<p>Its funny, I was about to put 'aprox 500 people' and then I went on wikipedia and it said 270, oh well;)</p>
<p>Ok Romani, maybe you are right that the world hates us because of Gitmo, then that must clearly mean that there was a magical time before gitmo when the world didnt hate us. Remember that magical time long long ago, when that man, the call him Cleen-ton, ruled our fair land. Those were the days. Remember how they called the US a "Paper tiger" and the burned US flags, and the bombed the US cole, and the twin towers, and the multiple embassies in Africa. Oh wait, to get to that magical time you are talking about you must go back even further, to the time of Jym-e Khar-tar. Remember how he valiantly defended our Iranian embassy from the revolutionaries. Remember how every single one of the hostages was released on his plea on the grounds of "humanitarian consideration" the night the students stormed the embassy. Remember how six minutes after Reagan got elected, the Ayatollah let the hostages go because he knew Reagan meant business.</p>
<p>ADDITION:</p>
<p>i dont think torturing them will make them stop, and that isn't its purpose anyway. The reason we torture them is to get information, and while we differ on what we believe the results are, the fact is that we have been doing it for a while. Iraq now is actually remarkably stable. Your claim about the insurgents being greater now than later was probably true about a year ago, but it is still irrelevant to our argument.</p>
<p>ABE:</p>
<p>Yes I agree with what you are saying, but at least giving democracy a try should be effective in the saving of hundreds of thousands of civilian lives from both sides of this argument. If this option does not work, then I definetly agree a more agressive stance should be implicated. However, in an effort to save hundreds if not thousands of civilian lives on both sides due to a war, I think that the democratic solution should be our very first approach.</p>
<p>You assume I like Clinton. I do not. I am liberal, I am not a Democrat. Wow, way to make assumptions. </p>
<p>And popular world opinion was much higher before the war and before Gitmo. I never said they hated us because of Gitmo, they hate us because we invaded a country for really no reason and are keeping and torturing prisoners. Plus, we ignored all of them and did what we wanted with absolutely no regards to anybody else. We are not the only country in the world, like we'd like to think.</p>
<p>Imagine if England did that. Seriously, do it for a second. Or Spain, after the train bombings. Do you truly think that we would stand for it? No, we'd demand that they uphold international law.</p>
<p>We didn't invade Iraq because of the terrorist attacks. Plus if Sadam were still alive some terrorists would receive more funding and thousands would die by his own hands. Do you think terrorists follow and uphold the "law"? Its a terrorist group not government fraction.</p>
<p>To your edit:
What information do you think they'll give us? Those who truly are terrorists are willing to blow themselves up to destroy us. They train their whole lives to never release any info and to destroy Westerners as much as they can. And what about those who are tortured who are innocent? And what about the children who have been found there, as young as 14? What do you think we could possibly have to gain from torturing a child?</p>
<p>abe, you're right we didn't invade because of Terrorism. Why did we invade? Oh yeah, that whole Saddam-thing. Hmm... how long has he been out of power/dead? How many elections have they had? So... why are we still there? Haven't the faintest idea. All we're doing now is hindering a process and creating even more enemies.</p>
<p>GitMo has been open for years do u think we're doing this for no reason? There has been various leaks of intelligence by detainees. We now know for sure that they recruit in Europe and is planning biological/chemical attacks. Why do you paint America as the "bad guy" all the time like the error was on us, not the terrorists to begin with?</p>
<p>
[quote]
but at least giving democracy a try should be effective in the saving of hundreds of thousands of civilian lives from both sides of this argument
[/quote]
</p>
<p>craze-what do you mean by democracy?</p>
<p>
[quote]
. We are not the only country in the world, like we'd like to think.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>No, we are not the only country in the world, but like it or not, we are the worlds policeman. The reasons that globalization is accelerating is because increase interconnectedness is being protected by the united states and some military alliances. Why does Russia not invade the Ukraine today? Its because it knows that the US and Nato countries will come back and destroy Russia. Global free trade on the oceans would not be possible if the US navy did not protect sea lanes from piracy. I am not sure at this point if invading Iraq was a strategic mistake or not, but I am open to the idea that it was. </p>
<p>England and spains problems were completely different because they were both caused by native citizens.</p>
<p>EDIT/answer: we are still in Iraq to train the troops, and because Iran is still meddling in Iraq. Regardless, we will be out by 2011, which I think is a good timeframe.</p>
<p>You can't abruptly leave a place after there has been a war. Why are we still in Germany and Japan? WWII happened YEARS ago but we are still there. It would be dumb of us to leave and have everything we worked hard for go haywire. Most Iraqis are proud of what they have become and that there is no longer torture from their own government. Elections were recently held...thats something to be proud of:)</p>
<p>Because we invaded the wrong country. And that's besides the point. The point is, we are doing the same thing they did. We are going and killing innocent people just like they did. We are no better. We did what we needed to do in Iraq, now we should leave. We simply should not be there anymore. If we do need to be, why not declare war? Oh yeah, because we have no reason to. </p>
<p>Furthermore, anybody we detain should get a trial. Innocent until proven guilty does not only apply in times of peace. </p>
<p>Oh and trivia for ya: I supported Bush. For a long time. Until after the 2004 election, so I used to have similar opinions to yours. Until I realized that we should have left and we shouldn't be there and we shouldn't be torturing innocents. </p>
<p>Like craze said, two wrongs don't make a right. Furthermore, I see no "end" to this "war" unless we do it ourselves. We will never defeat terrorists, so we should stop making new ones.</p>
<p>abe, you're right, we're still over there. But two major differences. One: we declared war there. We have not declared war in Iraq. Two: we are not there in active military duty. We are still actively fighting and are invaders in Iraq. </p>
<p>Tboone: what resources exactly should we use to be the police of the world? Money? Nope, we don't have that. The confidence that the world has in our judgment? Nope don't have that.</p>
<p>How are we killing innocent people? most of them are not innocent to begin with</p>
<p>How ignorant are you? You think most of the people in Iraq are not innocent? That's like saying that because we have a few nutjobs in America that most of us are not innocent. There's a kid at my school who chopped a guy's head off. Does that mean we're all murders? We are killing INNOCENT civilians in Iraq. Again, remind me why we are over in Iraq anyways. You have yet to answer that question.</p>
<p>EDIT: And if you are saying that those in Gitmo aren't innocent, how do you know? None of them have had a trial.</p>
<p>Tboone:</p>
<p>I should have been clearer, although I meant democracy in the general sense, as in having a democractic or a less agressive or militarism stance against this war on terror. More call for co-operation than agressiveness, as it seems only a select few against a majority are the radicals. Calling out for co-operation to this majority will help us and humankind ultimately win, and the pursuit of a more aggressive behaviour towards these civilians will only turn them more against us.</p>
<p>The "surface" reason we went into Iraq was for some faux WMDs that GW said were there. The most probable and strategically viable reason was that we wanted to prevent a regional power from developing in the middle east, and Sadam/Iraq was becoming a dominant regional power. The most probably psychological reason has something to do with his dad and the Gulf War. The most probably conspiracy theory reason has to do with dick cheney and Haliburton. I think the real reason can be found somewhere in the middle of all of these (reasons 1 and 2 being the only legitimate ones in my opinion, except the WMDs didn't exist).</p>
<p>Craze, I actually somewhat/whole heartedly agree with you. I think our military offensive/occupation should be accompanied by a drastic increase in humanitarian aid and and increase in funding for secular/american schools in these areas. The vast majority of radical muslims become radical because they go to radical wahabist schools run by terrorist/somewhat legitimate but still shady organizations. If we create an alternative system of education, we could cut of radicalism at its source. We may win or loose the battle on the ground, but we NEED to win the battle in the hearts of the next generation.</p>
<p>Romani-If I had the same ideology as you I wouldn't be living in America. Sure we have civilian CASUALTIES but our intentions are not to kill them ( we wouldn't be in Iraq in the first place). If combat is gonna go down there is no way to plan it out so that every civilian is unharmed- that's just the reality of war. And there a lot more than a "few" nutjobs in Iraq that we have yet to weed out. And yes even though it was wrong to a certain extent, we invaded primarily because of weapons of mass destruction. Why do U think we are in Iraq? Just so we can kill people and get their "oil"?</p>
<p>Tboone:</p>
<p>Thank you, I am glad you agree with this theory because the ultimate end to terrorism can only be acheived through as you said "winning the battle in the hearts of the next generation." :) See, through this democratic stance we have come to an effective resolution.</p>
<p>
[quote]
that's just the reality of war
[/quote]
You are right. That is the reality of war. BUT WE ARE NOT IN A WAR. You really don't seem to grasp that do you? </p>
<p>We went in there because of oil. Plain and simple. </p>
<p>Do not get me wrong. I love America. I love the people. I dislike what people did with our government. I do not agree with what we are doing, and hopefully we will rectify this situation with our new administration. I am not willing to jump ship and move because some people hijacked our government.</p>
<p>EDIT: I hate going in circles, and that is all we're doing. So I am going to bed since it is 4 AM. Continue to argue if you'd like. "Good night. I'll most likely kill you in the morning." Anybody who gets that reference is my hero :).</p>
<p>We went there because of oil? even though until recently our oil prices have surged. What T-Boone said I think is the real reason</p>