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>As for the Republican Guard, I've seen the story of how the national museum was looted (and this was a place where the world's heritage from pre-Greek cultures was kept) went pretty much undisturbed. US troops actually refused to protect the place. If you don't trust my memory, search the BBC archives.
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The difference is the museum in Baghdad was looted by Iraqis, not American troops. Kuwait was also looted by Iraqis, when they were the invaders. I think the museums should have been protected. But I also think the Iraqis behaved rather badly. Iraqis should have protected the museum and a lot of the rest of the infrastructure. It was quickly obvious the big danger was not from us.

>>The truth will be known in time, but I am suspect of spin and political agendas. I am a especially suspicious of people who cut off the heads of innocents on video, and of their aplogists. That's not the 'Iraqi Resistance'. Al Zarqowi is a Jordanian thug.
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>I've heard some comments that these beheadings actually cost fewer lives than other attempts of whoever was behind these tapes to get their word heard.
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It is still barbarism.

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>History may show that Saddam wasn't so bad, specially in the beginning when he was a marionette of the West. If I recall well, he was a renegade CIA trainee, set in position by CIA, and played nice for a while. But then he decided the oil belongs to Iraq... and felt he's got all the dictator's prerogatives as well.

This is completely wrong. Saddam was hitman for the Baathists in the 50s. He later assassinated one of his mentors and took power (1968) He played the cold war game - ala Nassar - but over the years got far more aid from Russia and France than from the U.S. Jacques Chirac gave him a nuclear reactor, with little thought for the consequences. Fortunatly the Israelis thought through the implications and did not share your view that 'saddam wasn't so bad' I think it is safe to say a Saddam with a bomb around the time he invaded Kuwait would not have been a good thing. It would have unquestionably meant nuclear war in the mid-east.

>I'm not surprised that Uday turned the way he did, these guys were the best of the worst of royal tradition of the Old World. Compare Uday with Ceausescu's son, and you get pretty much the same picture, the spoiled sadistic son of a dictator who kills for pleasure or just uses his power any way he likes.
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Being mentioned in the same sentence with Cauesescu is not exactly a character reference <g>

>The court-martialed guys got one year... I don't know much about American legal system, but I do watch "Law & Order" regularly, and I hear "15 to life", "20 to life", "25 to life" at least twice a week. Are these guys on TV totally off the mark?

The guy who actually killed a prisoner got 20 to life. The people who took pictures of them naked and humiliated them got much less.

I wonder what they did to prisoners at Abu Ghareb when Saddam's people ran it? I would imagine the prisoners with the best stories are dead.

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>As far as mentioning the Jews go, I have a lot of historical reasons to be on their sides. Our ancestors were roommates in several heavily populated (and rapidly depopulated) concentration camps. Zionism however... again, I tend to distinguish the people from powers-that-be.
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>>The site Terry linked has a pretty obvious bias. I also suspect spin, of course, in any U.S. Military press briefing. I feel better about the embedded reporters, but still consider that in battle very few people have the whole picture, however well-intentioned.
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>I think such texts deserve to exist. What if it is a real whistle-blower? It's a call for attention to what is going on.
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You do know, though, that many of the 'anit-zionist' websites have re-published The Protocols of the Elders of Zion

I was tempted to point Terry at it just to get him all excited, but that would be taking advantage of his less than solid command of history. <g>

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>The Kurd question is very interesting to keep track of... I got a feeling this nation will get screwed all over again, simply because half of them are in Turkey, and Turkey is a member of which soccer league?

It is indeed very interesting. In my first overseas job I once found myself in a Kurdish camp on the Syrian border with some sheep smugglers who wanted to take me to Damascus. This particular group of guys looked like Pancho Villa style bandits - lots of horese and guns and bandoliers and big moustaches and all. I was 22 and felt like Lawrence of Arabia <s> We got very drunk on date wine and I spent the evening sitting on my left hand so I would not inadvertantly use it ( I am left handed ) to dip into the communal cooking pot ( I had been assured by a friend that if I did so they would kill me )

I rather liked the Kurds, but since most of my friends were Turks, it was my first lesson in one man's terrorist being another mans freedom fighter - and also realizing that sometimes a bandit and a killer is just that. I find lots of things romantic - it is my nature - but being very cynical allowed me to survive my youth. <s>