Bush, jr.'s Iraq war and weapons of misinformation

[poaw]

Just that this war was illegal by terms of a treaty your country has not only signed, but in fact helped to create in the first place. Just because a law isn't enforced it doesn't mean breaking it without being persecuted makes it legal.
And in regards of war crimes: Torturing prisoners of war is indeed one.

Just personally I find the idea of legal or illegal wars laughable. Kind of like if someone suggested a particular rape was impolite or not. The precedent for their existence comes from the need to feel morally superior while the winners did victory laps around Europe offing as many Nazis as they could once the war was over. The tradition is carried on in this same manner today with the clearest indication of who is the winner is which side's leadership is wearing a hemp necklace when all is said and done.

TLDR ICC is a joke because because none of the western nations have any reason to enforce the laws against themselves or each other.

Except that Bush is actually an illiterate moron

I'm almost 100% certain that Bush can read.

[Bill Schwartzski]

If you look at video of Bush giving speeches when he was Governor of Texas, he wasn't as stupid sounding. I truly believe he was just a smart frat guy with connections who bit off more than he could chew and visibly fumbled after realizing it.

In addition to being a war criminal, his administration was also responsible (not proven, I know) for outing a CIA agent that contradicted the WMD lies. (Valerie Plame). In an administration that passed "The Patriot Act". The sad irony here can't be understated.

But ultimately what happened to Bush was probably the following:

- likable bro who was charismatic has rich family
- "friends" and family (with crazy big money ties) say "hey you should run for president"
- as governor, president sounds pretty fuckin cool bro
- once he got into office, the Cheney business machine got its claws into him
- Karl Rove probably sat on his face every night (aka Turd Blossom)
- I genuinely believe he was in over his head after 9/11 and was manipulated by industrial military complex interests (Cheney)
- The whole Valerie Plame thing was grossly understated in the media as a whole because the implications were grave (government at war with itself)

[Grogoth]

If W was so shit, why did you vote him in TWICE?

Checkmate, americans

[Grim]

Bush was a war criminal. Sure...

Please elaborate on the many "crimes" he ordered.

[Grim]

Still waiting to hear about these war crimes Bill...

[Stronke]

derp

[Brooks Puuntai]

You're only a war criminal if you lose.

Edit: Missed this.

If W was so shit, why did you vote him in TWICE?

Checkmate, americans

He lost the popular vote for his first term, so really the majority didn't vote him in. Blame the shitty electoral system, or Florida.

[poaw]

You're only a war criminal if you lose.

You can actually lose and still be fine. Just as long as no one is willing to enforce the "laws" against you. A fact that the UK, Russia and others have benefited from considerably. IE their countries didn't get Libya'd at the first sign of trouble.

Ninja Edit: Now that I think about it, I don't think their ever has been a world power that has followed those laws.

[Agathor]

Well, all is fare in love and war they say. I draw the line at industrial genocide though.

[Quesa]

The same could be said about Obama. Most of our problems in the US are politician-born and have nothing to do with the left or the right.

[Raketefrau]

Go back to bed, America, your government is in control.

[Barry Zuckerkorn]

Most of our problems in the US are politician-born

Let's throw in corporations, hippies, and everything in between. I think most problems are just 'person created' or naturally created, then it becomes the politician's problem to deal with it because we live in a democracy instead of say, Somalia (No government, No taxes, No gun laws, tea party capital of the world?). But they often do keep the ball rolling.

And non-scientific research has shown you can't please everyone.

[Grath]

Bush was a war criminal. Sure...

Please elaborate on the many "crimes" he ordered.

The invasion of iraq.

[Grogoth]

That isn't actually a crime though big dog, a shitty thing to do, immoral, fuelled by lies and bullshit (probably) - but not a crime? per se

[Brooks Puuntai]

That isn't actually a crime though big dog, a shitty thing to do, immoral, fuelled by lies and bullshit (probably) - but not a crime? per se

Falsifying information in order to justify a war kind of is. Though I don't think they actually made the shit up, more they just believed what they wanted to believe.

[Grogoth]

A crime breaks a law, what law was broken?

[poaw]

The one in the UN charter about countries not starting wars of aggression.

http://www.informationclearinghouse....rticle6917.htm

And The World's Most Authoritative Answer Is ... Among the world's foremost experts in the field of international law, the overwhelming jurisprudential consensus is that the Anglo-American invasion, conquest, and occupation of Iraq constitute three phases of one illegal war of aggression. [3]

Moreover, these experts in the international law of war deem both preventive wars and preemptive strikes to be euphemistic subcategories of outlawed wars of aggression.

But like I said, just because the grounds exist for him to go to trial for it doesn't mean he was necessarily be convicted, so it's kinda inaccurate to call him a war criminal. It's especially presumptive because both the UK and US are permanent members of the security council and will veto that shit outright if anyone brought it up. Just like China and human rights.

I'm pretty sure you could stretch some of the laws regarding perjury and Congress to cover it too, but that would make him a regular criminal not a war criminal and you'd have a really hard time proving what he knew and when he knew it in order to establish actual culpability.

All that being said, I'd like to point out once again those laws aren't intended for the hometown favorites from 1945. They're for everyone else.

[Grogoth]

Oh, so ~the UN~ says so.

Yeah well, when I need someone with a bright white tank, I will let them know.

[Brooks Puuntai]

Even side stepping the justification of war. The use of banned torture tactics, treatment of prisoners being in violation, bombings of "prohibited" targets(heavy civilian areas), and the use of banned weaponry([s]land mines[/s], scatter bombs, DU ammo, etc). These where all "authorized" under the Bush Adm for the Iraq/Afgan war, all of which could be considered war crimes.

Though UN would never enforce these on the US or really any of the other "major powers" within the group, so it is a mute point.

Edit: US never agreed to the treaty outlawing landmines, nor am I 100% sure they where even used.

[Grogoth]

Moot point, not mute point.

Additionally, the fact that it cannot or will not be enforced is the whole point of my argument - A crime that isn't enforced, isn't really a crime.

You also shifted the argument from W, to his administration. He has plausible deniability that he didn't know about a lot of it.

[Grim]

Even side stepping the justification of war. The use of banned torture tactics, treatment of prisoners being in violation, bombings of "prohibited" targets(heavy civilian areas), and the use of banned weaponry([s]land mines[/s], scatter bombs, DU ammo, etc). These where all "authorized" under the Bush Adm for the Iraq/Afgan war, all of which could be considered war crimes.

Though UN would never enforce these on the US or really any of the other "major powers" within the group, so it is a mute point.

Edit: US never agreed to the treaty outlawing landmines, nor am I 100% sure they where even used.

The US has never agreed to treaties limiting cluster bombs, land mines, and the rest of that shit. As for the bombing of "prohibited" targets I would say we have shown enormous restraint in that area. In fact, there was too much paperwork involved in striking targets like Mosque's full of enemy troops shooting at you that it just encouraged the enemy to abuse them. And so whenever we did strike a target like that we did so within the law (since the enemy was using its ok), and if we bombed some other places accidentally I would say that isnt really a crime (its war).

The prisoners were not POWs, therefore the laws of war didnt apply to them.

[Stronke]

The prisoners were not POWs, therefore the laws of war didnt apply to them.

Yeah I agree you were not torturing POWs but civilians. Not sure what is worse.

[Grogoth]

Not civilians either, enemy combatants

None of this matters though, it simply highlights the point that it is so open to interpretation and conjecture that there CANNOT be a hard and fast law that was broken.

Shit happened, arabs died, abloobloobloo

[Stronke]

And America is shit.

Good talk my Abo friend.

[John Smith]

The fact remains that America created the next generation of terrorists with what they(with help from allies as well) did in the last decade. Whether or not the Iraq war and how it was executed makes western leaders war criminals doesn't really matter since they won't be prosecuted, but if you think it was a good thing for the West you are retarded.

How many children lost their fathers and will blame the west for it? How many Imams are using pictures of Abu Ghraib to radicalise youths across the world? None of this is good and will come back to bite innocent civilians in the arse.

[Barry Zuckerkorn]

The fact remains that America created the next generation of terrorists with what they(with help from allies as well)

Now, now we also helped organize, supply, and train Mujahideen(and future elements of Al-Qaeda) when they were freedom fighters fighting against communist occupation of Afghanistan 1980's, so that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan would become their Vietnam.
So we kinda deserve credit for more than one generation.

We just didn't anticipate that we would be invading the Afghanistan so soon!

[somedude76]

If W was so shit, why did you vote him in TWICE?

Checkmate, americans

Because the democrats put up terrible candidates. And not just bad one, terribad ones.

Gore was and is insane. People were less scared of GW than of him. Kerry? LOL, he was a fucking joke.

[Raketefrau]

Kerry? LOL, he was a fucking joke.

So we passed over a joke in favor of a punchline. One we'd heard before, and it wasn't very funny the first time.

[poaw]

the use of banned weaponry([s]land mines[/s], scatter bombs, DU ammo, etc).

Edit: US never agreed to the treaty outlawing landmines, nor am I 100% sure they where even used.

Depleted Uranium ordinance and scatterbombs aren't banned either. The US and other nations (the ones who produce/use them) voted against a DU ban in UN, but championed a ban on clusterbombs made before 1980 / which have a failure rate higher than 1% (guess who is able to reliably produce large numbers of such devices with a failure rate at or below 1%?).

Basically since WW1 weapons bans are what you use to take away the other guy's toys, while resisting pressure to do the same. Or when both sides deliberately use a questionable interpretation of the law. "The US doesn't use napalm, we use an incendiary jelly instead." And "White Phospherous is banned because incendiaries are banned." They aren't, you're just not supposed to use them on military targets in areas with high civilian concentrations, or to start forest fires, things which have secondary incendiary effects are exempted.

[Grogoth]

The fact remains that America created the next generation of terrorists with what they(with help from allies as well) did in the last decade. Whether or not the Iraq war and how it was executed makes western leaders war criminals doesn't really matter since they won't be prosecuted, but if you think it was a good thing for the West you are retarded.

How many children lost their fathers and will blame the west for it? How many Imams are using pictures of Abu Ghraib to radicalise youths across the world? None of this is good and will come back to bite innocent civilians in the arse.

You are super retarded if you think that sand niggers living in the shit hole that is the middle east didn't want to bomb america before the last decade.

Case in point, 9/11 was 10 years ago

You stupid faggot

[Bill Schwartzski]

Still waiting to hear about these war crimes Bill...

I'm sorry I didn't realize that outing a CIA agent to keep a lie in place to invade a country wasn't a criminal act.

I mean, it isn't like outing a CIA agent is *treason* or anything.

It isn't like Colin Powell was deliberately misled in order to feed lies to the UN on behalf of the Bush administration. From what I hear he is still very proud of being duped and playing the part of the patsy.

From a simple standpoint, fraud is a crime. The entire precursor for invading Iraq was a fraud.

bonus points edit: I support the first Iraq War; because it wasn't based on fraud.

[Grim]

Bill, I dont think you understand what a war crime is.

[Grogoth]

How can you commit treason against yourself?

~deliberately misleading~ isn't a crime of itself, fraud is, but you have to prove intent (which you can't).

[poaw]

How can you commit treason against yourself?

Uh, with regards to nations you can ONLY commit treason against yourself. James Bond blowing up a British moonbase would be treason, blowing up a Soviet moonbase would just be him being a fucking master spy.

EDIT: If you meant to say that a nation's chief executive can't commit treason then in the case of the US that is incorrect. No special protection is given to any government functionaries with regards to treason. Although by the American definition you couldn't regard it as treasonous in the legal sense because the Constitution specifically defines treason as waging war against the nation itself, or giving aid and comfort to it's enemies.

You'd have to make one hell of a stretch to even get that shit into court.

[John Smith]

You are super retarded if you think that sand niggers living in the shit hole that is the middle east didn't want to bomb america before the last decade.

Case in point, 9/11 was 10 years ago

You stupid faggot

Look up spirals of hostile actions.

[Grogoth]

Look up the history of the middle east.

[Grogoth]

Uh, with regards to nations you can ONLY commit treason against yourself. James Bond blowing up a British moonbase would be treason, blowing up a Soviet moonbase would just be him being a fucking master spy.

EDIT: If you meant to say that a nation's chief executive can't commit treason then in the case of the US that is incorrect. No special protection is given to any government functionaries with regards to treason. Although by the American definition you couldn't regard it as treasonous in the legal sense because the Constitution specifically defines treason as waging war against the nation itself, or giving aid and comfort to it's enemies.

You'd have to make one hell of a stretch to even get that shit into court.

I miswrote or you misread, as the commander in chief, how can you commit treason against a subordinate in your chain of command

[poaw]

I miswrote or you misread, as the commander in chief, how can you commit treason against a subordinate in your chain of command

If by doing so you are betraying national interests or assisting an enemy then it would be treason.

Like I said that would be one hell of stretch to apply that to this situation, but they could always go with the Clinton loophole and get him for lying to Congress (or having others do so for him).

[Some Lemming]

Yeah I agree you were not torturing POWs but civilians. Not sure what is worse.

The Geneva convention protects civilians and organized, uniformed military personnel including militia forces (please note the 'uniformed' part). If one engages in combat, dressed as a civilian, that person is not protected under the Geneva convention; the uniform is what differentiates military personnel from civilians. Now, who exactly, in this particular situation, is dressing in civilian garb, but participating in combat situations?
Oh that's right, fucking terrorists. Even if pouring a jug of water on their face, or letting dogs bark at them or bite them a bit, or making them get all nekkid and in a pyramid was torture, which it fucking isn't, they literally have no right to not get tortured.

Geneva Convention Edit: Similarly, if you dress up in your enemies' uniform, in order to kill said enemies or any such tomfoolery, you also lose any rights you had under the Geneva convention. If you get caught doing that shit, the only right you have is a final cigarette before the firing squad.

[Grogoth]

War is some terrible shit, and it is especially terrible for america. They are bound to all of these gay ass rules that should never be applied to warfare.

Yes, the Geneva convention is a good idea, and not mutilating prisoners is important - but what do you think happens to US soldiers, or even Canadian or AUS ))) soldiers if they get caught in durkadurkastan? Jesus fuck, civilians get tortured and beheaded and then dragged around the streets.

War should be equal - if people are going to fuck your duders up, you should be completely exempt in fucking their dudes up, in whatever way you like.

The entire middle east is a shit hole, the sooner some dumb fuck WMDs Israel and force them to push the ARMAGEDDON button that nukes everyone around them, the better.

[Stronke]

The Geneva convention protects civilians and organized, uniformed military personnel including militia forces (please note the 'uniformed' part). If one engages in combat, dressed as a civilian, that person is not protected under the Geneva convention; the uniform is what differentiates military personnel from civilians. Now, who exactly, in this particular situation, is dressing in civilian garb, but participating in combat situations?
Oh that's right, fucking terrorists. Even if pouring a jug of water on their face, or letting dogs bark at them or bite them a bit, or making them get all nekkid and in a pyramid was torture, which it fucking isn't, they literally have no right to not get tortured.

Geneva Convention Edit: Similarly, if you dress up in your enemies' uniform, in order to kill said enemies or any such tomfoolery, you also lose any rights you had under the Geneva convention. If you get caught doing that shit, the only right you have is a final cigarette before the firing squad.

Good troll, unfortunately for you Americans more then half of the people you locked up there and tortured were innocent men who had no terrorist connections what's so ever. But go ahead and keep telling your self those fairy tails. The next time some terrorist organisation stuffs several planes down your throat I'll be cheering with joy again just like I did with 9/11.

[Grogoth]

Celebrating another's misery causes all kinds of bad juju for you.

Apparently it is starting with you being terrible at English.

e: unless you are celebrating the misery of someone brown l0l (sorry mfume)

[Stronke]

Please Grogoth anything but my spellings backbone

[Dunarad]

The Geneva convention protects civilians and organized, uniformed military personnel including militia forces (please note the 'uniformed' part). If one engages in combat, dressed as a civilian, that person is not protected under the Geneva convention; the uniform is what differentiates military personnel from civilians. Now, who exactly, in this particular situation, is dressing in civilian garb, but participating in combat situations?
Oh that's right, fucking terrorists. Even if pouring a jug of water on their face, or letting dogs bark at them or bite them a bit, or making them get all nekkid and in a pyramid was torture, which it fucking isn't, they literally have no right to not get tortured.

Geneva Convention Edit: Similarly, if you dress up in your enemies' uniform, in order to kill said enemies or any such tomfoolery, you also lose any rights you had under the Geneva convention. If you get caught doing that shit, the only right you have is a final cigarette before the firing squad.

Do you know the difference between French Resistance in WW2 and iraki's ''terrorists''? Both wear civilian clothes, boths put bombs to blow up as many invaders as they can, and boths where tortured and killed by the occupants. ''Terrorist''' and resistant is the same thing, it's the guys naming them who are not.

(Can i have my godwin now?)

[Grim]

Do you know the difference between French Resistance in WW2 and iraki's ''terrorists''? Both wear civilian clothes, boths put bombs to blow up as many invaders as they can, and boths where tortured and killed by the occupants. ''Terrorist''' and resistant is the same thing, it's the guys naming them who are not.

(Can i have my godwin now?)

And by the laws of war they were francs-tireurs and had no legal rights if captured. The French should have faced the German armies in honourable single combat, but C'est la vie.

[Some Lemming]

Good troll, unfortunately for you Americans more then half of the people you locked up there and tortured were innocent men who had no terrorist connections what's so ever. But go ahead and keep telling your self those fairy tails. The next time some terrorist organisation stuffs several planes down your throat I'll be cheering with joy again just like I did with 9/11.

Snagging randoms for laffs, likely story.
Anyhow, waterboarding isn't torture.
For the purposes of this Convention, the term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person.....
Waterboarding causes discomfort and a feeling that you are drowning, not severe pain or suffering. Not torture.

Anyway the next time whatever shitbird coward-assed country you are from needs saving from the Germans or Russians or whomever the FOTM badguy is, ask the UN for help instead of the one country in the world that can fuck off said bad guys.
Lol, also a likely story.

[Stronke]

I think my country is fine when a invasion comes, thanks for caring tho

[Grim]

I think my country is fine when a invasion comes, thanks for caring tho

Yeah, just collaborate for a few years until someone comes to liberate you.

[Agathor]

The Vikings and Scandinavia

Main articles: Thrall and Volga trade route
In the Viking era starting in approximately AD 793, the Norse raiders often captured and enslaved militarily weaker peoples they encountered. In the Nordic countries the slaves were called thralls (Old Norse: Þræll).^[158] The thralls were mostly from Western Europe, among them many Franks, Anglo-Saxons, and Celts. Many Irish slaves participated in the colonization of Iceland.^[159] There is evidence of German, Baltic, Slavic and Latin slaves as well. The slave trade was one of the pillars of Norse commerce during the 6th through 11th centuries.^[160] The Persian traveller Ibn Rustah described how Swedish Vikings, the Varangians or Rus, terrorized and enslaved the Slavs. The thrall system was finally abolished in the mid-14th century in Scandinavia.

Spain

See also: Spanish Empire, Spanish colonization of the Americas, and Black ladino
Spain had to fight against relatively powerful civilizations of the New World. However, the Spanish conquest of the indigenous peoples in the Americas was also facilitated by the spread of diseases (e.g. smallpox) due to lack of biological immunity.^[200] (like the Europeans that had lack of biological immunity to African diseases) The Spaniards were the first Europeans to use African slaves in the New World on islands such as Cuba and Hispaniola, where the native population starved themselves rather than work for the Spanish. Although the natives were used as forced labor (the Spanish employed the pre-Columbian draft system called the mita),^[201] the spread of disease caused a shortage of labor, and so the Spanish colonists gradually became involved in the Atlantic slave trade. The first African slaves arrived in Hispaniola in 1501;^[202] by 1517, the natives had been "virtually annihilated" by the settlers.^[203]

Netherlands

Although slavery was illegal inside the Netherlands it flourished in the Dutch Empire, and helped support the economy.^[204] By 1650 the Dutch had the pre-eminent slave trade in Europe.^[205] They were overtaken by Britain around 1700. Historians agree that in all the Dutch shipped about 550,000 African slaves across the Atlantic, about 75,000 of whom died on board before reaching their destinations. From 1596–1829, the Dutch traders sold 250,000 slaves in the Dutch Guianas, 142,000 in the Dutch Caribbean islands, and 28,000 in Dutch Brazil.^[206] In addition, tens of thousands of slaves, mostly from India and some from Africa, were carried to the Dutch East Indies.^[207]

Maybe you should look closer to home if you want to find bad people Stronke

[Agathor]

Heh, why do Belgians always pop up as the sick assholes in history.