<<Every life that dies in war is directly as a result of someone killed by someone purposely or accidentally. Anarchy is being caused by Iran & Syria, fueling the civil unrest, >>
Funny how before the U.S. invasion there was no civil unrest to fuel and most Iraqis polled now say things were better before the invasion. Funny also how nobody really knows WHO is fuelling the "sectarian" killing, since the average folk there aren't that concerned about the religious divide in what used to be (under Saddam) a secular nation. And funny who really benefits from all the killing, isn't it? "We can't go now, there'll be a bloodbath." Anarchy is caused DIRECTLY by the U.S. invasion and right now we don't know exactly WHO is behind the sectarian killings. In Lebanon, some of the civil strife violence including the Hariri assassination is now being traced back to Israeli-organized hit squads using Arab manpower. Who says the same techniques aren't being employed right now in Iraq?
<<both directly with militants coming in from those countries, and indirectly with the military arms they provide, while AlQeada tries to simply fight back. Take away those 2, and there'd be no anarchy. Take away the U.S., and you have Terrorist Heaven. But I do appreciate you conceding that the vast majority of lives lost are at the hands of terrorists and Iraqis>>
No I didn't - - there's a reason why Tommy Franks said "We don't do [civilian] body counts." A very good reason. You DON'T WANT TO KNOW how many Iraqis you have killed. Which suggests it's one hell of a lot of Iraqis.
<<No, actually logic and common sense [tell sirs that "terrorists" kill more than Americans kill.] You should try it some time. How far back you want to go? Hundreds, if not thousands of Israelis killed by homicide bombers, over the last 2+decades.>>
Adding up to a fraction of the number of Palestinians, Lebanese and Israeli Arabs killed by Israel in the same period.
<<Beirut in 83, >>
I guess you are totally unaware of the fact that about TWENTY THOUSAND Lebanese were KILLED in the first Israeli invasion of Lebanon, without even counting the thousand killed in the latest one.
<<Russia in 92, Madrid, Bombay/Mumbai, Nigeria, Bali, Dahab, Somalia, New York, DC, etc., etc., etc. >>
Yeah, what's that add up to? One Falluja plus a couple of bunker-busters and a willie peter? Ten wedding parties plus a dozen family cars lit up at check-points? GET REAL for once in your life.
<<Perhaps you should stick with sarcasm, since civil & substantive debate is definately not your strength>>
When my sarcasm sails right over your head and draws the same kind of response most sane and normal people would give to serious debating points, I think it's the sarcasm I should give up completely and try to concentrate on building my civil and substantive debate skills up to the point where they can match yours.
<<Of course isolated events at locations like Abu Graib have occured. And those folks are condemned & prosecuted. The issue, continues to be Tee's grand proclaimation of the U.S. military as a whole being this barbarous out-of-control raping machine, then using hyperbole to supposedly validate it. >>
What's hilarious is that every time it occurs, it's another "isolated event." That the folks "condemned and prosecuted" include not a single senior officer despite the fact that most of the torture occurs within the four walls of prison compounds and not in the field, sails right over sirs' head. That the "condemned" suffer at most an original eight-year prison sentences (always reduced on appeal) andat least mere reprimands is never mentioned. That the "President" has instructed his legal officers to defend his right to define "torture" and refuses to submit his troops to the scrutiny of international war crimes courts means nothing to sirs. That the practice described as "isolated" has cropped up in American prisons separated by hundreds and even thousands of miles is of no significance. That the President's legal advisers have declared the Geneva Conventions "quaint and old-fashioned" is undoubtedly also an isolated instance. What we have here is not an inability to connect the dots, ladies and gentlemen, it is an inability to see a picture that is as plain and unambiguous as a Renoir painting, only a lot uglier.
<< pay close attention to some of this hyperbolic stuff like "they're trained killers, >>
No, they're psychiatric social workers and Professors of Greek philosophy.
<< . . .and what they were sent over there to do was to kill and to keep on killing until all resistance to their occupation of another people's homeland was completely and utterly crushed">>
No, they're ordered to party and boogie all night long and then teach little kids how to read Arabic and study Koran.
<< . . . . and that it's a war against all Arabs.>>
Now THAT'S not true. The war is against all Arabs who have oil and won't give it up to the Americans or have land and won't give it up to the Israelis. The rest of the Arabs can all go fuck themselves, unless of course they choose to come to the assistance of the "bad" Arabs who won't give up their oil or their land. But you knew that.
