http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040405/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq&cid=540&ncid=716
The death count is starting to become the focus. It is like a thing I was watching about the start of the war where it said that it is scary that the government has forgottent he lessons from Vietnam (such as exaggerating things to force us into war). In an election year, increasing casualities and fighting in an unpopular war can’t be good. It’ll be interesting to see how this affects the race.
Vietnam 2.
This time it’s Iraq!
Damn Bush. 613 Soldiers dead? Why the hell did we even go there in the first place? We already know there are no weapons that Bush led some people to believe.
“Marines attack in Fallujah”
…happens what I’ve been reading about today. Tsk tsk, I say.
It’s 616, now. And that doesn’t even count the wounded.
At this point, it would be a terrible mistake to pull our troops out of Iraq. We should be sending more.
If you want exagerrations, try comparing the current conflict to Vietnam. Now THAT is an exagerration.
Whatever the popular support for this “war” is, there is a helluvalot more of it than there was in Vietnam. Furthermore, even though it appears there might not have been any weapons, it is not an absolute assurence that there weren’t.
Iraq is a big place, for all we know we’ll stumble upon some nerve gas buried under a rock 10 years down the road.
In any event, it seems the people of Iraq are happier for the most part, a reformed government is better than being stuck with Saddam.
Furthermore, even though it appears there might not have been any weapons, it is not an absolute assurence that there weren’t. Iraq is a big place, for all we know we’ll stumble upon some nerve gas buried under a rock 10 years down the road.
Nerve gas is not a WMD. Only if nuclear missiles are found under a rock will this war be justified.
“It is not an absolute assurance that Iraq did not have weapons” does nothing to justify the war. We were the ones accusing Iraq; it was our job to prove that Iraq did have weapons, <i>before</i> the war started. We couldn’t do that then, and we won’t be stumbling on any weapons of mass destruction now or ten years from now. Even Bush’s top weapons hunter David Kay, who apparently was a true believer in these nonexistent weapons, has come out and said outright that after his lengthy, costly search for the weapons, he has concluded that there are none. And this guy has always been on <i>Bush’s</i> side.
Yeah, especially the 10,000 dead civilians and 100,000 dead soldiers. You know, Bremer was bragging recently about how he’s finally “restored” the electricity and water in Baghdad to “pre-war levels.” Assuming that’s even true, one year of having no electricity or water is nothing to be happy about, and neither is the Iraq unemployment rate, which is over 50%. And this pathetic result, which we spent billions of dollars to get, is just in the capital, which is supposed to be the one place we really have a grip on.
Add to that the facts that so far the occupation has got 13,000 people in concentration camps, surrounded whole towns with barbed wire, bulldozed people’s property as “collective punishment,” conducted countless searches without warrants in the middle of the night, and shot a whole bunch of folks “by accident.” But even aside from all of that, we now have to deal with a militant cleric who has the support of 20-30% of the Iraqi populace, “pacify” Fallujah somehow, and try to keep the Kurds from seceding from Iraq. These last three problems have nothing to do with Hussein - by now, the insurgency is in the hands of ordinary people who probably were against him, and now are definitely against us. From that alone, it should readily be obvious that we’re only sinking into a quagmire.
The reason for the “higher support” (currently 37% of people think that the results have been “worth it”) is because there’s no draft. When the draft is brought back, more people will think twice about it.
The problem with that, is that the inspectors said that they needed more time and now the administration is saying they need more time, despite not giving it to the inspectors. Also, the support for Vietnam started out pretty high, but changed greatly. It was a pretty long and complicated war. You can’t just look at the end and resonance of it and say it had worse support since that wasn’t always true. We are only a year into this war. Vietnam had 8 years of conflict, with 10 years prior involvement, constant invlovement. Also, my comment about Vietnam was not abotu the supprot or the fighting, it was about the government forgetting the lessons we learned in Vietnam, such as how we can’t throw our weight around. The start of Vietnam was a little fabricated since it started with an atatck on one of our naval ships.
Yeah, the majority of the deaths in that war didn’t start happening until a few years into it.
The support also seems a bit better I should say in that people don’t hate the troops and aren’t angry with them. In fatc, support for troosp is pretty high from what I’ve seen. I get complimetns all the time and get told to keep up the good work and to tell the others that they are supported. Most of the anegr does seem directed at the war itself, which si better than Vietnam. However, like you said SK, part of the reaosn fro more supprot could very well eb just becuase there isnt’a draft. I was gonna say which is why we don’t see as many protests, but protests are pretty high around the world, but directed against the war, not the troops. The funny thing is, one of the NCOs (a middle ranking enlisted) in my section said that this how the war was gonna be before the war even started.
On the plus side, at least the violence in Haiti has calmed down.
"Whatever the popular support for this “war” is, there is a helluvalot more of it than there was in Vietnam. Furthermore, even though it appears there might not have been any weapons, it is not an absolute assurence that there weren’t. "
This is actually false, so it doesn’t even need to be argued against. The majority of Americans supported the Vietnam War right into the Nixon administration.
Could you rephrase what SK and I are sayign again please? SK and I both said that supprot for Vietnam started strong, liek you said with Nixon, but got terrible after a couple fo years. Let see here, Iraq has bad support and it is oen year into it, Vietnam had terrible support after several years. AT this rate, Iraq could top Vietnam, I don’t think we’ll lose, since by capturing Saddam, we did effectively win. Now if we are sort of forced out because it is too tough, then we’ll lose, but it wouldn’t be a complete loss.
Also, I already addressed yourt hing about the weapons. The administration didn’t givet he inspectors the time they asked for to determine if there were weapons, yet we still didn’t give them the time. Now that we are struggling to find the weapons, we are sayign that it will take time. It is quite hypocritical of the administration to act that way and why nto giving the administrationt iem to find the weapons is fair. They didn’t give the time to the inspectors, so why should the administation be given more time?
Also, my whole brining Vietnam into thsi wasn’t the support for the war, ti is abotu the government forgetting what we learned in Vietnam. It means that the government didn’t elarn form the past, which is why ti is repeating some of the mistakes. Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. It is scary that they forgot the lessons since it means that they may repeat the mistakes again, which will be very dangerous.
I’m saying support for Vietnam started strong and stayed strong. The war was almost over by Nixon’s administration, though we killed the most Vietnamese during his administration.
Its worth noticing that the majority of people still support the Iraq war itself and think it was the right decision(57%). People generally don’t think too hard about what they choose to support or not support.
Dont listen to Info, he’s still drunk.
Bubble Boy! I can’t believe I’ve finally foudn you after so many years. I’ve heard of you, but I didn’t blieve that you could possibly exist. Well, there is one mystery solved.
Seriously though, have you been living in a bubble? If you haven’t you’d know how Vietnam is a dark mark on our record and how many people hated the war. I haven’t heard anythign good about the war outside of military sources. Everyone I kknow and have hear from and read online and absicalyl everywhere says that we lsot the war and it was a mistake. I knwo that Vietnam vets were shunned when they got back because of what happened over there. People are always talkign about how we lost many lives needlessly. There was almost no support for Vietnam after a couple fo years. That si why when you think of the '60s and Vietnam you always think of protests and draft card/bra burnings. They did it be cause they opposed the war. That is why many people moved to Canada, to escape having to go over. Yeah tehre was strogn initial support, but it faded. That is one reason why thiings aren’t looking good in Iraq. Vietnam started out with high support, Iraq didn’t, and with the increasing verocity of the attacks and deaths, that support is going to drop more.
It’s getting so bad a Canadian security guard in Iraq died. And he shouldn’t have even been in Iraq, he was Canadian for fuck’s sake. WE DON’T GO TO DANGEROUS PLACES! We know we’ll die!
“Seriously though, have you been living in a bubble? If you haven’t you’d know how Vietnam is a dark mark on our record and how many people hated the war. I haven’t heard anythign good about the war outside of military sources. Everyone I kknow and have hear from and read online and absicalyl everywhere says that we lsot the war and it was a mistake. I knwo that Vietnam vets were shunned when they got back because of what happened over there. People are always talkign about how we lost many lives needlessly. There was almost no support for Vietnam after a couple fo years. That si why when you think of the '60s and Vietnam you always think of protests and draft card/bra burnings. They did it be cause they opposed the war. That is why many people moved to Canada, to escape having to go over. Yeah tehre was strogn initial support, but it faded. That is one reason why thiings aren’t looking good in Iraq. Vietnam started out with high support, Iraq didn’t, and with the increasing verocity of the attacks and deaths, that support is going to drop more.”
Info, right up until the end of the war support for Vietnam remained at a high percentage. It wasn’t until after we had pulled out that support began to significantly slip, slipping more and more over several decades until the modern era when people began to see Vietnam as a mistake. Look up the poll numbers if you don’t believe me; the idea that the American people mostly were against Vietnam is one of the great myths of American history, and its not a conservative lie, its something thats taught in colleges and accepted in serious studies of Vietnam. During the actual war, most people refused to believe that Vietnam was a mistake, and therein lies the danger; people will generally continue to support a war as long as the war is being fought, and won’t begin to see themselves in the wrong until well after the war is over.
Well, looking at polls conducted by the NES from 1964 to 1970, in 1965 about 10% of people wanted to pull out of Vietnam, and 20% more thought we should stay there but try to end the fighting (presumably by some kind of settlement). By 1968 those numbers had increased to 20% and 40%, and by the end of 1970 they were 45% and 30%, respectively. That was still about two years before Nixon signed the peace plan in January of 1973.