Appeasement - Page 8 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

aklim · #**106** 05-24-2008, 07:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RichC

What else do you want ?
What would you call winning?

Annihilation of the enemy

Honus · #**107** 05-24-2008, 08:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

According to the terms of the ceasefire, there should have been no forcing, coercion or anything of that sort.

So? We started this war because Saddam was disobedient? That would be silly if it weren't so tragic.

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How did anything he did differed from the previous years of games?

What he did or didn't do seems unimportant. What matters is that we (the U.N. and the U.S.) were finally starting to use force and threats of force to make sure that the inspections proceeded. Why we didn't do that from the beginning is a mystery to me. In the end, Saddam didn't prevent the inspections. W did.

Honus · #**108** 05-24-2008, 08:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

Annihilation of the enemy

And who would that be?

Botnst · #**109** 05-24-2008, 09:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DieselAddict

You are completely delusional if you believe the "war" in Iraq is anything like WW2 or that pulling out of there is like the German or Japanese surrender in WW2.

Thank you for your carefully crafted argument.

aklim · #**110** 05-24-2008, 09:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dculkin

So? We started this war because Saddam was disobedient? That would be silly if it weren't so tragic.

What he did or didn't do seems unimportant.

What matters is that we (the U.N. and the U.S.) were finally starting to use force and threats of force to make sure that the inspections proceeded.

Why we didn't do that from the beginning is a mystery to me.

In the end, Saddam didn't prevent the inspections. W did.

It wasn't like the man had 3 unpaid parking tickets, was it? IIRC, there was more at stake. Based on his history and arsenal, something had to be done.

How so?

Just like in the past, things proceeded and stalled. Tell me that it wasn't following a pattern.

Because Clinton wasn't insistent and other members of the council had other sweet rackets going on. The Russians didn't want to upset the apple cart because they were owed huge sums of money. Money the current administration probably might not honor. The French and Germans had contracts with the administration that the new one might not honor.

In the end, lets not forget that it was Hussein that pushed it to this point. Can you disagree with the point that if he had followed the FIRST resolution, the other 12 wouldn't be needed and we wouldn't be in this situation?

Honus · #**111** 05-24-2008, 11:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

...Just like in the past, things proceeded and stalled...

That's just not true. Things were not stalled. There is a lot that is unclear about the Iraq situation. One thing is clear - in the end, it was George Bush who expelled the inspectors.

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...Tell me that it wasn't following a pattern...

That is exactly what I've been telling you.

Quote:

...Because Clinton wasn't insistent and other members of the council had other sweet rackets going on. The Russians didn't want to upset the apple cart because they were owed huge sums of money. Money the current administration probably might not honor. The French and Germans had contracts with the administration that the new one might not honor...

That's as good an explanation as any.

Quote:

...In the end, lets not forget that it was Hussein that pushed it to this point. Can you disagree with the point that if he had followed the FIRST resolution, the other 12 wouldn't be needed and we wouldn't be in this situation?

That's almost right. Hussein is the one who pushed things to the edge. For whatever reason, the rest of the world didn't push back until it was too late to stop Bush's invasion.

tankdriver · #**112** 05-24-2008, 11:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst

Ah, I see your point.

The reason why I asked what difference it makes is this: In war, what matters is winning. Unlike a sport or board game, there is seldom a second chance and rarely an umpire governing issues of fairness. To accept less than victory is yo accept defeat. The defeated do not determine whether the war was just or unjust, that is no longer for them to decide. Had Nzi Germany or Imperial Japan won WWII the history we read would have been entirely different and so would our culture be.

In war is the key. We are not at war with Iran, N. Korea, China, and a host of other countries who don't see eye to eye with us. As for winning/victory, I agree, but they need to be defined before engaging in war.

Quote:

These are EXACTLY the stakes faced by the Islamists and by ourselves. The difference between our perspectives is that they fully realize and acknowledge that fact. We, as a nation and as a secularist culture, do not.

Obama was talking about sitting down with leaders of rogue nations, not Islamic fundamentalists. Also, as raymr pointed out, the vast majority of people regardless of the leaders, pretty much want the same things. Engaging in dialogue can only help bring our side and their side closer.

I think the precondition argument is a non-starter. We have a President, not a King granting audiences as favor. You cannot really negotiate with people if you make your demands before you even start negotiating. Concede, then we'll talk about what else you can concede is really not effective and certainly not a motivator for change.

Honus · #**113** 05-24-2008, 11:29 AM

After you guys get done making fun of the author of the following column from today's Washington Post, maybe you could explain why he isn't exactly right:

Quote:

The Wisdom In Talking
By John F. Kerry
Saturday, May 24, 2008; Page A21

As President Bush commemorated Israel's 60th anniversary by attacking Barack Obama from overseas, here at home he found an all-too-frequent ally: John McCain.
When Bush accused "some" -- including Obama, Bush aides explained -- of "the false comfort of appeasement," McCain echoed this slander.
"What does he want to talk about with [Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad?" McCain asked, fumbling to link Obama to the Iranian president's hateful words. Soon, a GOP talking point was born.
Lost in the rhetoric was the question America deserves to have answered: Why should we engage with Iran?

In short, not talking to Iran has failed. Miserably.

Bush engages in self-deception arguing that not engaging Iran has worked. In fact, Iran has grown stronger: continuing to master the nuclear fuel cycle; arming militias in Iraq and Lebanon; bolstering extremist anti-Israeli proxies. It has embraced Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and spends lavishly to rebuild Afghanistan, gaining influence across the region.

Instead of backing Bush's toxic rhetoric, McCain should have called George H.W. Bush's secretary of state, James Baker. After years of stonewalling, the administration grudgingly tested the Baker-Hamilton report's recommendation and opened talks with Iran -- albeit low-level dialogue restricted to the subject of Iraq. Is James Baker an appeaser, too?
While the president attacks political opponents from the Knesset, responsible members of his own administration meet face to face with Iranians. Yes, Ahmadinejad's words often are abhorrent, and often Iran has played a poisonous role in Middle East politics. But when our ambassador to Iraq meets with his Iranian counterpart, he isn't courting "the false comfort of appeasement" -- he is facing the reality that Iran exerts influence in Iraq. That's why Defense Secretary Bob Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, have called for engaging Iran. Appeasers all? Nonsense.
Direct negotiations may be the only means short of war that can persuade Iran to forgo its nuclear capability. Given that a nuclear Iran would menace Israel, drive oil prices up past today's record highs and possibly spark a regional arms race, shouldn't we be doing all we can to avoid that conflagration?
Opponents of dialogue often quip that talking isn't a strategy. Walking away isn't a strategy, either. McCain says that "there's only one thing worse than the United States exercising the military option, that is, a nuclear-armed Iran." But for all his professed reluctance, when McCain disavows diplomacy, he is stacking the deck in favor of war.
What might we achieve by talking with Iran? Some say our engagement to date has not been productive -- but a less half-hearted and less conditional approach might well break the stalemate. We won't know until we try.
Dialogue helps us isolate Ahmadinejad rather than empowering him to isolate us. More important, even if we fail to reach an agreement, engaging Iran will spark three conversations likely to strengthen our position.
The first is between our leaders and Iran's. From nonproliferation to counterterrorism, frankly, Iran won't care for much of what we have to say -- but at the right moment, it is not unreasonable to think Tehran would cut a deal in exchange for economic incentives, energy assistance, diplomatic normalization or a noninvasion guarantee.
Second is the conversation America's president should be having with the Iranian people. We should seize the chance to tell some of the region's most pro-American people how their own president has isolated them, denying their great culture its place in the world and the region a constructive dialogue.
There's a reason the late Tom Lantos, Congress's only Holocaust survivor and a formidable diplomat, applied for a visa to enter Iran every year for the last decade of his life. What better way to puncture the petty lies of a demagogue than to force him to confront a man who has lived the very history he denies and trivializes?
Some have asserted that meeting with Iran's leaders would legitimize Ahmadinejad, who is neither Iran's supreme leader nor someone whom Obama specifically promised to meet. Curiously, many critics then hype Ahmadinejad as a threat of historic proportions, thereby granting the stature they seek to deny. Iranian elections in mid-2009 could yield a less objectionable president; engaging Iran makes that more likely.

The third conversation is with the world. By engaging Iran, we reclaim the moral high ground -- no small feat. If Iran refuses to budge, we have new leverage to expose it as a threat whose bad intentions cannot be explained away.
Those who say they take no option off the table should not put America in a straitjacket by denouncing diplomacy.
As Iran's centrifuges churn out enriched uranium, we're asking the wrong question. Instead of wondering why Barack Obama wants to talk with Iran, we should ask: "What are George Bush and John McCain waiting for?"
The writer is a Democratic senator from Massachusetts.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/23/AR2008052302170.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

aklim · #**114** 05-24-2008, 12:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dculkin

That's just not true. Things were not stalled. There is a lot that is unclear about the Iraq situation.

One thing is clear - in the end, it was George Bush who expelled the inspectors.

That is exactly what I've been telling you.

Hussein is the one who pushed things to the edge.

OK. So what do you call the "back and forth" games? What do you think the reasons for all the UN resolutions? Because they wanted something to write?

Once war was about to break out, yes. What brought it to that point? Lets say it was all Bush. What was going in during the Clinton years? If the inspections were so successful, why did the UN have to keep revisiting the same issue?

So what makes you so sure, that back in 02, we could have said "This time it is real."? Besides good hope, that is.

So if it was he who pushed things to the edge and in this case over, why is anyone else to blame? If I write a bad check and they take me to court and sue me for 3 times what I owe or $500 per WI law, how is it their fault?

LaRondo · #**115** 05-24-2008, 01:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

Annihilation of the enemy

No such thing ever happenend since the existence of living creatures. You must be dreaming.

aklim · #**116** 05-24-2008, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LaRondo

No such thing ever happenend since the existence of living creatures. You must be dreaming.

So Hiroshima and Nagasaki were dreams?

LaRondo · #**117** 05-24-2008, 01:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

So Hiroshima and Nagasaki were dreams?

Yeah, that one hit a couple of hundred thousand civilians. Worse than a dream.
Today, Japanese are thriving more than ever. Where is the annihilation?

aklim · #**118** 05-24-2008, 01:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LaRondo

Yeah, that one hit a couple of hundred thousand civilians. Worse than a dream.

Today, Japanese are thriving more than ever. Where is the annihilation?

It was a good one.

Are they still the enemy? Kill them with more and more sophisticated means till they are all dead or stop fighting. Enemy destroyed. You do realize we have the technology that our past generations didn't have.

LaRondo · #**119** 05-24-2008, 02:15 PM

I don't know what you are talking about, but complete annihilation of one or the other specimen will never happen, no matter how sophisticated your technology is.

Technology is a whoop in the course of time.

The nature of Biology rules here. Even reptiles weren't annihilated entirely by the ice ages.

Now you come with technology. It's almost laughable or at best a temporary appearance.

Even in the theoretical event, that one enemy has been completely removed, sure as Adam & Eve, another will emerge.

For that matter, wars are extremely temporary solutions, hardly worth the consideration.
Well, except within the limited perspectives of profit seeking politicians ...

aklim · #**120** 05-24-2008, 02:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LaRondo

I don't know what you are talking about, but complete annihilation of one or the other specimen will never happen, no matter how sophisticated your technology is.

The nature of Biology rules here. Even reptiles weren't annihilated entirely by the ice ages.

You don't think we could have wiped out the Japanese if we kept dropping atom bombs on them and preventing them from leaving the islands? It will not happen only if you don't have the stones for it.

How do you figure? We have wiped out species with cruder technology. If it wasn't for us stopping, don't you think the buffalo that roamed the plains could have been eradicated till their numbers were too small to reproduce effectively? IIRC, at one time, they were so plentiful that the plains were black as far as the eye can see. They were almost extinct.