Help me with this well prepared Freeper (not an oxymoron)

[bacchant]

I've been debating the validity of the Iraq war with a wing-nut on another board (I know, pointless). Because WMD and connections to 911 have turned out to be bullshit, he of course has seized on the "liberation" excuse; "Do you honestly believe the Iraqi people would be better off under Saddam Hussein?" (Nothing like a simple rhetorical question to frame a complex issue)

The argument has devolved into a numbers war over which dictator, theirs or ours, has brought more destruction to the Iraqis. Below are some of his statements with links to supposedly accurate statistics.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The atrocities of Saddam Hussein are well documented and extreme.
usinfo.state.gov/regional...raq99h.htm

Genocide watch gives the figure of Iraqis killed by Saddam (inclusive of those killed in the bloody Iran-Iraq war) at a million with at least 200,000 civilians executed without trial or tortured to death.
www.genocidewatch.org/Ira...uary26.htm

First hand account of Hussein horrors
www.washtimes.com/upi-bre...-5940r.htm

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The crux of this guy's argument is that the "few" civilian deaths we caused are negligible compared to the history of Saddam's atrocities. Put in those terms he probably wins, but he's known for lies of omission and referencing partisan sources.

My problem is, I'm swamped at work and don't have time to check this stuff out right now. Besides, I suck at research. If there are any well-read-stat-freaks here who could help me debunk or counter his data with some links to reputable sources, I would be in your debt.

[Yavin4]

1. What He's Doing Is...

arguing that your opposition to the war is tantamount to supporting Saddam. There were a million other avenues to get rid of Saddam without going to war. The war may have gotten rid of Saddam, but it's left the Iraqi people vulnerable to violence and to having muslim fundamentalists running the country. IOW, the Iraqi people have gone from the frying pan to the fire.

Yes, Saddam was a bad man, and we needed to get rid of him, but this war was the worst way to do it.

[rumguy]

11. Are they better off?

1. The way things are going now it's hard to say. They now have terrorists in their midst, and lots of them. If it continues to get worse, this is a seriously debatable question.

2. This was also the wrong war at the wrong time carried out in the wrong way. That's part of the reason it's blowing up their faces. We are spread thin, the Taliban is rearing it's head in Afghanistan, and our country is going into massive debt. On top of that we've alienated many of our strongest allies - so we have practically no help in Iraq at all.

3. We are making new enemies, and creating more terrorists...and that's not good for anyone, anywhere.

4. Iraqis themselves are starting to get pissed.

5. Everything this administration touches ends up ruined.

[MidwestTransplant]

2. Your freeper friend is changing the subject

We did not go to war for the Iraqi people. We were told we were going because a threat posed by the regieme, plain and simple. Whether the Iraqis are better off is not the point.

[bacchant]

Yeah I know.

You guys are right and I've made those same arguments, but I'm still interested in numbers for US caused deaths, including estimated deaths due to UN sanctions, residual deaths from disease, and all caused by US military involvement in Iraq before and after Saddam. Also, I wonder about his numbers; is it fair for him to count casualties from the Iran - Iraq war for instance?

[newyawker99]

15. Hi awake!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[reprobate]

3. Some things you might mention.

The fact that we kept iraq below poverty status with eleven years of sanctions, with constant bombings during that time. In the period of the sanctions well over a million iraqis died as a result of the american sanctions, 500,000 of whom were children. They died from disentary, cholera, etc from sewage systems and water systems that were destroyed by our bombings. One huge cause of death for these children was lueckemia, caused by depleted uranium.

Got to go now, but I'll try to come back with more later.

[tinnypriv]

4. Why bother with the stats?

They're probably right anyhow.

The real answer is that if "liberation" is the goal, three questions arise:

1. Why haven't the principal backers of Saddam Hussein in the 80's (who are currently in government) uttered a word of contrition about that earlier policy?

2. If "liberation" is the goal, that negates everything that happened in the security council from 2002-invasion. So, why bother lying to congress and the public by pretending WMD is the "single issue"? In a sense, why all the lies?

3. Why did Bush state (at the Azores) that even if Saddam Hussein and his cohorts left Iraq unconditionally (collapsing the regime), the United States would invade regardless?

If the answer to any of these involves magical "reversal" of policy or "a realisation after 9/11", call the guy a dumbass and walk.

[wuushew]

5. Tell him the ultimate freedom is life

For most of the 1990's Saddam personally killed a (compartively) low number of people.

The direct result of our military intervention has killed several thousand Iraqi civilians, perhaps 6-10k.

Since we are only interested if Iraq would be better off with or without Saddam(not factoring in his sons) we must ask if invading Iraq saved more people than it killed. For added complexity use the positive factors of lifted sanctions and the negative factors of regional chaos and lawlessness.


He will probably come back and say some bullshit that people should die for freedom, western values, oil or some other non-sense.

[snippy]

6. I have heard this argument from dozens of kkkreepers and shittoheads.

I just say "It really makes you wonder why Bush insisted that eveyone in his administration lie about the reasons for invading Iraq. Although it does explain his insane desire to invade additional countries." I find this effective and satisfying.

[Kamika]

7. I think you should point out how christians were high in his goverment

And also that 50% of university students were women during Saddam

[HFishbine]

8. Not sure how far you'd get with this but how about

"Do you honestly think the American people are better off now that we are in Iraq?" The point being, does he want to frame the debate around what's best for the Iraqi people, or what's best for the American people?

[alcuno]

9. Welcome to DU, awake.

I'm not going to help with that argument because it's a detour from the central issue.

The truth is that we have a duty to hold our public officials accountable for their actions. This country was led to believe that Iraq was a "direct threat" to us. Now, I didn't believe it then and I've seen no evidence to the contrary. But that's what we were told.

I don't oppose the concept of liberation on its face. Had a candidate for the presidency gone to the American people and said that he wanted to liberate oppressed people throughout the world, I probably would have supported him. The American people could have judged whether that was the course they wanted America to take.

Informed consent was taken out of the hands of the people. Don't debate liberation since that was not the argument at the time. If the administration suddenly finds WMD's in Iraq, do you think they're still going to be talking liberation? No way. Their first argument failed so they've come up with a new one. The real question is why are there so many people in this country who are willing to be lied to? And seem to like it.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

10. Cite Poppy's rationale for NOT ousting Saddam

It's all over the Net, I don't have a link right now.

[wuushew]

12. I truly believe Bush 41 is being marginalized in the eyes of freepers

-raised taxes
-rejected voodoo economics
-was actually concerned about the debt
-did not believe in unilaterialism
-trusted Colin Powell
-not a fundie nut


As these trends are not currently in vogue with radical-conservatives the sheep will tend to side with the son over the father.

[durutti]

13. A Detailed Response

First of all, those links aren't working for me. The State Department has history of downplaying the crimes of allies and exaggerating those of enemies, so it's not really a trustworthy source. Neither is the thoroughly ideological Washington Times.

I've never heard of Genocide Watch. It could be a front group, or it could be genuine.

In any case, it's certainly true that the Hussein regime committed many atrocities. It killed hundreds of thousands of people. Its human rights record was awful.

There are a few thing worth noting, however. First of all, Saddam Hussein's rise to power was supported by the U.S. government. In fact, the CIA Hussein a list of leftists to kill. The United States continued to provide both material and political support to Hussein throughout the 1980s. The infamous massacre of the Kurds at Halabja was done with U.S.-supplied chemical weapons. After it happened, the Republican administration tried to blame the atrocity on Iran.

Hussein was only one of countless tyrants that the U.S. government in general, and the Republicans (especially those connected to the current administration) in particular, have supported. For example, from the time he came to power to the time he was deposed in the late 1990s, Paul Wolfowitz praised Suharto of Indonesia. Suharto always had an awful human rights record. He also killed hundreds of thousands -- probably more in actual numbers, and definitely more per capita, than Hussein.

It's also worth noting that Hussein's regime, brutal and wicked as it was, at least had some progressive aspects. Hussein took many lives; but he also saved many lives when he instituted the most comprehensive universal healthcare program ever seen in the Arab word. (That crumbled with the sanctions, of course.)

It's obvious, then, that the administration doesn't care about human rights or democracy. More to the point, it cannot be trusted to further the cause of human rights or democracy. There's nothing guaranteeing that the U.S. won't just put another tyrant in Hussein's place, or let Iraq fall into chaos as it has Afghanistan. In fact, as recently as 1998, Richard Perle was advocating turning Iraq back into a Hashemite monarchy.

Because they couldn't (and can't!) be trusted to institute real change, the important question to ask isn't whether the U.S. would kill more than Hussein ever did. After all, the U.S. must at least share responsibility for most of Hussein's atrocities (plus the 1.5 million people killed by sanctions). The important question to ask is: would an invasion kill more people than would have otherwise been killed?

According to the State Department, the Hussein regime committed over 1,000 extrajudicial executions per year. But let's be generous, and say 2,000.

The U.S. invasion killed around 50,000 civilians altogether. It also killed a countless number of soldiers, most of them conscripts. (We should count them too, since they were equally terrorized by the regime.) So let's say the U.S. killed 80,000. Saddam Hussein was around 66 at the time of the invasion. So let's use the average U.S. male life expectancy, and assume Hussein would live to 75.

75 - 66 = 9 years he had left to live.

9 X 2,000 = 18,000

80,000 - 18,000 = 62,000 excess deaths due to the U.S. invasion.

And of course, it could get much worse under the current occupation.

It's also worth noting that the invasion has inarguably increased the threat of terrorism, and has had the effect of encouraging states to acquire nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons. This could ultimately have a much more damaging effect on the world than keeping Hussein in power would have.

[slaveplanet]

14. Saved this from July 2002

I forgot to save the source- but it may give you some leads- I can't personally vouch for the veracity of these statements, but you can use the leads to research further. I have more

Talking Points
Iraq and the Weapons of Mass Destruction:

* While it is clear that Iraq attempted to subvert and circumvent weapons inspections, Iraq also complied with hundreds of extensive weapons inspections. According to former United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) chief inspector Scott Ritter, "rom a qualitative standpoint, Iraq has in fact been disarmed... The chemical, biological, nuclear and long-range ballistic missile programs that were a real threat in 1991 had, by 1998, been destroyed or rendered harmless."


* The US is not really interested in weapons inspections. People forget that the Iraqi accusations that UNSCOM was spying on the Iraqi government turned out to be true. The U.S. infiltrated and subverted the mission of the international inspectors, and then used the Iraqi government’s protests against that subversion as an excuse to bomb the country.  The U.S. itself destroyed weapons inspections in Iraq, and used the expected dramatic standoffs as a reason to unleash the deadly ‘Desert Fox’ bombing.


* Contrary to popular belief, Iraq never kicked out the weapons inspectors.  Richard Butler, the head of UNSCOM, pulled the inspectors out of Iraq in anticipation of the 1998 U.S. Desert Fox bombing campaign. It was only as a result of these bombings that the Iraqi government subsequently refused to allow inspectors to return to the country.  


* UN Security Council Resolution 687 calls for regional disarmament throughout the Middle East, not just in Iraq. We can call on our government to stop ignoring the fact that Iraq’s disarmament was intended to be part of a broader dismantling of arms in the whole Middle East region.  The US can begin good-faith negotiations with the Iraqi government to return weapons inspectors to Iraq in the context of this regional call for disarmament.



* The US supplied Iraq with most of its weapons during the 1980’s. Just one day before Iraq invaded Kuwait, then-President George Bush approved and signed a shipment of advanced data transmission equipment to Iraq. The United States and Britain were the major suppliers of chemical and biological weapons to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War, in which the United States supported both sides with weapons sales.

US Military Escalation against Iraq

* There is no credible evidence whatsoever that Iraq had any connection to the September 11 attacks on the US.  If one holds al-Qaeda responsible for the September 11 attacks, then there is no justification to turn next toward Iraq.


* Civilians will be the ones to continue to suffer under an attack on Iraq, not Saddam Hussein. Unfortunately, the war against the Iraqi people did not end with the cessation of military attacks in 1991, but continues to this day with a suffocating blockade that has already claimed over one million civilian lives, the vast majority of whom are children and the elderly. More than 500,000 toddlers and infants have died due to the consequences of the sanctions.  Including the 50,000 adult deaths caused by sanctions every year, Iraq now has a mortality rate of over 200 people every day  


* A military operation to topple the Iraqi regime will surely plunge Iraq into a civil war. In the absence of any meaningful political alternative for Saddam Hussein (as well as the lack of any powerful or popular opposition group), the most likely scenario will be an endless cycle of violence and bloodshed among different religious and ethnic groups (Shiites in the South, Sunnis in the middle and Kurds in the northern part of the country).


* The war against Iraq will have an immediately destructive impact on the whole region and can potentially lead to a military standoff between Iraq’s neighbors. While the fundamentalist Iran will do anything to bring the Iraqi Shiites into power, the nightmare of having another Islamic Republic in the region will cause Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Jordan to counter Tehran’s attempt. Also Turkey might want to take advantage of the vacuum of power and annex the oil-rich Iraqi Kurdistan, a move which will put the NATO member at verge of war with neighboring Iran (which has a sizable Kurdish population) as well as Arab countries (who can not tolerate the partition of an Arab nation).


* In a time of unprecedented financial crisis, the Bush administration is spending billions of dollars in bribes to Iraq’s neighbors to use their territory for yet another devastating war in the Middle East. According to recent reports, Turkey "probably would allow" the U.S. to launch a war on Iraq from Turkish bases. However, Turkey wants Washington to forgive $5.5 billion in military debt and speed up the delivery of more than $228 million in fresh cash.  Turkey may also demand billions more to pay for lost business with Iraq.


* Targeting another Muslim country will portray the US as an interventionist and expansionist country and cause a new wave of anti-American and anti-Western sentiments among Arabs and Muslims. This will in turn help the Muslim extremists receive more sympathy and support from the average person in the Middle East and eventually make future attacks against United States interests and its regional allies quite likely.

[Yupster]

16. You're not going to win a bodycount argument

defending Saddam. The Iran - Iraq war, which was started completely by Saddam was like World War I with its carnage.

Switch to a different argument.

[bacchant]

17. Thank you DUers for the help!

:)

[SteveG]

18. The liberation gambit

When I've run into it, I've made the following argument.


If liberation from a tyranical murderous regieme is sufficient justification alone for the U.S. to enter into a pre-emptive war, then why did we not invade Malawi, or Burundi when the horrors were going on there? Why do we not invade Korea, or the Sudan? Why have we ignored so many other brutal tyrannical regiemes while deciding that we had to invade Iraq and get rid of Saddam specifically?

You can insist that they answer each and every point (they don't hesitate to use the same sort of tactics, so why should you?). My experience with using this approach has been that they walk away.

[Bandit]

19. Well by his logic China and Russia should be next

After all they have imprisoned and killed millions of their citizens also. How about Columbia or Nigeria should they be next also? Yes it is just to eliminate a cruel dictator but not as a single country. That becomes Imperialism. If we had the world community with us no one would object at all. And by the way that was not the justification used to launch this killing spree. Very few liberals would disagree with having a world police force and to ridding the world of evil people including Bush* but that isn't how they are looking at it. They are looking at establishing a power base in all places in the world so we control all of the worlds resources. That is quite different than being a police force.

[salin]

21. the 'liberation' argument - never answers why Iraq?

what about the other horrific/oppresive regimes? Is it Uzbekistan whose ruler disappears and tortures opposition (including death by boiling water?)... why Iraq... There are, sadly, a number of other countries with human rights abuse records that rival Sadams... should the US go after each of these? And if it is our role, how does one explain the role of the US in the eighties financially bolstering El Salvidor where government sponsored death squads killed thousands?

[Skittles]

20. ask him why republicans

who don't give a DAMN about the poor and oppressed in AMERICA, are so suddenly concerned about the plight of FOREIGNERS.