Right. These things had no influence...
Let's set the context first. We were in a state of war with Iraq, under a cease fire.
I left out the 500,000+ people Saddam had killed because, after all, neither you nor I care about those filthy little brown people. Right? /s
If Bush1 hadn’t allowed us to be sucked into a war that wasn’t in our interests, there wouldn’t have been any No Fly Zone in the first place.
Iraq nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programs posed no threat to the US. We saw the state of their technology, the SCUD missiles with “warheads” on them that were like flying pipe bombs, and even less effective. If some in the Middle East felt threatened by these things, they should have taken care of it themselves.
All that is true. However, Donald Trump is correct: Taking out Saddam destabilized the Iran/Iraq conflict.
I was a civilian contractor at the Marine Corps Intelligence Activity during Desert Storm, and while the military invasion plans were amazing, there was no real planning on how to handle the defeated armed forces and the liberated civilian population. “Let them loot!” is not a good policy for restoring order and establishing “democracy”. The de-Baathification program was a disaster and left such a power vacuum that the country never recovered. Everyone in the deck of cards other than the four Aces should have been co-opted into the new government.
You’re right. Not one American life is worth those filthy brown people.
Watch out, your globalism is showing.