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Michael,
Russia obsolutely was not neutral in the run up to war. France would not make up any money lost in a war because they don't supply US and UK who were likely to do most of the fighting. Germans can afford to be pacifists, since they have US army there to protect them for last 60 yrs.

Obviously Bush had no idea what was going on in Iraq and yes the Europeans are more well-read than Americans, but when it comes to security measures I don't listen to a group of people that let Hitler take over all of Europe in about 2 yrs.

Susan,
John is right. The US never sold Iraq any weapons. A couple transport helicopters and readio equipment. Nothing compared to France and Russia. Read up for yourself.

John, it has been well-documented that Saddam was the US's guy in the 1980s. This country armed Iraq to fight the Iranians. Wake up!

I am so weary of hearing this myth that Saddam was "the US's guy throughout the 80s," as stated by one email above. No, he was the Soviet Union's guy. Saddam was never a US "ally" - over that time, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Iraq were all adversaries of the US (and, I might add, they also happened to be the most repressive regimes in those regions, although the others - our "friends" - were hardly places of freedom; not our preference, but the US has rarely had the partners it would really want).

In the first Gulf War, Saddam was using SOVIET weapons, not American. His largest contract relationships were with the Russians, the French, the Germans, and (until he scared them) the Saudis. The provision of intelligence info and other (limited) assistance from the US in the 80s was given grudgingly to Saddam when it looked like Iran might defeat him - an even worse scenario than allowing him to continue in place.

I was against the (most recent) war, but let's not make up "history," this time to please the left's view of the world. There is no need to exaggerate the US connection to Saddam.

POST #7

Chris it's a little naive to say France, Germany and Russia didn't want to invade because of the money they were making.

In German there was ZERO public support for the war.

Russia didn't care invade don't invade.

France one of the 4 largest arms dealers in the world would have certainly made up for any losses by supporting the war. Fact is there was ZERO public support for the ear in France.

The French and German voter generally reads unlike the American voter.

So when you have an uninformed voter and a voter who refuses to find out the truth then you'll have the American voter who believed everything they were told by Cheney & Bush.

Mr Steele is a bit naive. The reason France, Germany and Russia had embassies in Iraq was to continue to do business with Saddam. This was the same reason they didn't want to invade.

The guest indicates that Iraqis will magically solve their own problems if US withdraws. However, the resulting power vacuum would inevitably be filled by the party with the biggest guns (either an internal or external entity). While I'm all for withdraw, the resulting order would likely be worse than the status quo.

Since Saddam Hussein was the US's guy throughout the 80s, what happened in that relationship that led the US to attack Iraq in the first place? The US backs dictators all over the world, so what's the distinction here?

I thought there *was* an organization that called itself "al-Qaeda in Iraq" that wanted to model itself on the real al-Qaeda but didn't have any direct connection w/is, at least the last I heard. Is that correct, & if so, has it changed?

Our goal is to help make things better in Iraq. Simply thinking we can 'fix' it by staying there longer is somewhat arrogant. The best way to fix it, is to begin the withdrawal process and help the iraqis get their own plan to fix the place.

We're losing in Iraq because we never should have invaded!

There will never be peace there as long as the shites want to kill the sunis.

Divide the country into three states.

Not to mention Turkey invading when ever they feel like with US blessing.

The place is a mess and always will be.

Get out before everyone's dead.

"We" didn't lose the war; we lost the peace. There's a difference. Since we wrecked the place, we have a moral obligation to fix it. Walking away would be immoral and would allow al Queda to claim victory. Both are unacceptable.