I’m honestly holding out some hope that this WASN’T a gigantic stack of lies, and that something will be found. But to be honest, I suspect Bush et al. took us all for fools, and I think a lot of people proved him right.
Well, I’m pulling this opinion right out of my Nixon, but I dont think so. There is lots and lots of indications of intelligence ignored and bullshit believed. Seymour Hersh has an article in the most recent New Yorker that’ll curl your hair. If he’s right, and I think he is, we got our story straight from the horse’s ass, from people we knew had every reason to tell us what we wanted to hear.
Remember when Rummy bitched that the CIA wasn’t telling him the truth, because they weren’t telling him what he already believed? Stuff like that.
I watched all the newsy talk shows this morning. Not one word about this. Liberal media, my ass!
If you check CNN, Reuters et al, you’ll notice how the gave the thing a whole one and a half paragraphs bundled in under headlines about the Iraqi occupation gov being replaced.
And who’s fault would that be? Hmmm?
No-one, repeat, no-one knows, and uses, the power of the veto more than the US.
Remember kids; US appealing to their right-wing voters = good. Germany appealing to their leftists voters = bad. And always a good excuse to trot out a World War joke!
Not to mention that Germany did, in fact, NOT appeal to leftist voters. Leftist voters have a pretty strict opinion as to what the part of the German constitution that reads
Article 26 [Ban on War]
(1) Acts tending to and undertaken with intent to disturb the peaceful relations between nations, especially to prepare war or aggression, are unconstitutional. They have to be made a criminal offence.
Had the chancellor catered to German leftists, he would have done what Belgium or Switzerland did: Refuse to grant transit rights and stop all arms exports. The US can count itself lucky he didn’t go that far for the sake of not disturbing relations with the US even more. It would have screwed up the operation big time.
What the original poster also forgets is that it wasn’t just German leftists who were opposed to the war. Except for their party leadership, it was German conservatives as well. The fact that their party leadership was willing to throw their christian traditions overboard did not impede their constituents from listening more to Rome than to their party heads.
The German government lacked any mandate for support for the war. It also lacked constitutional leeway in the absence of a NATO or UN mandate and a clear and impending crisis. But that’s not all. Given that the UN charter imposes strict primacy of itself over other treaties, the principles of the UN take primacy over other alliances.
This is a link to Colin Powell’s speech before the UN less than a year ago. I know that you are familiar with this speech, so I honestly don’t understand how you can say that it wasn’t a reason given.
This seems to be the premise of his speech:
And another excerpt:
He also mentions the Iraw/ Al Quida Network as being a danger.
As an American, I certainly thought that these were the reasons that my country gave for going to war. I think most Americans thought so.
Did we just sort of miss what Bush was driving at?
Ah, Zoe, do you realize that you are responding to a 6 month old thread?
Many of the reasons given were very subjective, and based on American definitions and standards. If you took the reasons, but view them from a different point of view, then even America looks bad.
For example, I saw a news report just before the war on BBC2 where they spoke to a group of Anti-castro freedom fighters operating out of Florida. The authorities were aware of their existence, and either turned a blind eye, or actively helped them out. If you’re a member of the cuban government, then these freedom fighters sure look like terrorists being harboured by the US (desperately tried to find a cite for this, but can’t).
I’ve also read about the growing gap between rich and poor in the US. How large does this gap have to be before you consider it to be an unfair society and a reason for invasion?
Americas use of the death penalty is abhorrent to many countries. According to Amnesty, you are in the top three executers in the world (Found a cite for this one ). You also execute minors, which could also be considered a violation of human rights.
There were serious doubts about the validity of the last election. Whether you believe them or not, these could be given a reason to doubt the democratic nature of the US (at the moment at least).
Finally, you have LOTS of WMDs. I know that Saddam was considered a dangerous man to have WMDs, but part of that reputation was down to his unprovoked invasion of another country. If the war-doubts are to be believed, then so has Bush. Should he be left with his finger on the button?
I really want to stress I am NOT suggesting that America is like Iraq, that Bush is like Saddam, or that America needs to be invaded. I don’t want to debate the pros and cons of America.
I am merely trying to show how the reasons given for the war can be twisted to fit even the US, if you see it from a different point of view.
As most politicians can twist the facts to fit their own agenda, it is quite conceivable that a skilled leader in another country could build a convincing argument for going to war with the US, and even try to make themselves look like the good guy.