comparing Iraq and Ukraine wars

[noonereal]

Whatever. What I note is that you don’t actually make any claims that my post is incorrect, but prefer to resort to juvenile ad hom instead. Again, whatever.

Because I post objectively you ascribed a position to me which I do not hold.
So I respond.

 

[noonereal]

It is your FALSE claim that we are unaware of said cultural history. Simply not true.

Then why did you attack my post?

 

[noonereal]

Why do you assume I'm unaware of it, and how would being aware of it make it any better or less a justification? It has no bearing.

I ask you the same, then why attack my post which simply was posted to clarify as our tribe propaganda igores what I stated?

 

[Lord Tammerlain]

Countries aren't entitled to buffer states.

Monroe doctrine?

 

[Cardinal]

I ask you the same, then why attack my post which simply was posted to clarify as our tribe propaganda igores what I stated?

Probably because of when you said "Russia has better justification for going into Ukraine."

 

[Cardinal]

Monroe doctrine?

We're talking about modern history. After WWII, most of the world agreed that imperialist wars were no longer okay, including attacks on countries for no good reason whatsoever.

 

[Phys251]

Allowing the GOP to scrub its history made a repeat of its horrific performance more likely, not less.

Which is exactly why we must never forget it.

 

[Phys251]

No doubt, going to Iraq under junior was hypocritical and immoral.
It simply cannot be justified. Russia has better justification for going into Ukraine.

Historical Russia has always sought to have a buffer between them and the west. This is nothing new at all. Its cultural for them . Iraq had no such traditional compulsions to satiate.

^ This is what Russian propaganda looks like.

Noonereal has no way to justify the cruelty that Putin is inflicting on Ukraine, so he parrots the Russian party line as if it makes the barbarian war justifiable.

 

[Michael Cole]

^ This is what Russian propaganda looks like.

Noonereal has no way to justify the cruelty that Putin is inflicting on Ukraine, so he parrots the Russian party line as if it makes the barbarian war justifiable.

Indeed. Putin is looking for a buffer like the Soviets used East Germany, Berlin and Poland as buffers.

Ukraine was a buffer. Ethnically and historically tied to Russia with a struggling democracy. Russia just isn't fit for democracy. That's what Putin fears, and his goal is to annex Ukraine, not use it as a buffer.

 

[Noodlegawd]

Some comments about the wars in Iraq and Ukraine, and comparing them. First...
The same rules of logic that apply everywhere else, must apply to morality as well. If X+Y= 4, then Y+X = 4 also. If A doing X is morally ok, because B somewhere completely else does X too, then also B doing X is morally ok too by the same rules, because A does X also. If Putin's war in Ukraine is morally ok/completely excuseable because W did similar in Iraq, then by the same logic Iraq war is also morally ok, because Russia does the same too. This is a logical trap some anti-war people sometimes seem to fall into.
Also, the cases are not of course completely similar. It is easy to quickly find at least 3 reasons why the war against Ukraine is even worse then W's war in Iraq.
1: The lies about Ukraine are even worse, bald-faced lies than lies about Iraq.
2: Ukraine is a democracy, Iraq was a dictatorship, so attacking the former was even more wrong.
3: While this thing is difficult to estimate, it seems to me Russia is more intentionally targeting civilians, their own casualties seem already larger than America's in Iraq, and the overall human cost will be more terrible in Ukraine than in Iraq as time passes and the war drags on.

It seems to me W's war in Iraq kind of shows what can happen when people get as much power as a president of a superpower can have too young and too immature to wield such power (also something that ought to be remembered imo when presidents' age is in discussion). Putin's war in Ukraine shows what can happen when a super power president has no term limits on how long he can stay in power.

Another matter about the two wars - the soldiers suicides because of the lies told to them by the political leadership. As happened after the Iraq war lies. Just wondering - how many cases there will become to be, of Russian soldiers in their last letter to parents before shotting themselves in the head, telling about how all the things they were told were lies, about Nazies holding power in Ukraine, about biological/chemical weapons, about civilians welcome then... all were lies, bald-faced lies, intentional lies, and about how their have lost their faith to the own country, to the life itself. Also wondering how many Russian propagandist have ever paused to even consider such a scenarion. And how they can sleep at night if they have.

Oh how quickly people forget. The 2nd invasion of Iraq grew out of the first Gulf War (which was a massive international response to IRAQ's invasion of another country), and Hussein's refusal to comply with the terms of his surrender in that war. The fact that the stated premises for the invasion turned out to be incorrect doesn't mean the invasion was not justified. The fact that we had to invade to confirm that the premises were incorrect should tell us all we need to know.

In short, there's no comparison. Not even a little.

 

[noonereal]

Probably because of when you said "Russia has better justification for going into Ukraine."

It did. My statement is accurate.

We had ZERO reason to go into Iraq.
ZERO.

RUSSIA, has historic concerns, we had none.

 

[Michael Cole]

Oh how quickly people forget. The 2nd invasion of Iraq grew out of the first Gulf War (which was a massive international response to IRAQ's invasion of another country), and Hussein's refusal to comply with the terms of his surrender in that war. The fact that the stated premises for the invasion turned out to be incorrect doesn't mean the invasion was not justified. The fact that we had to invade to confirm that the premises were incorrect should tell us all we need to know.

In short, there's no comparison. Not even a little.

I remember. I don't disagree with your reasoning, and I don't disagree with the reason for the invasion. What I disagree with was the claim of 'imminent' threat. The UN wanted more time, and I supported giving it to them. The evidence presented, even if true, did not amount to an imminent threat in my opinion.

The result may have been the same, but I think we should have given Blix more time.

 

[Cardinal]

It did. My statement is accurate.

We had ZERO reason to go into Iraq.
ZERO.

RUSSIA, has historic concerns, we had none.

Oh, well if you're going to use historical precedent, then we were justified in invading Iraq because we invaded them a decade earlier. Bam. Historical concerns.

 

[Cardinal]

Oh how quickly people forget. The 2nd invasion of Iraq grew out of the first Gulf War (which was a massive international response to IRAQ's invasion of another country), and Hussein's refusal to comply with the terms of his surrender in that war. The fact that the stated premises for the invasion turned out to be incorrect doesn't mean the invasion was not justified. The fact that we had to invade to confirm that the premises were incorrect should tell us all we need to know.

In short, there's no comparison. Not even a little.

The arguments for invading Iraq the second time around were obvious bullshit to everybody with a functioning cortex. People believed the arguments if they were predisposed to believing them.

 

[noonereal]

Oh, well if you're going to use historical precedent, then we were justified in invading Iraq because we invaded them a decade earlier. Bam. Historical concerns.

 

[watsup]

Oh how quickly people forget. The 2nd invasion of Iraq grew out of the first Gulf War (which was a massive international response to IRAQ's invasion of another country), and Hussein's refusal to comply with the terms of his surrender in that war. The fact that the stated premises for the invasion turned out to be incorrect doesn't mean the invasion was not justified. The fact that we had to invade to confirm that the premises were incorrect should tell us all we need to know.

In short, there's no comparison. Not even a little.

The inspectors in Iraq had stated that they could find no WMDs. The proper reponse: let them keep looking. The wrong response: start a war based on lies, as Bush and Cheney did. Your apologism for them is no different than the apologism for Putin that we see from a bunch of chatters here at DP at present.

 

[multivita-man]

Many Americans were against Bush’s little war based on lies in Iraq. The primary difference at this point is that we were able to say so quite out loud and quite often, as is the wont generally in this First Amendment nation, whereas those who speak out in Russia about the little war based on lies by the evil madman Putin are arrested and put in jail, WORDS THEMSELVES (war, invasion) become criminal acts, and any media that dares to speak the truth are immediately shut down. Huge difference! We were unable to stop Bush’s little war based on lies in Iraq, but at least we had the opportunity to try.

Together, these two examples - Putin's war and the suppression of protest, and Bush's war and the inability to suppress protest - should serve as a warning for why the balance of power between the government and the governed should always be tilted in the direction of public power. I agree in some state secrets, but there should always some reliable means of oversight, and that's very much in doubt these days in the U.S.

I don't necessarily agree with how Edward Snowden blew the whistle, but he did have a valid point in that there are two dangerous trends. One is that the US government increasingly operates with greater secrecy, and American people are losing more and more of our privacy and anonymity. Extend it too far, and you have a government that can do as it pleases without any accountability, which is what Russia has living under Putin. The war is going to be a monumental disaster that will harm Russia's economic wellbeing and strip away whatever liberties that they have for years, if not decades.

And guess what? It could happen here, too.

 

[watsup]

It did. My statement is accurate.

We had ZERO reason to go into Iraq.
ZERO.

RUSSIA, has historic concerns, we had none.

Historical concerns blah blah blah. Putin propaganda.

 

[noonereal]

Historical concerns blah blah blah. Putin propaganda.

To the blind tribalist, yes.

 

[multivita-man]

We're talking about modern history. After WWII, most of the world agreed that imperialist wars were no longer okay, including attacks on countries for no good reason whatsoever.

Well, I think what's more accurate is that empires were replaced by hegemonies.

 

[Noodlegawd]

I remember. I don't disagree with your reasoning, and I don't disagree with the reason for the invasion. What I disagree with was the claim of 'imminent' threat. The UN wanted more time, and I supported giving it to them. The evidence presented, even if true, did not amount to an imminent threat in my opinion.

The result may have been the same, but I think we should have given Blix more time.

I don't disagree. What I disagree with is the idea that the invasion of Iraq and the invasion of Ukraine have anything whatsoever in common (other than the invasion part).

 

[multivita-man]

It did. My statement is accurate.

We had ZERO reason to go into Iraq.
ZERO.

RUSSIA, has historic concerns, we had none.

Mexico has historic concerns, but I'm guessing Los Angelenos would resist if they tried to retake the California Republic.

 

[Noodlegawd]

The arguments for invading Iraq the second time around were obvious bullshit to everybody with a functioning cortex. People believed the arguments if they were predisposed to believing them.

Which arguments? Were they or were they not in flagrant violation of the terms of their surrender?

 

[Noodlegawd]

Your apologism for them is no different than the apologism for Putin that we see from a bunch of chatters here at DP at present.

If you can't see a different between what happened in Iraq and what happened in Ukraine, there's something seriously wrong with you.

 

[Cardinal]

Which arguments? Were they or were they not in flagrant violation of the terms of their surrender?

Only if you think that canister of mustard gas from the neolithic period they finally found was evidence of that.