"Mark K. Bilbo" <y@hoo.com-amikchi> wrote in message
news:<pan.2004.04.09.20.20.14.592545@hoo.com-amikchi>...

On Fri, 09 Apr 2004 17:06:00 +0000 in episode
<Xns94C6C2276AB9Dinsensitiveclodhotma@192.71.180.100> we saw our hero
Maverick <insensitive_clod@hotmail.com>:

"Mark K. Bilbo" <y@hoo.com-amikchi> wrote in
news:pan.2004.04.09.13.17.07.348860@hoo.com-amikchi:

On Fri, 09 Apr 2004 04:03:59 -0700 in episode
<18510aff.0404090303.71f633e1@posting.google.com> we saw our hero
maff91@yahoo.com (maff):

What if the war hadn't happened?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1188734,00.html

Would it have been better or worse for Iraq - and the rest of the
world? We asked a number of eminent commentators


Friday April 9, 2004
The Guardian

Richard Dawkins
What if there had been no war? Soldiers and civilians would have
kept eyes, legs, arms and lives. Spain would not have suffered an
obscene revenge attack, and its previous government would still be
in power. So, it has to be admitted, would Saddam Hussein. But if,
as now seems likely, a Taliban-style, woman-hating theocracy takes
over, we shall stop having to admit that surviving Iraqis are better
off without Saddam. And even good consequences don't justify illegal
actions.

Actually, considering the state the Hussein regime was in after the
'91, the sanctions, the '98 destruction of most of the remainder of
his weapons infrastructure, and the rest of the policies of
containment...

The regime may have collapsed by now without a war at all...

I'm not so sure about that. Didn't the sanctions affect the people
more than the regime? Either way, what I fear will happen in Iraq now
is civil war and/or a theocracy taking over.

The state we found the Hussein regime in wasn't good. The man wasn't
just losing his grip on power but his grip on *reality.

Yes, sanctions hurt the people there. But, then again, so did dropping
bombs on them...

Saddam's grip on power was probably a lot more tenuous than most people
think. His eldest son had been the victim of a suicide attempt, had been
shot 8 times and had escaped, but was badly damaged. Saddam himself had
to fend off several coup attempts. I think he saw himself slipping. His
reaction to the UN inspectors was symptomatic of a man who had to maintain
a strongman image to retain power. He might have felt that, had he
tolerated inspections of his private palaces and given the inspectors free
reign, the very presence of these foreigners looking through everything
with complete impunity would have compromised his regime and emboldened
his enemies, perhaps tipping everything over. He threw them out, gambling
that the US would not take catastrophic military action, apparently
thinking the risk of war with the US was tolerable compared to the much
greater risk he faced from his own enemies if he allowed the inspections
to continue.