Riddle me this....

[gatorboy]

The amount of suicide bombers in Iraq right now is staggering.
But what I want to know is, if things were so bad in Iraq before we charged in to "liberate them", why did they just now decide to do this? Why wasn't this a problem before?

I mean if it was such an oppressed society during Saddam's reign you'd think there would've been suicide bombers left and right to fight the tyranny. What was there to lose? Saddam couldn't very well torture their remains after the fact. And it couldn't have been cause they were afraid of Saddam bringing down vengeance on their loved ones left behind. Palestinians have been doing it for years in Isreal knowing full well what the consequences could be for their families if found out.

Yet you heard nothing about this in Iraq previously. But suddenly suicide bombers are flying in because they hate freedom? Please.

Yes, Saddam was a bad guy, but the people of Iraq didn't feel the need to take their own lives in protest as they do now.

[xray s]

1. easy answer

Saddam had all the high explosive stuff under lock and key, heavily guarded.

When we came in Rummy the Dummy didn't plan on guarding those stockpliles, so the stuff got looted and is now in the hands of those blowing everything to pieces.

Another fine mess Bush has gotten us into.

[HuskiesHowls]

2. Because before they used to live in cities,

with running water, and electric lights, a secular dictator, and streets that weren't full of bomb craters, and they didn't have unexploded munitions all over the place, and depleted uranium helping them to glow at night.....

Maybe because they didn't have * telling them how great life is??

[babylonsister]

3. They are fighting US!

Whoever thought they could get rid of Saddam with nary a problem, without repercussions, including the innocent people involved, were delusional.
Give me a break. Look at Israel and their ongoing fight.
Our gov't FUCKED UP! They bit off more than they can chew, and it WILL eventually bite them in the ass!
Having read that as a self-imposed optimist, that scares me!

[Fridays Child]

4. Because Saddam tamed them with the magic trick of staring into...

...all their yellow eyes without blinking once and they were frightened and called him the most wild thing of all and made him king of all the wild things.

[uppityperson]

5. Very good.

[applegrove]

6. Because under Saddam if you were caught - 100 of your relatives

would be punished.

In a sense - they are freer. And influenced by experienced Islamist doctrine on how to turn someone religious or depressed into a bomber. I would love to know the age of the average bomber. In Palestine & Israel it was very, very young. So young the kids really had no understanding of what life was about - or what it could be.

Saddam Hussein did fund the families of the suicide bombers in Israel. He gave many of their families $25,000 dollars for each Martyr.

In a sense - someone like Saddam has bigger 'carrots' & 'sticks' because he has no basis in any sort of morality. And American soldiers do.

[Old and In the Way]

7. Because, they hate us for their freedoms.

Actually, I think the Iraqi's are deeply and truely screwed. Iraq has been turned into the 80's equivalent of Afghanistan....a lightening rod for a cultural war pitting radical Islam vs. the Godless West. George must have been busy playing in the snow when that war was being fought.