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Obama wants Muslims to Fight it Out, Not the U.S.

(MADDOG @ Sep. 03 2014,8:50 am)

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Your cartoon involves no more speculation than scenarios of what could occur once these extremists infiltrate our borders.

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ISIS is obviously Muslims

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“Well, I think there was one important point that he was making about them not being Islamic or a form of true Islam,” he said. “I think it is important not only to the American public but for the world and the Islamic world to point out this is not a true form of Islam. This is an aberrant form that should not represent most of the civilized Islamic world.”

(Rosalind_Swenson @ Sep. 11 2014,1:16 pm)

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I'm not talking about isolationism. I'm talking about screwing with other countries we have no business screwing with. Meddling in their affairs to get the outcome WE would rather THEY have.  Starting wars with lies. Putting military bases in how many countries? Is isolation or hegemony the only 2 choices there are?

(Self-Banished @ Sep. 16 2014,11:34 am)

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We've been rebuilding wrecked countries since WW I

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< 50 nations with US in fighting ISIL >

ASHINGTON--The State Department on Friday released the names of more than 50 nations plus the European Union and NATO who are part of the U.S.-led "global effort" to destroy the Islamic State militants, also known as ISIL or ISIS.

"The breadth and diversity of countries and organizations making contributions across one or more of the lines of effort demonstrate the global and unified nature of this fight.  Below are some of the partners that have made contributions and commitments to date.  This is an ongoing effort, and we expect the number of countries to grow," the State Department said in a statement.

The nations are:

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March 25, 2014

< Obama to kill Navy’s Tomahawk, Hellfire missile programs >

President Barack Obama is seeking to abolish two highly successful missile programs that experts say have helped the U.S. Navy maintain military superiority for the past several decades.

The Tomahawk missile program—known as “the world’s most advanced cruise missile”—is set to be cut by $128 million under Obama’s fiscal year 2015 budget proposal and completely eliminated by fiscal year 2016, according to budget documents released by the Navy.

In addition to the monetary cuts to the program, the number of actual Tomahawk missiles acquired by the United States would drop significantly—from 196 last year to just 100 in 2015. The number will then drop to zero in 2016.

(MADDOG @ Sep. 23 2014,11:10 am)

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Gee, we used 47 of them last night.

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< Defense News > WASHINGTON — Most of the US Navy’s aviation programs take significant hits in the 2015 budget, including the P-8A Poseidon, F-35C Joint Strike Fighter, and MH-60R helicopter, and plans to buy the MQ-8C Fire Scout unmanned shipboard aircraft have been shelved for now.

The budget also takes a big bite out of weapons procurement, notably the elimination of Tactical Tomahawk cruise missile procurement after this year.

QUOTE

Weapons procurement showed striking reductions from last year’s plans. Then, the Navy planned to buy 980 Tactical Tomahawks, the primary cruise missile in use throughout the fleet. The new plan shows only 100 missiles in 2015 and none thereafter.

The reduction reflects shifting investment to a new next-generation land attack weapon, said Lt. Caroline Hutcheson, a Navy spokeswoman at the Pentagon, who also noted that the current inventory of Block IV Tactical Tomahawks exceeds combat requirements. A recertification line for existing missiles will be established to retain effectiveness of current TacToms, she added.

Buys of Standard SM-6, Rolling Airframe and Evolved Sea Sparrow missiles, as well as the Mk 48 heavyweight torpedo and Mk 54 lightweight torpedo were also reduced, and procurement of the advanced medium-range air-to-air missile is suspended in 2015. Purchases of the Hellfire air-to-ground missile and the advanced JSOW-C version of the Joint Standoff Weapon were dramatically reduced — Hellfire from 1,519 from 2015-2018 to zero; JSOW-C from 1,799 over the same period to 400.

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The destroyer Sterett launches a Tomahawk cruise missile, a mainstay of Navy forces worldwide. Purchases of new Tactical Tomahawks are being slashed, from 784 over four years to just 100. (MC1 Carmichael Yepez / US Navy)

(MADDOG @ Sep. 23 2014,9:02 pm)

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(Common Citizen @ Sep. 26 2014,7:42 am)

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I sure hope someone told the 1st Infantry Division that, although they are moving their HQ to Iraq, their CinC was quoted as saying, "There is no military solution to Islamic terrorism.  It has nothing to do with Islam, which is the religion of peace."

(irisheyes @ Sep. 27 2014,10:44 pm)

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No, Rush Limbaugh said that.  I Googled the quote and all the hits come back to a recent Rush Limbaugh episode.  

< Google Results >

(Rosalind_Swenson @ Oct. 01 2014,9:20 am)

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What I'm trying to say is that, even though the US knew Saddam was using chemical weapons (after helping him acquire them) they still kept helping him and considered him an ally.

(MADDOG @ Oct. 01 2014,10:05 am)

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They were only allies to one extent.  The United States aligned with Iraq and backed Saddam during the Iran-Iraq war because of the anti American revolution in Iran in '79.

Right or wrong, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" fit this one, Roz.

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The know-how and material for developing chemical weapons were obtained by Saddam's regime from foreign sources.[24] Most precursors for chemical weapons production came from Singapore (4,515 tons), the Netherlands (4,261 tons), Egypt (2,400 tons), India (2,343 tons), and West Germany (1,027 tons). One Indian company, Exomet Plastics, sent 2,292 tons of precursor chemicals to Iraq. Singapore-based firm Kim Al-Khaleej, affiliated to the United Arab Emirates, supplied more than 4,500 tons of VX, sarin and mustard gas precursors and production equipment to Iraq.[25] Dieter Backfisch, managing director of West German company Karl Kolb GmbH, was quoted by saying in 1989 that "for people in Germany poison gas is something quite terrible, but this does not worry customers abroad."[24]

< http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halabja_chemical_attack#Chemical_attack >

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The newspaper says a review of a large tranche of government documents reveals that the administrations of President Reagan and the first President Bush both authorized providing Iraq with intelligence and logistical support, and okayed the sale of dual use items — those with military and civilian applications — that included chemicals and germs, even anthrax and bubonic plague.
...

Congressional investigations after the Gulf War revealed that the Commerce Department had licensed sales of biological agents, including anthrax, and insecticides, which could be used in chemical weapons, to Iraq.

When Iraq used chemical weapons against the Kurds in 1987, there was anger in Congress and the White House. But a memo in 1988 from Assistant Secretary of State Richard W. Murphy stated that "The U.S.-Iraqi relationship is … important to our long-term political and economic objectives."

"We believe that economic sanctions will be useless or counterproductive to influence the Iraqis," the Post quoted the memo as saying.

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Iran had submitted a draft resolution asking the U.N. to condemn Iraq's chemical weapons use. The U.S. delegate to the U.N. was instructed to lobby friendly delegations in order to obtain a general motion of "no decision" on the resolution. If this was not achievable, the U.S. delegate was to abstain on the issue. Iraq's ambassador met with the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Jeane Kirkpatrick, and asked for "restraint" in responding to the issue - as did the representatives of both France and Britain.

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[T]he United States actively supported the Iraqi war effort by supplying the Iraqis with billions of dollars of credits, by providing U.S. military intelligence and advice to the Iraqis, and by closely monitoring third country arms sales to Iraq to make sure that Iraq had the military weaponry required. The United States also provided strategic operational advice to the Iraqis to better use their assets in combat... The CIA, including both CIA Director Casey and Deputy Director Gates, knew of, approved of, and assisted in the sale of non-U.S. origin military weapons, ammunition and vehicles to Iraq. My notes, memoranda and other documents in my NSC files show or tend to show that the CIA knew of, approved of, and assisted in the sale of non-U.S. origin military weapons, munitions and vehicles to Iraq.

The full extent of these covert transfers is not yet known. Teicher's files on the subject are held securely at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and many other Reagan Era documents that could help shine new light on the subject remain classified. Teicher declined to discuss details of the affidavit with the Washington Post shortly before the 2003 invasion of Iraq.[17]

About two of every seven licenses for the export of "dual use" technology items approved between 1985 and 1990 by the U.S. Department of Commerce "went either directly to the Iraqi armed forces, to Iraqi end-users engaged in weapons production, or to Iraqi enterprises suspected of diverting technology" to weapons of mass destruction, according to an investigation by House Banking Committee Chairman Henry B. Gonzalez. Confidential Commerce Department files also reveal that the Reagan and Bush administrations approved at least 80 direct exports to the Iraqi military. These included computers, communications equipment, aircraft navigation and radar equipment



On February 9, 1994, Senator Riegle delivered a report -commonly known at the Riegle Report- in which it was stated that "pathogenic (meaning 'disease producing'), toxigenic (meaning 'poisonous'), and other biological research materials were exported to Iraq pursuant to application and licensing by the U.S. Department of Commerce." It added: "These exported biological materials were not attenuated or weakened and were capable of reproduction."[29]

The report then detailed 70 shipments (including Bacillus anthracis) from the United States to Iraqi government agencies over three years, concluding "It was later learned that these microorganisms exported by the United States were identical to those the UN inspectors found and recovered from the Iraqi biological warfare program."[30]

Donald Riegle, Chairman of the Senate committee that authored the aforementioned Riegle Report, said:

U.N. inspectors had identified many United States manufactured items that had been exported from the United States to Iraq under licenses issued by the Department of Commerce, and [established] that these items were used to further Iraq's chemical and nuclear weapons development and its missile delivery system development programs. ... The executive branch of our government approved 771 different export licenses for sale of dual-use technology to Iraq. I think that is a devastating record.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control sent Iraq 14 separate agents "with biological warfare significance," according to Riegle's investigators.

QUOTE

that included chemicals and germs, even anthrax and bubonic plague.

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Commerce Department had licensed sales of biological agents, including anthrax, and insecticides, which could be used in chemical weapons, to Iraq.

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U.N. inspectors had identified many United States manufactured items that had been exported from the United States to Iraq under licenses issued by the Department of Commerce, and [established] that these items were used to further Iraq's chemical and nuclear weapons development and its missile delivery system development programs. ... The executive branch of our government approved 771 different export licenses for sale of dual-use technology to Iraq. I think that is a devastating record.

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Among the chemical precursors provided to Iraq from American companies such as Alcolac International and Phillips was thiodiglycol, a substance needed to manufacture mustard gas, according to leaked portions of Iraq's "full, final and complete" disclosure of the sources for its weapons programs. The provision of chemical precursors from United States companies to Iraq was enabled by a Ronald Reagan Administration policy that removed Iraq from the State Department's list of State Sponsors of Terrorism. Alcolac was named as a defendant in the Aziz v. Iraq case presently pending in the United States District Court (Case No. 1:09-cv-00869-MJG). Both companies have since undergone reorganization. Phillips, once a subsidiary of Phillips Petroleum is now part of ConocoPhillips, an American oil and discount fossil fuel company. Alcolac International has since dissolved and reformed as Alcolac Inc

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On October 27, 1992, the Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs held hearings that revealed that the United States had exported chemical, biological, nuclear, and missile-system equipment to Iraq that was converted to military use in Iraq's chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons program. Many of these weapons -- weapons that the U.S. and other countries provided critical materials for -- were used against us during the war.

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The story of U.S. involvement with Saddam Hussein in the years
before his 1990 attack on Kuwait--which included large-scale
intelligence sharing, supply of cluster bombs through a Chilean front
company, and facilitating Iraq's acquisition of chemical and biological
precursors--is a topical example of the underside of U.S. foreign
policy.

...

A review of thousands of declassified government documents and
interviews with former policymakers shows that U.S. intelligence and
logistical support played a crucial role in shoring up Iraqi defenses
against the ``human wave'' attacks by suicidal Iranian troops. The
administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush authorized the
sale to Iraq of numerous items that had both military and civilian
applications, including poisonous chemicals and deadly biological
viruses, such as anthrax and bubonic plague.

...

When United Nations weapons inspectors were allowed into Iraq after
the 1991 Gulf War, they compiled long lists of chemicals, missile
components, and computers from American suppliers, including such
household names as Union Carbide and Honeywell, which were being used
for military purposes.

...

The Commerce Department also
approved the export of insecticides to Iraq, despite widespread
suspicions that they were being used for chemical warfare.

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Thiodiglycol has both polar and nonpolar solvent properties. It is used as a solvent in a variety of applications ranging from dyeing textiles to inks in some ballpoint pens. In chemical synthesis, it is used as a building block for protection products, dispersants, fibers, plasticizers, rubber accelerators, pesticides, dyes, and various other organic chemicals. In the manufacture of polymers, it is used as a chain transfer agent. As an antioxidant, it is used as an additive in lubricants.

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Even though other countries sold them 4500 tons of actual mustard gas

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If the wikipedia page section you quoted is correct, and any country did sell Iraq complete ready to use chemical weapons

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You're a liar, nothing shows that we helped Iraq get chemical weapons but you'll just keep trying to twist the words of people to try to prove we sold them percursors even though we sold them dual use items. Like I said earler if we hadn't sold them pesticides you'd be sport bitching about how the US let Iraqis die from insect borne illnesses because we wouldn't sell them pesticides.

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If you dislike the evil American government so much why don't just move your bunker to Mexico, or Canada?

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Also countries sold them the chemical precursors and the equipment needed to turn them into chemical weapons because it's sort of dangerous  to ship things like 4500 TONS of mustard gas. You're trying to insinuate that we did something similar by selling them dual use chemicals.

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"The U.S.-Iraqi relationship is … important to our long-term political and economic objectives."

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You just like to sport bitch, you're one of those people that sits in front of a computer all day bitching about how tough life is, and how evil the government is, because you're either too stupid, or too lazy to try to change anything.

(alcitizens @ Oct. 14 2014,11:00 pm)

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Iraq Shiite Militias Killing Sunnis

< http://www.nbcnews.com/storyli...n225791 >