Military Respect

I've never actually lived in Star. Or Mississippi until college, actually. But my blood is here. My grandparents are here, and it's the only consistent place I've ever known. I was born in Camp Lejeune and have been moving around ever since. Dad was stationed three times in Fort Sill, and a few years overseas- Okinawa and Puerto Rico, if that counts. Nobody will ever turn me away from the Marines, if that's what I decide to do. Too many generations of Marine blood. And I was raised to believe that Marines are the best.

You know where Star is, but do you know where Currituck County is? That would be a million times more impressive.


Oh! And A Few Good Men is THE best movie EVER!
 
dt3 said:
In all fairness, there's a lot of countries (including Iraq under Saddam) where nobody has any personal choices to make regarding their government. If you believe personal choice is a natural right everybody should have, then wouldn't we be remiss in our duties as a superpower to sit idly by while innocents suffer?
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I know that.


I don't think its the duty for ONE nation to go in and change a nation. If there is a country like Iraq doing the things they were doing to their own people, we should use all diplomacy and the UN to sort things out.
 
All Else Failed said:
I know that.


I don't think its the duty for ONE nation to go in and change a nation. If there is a country like Iraq doing the things they were doing to their own people, we should use all diplomacy and the UN to sort things out.
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Very true! But unfortunately our boy Dubya didn't let the UN do its job when it came to Iraq. I think maybe that may have been because he knew they would discover that Iraq in fact did NOT have WMD's and that would have been detrimental to his grand "vision" of a free Iraq (aka an invasion of Iraq so he could finish what his daddy started).
 
All Else Failed said:
I know that.


I don't think its the duty for ONE nation to go in and change a nation. If there is a country like Iraq doing the things they were doing to their own people, we should use all diplomacy and the UN to sort things out.
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I don't think Saddam was very fond of diplomacy. And diplomacy is nothing without the backing/threat of a powerful military.
 
White2000GT said:
Very true! But unfortunately our boy Dubya didn't let the UN do its job when it came to Iraq. I think maybe that may have been because he knew they would discover that Iraq in fact did NOT have WMD's and that would have been detrimental to his grand "vision" of a free Iraq (aka an invasion of Iraq so he could finish what his daddy started).
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That may be true, but the UN tried. Remember when Saddam kicked the inspectors out? What did the UN do after that? I don't honestly know, but I don't think it was much.

And even if he did have no WMD's, I believe Saddam wanted the world to think he did. He doesn't have to have them to scare other governments in the region. Otherwise, why would he have kicked the inspectors out. The way I see it, we called his bluff and he lost. If we didn't do it, who would have?
 
Yeah you're right. The UN could have done more. And Saddam probably did want the world to think he had WMD's. Why, I don't know. In my mind, if he had nothing to hide then he shouldn't have had a problem with the inspectors being there. The fact is, Saddam was a lunatic with a god complex. Who knows what was going through his mind? Even after he was toppled from power and was in court he would still yell at the judge and tell him he had no right to judge him because he was the President of Iraq!

As far as who would have called his bluff if we hadn't? I'm not too sure it would have mattered much seeing as how he really didn't have any WMD's. Now, could he have secretly aquired them a few years down the road? Sure. But, if the UN watchdogs would have been doing their jobs then the world would have known about it, and THEN we would have had a more legitimate excuse to bring the military in on him. Just my opinion.
 
I guess it is weird, but in my opinion, it's wrong to sit around and watch something bad happen if you have the power to stop it.

Think on a smaller scale. If you saw a woman about to be raped, would you try to stop the guy? You're not law enforcement or anything, but don't you think you still have the responsibility to at least do something? That's how I see the Iraq situation.
 
dt3 said:
I guess it is weird, but in my opinion, it's wrong to sit around and watch something bad happen if you have the power to stop it.

Think on a smaller scale. If you saw a woman about to be raped, would you try to stop the guy? You're not law enforcement or anything, but don't you think you still have the responsibility to at least do something? That's how I see the Iraq situation.
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But thats just it. We do have the power and it is over-used in the wrong circumstances (ex. Iraq) and under-used in other situations (ex. any oil bearing country).

The reason the UN was put in place was to govern the rest of the world. Unfortunately as of late, when anyone thinks of the UN, they immediately think U.S.. We are not the UN, nor do we need to be taking on the responsibility and the duties of it.

The good thing is that the US is very good at learning its mistakes and eventually will get this right. Perhaps not in our life times, but eventually.
 
But how is Iraq the wrong circumstance? Even without WMD's, there's now question that Saddam was a brutal, oppressive dictator. Things may not have gone how we would've liked, but at least we did something. That's more than the rest of the world can say.

And yes, there's 192 countries in the UN. But honestly, what do we expect Bhutan, Benin, Andorra, Angola, Congo, Croatia, Cyprus, Grenada, Monaco, Palau, Swaziland, Tuvalu, Timor-Leste, and all the other (sorry if it's not PC) joke-countries to do? The US is the largest, freely-elected superpower in the UN. That gives us the responsibility to at least try to do what's right. And popular opinion isn't always right.
 
dt3 said:
But how is Iraq the wrong circumstance? Even without WMD's, there's now question that Saddam was a brutal, oppressive dictator. Things may not have gone how we would've liked, but at least we did something. That's more than the rest of the world can say.

And yes, there's 192 countries in the UN. But honestly, what do we expect Bhutan, Benin, Andorra, Angola, Congo, Croatia, Cyprus, Grenada, Monaco, Palau, Swaziland, Tuvalu, Timor-Leste, and all the other (sorry if it's not PC) joke-countries to do? The US is the largest, freely-elected superpower in the UN. That gives us the responsibility to at least try to do what's right. And popular opinion isn't always right.
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Because Iraq was a sovereign nation, and things there compared to other countries were not that bad. Everyone had a job, the economy was stable, no civil wars or anything. What Saddam did to his own people is terrible, but it wasnt on the scale where I think the entire country needed to be overthrown.
 
AllVenom said:
But thats just it. We do have the power and it is over-used in the wrong circumstances (ex. Iraq) and under-used in other situations (ex. any oil bearing country).

The reason the UN was put in place was to govern the rest of the world. Unfortunately as of late, when anyone thinks of the UN, they immediately think U.S.. We are not the UN, nor do we need to be taking on the responsibility and the duties of it.

The good thing is that the US is very good at learning its mistakes and eventually will get this right. Perhaps not in our life times, but eventually.
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The UN wasnt made to govern the world. The UN was made to keep wars and other conflicts from happening.

I wouldn't say that we're that good at learning from mistakes made from foreign policy. We have a history of starting illegal wars.
 
All Else Failed said:
Because Iraq was a sovereign nation, and things there compared to other countries were not that bad. Everyone had a job, the economy was stable, no civil wars or anything. What Saddam did to his own people is terrible, but it wasnt on the scale where I think the entire country needed to be overthrown.
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He used nerve gas on his own countrymen because they disagreed with him!!!! He made constant threats against the US, and literally everybody thought he had the means to carry those threats out!!!! What does it have to take before we step in?
 
All Else Failed said:
The UN wasnt made to govern the world. The UN was made to keep wars and other conflicts from happening.

I wouldn't say that we're that good at learning from mistakes made from foreign policy. We have a history of starting illegal wars.
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They tried to stop this war. Saddam kicked the UN Inspectors out, we gave him an ultimatum to let them back in, he didn't meet it, we made good on our threats. What steps did the UN take to get their inspectors back in? Sanctions? What were those supposed to accomplish? At some point it has to be admitted that talking has failed, and action must be taken.

I do agree that we don't seem to learn from our mistakes. Several comparisons to Vietnam immediately come to mind, which I didn't really see until I was over there.
 
dt3 said:
He used nerve gas on his own countrymen because they disagreed with him!!!! He made constant threats against the US, and literally everybody thought he had the means to carry those threats out!!!! What does it have to take before we step in?
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We start illegal wars that kill thousands of people just for natural resources. Why do you think we're so involved with South America?


Everyone knew that Saddam wouldnt make a move against the US. That lie was perpetuated by the media to make people afraid. Saddam wasn't stupid.
 
dt3 said:
They tried to stop this war. Saddam kicked the UN Inspectors out, we gave him an ultimatum to let them back in, he didn't meet it, we made good on our threats. What steps did the UN take to get their inspectors back in? Sanctions? What were those supposed to accomplish? At some point it has to be admitted that talking has failed, and action must be taken.

I do agree that we don't seem to learn from our mistakes. Several comparisons to Vietnam immediately come to mind, which I didn't really see until I was over there.
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They were actually going to work, and Saddam was going to let them back in, But Bush cut that short, didn't he?

What mistakes have we learned from?
 
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