Iraq now 'finished' for United Kingdom

We have the Americans on our side if there is any other future wars! Surely that's a good thing? I'm kidding.

It's cost us £7 Billion a year - The invasion of Iraq, so i hope the government will use the rest of the money which is meant for the war for things like the Public sector.

I think loads of things have changed since the invasion of Iraq. Since the invasion there were 20-30 bombings a day, now current there's only 1-2 that are taking place a day. I would say that's a big difference!

The country is not going to be perfect "overnight" these things take time.

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Originally Posted by Alkaz

Why highlight that? How many millions of people did Saddam Hussein whilst he was dictating over them? I doubt it was anywere near that figure. In six years since we invaded and how ever many since he was killed I wonder how many he would have killed if we handn't invaded? I suspect many more than that number killed in the war. Iraq was good for me.


Maybe but thats how we got our empire which we should never have given back.

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As I said Saddam Hussein was nowhere near perfect, but many of those killed were to keep the regime healthy and strong otherwise if your not tough in a middle eastern country, you just get toppled. Iraq was good for you? - was it good for our reputation, for the dead soldiers, for their families, for the Iraqis who were innocently killed and for their families?

We invaded Iraq on a complete lie, and there is no denying it.

As I said before, before you go screaming about how evil Saddam was, maybe try and compare him and read up about him compared to Saudi Arabia and Iran because it makes him look like a sugar plum fairy.

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Originally Posted by Jordy

The empire is easily the best bit in our history (Although some parts of World War II were also phenomenal) but I'm afraid it was right to split up. If we didn't allow the empire to split up, they'd of just removed themselves. It split up just after World War II, our army was obviously over-stretched and we were a very poor country, we'd been battered by the war, we just couldn't afford to keep pouring money into the empire (bare in mind we'd already stole most the good things from the empire) and we had no means of controlling the empire anyway.

If we continued the empire I assure you that Britain would look nothing like it does today.

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Exactly, the Empire essentially went bust thanks to World War II. I think if World War II hadn't occured we would of still had our Empire, sadly though that is not how history took its course.

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The country is not going to be perfect "overnight" these things take time.

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The country faces a very unstable future, the Ba'ath regime offered stability and fairness compared with other groups, I think we'll see many topplings/weak governments in Iraq which will hold back its progress.

Now what will happen is they will take the troops from Iraq and put them in Afghanistan and they Taliban will retreat to Iraq again and they will get stronger.

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Originally Posted by -:Undertaker:-

As the United Nations didn't give consent and was lied to by the Bush administration, its similar to when North Korea have sanctions because they fire nuclear weapons, its 'illegal' or 'unjustified' in the eyes of the United Nations.

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But in effect all war is due to things that are "illegal". What really gives the UN the power to sanction war. As a matter of fact, nothing does. A war occurs because you feel that the laws have been broken and diplomacy will no longer work, thus you eschew the entire system that the UN is the crux of. The UN simply tries to maintain some vestige of legitimacy by going "ok we're useless at this point you're allowed to avoid us."

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Originally Posted by Undertaker

As for Saddam Hussein, of course he was, compared to our governments; brutal, harsh and not democratic at all. However if you look at his home policy and look at Iraq before and during his regime whilst also comparing it to Iran and Saudi Arabia it makes Saddam look like a powerpuff girl. If we could have democratic, fair and stable governments in the Middle East it would be wonderful and hopefully one day that will happen, but now in this world and in reality i'm sure Iraqi women, homosexuals and other groups would rather have more freedom than death, which they face in neighbouring states like Iran. Iran is democratic yet was much more harsh than Iraq in which women can be arrested or told to stop wearing western clothes, in which teenagers are publically hanged for being gay.

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I realize this is a terrible analogy to draw but Hitler was much the same way, Germany was a hellhole before he came to power. He really did a lot for the Germans but killed others much like Saddam catered to the minority Sunni and killed scores of Shia and banned their festivals. I realize the scope is massively different but the principle is the same...what Hitler did was not ok even if he made things better for the Germans.

That being said, we did not go into war with the Germans because of what they were doing to the Jews, we were clueless for the longest time.

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My opinion on his regime may be out of the ordinary and I too used to think he was the worst man on the planet thanks to western media, but now looking at his neighbours and comparing to other dictators, he was on the whole, a good dictator.

He was infact someone who would listen and tred carefully around the United States. Before the invasion of Kuwait (which was operated because apparently Kuwait were slant drilling) Saddam called an American offical to his palace and asked if Iraq was to invade Kuwait/take military action, would the United States intervene? - the answer he got was something like the United States does not wish to intervene in Middle Eastern politics or war - Saddam saw this as the go ahead, as America had not threatend to intervene in the war, but America later went back on itself. He wasn't perfect, but was a damn lot better than Robert Mugabe, Irans Presidents and Saudi Arabian leaders.

I agree, where are the weapons? - there are none, it was a complete cover up and the war cannot even be defended in my eyes, otherwise if we were to go on a culling of all governments we did not like, we'd occupy around half the world.

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Yes, it was a lie, and the bold sentence is my point. I don't agree though that he was best of the worst :P

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Originally Posted by -:Undertaker:-

Iraqi's now face a possibly unstable future in which they did not have under Saddam Hussein, and women and other groups in Iraq such as homosexuals now fear that tougher muslim laws will now punish them/hold them back in Iraq, whereas before it was one of the most liberal middle eastern countries in terms of equality.
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Oh yeah, because criminalising homosexuality was REALLY liberal

im sorry but this seems another one of your stupid arguements.
you try living in iraq when sadam hussain was in power, then give us a debate, ok? :)

Iraq was not okay with Sadam Hussain there. They told the British and US press that one minute he could be okay then the next he would make them do things they didn't want to do or they would be punished. They had to be apart of his army if he asked them or they suffered either death or a painful punishment. He also used them for their houses etc etc.

The main point is that Sadam was not a nice person. When he was at Iraq they hated him. Leave the law enforcing to the Police - not Sadam.

Sadam hussain was a misery to the people of Iraq. Sadam committed war crimes against humanity. The people of Iraq were scared of him, frightened of speaking out, knowing what would happen if they did. Who knows what the world would be now if it wasn't invaded.

I don't think Invading the Country has made Terrorists more wanting to shed blood in the Western Countries.

A few years ago Terrorism was a bad disease, it was breading heavily especially in Iraq/Afghanistan. We had to invade those two countries in particular as they were the main territory for "Terrorist actives"

The NATO's has done the country good by invading it!

The Country was on it's knees when it was invaded. Westerns couldn't invest in the country as it was too dangerous to do so.

Now people are investing in Iraq, setting up businesses which is good a good thing, as it's giving the people of Iraq the opportunity to get a Job.

The reasons why we started that war were completely ridiculous, and as a result, 234 People have lost their lives, with many others who may as well of due to their injuries.

In my opinion with expierence, war is pointless. Why cant everyone just get along?
It annoys me.