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Originally posted by paperplane_uk
Actually the UN Keeps track of such things and even produce a league table!!
It asseses quality of life for all member countries based on everything from how technologically advanced they are to how many public toilets there are.
For the last few years it has been Norway on top.
Is this fear of the USA you speak of a fear of the US invading and cleaning your house or is this as i suspect, more of a fear of their economies tanking if they try to wean themselves away from doing business with the USA?
I guess keeping your head in the sand and hoping that terrorism goes away is more important than actually taking a stand against lawless thugery and terror.
OR you take it out yourself.
When you create a monster, you have to feed it.
Hopefully they will blame the leaders of the countries for doing whatever it is at THAT time thats causing a fight to ensue....
You say it isn't a blame thing, but who will our grandchildren blame when they are called to fight against say Syria or China?
OH and pizzing off the USA IS??? Mabey the anti-west leaders out there should have thought about that before waging a campaign of terror strikes against us. Again i say ITS GOOD THAT COUNTRIES/PEOPLE WORLD WIDE ARE "FEARING" THE USA these days. Our credibillity as a world leader has been called out by these rouge nations and terrorists. They had been led to believe we didnt have the GUTS to do the hard thing. They are Wrong.
Enraging the entire Islamic nation is not a solution
Im actually going to give you a little on this one....Im one of the FIRST people to say.."never trust a huge company, their only in if for the profit"
Coporate America started this, and now claim they want to finish it, but the reality is, they want to continue it ad infinitum.
Yes, it unfortunatly can be. War is the ultimate expression of diplomacy...meaning, diplomacy is meaningless without something to back it up. War should be as near to a last resort as possible, but it should NOT be taken off the table, otherwise how do you back up all your hot air? War is messy, its brutal, dare i say it CAN be inhumane. (mankind has tried to define rules of war, which the terrorists have thrown out the window, making them MORE barbaric than others that still try to fight "fair")
Do you honestly believe, in your heart of hearts, that war is a solution? To anything?
The countries most valuable asset has far far mor deep reaching effects for the stabillity of iraq that ONE stockpile of weapons (which may have been dispursed before our forces got there) PS, How many times are you going to ask this same rhetorical question?
while the troops who invaded the country are busy securing the countrys most valuable asset,
It would be sad if this was the total truth...again for those of you slow on the uptake...mabey global economic stabillity is bigger and more important than making a short term buck.
Its a sad sad thing when making money is considered by some to be a justified reason to take human life and destroy a country.
Originally posted by CazMedia
Isolationism is denial of the situation, its hiding, its wishing the problem would go away, it is exactly the DO NOTHING policy that allows/encourages people like hitler, sadam, and thug terrorists to continue to do as they will.
Originally posted by CazMedia
Isolationism is certantly NO deterrent. Isolationism is definatly the WEAKEST possible position from which to LEAD your nation. Isolationism is a 1/2 step from capitulation. Isolationism gives up control from your hands to the hands of others.
Originally posted by CazMedia
Hopefully they will blame the leaders of the countries for doing whatever it is at THAT time thats causing a fight to ensue....
again, it is important to understand "how did we get here from there" but this is not an excuse for those in charge to cause a conflict, nor does it adress the NOW of the situation. Its excuse mongering.
Originally posted by CazMedia
OH and pizzing off the USA IS??? Mabey the anti-west leaders out there should have thought about that before waging a campaign of terror strikes against us. Again i say ITS GOOD THAT COUNTRIES/PEOPLE WORLD WIDE ARE "FEARING" THE USA these days. Our credibillity as a world leader has been called out by these rouge nations and terrorists. They had been led to believe we didnt have the GUTS to do the hard thing. They are Wrong.
Originally posted by CazMedia
Im actually going to give you a little on this one....Im one of the FIRST people to say.."never trust a huge company, their only in if for the profit"
BUT,
While i agree that coprorate (capitalistic) interests are certantly involved...i question weather this is "bad". I pose that while corporations do indeed take profits for their work/products...this is not a bad thing...they wouldnt do it if there wasnt something in it for them...however,
Perhaps our leaders know/realize thats this is deeper than companies making a buck, i think they understand that the quality of life for citizens is directly tied to the sucess of these businesses...that without this success (specifically oil products) that the worlds economy would head right into the toilet and a potential depression. Study the world wide effects of the great depresion and magnify those by 4 if youd like to get an idea of the widespread suffering that could ensue IF the world economy/markets falter...you dont think that our leaders want this do you? (especially on their watch)
Originally posted by CazMedia
Imagine the reaction of people if things were depressed, and we found out that it could have been avoided if only WE HAD TAKEN ACTIONS sooner, or more forceably. It is hard to say at the decision time, weather or not your actions will turn out for better or worse (tho you should have some kind of educated guess), but it is almost assured that doing NOTHING (isolationism) will not alter things either way.
Originally posted by CazMedia
War is the ultimate expression of diplomacy...
Originally posted by CazMedia
Otts, my neighbor to the north
I do understand this position you've put forth, but it lacks some depth of understanding that i think most citizens, both here and abroad just dont have...
Iraq was an easy domino to knock down,and it sends the message, WE WILL COME FOR YOU...without getting into a REALLY deep hole of say attacking Iran or the Saudi's. The general concensus about Saddam world wide is that he was a bad man, and things would better without him...(however this is justified) So this too made Iraq an easy second choice after afganistan.
Ahh the Saudi's,
This is really where thing get more complicated than the average citizen has looked at.
We know that the Saudi ruling family is racist and brutal
We know they have supported some terrorism
BUT
many nations depend on secure and stable crude oil from them...and a war there isnt going to help that.
The Saudi's were NOT under the same kind of international preassures that Iraq was under thru the UN, and so Iraq made more sense as the seccond domino to fall than Saudi Arabia did.
The Bush plan is not about just one place or the other, its about sending a message to the entire region....We want you to be part of the world community, but will no longer coddle you or tolorate threats and the support of terrorism from you.
Turning back means turning tail (...) Watch the bloodbath in Iraq swell to way over what it is now as the 3 major factions there duke it out for control...all the while being quietly threatened by terrorist, should we leave them destabalized...
Where is the UN or other countries humanitarian assistance, or peacekepers..dont just sit back and say "bad USA for making a mess, we're not going to help you clean it up"
The people you hurt by withholding security forcesandaid arent the Americans, its the innocent Iraqi's that so many of you want to hold up pictures of to show haw bad the USA is.
Ok you dont agree with the actions of the USA there, but again adopting a policy of DO NOTHING seems to indicate you aprove of the suffering there MORE than you think it would be catering to America to lend a hand, even if you dont agree with us to start with.
You need to be able to back up those wild allegations with some facts, or your spewing blind rhetoric.
Yeah, so instead of buying it, it is better that we go over there and take it from them and kill thousands of them in the process and create breeding grounds for more terrorism. Am I to believe that you are ok with our foriegn policies being madated by Halliburton and Unocal?
OK, ill play make believe with you here...I can imagine several mid-east nations that once had a commodity that was able to pay for MOST of their nations support and growth, suddenly getting more desperate as the value of their lead resource dwindled....less abillity to pay the upkeep on their infrastructure, less jobs there as demand drops and production of a now less valued resource shrinks, economic hardships increase internal tensions resulting in EITHER internal strife or this angst spreading to another country when it gets attacked by the now"have nots" living in a desert that need basic materials for survival.
Imagine if we left them alone and developed energy sources that didn't require military occupations and invasions?
Ill agree with OTTS when they say
I do understand this position you've put forth, but it lacks some depth of understanding that i think most citizens, both here and abroad just dont have...
No i dont, but there are some REALLY BASIC tennants of these ideas that are considered GIVENS in both discussing them and implimenting these ideas that i have not seen expressed by most of the people that just gloss over these things in an effort to "blame the USA" or say "war is bad...stop it".
You don't have the monopoly of understanding international matters.
Originally posted by Otts
�������Unfortunately, not being tougher with the Saudi regime is detrimental to the U.S.' credibility in the Middle East. How can the U.S. pretend to be in the Middle East to end injustices and spread democracy when it openly supports the Saudis? I understand that the Fahds are a guarantee against Saudi Arabia turning on America and the world. However, what I'm saying is that the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq while leaving Saudi Arabia (where a good number of the hijackers came from) alone is not playing well with the international community and especially not for the Arab world.
Originally posted by Otts
The U.S. put up that domino in the first place, by arming Saddam in the 80's. Now it's knocking it down. Can you say the U.S. doesn't have a part of blame for the Middle East being a mess? And no, I didn't say ALL the blame.
Originally posted by Otts
Actually, the way the rest of the world is receiving this message is "You (the Saudis and the Taleban) punched us in the nose on 9/11, so now we're going to punch your neighbors." A well-defined police operation to knock down terrorist players where they are would've sent that message much better.
Originally posted by Otts
Canada wanted to bid for reconstruction contracts, it got told that it wouldn't be allowed to do so since it hadn't sent invasion forces to Iraq.