Maybe war's outcome makes up for rationale

The Deseret News ^ | 4/22/2003 | William Raspberry

[Utah Girl]

I love courtroom dramas. Maybe that's why I keep going back to that February day when Colin Powell, as powerfully persuasive as any district attorney ever was, put on that famous multimedia production that convinced me — convinced America — that Saddam Hussein really was developing (and hiding) weapons of mass destruction.

Here, the secretary of state was telling the jury masquerading as the U.N. Security Council, you see the chemical and biological labs at one of the production sites. And here, you notice the trucks are gone — just hours before the U.N. inspectors are due on the scene. Here are the time-lapse photographs, taken by satellite and spy planes, showing the bulldozed-over locations where the WMD plants used to be. And here is the incontrovertible evidence we would have preferred not to show you, because it could compromise our intelligence sources, that Saddam is not only in open defiance of U.N. resolutions but is a threat to the security of the world.

I believed it — and for much the same reasons I believed the prosecution's DNA evidence against O.J. Simpson. That is to say, I didn't understand most of it but I was terribly impressed by the certitude of those who said they did.

I suspect I had a lot of company — that hundreds of thousands of Americans who earlier had had their doubts were now convinced that all the charges against Saddam had been proved. And a lot of them, according to the polls, were ready to endorse military action against him — with the United Nations if possible, alone if necessary.

And here's what I can't get out of my mind. Those weapons of mass destruction that our intelligence sources had pinpointed, and which became the principal rationale for our pre-emptive war on Iraq, haven't turned up. The inspectors couldn't find them while Saddam ruled, and our military, with virtually free range of the country, can't find them now.

[Utah Girl]

Raspberry is a Washington Post writer, click on the link, it goes to the Deseret News, not the WP.

These must be the new talking points: "They can't find WMD!!! They were fooled!!!" Well, the UN and dithering did give Hussein six more months to coverup and move the weapons. And Raspberry does grudgingly say at the end that perhaps it was best that Hussein was "regime changed."

[prairiebreeze]

And Raspberry does grudgingly say at the end that perhaps it was best that Hussein was "regime changed."

Well that's magnanimous of him. /sarc

Maybe he's chronically cranky because his name is Raspberry.

Prairie

[annyokie]

[Utah Girl]

Great graphic! My other favorite one is Gen Tommy Franks lighting up a cigar in one of Hussein's palaces.

[annyokie]

I don't have that one. Could you send it to me, please?

[Utah Girl]

Sure, it is just a picture, not a graphic or altered or anything. Let me go find one for you. BRB.

[annyokie]

I'll be waiting!

[JoeSchem]

You might get whoever made the graphic to proofread for typos. 'Pack if Marlboros?'

[annyokie]

Oh, who cares? If you proofed for typos around here there'd be about zero posts.

[Let's Roll]

If we were going to plant something, we would have done it by now. They also had years to hide the stuff and I've heard that in the case of bio, it could all be hidden in a space the size of an average apartment kitchen. How many Iraqis in a position to know have to tell this guy about moving WMDs to Syria, destroying at the last minute etc.? When are they going to stop under-estimating GWB?

[Paradox]

What pre-emption? Iraq was in violation of various agreements which THEY made. Therefore, ceasefire "ceased". The whole pre-emption argument was pretty stupid in the first place.

[Utah Girl]

Still trying to find a graphic of Franks smoking a cigar. I don't know if I saved it to my hard drive or not. It may be tomorrow before I can look. But I won't forget. :)

[Utah Girl]

I didn't save a picture of Gen Tommy Franks smoking a cigar. :( I know I saw one picture, but sure can't find it. Sorry.

[ChuckHam]

You need to wake up and smell the coffee. I guess your lying eyes didn't believe the pictures of the proscribed weapons that still exist in Iraq. If you would stay away from those DNC talking point papers you might learn something.

[Paradox]

No, they haven't kept up their side of the bargain. Not at all. They had to provide proof that they had gotten rid of the WMD's, and allow unencumbered inspections. There was a whole host of things they reneged on. Therefore, end of ceasefire.

[JoeSchem]

Oh, who cares? If you proofed for typos around here there'd be about zero posts.

Well, the graphic deserved better.

[annyokie]

I'm sorry Joe. Someone sent me the graphic.