What will you be playing to celebrate?

Great posts Gunbei, humour (cluster fuck, ROLOL!) and some very thought provoking info.

Watching the news up here in the "great white north" yesterday evening, our national, publicly-funded broadcaster showed file-photo footage of a broadly smiling Donald Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam in the early '80s. The now-Defence Secretary was selling chemicals or something at the time of his meeting with SM.

One of the people interviewed by the CBC last night is a professor at Georgetown University who suggested that, although Saddam may have indeed been directing some of the insurgency up until some unspecifed time, there may be a number of groups that are likely acting independently of one another. He referred to two main groups: 1. Baathists loyal to Saddam and 2. Iraqi nationalists opposed to Saddam AND the US-led invasion. There was another analyst speaking of the three large ethnic divisions and their respective territories in Iraq: the Sunnis (Baghdad and Northeast), the Shiites (pretty much everything South of Baghdad) and the Kurds (North and Northwest). What a mess!

I wonder though, instead of invading Iraq and going after Saddam, if there had been as much effort and money put into the expedition to Afghanistan and getting bin Laden, would the latter now still be at large??? Should the US and its allies have finished the job there and, in the meantime, gather more concrete evidence of WMDs in Iraq before invading? One would think that the Allies were in control of a large part of Afghanistan at the time and with the patience/tenacity shown in Iraq could conceivably have captured ObL.

Don't get me wrong, I think the capture of Hussein is a good thing, but the rationale for the invasion was never what one could call rock solid. As for being a supporter of terrorism, one could argue that Saddam encouraged it with huge payments made to the families of Palestinian suicide-bombers, but that doesn't prove a link with Osama.

Slipknot and Bmwhaus, your skepticism is understandable. There are too many coincidences, including profits for those close to the White House, for there not to be serious questions. Whether are any real answers are given, or just the same stonewalling platitudes, is another matter. I won't hold my breath though.

Just my 2 cents (Cdn), 1.4 (US). :-)

Oh yeah, music to celebrate... I think I'd rather spend time remembering those who have lost their lives during the events of the past couple of years and teach my children about what it means to me to be a good person. Tolerance, love your fellow (wo)man, etc.

Peace, everyone.

Ah, but Gunbei, the money to conduct the war comes from your tax dollars. Haliburton may not even pay any tax??? The money to rebuild Iraq will also come from your tax dollars and make Haliburton and its owners even richer than they are now.

GWB and his buddies may simply be trying to ensure that the conditions for winning re-election are in place for 2004. Money wins elections, among a small number of other things. Corporate contributions make up a huge proportion of funds available to run campaigns, no? How do you ensure you get the greatest corporate contributions? Its all pretty abysmal...

In the end, all of this may be about a small group of people wanting the power to rule the strongest nation on Earth for another four years. Daddy Bush only had one term - a humiliation to be erased by the prodigal son? Although its arguable about how far he could have gone in 1991, Daddy did not really finish the job in Iraq at that time. Is the son being driven to redress a wrong, one that was obviously not of his Daddy's doing? I really don't like to sound so skeptical.

Hey Slappy, you better be shakin' in your boots, 'cause the Canadian Navy has these Sea King choppers that could really cause havoc if they were unleashed on the US... That is, by falling out of the sky onto unsuspecting Americans. :-) The Canadian military is a shadow of its former self, and may be another reason why this country didn't commit to the coalition of the willing in Iraq. However, there are some 2,000 Canadian troops on the ground in Afghanistan stationed near Kabul.

It may be that a lot of the UN's indecisiveness during the '90s had to do with the intransigence of Security Council members and dues owed to the UN by one of its strongest and wealthiest members. It may appear that some leaders sit idly by, but what you don't see are the diplomatic efforts to bring about change in countries that have less than democratic leadership/government.

How does one decide who should be invaded and toppled and who should not? What of the sovereignty of nations or the international/multilateral agreements in place all over the world? If, for example, Great Britain decided to invade France because it felt the President or the regime in power needed to be deposed, the rest of the NATO membership would be obliged to come to the defence of France.

Sure, Saddam is evil incarnate, one of the worst seen since WWII, but lacking proof positive of WMDs, should he have been deposed in a more or less unilateral fashion? Looking at it from another angle, even if the existence of WMDs were proven, who's to say Iraq should not have the capacity to develop nuclear capability, whether for military or civilian purposes? Well, perhaps the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (not sure if Iraq was ever a signatory), which may not have existed if the UN did not.

Sure the UN has a sketchy history, but it is the member nations, and particularly those on the Security Council, that make the decisions. Right or wrong, the US and its coalition members failed to convince other Security Council members of the case for invading Iraq. Should the UN and the Security Council simply acquiesce to an influential and powerful member simply because the latter says so?

If you don't like the way your neighbour treats his child, what do you do? Do you go over and beat him senseless? Or do you call the cops and appropriate authorities to investigate? They investigate and maybe lay charges. Those charges are presented before the court and the judge or jury decides whether to punish. Kind of like the UN, except that if the members of the UN can't agree (e.g. on the results of the investigation/weapons inspectors in Iraq) or if they don't provide the UN with the means to act (e.g. a clear mandate and sufficient means/forces in Rwanda), well there's not much it can do.

Treyhoss, your points are well taken. I guess my questions were more rhetorical than not and I certainly don't want to appear as though I think my opinion is more valid than another's. I'm just concerned about where it all ends, who gets invaded next, etc.

Yes, the USA and its armed forces are essentially the cops on the global stage. Also, there was no hesitation on the part of many nations to participate in the Afghan mission, where there was a fairly clear rationale for taking action. America was attacked, the culprit(s) identifiable and their whereabouts more or less known. America responded with the backing and military contributions of many of its traditional allies and others.

I just think that in the case of Iraq, the rationale was not as clear. Perhaps it is a pipe dream/naive to think that the members of the UN could or should act more decisively on these matters. However, I still hope for greater cooperation among nations and people.

This is what's so great about a forum like this (even though we are so far off of audio-related topics in this thread), the ability to share thoughts with others without fear of opression or retribution. Vigorous debate and disagreement are hallmarks of freedom and democracy.

Gunbei, the Sea Kings are a fleet of 40-year old helicopters still in service with the Canadian Navy and an embarassment. They have more of tendency to fall onto the decks of destroyers and frigates (upside down in one incident), rather than landing gracefully. Looks like our new Prime Minister has the military as a priority in general and replacing these choppers specifically in the short term. Some snipers from our Special Forces were even being considered for the US' Bronze Star (not sure if that's the right one) for their service in Afghanistan. In a couple of instances, they were able to 'neutralise' Taliban or al-Qaeda operatives from something like a mile or more away.