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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]So can someone remind me…
When the US went into Iraq, did we bomb all of their infrastructure and rape their children? Did we just destroy the place and roll out?
Can’t recall[/quote]

Oh, the lady wants reminders.  OK...

Since 2003, congenital malformations have increased to account for 15% of all births in Fallujah, Iraq. Congenital heart defects have the highest incidence, followed by neural tube defects. Similar birth defects were reported in other populations exposed to war contaminants.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3037062/

Between October 1994 and October 1995, the number of birth defects per 1,000 live births in Al Basrah Maternity Hospital was 1.37. In 2003, the number of birth defects in Al Basrah Maternity Hospital was 23 per 1,000 live births. Within less than a decade, the occurrence of congenital birth defects increased by an astonishing 17-fold in the same hospital. A yearly account of the occurrence and types of birth defects, between 2003 and 2011, in Al Basrah Maternity Hospital, was reported. Metal levels in hair, toenail, and tooth samples of residents of Al Basrah were also provided. The enamel portion of the deciduous tooth from a child with birth defects from Al Basrah (4.19 μg/g) had nearly three times higher lead than the whole teeth of children living in unimpacted areas. Lead was 1.4 times higher in the tooth enamel of parents of children with birth defects.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3464374/

Civilian infrastructure, you say:

Former UN humanitarian coordinator for Iraq, Denis Halliday, who resigned from the position in disgust in 1998, contends that epidemics of cholera, dysentery and hepatitis that have plagued Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War were the direct result of the US deliberately targeting Iraq’s infrastructure. He cites a recently released declassified US Defense Intelligence Agency document from the start of the conflict, pointing out Iraq’s vulnerable water situation. The document predicted that the shortage of pure drinking water resulting from the bombing of infrastructure could “lead to increased incidences, if not epidemics, of disease”.

“I think there’s no doubt whatsoever that the Americans had worked out the vulnerability of Iraq in terms of clean fresh water,” Halliday said. “So they set about destroying electrical power capacity, which is essential, of course, for the treatment and distribution of water.”

Halliday estimated that by 1999 the destruction of Iraq’s infrastructure and UN sanctions had directly caused the deaths of 600,000 children and 500,000 adults through malnutrition and disease. Tens of thousands more people, military and civilian, were killed in the US-led military assault. What will be the cost in human suffering of Washington’s next criminal venture in the Gulf?
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2002/11/iraq-n04.html

During the 2003-2017 period, Iraq Body Count recorded the killings of over 7,000 Iraqi children, among them 932 are attributed to the Islamic State, while twice as many were killed by the US-UK coalition. Estimates suggest that over 7,400 Iraqi children have been killed up to 2021, with over 1,000 deaths attributed to the Islamic State, and twice as many killed by the US-UK coalition.

https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/north-africa-west-asia/the-impact-of-the-war-on-terror-on-iraq-state-economy-and-civilian-deaths/
The mass killings of Iraqis commenced on 19 March 2003, with the ‘shock and awe’ bombing of Baghdad. Millions sat transfixed before their TV screens, watching as bombs and missiles exploded. The reports came with the warning that they contained flashing images. True enough, the sky over Baghdad flashed orange and golden, the sounds of war filling our ears. The narrative of terror that began that day was to last for years: terror from the sky, terror on the ground, terror from the foreign soldier, terror from one’s neighbour.

https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/costs/human/civilians/iraqi
Several times as many Iraqi civilians may have died as an indirect result of the war, due to damage to the systems that provide food, health care and clean drinking water, and as a result, illness, infectious diseases, and malnutrition that could otherwise have been avoided or treated.  The war has compounded the ill effects of decades of harmful U.S. policy actions towards Iraq since the 1960s, including economic sanctions in the 1990s that were devastating for Iraqis.

I mean, really.  Should I go on?[/quote]

So the US targeted infrastructure during the first war, when Iraq invaded Kuwait. 
Yeah that’s tough. Don’t invade your neighbor I guess.[/quote]

I'm just gonna let it sit here that your response to:

"During the 2003-2017 period, Iraq Body Count recorded the killings of over 7,000 Iraqi children, among them 932 are attributed to the Islamic State, while twice as many were killed by the US-UK coalition. Estimates suggest that over 7,400 Iraqi children have been killed up to 2021, with over 1,000 deaths attributed to the Islamic State, and twice as many killed in by the US-UK coalition."

was "yeah that's tough."[/quote]

NP.  2000 children died over 14 years due to US/UK coalition actions? Almost 1000 Ukrainian children have been killed by Russian attacks in the last 8 months. 3 million children inside Ukraine and 2.2 million children outside Ukraine need humanitarian assistance. Russians have deliberately bombed hospitals and schools.  2 out of every 3 Ukrainian kids have been displaced.

And your argument is what? — that because children in one conflict weren’t sufficiently protected, we should close our eyes to this and let children suffer similarly?  The US did an f’d up thing by providing false justification for war in Iraq, but is that really justification for Putin to invade Ukraine (a second time)?

I am amazed that the main argument on this thread is - the world failed to protect civilians before so why should the world do it now? 
[/quote]

Do you really want me to count displaced Iraqi children?

[b]Is it so wrong to want all invaders to be treated equally?[/b][/quote]

If your equality argument is we did a crap job at protecting civilians from the invader in X conflict, so we should keep doing a crap job and allow invaders to violate humanitarian law without consequence, then yes, I think it's wrong to work for and support that kind of equality.

This is actually a long-running argument in human rights -- some believe that international law has no meaning if it is not equally applied to all.  Others believe that international law is a work in progress and we are building to a world where it applies equally to all, but it's important to take what enforcement is achievable.  I am firmly in the latter camp. 
 [/quote]

It's not really about doing a crap job protecting civilians.  It's more about punishing invaders equally for equal sins.  I understand your position in support of "work in progress" but it isn't progress when punishment is applied selectively to certain countries but never others.

And of course it's easy to be in the latter camp when you know that no matter what crap thing your government does, no matter which country it chooses to invade, no matter how many civilians it slaughters in collateral damage, no matter how much land it annexes, your bank account will continue working, your credit cards are unaffected, your athletes are still welcome at international competitions, no country can deny you entry, and your job is secure.   Do you see what I mean?[/quote]

What I see is that you are using your point of view - to equate what the US has done in the past to support Putin today - his unilateral declaration of martial law in 4 municipalities of Ukraine that he doesn’t even fully control, which overwhelmingly voted to leave the Soviet Union nearly a quarter of a century ago, and where he is - right now - ordering the forced mass evacuation of non-Russian Ukrainian citizens (tens of thousands) deeper into Russian held territory as well as the forced conscription of any men remaining in areas under Russian control.

These people are likely to be put through filtration camps (where some of them will experience torture and extra-legal detention as did those being “evacuated” from the Mariupol region), sent onward deep within Russia from places it will be hard to return. Any unaccompanied minor children will be “fostered” with Russian foster parents and placed in an educational system that is designed to teach them to be good Russians. It is unlikely that these children will ever be reunited with their biological family or return to their country of citizenship.

None of this is supposition; it has already happened to Ukrainians living in the Mariupol region.

If you feel justified in supporting this, because other invaders haven’t been sufficiently punished for their sins, then I feel ashamed for you. [/quote]

Your shame for me isn't relevant. I've said nothing about supporting it, and you insist on focusing on the suffering of the (one type of) invaded rather than the consequences for the invader.   But I see you want me to give you this shibboleth.  OK.   I will join you in condemning this if you write up a list of sanctions that you think the US should have been slapped with after the Iraqi wars.  Please be specific.  Name American banks that should be cut off from the global financial system.  Name the amount of gold reserves that must be frozen.   The international sporting competitions from which America ought to be banned and for how long.  The countries that ought to ban entry to Americans. The war crimes tribunals that America should have been tried in.  The amount of reparations that America should have paid.  If you feel really generous, the number of years for which it ought to be demilitarized.  Really, anything and everything to which Russia is being subjected now.

When you give me a list of this, you can have my condemnation.  Until then, I'm sure you're a nice person and all, but assuming you're American like me, then a citizen of the country that brought the world Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and countless other unpunished invasions will not be lecturing the world on the evils of the invasions led by countries we happen to dislike. [/quote]

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