Murdered G.I.s may have died for a lie

NY Daily News ^ | November 25, 2003 | Richard Cohen

[presidio9]

The Republican National Committee - and, by implication, the White House - is running a TV commercial defending President Bush's handling of the Iraq War, saying Democrats are attacking him "for attacking the terrorists." Not really. It's for doing such a bad job of it. This despicable attempt to muffle criticism by throwing the flag over it may or may not work. But it does not change the fact that America went into Iraq for reasons that now appear specious and so distantly related to the war on terrorism that the connection seems merely rhetorical. Saddam Hussein lives, and Osama Bin Laden lives. And yet, somehow, the Bush White House wants nothing but congratulations.

Excerpt

[MarkL]

I stood behind the President on the war in Iraq but the reasons given for DO seem to be false. We all mocked the UN inspectors for searching with their eyes closed. Now American inspectors are on the ground, presumably with eyes open, and they have yet to find any WMDs. They have found evidence of WMD programs and even evidence of a coverup operation for WMDs but not the items themsleves.

Don't forget that while the inspectors were in Iraq, they were barred from a number of locations, giving the Iraqis a chance to "clean up."

On the other hand, Iraq had 8 months to move the WMDs and evidence out of sight, as the buildup to the war ran on and on... There's a lot of speculation that much of the actual WMDs wound up in the Bekka valley.

Mark

[marblehead17]

Thanks. I am fairly new and am used to the barf alert. I jumped to soon. Should have looked to see how long you've been around.

[JoJo Gunn]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A45080-2001Nov5&notFound=true

[Southack]

"If someone can explain a third option I will be happy to listen. Please, don't say we did it for the Iraqis because that would be the worst possible reason for us to go to war. War is, and should be, a pragmatic business."

The mastermind of the 1993 WTC bombing was caught by NYC police, then released for "cooperating" with the federal investigation that followed. Upon his release, he fled back to Iraq, where we later learned that he was an Iraqi agent. It was around this time that Hussein also tried to assassinate the first President Bush during his visit to Kuwait.

After the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq signed a surrender agreement that mandated that it *prove* that it destroyed all of its admitted WMD programs. In those surrender documents, Hussein admitted having a nuclear, a chemical, and a very large biological WMD program.

The UN inspectors were sent to Iraq to do that very thing: inspect. Note: those inspectors weren't sent to be detectives. They were sent to inspect and verify Iraq's claims of destruction for its 1991-era WMD programs and arsenals.

By 1998, Iraq had grown so bold as to throw out even the UN inspectors. At this point, no evidence of the destruction of those admitted WMD programs had been shown.

Following the Intifada in Israel, Hussein began paying the families of Palestian suicide bombers a $20,000 reward.

After 9/11/2001, the sum of the above was clearly more than could be tolerated by the civilized world. Hussein's direct, proven involvement in the 1993 WTC bombing, plus Hussein's payments to the families of Palestinian terrorists in Israel, combined with Iraq's failure to prove that it had complied with its 1991 surrender treaty agreement was simply too much to permit to go on.

The left-wing news media, however, was able to successfully spin all of the above as being solely about WMD's. Due to this propaganda, the public perception became such that the UN inspectors were supposed to play detectives, and that if they couldn't find WMD's, then there wouldn't be a reason to invade Iraq.

Fortunately, President Bush wasn't swayed by this propaganda. Hussein is now no longer in a position, thanks to Bush, of being able to use the annual oil revenue of the Middle-East's second largest oil exporter to continue to fund terrorists in Palestinian areas, much less to fund speculative WMD research and development programs at large.

[stands2reason]

Run your cursor over the screen name of the poster and you can see the date he/she signed up.

And what does the signup date have to do with anything?

[stylin_geek]

Excellent Fisk, well done. I might add, I don't think the case was ever made that Saddam had WMD, the case was "do we dare wait until he gets them." The obvious answer was "no."

[stands2reason]

The writer is correct about certain attempts to stifle dissent

Bullskite.

[Admin Moderator]

The author, Richard Cohen, writes for Washington Post.

[presidio9]

BTW, I am a big fan of the Hate Crime Helper linked to your web page.

[CedarDave]

I think the third option could be that there was a deliberate attempt by Saddam Hussein to exaggerate his WMD programs (which were real but overrated) in order to intimidate his enemies and gain respect in the Arab world.

If this is indeed the truth about his WMDs, the entire intelligence network of the western world was suckered in. If so, it shows how adept Iraq's double agents were at spreading lies that our intelligence agencies were only to happy to embrace. And why not; Saddam used these weapons against his own people so we knew he had them. However, I'm not quite ready to accept this explanation. After all, he had at least since the late summer of 2002 to prepare for the US invasion and to move, bury and destroy the weapons.

[presidio9]

And what does the signup date have to do with anything?

When we're talking about FRettiquete?

[presidio9]

The author, Richard Cohen, writes for Washington Post.

Forgot. The article was in the Daily News, but Cohen is syndicated out of Washington...

[stands2reason]

Huh?

[marblehead17]

Thanks for the link. What planet is this idiot from. Oh, The Washington Post.

[saminfl]

I just drove back to Florida from Salt Lake City. I spent the first night of the trip in Durango Colorado. I thought Durango was a beautiful place. In the parking lot of the hotel where I stayed was a car with a bumper sticker that said, "When Clinton lied, nobody died." I thought two things; Durango may not be as beautiful as I thought, and is this going to be the new DNC mantra? Maybe this piece by Cohen is part of that.

[CedarDave]

The author, Richard Cohen, writes for Washington Post.

My question in post number 22 has now been answered.

[Wondervixen]

Marblehead, don't go condemning the messenger who posted this. He's just allerting us to the absurdity of a leftist author. Attack the bastard (Cohen) who penned this crap in the first place.

[netmilsmom]

>>Run your cursor over the screen name of the poster and you can see the date he/she signed up.

And what does the signup date have to do with anything?<<

This is just my experience and perhaps I am wrong but if someone signed up in the last week and has posted something I do not like, I am more open to saying they should depart.

If someone has been been here for a while, I will not do that.

[FormerLib]

Sarge, now if we could just work it out that Dickie here had to walk past you each morning on his way to his office.

[marblehead17]

I realize that now and have apologized. My mistake