QFT, even if the rest of your post is a bit out there.
Bush’s incompetent expensive war based on lies created very fertile recruiting grounds in Iraq for Al Qaeda. His budget plans at home were disastrous. He’s done damage to America Al Qaeda could only dream of. He shit all over the Constitution . Then for good measure dipped our flag in a shit flowing sewer with his torture and other crimes against humanity. His escape from justice brings shame to every American. Mean while, knowing full well about the danger of the housing bubble, ignored it for his fool war and ran our economy into the ground.
I bet Osama faps to Bush. Bush did the kind of damage Osama could only dream of.
Also don’t forget Bush heavily capitalized on fear of Osama to push his incompetence. There wasn’t any formal agreement but Bush and Osama sure did make a good team for trashing America. Bush wouldn’t have been able to do all he did without Osama’s help.
That is part of why I say Bush voter either equals deluded fool or selfish traitor.
As for Saddam not believing the US would invade: do you think he noticed the US sending 250,000+ troops, plus tanks, aircraft, missiles and aircraft carriers to his borders?
And Saddam personally flew the planes into the Towers? :rolleyes:
The CIA installed Saddam and his party in power.
Rumsfeld sold Saddam WMDs which were used to kill millions in the Iraq-Iran war and later tens of thousands of Kurds.
Um…yeah. Very convincing. I don’t think there is any point in refuting cites from such well known and respected sources as fantompowa or Representative Press…
Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 and Gore would never hav contemplated invading it. The likelihood is that Gore would have sent troops to Afghanistan, just like Bush, removed the Taliban and tried to find bin Laden. He may or may not have succeeded at the latter, but he would have devoted more resources to it and not wasted so much blood and treasure on a ridiculous fiasco in Iraq.
Gore would have also not alienated world opinion to the extent that Bush did, and would not have wiped his ass with the Bill of Rights.
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No I do not think Gore wpuld have sent in the troops into Afghanistan. And on 9/11 he would not have shut down the airlines, More planes would have gone into buildings. gore would have been like Bill, Now just stop that.
Now from that date forward it is hard to find things that Bush did an good job on. But in 2004 I was almost afraid to vote. I knew what bush was and I remembered Carry from the 70’s.
Even if the US should have gone into Iraq. You do not go into a country and eliminate the government and set up anarcy, that is beyond dumb.
Would you care to explain precisely what the fuck you’re talking about, in a way that makes sense? I realize asking for evidence to back it up is too much to ask.
After the bombing of the World Trade Center during Bill Clinton’s Administration, the people who did it and ordered it done were CAUGHT. They are still in prison last I heard. And “Bill” also had a hunt going for Osama bin Laden - one of the first things Bush did was call it off. Bush also ignored the outgoing Administrations warnings about Osama, and the warnings of his own subordinates.
Al Qaeda supported Bush - Osama even timed the release of his communications in order to bolster Bush’s reelection according to the CIA at the time. As I said earlier; for all practical purposes Bush was the Al Qaeda President. If he had been a mole for them, he wouldn’t have acted much differently.
Given the bad feelings that remain from mouth-foamers on the Right calling opponents of the Iraq war traitors in 2002, I would hope that we would see less foaming-at-the-mouth calls of “traitor” from the Left, now.
If you wish to condemn Bush and chide his supporters, find a less inflammatory way to do it.
Fair enough. I’ll even say most of the people who voted for Bush prolly thought it was the right thing to do. I just have a very low opinion of the results, and the way many people let themselves be manipulated into them. Not everyone knows about politics so maybe calling them “fools” is a bit much. Those people can be likable, just ignorant. I wish they would have faught their ignorance, but we all do ignorant things from time to time.
The people who knew what Bush was really about, and voted for him anyway are the ones I consider the T word.
How about this? It’s as if after Pearl Harbor we attacked Japan and then after knee deep in that war we decided that Korea was close and probably had something to do with it so let’s invade them too.
I think there was a failed plan to dominate the middle east economically and militarily. Had Afghanistan and Iraq gone differently we’d probably be in Iran today with Israel helping us.
As others have said, we did do something. It was the 2nd war started later that was a huge mistake. It was a personal agenda rather than 9/11 related.
I knew after 9/11 we’d have to go after someone. While we were in Afghanistan and Bush began to talk about Iraq I did some research. It didn’t take long to discover Bush was lying and Iraq was no threat to us but rather a buffer against radical Islam in the Middle East. So, it’s not criticizing after the fact. I knew at the time that he was a lying SOB willing to throw our young men in women into a needless war to pursue his own agenda. If an uneducated joe like me can figure that out with minimal effort then the information was pretty easy to access. I primarily blame Bush and his administration but I think there’s blame to be shared by the gutless members of congress who should have taken a stronger stand against the war.
Same exact problem…why exactly would we have invaded Korea? We didn’t fight a war with Korea in the 30’s, hadn’t established a no fly zone over portions of Korea…in fact, my guess is that most American’s prior to Pearl Harbor wouldn’t have known where Korea was on a map, or have any feelings one way or another about Korea.
I seriously doubt it, but we’ll never know, so both of us are free to indulge in speculation about that however we like.
Right. It was reading the New American Century Web site that was a big part in convincing me Bush was pursuing another agenda using the tragedy of 9/11 as a cover, even before we actually invaded.
At the time I didn’t know if he had WMDs or not. What I discovered was that Saddam was not a wack job dictator bent on unending conquest. There was no way he would risk a direct confrontation with the US military, which had already easily thrashed his armies easily. That meant the whole imminent threat thing was bullshit. He did not invade Kuwait for conquest alone. It was largely financial and he contacted the US to ask what we would do before he invaded. That’s not the act of a wack job. Yes he used gas in the Iran/Iraq war , and we willingly and knowingly looked the other way until it became so embarrassing we had to condemn it. Saddam fought Iran for eight years in order to prevent the spread of extremist Islam into Iraq. He was considered a secular government in that area so removing him from power to prevent terrorism seemed counter productive.
I’m not sure what those details have to do with the lies we were told to justify invading Iraq. Like many Americans I knew very little about that area and our history here. With one war already going on and our president talking about another I took the time to find out. They tried to make a connection with Iraq and the events of 9/11 and couldn’t find much. They presented Saddam as a crazed dictator bent on conquest and compared him to Hitler. Also a lie. They claimed he was a threat to the US. A lie. And finally it became about spreading freedom and liberating the Iraqi people. A noble goal had it been true. The truth was the same reasons not to do it existed that kept us from ousting Saddam during desert storm.
I’m not sure what they realistically expected would happen. After reading this site in particular things like
{bolding mine}and the names at the bottom I realized some of what was going on. An influential and connected group were pursuing their personal vision for America. The signs indicated to me that they hoped to install a friendly, puppet like government in Iraq and establish military bases there to cower or act against any country that didn’t cooperate. Establishing a true democracy means we actually let that country steer it’s own course even if they are not cooperative with our agenda. That’s not what they wanted. IMO they were too fucking arrogant to consider how the people native to that area would reject our interference and fight to keep us from controlling their country. They also failed to consider how the information age would allow more people to know the truth about their activities and turn the tide of public opinion.
I remember the Iran talk months before the election took over the news cycle and I was seriously concerned that they might use more lies to start another conflict. I wonder if other dopers had similar concerns.
I wanted to comment on this as well. There are a lot of people in the military and there will be a variety of opinions and experiences. My daughters significant other was career military 11 years in and got out after one tour of Iraq because he couldn’t continue to serve with a clear conscience. There’s a film called The Ground Truth about some of our troops and how the death and killing of civilians affected them. There’s another film showing the positive side that I’d like to see. IMO that means the opinion of a few military people , while relevant, is not conclusive. Others have served and feel very differently. I’m sure a lot of positive things have happened in Iraq. A lot of Iraqi citizens were very glad to get rid of Saddam. The larger question is was it worth the overall cost on many fronts weighing the positive and the negative.
IMO war should always be the last resort for a commander in chief and only in a defense of America and American lives. IMO that was not the case concerning Iraq. We had already responded to the 9/11 attack. Promoting democracy in the Middle East was the right goal but this was the wrong way to go about it. Democracy can’t be forced at the end of a rifle barrel but must be nurtured and encouraged within the hearts of the citizens over time. Then, when the country is already tilting in that direction we can assist those who are trying to build a democracy. That also means, IMO, that we allow a democracy to determine their own destiny and support the same rights for them that we want to claim for ourselves. Adding the qualifier that a democracy must support American interests, principles and policies amounts to not supporting a true democracy at all.
Forget the manufactured connection between 9/11 and Iraq. This is a bit more basic than that. Nearly every American knew who Saddam was, knew where Iraq was, and knew we had been fighting a low grade war with them for over a decade…since we fought a high grade, if short war with them in 1991.
Prior to the Korean War I doubt very many American’s could find Korea on a map, had no idea who was the president of Korea, and had no opinion about Korea one way or the other. So…invading Korea after being attacked by Japan is not a good analogy for invading Iraq after 9/11. In fact, it sucks.
Why continue to push these bad analogies? It doesn’t help. Instead, why not just say ‘Invading Iraq was a mistake that was fairly unique in American history’?