granted, not the best example. but the fact remains that just because they have not been found DOES NOT MEAN they do not exist. I wasn't trying to insult your intelligence before rug, but i am now. If you can't understand that just because something has not been found it doesn't mean they don't exist then you deserve to be insulted.
Your teacher fully strip and body cavity searches you and all your friends. They still find nothing. Can they still legitimately argue you had drugs?
i personally don't agree with first strike on our behalf. That said, you've completely ignored the issue at hand, the fact that right now, first strike against us is not viable and if we reduced our numbers to what you're suggesting it would be
Yes, it is viable... someone could nuke Washington D.C, and they'd get nuked back. It doesn't matter if you have 10,000 nukes (current estimate) or 50... anyone who nukes you is going to get it in the shorts.
You do not need more than 5 or 10 nukes to cripple a country, unless its utterly huge. Even America could be laid low by that many weapons; One from D.C, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles... etc.
no, but we do invade the ones that sponsor terrorists, use weapons of mass destruction against their own people, have ruthless dictators and are openly hostil towards us.
Saddam didn't consider the Kurds his own people, due to them rising against him. Would you condemn Israel if they dropped Tabun on a Palestinian village?
Used weapons of mass destruction against their own people???
Have you been smoking something?
Saddam gassed a few towns in northern Iraq; Kurds who didn't like him.
with all due respect, how the hell would you know how to conduct a war. An army deprived of things like water and power will not function as well as an army with it. And we have been working to fix this "infrastructure" (which i still maintain is a buzzword activists like to throw around). If you'd like to argue Iraq was better off with their infrastructure intact(and in 3rd world condition) in Saddam's control than with its infrastructure destroyed(and being rebuilt to better standards) and Saddam removed, I'd like to hear how you'd do that.
Because I can read. If you can read, you can research. If you can research, you can become learned.
Yes, you have been working to fix the infrastructure. Over a year has passed and much of Iraq is still without power. Many Iraqi's have complained that conditions were better with Saddam in power - though this should be taken with a pinch of salt, due to underlying Anti-American sentiment (caused by what?) it does show something.
The CIA have aided with numerous coups and assassinations in the past. They are master conspirators, the professionals when it comes to under-the-table removal of power. Why not in Iraq? Possibly because of the stranglehold Saddam had on public opinion?
Yes, Saddam needed to go. No, you did not need to destroy the country while you're at it.
i can't speak with any authority on this subject, though i'd like to hear where you obtained your information that we have not aided afghanistan with funds to rebuild "infrastructure"
news.bbc.co.uk; februray 13th 2003; 'Afghanistan Omitted from U.S Aid Budget'
The United States Congress has stepped in to find nearly $300m in humanitarian and reconstruction funds for Afghanistan after the Bush administration failed to request any money in its latest budget.
One mantra from the Bush administration since it launched its military campaign in Afghanistan 16 months ago has been that the US will not walk away from the Afghan people.
President Bush has even suggested a Marshall plan for the country, and the Afghan leader, Hamid Karzai, will visit Washington later this month.
Washington has pledged not to forget Afghanistan but in its budget proposals for 2003, the White House did not explicitly ask for any money to aid humanitarian and reconstruction costs in the impoverished country.
The chairman of the committee that distributes foreign aid, Jim Kolbe, says that when he asked administration officials why they had not requested any funds, he was given no satisfactory explanation, but did get a pledge that it would not happen again.
'Too early'
A spokesman for the US Agency for International Development, which distributes the money, says the reason they did not make a request was that when budgetary discussions began in 2002, it was too early to say how much money they would need.
Jim Kolbe has expressed surprise at the administration's oversight.
The US will spend over $16bn in foreign aid this year.
The main beneficiaries will be Israel, Jordan and a number of anti-Aids programmes.
However, Mr Kolbe says that should there be a military conflict in Iraq, he believes the US will have to find billions more, not only to help Iraq, but also Turkey, Jordan and Israel.
yes, there are. and they're even more long and drawn out. and i'm sure you know more about toppling governments than all the military leaders. once again, with all due respect, i'd trust many people about how to effectively bring down a government than someone like you or me who has absolutely no military, diplomatic or any other relevant experience.
Either that or you wanted to thoroughly break the back of the country, so you could move in and secure all the resources you want, which wouldn't be doable with an under the table toppling of government.
I would point out that if Saddam really didn't have weapons (I can't honestly say he did, but I believe so... or at least all the components to make them), he would have said so in no mistakable terms when Bush started playing hardball. Why knowingly sacrifice your regime and power (yes, I'm pretty sure Saddam knew America would invade when he kept stalling) when you could prove yourself innocent?
If Saddam had NBC weapons, why didn't he use them when we invaded? As whiteknight noted, he had no issues about gassing his own people, so why not invading Americans, who he hates so much? Possibly because he had none when we invaded?