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Originally posted by NaplesX
Ah but that is exactly what many vets of WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam and others did and are doing. They moved on and are still doing so. Where is your outcry for their torturers? This whole thread is just political garbage. I am slow and even I can see that.
All torture is an abomination. The difference, when it comes to WWI, WWII and Korea is that many of the torturers are either dead or have been tried and imprisoned for their crimes.
Vietnam is a different matter, of course, since many, many of those guys are still alive. Should their torturers be made to stand for their crimes? You betcha. But they won't. You know why?
Because we retreated and effectively lost that war. You don't get to bring people to trial unless you actually win the war and then occupy the country. The problem with your statement, however, is that many of those who were tortured in Vietnam have not given it up even 30 years later.
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I would like to see everyone put blame where it belongs, as opposed to where the collective democrat/liberal finger is firmly locked in place, now.
What do you think we're trying to do? Our guys tortured someone and apparently had fun doing so. They also apparently killed somewhere around 35 people (at last count...the story was in the Times yesterday). All anyone wants to know is how and why this happened, what went wrong, and whether the soldiers' claims that MI ordered them to do this are true. If that is the case, then we want to know where those orders from MI originated.
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Bush had nothing (zero, zip, nada) to do with any prisoner being mistreated.
That is most likely true. Even if it does go to that level (WH and cabinet), he would most likely have been kept out of the loop for purposes of deniability. But then again,
you do not know this and, apparently, if you had your way would never even bother to ask the question.
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In fact this war was started by a small group of people long ago, and Bush was not in that group.
You are correct.
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Of course I mean SH and crew.
For over 10 years now people have been looking for evidence to support this belief, and as I have pointed out to you again and again and again, it stems from the mistaken and old-school belief that large-scale terrorism requires state sponsorship. This, as AQ has proved again and again, is simply not true.
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Ultimate responsibility and blame lies on SH for a lot of this.
You are claiming that SH made our soldiers torture people. Please explain how that happened. Did he use mind control from prison?
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Don't forget recent history even though we are talking WWII and such.
Indeed.
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"We have difficult work to do in Iraq. We're bringing order to parts of that country that remain dangerous." Do you forget those words from that speech? Over? Maybe among liberal pundits wish that he said that.
You're right. He didn't say "Well! We're done!" The speech was
carefully crafted to avoid such a declaration. But he did, nonetheless, stand under a gigantic "mission accomplished" banner (which he later tried to blame on the military) and say "major combat hostilities are over." And now more men have died in Iraq since then than before.
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You may want to look back at the conversation. The flaw is that every thing is a result of some US action. That logic is for the weak minded.
You may want to look back to the conversation. No one is saying that everything is a result of some US action. Nevertheless, our boys and girls
tortured and killed. And you want to blame it on SH? Which is the weak-minded logic, again?
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To say that the problem is systematic is one thing. But to then try to connect it all the way to Bush' office is more political mud slinging. All this assuming that any of us know anything about the actual issue and the full facts.
The fact are actually quite public. The Taguba report is public and describe a systematic abuse of prisoners and abuse of human rights. War crimes. By our boys and girls. Your argument seems to be that we ought not investigate this or ask any questions about it. This is little more than wanting to stick your head in the sand, and no doubt stems for your need (as you admitted elsewhere) to see this in binary terms: We're all good; they're all bad. Well, some of us, clearly, are not good. Some of us tortured people. And because it's "easier" (your word) to see the world in binarisms, you are forced to make the utterly bizarre claim that SH is somehow responsible for our soldiers torturing people.
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For someone that tries to put himself across as so smart you sure don't know how to read and comprehend to well, do you?
I'm not going to respond to this, since I'd just insult you and I'm trying to remain civil, even though you, apparently, cannot. Regardless, insults such as this are signs of desperation.
And "to" is spelled "too."
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The US has fought and put their young men's blood on the line and spent trillions to help those countries. Does the US own them? Does the US even have any influence over them when you would think it would?
Go get you a history book and find out for yourself. Others here have listed off the countries we have invaded and owned, and yet you seem to have completely ignored them. At any rate, I suggest that you pick up Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States." That'll get you started.
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I suppose in your book, they didn't really need the help? I suppose the contribution was insignificant?
You're talking about every US military operation in history? That's a big question.
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If the US did not get involved the French would be saying Sig Heil for breakfast every day along with the Germans.
We actually don't know this. Did the French get the absolute shit beaten out of them by the Germans? Yup. Did we liberate them? Yup. But whether or not Germany would've been able to hang on to what they'd conquered is another matter. At any rate, we sure jumped right in there as soon as we saw an injustice, didn't we? We were in the moment Germany invaded Poland and began rampaging all over Europe and killing Jews by the millions, right? No. We weren't. My point here is not that America is bad. My point is that you cannot make the claim that in WWII we did this great thing (we did, indeed) and helped defeated this horrible evil (we did, and it was) without acknowledging that we sat back for 3 years and watched it all happen and did nothing, nationally, at all, until we were dragged kicking and screaming into it by the bombing at Pearl Harbor. BTW, go dig up a copy of FDR's Pearl Harbor Address and take a look at that long list of countries Japan had bombed that same night. Looks bad, huh? Go find out how many of them were US holdings. The CIA World fact book is a good place to start.
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The Russians owe the US a lot also.
The Russians (those pinko commie bastards)
destroyed the Germans on the Eastern front. They were waiting on us in Berlin when we got there. They do owe us for McDonald's, though. But they're paying up.
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Give me a break. The US rebuilds it's conquered enemy's countries to promote the global economy, which in turn helps the US economy. Look at Japan.
Hrm. Japan. China. Russia. All pretty close together over there. And oh look! They let us keep a few military bases! To protect them, of course, since they were forbidden from having their own army. And Germany, of course, allowed us to keep a few bases--pretty handy for keeping an eye on the Soviet Bloc. And the UAE! And those no-fly zones in Iraq. And Afghanistan! And Cuba! And...
I can't speak to the notion of a "global economy" prior to the 80s. I'm sure the idea existed, but I don't know to what degree we thought about it in the same terms we do today.
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I love the way you call names and condescend and marginalize. Seriously, keep it coming. [/B]
I say again that you really ought not post on US foreign policy--or even history. Post a thread on some ethical dilemma or on some injustice or something. History and foreign policy aren't your strong areas.
Cheers
Scott
