From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Sat Mar 29 2003 - 11:19:13 MST
On Sat, 29 Mar 2003, matus wrote:
> As Robert Bradbury pointed out, leaving Saddam in power will cause more
> deaths of Iraqi people then taking him out of power. He asked anyone
> to present a reasonable challenge to that notion, and received no
> responses as of yet.
Actually Michael I did receive a couple of offlist posts questioning
(validly I think) some of my assumptions. The most significant of
which (IMO) is the question of whether the U.S./U.K./Au will have
to completely eliminate the Republican Guard (probably 100K+ individuals,
similar to the casulties in Gulf War I) in order to take out Saddam
and the ~100 top level individuals that constitute his "regime".
Such costs (from an extropic perspective) make special ops and
assinations seem "reasonable" were it not for the knowledge we
have of how often these create more problems than they solve.
If that turns out to be necessary then my calculations may be
somewhat more questionable from a utilitarian perspective.
> We do not support war because we like to see people die, or get our jollies
> off of watching bombs fall in Iraq, and until you understand the reasons
> *why* those of us who actually support this effort support it, and address
> those points, your comments will not persuade anyone.
I think this the key point that Hubert, Max and others need to understand.
I refused to return my draft card during the Vietnam war until my father
(who had served in WWII) made it clear he would throw me out of the house
if I did not do so. I am *NOT* a "fan" of war. *But* I am very aware
(much more aware than most people on the list) of how the technologies
for developing/producing WMD are becoming increasingly available to
both rogue nation-states as well as terrorist organizations.
People who promote "peace at all costs" simply do not recognize
that these technologies have the capacity for eliminating civilization
as we know it (note my recent posts on SARS -- and that is probably
a natural situation).
I'll make an assertion to people who object to my position (or the
activities of the U.S./U.K./Au) -- *you* are *clueless* with respect
to how bad it could get and how close people who have virtually
no respect for "human dignity" are to bridging the gap to the point
where they are executing your worst nightmare. How long do you need
to watch Al-Jazeera before you figure out that they are promoting
the "unextropic" concept that they want you ("us") dead?
And thank you Michael for detailing points that need to responded
to (i.e. the rationale behind a pro-war position) much better than
I might have done.
Robert
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