No smoking gun? NO SMOKING GUN?? [in Iraq]

Great Debates
41

december - Sure, context is always vital but I don’t agree with your choice of 12 years. Saddam is being assessed by Blix on the basis of this 6-8 week old Resolution – hell, if you want 12 years, I want 25, to back when Saddam was America’s big buddy in the region, the man to see off the crazy Iranians and their returning Ayatollah.

If you want Saddam to be in breach now, fine; That’s your personal, subjective judgment but, as I’ve just posted, that, in my view, is exactly what Saddam wants; for us to go in with the least possible justification and to maximum the potential for martydom for him and his country.

Walking into that is just naïve.

This isn’t about appeasement, it’s about getting the end game right.
And besides, I think you are totally wrong about France. They will not use the Veto if they can avoid it – that’s what this is all about at the moment. Give ‘em half a chance (two-three months of Inspectors) and they’ll abstain for the good of the UN itself. I believe that’s the thinking just now, anyway.

Milo – at present I think the Inspectors keep going until a second Resolution won’t get Vetoed (as per above to december, right now it’s about getting Abstentions on the second Resolution from those Permanent Members who are currently inclined to Veto) – I presume when that will be possible depends on how things unfold on the ground.

No one wants to see a Veto ever – it undermines the whole UN and risks the US leaving. Absolute worst-case diplomatic scenario. The French really, badly don’t want to use it……….but they would if pushed right now.

To be honest, I have more extreme views on Bush’s motivations but we can save those for another day.

42

It’s not what I want; it’s what the UN wants. Resolution 1441 cites earlier UN resoutions, which I assume, cite earlier ones still right back to 1991.

Actually it’s now Hans Blix’s official judgement.

Why do think this is what Saddam wants? I don’t expect a cite from Saddam’s psychiatrist, but what is your basis for this guess.

What difference would 2 or 3 months make? Iraq is in material breach, but there is no smoking gun. That will still be true 3 months from now. A delay of 3 months could make the war more difficult to conduct, because of the hot weather and the need for protective suits. I would be unwilling to sacrifice the lives of British and American soldiers in order to play political games with France.

43

The act of engaging in warfare with another country should be one of the most serious and deliberate acts a country commits. I don’t understand the suggestion by december and Milossarian that the present situation is the result of 11 or 12 years, rather than something more recently whipped up. Largely, very few disagree that anything regarding the threat posed by Iraq has changed in the past decade - in fact, those in favor of war use this to support their position. Because there has been no significant change, it seems to me that if Bush is prepared to go to war with Iraq now, he should have been preparing to do so from the moment his keister hit the chair in the oval office. If Iraq is the threat to us that he purports it to be, he should have been calling for action immediately. Who would sit by and allow an imminent threat to fester for three years? If this is all true, he is worse than Chamberlain.

On February 17, 2001, for example, he was saying this of Iraq:

So, as of that date, Bush believed he had not developed weapons of mass distruction. He does not say then that we are going to war with them over the issue. He does not say that we will “take appropriate action” if they fail to document what happened to their VX supply. He has not recently suggested that Hussein has developed weapons of mass distruction between 2001 and 2003. Our present actions are truly a rush to pre-judgment, and a weapon of mass distraction. If Bush failed to act to prevent doom to America that has been present for 11 or 12 years, he is a coward. Alternatively, if he is merely engaging in warmongering and willing to end lives simply to distract from his woeful presidential performance, he is a coward of the highest degree.

This notion that 11 or 12 years is not a rush to judgment implies to

44

Sorry about the lack of previewing above. The quote is from
CNN.com .

45

Milo, I’m tempted to say, “The same thing as with all the hundreds of other UN Resolutions that aren’t being complied with: nothing.” But that says a bit more than I want it to, when actually all I want to say is that we don’t routinely go to bat to insist on enforcement of UN resolutions. So whatever we should do, the fact that there’s a UN resolution involved shouldn’t be the determining factor, unless we’re planning on inventorying all the unenforced UN resolutions, and working our way through them one at a time.

The same goes for how Saddam treats his countrymen. We aren’t invading North Korea, Burma, or a host of other places where rulers are being extremely unkind to their people.

I mean, I’m all for using the usual tools to the max in such places. But Bush’s alleged concern for the people of Iraq only, out of all the mistreated people in the world, smacks of bullshit. It smacks of him telling his advisors, “I want to attack Iraq. Now give me some reasons.”

[1] Only when I’ve had it explained to me by the present Administration why Iraq is the most urgent and serious threat in the world today. And that hasn’t happened yet.

You see, what’s happened is that Shrub has managed to put the debate in terms of “I want to go to war with Iraq. Is Saddam nasty enough or not?” Sure, he’s nasty, but there are a lot of nasty, dangerous people in this world. And glaringly unsaid is: why Iraq, 3-5 years away from nukes? Why not Iran, 1-2 years away? Or North Korea, which may or may not have them now, and has a genuine loonytoon as Supreme Exalted Leader? Or Pakistan, which has had them for a few years, and came pretty damned close to firing them off last summer? Or Al-Qaida, which doesn’t have nukes, but which brought down the WTC towers about 16 months ago, and still seems to be alive and kicking around the world?

AFAICT, that question has never been answered. So I have no idea how Iraq got to the top of the list, and as a result, I doubt that I know the true reasons why the Bush crowd has such a hard-on for Saddam. Maybe they really believe they can remake the Middle East in their own image. Maybe they figure it’s just a matter of time until the Islamic revolution takes Saudi Arabia, so we’d better fix Iraq now to keep the oil flowing. Maybe it’s personal for Dubya: wanting to kill the guy who tried to kill Daddy, and finish the job Daddy left incomplete. Maybe…I don’t know - and that’s the problem. A step has been skipped in building up the reasoning for this war, and what fallacies are covered up by pretending the need for that step isn’t even there, I don’t know, because I can’t check his work.

OTOH, it’s quite possible that the Bushies are right, and Iraq is the nation we should be dealing with first. But I have no way of knowing whether that’s true or false.

46

If this case is so cut and dried, if any reasonable person would be convinced that a pre-emptive war is absitively posolutely unavoidable…why all the bullshit?

Why publicly insist that aluminum tubes have no other purpose than for creating nuclear weapons, only to be caught lying?

Why publicly flaunt a UN report as being proof positive when any moron would have to know somebody would check on that, and that, in truth, no such report ever existed?

After 9/11, America briefly had the good will of the world. We have irrevocably squandered that good will. Now we are widely perceived as war-mongering bullies, and seem damned and determined to scare the world out of its wits.

And to top it all off - GeeDubya stomps into the UN and demands that it hew to his will, expresses utter contempt for it as a body and states repeatedly and relentlessly that the US is not subject to its suasion, or its rules, or its opinion. We will do what we will do, and the world be damned.

And then he trys to pretend that Iraqi compliance or non-compliance with a UN resolution is cause for war. How many UN resolutions has the US batted aside for Israel? How can he possibly keep a straight face when he insists that UN resolutions have the force of international law and in the next breath deny that such law applies to the US?

And how is it that those amongst us who have supported this policy every step of the way seem to be utterly unfazed by each suceeding revelation of falsehood? Does it bother you guys in the least bit that our government has been lying in order to justify a war with a country that has not attacked us?

What if we had launched an attack based on the false evidence presented? What do you see yourself saying? “Ooopsy!”?

It is entirely true that I am reluctant to be persuaded to war. But I’ll be damned if I will accept being bullshitted into war.

“I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just” - T. Jefferson.

47

Methinks at least the last two posters need to stop reading my words, and go read Hans Blix’s.

48

There is not one - not one - other country in the world besides Iraq that has invaded its neighbors unprovoked in the last decade or so; has lobbed missiles at another country, also unprovoked; and has repeatedly violated U.N. Security Council resolutions regarding its WOMD programs.

Not one.

If you want to drag North Korea into this, I have little doubt that will end militarily too, if Kim Jong-Il continues on the insane path he’s taking now, in the face of international pressure. Somehow, I can’t see Russia and China sitting on the sidelines on that one, though. For that reason, and the pressure from Japan and South Korea as well, I think it’s more likely a diplomatic solution will be attained there.

49

To quote dubya, I am sick and tired of people referencing reasons for going to war in 1991 as reasons to go to war in 2003. Did you know that Japan bombed Pearl Harbor? Let’s kill them! Perhaps double jeopardy does not really apply, but gassing his own people, invading Kuwait, and lobbing scuds about were things that occured prior to GHWB’s decision to stand down. Get a new justification - say, like the revelation that North Korea was plucking random folks out of China and holding them indefinitely.

50

Milo:

Grenada? Operation Urgent Fury? When America flexed its military might to root out a crack team of elite Cuban commando bulldozer drivers, and thwart thier nefarious scheme to build an airport? What’s the statute of limitations on aggression?

51

Speaking only for myself, I’ve read Blix’ words, and Bush’s words, and Powell’s, and Rice’s and Rumsfeld’s. I’ll be damned if I can figure out a compelling reason for war.

There are plenty of reasons for a large, multinational, full time military presence in the Gulf. There is inarguable need for the international community to compel Iraq’s disarmament, through increasingly intrusive means if required. There are uncountable reasons why Hussein should not be ruler of Iraq. Undeniably, the region will be safer and more secure when his rule has ended.

All of these things can be accomplished without a rush to war.

But I’m convinced we’ll have this war of which you so approve, Milo. And I hope beyond reason that it’s conducted with genius and that it’s over quickly. I hope Hussein can be ousted by his own, and that this can prompt a quick peace agreement, and that America, its allies, and Iraq itself suffer few casualties. Because if it goes as poorly as pessimists like me expect that it will, I can think of no better anti-American propoganda to put in the hands of terrorist recruiters.

52

How?

I mean, your position would be stronger if you actually stated what action other than war would compel Iraq’s disarmament. Since 1991, the UN has tried believing Iraq’s commitement to disarm, multiple resolutions when they didn’t, and sanctions. None of these worked. What makes you so confident that a non-war alternative exists – particularly if you cannot even identify it?

53

december, I’ll give you a detailed plan for strong-arm diplomacy and economic persuasion, including names of participants, locations of inspection, points of trade, etc. just as soon as you or any of the other hawks can give me a detailed military plan including which military units should be employed, locations of necessary targets, timing of execution and names and relative strengths and political positions of all Iraqi opposition leaders.

:rolleyes:

[rhetorical question]
Why is it standard practice to require detailed diplomatic knowledge and an iron clad plan of action with proof of efficacy from war opponents, when no such detail or guarantees are offered by supporters of military solutions?
[/rhetorical question]

54

hetorical or not, it seems not to be obvious to you so I will clue you in.

You see, the folks like december are saying they have at least some faith in those whose job it is to do certain things. If not experts, they are at least the professionals in the field whose sole duty is to come up with this stuff.

that would be like you having a personal certified mechanic working on your car and some schmoe walks up off the street and tell you the mechanic is doing it all wrong. Who’s word would you take? And would it be " :rolleyes: " to you if december was the owner of the car and wanted some kind of verification from the schmoe?

55

Ooooh, nice try, but kind of a bad profession to pick as an example, Saen. Can you say “20/20 expose?” or “Car Talk, NPR, Saturdays” I hope that you always ask your mechanic for the old parts that he replaced.

Apart from that, using your example, it’s kind of like a mechanic saying, “Ma’am, you’re going to have to your transmission replaced,” and some “schmoe” saying, “Wait a minute, ma’am. Just what is it that tells you the transmission needs to be replaced?”

The mechanic, George, says, “Well, there’s something wrong with the car.”

“Yes, but the transmission? How do you know.”

“In 1989, the car leaked oil.”

“But the transmission?”

“Once, the car ran off the road.”

“But why do you have to replace the transmission now?”

“Shut up, you dumb schmoe, what do you know about cars anyways?”

Hey, but thanks for cluing me in!

56

[rhetorical answer]
Because the UN has now spent 12 years trying all the other, non-war alternatives they could come up with, and none of them worked.
[/rhetorical answer]

57

Notice I said personal mechanic? I have a personal certified mechanic. My uncle. So schmoe can take a hike.

58

Well, since I like kicking the hornet’s nest, I’ll just point out that there was a certain someone in charge for 8 years over that period that didn’t particularly care for the military and never really did too much militarily other than pop off a few cruise missiles and send the military out for “peacekeeping”.

In his defense, though, he was too busy with other things. :rolleyes:

Bush’s actions towards Iraq are a logical extension of the war on terrorism, as far as I’m concerned.

59

Airman:

Can you clarify how going after Iraq equates to war on terrorism? Imagine that tomororw Iraq simply ceases to exist. Al Qaeda is still out there, half the Muslim world still hates us, and there are dozens of countries that have weapons as bad or even worse that Iraq (republics of the former USSR, Pakistan, etc). I cannot believe that Al Qaeda terrorists need Iraq in any significant way to supply them with weapons to use against the US.

By taking out Iraq, we inflame, even more, that half of the Muslim world that already hates us, and in the process how many US and Iraqi people die? Honestly, if we invade Iraq, how many deaths do you think will result? As a military guy, I’d really like to know your thoughts on that.

And don’t get me wrong. As I stated on this thread early, I believe we can justifiably invade Iraq based on what happend during and after the Gulf War. I just don’t see it as a wise step in fighting terrorism. You spoke of stirring the hornets nest-- isn’t that EXACLTY what we would be doing?

60

Set your VCRs for Powell’s Adlai Stevenson moment on February 5. This will either win over elucidator (OK, maybe that won’t happen) or be the biggest bust in speechification history.

To extend on the Airman’s remarks: in 1998 Clinton had an opportunity / grave decision as to what level of force to use to combat Iraq to force them into compliance or disarm them. Unfortunately, he was engaged with impeachment and decided on some timely bombing which ended about the same time as impeachment.

Had he suggested a prolonged military effort to disarm Iraq / dislodge Saddam I cannot be certain what would have happened. I do know that many critics believed air strikes were not a solution to the lack of cooperation in disarmament problem.

Often Clinton defenders argue that whatever course he took he would have been attacked from the right. True. This is not a justification for bad decisions.