Zarqawi Killed - Will It Make A Difference?

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

Not speculation, at least not entirely. My memory was a little spotty (I got it wrong which side of the Kurds he was on), but I wasn’t wrong that Bush passed on multiple chances to wipe out Zarqawi’s camp before the war.

Not to talk for John, but I believe that this was the speculation part:

@Diogenes the Cynic

but they chose not to because they wanted to be able to say that al Qaeda was in Iraq

Its not even really interesting speculation (JM was being overly generous IMHO )…Zarqawi wasn’t even associated with AQ at that point.

-XT

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@xtisme

Not to talk for John, but I believe that this was the speculation part:

Its not even really interesting speculation (JM was being overly generous IMHO )…Zarqawi wasn’t even associated with AQ at that point.

Yes he was. Read the article:

In June 2002, U.S. officials say intelligence had revealed that Zarqawi and members of al-Qaida had set up a weapons lab at Kirma, in northern Iraq, producing deadly ricin and cyanide.

yourself.

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

By the way, the article also supports my “speculation” that Bush wanted to keep Zaraqawi’s camp intact for propganda reasons, so it turns out I wasn’t really speculating at all.

How do YOU feel about Bush deciding three (3) times to pass on the chance to kill Zarqawi before the war?

[XT]

sigh

Leaving aside for a moment whether or not you are correct that AZ was or was not a member of AQ (or perceived to be a member of AQ) prior to the US invasion (first I’ve heard that anyone thought that in 2002), do you have a cite showing that ‘they chose not to because they wanted to be able to say that al Qaeda was in Iraq’…‘they’ presumably being the administration, and ‘chose not to’ being they didn’t attack AZ BECAUSE of the reasons you are putting forth?

Because if you don’t have such a cite handy its, you know, speculation.

-XT

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

How do YOU feel about Bush deciding three (3) times to pass on the chance to kill Zarqawi before the war?

The same I feel about Clinton failing several times to wack Bin Laden. The devil is in the details (i.e. WHY did they not go after them)…and hindsight is always 20/20. Sure, NOW it looks like it would be worth it to do whatever it takes to kill those guys. At the time though the risks (perhaps of civilian casualties and the backlash it would cause from guys like you…or hell, even guys like me ) may have outweighted the PERCEIVED benifits.

-XT

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

By the way, the article also supports my “speculation” that Bush wanted to keep Zaraqawi’s camp intact for propganda reasons, so it turns out I wasn’t really speculating at all.

BTW, I’m really looking for a direct cite on this…not an article citing what an unnamed Pentagon official SAYS was the administrations position. For all I know they really didn’t go after him simply because they wanted to leave him alive so that they would have a stronger case. I’ve never seen the first hand data on this though so I’m curious what the exact wording is on their rational…and if its the ONLY reason.

IF it turns out that this was the primary reason though…well, my opinion of this administration can’t possibly go down further, but it certainly won’t improve my thoughts toward them.

-XT

[Squink]

Zarqawi and the British Ricin Plot:

Within days of the apartment raid, British authorities spoke of concerns about possible ricin attacks. Public speculation followed, both there and in the United States, about links between the arrested men and Abu Musab Zarqawi, whom U.S. intelligence had tried to identify as linked to al Qaeda, Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and a camp in northern Iraq where ricin was made.

More at BBC

Mr Powell said: “These al-Qaeda affiliates… now co-ordinate the movement of people, money and supplies into and throughout Iraq for [Mr Zarqawi’s] network.”
Zaqarwi has been sentenced to death in his own country
He said Mr Zarqawi, a young Jordanian of Palestinian descent, had operated al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan specialising in manufacturing poisons.

He said that after the fall of the Taleban, Mr Zarqawi travelled to north-eastern Iraq, where he and his network helped establish another camp specialising in producing deadly poisons, including ricin.

Source of the ‘Bush let Zarqawi live’ meme:

Mr Scheuer was a CIA agent for 22 years - six of them as head of the agency’s Osama bin Laden unit - until he resigned in 2004
…
Mr Scheuer claims that a July 2002 plan to destroy the camp lapsed because “it was more important not to give the Europeans the impression we were gunslingers”.

“Mr Bush had Zarqawi in his sights almost every day for a year before the invasion of Iraq and he didn’t shoot because they were wining and dining the French in an effort to get them to assist us in the invasion of Iraq,” he told Four Corners.

“Almost every day we sent a package to the White House that had overhead imagery of the house he was staying in. It was a terrorist training camp . . . experimenting with ricin and anthrax . . . any collateral damage there would have been terrorists.”

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@xtisme

sigh

Leaving aside for a moment whether or not you are correct that AZ was or was not a member of AQ (or perceived to be a member of AQ) prior to the US invasion (first I’ve heard that anyone thought that in 2002), do you have a cite showing that ‘they chose not to because they wanted to be able to say that al Qaeda was in Iraq’…‘they’ presumably being the administration, and ‘chose not to’ being they didn’t attack AZ BECAUSE of the reasons you are putting forth?

Because if you don’t have such a cite handy its, you know, speculation.

I already posted the cite. What do you think is meant by “The administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam?”

Here’s some more quotes linked by Mediamatters

Yet, according to a report by NBC last March, military officials have speculated that the continued presence in Iraq of Zarqawi – an al-Qaida-affiliated terrorist who had fled Afghanistan with his followers – may have helped bolster the administration’s case for an invasion. (Sarasota Herald-Tribune)

Citing ‘‘military officials,’’ the original NBC report explained that the failure to go after Mr. Zarqawi was based on domestic politics: ‘‘the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq’’ – a part of Iraq not controlled by Saddam Hussein – '‘could undermine its case for war against Saddam.’ (Paul Krugman of the New York Times

A superficial Google search shows similar quotes, all apparently stemming from an original NBC report and all sourced as coming from “military officials.” I guess you can quibble about whether Zaeqawi’s PR value was as a “terrorist” or as al Qaeda but I don’t remember the administration being shy about playing up the AQ connection at the time.

[RTFirefly]

@John Mace

I know that’s the way your favorite left-wing blogs like to quote that part of the speech. Why not actually quote the whole context:

Emphasis added, to show how this quote has been chopped up, presumably for added effect.

With all due respect, John, I don’t see how the context does much to change the meaning. If anything, reading the whole thing makes Bush look worse, IMHO. So if there’s an intended criticism of rjung’s “favorite left-wing blogs,” I don’t think it’s warranted.

[XT]

From your cite Squink:

Mr Scheuer claims that a July 2002 plan to destroy the camp lapsed because “it was more important not to give the Europeans the impression we were gunslingers”.

So, even if DtC’s ‘speculation’ was true (and I conceed that its not HIM speculating, and perhaps not even speculation at all), there were other reasons…perhaps equally important than leaving him alive simply to have an excuse and association between Zarqawi, AQ and Iraq. In fact, I’m guessing that THIS may have been more important during the run up to war…showing ‘restraint’ to our European buddies in the (later proved vain) attempt to bring them on board.

And this is still some guy (albiet a purported CIA operative who had perhaps first hand knowledge) telling us the administrations position and reasons. Anyone have anything on what the administration ACTUALLY said wrt not killing Zarqawi when they had the chance?

-XT

[Birdmonster]

Thought John Mace’s entire quote was rather enlightening but, still, the point remains that the man is still out there. If we’re talking about the death of Zarqawi being a “morale booster,” the capture of Bin Laden would be about a thousand times more effective, both for the administration and as, I’d assume, a cathartic experience for our country as a whole. To simply say “we forced him into hiding, so don’t worry about it” (essentially the entire point of the non-truncated '02 quote) doesn’t make me feel safer in any way. Bin Laden, marganilized or not, is the figurehead of AQ and you notice Bush sidestepped the question of whether the threat he posed could only be eliminated if he was found. He just said “I’m done worrying about the guy.”

Well, the fact he hasn’t been found stands as an example that you can perpetrate & organize heinous acts against our country & get away with it. That’s a powerful message.

[Birdmonster]

Weirdly enough, that was post 911 for me.

[John_Mace]

Diogenes: What’s the 13th word in your first mediamatters cite?

[John_Mace]

@John Mace

Diogenes: What’s the 13th word in your first mediamatters cite?

make that quote, not cite.

[Squink]

@xtisme

Anyone have anything on what the administration ACTUALLY said wrt not killing Zarqawi when they had the chance?

Some PIE would be nice too! What are the chances of that sort of info coming out? We’d have a whole platoon of federal prosecutors going after the evil leaking bureaucrats who hate America.

[XT]

@Diogenes the Cynic

I already posted the cite. What do you think is meant by “The administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam?”

I don’t see that exact quote in your first cite. I see this “Military officials insist their case for attacking Zarqawi’s operation was airtight, but the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.” How do I interperet it? That an unnamed ‘military official’ is telling us what the administrations reasons for not attacking are. Pretty clear from my perspective. YMMV on this.

Your other two quotes (I admit I only skimmed the parts you cited) seem to say exactly the same thing. A ‘military official’ is basically putting words in the administrations mouth and telling us what THEY think the administrations reasons were. If you have a direct quote from an administrations official then that would pretty much force me to conceed that you are correct. I do conceed that YOU weren’t speculating though and that you have a valid source for the speculation on this point.

-XT

[Diogenes_the_Cynic]

@xtisme

BTW, I’m really looking for a direct cite on this…not an article citing what an unnamed Pentagon official SAYS was the administrations position.

Well dude, of course there isn’t going to be any direct confession by the administration, but I think the circumstancial evidence along with claims from the Pentagon is at least strong enough to move this possibility out of the realm of wild speculation.

The story that Clinton had a chance to get bin Laden is bullshit, by the way. The 9/11 commmission debunked that whole Sudanese offer thing. It never happened.

[XT]

@Squink

Some PIE would be nice too! What are the chances of that sort of info coming out? We’d have a whole platoon of federal prosecutors going after the evil leaking bureaucrats who hate America.

Granted. Its going to be well neigh impossible to nail the administration on this…assuming they did in fact make the decision based on this point. Thats why I called it ‘speculation’.

I will at this point also conceed that it WAS a good speculation and I was unfair to DtC on that…John Mace was correct.

-XT

[RTFirefly]

@DeAngelo Williams

How do you know that?

Was in the news.

Whether Zarqawi’s death will be trival in it’s consequences is something we will have to wait and see.

In a trivial sense, yes. Nothing is 100% predictable.

If someone claims to know the answers — believe me, they don’t.

Why should I believe you? It’s not like the overall direction of this whole business has been that hard to call. Plenty of people have known a great deal of the answers since before the invasion, because they were obvious.

The Iraqi themselves were involved to killing Zarqawi – how will that play out? Will this bring more credit to the Iraqi forces.

Cite, please? Guy got killed by an airstrike. I’m getting tired of saying that.

Zarqawi’s plans for civil war — will that scheme be prosecuted with the same vigor as before?

I dunno. Do Sunnis and Shi’ites hate each other as much as they did two days ago? Oh, wait - they sure do.

Who knows? Not you, not me, and not anyone else outside of those who have intimate knowledge of the situation. As I’ve already said, I doubt a reasonable person will claim that his death doesn’t make a short term difference in morale – and morale is a substantial part of the battle.

Sure, morale is a substantial part of the battle. But it’s affected a heck of a lot more by the day-to-day stuff than by some one-off bit like this.

However, since this isn’t an organization that believes in public disclosure, I’m not willing to go as far as most on the board and almost assert the fact that ‘yes, there will be some lasting affect that matters’ or ‘no, never, nada.’ Anybody that does is fooling themselves, not me.

Over three years ago, I made a fool of myself by warning of the dangers of our invasion resulting in a civil war. I guess I’ll keep on making a fool of myself. Feel free to look this up in a year: Zarqawi’s death does not affect the fundamentals of this war.

I don’t know what the effects of Zarqawi’s death will have on the long term psychology of the war. Never said that – never even implied it. Now, if I were a betting man, I’d think it’s not going to have any long term effect all else being equal. That said, it doesn’t remove the fact that this news has to be a boost to morale, both military and civilian ---- and it certainly doesn’t remove the possibility that a different al Quida leadership might decide that car bombing Iraqi civilians isn’t getting the job done – or that civil war is no longer on the agenda. Who’s the next new beheading star? Whose face will we all recognize next? Who will be his advisors? Again — Who knows? Point is - anyone that claims that this does or does not change anything long term is really just blowing smoke out of their backside.

OK, have it your way: making judgments about the future based on the past and present is impossible, and anyone who tries it is blowing smoke out of their backsides.

I could be wrong, but I’m willing to put my words out there and see how they stack up in six months or a year. Chances are it won’t take that long.

[John_Mace]

@RTFirefly

With all due respect, John, I don’t see how the context does much to change the meaning. If anything, reading the whole thing makes Bush look worse, IMHO. So if there’s an intended criticism of rjung’s “favorite left-wing blogs,” I don’t think it’s warranted.

I think the added context takes a lot of the sting out of it. So I guess reasonable people can disagree about what conclusion to draw. Therefore, I think it makes senes to give the entire quote.