when figures like that are trotted out as a source of pride for the US.
here's your own bias showing up because I didn't say anything about the US. I was talking about life for Iraqis. You seem to busy condemning the US invasion to care about them unless they are suffering at the hands of the Americans.
And guess what, I've been writing about Iraq since 2002 an have always been against the war but that hasn't stopped me from trying to analyzing what's going on there and seeing that things have changed, becaus guess what? The Iraqi governments top priorities his year are to boost oil exports because they have a state run socialist economy that depends upon oil for 95% of it's revenue, they want to provide 24 hrs of power each day, and build apartments to address the housing shortage. Does any of that matter that the government is trying to develop the country? Will it matter whether they are successful or not? Or do you not give a damn because all you care about is that the US invaded?
To further that point infant deaths increased under the UN sanctions in the 1990s. You say that's bad. Today infant mortality rates are down to what they were before sanctions. You said that didn't matter because the US invaded. So in effect you don't care whether Iraqi babies die, You just care about US policy.
i never said that there was nothing good going on in the country, just that the horror visted upon iraq by the US and it's allies over the past 25 years is a major crime and the criminals should be punished. the US' impact on iraq has been ridiculously net negative, why should i applaud the benevolence of the current people in power, just because they're trying to get power on 24 hours a day? that's their job.
you seem to think that criticising the US and it's allies on one hand, and supporting the lives of Iraqi citizens on the other, are mutually exclusive. which is weird.
You once again are just proving my point that you only care about the U.S.
A little over 100,000 Iraqis have died since the 2003 invasion. Saddam killed 300,000 Iraqis beginning in the mid-1980s. Saddam was also the one that decided to invade Iran and Kuwait, which destroyed Iraq's economy, and he's the one that decided to hide his weapons program from U.N. inspectors and didn't think the sanctions would do anything, which is why they dragged on for more than a decade.
And you're the one that dismissed the improvement in infant deaths because of the U.S. invasion.
Finally, the point about the Iraqi government's development plans this year is because that's the number one issue for Iraqis right now. It's not security anymore and its not the U.S. They seem to have moved on, you haven't.
Dec. 09 IIACSS public opinion poll of Iraqis
1. Do you think that 2010 will be better or worse than 2009 51% Better 28% Same 18% Worse 3% No response
2. Compared with the year 2009, in your opinion will 2010 be a year of economic prosperity, economic difficulty or remain the same? 40% Economic prosperity 38% Remain the same 18% Economic difficulty 4% No response
3. Expectations on unemployment in Iraq in the next 12 months? 31% Fall slightly 24% Remain the same 19% Increase slightly 16% Increase a lot 6% Fall a lot 4% No Response
Dec. 09 YouGov public opinion poll of Iraqis
What is the most important issue currently facing Iraq? 21% unemployment 16% security 15% financial insecurity
i care about the US, actually more it's allies, because that's my tax dollars and my government that has committed these atrocities. they're the only government in the world that i can have an impact on.
it's fine that "iraqi's have moved on". the crime has been committed, and the perpetrators need to be brought to justice. in no court of law does the victim determine the justice. in a so-called democracy, that is the role of citizen.
you seem to fully believe the humanitarian intervention line, and good for you, it must be comforting. but it's a fantasy, not even believed by the architects of the war. anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000. while iraq has made some advances in some areas, as you said it's still a horrific place to live, a fact that was largely brought about by the series of decisions made by the US to first prop saddam up, then carpet bomb his country while leaving him in power, then implement completely ineffective and strangling sanctions, then invade and occupy for 7 years and running. rising social indicators are occurring despite the US, not because of.
while 100,000 excess deaths caused by the iraq war is conservative, if you accept that figure, it shows a crime beyond comprehension. 100,000 is a huge figure.
HarveyCanal"a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000.
HarveyCanal"a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
This whole look how the US is now making Iraq better despite years of their own agent Saddam fucking shit up shit is a load of crap and a half. Dude, you seem to have no concept that that's the same exploitative game the US has been improperly playing with foreign nations for centuries now. And noone is actually asking for that help. Yes, come in, kill our babies, decimate our land with your toxins, get your grips on our natural resources...and then tell how you've improved our unemployment rate as some sort of petty consolation. Nation building is nothing short of a reactionary pr move to cover up grave injustice inflicted upon what the US overnment clearly views as subjects to its violent impositions. You simply cant be against the war with Dick Cheney's 80 year old balls in your mouth like that. Fuck it, you aren't even worth it.
I don't believe in the humanitarian intervention. I've always been against the war and think it's the stupidest thing the U.S. has done in decades and wrecked Iraq. But guess what, things change, but you can't seem to realize that.
And the U.S. did not play a large role in Iraq when Saddam crushed the Kurds and Shiites in the 1980s and 1990s. Most of Iraq's income from oil and weapons came from France, Russia, China, and Brazil during those years. And it got massive financial backing from the Gulf States up until Kuwait in 1990. The U.S. can be blamed for not giving a damn when Saddam launched the Anfal campaign against the Kurds in the mid-1980s. After the Gulf War there was a huge Shiite and Kurdish uprising, which Saddam crushed with a huge loss of human life, and that was when Iraq was considered a U.S. enemy and sanctions were on.
1980-1990 Major Arms suppliers to Iraq 1. Russia $19,309 mil 2. China $4,928 mil 3. France $4,658 mil 4. Brazil $556 mil 6. U.S. $201 mil
Financial Support to Iraq during Iran-Iraq War Saudi Arabia $30.9 bil Kuwait $8.2 bil UAE $8 bil
And again, you keep on showing your obsession with the U.S. Nothing for the Iraqis except that they died and you want to blame the Americans for it.
This whole look how the US is now making Iraq better despite years of their own agent Saddam fucking shit up shit is a load of crap and a half.
You and brody need to go drink a beer together because both of you are obsessed with the U.S. even though that's not what I'm trying to talk about. Iraq has changed largely because of Iraqis. Remember them? No you don't because it's all about the U.S. killing them. And it's especially nice to know that two bit blood thirsty totalitarian dictators like Saddam can get a free pass from both of you because the U.S. invaded Iraq.
P.S. - Saddam instituted a top-down, Soviet style socialist/command economy, which Iraq still has to this day. We all know that in the 1980s under Reagan that's exactly the type of country the U.S. liked right?
P.P.S. - The U.S. was so committed to Iraq during the 1980s that they secretly sold weapons and spare parts to Iran during the Iran-Contra affair. Remember that? But wait, that's probably just part of how the evil empire works right.
P.P.P.S. - Also gotta remember that in the 1980s Russia was Iraq's largest arms suppliers and one of its main trade partners and this was when the Soviet Union were the Commies and the Cold War was going strong with Reagan as president in the U.S. But I got this one too, the U.S. is soooo powerful, that they even had control over those damn Ruskies and told them to support Saddam right?
Harvey: Iraqi babies died because of the sanctions. The U.S. is at fault!
brody: Iraqi children died because of the sanctions. It's the U.S.'s fault!
Harvey: The U.S. was at war with Iraq and bombed and killed Iraqis during the sanctions
Brody: The sanctions were a crime by the U.S. against Iraq
Me: During the sanctions Saddam killed between 100,000-200,000 Shiites and Kurds
Brody and Harvey: Saddam was on the American payroll then. Saddam was a U.S. puppet. It was the U.S.'s fault!
So we were at war with Iraq, we were destroying Iraq with sanctions, but at the same time we were propping up and supporting Iraq, and were responsible for Saddam's crushing the Kurdish and Shiite revolts????
I'm going to be the one that needs to take a drink after you two are done twisting everything around trying to justify your own biases.
Wait I can already predict the response:
Me: Iraqis did this, Iraqis did this, Iraqis did this
Harvey and brody: How can you say the U.S. did that? How can you say the U.S. did that? How can you say the U.S. did that?
HarveyCanal"a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
Oh no, I'm biased against baby killing and then coming up with 14 unrelated excuses why that's now okay. And oh no, I'm an idiot for following through on my assertion that the best way to make up for the mistake of invasion is to simply get the hell out of there. And oh no, I'm a hypocrite for knowing full well how the US haa made it a habit of playing both sides of a conflict in order to crank up its own war machine.
Look dude, it's great, I guess, that you have become somewhat of a scholar on Iraqi affairs. But I frankly don't care about 90% of the reasons you as someone who is supposedly against the war comes up with to play apologist for that war. The US gave Saddam the greenlight to invade Kuwait. Then the US obliterated a withdrawing Iraqi army killing thousands of civilians and destroying the natural habitat (yep, Saddam ordered the burning of the oil derricks, but he never would have gotten to that point without that green light from the US) in the process. The US could have removed Saddam at that time, but made the point not to. And that's where the US did its best US impersonation, coming up with 50-eleven reasons why it was going to run a foreign country better than that foreign country could run itself.
Sanctions for what anyway? What's hypocritical is for the only nation to ever use atomic grade bombs on human beings, and mostly civilians at that, to be telling other independent nations that they can't develop the same sort of weapons. Go ahead Israel, you go on and threaten your neighbors all day with your nuclear weapons. But those that don't march lockstep to the beat of the US drum, we're just gonna have to get to killing your babies until we get bored of it.
The allegations were phony anyway. And shifting the conversation to nation building which is being done for US profit by the way, not out of good heartedness...and it's just the same old imperialist bullshit that the US has no interest in ever diverting from. Things don't change...except for the way that you dance around the whole truth. And your sea of insignificant details seeking to shed positive light on this unmistakably deplorable activity by the US in Iraq is just that...insignificant in the face of hundreds of thousands of civilians murdered.
Can you give us details and figures on how control and production of Iraqi oil has changed before and after invasion?
It is my understanding that control has gone from France and Russia to US companies. Pre-invasion production was down because of sanctions. Post invasion production was further reduced because of infrastructure destruction.
Iraq nationalized its oil industry in 1972. In the 1980s and 1990s they signed some deals with foreign companies from France and Russia, but they had joint ventures with the state-run oil company. (Iraq has a state-run socialist/command economy). Today all of the oil is produced and exported by the state-run oil company.
In 2009 they had two rounds of bidding for international companies. No U.S. firm won a winning bid. The ones that did were from places like France, Russia, Malaysia, Angola, China, Japan. They also got what are called technical service agreements where they don?t get to claim the oil reserves on the fields that they?re working on. They are going to enter into joint ventures with the Iraqi government, have to pay a huge signing bonus to the Iraqi government, and then reach a set production level before they even get paid, and their pay rates are really low. For a number of reasons, which I wont bore you with those companies are probably never going to reach their production marks and are going to make very little off of these deals. They bid because they want to get involved in the Iraqi market because it has the 3rd largest oil reserves in the world, which have basically been shut off since the U.N. sanctions and then U.S. war. They hope that later on they can get better terms and make some real money.
When people talk about American companies and Iraq?s oil they are talking about oil service companies that drill wells, work on pipelines, etc. That?s what companies like Halliburton do. There are not oil companies however that are in charge of the production and marketing of oil. The U.S. has the largest oil service companies in the world, so it?s pretty natural for the Iraqi government to ask them to work on some of their fields. There are some companies from other countries working on the services as well I believe.
Overall, Iraq?s current oil production and exports are still below pre-war levels. Their oil infrastructure is decrepit and breaking down and the government relies upon 95% of its revenue from petroleum so if they don?t get this help from the international companies their production is likely to go down soon because things are going to start falling apart. Iraq will probably be able to double their oil production as a result of the recent oil deals in about 10 years.
Here?s an article I wrote about Iraq?s recent oil production levels:
Naked partisanship is part of the reason for the decline interest. Another is how comically wrong so many were on the prospects of 'the surge'.
In any case I think it's clear that many more looked at the campaign against the war in Iraq as a means to to damage the bush administration than did as a means to end the war.
Comments
here's your own bias showing up because I didn't say anything about the US. I was talking about life for Iraqis. You seem to busy condemning the US invasion to care about them unless they are suffering at the hands of the Americans.
And guess what, I've been writing about Iraq since 2002 an have always been against the war but that hasn't stopped me from trying to analyzing what's going on there and seeing that things have changed, becaus guess what? The Iraqi governments top priorities his year are to boost oil exports because they have a state run socialist economy that depends upon oil for 95% of it's revenue, they want to provide 24 hrs of power each day, and build apartments to address the housing shortage. Does any of that matter that the government is trying to develop the country? Will it matter whether they are successful or not? Or do you not give a damn because all you care about is that the US invaded?
you seem to think that criticising the US and it's allies on one hand, and supporting the lives of Iraqi citizens on the other, are mutually exclusive. which is weird.
A little over 100,000 Iraqis have died since the 2003 invasion. Saddam killed 300,000 Iraqis beginning in the mid-1980s. Saddam was also the one that decided to invade Iran and Kuwait, which destroyed Iraq's economy, and he's the one that decided to hide his weapons program from U.N. inspectors and didn't think the sanctions would do anything, which is why they dragged on for more than a decade.
And you're the one that dismissed the improvement in infant deaths because of the U.S. invasion.
Finally, the point about the Iraqi government's development plans this year is because that's the number one issue for Iraqis right now. It's not security anymore and its not the U.S. They seem to have moved on, you haven't.
Dec. 09 IIACSS public opinion poll of Iraqis
1. Do you think that 2010 will be better or worse than 2009
51% Better
28% Same
18% Worse
3% No response
2. Compared with the year 2009, in your opinion will 2010 be a year of economic prosperity, economic difficulty or remain the same?
40% Economic prosperity
38% Remain the same
18% Economic difficulty
4% No response
3. Expectations on unemployment in Iraq in the next 12 months?
31% Fall slightly
24% Remain the same
19% Increase slightly
16% Increase a lot
6% Fall a lot
4% No Response
Dec. 09 YouGov public opinion poll of Iraqis
What is the most important issue currently facing Iraq?
21% unemployment
16% security
15% financial insecurity
it's fine that "iraqi's have moved on". the crime has been committed, and the perpetrators need to be brought to justice. in no court of law does the victim determine the justice. in a so-called democracy, that is the role of citizen.
you seem to fully believe the humanitarian intervention line, and good for you, it must be comforting. but it's a fantasy, not even believed by the architects of the war. anyway, saddam was on the US payroll while he murdered those 300,000. while iraq has made some advances in some areas, as you said it's still a horrific place to live, a fact that was largely brought about by the series of decisions made by the US to first prop saddam up, then carpet bomb his country while leaving him in power, then implement completely ineffective and strangling sanctions, then invade and occupy for 7 years and running. rising social indicators are occurring despite the US, not because of.
while 100,000 excess deaths caused by the iraq war is conservative, if you accept that figure, it shows a crime beyond comprehension. 100,000 is a huge figure.
And the U.S. did not play a large role in Iraq when Saddam crushed the Kurds and Shiites in the 1980s and 1990s. Most of Iraq's income from oil and weapons came from France, Russia, China, and Brazil during those years. And it got massive financial backing from the Gulf States up until Kuwait in 1990. The U.S. can be blamed for not giving a damn when Saddam launched the Anfal campaign against the Kurds in the mid-1980s. After the Gulf War there was a huge Shiite and Kurdish uprising, which Saddam crushed with a huge loss of human life, and that was when Iraq was considered a U.S. enemy and sanctions were on.
1980-1990 Major Arms suppliers to Iraq
1. Russia $19,309 mil
2. China $4,928 mil
3. France $4,658 mil
4. Brazil $556 mil
6. U.S. $201 mil
Financial Support to Iraq during Iran-Iraq War
Saudi Arabia $30.9 bil
Kuwait $8.2 bil
UAE $8 bil
And again, you keep on showing your obsession with the U.S. Nothing for the Iraqis except that they died and you want to blame the Americans for it.
You and brody need to go drink a beer together because both of you are obsessed with the U.S. even though that's not what I'm trying to talk about. Iraq has changed largely because of Iraqis. Remember them? No you don't because it's all about the U.S. killing them. And it's especially nice to know that two bit blood thirsty totalitarian dictators like Saddam can get a free pass from both of you because the U.S. invaded Iraq.
P.P.S. - The U.S. was so committed to Iraq during the 1980s that they secretly sold weapons and spare parts to Iran during the Iran-Contra affair. Remember that? But wait, that's probably just part of how the evil empire works right.
From 1990-2003 the U.N. had sanctions on Iraq
Harvey: Iraqi babies died because of the sanctions. The U.S. is at fault!
brody: Iraqi children died because of the sanctions. It's the U.S.'s fault!
Harvey: The U.S. was at war with Iraq and bombed and killed Iraqis during the sanctions
Brody: The sanctions were a crime by the U.S. against Iraq
Me: During the sanctions Saddam killed between 100,000-200,000 Shiites and Kurds
Brody and Harvey: Saddam was on the American payroll then. Saddam was a U.S. puppet. It was the U.S.'s fault!
So we were at war with Iraq, we were destroying Iraq with sanctions, but at the same time we were propping up and supporting Iraq, and were responsible for Saddam's crushing the Kurdish and Shiite revolts????
I'm going to be the one that needs to take a drink after you two are done twisting everything around trying to justify your own biases.
Wait I can already predict the response:
Me: Iraqis did this, Iraqis did this, Iraqis did this
Harvey and brody: How can you say the U.S. did that? How can you say the U.S. did that? How can you say the U.S. did that?
Look dude, it's great, I guess, that you have become somewhat of a scholar on Iraqi affairs. But I frankly don't care about 90% of the reasons you as someone who is supposedly against the war comes up with to play apologist for that war. The US gave Saddam the greenlight to invade Kuwait. Then the US obliterated a withdrawing Iraqi army killing thousands of civilians and destroying the natural habitat (yep, Saddam ordered the burning of the oil derricks, but he never would have gotten to that point without that green light from the US) in the process. The US could have removed Saddam at that time, but made the point not to. And that's where the US did its best US impersonation, coming up with 50-eleven reasons why it was going to run a foreign country better than that foreign country could run itself.
Sanctions for what anyway? What's hypocritical is for the only nation to ever use atomic grade bombs on human beings, and mostly civilians at that, to be telling other independent nations that they can't develop the same sort of weapons. Go ahead Israel, you go on and threaten your neighbors all day with your nuclear weapons. But those that don't march lockstep to the beat of the US drum, we're just gonna have to get to killing your babies until we get bored of it.
The allegations were phony anyway. And shifting the conversation to nation building which is being done for US profit by the way, not out of good heartedness...and it's just the same old imperialist bullshit that the US has no interest in ever diverting from. Things don't change...except for the way that you dance around the whole truth. And your sea of insignificant details seeking to shed positive light on this unmistakably deplorable activity by the US in Iraq is just that...insignificant in the face of hundreds of thousands of civilians murdered.
Can you give us details and figures on how control and production of Iraqi oil has changed before and after invasion?
It is my understanding that control has gone from France and Russia to US companies.
Pre-invasion production was down because of sanctions.
Post invasion production was further reduced because of infrastructure destruction.
Where are we at now?
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1948787,00.html
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/se...lient=firefox-a
Edit: The first link won't work, but you can cut and paste it into your browser to get to the article.
In 2009 they had two rounds of bidding for international companies. No U.S. firm won a winning bid. The ones that did were from places like France, Russia, Malaysia, Angola, China, Japan. They also got what are called technical service agreements where they don?t get to claim the oil reserves on the fields that they?re working on. They are going to enter into joint ventures with the Iraqi government, have to pay a huge signing bonus to the Iraqi government, and then reach a set production level before they even get paid, and their pay rates are really low. For a number of reasons, which I wont bore you with those companies are probably never going to reach their production marks and are going to make very little off of these deals. They bid because they want to get involved in the Iraqi market because it has the 3rd largest oil reserves in the world, which have basically been shut off since the U.N. sanctions and then U.S. war. They hope that later on they can get better terms and make some real money.
When people talk about American companies and Iraq?s oil they are talking about oil service companies that drill wells, work on pipelines, etc. That?s what companies like Halliburton do. There are not oil companies however that are in charge of the production and marketing of oil. The U.S. has the largest oil service companies in the world, so it?s pretty natural for the Iraqi government to ask them to work on some of their fields. There are some companies from other countries working on the services as well I believe.
Overall, Iraq?s current oil production and exports are still below pre-war levels. Their oil infrastructure is decrepit and breaking down and the government relies upon 95% of its revenue from petroleum so if they don?t get this help from the international companies their production is likely to go down soon because things are going to start falling apart. Iraq will probably be able to double their oil production as a result of the recent oil deals in about 10 years.
Here?s an article I wrote about Iraq?s recent oil production levels:
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2010/04/iraqs-oil-industry-hits-plateau.html
Here?s another about why Iraq isn?t going to reach its production goals:
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2010/04/more-oil-analysts-say-that-iraqs-oil.html
Here?s one on the oil bidding round they had in Dec. 09
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2009/12/2nd-round-of-bidding-on-iraqs-oil.html
In any case I think it's clear that many more looked at the campaign against the war in Iraq as a means to to damage the bush administration than did as a means to end the war.