What if Saddam complies?

Turnip

Someone asked me this yesterday and I have to admit I was stumped. He will probably allow the UN inspectors in but what happens *if* they complete their mission and find and destroy all his WMD without a hitch? How can he be removed then? However I'm pretty sure that he won't comply fully and the US will go in before the end of the spring.

Bluehair

For a multitude of reasons I aggree it's unlikely Iraq will comply but if they did and were fully disarmed the US would still win..

Why? since if they do toe the line the long running UN sanctions will be dropped and the US(and company) will have access to the Iraqi oil with which to challenge Saudi dominence of the market..

'Regime Change?' my @rse...

Typedef

If Saddam complies, it won't matter a damn.

Why? Because the American Administration cares nothing for the "weapons of mass destruction" (some of which America help Saddam to acquire in the not so distant past), but cares only for establishing hegemony in the region and controlling the oil stocks in the same, that is the reality, not some showcase cause to disarm Iraq.

Pakistan for example has access to Nuclear Weapons and is ruled by a Military Dictatorship and with the relations between Pakistan and India, Pakistan is far more likely to use it's Atomic weapons against India then Iraq would be to use Atomic weapons against Israel for example, yet there is no question of Pakistani complicity in the "War on Terror", nor is there any wardrum sounding to disarm that particular dangerous Military Dictatorship.

Thus the notion of disarmament is a misnomer for American military occupation of Iraq, where a puppet regieme is installed to allow and facilitate American hegemony in the region, to control the petroleum stocks in the area and of course to protect Israel (as if Israeli Nuclear deterrant were not sufficient).

Typedef.

Originally posted by Typedef
Pakistan for example has access to Nuclear Weapons and is ruled by a Military Dictatorship and with the relations between Pakistan and India, Pakistan is far more likely to use it's Atomic weapons against India then Iraq would be to use Atomic weapons against Israel for example, yet there is no question of Pakistani complicity in the "War on Terror", nor is there any wardrum sounding to disarm that particular dangerous Military Dictatorship.

Thus the notion of disarmament is a misnomer for American military occupation of Iraq, where a puppet regieme is installed to allow and facilitate American hegemony in the region, to control the petroleum stocks in the area and of course to protect Israel (as if Israeli Nuclear deterrant were not sufficient).

Typedef.

I would agree, that the bulk of this Anti Sadam Stuff by the U.S and the U.K is drawn from what you have said.
Sadam though is a nasty piece of work, when compared to those in charge of India and Pakistan.
Diplomatic pressures yield more results always with India and Pakistan than they ever would with the volatile Sadam.
I think Sadam is mad enough to ignore Israeli weapons of mass distruction when it comes to using his own.
He's not likely to ever use them if he's being scrutinised as closely as he will be from now on.
If there is no war and things are left on the brink as they are now, and the weapons inspectors are left there reporting ad-infinitum, that would be best and was the spirit really of what the Security council voted for.
In that situation, it's a win , win for the rest of us,not for the U.S though, if the purpose of this is to control oil resources.
mm

Biffa Bacon

Here's an interesting rebuttal of the "It's all about oil" argument:
Cherchez le petrol

No "It's from a right-wing website so it's obviously not true a-hur-hur-hur :rolleyes:" foolishness please. You will earn nothing but my contempt.

Raskolnikov

Originally posted by Typedef
Pakistan is far more likely to use it's Atomic weapons against India then Iraq would be to use Atomic weapons against Israel for example

Typedef.

I don't think so, during the Gulf War, Sadaam was only too happy to launch Scud missiles at Isreal, if Sadaam did acquire nuclear weapons it's reasonable to assume that his first target would be Tel-Aviv. If General Mushareef wanted war then i think he'd have already launched nukes against India.

Zombrex

I don't think so, during the Gulf War, Sadaam was only too happy to launch Scud missiles at Isreal, if Sadaam did acquire nuclear weapons it's reasonable to assume that his first target would be Tel-Aviv.

But he would have no reason to lanch them, unless he was backed into a corner by an American invasion ... then he would blast the sh1t out of Israel in an effort to draw the other Arab countries into the war.

Saddam maybe "evil" but he is not stupid ... an attack against Israel would be suicide, America would bomb Iraq back to the stone age.

Here's an interesting rebuttal of the "It's all about oil" argument:

Not very interesting and not really that good of a rebuttal. What they say is Bush wouldn't be interested in Iraq oil cause it wouldn't help the economy and he wouldn't get that much of it. But it doesn't really back that up with much other than saying that the economy was good between 1992 and 2000 while there were sanctions on Iraq oil, so why would Bush want Iraq oil. Now I don't know much about oil economics, but this seems like a very overly simplified arguement.

To me what it boils down to is do we trust that the American government really wants to help make the world a better place ... that they are really concerned about the Iraqi people (had to force myself not to burst out laughing at that, cause I am on dial up and every second counts )

The issue isn't "Is Saddam evil" ... Saddam was evil 12 years ago when the US loved him ... there are loads of evil dictators in the world. If America wanted to make a difference why don't the stop supporting dictatorships before they start trying to topple them.

DadaKopf

Since the US and her 'friends' are consistently unwilling to define their terms clearly, the whole issue remains infuriatingly problematic for all concerned, either on the firing end or the receiving end.

Firstly, there's the nebulous term "weapons of mass destruction". If this is to be taken literally, then the US and her allies are hypocrites. If it's to be taken in the way it's meant, it means any weapon with a large destructive capacity in the hands of someone who is untrustworthy or unstable, or who has used them in the past so as to amass political capital. So the US and Iraq are in possession of these weapons. At least this way, an argument can be made to minimise Saddam's destructive capabilities - he has acted irresponsibly in the past and has murdered innocent civilians. But so has the US on many occasions. Basically, there's a tacit agreement among the more powerful members of the international community to fudge this issue so, while I would still say Saddam should be deposed (because let's face it, he diverts much needed funds into military and prestige projects rather than medicine etc.), the US is playing the same game as Saddam - on both sides of no-man's-land, there are two actors seeking regional hegemony. But because the US is 'good' and Saddam is 'evil' from the Westerner's point of view (and often the reverse in the Middle Eastern's), we're expected to ignore this little issue.

Secondly, the US has consistently changed its position from the UN's original position of WMD destruction to 'disarmament'. While Joe Public is expected to perceive disarmament as meaning the same thing, it doesn't. Disarmament implies the liquidation of most, if not all military capabilities; it amounts to one of the gravest political insults a politician can make. Just like Austria-Hungary's ultimatum to Yugoslavia, the whole resolution is designed to be rejected. No one should ever expect any state to willingly leave itself defenceless.

It's a bit strange, then, that the pundits expect Saddam to pretty much accept Resolution 1441 on Friday. Of course, he's caught between a rock and a hard place and for obvious reasons, he has to avoid a war - he knows that this time. That's not to say he won't be belligerant about UN interference and the US will jump on that like a Vietnam vet jumps on a grenade. I hope for Saddam's sake he complies and that Blix's report is thorough and give the US no reason to attack. Eventually, Bush will lose interest.

I'm not optimistic about that scenario, though.

DiscoStu

Saddam Hussein is obviously an evil man, but when we were selling arms to him to keep the Iranians in check he was the same evil man he is today." "In the same way he served western interests then, he is now the distraction for the sleight of hand to protect the west's supply of oil."

Now these arguments--actually banal assertions backed by little more than overwrought speculation, connect-the-black-helicopter-to-the-grassy-knoll theorizing, and delusional are readings of run-of-the-mill American security documents pertaining to energy policy...

Is he trying to deny that sadamn was cozy with the us before the gulf?

In the first place, American oil companies will hardly have a monopoly on post-war Iraqi reserves. French, Russian, Indian, Algerian, Vietnamese and Italian companies, among others, have long been maneuvering to secure a slice of this petroleum pie.

Didnt the iraqi "opposition" publicly engage in negotiations with the us administration to give american oil companies preference in post war iraq?

Moreover, U.S.
economic performance plummeted in 1991, the year of the Gulf War, and before any malaise issuing therefrom could have developed.

was i dreaming when i watched massive oil fields burn on tv as the iraqi army retreated destroying billions of dollars of oil thus causing a massive increase in the price of a barrel of the black stuff?

Goldberg also reports a tape recording of Saddam's cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid, addressing the Baath Party on the subject of the Kurds. On the tape, al-Majid rages, "I will kill them all with chemical weapons! Who is going to say anything? The international community? F*** them!

why do these people mean anymore to america now than when the promised protection against saddamn never materialized after the gulf war. the final line of the quote could easily describe the american line on the situation. this moral police charade is quite pathetic.

Sorry but this kind of right wing crap annoys the hell out of me.

PH01

It's as clear as the garden hose on your Brendan Grace what this pot stirring on Iraq and Saddam is all about? So it won't make a difference whether Saddam complies or not. Saddam is going to string out Bush as long as he can go - just doing enough to keep the wolves from the door.

And he will do all that he can to hold on to power even if it means turning all his so called weapons of mass destruction. Because like the IRA, he can always go out tomorrow morning and buy some more.