# What's the current Bush Administation explanation for why we are in Iraq **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 27, 2005, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871 "2005-08-27T17:03:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/1 "2005-08-27T17:03:30Z")
One thing I really haven’t tracked over time is what the current Bush adminstration expanation is for why we are in Iraq. IIRC as the Iraq invasion began it _was_ probable Iraqi support of Al Queda terrorists + WMD stockpiles + incipient near term, real world nuclear capability. As far as I know, to date, all those justifications have been determined to be generally incorrect or vastly overblown. So… that was then, and this is now. \*\*What is the current logical justification \*\* for why we are there spending billions, and spilling American (and Iraqi) blood. Break it down for me. What is the current justifying explanation? ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/2 "2005-08-27T17:04:34Z")
Sigh… Would a kindly Mod please move this to GD. ---
**Author:** ![Electronic\_Chaos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Electronic\_Chaos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Electronic_Chaos)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/3 "2005-08-27T17:15:31Z")
From what I’ve heard of the clips of speaches, we’re: - Spreading freedom and Democracy to the Middle East - Fighting the terrorists over there so we don’t have to fight them over here - “Staying the course” so we don’t look weak to our enemies ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/4 "2005-08-27T17:15:40Z")
It’s two things. **Liberation.** We are bringing liberty, democracy, and gallons of happy juice to the people of Iraq, for both abstractly philosophical reasons (freedom is a gift from God or some such) and realpolitik reasons (creating an example for other countries in the region to aspire to). **Flypaper.** “Fight them there so we don’t have to fight them here.” Make Iraq a honeypot for terrorists in order to draw them out and then annihilate them. Centralize the battleground. Nobody seems to have noticed that these objectives are directly contradictory and mutually incompatible. How do you make Iraq a heaven while you’re simultaneously making it a hell? ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/5 "2005-08-27T17:42:35Z")
I thought it was part of the “global struggle against extremism.” Or has that sound bite been replaced already? ---
**Author:** ![sturmhauke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47c2d/32.png) [@sturmhauke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sturmhauke)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/6 "2005-08-27T18:44:33Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > Nobody seems to have noticed that these objectives are directly contradictory and mutually incompatible. How do you make Iraq a heaven while you’re simultaneously making it a hell? You do not have clearance for that information, Citizen. You must be eliminated! ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/7 "2005-08-27T20:18:22Z")
> [@](#): > > Q Does the President feel that over the last couple of days he’s made an effective and convincing case that Cindy Sheehan is misguided in her feelings about the war and what should happen to the troops? > > MR. DUFFY: Well, first of all, the President has spoken continuously about the way he approaches this war, following September 11th, 2001. On September 14th, 2001, he stood at the National Cathedral and told all of America that this was going to be a very long and difficult war, and that there were going to be some very trying moments; but that because of what happened on 9/11, that we had to view the world in a different way. [August 25 Press Briefing](http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/08/20050825-2.html) Iraq is part of that ‘different way’. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2005, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/8 "2005-08-27T22:05:30Z")
Isn’t it sort of the reverse domino theory? If we establish democracy in Iraq, all of the other countries in the Middle East will get mellow? What is Farsi for _Kumbaya_? ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/9 "2005-08-28T00:24:22Z")
> [@astro](#): > > As far as I know, to date, all those justifications have been determined to be generally incorrect or vastly overblown. I have no memory of him actually saying anything like this, but this sentence gave me a vision of Ron Zeigler saying, “Our previous statements are no longer operative.” ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/10 "2005-08-28T05:04:08Z")
The latest, up to the minute reasoning is that if we fail to acheive our goals in Iraq, the sacrifices of our troops will have been in vain. The Bushiviks have learned one very important lesson: good liars offer details, but _really_ good liars don’t. If you reference an objective reality, you create a vulnerability. Facts can be checked, grand and nebulous pontifications cannot. They have one hope, and one only: that somehow, if they don’t admit defeat, defeat can be forestalled long enough to become Victory Lite. And maybe, just maybe, somehow it will all turn around, the Kurds, Sunni and Shia will all fling themselves into each others arms, blubbering promises of brotherhood and fealty, Ahmed Chalabi will walk across the Tigris River to host the “Gosh, Do We Ever Love George Bush!” demonstration, while children scatter over the countryside to gather flowers to strew in the path of the departing heroes, as all America joins hands to sing the praises of The Leader. We are given to understand that the people who present this extraordinary scenario do not indulge in psychoactive chemicals of any kind. We are therefore left with only one possible conclusion. I’m speaking, of course, of Cognitive Dissonance, the Number One threat to the Republic! The Mother’s March Against CD is gathering…hey, leggo my arm!..stop that! quit shoving…hey, uncool, man, really _uncool_… ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/11 "2005-08-28T05:30:15Z")
I thought the current line is that we were supposed to stop dwelling on the past and thinking about who made what mistakes or why we did what and concentrate on the NOW. Just restart from zero and believe whatever the Chimp in Chief says. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/12 "2005-08-28T06:45:45Z")
1. We must stary the course so as not to dishonor those already killed there. (I’m not making this up.) And those who fell for the original scam will also fall for this one. Barnum underestimated. ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/13 "2005-08-28T11:57:55Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > I thought the current line is that we were supposed to stop dwelling on the past and thinking about who made what mistakes or why we did what and concentrate on the NOW. Mistakes…what mistakes? I can’t think of any mistakes that we have made. Isn’t Step 1 of a 12 step recovery program acknowledging that you have a problem? G.W. is still on Step 0. ---
**Author:** ![Spavined\_Gelding](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/958977/32.png) [@Spavined\_Gelding](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spavined_Gelding)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/14 "2005-08-28T13:17:52Z")
I’m told that in the later stages of WWI, that is, starting in 1916, British troops sang this song to the tune of Auld Lang Syne: _We’re here because We’re here because We’re here because We’re here We’re here because We’re here because We’re here because We’re here. (Repeat until exhausted)_ Despite all the glittering rationales advanced for the investment of treasure, blood and credibility in Iraq, despite the repeated decelerations that the mission had been accomplished, that our forces were being accepted as liberators, that the guys blowing our forces up were merely a small bunch of Saddam loyalists and dead enders, that the insurgents were outside agitators, that the insurgency was in its last throes, that the end is fast approaching, it is fairly clear that our country is now in Iraq because it can not figure out any way to leave that preserves some amount of dignity or claim of accomplishment. We remain in Iraq under the tar baby scenario y’clept the doctrine of stay the course. The Brits called it muddling through. We have seen this before. Think Vietnam. Think the French invasion of Mexico. Think the Philippine Insurrection. Think the First and Second Boer Wars. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2005, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-current-bush-administation-explanation-for-why-we-are-in-iraq/318871/15 "2005-08-28T13:23:29Z")
> [@Spavined Gelding](#): > > … that the insurgency was in its last throes, that the end is fast approaching, … The insurgency has as many last legs as cats have lives.