Strike on Iraq

According to CNN and various other news sources, Iraq is now under attack by the US. Here is a link to the current story running at CNN right now, but there's really not much except that it has started. CT Cruise missiles launched against "Target of Opportunity". The full assault has not begun. CT The attack was specifically intended to take out Saddam. CT Saddam appeared on iraqi TV to condemn the US, and Iraqi missiles have been fired at Kuwait.

Comments

Waiting

[ELCarlsson]

I'm in the US Air Force stationed Germany at work right now and we've been watching CNN non-stop all night. There is definatly a nervous tension in the air right now. But we're ready. I may not totally agree with Bush but I'll do the job I was trained to do.

I was going to be a karma whore and

[t0qer]

Post a bunch of links to high tech weapons like the ABL, and the new mobile artillery we have, then I thought, is this appropriate?

Some geek in Iraq, who just doesn't want to be involved in the fighting is sitting on his pc same as me, reading slashdot (if they're a fan) and probably see's thousands of people fleeing the streets, heading for the hills. Maybe he's just some student hoping to come here someday, but now has to face the horror of war.

Iraq is no stranger to war, the middle east has had ongoing wars as long as the bible has been written. Before USA intervention, who was the country trying to break up fights between middle eastern neighbors? Was it the british? the french?

I just heard a jet fly overhead, and it scares me, but that poor shmuck, who probably isn't too different than you or me, is hearing gunshots, sonic booms, and people running and screaming for cover.

On top of all that, his leader, wouldn't hesitate to turn the world into one giant jonestown. Rumors of anthrax, smallpox are everywhere.

If anyone is out there going through this shit right now, could you be brave please? Stay where you are and let the rest of us on slashdot know how you're doing?

Good luck if you're out there Iraqi slashdoter. May whoever you worship watch over you and keep you safe.

Same goes for the US troops too.

Re:WRONG!

[jsgf]

No one inside Iraq is for war (note I said war not a change of regime), no human being in his right mind will ask you to give him the beating of his life, unless you are a member of fight club that is, and if you do hear Iraqi (in Iraq, not expat) saying "come on bomb us" it is the exasperation and 10 years of sanctions and hardship talking. There is no person inside Iraq (and this is a bold, blinking and underlined inside) who will be jumping up and down asking for the bombs to drop. We are not suicidal you know, not all of us in any case.

That sounds like someone who's got the freedom to speak his mind. Wonder where lives... Hm, Baghdad perhaps?

Face it: Bush has engineered the situation to justify a war.

The Former British Foreign Secretary's resignation

[Ed_Moyse]

This is largely for the benefit of non-Brits, and in particular Americans. Robin Cook, the former British Foreign Secretary resigned on Tuesday saying that he could not support the war. The speech is relevant because some (including me) initially assumed that there must be something awful that they couldn't reveal, some imminent danger from Saddam that made continuing with 12 years of containment futile, that we wouldn't be going to war for the shaky, rapidly -changing reasons given to us.

Robin Cook saw this secret intel, was not convinced, and his resignation speech is (for me) an extremely eloquent explanation of why this war is *NOT* justified, and why it has done severe and possibly irreparable damage to western relations.

The speech is here:here but I've cut and pasted it below:

This is the first time for 20 years that I have addressed the House from the back benches.

I must confess that I had forgotten how much better the view is from here.

None of those 20 years were more enjoyable or more rewarding than the past two, in which I have had the immense privilege of serving this House as Leader of the House, which were made all the more enjoyable, Mr Speaker, by the opportunity of working closely with you.

It was frequently the necessity for me as Leader of the House to talk my way out of accusations that a statement had been preceded by a press interview.

On this occasion I can say with complete confidence that no press interview has been given before this statement.

I have chosen to address the House first on why I cannot support a war without international agreement or domestic support.

The present Prime Minister is the most successful leader of the Labour party in my lifetime.

I hope that he will continue to be the leader of our party, and I hope that he will continue to be successful. I have no sympathy with, and I will give no comfort to, those who want to use this crisis to displace him.

I applaud the heroic efforts that the prime minister has made in trying to secure a second resolution.

I do not think that anybody could have done better than the foreign secretary in working to get support for a second resolution within the Security Council.

But the very intensity of those attempts underlines how important it was to succeed.

Now that those attempts have failed, we cannot pretend that getting a second resolution was of no importance.

France has been at the receiving end of bucket loads of commentary in recent days.

It is not France alone that wants more time for inspections. Germany wants more time for inspections; Russia wants more time for inspections; indeed, at no time have we signed up even the minimum necessary to carry a second resolution.

We delude ourselves if we think that the degree of international hostility is all the result of President Chirac.

The reality is that Britain is being asked to embark on a war without agreement in any of the international bodies of which we are a leading partner - not NATO, not the European Union and, now, not the Security Council.

To end up in such diplomatic weakness is a serious reverse.

Only a year ago, we and the United States were part of a coalition against terrorism that was wider and more diverse than I would ever have imagined possible.

History will be astonished at the diplomatic miscalculations that led so quickly to the disintegration of that powerful coalition.

The US can afford to go it alone, but Britain is not a superpower.

Our interests are best protected not by unilateral action but by multilateral agreement and a world order governed by rules.

Yet tonight the international partnerships most important to us are weakened: the European Union is divided; the Security Council is in stalemate.

Those are heavy casualties of a war in which a shot has yet to be fired.