Who Is Lying About Iraq?

CommentaryMagazine ^ | 11-07-2005 | Norman Podhoretz

[KJC1]

Among the many distortions, misrepresentations, and outright falsifications that have emerged from the debate over Iraq, one in particular stands out above all others. This is the charge that George W. Bush misled us into an immoral and/or unnecessary war in Iraq by telling a series of lies that have now been definitively exposed.

What makes this charge so special is the amazing success it has enjoyed in getting itself established as a self-evident truth even though it has been refuted and discredited over and over again by evidence and argument alike. In this it resembles nothing so much as those animated cartoon characters who, after being flattened, blown up, or pushed over a cliff, always spring back to life with their bodies perfectly intact. Perhaps, like those cartoon characters, this allegation simply cannot be killed off, no matter what.

Nevertheless, I want to take one more shot at exposing it for the lie that it itself really is. Although doing so will require going over ground that I and many others have covered before, I hope that revisiting this well-trodden terrain may also serve to refresh memories that have grown dim, to clarify thoughts that have grown confused, and to revive outrage that has grown commensurately dulled.

[WmShirerAdmirer]

Reason for December 2005 date is "Commentary Magazine (Advance release), by Norman Podhoretz".

[ClaireSolt]

I don't fault the administration, I applaud them for moving on. Some people are just stuck on stupid. We could spend all day every day rebutting allegations about Florida 2000, for instance. It doesn't do any good. They are propagandists. that's all.

[WmShirerAdmirer]

I agree. Unfortunately, other than some (past) utterances (always condemned) from Cheney, the G. W. Bush Administration's policy seems to be not to challenge the lies the Dems spout constantly. It use to frustrate me not being able to figure out why (could the intelligence given the President be "so incredibly bad" that even he is afraid to firmly use it to back up the truth of reality?)

[borkrules]

In darker moments, when I consider the endless attacks of the dems and the supine "response" of the GOP, these lines from Yeats come to mind:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all convictions, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

[daviscupper]

This is a great read and should be filed away and used repeatedly to beat lying DemoRATS and MSM liberals over the head. Learn the details. The facts are on our side. GLTA

[txhurl]

Well, curl my hair.

[ANGGAPO]

But the distortions and half truths had a lot of help from the Democrats, newspapers and TV "experts". And if you notice Dirty Harry is at it again.

[marblehead17]

ping for later

[Calpernia]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1518385/posts
Iraqi's Thank America (Wow, this is moving!)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1518791/posts
KURDS SAY THANK YOU--AWESOME AD ON FOXNEWS!!!!

[Calpernia]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1518780/posts?page=11#11

Bump Quilla!

[Yardstick]

Reference bump

[BlueStateDepression]

"Silence lends credence to even the most blatant of lies."

It does, until such time as it is reposessed and facts are presented in such a way that the claims end.

I am thinking that the right sees the left still holding on to things they KNOW aren't true. I see them letting a little more rope drag out and then SNAP the run will end and the DEMS on the left will be hanging on their actions and claims of the last several years.

This will happen in the next six months when the run up to the 06 elections come into full swing.

[SunTzuWu]

I think the administration did tell some fibs in the run up to war.

Please, don't keep us in the dark. What lie did the Bush administration tell to get us into Iraq.

[cwb]

"Saddam was also funding terrorists in the Middle East and elsewhere."

---

Exactly! Saddam's terrorist-ties, alone, were enough reason to depose this threat. What many liberals ignore is that even "before" 9/11, Al Qaeda and Al-Zarqawi were courting the Arabs and Kurds in N. Iraq in an effort to create AQs new affilate...Ansar Al-Islam. In August 2001, leaders of several Kurdish Islamist factions reportedly visited the al-Qaeda leadership in Afghanistan with the goal of creating an alternate base for the organization in northern Iraq.  Soon thereafter, Ansar al-Islam was created using $600,000 in al-Qaeda seed money, with even perhaps as much as $35,000 donated directly from the Mukhabarat branch of Iraqi Intelligence Service.

This callaboration was further substantiated during the Afghanistan War, when a document found in an al-Qaeda guest house by the NY Times discussed the creation of an "Iraqi Kurdistan Islamic Brigade" which vowed to "expel those Jews and Christians from Kurdistan and join the way of Jihad, [and] rule every piece of land...with the Islamic Shari'a rule."  

As the Afghanistan War wore on, it wasn't a conicidence that many remnants from the Taliban and AQ were finding themselves within this newly created "affiliate" in N. Iraq. Human Rights Watch even confirmed this when they visited the region and reported that hundreds of foreign fighters from Afghanistan were joining up with Ansar, some from as early as September, 2001 (even before the Afghanistan War). Adding further evidence to this collusion was HRW's own interviews of Ansar al-Islam members in PUK custody, who according to HRW, "described in credible detail training in al-Qa'ida camps in Afghanistan."

Heck, after Zarqawi was injured in the Afghanistan War...and even before the war in Iraq began, he found himself being treated in a Baghdad hospital owned by one of Saddam's son...only to leave with his Egyptian Islamic Jihad followers and later meet up with Ansar. This action completely contradicts the claims of those who said Saddam would never ally himself with these "radical" Islamic groups for fear of being overthrown. If that were true, AZ woud've never left Baghdad alive. In fact, this alliance was quite reasonable...not just because of their shared hatred of America, but because Ansar was doing something for Saddam that Saddam could no longer do for himself; Ansar was attacking the two largest Kurdish factions (PUK and KDP) in N. Iraq...which had long been the biggest threat to Saddam.

Evidence suggests that the very creation of Ansar Al-Islam may have been as a secondary base of operation should America succeed in ousting the Taliban and AQ. And this is important because after the destruction of the terrorists camps in Afghanistan, the sancturaries for these terrorists were running thin. In fact, over the last decade, AQ and their more radical elements had been getting kicked out of their own homelands and host countries.

From Saudi Arabia to Egypt to Lebanon to Jordan...and even terrorists supporters like Syria and Libya, these countries no longer wanted these groups operating from within their borders. With Sudan offering up UBL and even Musharif in Pakistan joining the WOT, there were little places left for AQ to coalesce, especially after 9/11 and the retribution America was now seeking. No one wanted these groups for fear the US would make their state the next target in the WOT. Even Iran supposedly expelled Zarqawi after it was learned he may hiding there....which is when he supposedly made his way to Baghdad.

The simple fact is the war in Afghanistan made Iraq a natural choice for these groups. Saddam already had the propencity for harboring wanted terrorists; he had already offered safe-havens to both Abu Abass and Abu Nidal--two of the world's most wanted terrorists. As Reuter's reported...and was later confirmed, Nidal entered Baghdad just days before Clinton's Dec. 16, 1998 bombing of Iraq. A brief history of Nidal shows that he and his group were responsible for the killings of over 900 people in over 20 countries. Nidal was a leader in the PLO...and after leaving them, formed his own group, the Abu Nidal Organization, which operated at an even more violent level. Nidal was once America's most wanted terrorist and a 1989 State Department report called his organization the most dangerous terrorist group in the world.

Since the 9/11 attack, it was learned that two of the hijackers...Mohamed Atta and Ziad Jarrah, had very close relations with Nidal. Nidal is to be believed to have met with several of these radicals in helping them to draw up plans against American interests...which may explain his untimely death. Further confirmation of these alliances may be found in the fact that after the first 1993 WTC attack, Abdul Rahman Yasin, the man who mixed the chemicals for the World Trade Center attack in 1993, subsequently sought and found refuge in Baghdad. Coincidence? Not if you believe this and what others have said about Ramsey Yousif being a former Iraqi Intelligence officer.

The same was also true for Abu Abass. This convicted Palestinian terrorist...and the mastermind behind the Achille Lauro hijacking, had been calling Baghdad his home since 1994...under Saddam's personal protection. Abbas was the leader of another Palestinian terror organization (PLF) that, after leaving Tunisia, set up shop in Iraq. These alliances with both Abu's were very convenient, as Saddam became one of the largest providers of finanical and material support to Palestinian suicide bombers, offering up to $25,000 to the families of these killers.

In Iraq, Abbas operated with impuinity as he became the intermediary between Saddam and the Palestinians, were both financal and material support flowed directly from Saddam to the blood-filled streets of Israel...with the PLF setting up terrorist training camps right in Iraq. Between the two Abu's...and the material support flowing between them from Saddam...and Hamas and Hezbullah, Iraq was already one of the largest terrorist havens in the world, complete with a terrorist training center at Salman Pak.  

For those who truly seek peace in the ME...especially between Israel and the Palestinians, that peace would've never had a chance with Saddam in power financing these organizations. This reason alone, makes the ouster of Saddam a legitimate cause, especially since Saddam's harboring of any terrorists was prohibited by the Gulf War Cease Fire and following UN resolutions.

[Stultis]

The following passage from the OSS's psychological profile of Adolf Hitler might have been written for today's Democrat leadership:

His primary [propaganda] rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

[Stultis]

Hard as it is to believe, let alone to reconcile with his general position, Joseph C. Wilson, IV, in a speech he delivered three months after the invasion at the Education for Peace in Iraq Center, offhandedly made the following remark: “I remain of the view that we will find biological and chemical weapons and we may well find something that indicates that Saddam’s regime maintained an interest in nuclear weapons.”

It looks like you can download an MP3 recording of Wilson's lecture here.

[VOA]

bump

[Delta 21]

Poker faced until the final hand is dealt.

I have faith that "W" (and Rove) have things well in hand. Concidering all the alternatives that could have been handling the situation we are in right now, Im sticking with "W".

[r-q-tek86]

This is great... thanks for posting

I'm wondering... is there a rebuttal article out there that is as well documented? (I know that isn't possible... but I'm sure some DUmmie has tried)

It would be interesting to see their version of the "facts".

[commonguymd]

Thanks for the ping KJ!