Well theres over a billion population in China and as the Soviets used to say 'quantity has a quality all of its own'! :huh:

Would the US be able to project enough force across the Pacific to China? Unless maybe Russia decided to settle some old scores and allowed a US a presence in Siberia? :hmm:

Could be nasty could well go nuclear.

I don't think Bush Sr. chickened out really. I think he saw Saddam keeping the lid on things in Iraq and knew what kind of war would ensue if he pursued him. "Better the devil you know" I think he said. Besides, Desert Shield was over so fast the politicians didn't get a chance to screw things up.
I think the other factor was that we were supposed to push Saddam back out of Kuwait, and we did that successfully. It might have been much more difficult to prosecute the war further AFTER the initial goal had been met.

I'm pretty sure we'll be there for awhile regardless... We're committed.

The reason the UN has no 'teeth' is that it relies the strength and help of the nations that form it. On its own the UN is just a talking shop. Unless its backed by powerful nations, principaly the US, if the US chooses to ignore the UN then there is little it can do.

Nah, I doubt that right now we can even project enough force into Mexico and stop unarmed illegal immigrants... ;)

DeepIron there would actually have been a precident for going beyond the initial UN mandate of expelling Saddam from Kuwait. During the Korean War after UN forces had driven North Korean forces out of South Korea they continued over the 38th Parallel and attempted to remove the Communist regime from power. This policy was known as 'Roll Back'.

However, it proved problematic and after initial success it triggered Chinese intervention.

I don't think it was cowardice that stopped Bush's hand in Iraq but a realisation of what may well happen if US troops attemped to invade and occupy Iraq. Ultimately Bush chose stabilty and containment over removing Saddam and wisely so IMO. But his later abandonment of the Kurdish and Shia uprisings is more controversial.

Also, while it is trendy to badmouth the UN, please realize that its very structure is designed so that a few (5) countries can stop any actions by the UN.

It is comical to hear people bitch that the UN has not teeth and why can't the UN force countries to change, but what happens when the UN rules against the United States? We are the first ones to whine about sovereignty when the UN rules against us.

But when other countries claim sovereignty, it is "different". Double standards :nope:

In order to fix the UNSC the first step is to get rid of the blatantly undemocratic single veto vote rule. Equality has never been a part of the UNSC.

No wonder the other countries ignore the UNSC. It is just the stooge of the big five.

Theres another example of when we should have kept pushing on but "couldn't be arsed" to finish the job. More tension has remained from halting a rolling ball than actually finishing the job. Its like starting a book, but only reading half way. Cyprus again, we could and should have thrown the turks out. I mean if Germany invaded France tomorrow I doubt they would let them get halfway to paris before saying "bugger this, you can have that chunk of our country" :damn: :damn: :damn:. Of course Cyprus is such a small place it doesn't matter what happens there :nope:...

The UNSC is a useless piece of red tape. X and Y can't do this because Z veto'd it. Its just a constant rambling debate which can and never will reach a unaminous conclusion because of the countries in it. For instance China would automatically veto any action against north korea... Russia will veto any action against Iran because they won't be able to sell them arms... see the situation. The UN is a waste of space until its reorganized and given teeth to put the "big five" into their places.

Nope, they don't have the necessary numbers of ICBM's to do it. And the ones they do have in operational service are vulnerable. The USA does have over 840 warheads available in the Pacific alone on top of SLBM's. This doesn't count any heavy bomber aircraft or land-based systems. Nor does it count tactical nukes, re-established capabilities, or East Coast SSBN's. Despite the fact that the Chinese got more capability during the Clinton Administration to help the accuracy of their missiles, I still do not believe they would be adequate enough to harm more than a handful of cities. Not to mention the US's limited yet growing ABM capabilities. China's true power is way overhyped. They don't have enough nuke subs, no intercontinental bombers, no nuclear triad deterrance capabilites, small to non-existent net-centric warfare systems in place, little to no early warning capabilities, small and very vulnerable sea-lift capabilities, little airlift capabilities, crappy and vulnerable bases on their East coast, and no real abilities to protect their sea lanes from US naval forces. That's just for starters. Let's not mention the fact that they need trade with the West to assure their own economic stability. Not only can we deploy across the Pacific to take on China, we're already in the WestPac operating today. Not to mention we have bases in the Indian Ocean, ME, and land bases in the Western Pacific from where we could take on China. Not to mention that China would have to attack 5 different countries to target our forces. Chiina would have to set itself as the enemy of all these nations to go to war against us geopolitically. I don't think alot of people understand just how truly limited China is in her options. Even though her power grew with help from the Clinton Democrats, we have also increased our own capabilities to ward against those offsets. And continue to do so. China would never lob a few nukes at us, when we could turn around with thousands of warheads within 30 minutes. And with ABM, they wouldn't know how succesful any of theirs would be. That throws a monkey wrench in their whole game plan. They have no such defense against a Trident II-D5. ;)

I absolutely agree with you on both points MB. No cowardice at all. I think the elder Bush saw more of the potential consequences and made a "difficult" and unpopular decision. Schwartzkopf wanted to keep going but was denied that course of action. What sucked was that the US had "promoted" the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and then backed out of supporting Iraqis who would have perhaps tried...

I think we are forgetting the massed numbers of Chinese built aircraft, like the new J-10 coupled with their anti-stip missiles i.e sunburn would have a pretty devastating effect on US forces in a conventional war, unless the AEGIS anti-air system wipes the floor of the Chinese airforce they are a very potent threat within their own sphere of influecen. I do however agree with you on the over hyped threat posed to the mainland United States, its not as great as the Bush administration claims. I'd be crapping myself if I were in Taiwan though, all that force bearing down on you must be quite intimidating.

Think you are misundrerstanding what the UN's purpose is and its not putting the world to rights. Its purpose is to prevent another world war which it has done. Agreed its not ideal but the whole point of the veto is to prevent the UN being manopolised by any single country or power block.

And BTW thats a hell of a lot of wars you're advocating there Steel_Tomb. :hmm:

They have a small number of around 100 J-10's. And that's early gen 4 in capability. And right now, they have no inter-continental heavy bombers at all. And Sovremenny and other surface ships cannot hide so easily from things like Hawkeye radar, or E-3. Has anybody even considered the option of mining China inside the first island chain before hostilities even break out? Don't you think that has been considered? ;) Fighting China would be much different than fighting in Iraq against insurgents. I believe we would be much more brutal in application, and would have to be less worried about civilian casualties. A war like that would be unlike anything you have ever seen, and would probably be over very quickly. And no, China doesn't have the capabilities to overcome if we totally let it all hang out if you get my drift.

Wars or diplomating crisis's that wouldn't be nessecary if the UN had finished the job properly the first time. I'm not a warmounger, I don't like war... but its the fact that the world has been left to get so messed up by sitting on issues instead of sorting them out that gets me angry.

Im not answering this poll, but i will state my feelings.

I tend to take the Grunts eye view of things. Knowing what i do about NBC warfare from training in the service - if the intellgience reports were correct - if Saddam had the stuff and intended to use it and/or sell it to people who would use it against us ; i dont see what choice we had. We coudlnt afford NOT to act.

However the intelligence was faulty. So not only did we f**k up, but we also destabalized the region. This is THE debacle of the 21st century, bar none. The only thing i wonder, is if the intelligence is genuinly mistaken, or if someone, somewhere, knew there was not much to go on, so they embellished the intelligence reports to fabricate a pretense when there wasn't one. In short, I wonder if i was lied to or not.

You really are a piece of work DeepIron.