When a civilian flight is shot down...

[targus]

When a civilian flight is shot down with one of Gadhafi's surface to air missles by some terrorist would Obama morally share in the blame since it was his unnecessary war in Libya that caused the missles to end up in some terrorist's hands?

http://www.wlsam.com/Article.asp?id=2281782&spid=

From the linked article:

Almost every outpost captured by opposition forces has yielded weapons -- everything from AK-47 assault rifles to grenades to surface-to-air missiles (SAMs). And the rebels tell ABC News that they don't have enough resources to safeguard them all -- which means they may wind up in the hands of people who have other agendas than defeating Gadhafi.

According to Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, the weapons the looters want most, and take first, are the SAMs.

HRW estimates there are 20,000 surface-to-air missiles in Libya, and many of those are now missing. Some are recent Russian-made SAMs, capable of shooting down aircraft flying as high as 11,000 feet.

"They have no military use in this war," said Bouckaert. "Gadhafi is not flying any airplanes, he's not flying any helicopters. So why are people looting these very powerful and dangerous missiles?"

Bouckaert suggested that some of the looters might have other targets in mind. "They can be used to shoot down a civilian plane. That's what al Qaeda tried to do in Mombasa a few years ago."

 

[freeatlast]

No I don't believe that the President would hold any responsibility. That would be like blaming the police for the death of a fugitive because he was being pursued in a high speed chase and he lost control of his vehicle and died. His death is totally on his own head as the shooting down of a commercial airline would be on the shooters head as well as anyone who helped him.

 

[NaasPreacher (C4K)]

No I don't believe that the President would hold any responsibility. That would be like blaming the police for the death of a fugitive because he was being pursued in a high speed chase and he lost control of his vehicle and died. His death is totally on his own head as the shooting down of a commercial airline would be on the shooters head as well as anyone who helped him.

Yup - it is a HUGE politically motivated stretch to try and implicate the president

A more likely reason? Financial gain.

 

[InTheLight]

BTW, Qaddafi was using airstrikes against the rebels back in March.

Yup - it is a HUGE politically motivated stretch to try and implicate the president

So then it was also wrong for libs to implicate Bush 1/Rumsfeld/Cheney in the fact that Afghan rebels in the 80's got stinger missiles?

I think Targus is pointing out that if this were to occur he hopes that liberals will hold Obama somewhat responsible just as they blame Bush 1 for "arming" Saddam Hussein and the Afghan rebels in the 80's.

In Qadafi's case, the linkage to Obama is weaker in that we didn't supply weapons, rather the weapons were plundered.

A more likely reason? Financial gain.

Sure, sell them to Al Qaeda and other terrorists who will use them on Western aircraft. Same end result.

 

[targus]

I seem to recall the libs/dems being all upset with Bush when looters in Iraq were taking furniture and things like that and our troops did nothing to stop it.

Now we have a case where serious weapons are getting into the hands of who knows - most likely terrorists - and the libs/dems don't seem to think that Obama has any responsibility even though he is the one that set things into motion.

Why wasn't securing surface to air missles considered before cowboy Obama started this little war?

 

[Robert Snow]

I seem to recall the libs/dems being all upset with Bush when looters in Iraq were taking furniture and things like that and our troops did nothing to stop it.

Now we have a case where serious weapons are getting into the hands of who knows - most likely terrorists - and the libs/dems don't seem to think that Obama has any responsibility even though he is the one that set things into motion.

Why wasn't securing surface to air missles considered before cowboy Obama started this little war?

Rush would be proud!:thumbs:

 

[targus]

Rush would be proud!:thumbs:

Were am I wrong?

Care to discuss the merits?

 

[InTheLight]

Rush would be proud!:thumbs:

No, Rush would say (after the fact), "You just know that if this were a Democrat that allowed terrorists to get weapons, there would be scarcely a word said about it."

However, Targus is pre-empting the whole argument. I think it bears watching. I think Targus has a point. Let's see what happens.

 

[targus]

How about if one of those SAMs is used on the anniversary of 9/11 as part of the credible but unconfirmed planned terrorist attack that has been reported in the news lately?

Will the libs/dems say that Obama should have connected the dots?

 

[preachinjesus]

Which administration sold them the missiles?

Since we're not actively engaged in this conflict (left it to other UN/NATO countries) how is this the current Presidents fault?

 

[targus]

Which administration sold them the missiles?

Not the issue in my opinion. They were securely locked up until the war - now they are in the hands of who knows who? It was the military action against Libya that resulted in possible terrorists getting access to them.

Since we're not actively engaged in this conflict (left it to other UN/NATO countries) how is this the current Presidents fault?

Not actively engaged? Who do you think is flying all those U.S. aircraft over Libya? NATO would not even have gotten involved were it not for Obama who started it then handed it off to NATO.

From the very beginning there was speculation that a fair amount of the "rebels" were Al Qaeda, but Obama ignored it.

Should it turn out that the "rebels" were actually Al Qaeda, have the SAMs and then turn them on U.S. citizens then I don't see how Obama's hands are clean.

 

[Robert Snow]

Which administration sold them the missiles?

Since we're not actively engaged in this conflict (left it to other UN/NATO countries) how is this the current Presidents fault?

I believe the only reason Targus posted this was an effort to blame President Obama for something he is not responsible for.

Although there are many legitimate reasons to criticize the President, this is stretching the limit. Thus my comparison of Targus to Rush.

 

[targus]

I believe the only reason Targus posted this was an effort to blame President Obama for something he is not responsible for.

Although there are many legitimate reasons to criticize the President, this is stretching the limit. Thus my comparison of Targus to Rush.

It would be so much more interesting if you occassionally had something to say concerning the topics of discussion rather than your immaterial personal beliefs concerning the personalities/motives/intelligence/etc of those with whom you disagree or don't like.

But hey, that's just my opinion. :laugh:

 

[targus]

No, Rush would say (after the fact), "You just know that if this were a Democrat that allowed terrorists to get weapons, there would be scarcely a word said about it."

However, Targus is pre-empting the whole argument. I think it bears watching. I think Targus has a point. Let's see what happens.

Bush was blamed for missing explosives in Iraq.

Do we now have a different standard for "the one"?

"Whether Saddam Hussein’s forces removed the explosives before U.S. forces arrived April 3, 2003, or whether they fell into the hands of looters and insurgents afterward — because the site was not guarded by U.S. troops — has become a key issue in the campaign."

"...further questions about the chain of events surrounding these explosives, the disappearance of which has been repeatedly cited by the Democratic presidential candidate, Sen. John Kerry, as evidence of the Bush administration’s poor handling of the war in Iraq."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6323933

 

[poncho]

Not the issue in my opinion. They were securely locked up until the war - now they are in the hands of who knows who? It was the military action against Libya that resulted in possible terrorists getting access to them.



Not actively engaged? Who do you think is flying all those U.S. aircraft over Libya? NATO would not even have gotten involved were it not for Obama who started it then handed it off to NATO.

From the very beginning there was speculation that a fair amount of the "rebels" were Al Qaeda, but Obama ignored it.

Should it turn out that the "rebels" were actually Al Qaeda, have the SAMs and then turn them on U.S. citizens then I don't see how Obama's hands are clean.

Actually the U.S. has been using Islamic terrorists as part of it's "foreign policy" for decades. It should come as no surprise that the U.S. is supporting "Al Qaeda" terrorists in Libya. There's plenty of proof including the admissions of the U.S. State Dept. and the terrorists themselves.

What would happen if an airliner was shot down with one of the weapons taken from Libya? Well, what always seems to happen during a "national crisis"? Our politicians would wrap themselves in the flag make long emotional speeches and call for more wars abroad and less freedom at home while the corporate media covers up any complicity or wrong doing on our government's part. Like they always do. (you never want a serious crisis to go to waste)

And the people would rally around that flag and Obama no matter how much his actions were responsible for the death of innocent (Americans) people like we always do. The banks and corporations would make out like the bandits they are and we'd lose even more of our dwindling wealth and freedoms. Like always.

Assuming of course the past can be used to look into the future. What does history tell us about our support for these radical groups like the LIFG?

In each instance, whether it is in Libya, Algeria, Syria, Iran, or Pakistan, immense efforts have been made by these governments to destroy entirely these organizations. In each case, the US purposely arms, trains, and shelters these organizations, with troupes of dissent leaders populating London, Washington, and Langley, Virginia, creating a "rouge's UN" of sorts. Careful observers who check the backgrounds of "experts" brought onto the duplicitous BBC, CNN, or Al Jazeera networks for interviews can see sometimes 2-3 of these exiled extremist leaders at a time being given airtime and dressed up as "freedom fighters." The threat of militant extremism is one the United States government and its allies have been purposefully perpetuating as a pretext for expanding military and economic power into sovereign nation-states disinterested in their Wall Street and London centric "globalization." SOURCE


West Point Terror Center Confirms Al Qaeda in Libya. Then apologizes for them.

The 2007 West Point Combating Terrorism Center (CTC) report [1] examining the demographics of foreign fighters caught in Iraq fighting US troops has been cited by alarmed analysts as proof that the current NATO-backed rebellion in Libya is literally handing an entire nation over to Al Qaeda linked terrorists, namely those of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) listed by both the US State Department and UK Home Office as a foreign terrorist organization.

The report indicated that by far, the eastern region of Libya, in particular the cities of Darnah and Benghazi now serving as the epicenter of the NATO-backed rebellion, provided more fighters per capita to combat US troops in Iraq than any other nation, including Saudi Arabia. In the report, it is noted that most of these Libyan fighters were members of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) who were involved in an increasingly cooperative relationship with Al Qaeda. This relationship culminated in November 3, 2007, when the CTC report claims that LIFG officially joined Al Qaeda. The report than goes on to elaborately depict just how close together LIFG has been working with Al Qaeda, including the mention of LIFG member Abu Yahya, who is noted as second only to Ayman al-Zawahiri within Al Qaeda - al-Zawahiri at the time was Al Qaeda's #2 under "Osama Bin Laden."