Because it will give the idiots, the zelots, and the extremists another piece of ammunition to use against both the United States and Israel.

What do you think is going to happen when the first Golan armoured vehicle rolls over a civilian? Or busts through the wall of a civilian house? The extremists are not gonna give [much of a] rats ass who was driving it or what flag was painted on the side of it are they?

Why give them more propaganda tools?

If logic and pragmatism played any part in politics we’d be living in a far different world, and whether or not the extremists actually need any more propaganda tools or not is completely irrelevant - do you think they’ll turn down any new ones left at their door step?

The Iraq war has been a balls up since day one, pouring any amount of fuel on any of the fires that are burning there is both stupid and short sighted.

If logic and pragmatism played any part in politics we’d be living in a far different world, and whether or not the extremists actually need any more propaganda tools or not is completely irrelevant - do you think they’ll turn down any new ones left at their door step?

Balls. What would be short sighted would be buying ineffective equipment. We need to provide our troops with the best equipment we can, and get them out of there as soon as possible. The Iraqis aren’t going to like us no matter who we buy equipment from.

It would be just as irrational to say we shouldn’t buy the safety exit equipment (link below) for use in NYC buildings, because Moslems might be offended. It also might be Moslems that are saved by it. If they’re offended, they can stay in the burning building and take their chances. I’ll bet every Moslem in a burning building would suddenly forget that Israel was the manufacturer and jump on this baby.

http://www.israel21c.org/bin/en.jsp?enDispWho=Articles%5El1573&enPage=BlankPage&enDisplay=view&enDispWhat=object&enVersion=0&enZone=Technology

Jon,

I agree, I did not express myself well.

I meant that it is impossible to anticipate what unreasonable propaganda tool crazies like Al-Qaeda will choose, so it is pointless “self-censuring” yourself. You’ll be risking doing what Al-Qaeda wants you to do at all times, but they will still think of something and you might as well just make the right decision based on other factors. Of course it’s good to know your enemy and decisions should be based on that knowledge.

The war against Saddam’s Iraq was won a long time ago.

Now the US found itself in the middle of a civil war, which is nothing like the original conflict. Was the civil war unavoidable? I don’t know. Everyone is a stategist watching battle from the distance and after the fact.

You may be right that the US isn’t able to stop the bloodshed and should pull out. The trouble is that a) the bloodshed will intenstify and b) Iran and Syria may move in.