I was born, brought up and lived 2/3 of my life in Eastern Europe. Don Quixote was part of the mandatory school program. I was brought up on French, English and German literature and philosophy. Understand? I also know both sides of the Iron Curtain, I know opression and totalitarism, not from your socialist tabloids but from real life experience. And I do know that the destruction of iron curtain, collapse of the Soviet Union, Berlin wall and liberation of Eastern Europe from communism was due to one and only one factor - USA muscle and uncompromizing position. French diplomacy and German pacifism contributed absolutely, absolutely nothing to all the positive which happened in the world in the last 50 years.
Here's something they didn't teach you - my Government, my people as a whole could not have cared less about your oppression. My Government spent itself into oblivion, trying to force Russia into spending itself into oblivion not to free you, but to keep the idea of communism from spreading across the Atlantic. Communism sucks if you are into banking, insurance, mortgage writing, or any number of other interests that drive and control our capitalistic system - a system I approve of, but for God's sake, don't kid yourself into thinking we did it for you - we didn't.
Tampa, You actually are sick. I was just trying to answer your question, - why no "Anti-Saddam" protests. You do not have to agree with my arguments but there is no reason to overreact. It is not good for your health. Given your tendency of personal attacts on anybody you disagree with, you also suffer from obvious inferiority complex. A good psychiatrist can help (hopefully). As far as the subject matter is concerned... Whatever the motives of this country were is absolutely irrelevant, what is important is that they did good. Can you possibly deny that South Korea is better off now than North Korea. I am not talking about the reasons why USA got involved. I am talking about the results for South Korea. Can you deny that the developments in Afghanistan are positive and that the country is better off now then before. Regarding Kuwait your are confused, nobody ever promised to restore democracy there. You cannot restore what never existed. But the country was liberated from an oppressive regime. Can you possibly deny that whether it was all about oil for USA or for any other reason, but our military did the right thing and saved Kuwaitis ass. People in those countries do not care whether USA was motivated by oil, ambitions, geo-political interests or whatever. They are just greatful.
I don't. And I do not care why it was done as long as it was done. And I am greatful to the country which did it. Whatever other pragmatic reasons they may have had to do it is irrelavant. Cause I am free now. Eastern Europe is free. And I would not be free if we had it the French or German way.
skeptik123:`People in those countries do not care whether USA was motivated by oil, ambitions, geo-political interests or whatever. They are just greatful.´ grateful for what ? the USA have always stuck to the Yalta agreement - they did neither interfere in the East German (1953), Polish (1956 & 1981), Hungarian (1956) and Checho-Slovak (1968) popular uprisings nor did they do anything against the erection of the Berlin wall in 1961. the USA have not `democratized´S. Korea before and after the 1953 armistice but turned it into a brutal dictatorship under Dr. Syngman Rhee.
msfe, you are truly unbearable, you made several posts in this threads: - first post was "war is bad" slogan - next "USA is not a democracy" crap. Then you quoted some moron who believes if USA is trying to do something good - Europe should unite and oppose it. - next totally absurd and irrelavant reference to Don Quixote - now totally absurd and irrelevant reference to Poland, East Germany, Hungary etc. That's quite an imressive, well thought out and intelligent contribution you're making. Switching topics, not even bothering to respond to facts, coming up with endless chain of baseless and irrelevant accusations. How old are you anyway? 15 Already? I am not going to waste any more of my time responding to your absurd posts. I can sincerely congratulate you though - you are a typical representative of completely clueless, fact-ignoring, logic-challanged, America-hating peace movement. Grow up.
Take your dime store psychoanalysis and shove it... And when you are done doing that, go do a search on George the First and Kuwait, and you will indeed find that his original excuse to drive out Iraq was to "restore democracy". Then do another search and see if you can find any reference from me to a "anti-Saddam" rally. And then perchance you might try searching your soul to find why you attempt to insult/intimidate others with your Grade School swipes at your "opponent".
'Take your dime store psychoanalysis and shove it...' Done. I am really not a doctor, you know. 'And when you are done doing that, go do a search on George the First and Kuwait, and you will indeed find that his original excuse to drive out Iraq was to "restore democracy".' Did not find any. Will take your word for it that Bush the First may have said something like that. It is all semantics though, neither he nor the rest of the world thought Kuwait was a democracy. That does not refute my argument that USA did good and saved Kuwait from occupation though. 'Then do another search and see if you can find any reference from me to a "anti-Saddam" rally.' Yeah, I did it on purpose. You refered to them as "pro-war" people. It is all semantics again. Pro-Choice people would not want to be called anti-life, pro-life folks would not like to be called anti-choice. I do not think it is fair to call people "pro-war". They are not blood thirsty monsters, you know. They are anti-Saddam, rightly or wrongly believing that he is a clear and present danger. Each one of them would much prefer a non-violent solution to the crisis, but NOW, before it is too late. Example: if we bombed Afghanistan in 2000, we would not have 9/11/2001, but then again we would never have gotten UN approval in 2000, France grudgingly approved Afghanistan even after 9/11. 'And then perchance you might try searching your soul to find why you attempt to insult/intimidate others with your Grade School swipes at your "opponent".' I really did not mean to offend/insult/intimidate my opponent, sorry if it came through like that. Wish I was 15. I just do not enjoy his discussion "techniques". Each one of his posts has absolutely nothing to do with either his previous post or your response to it. At best he just picks a line in your post and takes the discussion in a totally different direction. How can you discuss anything in this manner. I may be wrong but it looked very childish to me.
And boy, oh boy, did it WORK, baby!! Does that upset you? or freedom of speech, freedom to try and better yourself, freedom to live without fear of being jailed or worse when you criticize your government, etc, etc. Interesting that you forgot to mention those points and instead tried to make it all about economics. Of course we did it for ourselves first - is any nation going to commit the capital and manpower we did solely for the good of others? But in doing so we not only managed the collapse of communism but freed millions, skeptic123 included. That you ridicule him, a person who has benefited directly from our policies, only shows that you would rather rail against your government then admit for an instant that our policies WERE SUCCESSFUL. The Domino Theory was absurd? Okay, I guess the ex-USSR had no intention of spreading its dogma. Eastern European countries were communist as a choice of the people. ROFL! And last I checked, S. Korea was a democracy, unlike it's northern neighbor. Ahem, not just America's right, but the world's right to the oil. Or would you have been content to let Saddam remain and then go into Saudi Arabia or other neighbors? Quite a sweeping statement. So American humanitarian agencies tried to do nothing at all, huh? This statement of yours succinctly excludes the millions of dollars US agencies and NGOs spend every year around the world. You seem to require that the US help the entire world, otherwise it is guilty of hypocrisy or worse. In every foreign policy venture you find blame, regardless if the results have been beneficial to the country in question. You want the US to be everything to all people. Not possible.
Another example of the unrealistic expectations you place on the country you live in and hate so much. China is different from the Iraqi situation in so many ways that if you need them to be explained you truly are ignorant.