Posted on 12/28/2006 9:36:03 AM PST by ARealMothersSonForever
WASHINGTON - Former President Gerald R. Ford questioned the Bush administration's rationale for the U.S. invasion and war in Iraq in interviews he granted on condition they not be released until after his death.
In his embargoed July 2004 interview with The Washington Post, Ford said the Iraq war was not justified, the Post reported Wednesday night.
Ford "very strongly" disagreed with the current president's justifications for invading Iraq and said he would have pushed alternatives, such as sanctions, much more vigorously, the Post's Bob Woodward wrote. The story initially was posted on the newspaper's Internet site.
"I don't think I would have gone to war," Ford told Woodward a little more than a year after President Bush launched the invasion.
In the tape-recorded interview, Ford was critical not only of Bush but also of Vice President Cheney — Ford's White House chief of staff — and then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who served as Ford's chief of staff and then his secretary of defense.
"Rumsfeld and Cheney and the president made a big mistake in justifying going into the war in Iraq. They put the emphasis on weapons of mass destruction," Ford said. "And now, I've never publicly said I thought they made a mistake, but I felt very strongly it was an error in how they should justify what they were going to do."
In an interview given with the same ground rules to the New York Daily News last May, Ford said he thought Bush had erred by staking the invasion on claims Saddam had weapons of mass destruction.
" Saddam Hussein was an evil person and there was justification to get rid of him," he observed to the Daily News. "But we shouldn't have put the basis on weapons of destruction. That was a bad mistake. Where does (Bush) get his advice?"
In the Daily News interview, Ford was more defensive about Cheney and Rumsfeld. Asked why Cheney had tanked in public opinion polls, he smiled. "Dick's a classy guy, but he's not an electrified orator," Ford said.
The former president did not like Bush's domestic surveillance program.
"It may be a necessary evil," Ford conceded. "I don't think it's a terrible transgression, but I would never do it. I was dumbfounded when I heard they were doing it."
Woodward wrote in the Post that his interview took place for a future book project, though the former president said his comments could be published at any time after his death.
In another interview released after his death, Ford told CBS News in 1984 that he initially was against using the phrase "long national nightmare" in his first speech as president following Richard Nixon's resignation, concerned that it was too harsh.
Ford said he reconsidered and sought his wife's advice. "After thinking about it and talking to Betty about it, we decided to leave it in and, boy, in retrospect, I'm awfully glad we did," he said.
In the Daily News interview, Ford, a few weeks from his 93rd birthday, showed frustration with the toll health problems had taken on him, saying he thought doctors were too strictly limiting what he could do.
At one point, he offered to share some butter pecan ice cream, his favorite dessert, with his guest, correspondent Thomas M. DeFrank.
Asked what his doctors would think about that, the former president said, "We have it anyhow."
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that is "the Wilsonians were wrong"
Bingo! We have a winner!
The man was 90 years old when he gave the interview.
I'd call the interviewer the lowest form of predator, not the old man.
Where do you get your 'facts?'
From Bob Woodward?
Because the people IN Iraq are telling a completely different story than you and the leftist MSM.
Not to mention he was in his 90's when he made these comments. Why would I pay attention to what he had to say now when I haven't agreed with him in years?
I appreciate what he did in taking over the Presidency but I don't think he did a very good job and why Carter beat him.
Just remember that we had Freepers on here when Ma Richards died doing the same thing. Made the far left liberal a conservative and a friend of the Bush Family -- neither of which were true. Someone dies and people rush to praise them. If I didn't like someone when they were alive, why would I praise them when they are dead?
Woodward proves himself to be scum once again.Who would have thought Bob Woodward would tie the former president down and pull out toenails until he made those statements on tape. What's the world coming to.
Just put your hands over your ears and keep repeating: "The Iraq war is a stunning success. Maliki (and his Shi'ite friends are great democrats), the war will pay for itself, we are winning" and you may convince yourself.
Isn't it funny that the same people who would have us overlook the factual errors in Carters latest folly because he is a tottering old fool want us to hold this man who was many years his senior as the most astute and competent person to have ever opined on the present administrations Iraq policy. If we look hard enough we may discover that someone has an agenda here.
Me thinks you need to go to the local nursing home and see what kind conversation you can get out of most 90 year olds.
Geez..the man is barely dead. Is there no respect in anything anymore?
Ya'll said ......
"We did not go into Iraq because we thought he had weapons of mass destruction, we went in because he had violated UN resolution after UN resolution and to enforce the 1991 Gulf War cease fire agreement. I am so sick of the MSM and other liberals re-writing history.
Saddam was blocking inspectors, he was firing on US and British aircraft trying to enforce the no-fly zone, and would not account for know weapons and weapon materials. After 9/11 the entire country (including Dave Letterman and Dan Rather) were in agreement that we could not risk another known enemy of the US to defy our sovereignty and risk our security."
and ya'll are sooooo right!!!!!
But, you called it a 'neo-con disaster.'
Making me wonder what you mean by 'neo-con'..........and why you call free elections, a functioning government and military, and the upcoming execution of the monster who brutalized them for decades who was deposed in a matter of weeks by our military, a 'disaster.'
Who cares whether Saddam violated a UN Resolution. I thought that freepers were against the UN. I guess not when it can be used for a rationalization for the Iraq mess!
"The interview conducted and edited by the completely unbiased Woodward, and only made public when Ford is dead and can't respond?"
If Ford had wanted to respond, he wouldn't have insisted on a posthumous release.
Don't look too hard. I love watching the suckers of the MSM make a fool of themselves in the afternoon.
I'm in favor of keeping American troops in Iraq. Indefinitely. And so (I suspect) are a large number of demonrats, when it comes right down to it, and it will, since, as you say, they are in charge of the spending now.
That doesn't mean that the parameters of the mission shouldn't be tweaked in a way that's more favorable for our guys. But I don't think "exit" is the key word here. There's another word. Seems like there are some here who have forgotten it. Begins with a letter towards the end of the alphabet. Need a hint?
What kind of rationalization makes that not matter to you?
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