Bush is an idealist with a sense of history (even though I think he's wrong) and you are an idealist with no sense of anything.

Submitted by Rick (United States), Jul 11, 2008 at 17:43

First, let's discuss undeniable facts. Saddam used WMD on Kurdish civilians. So he had no moral or ethical problems of using gas to kill thousands. The only reason he did not use gas on American troops in the 1991 action was because the US give him the clear message that if he did use gas on American troops, the US would use nuclear weapons on him.

However, he realized during the 1991 Gulf War that the only way to convince the US not to interfere with his imperialism was to have nuclear weapons. Nothing else could possibly make the US think twice when he moved his armies into Kuwait or Iran or Saudi Arabia or whenever he decided to go. And let's not forget that France was very close to finishing a nuclear facility for Saddam in the 1980s and only the bombing of it by Israel in 1982 ended that threat. The Israeli attack was soundly criticized by the entire world including the US. If he had that nuclear facilty, Kuwait would now be the 19th province of Iraq today Iran may have been nuked and forget about the Kurds and Shi'ites in Iraq.

Now for your other absurdist historical comparisons. You write 'And i wont even yield to the temptation to talk about vietnam, japan and others where the american nation has engineered suffering without any reasonable justification."

Although I agree totally with you about Vietnam, don't be so historically ignorant as to compare that to Japan in WW II - who by the way the Vietnamese under Ho Chi Minh also fought during the 1940s. Japan was a rapacious, imperialist power which committed genocide in China and the Phillipines. Japan is still hated for it today.

The Atomic bombing of Japan saved lives. Yes, that's correct. An American invasion would have spread devastation throughout Japan ,resulted in a milion dead Amercians - including the thousands of American prisoners and GOD knows how many million poor Japanese. It was a horrible event but the alternative was even worse. To compare Japan to Vietnam really shows your ignorance of history.

That said, I agree with you about Bush spreading American democracy in Iraq. As I said I am not an idealist and revolutionary like President Bush. I am sure you cringe at thinking of Bush as a revolutionary but that is exactly what he is.

He believes that through an act of force in Iraq,he can change the course of history. That is a revoultionary idea. He is not seeking conquest but to spread an idea which is based on equality and freedom. That is a revolutionary motive.

However, I agree with you that is not our responsibility in the Middle East. Our responsibility is to protect the interests of the United States and that did require us to depose of the Saddam / Baathist despotism because it was imperialist, agressive and threatened the region.

Disrupting Iraqi society and causing the deaths of thousands is not the only way to pursue that end. A campaign of assassination of targeted Iraqis- Saddam, his sons, certain of his war criminal generals and henchmen would be far less disruptive and achieve our ends. But Bush is looking at effecting a distinct break in the despot to despot history of Arab nations.

Bush believes if he can "turn" Iraq, it will have a rippling effect on other despotic regimes and change the course of Middle East history. I give him a 20-80 percent chance. Removing the Saddams, the Assads, the Ayatollahs, is cheaper, less disruptive, more humane and achieves a stability and who knows may even allow democractic forces - if they really exist- to come forward on their own.

Going into a former democracy that has been taken over by a despot can be an effective way to return a nation to its former self ( Germany, France) but when you have - as all Arab regimes are - total despotic, corrupt and family/clan run which have never experienced democracy, I advise against going in like a bull to change things. There, it's better to go in as a ninja and leave before they know you were even there.

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