C'mon Newscorp, you can do better than this...

Sure, there is certainly plenty of that.

Or any real say on what gets done at the most fundamental level, like whether Afghanistan or Iraq gets invaded either.

There is however considerable influence in the sense of how the carve up the detail, like which country is primarily responsible for particular areas on the ground after invasion etc or the detail of particular ops etc.

Yeah, tho most of that isnt actually from the US govt, its mostly from US citizens and the US politicians are very wary about pissing off those voters who do have an interest in Israel's survival and even just the state of the country.

Another lie.

And only a terminal fool would ever believe it was even possible.

Nope, its time to make an obscene gesture in the general direction of fools like you instead.

As anyone with a clue has always done.

In spades with the invasion of Iraq.

Ahh yes now I understand what yoursaying competely!

Thanks!

Ok, if you put it like that, if the UK was strictly against attacking iraq? Well we will never know but I would put money on it, and I would believe that the US definitly would have had no problem going it alone!

Yes, thats is very true, the Jewish Lobby in the US is very powerful...and israel gets alot of money from the Jewish Lobby.

Officially they were. In practice they had tolerated it too.

They never put the same effort into stamping out opium growing and heroin trafficking as they did into stomping on women for example.

Mainly because it did provide considerable funding for their military activitys.

Yep. And that bit on heroin was just one small part of that.

I dont believe he has had much real effect, just his support is welcomed.

Particularly when fools like Chirac made such spectacular fools of themselves.

Corse they cant. In spades with the lunatic fringe of the british labour party. They only just stopped singing the Red Flag at party conferences.

Corse he has. The claim that he deliberately lied about heroin is completely off with the fairys. Nothing new for Forster tho.

Just like he did before that putting the boot into the labour party and ensuring that it was a viable electoral alternative too.

Thats been a fact of british political life for most of the last half of the previous century with the Irish.

Its never about money for politicians.

I doubt it.

There were no 'official warnings' from any country that something like that was likely to happen.

And even fools as stupid as you should have noticed the previous attempts on the WTC by that lot etc.

You didnt predict Sept 11 before it happened either. Funny that.

Just where we always were, with the FACT that its almost impossible to predict something as spectacular as that.

It was absolutely no news to anyone that there had been previous attempts to blow up the WTC, fool.

Certainly not Saddam, fool.

Corse it didnt, it was the result of the full scale military invasion of Kuwait, stupid.

And kicking Saddam out of Kuwait had the support of almost every single country in the middle east too.

Completely irrelevant.

BS. Check the UN data.

Saddam certainly did, he always modelled himself after Joe and was happy to rave on about how Stalin's approach was the only way to operate to anyone prepared to listen.

Nope, fact.

The UN wouldnt even notice if its arse was on fire on that stuff.

Nope, they clearly didnt bother to do much about the heroin trade, stupid.

I agree.

Yep

Hmm, yes, actually they say Tony Blair has put troops into action more than any other prime minister this century except for Churchill..

They worked excellently together, I think the US/UK make the best team, forget Europe, UK and Americans understand the same language and the same culture, just like Australians, Canadians and New Zealand as well.

Maybe some other countries in Europe, but I was really really surprised about France and Germany not comming on board..that really surprised me alot.. Do they think terrorists will not attack them?

Yes but I'm talking about the direct US Government Aid to Israel, its huge, its billions of dollars...

I don't know how economically secure Israel is, but I know that US/Israeli ties are pretty strong.

Interesting point BJ, however, thats exactly right, but why would he need to lie? I am wondering why? I mean he could just have easily made a case for going into iraq I think, they would not have had to lie, or make things up. They easily could have made the case based on just the "chance" that he could be capable of making weapons of mass destruction, that together with the way he's treated his country, that alone could have given him the support he needed.

Many reasons...also the fact the US would go alone anyway, that also is another reason to justify it. I really dont' think he needed to make the case regarding WMD unless he really really believed it.

Do you really think Tony Blair is that bad that he's a liar? Do you really think the UK gov is so bad it lies that much?

I can't see that, drugs is a personal problem, it is a cultural problem, if it was'nt heroine it would be crack cocaine or some manufactured problem, what about ecstacy? that is also a bad probem, crack cocaine is far worse than heroine, drugs are not such a simple problem as get rid of the opium fields..if it puts the price up, then they will just grow it some other part of the world, or drug addicts will start taking more cocain from South America, you know...or they will grow it in another region such as Burma, or Thailand, Afganistan is not just the only place it is grown, Pakistan is probably the second largest place for growing the drug! You know it is not that simple, and has nothing to do with September 11th.

If one of our leaders promises to clean it up and the

Whilst I respect your views, I don't think making a pledge or saying your going to tryto do something is the same thing as a lie. Life is black and white, politicians are not gods, they are ordinary men like me and you, they can't control fate any more than you can. We just have to elect the best amongst us.

>

Definitely, greater support, even the arab countries supported getting him out..

Dunno, thats a VERY dubious proposition indeed.

I dont believe thats correct with the time immediately post Churchill, what with Palestine, Aden, Suez, Malaya, and the considerable number of colonial ventures like Kenya etc, let alone Korea etc etc etc.

Then there's the Falklands and the Gulf War.

And did in WW2 too.

Yep.

It was more that that fool Chirac wanted to posture on the world stage as a result of the fact that France is completely irrelevant now and has been for decades.

With Germany its just that they have limp wristed lefty at the controls currently and the fact that Germany always has to be careful getting involved militarily in anything. Their involvement in the Gulf War was pretty low key too and they stayed right out of Kosovo etc for historical reasons.

Nope.

It'd go straight down the tubes without the financial support of jews outside the country.

Sure. Mainly because thats where so many of the world's jews choose to live now. Specially the ones with a real vote.

26 July 2001 "Fishing rod in hand, Attorney General John Ashcroft left on a weekend trip to Missouri Thursday afternoon aboard a chartered government jet, reports CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart.

In response to inquiries from CBS News over why Ashcroft was traveling exclusively by leased jet aircraft instead of commercial airlines, the Justice Department cited what it called a 'threat assessment' by the FBI, and said Ashcroft has been advised to travel only by private jet for the remainder of his term.

'There was a threat assessment and there are guidelines. He is acting under the guidelines', an FBI spokesman said. Neither the FBI nor the Justice Department, however, would identify what the threat was, when it was detected or who made it".

I'm in excellent company it seems

Thanks for the abuse, I will refrain from responding in kind.

It's irrelevant if you ignore the hypocritical spouting about democracy from "President" Bush and his lacky Bliar.

Actually if I recall correctly it had everything to do with Diplomacy (or lack there of). If I am correct, the primary reason Saddam took Kuwait is because he believed the US wouldn't interfere & didn't care as long as the oil continued to flow.

I think that the quote that was the impetus for Iraq's initial action was "we don't want to interfere in the affairs of the Middle East" . That was in conjunction with the sending of a female diplomat into an extremely conservative area where items of grave importance are handled by men and items of lesser importance are handled by women.

Indicating your willingness to act is as important as actually acting. Hence an up side to Gulf war II to the other axis member states.

Feel free to add or correct anything that I have missed.

Stephen.

All politicians in the great democracys tend to oversell the case for war.

Its an inevitable consequence of the percieved need for political correctness that was War Departments and the Minister for War renamed to the Defence Dept and the Minister for Defence.

Its only the most black and white situations like the Falklands where they dont feel they need to do that. And the more gung ho like Maggie do it anyway.

Not given the unstated opinion amongst so many that the invasion of a country that hasnt invaded cant be justified.

They didnt do either. Just overstated the WMD issue.

Yes, but I doubt most of the voters would have bought that more complicated arguement.

The real reason the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq had so much popular support in the US was JUST Sept 11.

I doubt it. Popular support for involvement in Kosovo wasnt that great for example.

Yeah, it was a mistake to attempt to get UN backing for the invasion. That was the reason for most of what fools like Forster claim are 'lies'

Corse its easy to be wise after the event on that, it wasnt initially clear just how the likes of Chirac would behave.

Corse he believed it. So did Blair.

People like Blair dont deliberately flagrantly lie.

Some like Churchill did, but Blair doesnt.

Even Roosevelt was pretty economical with the truth until Pearl Harbor changed the opinion of the US voter overnight.

Yes, he really is that terminally woolly minded.

Yes, he really is that terminally woolly minded.

I cant either.

And only a personal problem for the dregs of any society. Even if they happen to be very well paid dregs.

He doesnt, he's that terminally woolly minded.

I dont, they're terminally woolly minded.

Indeed.

Or recognise that no political or political 'leader' has much real effect on any first world country.

Yep, and thats why they were electorally completely irrelevant for so long.

And they did eventually get elected to govt because they arent.