Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?[W:272]

[Visbek]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

I've explained it. Iraq was easy.

Wow. Powerful moral argument there.

But no, that still doesn't quite explain it.

1) Iraq was not weaker in 2003 than in 1998, or 2000, or 2001.
2) Many other authoritarian regimes would be just as easy to invade as Iraq.
3) Since you forgot, we were busy. We were still dealing with Afghanistan, and had not captured OBL or Mullah Omar, or put much of a dent in AQ. Domestic security was also still a work in progress.
4) While toppling Hussein was relatively easy, dealing with post-war Iraq was not -- and we knew it. (It wasn't cheap either....)

The American people already thought of Iraq as an enemy so obtaining political support was easy.

NOW we're getting somewhere.

And yet, still missing something. Why would Iran be any more difficult? Iraq and Iran fought each other to a standstill in the 90s.

In 2003, were Iran or Qadaffi seen as any less hostile to the US than Hussein?

And was it really that easy? It took over a year of the Bush administration beating the drums, and a lot of trumped-up evidence. Support for the war started eroding shortly after the initial invasion, and is so low that today a Republican candidate for President who defends it needs to do a volte-face within 24 hours.

 

[Manc Skipper]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

We Are Many. coming soon!

We Are Many: the legacy of the global anti-war protests in 2003

 

[Glen Contrarian]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

US did find Iraq WMD | New York Post
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...casualties-of-iraq-chemical-weapons.html?_r=0
Report: U.S. kept secret chemical weapons finds in Iraq - CNN.com

Unless you don't believe that CNN, the NY Times or the NY Post are credible sources, we did find and destroy chemical weapons (colloquially known as weapons of mass destruction) in Iraq.

IRAQ: Iraqi Ties to Terrorism - Council on Foreign Relations

And Iraq was a state sponsor of terrorism.

The only lies come from the left claiming this was about oil.

What is funny is how the left is trying to claim that Hillary's e-mail gate and Benghazi stupidity is "old news" and "no one cares" while they try to rehash blame Bush 7 years after he left office.

FYI, chemical weapons are nowhere near as great a concern as nuclear weapons...and that's what the Bush administration was claiming, that Iraq was working on NUCLEAR weapons. Yeah, chemical weapons can kill a lot of people, but they're nothing compared to nukes, and you know it. Just the fact that a nation has chemical weapons does not justify us invading that nation.

And BUSH HIMSELF admitted that Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction - which means that in his eyes, chemical weapons are not a great concern. So who's being inaccurate here? Your sources? Or president George W. Bush?

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Which would have been defensible cause for war. Our security with the Iraqi oil supply has not been nearly as fortuitous as the anti-war crowd was fearful of, unfortunately.

Instead we focused on the arduous task of setting up a democracy.

At least if it had been truly about the oil, we could have gained something from it instead of playing humanitarian.

So we invaded, & spend a trillion dollars out of the goodness of our hearts. I don't think so man. Defensible cause for war? I don't why Iraq would put their country on top of our oil.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Don't be silly. The war had nothing to do with possession of the energy resources as history has shown. And interpreting the invasion as a war crime might fit Putin's propaganda, but it is just that and doesn't hold up under the light of evidence.

It was about oil & we condemned the Nazi's for the same type of aggression.

 

[Geoist]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

It is amazing how people are still willing to defend such a clearly poor decision (fighting the Iraq War). There is no doubt the neocons took full advantage of a vulnerable America. Before 9/11, PNAC was seeking to invade Iraq and pushed Clinton to do so. After 9/11, Rumsfeld searched high and low for any evidence to link Iraq to the attacks. When nothing came up, they started making a case over WMDs and how Hussein was a direct threat to our nation. I still laugh thinking about all the talk about mobile weapons facilities being speculated on Fox News at the time.

 

[joG]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

So we invaded, & spend a trillion dollars out of the goodness of our hearts. I don't think so man. Defensible cause for war? I don't why Iraq would put their country on top of our oil.

If you want to call international security 'out of the goodness of our hearts', I guess you might say so. Personally I would have said that such security is only a public good that profited everyone, once we had produced it, or should have, whether they had acted like Putin, Schröder and Chirac or not. AcrActually it profited Putin by harming the USA and he rewarded Schröder later for his loyalty. But oil did not factor into the US decision as you well know.

 

[joG]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

It was about oil & we condemned the Nazi's for the same type of aggression.

As you well know, if you did your homework and followed the aftermath, the oil was not taken and to think it had anything to do with the invasion says a lot about the ones that think so. To compare Iraq with Poland 1939 is close to as absurd as one can get.

 

[Fiddytree]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

So we invaded, & spend a trillion dollars out of the goodness of our hearts. I don't think so man. Defensible cause for war? I don't why Iraq would put their country on top of our oil.

No, not out of the goodness of our hearts, but securing our national interests was not accomplished by trying to prop up liberalism in a country not yet ready for it.

We ended up failing in securing much of anything economically and haven't succeeded in creating and maintaining a government.

We should have been more selfish rather than more selfless.

 

[faithful_servant]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Uh... wha?

Iraq hadn't invaded any sovereign nations (allied or otherwise) any time near the 2003 time frame. They were openly willing to have inspectors comb Iraq looking for WMD's. They didn't do anything between 2000 and 2003 that qualifies as a serious violation of any agreements.

Neither 688 or 1441 licensed the use of force in 2003. Kofi Annan, among others, believed the invasion was a violation of the UN charter.

And, last but certainly not least... It is not the purpose of international law to provide excuses to invade sovereign nations.

You want to try that one again?

2003??? We were CONTINUALLY engaged with Iraq since Operation Desert Storm. At no time during that entire span of time were not engaged with Iraq. It's this kind of selective interpretation of the facts that makes these kind of discussions so frustrating. Those who oppose our work of stopping Iraq's attacks on it's neighbors and people just can't seem grasp the fact that Iraq spent those years under a cease fire treaty that they REPEATEDLY violated. There wasn't one war in the 90's and another one later, it was all ONE ACTION with a long period of limited engagement.

 

[Kobie]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

I am not a Democrat. Yes, some were lying. All them are equally culible to the Republicans who pushed the incorrect decision to go to war.

And there's the thing. On a personal level, one of my litmus tests for voting for anyone, Democrat or Republican, is their Iraq vote.

GOP apologists will IMMEDIATELY deflect to the Democrats (2/3 of which in Congress, mostly in the House, voted AGAINST the war, dontchaknow) in order to take the heat off the charlatans who sold the war in the first place. They think it's an I-Win button, ignoring the fact that most liberals don't like the Democrats who voted for the war either.

 

[Born Free]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Why was it the correct one? Every rationale provided to us was false. Iraq was far from having any tangible weapons of mass destruction. They were not harboring terrorists. You can't argue it is a better, safer place today than it was under Saddam, and nothing we could have done would have resolved the centuries old cultural conflicts in the region. How was it correct?

There really is two questions,

Was it correct to go to war based on the evidence of WMD at the time. The answer by congress and the president was YES

Knowing what we know now that WMD did not exist would it be correct to go to war. The answer by all is NO.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

If you want to call international security 'out of the goodness of our hearts', I guess you might say so. Personally I would have said that such security is only a public good that profited everyone, once we had produced it, or should have, whether they had acted like Putin, Schröder and Chirac or not. AcrActually it profited Putin by harming the USA and he rewarded Schröder later for his loyalty. But oil did not factor into the US decision as you well know.

Iraq was no threat to the US, nor was Afghanistan for that matter. Security for public good? You mean like the NSA surveillance that does nothing to protect us against terror.

Why does the US set up military bases all over the world. Which Bush wanted to do in Iraq. To protect economic interest, in the case of Iraq their's nothing to protect but oil.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

No, not out of the goodness of our hearts, but securing our national interests was not accomplished by trying to prop up liberalism in a country not yet ready for it.

We ended up failing in securing much of anything economically and haven't succeeded in creating and maintaining a government.

We should have been more selfish rather than more selfless.

OK, give me one war the US has fought after WWII, that was not to benefit the US Empire.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

As you well know, if you did your homework and followed the aftermath, the oil was not taken and to think it had anything to do with the invasion says a lot about the ones that think so. To compare Iraq with Poland 1939 is close to as absurd as one can get.

I don't think international law cares what country it is. An act of aggression is a war crime. Do you know that Bush & Cheney can not travel to certain countries without being arrested.

 

[Fiddytree]

Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

OK, give me one war the US has fought after WWII, that was not to benefit the US Empire.

You keep seeking the darks, when I keep telling you that inside the grays, we are moving too far into one shade or the other. If we were truly interested in securing oil, instituting a liberal democracy should have been the least of our desires. Puppet regimes mixed with one-sided oil deals would be more in benefit to us than trying to give weight to the fragile institution of democracy in a region that isn't ready to be careful enough.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

You keep seeking the darks, when I keep telling you that inside the grays, we are moving too far into one shade or the other. If we were truly interested in securing oil, instituting a liberal democracy should have been the least of our desires. Puppet regimes mixed with one-sided oil deals would be more in benefit to us than trying to give weight to the fragile institution of democracy in a region that isn't ready to be careful enough.

If you are saying that Bush was trying to set up a new puppet in Iraq, I agree. It was never about democracy, you don't kill a million people by bring them democracy. You do it by trying to take what is their's by occupation. Which is what Iraq was about.

 

[Fiddytree]

Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

If you are saying that Bush was trying to set up a new puppet in Iraq, I agree. It was never about democracy, you don't kill a million people by bring them democracy. You doing by trying to take what is their's by occupation. Which what was Iraq was about.

No, I'm saying that wasn't his intent, because doing it this way is entirely counterproductive. We wouldn't have bothered with trying to make sure there were fair elections, that there was a parliament that could and has continued to vote against our interests, and so on. We barely got anything at all out of the deal.
We would want an autocracy that supports our positions and relies on us.
That's a puppet government.

Leftists forget what a puppet regime actually is.

 

[Thrilla]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

I don't support " going into Iraq"... but i sure as hell support removing Saddam and his hell spawn from the gene pool.

always have, always will.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

No, I'm saying that wasn't his intent, because doing it this way is entirely counterproductive. We wouldn't have bothered with trying to make sure there were fair elections, that there was a parliament that could and has continued to vote against our interests, and so on. We barely got anything at all out of the deal.
We would want an autocracy that supports our positions and relies on us.
That's a puppet government.

Leftists forget what a puppet regime actually is.

So you're telling me that no US Oil company made a profit off the war, in the 8 years we were there. Wasn't the oil going to pay for the war. well what happened to it.

 

[Fiddytree]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

So you're telling me that no US Oil company made a profit off the war, in the 8 years we were there. Wasn't the oil going to pay for the war. well what happened to it.

Some had in some small measure. In the aftermath, the oil contracts which were pilloried by the Left and somewhat quietly desired by the Right didn't really come to fruition. I wish it had, personally.

 

[kjwins]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Some had in some small measure. In the aftermath, the oil contracts which were pilloried by the Left and somewhat quietly desired by the Right didn't really come to fruition. I wish it had, personally.

All I can tell you is Smedley Butler.

War Is A Racket, by Major General Smedley Butler, 1935

 

[cpwill]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Please do not try to pull a Jeb and argue it is disrespectful to our men and women who gave their lives to question the decision to go into Iraq. I sincerely believe our military personnel did the best they could with what they were given. However, with everything we know now about the costs of the war, the effects of that decision, and the misinformation that we were given, can anyone continue to defend that decision?

I think you are setting up a bit of a double standard, here, granting the military personnel judgement in the light of what they were dealing with, but insisting that the policymakers exercise 20/20 foresight.

 

[cpwill]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

Some had in some small measure. In the aftermath, the oil contracts which were pilloried by the Left and somewhat quietly desired by the Right didn't really come to fruition. I wish it had, personally.

True enough. Oil prices were high as crap.

 

[cpwill]

Re: Is there anyonw left defending the decision to go into Iraq?

You keep seeking the darks, when I keep telling you that inside the grays, we are moving too far into one shade or the other. If we were truly interested in securing oil, instituting a liberal democracy should have been the least of our desires. Puppet regimes mixed with one-sided oil deals would be more in benefit to us than trying to give weight to the fragile institution of democracy in a region that isn't ready to be careful enough.

That is correct. Creating a representative government that is sure to include deep and broad elements that are more likely to listen to Iran than the US isn't exactly Winning Step #1 For Evil War-Lordism.


The "war for oil!" bit was snappy on a bumper sticker, but lacked what Kissinger used to call "The added benefit of being true."