Were We Right to Take Out Saddam?

National Review ^ | 05/19/2015 | Victor Davis Hanson

[SeekAndFind]

Probable Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush got himself into trouble by sort of, sort of not, answering the question whether he would have supported going into Iraq in 2003

[Sir Napsalot]

This one is definitely a ‘keeper’.

Thanks for the article, Dr. Hanson. (And SeekAndFind)

[TomasUSMC]

Yes we were right to take him out, the problem was we didn't take out Islam out of their Constitution .....when a Constitution states..
“NO LAW SHALL CONTRADICT ISLAM”....in reality that constitution is then superseded by the Koran.

[fuzzylogic]

To all of the “know it all’s”...

Please tell me exactly what the alternate consequences would have happened if we’d *not* taken out Saddam?

Remember, he DID have WMD’s. The Oil For Food program WAS corrupt and falling apart. He DID have hundreds of tons of yellowcake. He WAS waiting to restart these programs at the drop of a hat. He WAS the biggest sponsor of terrorism. He HAD used WMD’s in the past.

To say we shouldn’t have done this “knowing what we know now” is quite arrogant, it also requires buying into media lies and revisionist history.

He’s one alternate version:

We don’t get involved in Iraq. Oil for Food ends. U.N. weapons inspections never resume. Saddam restarts all WMD programs; nuclear, biological and chemical. Within ten years he’s more dangerous than ever. He’s trained 1000’s of terrorists. He gives them the means to attack the world. Hundreds of thousands are killed, if not more. ...the same people saying “we shouldn’t have gone in” will instead be saying the opposite.

[combat_boots]

Don’t forget Salmon Pak and the buried jets. And the buried WMDs.

[RinaseaofDs]

I’m reading an excellent book about Operation Paperclip at the moment, and it covers IG Farben’s invention of the chemical weapon called Tabun.

One drop on exposed skin, and you are done in seconds. That was back in the late 30’s to mid 40’s.

It was a big deal, and it wasn’t just us saying Saddam was manufacturing this kind of stuff. In fact, just about a couple of months ago, our forces found a stash of NBC stuff in a bunker somewhere. I read about it on this forum.

[Sir Napsalot]

Another thing this article has demonstrated is Americans’ attitude towards war/conflict has changed A LOT !!! Since WWII. And granted, that was a looooong time ago.

Not just the fingers-in-the-wind politicians trying to amass their personal fortunes. Steadfastness and Leadership are completely missing from today’s crop.

[TomasUSMC]

If we changed the insane Nazi Germany and the equally insane Tojo Japan, we could do the same to moslum countries, except we don’t have the willpower we did in WW2. We don’t teach our youth that America IS exceptional, and why it is.

And thus, we elect Carter, Clinton and Obama.

[servantboy777]

Yes, it was right. He and his sadistic sons Uday and Quesay.

These guyz were torturing folks for fun. Some of the most horrendous acts ever committed against another human being was taking place in Iraq. For this reason alone, we sent them to their father...satan.

Good grief, chopping off heads and leaving them on the doorsteps of the families to intimidate. Pushing bound men off of rooftops to watch the terror in their faces. Executing men, making them pull the pin on grenades and filming them blown apart. Dismemberment's, rapes, electrocutions and so forth.

It was reported that one of the sons would play the videos in his private movie theater over and over again. Sick sick sick men.

[TomasUSMC]

And stamping out Islam.
////////////
yep..... the root of the problem.

[Partisan Gunslinger]

Yes, the 9-11 terrorists were trained at Salmon Pak.

[Partisan Gunslinger]

Salman, rather.

[Cementjungle]

All this Bush retrospect stuff now, 12 years after the fact, is nothing more than smoke designed to shield Obama from any discussion at all about his own strategy (or lack thereof) for the past six years.

Time didn't stop when Obama took office, and he does bear responsibility for his actions while in office. The Dems are making every effort to get us all debating GWB all over again so we can protect Obama from having to face any scrutiny for anything.

The GOP is totally handing this election to Hillary by entertaining the "knowing what you know now..." questions and making this election about GWB. They should be responding with something like "Had I known that Obama would mismanage the situation so badly, I would have..." instead.

[xzins]

I totally agree with you.

[The_Media_never_lie]

I like what someone else said in another thread. If a reporter asks a GOP candidate the question “knowing what you know now would you go into Iraq?” The answer should be “If I knew that a democratic President would betray the American people and pull all of the troops out to allow the enemy to re-take the lands which American blood won, then no I would not go into Iraq.”

Wonderful!

[rockinqsranch]

Taking out Saddam Hussein was the correct thing to do.

Electing Obama was the wrong thing to do.

[Jim Noble]

He and his sadistic sons Uday and Quesay.

Putting the al-Saud family being turned over to Uday and Qusay on pay-per-view would have been quite lucrative.

[Sam Gamgee]

Yes, and we know he met with Al Queda and helped plan the insurgency knowing his time in office was pretty much coming to an end soon.

We kept Al Queda busy in Iraq and killed large numbers of them, which kept America safer.

[Cliff Dweller]

In a word... Yes.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Well you can argue whether we should have taken out So Damn Insane. I was not a big fan of the invasion. But IMO what the real mistake was was annihilating his entire military. We killed all the real warriors. We should have gotten rid of So Damn and then purged the bad apples out of the officer hierarchy and left the army in place.

[roamer_1]

Why does everyone analyze this so incorrectly? It isn’t that he had stockpiles of WMDs (although he did). It is that he could (and did) produce lethal chemical and biological agents. Period. That’s it.

I don't even have to take it that far:

It was going to be a whole lot easier to fight the coming war in a sandbox than in the unforgiving mountains of Afghanistan... So pick the nearest ***hole with a sandbox...

And I am ok with that.