"Well, just as it’s important, I think, for a president to know when to commit U.S. forces to combat, it’s also important to know when not to commit U.S. forces to combat. I think for us to get American military personnel involved in a civil war inside Iraq would literally be a quagmire. Once we got to Baghdad, what would we do? Who would we put in power? What kind of government would we have? Would it be a Sunni government, a Shi’a government, a Kurdish government? Would it be secular, along the lines of the Ba’ath Party? Would be fundamentalist Islamic? I do not think the United States wants to have U.S. military forces accept casualties and accept the responsibility of trying to govern Iraq. I think it makes no sense at all." --- Dick Cheney, U.S. Secretary of Defense, 4/7/91
Did it occur to you that we had a lot of troops already tied up in Afghanistan already?
So what did our "undermanned" force of 130,000 troops do? We took down an entire country in 4 weeks. Completely defeated his military, took down the government.
Here's a question 4 you - When Dick Cheney made that statement in 1991, had the first WTC bombing, the African Embassy Bombings, the Khobar Towers Bombings, the Assasination Attempt on President Bush I, the USS Cole Bombing, and the 9/11 Attacks, had any of these taken place yet?
Do you think Dick Cheney might have realized that we've waited around too long to take care of a pressing problem?
I understand the rationale for why Dick Cheney v.2002 thought an invasion of Iraq was a good idea. What I don't understand is: What transpired between 1991 and 2002 that made him think Iraq would not descend into civil chaos, that establishing a government in Iraq was feasible, that governing Iraq was feasible, that it "made any sense at all," etc.?
In spite of your attempts to rationalize this, it's worth noting that the predictions laid out by Dick Cheney v.1991 turned out to be EXACTLY CORRECT.
"I do not think the United States wants to have U.S. military forces accept casualties and accept the responsibility of trying to govern Iraq."
Unfortunately for us, the 2006 and 2008 elections are going to turn out to be a thorough vindication of this statement.