Submitted by philiplisagor(United States), May 13, 2005 at 18:12
Having recently returned from Iraq as a service member, and having been involved in the care of victims on 9/11, I have finally articulated to myself what the correct response would have been, given that the perpetrators of 9/11 were nearly all Saudis and all were under the influence of the Wahhabist philosophy and financially supported schools of ant-westernism. Clearly Iraq and Saddam weren't the correct target for this, they may have represented a chance to mobilize anti-westerners and kill them in Iraq, but but the Iraqis weren't connected to 9/11. No, we should have placed a large joint force in Saudi Arabia, placed the Royal Family under some sort of house arrest and told them we staying there until they corrected the role of the extremists and ended the financing of this. I doubt they would have blown up their oilfields, after all, this is their primary chow trough. No, they would have done this bidding and we could have left. They would not have been able to marshal much of a resistance, and indeed, maybe their citizenry would have welcomed a 'liberation.' No matter what happens in Iraq, this action is now overdue in Saudi Arabia. So far we seem to be delivering the Middle East into the hands of the Shiites and not dealing with the issues emaniting from Saudi Arabia.
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