He voted to KILL the F-15, the B-1, the B-2, the patriot missles, and many many more I cannot remember.

No he didn’t- the Republicans just pulled out his voting against two entire defense bills (1990 & 1995) and pretended that he had voted “against” every weapon in those bills. Out of those weapons, the only weapon he’s voted to actually kill is the B-2, and quite frankly, it’s not like it was a trouble free procurement program beyond criticism.

It’s true in 1984, he did, as a candidate, say he’d like to cancel all sorts of weapon systems, but once he got into office he never did any such thing. In addition, since 1997 he’s been a big defense ‘yes’ voter.

I fear he’ll kill some projects we need, and it’ll come back to haunt us.
If, the F-22 and F-35 are cut, in 15 years we’ll be flying against top of the line Migs and sukoi’s and their Indian/Chinese equivalents–with near FIFTY YEAR OLD designs!

He hasn’t said anything about cutting either, personally I think they’re safe.

Originally posted by SOC
[B]The UN didn’t specifically rule out an invasion either.

By affirming Iraq’s sovereignty in the various post war resolutions, it implicitly does.

You get points here. Most of the blithering anti-war idiots on TV fail to get at the meat of the issue-military action to disarm Iraq was fully justified the minute he did not turn over the SCUD launchers which were used to fire missiles at Israel after the war (among other things). What most people don’t argue is the issue of regime change. They’d rather sit on their high horses and pad their egos by illustrating how the warmongering practices of the US demonstrated by invading Iraq are just horrible. I’ve brought it up in debates before that the issue of military action to disarm Iraq was fully legal whether people want to admit it or not (yes, the justification is totally underhanded and sneaky, but it is there nonetheless), but the issue of regime change is another story entirely, and one which is clearly not allowed for in ANY of the UNSCR resolutions which can be used to justify military action with the intent of disarmament only.

I personally think the legal argument has no merit- the best arguments you could make are “it was best for the Iraqi people and/or the region because of so and so and to hell with the UN”. The UN resolutions simply do not allow for regime change in Iraq.

To be honest, even though I’m a lawyer by trade, I have contempt for legality arguments- just because it’s not legal doesn’t mean it’s not right.

And if Saddam were only a direct threat to Israel, I say let him be and get out of the region and back to more intelligent things. The first US President, of any party, who actually has the balls to order his UN rep to go along with the resolutions which want to condemn Israeli action and force them back to the 1947 borders and out of stolen territory has got my vote for Emperor of the US for life. I consider myself a pro-war guy, and not necessarily because of my job, but I have said here time and time again that I find the preferential treatment we give to that country absolutely deplorable.

Good to know- that’s extremely rare. I think the consensus is going back to 1967 borders.

Doesn’t mean it can’t be tinkered with and transformed into something much more virulent and deadly.

Doesn’t mean it can, either. The preponderance of evidence is on the side of cannot.

Actually you’d be suprised to see the kinds of targets we hit on a semi-regular basis in Iraq over those 12 years. Definitely not WMD-type sites. ANd yes, who does care what Iraq thinks regarding the issue? They agreed to the terms and then went back on that within a month, legally ending the ceasefire. Why did WE wait 12 years to go back in? That’s a blindingly easy question to answer if you have a miniscule knowledge of US history and politics.

Because we never went “in” in the first place. The cease fire was a UN resolution, dealing with the cessation of hositilies and the liberation of Kuwait. The UN *never* authorized an invasion of Iraq- not 10 years ago, and not last year. Therefore, any appeals to decade old resolutions is entirely deceptive.

Capabilities they should not have had to begin with, you mean. Breach of the cease-fire set down in UNSCR 687 either way.

It doesn’t matter, considering the cease fire says nothing about invading Iraq for the purposes of regime change- and you’re not going to seriously argue that Iraq had any significant capability, are you? Kay came back in October with nothing but inneuendo and could haves and maybes- and if you read the UNMOVIC reports from before the war, you’ll see that Iraq had no signficiant capability to build any weapons whatsoever. The fact remains that the accusations levelled by the US were entirely false.

Was Saddam Hussein a bad man? Yes. Was Iraq a threat to anyone? Absolutely not, as anyone who can see the outcome of the war can figure out for himself.

Another thing: a lot of the pro-war guys like to toss around a threat to Israel (as if Iraq could possibly theaten Israel with it’s piddly Al Samouds, but anyway) If Israel is feeling so goddamned threatened, let them do it. I’m sure those 600 American dead would love to hear about how they died for Israel.

A clandestine network of laboratories and safehouses within the Iraqi Intelligence Service that contained equipment subject to UN monitoring and suitable for continuing CBW research.

Wow! A laboratory … *suitable* for research! What kind of laboratories aren’t suitable for that ….

· A prison laboratory complex, possibly used in human testing of BW agents, that Iraqi officials working to prepare for UN inspections were explicitly ordered not to declare to the UN.

*Gasp*! So there was this lab, in a prison … and we don’t have any proof, buit it MIGHT have been used for human testing of BW agents! Except we didn’t find any. Yeah.

· Reference strains of biological organisms concealed in a scientist’s home, one of which can be used to produce biological weapons.

Incorrect: http://fairuse.1accesshost.com/news1/latimes13.html

· New research on BW-applicable agents, Brucella and Congo Crimean Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF), and continuing work on ricin and aflatoxin were not declared to the UN.

ROFLMAO. CCHF is a common middle eastern disease.

· Documents and equipment, hidden in scientists’ homes, that would have been useful in resuming uranium enrichment by centrifuge and electromagnetic isotope separation (EMIS).

Oh, documents that would have been useful. Well, that must mean they were building nuclear weapons! Never mind they had no enrichment facilities of any kind!

· A line of UAVs not fully declared at an undeclared production facility and an admission that they had tested one of their declared UAVs out to a range of 500 km, 350 km beyond the permissible limit.

Shocking. Just shocking. Will they be spraying anthrax on New York any time soon ….

· Continuing covert capability to manufacture fuel propellant useful only for prohibited SCUD variant missiles, a capability that was maintained at least until the end of 2001 and that cooperating Iraqi scientists have said they were told to conceal from the UN.

Wow- *capability* to produce fuel for missiles. I’m feeling so threatened!

· Plans and advanced design work for new long-range missiles with ranges up to at least 1000 km — well beyond the 150 km range limit imposed by the UN. Missiles of a 1000 km range would have allowed Iraq to threaten targets through out the Middle East, including Ankara, Cairo, and Abu Dhabi.

Uh huh. And why are we to assume that these plans or advanced design work would’ve come to fruition with UN inspectors in country?

· Clandestine attempts between late-1999 and 2002 to obtain from North Korea technology related to 1,300 km range ballistic missiles –probably the No Dong — 300 km range anti-ship cruise missiles, and other prohibited military equipment.

Attempts that FAILED.

In addition to the discovery of extensive concealment efforts, we have been faced with a systematic sanitization of documentary and computer evidence in a wide range of offices, laboratories, and companies suspected of WMD work. The pattern of these efforts to erase evidence — hard drives destroyed, specific files burned, equipment cleaned of all traces of use — are ones of deliberate, rather than random, acts. “

How convenient.

What was PROVED was not that “there were/were NOT WMDs”, but that Saddam continued to defy the UN, and kept his programs either hidden or in limbo, so that he could continue if he so wished.

The fact is that Saddam was in material breach, and was “supposed’ to face severe consequences.

Serious consequneces can be all sorts of things. All necessary means is war, and there was no resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq. Sorry.

The UN’s idea of severe consequences, after 12 years of defiance, and chances, was, simply, to give him more chances!

Funny, we didn’t get a chance to see what they would be considering the invasion. Furthermore, those “12 years of defiance” resulted in the destruction of Iraq’s WMD infrastructure and WMD stockpiles. Who cares if Iraq liked it or not?

Kay’s October report was pure inneuendo- “they might have”, “they had the capability to” etc etc ad infitum. It did nothing to make the administration’s case. In essence, they went from

“Iraq has weapons of mass destruction stockpiles to”

to

“Iraq had capabilities that might be useful for in the future when they might start thinking about a program which may result in weapons of mass destruction related activities which might result in stockpiles. Yeah.”

Can you explain how the Su-47 is stealthy? The PAK-FA would need to have more than anti-radar gizmos to match the F-22 in stealth.

I didnt’ say it was stealthy. I said saying it was Su-27 configuration was false.

Originally posted by SabreAce
The Su-47 looks more or less like an Su-27 with FSW and hardly stealthy. I hope the PAK-FA does’nt end up that way.

How so? It may incorporate some Su-27 components (cockpit section) but it’s nowhere near an Su-27 configuration wise.

I couldn’t stand the litany of propaganda any longer:

Saddam was in material breach of UN resolutions for weapons systems that he was not “supposed” to develop, use of these weapons, and affiliations with TERRORISIM. He financed terrorists, this is a known fact. Terrorists trained in Iraq(under his control or not), this is a fact.

Saddam financed terrorists? News to me? Or is that specious reasoning based on an Iraqi-affiliated Palestinian political party giving cheques to the families of dead suicide bombers?

The UN voted UNANIMOUSLY that if he did not: a. give inspectors “unfettered” access to EVERYWHERE. b. document ALL his weapons programs to the UN. He would face “SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES.”

Which does not mean war. UN speak for war is “ALL NECESSARY MEANS”. The resolutions also say nothing about invading Iraq for regime change.

Saddam CONTINUED to mislead inspectors. Saddam did NOT document ALL of his weapons programs, not even considering the “supposed” WMD’s.

I think you and reality need to take a walk to get to know each other. The point where everyone has admitted the obvious has really gone beyond a joke.

Bush went to the UN to get them to ENFORCE THEIR OWN RESOLUTION. But they didn’t, they wanted to give him more time, just a few more months. More time while the Iraqi people suffered under UN resolutions.

So Bush wanted to save the Iraqi people from UN sanctions, did he?

[qote]When we talk terrorists, why assume Al-queda alone, they’re all terrorists, and they all have a common goal. Saddam funded terrorists. [/quote]

No such evidence exists.

Saddam may or may not have had stockpiles of WMD’s, but he definatly maintained the abilitryt to make and use them.

He did not have them. Furthermore, he did not have the ability to make them. Iraq’s WMD infrastructure had been destroyed by UNSCOM in the 1990s. UNMOVIC’s return in late 2002 confirmed this. This is all on the public record.

Nobody mentions the LIVE culture of botulinin found, able to be used to , well, MAKE BIOLOGICAL WEAPONS, or Botox.

Fact 1: It was Botulin “toxin B”: which has never been successfully weaponized, and can be actually found in your garden.
Fact 2: It had been sitting in the fridge of some guy since 1993, untouched.

That’s why noone mentions it. Because it didn’t mean anything.

The fact that it was found in a weapons scientist’s hpome, kinda rules out cosmetic applications.

Along with hundreds of other kinds of cultures.

Longer than allowed range missles were found, and FIRE at US troops.

Yeah, kit-bashed SA-2s which barely exceeded the range limit and which couldn’t hit the broad side of a town- missiles that were found and being dismantled by UNMOVIC when the US invaded, btw.

Hollow warhead missle and rockets were found–able to be quickly filled with any biotoxin/chemical weapon needed.

Which were leftovers from the 1980s. Did you even bother to read the UNMOVIC reports in this regard?

Plans for nuclear programs were found.

ROFLMAO. There *was no nuclear program*. David Kay said so himself. Where do you get this stuff? There was no nuclear program. There were no ”plans”.

Long range(Isreal) missle programs were under way. Chemical plants of dubious nature were found, including those mobile labs.

In case you didn’t know, that story was debunked- they were actually hydrogen generators for artillery balloons- sold to Iraq by the good ol British. They also were highly inappropriate for the production of biological weapons (that’s right, they were claimed to be biolabs, not chemical labs)- the canvas sides being the most obvious indicator to experts.

All in all, Saddam could have rebuilt his stockpiles of chemical/biological weapons in less than a year, with his current programs restarted, once the inspectors left.

Even if this was true (and it quite simply isn’t)- why do we want inspectors to leave again?

You’re free to your opinions as to Iraq’s future, but sorry, I simply can’t stand seeing such a load of year-old misinformation being blurted out as if it were fact.