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The killing under Saddam was less than the killing under George Bush.

Sad, but true I'm afraid. There's no opinion here. BBC and others have estimates of the many Iraqi citizens killed by Americans just in the last year or so alone. The US isn't keeping track of civilian casulties. Of course the US news media never talks about this, as the media are in on the brain-washing scheme. Add in the destruction of services- water/power operations, etc. and there ya go. That's Bush 'spreading freedom' for you. Gee- I wonder why so many of them hate the US over there..... hmmmm... that's a hard one.

Saddam Hussein Walks Out On Stage Right When The Script Demanded It

> FLASHBACK: U.S. Rep. Ray LaHood predicted imminent Saddam capture 10 days ago: A member of The Pantagraph editorial board -- not really expecting an answer -- asked LaHood for more details, saying, Do you know something we don't?

Yes I do, replied LaHood.

> Saddam 'had time to commit suicide': Yet chose to spend the rest of his life in a torture camp: WHY? Why did the 'evil tyrant' cower in a cellar? Unless of course this was a stage-managed theatre production.

> FLASHBACK: Saddam Key in Early CIA Plot: Their gopher boy all along.

> FLASHBACK: Iraqi Commander Swears He Saw USAF Fly Saddam Out Of Baghdad

> FLASHBACK: Iran continues to raise secret deal claim: US flew Saddam out of Baghdad in April

> FLASHBACK: Look at how many arrests they have faked in the past dd

• The third issue is licensing. Linux people don't believe in Intellectual Property Rights. This is the biggest problem in the Linux world. How can one be sure that the code of software that has been contributed by programmers across the world to create this Linux software is unique and is not lifted from somewhere else? This is a big legal concern.

  That is what the latest SCO-Linux lawsuit is all about. Now SCO is suing every single user of Linux because they believe parts of their UNIX code is being used in Linux. As a matter of fact, the Gartner Group came with a recommendation that every customer should stay away from Linux until this problem is sorted out. This is a serious issue. The model is broken basically.

For a nice little look at how the FUD is being used, check out this interview with the Middle East regional director. To me he outlines how MS is going to use the recent SCO FUD.

Although the Iraqis initially used chemical weapons to prevent defeat and to reduce battlefield losses, they later integrated CW attacks into combined-armed operations designed to regain lost territory and to gain the offensive. Iraq's use of CW in the war with Iran can be divided into three distinct phases:

1. 1983 to 1986--used in a defensive role; typically to deflect Iranian human-wave assaults. In 1984 Iraq became the first nation to use a nerve agent on the battlefield when it deployed Tabun-filled aerial bombs during the Iran-Iraq war. Some 5,500 Iranians were killed by the nerve agent between March 1984 and March 1985. Tabun kills within minutes. Some 16,000 Iranians were reported killed by the toxic blister agent mustard gas between August 1983 and February 1986.
2. 1986 to early 1988--iraq adapts use against Iran to disrupt Iranian offensive preparations.
3. early 1988 to conclusion of the war-- Iraq integrated large nerve agent strikes into its overall offensive during the spring and summer of 1988 leading to the ceasefire.

Iran used chemical weapons late in the war, but never as extensively or successfully as Iraq. The success of Iraqi offensive operations in the southern sector in mid-1988 ultimately caused the Iranians to cease hostilities. The use of chemical weapons contributed to the success of these operations.

The first chemical attacks by Saddam Hussein against civilian populations included attacks launched by Iraqi aircraft against 20 small villages in 1987.

The real question is, what was the status of Iraq's programs before the Iraqis were liberated? Since Iraq developed binary chemical munitions, and some components of them are dual use and difficult to track down, it may be that we will never find a filled munition. But even the UN inspectors found some empty missile chemical warheads that they shouldn't have had before the war. Since the war the US has found several mobile labs. And there are still massive amounts of weapons material unaccounted for.

when Saddam forced UN weapons inspectors to leave the country in 1998, up to 360 tonnes of bulk chemical warfare agents, including one and half tonnes of VX nerve agent, were still unaccounted for, as was the growth media sufficient for producing 26,000 litres of anthrax spores.

Tens of thousands dead? I dont' think so. Most of the estimates that I've seen are more like 5-10,000. Even if its more, it will still mean the end of Saddam's mass graves.

Another day and another mass grave is unearthed in Iraq. This weekend a team of British forensic scientists has the unenviable task of collating evidence from the latest of Saddam's killing fields to have been positively identified.

So many of these harrowing sites have been uncovered in the two months since Saddam's overthrow that even the experts are starting to lose count of just how many atrocities were committed by the Iraqi dictator's henchmen.

Officials working for Iraq's interim government say that more than 150 such sites have been reported to them, and that about 40 have been positively identified.

According to Human Rights Watch, the bodies of some 300,000 Iraqis could be occupying these mass graves, the victims of the numerous bloody campaigns of persecution and retribution that Saddam Hussain conducted against his own people, whether Shiites or Kurds.

Although the Iraqis initially used chemical weapons to prevent defeat and to reduce battlefield losses, they later integrated CW attacks into combined-armed operations designed to regain lost territory and to gain the offensive. Iraq's use of CW in the war with Iran can be divided into three distinct phases:

1. 1983 to 1986--used in a defensive role; typically to deflect Iranian human-wave assaults. In 1984 Iraq became the first nation to use a nerve agent on the battlefield when it deployed Tabun-filled aerial bombs during the Iran-Iraq war. Some 5,500 Iranians were killed by the nerve agent between March 1984 and March 1985. Tabun kills within minutes. Some 16,000 Iranians were reported killed by the toxic blister agent mustard gas between August 1983 and February 1986.
2. 1986 to early 1988--iraq adapts use against Iran to disrupt Iranian offensive preparations.
3. early 1988 to conclusion of the war-- Iraq integrated large nerve agent strikes into its overall offensive during the spring and summer of 1988 leading to the ceasefire.

Iran used chemical weapons late in the war, but never as extensively or successfully as Iraq. The success of Iraqi offensive operations in the southern sector in mid-1988 ultimately caused the Iranians to cease hostilities. The use of chemical weapons contributed to the success of these operations.

The first chemical attacks by Saddam Hussein against civilian populations included attacks launched by Iraqi aircraft against 20 small villages in 1987.

The real question is, what was the status of Iraq's programs before the Iraqis were liberated? Since Iraq developed binary chemical munitions, and some components of them are dual use and difficult to track down, it may be that we will never find a filled munition. But even the UN inspectors found some empty missile chemical warheads that they shouldn't have had before the war. Since the war the US has found several mobile labs. And there are still massive amounts of weapons material unaccounted for.

when Saddam forced UN weapons inspectors to leave the country in 1998, up to 360 tonnes of bulk chemical warfare agents, including one and half tonnes of VX nerve agent, were still unaccounted for, as was the growth media sufficient for producing 26,000 litres of anthrax spores.

Tens of thousands dead? I dont' think so. Most of the estimates that I've seen are more like 5-10,000. Even if its more, it will still mean the end of Saddam's mass graves.

Another day and another mass grave is unearthed in Iraq. This weekend a team of British forensic scientists has the unenviable task of collating evidence from the latest of Saddam's killing fields to have been positively identified.

So many of these harrowing sites have been uncovered in the two months since Saddam's overthrow that even the experts are starting to lose count of just how many atrocities were committed by the Iraqi dictator's henchmen.

Officials working for Iraq's interim government say that more than 150 such sites have been reported to them, and that about 40 have been positively identified.

According to Human Rights Watch, the bodies of some 300,000 Iraqis could be occupying these mass graves, the victims of the numerous bloody campaigns of persecution and retribution that Saddam Hussain conducted against his own people, whether Shiites or Kurds.

The museum looting story seems to have been overblown. During much of the looting of the museum, US forces were under fire from inside the museum and could not have prevented the looting without damaging the museum itself.

You think that kind of infrastructure just gets restored overnight? Shit, we had a squirrel zap one of our transformers yesterday. The circuit has 100 families on it. It took the local power company 6 hours to get our power turned back on. Multiply that by a whole country...

... And also for the record, much of Iraq's long tradition of "civilization" has consisted of conquering and looting its neighbors.

Afghanistan is probably better off today than at any time since the start of the Soviet invasion.

The story on Salon was a collection of foreign news reports, each shortened to four or five paragraphs. Curiously enough that particular story has been removed and replaced with one from the United Arab Emirates which is considerably more volatile. Also from the list is Der Spiegel's opinion piece on US Imperialism (roughly summarized as the bigger they are, the harder they fall.)

These were useful during the Afghan invasion: Lebanon, Jordan, Arab News, Gulf News

Story about Kramnik's blunder costing him a game found here...