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

[xzins]

Feith Memo


It blows the president lied propaganda out of the water!

Al Qaeda operated with Iraqi complicity.....THAT WAS the issue!

[Saints fan]

<> <> -------- I agree. I was a regular lurker on this site long before I signed up. I have never started a thread or posted a picture, but I visit FR everyday.

[Denver Ditdat]

Great comeback bumper stickers! (Before you print them up, though, the Cole's dead were sailors. Soldiers are Army.)

[lentulusgracchus]

There'd be no talk of "illegitimacy" if this was a Democrat Party action, like Vietnam, for example.

Nonstatist is correct. No such criteria were applied to Clinton's actions (except by John McLaughlin and Pat Buchanan, who were relying on Catholic concepts of "just war"), and none were applied to Kennedy's or Johnson's actions in Vietnam, except by Communists and KGB assets, until SDS-related groups (and Clinton was a member of SDS) began agitating against the war among potential draftees and their parents.

Furthermore, given that spotting the other fellow the first clean shot means thousands, perhaps millions, of deaths among your own people, a morally responsible president will not wait for such an attack to be delivered. He will instead, as Bush 43 has done with Iraq, apply the Mahan Doctrine (dating from Theodore Roosevelt's administration) and engage the enemies of the United States preemptively, and at the greatest practicable distance from the shores of the United States.

The Royal Navy was about protecting the sealanes and British commerce. The German Navy, in both World Wars, was a raiding navy, as was the U.S. Navy before 1904: the Great White Fleet included commerce raiders, a fact now little known. The French Navy has always been a coastal navy, as have most of the other navies of Europe. But the United States Navy and its Marine Corps, since Admiral Mahan promulgated the doctrine in 1904 (iirc), has been an instrument of power projection built to support and implement the Mahan Doctrine of forward engagement.

And that is what George Bush did when he went after first Al-Q'aeda, and then Iraq. Now we have a solid army in the middle of all the people who want to kill Americans, whom it is drawing toward itself like iron filings to a magnet. So ask yourself, folks, which matchup do you like? Al-Q'aeda versus a schoolyard, or a rock concert, or a packed church or synagogue? Or Al-Q'aeda versus the Screaming Eagles, or maybe First Tanks? I pick the latter.

Go, big Green Machine! Suck 'em up and chew 'em up!

[Republican Wildcat]

The tone of all the liberals' argument about this ad is not to criticize the content, but to criticize the Republican Party for having the audacity to defend its candidate from attacks. How dare they. They have no right to run ads defending their candidate against attacks and criticize the comments of others.

[Republican Wildcat]

((((APPLAUSE))))

[arasina]

Excellent! Could you please send your entire Post #65 to Mr. Cohen c/o The Washington Post via Express Mail or something? :o)

[John Valentine]

For someone who claims to "love the truth", this Cohen sure tells a lot of lies.

I suppose that makes him a hypocrite. Or a Democrat. Hard to say.

[dwd1]

Bosnia in different in this way... There was massive ethnic cleansing and genocide happening... After Rwanda and all the other places where we just stood by, the international community just stood by... What was also different was an unwillingness to make a "deal with the devil" by so many in the international community because of oil... And Milosevich had no leverage... When his human rights abuses were exposed, support fell away from him... The thing about was that no one (including the US) wanted to risk a bloody ground war there because no compelling national interest... The motivation was almost completely humanitarian... And people forget that the victims of the ethnic cleansing were mostly Muslim...

Also, Bosnia is not considered a sponsor of terrorism and they were not put in the "Axis of Evil" group...

I would think that Iraq is different because everyone knows that without the oil and the wealth of his nation under his control, he would have been dead a long time ago...

He would not have been able to perpetrate the aggression that he has...

And Congress always questions the actions of the president regarding military matters...

Everyone was saying that Clinton was bombing in Sudan and other places to distract us from his Monica Issue.. (That may have been true)...


And when we went into Grenada, Panama, bombed Libya, attacked Syria, had Marines killed in Grenada, there may have been questions about the means but not about the right of the president to do what he felt was necessary...

What we could say is true is that Democrats have been questioned more when they do not use military force...

And I don't think we ever got a chance to discuss in a public forum the CIA actions in Afghanastan...

Also, the War Powers Act clarified the authority and responsibilities a little...

The questions that I see coming from democrats and others are

Regarding France: I think they have a tendency to intervene in their former colonies at will... They have the same "big brother" role that we have with the Phillipines, Liberia, etc...

[dwd1]

I was curious why this memo was leaked to news outlets as opposed to the President getting on National TV and stating "I know you have questions about this war... Here is proof that there is an Iraqi-Al-Qaeda connection... Any questions, please" Where is that "bring it on!" attitude when questions arise...

Rumsfeld, Powell, Rice.... Someone needs to be out there stating "Here is the proof!"... A memo is a long way from a satellite photo...

[dwd1]

I don't think the question is whether we should be or should not be in this war.. It is a fact that we are.... The legitimate questions I am hearing deal more with how we are fighting the war...

Are we doing enough for force protection...

What are we doing to enhance infiltration from neighboring countries...

How is the search for the WMDs going....

Do we need more troops on the ground..

What will be required to get the Red Cross and other NGOs to come back...

Did we make a mistake in getting rid of the Iraqi Army...

Should we declare martial law to deal with the situation over there better..

Until the Iraqi Police and Military can handle things, what can we do to increase the security for the Iraqi Civilians being attacked....

To an outsider, it appears that the insurgents make every effort to discredit any statement made by military commanders...

Less attacks, but deadlier attacks is still not a good thing...


These are not unpatriotic questions.... They are about issues that can cause more young men and women to come back in body bags... That is what I want to see stop...

No one questions the fact that we need to engage the terrorist someplace else...

I think questioning of methods and strategy that appear to not be working as well as expected is acceptable...

Everyone should be looking for the best answers of how to win this thing...

And if martial law and 50,000 more troops mean that only 10 instead of 100 soldiers get killed in the next year, I don't see a problem with that...

[Nonstatist]

The motivation was almost completely humanitarian

I would argue.. completely political. The "cleansing", btw, was nowhere near the scale that occurred in Iraq. Milosevic was not threatening his neighbors; this was an "internal civil disturbance". What's more, this was done in contravention to UN guidelines; without the okay of the UN. I believe there were more civilian casualties and destruction there than there were here.

Its just that this was a Democrap action, so the media shuts up about it. And now theyre exploiting the "illegality" of this "war", and the several hundred dead soldiers, because... well, because their boys arent in power. IMO.

[dwd1]

True, it was done without the UN but Nato provided political cover...

As I have said before, I don't have a problem with legal issues on this war.. I just wished we would use a different approach... I understand that could be a distinction without a difference but I think the way we are doing things could come back to bite us in the butt later... And we are going to have trouble telling someone like India, North Korea, Russia, or Israel that they should not use pre-emptive war when they feel threatened...

Short term, I think this is what must be done but long term, we are going to have to sell our policies a little better...

And the Democrats take their lumps for inaction as well as action...

And please tell me that we be not be in this trouble if we had not supported Hussein in his war with Iran rather than taking the fight to them ourselves...

Carter and Reagan could have done better on that one..

I do think the media questions this war but most like because of the fringe benefits, the questionable intelligience, the GI body count, etc...

But no one is really unhappy about Hussein losing power...

BTW, would you care to bet on Hussein or bin Laden being captured or killed between September and November of next year?...

And the media on both sides is overanalyzing this war.... Feels sometimes like we have more journalists that troops...

I do think that some parts of the media think Bush can do nothing right and others think he can do nothing wrong... It's pretty much a wash with me...

I am a numbers guy and I see too many GIs coming back horizontal instead of vertical...
I just want them to win....

[xzins]

Why would a government keep certain information secret even when it would be in their interests in some areas to reveal it?

1. Protect sources.
2. Protect ongoing operations.
3. Keep enemy from changing their methods.
4. Political concerns.

[Nonstatist]

True, it was done without the UN but Nato provided political cover... we are going to have to sell our policies a little better...

The major difference in these 2 operations is the support of France and Germany (Germany wagging the tail of France). Thats it, period. Both intervaentions are "questionable" and "preemptive" , they both had substantial civilian casualties. But from a humanitarian viewpoint, Iraq is of course much more justified and urgent an intervention, and as far a foreign threat, it would be Iraq again, with their ties to terrorists, etc.

France will NEVER be in our camp again unless their own interests are engaged, like in Bosnia where we did their dirty work. Dont be fooled by the leftist European media hysteria; all they care about is their own direct interests. Its not a principled thing at all. The inconsistencies and hypocrisies are glaring.

[dwd1]

Number 4 sounds most plausible...

And if the Senate Intelligience Committee is aware of the truth and accuracy of the memo, then there is no excuse for them going out and saying that they question the reasons behind the war....

Being that we have 100K pairs of combat boots in Iraq, the country has a hard choice to make about keeping the public supportive of the war versus keeping OPSEC,etc...

The point is that the memo was leaked... If we find out two years later that we were duped like when the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador called in and lied about children being taken away from their incubators, then be upfront about the whole thing but don't play this game of "I know something you don't know" when lives are at stake!"

If the "American People" have the right to know about Bill Clinton's sex life, then we also have the right to know about evidence that would convince the unwilling part of the electorate and the international community that what we are doing is right.... I believe it is but without WMDs and Saddam Hussein dead or alive, it is a case that needs to made a little better...

[dwd1]

To keep the record straight, France only acting in their national interests is absolutely correct....

Sometimes, I wonder if it could be said that nations go to war for national prestige or pride... And in the case of others, speaking out against military action may be their way of throwing their weight around...

What would it take to take the permanent seat on the Security Council from France? (Just kidding!)

[BushisTheMan]

Great comeback bumper stickers! (Before you print them up, though, the Cole's dead were sailors. Soldiers are Army.)

My apologies to sailors and soldiers everywhere. Yes, I meant sailors on the Cole.

[Dr. Frank fan]

This is wise:

Being that we have 100K pairs of combat boots in Iraq, the country has a hard choice to make about keeping the public supportive of the war versus keeping OPSEC,etc...

...but this takes it too far IMHO.

If the "American People" have the right to know about Bill Clinton's sex life, then we also have the right to know about evidence that would convince the unwilling part of the electorate and the international community that what we are doing is right....

Suddenly you've taken that "hard choice" and made it seem like a slam-dunk in favor of Laying All Our Cards On The Table (vis-a-vis Iraq/Qaeda connections). How did that happen?

xzins has given you a list of understandable reasons for Bush not to blab "Iraq-Qaeda" on TV. After (somehow) dismissing all but one, you still acknowledged that there's a hard choice involved, but then in the end still come out with an absolutist "we have a right to know". I guess I don't get it.

The fact is that you seriously overestimate the up-side of the tradeoff involved. How much is worth getting the "unwilling part of the electorate" on board? Not very much. Bush already got his War Powers resolution (which was all he needed for the war), he got the 87 billion (to continue the policy); people like you act as if he should be desperately trying to win over the hearts of the marginal unconvinced but that's just not true. I'm sure all other things being equal he would like to get back to 80% poll numbers etc. but all things considered, winning over the "unconvinced" just isn't as important as a lot of people seem to think it is. (His re-election is, undoubtedly, important to him, and it's clear that he will place high value on such efforts if he feels his re-election would depend on it, but there's no indication yet that this is the case.)

And as for the "international community", that's even less important. (The "international community" gets no votes in our Presidential or Congressional races.) France/Germany for example are never going to Approve of our war, so the costs of getting their Approval are near-infinite. It's not worth losing sleep over their Disapproval, therefore.

For my part I think there are many conceivable reasons (the ones xzins cited, and more) for why Bush hasn't been willing to publicy get behind an Iraq/Al Qaeda connection. (If there is one.) People who don't, seem to have no imagination, or to reduce executive leadership to some kind of caricature that takes places entirely on CNN.

First of all let's keep in mind that these links are evidence not proof. I am certainly not saying they are proof. (On the other hand, they are *disproof* against people who say "no evidence of a connection has been found", get it?) The point is, were Bush to get on TV and list these things, a public debate would ensue, which most of the public would perceive as a sequence of snappy back-and-forth soundbites between the President's spokesman and Ted Kennedy. This would not necessarily give the public any more of an accurate picture of Iraq/Qaeda connections than they already have. :)

In particular, his critics would nit-pick away at all of the items. Some, undoubtedly, would prove on shaky ground, perhaps false. Just think of the "flap" over the completely-true statement in Bush's State of the Union address about Africa (not "Niger") and multiply it by 50. If you're Bush, is it worth it to invite that controversy, if you don't need to? (If you think Bush "needs to", please explain why. Remember, he *got* the War Powers vote last fall, which was *all* he needed for the war. He *got* the 87 billion, which signals continued support from Congress. Again, it would be *nice* to have overwhelming majority support of all these things - instead of shaky support with a vocal, whining opposition - but it still seems to me that the marginal costs of going for that 70% instead of 55% support - or whatever - makes it not worth it. What's the point?)

And some costs of trumpeting these things have already been listed by xzins. In particular, generally speaking, I'd like to ask: It's late 2002/early 2003, and we know about Connections. Now then: if we know, why should we let Saddam *know* we know? What would have been his likely response in the dangerous stand-off we had with him? It's interesting to think about.

Finally, another unexamined - but very important - factor in all this is anthrax. Remember the anthrax? Most people seem to have forgotten. But think back to late 2001, we'd been attacked, and someone was demonstrating that they had weaponized anthrax and were willing to use it: how do you respond if you're Bush? Much depends on where that anthrax came from. This is something that, frankly, none of us know, and I'm not sure it would even be correct to say we have a "right to know". But unless we know where that anthrax came from, we have no hope of evaluating accurately the strategic choices faced by the Bush admin. after 9/11. Was the anthrax really some "lone scientist"? Or was there (as, it seems, the admin. may believe) a state sponsor behind it, demonstrating his ability/willingness to use WMD as a deterrent? And then at the UN, it's rather hard to believe that the whole situation really boiled down to us and Saddam fighting over the affections of Jacques Chirac; what kind of standoff really took place between the US and Saddam?

We just don't know.

But until/unless we know such things, and more, it's ridiculous to sit here and state matter-of-factly that "if Bush had such info about Iraq/Qaeda connections, it would behoove him to get publicly behind that info". I really don't think anyone here is in a position to make that statement.

* my 2 cents *

[HardStarboard]

>>>Saddam may have ended the programs but kept them seed stock to restart when he felt it was safe to. <<<
>>>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. <<<

Perhaps you were unaware that David Kay's team has found just that in the refergerator of an Iraqi scientist. It was a vial of weapons grade botulism.

It was indicated in his interim report that this could easily be use to reconstitute stockpiles in fairly short order - days and possibly weeks, not months.

Kay also found 18 clandestine labratories in contravention of UN sanctions. Also, an advanced program to develop long range missles was uncovered. This also against sanctions.

And this is the interim report...lump this together with the brutality of Saddam's regime (300,000 in mass graves so far) and his cozyness with al Qaeda (or have you missed recent revelations on that issue too?) and it is plain that WE WENT TO WAR FOR THE RIGHT REASONS!