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Originally Posted by host
Does it follow, then that as co-conspirators with and suppliers and enablers of Saddam, even to the point of continuing a diplomatic, advisory, and ongoing material support relationship with Saddam, even after the "brutal dictator gassed 10,000 of his own people", with our gas.......that the Reagan and Bush '41 administrations, by their complicity, and your own definition, frogza, were "terrorist regimes", and that Rumsfeld was personally culpable, meeting with Saddam, and participating in arming, enabling, and advising him?
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Instead of your supposition, might it be possible that the aims of those administrations was to curb what they believed was the greater threat against US interests - an Iranian Islamic government inimical to the US that might be supportive of terrorist acts against "the Great Satan"? Which side might you pick, especially when many people agree that the Iraq of Saddam Hussein's era - while bloody and repressive, certainly did not seem to be one disposed towards radical Islamic revolution and, indeed, sported a decent standard of living for its citizenry?
Why must everything be black and white? I, for one, would not have relished being in Reagan or the 1st Bush's shoes. We know in hindsight that supporting Iraq against Iran was fruitless and did nothing good for the region, but I would bet that that atmosphere in the White House at that time was to try and limit Iran - a country who's revolution and taking of US hostages at our embassy still loomed large in the country's collective memory.
And once again we have someone trotting out previous US transfers of biological and chemical samples that were used in Iraqi weapons programs. I have some questions here:
1) Did the UN inspectors verify that all such stocks, and the production runs Iraqis made from those stocks, were destroyed? I believe that the first post (from 9/30/02) listing those anthrax transfers states that the UN was UNABLE to verify total destruction. It also stated that botulinum toxin was unaccounted for. That makes me nervous.
2) Where did all of this stuff go? WAS it destroyed? If so - why no records for some items? That makes me nervous.
3) This is the $64,000 Question: If you were responsible for one HELLUVA big mess, wouldn't you be responsible for cleaning it up? My answer to this question is YES. We - the UNITED STATES - had a hand in propping up and supplying Hussein, so WE have a responsibility to clean up our mess.
I won't argue that - in the act of cleaning up our one mess - we've created quite another one. I can only hope that the country has the fortitude to stay in Iraq until they are able to do the day-to-day stuff on their own. And yes - I know that US foreign policy is responsible for other major messes around the globe. Sorry - I guess the blunders that have the most effect on US economic interests get the grease.