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GarzaUK said:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4414291.stm
Quite shocking after two years after the fall of Saddam. Is Iraqi or the world a safer place now, I think not. It is only matter of time before the Iraqis start to get really pissed off.
Oh wait that's right, tens of thousands held an anti-american protest today. If the new Iraqi Government isn't efficient or capable of running Iraq, I guess all our soldiers are royally screwed.
myshkin said:and the companion piece from a few days earlier.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0503310323mar31,1,1003674.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed&ctrack=2&cset=true
By Jonathan FowlerSquawker said:Would you post some of the key points in the article, Myshkin? This is a site people have to register for. The thing I noticed in the BBC article was the garbage in the street. What are the people doing to clean the mess up themselves? My other question would be how the current situation compares to the pre war conditions. What are the Iraqi's doing to help our troops locate and capture terrorists? Do they expect the troops to do everything for them?
Squawker said:Would you post some of the key points in the article, Myshkin? This is a site people have to register for. The thing I noticed in the BBC article was the garbage in the street. What are the people doing to clean the mess up themselves? My other question would be how the current situation compares to the pre war conditions. What are the Iraqi's doing to help our troops locate and capture terrorists? Do they expect the troops to do everything for them?
Really? I guess if the UN gave a damn, they would have made sure the oil for food program worked like it should have instead of stuffing their pockets.A United Nations (UN) food expert has attacked the American-led occupation of Iraq, saying that since Saddam Hussein was ousted the number of Iraqi children suffering from malnutrition has almost doubled.
Well gosh darn, why doesn’t the almighty UN do something about it?Growing numbers do not have enough food to eat and more than a quarter are chronically undernourished, according to the report. The worst cases, where children under five are suffering acute malnutrition, rose late last year to 7.7 per cent from four per cent immediately after Saddam Hussein was ousted in April 2003.
Jean Ziegler, the UN Human Rights Commission’s special expert on the right to food, blamed the situation on the invasion, saying it was "a result of the war led by coalition forces".
Squawker said:Well gosh darn, why doesn’t the almighty UN do something about it?
Squawker said:Really? I guess if the UN gave a damn, they would have made sure the oil for food program worked like it should have instead of stuffing their pockets.
Well gosh darn, why doesn’t the almighty UN do something about it?
SourcePublished on Sunday, February 20, 2000 in the Baltimore Sun
Clinton Administration Turns Deaf Ear As UN Officials Voice Concerns About The Way Sanctions Have Ravaged Iraqi Society
-snip-
The sanctions, in place for almost a decade, have been responsible not only for the deaths of about 1 million Iraqis -- 500,000 of them children, according to UNICEF -- but also for the absolute shredding of the cultural, economic, political, family and intellectual fabric of Iraqi society.
When the first delegation of congressional staffers traveled to Iraq last summer, Von Sponeck provided extensive briefings and made his top staff accessible to them. He described for them the less visible but more corrosive long-term effects of the sanctions on Iraqi society.
Food shortages resulting from the sanctions remain a serious problem in Iraq. Burghardt, who just quit her post as the World Food Program's director, told the congressional staffers that 70 percent of household income goes for food: by U.N. and world standards, she said, that is considered an indicator of imminent famine.
Burghardt described how the oil-for-food program is shielding, but not reversing, the accumulated effects of sanctions. "Iraq's middle class is disappearing," she said, "and the stunted children will never recover. The monthly food basket lasts only about 21 days. Many families have no other income, and so are living in a situation of complete deprivation."
Squawker said:I think you should put some of the blame where it really belongs. All the time the UN knew people were starving, they took the money for themselves. How disgusting is that? :screwy
Source
I don't think I agree with that one. They act like the gangs in the US do. The terrorists are not reacting to oppression, they are two bit thugs. No more, no less. Don't elevate them to a status of legitimacy.Terrorism is a weapon of the weak. It is used in response to the heavy handed lawlessness of the powerful.
Thoughs who are weak have two choices they may capitulate to power or fight back in a way they deem effective.
Squawker said:I don't think I agree with that one. They act like the gangs in the US do. The terrorists are not reacting to oppression, they are two bit thugs. No more, no less. Don't elevate them to a status of legitimacy.
myshkin said:bin Laden left a personal fortune estimated at $300million behind to go to Afghanistan .
Arch Enemy said:Correct he did do this to fight Russia, he then returned to Saudi Arabia and got into the construction industry (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/155236.stm) he then was expelled back in 1991 because of his Anti-Government propaganda. He never actually "left" his money.. he started using it for his terrorist organizations.
If he was committed for ideological reasons, he would have become a human bomb, wouldn't he?Arch Enemy, I'm sure that you are right about that but what I am trying to show is his commitment to his ideology.
When one leaves his home to fight a force like the Soviets in a Guerilla War one faces the prospect of not returning at all.
That he uses his personal fortune to finance his war seems to reinforce the observation that he is deeply committed don't you agree?
Squawker said:If he was committed for ideological reasons, he would have become a human bomb, wouldn't he?
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