Quote:
Originally posted by Superbelt
I'm sure your position would change if you were a Uzbek refugee who saw his whole family boiled alive for dissent.
Uzbek is a hard up country. Money does a lot of things for them. The money being used to disable their nukes should come with the requirements for human rights improvements. Not a waiver. At the same time this Islam Karimov gets cocky much the way Iraq and Kuwait have been knowing that they can do anything they want because they know they have Americas support behind them. They know we will provide cover for their operations.
This is the same situation as Iraq, from when we were friends.
We funded Iraq because they were a stated policy goal for our national security. And look what happened, they became much more dangerous to the world than Iran ever was and we had to put them down numerous times.
Without concrete improvements for human rights, we are still creating monsters, and history shows, that never has turned out well. I swear to God, we continue on this path with Uzbek, we will regret it one day.
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And I'm pretty sure your position would change if a dozen warheads started floating around terrorist circles after the Uzbekistan invasion. Or if one of those warheads destroys a city (whether in Uzbekistan or elsewhere).
Sometimes there is no way to change a situation in the short term and you need to make concessions with hopes/plans on how to change things when possible.
As far as Iraq, as pointed out many times before, it wasn't just the US who helped enable Hussein. In fact, it's quite possible he would have been able to build his army without the aid of the US. Having a big stockpile of oil to trade for weapons or cash to buy weapons is a pretty big enabler as well.