Obama General Discussion

[U2387]

None of that shows that he was against the removal of Saddam in 2003 with US forces. Powell says SPECIFICALLY in the Barbara Walters show in 2005 that he supported the Presidents decision to remove SADDAM. To qoute Powell, "when the President said it was not tolerable for Saddam to remain in violation of these UN resolutions, I am right there with him on the use of force!"

Powell was the one who got the Bush administration to go back to the United Nations for resolution 1441 that was not technically needed to authorize the invasion. He disputed the contention of others that resolution 1441 did not authorize the use of military force.

Another famous qoute by Powell in 2002:

"It is not incumbent on the United States to prove that Iraq has Weapons of Mass Destruction, it is incumbant on Iraq to prove that they don't."

Powell has also been against any form of pre-mature withdrawal. He stated in the Barbara Walters interview in 2005 that the United States needed to stay the course in Iraq and develop the countries government, military forces and economy.



He never advocated a pre-mature withdrawal, but in any event, history has shown any opponents of the Surge to have been flat out wrong about the impact it would have on the situation in the country.





The invasion of Iraq was spearheaded by heavy armor units that have not been used in Afghanistan to date. You can't be claiming the President was not focused on Afghanistan because a tank division that would be unlikely to be sent to Afghanistan was used to invade Iraq.

The US used a total of 11 brigades to invade Iraq and a two brigades on the ground in Afghanistan at the time.

But the USA still had a total of 30 Active Army and Marine brigades back in the USA, Germany, Japan, and South Korea.

In addition, there were 38 National Guard Combat Brigades that were not being used at all back in the United States.


So the idea that the President underresourced Afghanistan to invade Iraq in 2003 is flat out FALSE!




Saddam failed to verifiably account for a long list of WMD items while the inspectors were in country. It was also found out after the war that he hid production related WMD facilities that were in violation of multiple UN resolutions and the 1991 Gulf War Ceacefire agreement.

At no time in 2003 was Saddam EVER in compliance with ANY of the 17 UN Security Council resolutions passed under Chapter VII rules of the United Nations.



The COLOSSAL MISTAKE would have been to leave Saddam in power. But please, if you have logical explanation that leaving someone, with Saddam's behavior and history, in power in Iraq would be best for the security of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the persian gulf region, and the world, lets here it. I don't see too many arguments these days defending Saddam as a source of peace and stability for the Persian Gulf.



INSPECTORS NEVER GAVE IRAQ A CLEAN BILL OF HEALTH! THERE WERE NO INSPECTORS EVEN ON THE GROUND IN IRAQ IN 1999!

This is basic factual history.

Clinton bombed Iraq in 1998 precisely because Iraq was NOT complying with requirements of the 1991 Gulf War ceacefire.

1. The fact that no WMD weapons were found in Iraq after Saddam was removed does not prove that were NONE in the country before the US invaded.

2. It does not change the fact that WMD production related facilities that were in violation of the UN resolutions were found in the country after Saddam was removed!

3. Saddam remained in violation of 17 UN security council resolutions from 1999 until the US invaded and removed Saddam.

4.Most importantly, the key means of containment, Sanctions and the Weapons embargo, had fallen apart by 2002. Its impossible to contain Saddam without them. Every day that would go by without effective sanctions and weapons embargo regime would allow Saddam to rebuild both his conventional and unconventional military forces. The inability to effectively contain Saddam meant that the only option left was regime change.

5. Both Bill and Hillary Clinton supported the invasion of Iraq to remove Saddam in 2003!

I also do not recall Biden in March 2003 saying that Bush had violated his own resolution on Iraq. There was nothing dissenting from Biden at all in March 2003.




No one ever said that Saddam had a nuclear weapon! The whole point of containing Saddam was to prevent from rebuilding his military or obtaining new WMD or even worse a nuclear weapon! Its about PREVENTION and not waiting for a leader to get such weapons that could be used against any invasion force.

But again, without containment which involves an effective Sanctions and Weapons embargo regime, containment cannot work. The only other option besides containment was regime change.




If that were clearly the case, the UN inspectors would not have been so extensively involved in Iraq, year after year AFTER 1991. In 2003, Saddam had still failed to account for thousands of stocks of WMD. IT IS A THEORY, NOT A PROVEN FACT, THAT SOME OF THOSE STOCKS WERE DESTROYED WITHOUT VERIFICATION IN 1991.





If this had any truth to it at all, the United States would have NEVER gone to WAR with Iraq in 1991, bombed Iraq year after year, or attempt to put Iraq under the most extensive sanctions and weapons embargo regime in history!

Can you name another country on the planet in 2003 that was in violation of 17 UN Security Council Resolutions passed under chapter VII rules of the United Nations?

Lets stop going over stuff we have already been going over for 2 years and ask ourselves a simple question.

Did Bush let Iraq prove they had no WMD?

No, he discounted the entire inspections process, made a show out of it, and was set on going to war regardless of the facts.

Bush obviously did not look at the evidence that showed that all the WMD were gone.

How could Iraq be deemed in violation of WMD resolutions when they were falsely being accused of having them?

And the incontrovertible and proven fact is that there were no WMD.

You are wrong, I and many others are right, and there really is nothing more to discuss here.

The troop level stuff, the inactive guard brigades crap, etc all just shows how woefully uninformed you are. That never changes, I am going to stop trying to change that.

Life is too short to keep discussing things with you in circles, the same things multiple times.

 

[A_Wanderer]

U2387 I'm still waiting for you to justify the claim that Iraq got a "clean bill of health" in 1999.

Is it plausible that all the obfuscation over inspections during the 1990's had more to do with bluffing regional powers to protect Saddam's leadership?

 

[Strongbow]

I am still reading up on all this.

I think it may be a bit more than a couple of words, as you describe it.

Why did he even accept the interview with RS?

And after agreeing to do it, he should have realized the readership would be comprised of mostly young people, A lot of his enlisted men and potential recruits. With that in mind he showed very poor judgement, or just a complete lack of respect for the Commander in Chief, and let's keep in mind, the V P is a member of the executive, aka Commander in Chief.

Just so were clear, here is the chain of command from Mycrystal to Obama:

1. President - Barack Obama
2. Secretary Of Defense - Robert Gates
3. CENTCOM Commander - General Petraes
4. Commander in Afghanistan - General Mycrystal

Again, the only comment from Mycrystal, involving someone in the Executive Branch, was the comment about Biden. The other comments were either made by other officers or were not directed toward someone in the executive branch.

I'm not defending the comment at all. It was wrong, but I think it is unhelpful to the country to remove the man who has been serving on the ground in an Iraq for 5 years and now Afghanistan for a year and half and who succeeded in catching Saddam Hussian as well as Al Zarqawi.

In terms of catching specific terrorist or rolling up a specific terrorist cell, no one has the track record like Mycrystal, and that is something important that he brings to the job in Afghanistan.

In the past, generals have been fired for poor track records, or openly opposing the commander in chief on policy. All we have here are a couple of words in the "good old Rolling Stone", and not in opposition to anyones policy.

The work that General Mycrystal has done on the ground Iraq and Afghanistan for the past 7 years must be weighed against this offense. His level of experience and successful track record, especially in the two wars the country is fighting is unique and difficult to replace. In his 18 months in Afghanistan, he has made relationships with the leaders of various Afghan tribes and groups that had not been made before. He has won many Afghans respect and trust which is vital in a society like that and is a key to winning in Afghanistan. Given this and the fact that the US military is in the middle of an important operation there, I think it is a mistake to be removing Mycrystal for a couple of words directed at Biden in a magazine.

 

[Strongbow]

Whether I agree with the General and his staff, or not....

he left the president with little choice here. Too bad all around

The President always has a choice and that choice should be to keep the best people in the field and not remove them because of a couple of words printed in a magazine. I think it is indeed the first time any commander of a specific war has been fired simply because of a couple of words in a magazine. In past wars generals were sacked for lack of performance or openly opposing the President.

How exactly is US Security being improved by removing a leader with one of the best track records in the military in these specific conflicts?

 

[Strongbow]

On that point, I will say this bit I saw in one of the many articles on this issue is one thing that bothers me a little (or a lot):



...can someone please tell me exactly how long we are going to wait for that to happen? And would we actually truly completely leave if and when it does?

We're never getting out of there fully, are we? We're just gonna keep paying to funnel this war that isn't working anymore (if it ever really did). Hooray.

Angela

Do remember why the United States invaded Afghanistan in the first place? What makes you think that going back to the same policy that was in place before September 11, 2001 in regards to Afghanistan would be better for US Security?

Think about the cost and consequences to the United States and other countries if the United States pre-maturely left Afghanistan.

 

[U2387]

U2387 I'm still waiting for you to justify the claim that Iraq got a "clean bill of health" in 1999.

Is it plausible that all the obfuscation over inspections during the 1990's had more to do with bluffing regional powers to protect Saddam's leadership?

1.)I don't have to justify anything, the facts have proven me right. The burden of proof is on the delusional who think there were weapons. Where are they?

Did you and Strongbow find them yet? Are they in your basements?

2.)But here it is, from the head weapons inspector in Iraq and other sources.

As Ritter makes clear, we can never conclusively give a clean bill of health(that was a bit of a rhetorical flourish by me), but read what he says. There was no threat from the stuff in the remote chance Iraq actually retained it, and certainly nothing even remotely approaching a justification for war. Numerous other countries have more weapons and more ties to Al Qaeda right now than Iraq did in 2003, and no one is suggesting invading them.

When the inspectors were let back in(which is what the resolution that Strongbow keeps harping on made clear was to be done in good faith), they found nothing and then Bush pulled them out and said "lets go" regardless.

Because he always wanted to invade Iraq, it had always been on the neo con wishlist.



Extract from Scott Ritters new book | World news | The Guardian

Wrong on Iraq? Not Everyone

YouTube - Rice and Powell in 2001 saying Iraq had no WMDs

You want to quit while you still look rational, or join the delusional?

Your choice here.

 

[Strongbow]

Did Bush let Iraq prove they had no WMD?

No, he discounted the entire inspections process, made a show out of it, and was set on going to war regardless of the facts.

Saddam was given 12 years to comply with resolutions and verifiably disarm of WMD yet failed to do so. Belarus, Kazakstan and Ukraine verifiably disarmed of thousands of nuclear missiles and warheads in a matter of months.

Bush is the reason the inspectors were actually able to get back into the country. If it was Saddam's intent to comply with any of the resolutions why did he continue to hide multiple WMD related production facilities from the inspectors that were in violation of the 1991 Gulf War Ceacefire agreement?

Why did Saddam fail to ACCOUNT for ANY of the several thousand stocks of WMD that UN inspectors said were still unaccounted for in December of 1998?

Lets not forget that at this time and after inspectors were in country for over 3 months that Saddam was still in violation of 17 UN security council resolutions, was smuggling Billlions of dollars worth of oil out of the country, was selling huminatiarian supplies meant for the Iraqi people in places like Jordan, was recieving new military technology for Iraq's air defense systems from China etc.

Bush obviously did not look at the evidence that showed that all the WMD were gone.

There was no intelligence that showed all the WMD were gone. The NIE estimate of 2002, concluded that Saddam still had WMD and his capability to acquire more was growing with the collapse of sanctions and the weapons embargo.

Again, the removal of Saddam was NOT just about what he technically had in terms of WMD in 2002-2003, it also involved the erosion of the containment regime which short of regime change was the only option available for dealing with Saddam.

How could Iraq be deemed in violation of WMD resolutions when they were falsely being accused of having them?

By the way, lets not forget were talking about SADDAM here, and not the country he had imprisoned.

Because based on the inspectors work in Iraq and Iraqi records, SADDAM's regime had failed to account for several thousand stocks of WMD. In order to be in compliance with the resolutions, SADDAM's regime needed to hand over the WMD or prove that it was dismantled by showing the remains. None of this was ever done.

In addition, after the war, the US military found multiple WMD related production facilities in Iraq that violated the UN resolutions.

Lets not forget that Saddams violations of the sanction and weapons embargo regime's place against it must also be considered as well as their harrasment and treatment of the UN inspectors which caused them to be removed for years, its abuse of the UN oil for food program, its failure to repay Kuwait for the damaged it did to the country when it brutally annexed it in August of 1990.

And the incontrovertible and proven fact is that there were no WMD.

CORRECTION There was no WMD found in Iraq after the United States removed Saddam from power. But WMD production related facilities that did violate the resolutions were found. In addition, Saddam's regime never did account for thousands of stocks of WMD. There are some theories as to what might of happened, but no proof. The inability to find certain things does not prove they do not exist or did not exist at the time.

You are wrong, I and many others are right, and there really is nothing more to discuss here.

If the necessity of removing Saddam actually rested on what the USA would find in terms of WMD after they removed him, you would certainly have a stronger case. But not finding WMD does not actually prove that he had none, and it is a fact that WMD related production facilities were found that were in violation of the resolutions.

The much larger and long term issue for US policy in the region was the erosion of the international sanctions and the weapons embargo that were the key means of containing Saddam. Without an effective sanctions and weapons embargo regime, Saddam would be able to rapidly rebuild his conventional and unconventional forces. Given how difficult it is to have accurate intelligence on WMD activities that are being concealed, it would be always be difficult for the US to accurately estimate what Saddam had or did not have at any particular time. Even if Saddam did not have any WMD in the 2002-2003 time period, how could the international community be sure that would be the case in 2004, 2006, 2008, 2010, 2015, especially now that the sanctions and weapons embargo regime had collapsed?

The troop level stuff, the inactive guard brigades crap, etc all just shows how woefully uninformed you are. That never changes, I am going to stop trying to change that.

Life is too short to keep discussing things with you in circles, the same things multiple times.

I see you still have yet to learn how discuss an issue without making personal comments about other people.

I simply explained the basic size and number of combat brigades available to US commanders in 2001-2003 time frame. It accurately shows that Afghanistan was not under-resourced at the time to support an invasion of Iraq. The national guard brigades can be called up at any time, and there were a total of 38 of them during the time period. More important than that there were active duty combat brigades that were still at their home stations at the time, although many of these would have to deploy several months later to replace the brigades in Iraq and Afghanistan that were reaching a year of being deployed.

So, if your going to be making some sort of case about troop levels and needs during this time frame, its important to actually know precisely what was available. Its also important to realize that the heavy armor units that were used to spearhead the invasion of Iraq were not in Afghanistan and have actually to date not been used in Afghanistan.

At the time in 2003, the United States ground combat force consisted of:

33 Active Army combat brigades
38 National Guard combat brigades
3 Marine MEF's which is the equilavent of 12 combat brigades
1 Marine reserve MEF or 4 combat brigades.

By 2009, the United States had the following totals for its ground combat forces:

48 Active Army combat brigades
34 National Guard combat brigades
3 Marine MEF's or 12 combat brigades
1 Marine reserve MEF or 4 combat brigades

 

[Strongbow]

1.)I don't have to justify anything, the facts have proven me right. The burden of proof is on the delusional who think there were weapons. Where are they?

Did you and Strongbow find them yet? Are they in your basements?

The burden of proof is on the leader who was in violation of 17 UN security council resolutions. Can you name a single resolution that Saddam was proven to have complied with before the invasion in March 2003. Did Saddam ever account for the thousands of stocks of WMD weapons that were missing according to UN inspectors.

2.)But here it is, from the head weapons inspector in Iraq and other sources.

As Ritter makes clear, we can never conclusively give a clean bill of health(that was a bit of a rhetorical flourish by me), but read what he says. There was no threat from the stuff in the remote chance Iraq actually retained it, and certainly nothing even remotely approaching a justification for war. Numerous other countries have more weapons and more ties to Al Qaeda right now than Iraq did in 2003, and no one is suggesting invading them.

The issue was NOT necessarily any retained weapons but Saddam's willingness to verifiably show where they were or what happened to them. The issue here is Saddam's willingness to and intentions to work with the international community on these issues. The inspections process can't ever work if Saddam is unwilling to fully comply. Its also not just an issue of what Saddam may of had in March 2003, but would he could get in the years to come because of the collapse of sanctions and the weapons embargo.

There might be some other countries that do have WMD that Saddam did not have, but again, they were not countries that had invaded and attacked unprovoked four different countries, ACTUALLY USED WMD against their neighbors, threatened the majority of the planets energy supply with siezure or sabotage, annexed a neighboring country, launched ballistic missiles at other countries etc and were in violation of 17 UN security council resolutions passed under chapter VII rules of the United Nations.

When the inspectors were let back in(which is what the resolution that Strongbow keeps harping on made clear was to be done in good faith), they found nothing and then Bush pulled them out and said "lets go" regardless.

Because he always wanted to invade Iraq, it had always been on the neo con wishlist.

Saddam was given plenty of time, too much time in fact, to come clean and resolve all the issue relating to WMD and he failed too. None of the issues regarding the unaccounted for stocks of WMD had been resolved at the time of the invasion. Saddam had not even scratched the surface. In addition, WMD production related facilities were found after the invasion that were in violation of the resolutions.

The majority of the US Senate including a majority of US democratic senators supported the war. The majority of congress supported the war as did former President Bill Clinton.

NONE OF THEM CAME OUT THE WEEK BEFORE THE INVASION TO SAY THAT IT WAS PRE-MATURE AND THAT BUSH WAS DOING THE WRONG THING!

Scott Ritter used to be a supporter of US policy in Iraq and then strangely when the inspectors were thrown out in 1998, made a movie with Saddam's help and then was caught trying to meet a 15 year old girl at Burger King in 2001. To bad Chris Hanson of Date line NBC did not have his show "How to catch a predator" back then.


I've seen the comments made by Powell in February 2001 just as he came into the post of Secretary of State a thousand times. Powell never says that Saddam is no longer a threat and that the United States and its allies can end the containment regime that had been put in place and was costing Billions of dollars every year. He does not actually state that Iraq has absolutely NO WMD. It had only been a little over 2 years since the inspectors had been kicked out and there had been no fresh estimates on Saddam's WMD capabilities. In addition, the full extent and nature of the collapsing sanctions and weapons embargo was not fully known yet at that time. New estimates by the intelligence community would come out though showing increased concern. This combined with the collapsing sanctions and weapons embargo, plus the events of 9/11 meant the United States could not continue to procrastinate in dealing with Saddam.

Powell himself has said that his statements in February of 2001 are not in conflict with his actions as secretary of State in 2003. New information about Saddam was aquired during that time, and the failing sanctions and weapons embargo also became an issue. 9/11 heightened the need to resolve the serious issues that the international community had with Saddam.



Finally, lets take an accurate look at how Bill Clinton viewed the situation in December 1998:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENAV_UoIfgc



"The hard fact is, that so long as Saddam remains in power, he threatens the well being of his people, the peace of his region, the security of the world. The best way to end that THREAT, once and far all, IS WITH A NEW IRAQI GOVERNMENT, a government ready to live in peace with its neighbors, a government that respects the rights of its people."

"Heavy as they are, the costs of action must be weighed against the price of inaction. If Saddam defies the world and we fail to respond, we will face a far greater threat in the future. Saddam will strike again at his neighbors. He will make war on his own people.

And mark my words, he will develop weapons of mass destruction. He will deploy them, and he will use them."

President Bill Clinton - December 16, 1998

You want to quit while you still look rational, or join the delusional?

Your choice here.

I choose to discuss the issues. Unfortunately, you continue to discuss other forum members rather than the issues.

 

[U2387]

We have been over everything you wrote before, and it is all bullshit.

Don't ever address anything I say here again, and I am truly done with you and your idiocy.

I factually rebutted all of this as early as 2008.

 

[A_Wanderer]

You want to quit while you still look rational, or join the delusional?

Your choice here.

Iraq didn't have weapons stockpiles.

Iraq retained some of the elements of its weapons programs which may have been able to be reactivated after sanctions were lifted.

The intelligence was manipulated to sell the lie that Iraq was an imminent threat.

The sanctions ruined Iraq, and the war took the slaughter even further.

I don't think it's irrational to think that the regime in Iraq had to bluff against external and internal enemies with ambiguity, and that allowed the Bush administration to invade so quickly.

If it was considered effectively clear in 1999 why did two administrations prolong those sanctions and no-fly zones? Why didn't they try to cut a deal with Saddam for cheap oil without any bloody invasion?

Sting may be stuck in 2003, but at least he is a record of the arguments which were thrown around at the time before the truth of Iraq's weapons came out when it was more ambiguous.

 

[Strongbow]

We have been over everything you wrote before, and it is all bullshit.

Don't ever address anything I say here again, and I am truly done with you and your idiocy.

I factually rebutted all of this as early as 2008.

Again, why all the personal crap? Are you incapable of discussing issues without saying something personal about another forum member.

The views I hold on these particular issues are also held by the majority of the members of the US military, Colin Powell, former Secretary Of State James Baker, former national security advisor and Secretary Of State Condeeliza Rice, Clinton's former national security expert on Iraq Kenneth Pollack, Michael O'Halon of the Brookings Institution, current Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, Admiral Mike Mullen, General Petreus, and millions of other Americans including 40% of Americans when it comes the removal of Saddam. A poll result I might add that will gradually shift back up above 50% where it was as late as 2005 in the years to come.

The number of people willing to defend keeping Saddam in power will only shrink in the coming years. I have yet to see anyone write a book explaining why leaving Saddam in power would be better for the security of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Persian Gulf Oil supply, stopping the spread of WMD, the security of the persian gulf region, the world and of course the United States which has security interest in all these area's.

 

[U2387]

U2387 I'm still waiting for you to justify the claim that Iraq got a "clean bill of health" in 1999.

Is it plausible that all the obfuscation over inspections during the 1990's had more to do with bluffing regional powers to protect Saddam's leadership?

Iraq didn't have weapons stockpiles.

Iraq retained some of the elements of its weapons programs which may have been able to be reactivated after sanctions were lifted.

The intelligence was manipulated to sell the lie that Iraq was an imminent threat.

The sanctions ruined Iraq, and the war took the slaughter even further.

I don't think it's irrational to think that the regime in Iraq had to bluff against external and internal enemies with ambiguity, and that allowed the Bush administration to invade so quickly.

Well that was perfectly reasonable, and of course, that provides the explanation for why Saddam only verifiably destroyed 90-95% of the WMD.

He wanted to bluff against the region, you are exactly right, but even that was a miscalculation on his part as I saw no one in the region too worried about him after 1991. Ask de facto thriving democracies of the 1990s like Jordan and Lebanon if they were afraid of Saddam. More like they laughed at him, running the entire place into the ground and unable to even feed his people.

But calculate he did nonetheless, and he thought that was how to keep the region in some kind of ambiguous fear. Whatever, he had an inflated ego(obviously) and was convinced of his superior mind and judgement, so its easy to see how he actually believed that people in the region were afraid of him.

There was no chance sanctions were ever going to be lifted, HW Bush, Clinton and W Bush said as much, the sanctions were going nowhere until Saddam was gone. This whole thing was not about disarmament but about regime change.( I saw your edit, and therein lays the answer to your question as to why sanctions and no fly zones were kept in place)

Thats why all the resolutions talk is so disingenuous- not only was 95% verifiably destroyed and the other 5% verified by UN Inspectors as worthless goo by the time period in question-but disarmament was just an excuse for the real objective of the sanctions in the first place, regime change.

Fine in and of itself, but HW, Clinton and the Iraqi liberation act of 1998 made very, very clear that regime change in and of itself was not to be implemented by spilling the blood of American soldiers in a useless war.

Lets pretend for a second sanctions were lifted, that does not mean that Saddam would have been able to reconstitute the programs. All of his factories were destroyed, and any and all attempts to reconstitute the capacity would have been eminently detectable by intelligence agencies. Then, the facilities get taken out and the sanctions restored.

Of course the likely course of action would have been quite different- sanctions lifted, Saddam just yawns and tries to hold together a country he was losing his grasp on and Iraq eventually fades into God knows what.

You are quite right on all of this

And most importantly, I am very sorry for interpreting your post as a defense of the Iraq war, A Wanderer.

I am even more sorry for snapping at you.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Why are you appealing to Powell and Baker as supporting the views you hold, that's a straight out lie about two foreign policy realists.

 

[U2387]

Again, why all the personal crap? Are you incapable of discussing issues without saying something personal about another forum member.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Issues don't work with you, I have tried and failed and then pointed out as much. That is, for the 6 millionth and last time, not a personal attack.

I said nothing about your religious views, political views, your family, your life, your job, anything personal.

I don't care about your life and you don't care about mine and that is how its staying.

I am done with you.

Get it yet?

 

[U2387]

Why are you appealing to Powell and Baker as supporting the views you hold, that's a straight out lie about two foreign policy realists.

Baker was writing op eds in the Wall Street Journal with Scowcroft cautioning Bush in 2002 not to do something stupid and invade Iraq before the facts are in.

Powell was telling anyone who would listen how nuts this push for Iraq was in private conversations in the run up to the war.

He went along out of a sense of duty, but he had the power to stop it and his endorsement of Obama shows anyone blessed with the gift of logic(which excludes some people...note to self- don't mention who) that he regretted that decision.

A Wanderer keeps making sense.

 

[Strongbow]

Iraq didn't have weapons stockpiles.

Saddam did not have stockpiles that were found after the invasion. Its still inconclusive to this day what happened to the unaccounted for WMD or whether other WMD was produced and then hidden or dismantled, or not.

Iraq retained some of the elements of its weapons programs which may have been able to be reactivated after sanctions were lifted.

The sanctions and weapons embargo had effectively collapsed by 2002. Saddam was able to sell over 3 Billion dollars worth of oil on the Black market in 2002. Syria stopped cooperating with the inspections process along its entire border with Iraq. Banned items and the sell of oil was also getting their the Turkish border, Iranian border and Jordanian border. Elements in both countries were also profitting from the illegal trade.

By the time of the US invasion in March 2003, sanctions only really existed on paper.

The intelligence was manipulated to sell the lie that Iraq was an imminent threat.

No one lied, but a case was indeed made to invade Iraq and naturally, as has happened in the past, many dissenting views were not considered in the specific case that was made.

Much of the intelligence was from the UN inspectors as well as Saddam's failure to comply with multiple UN resolutions. The case for war never rested solely on certain bits of intelligence that later turned out not to be true. The case for war involved many issues besides the WMD issue.

The sanctions ruined Iraq, and the war took the slaughter even further.

Saddam's uwillingness to work with international community to prevent the sanctions from burdening the Iraqi people was the problem. UN humanitarian aid meant for Iraqi's often ended up being for sale in Jordan or Syria.

I don't think it's irrational to think that the regime in Iraq had to bluff against external and internal enemies with ambiguity, and that allowed the Bush administration to invade so quickly.

Its one theory, but the fact remains that the only true threat to the survival of Saddam's regime was a US military invasion. The majority of the internal opposition to Saddam was put down by conventional means through out his quarter century in power.

The best way to prevent a US military invasion was through full compliance and cooperation with the international community on these issues. Saddam did the opposite despite the risk, which is the real sign of his intentions.

 

[A_Wanderer]

I understand that you want somebody to argue with but you're not worth my time.

I supported the invasion and occupation of Iraq out of my own ignorance. There are things which make me uneasy about being a flat out opponent of the war (the human rights issues under Saddam and an idealistic desire to see secular democracy spread). There are things which make me feel uncomfortable with myself (the massive casualties and failure to achieve the gains in human rights or secular democracy post-war).

I'm not certain that the violence inflicted by sectarian gangs and Islamists can be entirely attributed to the coalition because it may have been an inevitability when the Baathist apparatus collapsed through its own decay.

If you want to justify the invasion on the hypothetical situation of the regime crumbling and unleashing all the horror seen after the invasion, but with the additional element of regional powers invading and carving up the country then be honest and do it - I think I could.

If you want to justify it because it allows America to have a staging post for more attacks in other countries then defend that position.

If you genuinely believe that America is able to use imperial power in a way that can undermine the politico-religious ideology of Islamist terrorism then defend that position.

As it stands you repeat Bush-era talking points ad infinitum as if they constitute a valid argument (hint: they don't).

 

[U2387]

I understand that you want somebody to argue with but you're not worth my time.

I supported the invasion and occupation of Iraq out of my own ignorance. There are things which make me uneasy about being a flat out opponent of the war (the human rights issues under Saddam and an idealistic desire to see secular democracy spread). There are things which make me feel uncomfortable with myself (the massive casualties and failure to achieve the gains in human rights or secular democracy post-war).

I'm not certain that the violence inflicted by sectarian gangs and Islamists can be entirely attributed to the invasion because it may have been an inevitability when the Baathist apparatus collapsed.

If you want to justify the invasion on the hypothetical situation of the regime crumbling and unleashing all the horror seen after the invasion, but with the additional element of regional powers invading and carving up the country then be honest and do it - I think I could.

If you want to justify it because it allows America to have a staging post for more attacks in other countries then defend that position.

If you genuinely believe that America is able to use imperial power in a way that can undermine the politico-religious ideology of Islamist terrorism then defend that position.

As it stands you repeat Bush-era talking points ad infinitum as if they constitute a valid argument (hint: they don't).

Wow.

I was a real idiot for thinking you were defending the war!

Saddam was not a good guy, in fact he was an evil bastard, and that is undebatable.

However, as you know well, if human rights abuses were a reason to start a war, we'd be in Congo, Liberia, Sudan, Burma, the list goes on. And many of these people make Saddam look like a rookie hit man.

As for the suggestion that the collapse of Saddam absent an invasion(which all indicators say, this would probably have happened) would have led to the same chaos, I will just say that we wouldn't have had Rumsfeld disband the entire army and police force and they would have stood up for a government that was not Saddam. The insurgency and later sectarian violence that Iran and Saudi and AQaeda joined was a direct result of disbanding the Army and giving a lot of people with military training no job and a reason to be pissed at Americans.

 

[A_Wanderer]

That was a response to Strongbow and not you (this may have happened because you're blocking it).

I don't disagree with anything in your post.

The only reason that there are interests in Iraq is because of the oil, and if there those interests happened to motivate something positive then it could be supportable.

But it's clear that the outcome of the war was much worse for Iraq than waiting for Saddam to die or cutting a deal.

I was just acknowledging my position, and stating what makes me uncomfortable about both sides. At the same time fence-sitting is weak, and given the effects of Iraq I don't think I'd support any other invasions and "nation building" attempts.

 

[Strongbow]

Well that was perfectly reasonable, and of course, that provides the explanation for why Saddam only verifiably destroyed 90-95% of the WMD.

He wanted to bluff against the region, you are exactly right, but even that was a miscalculation on his part as I saw no one in the region too worried about him after 1991. Ask de facto thriving democracies of the 1990s like Jordan and Lebanon if they were afraid of Saddam. More like they laughed at him, running the entire place into the ground and unable to even feed his people.

Why did Jordan violate the sanctions regime and begin helping to buy and sell Iraqi oil illegally? Why was Jordan allowing UN humanitarian aid meant for the Iraqi people to be resold by Saddam in Jordan? If Jordan has no fear of Saddam why did they start to cooperate with Saddam against the UN sanctions?

Do you understand where Lebanon is on the map? They don't border Iraq and have hundreds of miles of Syrian land between them and Iraq. Plus far more immediate problems in the country as well as Syrian troops in the country to contend with back then.

But calculate he did nonetheless, and he thought that was how to keep the region in some kind of ambiguous fear. Whatever, he had an inflated ego(obviously) and was convinced of his superior mind and judgement, so its easy to see how he actually believed that people in the region were afraid of him.

The other countries in the region were indeed concerned.

Lets take a factual look at the conventional military balance in the region as of 2002:

MANPOWER:
Iraq - 424,000
Kuwait - 15,500
Bahrain - 11,000
Saudi Arabia - 201,500
Iran - 513,000
Jordan - 100,240
Syria - 321,000

MAIN BATTLE TANKS:
Iraq - 2,800
Kuwait - 385
Bahrain - 106
Saudi Arabia - 1,055
Iran - 1,565
Jordan - 1,058
Syria - 3,500

ARMORED PERSONAL CARRIERS:
Iraq - 3,700
Kuwait - 506
Bahrain - 306
Saudi Arabia - 4,640
Iran - 1,450
Jordan - 1,225
Syria - 4,885

ARTILLERY:
Iraq - 2,050
Kuwait - 86
Bahrain - 84
Saudi Arabia - 438
Iran - 2,395
Jordan - 531
Syria - 2,080

TOTAL COMBAT AIRCRAFT:
Iraq - 316
Kuwait - 82
Bahrain - 34
Saudi Arabia - 348
Iran - 283
Jordan - 101
Syria - 589



As shown above, there was still a major conventional imbalance in several area's when it came to the forces, especially when your just considering the Persian Gulf area, or just Kuwait VS Iraq.

There was no chance sanctions were ever going to be lifted, HW Bush, Clinton and W Bush said as much, the sanctions were going nowhere until Saddam was gone. This whole thing was not about disarmament but about regime change.( I saw your edit, and therein lays the answer to your question as to why sanctions and no fly zones were kept in place)

No not officially. But what you don't seem to understand is that for an effective sanctions and weapons regime to remain in place against Iraq, it required the cooperation of all of Iraq's neighbors. By 2002 though, Syria had ended all inspections along its border with Iraq and was actively helping Saddam sell his oil illegally. Jordan was doing the same and reselling humanitarian aid meant for the Iraqi people. The sanctions were leaking along the Turkish and Iranian borders as well with massive increases in Truck traffic. Even France, Russia and China broke the sanctions. Russia and France started international flights into Iraq violating the sanctions. China was helping Iraq with military enhancements to its air defense systems.

So the fact that the United States was not going to officialy lift sanctions did not matter at all. Without the support of all of Iraq's neighbors and several other members of the international community, keeping sanctions in place on Iraq would be impossible, even if on paper it was still official.

 

[A_Wanderer]

You're being dishonest by not using the condition or age of Iraqi military equipment.

Those figures are demonstrably rubbish given how easily the coalition toppled the regime and destroyed the much hyped Iraqi Republican Guard.

You're not contributing anything new to any discussion and should be treated like a troll.

 

[U2387]

You're being dishonest by not using the condition or age of Iraqi military equipment.

Those figures are demonstrably rubbish given how easily the coalition toppled the regime and destroyed the much hyped Iraqi Republican Guard.

Run down like a bunch of Boy Scouts any time they were confronted, needed 8 years and a ton of American military aid to fight a brand new Iranian government to just a stalemate.

Sounds like the much feared Iraqi Army with their great and overwhelming conventional power presence.

Those guys were good, real good, let me tell you.

If they were showing up at my door, I'd laugh and laugh some more.

 

[nathan1977]

Back onto something that isn't about the Iraq war...

Nearly $30 million stolen from Homebuyer Credit: report - Yahoo! Finance

Charming.

 

[Strongbow]

You're being dishonest by not using the condition or age of Iraqi military equipment.

I could break down the age of equipment for each of the countries but that would take more time. Iraq is far from being the only country on the list that had "aged" equipment.

In terms of condition, the Iraqi military was far more active in both training as well as surpressing opposition to the regime than most of its neighbors, especially Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. That alone proves the condition and battle worthiness of much of the force.

Those figures are demonstrably rubbish given how easily the coalition toppled the regime and destroyed the much hyped Iraqi Republican Guard.

The figures are facts from the Center for Strategic and International Studies and were confirmed by the US military during the invasion. The above list compares the countries in the region, it is not a comparison to a large scale deployed US/British invasion force.

The swiftness of the US/British victory does not change the fact of the potential threat posed by the size and quality of Iraq's forces in an offensive mode striking at specific targets in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, especially with a US force in the region that was a tiny fraction of the invasion force. Plus, this is without considering the whole WMD issue which would greatly complicate the balance.

You're not contributing anything new to any discussion and should be treated like a troll.

I'm offering my opinion on issues being discussed. There is nothing wrong with that. There is something wrong though with making personal comments against another person, obviously because you disagree with them.

 

[Strongbow]

Run down like a bunch of Boy Scouts any time they were confronted, needed 8 years and a ton of American military aid to fight a brand new Iranian government to just a stalemate.

Yep, thats exactly what happened when Iraq invaded Kuwait on August 2, 1990. They were run down by the Kuwaiti army like a bunch of boy scouts.

Think about the size of the coalition that the United States built up in order to remove Saddam's military from Kuwait.

Also, it was the SOVIET UNION, NOT the United States that was the primary supplier of Iraq during the 1980s.

In addition, the Iraq war ended in a draw in name only. Iraq was the clear victor when you look at the balance of forces in 1989, which I can print out here if you would like.

Sounds like the much feared Iraqi Army with their great and overwhelming conventional power presence.

Those guys were good, real good, let me tell you.

If they were showing up at my door, I'd laugh and laugh some more.

Well, you would not be laughing if you experienced what several million Iraqi's, Iranians, or Kuwaiti's experienced, who were either killed, wounded, tortured, or raped by Saddam's military from 1979 through 2003.

Most knowledgable people including President Clinton did not consider it anything to laugh about either.

 

[Strongbow]

Thats why all the resolutions talk is so disingenuous- not only was 95% verifiably destroyed and the other 5% verified by UN Inspectors as worthless goo by the time period in question-but disarmament was just an excuse for the real objective of the sanctions in the first place, regime change.

The resolutions involved multiple issues of which WMD was one. The chief issue is Saddam's full cooperation and compliance as that is the best indication of his willingness to cooperate with the international community in the future. The 5% you talk of was more than enough to force the entire coalition to suit up up in full MOPP gear for protection during the duration of the invasion.

Fine in and of itself, but HW, Clinton and the Iraqi liberation act of 1998 made very, very clear that regime change in and of itself was not to be implemented by spilling the blood of American soldiers in a useless war.

George Bush Sr, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush NEVER ruled out the use of military force in any capacity against Saddam in order to protect the United States and its interest in the region!

Every time Bill Clinton sent the air force into Iraq to strike targets, or pilots were patrolling the no fly zone, there was a RISK of "spilling the blood of US military personal!

Lets pretend for a second sanctions were lifted, that does not mean that Saddam would have been able to reconstitute the programs. All of his factories were destroyed, and any and all attempts to reconstitute the capacity would have been eminently detectable by intelligence agencies. Then, the facilities get taken out and the sanctions restored.

All of Saddam's factories were not destroyed, and multiple ones were found that had the capability to produce WMD. As for US intelligence agencies being able to detect WMD, lets look at what we know. Prior to the first gulf war, most of the assessments on Saddam's WMD capabilities were proved wrong. His capabilities were shown to be far more extensive once the inspectors got a look, and instead of being 10 years away from having a nuclear weapon, it was shown that he was only 6 months to a year away from having one back in 1991.

Then of course, there were the assesment on Saddam's WMD prior to the 2003 war, and this time none were found. So clearly, dectecting WMD accurately is very difficult, and the advantage is clealy with the country attempting to produce and conceal the production of such weapons.

US intelligence is currently not confident that they know where all of Iran's nuclear facilities are, let alone places where warheads may be under development. Thats why the whole issue of airstrikes against Iran is seen as not being able to resolve the Iranian nuclear issue. The US could strike and hit multiple targets, but obviously miss many ones it simply does not know exist. In addition, anything struck can be rebuilt and hidden better.

Finally, the sanctions regime required the efforts of multiple countries that bordered Iraq. Its already been shown that the sanctions and weapons embargo against Iraq started taking on water after 1998 and had essentially collapsed by 2002.

Of course the likely course of action would have been quite different- sanctions lifted, Saddam just yawns and tries to hold together a country he was losing his grasp on and Iraq eventually fades into God knows what.

Well, by far the best indication of what would be in Saddam's future after the collapse of sanctions and the international community doing nothing about it can be found from Saddam's past, invasions and attacks on four different countries, the attempt to annex countries and land near Iraq, the manufacture, deployment and use of WMD against his own citizens and the citizens and soldiers of other countries, the purchase of large numbers of military hardware from abroad with Iraq's vast oil wealth! A future that would promise chaos for the region and the world.

 

[Strongbow]

Baker was writing op eds in the Wall Street Journal with Scowcroft cautioning Bush in 2002 not to do something stupid and invade Iraq before the facts are in.

Baker supported the removal of Saddam then and still supports that course of action today!

Powell was telling anyone who would listen how nuts this push for Iraq was in private conversations in the run up to the war.

Again, this is liberal myth dispelled by Powell himself when he appeared on Barbara Walters show in 2005 and clearly stated that he believed removing Saddam was still the right course of action. He said that when "President Bush stated it was not tolerable for Saddam to remain in violation of the UN resolutions, I was right there with him on the use of military force"!

He went along out of a sense of duty, but he had the power to stop it and his endorsement of Obama shows anyone blessed with the gift of logic(which excludes some people...note to self- don't mention who) that he regretted that decision.

Well, show us one qoute where Powell regrets removing Saddam from power! Just one!

He stated clearly when he was not in the job anymore in 2005 that removing Saddam was the right course of action, and he has never deviated from that position since then, regardless of voting for Obama in 2008.

 

[Strongbow]

I understand that you want somebody to argue with but you're not worth my time.

Thanks for sharing that with us. This personal opinion of me is just one more thing that has nothing do with the issues.

I supported the invasion and occupation of Iraq out of my own ignorance. There are things which make me uneasy about being a flat out opponent of the war (the human rights issues under Saddam and an idealistic desire to see secular democracy spread). There are things which make me feel uncomfortable with myself (the massive casualties and failure to achieve the gains in human rights or secular democracy post-war).

Well, there are much more important and vital security issues to consider when thinking about the removal of Saddam although I agree that human rights and seeing democracy spread are important.

But there has been huge gains in the area of democracy in Iraq since the removal of Saddam, but this was always going to be a process that would take years if not decades to achieve.

The level of casualties although terrible pales in comparison to what was experienced under Saddam through his wars and the mass execution of his own citizens.

I'm not certain that the violence inflicted by sectarian gangs and Islamists can be entirely attributed to the coalition because it may have been an inevitability when the Baathist apparatus collapsed through its own decay.

The coalition made mistakes early on that made the rebuild of Iraq more difficult, but I think some level of violence was inevitable.

If you want to justify the invasion on the hypothetical situation of the regime crumbling and unleashing all the horror seen after the invasion, but with the additional element of regional powers invading and carving up the country then be honest and do it - I think I could.

If you want to justify it because it allows America to have a staging post for more attacks in other countries then defend that position.

If you genuinely believe that America is able to use imperial power in a way that can undermine the politico-religious ideology of Islamist terrorism then defend that position.

As it stands you repeat Bush-era talking points ad infinitum as if they constitute a valid argument (hint: they don't).

The United States did not invade Iraq to have some staging ground to invade other countries or because it thought that Iraq was about to crumble into a civil war or to undermine Islamist terrorism.

There was a reason the United States and its allies passed multiple resolutions against Saddam after the 1991 war, as well as constructing a large sanctions and weapons embargo regime. It was believed that least costly way of dealing with Saddam at the time was to contain him in a box and that within 5 years he would be gone from events within the country.

Unfortunately, Saddam survived and tightened his grip on the country. Then the sanctions and weapons embargo against him started to take on water and finally collapsed.

Saddam had to either be contained or removed, and with the effective end of the sanctions and weapons embargo by 2002, containment of Saddam was impossible. Saddam's strength after this point would only continue to grow do to Iraq's oil wealth. Saddam would quicly or gradually rebuild his conventional forces, rebuild his WMD capacities. With each passing month or year, Saddam would grow stronger and any invasion to remove him would become more difficult, costly and bloody. The risk of Saddam invading another country or attacking another country would grow.

This is precisely the senerio that the international community was dedicated to preventing after the 1991 Gulf War. There were only two options, large scale containment or regime change. Containment was tried but it ultimately fell apart, leaving regime change as the only option.

Thats the basic history in a nutshell, and nothing that has happened since Saddam's removal changes any of it.

 

[Strongbow]

The only reason that there are interests in Iraq is because of the oil, and if there those interests happened to motivate something positive then it could be supportable.

Its the oil in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain that the United States has been concerned about protecting for 60 years now. Saddam, his past actions and behavior, and capabilities were a major threat to this. Containment was tried and failed, which is why Saddam had to be removed.

But it's clear that the outcome of the war was much worse for Iraq than waiting for Saddam to die or cutting a deal.

What is that based on? Certainly not Saddam's past history as ruler of Iraq. That involved repeated invasions and attacks on countries in the region. The use of WMD against his own people and the citizens and soldiers of other countries on a massive scale. The huge threat to much of the planets energy supply from being controlled by Saddam. It would also involve the continued annual state murder of citizens and military personal throughout the country that Saddam would suddenly deem to be a threat.

Saddam's own death would only result in his replacement by one of his sons. The Regime would indeed continue and the evidence from history shows would be ever bit the threat that it was in the past if not more so.

The only way you could live with Saddam is if he could be effectively contained and cut off from the rest of the world. But that project unfortunately fell apart.

At the same time fence-sitting is weak, and given the effects of Iraq I don't think I'd support any other invasions and "nation building" attempts.

While many mistakes were made and there has been much loss of life, the worst senerio's never even came close to happening. The level of casualties pales in comparison to the Iran/Iraq war or even Saddam's slaughter of Shia and Kurds in the months after the 1991 Gulf War.

Your also forgetting the enormous security value in removing the largest aggressor and greatest threat to the vital countries in the region like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

As the new Iraqi government emerges and the violence continues to drop over time in Iraq, and the country continues to manage more of its own security without the aid of foreign troops, more people will come to conclude that removing Saddam was indeed the right course of action.

 

[Irvine511]

and after all that, we fail to get any sort of meaningful intellectual exchange of ideas.

droning on and on into a megaphone isn't making an argument.