Zubzub, i just read in one go all the postings on this subject and something strikes me. You consistently complain, rightly or wrongly about the level of postings by particular people and then set about refuting them, but rarely attempt to tackle the more competent postings of which there are a few. I don't have much to add to the argumant as I cannot claim to know the facts from pure specultaion based on my imagined, innacurate view of sudan as you do. If you yearn for a more accomplished opponent in your sparring then answer more fully the guy from sudan or jc something, (i have forgotten his name). also, breifly, blaming the current state of sudan exculssivley on the sholders of the current government displays ignorance of history. as with many of the problems with africa, its history can be traced back to the colonial period. i hope i have not walked into an empty room and that you have already left.

I am a 16 year old student from Canada and stumbled upon this page while researching a law paper and to me it seems that in everyone's eagerness to have their opinion heard they forget why they are so passionate about the subject in the first place. Thousands of people died. Innocent people, guilty people, but none-the-less people, fellow humans, our kin. We are so busy assigning blame and accusing each other of stupidity that you have let opinions and facts become so muddled and contorted that i cant make sense of anything. It has come to the point where so much information exists that the person communicating merely has to choose those pieces which serve their needs best. The only analogy that comes to mind in this case is two young children arguing over who started it, untill their stories are so twisted, the disciplinarian has to forget the possiblity of taking sides, make the two kids shake hands, say their sorrys, and warn them to try and handle themselves more maturely the next time a difference in opinion arises. I think, in this case, what we really need, is a smart mom.

you shouldnt bother making fun of my opinion or telling me how very wrong i am because im not coming back to check, but if it makes you feel better about yourself, by all means.

well, i said i wouldn't, but i am..  i just wanted to make one more comment to you cyrano..  those corporations that the u.s. (in your mind) represent are vital to not just u.s. economy but global economy..  if you're so adament about the poor and the not-so-well-off, then you wouldn't hate corporations..  also, chomsky is a living, breathing testament to profiting from those corporations and the market..  he's a millionaire and a hypocrit to call himself a liberal..  he adapts these ideals but doesn't live by them..  frankly, it makes me cringe to know that people listen to him and hold him in such high regards..  these are the people that chomsky is fooling, and lying to..  chomsky and others like him are the ones that really and truly do not care about you or anyone like you..  it's sad..  by the way, i'm on the far end of the financial stick..  if you are on the side of the poor..  help me out..  please..  just like chomsky, i'm sure you wouldn't even begin to think about helping someone like me..  in my opinion, chomsky is all talk and no action..  this can be said about so many on the left..  glad i switched to the right side before i bought into liberal ideas..  otherwise, i'd be worse off than i already am..  if i lived by liberal ideals, i would have nothing and nothing to offer my children..  thankfully, God has blessed me with everything except money..  so my life is full and it's not found wanting with material things and such..  (and this is supposed to be a liberal way of life!)  simplicity..  life not tarnished by money and greed..  unfortunately, chomsky is a multi-millionaire that is a spokesman for these ideas..  the stock market and the corporations that he hates have been very good to him..  so please don't confuse the u.s. with chomsky.. 

you said that the U.S. soldiers and the administration just don't care how many people die and/or are killed..  are you generalizing that to say they don't care about any person from any country..??  do you believe that the administration doesn't care about it's citizens dying..??  the word is inadvertently..  i personally know many arabs and others of Islamic faith..  here at home in the united states..  many of them are warm and kind and have big hearts that mourn any loss of life, no matter what side it's on or what side it came from..  but i was there..  i remember..  i remember watching arab tv after 9/11..  i remember thousands of muslims dancing in the streets, celebrating..  key word here..  celebrating the loss of life on that day..  even if i saw someone dying or being murdered as a much needed or long awaited injustice being righted, i would never rejoice at the very fact that this someone is now dead..  it's atrociously hard for me to even try to imagine being so hateful that human's dying would make me impulsively dance around and priase God that He took those lives..  here's a serious question for you..  if bush died, or was killed, would it make you happy..??  would you smile, dance, sing, rejoice..??  from your posts it would not be far fetched to think so..  so what does that say about you, as a person, as a human being..??  hmm..  one could wonder..  i'm not looking to get into all of the issues on this thread..  i simply have a problem with you..  it seems that all of your posts are "right on"'s and "you tell 'em"'s..  you simply don't have the ability to conjure up words to debate issues..  so you let others do it for you..  and i've been wondering for quite a while, what bush has to do with this thread..??  is your hatred so overbearing that during a discussion about a bombing that took place during the clinton administration, you see fit to name-call, and bash president bush..??  i am so confused..  i have never been confused about where i stand and what i believe in..  and i have never limited my thinking so much that opinions can't change..  but i am so confused by people like you..  i don't understand where all the hate comes from..  well, i can certainly understand anger, disappointment, and so on..  i've been angry so many times in my life, at politics, politicians, policies, and hypocrisies..  but i have never resorted to bashing to make myself feel better..  and i have never thought for one sencond that everyone on the left is unintelligent or just too ignorant to see truth and light..  you obviously have a different opinion, which you are rightfully entitled to..  it just pains me to see someone like you bashing your way through threads just to make yourself feel bigger, better, more important, or (dare i say it) intelligent..  i'm hoping that it makes you feel good when you hate, because it certainly doesn't promote your intelligence..  i don't usually tread on threads..  i see them as a waste of energy..  i read them and move on..  and i have never, not once, ever seen a thread between opposites sway anyone in the other direction of their initial positions..  maybe yes, it has changed someone's mind about a certain fact or lack of..  but it's rare to find a thread that is soaked in joyous conversion..  zubub is right on almost every point he/she made..  zubub is intelligent, well-worded, calm, and eloquent..  you are simply a hater with nothing more to say or do than hate..  hatred seems to seethe inside of your irrationality..  nothing you have said has made any sense at all..  nothing you say is debatable in the least..  it is simply opinion ridden and hate promoting..  but i can say atleast you don't swear all over the place..  that's a good sign and an overwhelmingly welcomed (by me) position to take..  i'm just asking for a little bit of debating and less bashing..  don't be so quick to love hating and promoting it..  you are damning your own position by hating so much..  hopefully, you will take this anonymous criticism to heart and pop open a book every now and then..  you never know what you might find when you let go of hatred.. 

sincerely, princess pink..  God bless..

p.s.  you don't need to respond, i will stay anonymous and will not interfere anymore than i have.. 

thank you for the facts, hopefully, no one (no dick cheney) would be able to steal sudan's oil using back doors. note its very much an accomplisment that sudanese can extract oil while currently at war with guerillas sponsored by the US.. all this barbarism, really I think its time for a regime change in the US..

I know this is an old message. But I want to tell some facts about Sudan as it is clear that there is tolittle knowledge there. I am Sudanese by the way, and it doesn't help that the vast majority of Sudanese have no internet access to help in correcting wrong concepts out there. "But also, feel free to use the brain that God or nature provided you. Do you think it is likely that in a country the size of Sudan, population 40 million, of course not wealthy, but with a trade surplus, including from export of crude oil, and with a robust pharmaceutical industry (tenth among its industrial sectors), that the bombing of a single pharmaceutical plant could result in "half" ..." As of 1998, the year of the shifa bombing, Sudan did not produce oil at all. First "experimental" production was in 1999, and actual exporting in 2000. There was no trade surplus at the time, in fact there was a huge deficit. Actually currently the budget is still in deficit. Sudan is mainly an agricultural country with agriculture accounting for 40% of the economy, but 80% of all Sudan workforce. Only 20% of Sudan's economy is coming from industry. Almost all industry is very recent and is dependent on oil. By the way all of these information can be checked on the CIA factbook, which is probably a credible source to you. Especially as it looks that you found that number, the tenth industry from it. To give you more information about the actual status in Sudan, there is no industry. As in the list 'oil, cotton ginning, textiles, cement, edible oils, sugar, soap distilling, shoes, petroleum refining, pharmaceuticals, armaments, automobile/light truck assembly' Sudan actually has 4 sugar factories, 2 cement factories, 3 pharmaceutical factories (were two at the time of the bombing, Shifa being one of them). Textiles, oils and soap distilling are traditional small factories, and are not sufficient for Sudan's needs, certainly no exporting. There is one automobile assembly which is relatively recent. That is what Sudan calls industry, and the 20% is probably mostly oil. Currently, oil exporting and oil related services and industries account for about 70% of Sudan's revenues. And this was not there at the time of the bombing. As for al-Shifa factory, it did manufacture about 60% of Sudan's needs for malaria drugs, and suppiled other drugs with ratios around 30-70% of others as there is only one other factory at the time. "GDP close to $100 billion" The nearest number I got to this is the GDP (PPP) estimate on world factbook estimate 2005, it was around $86 billion. Now, let's check the world factbook 1999, we find that the GDP (PPP) is estimated for the previous year 1998 at $31.2 billion. That should give you a clue about the oil influence, which came after the US bombing. As you bring the point that Sudan population is 40 million, let's see how does their wealth per person does. In comparison of countries by GDP per capita, Sudan currently ranks 131 in the world. That is now, after this huge oil 'improvement'. Still sure you are using "the brain that God or nature provided you" wisely? I could comment on the details of the discussion, but I think this expnanation of facts is a good enough participation.

I dont think you can fairly compare America to terrorist's. Actually, i beg to differ, America sponsor terrorism for a number of year, in lots of way America with its ability to launch wars and provide weapons cause more death than terrorism. There have been incidents when we have inevertly killed civilians. The main difference is that for us evry dead civilain is a tragedy and for them it is simply a victory and a cause for celebration. For the normal folk tah has been suffering, our civilians dying may be a celebration, we can describe civilians death as tragedy.. For US soldiers and the US administration, its different these people just don't care how many dies, who dies and how many casualities, only a certain obscure agenda is considered. Even when our military targets sights that they know would have civilain casulitys that is not normally our main target. In the handfull of occurnces that this is not true it is the exeption not the norm, and our goverment has recognized these as tragedys rather then rejoicing over them. Your government does not care..it cares to bring profit to the corporation it represent.

 

Bush is a no good for nothing

I dont think you can fairly compare America to terrorist's. There have been incidents when we have inevertly killed civilians. The main difference is that for us evry dead civilain is a tragedy and for them it is simply a victory and a cause for celebration. Even when our military targets sights that they know would have civilain casulitys that is not normally our main target. In the handfull of occurnces that this is not true it is the exeption not the norm, and our goverment has recognized these as tragedys rather then rejoicing over them

laughs, may be you should try to make him do a paragragh of 6 lines.. ( if you dare..) Heil your TVs..

Terrorism has now become the most misused word in the dictionary. It all depends upon who is using the word terrorist. Terrorist has now become synonomys with the word enemy.

The Temple of Love - The World Peace Religion, Environmental Organization, Save the World Organization

http://www.thetempleoflove.com/

 

 

 

 Is anyone else fascinated by Chomsky's style here, in which he uses five paragraphs of four or five lines each? It's very neat.

 

 'Chomsky's point is absolutely clear: that the bombing of the al-Shifa pharmaceutical company was an appalling terrorist act. If you don't understand that that is the point, you really don't understand anything.'

 In Chomsky's final paragraph, he indicates that his 'exercise' is semantic, not ethical. That is, he doesn't ethically condemn the al-Shifa bombings as 'appalling terrorist acts.' On the contrary, he wants us to consider whether this language is useful at all.   

 

 ...than angst that professes to be pity?

To get back to Chomsky’s original allegations, “Suppose that Al Qaeda destroyed half the pharmaceutical supplies in some country where people matter”, it’s nice to see that the left’s foremost “intellectual” isn’t above using ad-hominen.  The West couldn’t possibly have bombed al-Shifa because it was being used to manufacture chemical weapons, not at least, when that universal leftist explicator, racism, can be invoked instead. Can I ask, “where people matter” to whom? Did American lives matter to the Palestinians who danced in the streets after 9/11? The standard Muslim response to Muslim atrocities like those committed in Beslan, Madrid, London and New York is to bleat about the imminent danger posed to Muslims by a white backlash. Any expression of remorse comes as a distant afterthought.
 
Of course, the foremost Islamic terrorist of modern times couldn’t possibly have been in Sudan to foment and further the ends of Islamic terrorism. Bin Laden must, surely, have been lavishing millions of dollars on Sudan for purely philanthropic reasons. Excuse me while I roll on the floor laughing. Even if the al-Shifa factory did prove to be nothing more obnoxious than an Eastern European Soros abortion factory, the Americans would have to conduct a similar bombing every day for a decade to inflict a similar level of attrition upon the people of Sudan than has been inflicted by the people of Sudan themselves. So if Mr. Chomsky is right in claiming that the finger of blame should be pointed primarily at the most guilty, shouldn’t we be pointing it at the clitoral circumcising, genocide merchants of Sudan? If this is the best that the cream of the academic intelligentsia can do, I pity you guys

Ron Silliman's Libel

It is only too sad isn't it?  No one is right, everyone is right....somewhere in all of this there must be an incredibly huge message.

 

 

http://carmenisacat.blogspot.com/

There are several issues to deal with here, and I unfortunately don't have the time to contend with them all, but some things should be straightened out. Chomsky is being taken issue with for several reasons that are loosely correlated into a supposed lack of intellectual rigor; factual inaccuracy and "Anti-American" bias being two prime constituents of this argument. The validity of the "percentage" claim is taken from such unreliable rags as The Boston Globe, and the Observer among others.

A year after the attack, "without the lifesaving medicine [the destroyed facilities] produced, Sudan's death toll from the bombing has continued, quietly, to rise... Thus, tens of thousands of people -- many of them children -- have suffered and died from malaria, tuberculosis, and other treatable diseases... [The factory] provided affordable medicine for humans and all the locally available veterinary medicine in Sudan. It produced 90 percent of Sudan's major pharmaceutical products... Sanctions against Sudan make it impossible to import adequate amounts of medicines required to cover the serious gap left by the plant's destruction.... [T]he action taken by Washington on Aug. 20, 1998, continues to deprive the people of Sudan of needed medicine. Millions must wonder how the International Court of Justice in The Hague will celebrate this anniversary" (Jonathan Belke, Boston Globe, Aug. 22, 1999).

 

"[T]he loss of this factory is a tragedy for the rural communities who need these medicines" (Tom Carnaffin, technical manager with "intimate knowledge" of the destroyed plant, Ed Vulliamy et al., London  Observer, 23 Aug. 1998).

 

The plant "provided 50 percent of Sudan's medicines, and its destruction has left the country with no supplies of choloroquine, the standard treatment for malaria," but months later, the British Labour government refused requests "to resupply chloroquine in emergency relief until such time as the Sudanese can rebuild their pharmaceutical production" (Patrick Wintour, Observer, 20 Dec. 1998).

 You can also read this article by David Hole in the European-Sudanese Public Affairs Council.

"The factory’s lawyer, and Sudan’s most prominent anti-government activist, Ghazi Suleiman, said that the factory produced 60 percent of Sudan’s pharmaceutical drugs, including antibiotics, malaria tablets and syrups, as well as drugs for diabetes, ulcers, tuberculosis, rheumatism and hypertension."

 "Mr Bekheit Abdallah Yagoub, the deputy commissioner of the Sudanese Humanitarian Aid Commission, said the factory supplied 70 percent of the drug needs of southern, eastern and western Sudan, areas wracked by famine and disease." [from abouve article, section 3.7]

Surely you don't need more to convince you that the claim is at least valid (these being in addition to the Wikipedia sources already listed). Do you have any evidence stating that "Nor did the attack destroy "half" the pharmaceutical products of Sudan" or are you going to give us more rock-solid arguments like "The half-supply example is ludicrous because the U.S. didn't destroy half the pharmaceutical supply of Sudan". You have a time-honored tactic of just writing off evidence that you disagree with for being "anti-American" (such as you did with Werner Daum), so I have no doubt that the above citations will also become intellectually verboten in your view. I'm well aware that you left your interpretation of the event up for argument, but, really, stumbling upon these sources while researching the event in question (a crucial step in any worthwhile argument, needless to say) was pretty hard to avoid. How is someone supposed to even entertain an argument with a person like you when you discredit their evidence on the basis of being "anti-American" (Stalin would understand I'm sure). You also left out the findings by Human Rights Watch, which stated that several relief efforts were "postponed indefinitely" due to the bombing, "including a crucial one run by the U.S.-based International Rescue Committee in the government garrison town of Wau in southern Sudan, where more than fifty southerners are dying daily" (source). Finally, you made denunciations of the potential human cost based on the premise that "not a single aid agency reported" the potential deaths due to drug shortages; but this is no way confirms such a premise. It is not the responsibility of the aid agencies to research the effects of U.S. military actions, as there are countless factors that must be computed before such a crisis would be obvious in isolation to any independent aid agency. We don't have detailed evidence of exactly what drugs were utilized in Sudan, and from where said drugs were manufactured, but this isn't the point of Chomsky's assertion anyways. We must assume that in a land where life saving medicine is in short supply, the bombing of the prominent medicine factory will only spread limited quantities even thinner - thus resulting in a loss of life. This is the core of Chomsky's argument, if you care to refute it with anything besides things you copied and pasted from Wikipedia. You also fail to give any evidence countering Daum's claim that "It took more than three months for these products to be replaced with imports"[source]. Unless you can respond with something tangible , elementary logic would tell you that the human death toll must have been high in a land so stricken by malaria (even if it were only two months or two weeks). But oh well, an anti-American fellow at Harvard that happened to be an ambassador to the nation in question at the time can't possibly have any insight into the subject beyond that of Keith Windschuttle, eh? I suspect that you're getting most of your "insight" from the Windschuttle's article "The hypocrisy of Noam Chomsky", which is a long unsubstantiated tirade. Windschuttle (and zubub, I can assume, since your arguments mirror this rubbish verbatim in some parts) admit the existence of Human Rights Watch (meaning he surely knew about the "indefinitely postponed" programs) but mysteriously doesn't mention them. He even goes as far as saying that " The idea that tens of thousands of Sudanese would have died within three months from a shortage of pharmaceuticals is implausible enough in itself", which is simply ludicrous. Consider the 2000 estimate, which had roughly 10,290 people dying of malaria and tuberculosis alone in an average three month period. The source is derived from a crude index, with 85,888 average deaths overall in the same three months - and this was after the U.S. had changed its sanction policies to allow the sale of U.S. pharmaceuticals in Sudan. Considering these are only estimates of two known ailments, and that the Al Shifa plant supplied more than just Sudan with life saving medication - the effect of the bombing was surely dire for the poor. Regardless, neither Chomsky nor Daum said these figures were anything close to exact. There was, in fact, no in-depth investigation of the of the bombing due to the U.S. blocking any UN inquiry, so the exact consequences are pure speculation from those with advanced knowledge on the subject. Try and find other sources that give a reasonable, alternative estimate of the cost in human terms of the attack, and get back with us with your results.

 The next problem, namely Chomsky's anti-American bias, is simply a straw-man argument. Not only does it have nothing to do with the issues in question, it devalues legitimate debate into the shouting punditry we are supposed to accept as rational discussion on television. Again, I don't think you really grasp the discussion well enough to comment past the first anti-Chomsky article you could Google. Any of your counter-arguments to Chomsky's parallels require us to adopt as a basic belief that murder with the intention to immediately kill few (but will knowingly endanger many) is better than just killing many outright. We would then be led to believe that such an act is less of a crime, because the intentions were more sincere. It is exactly this kind of rationale that Chomsky is criticizing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

About "the bulk of the burden of policing the world":

It has been sugested that it's better that the US has this role than the UN. The argument for this seems to be that this is more democratic (?), since the UN includes dictatorships. But is it? Who voted for Bush and Clinton? I didn't. A majority of people of the world didn't. Not even a majority of the people of the US did (if you count the people that did not use their right to vote).

Of course, you failed to explain what level or comparative standard you will apply to republicans and the people whom vote for them..

Zubub, don't let yourself be too deconcentrated by a few well placed personal attacks..take example on mr Chomsky whom amid all the labels, attended faithfully his interviews and still wrote over 72 dissenting books.. hey agree i am illiterate, I come here to learn.. so educate me..

Thanks Zubub ffor your admiration of my level of illeteracy as describing myself as being beyond competition.. Actually you are wrong on the competition level, you make a number of attacks on Mr Chomsky that are unfunded and you dont seem to be embarrassed by it at all in fact your attacks are routine.. Zubub, now you are accusing me of doing the same thing to you which you are doing Mr. Chomsky non mon bon monsieur Zubub, j'en ai aucunement honte de vous faire la même chose! I do however have ONE apology to make, I shouldnt had called you a republican..

Actually, Cyrano, of all the people on all the threads of this entire website, and that includes many people of less than sparkling intelligence, there is no one but no one who lowers the level of debate more than you. And that's quite an achievement given the competition. You seem utterly incapable of following an argument of any subtlety or complexity. It seems as if you never even read the postings that you attack. You never once pause to think, about anything. You have a comment about everything while evincing knowledge of nothing. A new blog is out, there are five instant postings from "Cyrano", each more confused than the previous. That you have no embarrassment is your problem, but that you consistently lower the level of debate is everyone's. You accuse me of "apologising for infanticide" because "Its ok, Clinton did this for his country". Could you care to quote from a single one of my postings where I said anything like this? I could just as well accuse you of being a Nazi war criminal - the standards used would be at least as good as yours. In fact, if you'd like to accuse me of something, why not "infanticide-denier", since I deny outright that an infanticide took place? That is my position. If you think it's so obvious that infanticide took place that it's not even worth debating, then I wish you lots of luck in your cozy little web of belief. But if you happen to think there is good evidence to refute my scepticism, why are you incapable of citing it? What interest do you think you serve with your insults ("fascist", "apologist for infanticides", etc.)? Don't you realise that only someone as illiterate as yourself could possibly be influenced by such postings, and that you are beyond competition?

sounds pretty spot on pangaea, it does appear the us goverment keep rehashing the same model under slighly diferent names, unfortunately yielding similar results for the populations that it is thrust upon.

Aside from choosing which is the right side, present U.S. administration has to realize they themselves make many other terror exercises. They're not qualified to discuss terms like "justice," "terror" etc. by their own mouth.

So your conclusion is basically: "If they commit crimes against us, it's terrorism. If we commit crimes against them, it's collateral damage". The greatest form of (state-)terrorism is to attack another country. The US has done this on countless occations. They have been involved in terrorist actions pretty much all over the world for decades. There's also ample evidence they've been involved in mosque shellings and bombs. If/when muslims do this it is instantly branded "terrorism", but if the US does it, it is not. Double-standards. "One thing is morally beyond question, however: we are all indebted to the Israeli government for having destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osiraq in 1981." That is simply not true. Iraq was not building nuclear war-heads or the like. Inspections of the bombed out factory (by Scott Ritter?) proved that they only had equipment for building nuclear power-stations. This is yet another attack that would instantly be branded as "terrorism" if commited against Western states. "Terrorism" is the new "communism" argument. Brand anything or anybody as "terrorists", and you can do whatever you like with them. This doesn't only happen in the Middle-East, it also goes down in Indonesia and the Phillipines for instance. Most aren't even terrorists. In Iraq the great majority are part of the legimate resistance movement against the occupation. In the Phillipines most of the killings are of activists, union leaders, and even priests. Even elected officials are being branded as terrorists, and are in danger of being assasinated. Military "aid" from the US has increased. You referred to the US as the main provider of aid. A large portion of their aid is military "aid", meaning for instance that Israel gets $2bn, which they then have to use to buy American weapons for. The same goes on in Asia. This isn't aid, it's propping up the military, often in dictatorial regimes. This went on in the last "war on terror". The process is pretty much the same. Today's "good guys" will become tomorrow's terrorists once the US turns their back on them, as they have a really bad habit of doing. They're just pawn in a global chess game where the goal is US global dominance as laid out in the PNAC papers and the NSS of 2002.

In the hands of the republican regime, the US polish its status of rogue state, nice post itsilihin..

didn't say the U.S. was right not to replenish Sudan's pharmaceutical stock. I just say that it was not "state terrorism" comparable to Al-Qa'ida, a comparison which is a moral travesty. Almost everything about the Clinton administration's relation to Sudan was criminally negligent, irresponsible, and stupid, and that includes failure to accept repeated offers from the Sudanese to give them access to files on Al-Qa'ida and even to question al-Qa'ida operatives linked to the bombing of the U.S. embassies in Africa. Zubub , zubub the bombing falls into the definition of state terrorism becaue the population is taken in hostage..Your post of the Clinton admin is apologitical. BTW Al-Qaida does not fall into state terrorist organization, Al-Qaida is not a country..

This is how rational the analysis nowadays is: politicization of intelligence

 

 

the republican regime= tyranny upon other nations.

I seen a few..." Oh really? What regime? And I doubt you know what a regime is. And where do you get 95% as your figure? Out of your empty head? The republican regime. Actually you are right that figure come from my head.. The US is nearly accountable for all the terrorism around the world.. with few exception..

"While much of the wrold is still run by vicious dictatorships, unfortunately it is we who must assume the bulk of burden of policing the world, while trying to foster the spread of democracy until we can reach that dream."

 

The problem is that while the US is trying to 'police' the world it is NOT trying to foster the spread of democracy! That's why the US is seen, at least in the Middle East, the mother of all evil, not because 'they hate our freedom' like George W. Jr. put it.

Because the US has supported and continues to suppport quite many of the vicious dictatorships and provides money and weapons for some of the worst regimes of the world (Egypt and Columbia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait for example) almost no one else in the world accepts the US assuming the bulk of burden of policing the world.

And if you take a look at the opinions of the US citizens, the majority of them seems to agree with the rest of the world! This world doesn't want or need that kind of policing!!!

Bwong, I didn't say the U.S. was right not to replenish Sudan's pharmaceutical stock. I just say that it was not "state terrorism" comparable to Al-Qa'ida, a comparison which is a moral travesty. Almost everything about the Clinton administration's relation to Sudan was criminally negligent, irresponsible, and stupid, and that includes failure to accept repeated offers from the Sudanese to give them access to files on Al-Qa'ida and even to question al-Qa'ida operatives linked to the bombing of the U.S. embassies in Africa. Incidentally, I don't know that the U.S. didn't replace the stock either. The U.S. is the world's leading donor to charities, and dozens of leading charities were operating throughout Sudan in this period. So one would have to check whether these charities replaced the inventory destroyed in the al-Shifa attack. (My guess, in fact, is that it is likely that they did). I presume the U.S. government, as opposed to U.S.-based NGOs and private philanthropies, would have been reluctant to make government-to-government acknowledgements or compensation due to Sudan's mostly well-earned pariah status at the time. But what occured at the level of NGOs and charities I do not know. Your comparison to Iraqi children who allegedly died because of sanctions is not immediately relevant, since as far as I could ascertain nothing like his occurred in Sudan. But just to address the Iraqi point, in the real world, which differs from both ideal theory and from sanctimonious pseudo-left posturing, one has sometimes to adopt policies that are the lesser of evils, even though none of the policies are ideally satisfactory. In 1990, Chomsky condemned, in the Guardian, the build-up to war in the Gulf, arguing that there were alternative ways of forcing Saddam out of Kuwait, such as diplomacy (laugh) and sanctions! Today he calls the sanctions policy "genocide". Chomsky and other anti-war activists say that the new war was unjustified because Saddam was no longer a threat to anyone; his government had been militarily and economically weakened. But that was because his army was crippled by the first war and the economy was crippled by sanctions! So this starts to sound like a lot of posturing: "Look at me, I'm better than those of you in government because I oppose all the evil policies you do" but as for an agenda of coherent alternatives there is none. On palaces, there is no reason for you to doubt that new palaces were built with money that could have gone to allegedly hungry children; this is beyond controversy and was reported on by many sources not particularly pro-American. We now know how the oil-for-food program was used by Saddam for similar purposes and to line the pockets of his cronies. Incidentally, the original sanctions were imposed by the UN Security Council in the wake of the invasion of Kuwait. When the U.S. operates unilaterally and ignores the Security Council, the Chomskyite crowd howl that this is a violation of international law. When the U.N. Security Council imposes sanctions, suddenly it is just a tool of U.S. "genocidal" imperialism and "state terrorism" (Chomsky). As early as 1991 the U.N. offered Saddam (resolutions 706 and 712) an oil for food program to relieve the anticipated humanitarian effects of the sanctions. Saddam refused the offer! (For a UN source, see, for instance, http://www.un.org/Depts/oip/background/index.html ). So what should the U.N. have done at that point - say 'Oh well, never mind then, go ahead and rebuild your army and let's all go back to square one"? In 1995 it adopted another resolution establishing an oil-for-food program that went into effect in 1996. It should have covered all of Iraq's basic humanitarian needs. At what point may one say that the bloody dictator takes responsibility for the vicious consequences of his actions? If he holds his citizens' children hostage against the will of the international community, it's a typical case of a terrorist holding hostages: you're damned if you do and damned if you don't. One thing is morally beyond question, however: we are all indebted to the Israeli government for having destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor at Osiraq in 1981.

And what about supporting dictators in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait..may be Zubub could explain why the law system is "worst" there than it is/was under the Taliban.. I cant say much of the american political system, it has become a facist obligarcy that gave power to the presidency to act like a dictator.. * make retraction, if I ever need a lawyer, cyrano will take bwong..

common sense, I meant what i said..,, dont have much respect for american HEROES whom highjack civilians hospitals The US Army could had just send an ambulance to the hospital instead of fabricating a show and killing few civilians... 'm guessing here; that we are terrorists and we shouldn't have deposed a dictator? I' say the most reckless terrorists, In retrospect no, this dictator was the US only friend in Iraq...this adventures of yours costed more than 100.000 death civilians..Also it was an unessary war, Saddam could have been force to hold elections. .he US would had better success if it didnt fire a single rocket.. With this war you created yourself countless enemies, and you succeeded in doing what Komenei and Osama Bin Laden failed to do, you created a general insurgency unified under the banner of fundamentalism Islam.

...predispose it to fostering and supporting similar governments as long as...

 

How about fostering and supporting 'similar governments' of Egypt, Columbia, Iran prior the revolution of 1978-79, Pinochet's Chile.... And Iraq prior Saddam was considered the bad guy...

 

 

—Zubub

 

     This is a little off topic, but you’ve helped clarify a problem for me.  Aside from wherever you or I might draw the line on “humanitarian military interventions,” (which sounds slightly like an oxymoron), I might ultimately bow to global democracy, and note that I may not always get my way with a vast majority, as represented in the UN.  That is the nature of representative democracy.  A key issue concerns how representative various world leaders are of their constituents, and how much they go their own way (how much they lead, and how much they follow their peoples).  Somehow, the UN has pretty much agreed on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: from freedom, to marriage (some might like this refined), to limiting the rights of others to destroy these very rights.  The UN has its own constitution that respects much of the various ethical elements you site.  Possibly, you would say that those who don’t respect those human rights don’t deserve a vote in the UN.

 

     I think a trouble for many at ZNet, is that they see the US leaders as “leading” too much through propaganda, and moneyed elections (both of which I believe are mitigated quite a bit through an often smart electorate with a pretty good intuition trained by history).  Just as many ZNetters are frustrated with a majority of “Red States,” you seem frustrated with a number of “Red Countries.”  As we’ve both noted, countries tend to pursue their own economic and political self interest (which can be a natural, and I believe healthy, driver of innovation through competition); but when a few competitors begin to try and stake the moral high ground, “Saint US,” for example—even a whiff of hypocrisy due to a conflict of interests may make Uncle Sam look less like a prophet of promise, and more like your warty old uncle with a weird beard and a loaded gun (who hopefully won’t accidentally shoot you in the face on a hunting expedition!) 

 

 

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

 

"How can a country exporting 500 barrels of crude oil PER DAY not be able to replace the medicine lost in a single REPACKAGING plant? "

So if I smash your car, say, I should be able to walk away scot free because you're rich enough to buy a new one??!

So let's say the Sundanese governent is rotten, it could have replaced the drug but didn't. How does that justify the U.S for not paying for what it destroyed?

Since we all know and agree that the Sudanese governmnet is run by a bunch of thugs who don't give a damn about their own people, shouldn't the U.S have enough foresight to see that without replendishing the drugs IT has destroyed, the Sudanese people would suffer terribly because their govenment would rather spend its oil wealth on weapons? What happened to American humanitarinism?

If the U.S could miss such an elementary point how can the poor oppressed people who "yearn true democracy" around the world have any confidence that their would be liberator has the competence to deliver them "freedom" even if it truly desires it?

This reminds me of the sorry excuse that it was all Saddam's fault that so many Iraqi died under the U.S led embargo.

Assuming indeed the Iraqis only died of lack of medicine and public infrastrutures because Saddam squandered all the cash on palaces, which was dubious but let's say that was true.

Knowing that it was the case, why the hell did the U.S still insisted on keeping up the sanctions, whose only effects were a lot of dead Iraqi children and new palaces for Saddam? Apparantly the humanitarians in the U.S and U.K thought "it was worth it" to play chicken with Saddam, daring him to let his people die.

 

"Of course, if being "radical" just MEANS being anti-American, then of course he's wonderfully radical, but how does that help Bosnian and Kosovar Muslims, Afghan women, peace-yearning Palestinians and Israelis, Chinese yearning for real democracy (who built a statue of liberty at Tiananmen square before being massacred), Lebanese wishing to be free from Syrian domination, Ukrainians struggling to be free of Russian hegemony?"

How can a country exporting 500 barrels of crude oil PER DAY not be able to replace the medicine lost in a single REPACKAGING plant? Zubub the answer is very simple : sanctions... BTW zubub, The US used 16 cruises missiles to destroy the plant: Imagines if the money spent to makes these cruise would have been spent buying medication for the sudanese instead ? spending taht sort of money for the cruise was a crime by itself..

Mondo, dismiss what zubub said, The majority of people here are pro-american but on the other side of the political spectrum eg they are on the side of the poor people.. In the same token, you shouldn't take Zubub wrong perception that the blog is anti-semite, zubub appears to be an apologist of infanticide.. Most people here have jewish friends and jewish brothers for whom we hope no harm will ever come to them nor to their families ..

I guess I betrayed my "authoritarian fanaticism" when I said that I believe that sometimes the U.S. does good in the world and sometimes bad, and that I have long been a critic of a number of its foreign policies, especially in Latin America. I guess I betrayed it as well when I searched for reliable evidence to corroborate Chomsky's claim and couldn't find any, but invited everyone to do their own search and stated that I would change my mind if someone could provide me with a reliable source. You, on the other hand, are not going to "bother with a point by point analysis because it's a waste of time", which is undoubtedly true about someone who is going to believe what Chomsky says regardless of the facts. My very point all along, which I again thank you for once again confirming. Regarding your expressions - "jerk off", "fascists", "verbal masturbation" - don't you see how much it confirms my general claim? The less evidence and fewer sound arguments you have, the more you need to be abusive and ad hominem to cover it up. I doubt it fools even your comrades who share your urge to silence any critic of Chomsky. (Which I admit is touching, or would be, if we were all in the Boy Scouts). On another point, what do you mean by "leftist/radical"? Do you mean blaming the U.S. for all ills of the world and being a priori against any American policy, or do you mean free, independent, and undogmatic thought about how to advance human rights, democratic forms of government, and valuable forms of equality? If the former, I grant you that Chomsky and his sycophants are leftist and radical. But if the latter, I don't see how Chomsky's adoption of the most abysmal Serbian nationalist propaganda while genocide was being committed in Bosnia, his deafening silence now during the greatest challenge to free speech in our era (by Islamist fanatics, despite his libertarian pretentions that served as pretexts for his woeful intervention in the Faurisson affair), his appallingly tendentious analysis of the Arab-Israeli conflict, his minimisation of crimes by Pol Pot, his career-long downplaying, apology, and ignoring of anti-semitism, his opposition to the American liberation of Afghanistan from the Taliban - I don't see how these positions are "leftist" or "radical" in any meaningful sense. At the very least, one would think that real leftists and real radicals would welcome a genuine debate about them. As for Chomsky's laughable "encouraging people to NOT believe him" which impresses you so much, I guess you haven't been to many conferences nor read very much. In most liberal circles it is so taken for granted that one may disagree with a speaker that it would sound absurd to say it, as if someone was setting himself up as a prophet beckoning to his multitude of followers to go off into the wilderness. Do you think Rawls, Scanlon, Dworkin, Berlin, ever NEEDED to say that? The invitation was there in every turn of phrase. Chomsky, on the other hand, used his influence with Random House to censor critics of him, he denounces any opponent as a "liar", and so forth. Look what he did with the Guardian a couple of months ago, despite the fact that anyone familiar with his views on Kosovo could see the interview rang true. Larissa MacFarquhar, in her profile of Chomsky in the New Yorker, showed him to be a bully of graduate students who dissent from the guru's views; he is the same with political opponents of any kind (but especially on the left), while presenting himself as some kind of great DISSENTER. If you want to be "on the left" in any meaningful sense why not begin as a first step to think for yourself?

Mike, mike , then you may have noticed that in court both the crown and the defence are legal expert, yet there is always a legal expert that loose..You may also have noticed that it is the judge whom end up chewing and spitting the looser bones.. That is the reason why I dont take lawyers to argue my cases i just argue whichever the judge wanna hear.. I am not the spoke person of Mr Chomsky, the reason why he seems not to takes sides or takes positions could be multiples, but my best guess is that your reading abilities are too limited to understand what he says or what his position is.. In this particular instance he accuse the US of being rather hypocrites as per its crimes by comparison to the muslim insurgency.. I agree with him..

Mike, mike , then you may have noticed that in court both the crown and the defence are legal expert, yet there is always a legal expert that loose..You may also have noticed that it is the judge whom end up chewing and spitting the looser bones.. That is the reason why I dont take lawyers to argue my cases< i just argue whichever the judge wanna hear.. I am not the spoke person of Mr Chomsky, the reason why he seems not to takes sides or takes positions could be multiples, but my best guess is that your reading abilities are too limited to understand what he says or what his position is.. In this particular instance he accuse the US of being rather hypocrites as per its crimes by comparison to the muslim insurgency.. I agree with him..

Mondo: "But who knows, maybe they all hate the US and are also Chomsky cult members too." The former part is exactly right; as for the latter part, I suppose you know to whom it applies. And how do you explain the absence of any evidence from established NGOs?

Hobbes: "Chomsky's work is full of evidence and citation, your scurrilous reponses are filled with your own assertions glibly posing as fact". Nice try, Hobbes, but I presume you can follow the debate here. Chomsky's "evidence and citation" amounts to nothing, as his would-be defenders actually proved. On THEIR OWN EVIDENCE, the plant at al Shifa didn't even manufacture medicine, but just "repackaged" already processed material from abroad. You are perfectly free to use your head, however much you adulate Chomsky. How can a country exporting 500 barrels of crude oil PER DAY not be able to replace the medicine lost in a single REPACKAGING plant? At this point it's no longer a question of evidence, but of using your head and freeing yourself from a cult-like adulation for one self-serving writer. As for any other evidence, I continue to invite everyone on this thread to make the same searches I did, and to cite a reliable source. Go ahead and do it. If you had any evidence yourself, Hobbes, you wouldn't waste your OWN time (and everyone else's) with ad hominem attacks against me, but you would instead just quietly cite the evidence. As for my own research, whenever I have thoroughly researched an issue I have discovered that Chomsky's work on the same topic is astonishingly unreliable. His book on Kosovo is an intellectual and moral scandal. His writings on the Middle East are full of factual errors - sometimes elementary, absurd moral positions, incredible tendentiousness, glaring omissions. He is crassly prejudiced and dogmatically anti-American in a way that has nothing to do with being "radical" in any meaningful or valuable sense. Of course, if being "radical" just MEANS being anti-American, then of course he's wonderfully radical, but how does that help Bosnian and Kosovar Muslims, Afghan women, peace-yearning Palestinians and Israelis, Chinese yearning for real democracy (who built a statue of liberty at Tiananmen square before being massacred), Lebanese wishing to be free from Syrian domination, Ukrainians struggling to be free of Russian hegemony?

"Treat others as you would have them treat you" I'm not a mass goer but these words I have always loved. I think most people who have heard them remember them somewhere & those who havnt probly have the same theory in other words. They are simple words but i believe when the idea is employed to judge my actions & the actions of others it can reveal the fair & balanced truth. It is in my opinion inate wisdom that balances the humans interactions with others like fluid in the ears ballances the physical body! In this hypocritical murdering world today it is as revolutionary an axiom as ever terrified the devil!

Thank You Noam & I'm grateful for your recent visit to Dublin & your lecture 4 Amnesty which I attended luckily.

Antonio Carty

You mean if I take my medication I won't see the anti-Semitic garbage like :  "Suppose that Al-Qaeda destroyed half the pharmaceutical supplies in some country where people matter - say the US, or Israel etc."

"Would we..."

"They would claim.." 

Simply put, Mr Chomsky, who takes great exception when any rational person points out his leanings, makes it very clear what his position is.

As soon as anyone confronts him he tries to spin his way out.

I spend my life cross-examining in court.

Could Mr Chomsky or the rest of his sycophants explain why, in light of the above, it is submitted that  he does not fall into a camp.

And if he is in a specific camp, how any rational thinker can assess his views as anything other than more of the views of that camp. This as opposed to rational analysis of any given situation.

 

  

 

 

 

 

I disagree, zubub should voice his opinions here if he wants too. Also he has the right to be wrong. If the bloggers were all in agreement with the others you wouldnt have debates.. If he wants to call us chomsky cultist and use provocation a tiny bit, let him do so.. also zubub tries to back ups counter arguments so.. I don't think he had much success countering leila mouammar blogs..

if this will riase you to take your meds..

If you could just riase (sic) your spelling that would be enough.

 

 

Zubub,

what is the purpose of maligning Chomsky as you attempt to do?  First of all, while Chomsky's work is full of evidence and citation, your scurrilous reponses are filled with your own assertions glibly posing as fact.  Perhaps you could spend more time doing research and less time shooting from the hip.

Secondly, why are you so threatened by the work of Chomsky and others on Znet?  The consensus that we (the US) are the good guys and they (those with a different view of US foreign policy) are the bad guys is firmly in you favor.  What do you have to worry about?  You can go on believing what you want in peace and quiet.  This is a free country, right?  You'd probably be just right for a talk radio spot, btw.

 But you insist on calumniating the writers of this site?  Just curious as to why you waste your time?

 

 

To the extent that Chomsky is the only political commentator I have ever EVER heard of encouraging people to NOT believe him renders an alleged controversy over the Al-Shifa bombing null. 

I don't bother with a point by point analysis of Zubub because it's a waste of time.  I assume this is leftist/radical site where people come together for solidarity's sake not to allow the focus to be shifted towards a few fascists who get their rocks off by via verbal masterbation.  If you doubt NC credibility which he openly encourages you do then you should follow the advice he gives on this matter.  Look at the sources look at the information and evidence available.  Find things out for yourself. 

And finally on psychological note, if you were intelligent enough to find your way to this site through all the propaganda and distortions the world bombards you with, but not smart enough to see this little game jerk offs like Zubub play has a lot more to do with rationalizing their own authoritarian fanaticism than with any of the actual issues qua issues addressed in these threads, then you need to take a step back and ponder whether you've bothered to dig deep enough in to the real world yet.  Go back, learn to read between the lines, and look at the presuppositions of one's rhetoric before you end up working for Rupert Murdoch at Fox News.

You are correct that I am only doing some search on the web. But I never claimed to be an expert and that I knew the definitive answer. That's why I qualified my statement with "it seems" and "apparantly". I never said I have a definitive conclusion, only that based on my admittedly limited sources and reading through debates on certain sites it seems that Zubub was correct.

But then at least I can say definitively that this is not "uncontroversial". I should add that in my web search most people who insist that the bombing destroyed 50% -90% of Sudan's drug supply cite the same single source that Chomsky and Clark quoted from,--or secondary sources citing it,-- and this primary source based its assessment on the words of an Sundanese official. Thanks for pointing out there are others such as Blix.

I think Zubub's points and arguments are well thought out, even though I disagree with a lot of them. It's not like he just comes along and says Chomsky is an idiot, end of story, like some trolls do. In this case I think it is possible to have a civilized dialogue without name calling and patronizing (I mean on both sides, like labeling people "Chomsky cultists" or "neo cons")

It doesn't bother me at all that Chomsky may be wrong. His works would be very fragile if they have to be premised on his infallibilty. I would hope that his big picture insights are more roboust to sustain themselves against flaws here and there.I see no need at all to get defensive even if someone like Zubub succeeds in poking some holes.

So you typed, a few key word into google and came to a valid conclusion? LOL. Not to berate you but they are not Chomsky's claims nor Clark's claims, and they aren't controversial in the least. Just because Zubub is ignorant, please don't play along with him.

 Hans Blix, (you remember him? the guy that was stopped from doing his job in iraq), Dr Werner Daum the German ambassador to Sudan from 96-2000, Jonathan Belk regional program manager for the Near East Foundation among others are whom the information about death tolls from the bombing come from.

 But who knows, maybe they all hate the US and are also Chomsky cult members too.

 

I just read the PDF report, I am truly disgusted.. the more and more i look at it, the more i am disgusted..

I have done some research in the Sudan bombing. It appears that you are correct. Chomsky and Clark's claim apparantly stemmed from the same source and it is not coroborated by other independent observers and not surprisingly, highly contested.

As jd says, Chomsky might have jumped the gun. But the U.S should still have compensated for the destructions they caused in a timely fashion, knowing that there was no nerve gas there(this is not in dispute, I think).

But there is still a bigger question. Suppose someone, say the Chinese, bomb an American factory on the ground that it produces chemical weapons (there are plenty of them) or shoot missles at an American embassy under some pretext I am pretty sure that it would be construed as an act of war no matter how big or small the casaulty is (even though Clinton again got away with bombing the Chinese embassy in Belgrade)

Now who gave the right to the U.S to carry out the bombing in the first place?

While in this instance the terrorist label may not be appropiate, but it could be interpreted as something much worse.

On the other hand, there is no shortage of U.S sponsored terrorist acts all over the world.

You disputed the Contras example (one of many) which someone else brought up, saying that  using a proxy somehow lessen the responsibility of the U.S. That is strange logic. It is like saying the guy who hire a hit man is less guilty than someone who, perhaps for lack of cash or being too cheap, commits murder with his own hands.

Personally I don't think all of U.S's interventions inevitably result in bad outcomes. Most political actions have complex consequences. One can always look for silver linings in a situation.

Since the world community is made up of diverse interests, a "bad" incident for oppressed people somewhere may have a beneficial effect to another oppressed group elslewhere.By the same logic, the impact of the Soviet Union was no uniformly bad either. Many Africans missed the U.S.S.R because it was the only force to counter U.S heagemony in THEIR continent. The people who lived in the Soviet orbit desired the U.S as a counterweight to their overlord while those who were bullied by the U.S sought Soviet support. Nothing unusual here. You don't need to see this through some ideological lenses.

You mention the liberation of Eastern Europe. But perhaps we should also note that the livihood of ordinary people,-that is, apart from the chattering class and the capitalists,--may have taken a big step back. Havel is not a very popular man in his native Cezch now, from what I gather. Communist parties, now calling themselves social democrats, are making come backs in many Eastern European countries.

I agree with you that there is no cause and effect link between intentions and outcomes.Beneficial outcomes can be the un intended "side effect" of selfish motivations.  But when we have to make a decision NOW, not with the hind sights of historians, should we support a manifestedly illegal and unjust act on the ground that it MAY lead to good results, based only on the most optimistic projections and the self proclaimed altrusim of the perpetrators?

I never thought or said you're a "neo con".You raise many thought provoking and challenging points. I think people who take the opposite side in the debate would be benefited by carefully addressing your arguments.

nope because the garbages your wrote; I tell you what if you have problems obtaining your meds tell us, tell us we'll do the humane thing, riase money just to make sure you get them.. It might help..

nope because of the non-sense you wrote..

Why because I don't subscribe to the garbage Chomsky writes?

:0) 

 

pss , I think they are sending him toomany americans movies..

The doctor said 90% of the maleria medicine. Ramsey Clark say 50%. Ok fine lets take that 50% account. This number is still to HIGH and it is still a inhumane crime and an infanticide. You destroyed the (a) medical stock used to fight malaria, you tell me where are this country supposed to get (b) the new stock when this country is under economic sanctions? You named Darfur as a site for interventions, but you fail to name the US as a part of the problem in Sudan ( like everywhere else) ..The bombing al-Shifa is a good indicative of the US being a problem (-infanticide-) there ..The US being a problem where ever there is oil.. I think the first intervention in Sudan will be the make sure the US is stopped from being a nuisance. I think if that if the nations should intervenes against terrorism, it should do so in Washington, this would resolve 95% of terrorism world wide.. zubub, your country does not qualify as a police, it qualifies as a nuisance..

ttribe, you've misread what I've said, as well as making the false presupposition that I'm American. I've long been a critic of American policy in Latin America, although I don't agree with you that democracy in countries like Costa Rica means nothing more than "corporate control", nor would most Costa Ricans agree with you. I agree that the electoral system in the U.S. leaves much to be desired. But if you compare it to some of the other U.N. members, including permanent Security Council member China (still a totalitarian dictatorship) and many others, American democracy is still light years ahead. I never said that the U.S. just fosters democracy in the world. What I said is that hundreds of millions of people the world over, especially in Eastern Europe - including former dissidents like Vaclav Havel and Adam Michnik, who paid for their fight for freedom with long jail terms - greater admirer the U.S. as having played a vital role in their liberation. This is true again in Ukraine, Bosnia, Kosovo, Croatia, Taiwan, Singapore, and many other countries.

ttrihe10, I agree zubub is not completely unintelligent. I was once told that the majority of American would not tolerate critic of their president or the US policies because they feel it anti-patriotic.. At the very least Zubub voices his beliefs instead of threatening to kill you..

Thanks for your kind words; they show you in the best possible light. Actually, what I said was I don't believe that tens of thousands died from a shortage of medicine caused by the al Shifa bombing, but that I would change my mind if someone provided me with a reliable source that was not Chomsky or Ramsey Clark (the virulent anti-American and current legal adviser to Saddam Hussein). So what do you do? You go and cite me the same ultra-left delegation headed by Ramsey Clark. Don't you see that you are just confirming what I said: that despite the large presence in Sudan of dozens of aid groups, from Oxfam to the Red Cross to Medecins sans frontière - the organisations that have provided enormously valuable and detailed information on Sudan for the last two decades, the most reliable sources of conditions in Sudan, including the horrific war crimes of the Sudanese government (that have never bothered Chomsky or any or you, at least not so that one would notice) - you had the same trouble as me: you couldn't find a single confirmation about the drug shortage allegations from any of these groups? A discussion of the whole issue in on Wikipedia. Interestingly, one of the people accompanying Clark - Dr Mohammed Haque - has this to say about the plant: "Al Shifa was really a sophisticated packaging plant... It did not even use raw materials but instead imported and repackaged processed materials". Dr Salam, the Sudanese General Manager of the Central Medical Supply, is quoted as saying: "This was a packaging facility. It didn't even have equipment to synthesise milk into cheese, much less make nerve gas". Of course, these people might be saying one thing when responding to the nerve gas allegation, and another thing when trying to talk up the importance of the plant for Sudan's medical health. But if these statements are to be believed, it seems that the plant was not even manufacturing medicine for malaria, but "repackaging" imported materials. To think that such an operation couldn't be done elsewhere, or that Sudan couldn't import the "packaged" version of the medicine, continues to defy all logic except to people who simply believe what they want to believe (while ignoring the real genocides that have taken place in Sudan, one of them ongoing in Darfur, about which no Z-Net blogger or cult-member has had a word to say, to the best of my knowledge). Recall that Sudan produces about 500,000 barrels of crude PER DAY (!), most of it for export. You can believe the delegation headed by Ramsey Clark if you like, and you can call me any names you like, but I'm still waiting for a reliable source.

Heklo mike have you taken all your meds ?

The White house is still behind in term of using common sense.. its behind in commonsense if their intention wasnt killing civilians or accelerating the death of civilians.

you are generalyzing too much.. If your interventions involved air strikes with depleted uranium bombs, cluster bombs in the middle of civilians, what is the point.. take Kosovo as an example , everyone were opposed to air strikes including Chomsky. You said he was opposed to intervention , this isnt true. The majority of people were for some form of intervention , But ON FOOT because the killing were to be stopped immediately! Actually the first guy to arrive there on foot was Freaking Osama Bin Laden..this tell you , that beyond all that advanced technology and scientific knowledge, The White house is still behind in term of using common sense..

Friztbuster, I wouldnt worry about common sense, common senses must had deserted him,including reading comprehension.. lol

Well, I gave you several examples of military interventions that saved enormous amount of life. Beyond that, the U.S. is far more active in supporting sanctions against regimes like Myanmar, while the Europeans undermine these efforts. As for the Security Council, it is not only the temporary member dictatorships that oppose sanctions against brutal regimes, but China and Russia, both veto-carrying permanent members, who consistently oppose sanctions and interventions that are urged on humanitarian grounds.

Zubub u are obviously an educated person which is why it is funny to how blinded you are by American partiotism, you use the same old rhetoric of spreading democracy all over the world and bla bla bla, which I'm sure instills pride and such, but  maybe you should have a look at what that realy means in the places in which America has brought democracy, a good example is latin America, opening a country up to private investment and corporate control, the same old story, the general population gets screwd while the few elite bask in sunshine. What's more America is hardly the poster pin up of a functioning democracy where 30% of the population votes for two candiadates funded by the corporate dollar and do the same thing. Why is the US always in a state of waging a war?

Supposing Al-Qaeda or the Taliban destroyed all the religous symbols, other than their own, in a country where people matter, say Afghanistan, would you regard it as the basis for worldwide riots or would you, in that instance go overboard about freedom of "expression" being of paramount importance?

If Ahmadinejad is "a loose cannon" what would Armageddon be? 

While you use an Israeli historian to try and justify Iran's reasons for wanting a nuke, even though you claim any sane person would reject it, you fail to give any depth into the reasons why most countries are aghast at the very idea.

Perhaps it is because the "loose cannon" is not part of a minority but rather a father-like-figure to the extremist majority of Muslims. As the world is currently learning :

Elections bring in the extremists not the so-called moderate majority.

A cartoon is used to set off worldwide rioting while the extremists forget to point out that images of the Prophet have been around for hundreds of years and drawn by Muslims themselves. In other words any ratio for violence will do.

If the "loose cannon" believes the 12th Imam will return during chaos, nuking Israel and friends may just bring about paradise now. Shiites only?

Sunnis think nothing of bombing Shiite mosques to create a Caliphate-conducive climate of their own.

Nothing is sacred : Religous Temples, skyscrapers in New York or anything else.

That is why sane people don't want the Iranians to have a nuke. Your start up claim that this is so, while justifying the opposite, classifies you as an idealist not a thinker.

Your zeal to be contrary makes you as conventional as any of the Rednecks you ridicule. You are not the great thinker you and those who can't analyse believe, merely another zealot on a mission. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It took about five minutes time to breech the hull of your Exxon-Valdez Oil Spil of a lie on the Al-Shifa Bombing. 

So according to your "sources"  Ramsey Clark started the so called "myth" 50% of the malaria drugs were accounted for by the Al-Shifa factory as well as the statements pertaining to the ultimate consequences of the bombing.  Now where I wonder would Clark come up with such pie-in-the-sky notions. 

Let's see maybe looking at an article written by Richard Becker of the IAC might be instructive

 "The delegates were: former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark; Dr. Mohammed Haque of American Muslims for Global Peace & Justice and past president of the Islamic Medical Association, from Chicago; Dr. Sapphire Ahmed of Harlem, New York; Sara Flounders and John Parker from the IAC in New York; and Richard Becker from the IAC in San Francisco."

 http://iticwebarchives.ssrc.org/International%20Answer/www.internationalanswer.org/pdf/sudanfact.pdf

I guess it would make sense to beleive the word of someone who took the time to travel to the Sudan after the incident to investigate the aftermath over right wing punditry who conviniently think NC supported Pol Pot. 

Do you really mean to assert that no one falied to recieve malaria drugs following this act of agression during a time of U.S. sanctions when the plant accounted for 90% of the country's malaria drugs? 

Of course you do....because you're a miltarist douchebag with way too much time on your hands...

Zurbub—

     Generally speaking, again, I’m not only for tending my Epicurean garden – but you tend to have a more “pro-active,” maybe Hitchensian, vision of the roll of the US on the international scene.  I see our less than humble foreign policy as too costly, in terms of the US military budget’s leeching off the US (and also world) economy; and I see too many tar-baby quagmires arising from supporting what turn out to be the wrong regimes, rebels, etc. in the long run (barely to mention catastrophic “mistakes”).

    Yes, humanitarian efforts like combating genocide are quite reasonable—the Dafur situation being critical. I see military intervention being a quite short-term bandage for problems that have long term cultural histories—sometimes the bleeding must be stopped; but the over-all hemophilia must be treated too—and this is probably more important for long term life-saving.  This requires, I believe, improving the crucial areas of economic development—a more integrated globe; and education—on pluralism, critical thinking, etc. to combat “sexism, racism, slavery, and anti-semitism.”

     The UN tends to be funded more by wealthier nations, and hence they may merit more say in how that money is spent (yet, compare this to taxation and representation at the national level).  I don’t think dictators should be vetoing measures of the Security Council; but if democracy—giving voice to the larger populace—is a goal, then multitudes of other people deserve some sort of voice in global matters that affect them—and sooner rather than later; otherwise the US might appear as the arrogantly self-appointed police which—as you pointed out—“pursues its own interest.”

     As to your “consequentialism,” I think your “all else equal it should be the determinate” phrase deserves attention.  I think this rarely happens; but agree that it should be a strong factor in political ethics.

 

Zubull, everyone know that where areas the US has been tempering with the governments of other nations , these nations took longer to implement democracies.. Simply put every thing the US touches , it screws up..

While much of the world is still run by vicious dictatorships, unfortunately it is we who must assume the bulk of the burden of policing the world, while trying to foster the spread of democracy until we can reach that dream., Zubub, that is bullshit..you are being apologist for an inherent fascist ideology in support of an imperialism aimed at enslaving other nations. On top you elect psychopaths for presidents.

I've read some of his articles on his site.  This current one is a good example of his style.  If he tried to make an argument like this in court  he would be told to write it over so that his argument is clear. (if they were nice) And as for the figure someone said 70%, where did it come from?  Just slapping a number up doesn't make it a fact.  But anyway he never writes clearly, at least not from what I've seen regarding politics.  I seriously think he has a mental illness.  He thinks that only a few can see through the lies and supposed conspiracies.  He sounds delusional and he doesn't even have a good delusion going, it's way out there.  And lastly I think some of you loyal subjects need to do some reading also, just about anywhere but here.

To add, if you ever have difficulty understanding what points he is trying to make in his articles or books or are at a loss as to where he obtained a particular fact which he makes reference to, you can always just write him.  His e-mail is up on his website, and he's usually pretty good at responding to people who have questions for him.

I've read some of his articles on his site.  This current one is a good example of his style.  If he tried to make an argument like this in court  he would be told to write it over so that his argument is clear. (if they were nice) And as for the figure someone said 70%, where did it come from?  Just slapping a number up doesn't make it a fact.  But anyway he never writes clearly, at least not from what I've seen regarding politics.  I seriously think he has a mental illness.  He thinks that only a few can see through the lies and supposed conspiracies.  He sounds delusional and he doesn't even have a good delusion going, it's way out there.  And lastly I think some of you loyal subjects need to do some reading also, just about anywhere but here.

You do realize that your arguments aren't exactly good refutations of his either, don't you?  Call Chomsky names all you want, but you won't be demonstrating exactly what you find wrong with his arguments.  There's a good reason why the ad-hominem attack is considered an informal logical fallacy. 

In addressing the "70%" figure, according to the National Geographic article which cyrano provided a link to, 70% of malaria deaths occur in children under the age of 5. 

First, jd, you are right that the argument is not with a neo-con pacifist; actually it's not with a neo-con either. I'm not sure what that term actually means, other than circumcised conservative (which is how it seems really to be used), but since I've been a vehement opponent of American foreign policy in Latin America and Indochina I doubt I would meet anyone's definition of "neocon", except that people here (I'm not saying you) like to use it whenever they need a convenient label to dismiss arguments that they can't refute. First, let's use the term 'consequentialist' instead of 'utilitarian' (since we aren't discussing making anyone happy). I don't say in every case in which there is a greater payoff in terms of lives saved overall that that should be the sole determinant of the morally right action. There are other values such as the rule of law, itself important for long-term respect for lives. But it is nevertheless a very powerful consideration, and all else equal it should be the determinant. And that is because there is nothing as precious as a human life. I assume, of course, that we are talking about lives of innocent civilians. Members of terrorist organisations, I hold, forfeit virtually all their rights. Now you say that the U.S. normally pursues its own interest. One is tempted to reply, 'Welcome to the real world'. Of course this is true (and can you name a country that doesn't?). But that doesn't mean that independent people of conscience shouldn't support policies that are also defensible on independent humanitarian grounds. All the examples I cited fall under that category: Bosnia, Kosovo, and Afghanistan. Moreover, the expression "the leader of the free world" might seem like nothing but pukey hypocrisy for most Z-Netters and Chomsky-clones, but for many many people around the world, for instance throughout Eastern Europe, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bosnia, Kosovo, Israel, Kurdistan, and now most of Afghanistan, this slogan rings a great truth. It happens that the ideology of the United States, its liberal values, and its democratic system, predispose it to fostering and supporting similar governments as long as those governments don't directly threaten it. And that is something that independent activists can make great use of, as they did with regard to ending the genocide in Bosnia. Now you say that the U.S. taxpayer never signed on to funding the policemen of the world. And you suggest the U.N. should do it. These are two different points. On the first, you could be objecting in the old American tradition of no taxation without representation. That would mean merely that you don't think citizens have enough control over foreign policy in general. I won't comment on that now. But if one asks who SHOULD pay for the policing of the world, I don't see why it shouldn't begin with the richest nations. What is admittedly unfair is that Canada and Europe shirk their duties in this regard, and I think the U.S. is right to criticise them for it. But now on the question of whether the U.N. should be the policing force, I am afraid I disagree with you, and here on Kantian grounds (his Perpetual Peace article). One simply cannot allow Syria, Iran, Myanmar (Burma), Zimbabwe, Cuba, and whoever else might be a temporary member of the Security Council, to control the policing of the world. We citizens of liberal democracies, where public policies of sexism, racism, slavery, and anti-semitism are illegal and where liberty of the press and human and civic rights are enshrined in our constitutions, must regard the prospect of a truly international police force as a dream for a future world, but not for ours as it is currently constituted. While much of the world is still run by vicious dictatorships, unfortunately it is we who must assume the bulk of the burden of policing the world, while trying to foster the spread of democracy until we can reach that dream.

I've read some of his articles on his site.  This current one is a good example of his style.  If he tried to make an argument like this in court  he would be told to write it over so that his argument is clear. (if they were nice) And as for the figure someone said 70%, where did it come from?  Just slapping a number up doesn't make it a fact.  But anyway he never writes clearly, at least not from what I've seen regarding politics.  I seriously think he has a mental illness.  He thinks that only a few can see through the lies and supposed conspiracies.  He sounds delusional and he doesn't even have a good delusion going, it's way out there.  And lastly I think some of you loyal subjects need to do some reading also, just about anywhere but here. 

So far you and your fellow cultists do not back up your views with facts, or even reason.

Well, you can't expect to become knowledgeable about every facet of the historical record from which Chomsky's analyses draw upon from reading a blog entry if that's what you mean.  Why don't you read a few of his books, many of which are posted online in their entireties so that you may peruse them completely free of charge?  

Zubub—

     I’m not completely a pacifist and I don’t get the impression the argument here is with some neo-con Jesus/Buddha either.  Yes, intervention might be “necessary” (I’ll get back to your word choice in a bit) at times—but all too often US foreign intervention, shaped by terms the opposite of “cowardly,” “wimpy,” and “reactive,” (“brave,” “bullying,” and “first to act”), goes beyond, or below rather, humanitarian concerns (concerns which I may see as dictating action), and has much to do with gaining or maintaining political and/or economic advantage.

    Consider: should the US taxpayer really be expected to fund an international police force?  (And people in the military, including me at one time, usually weren’t told by their recruiters that beyond defending their country, they would be policing the world).  This should be a matter for the UN, which needs more teeth IMO, and expanded representation in the Security Council (although those offering more troops might deserve more say).  Moreover, such “police” forces should be held accountable the same way domestic police forces are; hence my prior reference to justified deadly force.

     Now, as to the word “necessary;” I assume you are using that word on utilitarian grounds.  As I noted before, there are many more ethical elements than just utilitarianism (e.g. human rights, responsibilities, intentions, consensus, etc.).  Is it always “necessary” to sacrifice 5 people to save 20?  For example—should we take 5 people at random and kill them to save 20 people with organ transplants that are “necessary” for them?  If not 5 to 20, at what point do we start killing people at random, in order to save other random people?

     I sympathize with your taking issue with Chomsky saying that the US has a terrorist foreign policy—but from the perspective of a foreign neighborhood that is lost due to US collateral damage, because they didn’t have the courage, power, or will to overthrow their government; or because they were in the vicinity of suspected terrorists—well the US must strike a bit of terror in their minds.

What Chomsky is saying is that the US is more hypocritical that Al-Quaida when it perform its act of terrorisms. in fact he is saying that US is not better than than the terrorists that made the WTC falls .. he says the US is worst and its hypocritical about its own act. I agree with him because the pharceutical attack on Sudan was a the most bold act of infanticide. As far as the hypocritical excuse the Ayatollahs of hypocrisy in Washington have been giving for explaination, we take it, provided that you do not understand that the attck on Sudan was an infanticide.. Clinton got away with murder and he does deserve to be shot with shit and Bush derserve no less.

Wanna know how many people died from the dudan pharamceutical bombing ? 70% percent of death weres in children under 5.. This makes you infanticide

The part where the american claim that the plant was used to make chemical /biological weapons does not stick. if this had been true the US would have tried to kill as many people it could..

Ok, I've read enough for now.  No wonder you think there are those with quite primitive debating skills on here, there's nothing to debate.  Chomsky starts with a falsehood and rambles on about it.  What's to debate?  It's been a learning experience, thanks.  To those of you who subscribe to Chomsky's inane ramblings you might want to consider a mental health evalution. 

So far you and your fellow cultists do not back up your views with facts, or even reason.

"I seen a few..."  Oh really?  What regime?  And I doubt you know what a regime is.  And where do you get 95% as your figure?  Out of your empty head? 

"It even tied up few injuried to their bed."  What is "it?"  And do you mean that few were injured (or injuried, as you put it) and so therefore only a few beds were taken up?  And your conclusion is that because a few soldiers entered a hospital, what, I'm guessing here; that we are terrorists and we shouldn't have deposed a dictator?  I'm so glad you people are such a small minority.  I'm beginning to think you're mentally ill.

I could apply what you wrote to your own post.  You said nothing.  What social change is he trying to bring about by his article, I don't see it.  And since you obviously have such superior debating skills, explain this poorly written article to me.

I don't think the article was well written at all.  I'm not sure what his point is about the WTC and if the terrorists thought no one would be hurt.  I guess he fails to make a point.  Then he concludes with, I guess, that we should question if attacks against us are terrorist acts?  So, ok, someone explain this to me, that's why I'm here, to see your side of it. 

Clinton acts define him as is an infanticide and a malaria killer, I am not going top be apological for his actions, he already got away with the perfect infanticide, but for zubub, its ok, Clinton did this for his country..

Zubub, you cn't tell me the US administration did not know about the malaria stituation of sudanese.. National Geographic

Look, Clinton was one of the worst presidents this century in foreign policy. He was cowardly, wimpy, and reactive. He should have intervened in Bosnia in 1992 and saved at least 100,000 lives (as he implied he would do during the 1992 election campaign), instead of waiting until 1995 and after Srebrenica. When he intervened in Kosovo he was afraid to send ground troops, leading to unnecessary bombing for weeks until he finally was forced (and pushed by Blair) to threaten ground troops, leading to Serbia's exodus from Kosovo. And in retaliation against al-Qa'ida he should have done what Bush did, namely issue an ultimatum to the Taliban and act on it. When Warren Christopher was Secretary of State, the big joke among humanitarian activists for Bosnia was "If Warren Christopher were alive today things would be really different". The attack on al-Shifa was cheap, poorly thought out, and bordering on criminality in its stupidity. But it was not terrorism. It was a stupidly planned retaliation against terrorism and attempt to take out a putative chemical weapons plant, and it was carefully timed to occur when the building was empty (save for one man). Now you are right that one should be careful about attacking others and putting others' lives at risk, no matter what the justification. Your mistake, however, is to think that one need not be equally careful about NOT attacking when it is in fact necessary to do so. On another Chomsky thread here, Chomsky criticises the U.S. for "undermining" "popular" Iraqi attempts to overthrow Saddam. Again, this is probably pure fantasy on Chomsky's part, but one contributor actually suggests the only plausible sense those words could have, namely, that the U.S. was guilty of failing to impose the no-fly zone early enough to save the Shi'ites from Saddam's repression. The no fly zones were imposed after, to protect the Kurds and then the remaining Shi'ites and Marsh Arabs. But the point is that the U.S., as the world's leading power, had a duty to intervene militarily which it failed to discharge. Meanwhile, the Z-Net cult led by Chomsky opposed ALL these interventions: the one that finally stopped the genocide in Bosnia, the one that liberated the Kosovars from 10 years of bitter repression, the one that liberated the Kurds from genocidal repression and created the freeest area in the Middle East after Israel, and the one that liberated nearly all of Afghanistan from the Taliban.

Actually the statistics on malaria are rather awful.. 70% percent of death by malaria occurs in children under 5, zubub consider this, even if youd remove the bombing of the pharmaceutical plant as an intended terrorist act, the mere fact that there is pharmaceutical sanctions on a country that is ravaged by malaria is cause of blame.. The fact is you can't remove the bombing, it occured. By all mean the forementioned actions by the US (hello Clinton) constitutes an infanticide of the worst kind. In my opinion these acts are way worst than WTC..

Actually the statistics on malaria are rather awful.. 70% percent of death by malaria occurs in children under 5, zubub consider this, even if youd remove the bombing of the pharmaceutical plant as an intended terrorist act, the mere fact that there is pharmaceutical sanctions on a country that is ravaged by malaria is cause of blame.. The fact is you can't remove the bombing, it occured. By all mean the forementioned actions by the US (hello Clinton) constitutes an infanticide of the worst kind. In my opinion these acts are way worst than WTC..

Zubub –

     Although Chomsky’s sarcasm may not help his logic, and his facts may be disputed, I think there is a semi-philosophical point that he is making: “peoples” tend to care more about themselves than others—and there may be problems justifying even one human death due to “collateral damage.”  I remember hearing about that night watchman way back when, and thinking to myself—what a terrible sudden surprise death for him.  Not only was he drafted into this military effort, he was drafted and sentenced to immediate death.  Imagine your child was drafted for torture and death – because your government made a mistake in its paranoid intelligence?  Highlighting the Al Shifa bombing intelligence error brings to mind the WMD in Iraq intelligence error— any way you slice it, people died due to jumping the gun on intelligence: actions based on suspicions rather than facts.  Maybe Chomsky is jumping the gun too, making accusations based on faulty intelligence—but that only underscores the point that taking major action should rely more on careful study rather than trigger-happy paranoia.  I think that a major point that Chomsky is implying here is that “risk-assessment” should place as much value on others’ innocent lives you may be taking as on your own lives you may be saving; and a rather round about way of critiquing long range pre-emptive action (which touches on issues ranging from last minute attempts to shoot down a missile to deterring nuclear proliferation).  When is a police officer justified in using deadly force?  Usually, not based on a couple of tips from informants, but as a last-second defense measure.  IMO, Serendipity, moral luck, or retroactive justification don’t rescue bad choices: people—as individuals and as communities should own up to their mistakes and make amends however much pride and denial build excuses—only then start the journey of turning a mistake into possible opportunity.

 

Clinton did not bomb the pharmaceutical plant to save people from malaria..Zubub. You are going to tell me the US intelligence is not intelligent enough to know people would die from the effect of this bombing... As weel there were sanctions imposed by the US, you tell me how these drugs were replaced..

Sudan is the largest country in Africa, comprising more than 8% of the entire continent. The total population is estimated to be 30.3 million inhabitants, of whom 75% live in rural areas. In Sudan, there are 7.5 million cases and 35,000 deaths every year due to malaria. Whilst the whole population is at risk from the disease, there is higher incidence among pregnant women and children under five years of age. This results in complicated pregnancies, low birth weight and infant mortality. Zubub could divide 35,000 by 3 months to estimate a total. It is war in Sudan nobody will venture over there to investigates how many died. Its the perfect crime.. Sudan map Malaria in Africa malaria in sudan Malaria is the number one killer in Sudan, cutting both the drug supply and a pharmaceutical plant is a gruesome crime..

Mondo says that I "conflated the al shifa bombing with the WTC", thereby demonstrating my "muddled thinking", also my "frothing at the mouth exhibited by someone shown to be ignorant", etc. Given the virulence of the insults, you would think that in two postings Mondo would take just 30 seconds more to point out what Chomsky's actual argument is, on Mondo's clear-headed and knowledgeable reading. But in two postings Mondo couldn't actually be bothered to do so. Here's why. Mondo just proved himself again thoroughly confused. Mondo thinks I "conflated" the al shifa bombing with the WTC. But in the very passage he quotes I couldn't possibly have "conflated" (i.e. treat as one) the two bombings, because my entire interpretation (as is anyone's with elementary reading skills) is that Chomsky is drawing an analogy between the two (with the proviso, pointed out by me in both postings, that Chomsky modifies the WTC attack to include a hypothetical - or "imagined" as I say in the very passage he quotes - claim by al Qa'ida that they didn't intend to harm civilians. ) That is, each one is an analogue in an analogy: that's how I clearly state that I read it (how could one read it otherwise?), so I couldn't possibly be treating two analogues of an analogy as one. The whole point of Chomsky's posting is to argue that the al Shifa was an appalling terrorist act, and that the claim of the Clinton administration that it was not intended to harm anybody "reaches the level of plausibility", i.e. is just as laughably dubious, as would an al Qa'ida claim of that sort regarding the WTC bombing. If Mondo thinks Chomsky is saying anything else at all it would wonderful if, after he has stated his many insults, he takes 20-30 more seconds to explain his alternative reading of the posting. After all, a clear-headed thinker like himself shouldn't have much problem handling this challenge. Mondo also says I "deny reality" and "then proceed to blame the very victims of the illegal attack". He adds that "the US did indeed bomb the plant". Does he think I was denying that? Well, I won't comment further on that reading comprehension display. He adds that "the 50 percent figure is the one widely quoted". Well, I know how "wide" the circles of some Z-Net people go, namely as "wide" as Z-Net, where Chomsky quotes Herman quoting Chomsky, and Peterson quotes Herman, and Herman quotes Peterson quoting Chomsky quoting Herman, and everyone else quotes Chomsky. So I still repeat my request that someone who believes this claim provide a reliable non-Chomskyite source. It is incorrect to say that I "then proceed to blame the very victims of the illegal attack". The victims are supposed to be ordinary Sudanese ("tens of thousands", in Chomsky's original claim) who allegedly died from a shortage of pharmaceutical products. As Mondo must know, I blamed the Sudanese government. I doubt that even he thinks that members of the government died from a lack of pharmaceutical supplies. I merely pointed out the obvious, that even if there was a "humanitarian catastrophe" (which I do deny, though I will change my mind if someone provides me with a reliable source that is not Chomsky or Ramsey Clarke) it would be the fault of the government that spends billions in its wars to establish Arab domination over the non-Arab African population, and has a robust oil export trade. People on this thread should consider: a pharmaceutical plant is not a nuclear plant. The latter takes 20 or 30 years for a developing country to produce. Destroy it and you set them back decades. A pharmaceutical plant can be replaced within months if not weeks, not to mention the possibility of interim importations. I try not to "froth at the mouth", but it is just lunacy to believe that the destruction of a single plant was a primary cause of a "humanitarian catastrophe" (that went unreported in the liberal press because it is really Stalinist-indoctrinated). In fact, if one tries to follow this debate via google, one finds that there is not a single aid agency that supported Chomsky's claims, despite numerous agencies on the ground in Sudan throughout the period in question. Aside from Chomsky the only other "sources" were Ramsey Clarke (apparently repeating Chomsky's allegations) and a virulent anti-American former German ambassador to Sudan named Werner Daum. As the Wikipedia entry on this calmly observes, it is impossible to take Daum's estimates of tens of thousands of deaths seriously. Daum claimed it took three months before imports could replace the al Shifa supply. But (a) that is extremely implausible, especially as concerns any vital supplies, and (b) if it were true then there would have had to have been tens of thousands dying in that three month period, yet not a single aid agency reported it, which, to borrow Chomsky's rhetoric, is "at a level of plausibility" of, well, lots of other Chomsky claims (yep, that bad), e.g. Chomsky's shrieking about an imminent genocide in Afghanistan, his apologies for Pol Pot, his claim that he could find nothing "per se" anti-semitic in the Holocaust-denying writing of Faurisson, etc. etc.. Chomsky and Daum alleged that medicine for malaria went short, yet no aid agency reported any epidemic of malaria. The claims are completely implausible.

he US recognized their [t]error... fritzbuster I dont like your analogy too much.

With this excuse, If anyone not liking the US policies, would legitimate itself for preventive attacks against further US terrorists attacks.. Someone could bomb Washington, the White House and claim the place was packed with infected american terrorists..

I should welcome the excuse on the mere ground that the US own the terrorist patent..

If I recall, Clinto was saying that there manufacturing chemecal weapons there..not biological weapons..

You have to realize that I'm not endorsing the position you take umbrage with.  I was just trying to anticipate what others might say in response to Chomsky's comparing of the al-Shifa bombing with the stepping on of ants.  I felt that his analogy wasn't necessarily the best way to argue his point and that concentrating on the tenuousness of the evidence for the plant having been a manufacturer of biological weapons would be a better strategy.

"The absurdity of Chomsky's new piece outdoes even his normal fare. That the bombing of a single pharmaceutical plant, at a time the building was empty, because it was believed to be involved in the manufacture of biological weapons, could be considered at the same "level of plausibility" as an imagined claim by WTC attackers that they had no intention of harming anyone is so incredibly stupid that only the most hard-bitten cult members and Chomsky-clones will be able to swallow this one."

 Those are your words, not mine. You conflated the al shifa bombing with the WTC not Chomsky, nor myself. I was merely trying to point out your muddled thinking. So aside from the normal frothing at the mouth exhibited by someone shown to be ignorant, your new post adds nothing, except this gem

" The half-supply example is ludicrous because the U.S. didn't destroy half the pharmaceutical supply of Sudan (and if a single plant constituted half the supply, it would demonstrate only the murderous callousness of the Sudanese government, which spends hundreds of millions of dollars per year committing genocide in Darfur and until recently against the Christians and animists in the south)."

In this one paragraph, you not only deny reality (The US did indeed bomb the plant, and the 50 percent figure is the one widely quoted), you then proceed to blame the very victims of the illegal attack. Bravo.

I can only assume for an encore, there will be more frothing at the mouth(vapid claims of chomsky cultists running amok).

Hurray for literacy!

 

Cyrano – thanks for checking out my site, with my schizophrenia it is often difficult to read.  I believe “greed” to be “desire” out of balance.  Greed in moderation might be OK with me.

 

Zubub –

 

     I think it might be noted that intention and utility are not the only relevant aspects to morality.  Utilitarianism can imply slavery: the sacrifice of the few for the many (and in practice, sacrifice of the less powerful for the more powerful).  Also, a rapist may intend that their victim love them in return.  Another import element, no doubt among very many elements, is the concept of rights: especially fundamental human rights.

 

     There is also the element of responsibility: every action has the possibility of an indefinite number of consequences.  Being overly self-Conscious of consequences prior to action can lead to paralysis, and to loosely quote, or paraphrase rather, Vice President Cheney, “hesitation in the heat of battle can mean death.”  I was struck by the number of times VP Cheney used the phrase “I’m confident” in a televised debate with Senator and VP hopeful John Edwards.  One gets the impression of his intending to act like a field commander executing tough quick decisions & making the big sacrifices for an even bigger picture.  The recognized problem was that the quite larger picture of the world community was not in agreement with these big sacrifices.  Basing one’s ethics solely on an intention to bring about utilitarian results may result in a “mathematical equation- unilateral confidence” that flies in the face of a multilateral community of competing values: small groups can have an internally coherent world view that gives them the confidence to battle a larger community and feel that they are right; as if they were the aberrant DNA that would advance the species—yet, more often than not, the aberrant DNA leads to crippling deformity, and “bold action” leads to unintended consequences (e.g. a robust insurgency rather than some serendipity).

 

       Here is where intention, responsibility and “bold action” intertwine: the greater the boldness of your actions, the more you should be aware of possible consequences.  With socio-technical multipliers, a few people’s bold actions can reverberate far beyond their expectations with disastrous results of monumental proportions.  Attempts at Hyper-Controlling may stem from fear, anxiety, and paranoia (invoked, e.g. by terrorist acts, or feelings of being subjugated by a greater power), but on the world scene there are simply too many variables to account for, and bold acts to seize control from a centralized power focus is bound to encounter resistance, both centralized and decentralized.  I’m not suggesting in turn that those who have worked harder and legitimately to obtain their centralized power should be forced to share it (beyond taxation); but that actions of the powerful within the community should be regulated by that larger decentralized community: a bicameral view of power, with a senate/house of lords and house of representatives/house of commons.  I do recognize that some in the Znet community would say get rid of the lords/senate or even go beyond the commons/representatives and become more decentralized and proportionately democratic; but I think there is some merit in the notion of merit-proportional power accumulation and the ability to share that power (e.g. money, knowledge & connections) with loved ones—this is an issue that needs to be addressed directly by some on the left.

 

     In other words and more on point, I think Chomsky should be given credit for fostering some hesitation in foreign policy and a lack of confidence when it comes to swinging a big stick semi-blindly in a crowded room: you may not know the other people in that room, but they have their human rights too—and their own sticks.  What are Chomsky’s intentions, what are the consequences? 

 

zubub, If your president can get away lying the way he does WITHOUT any shame, why should I get ashamed of a few apostrophes? I seen a few of your stances already,it does seem that you are supporting a regime that is responsible for 95% of state-terrorism around the world.. Does your sponsoring of the murderers shame you ? jdcasten, whatever is convenient language to justfify greed..I like the content of your website but noticed a tiny flaw..You use colors upon colors and it can be difficult to read..apart from it, its very interesting...also ( you read a lot!)

Noting hypocritical uses of terms like “terror,” where definitions shift relative to “ours” or “theirs,” is relevant to other politically charged words like “torture,” and “genocide.”  Resistance to the McCain “torture-ban,” (“this ‘wimpy’ stuff happens in our boot camps”) or recognizing “genocide” as legitimating international intervention imply that politicians are not in total denial that they advocate torture, and that their international interventions are rarely or not always legitimate.  There is no global “manifest destiny” to spread “our” kind of democracy, but FDR’s lease-lend “fire-hose for a neighbor’s burning house” language soon turning to the “arsenal of democracy” language helps shape events of “biblical proportions” (like the tsunami).  Who worries about a murdered night watchman’s family’s day in international court?  Terms like “collateral damage” demonstrate intentions both to avoid murder AND avoid noting that it is “murder:” when it looks like horse-shit, smells like horse-shit, and tastes like horse-shit- to be precise, it is horse shit.

My views, etc. can be seen at my website: www.jdcasten.info

Cyrano, doesn't anything embarrass you? Frankly...

I dont know for him, Mr Chmsky is a liar but his president speak the true : BUSH CLAIM HE AVERTED ATTACK! 'cyrano knows when the president lies, president lies each time he opens his mouth' and I am disgusted. testing apostrophes... one's apostrophe is easy to write when cyrano write it,, but bwongs believe that there is an apostrophe's conspiracy.. {smirk and smile t bwong.. hmmm err i don't know...)

zubub, wasnt the pharmaceutical plant in Sudan the only drug plant in Sudan ? The US admitted the error as per the plant, why didnt they repair the [t]error?

Bwong, let's take your points one by one. First, the allegation that there has been a "humanitarian disaster" in Sudan because of the destruction of one single pharmaceutical plant is complete fantasy. Ok, if your source for this lie is not Chomsky, please provide a more reliable one. But also, feel free to use the brain that God or nature provided you. Do you think it is likely that in a country the size of Sudan, population 40 million, of course not wealthy, but with a trade surplus, including from export of crude oil, and with a robust pharmaceutical industry (tenth among its industrial sectors), that the bombing of a single pharmaceutical plant could result in "half" (Chomsky) the pharmaceutical supply being lost and a "humanitarian catatstophe"? Recall, this is a country that has waged two bloody civil wars of Arab domination, including one in the south that according to some has resulted in two million deaths, and another more recently in Darfur that has displaced some 2 million refugees. The cost of these wars has been in the billions of dollars. Do you think, in a country that size and with a GDP close to $100 billion, that if there is any serious pharmaceutical shortage the blame should rest on the destroyers of a single plant, or rather on the criminal budgeting priorities of the government? But as I say, in the absence of any plausible evidence that the destruction of the plant has led to a "humanitarian catastrophe" - it is much more likely that this is another of Chomsky's fantasies along the lines of his ongoing belief that a "genocide" was a "likely consequence" of the U.S. war against the Taliban (and many other fantasies too numerous to cite). As to the moral question, first, we still are in need of a real example in any way comparable to your imagined examples. But leaving this aside, you still misdescribe your examples. If someone attempts to target a terrorist leader and ends up killing many innocent people, it doesn't follow, as you think, that the difference between this act and the deliberate attempt to murder many innocent people is merely one of "spin". It is one of intent. Now Chomsky is right about one thing. If you KNEW that many innocent people would die as a result of your act, then morally the act might be hardly better (he claims "worse", but that could be written off as rhetoric) than the deliberate targeting of the innocent. I say "might be", because one still needs to weigh the consequences of doing the act versus the consequences of letting the terrorist leader get away. For instance, it is hardly to be doubted that the destruction of al-Qa'ida's open training camps and lethal laboratories (where they were actively working on various weapons of mass destruction) in Afghanistan has saved in the long run countless lives, despite the 3 to 4 thousand deaths during the bombing campaign and routing of the Taliban. (In fact, that number of deaths is roughly equivalent to annual deaths at the hands of the Taliban, even without calculating the tens of thousands of potential Qa'ida victims saved from poison gases and more conventional planned attacks.) So sometimes taking out a terrorist gangleader or resource network, even when other deaths are caused, is justified. But even when the number of deaths caused cannot be justified, it does not follow that the only moral difference is one of "spin". In some cases one might not have believed there would be such fatal consequences. So the deaths really might have been accidental viz a viz intentions. (Again, not because the target was a terrorist but because the deaths were not seriously predicted). True, even some terrorist acts kill more than the terrorists intended. (Not al-Qa'ida, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, or Al-Aksa Martyr's Brigade: they always intend to kill as many civilians as possible). The IRA sometimes killed more than intended. In fact so did the Sikh terrorists who took down the Air India flight. But their intentions were all to attack civilian targets, while in your imagined examples the targets were precisely terrorists. That's a difference in intent, not spin, and you don't have to be Immanuel Kant to understand that in morality intent makes all the difference in the world. (See his own examples in Section I of the Groundwork to the Metaphysics of Morals).

psss pangaea have you noticed ? there something 'wong' with bwong apostrophe,,,, Bwong agreed 100%, The US should hade remove the sanction and refund the drugs..

so please don't insult the reader's intelligence by accusing me of being a "Chomsky clone" or "Chomsky cultist" Bwong, he most be talking about me.. someone must have told him the number of Chomsky scltures in my home... the aposthrophe look ok.. what are you talking about? okay doing the apostrophe test my best friend's dog... see ? * Looks in Norway direction..

I dont have much respect for american HEROES whom highjack civilians hospitals Does anyone recall that heroic rescue of a woman from an Iraqi hospital ? The real news were there were no soldiers there and the only ones american shot at were civilians. It even tied up few injuried to their bed.. I fell off my chair when Iraqi doctors gave contradictory version to the US army.. please liberate us from false liberals and republicans.

So let us take the words of the U.S at face value and assume that the destruction of half of Sudan&undefined;s medical supply was indeed "unintended".

What did the U.S do to compensate Sudan once it discovered that it has "mistakenly" wiped out half of the latter&undefined;s drug supply? What did it do to prevent the humanitarian disaster which you don&undefined;t need to consult the Oracle of Delphi to see would inevitably follow?

Nothing apparantly.

Now the deaths that occured in Sudan because of lack of medicine did not happen immediately after the ACTUAL bombimg, --which killed one as you correctly pointed out. These happened over several years AFTER the U.S has realized it has made the mistake, and therefore could have taken steps to prevent. But instead it sat and watched the Sudanese died in agony and in large number.

Even if I accept that the ACTUAL bombing was a mistake, the inescapable conlcusion is still that the massive deaths which followed were anticipated if not actually inteneded. There were plenty of opportunities for the U.S to rectify its "mistake" if it sincerly believed its own spins but it hadn&undefined;t.

Your way of thinking is quite clear based on your posts here and on other blogs.

Say if someone blows up a flight full of civilians to make a point it&undefined;s terrorism, but if the same guy blows up the same flight but claims that he does so only to kill  a mass murderer onboard  it is an "accident" because the deaths of all the non mass muderers are "unintended"(even though in your universe apparantly the family of the mass murderes are fair game, see your long post on Liela&undefined;s blog)

So It all boils down to whether one can come up with a good spin. Maybe Hamas should seriously consider hiring an expensive PR firm.

BTW, I have only read a few essays by Chomsky but never read a complete book by him. I never quote Chomsky in my arguments so please don&undefined;t insult the reader&undefined;s intelligence by accusing me of being a "Chomsky clone" or "Chomsky cultist".

To all :

Don&undefined;t know why the "aphostrophe" comes out as "undefined". Any advice?

Zubub, you right there is no comparison to be made, the l-Shifa bombing is actually worst than the WTC bombings because Sudan was already under economics sanctions from the US (sanctions were no drugs for sudanese) Clinton just wanted to make sure the sanctions wer going to be costly, eg that sudanese were going to die.. sanctions are a form of terrorism, look what the US is trying to do after hamas got elected.. it wnats to cut any for of legitimate aid to the palestinians..The US want to starve the palestinians population. I just fell on an article a memo from Bush to Blair, they were ordering the bombing of Al-Jazeera tv station in Iraq.. The US zubub is a terrorist state, look at Vietnam it used NAPALM on civilian population, it used agent orange on half of Vietnam farm land and at least 1 million people died from this 'contamination" during the past 30 years, even to this day vietnamese still suffer birth malformation due to the poisons. Chomsky never trew a bomb, he just tell you his opinion.. if you dont like it ,look the other way.. You cry for WTC, my personal opinion is that you got lucky you didnt get worst..its my opinion, don't like it ? look the other way..

Actually it is you, Mondo, who seems in dire need of a reading comprehension lesson, although I readily agree that the real problem is much more likely your cult-like adulation of Chomsky and consequent presumption that everything he says makes sense. I am perfectly aware, as my posting showed, of what Chomsky is comparing, while you failed to grasp it; I'll charitably assume your own reaction was "knee-jerk", i.e. the knee-jerk reaction so typical on this site of cult-members to any criticism of their guru. Chomsky makes two comparisons. One is between a hypothetical al-Qa'ida bombing destroying half the pharmaceutical supply of a country WITH THE ACTUAL BOMBING OF AL-SHIFA IN SUDAN, the other with the ACTUAL bombing of the WTC by al-Qa'ida MODIFIED BY AN IMAGINED OR HYPOTHETICAL ELEMENT of their declaration of non-intent to harm civilians WITH (AGAIN) THE ACTUAL BOMBING AND JUSTIFICATION OF AL-SHIFA IN SUDAN. It is you, Mondo, who fail to grasp Chomsky's point: that the ACTUAL bombing of al-Shifa and its justification, which is one side of each of his two comparisons, was an outrageously immoral act, and that the imagined justification of the WTC bombing "reaches the level of plausibility of apologetics for the (actual) al-Shifa bombing." Chomsky's point is absolutely clear: that the bombing of the al-Shifa pharmaceutical company was an appalling terrorist act. If you don't understand that that is the point, you really don't understand anything. His hypothetical case of al-Qa'ida destroying half the pharmaceutical supply of a country and then saying they didn't mean to harm anyone is supposed to be an exact parallel to what the U.S. ACTUALLY did in Sudan. And that is ludicrous. Both comparisons are ludicrous for reasons that I said. The half-supply example is ludicrous because the U.S. didn't destroy half the pharmaceutical supply of Sudan (and if a single plant constituted half the supply, it would demonstrate only the murderous callousness of the Sudanese government, which spends hundreds of millions of dollars per year committing genocide in Darfur and until recently against the Christians and animists in the south). The WTC attack example is ludicrous because it is patently obvious that when you destroy a twin tower office building of that size, especially during the day when it is most likely to be filled with people, your actual intention is to kill as many people as possible. That's the whole point of Chomsky's example - that's why he concludes rhetorically: "Would we even bother to laugh?" (at the imagined declaration of not wanting to harm civilians). The point is that it is obvious that they had committed an attack that would harm thousands of civilians, just as it's supposed to be obvious (except to those like myself indoctrinated by the American-Stalinist system of propaganda) that the actual U.S. bombing of al-Shifa was either intended to harm thousands or known in advance to have that result. And once again, this is ludicrous, except to a Chomsky cultist.

Well, the sustainer forum system is where the polite, supportive talk takes place, and where Chomsky actually reads questions in his forum (they are forwarded to him, and he's been responding every week or so for many years (over ten, I think).  The blogs are open to the public for now, so this is what we get.

This post is easily coupled with the recent about definitions of terrorism. There is one definition of terrorism against the West, and one against the Rest. The former we decide at will, the latter doesn't exist, according to the West. The greatest form of terrorism/aggression/atrocities - invading and occupying a non-threatening and defenseless country - doesn't even qualify as terrorism. While the recent attack on Norwegian and Danish embassies in the Arab world, are called "acts of war" with a straight face. The double-standards are mind-blowing! Fair enough, it hasn't been called terrorism yet, but I won't be surprised if it happens. Then on the other hand, western politicians and intellectuals have a really hard time calling the Iraq war a war. They often call it a "conflict", "intervention", "doing a job" and so forth. But when two rival football teams meet, for instance, the media are very quick to call it "war" and "battle of britain" etc. It's Orwellian language of the highest degree. The reason is probably the tabloids' need for sensationalism to sell more papers, but it could also be seen as a campaign to "water down" the meaning and feelings around the word "war".

may be zubub could tell me how many people died because of a lack of pharmaceutical drugs.. guess what it is sudan, they are muslim som who cares how many have died..it did possibly kill more than there were in WTC.. The US is not there to make the bodies count.. look the santions on Iran killed about 1000000 people including 500.000 kids.. who knows The US probably intended to kill 2 million. If you compare Bin Laden and WTC , Bin Laden is way less a mass murderer than Georges Bush

As someone new to Z-net... I'm amazed by the number of narrow minded, knee jerk attacks on many of the Bloggers entries, Particularly Mr Chomskys.

 At the top of the screen it reads:-

"A community of People Committed to Social Change"

 

 Many of these "contributers" display quite primitive debating skills.

 Perhaps a cry for help, rather than a real grievance with whats been written.

 

 

 

 

I think you need to learn to read. Chomsky isn't comparing the al-Sifa bombing to the WTC attack. He is comparing it to a hypothetical case  where half of the US pharmaceutical supply was destroyed.

Chomsky does mention the WTC but only in regards to excuse making and the absurdity of such statements.

 The problem I encounter with most of Chomsky's critics such as yourself is that you simply fail basic reading comprehension, over and over. While initially amusing, it becomes tiresome to encounter these knee jerk, quasi-literate posts.

 

The absurdity of Chomsky's new piece outdoes even his normal fare. That the bombing of a single pharmaceutical plant, at a time the building was empty, because it was believed to be involved in the manufacture of biological weapons, could be considered at the same "level of plausibility" as an imagined claim by WTC attackers that they had no intention of harming anyone is so incredibly stupid that only the most hard-bitten cult members and Chomsky-clones will be able to swallow this one. The purpose of the al-Shifa bombing was to get rid of a putative biological weapons plant. It was done at a time when no workers were in the building. A single nightwatchman was unfortunately killed. The attack on the WTC was planned and designed to kill as many people as possible, just as Hamas and Islamic Jihad pack their bombs that they explode in buses and shopping malls with nails and broken glass in order to kill and maim as many civilians as possible. Only a deranged mind could see the plausibility of the imagined WTC apology as equivalent in plausibility to the Clinton regime's justification of its attack. Nor did the attack destroy "half" the pharmaceutical products of Sudan. As far as anyone knows, one person died as a result of the attack, and that death was unintended, compared to approximately 3,000 dead in the WTC attack, which was undoubtedly much less than the perpetrators had wished. Sad, miserable, juvenile anti-U.S. propaganda that deflects attention from the cogent criticism that could be made of some U.S. policies, and has been made by rational commentators.

he US recognized their [t]error... fritzbuster I dont like your analogy too much. With this excuse, If anyone not liking the US policies, would legitimate itself for preventive attacks against further US terrorists attacks.. Someone could bomb Washington, the White House and claim the place was packed with infected american terrorists.. I should welcome the excuse on the mere ground that the US own the terrorist patent.. If I recall, Clinto was saying that there manufacturing chemecal weapons there..not biological weapons..

The US recognized their [t]error... fritzbuster I dont like your analogy too much. If anyone not liking the US policies could legitimate itself against further act of [t]error.. Someone could bomb Washington, the White House and claim the place was pact with infected american terrorists..

Suppose we decide that the Clinton bombers had no specific intent to harm civilians [in the Sudan], though of course they knew that the effects would be very severe.  That puts them at even a lower moral level than the major international terrorists.  It means they are treating people rather as we treat ants when we take a walk.  We don't intend to kill them.  It's just that they mean so little to us that we don't even consider the matter.

Just to play devil's advocate, I need to put this out there: One possible apologia for distinguishing the al-Shifa bombing and the trampling on of ants would be one of utilitarian concerns: While most of us pay no mind to the fact that we step on ants every once and awhile as we walk and accept their deaths out of lack of empathy for them, that we also accept the deaths epiphenomenal to the bombing of a factory alleged to house a biological-weapons-manufacturing operation does not necessarily allude to a similar lack of empathy on account of the possible alternative situation that must be avoided that would result in an even greater amount of deaths, namely that situation in which the weapons thought to have been produced in the factory are used on a very sizable population. 

I would figure that the best way to handle an argument of the above sort would be to question the quality and quantity of evidence gathered before the al-Shifa disaster for there being a strong likelihood of biological weapons being used with devastating destructiveness as the consequence of inaction.