Chirac and Putin - was their loyalty to Saddam bought and paid for by oil?
 

New evidence suggests that several of Saddam's strongest supporters in the months leading up to the war were bribed with lucrative oil contracts under the UN's so-called "oil-for-food" program.

The credibility of some of the world's most powerful and outspoken leaders has been dealt a serious blow. Never again will Chirac or Putin be able to take the moral high ground. For them, it seems, this whole thing really was all about oil.

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/WNT/I..._040129-1.html


"No blood for oil! No blood for oil!"

Not really surprising. Iraq knew they needed to influence UN/world opinion, the only resource they had to do so was oil. They used it. The politicians who accepted these contracts should be voted out of office or, in the case of appointed positions, fired.

Accepting bribes is a serious crime.

Absolutely but I am sure it can't be traced back to the leaders of each country and I'm sure they will come up with another explanation for the "payments". Perhaps consulting fees or some such bs.

I'm not surpised i guess. Although you can hardly claim that the massive demonstrations by people all over the world were the result of oil contracts.
Besides, looking out for your country's percieved best interests is what any good leader does.
I don't see how this is any different from our not so recent ties to saddam. Maybe its comparable to our current ties to uzbekistan. In any case "the moral high ground" is something you have to forsake as the price of entry into having any kind of voice in the world. The us lost its moral high ground abilities a long time ago.

Well I, for one, am thoroughly outraged.

I can not and will not dismiss it so easily as Filtherton has.

This is serious corruption at the highest levels of government. The people these leaders represent have been betrayed, and the twenty milllion Iraqis that lived under the violent, murderous tyranny of a brutal dictator were left to suffer because a few political leaders obstructed the US liberation for no reason other than to line their own pockets.

Where is the righteous indignation of the left now?

No blood for oil...

Your point was made in your first post.

If you are just going to repeat yourself with baiting, I'll close this thread as a troll.

Sorry, but this had nothing to do with "looking out for your country's best interests", this was influence peddling plain and simple. Having governmental ties to regimes like Iraq out of necessity is far different than personally held oil contracts for those in positions to make/influence decisions. If there was no UN/French/Russian opposition to an Iraq invasion do you think the protests would have been as popular? I doubt it.

"Where is the righteous indignation of the left now?"

That's the part I'd like to hear!

"This is serious corruption at the highest levels of government. The people these leaders represent have been betrayed, and the twenty milllion Iraqis that lived under the violent, murderous tyranny of a brutal dictator were left to suffer because a few political leaders obstructed the US liberation for no reason other than to line their own pockets."

C'mon you three - you preached this from the highest hill for weeks - have you nothing at all to say about this side of it?

This isn't really surprising, it was pretty clear that some people seemed to be a little too friendly to Iraq and there was talk of bribes. The left knew this too, they just ignored it then, and they will ignore it now.

Or could the reason they didn't want to go to war be that they knew there was no weapons of mass destruction and didn't feel like spending billions and billions chasing a ghost inside the mind of the US president?

I honestly don't care very much if thewar was about 'blood for oil' as long as they don't lie about it.

This is sorta' one of those "I don't go to the movies to watch the film - they have the greatest popcorn..."

Yes, if 270 people out of the 20 million who protested against it hadn't shown up, it would have made a big difference.

As for the bribery of high-level officials by a foreign government, a crime is a crime, and they should be prosecuted to the utmost extent of the law.

I guess i'm all righteous indignated out. You're right that they weren't looking out for the interests of their countries, just a few wealthy individuals. I read it wrong. At this point all this news does is put chirac and putin a little closer to bush on my own personal "bought and paid for politicians" continuum.

I wonder if it may be possible to be against this war, and yet, not have lucrative and questionable oil contracts with the former iraqi leader? I didn't hear any mention of any canadians on that list. I was against that war and i'm just a poor student with a small income.


no blood for oil isn't accurate, and i doubt you could find a place on the tfp where i said such a thing. If i did, i'm sorry. I'm also sorry to inform you that you can't make me, or sparhawk or any one single person answer for the actions and opinions of the liberal archetype in your head. By that logic i could say imminent threat... imminent threat... where's your conservative righteous indignation?


You say this as if there was no other reason to be antiwar in this instance. I wasn't aware of bribes and neither were you. That article is dated Jan. 29th.
Of course there were ulterior motives in france and russia's decision not to support a war. There are always ulterior motives. Notice our stated purpose for war(wmd's and liberation) and our probable actual purpose for war(sending a message to rogue nations). You can't claim that "the left" was aware of them any more than "the right" was. What were the ulterior motives of germany and canada? Who was greasing their wheels?


Well, we can speculate all we want. Tony blair was pretty gung ho about invading, yet brits turned out by the thousands to voice their lack of support. As did many americans.

I dont get it, maybe Im slow.

What's wrong with feeling that the people who pays for a war (soldiers and civilians) should be told the right reason why they are doing it and how does that have to do with your post?

Big deal.

Let me see if i understand the article.

People continued to do business with Saddam even though they knew he was a murderous bastard. In other words, "it's just business"

Wow, shocking stuff eh.

Now, the US has never done anything like that have they? No, Americans are far too moral to EVER do business with a bad guy like Saddam Hussein. No, they would never do that!!! We have self righteous indignation.

"What's that?"

"How do i explain all the business that the US did with Saddam prior to 1991?"

"Well of course, that was BEFORE Saddam became an evil dictator. Up until 1991 he was a good despot, so the USA did business with him. After 1991 he was a bad despot."

"Same goes for all those other evil dictators in the world who we do business with today!" They are good dictators!

Trust America to differentiate between good and bad dictators.

In a related story, duh.

The Brits saw Tony Blair as cow towing to the US and they were especially incensed that the French and Germans were standing up to us for moral/humanitarian reasons.

Had France, Germany, and Russia not opposed the action so vehemently the protests would never have been as large. The opposition of France and Germany was especially incendiary because of the mistaken belief that we're all "allies".

Many Americans also protested the first Gulf War, yet France and Germany approved of that. There will always be a group of people who believe war is unnecessary and groups of people who believe the US is a big evil monster bent on world domination.

Sorry if this raises no relevant points...
But I find the article amusing when it says PUTIN lost his moral high ground. Since when did he have a moral high ground, he is definately not the most saintly leader in the world.
And corruption in the Russian government probably goes without saying :P

Lenin called such people 'useful idiots'.

I don't think he was refering to just the antiwar crowd. He was probably refering to anybody who would blindly follow the leader, in which case america is full of your man lenin's useful idiots.

With all due respect, Captain, I do believe you missed one rather crucial point.

That point being, of course, that the above named political leaders were given valuable oil contracts not in exchange for any good or service, but expressly to influence their views and conduct.

That's called bribery.

When one acknowledges the distinction between bribery and business, one begins to see the point.

So what is it called when certain industrialists give presidential candidates bootyloads of money, and the president in turn puts said industrialists on comittees that shape policy for their particular industry?


It's called politics as usual.;)

This is funny.
Maybe it has something to do with the Euro

"The dollars cost the US next to nothing to produce, so the fact that the world uses the currency in this way means that the US is importing vast quantities of goods and services virtually for free."

Possibly the dumbest statement I've ever heard in terms of monetary economics. If this were true, the solution to all economic woes would be "Print more money."

So then it's ok, nevermind then. ;)

Actually you may be right because the US does not produce money..the Federal Reserve Bank makes it.

There are consequences to increasing the money supply. Basically, the more available something is, the lower its value. Having too great a money supply can also undermine the faith people have in the currency.

Further, the Federal Reserve uses monetary policy (changes in the money supply/cost of money) to regulate the economy. Easing monetary policy (making more money available or making it less expensive) increases employment and nominal economic activity but can lead to inflation. Restricting the money supply slows the economy, increases interest rates, lowers employment, etc. but can be an effective tool to decrease inflation. The last thing the Federal Reserve wants is to have to play catch up to the economy. Once the economy starts heading in one direction or another it's difficult to slow the momentum. Small cuts (or increases) in interest rates or reserve requirements for banks help to minimize the momentum. If the money supply gets too big, it's more difficult for the Fed to influence the economy.

I will admit that it is distressing to me that so many here are dismissing political bribery simply because it agrees with their political views against this war.

You cant really use that argument until you bring to light all the 'Political Bribery' eminating here at home which may or not have influence on our decisions and incentives surrounding the war.

I'm sorry?

Are you arguing that since bribes happen here that they are ok elsewhere?

Or are you arguing that campaign contributions (on public record) are equivalent to under the table bribes made by foriegn leaders?

Regardless, I feel the comment I made is very appropo.

I am arguing that France & Russia are not the only ones involved in these practices. I am saying that for the US to make these claims is truly a mistake. How can we even make this an issue when the two countries under the scope were against the war..a war which we tried to convince others to join...with claims of WMD...some didnt join us...we changed the name of "French Fries" behind it....AND WE STILL HAVE YET TO SUPPORT OUR CLAIMS.

Kinda embarrassing.

This is called a straw man argument.

In otherwords, do not address the issue at hand, but bring up other issues and say, "Well, what about those???"

Wait...
Are you saying that this has nothing to do with France & Germany's reluctance to join the war?

I was referring to this post:

Namely, that claims of WMD, French/Freedom fries, and "SUPPORT OUR CLAIMS" are all straw man arguments and have nothing to do with this thread.

Certainly, I think that Saddam's bribing of high officials in Russia and France are very relevent, and really, the whole point.

It's called a red herring

A straw man is when one builds a weak caricature of the opponents argument and argues against that instead of the stronger point the opponent actually made.

Anyway, I doubt the "anti-war crowd" is excusing political bribery, even if the motivation fits in with their bias against invasion. It appears they are using similar arguments conservatives have been leveling at their position throughout the duration of this fiasco.

Interestingly, most anti-war folks I know were against all interested parties--not just the US. Of course they are going to align themselves with an entity with enough clout to actually stand up against the US and UK, I don't see what is distressing you about that so much.

Aligning oneself with a group with enough power to support one's cause doesn't imply agreement with all acts of the entity, right? After all, that has been the rationale from the conservative side for some time.

I cant spell it out for you any more man so I will try to sign off.
My parting words...What is it a straw argument?? OR you agree by saying that the bribes "CERTAINLY" have something to do with the thread?

I repeat...trying to claim that Russia and France were involved in bribes which resulted in them not supporting the war is open-ended. OK, maybe they rec'd the contracts but what does that have to do with the lack of supporting evidence to convince them to join the war? Maybe you and the article should just come out and say that Russia & France are in bed with Iraq.

anyways..over & out.

You are right about the argument being a red herring and not a straw man.

My appologies.

As to the rest, it seems you are making the same argument: because conservatives do it, it must be ok for liberals.

I'll remember that.

I'll also remember what you've said about aligning yourself without necessarily agreeing with everything that entity espouses.


My own view is simplistic and perhaps even quaint to the modern, forward thinking, 21st century intellectual: Two wrongs don't make a right.

I've consistently said that (Actually in bed with Saddam).

I'm sorry, didn't I make that clear?

LOL, please reread my post--there isn't any mention of "myself" in there.

I was merely pointing out that people may be posting tongue-in-cheek. Even if they aren't, I don't understand why you are "distressed" when one political group acts in such a way in response to a different political group declaring such actions fair game.

Ah, I see.

So you are not with the anti-war crowd or you do not condone (or at least minimalize the importance of) this high level political bribery?

And to further explain, it distresses me when any group who claims moral highground dismisses immoral practices because it is hypocritical.

OK, let me "further explain"

I am with the anti-war crowd, but I don't condone "high level political bribery."

The first thing I'll point out is that I've consistently said that access to oil has driven our politics, as well as the foreign policies of all industrialized nations. So, no, this doesn't surprise me that politicians in foreign nations were involved in lucrative oil contracts. I don't understand what trap you're trying to lay for me--my position has been consistent on this from the first post I ever typed on this board.

I don't have any "righteous" indignation for any leaders. Foregin leaders aren't answerable to me and, in regards to my own leaders, such verbage is usually reserved for the religious right, not classical rational thinkers (often labeled "lefties").

Lastly, I don't know how this turned into a "bribery" accusation. It appears people had lucrative contracts with a foreign government--not something that falls in the purvue of our domestic legal codes, if the accusation is even a legalistic one versus a moral one.

Furthermore, the OP linked political bribery (granting for the sake of discussion that it is such) to anti-war demonstrations. We were demonstrating against control for oil by world powers in all nations--get your facts straight. People around the world demonstrated against their leaders as well as Bush and Blaire, who were leading the charge. It wasn't until millions of people scared the shit out of those minor players that they listened (for the most part) to their citizens and grew a spine and stood up to what was going on. It's absurd to couple anti-war demonstrators with corrupt politicians, since that's what we were protesting. The crowd that is maligning us now is the same crowd that maligned us then--namely, that we were merely protesting Bush because we hated him personally.

If you set up a ridiculous premise, you're going to keep coming up with ridiculous conclusions. Listen to what people are saying instead of telling them what they are saying and you'd learn a bit more about what and why we believe the way we do. Evidently, it turns out we were pretty damn accurate, control over oil was an underlying root of this fiasco.

"No blood for oil" was an indictment about going to war over oil interests, it's also an indictment of those supporting dictators for decades. This side has been making the claim that we ought not be meddling in foreign nations' affairs to secure oil interests for the past 30 years, it's not my fault you only paid attention when CNN showed you pictures of protesters holding signs of Bush (who happened to be the focus of current protests because he's the one in power).

It is distressing me that so many are now suddenly outraged by politics as usual because it gives them an excuse to talk shit about the antiwar croud. C'mon, let's not be so naive, how many of you who are outraged at france and russia over this would be outraged if somehow the u.s. had bribed australia or one of the other members of the coalition of the willing with favorable trade status or international aid?

You are aware that the u.s. attempts to claim moral high ground with our every action? Are you one of those, "our support of murderous regimes like uzbekistan is okay because that is what it will take to win this moral war on terrorism" types? If so you must be really distressed. I'm not trying to claim that it is morally right for france and russia to accept bribes. I don't think a moral high ground really exists in politics. I think anyone claiming the moral high ground in a political situation needs to be introduced to the word irony. In any case i still think that peace was the moral answer, and i wasn't getting any money from saddam's oil.

That’s good to know. Sometimes it is hard to figure out exactly what you stand for and don’t stand for.

Trap?

There’s no trap.

What I’m looking for is consistency in your arguments.

I can at least respect another person’s position, although I may disagree with it, if it is consistent.

Why not righteous indignation?

Certainly the left has not hesitated to praise those same leaders when it is convenient? Certainly protesters in this country have castigated Blair? If you have ever done this, I would expect you to express indignation at this latest news.

If you have not, then at least you are consistent.

I could be mistaken, but in reading this article, all of these contracts were made under the table, without disclosure to the public.

THAT is what makes it bribery.

If I am wrong about the disclosure, then I’ll gladly admit it.

I’m pretty sure I have my facts straight.

The protesting was against the United States and Britain going to “war over Oil”. I also recall the protestors (not you, necessarily) praising the peace loving governments of France, Germany, Russia, etc. for not going to war over oil, the premise being that they were doing so altruistically.

The hypocrisy being that they were NOT going to war, because of Oil.

Presumably, they would still not go to war even if there had in fact been WMD’s (French and Russian having been caught helping Saddam break the UN embargo, not withstanding) again, because of Oil.

Hmmm, nice assumption (incorrect) about my attention span.

And if I’ve been telling you what you’ve been saying, it’s because sometimes that is hard to figure out.

But as to oil interests, why should we not be securing our interests? As you’ve pointed out, you have no problem that foreign governments have their own interests at heart. Why then is it ok for others to work for their interests while we don’t work for ours?

I can’t speak for anyone else, but I personally would be outraged. As it is, I am none to happy about how our intelligence community let us down and would have preferred it if Bush had gone to war to get rid of Saddam rather than base it on less than 100% reliable information.
Yes, and I believe that we do try for the most part to be in the moral right with our foreign policy. But I disagree with the strategy of “the enemy of our enemy is our friend” and I would like to see that change. So, to answer the question, yes, I am also distressed about that.

But I’m curious why you don’t think a moral high ground exists in politics?

Politics like any other human endeavor has only the qualities human beings bring to it. If we bring morality to it, it will have it. Conversely, if we leave morality out of it, there will be none.

Also, are you an absolute pacifist or were you just against this particular war?

This will be my last post in this thread, I've got midterms to deal with and you are just arguing in circles without intent to listen to my actual words.

Here's an example of how you create a false archtype in your head of my belief system, then later argue I'm not being consistent when I don't abide by the construct you created:

I state that I'm not going to express righteous indignation at anyone because foreign leaders aren't beholden to me and, regardless, righteousness is a relgious term.

Somehow this bounces around in your head and comes out like this:

Based on that twist of my statement, you ask me this:
So now I have to reiterate myself or risk being labeled as inconsistent. Here goes:

I didn't say I condoned the behavior of leaders in foreign nations--just that I'm not going to take a religious/moral highground stance against them.

They don't share my belief system and aren't even supposed to representative of it--unlike the leaders in my country.

I also didn't say my country's leaders shouldn't persue the interest of my nation. What I did say is that the people weren't told the truth so they could deduce whether our current actions really are in the best interest of our nation. Many people who follow geopolitics closely realize that our current course of action isn't in our long term interest.

Whatever else may happen in the long term, it ought to be fairly obvious that neither the Iraqis nor the US public is benefitting in the short term. Corporations, in contrast, are benefitting from what is going on. So if you are the CEO of a major corporation, I'm confused how you can construe the current activities as being in your "best interest."

I'm not an absolute pacifist, i believe in self defense. At this point i need to qualify self defense because depending on who's spinning it, self defense can range anywhere from defending my person from direct assault to shooting somebody i deemed threatening on the subway because i thought that they might have ill intent and the means to act upon it. I think the former is justified but not the latter. There is a point where the rights(i'm talking about god-given rights, not codified rights) of each individual outweigh my desire to put my mind at ease. At this point i think it fairly misleading to paint our actions in iraq as self defense any more than our friend on the subway.

As for politics, there is a phrase that comes to mind. "The good guy always finishes last." Anyone who claims to have the moral high ground is selling something. I know that there is still morality in politics on the very local level, but the higher up you get the more beholden you are to special interests and political games- the more people you owe favors to. What is moral about that?

Thank you for a great example of the kind of strawman argument I’ve come to expect from you.

In otherwords, argue with the definition of a word instead of the intent. And you still didn’t answer my question about whether or not you also passed moral judgement on Blair, Chiraq, et al.

Your opinion, not fact.

What is closer to the fact is that Bush and Blair probably told the truth as they understood it from the intelligence community. Or should I dig out the quotes from the Clintons, Gore, etc. saying the exact same thing, that Saddam was a very real threat to the U.S.?

Again, your opinion.

If you are accusing me of watching too much CNN, perhaps you better check your own viewing habits.

I continue to maintain that Iraq is better off and that vast strides have been made to restore the country. Religious freedom is a reality, power levels are up beyond pre-war levels, schools and hospitals are being rebuilt as is the rest of the country’s infrastructure. And it is very likely that the US will turn over control of the government to the Iraqis sometime this year.

All this less than a year after the war started.

Now I know this is hard for our 30 second sound bite society to understand, but this is actually happening very fast.

It took us something like 20 years or more to turn over control to Japan and Germany (sorry, don’t remember the exact numbers). Heck, we are STILL in Germany.

So, yes, I think things are better right now for Iraq.

As to corporations profiting, Fina-Total was set to make several billion dollars profit so long as Saddam stayed in power, as were German and Russian firms. So to argue that corporations are profiting, strikes me as non-sensical.

As I said to smooth above, everyone thought Saddam was a real threat, not just Bush and Blair. Personally, I’m still not convinced he wasn’t.

As long as people continue to believe this, it is a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I personally am trying to hold politicians to a higher standard, instead of the lowest common denominator.

Let me first just say that i think that the words morality and ethics are interchangable in this instance so i use them that way.

I look at morality/ethics in politics like i look at world peace. Just like there is always going to be somebody who will resort to violence as a viable means to solve problems, somebody will always resort to immoral/unethical actions to achieve their goals.

Like you said before, politics, as they apply to humanity, are a human creation. While we might create such things with the best intentions we are all only human and the qualities of selfishness and shortsightedness are just as inherent in the human condition as compassion and integrity. We can just as easily inject any human creation with reprehensible behavior as we can inject it with virtuous behavior.
Th reason i think morality/ethics generally don't exist in any meaningful form in politics is this: When there are no rules governing conduct between two competing forces, the side that is willing to resort to tactics that the other won't will be the victorious one. I realize that politics are heavily regulated, but in light of restrictions placed on regulations due to the first amendment they don't amount to much in terms of putting morality back in the mix. The gop can still unethically read electronic communications between members of the democratic party discussing unethical political battle strategies against the gop.