wikistan

I’m sure Al Capone would have loved to have had you on his defense team. “Sure, he’s a bad guy. . .We just can’t get him!”  How many more reasons can you come up with? Hell, you’re even providing answers to questions I never even asked. As for showing that there is no formal relationship between Saddam and terrorism, the Senate Intelligence report from this weekend does no such thing—it only clears up the murkiness between Zarqawi and Hussein, and Hussein and AQ.
There is no way to answer this lengthy post without making it lengthier. . .Here are some redlines:

“I think I’ve been quite deliberate in pointing out WHY you’re wrong. As for WWII… the similarities end with a very simplistic view of the analogy. Subscribing to an anti-intellectual ideology may keep you from looking too closely at things (science behind global warming for instance) but you must be willing to accept that it makes you look silly in doing so. Iraq’s first invasion was eventually funded with US tax dollars and we didn’t seem to concerned that they were using chemical weapons in that war. And lets not forget the Rummy / Hussein handshake from that period. We decisively expelled Iraq from Kuwait after Saddam invaded it and then negotiated a peace agreement w/ Iraq. The exact nature of Saddam’s relationship with terrorism is obviously debateable but the final US intelligence assessment was that there was no formal relationship and you’ve yet to address the point that as far as middle eastern supporters of terrorism go, Saddam was not the greatest threat.
I don’t think I ever said there was “no link”. I wouldn’t be that careless with my words. I don’t think its a big secret that Saddam spent many years on the state dept . list of state sponsors of terrorism but it’s odd that we waited 24 years after it first appear on the list to invade and have yet to invade and otherthrow any of the other countries on the state dept’s list? And let’s not forget that we were willing to take them off the list in the 80’s so that we could legally provide technical military and monetary assistance to them in their fight against iran.”

I’m anti-intelluctual but you’re still masturbating to some Rummy/Hussein fantasy? Entirely blaming the US for Iraq’s fateful decisions means that you’re ready to indict the entire American foreigh policy establishment with little evidence other than some Goebbelian propaganda. There’s probably some pictures of Joe Wilson shaking Hussein’s hand too. You have to be used to having strange bedfellows in foreign strategy, but even back then, Iraq was one of our dikes against the Iranian revolution. And what peace did we negotiate with Iraq in 1991? The West imposed a cease fire with many restrictions, almost all of which were broken by Iraq. . .Plus, the Senate report only clarifies the Zarqawi/Hussein link but still insists that Zarqawi was in Baghdad for at least 6 months, but the IIS just couldn’t find him! I agreed with you earlier about threat levels–Saddam may not have been the greatest terror threat but he would have been the easiest to depose.  You mocked the Joint Resolution for War in 2002, much of it was proved infactual with time.  But what about the rest?  For someone who would conceivable included the UN more in negotiations to stave off a conflict, you curiously have dismissed those same efforts as something you can “wipe your ass with”.

“As far as AQ’s migration into Iraq… why would you go to so much trouble to essentially say that military planners expected AQ to come to Iraq and they were right? Aren’t you just highlighting the failure of Rumsfeld to accept a war plan that would have limited the AQ migration?”

No, I was repeating analysts (pre-war) fears that AQ could come to Hussein’s aid during a prolonged insurgency. The postwar report proposes a more correct, alternate scenario, that AQ would take an opportunistic posture and fill the void

“My charge of malfeasance was levelled at the bush admin for deliberately promoting one sided intelligence to the public. Did you ever hear Bush, Cheney, et al. mention that there was strong evidence against the very intelligence findings that the admin. was citing? Did any of them ever say that there is a great debate as to whether or not those aluminum tubes could be used in centrifuges for uranium enrichment? Did they ever say that many of their intelliegence sources were INC members who stood to gain a lot if the US overthrew saddam? Did they ever say that the CIA considered Chalabi a fraud. Did they ever say that the CIA considered Curve Ball a fabricator? Did Cheney ever renounce his comment about Atta in Prague after the CIA concluded that it never happened? Did they ever say that CIA doubted the accuracy of the yellowcake story. Technically, this isn’t manipulation but I would call it criminal ommission.

It wasn’t Bush who gave the state of the union address and cited iraq’s intent to purchase yellowcake from niger? I could swear that was him. i guess you don’t believe that politicians should be held accountable for the words they speak?”

Why don’t you ask “Slam Dunk” Tenet? Reading the after-action reports in 2006 gives us a lot of insight to what could have happened four years ago. Don’t you just wish you could go back in time, zac? Wheeeee!
Cheney was very careful to mend what he said in Decemeber 2001 about Atta. Try doing some searches. On “Meet the Press” ALONE (3/24/02, 9/08/02, 9/14/03) he’s tended to his earlier statement.

“Kerry makes some damn good points in the link you provided… where’s the cretinism?”

What were we talking about with Kerry again? Until he releases his Form 180, I don’t give a damn what that cocksucker says.

“When did he plan for it? The story you link to cites a report that covers “July 2003 through early 2004.” The war started March 2003. So did Saddam really begin planning for an anti-US insurgency prior to the invasion? I don’t think so. On December 18, 2002, at a meeting of senior Iraqi military leaders, Lt. Gen. Sayf al-Din al-Rawi, chief of staff of the Republican Guard laid out Saddam’s plan of defense in the event of a US attack. The plan called for three concentric lines of defense that would surround baghdad with the nearest “Red line” being the special republican guard. The fedayeen would be dispatched to implant among the general public where they would be the first reponders to any attempt by shiites to mount an uprising. Saddam didn’t even believe that there would be a /us ground war. His greatest concern was that the air war would set the stage for successful internal revolt. This is all based on post collapse interrogations with senior Iraq military and intelliegence officials and is laid out in far greater detail in Cobra II by Michael Gordon and Gen. Bernard Trainor.”

My point was, innocently enough, a hypothetical scenario. I’m surprised that you’ve latched onto it such. Seriously. He may or may not have done that but you’ve sure gone to some great lengths to prove that he didn’t. Was that Ramsey Clark’s limo in front of your house the other day?

“The onus is on you to prove that zarqawi a) was in iraq (excluding kurdistan) b) had any relationship with saddam whatsoever.”

He was there. I will abide by the Senate report but am a little skeptical that we can truly trust any official Iraq remarks about his disposition. I’ll live with that vagueness.

“It was reasonable for the administration to ask if Iraq was responsible for the 9/11 attacks since there was possible linkage to the ‘93 attack.” I never said that it was unreasonable to ask and I never called it malfeasance. I cited it as a strong indication that the white house was eager for an excuse to attack Iraq. Due diligence is fine but Clarke, an expert on AQ and terrorism, told Cheney at the time that AQ was responsible for 9/11. Cheney still insisted on pursuing the iraq link indefinitely . As for Iraq’s link to the ‘93 attack… Again, the CIA’s official stance is that Saddam had no envolvement in the ‘93 attack.”

Attack-no. Aftermath-possibly.  We can get into that later or in another thread.  For now, like you, I’m done.

I missed these paragraphs while copying and pasting my above comment:

I don’t think the contents of the downing street memo are of any big surprise and neither the british or the US have refuted the truthfulness of them. The existence of WHIG and the admins willingness to present a completely one sided assessment of the intelligence to the public is pretty damning. which unsubstantiated claims are you referring to?

“It was reasonable for the administration to ask if Iraq was responsible for the 9/11 attacks since there was possible linkage to the ‘93 attack.” I never said that it was unreasonable to ask and I never called it malfeasance. I cited it as a strong indication that the white house was eager for an excuse to attack Iraq. Due diligence is fine but Clarke, an expert on AQ and terrorism, told Cheney at the time that AQ was responsible for 9/11. Cheney still insisted on pursuing the iraq link indefinitely . As for Iraq’s link to the ‘93 attack… Again, the CIA’s official stance is that Saddam had no envolvement in the ‘93 attack.

This is it for me and this post…

Political debate, like all contact sport, is more fun with a little trash talking. Sorry if I hurt your feelings, sissy. Besides, my harsher attacks have focused on your reasoning. What “factual conclusions” and “unsubstantiated accusations” are you referring to”?

“Reasonable” is well and good but the question of “reasonable” is subject to the core values and beliefs of the people involved. For example, If you believe that Jews are sub-human and a malignant force on society then you may consider genocide “reasonable”. In regards to the war in Iraq I question the core values and beliefs of a lot of the central figures who took us there.

I think I’ve been quite deliberate in pointing out WHY you’re wrong. As for WWII… the similarities end with a very simplistic view of the analogy. Subscribing to an anti-intellectual ideology may keep you from looking too closely at things (science behind global warming for instance) but you must be willing to accept that it makes you look silly in doing so. Iraq’s first invasion was eventually funded with US tax dollars and we didn’t seem to concerned that they were using chemical weapons in that war. And lets not forget the Rummy / Hussein handshake from that period. We decisively expelled Iraq from Kuwait after Saddam invaded it and then negotiated a peace agreement w/ Iraq. The exact nature of Saddam’s relationship with terrorism is obviously debateable but the final US intelligence assessment was that there was no formal relationship and you’ve yet to address the point that as far as middle eastern supporters of terrorism go, Saddam was not the greatest threat.

I don’t think I ever said there was “no link”. I wouldn’t be that careless with my words. I don’t think its a big secret that Saddam spent many years on the state dept . list of state sponsors of terrorism but it’s odd that we waited 24 years after it first appear on the list to invade and have yet to invade and otherthrow any of the other countries on the state dept’s list? And let’s not forget that we were willing to take them off the list in the 80’s so that we could legally provide technical military and monetary assistance to them in their fight against iran.

So you consider “reasonable concern” justification for war? How about “reasonable concern” as justification for pursuit of good intelligence from reliable sources, instead of basing analysis on intelligence that they admit is “poor” and from “sources of varying reliability”?

I don’t know who is arguing that the troop level was appropriate? The original Iraq war contingency plan (OPLAN 1003-98) as drawn up by Gen. Zinni in the 90’s called for 380,000 – 500,000 troops. This plan accounted for securing Iraq’s borders and and the power vaccuum that would en sue in Saddam’s absence. Rumsfeld asked to be briefed on this plan in 2002 and was unhappy with the high troop count. Rumsfeld then told Gen. Franks, who replaced Zinni as CENTCOM Commander, to draw up a new plan. During the course of that planning and at Rumsfeld’s insistence troop strength was reduced from 385,000 to the 140,000 that invaded Iraq. Read Cobra II for further detail.

As far as AQ’s migration into Iraq… why would you go to so much trouble to essentially say that military planners expected AQ to come to Iraq and they were right? Aren’t you just highlighting the failure of Rumsfeld to accept a war plan that would have limited the AQ migration?

My charge of malfeasance was levelled at the bush admin for deliberately promoting one sided intelligence to the public. Did you ever hear Bush, Cheney, et al. mention that there was strong evidence against the very intelligence findings that the admin. was citing? Did any of them ever say that there is a great debate as to whether or not those aluminum tubes could be used in centrifuges for uranium enrichment? Did they ever say that many of their intelliegence sources were INC members who stood to gain a lot if the US overthrew saddam? Did they ever say that the CIA considered Chalabi a fraud. Did they ever say that the CIA considered Curve Ball a fabricator? Did Cheney ever renounce his comment about Atta in Prague after the CIA concluded that it never happened? Did they ever say that CIA doubted the accuracy of the yellowcake story. Technically, this isn’t manipulation but I would call it criminal ommission.

It wasn’t Bush who gave the state of the union address and cited iraq’s intent to purchase yellowcake from niger? I could swear that was him. i guess you don’t believe that politicians should be held accountable for the words they speak?

Kerry makes some damn good points in the link you provided… where’s the cretinism?

When did he plan for it? The story you link to cites a report that covers “July 2003 through early 2004.” The war started March 2003. So did Saddam really begin planning for an anti-US insurgency prior to the invasion? I don’t think so. On December 18, 2002, at a meeting of senior Iraqi military leaders, Lt. Gen. Sayf al-Din al-Rawi, chief of staff of the Republican Guard laid out Saddam’s plan of defense in the event of a US attack. The plan called for three concentric lines of defense that would surround baghdad with the nearest “Red line” being the special republican guard. The fedayeen would be dispatched to implant among the general public where they would be the first reponders to any attempt by shiites to mount an uprising. Saddam didn’t even believe that there would be a /us ground war. His greatest concern was that the air war would set the stage for successful internal revolt. This is all based on post collapse interrogations with senior Iraq military and intelliegence officials and is laid out in far greater detail in Cobra II by Michael Gordon and Gen. Bernard Trainor.

The onus is on you to prove that zarqawi a) was in iraq (excluding kurdistan) b) had any relationship with saddam whatsoever.

Zac, there are some reasonable people in our government making reasonable assessments of what’s happened in the last several years. You can believe what you want or criticize what you think isn’t reasonable but be reasonable. The key word here is reasonable. Is that reasonable? You can’t repudiate a factual conclusion made by reasonable people in a reasonable forum with a continuing ad hominum attack of unsubstantiated accusations. That’s not reasonable.

Don’t just suggest I’m incorrect–tell me WHY I’m wrong.  That’s what reasonable people do.
I would *love* to sit down and talk about WWII sometime. I was drawing similarities, not making generalizations Maybe I got lost in your excessive double-negatives, but Iraq declared war on the US in 1991 which they never retracted after the cessation of hostilities, sheltered terrorists and maintained alliances with terrorist organizations, and invaded two countries prior to 1991. If they hadn’t have done any of these things, your attempt at refining my analogy would have worked.

Lotsa money in this phase of the war, and I’m pretty sure that some of it has gone to exactly what you listed. Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m free to guess about its best uses as much as you are. How much money has been spent since 1991 containing this asshole? How much money has the world wasted in containing this asshole? How much UN Aid did this asshole divert to his own use? Don’t talk to me where’s the money going.

I’d also really love to hear more of what you think of the ICC. Since not one of our enemies expresses any willingness to abide by any EXISTING international treatises, what makes you think they’d be more cooperative if we’re a member of such an organization? What difference did that make to Hussein, who had every opportunity to come to the table and come clean? Forcing someone to come to the table with military force means that diplomacy had failed in the first place. But you’re only concerned what’s happened since Bush stole the election in Florida and you don’t care about any of the historical perspective. You only saw the last half of “Dr. Zhivago” and boy, did it suck!!!

You mention Hussein’s support of suicide bombing but then later say there’s no link to terrorism??? Then, Nidal suffered a mysterious death, the circumstances of which are rightly open to speculation. The clear realities, which I wrote earlier and you ignored, is that he had lived in Baghdad for years on government property and only met his demise on the eve of our intervention.

CIA had “reasonable concern” as opposed to having, say, unwarranted concern.

The right amount of troop levels in Iraq during and after the invasion are certainly open for debate. However, my statement about AQ’s migration to Iraq after the invasion is not ridiculous because pre-war planners, according the 9/11 Report had “reasonable concern” that such a thing would happen when an Iraqi vacuum began to materialize. The planners had no such worries about the Guardian Angels or, say, the Bee Gees filing that space. That migration alones doesn’t prove an alliance existed, but certainly proved the planners fears were indeed true, which was my point. I have already provided examples of AQ linkages to Iraq. Zarqawi’s story means nothing to you since he was a creation of the Douglas Feith and the rest of the neocons, and Hussein only hung out with nice guys.

Bush’s many lapses of judgement include not firing the disgraceful Tenet ASAP. He must have been in one of his “govern from the middle” when he treated the Clinton-era appointee with a medal.

Despite the wealth of detail available in the 9/11 and Senate reports, you instead use the Downing Street Memo and unsubstantiated accusations of impropriety as a foundation of your message. I guess you get a pass here since you’re talking hypotheticals about what Democrats would and wouldn’t have done.  What Al Gore says today and what he would have done back then if he was the boss are likely two different things.
It was reasonable for the administration to ask if Iraq was responsible for the 9/11 attacks since there was possible linkage to the ‘93 attack (in which my nine-month pregnant cousin had to descend 90-odd floors of stairs to evacuate the building). Their insistence of a thorough analysis of a possible link is due diligence to normal people—to you, it’s an example of malfeasance and a pretext for a war based on a non-existent link to 9/11.  WTF?
Some findings from the Senate Intelligence Committee’s report on prewar intelligence assessments Nowhere is there any finding of manipulation of data:

Conclusions 11-26 address faults in the Niger Yellowcake. Wasn’t Bush, sorry.

(U) Conclusion 83. The Committee did not find any evidence that Administration officials attempted to coerce, influence or pressure analysts to change their judgments related to Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction capabilities.

(U) Conclusion 84. The Committee found no evidence that the Vice President’s visits to the Central Intelligence Agency were attempts to pressure analysts, were perceived as intended to pressure analysts by those who participated in the briefings on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction programs, or did pressure analysts to change their assessments.

WTF, zac?

Maybe Feith was fired? If Franklin was guilty for something totally unrelated, let him hang. What do I care? You really want to go there with me?

Cretinous Democrats:

I was referring to the “plenty of them (who) made statements about . . intelligence”, which you seem to agree with. Those Democrats who voted “yeah” for Joint Resolution (H.J.Res. 114 ), who are running for President in 2008, and are now carrying the “Bush Misled” stance:
Kerry – http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10088231/
Would you expect that any of them (Biden, Clinton, Edwards, etc) would go on the record as standing with the President in an Election cycle?

And now for Plan B. .

Are you now just hoping I’m making some of this shit up? I was just playing with hypotheticals based on the premise that the Taliban didn’t think we’d actually invade Afghanistan; Saddam observed this and planned for the inevitable. His plan was certainly executed early after the seizure of the capital. How long his planned resistance lasted is still a matter of conjecture but, if not already over, it must be in its last throes.

Yes, Zac, the rest of the occupation MUST be due to piss poor planning! It MUST! Why do you think it’s a bad thing to find that I’m actually right? You’d think I’d post in a public forum something that I know is false?

“50%” was a response to your stupid nickname for Cheney. You quoted his famous overstatement but implied that we weren’t received as liberators, which we actually were in parts of the country. Not all of the country, but some. And I suspect we still are regarded as such, if only we would just leave.
“5%” was my number and was reference to scattered reports that of the total insurgents killed, only a small portion appear, lately, to have AQ ties. Most enemy deaths today appear to be local militia members fighting coalition forces.

Can you provide some context for me here to show me how you disproved my earlier statements about Zarqawi?

Your Reasons for War – Part II
You forgot to mention oil, Halliburton, the Zionist agenda, and popularity ratings, but I think you were just about to get there, weren’t you?”

Your understanding of logic is whack, yo! My position is that WWII and the Iraq war are not analogous and therefore US rationale for action in WWII is not applicable to the Iraq war (and vice versa). You attempt to use “my logic” to present my position as something that it is not? “My logic” does not permit the analogy you provide above. But again, I’ll hold your hand and attempt to turn an orange into an apple for the sake of your education. If Italy had not declared war against the US, had not allied itself with Japan and German, and had not invaded other countries, then the answer is no – we should not have sacrificied thousands of American lives to “liberate” it. I’m no isolationist – we should have supported democratic reforms through other means – but invading a sovereign country and sacrificing US lives just because we don’t like their government seems unwise. I’m glad we didn’t decide to invade the USSR to “liberate” them.

There’s nothing specious about my argument. Reread your first sentence, it doesn’t make any sense (or at least a point). Bush didn’t shit 250 billions dollars. Maybe you have no regard for a fiscally responsible federal govt but I’m a little miffed. We could have spent half of that on drastically expanding the CIA foreign intelligence capabilities, quadrupling the US Special Forces, supporting moderate religious voices in the middle east, etc. maybe we could have trained more arabic speaking intelligence officers (instead of dismissing them for being gay). It’s especially hard to summon hostile leaders to court when the world’s lone super power won’t sign on to the International Criminal Court.

Again, compare Hussein giving $25,000 to the family of a suicide bomber (despicable yes) to Iran giving $200,000,000 a year to hezbollah. Nidal came home to Baghdad but then either a) shot himself instead of being detained by Iraqi Intelligence or b) died in a fire fight with Iraqi intelligence. Doesn’t sound like he and Saddam were buddies?

“AQ/Iraq relationship, although murky, was sufficient enought to warrant reasonable concern by the intelligence and defense towers” Since when is “reasonable concern by the intelligence and defense towers” synonymous with war?

“That AQ emerged as one of the most dangerous players in post-Saddam Iraq seems to be a positive testament to this earlier concern.” Ridiculous statement. Iraq shares a border with Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Jordan that the US chose not to secure after the invasion (probably because the military had 1/3 the number of troops recommended by senior pentagon military planners for the invasion). The fact that AQ migrated to attack US targets does nothing to establish an AQ/Iraq relationship.

Tenet was as shitbag too. I think he wanted to keep his seat at the table with the big boys so he sold his soul and started marching lock step with Cheney and Rumsfeld on flawed Iraq intelligence. Good thing your hero Bush gave him the presidential medal of freedom for overseeing two of the US’s greatest intelligence failures. His self esteem was probably getting low.

I’ll gladly answer your questions. “Unnecessary death” seems completely self explanatory. I’ll gladly expand on that if you tell me what you’re trying to get at.

I would argue that it is highly unlikely that a Democratic pres. would have taken us to war when you consider the following: It wasn’t the Democrats, as stated in the Downing Street Memo, that were fixing the facts and intelligence to fit the policy of invasion. That was the White House. It wasn’t a Democrat that asked Richard Clarke to find a Iraq / 9/11 connection in the immediate aftermath of the attack. That was Bush. It was not a Democrat who made the false claim on national television that Iraq purchased yellow cake uranium from Niger. That was Bush. It was not a Democrat who on a number of public speaking occasions speciously tied Saddam and 9/11 together. That was Bush. It was not a Democrat that made the claim on national television that 9/11 hijacker Atta met with Iraqi Intelligence officers in Prague. That was Dick Cheney. Democrats didn’t start their own organization to sell the public on the Iraq war. This White House did – WHIG (the White House Iraq Group). It was not a Democrat that said “From a marketing point of view, you don’t introduce new products in August” when asked why the administration waited until labor day to sell the American people on the war. It was Andrew Card, the head of WHIG. Democrats didn’t start analyzing their own intelligence with the intention of discrediting any intelligence findings that did not support their rationale for war – that Saddam had WMDs and was explicitly collaborating with terrorists. Rumsfeld’s DoD did – The Office of Special Plans. Sidenote: The head of The Office of Special Plans (and source of shitloads of bad intelligence analysis and sophistry), Douglas Feith, is under investigation by the pentagon for his role in pre-war intelligence failure. Feith underling, Larry Franklin, is serving 12 years for espionage.

Body count has nothing to do with whether or not a war is just.

Stupid shit Democrats said in the lead up to war is fair game but I don’t recall you providing specific examples. Plenty of them made statements about Iraq Intelligence that turned out to be false. They should have dug deeper and asked more questions. I took issue with your “cretinism” charge because a) you weren’t very specific and did make much of a case b) Democrats should hold The White House for its actions (some which are listed above) and c) what does criticism of the planning and execution of the war have to do with their pre war statements?

No, you said Saddam had a Plan B and that he had plenty of time to conceive it. You suggested that this distinguishes Iraq from Afghanistan and implied that saddam’s Plan B accounts for the disparity in the mess in Iraq vs. the relative calm in Afghanistan. I was hoping that you could provide some proof that a plan existed otherwise the current situation in Iraq can be solely attributed to piss poor planning and leadership.

Most of my statements have been widely reported in the media. Point to one that’s not and I’ll find the source. My problem is that you make statements like “50% of Iraqis greeted us as liberators” and “AQ is responsible for 5% of violence in Iraq now” and “the iraqi economy is growing at a decent clip.” In other cases, you stick somebody’s name at the end of statement… a little more detail would be helpful. For instance, who were the sources that Stephen Hayes, the Weekly Standard reporter you credited previously, used to make his arguments?

I’ve read quite a bit of the report but my interest was disputing your zarqawi claim, which i did. i know you want to believe that if you say something it is true but it doesn’t work that way. this is pretty telling statement from the senate report:

“In Iraqi Supportfor Terrorism, the CIA acknowledged the poor intelligence collection on both the Iraqi regime and al-Qaida leadership. Further, with respect to the information that was available, the CIA specifically noted that the information was from sources of “varying reliability.”"

We went to war for 2 reasons only: a) Saddam had WMD b) Saddam was collaborating with terrorist and you can take all the other reasons on the Joint Resolution and wipe your ass with them. The American people only supported the war for these two reasons and had they been true the Iraq war would have been just.

But the truth as we now know it is that Saddam had no WMD, was not collaborating with terrorists, posed no immediate threat to us. This was a war of choice and you only belittle the “costs” because you’ve paid none of them except for in taxes (that you’ve argued against paying since the war began).

Were there Italian U-boats prowling off Long Island? By your logic (fully fleshed out below) Italy may have been a evil, fascist swamp but it wasn’t worth the lives of thousands of Americans to liberate it. Iraq attacked Iran in 1980. We fought Iraq in 1991 after they overran a neighbor in an aggressive fit of empire building. They remained in violation of so many cease fires and routinely attacked coalition aircraft patrolling the UN-accepted no-fly zones. And directly and through intermediaries, they continued to expand their influence in the middle east, south and south east asia. No, Iraq didn’t “attack” us after 9/11 but they did before.

You say we CAN fight on multiple fronts but then you go on to say Iraq is diverting resources away from the hunt for AQ. This is a specious argument, especially considering that you suggested earlier the best tools for fighting terror are our intelligence and law enforcement resources. Which resources are bogged down in Iraq? It’s not the FBI and definately not the CIA/NIA/DIA/etc. And certainly not the worldwide intelligence net in which we participate. You pine for an enlightened pursuit of the root causes of terrorism versus pounding states into the ground but the truth is that states directly sponsor terrorism, and you cannot summon hostile leaders to court.

Maybe I should have pointed out some instances where Iraq was doing quite the same as (your example) Hezbollah.. Let’s ignore the AQ link for the moment since it was only one of Hussein’s many intrigues Abdul Rahman Yasin, Abu Nidal, and Abu Abbas would love to get in on this conversation, as they all at one point came “home” to Baghdad after getting busted doing something naughty, in at least two cases being sheltered on Iraqi intelligence property (Same Senate report) I mentioned the funding of Palestinian suicide bombers earlier and dinars in the Philippines earlier, but you apparently weren’t reading. There are several other terrorist organizations listed in the Senate report as having some level of connection with Iraq, including AQ. Interestingly, according to the report, the only terrorist body that CLEARLY rebuffed Hussein in the 90’s was Hezbollah.

I didn’t carelessessly mention the supposed Prague meeting and other unverifiable linkages. I didn’t say Iraq employed AQ in any attacks. The connections I listed before are true, whether you like it or not. The same Senate report comes to the same conclusion—that the order of magnitude of the AQ/Iraq relationship, although murky, was sufficient enough to warrant reasonable concern by the intelligence and defense towers. (pages 325-355) The threat was vetted and passed alongside hundreds of other critiques through the chain. That AQ emerged as one of the most dangerous players in post-Saddam Iraq seems to be a positive testament to this earlier concern. The Senate report also mistreats the notion that AQ couldn’t possibly collaborate with a secular Iraq when in fact the reality was quite different in the late ’90’s. (Gunaratna, Miniter)

(fact) The scope of the relationship between Iraq and AQ was not complex (as we understand it), but it did exist.

in re: quoting—-Those were my words characterizing your statements. No need to quote. Check the previous post again.

Oh yeah, I forgot that Rummy was created in late 2000, and I must have missed it when he said Iraq’s intel was a “Slam Dunk”. Wait, that wasn’t him, was it? There’s a quote for you. In this stint of his DoD career, whether you agree with it or not and whether he’s been successful or not, he’s been an agent of change in the defense establishment, with a more flexible and precise military being the hallmark tenet.

in re: violence: Yes, some aspects of today’s Iraq REALLY SUCK. I don’t need you to give me the Amnesty International piss and moan list. I can read USA Today, Newsweek and Time and get the same bullshit you read. Although it’s been plagued with myriad problems, it is NOT a blunder, for reasons specified in my other posts. I will cede this point to you if you can show me you can make the distinction between realities and media narratives. Perhaps you’d like to start another post to discuss this.

Why don’t you explain first what your definition of “unnecessary death”, how we wouldn’t of started this war if Democrats were in charge, why Bush should be held to a different standard since he ‘fell” for the same faulty intelligence as everybody else did, and lastly, what should the casualities be to make this a just war? You’re free to hold Cheney accountable for remarks on a TV news program “liberators” but you take offense when I mention similarly stupid shit Democrats said about Iraq before everything unfolded.

I suggested that Saddam had a Plan B and that was a plan for guerilla resistance long after he was deposed. It would involve the continuation of hostilities to protect (mainly) his Sunni homeland, and would invite any other willing allies to the fight, You disagree with this, or are you seeking information? It has been claimed that Izzy al-Douri was, at least in the initial stages of the occupation, given authority to direct some of the ‘late-adopters’ against coalition forces and join with (or in some cases destroy) other insurgent groups. Do we need to discuss this more?

in re: Providing little supporting evidence—How many sources have you accurately quoted in this discussion, Zac? How many accusations have you leveled without any proof? Why should i have to answer any of them?
You mentioned a single paragraph in the Senate report but ignored other pages full of inconvenient facts that don’t support your outlook. Quit it with the Wikipedia summaries and dive a little deeper. Hussein was “contained, defanged, and under close scrutiny” but still harboring terrorists, bribing UN officials, starving his people, and deceiving the international community while still under T&C’s established by both the US and the UN. Yeah, sounds like a great idea to keep him around just because the “costs” were too high.

According to the Iraq Health Ministry, 3400 Iraqis died in July (that is the current pace). I never said that Americans killed any of them but if we had not invaded Iraq, most, if not all of those 3400, would be alive today (as would the remaining 42000 that have been killed as confirmed by the website link you provided).

It’s technically correct but why denigrate the religion of a billion people by attaching the word fascist to it? As Pat Buchanon pointed out on the McLaughlin Group, “We didn’t call Mussolini and his followers Christian fascists … and … we should divide and conquer our enemies, not unite them.” I never thought I would find myself agreeing with PB so much?

Japan, Germany, and Italy were an overt alliance agressively pursuing a global empire with the means to accomplish it. Germany and Italy declared war against the US before we declared war on them and German U-boats were attacking US Navy ships before the US ever attacked Germany. Unlike Germany and Italy in WWII, Iraq in 2003 posed little or no threat to the US. You are comparing two vastly different things and therefore your analogy is bad. I never said we couldn’t fight multiple fronts on the war on terror but Iraq (not really war on terror target in 2003) is diverting enormous resources that could be used to pursue AQ and combat terrorism.

“dialogue and mutual understanding” sounds like the makings of a relationship that might exist between two strangers during the course of a 15 minute wait in the line at the DMV? Iran gives hezbollah hundreds of millions of dollars a year, Pakistan sells nuclear technology to Iran and Libya, and north korea is pursuing nukes, and you point to a tenuous relationship at best between Iraq and AQ. There are US agents on the Afghan/PAK border. Does that make the US a supporter of terrorism?

Again, your AQ / Iraq connection is long on conjecture and short on evidence as if you believe that if you say something it is true. Which accounts are you referring to when you say “most accounts”? Zarqawi in a Baghdad hospital hardly establishes a working relationship and there seems to be no credible evidence to confirm that he was even there. Furthermore, the Senate Report found that Iraq and AQ did not have an established formal relationship and would be wary of working together. No evidence that has come to light since has altered that assessment.

again, compare the resources being poured into Iraq vs. non-military efforts to combat terrorism. military intelligence is tactical support. you’re the one blaming tactical errors as the source of most of our problems in Iraq. “Troops” follow orders and I’ve never demeaned their tactical performance. That’s all your doing. I don’t think Rumsfield should be applauded for anything intelligence related. he is the one who wanted the DoD to do its own intelligence gathering and analysis. he got what he wanted and we got bad intelligence that helped lead us to war. Rumsfield was in the private sector when precision guided munitions were first used in the Gulf War. I don’t think he deserves credit for “creating a military that doesn’t just bomb the heck out of everything.” We’ve been attempting to not “bomb the heck out of everything” for a while now. And for fucksake when you interpret my statements quote my words. I never said that there “have been no improvements in our intelligence, counterintelligence, and law enforcement capabilities since 2001″ as you claim I did.

I never generalized Iraqi sentiment but I think most human beings have some basic needs that could include freedom from harm, water, electricity, and fuel. By all means provide some documentation to support this rosie economic picture you’re painting. I hope you’re right but I think we should place the general safety of the public above economic measures. What good is a growing economy without the most basic security? I’m really not sure what you’re trying to say with the AQ violence percentage or how you arrived at the figure? More people are dying in Iraq on a daily basis now than were before.

how are you defining “premature withdrawal”? A timeline for withdrawal vs. indefinite war are vastly different. i think unnecessary death and destruction as a result of poor leadership justifies anger and demands for accountability. without bush as pres., dick cheney as vp and rummy as SoD there would not have been an iraq war. which votes by democrats are you referring to? as for the first vote “most Democrats voted for the damn thing” because they believed that the intelligence on WMD provided to them was accurate. if that intelligence turns out to be false then they are completely justified in being critical of the administration for peddling bad intel. as a separate issue, criticizing the planning and execution of the war is entirely justified and your reasoning to the contrary is ridiculously flawed. again, it would be helpful if you could provide some specifics with this cretinism charge.

It is cowardly for people who are capable of serving in the military but do not to advocate war. There is a difference between my position and what you presented my position as but I don’t expect you to recognzie it. You don’t think its cowardly to say “I believe in this war as long as other people are dying for it”? If Rumsfield were the most decorated veteran in the history of the US he would not be “off-limits to criticism of the prosecution of the war.” How did you arrive at that conclusion based on my statements? I’ll give Rumsfield credit for the initial victory in Afhganistan, but contrary to what you say above, his inability to recognize that Iraq was a far different military target than Afghanistan is a blunder of historic proportions. His long term planning in all cases is abismal. The absence of a “goddam revolt” is a measure of success? I guess in your mind it is.

It’s great that some (not sure how you arrived at “about half” but who needs sources) Iraqis greeted us as liberators but when one Iraqi hands you flowers and the next blows you up what is there to celebrate?

If Saddam had so much time to create his “Plan B” it must be quite a highly detailed and elaborate plan? Surely, you can provide some documentation?

You’ve provided a series of conclusions with very little supporting evidence and even if one assumes your conclusions were supported by facts you’ve not made a strong case for war when the costs are considered. Saddam was undoubtedly a bad guy but he was contained, defanged, and under close scrutiny (you even suggest that he was unwilling to work too closely with AQ because we were watching and david kay pointed out that north korea refused to follow through on the MID-ranged missile deal with him for the same reasons). Saddam was more concerned with preserving his own power than fucking with us.

freecreditreports freecreditreports

Please read the whole thing this time.
Paragraph 1)

I agree with you here,, Just look at anybody from the al-Dawa party (including Maliki). The potential for such a character to find his way to the top is significant, but I think the likely permanent presence of 1,000 – 2,000 “advisors” may be enough to stave off such a threat. Shaky as the Maliki democracy is, it appears to be more stable than the often violent sub-regional conflicts are.

Paragraph 2)

Your “fact” parroting, then, overestimated Iraq civilian deaths. How many civilians are the Americans really killing?
http://www.iraqbodycount.net/
Paragraph 3)

Our enemies in Iraq, Afghanistan, Britain, Iran, Chicago, et al, although on many different teams, *are* Islamic fascists. What’s incorrect about that?
The WW2 analogy is not wrong; we declared war and attacked an enemy that hadn’t yet (publicly) attacked us. We had enough resources to fight all of the enemies on many fronts, including some fronts we created ourselves. To assume that we couldn’t do so now is retarded. Your version of my analogy leads nowhere.
You’re wrong about AQ and Iraq.
I have not suggested that there was an open alliance between AQ and Iraq, but it serves your purpose to assume that I would. (Kinda like you assume that I’m some kind of “Republican”). There is conclusive evidence of sustantial Iraqi interaction with AQ in Sudan in the 1990s. Although there is no direct evidence of AQ and Iraq coordinating in attacks on Americans, there is strong evidence of dialogue and mutal understanding. Again, AQ didn’t have this kind of dialogue with, say, Iceland. (Richard Miniter, Stephen Hayes, the State Department, and Patrick Fitzgerald). I find it laughable that you cannot understand this distinction, but it doesn’t surprise me. Iraq agents, according to Jane’s Foreign Report and the Guardian, had been reported and captured along the Afghan/PAK border between 1999 and 2000.

You’re wrong to think that AQ didn’t work with secular entities. During the nascent years of the early ’90’s, AQ was indeed against the Iraqi regime and was especially active in the Kurdistan region. It was during this time Zarqawi’s Ansar al-Islam and other AQ-friendly militias propagated in Northern Iraq. Then, in the late 90’s, something clicked, and AQ was suddenly on cooperative terms with Baghdad, and both were allied and committed to a common cause against the West. Most accounts suggest that AQ was pragmatic enough to overcome the geopolitical realities presented by the adherence to strict Salafist Wahhabism. Zarqawi shows up in a Baghdad hospital, but I’m sure it wasn’t because of Hussein’s renowned medical facilites (Cuba anyone?) Was it that Hussein had offered a helping hand to AQ envoys, as Defense Intelligence Agency documents have shown, or was it that AQ approached Baghdad several times, as Rohan Gunaratna has written, seeking a working relationship? One can only imagine Hussein giving bin Ladin the “shhh, these guys are watching me” gesture as he points up to the UAV at 20,000ft. Just because AQ hasn’t been linked to Iraq in the execution of particular plots doesn’t mean there is no connection. According to Gunaratna, “Iraq’s support for Islamist (as well as) secular terrorists as well as criminal increased during and after the First Gulf War.” The network extended to Thailand, Sri Lanka, and the Philipines with the intention of attacking US and allied targets. Hussein delegates were also in Damascus in Dec 2002 trying to negotiate a long-range missile purchase with North Korea. But, geez, only the criminally incompetent Bush is capable of backdoor liasons with nefarious forces.

I never suggested military force is the only answer to combating terrorism, and there is no reason to think that our government thinks that way, no matter how hard you idiots try to suggest. You’re demeaning the very troops you repeatedly overextend your appreciation by ignoring that a good many of them are intelligence specialist and have created direct links to other intelligence and law enforcement entities. Rumsfeld himself deserves some of the credit for breaking down the legacy barriers to these linkages and creating a military that doesn’t just bomb the heck out of everything they see but instead is pragmatic and capable of changing tactics on the fly according to the situation on the ground. You’re also saying that there have been no improvements in our intelligence, counterintelligence, and law enforcement capabilities since 2001.

Paragraph 4-6)

He may have been only one in the world, but he was one of the worst, and already had many strikes against him. The additional option–more than a decade of treatise–had already been exhausted. Was letting this guy sit around dispatching Tariq Aziz to jerk us around in front of all of the masturbators at the UN going to settle anything? I think you’re sleeping right now in a mattress infested with bed bugs.
Paragraphs 7-8)

Please do some more reading before you come here an post your generalizations of Iraqi sentiment. Their economy is growing at a decent clip despite some of the problems. Did you think we’d just be able to throw a switch somewhere? . . . .AQ attacks continue, but only represent about 5% of the violence (i.e, they’re not blowing up UN headquarters and Golden Domes like they used to. But, remember, AQ has no link to Iraq, and only came there after we showed up!.
Paragraphs 11-15)

Who is calling for a premature withdrawal? Most of the more strident Lefties are. What Bush calls “stay the course”, which is incidentally the target of most Lefty attacks on the strategy of the war, is actually the same policy they have voted for numerous times. In fact, the biggest difference between the Bush plan and Ned Lamont’s plan is Bush’s refusal to give a timeline. So how can there be huge ideological skirmishes on this point if they prescribed solutions from both sides are pretty much the same? Is the hatred and spitting vitriol necessary? And to say that a Democrat woudn’t have brought us to Iraq in the first place is not a good presumption to make, since most Democrats voted for the damn thing in the first place, long before they figured out they could make a political living by opposing it at all costs, regardless of what they said & voted for before. That’s the cretinism I spoke of earler.

According to your logic, then, most Americans who support the continued war but don’t have any military history or connection to today’s military are cowards. That’s a smart thing to say, you nitwit. If you’re still ranting about Rumsfeld, then he should be off-limits to criticism of the prosecution of the war since he actually served in the military. He’s also the architect of the success in Afghanistan. If the shit is so bad, why hasn’t there been a goddam revolt? And, we were greeted as liberators in about half the country, but that doesn’t matter to you.

Hussein’s Plan B was the planning for a Byzantine, entrenched warfare that would occur after he was deposed (and which al-Douri still leads). I was saying that the Taliban had less reason (and time) to plan this, since they didn’t expect America to react in such a way. This movement is diminishing, eclipsed by a surge of intercine warfare among tribes, the bloodletting of which was underestimated but expected nonetheless. This situation will also diminish once decade long scores are settled and Baghdad flexes its newfound strength. You don’t have to agree, but this scenario is preferable to an uncontrollable rogue state engaged in who know’s what.

It’s great that there is currently one less tyrant in the region but what makes you think that Iraq won’t end up with another one in the not too distant future (there are already some players of questionable character in positions of great power)? Or perhaps you think there should be a permanent US presence there? I wouldn’t exactly call Iraq a stable democracy at this point.

I’m sure the families of all of those killed would disagree that those statistics “don’t mean anything when taken in context.” What context are you referring to? I think it is widely understood that to “echo” someone is to repeat their opinion – facts are facts regardless of who is speaking them.

Bush carelessly mislabels our enemy as Islamic fascist and you pull the old and ridiculous WWII analogy back out of the toilet. Remember the analogy questions from standardized tests… If Al Qaeda = Japan then Iraq = Italy or Germany? Laughable… more like Iraq = slovakia. The WWII equivalent would be Japan attacks the US and the US pours the vast majority of its resources into attacking tripartite slovakia while mostly ignoring Japan, Italy, and Germany. Seems unwise to me. Further discrediting your analogy, and I know you don’t want to believe it, but Iraq had no alliance with Al Qaeda and to suggest that in 2003 Iraq posed a threat to the US equal to that of Germany and Italy in 1940 is absurd. Even with the benefit of hindsight you are grossly mistaken. Osama bin laden considered secular Saddam Hussein a threat to his vision for theocratic rule in the region and vice versa. Furthermore, you need to abandon this perilously antiquated view that terrorism is a nation that you can bomb into oblivion. There is no military solution to terrorism (just ask Israel, Madrid, London, Baghdad, etc.).

No one disputes that Saddam Hussein was one evil motherfuckin’ dude and that removing him from power was a good thing. But he was one of many throughout the world and with respect to his threat to us and as a priority in the war on terror he was way down the list. Why haven’t we invaded and democratized every other country ruled by an evil dictator who could potentially aid terrorists?

Wow, you present two options for Iraq. You really kicked the imagination into overdrive! I know nuance is a bad word in your ideological circle but why not deal with Saddam after dealing with Al Qaeda (again, who attacked us on 9/11). Al Qaeda has active cells in over 60 countries. Maybe we should have dealt with them first?

Iraq was more like a bed bug infestation, a total nuissance but, relative other threats (a termite problem for instance), not a priority.

No one said stand down. My point is that we should have stayed militarilly focused on al qaeda and the like while diplomatically and through peacful means combat the root causes of terrorism. Our military response in afghanistan (although delayed too long perhaps) served as strong message that the US didn’t plan to sit on its thumbs.

Iraqis are murdering each other for their religious affiliation and you consider Iraq a stanchion against the spread of fascism? And no one disputes that Iran is more powerful today than it was 3 years ago. I’m sure Iraqis are thrilled with all the new political freedom and economic opportunity considering there are still widespread shortages of electricity, drinking water and fuel (in the country possessing the third largest oil reserve in the world) and they’re being killed at a pace of 3000 a month. That’s a 9/11 attack every month and as a proportion of population that would be the equivalent of 40000 US citizens dying each month. As for your claim about al qaeda, this is from Wednesday’s NYtimes: “WASHINGTON, Aug. 16 — The number of roadside bombs planted in Iraq rose in July to the highest monthly total of the war, offering more evidence that the anti-American insurgency has continued to strengthen despite the killing of the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.” It doesn’t seem that they’ve taken their sights of of us.

Who is calling for a “full premature withdrawal”? “Bring it on!” Bush, “Greeted as liberators” Cheney and “Beyond Nation Building” Rumsfield continue to deny the reality on the ground in Iraq, won’t take any responibility for it, and refuse to take corrective action.

“A lot of tactical”? Nothing more patriotic than blaming the troops. “Some strategic” Throwing out 10 years worth of war planning for Rumsfield’s half baked war vision… not enough manpower, inadequate postwar security plan, no contingency for sectarian violence, dissolving the iraq army… I guess you could call that “some”… if you’re an ideologue uninterested in the accountability of your civilian military leadership. If a democrat were in office there would not have been an Iraq war so you can pull that off the table.

As for my “keyboard cowards” comment – You think it’s dumb because you can’t argue your way around it. Everyone is entitled to voice their opinion but if they are going to talk the talk they better be willing to walk the walk and if they’re not then I can’t respect that opinion. If you are for this Iraq war but only in so far as it doesn’t require you to make real sacrifices then your support for the war is cowardly.

What was Hussein’s Plan B? And are you trying to imply that Hussein had a plan that led us to where we are today?

I’m sure NATO is helping but within days of assuming control earlier this month they lost 4 soldiers to insurgent attacks and Afghanistan remains, to a lesser extent than pre-US attack obviously, a safe haven for terrorists.

I didn’t answer my own question, I posited the opportunity for you to submit an intelligent reponse, hopefully one that acknowledged the possibility of a Persian Gulf with one less tyrant. Instead you took the chance repeat a bunch of statistics that don’t mean anything when taken into context (and which, clearly enough, precisely fit the narrative of most anti-war hysteria) -  2500 killed, thousands of civilian casualties, 44 million uninsured Americans, 15 million illegal aliens, real wages grew less than inflation, etc.  You’re echoing a little Ahmadinejad (from his statements in the Mike Wallace interview the other night).  Or is he echoing you?  Can’t tell a bloody difference.

Suggesting that Iraq should have been segregated from the overall “War on Terror” is a proposition that is unknowing of the political realities of the situation. Let’s call it a different name so you won’t have any preclusions to its true meaning.  How about WW4?   ;^)   Why did we fight Italy in WW2?  For that matter, why Germany?  Were the men sacrificed on Anzio and Normandy just statistics critcis could use to discredit the ‘real’ war against Imperial Japan, who actually attacked us?  How did the war against fascism in Western Europe keep us safer at home?  Churchill and FDR must have devised some false presumptions and scared everybody into war with the Reich.  Fatuous questions, all of them.

I was suggesting that there weren’t any good options, since permitting the status quo seems to me a little scarier than what we have now, warts and all.  Knowing that more than one war and almost twelve years of diplomacy had not worked, if I were running this starship I would have ultimately prefered an attempt at democratization as it is less bloody than these two options:

Bad option #1:   leave Saddam installed, although he’s broken almost every condition of the cease fire in ‘91, proved to be responsible for the attempt assassinations on at least one former president, remained in abrogation of more than a few UN mandates without efforts at rapproachment, engaged coalition military in no-fly zones on a daily basis (violation of cease fire), and was systematically deceiving every attempt at oversight.. . . Blah Blah Blah   Impoverished his nation and starved his children . .   Who was also responsible for the destruction of, by most counts three hundred thousand lives, one who has started at least two major wars, who was known to have used chemical weapons against his own citizens and, quote possibly, could be still developing and warehousing similar weapons, who bribed UN officials with oil credits and has knowingly harbored various sorts of wanted criminals aka terrorists..

Even worse option #2 -  Full power vacuum after Hussein’s inevitable collapse.  Who knows WTF could happen here.  This event could have been twenty years from now, but the bill was already long overdue.

Kinda like a bad termite problem, the earlier you address it, the more damage you can avoid:

Adpoting an agressive position in the Middle East was a bold thing to do and upsets a five decade long status quo that only produced more misery for millions of people and preserved another possible bastion for possible threats.  Nobody except you is rueful of a Saddam-free Iraq.   Should we continue to stand down while we get the crap kicked out of us by so many little shitheads?  Much of the terrorist reasoning behind launching the 9/11 attacks was that there was not an expectation of retailition.   When America did retaliate, nobody expected that after knocking the clowns out we’d tear down the whole circus tent too.  How’s that for “stirring the hornet’s nest”?   Oh, but we need to believe Terror Inc that it was America’s overreaction in Iraq that is causing the continual pronouncements of jihad against the West.  Let the Newsweek and Time play that game..

You asked, so here are some improvements that I think you can agree with:

1. Iraq can now be a maneageable stanchion against the viral fascism exploding from Iran and Syria, where none existed before. Since the fall of Hussein, there is substantially more trade, religious and personal exchange between southern Iraq and Iran, which is a good thing although the very notion of it can make some nervous.  Sure, this can blur the border but people are generally advantaged by economic opportunity.  An aside: it is worth noting that with the fragile cease fire in the Levant there are now two internationally-recognized buffer zones JUST FOR TWO COUNTRIES (Iran and Syria).
2. We removed the dictator described above. For most intelligent people, this is enough of an improvement.
3. More than six million stateless Kurds already within Iraq’s borders were given the right to statehood, and others from outside the zone are free to emigrate there.  This is more than twice the number of Palestinians living in the occupied territories of Gaza and the West Bank.  Those Kurds outside of Iraq’s borders who were lucky enough to evade Hussein’s persecution but unlucky enough to deal with Turkey, Iran, and Syria.  Within the span of three years, Bush the Stupid has lobbied for and succeeded in creating TWO new autonomous governments that will serve two aggreived nationless people.
4. Political freedom for all Iraqis
5. New transborder economic opportunities with private enterprise leveraging increased oil production and improved security for commodity transit throughout the region.
6. As of this moment in time, Al Qaeda has been diminished as a force in Iraq, and thus should be counted as a military victory for the Coalition. This is my own speculation, but most of the recent killings in Iraq seem to be internecine sectarian strife.  This is a good sign unless you think that America is the only power that has trouble fighting a multi-front war.

You suggest that there were few if any terrorists before the War in Iraq–I agree that our military action probably encouraged many to profess jihad but you must also accept the corollaries to that belief, which are that international terrorism had many homes including Iraq (abu Nidal, the funding of PLF martyrs, and a “working understanding with Al Qaeda”, which is remarkable in itself that no such understanding existed with, say, al Qaeda and a Western government), and that a provoked America is itself a stirred beast.

“My side is obviously far more interested in
seeing Iraq succeed than yours.  Your side would rather continue to feed US
soldiers and Iraq civilians into the meatgrinder that is their Iraq policy than
accept responsibility for the failure of that policy and take corrective
action… “stay the course!”  Success (or the appearance thereof) in Iraq as a
result of a proposal from a Democrat = death to the Republican party.”

If the left is “obviously” far more interested in success in Iraq then why the habitual embracing of defeatist candidates who want nothing more than a full premature withdrawal?  I don’t trawl the left’s websites–would you at least link me or summarize one realistic proposal from a democrat, progressive, or anyone left of center that suggests a constructive solution to Iraq?  Let’s have a honest debate of solutions (perhaps in another post–this one’s getting too long).  You brought it up so please name a GOPers running from any of the wars realities and washing his hands of the responsibiilty. Can you, or are you just making up stupid shit again?

Which policy in particular as failed?  I can name a lot of tactical and some strategic mistakes in Iraq–and I’m not convinced they wouldn’t have been made by an equivalent Democratic administration– but which failure continues to enrage you so much as to continue to think that Iraq is in dire straits?

“Your side, especially those able-bodied and ripe for military service, is
suspiciously cowardly in advocating war from the peace and comfort of their
computer keyboards, and I’d like to know why.”

This is the dumbest thing you’ve ever written, and you know it.

———————————

I thought you were going to try to lure me in and try to get me to say that Iraq was in some way responsible for 9/11!  Wrong!  I know that the Taliban and Al Qaeda did it because I read Newseek!  I love that Fareed guy.  He’s so smart!

The Taliban were a much more informal government and didn’t expect such a concerted effort to oust them (see ‘expectations’ above), and were dispatched to the hills to where they hide today. Hard to pursue them when they ran to the PAK.  They didn’t have months of preparation like Hussein did to enact their Plan B.  Also, the fighting there is on the rise – EVERY WARM SEASON.  These guys come out to fight in the summer. I’d suppose that when the winter comes and they crawl back into their redoubts the same observers will remark about the lull in the fighting, and hold Afghanistan up as the model once more!

Additionally, how can Taliban strength be resurgent due to a distracted US military when Afghanistan is the one region the US is getting most of the international help (NATO, Coalition, etc)?  Surely our partners are helping us bridge the gap, are they not?

Even though you won’t (most likely can’t) answer many of my questions with much substance, I’ll hold your hand and address a few of your questions.

“Sure, Iraq was an optional war, but what were the options?” If you acknowledge that the Iraq war was “optional” then you are acknowledging that not going to war was another “option,” hence, answering your own question. But I’ll play on… Given the litany of costs of the Iraq war I provided and your inability to provide any benefits to the region resulting from the Iraq war I would say the option I proposed in my previous post seems likely to be superior to going to war with Iraq, where, at the time, there were few if any terrorists and no WMDs. I can only imagine that the US govt. could have devised a better course of action to combat terrorism that did not include a war in Iraq.

“How is the war in Afghanistan a qualified success, but the war in Iraq is not and won’t be?” Afghanistan was legitimate target on the war on terror. The Taliban was an al qaeda (the terrorist organization responsible for 9/11. Perhaps you forgot?) soulmate and provided them safe haven and material support. I would characterize our efforts there as successful in that the taliban was deposed without widespread death and destruction. Afghanistan was stable, people were enjoying greater personal freedoms, elections were held and all of this without having to sacrifice 2600 US troops, 50,000 afghanis, $250 billion spent, etc. Unfortunately, since we’ve focused most of our resources on Iraq, taliban power is on the rise. I never said that Iraq won’t be a success but if you can’t see why it is not yet then you are not worth my time.

“Your side is suspiciously motivated in wishing that the latter doesn’t happen, and I’d like to know why.” My side is obviously far more interested in seeing Iraq succeed than yours. Your side would rather continue to feed US soldiers and Iraq civilians into the meatgrinder that is their Iraq policy than accept responsibility for the failure of that policy and take corrective action… “stay the course!” Success (or the appearance thereof) in Iraq as a result of a proposal from a Democrat = death to the Republican party. At least for a little while. So Republicans label any proposal on Iraq from Democrats as “cut and run,” regardless of its merit. Meanwhile, the only ones cutting and running are Republicans from the reality in Iraq and their responsibility in creating it.

Your side, especially those able-bodied and ripe for military service, is suspiciously cowardly in advocating war from the peace and comfort of their computer keyboards, and I’d like to know why.

We both agree that this article should not be sitting in grandma’s Yahoo RSS newsfeed. So it’s OK for the nation’s largest wire service to pass opinion through the system but not OK for FoxNews to (maybe carelessly) incite viewer reaction during what was most likely an opinion call-in show.

I don’t have to document the list of politicians who might have agreed with prewar intelligence assessments but who now, in their individual quests to retain elected office, denounce not their “ealier statements” but instead the Bushies, who are the only ones left holding the bag of accountability.
Enough with the “America squandered good will crap”. The world never needs someone to bestow empathy upon. If it does, we’d be last on the list anyway. Sure, Iraq was an optional war, but what were the options? How is the war in Afghanistan a qualified success, but the war in Iraq is not and won’t be? Your side is suspiciously motivated in wishing that the latter doesn’t happen, and I’d like to know why.
Also,
You said:

“(a real leader would have) called a summit in the region and invited the leader of every middle eastern country and said “you are going to help us eradicate terrorism and we are going to help you (fill in shit they want here)… or else” Unfortunately, we were cursed with the least competent, least capable, and least courageous president in the history of the Union”.

You must be talking about John Kerry when you say ‘real leader’. Even if you’re not, you’ve still blown your cover as one sappy nancy. Perhaps roundtables work—in fairy tales!

BTW. . an increasingly belligerent Iran is an intended consequence, not an unintended one.

I agree that Hanley’s article should be categorized as op-ed and with that in mind I don’t think Hanley’s piece is unfairly slanted by use of “subjective” sources. Unless you can provide evidence to undermine the validity of the statements of those sources they are only subjective in tone? Facts are facts. I’m far more concerned with what people say than who they are. if you use a source that makes statements that are factually wrong I’m going to point to those errors and not to the fact that that person is a “conservative” or a member of the Club For Growth or the AEI or whatever. That being said, I agree that the more disclosure and transparency regarding the sources the better but instead of challenging the credence of this article because the sources are predominantly “liberals” why not further challenge the assertions of the sources and the author?

you admit that you can’t really tie the war critics to the results of the poll, and i agree, but I would be curious to know which critics you are talking about because without knowing more details i wholeheartedly disagree with your characterization that they are making a “cretinous proposition.” I think you could call scaring the public into war by pushing unverified (and ultimately false) intelligence, malfeasance. if those critics that you are referring to are politicians and journalists who believed and parroted the Bush admin’s intelligence claims then they are certainly guilty of inexusable naivete for thinking that the Bush admin wouldn’t be so intentionally careless (to put it nicely) with their claims regarding such a serious issue. you’ll need to provide some specifics to make the “cretinous proposition” argument.

high stakes do not necessitate a bloody and costly war. i could have also included “instability in the middle east, a more powerful and defiant iran, increased support for islamic extremism” in my litany of “costs” of the iraq war. what evidence do you have that the situation in the region has improved as a result of the war? I would argue that “the pen is mightier than the sword” and that after 9/11 and our military success in afghanistan we could have embarked on an unprecedented “propaganda” effort to promote freedom, democracy, moderate religious views, and the growth of a middle class in the middle east. We still had the sympathy of most of the world and had just handed the taliban an asswhoopin’. A real leader could have used that leverage and called a summit in the region and invited the leader of every middle eastern country and said “you are going to help us eradicate terrorism and we are going to help you (fill in shit they want here)… or else” Unfortunately, we were cursed with the least competent, least capable, and least courageous president in the history of the Union.

Hanley took aim at Fox because they were the largest main stream media source that treated the recent old missile story as proof that Iraq had WMDs (despite the pentagon’s confirmations otherwise). That’s pretty good evidence when you consider Hanley’s topic is “why do so many americans still think Iraq had WMDs at the time of the invasion.”

As for your desire for Hanley to cherry pick the polls other findings for a counterargument… those are not counterarguments to his claim. Those are separate issues entirely but are equally worthy of discussion considering they also find Americans reaching unreasonable conclusions.

Well said. .

I was trying to stress the importance of quoting non-partisan sources for a national article categorized under “News”. Balance sheet reporting is exactly what it looked like I was suggesting, but I don’t think I made my point accurately. The merits of the opposing viewpoint are indeed weak, but using subjective voices to bolster the affirmative seems a little slanted. . .
Here are the individuals quoted as affirmative to the byline:

Steven Kull
Largest sponsors of his research include:

• Rockefeller Foundation
• Tides Foundation
• Ford Foundation
• Ben and Jerry’s Foundation

Michael Massing
Contributes most prominently to The Nation

Scott Ritter
Well, he’s Scott Ritter;)

John Prados
‘Conspiracy theorist’ (my words) almost exclusively published on progessive networks.

Kathleen Hall Jamieson
Liberal academic most often cited to create an illusion of consensus.

Then the negative voices:

Jamal Ware
“Republican” Pete Hoekstra’s spokesman.

“Conservative” commentator Deroy Murdock

The two individuals quoted against the story are clearly identified as either conservative or republican. NONE of those quoted to support the story are identified with similar political affiliation, as if their opinions represent some kind of verifiable national consensus.
In order to score political points, many vocal Iraq ware critics I was referring to would rather promote the concept of Bush malfeasance than an honest excuse of “we were wrong”, which is cretinous proposition considering that it’s very easy to Nexis past debates. Stepping above this narrow-minded politicking, either decision by itself is oblivious to the much larger strategic reasons for such an intervention in Iraq.  The oft-repeated litany of the costs of such an tactical intelligence shortcomings in Iraq–although tragic–misinterprets the true scope of what is really happening in the Middle East and Central Asia.  The costs are enormous but so are the stakes.  The media has squandered another chance to inform.

Not sure how to link critics of the way to the mysterious 50%, so I didn’t attempt. But Hanley attempts to blame the supposedly inflated findings on outlets like FoxNews, without any real evidence to support such speculation. If true, then Fox must be doing something right (for the Left), because, according to the same poll:

• By 56 to 37 percent, a majority is not confident that Iraq will be successful in developing a stable and reasonably democratic government.
• Furthermore, a large 68 to 28 majority thinks the United States is less respected around the world as a result of the invasion in Iraq.

Did Fox influence these numbers or are these findings more of a result of the meddling of MSNBC, CNN, Reuters, AP, NBC, NYT, WP, ABC, the BBC, and CBS news?

The following statements had strong favorable answers. Couldn’t Hanley cherrypick any of these for a counterargument?

• The Iraqis are better off now than they were under Saddam Hussein.
• Saddam Hussein had strong links with Al Qaeda.
• History will give the U.S. credit for bringing freedom and democracy to Iraq.

Just about any angle can be derived from this poll, I guess.  Problem is, Zac, most of the zombies out there won’t read much past the headline.  And Charles Hanley gets to keep writing more releases.

There is no such thing as objectivity in reporting, only degrees of it, and in this case in particular, the slant is obvious but the opposing arguments are not of equal merit. “balance sheet reporting” (I just coined that term, maybe), where reporters find it necessary to give each side equal consideration regardless of the strength and cogency of the arguments, is partly responsible for the fact that we have 50% of Americans believing something that is probably not true. Sometimes the truth is one sided and reporters should not be afraid to present it as such.

As for the counterarguments that you provided… In the lead up to war the President, VP, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of State, National Security Advisor, and many others in high places were peddling bullshit pre-war intelligence around the clock. In 2003, everyone thought Iraq had WMDs (including me). How are previously misinformed comments by present day war critics responsible for the continued belief by 50% of Americans that Iraq had WMDs in 2003?

That leaves us with the noncompliance issue… what a surprise that an evil dictator would be uncooperative? However, the Duelfer report does nothing to refute the AP article as far as post September 2002. It actually supports it by stating that in September of 2002 Hussein “finally agreed to unconditional acceptance of the UNMOVIC weapons inspectors.”

The evidence to support the argument that Iraq had WMD is hardly the “smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud” the Bush admin terrorized the public with and is certainly not sufficient to justify the deaths of 2,600 US soldiers, 50,000 Iraqis, countless wounded, and $250 billion taxpayer dollars spent. If the media had done its job in the first place we probably could have avoided it all.

Before you jump all over this–I’m not suggesting that there are WMDs buried somewhere.

This is more of an opinion piece than a true news article. Although some news outlets categorize this story under “Opinion”, as of Monday afternoon Yahoo’s AP Newswire does not.

No mention that many of the war’s current critics made very public statements before the invasion about the existence of such weapons.

Although Duelfer himself is quoted favorably (for the byline), the author doesn’t also quote ISG’s findings of noncompliance and intentional avoidance of UN mandates. Less true is the article’s assertion that Bush lied about Hussein refusing compliance yet, to Kathleen Hall Jamieson, it is the President who is creating a false reality.

Of the nine individuals quoted for the story (with two neutrals), only two were quoted to go against the byline of the story, and only then with a very limited relationship with the context. An editorial should should be a little more evenhanded for credibility.

What are the counterarguments?