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[FightyF]

Are you saying that American foreign policy, in and of itself, "created" the terrorists? As I have said a million times, I realize that the people who make American foreign policy have made errors. I also understand that every country on the earth has made foreign policy errors. I don't understand how some people think a reasonable response to disagreement with American foreign policy is to hijack planes and steer them into buildings.

I agree with your last statement, maybe I should clarify.

The US did not invent evil, and you can't blame their foriegn policy for being the direct cause of 9/11 (IMO...heheh need that in there, it almost seems like I'm stating it as fact).

But do take a look at where Al Qaeda came from. I'd argue that Islam was exploited for the US's gain when the US/CIA supported the Mujahideen in Afghanistan to fight Communist Russia. A new mentality was created, that Muslims must bear modern weapons and fight an enemy that threatens them. Get trained in training camps, learn modern warfare, and fight. Communism does threaten people who hold religion dear to their hearts, but I know that many Afghans did not think too much as to why they were fighting the Russians. So words like "Jihad", "Mujahideen" and many more were brought up in order to fight off the Russians. Religion was used as a tool to gain political support, and exploited in order to convince the people there to fight with all of their might. I'm not saying that fighting off the Communists was a bad thing, but it started an ideology that wasn't too well thought out to begin with. This ideology grew further twisted and demented over time.

It started out as "killing enemy soldiers is good", to "killing anyone who is from the region of the enemy is good". I'm not blaming the US for causing this mutation, but IMO, they were the direct cause of a seemingly righteous ideology, that got twisted over the last decade and a half. This is why I say that their foriegn policies have created terrorists. In the case I've shown, it's direct. In many other cases it's indirect, but I feel that what occurred in Afghanistan 20 years ago is directly tied to what's occuring to the US now (feel free to disagree). Another great example is Saddam Hussien, but let's not get into that. The US can't please everyone, but it's important to learn from past mistakes so that former allies or partners don't start biting us in the ass in the future.

And this may be off topic from the original thread so I'll zip it.

 

[Evolution VIII]

evolutionVIII, I don't understand what you are saying. Western companies are there to extract the oil because they are the most capable of doing it profitably. The western companies are there because of superior expertise and capitalization. They would not be there behind huge walls, costing the Saudis a fortune in security costs, unless they had to be. I'm not making this up, nor do I have any reason to do so.

Perhaps I should reiterate. The western companies are not any more capable of extracting the oil in Saudi Arabia than the Saudis are able to. The infrastructure that exists in Saudi Arabia was and has been erected by the Saudis way before any western company stepped foot in the country. Also, the majority of American expatriates in Saudi Arabia or any Middle Eastern country are not working on extraction of oil or anything else, but are providing other types of services, such as rebuilding of damaged or undeveloped infrastructure, teaching, or doing work for the US government. While there may be some who do work on the oil infrastructure, it is few and far between. As I've stated before, the guy that had gotten killed was working for Lockheed Martin repairing Apache helicopters.

 

[Pimpwerx]

From the June 17 broadcast of The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly:

O'REILLY: Because look ... when 2 percent of the population feels that you're doing them a favor, just forget it, you're not going to win. You're not going to win. And I don't have any respect by and large for the Iraqi people at all. I have no respect for them. I think that they're a prehistoric group that is -- yeah, there's excuses.

Sure, they're terrorized, they've never known freedom, all of that. There's excuses. I understand. But I don't have to respect them because you know when you have Americans dying trying to you know institute some kind of democracy there, and 2 percent of the people appreciate it, you know, it's time to -- time to wise up.

And this teaches us a big lesson, that we cannot intervene in the Muslim world ever again. What we can do is bomb the living daylights out of them, just like we did in the Balkans. Just as we did in the Balkans. Bomb the living daylights out of them. But no more ground troops, no more hearts and minds, ain't going to work.

Times like these call for douchebaggery. Wow...I mean...wow. This is the same dickhead who prior to the war berrated antiwar people for warning that it was a worthless venture. But no, it's not the fault of the war-mongerers. It's the fault of those primitive Iraqis who can't take getting shelled. PEACE.

 

[Chrono]

I just want to say a few things here, I don't plan to "defend" my points and participate in this discussion. I only skimmed through parts of this thread.

Perhaps I should reiterate. The western companies are not any more capable of extracting the oil in Saudi Arabia than the Saudis are able to. The infrastructure that exists in Saudi Arabia was and has been erected by the Saudis way before any western company stepped foot in the country. Also, the majority of American expatriates in Saudi Arabia or any Middle Eastern country are not working on extraction of oil or anything else, but are providing other types of services, such as rebuilding of damaged or undeveloped infrastructure, teaching, or doing work for the US government. While there may be some who do work on the oil infrastructure, it is few and far between. As I've stated before, the guy that had gotten killed was working for Lockheed Martin repairing Apache helicopters.

Evolution: The western companies try to hire as many native workers as possible to save money. They also send to training courses and stuff. I know this is the case in Kuwait, Bahrain, and maybe Qatar and emirates since I know A LOT of engineering students studying here. Also, Saudi Arabia does NOT have anything close to infrastructure to extract oil. I've seen reports and read articles on how one of the biggest problems in S.A. is that the majority of the work force specializes in the humanities... 95% of engineering/science jobs are done by foreigners like westerners and especially other Arabs from Egypt, Syria, etc...


One last thing: there are a lot of poor people in this world. It does not make one bit of sense that Saudis have the moral right to murder someone because he "took their job." ESPECIALLY since none of them could do that job. And even add to that the fact that he's working on extracting the oil that is the ONLY profit to their country. Roads, hospitals, schools, government salaries, are all dependant on Oil.

It's strange how eveybody here is trying to make excuses for such a crime by trying to "make sense" of any kind of "Saudi suffering." I know that's not your intentions but there are many poor and suffering people much more disadvantaged then the Saudi's and none of them kill people on TV. There's a culture in that country that existed before there was such thing as "America" and that cultures dictates that their way of life is not only better but from God and should be the only one in this world. Wahabism is at the root of this problem.

I realize this is also said by any racist or anti-muslim freak. But it's also said by muslims trying to change their world. It's simply the truth to a lot of people. There are a lot of things wrong in that part of the world and saying there isn't won't solve the problem. yes it's important to look at your self first in the mirror and many are doing this. There are many errors in foreign policy and injustices that occurred. However, changing this topic to fit your agenda of "only the U.S. is mainly to blame" makes the problem even bigger. I'm also sensing a lot here are equating blaming the U.S. and west alone as to some kind of way to "oppose" morons like bill o'reilly and racists. Those people are racist and will not change-- they're assholes whether the Saudi’s are wahabist or Buddhist. It doesn't matter to them. Even if their points are motivated by hate and have no logic, the end result is something being echoed by non other then reformist muslims in jails in Iran, and even mosques in najaf. This I'm-so-open-and-liberal-it's-all-americas-fault- bandwagon in this thread has NO IDEA of the realities of the middle east. I'm not sure if Guileless does either. His point of view could be influenced more by his patriotism then knowledge of the Middle East. And I'm definitely not sure of Che whose username really doesn’t leave much guessing for us to know his bias.

What I'm trying to say is, trying to throw a blanket on this matter by what should make sense as the problem won't solve it. And neither will dividing sides of this argument by degrees of blind of patriotism and bigotry to the opposite of only looking at the good side of others and bad side of yourself. The latter sounds a sane and logical way to improve your self, but it won't change what is really the problem behind all of this. All it does is raises the tension between "west and east" until the next terrorist attack and BBC surveys showing half the Muslims world supporting bin laden-- resulting in a bigger backlash and widening of the gap.


man that was like a whole essay =\ .. I wish I could write this much when I'm on a deadline lol.

 

[Wolfy]

Bill O'Reilly is right on: Why the fuck continue with 'liberation' (revisionist history by the right) when A) Saddam's regime is already gone and B) most don't want it?

 

[Evolution VIII]

Evolution: The western companies try to hire as many native workers as possible to save money. They also send to training courses and stuff. I know this is the case in Kuwait, Bahrain, and maybe Qatar and emirates since I know A LOT of engineering students studying here. Also, Saudi Arabia does NOT have anything close to infrastructure to extract oil. I've seen reports and read articles on how one of the biggest problems in S.A. is that the majority of the work force specializes in the humanities... 95% of engineering/science jobs are done by foreigners like westerners and especially other Arabs from Egypt, Syria, etc.

Perhaps you have "infrastructure" confused with "human capital". If the Saudis didn't have infrastructure to extract oil, I'd be wondering what the hell they're doing sitting on the largest deposit in the world. And when you say native, are you talking about native American workers or native Middle Eastern workers? Because if it were the latter then they're not really saving money when the cheaper Middle Eastern worker would have them save a lot.

As far as justifying what al Qaeda Saudi Arabia had done, I'm not saying what they had done is justifiable. What I am saying is that Americans and other westerners know that Arabs are gunning for them and that no amount of money can replace the loss of life. I'd much rather suffer burgeoning debt and living paycheck to paycheck than live in constant fear not knowing who is targetting me for just working in a foreign land.

 

[xsarien]

Bill O'Reilly is right on: Why the fuck continue with 'liberation' (revisionist history by the right) when A) Saddam's regime is already gone and B) most don't want it?

It's not as simple as them not "wanting" it. If you ask the average Iraqi if he's glad Saddam's gone, he or she will say "Yes." But I think the perception at the time, from the Iraqi point-of-view, anyway, was that once Saddam was gone, we'd immediately leave it up to them to establish a new form of government. We're widely seen as meddling now, as occupiers, not liberators.

But given the violence, we can't just up and leave all at once, either. That's why a more International presence to replace the one that's largely U.S./U.K. is probably the better way to go, coupled with not installing so many provisions in the new Iraqi government that say "Yeah, you can't do this or this or this or ask the military forces to leave or anything."

 

[Hero]

America is a threat to the Middle East regardless of where we occupy or who we aid politically. Our way of life and our beliefs are in direct opposition to their own. By this 'virtue' alone we are made targets time after time with no end in sight.

If anything, I think we're fighting too nicely in this war on terrorism. Obviously we know the names of these terrorists through our information sources. If anyone wanted to truly end terrorism they would not stop at just trying to capture/kill the terrorist, but their immediate family as well. I doubt anyone would want to carbomb or hijack a plane if they knew their parents, siblings, children, and cousins would suffer because of it. Note that I AM NOT condoning this type of behavior, I am merely stating that this would be much more effective than this reactive stance we have to terrorists.

 

[neptunes]

they now have south korean!