"Iraq supplied al-Qaeda with WMDs" -- Does this report justify the war?

Great Debates
181

SimonX:
I don’t think that the Soviet Union was less determined to harm the US. I do think that the Soviet leadership was more rational and realistic than Saddam. And I don’t find a replay of the Cold War acceptable. A replay would have cost more money and more lives than the war in Iraq has.

If Saddam had gone on to use WMD’s in the mideast, the overall cost to the US in dollars and lives would be incalculable. Who knows what wars would have resulted from the utter chaos afterward, whether a massive depression results from the sudden destruction of the Oil reserves in the biggest oil fires in history. And who knows what wars and dislocations would result from the biggest depression in history.

We’ve never triggered a nuclear device over a rich oil field before, I wonder if a nuke would open faults that drain away that portion of the oil that does not burn. Would the remaining nations now go to war over coal reserves?

And I’d like to remind everybody that Saddam doesn’t need to get the yellowcake from Africa. There’s a real chance that either Pakistan or North Korea would sell him complete warheads. That is what North Korea was threatening. And who knows who’ll be in charge of Pakistan in a few years.

Then there’s all that Russian Uranium and those Russian warheads, possibly for sale.

182

I have to say that I find your post a mixture of desperate hope and illogicality:

I’ve never seen any evidence that Bush would have helped al-Queda, although it could never be ruled out.

After WW2 had been going for 2 years, the Japanese launched an attack on the USA. The USA joined the other side. The fact that the USSR was on the other side is pretty irrelevant. You might as well say the US and the Channel Islands allied themselves in 1941.

I agree.

Yes, they are a frighteningly determined bunch who want no interference from the voters. Incidentally your evidence of ‘genuine security needs’ is?

How many of the administration are on boards of the companies (like Bechtel and Halliburton) that are exclusively being awarded the massive contracts?
How much did these companies pay in campaign contributions last time?

Scene: The offices of the Nepalese Governnment…
President (addressing his Government colleagues) “We must devote resources to researching for evidence of US corruption in Iraq. We must hack into Pentagon databases, and burgle the White House.
Once we have the evidence, we can confront Bush and force him to resign.”
Trade minister “Sir, even if we do get the evidence, the US will crush us with trade sanctions. Also we don’t have the money or the expertise required.”
President “We must not get left behind. Even countries like Monaco, Bangladesh and Fiji are searching…”

183

Disagree. I do not think it is implausible to believe that the Administration planned to deflect any domestic criticism/questioning/skepticism by simply labeling the critics as “unAmerican” or “not patriotic.” I can easily imagine Ari Fleischer or George W. Bush parroting something like “The Democrats’ criticism of our efforts is dividing the country! We are waging a war on terror, and they’re engaged in partisan nitpicking.” Even now, you’ll find various conservative pundits who will argue that the President should be given a wide latitude of powers, and a free pass to go along with it, as if 9/11 was an excuse to throw 200+ years of checks and balances out the window. :rolleyes:

As for criticism from other governments, the Administration has shown time and time again that it doesn’t give two hoots what the rest of the world thinks…

184

I don’t think they made their decisions for personal gain, either. However, since Wolfowitz and several other memebers of the administration had written or signed on for pie-in-the predictions of how wonderful itr would be to go to war against Iraq in the late 1990s and since President Bush declared during his election campaign that he thought we should wage war of Saddam Hussein, I think this administration leaped on the opportunity to try out their dreams, using whatever lies were necessary to carry out their goals. Given that they appear to have had no plan for the follow-up to the war*, I find their self-serving rheoric and continued lies to be no more agreeable than if they had been in it for wealth instead of glory.

  • (The administration apparently believed their own baseless rhetoric that the Iraqis would be so jubilant at our invasion that they would fall over themselves trying to make themselves into copycat Americans, fueled by enormous petroleum reserves, rather than realizing the Iraqis would resent the U.S. invasion and would resume the ethnic and religious feuds that have traditionally divided them, while being impoverished by their inability to produce enough oil at a reasonable price to even rebuild their own country.)
185

The US sent a lot of military supplies to the Soviet Union in the 1940’s. Despite the mutual hatred of the Soviets and the Americans. This is an analogy to Saddam helping al-Queda, arguing that politics (or war) sometimes make strange bedfellows, and the fact that Saddam and OBL are such polar opposites doesn’t rule out such aid. Apparently I was too indirect and unclear here.

The next attack from al-Quada. The idea is that if another series of attacks occur, Bush can point out that he went the extra mile and even went after Saddam Hussein. Yes, the American people might find a similarity or connection between al-Queda and Iraq.

Not the African-Iraq nuclear program, necessarily. We do have lots of evidence that Saddam had hidden a nuclear weapons program from prying eyes in previous decades. Bush was worried about Saddam acquiring nukes. It’s a reasonable thing to worry about. And if you decide the only solution is removing Saddam by force, the best time to do it is right away. Even if there is no imminent threat.

Would you trust Uday and Qusay with nukes?

Invading another country might stop them from attacking first. This is an old principle.

Strike while the Iron is hot, while you’ve got the votes in Congress. I knew what I meant! In other words, use the approval rating lift from the 9/11 events to put through a difficult program. That’s what leadership does, for good or ill.

Wag-the-dog accusations refer to a bad movie in which the US President starts a war before the elections so he’ll be re-elected. A case of the tail wagging the dog, instead of the right way around. That is, if Bush had waited until 2004 to start the war, the Democrats in the US would accuse Bush of doing it just to use the war as an election issue, and balk rather than hand the election to Bush.

Both al-Queda an Saddam wanted to be militarily stronger, and had some motive for looking for allies, even in strange places. Bush doesn’t need help from a terrorist.

Doing it for the oil is too vague a charge to analyze. The west is still going to have to pay somebody for the oil. It might be smarter simply to take it by force, but that is not politically possible.

The idea that Saddam destroyed the WMDs he had in such a way as to keep the sanctions active when he could have killed the sanctions by destroying the weapons in front of the UN inspectors is just too crazy to believe. Even if something that crazy happened, I’d have a hard time believing it.

By Saddams refusal to back down I refer to his unwillingness to pull out of Kuwait when confronted by overwhelming military force. Nearly a suicidal decision. Likewise, the apparent decision to keep on hiding the WMDs also gives the appearance of suicidality.

A nuclear armed Iraq using both its military and its oil as an economic weapon would be very very expensive to deal with. Even if we decided to invade at that time.

Between elections, the administration doesn’t need diddly squat from the voters. The US is not a Parliamentary system, Bush can come up with all the reasons during an election campaign at the designated time.

So far, no “Massive contracts”. You tell me who’s profiting.

Scene: The offices of the French Governnment…
“Has the German intelligence report come in yet? — the Russian data is all ready to send to the New York Times”.

186

I wont go over the points already covered. I will try to cover some that werent given enough emphasis.

Radon a possible future link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda and very little evidence of nukes are enough reason for War ?

If Iraq didnt have any nukes ready… why was it so urgent to attack Iraq ? Its not like Saddam was going somewhere.

Why were oil fields well defended... but priceless museum collections and a nuclear material deposit neglected ?

Basically things dont add up. There was a War plan since the 90’s but there was no reconstruction plan. Oil pipelines were fixed before eletricy and water. You might think they arent getting rich on this… but their friends are pretty happy thou.

Have you seen how much money the Bush relection has already managed to collect ? Isnt it strange how generous people are 15 months before an election ?

Notice how when news go against Bush there is a sudden change in the color of the Terrorism Alert ?

I personally think Iraq was something that needed fixing (US made mess BTW) but now everyone is more afraid of the US than they ever were of Iraq or Al Qaeda. So the whole affair stinks. By provoking Arabs even more Bush is guaranteeing future attacks and his future reelection.

If the US goes above and beyond the UN then any appearance of lawful world affairs ceases to exists and might makes right again. The US is worse off in a world like that thou it might be mighty.
187

About these,
The first ones involve the conflation of Hussein and bin Laden. Hussein was not responsible for the September eleventh tragedies.

In addition, the established American intel agencies were of the professional opinion that the likelihood of Hussein initiating a terrorist attack on the US directly or by proxy in the “forseeable future” was very low. It is/was also a widely held belief among American intel analysts that attacking Iraq would/did:

  1. increase the likelihood of whatever banned wepaons Iraq had would end up in the hands of international terrorists. You yourself acknowledge how the invasion of Iraq could made it more likely that Hussein and al Qaeda might cooperate.

  2. dramatically increase the pool of those who’re willing to engage in terroristic activities against the US

  3. make it more likely that Hussein would initiate a terrorist attack against the US.
    There just wasn’t the idea in our established, professional, American intel agencies that the rapid invasion of Iraq was either necessary for national security or that the rapid invasion of Iraq would make the US safer from terrorist threats. There was, however, an ad hoc intelligence agency made up of political appointees who used information, sources and analyses that were known to be unreliable and untrustworthy to fulll fill the mission that they were charged with, which was finding a way to sell the invasion of Iraq to the American electorate and Congress. This agency charged with the rationalization was called the Office of Special Plans.

“Arabs worry[ing] about the crazy Americans,” is the motivation for anti-American terrorism in the first place. Increasing this worrying is not productive toward the ends of reducing terrorism.

“Because we can,” is a reprhensible reason for sending other people’s mothers, fathers and children to war.

These all rest on the idea that Iraq was somehow capable of surviving even a measured offensive from the US.
These also fail to demonstrate a reasonable threat to the US from Iraq.
Remember, that the “genuine concern about Iraqi aggression” wasn’t a concern about agression against the US- when Hussein “invaded in 1991” he invaded a tiny oil-rich country called Kuwait, not the US.

I don’t know what you mean by this.

There are some that “weigh in” on these connections, but they weigh in on the side of their NOT being a threat to the US from these connections.

That alone should tell you something.

This also should tell you something.
I’m not sure how “deep down” the short-sightedness of the admin that you reference is. I’m not seen any evidence that shows the invasion of Iraq was a “genuine security need.”

I don’t think that they initiated the invasion solely as a means of enriching themselves. Arguably they would’ve enriched themselves to whatever extent they were able regardless of the invasion of Iraq. ( Think Perle.)

188

Re: Weighing the Factors

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

Personal animus from having the government directly targeted.
Taking a lot of visible action immunizes the Bushies against charges of do-nothing after the next attack.
A sense of guilt at 9/11, for letting it happen. A desire to close the barn door.
A geopolitical decision to not let the US worry about the crazy Arabs, but to let the Arabs worry about the crazy Americans. That is, peace through intimidation.

About these,
The first ones involve the conflation of Hussein and bin Laden. Hussein was not responsible for the September eleventh tragedies.

In addition, the established American intel agencies were of the professional opinion that the likelihood of Hussein initiating a terrorist attack on the US directly or by proxy in the “forseeable future” was very low. It is/was also a widely held belief among American intel analysts that attacking Iraq would/did:

  1. increase the likelihood of whatever banned wepaons Iraq had would end up in the hands of international terrorists. You yourself acknowledge how the invasion of Iraq could made it more likely that Hussein and al Qaeda might cooperate.

  2. dramatically increase the pool of those who’re willing to engage in terroristic activities against the US

  3. make it more likely that Hussein would initiate a terrorist attack against the US.
    There just wasn’t the idea in our established, professional, American intel agencies that the rapid invasion of Iraq was either necessary for national security or that the rapid invasion of Iraq would make the US safer from terrorist threats. There was, however, an ad hoc intelligence agency made up of political appointees who used information, sources and analyses that were known to be unreliable and untrustworthy to fulll fill the mission that they were charged with, which was finding a way to sell the invasion of Iraq to the American electorate and Congress. This agency charged with the rationalization was called the Office of Special Plans.

“Arabs worry[ing] about the crazy Americans,” is the motivation for anti-American terrorism in the first place. Increasing this worrying is not productive toward the ends of reducing terrorism.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

Strike while the iron is hot, while you’ve got the votes.

“Because we can,” is a reprhensible reason for sending other people’s mothers, fathers and children to war.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

The 1991 war discovered that Saddams nuke program was further along than expected.
It is impossible to believe that Saddam destroyed the chemical and biological weapons we know he had without showing the destruction to the UN. Even if that turns out to be what he really did
A genuine concern about Iraqi aggression. Saddams refusal to back down after invading in 1991 and apparant refusal to destroy the chemical, biological and missle weapons afterward do not give warm and fuzzy feelings about him being reasonable and deterrable.
A fear that Saddam would use oil supplies as an economic weapon rather than for simple profit.

These all rest on the idea that Iraq was somehow capable of surviving even a measured offensive from the US.
These also fail to demonstrate a reasonable threat to the US from Iraq.
Remember, that the “genuine concern about Iraqi aggression” wasn’t a concern about agression against the US- when Hussein “invaded in 1991” he invaded a tiny oil-rich country called Kuwait, not the US.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

No wag-the-dog accusations if invade in 2003.

I don’t know what you mean by this.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

There may really be some intellgence reports that weigh in with a connection to terrorism or al-Queda. I guess I have to hope so.

There are some that “weigh in” on these connections, but they weigh in on the side of their NOT being a threat to the US from these connections.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

I do agree that the reasons expressed publicly by the administration aren’t quite as coherent as my presentation here.

That alone should tell you something.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

I guess deep down the administration doesn’t see the need to explain itself, just the need to be right in their own minds. I think they resent public scrutiny and they’ve integrated that resentment with genuine security needs.

And this doesn’t bother you?

189

Great Scott!

This is all that was supposed to appear in my post above.

quote:

Originally posted by Radon

I guess deep down the administration doesn’t see the need to explain itself, just the need to be right in their own minds. I think they resent public scrutiny and they’ve integrated that resentment with genuine security needs.

And this doesn’t bother you?

190

Strange bedfellows can occur anywhere. Prior to the war against Afghanistan, a link between al Qaida and Pakistan (where the top military command was sympathetic to the Taliban and which is already nuclear capable) would have been possible. Possibilities do not justifiy wars. We used the excuse that al Qaida had a training ground in Iraq to claim a connection, even though al Qaida deliberately set itself up in the region of Iraq that the Iraq government could neither attack not protect because of U.S. sanctions. We made a claim of an Iraq/al Qaida connection based on the movements of Zarqawi–who is not a memebr of al Qaida.

It is possible that an irritated Putin could bury the hatchet with the Chinese and decide to take on the U.S. together. That possibility does not justify a pre-emptive attack on Russia and/or China.

191

Futhermore using the possibility of an Baathist-Alquaeda alliance as a justification for war doesn’t make any sense because the invasion increased that possibility. In fact such an alliance may well be forming now to fight Americans troops in Iraq.

If Iraq did possess biological weapons and chemical weapons what is stopping Baathist militias from passing them on to Al-queda terrorists now? They have much less to lose than when they ran a regime.

The war never made much sense even on its own terms.

192

What’s stopping them now is that we control the country, so they cannot transport any weapons to al Qaeda.

More importantly, the Iraqi Baathist Party is now out of power, so we don’t have to worry about weapons they might develop in the future. Future WMDs have been a big worry, given Iraq’s history of WMD development, non-compliance with their agreements, and aggressive attacks on other countries.

193

Except that loads of countries from Iran to N.Korea are speeding up their WMD programs to guarantee no US interference. That funding for terrorists is probably on the rise instead of decline even by the Saudis.

Do you really feel safer december ? Iraq was just a convenient target… Terrorism has been barely scratched with the colonization of Iraq.

194

“What’s stopping them now is that we control the country, so they cannot transport any weapons to al Qaeda.”
Huh? Do you follow the news? The US is far from total control of the country particularly the borders (for that matter it doesn’t fully control its own borders). There have been plenty of reports of Baathist leaders fleeing the country and of foreign fighters entering it. There is little stopping Baathist miliitias from passing bio/chem weapons to terrorists if they had them. My guess is that the only the reason they aren’t doing this is that they didn’t have the weapons in the first place.
“More importantly, the Iraqi Baathist Party is now out of power, so we don’t have to worry about weapons they might develop in the future.”
First of all there isn’t much evidence that the regime was developing WMD particularly nuclear weapons. Secondly we still have to worry about what a future Iraqi government might develop possibly in co-operation with Iran. It isn’t remotely clear that the US will succeed in installing a US-friendly government in the long run and the odds are probably against it.

195

Sure

196

I dont want to sound ultra left, but so far there have been no physical operating WMDs found in Iraq. Evidence? yes, but none in operation. Weather Al-Queda brought their buisness to iraq or not has nothing to do with the Iraqi regime. Let us not forget, Osama Bin-Laden did condem Sadaam, calling him an “Infidel” and so forth. I say, it was a mistake to go into Iraq and it is a joke that we are still in there.

197

Whoops, sorry, I am behind the times. Please excuse my lack of reading the news.

198

???

199

I’m not sure my comment applies to the CURRENT situation.

200

Generally, I think the Bush administration came to the conclusion after 9/11 that Saddam Hussein had to go, that the easiest and best time to get rid of him was as soon as possible, and to use the heightened US public tension as a result of 9/11 to push through a war program that Bush really believed in.

I think Bush is correct in his judgement.

There are real arguments that you guys are making that the plan won’t work or is misguided. I respect these arguments and agree the negative outcomes you predict are worrisome. Time will tell.

Rashak Mani:
For the overall reasons for war see my forest/trees posting above at 11:52

No the slim al-queda/nuke stuff is not enough by itself.

The timing issues in “Weighing the Factors” I posted at 2:10 PM. Basically, if one decides that Saddam absolutely must be booted out eventually, the best time to do it is now. Agreed that this is a bold and very risky approach. I think that as more WMD technologies spread to more places, and as more terror attacks are chalked up, Bush may be judged as wise by history. If things calm down, Bush may be judged harshly.

Even if Bush is proven 100% correct, the restraining hand of public opinion against war is a necessary tonic.

Museums and especially nuclear sites were neglected out of raw human stupidity. Probably a failure to communicate. The museum turned out to be better off than we thought.

Soldiers have been planning war for thousands of years. The Bush admin came in with an allergy to the idea of “Nation building”. Now they are stumbling through. The Oil isn’t flowing properly yet, either.

If the terrorist, rejectionists, al-Queda and Sadda fedayeen get the upper hand in Iraq, things could go very bad very quickly over a wide area. We must all try to prevent this. Or are you in favor of a new war in Iraq?

That some are truly afraid of the US is something Bushies did not and do not understand. It’s hard to believe. The aggressive nature of the US foreign policy is purely temporary.

The idea that the invasion of Iraq will lead to more terrorism is just interesting speculation, hard to prove or disprove.

SimonX:
I think the things you bring up in your 6:42 post are basically right. The decision to go to war wasn’t based on any one thing, but rather the overall picture of the worst-case outcome if Saddam is left in power: The mideast in ruins, widespread oil panics, megadeaths…

But it’s not based on Saddam surviving a US offensive, but on Iraqi first strikes.

David Simmons:
Iraq didn’t do the 9/11 attacks. This seems quite firm. The concern was what would Iraq do in the future. The 9/11 attacks were educational to both Saddam and Bush.

You just trust the CIA more than Bush.

“Because we can” is a reprehensible reason. Of course. My analysis is that the reasons are different, but when it came to look at when the removal of Saddam should be done, 2003 was clearly the best time. Otherwise it could have been delayed.

Iraqi aggression in the Mideast could do worldwide damage by 1) Nuking the oil fields etc. or 2) Using the oil billions to get globe-spanning weapons.

Oh, a lot of this stuff bothers me. The decision to invade Iraq is a world-sized historical gamble. I just see leaving Saddam in power for another decade as being more dangerous than you do. I see Saddam owning or dominating Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. This would put enormous world power in the hands of psychos.

If you don’t see that much danger in Saddam, then, of course, the whole thing looks like US arrogance.

tomndebb:
I just don’t see a Saddam al-Queda link as very likely or as the reason for the war. I see that connection as a dumb attempt to drum up support. I could be wrong, there could be a closer connection. The problem with Saddam is Saddam.

It all depends on how dangerous you think Saddam was.