26th March 2004, 9:37 AM
Quote:That is such an old myth it's not even funny anymore. It's very common knowledge that everyone, including Saddam, thought he had the WMDs. Clinton was very convinced. Wes Clark was very convinced. Hans Blix just recently stated that he was also very convinced for a long time. The idea that WMD is a lie started by Bush is complete bullshit, and no one ever makes that claim anymore.
I'll admit that Bush thought he had them. It is, after all, why he chose it as his main reason for going in -- he thought it was the easiest to prove.
And yes, it wasn't new to Bush and Clinton's administration thought many similar things.
However. If they had really wanted to see what was in Iraq, they would have looked harder. What they essentially did was look a little, trust their sources (who were not exactly always telling the truth), and then make 'maybe's and 'i wish's into "YES THEY ARE THERE"s. Bush is guilty of greatly, greatly inflating very shaky evidence into 'definite proof'. He didn't WANT to know if his evidence was good before going to war -- it might prove him wrong! So he kept saying it and closed his eyes and ignored anything else... okay it was institutional in the CIA to think this, and many in the world did too, but I've read enough about how bad our intelligence in Iraq was after the inspectors left in '98 (the Iraqi claims that the inspectors had US spies among them were absolutely true) to know that we did not have the ability to come anywhere close to claiming what we did. The proof just wasn't there. And the CIA did do some limiting of the reports... it's the Bush administration that removed those qualifications when they talked about that intelligence. So it's close enough to lying to not matter much...
Quote:Now, we have a certified madman, and the entire world believes he has these weapons. He refuses for years to cooperate with inspectors. Before we had patience, but 9/11 changed that. He still wouldn't cooperate. The UN wasn't working fast enough, 12 years was way more time than necessary. So we took him out. And it was the right thing to do.
Absolutely ridiculous! Now, the UN from '91 to '98 was in Iraq looking for weapons. They found plants. They found weapons. They confiscated and destroyed them. By being there they kept Sadaam from being able to set up any new weapons factories to make more stuff. They served their purpose perfectly. Then they were kicked out, but still Sadaam didn't make more weapons... the crippling blockade and the threat of their return was obviously strong enough. The UN blockade by the way... then the inspectors returned. They found nothing. Bush said that it didn't work, and he attacked WELL before they could possibly have said a final report. Why? I bet it's because he was afraid that they'd take too long and not find anything and erode any minimal pretext for invasion... so despite the fact that Sadaam was doing as much as he ever would to cooperate (allowing inspections all over, destroying those missiles, etc) he attacked anyway. Your claims here are patently absurd.
Oh, and 9/11 has NO connection to Sadaam. N-O-N-E. THAT we know for a fact.
As for 'Sadaam is a madman' well yeah, he was an awful ruler, but there are SO MANY of those! We don't do anything about, oh, Haiti (well no we are doing a little but not trying very hard, and cutting aid!), Liberia, Burma, China, etc, etc... so that arguement is ridiculous. That wasn't the reason and everyone knows it.
Quote:Yeah, that people make mistakes, especially when you have the mad Ayatollah in Iran? We made a mistake propping him up. It was hardly the only time. One could just as easily blame Clinton for two major transgressions of a similar taste, one being the disastrous agreement with North Korea that allowed them to build their nuclear weapons program, and the time in 1998 when Sudan offered Bin Laden to America and Clinton refused to take him.
Sudan's government is a pretty brutal regime and the nation is in a permanant war, pretty much... not exactly one I'd trust too far... As for North Korea, yes, the Koreans immediately lied and did what they had promised not to do. But you know what? I still think it was probably a good move. We can't "solve" the North Korea problem militarially. Political isolation we try but that nation is the most isolated in the world... and we can only do economic blocade as far as China wants, which is only to a point. As I've said before it's a horrible situation, but I see no way out... making agreements like that and hoping they will listen is about our only option.