Because it’s interesting. And the reason they are doing this whole “decision points” thing is because for all the Bush administration’s faults, one thing they actually did better than any other administration was make decisions and follow through on them.
Of course, they made mostly bad decisions. But it gets annoying to see Presidents dither for months while people die, then get involved in a half-assed way, pull back when things get too hairy, then get back in with a vengeance when things reach a crisis point.
With the Balkans, Libya, and now Syria, we should have either intervened or not intervened. What actually happened ended up prolonging suffering. It’s always said that war should be a last resort, but that’s assuming there’s no war and you’re planning on starting one. Once a war is a fact, the decision to intervene or not intervene should be made, and once made, stuck to unless the facts on the ground change drastically to justify a new decision. Most Presidents fail to do that. If Bush had had even a tiny amount of foresight and competence, he would have been a great President.
Do you agree or disagree with the point of the question posed that Bush is wrong in his video taped performance to state that his first choice was diplomacy?
That is primarily what I would like to know.
If you would like to express your opinion of course.
Are you aware that Bush spent at least six months deciding on the 2007 surge? Some say he spent one year deciding that.
Plenty were dying as that decision was being made.
Bush did not act on the last troop request for Afghanistan at all.
Obama decisively decided to send 20,000 needed troops to Afghanistan within one month of taking office. With that first surge if troops the US military, launched the biggest air to ground offensive into Taliban strongholds in the south, since the war in Vietnam.
I don’t know if you were comparing Bush to Obama, but I just wanted you to be aware of some fairly decisive moves on Obama’s part with respect to his duty as Commander in Chief and as POTUS.
Like the inspections issue, that military offensive of 2009 is little mentioned.
But thank you for bringing up more matters of interest for this thread about President’s decisions on matters of war.
I do appreciate your views and will address all of them in a matter of time.
That’s because the decision had been made earlier that no more troops were necessary. That was inflexibility biting him in the ass.
Obama split the difference between what the military wanted and what the political advisors and Joe Biden wanted. And that took a LONG time to decide. And he only decided when he did because the military kept on strategically leaking to force him into deciding the way they wanted.
Now mind you my source on both Bush with the surge and Obama with his surge comes from Bob Woodward’s books. I know some people don’t take him seriously anymore. But I still think his books give the best inside views of Presidencies and he’s really skilled at getting people to sell each other out rather than just give the administration line.
Take a moment to recall that Iraq invited the CIA into Iraq in December 2002. Wouldn’t that have enable the same thing taking place as you have described?
I believe mostly what enraged SH in 1998 was that the UN wanted access to his palace and SH figured that gave access to CIA agents he perceived perhaps incorrectly were working on the inspection teams at the time,
I saw no evidence of the same CIA issue in 2003 since as I have said, the CIA was invited in for the 2002/03 round of inspections.
I respect Bob Woodwards work on Iraq and Afghanistan on both presidents.
I’ll have to brush up - since I have not focused on his books for a couple of years.
Funny, I read Woodward’s account in The Washington Post and got a very clear view that Obama was much more decisive during what Republicans called the dithering period prior to the announcement of the second surge at West Point in December 2002.
I think the problem is that Obama likes consensus within his administration and Clinton and Biden weren’t on the same page. Biden has been consistently dovish, even opposing the bin Laden raid, while Clinton’s always taking the most hawkish position. So they’d have endless meetings where they’d ask the same questions over and over and never get anywhere. Obama did however set a deadline for making a decision and then he made it, although as I said, it split the difference between the minimalist option and the counterinsurgency option.
Bush, once presented with the surge option just took it, despite massive public and Congressional opposition. Obama has always had to keep an eye on the politics of the wars, but his base wouldn’t abandon him over them unless he did something outrageously warmongerish. Bush was dealing with a Democratic Party that was stridently in favor of withdrawal by 2007 and called the surge an “escalation”, which is just absurd.
I disagree that was the question you asked. I agree that Bush made a serious mistake, but I think he made that mistake by pretty much deciding for was in September-ish 2002, and that anyone who voted for the war resolution shares equally in the disaster that was Iraq, because they gave Bush a literal blank check to decide whether or not to go to war.
In any case, I think the primary value of Bush’s library (as with other presidential libraries) is not to answer the question of whether he made a good decision or not, but to illuminate for historians what exactly was going through his head at the time.
Taking an issue with whether Bush’s first choice was diplomacy gets into a pointless debate about what constitutes “first choice” and what constitutes “diplomacy.” He did ask the UN for various resolutions, and I think that’s exactly what he was referring to.
But the fact still remains that, both in hindsight and with the foresight of many people who said so at the time, there was no good reason at all to provoke such a serious confrontation with Iraq.
It had to happen eventually. 2002 was too soon, but there was broad agreement among the US political establishment that Saddam had to go. Now for politicians, agreeing that something has to be done yet not doing it is normal behavior. That’s not how Bush was wired though.
I admit that the critics of the war were mostly right. But there’s just one little detail that they don’t really address: what was the alternative to never going to war? I can understand waiting until we got bin Laden or something, but the sanctions regime had become unsustainable and was brutally inhumane, worse than war.
Another counterfactual I wonder about is, what happens if Saddam is still over there and the Arab spring is taking place? Iraq is in flames. What do we do? And you can’t just say, “Don’t intervene” because we were already enforcing no-fly zones and had the Kurds under our protection with ground forces if necessary. If Iraq went into civil war, our only choices would be to get fully involved in overthrowing Saddam, or pull back and let Saddam have his way with his people.
My point is that one way or another, the Saddam problem had to be resolved, and subsequent events have shown that to be even more clear than in 2002.
That just isn’t the case that Iraq had to be “solved.” I can name five more pressing issues than Iraq during that general time period, starting with Iran and Pakistan. There was no good reason to go to war with Iraq, and much less absolutely nothing compelling us to do so.
I would like to start with your very last paragraph and work back from there. My contention is and the indisputable historical reality exists that Saddam Hussein at the time was in violation of international law and I believe you are aware of why.
You may disagree with that condition of global affairs but it was indeed a fact.
That means there was a reason to confront Saddam Hussein on the matter in a post-911 world. That violation of international law and order needed to be addressed in a way that could forcefully ensure a reasonably prompt resolution. (Get inspectors back in) and thereby compel the end of what Adaher brings up about the humanitarian issue caused in due part by the sanctions.
If you will be open to where I can take the argument against what Adaher is saying it will explain and perhaps settle a lot and should prove to be interesting.
Lets not approach this discussion with our absolutes like, there-was-NO-reason, if we may. That is all I ask here.
With regard to speculation that Bush decided somewhat definitely in favor of war in September 2002, would you agree however that in public displays it was apparent that Bush had broken with the Cheney camp that opposed going to the UN for one last shot at a diplomatic resolution to Saddam’s WMD violation?
It is important and pretty much a matter of public record is it not?
Iran and Pakistan were more important issues, not more pressing. There’s a distinction.
Iran and Pakistan are pretty much where they were in 2002. Iraq, however, was about to go through a lot of changes. For one, the sanctions regime was unraveling. So chances are, by 2010, Iraq is stronger. And with a far more reckless leader than Iran or Pakistan.
Are we still in containment mode today if we don’t invade Iraq? Is that even plausible? Or like the sanctions, would we have just given up after awhile?
And to “remedy” that situation, the United States violated its commitment to the UN Charter by authorizing and carrying out a war that was inconsistent with Chapter VII of the treaty. Two wrongs don’t make a right.
I’ll be clear: I was in favor of the sanctions, but given the US history on sanctions, let’s not pretend that only ways to conclude sanctions are (1) capitulation by the sanctioned party or (2) war on same. We’ve embargoed Cuba for generations, and not found the need to invade them.
I’m not being hyperbolic. I said there was no GOOD reason. And that, from my perspective, is even more true now than I thought it was 10 years ago. I will shout it from the hilltops: there was no good reason to instigate a war. You haven’t named one, in my estimation. Shoot, you haven’t even come close – you’ve only mentioned BAD reasons for war.
In what way was Iraq in 2002 more pressing than Iran today, in which they are believed to be creeping toward a nuclear weapon, they hold ever-more lethal weapons to close off the access to a large chunk of the world’s oil by sinking shipping in the Straits of Hormuz, and they continue to actively sponsor terrorism including Hizbollah? It’s just pure BS that Iraq in 2002 is anywhere near what we see in Iran over the past 10 years, including today. That allegation doesn’t even pass the laugh test.
Who knows? What would have happened if the Japanese didn’t bomb Pearl Harbor? What is clear is that if Iraq had not been invaded in 2003, and later decided itself to go back into Kuwait in 2009 (or whatever), we would have been justified in going to war with them and we still would have beaten the crap out of them.
Plus, there’s a minor chance that Afghanistan would have turned out a little better in the meantime, instead of sending nearly 250,000-odd coalition troops into a place that had very little to do with our security post-9/11.
Just to let you know in the spirit of constructive dialogue that I one hundred percent agree with with one objection and the distinction being that when the US Congress authorized military force specific to Iraq in October 2002, Iraq was in violation of international law.
I agree with the argument that UN member states can enforce UN resolutions without UNSC authority such as Iraq’s disarmament agreement following the First Gulf War.
When the US military invasion began in March 2003 however there was a changed condition with respect to international law and Iraq. Iraq was given a Final Opportunity to get into compliance and the US signed on.
Iraq according to to UN Res 1441 was in compliance with the final opportunity afforded it when they agreed to allow inspectors in and then were in a stage of proactive cooperation by the end of Feb 2003.
That changed legal condition means what you said is true with respect to the final decision to invade which meant kicking the succeeding UN inspectors out and attempting to disarm (in the Bush Admin’s mind) by war and regime change.
I am suggesting that the majority view pont even at the UN with the unanimous consensus of the UNSC including Russia France and China agreed that Saddam’s violation of international law needed to be resolved. They all agreed with Bush on that matter and voted on it in November.
I am arguing based upon the reality that was present at that time.
I would like to be told why I am wrong about that.
We’re digressing into the same topic that you always want to discuss. If you can loop this conversation back into something having to do with the Bush library, I’ll rejoin later.