> But it is funny that you would call a double standard given that
> you expected the inspectors to work this fast even though they
> were working under far more adverse conditions.
Right. Eleven years is less time than eleven weeks.
That’s why I failed math!
During what eleven years were UN inspectors there? Please be specific.
(It’s a trick question, of course; UN inspectors were not there for 11 years, so there is no right answer.)
They didn’t have eleven years. That’s already been pointed out to you.
And Shrubya said he knew where the WMDs were. His “intelligence” [snicker] didn’t help the inspection teams any. In fact, we now know that some of his intelligence was forged or fabricated. Thus far, this administration has failed to substantiate any of its claims about WMDs. It isn’t like they were mostly right, or they got a little bad info on something. They’ve been completely wrong on all accounts.
It should be even easier for him now that the US has occupied the country, but nope, no dice. Even his offers to bribe Iraqi scientists haven’t produced anything. The fact that Rummy is now floating the idea that the war was still justified even if there were no WMDs is basically proof that there weren’t any WMDs.
Under the UN charter, the only legal justifications for an attack on another country’s sovereignty are self-defense, or if the other country can be shown to be an 'imminent" threat. The WMD thing was a -pathetic attempt to paint Iraq as an imminent threat. If there were no WMDs, then the US no longer has even a flimsy legal pretense for what it did. “Saddam-was-evil” is not a legal justification and internal politics, even despotism, are explicitly proscribed as justifications for aggression.
This was an illegal invasion, staged for purely self-serving political reasons. Just admit it.
From the articles I have read the ‘labs’ housed fermenting machines. At least that
was their most interesting feature worth mentioning.
So they really could have been used for making moonshine.
Maybe Saddam destroyed all the WMD before the war? Golly, that means wE SHOULD HAVE
GOTTEN PROOF BEFORE WE STARTED BOMBING. Securing Saddams WMD before the war, if it
existed, would not have been impossible given the technology we have. The US had
special forces teams within Iraq six months prior to the invasion. All that time and
the resources of the most powerful military in history and what do we get?
Zilch.
In fact, the US military left key nuclear storage sites(ones previously inspected by
the UN) completly unguarded for over 2 weeks. Looters took fuel rods, shielding, and
barrels. Lord knows who has them now.
If you look closely at every step the bush administration has taken in the Iraqi
invasion and occupation, you can reach two conculsions.
OR
I am not comforted by either of these.
I don’t know about “illegal” – the U.N. Charter and resolutions and rules are not really “law,” at least not the kind of law that means anything to me (or, importantly, to wrongdoers; cf. O.W. Holmes admonition to view the law as would a “bad man”), given the lack of any enforcement mechanism for it, the lack of any ability of U.S. citizens to have a direct vote on it, etc. I think GWB’s possible accountability problem is not to some hypothetical “international law,” but to his own people, who are not wildly interventionist but whom he got (more or less) on his side by talk of an imminent threat of WMD deployment. Because that threat hasn’t materialized, and won’t, he may have something to answer for (Blair likewise) to his electorate – but only the electorate knows whether they’ll be mad about being led down the path on that.
DtT, what do you view specifically as the “self-serving political reasons” motivating GWB and his court?
We’re left with:
a) There were WMD in Iraq and we didn’t know it
b) There were WMD in Iraq and we knew it
c) There never were WMD in Iraq and we did not know it
d) There never were WMD in Iraq and we knew it.
We can forget (a) otherwise Rick’s sig. get even funnier. (d) Makes the US out to be liars and war mongers. I’m not ready yet to believe that, though they’re making it damn hard not to see it that way. (b) Requires actual evidence to be produced. If you knew they were there to the degree professed by the US government you better damn well be able to hold them up.
Its © that’s interesting to me. Could all this WMD based information be based on underlings reporting better progress than was actually occurring? The intelligence agencies would then pick up all the WMD chatter, Saddam thinks he has WMD and bluffs that the US et al won’t call him. The invasion occurs and crickets start chirping in the WMD labs.
Real weapons of mass destruction found! No joking!
Problem is: they were found in Maryland:
Gee, they certainly were considered pretty important when they were the WHOLE PRETEXT claimed for the war.
I don’t know what DtC thinks they are, but I think that it’s just the implementation of the PNAC plan, REBUILDING AMERICA’S DEFENSES Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century (warning, large PDF file).
The invasion and occupation of Iraq wasn’t in response to 9/11, it was something that was decided in advance, and 9/11 provided a convenient excuse.
The Department of Homeland Security and the Patriot Act, likewise, weren’t in response to 9/11, but 9/11 provided a convenient excuse.
This was always the agenda, but it wasn’t ever put to the voters until after the election.
The UN Charter is a ratified treaty. As such it has the same authority of law as the US Constitution.
I think that there were multiple political motivations for the invasion. It provided a surrogate boogeyman in the wake of US failure to find ObL. It provided an appearance of a “victory” in the war on terror, even though the WH utterly failed to ever connect any dots between Iraq and 9/11. It was hoped that a war would jump start a sagging economy. It provided Bush/Cheney corporate cronies with lucrative contracts. It boosted W’s approval ratings. This was primarily about one thing and one thing only: getting the Smirk re-elected.
They weren’t the whole pretext claimed for the war (though certainly they were stressed) because American voters wouldn’t, I think, ever have supported going to war solely to redress some technical violation of a non-binding resolution of a body that many Americans consider a goofy debating society – which is precisely why the “imminent threat that WMD will be unleashed on America or its ‘friends and allies’” theory had to be added to the mix. Put differently, maybe the “Violation of international law” argument was for the wacky internationalist Euros’ consumption and the “WMDs are headed for New York” was for the soccer moms in Plano. I don’t think either of them alone, and certainly not the “international law violation” alone, could have raised an international or domestic consensus.
This is why there’s an argument that GWB really painted himself into a corner here. Either he really believes and cares about “international law” for its own sake (though his domestic constituents don’t, and though America stands to lose a lot if “War Crimes Tribunals” start being held every time a U.S. fighter plane slices through a cable car cable), or he doesn’t; but in either case, all his talk about such “law” does leave him open to charges that he himself has violated such “law,” in a way that past Presidents, who would have blown the UN and “international law” off as abstract irrelevancies from the outset, were not vulnerable. By harping on (albeit inconsistently) “international law,” Bush has made himself vulnerable to charges of hypocrisy, and has diminished the ability of the U.S. or his successors to maintain the “U.S. sovereignty trumps international law” position that many Americans have traditionally preferred. Adding the WMD claims, which were factually-based and falsifiable, put him in an even more difficult-to-defend position.
The US can say it doesn’t have to follow international law all it wants, that does not mean they aren’t violating international law. Furthermore, if the US is going to place itself above international law, the it has no right to demand that other countries follow international law.
Any perceived violations of the UN treaty by Iraq were the UN’s problem, not GWB’s. The US does not have any authority to unilaterally enforce UN resolutions, especially when that enforcement goes against the will of the UN.
The only (theoretically) legal justification for the US invasion of Iraq was “imminent danger.” That justification has been shown to be bogus.
What otherlegal justification do you think would attach here?
What remarkably bad timing. In that the election is very far away, we’ll all have many months to examine the case leading up to war.
I’m more worried about actual WMDs having escaped Iraq (maybe)–and the staggering occupation–than GWBs political career right now. I don’t think we have a no confidence vote. Let me check on that.
Anyway, it’s obvious that the US military did what it could to seal up Iraqs borders and governmental installations. That is especially true if you believe that “what it could” equals “not much.” That was one area where more troops would have made a big difference. In a similar vein, where the hell is Saddam?
This occupation might well be blowing up in GWB’s face right now. The Baath Party appears to be making a comeback. Yet, the loyal opposition is still arguing against the war. Again, bad timing.
Be sure to Google under “impeachment” while you’re checking on that.
DtC, if you read your posts and my posts, we’re not really disagreeing on the fact that GWB said and did at least a couple of things that were inconsistent on both WMD and int’l law (putting aside how much one cares about “int’l law” or wishes to see it “enforced”). While we might differ on the practical usefulness of “int’l law” (I question it because there’s no court with the jurisdiction to adjudicate it, no marshals with the power to make anyone show up to such a court, and no world police or army with the enforcement power that (implicitly) lies behind other, “real,” systems of law), we don’t differ on the fact that any way you slice it, GWB has created for himself a situation at best embarrassing and inconsistent, and at worst Orwellian (“We have to defy the Security Council in order to uphold the all-holy will of the Security Council Resolution”).
Perhaps every president will be impeached from here on out? Bush has several good defenses. This should be exciting nevertheless. Oh, but it is a major hijack of the thread. :o
You know, I read the editorial twice, and I never even saw where the author mentioned the Holocaust, let alone “trivialized it”. However, what is that rule- the first person to compare someone to Hitler & the Nazis loses? You lose.
On to your reply to me. Sure, Blix was indeed quoted (at one time)as saying “There is a significant Iraqi effort underway”. Note th ewords “effort” and “underway”. And note they are talking here only about one small portion of the WMD. The fact remains- Iraq had tons & tons of such WMD. Still, at the time Blix was recalled, and Bush issued his ultimatum, Blix still was not anywhere near satisfied with the evidence they had been destroyed. Now, you cany GUESS that if we had let the Inspections drag on for anither 4 year- maybe Blix would have been satisfied- or not. But remember- only the threat of US Military action was making Saddam comply- even Blix said that. How long are we going to keep massive troops deployed as a “threat”? Sure, even I was in favor of letting Blix have a little more time. But HOW LONG? A Month? Sure. 4 years? No way.
But you still have not answered my question. Why would SH have secretly, and without documentation, have destroyed the WMD he very clearly did have? Since that seems to be your hypothesis to account for the disappeance of the tons & tons of WMD he did have, pre-Blix?
Grey- there WERE illegal WMD in Iraq- and everyone knew it. The UN, EVERYBODY. And, it now seems like SH got rid of (most of?) them, sometime, somehow. Both facts are without question. The questions is “when” & “how”. From what I have seen, OliverH would have us believe SH secretly destroyed them pre-Blix. (But why could they not have also been moved out of Iraq?) Possible, I’ll admit, but there should have been more “traces”, and it doesn’t fit with what we know about Saddam & his motives. And why oh why- “secretly”? If he did destroy them, why not openly, so the hated sanctions would be removed?
I think they were moved & destroyed (mostly moved), some Pre-Blix, and the rest Post-Ultimatum. The fact is- we don’t know.
Sure, I will admit that I think many were moved to Syria & maybe Iran pre-Blix, and that Bush was mislead by his intelligence- and wanted to beleive they were still there. I think some were, but were moved after the Ultimatum.
You know, I read the editorial twice, and I never even saw where the author mentioned the Holocaust, let alone “trivialized it”. However, what is that rule- the first person to compare someone to Hitler & the Nazis loses? You lose.
On to your reply to me. Sure, Blix was indeed quoted (at one time)as saying “There is a significant Iraqi effort underway”. Note the words “effort” and “underway”. And note they are talking here only about one small portion of the WMD. The fact remains- Iraq had tons & tons of such WMD. Still, at the time Blix was recalled, and Bush issued his ultimatum, Blix still was not anywhere near satisfied with the evidence they had been destroyed. Now, you can GUESS that if we had let the Inspections drag on for anither 4 years- maybe Blix would have been satisfied- or not. But remember- only the threat of US Military action was making Saddam comply- even Blix said that. How long are we going to keep massive troops deployed as a “threat”? Sure, even I was in favor of letting Blix have a little more time. But HOW LONG? A Month? Sure. 4 years? No way.
But you still have not answered my question. Why would SH have secretly, and without documentation, have destroyed the WMD he very clearly did have? Since that seems to be your hypothesis to account for the disappeance of the tons & tons of WMD he did have, pre-Blix?
Grey- there WERE illegal WMD in Iraq- and everyone knew it. The UN, EVERYBODY. And, it now seems like SH got rid of (most of?) them, sometime, somehow. Both facts are without question. The questions is “when” & “how”. From what I have seen, OliverH would have us believe SH secretly destroyed them pre-Blix. (But why could they not have also been moved out of Iraq?) Possible, I’ll admit, but there should have been more “traces”, and it doesn’t fit with what we know about Saddam & his motives. And why oh why- “secretly”? If he did destroy them, why not openly, so the hated sanctions would be removed?
I think they were moved & destroyed (mostly moved), some Pre-Blix, and the rest Post-Ultimatum. The fact is- we don’t know.
Sure, I will admit that I think many were moved to Syria & maybe Iran pre-Blix, and that Bush was mislead by his intelligence- and wanted to beleive they were still there. I think some were, but were moved after the Ultimatum.
Huerta88, the fact that certain countries violate international law does not render it only hypothetical.
Remember, Bush originally wanted to stage the invasion before the November Congressional elections. He was stymied by the UN, but he could not very well have backed off at that point and said he wanted to wait until '04.
There isn’t any evidence that WMDs ever existed at all, much less that they were spirited into Syria or Iran.