is concentrating its attention on a major air campaign and ground invasion, with initial estimates contemplating the use of 70,000 to 250,000 troops.
The administration is turning to that approach after concluding that a coup in Iraq would be unlikely to succeed and that a proxy battle using local forces there would be insufficient to bring a change in power.

One would think after having world realities stomped for 11 days into his face by almost every regional leader, VP Cheney would have seen the light. No, this right wing extremists lives in a world where everyone agrees with America:

Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and their senior aides contend that Arab leaders would publicly protest but secretly celebrate Mr. Hussein's downfall - as long as the operation were decisive - and that ousting him would actually ease the job of calming violence between Israel and the Palestinians.

This is closer to reality:

But others at the State Department and the White House argue that efforts to topple Mr. Hussein would be viewed by Arabs as a confrontation with Islam, destabilizing the region and complicating the broader campaign against Osama bin Laden and his network, Al Qaeda.

Are they so outrightly psychotic as to think a unilateral attack on Saddam would calm violence between Israel and Palestine? They must also think that Sharon is an honest man who just does not understand the word "immediately".

Honest? He promised to let the UN investigate. Another front page article in the NY Times:

After a lengthy debate, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Cabinet declared that the makeup and the procedures set down for the Jenin inquiry were unacceptable. The team had been scheduled to arrive Sunday after several delays.
The mission is to look into a bloody eight-day battle at the Jenin camp, where at least 50 Palestinians and 23 Israeli soldiers died and Palestinians say Israel massacred civilians. Israel objects to the composition of the team and its planned scope.

Of course Israel changes its mind, again, at the last minute. Stall. Sharon cannot permit any of his massacres to be documented. Sharon all but proved that a US president has no backbone - or at least does not understand the defintion of "immediately". Why not make the UN look just as mentally deficient? Or at least stall long enough for all evidence to be destroyed. Even the victim's families are not permitted to see their bodies. Proof of a massacre?

Only a polictally extremist, mentally impaired person would think the US has any right to unilaterally attack Iraq. Did we not "meet the enemy and he is us" in VietNam? But then Bush did not even know Israel's dimensions until last May. Too mcuh alcohol and cocaine do keep one from learning about reality. And so we plan to attack Iraq using the same reasons that Hilter used to plan an attack on Czechoslovakia.

Some leaders are so introverted as to think they can create "Peace in our Time". Bush is talking like a dangerous, right wing extremist - and without sufficient knowledge even of the word "immediately". Will he say, "Read my lips. No new taxes". No. Even George Jr could remember that mistake.

Once registered for the NY Times, then all articles appear automatically on that computer without login. Its much simpler to register - or just buy the hardcopy edition.

[Undertoad]

There was no massacre. Sorry. I know you wish there was, but if you believe there was then you simply haven't been paying attention. There's just too much evidence that says otherwise.

Even the initial estimates from the Israeli side are now considered high. The mass graves are missing, there are no bodies that add up to 500 dead like the Palestinians claimed.

It gets worse. A few days ago, I posted the story of those three Palestinian kids, acting on their own, who built some pipe bombs and took off for the nearest Israelis they could find. And who were shot and killed by Israeli police.

That happened on Tuesday. By Friday, Palestinian security forces had detained 20 other copy-cat children.

The incredibly intelligent USS Clueless points out that, if they could stop 20 other suiciding kids, then they also could have stopped at least some of the previous adult suicide missions. Arafat had claimed it was impossible. Now we know that is bullshit; they could stop the attacks if they wanted to. They just didn't want to.

Some people now say that since Arafat is contained and the PA in tatters, they can't be held responsible for preventing further suicide attacks. That, too, we now know is bullshit.

It's like I said; you don't believe Sharon, so you automatically believe the other side. You're going to look more and more silly if you continue this approach.

[Hubris Boy]

Originally posted by tw
The United States loses every war that it starts unilaterally.

Actually, the US has an excellent, winning record in wars that it starts unilaterally... 4 - 0, I believe:

1846-1848 Mexican-American War- W
1861-1865 War of Northern Aggression- W
1898 Spanish-American War- W
1789-present Eradication of Aboriginal North Americans- W

We have no beef with this nation other than the personal biases of George Jr.

Oh? I can think of several, but, just to start the ball rolling, how about Iraq's failure to comply with U.N. Resolution 687? (The one that authorized those pesky inspectors, etc.)

I've noticed in the past your zeal in pointing out Israel's failure to comply with U.N. Resolution 242 (which sentiment I share, by the way.) Does this zeal extend to all of those wonderful, multilateral U.N. Resolutions?

[jaguar]

This we know too, is bullshit

(PA can sto pattacks...
um.....what have you been smoking? must be good stuff ot be able to remove you're entire capabiltiy to peform logical thought.

hmmletsee..
Adult attacks: Large, powerful, suppported groups operating with sophisitcated technolgoy though very secret and organised structures to deliver attackers to precise locations in complete secrecy.

Kid iwth bomb: Kid buys bomb on street and runs for nearest checkpoint.

What you are saying is that stopping an organsied crime family is as easy as catching a one-off shoplifter, there simply is no comparison.

And considering what the Isrelais are now asking for, they are only getting what they deserve. They should have learnt from vietnam, bloodying an enemy then trying to negoiate doens't work with deserate extremely pissed off people.

and if jenine was so damn innocent what are they making every move for it to be researched by the UN? Christ you've seen the place, they admitted using civies as human shields and to test for boobie traps, that itself is a breach of the rules of war as dirty as the US doing the same thing in Vietnam.

[Undertoad]

I should think it would be much harder to stop the kid in that circumstance. Wouldn't you? Working on their own, no announcement of what they're going to do, no evidence of what they're going to do, no Iraqi, Syrian, or Saudi payments for their family, no tracking of shipments of explosives for the organization.

And since all evidence says there was no massacre, of course -- of COURSE they want military experts and not politicians to examine the evidence. (That's what this delay is all about.) Because they feel the UN has recently been used as a wedge against them. Because the first UN guy in stupidly painted the bleakest picture he could paint, participating in the propaganda war instead of ending it pointedly. "It smells bad," he said. "It's disgusting and sad." Not "80% of the damage is tactical, there is evidence of booby-trapping, and the body count is consistent with house-to-house fighting."

And as far as breaches of war go, I still say they really screwed up as far as rules of engagement and keeping journalists out; it would have made a far better story for one of them to get a few nails in the leg from a booby trap, because then the nature of this thing would have been far more understandable to the world.

Why have house to house fighting at all? If all you want to do is wage brutal war on a people, the Israelis have excellent means to do that. They have fighter jets and Apache helicopters and serious munitions. If the only goal is a smackdown, send in the jets. The goal here was clearly something different. I think the big picture is yet to emerge, even. I think the real goal was the intelligence information they got from those locations, which they say proves a lot of the secret Arab/Iraqi/Iranian backing of all the warfare. That changes the politics of the thing.

And as far as war crimes go, there are surely many of them, but the very first one is you don't use unmarked civilians to kill civilians, isn't it?

There's the cause of an occupied people, and then there's the cause of the entire region which prevents there from being any progress on the cause of those people. The real problem is that this is a proxy war and the Palestinians are pawns. The real war is the Arabic/Persian world against the entire west.

[Undertoad]

Now that journalists are given more range, here is a Boston Globe article that sheds a lot of light.

In interviews yesterday with teenage fighters, a leader of Islamic Jihad, an elderly man whose home was at the center of the fighting, and other Palestinian residents, all of whom were in the camp during the battle, none reported seeing large numbers of civilians killed. All said they were allowed to surrender or evacuate when they were ready to do so, though some reported being mistreated while in Israeli detention.

Apparently these folks didn't get the fax telling them to shout massacre at the top of their lungs. Maybe that's because they were busy organizing 50 children in groups of ten, assigned to ambush Israeli troops. (According to the story.)

The more you know...

Tnoy, waht crakc are yuo smokign? Facts are nto welcmoe, nor aer bisaed western journalits. Ples grow a brian and lern to preform criticla thoguht.

[tw]

Originally posted by Hubris Boy
... how about Iraq's failure to comply with U.N. Resolution 687? (The one that authorized those pesky inspectors, etc.)

I've noticed in the past your zeal in pointing out Israel's failure to comply with U.N. Resolution 242 (which sentiment I share, by the way.) Does this zeal extend to all of those wonderful, multilateral U.N. Resolutions?

Thank you for providing obvious logic. If the US should unilaterally attack Iraq due to uncooperation with UN 687, then the US should also unilaterally attack Israel for uncoopertion with UN 242, 338 and UN Jenin investigation.

Even worse, only an idiot would plan to attack Saddam after giving a green light to Sharon. It does not matter whether you agree with that sentence since 'green light' is the dominant opinion of the Arab world. Only a fool would attack Saddam when Arab opinion of the US is so universally negative. Even Europe is more in agreement with the Arab world on Israeli Palestinian issues. Why then would anyone unilaterally attack any nation - even worse Saddam?

Bush Doctrine is the 'Axis of Evil'. It is George Jr's agenda - realities in the world be damned. Therefore we can unilaterally attack Iraq and yet financially support Israel - while both refuse to coooperate with the UN or those resolutions. Thank you for noting another double standard from our Administration. Logic dicates that an attack on Iraq should coincide with an attack on Israel and a cancellation of that $3billion we give to Israel so that right wing Likud extremists can bite our hand.

[MaggieL]

Originally posted by dhamsaic
Tnoy, waht crakc are yuo smokign? .

I thought it was supposed to be condescending and un-PC to pick on jag like that. ;-)

[tw]

Originally posted by Undertoad
And since all evidence says there was no massacre, of course -- of COURSE they want military experts and not politicians to examine the evidence. (That's what this delay is all about.)

The same tactics were successfully used to coverup the massacre of 5000 Palestinian women and children in Lebanon. The same tactics of keeping the press and UN away were also used in another rumored massacre of Egyptian prisioners in 1967.

The USS Liberty got too close to a 'rumored' massacre and was '''accidentally''' attacked by planes and then by torpedo boats for almost 1 and 1/2 hours.

The best way to coverup a massacre to is say that it is too dangerous for people who belong on the front line of the most dangerous battles - war correspondents. Anyone who says any battle is too dangerous for those correspondents is simply advocating a lie - and knows it. A battle is only too dangerous when the war correspondent says so. To claim otherwise is historically how crimes against humanity are covered up. Those who shoot at journalists - always Sharon's Israelis troops - are clearly suspect.

We want journalists from every nation in Jenin to report truth. Nothing claimed by a Likud Israel can be trusted without verification. Stalling a UN commmission is not about military men on the commission. Israel had already agreed the commission was properly staffed on Saturday. But an Israel that would be covering up crimes against humanity will stall every day - just like another war criminal - Saddam. So Likud conveniently said yes, then said no. Best way - just like Saddam did - to stall UN inspectors. Saddam - Sharon - what really is the difference? They both massacred innocent people. They both should be in The Hague for crimes against humanity. Both use same techniques to stall UN investigations. We just don't know which crimes against humanity Sharon may be guilty of this time.

Milosevik, Mlandic, et al did same stalling tactics successfully in their ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, etc. It was only when land was taken from them that we had any evidence of massacres. Massacres are so easy to coverup with enough time and if inspectors are denied access to possible grave sites.

Sharon uses same tactics. One difference. Honest countries will not invade Israel and locate mass graves. Without graves, then Undertoad can deny crimes against humanity - as if the Holocaust never existed. Without bodies, Undertoad would also have to deny the Holocaust existed - to be consistent in his logic. With enough time, Sharon can successfully coverup a massacre - as he has done previously.

We know something bad happened in Jenin. We know facts are being covered up. We just don't know how extreme and vile those crimes against humanity were.

True, we don't have any evidence of a massacre in Jenin just as we had no evidence early on of a massacre in Bosnia or Cambodia. That's right. It took years later to even learn of the Killing Fields.

Originally posted by MaggieL

I thought it was supposed to be condescending and un-PC to pick on jag like that. ;-)

Well, I chalk it up to typos. I wasn't personally attacking him, but just poking fun at his spelling/typing hilarities. Since I am not arguing with him, but rather, poking fun from an outside stance, I don't think it's quite the same.

In the interest of staying out of the argument, that's all I'm going to say

[tw]

Originally posted by dhamsaic
Well, I chalk it up to typos. I wasn't personally attacking him, but just poking fun at his spelling/typing hilarities.

I thought you posted it from your cell phone.

[Undertoad]

Just keep going man. The latest to weigh in today were the folks from Human Rights Watch. I assume you have some respect for this organization. They're on scene specfically out to find rights abuses and to document everything as carefully as possible.

They count 52 bodies. That's 2 less than Israel's own count. And 1448 less than the highest estimate given by Palestinian spokesmen... and 448 less than the number repeated most often by Palestinian spokesmen.

They do have rights concerns, and some of them are fairly serious. But... no massacre. They say 20 civilian deaths. I suppose someone has worked out a working definition of that word.

The more you know...

That Egyptian weekly report from the engineer said 50 houses were booby-trapped. HRW says the booby traps are definitely Palestinian in origin. HRW says Israeli forces destroyed 150 houses. That satellite photo looks about right. Are things starting to make sense yet? No massacre.