Quote Originally Posted by fishman3811
Rusty what i would like to know is given the circumstances of 9/11 why was Iraq invaded instead of Saudi Arabia and why Americans are not asking that same question.
Actually, Afghanistan was attacked as a direct result of 9/11.

But two different circumstances.

Regarding Saudi Arabia...Osama attacked us, not the Saudi's. Osama is a Saudi dissident, as were a good majority of his supporters. Since he (Osama) was based at the time in Afghanistan, and the Taliban refused to cooperate, and turn him over, they paid the price. The bulk of the higher-ups in the Saudi royal family are more moderate. (more of a pro-western philosophy) The others in this family of hundreds, have enough money to play the other side of the coin, and support strict sharia law, the hardcore madrasa's, and Al Qaeda. Their own form of the first ammendment, I guess.

On Al Qaeda:
"The organization's primary goal is the overthrow of what it sees as the corrupt and heretical governments of Muslim states, and their replacement with the rule of Sharia (Islamic law). Al-Qaida is intensely anti-Western, and views the United States in particular as the prime enemy of Islam. Bin Ladin has issued three "fatwahs" or religious rulings calling upon Muslims to take up arms against the United States. (see Bin Ladinâ??s Declaration of War).

1) Attempts to radicalize existing Islamic groups and create Islamic groups where none exist.
2) Advocates destruction of the United States, which is seen as the chief obstacle to reform in Muslim societies.
3) Supports Muslim fighters in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bosnia, Chechnya, Eritera, Kosova, Pakistan, Somalia, Tajikistan and Yemen"
Al-Qa'ida (the Base)

On Bin Laden:
"Bin Laden also studied with radical Islamic thinkers and may have already been organizing al-Qaeda when Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990. Bin Laden was outraged when the government allowed U.S. troops to be stationed in Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam. In 1991 he was expelled from Saudi Arabia for anti-government activities."
Al-Qaeda — Infoplease.com

Osama Bin Laden was rich and pissed at his government, our government, the Russians, Ghandi... He was starting a revolutionary force, made-up of former fighters from the Afghanistan/Soviet war, and religious zealots willing to follow him. His actions were drawing the attention of his government (the government that he was attacking) and instead of detaining this son of a wealthy construction conglomeration owner, they booted him out of the country.

Regarding Iraq...The common belief at the time was that Saddam was restarting his nuke program. A belief propogated by Saddam himself, in an effort to raise his appearance of leathality, to his hostile neighbors. This, plus his continued support of homicide bombings in Israel (he was openly giving around $10,000.00 to every one of the families of the palestinian homicide bombers) and his openly hostile stances tword the world community, hooked-up with his refusal to allow the UN inspections, ignoring sanctions, and the Oil for Food scam...it was his turn to go. (ok...oil for food came later, lol)

HTH...Rusty
Rusty Trichome Reviewed by Rusty Trichome on . Saudi Arabia is prime source of terror funds, U.S. says WASHINGTON â?? Saudi Arabia remains the world's leading source of money for Al Qaeda and other extremist networks and has failed to take key steps requested by U.S. officials to stem the flow, the Bush administration's top financial counter-terrorism official said Tuesday. Stuart A. Levey, a Treasury undersecretary, told a Senate committee that the Saudi government had not taken important steps to go after those who finance terrorist organizations or to prevent wealthy donors from Rating: 5