> I bet he tells the lie about the Nazi concentration camps too,
> isn't he ?
Lancet estimates the number of Iraqi civilians killed in just the current
conflict at around 100,000, possibly more. If you include Afghanis and Iraqi
civilians killed in the previous conflict, the number could be well above
150,000. This doesn't include the odd million or so who died as a result of
the sanctions.
Interesting that you'd compare the Nazi's with Bush.
>> No, it's not a "clean" war -- the insurgents who are hiding among the
>>civilians and using them as shields are seeing to that. So, who's fault
>>is
>>this?
Lets supposed China invades the US for some fictitious reason, blows up half
the country, takes over the government and disbands the US army. Let's say
China imprisons tens of thousands of Americans, with or without cause,
tortures a number of the "detainees", shoots a bunch of innocent civilians,
etc..
What would you do? Would you greet the Chinese soldiers with flowers and
open arms? Or would you fight back and do all you can to drive them out of
the country? I'd suggest that many Americans civilians, if facing the same
situation the Iraqis are now facing, would act in a similar manner against
an invading army. What may be an insurgent to you could be a freedom fighter
to an Iraqi.
>>Should the attempt to free the Iraqi's (something that the majority
>>of Iraqi people want) be abandoned and the Iraqi populace turned over to
>>thugs because those thugs are not fighting fair?
What do you consider a fair fight? Laser-guided 1 ton bombs, AC130's, Apache
attack helicopters, Bradley fighting vehicles, etc., against a mostly
rag-tag loosely organized group armed with AK-47's and a few RPG's? That
sound fair to you?
> I don't detect a mass insurgency in Iraq.
I don't know what you would call a mass insurgency, but it seems to be
growing rapidly. It's an order of magnitude stronger than it was a year ago.
> What it appears to be is a small
> number percentage-wise of mostly Baathists who like the old way when they
> were the oppressors.
That's what Rumsfeld and Fox news would have you believe, but the Baathists
are quite small in number, and from the reports I've read most of the
insurgents are average people angry with the occupation and fighting against
it. Much like any other nation would be under similar circumstances.
> So, you're saying the rules of the Geneva convention don't apply to the
> insurgents? You either fight "fairly" (i.e. don't hide among civilians,
> wear a uniform, etc) or you're outside the Geneva convention. Wait, let
> me
> guess...you want it both ways.
You're assuming two things here. One, that the US and Britain have been
following the Geneva conventions. They clearly haven't been, as witnessed by
the widespread torture, abuse, and indiscriminate killing of Iraqi
civilians, as well as the destruction of civilian infrastructure, among
other things. If the invading army did follow the Geneva conventions,
perhaps the Iraqis wouldn't be so angry and out for revenge. Two, you're
assuming that the resistance is an organized unit. Don't forget that the
Iraqi army was disbanded soon after the invasion, and there's no indication
that there is any meaningful organization of the resistance. It seems more
likely that there are multiple factions fighting the resistance, and soon,
possibly each other.
Note Follow-up.
mp wrote:
> > I bet he tells the lie about the Nazi concentration camps too,
> > isn't he ?
>
> Lancet estimates the number of Iraqi civilians killed in just the
current
> conflict at around 100,000, possibly more. If you include Afghanis
and Iraqi
> civilians killed in the previous conflict, the number could be well
above
> 150,000. This doesn't include the odd million or so who died as a
result of
> the sanctions.
>
1) Lancet is the journal that published the paper, not the part that
wrote the paper. Thus it was not Lancet that did the estimation.
2) The actual estimate in the paper was 98,000 with a .95 confidence
interval from 8,000 - 194,000. While that means that 98,000 is
the most probable value, the actual number is possible more and
possibly less. Most other estimates fall in the lower range.
What is significant is the high degree of confidence that
mortality has increased, rather than decreased as hoped.
3) The same authors did not include Afghanistan in their study.
However there is general agreement that Afghanistan was on the
verge of famine brought on by a combination of the UN sanctions,
mismanagement by the Taliban and civil war. Then there were
also the peopel being killed in the civil war itself and those
being judicially murdered under what passed for law under the
Taliban.
The US intervention in Afghanistan, sanctioned by the UN, supported
by almost every nation in the world, and planned by Powell and Tenet
has been overwhelmingly successful in improving the lot of the
Afghans themselves as well as improving the security of the US
and in the region.
The US invasion of Iraq, planned by Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld has
been a disaster that may yet be mitigated by the emergence of
a peaceful stable Iraqi nation, though at great cost.
--
FF
Note crossposting and follow-up.
Mark & Juanita wrote:
>
> If you look at the confidence interval, the
> numbers are meaningless,
Wrong. It is the confidnece interval that gives the number meaning.
Without a confidence interval (which one notes is typical of pre-
election pols) the number would be meaningless.
> the number could be as low as 8000 or as high as
> 150,000: i.e. the variances are so high as to make the study
essentially
> meaningless except as a pre-election political ploy.
Wrong again. The study shows a high degree of confidence that
Iraqi mortality increased during the period in question, rather
than decreasing as hoped. That is meaninful and significant
if the argument was that we went there to help the Iraqi people.
--
FF
Todd Fatheree wrote:
>
>
> So, you're saying the rules of the Geneva convention don't apply to
the
> insurgents? You either fight "fairly" (i.e. don't hide among
civilians,
> wear a uniform, etc) or you're outside the Geneva convention. Wait,
let me
> guess...you want it both ways.
A bit of an oversimplification since the Third Convention (on POWs)
includes several categories of civlian combatants.
But what is more important in this context is the process for
determining if a person 'commiting a beligerant act' is
a 'protected person' or not (Article V). The Bush administration
has rejected that process, thus violating the Geneva Conventions.
--
FF
Mark & Juanita wrote:
> On Tue, 25 Jan 2005 08:03:46 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Were you in SEA during that period? I was.
>
> Why is this relevant?
I see it as relevant to your characterisation of his viewpoint
as 'revisionist.'
There may have been (certainly there must have been) some people
during that time who thought that continued direct military
involvement by the US would result in the establishment of
peace in Vietnam, but damn few.
The notion that the United States could have 'won' the Vietnam
war, whether true or not, IS the revisionist viewpoint.
--
FF
Note follow-ups:
Mark & Juanita wrote:
> On Tue, 25 Jan 2005 08:03:46 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Were you in SEA during that period? I was.
>
> Why is this relevant?
I see it as relevant to your characterisation of his viewpoint
as 'revisionist.'
There may have been (certainly there must have been) some people
during that time who thought that continued direct military
involvement by the US would result in the establishment of
peace in Vietnam, but damn few.
The notion that the United States could have 'won' the Vietnam
war, whether true or not, IS the revisionist viewpoint.
--
FF
On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 19:38:08 -0700, Mark & Juanita
<[email protected]> wrote:
>On Sat, 8 Jan 2005 00:29:01 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>>And the same to the families of approx 150,000 thousand dead Iraq and
>>Afghani civilians.
>>
> Still hoping that if you keep repeating the lie often enough, it will
>become truth?
>
I bet he tells the lie about the Nazi concentration camps too,
isn't he ?
Mike Marlow wrote:
...
While I agree w/ not feeding the trolls in general, your comment here
was the one that finally reeled me in, too, Mike... :)
> ... then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
> the hell hole that was predicted, or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
> country that is simply living out life in the world?
...
Well, North Korea is a pretty dire hell-hole for many in rural areas and
they're probably the most realistic threat for a major conflict of
anywhere in the world at present (w/ Iran trying to catch up).
Fortunately, one positive result of the opening of China is that their
economic interests would be so disasterously impacted that they're now
the lid on the powder keg, so to speak...
Duane Bozarth wrote:
>
> Mike Marlow wrote:
> ...
> While I agree w/ not feeding the trolls in general, your comment here
> was the one that finally reeled me in, too, Mike... :)
>
> > ... then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
> > the hell hole that was predicted, or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
> > country that is simply living out life in the world?
> ...
>
> Well, North Korea ...
DOH! Man, I mixed my geog there, didn't I? Had one on mind even when
reading the other... :(
"GregP" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Tue, 11 Jan 2005 00:54:26 -0800, Fly-by-Night CC
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Part of the problem lies in which body count to believe - for example,
> >take the recent 500lb bomb on the wrong house: US govt. says 5 people
> >were accidentally killed; locals (and a journalist who eyewitnessed the
> >bodies) says that 14 were killed (7 adults, 7 children). Who is more
> >credible? Which number will the US-is-right faction cite, which will the
> >US-is-wrong faction cite? On the other hand, insurgent counts are likely
> >exaggerated by the US but undercounted by the al-Sadr's to al-Jezeera.
> >This is not the first time such discrepancies have arisen, it won't be
> >the last and we probably will never know the true numbers - just like
> >with the tsunami.
>
> and Vietnam.
Vietnam was easy. Every night we all got to watch the news and see that our
guys were killing hundreds of VC in every fire fight, while the American
death toll would only be something like, oh say... three. Then suddenly we
woke up one morning and discovered that 54,000 of our troops had been killed
over there. Funny thing - even with our cameras and news teams right over
there, the story that came home every night was exactly what the Pentagon
wanted the American public to hear. This action in Iraq is no different
than what we got tied up in over in Viet Nam and too many people who were
around back during Nam have forgotten the lessons learned there. Too many
other people, who weren't around during Viet Nam haven't learned their
history well enough to be wary of the way we're following down the very same
path now.
--
-Mike-
[email protected]
On Tue, 25 Jan 2005 22:43:29 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>"Mark & Juanita" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>
>
>Hey Mark, I'm going to bail at this point. Like I said when I put my big
>toe in the water, I generally avoid these discussions because they end up
>getting pretty heated, and end up accomplishing nothing. No point in
>creating animosity here over something neither one of us can control. I'd
>rather get into a pissing contest over whether everyone really needs a Griz
>or a Delta when we all know that nobody *really* needs anything more than a
>good 40 year old Craftsman Model 100.
Actually, I'm throwing my support to the "Robin's going missing" thread
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety
Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Mark & Juanita" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:42:31 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >I make it something of a practice to stay out of these threads but every
> >once in a while something flys by that just makes me want to throw my two
> >cents in. This is one of those. So what if they dissolve into civil
war?
> >Is that the business of the US or any other country? I'm sure you're
aware
> >that similar arguments were what kept us in Viet Nam until we finally
> >realized we could not pursuade a country that really did not care, to be
> >what we wanted them to be.
>
> No, contrary to your revisionist vision, what caused the outcome in
> Vietnam was the involvement of politicians and social scientists in the
> execution of the war. That was further exacerbated by the anti-war
> protestors at home. According to the memoirs of one of the North
> Vietnamese generals, they were ready to agree to a truce before the
> anti-war propaganda and sedition on the US home-front gave the NV the
> morale boost needed to continue until the US had to capitulate due to
> unrest in the US.
Were you in SEA during that period? I was. Kindly don't view me as holding
a "revisionist vision". Besides that, your comment does not refute what I
stated above. My comment was directed to the notion that the Viet Nameese
people would have been better served if we had left them to solve their own
issues. Over 54,000 American soldiers would have also.
>
> > Remember all of the rhetoric about the domino
> >theory? All of the horror stories that predicted what would happen if we
> >pulled out?
>
> Remember Laos and Cambodia? Kind of seems they fell after South Vietnam
So? They fell to what? Where are they today?
>
>
> > Remember how we could not defeat a backwards army of lesser
> >stature?
>
> Could not or were not allowed to? The fifth column saw to the fact that
> any attempt at victory was shown as brutal violence and uncivil.
Does not matter. It's not a question of whether we could have won a battle
or a war, it's a matter of whether we benefited anything by having been
there. Where are the Viet Nameese people today? After a major fiasco, a
people were left to settle their own lives... and they did. Civil wars are
no place for third party countries to push their own agenda.
>
> > And then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
> >the hell hole that was predicted,
>
> I suspect that if you have a few conversations with South Vietnam
> refugees, Hmong refugees, or other refugees who survived the killing
fields
> of Cambodia and the purges in South Vietnam following the fall of Saigon,
> you might get some idea of the definition of "hell hole"
As is the case in all conflicts. It's unfortunate, and it's cruel, but
that's humanity at work. 54,000 Americans would tell a story as well, but
that seems forgotten. My point is - where are they today? If the
attrocities immediately following the war continued over time, you might
have a more valid point, but the fact is, they didn't. The people of the
area settled their war and rebuilt a country in a way that is suitable for
them. It does not matter that it's not suitable for us or that it is not
what we wanted to see as an outcome. Our voice is irrelevant.
>
> > or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
> >country that is simply living out life in the world?
> >
>
> ... after they finished killing what, 3 million of their own citizens
> after the North Vietnamese take-over? Yeah, I suppose it's a pretty
quiet,
> unremarkable country now.
>
Again - the wages of war. It's not pleasant. I don't defend what happened,
but reality is that this is what happens. In countries that hold a
different definition of civilization than we do, we will see things that are
shocking and repulsive to us. The fact that these things are shocking and
repulsive though does not ensure that our intervention will benefit things
in either the short term or in the long run. We benefited nothing to the
South Vietnamese beyond reducing their population and ours over a long and
painful period. Takes me back to my only point - outside intervention in
Civil Wars is generally not a beneficial practice. Please remind me how our
experience in Viet Nam contradicts that. Forgo any inclination to suggest
what might have happened *if* we had done this, or done that.
--
-Mike-
[email protected]
I think we ought to think about helping out our people here at home. I saw
on the news that the folks in California are getting pretty beat-up and need
help too. Nobody in any of the other countries would ever lift a hand for
us.
"GregP" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> On Tue, 11 Jan 2005 00:54:26 -0800, Fly-by-Night CC
> <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> >
> >Part of the problem lies in which body count to believe - for example,
> >take the recent 500lb bomb on the wrong house: US govt. says 5 people
> >were accidentally killed; locals (and a journalist who eyewitnessed the
> >bodies) says that 14 were killed (7 adults, 7 children). Who is more
> >credible? Which number will the US-is-right faction cite, which will the
> >US-is-wrong faction cite? On the other hand, insurgent counts are likely
> >exaggerated by the US but undercounted by the al-Sadr's to al-Jezeera.
> >This is not the first time such discrepancies have arisen, it won't be
> >the last and we probably will never know the true numbers - just like
> >with the tsunami.
>
> and Vietnam.
I understand what you're saying, Mike, but I feel a lot more sadness for the
tens of thousands of people (especially the huge number of children) killed
by the tsunami. The honorable men and women that have given their lives in
Iraq at least went in with their heads up and were aware of what could
happen to them. It is still a tragedy that they died, but it was for a
purpose. The deaths from the tsunami will serve no purpose except to
further suffering and tragedy for generations to come.
I don't really think a price tag can be put on any of these deaths, it is
just terrible no matter which or how you look at it.
"mike hide" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> At the risk of sounding cheep, lets leave the US contribution as is [350
> million] and give the family of each serviceman killed in Iraq at least
> $500,000.....mjh
>
>
"J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> And what, leave Iraq to dissolve into civil war?
I make it something of a practice to stay out of these threads but every
once in a while something flys by that just makes me want to throw my two
cents in. This is one of those. So what if they dissolve into civil war?
Is that the business of the US or any other country? I'm sure you're aware
that similar arguments were what kept us in Viet Nam until we finally
realized we could not pursuade a country that really did not care, to be
what we wanted them to be. Remember all of the rhetoric about the domino
theory? All of the horror stories that predicted what would happen if we
pulled out? Remember how we could not defeat a backwards army of lesser
stature? And then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
the hell hole that was predicted, or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
country that is simply living out life in the world?
> So how many Iraqis will
> die in that war?
The nature of civil wars is that the country itself decides how many are
going to die. Not third party countries with external interests.
> And how many more Americans will die when the UN finally
> decides that enough is enough and sends the US back in to clean up the
> mess?
The UN can't send any country in to clean up any messes anywhere.
> Or do you think that _this_ time the UN will, for the first time in
> history, find somebody other than the US to do their dying for them?
Have they ever? What gives any reason to believe they would begin now?
> And
> don't give me any crap about "coalitions". In any UN sponsored
"coalition"
> it's the US that has the most casualties on the UN side.
>
All the more reason to let them go about resolving this mess on their own.
--
-Mike-
[email protected]
"mp" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> >> No, it's not a "clean" war -- the insurgents who are hiding among the
> >>civilians and using them as shields are seeing to that. So, who's fault
> >>is
> >>this?
>
> Lets supposed China invades the US for some fictitious reason, blows up
half
> the country, takes over the government and disbands the US army. Let's say
> China imprisons tens of thousands of Americans, with or without cause,
> tortures a number of the "detainees", shoots a bunch of innocent
civilians,
> etc..
> What would you do? Would you greet the Chinese soldiers with flowers and
> open arms? Or would you fight back and do all you can to drive them out of
> the country? I'd suggest that many Americans civilians, if facing the same
> situation the Iraqis are now facing, would act in a similar manner against
> an invading army. What may be an insurgent to you could be a freedom
fighter
> to an Iraqi.
I don't detect a mass insurgency in Iraq. What it appears to be is a small
number percentage-wise of mostly Baathists who like the old way when they
were the oppressors. If it was up to the libs in this country, we wouldn't
be able to do anything, because we wouldn't have the means to defend
ourselves.
> >>Should the attempt to free the Iraqi's (something that the majority
> >>of Iraqi people want) be abandoned and the Iraqi populace turned over to
> >>thugs because those thugs are not fighting fair?
>
> What do you consider a fair fight? Laser-guided 1 ton bombs, AC130's,
Apache
> attack helicopters, Bradley fighting vehicles, etc., against a mostly
> rag-tag loosely organized group armed with AK-47's and a few RPG's? That
> sound fair to you?
So, you're saying the rules of the Geneva convention don't apply to the
insurgents? You either fight "fairly" (i.e. don't hide among civilians,
wear a uniform, etc) or you're outside the Geneva convention. Wait, let me
guess...you want it both ways.
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote in
news:[email protected]:
> Still hoping that if you keep repeating the lie often enough, it
> will
> become truth?
"Duane Bozarth" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Duane Bozarth wrote:
> >
> > Mike Marlow wrote:
> > ...
> > While I agree w/ not feeding the trolls in general, your comment here
> > was the one that finally reeled me in, too, Mike... :)
> >
> > > ... then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
> > > the hell hole that was predicted, or is it more of a quiet,
unremarkable
> > > country that is simply living out life in the world?
> > ...
> >
> > Well, North Korea ...
>
> DOH! Man, I mixed my geog there, didn't I? Had one on mind even when
> reading the other... :(
You're obviously getting old. That's one of the early warning signs.
--
-Mike-
[email protected]
"mike hide" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> At the risk of sounding cheep, lets leave the US contribution as is [350
> million] and give the family of each serviceman killed in Iraq at least
> $500,000.....mjh
>
>Better yet.........lets get all the service men out of Iraq and send em to
>help out in Tsunami affected areas. At least they'll be welcome there.
On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 20:01:45 -0700, Mark & Juanita
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
> No, it's not a "clean" war -- the insurgents who are hiding among the
>civilians and using them as shields are seeing to that. So, who's fault is
>this? Should the attempt to free the Iraqi's (something that the majority
>of Iraqi people want) be abandoned and the Iraqi populace turned over to
>thugs because those thugs are not fighting fair?
We invaded Iraq, so we are responsible. Or are you
one of those people that do not believe that we should
take responsibility for our actions ???? This prez has
followed the time-honored tradition of other recent Rep
presidents by deciding to go in and beat the hell out of
a small country. It makes him a hero with the lobotomized,
it stirs up the True Patriots riding around with flags plastered
on their 10 MPG SUVs and pickups, it calls for lots of
Patriotic Proclamations from junkie talk show hosts who
wouldn't dream of subjecting their own precious bodies
to the cause, and it gives our own religious extremist
fundamentals something to bless with hosannahs. Mean-
while, countries where brutality and murder are/have been
committed on a truly major scale, China and Korea, are
left alone because this Prez doesn't have the courage to
invade *them*. Much better to beat the hell out of the
Iraqis to "save" them and can keep the casualties of our
boys and girls below the 1 million mark. It's too bad that
this Prez doesn't even have the courage to make us pay
the taxes for the money he wastes, pushing the cost off
on boys and girls who haven't been born yet. It's great
to be a Patriot when it doesn't cost you anything.
On Tue, 11 Jan 2005 00:54:26 -0800, Fly-by-Night CC
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>Part of the problem lies in which body count to believe - for example,
>take the recent 500lb bomb on the wrong house: US govt. says 5 people
>were accidentally killed; locals (and a journalist who eyewitnessed the
>bodies) says that 14 were killed (7 adults, 7 children). Who is more
>credible? Which number will the US-is-right faction cite, which will the
>US-is-wrong faction cite? On the other hand, insurgent counts are likely
>exaggerated by the US but undercounted by the al-Sadr's to al-Jezeera.
>This is not the first time such discrepancies have arisen, it won't be
>the last and we probably will never know the true numbers - just like
>with the tsunami.
and Vietnam.
Don wrote:
>
> "mike hide" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
>> At the risk of sounding cheep, lets leave the US contribution as is [350
>> million] and give the family of each serviceman killed in Iraq at least
>> $500,000.....mjh
>>
>>Better yet.........lets get all the service men out of Iraq and send em to
>>help out in Tsunami affected areas. At least they'll be welcome there.
And what, leave Iraq to dissolve into civil war? So how many Iraqis will
die in that war? And how many more Americans will die when the UN finally
decides that enough is enough and sends the US back in to clean up the
mess? Or do you think that _this_ time the UN will, for the first time in
history, find somebody other than the US to do their dying for them? And
don't give me any crap about "coalitions". In any UN sponsored "coalition"
it's the US that has the most casualties on the UN side.
--
--John
Reply to jclarke at ae tee tee global dot net
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 07:40:19 -0500, "J. Clarke"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>And what, leave Iraq to dissolve into civil war? So how many Iraqis will
>die in that war? And how many more Americans will die when the UN finally
>decides that enough is enough and sends the US back in to clean up the
>mess? Or do you think that _this_ time the UN will, for the first time in
>history, find somebody other than the US to do their dying for them? And
>don't give me any crap about "coalitions". In any UN sponsored "coalition"
>it's the US that has the most casualties on the UN side.
Old-timey Soviet-style Orwellian Speak. When did the UN ever "send"
US troops anywhere ? Without someone like Bush asking the UN to
legitimize adventurst crap like the Iraqi war by pretending it to be
a UN operation ?
On Tue, 25 Jan 2005 08:03:46 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>"Mark & Juanita" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>> On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:42:31 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >I make it something of a practice to stay out of these threads but every
>> >once in a while something flys by that just makes me want to throw my two
>> >cents in. This is one of those. So what if they dissolve into civil
>war?
>> >Is that the business of the US or any other country? I'm sure you're
>aware
>> >that similar arguments were what kept us in Viet Nam until we finally
>> >realized we could not pursuade a country that really did not care, to be
>> >what we wanted them to be.
>>
>> No, contrary to your revisionist vision, what caused the outcome in
>> Vietnam was the involvement of politicians and social scientists in the
>> execution of the war. That was further exacerbated by the anti-war
>> protestors at home. According to the memoirs of one of the North
>> Vietnamese generals, they were ready to agree to a truce before the
>> anti-war propaganda and sedition on the US home-front gave the NV the
>> morale boost needed to continue until the US had to capitulate due to
>> unrest in the US.
>
>Were you in SEA during that period?
Why is this relevant? Are you implying that one cannot observe or study
events in which one has not directly participated and draw conclusions and
insight from those events? If so, then you are totally unquallifed to
comment on anything relevant to WWII. If you have not been directly
involved in a drunk driver incident, either as a perpetrator or a victim,
you have no right to comment upon that topic. If you haven't cut your
finger off with a table saw, you are not qualified to discuss table saw
safety.
> I was.
Thank-you for your service to your country. No one should take away from
that.
> Kindly don't view me as holding
>a "revisionist vision". Besides that, your comment does not refute what I
>stated above. My comment was directed to the notion that the Viet Nameese
>people would have been better served if we had left them to solve their own
>issues. Over 54,000 American soldiers would have also.
>
Would that they were solving their own issues. However, the North was
being heavily funded by the other world superpower at the time. Had we
actually pursued victory, at least those 54,000 would not have died for no
gain.
>>
>> > Remember all of the rhetoric about the domino
>> >theory? All of the horror stories that predicted what would happen if we
>> >pulled out?
>>
>> Remember Laos and Cambodia? Kind of seems they fell after South Vietnam
>
>So? They fell to what? Where are they today?
>
>>
>>
>> > Remember how we could not defeat a backwards army of lesser
>> >stature?
>>
>> Could not or were not allowed to? The fifth column saw to the fact that
>> any attempt at victory was shown as brutal violence and uncivil.
>
>Does not matter. It's not a question of whether we could have won a battle
>or a war, it's a matter of whether we benefited anything by having been
>there. Where are the Viet Nameese people today? After a major fiasco, a
>people were left to settle their own lives... and they did. Civil wars are
>no place for third party countries to push their own agenda.
>
>>
>> > And then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
>> >the hell hole that was predicted,
>>
>> I suspect that if you have a few conversations with South Vietnam
>> refugees, Hmong refugees, or other refugees who survived the killing
>fields
>> of Cambodia and the purges in South Vietnam following the fall of Saigon,
>> you might get some idea of the definition of "hell hole"
>
>As is the case in all conflicts. It's unfortunate, and it's cruel, but
>that's humanity at work. 54,000 Americans would tell a story as well, but
>that seems forgotten. My point is - where are they today? If the
>attrocities immediately following the war continued over time, you might
>have a more valid point, but the fact is, they didn't. The people of the
>area settled their war and rebuilt a country in a way that is suitable for
>them. It does not matter that it's not suitable for us or that it is not
>what we wanted to see as an outcome. Our voice is irrelevant.
>
>>
>> > or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
>> >country that is simply living out life in the world?
>> >
>>
>> ... after they finished killing what, 3 million of their own citizens
>> after the North Vietnamese take-over? Yeah, I suppose it's a pretty
>quiet,
>> unremarkable country now.
>>
>
>Again - the wages of war. It's not pleasant. I don't defend what happened,
>but reality is that this is what happens.
Pretty callous view of your fellow humans
> In countries that hold a
>different definition of civilization than we do, we will see things that are
>shocking and repulsive to us.
Under that different definition of civilization, those 3 million dead are
still dead.
Guess we shouldn't have bothered with Europe in the '40s either.
> The fact that these things are shocking and
>repulsive though does not ensure that our intervention will benefit things
>in either the short term or in the long run. We benefited nothing to the
>South Vietnamese beyond reducing their population and ours over a long and
>painful period.
Again, that is not due to the fact we were there, it is due to the fact
that once there, we failed to act decisively, instead choosing to pursue a
"war of limited objectives" When one commits troops, there is no such
thing as "limited objectives".
> Takes me back to my only point - outside intervention in
>Civil Wars is generally not a beneficial practice. Please remind me how our
>experience in Viet Nam contradicts that. Forgo any inclination to suggest
>what might have happened *if* we had done this, or done that.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety
Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 19:38:08 -0700, Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
BTW who are the liars?
> Still hoping that if you keep repeating the lie often enough, it will
>become truth?
On Sat, 08 Jan 2005 04:09:19 GMT, "Mike in Mystic"
<[email protected]> vaguely proposed a theory
......and in reply I say!:
remove ns from my header address to reply via email
>The honorable men and women that have given their lives in
>Iraq at least went in with their heads up and were aware of what could
>happen to them. It is still a tragedy that they died.........
Amen.
On Sat, 8 Jan 2005 00:29:01 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> At the risk of sounding cheep, lets leave the US contribution as is [350
>> million] and give the family of each serviceman killed in Iraq at least
>> $500,000.....mjh
>
>And the same to the families of approx 150,000 thousand dead Iraq and
>Afghani civilians.
>
Still hoping that if you keep repeating the lie often enough, it will
become truth?
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Now we'll just use some glue to hold things in place until the brads dry
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:42:31 -0500, "Mike Marlow"
<[email protected]> wrote:
>
>"J. Clarke" <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>>
>> And what, leave Iraq to dissolve into civil war?
>
>I make it something of a practice to stay out of these threads but every
>once in a while something flys by that just makes me want to throw my two
>cents in. This is one of those. So what if they dissolve into civil war?
>Is that the business of the US or any other country? I'm sure you're aware
>that similar arguments were what kept us in Viet Nam until we finally
>realized we could not pursuade a country that really did not care, to be
>what we wanted them to be.
No, contrary to your revisionist vision, what caused the outcome in
Vietnam was the involvement of politicians and social scientists in the
execution of the war. That was further exacerbated by the anti-war
protestors at home. According to the memoirs of one of the North
Vietnamese generals, they were ready to agree to a truce before the
anti-war propaganda and sedition on the US home-front gave the NV the
morale boost needed to continue until the US had to capitulate due to
unrest in the US.
> Remember all of the rhetoric about the domino
>theory? All of the horror stories that predicted what would happen if we
>pulled out?
Remember Laos and Cambodia? Kind of seems they fell after South Vietnam
> Remember how we could not defeat a backwards army of lesser
>stature?
Could not or were not allowed to? The fifth column saw to the fact that
any attempt at victory was shown as brutal violence and uncivil.
> And then finally - where is Viet Nam today? Did it degrade into
>the hell hole that was predicted,
I suspect that if you have a few conversations with South Vietnam
refugees, Hmong refugees, or other refugees who survived the killing fields
of Cambodia and the purges in South Vietnam following the fall of Saigon,
you might get some idea of the definition of "hell hole"
> or is it more of a quiet, unremarkable
>country that is simply living out life in the world?
>
... after they finished killing what, 3 million of their own citizens
after the North Vietnamese take-over? Yeah, I suppose it's a pretty quiet,
unremarkable country now.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
The absence of accidents does not mean the presence of safety
Army General Richard Cody
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
"Mark & Juanita" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
Hey Mark, I'm going to bail at this point. Like I said when I put my big
toe in the water, I generally avoid these discussions because they end up
getting pretty heated, and end up accomplishing nothing. No point in
creating animosity here over something neither one of us can control. I'd
rather get into a pissing contest over whether everyone really needs a Griz
or a Delta when we all know that nobody *really* needs anything more than a
good 40 year old Craftsman Model 100.
--
-Mike-
[email protected]
On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:13:26 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>Interesting that you'd compare the Nazi's with Bush.
I am NOT comparing "the Nazi's [sic] with Bush." I
am comparing the people who pretend that this is
a nice, celan war where the only casualties worth
worrying about are US to the people who pretend
that the holocaust didn't happen.
In article <[email protected]>,
Mark & Juanita <[email protected]> wrote:
> I am calling into
> question the 150,000 number. The Lancet article uses 100,000, this gets
> boosted to "more likely 150k". If you look at the confidence interval, the
> numbers are meaningless, the number could be as low as 8000 or as high as
> 150,000: i.e. the variances are so high as to make the study essentially
> meaningless except as a pre-election political ploy. In addition, the
> numbers include insurgents (i.e., those whom we are fighting).
Part of the problem lies in which body count to believe - for example,
take the recent 500lb bomb on the wrong house: US govt. says 5 people
were accidentally killed; locals (and a journalist who eyewitnessed the
bodies) says that 14 were killed (7 adults, 7 children). Who is more
credible? Which number will the US-is-right faction cite, which will the
US-is-wrong faction cite? On the other hand, insurgent counts are likely
exaggerated by the US but undercounted by the al-Sadr's to al-Jezeera.
This is not the first time such discrepancies have arisen, it won't be
the last and we probably will never know the true numbers - just like
with the tsunami.
--
Owen Lowe and his Fly-by-Night Copper Company
____
"Sure we'll have fascism in America, but it'll come disguised
as 100% Americanism." -- Huey P. Long
On Fri, 7 Jan 2005 21:30:50 -0500, "mike hide" <[email protected]>
wrote:
>At the risk of sounding cheep, lets leave the US contribution as is [350
>million] and give the family of each serviceman killed in Iraq at least
>$500,000.....mjh
Or at least send the boys some armor for their Humvees and some vests.
I'm not for the war in principle, but if we've gotta do it, let's at
least protect the troops as much as possible- most of those guys are
kids, fer cripes sake.
Aut inveniam viam aut faciam
On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 12:31:06 -0500, GregP <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:13:26 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>>Interesting that you'd compare the Nazi's with Bush.
>
>
> I am NOT comparing "the Nazi's [sic] with Bush." I
> am comparing the people who pretend that this is
> a nice, celan war where the only casualties worth
> worrying about are US to the people who pretend
> that the holocaust didn't happen.
I'm not saying that. Civilian casualties are not good and are something
that our military has gone out of its way to reduce. I am calling into
question the 150,000 number. The Lancet article uses 100,000, this gets
boosted to "more likely 150k". If you look at the confidence interval, the
numbers are meaningless, the number could be as low as 8000 or as high as
150,000: i.e. the variances are so high as to make the study essentially
meaningless except as a pre-election political ploy. In addition, the
numbers include insurgents (i.e., those whom we are fighting).
No, it's not a "clean" war -- the insurgents who are hiding among the
civilians and using them as shields are seeing to that. So, who's fault is
this? Should the attempt to free the Iraqi's (something that the majority
of Iraqi people want) be abandoned and the Iraqi populace turned over to
thugs because those thugs are not fighting fair?
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Now we'll just use some glue to hold things in place until the brads dry
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
On Tue, 11 Jan 2005 13:11:08 -0500, GregP <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 20:01:45 -0700, Mark & Juanita
><[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>
>> No, it's not a "clean" war -- the insurgents who are hiding among the
>>civilians and using them as shields are seeing to that. So, who's fault is
>>this? Should the attempt to free the Iraqi's (something that the majority
>>of Iraqi people want) be abandoned and the Iraqi populace turned over to
>>thugs because those thugs are not fighting fair?
>
>
> We invaded Iraq, so we are responsible. Or are you
> one of those people that do not believe that we should
> take responsibility for our actions ????
You're right of course, I should have seen it before. We should have let
Saddam continue murdering, raping, and torturing his people even when we
had reason to stop him. How silly of me.
> This prez has
> followed the time-honored tradition of other recent Rep
> presidents by deciding to go in and beat the hell out of
> a small country.
> It makes him a hero with the lobotomized,
> it stirs up the True Patriots riding around with flags plastered
> on their 10 MPG SUVs and pickups, it calls for lots of
> Patriotic Proclamations from junkie talk show hosts who
> wouldn't dream of subjecting their own precious bodies
> to the cause, and it gives our own religious extremist
> fundamentals something to bless with hosannahs.
Nope, no stereo-typed elitism in that statement. Nosiree. Couldn't just
keep this at a discussion of differing opinions could you, had to make the
other side out to be a bunch of bible-thumping, gun toting,
whiskey-swilling, illiterate, mind-numbed robot rednecks (did I leave
anything out there?). Certainly no one who disagrees with your opinion
could have arrived at that opinion through an independent line of rational
thinking could they? Nope, to arrive at those opinions and beliefs,
someone else had to have fed them those ideas and brainwashed them.
> Mean-
> while, countries where brutality and murder are/have been
> committed on a truly major scale, China and Korea, are
> left alone because this Prez doesn't have the courage to
> invade *them*.
Oh yeah, had we invaded North Korea, I am certain you would have been
right up there praising the president for his bold decisive action and 100%
behind our troops and policies. You betcha.
> Much better to beat the hell out of the
> Iraqis to "save" them and can keep the casualties of our
> boys and girls below the 1 million mark. It's too bad that
> this Prez doesn't even have the courage to make us pay
> the taxes for the money he wastes, pushing the cost off
> on boys and girls who haven't been born yet. It's great
> to be a Patriot when it doesn't cost you anything.
Not even going to touch the difference of opinion here on how tax cuts
can be shown to be stimulative to the economy and actually increase revenue
as the economy grows. Certainly, there are extremes on the lower end to
where revenue declines to zero, however, we were headed the other way with
taxes headed to the level of discouraging people from taking the initiative
necessary to increase income since the drag resulting from excess taxes
didn't leave enough to make the extra effort worthwhile.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Now we'll just use some glue to hold things in place until the brads dry
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:13:26 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> wrote:
>> I bet he tells the lie about the Nazi concentration camps too,
>> isn't he ?
>
>Lancet estimates the number of Iraqi civilians killed in just the current
>conflict at around 100,000, possibly more. If you include Afghanis and Iraqi
>civilians killed in the previous conflict, the number could be well above
>150,000. This doesn't include the odd million or so who died as a result of
>the sanctions.
>
Well, let's see:
<http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=205657>
... "The researchers of The Lancet report concede that the data they based
their projections on were of "limited precision," because the quality of
the information depends on the accuracy of the household interviews used
for the study. The interviewers were Iraqi, most of them doctors."
<http://www.wbai.org/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=4400&Itemid=0>
"The Lancet study's headline figure of "100,000" excess deaths is a
probabilistic projection from a small number of reported deaths - most of
them from aerial weaponry - in a sample of 988 households to the entire
Iraqi population."
"the authors clearly state that "many" of the dead in their sample may have
been combatants [P.7]). "
You seem to forget the estimated millions that Saddaam killed during his
reign. Of course that doesn't matter because it wouldn't portray the US as
evil.
>Interesting that you'd compare the Nazi's with Bush.
>
Nope, pretty much shows the agenda and worldview of the poster.
In that world view:
1. Whatever the US does (intervene, neutral, support third party) === EVIL
2. Whatever France does == GOOD
3. Whatever the rest of the world does == GOOD
If the US does something good, see rule #1.
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Now we'll just use some glue to hold things in place until the brads dry
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
On Sun, 9 Jan 2005 17:13:26 -0800, "mp" <[email protected]> vaguely proposed
a theory
......and in reply I say!:
remove ns from my header address to reply via email
He's not in any way doing that, at least not here.
Someone accused him of lying when stating something that is blatantly
a truth. The Holocaust is a good example because of its obvious truth,
not by comparison or with judgment.
Which is not to...no.... (evil leer)
>Interesting that you'd compare the Nazi's with Bush.
>