QUOTE(Mahn Grayvee @ May 6 2003, 08:47 PM)i was born in france, moved here when i was 11.
i am 44 now.
i am a us citizen. i have dual citizenship.
france has so many more nice landmarks. the culture is
more open, and more informed than the us culture.
we are more understanding to other countires needs and problems.
we don't just drop a bomb at conflict.
we discuss it, try to have a resolution. saddam was not as bad as he was made out to be on american television.
right now the iraqi's citizen's are in worse shape than they were before.
sorry, but i believe in my heart this to be true.
i do love the americans too ! very much, this country is close to my heart too.
just a little narrow minded.
Interesting comments ManGrayvee and please don't take this personally; <_<
---- biting my tongue----
No offense but where have you been for the last 12 years?
"we don't just drop a bomb at conflict."
No kidding. The UN has many departments like the WHO that are not just lip serivce but as far as the (in)Security Council is concerned, just look at it's members. It should be easy to see why they have been ineffectual. You may wany to keep yourself "informed" by reading the following included articles to see why the French, among others, have been... how you say... recalcitrant?
It is also enlightening to read all of the UN resolutions on Iraq from the close of the Gulf War. A good place to start is
here::: (UN Resolution 1441 PDF) . Pay special attention to all of the resolutions preceeding it.
That the press even reports this phrase sickens me and its continued citation is an insult to all thinking life forms on this planet, whether they realize it or not.
How much time, exactly, do you think is enough from the intial UN Security Council Resolution 687 in April 1991? 100 years? Time until major cities start going up in mushrooms clouds? Time until your neighborhood is crop dusted with VX gas?
Do you recall the weapons inspectors being expelled BY IRAQ (actually more than once) in 1998 when there were plenty of verifiable WMD materials present including massive quantities of anthrax and VX? Wasn't that enough time?
Interested parties can find plenty of credible sources on the web documenting the Iraqi WMD status. For your perusal here is the British Government's report straigt from 10 Downing
here.
Do (you) recall the bait and switch the Iraqi regime played throughout the ENTIRE UNSCOM period as well as subsequent, post 1998 weaspons inspections via UNMOVIC?
Consider the situation of the pilots who have been patrolling the no fly zone patrols for over 10 years. They have been targeted and fired upon incessantly since the close of the Gulf War. It's AMAZING how convenient it has been for people to overlook this and the fact that SH's own blood testified to the nature of the development of nuclear and other WMD.
Give me a good argument, please. All these d#$m peacniks (more power to 'em) have not proposed ONE SALIENT POINT other than the typical, short sighted and and facile "no war for oil" BS rhetoric. Furthermore their pathetic use of one sided, incredibly biased imagery -as in last week's Metro Times photo essay - is practical anathema to a free and neutral press.
It is my hope that most people are smart enough to see past such disingenuous tactics. Of course, for people that can only handle one concept at a a time, much less the complexities and multinational politics and commerce what can you expect?
In closing, these are not simple times and for sure these are not the kind of issues one can easily wrestle with no matter how well informed one might be. You can only do your best to try and form your opinions around sound arguments based on facts and not the sit-com rablings of a spineless press.
---Big Daddy
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05-07-03
Bush administration plans to expose close relations between Chirac and Saddam and their families as revealed in secret Iraqi intelligence archives uncovered in Baghdad.
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Washington Targets Chirac and ElBaradai
From DEBKA-Net-Weekly May 2 Updated by DEBKAfile
May 7, 2003, 1:08 AM (GMT+02:00)
The Americans are sitting tight on the extremely valuable Iraqi intelligence archives discovered at Iraqi intelligence headquarters in Baghdad and at sub-departments of Saddam's clandestine machine never before known to exist. The only data released are a few leaks to the British media calculated to help prime minister Tony Blair stand up to anti-war campaigners at home and around Europe.
From this treasure trove, America has distributed to its war allies some materials relevant to their national security. But no decision has been taken as to the disposition of documents attesting to the clandestine ties of collaboration maintained with the Saddam regime by a whole range of foreign government and public office-holders, academics, media figures, financiers and industrialists the world over, many deeply involved in sanctions-busting. By and large, Washington is not inclined to bare these secrets or make use of them at the moment, except in some notable cases. One is French president Jacques Chirac; another is the head of the International Atomic Energy Commission in Vienna, Dr. Mohammed ElBaradai, who led the nuclear weapons inspection in Iraq before the war.
In addition, the administration has secretly handed over to various Middle East and Persian Gulf governments the names of ministers and public figures who were handsomely rewarded by Saddam Hussein for supporting his case in deliberations at the United Nations, other international bodies and inter-Arab forums. Washington was given to understand that these public officials would be held to account by their governments. This process has started quietly in Qatar and Jordan, where our intelligence sources expect overnight resignations of senior cabinet members.
DEBKA-Net-Weekly has been reliably informed that the nature of the relationships the French president and members of his family wove with Saddam Hussein and members of his regime is due to be revealed quite soon, drawing on the materials in the secret Iraqi files. Some sources say that the ties linking the two families were deep and ramified. Their exposure is likely to raise a storm.
As for Dr. ElBaradai, our sources report that, even before the Iraqi archives were examined, Washington had compiled a dossier on the chief nuclear inspector from discoveries made in the course of crises over the North Korean and Iranian nuclear weapons programs.
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Sources:
United Nations
British Government
DebkaFile
EDIT : FOOTNOTE
You may also want to check this article in the NY Times from this morning:
U.S. troops unearthed maps featuring terror strikes against Israel dating back to 1991.
