The Questions
1. Do you support an American war against the current Iraqi regime? If so, under what circumstances? And should this be a war for disarmament or for `regime change'?
2. Do you favor a UN-imposed inspection system for Iraq? Would you support he threat or the use of force to impose and sustain such a system?
3. What is your view of the Bush administration's new doctrine of preemptive war?
4. If there is a war, would you join an antiwar movement? Of what sort?
5. What are, what should be, the long-term goals of the United States in the confrontation with Iraq?
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You would think that out of the eight responses listed there would be something interesting or at least confrontational to read. Zero. And if not interesting or confrontational at least point blank reject the premise. No. What a bunch of mealy mouthed jack-offs.
I have to admit I am appalled at the pathetic, inarticulate, quisling like apologies that pass for writing in opposition to this utterly atrocious and fabricated war hysteria.
Why this need to be reasonable, reserved and well considered, when the people, events and policies are completely irrational and unreservedly stupid? This war shit is a goddamned outrage.
1. The promised war, the long list of contradictory reasons, the shifting and hypocritical policies of the US, the absolute absence of offensive threats or actions from Iraq, the complete separation between Iraq and anything to do with 9/11, and the utterly degraded military capability of Iraq, all beg to question what on earth possessed the Bush administration to fabricate such storm of war mongering and amp itself up for a major war of occupation---all in the name of combating terrorism?
In other words this war idea, the UN inspections, the blockaids and embargos, the constant air offensive over Iraq would all be utterly ridiculous if these were not blatant atrocities. Because they are nothing more than irrational and brutal bullying, they have completely corrupted any well reasoned US foreign policy or even debate, especially in the Arab and Muslim world. Why on earth would they or we even debate the question of their slaughtered like dogs?
The US war drum beat, conducted day after day after day is so ludicrous and uncalled for, such an absurdity at face value, that it forces anyone opposed to it, and many who are not to wonder what on earth are the real motives? Since only ridiculous motives, outright lies, and irrational and contradictory justifications have saturated all media channels, all public pronouncements, all print, all domestic debate and almost all everyday conversations, the effect of this total four dimensional assault has created an all pervasive climate of anxiety, apprehension, hysteria, and fear. It is tantamount to mass paranoia.
When this volatility is then inflamed by weekly, sometimes hourly announcements from various national security and police agencies of unspecified but imminent threats of terrorist attacks---which have always proved false---the effect is to add the gasoline of confusion and disorientation to the fires of mass paranoia and war hysteria.
This entire spectrum of US governmental activities is an atrocity perpetrated on us. While the justification is supposedly a series of policy reactions to the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, the reactive US policies have ranged from meaningless and silly to inadequate, mistaken and foolish, on out to counterproductive, dangerous and insane.
Do I support a war with Iraq? Fuck no.
2. Not that anybody is really asking, but there is no point to a UN imposed inspection of Iraq either. About its only usefulness would be to provide a pretext for the rest of the UN members to vote to end the embargo, blockaid, and withdraw support for the continually escalating US air assault.
It is already apparent that no matter what the UN inspection team reports, or what the UN decides, the Bush administration is going to pursue a war. If the UN can provide even a hint of reluctance from the Iraq government, or the hint of even minor resistance, all well and good. That will be sufficient to blast them out of existence. If no hint or ambiguity is forth coming, that's fine too. We'll blast'm anyway. This is the sort of trumped up foreign policy pretext the Nazis used to bully Europe into appeasement, while they systematically raped Europe at will. The current German government minister who said so, was right. (Hope she still has her job.)
3. What is my view of random, overt, US military attacks and military strikes on any and all targets our stupid asshole president deems fit to kill? The question answers itself.
4. I am a permanent and long standing member of any and all antiwar movements that blow into town. The more the merrier. But I must say, of all the brutal, nasty, and obnoxious policies and actions one US administration after another has pursued in the world, this Iraq crap is the most idiotic of them all. So, whatever antiwar movement is in town and currently holding demonstrations and rallies that are within walking or BART distance is the one I am currently in.
5. Long term goals? There are none. The war will probably be anticlimactic, a pathic mess and over quickly, a few thousand dead, another few thousand crippled and disfigured, and a few thousand more fucked up in some way or another. All the usual suspects: mostly civilians. And of course we'll never know the concrete toll it will take, since although it was all done in our name, all that shit is classified. Obviously, for security reasons the Pentagon would have to kill us, if we try to find out.
But what if it doesn't turn out to be just a simple, stupid and limited atrocity? What if ordinary people, actually get pissed off at a foreign attack and military occupation of their country? That is not exactly an unheard of consequence. Iraqis may or may not support their government. But their government is not the same as their family, their friends, their street, their town, their businesses, their lives. And while the US military is mauling Iraq, it will be busy shooting their family members, their friends, blowing up their streets, their towns, trashing their shops, markets, and schools, and destroying their lives. That pretty much makes the US the enemy, with or without the Iraqi government not matter who is supposedly in charge. And just exactly what kind of popular support would any fabricated government that replaced the current regime have when it was installed under military occupation by an enemy that has killed their neighbors, friends and relatives, and blasted their towns, streets and homes?
Disgusting.
Chuck Grimes