Zmid Posted June 17, 2004 Share Posted June 17, 2004 In pre-Gulf War Iraq, about a hundred people died from poverty daily. After the US blockade started on Iraq, that figure rose to 6000 deaths from starvation and poverty DAILY, to put that into context, the US inflicted upon Iraq two September 11ths every single day. A few tortured terrorists is humane by normal US standards... Just a slight correction - that was UN sanctions, which the US was part of, not purely a US blockade. As far as I can tell, the thinking behind that was 'squeeze the Iraqi people and Saddam will topple'. They seemed to forget Saddam didn't give a flying **** about the Iraqi people. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pharzon Posted June 19, 2004 Share Posted June 19, 2004 Yes, and that is normally the big problem with blocades. The victims are the civilians. This is not only the case in the Iraq-case but is also seen many other places. Cuba anyone? The only difference in the case of Cuba is that it is only an American blocade. Really, don't get me started on this whole Cuba-US thing. pharzon.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chunky_Moose Posted June 19, 2004 Share Posted June 19, 2004 Cuba, what and absolutely fantastic country. Too influential for the US to attack, not influential enough to cause a major global problem. Too rich to be affected seriously by the US sanctions but not rich enough to get the US to drop its sanctions. LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mojlnir Posted June 20, 2004 Share Posted June 20, 2004 No more playing the opposite side for me, lest anyone seriously start to think that I am an ignorant, rhetoric spewing arse. Cuba and the US: stupidity bred initially from significant contributions to political candidates by anti-Castro Cuban refugees and continued because, in all its sad honesty, Americans have forgotten about Cuba...ask someone on the street and chances are good they'll look at you like you're a leper with SARS Prisoner Abuse: I wish it wasn't true...but its something that we have to live with as Americans. I really do know a guy who told stories like the one I alluded to and I tried to understand his point of view, but never having experienced anything remotely like that I was at a loss. It feels wrong to implement policies like that, but you can't help but wonder what you would do in the same situation. As for torture, it has been around forever, and because I think conflict is here to stay as well, I don't think we're going to get rid of it. We can argue until we are blue in the face that we are more civilized now than ever before, but I would argue that we simply have more effective means of killing people and ignoring it than ever before. In all, I feel that the decision to employ these sorts of tactics was short-sighted and criminal though I doubt that those truly responsible will be held accountable. This sort of behavior makes an already unpleasant situation worse and serves only to increase the feelings of ill will that already exist. What's even worse though is that these acts were committed under the assumption that there would be no reckoning...no final accounting. Arrogance is perhaps the most deadly enemy of all. -M Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pharzon Posted June 20, 2004 Share Posted June 20, 2004 Cuba, what and absolutely fantastic country. Too influential for the US to attack, not influential enough to cause a major global problem. Too rich to be affected seriously by the US sanctions but not rich enough to get the US to drop its sanctions. LOL Too influential for the US to attack?That depends on what you call attacking, for sure.The US has founded several attacks on Cuba. In the sixties Cuba was attacked several times every month by American airplanes, who bombed the fields of the country. I would call that attacking myself.Furthermore there is, of course, the incident at The Bay of Pigs (not sure if that is the English word for it). That WAS an attack, which is not debateable.And no, no at all rich enough to not being affected by the blocades; the Cuban people would be far better off if the US stopped their pointless and aggresive behaviour. pharzon.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chunky_Moose Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Yes, the Bay of Pigs was really the only major US action against Cuba and it involved no US troops because the US were too scared of the USSR to send in their own troops. The invasion was an absolute failure and the US has never attempted another landing since. Even after the collapse of the USSR, the US has decided that it would cause SERIOUS international trouble for itself if it did attack Cuba so it decided not too. Also i guess another reason is because Cuba doesn't have any oil like Iraq so even if the US did have more reason to attack Cuba, it wouldn't be worth it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brighid Posted June 23, 2004 Share Posted June 23, 2004 Also i guess another reason is because Cuba doesn't have any oil like Iraq so even if the US did have more reason to attack Cuba, it wouldn't be worth it.Its because we had Kennedy in office then, and we have Bush in office now.Kennedy gave us the Peace Corps, NASA, and one liners memorable for their brilliance.Bush has given us 3 million lost jobs, NCLB, and one liners memorable because he can't pronounce the words. Today we have beauties like this in the Chicago Tribune headlines :!:http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/printed...i-printnews-hed Also in today's paper, to move back on topic, Bush Claimed Right to Waive Torture Laws http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationw...ll=chi-news-hed The Gall of that man! :angry2: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tyjet3 Posted June 23, 2004 Share Posted June 23, 2004 You guys make it sound like Bush has power over everything. You do know that we have a checks and balance system, right? Everything Bush does has to be approved by Congress. Don't blame just Bush, blame the whole government!! And just so you know, Kennedy was the worst President in the history of the US... As a great man once said, "Hate the actions of the man, not the man himself." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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