Did we do this? DID WE BOMB THAT MOSQUE?

[slybacon9]

I just heard Bush say on the nightly news that the bombing was an act by an evil group intent on causing a civil war.

GIVEN:
We know how he likes to accidentally tell the truth.

GIVEN:
We all knew that civil war was imminent, even before the bombing.

GIVEN:
This administration's penchant for blowing up buildings to build cases for going to war.

GIVEN:
The waning poll numbers for support of the Iraq war.

and GIVEN:
these mofos don't want to leave any time soon because they made 293% profit last year in Halliburton alone....


DID WE, THE US, BOMB THAT MOSQUE???

[TayTay]

1. Answer your own question

Who benefits from this? What is the benefit? What could the US possibly gain from inflaming the Muslim world even more against us?

[meganmonkey]

3. The US could gain exactly what Bushco wants

Justification to bomb Iran.

:(

[slybacon9]

6. exactly.

I'm sorry to be so slow, I was just too busy watching the port thing to really take a look at this.

I saw that photo of the mosque on the front of newspaper today and i said to myself. That is no IED. That's a USED.

[TayTay]

14. I don't buy it. I think this is a consequence of the incompetence

of the whole Bush enterprise in Iraq. We have 134,000 troops there. There was a story about Samarra last week from Knight-Ridder and it said that the US was basically understaffed there and powerless to do anything in the way of really policing Samarra. The US is a paper tiger over there. I think this is the civil war that so many people predicted back in late 2002 and early 2003 come to fruition.

I don't think it has to be a complicated scenario. The incompetence and lack of planning by this Admin led to this situation. They ignored so many things in their mad rush to go to war, including any rational plan for what to do once Baghdad fell that this kind of event was inevitable.

This Admin was incompetent in dealing with everything else including Katrina, Social Security reform, and so much more. I see this as more of the same, the basic inability to govern or plan at all. Everything they have ever done has turned to shit. The entire history of this misbegotten war in Iraq points to something like this happening because we lack the ability or power to prevent it, as so many people foresaw in 2002-03.

I don't think they have the capability or manpower to go to war in Iran. They may want to, but they can't, they don't have the people. nd the consequences would be so catastrophic and so horrible to the entire world that the US itself would become the world's pariah.

[Born Free]

the bush team can not afford to have the muslim world united

Iran was making some progress getting them together, stiring the pot and pointing to two foes of the Muslim world, Israel and USA led by the bush team. Now they are fighter each other and not working together and it hurts them and keeps them in their place. I would not be surprised if the bush team was behind it.

[jwirr]

18. or endless war.

[Cronus Protagonist]

5. Easy, War with Iran and a chance to nuke them too

Not to mention the BILLIONS of dollars that would be available for the taking while the "ragheads" kill each other.

Doesn't take much imagination, really.

Educate a Freeper Today!
Buttons, Stickers and Fridge Magnets made in America for brainy people
http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13

[Canuckistanian]

7. Two words

Everlasting war.

[tatertop]

12. By far Bush/Carlyle will benefit most from eternal war

The US will suffer but it's obvious
Bush doesn't care about that. He will profit.
His buddies will profit. The fundies are licking their chops
and giving Bush more money. Bush likes money.
All the while Bush touts terror as the reason he
continues to tighten his grip on this country.
Virtually unopposed.

As the sheep chant in unison: Iran, al Qaida, Zarqawi, 911,
cartoons... over and over and over again.

[meganmonkey]

2. I honestly wouldn't be surprised

In fact, I'd more surprised if it wasn't the US. Ugh.

We have no respect for anything. :cry:

[applegrove]

4. No. They don't want the war to get so bad that they have to spend

precious star wars money on it. They don't go that far. They just let it happen because of "assumptions" and "other priorities" & "small nuke legacy" and all.

Really - the Shiites and thier purple fingers is all they got right now.

[Flabbergasted]

8. This is exactly what the Arabs are saying as well as the Russians

One thing bothers me. This was a massive explosion. Its totally unlike anything else I've seen in the Middle East and Iraq. Was this a really a car bomb or did I misunderstand?

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. No, not a car bomb

A group dressed as police commandos overpowers guards and sets explosives that bring down the 20-metre wide, 100-year-old gilded dome of the Askariya mosque and shatter the sacred shrine.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20060223.IRAQ23/TPStory/TPInternational/

[mom cat]

11. And it looks like it blew off the top of the dome. Does anyone else think

that is strange?

[malaise]

24. Beyond strange n/t

[CJCRANE]

30. I'd say designed for max. photographic impact

to make top of the TV news headlines and front page of newspapers.

[mom cat]

41. Sort of like the twin towers?

This pattern is so out of character for car bombers. This seems much more like the black opps.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

65. First of all,

It wasn't a car bomb. Second of all, people in Iraq have television and satellite, too. Third, insurgents, terrorists, and other inferior brown-skinned people are just as media-savvy as us highly-evolved westerners.

[genie_weenie]

9. I again post, THE *TRUTH* OF WHO DESTROYED THE SHRINE!

Unrepentant descendants of the Society of Assassins, begun by the Old Man on the Mountain, and their current leader Hasan I Sabah XII, together with a secret clan of Warriors of Tamerlane, were contacted by the Ghost of Deep Throat, who informed them via Ouija Board to blow up the Shrine in order to stop the Return of the Mahdi (who will be portrayed by the bones of Laurence Oliver). The Mahdi, upon receiving instructions from the Skull of the Black Madonna will institute the Creation of the Canals, which metaphorically will combine all mankind...

[dysfunctional press]

13. no.

nt

[slybacon9]

15. K... just checking. Um... i like your screen name.

:)

[TomInTib]

16. That was a mofo of a concussion... when you look at surrounding

damage (outer walls, etc.) there is no way it was plastique (which requires a shaped charge).

Something this powerful would have had to be wheeled in or dropped from an airplane.

The concussive wave was stronger and larger thatn a 500lb HE bomb.

My bet is that it came from the air.

[slybacon9]

17. THAT is what i thought!!!

oioioi

maybe if we start an investigation now it can be done by early next never.

[TomInTib]

19. OK, just think about it...

Look at the before and after pics.

The entire dome is GONE- not damaged, heavily damaged, mostly demolished- GONE.

The walls of that mosque are 4 or 5 feet thick and some of the outer (surrounding- think of them as a fence) walls are flattened. There are also fierce breeches in the mosque walls themselves.It would take a big one ( I am guessing 1500-2500lbs HE) to create a shock wave of that strength. This was not a "soft" wave, but very violent and non-shaped. 360 degree damage.

I would love to see some aerial shots.

Have you seen any interior pics that showed a crater? I haven't. A charged of this strength detonated from the lower interior of the mosque wold have created a huge crater.

I believe it was an impact bomb that exploded immediately after striking the skin of the dome.
Probably penetrated 15-20 feet before detonation.

[Maru Kitteh]

33. Nobody said they laid it on the floor did they?

Sheesh. I cease to be amazed at the number of people here willing to just straight toward the most wild-eyed breathless speculation on the table.

It's also unbelievable to me the number of people here who seem to claim that Iraqi's are not capable of inflicting this kind of damage on a structure. This is very condescending, like they're all too ignorant to form their own sophisticated, organized attacks and therefore it must have been us, the great white satan. Bullshit. Saddam spent decades crushing sectarian conflicts and uprisings with a brutal hand. Now the genie is out and it's all bubbled back to the surface. Predictable and predicted.

This belongs on the same heap and in the very same category as the "Clinton body count".

[Junkdrawer]

20. Prelude to an attack on Iran?

Not saying that they did it, but if an attack on Iran were imminent would BushCo want the Iraqi Shi'a "available" for alliance with the Iranian Shi'a or locked in a civil war?

[slybacon9]

23. 293% profit for halliburton, and god knows how much for the other

contractors...

Plus, with a civil war and/or a war with Iran, there is what they would call "more reason to stay and fight for freedom".

Oh yeah, and dare i say, more justification for a DRAFT.

soooo....

I'd say yes, they would like it very much if Iran just happened to join in.

[ProfessorGAC]

56. Um! Actually There Is No SuchThing As A 293% Profit

The truth is that Haliburton's profits WENT UP 293% from the prior year, but one can't make more in profit than it takes in as revenue.
The Professor

[Emit]

21. I think it's fair to say

we should think outside the box.

Most people who are not considering that this was something desired by this administration perhaps are thinking too logically. Given what I have read, for instance, about the P2/Gladio/Strategy of Tension in the 70s and 80s -- efforts that included many different agents (CIA, etc.) and which allegedly involved persons such as Michael Ledeen-- my mind remains open to all possibilities.

[wildwww2]

22. If we hadn`t invaded Iraq for the vanity of Bu$hGOPco. that mosque

would not have been bombed. I have no doubt about that. Everytime Bu$h scratches his empty head or his arrogant ass. Another dozen people die because he had to start this war crime for the fear factor that floats his hideous bloody boat. We the people of the United States will continue to become more and more despised throughout the world. Until we get Bu$h and his gang of murderers behind bars. Where they belong. It does not matter if we bombed that mosque or not. Our invading Iraq in the first place caused this to happen. It`s called a chain reaction. Anyone with a little bit of insight could see this coming ever since the moron in chief sent our troops into this unwinnable blood bath.
Peace
Wildman
Al Gore is My President

[fujiyama]

25. Maybe

But I seriously doubt it.

I have yet to see a logical or coherent explanation for how this benefits the admin, Israel, or the US, let alone actual EVIDENCE supporting this "theory".

[radwriter0555]

26. Mossad. Even the iraqis are saying it's the mossad.

I have no reason to beleive that the Iraqis would bomb themselves. It makes no sense.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

28. Of course, it HAD to be Mossad.

Because everything is an Israeli plot. Clever.

[rman]

32. Yeah, the CIA never does that kind of thing.

Nor does MI6.
Though one does not exclude the other.

[sendero]

34. How does Israel benefit?

I just don't see how Israel would benefit from an all-out civil war in Iraq. 'Splain it to me.

[radwriter0555]

48. Israel has long recruited US interests in destabilizing the middle east,

and its interest in taking over states like Iran, Syria and Iraq are no secret, for decades now. That coupled with their hate for muslims is again, no secret and a clear motive for destabilization.

If israel assures civil unrest in Iraq as it did in the Palestine and Israeli conflict, eventually they may well be able to make inroads into an ultimate takeover of Iraq. Iraq is THE most important piece of real estate in the middle east -- perhaps in the world -- globally and economically.

I have never truly understood the motivations of israel, I just don't comprehend that line of thinking, I don't understand how evil people really think. I simply see what I see and try to put the pieces together. I don't believe the iraqis are killing each other, I just don't.

I do believe that the israeli mossad has a major motive for increased instability in iraq, I'm just not sure what their precise aim and goal is; I'll have to watch and see and put the puzzle pieces together as it plays out. It may be as simple as being a slippery entity capable of blending in easily to perpetrate the events that stir the hatred towards each other in order to assure the long presence of the US in iraq... it could indeed be that simple...

[Justice Is Comin]

27. This country lives for war.

The Sunni lost all the power they had, they were cut out of the government and it was destined to reach the boiling point. It did and the greatest way to damage the Shia was the sacred Mosque.

It's descended into exactly what we knew was coming.

[DoYouEverWonder]

29. Bush is in trouble

He needed a distraction. Plus, the PNAC plan is still on track because they, more then anyone else, want civil war in Iraq and to destabilize the rest of the region.

[Disturbed]

31. Another theory

The Neo Fascist Regime of America gains by a Civil War. Hoping the Sunni will be crushed because they are the impediment to US/UK domination of Iraq and oil flow. The Shi'ites and Kurds will play the US/UK game. The US will draw down it's troop force and hunker down on the permanent bases and ride out the CW if it gets full blown. The Neo Fascist Bush Regime will never entirely leave Iraq.

[npincus]

35. I believe it was Iran

engineered to blame the US and Israel. They know we are stuck there... a civil war will certainly pull us in deeper, further draining our resources and igniting more hatred of the US in the Middle East. Then, a weakened US is not in a position to prtoect Israel, which Iran wants to attack.

The Iran-backed Shi-ite majority would have control of Iraq after the collapse of the new government.

I think it's ridiculous to think the US was behind this- really ridiculous. Civil war is a horrible, horrible scenario for the US. We can't avoid geting sucked into their civil war unless we leave, and I do not believe our leaders will leave under these circumstances.

[DoYouEverWonder]

38. Who has the most to gain from a civil war in Iraq?

Certainly not the Iranians, because they know that it will not be contained to just Iraq.

This civil war is part of the PNAC plan for the region. They're just trying to kick it up a notch, for a number of reasons.

[Swede]

58. Iran has the most to gain from a civil war.

They will incorporate Shi-ite poplulation and territory. It is gonna be a mess.

[Taxloss]

36. No. n/t

[npincus]

37. folks are getting a bit wacky on this one

why the hell would the US ever, ever do that? It is an AWFUL scenario for us.

[DoYouEverWonder]

39. You assume that Bush & Co

give a shit for Iraq or for us for that matter?

The dark powers at work here want this war and are doing their best to make it happen. Sooner, rather then later at this point.

[Taxloss]

40. Exactly. I can't think of one shade of an iota of benefit the US could get

from doing this.

Denmark, however ... :evilgrin:

[CJCRANE]

42. Ok, name one thing

* has done that has directly benefitted ordinary Americans?

[Taxloss]

43. That's completely circular reasoning.

Bush hasn't done anything to benefit ordinary Americans, so anything that doesn't benefit them is done by Bush? That makes no sense.

[CJCRANE]

45. Not exactly -

just pointing out that Bush is not motivated by trying to benefit America.

[Taxloss]

46. But I can't see how this benefits anyone other than sectarian splinters in

Iraq itself. At this rate Bush is going to be left with an Iraqi civil war (no oil, not popular at home), or an unsympathetic Shi'a-dominated autocratic government and a succession of further bushfire conflicts in the west and north (even less oil, even less popular), or the second scenario with added Iranian chunkiness (even less oil, disaster whichever way it's sliced).

[muriel_volestrangler]

44. Yeah, the pieces of the dome looked like Lego

:spank:

[bpilgrim]

54. i can think of 2...

1. Divide & Conqure (old empire maxim, better they fight among each other then united against us)
2. Chaos - our ONLY excuse for remaining there any longer is the need for SECURITY.

peace

[Taxloss]

57. But civil war and chaos will mean many more US casualties.

The war is already unpopular at home, ramping up the casualties won't help. And corporate America profits from a modicum of stability in Iraq - it needs the oil to keep flowing. Civil war simply increases the chance of the USA cutting & running as the effort bacomes unsustainable. The USA cannot afford this war in terms of either blood or treasure.

If you saw the war as a method of transferring public money into the hands of a cabal of contractors, then it makes some sense in the very short term to create chaos. But the long-term consequences for those contractors are horrific.

Also, if your logic was carried through, it would benefit Bush to exaggerate the level of chaos and violence in Iraq rather than play it down - "See? We have to stay." Instead, the admin plays it down, which because it is a lie, hurts them all the time in the press and in the polls.

[bpilgrim]

60. do you really think the neoCONs care about casualties?

only in as much as it furthers their agenda.

as i noted above... their ONLY talking point for staying in the region is to provide security.

peace

[Taxloss]

61. But if the US is seen to be failing to provide security,

isn't that case undermined? If they demonstrably can't do what they claim to do, what then? They can't increase involvement, and the existing force is overstretched. Unless you think a draft is still on the table, and with Bush's ratings at under 40%, I doubt it.

[genie_weenie]

47. I See no ONE has the gumption to debate post #9!

Since, no one will debate my theory it must be true. :sarcasm:

[Taxloss]

51. Your powers of logic are unstoppable, genie.

No one dare counter them.

[genie_weenie]

53. HA HA Mission Accomplished

Democracy Underground on the March!

:yourock:

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

64. Dude,

I think the abject psychosis of your theory actually frightened the conspiracy nuts.

[anarch]

49. in a manner of speaking

Seeing as the illegal invasion destabilized and generally fucked up the country to the point where civil war is all but inevitable, the U.S. might as well have done it.

This is all just so fucking sad, watching things unfold exactly as sensible people have warned they might from the beginning of this evil business.

[insane_cratic_gal]

50. You see, we fight them over there so we don't have to fight

them here, but then we start looking like assholes..and we have a whole other country to bomb..(Iran) we just get them to fight each other.

Quickens the process eliminating the enemy if they are kill one another.

the Neocons aren't winning the PR campaign for Iraq... use civil war and you have free rule to do whatever you want and no one notices.

Anyone want to bet we'll start seeing problems breaking out in Iran too?

[spinbaby]

52. I suspect not

I don't see anything the Bush gang could possibly gain from this bombing that would be worth risking its many unpredictable repercussions. I must admit, though, that it was an exceptionally professional-looking job that does remind one of the CIA.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

63. The Iraqi army had plenty of professionals.

They weren't all unwilling conscripts.

[Beelzebud]

55. We destroyed the entire nation of Iraq, when we invaded them

FOR NOTHING

We are the largest group of criminal fucks on the face of the planet earth.

We are the new Nazis.

[Bridget Burke]

59. Ultimately, we are responsible.

Without our illegal invasion & the mishandled occupation of Iraq, the country would not be in such violent shambles.

To a certain extent, unrest in Iraq is to the advantage Bush & cronies. It excuses an ongoing military presence, until Iraqis live in peace. Or until the oil is gone.

But it looks as though the violence may have gotten out of hand. The Bush folks are known as schemers, but their incompetence is also notorious.

[yodermon]

62. Not us,

these guys: