Had we been told then what America knows now (Iraq WMD)

GoGov.com ^ | July 4, 2003 | Russell Betts

[cardinal4]

But, but, but its a quagmire! We will kill hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians! Hey! GWB is wearing a flight suit and landing on a carrier, hes looking Presidential, no fair! Itll cause more terror attacks..../sarcasm off

I could go on and on with the liberal complaints about W, but then I would sound just like them....

[Mike4Freedom]

I disagree completely with the premise of this article. If we had been told before the war that Iraq was absolutely no danger to us, that it had no WMDs, that it was an economic basket case, the American public and Congress would not have signed off on a war. The obvious rejoinder is that many nations are evil to their own people, as much or more so that Hussein was, but, as long as they are no threat to us, it is not our business to put our troops at risk and our money in the pot to do something about it.

All this discussion after the fact, in an attempt to make excuses for what happened is actually embarrassing. I am embarrassed that most of the public apparently accepts it. It bodes ill for our future.

[Grut]

Anything now about us being misled about weapons of mass destruction is only partisan background noise against an outcome an overwhelming majority of Americans agree with.

So next month or next year the administration says "Here's the situation and here's what we have to do." Aren't we well advised, in light of its intelligence failures on WMD, to doubt the administration's assessment?

This isn't just about Bush's critics maneuvering for advantage.

[Wonder Warthog]

"All this discussion after the fact, in an attempt to make excuses for what happened is actually embarrassing. I am embarrassed that most of the public apparently accepts it. It bodes ill for our future."

Oh, please! The only thing that should embarass you is your own stupidity. We KNOW Iran had chemical weapons of mass destruction, because he used them in the Iran-Iraq war. We KNOW that he never accounted to the UN Inspectors that those weapons and the materiel used to produce them had been destroyed. It has been PROVEN (by documentation found on-site in Iraq) that Iraq had contact with and was supporting Al Quaeda. These were (and are) good and sufficient reason for the action taken by the US with respect to Iraq.

[Frances_Marion]

" We KNOW Iran had chemical weapons of mass destruction, because he used them in the Iran-Iraq war."

Yeah, we know that because our government sold him much of those chemical weapons.

But that doesn't mean that there aren't or weren't biological and chemical agents in Iraq intended for use against us...we haven't had much time to find them, and it's entirely possible that they've been shipped to Syria.

[The_Pickle]

Yeah the vast majority of the citizens still feel that the war was justified despite the fact that we haven't found any weapons yet. What a bunch of twits, right Mike? You are so justified in being "embarrased" about freeing the Iraqi people and eliminating the dictator Saddam from power. What a horrible, wretched thing for us to have done. I mean to feel justified in freeing the Iraqis from decades of oppression and torture is just not cool because Bush said it was about the weapons and we haven't found any yet. I think that as soon as we find Saddam we ought to give him his country back, round up all those kids that we unlawfully released from prision, fill back in the mass graves, turn off the water and power, pack up and get the heck out of Iraq seeing as we didn't find any weapons yet.

[WarrenC]

If we had been told before the war that Iraq was absolutely no danger to us, that it had no WMDs, that it was an economic basket case, the American public and Congress would not have signed off on a war.

Really? We now know all those things? This is news to me. How did I miss this memo?

And what relevance does Iraq's being an "economic basket case" have? Castro's Cuba has been an economic basket case for 40 years and it hasn't prevented him from being an enthusiastic supporter of terrorism and Marxist governments.

[MEG33]

Could you give me a source that says we gave Iraq chemical weapons?I see this but never know where it's verified.

[SandRat]

Everyone has missed the hidden theme in all of this.

The only the right thing to do when a RAT President does it.

[Ditter]

Not only did Bush wear a flight suit but he obviously had it on wrong (because he is dumb) and it made him look ....... ah hem...... shall we say........ larger than life. I actually saw that on DU, by a liberal twit. (parapharased)

[BJungNan]

I disagree completely with the premise of this article. If we had been told before the war that Iraq was absolutely no danger to us...

I did not see that as the premise. I think it say that Iraq itself is a WMD. It definately is not saying "Iraq was absolutely no danger to us." By the way, I don't know any that thinks Iraq was no danger to us at all.

[John H K]

Could you give me a source that says we gave Iraq chemical weapons?

It's a lie.

On the other hand, the links between Iraq and Al Quaeda are incredibly tenuous.

[TheDon]

The reasons we went were valid before the war, and are valid now. The article is right about Demorat partisan background noise. When have the Demorats ever place the security of the nation before their own partisan advantage these days?

The big lie this go around is about WMDs. The mandate of the UN, and our reason for invading Iraq, was that Iraq was not proving they were clean on this point. They were not complying with the UN inspectors.

Those who didn't want us to interfere with their interests in Iraq, tried to cloud the issue, hoping the American public wouldn't grasp the difference between Iraq having WMDs, and Iraq proving they didn't have WMDs. The Demorats have and are currently using this subtle distinction for their own partisan advantage.

Case closed.

[MEG33]

Really?I read it over and over here.!I don't believe you heard the AlQueda rationale from Bush.There was a report of a meeting between Atta and an Iraqi official but it was dicounted and the "Egyptian dr" was said to have gotten medical care.Saddam gave money to Palestinian bomber families and did shelter known terrorists.

[TheDon]

"This isn't just about Bush's critics maneuvering for advantage."

That's precisely what the WMD issue is all about.

[MEG33]

They didn't hear the interview of the guy who said they strapped him extra tight..that was the ejection seat strap.

[billbears]

Well said, the first sentence of the article automatically goes into excuse mode

After what was found in Iraq and learned about Saddam and Sons, it is without question that the former Iraqi regime itself was a weapon of mass destruction

Well that's not what the President told us in the SOTU address now is it? Where are the thousands of tons of WMD that were an imminent danger?

[MHGinTN]

You start with the wrong premise and expect folks to give some credulity to your attack post? Get awake, mike. Stop being a deceiving liberal being deceived by fellow elitist liberals.

You wrote, "If we had been told before the war that Iraq was absolutely no danger to us, that it had no WMDs ..." Absolutely no danger to us? You're delusional! You and your liberal ilk choose to ignore the Salman Pak (terrorism training camp in Iraq; one of several discovered, but the one with the jetliner fuselage for training terrorist to take over planes with nothing but knives) evidence and choose to ignore the terrorists being trained in Iraq to work terrorism around the world. As long as you doofuses choose to be ignorant, choose to twist the truth, choose to ignore threats to US and the world, how do you ever expect to be trusted to have control of the helm of state again? You and your ilk cannot be entrusted with power again until you start admitting truths that are not ignored by rational people.

[John H K]

Really?I read it over and over here.!

Because people have an unfortunate habit here of just repeating what they want to believe to each other over and over and over again.

I said "Al Queda" not "Terrorists." Not all terrorists are Al Queda members.

The camp SE of Baghdad appears to be connected to Palestinian terrorist groups.

Al Queda had camps, and plenty of them in Afghanistan. There was no particular reason for them to train in Iraq. For all the obsession over the aircraft at Salman Pak, there is no evidence that a single 9/11 hijacker has EVER set foot in Iraq; most were from Saudi Arabia, spent time in Afghanistan, Europe, and the pilots trained in the United States.

And I supported the war on Iraq. However, it's become some sort of ideological test here to blindly believe that Iraq and Al Queda were very closely tied.