WMDs and Bush - Lie or mistake?

[nicky g]

[ QUOTE ]
Iraq delivers a 1400 page report detailing the elimination of WMDs--in Farsi. Q

[/ QUOTE ]

Surely Arabic?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Iraq delivers a 1400 page report detailing the elimination of WMDs--in Farsi. Q

[/ QUOTE ]

Surely Arabic?

[/ QUOTE ]

Picky, picky, picky.

If there are nits to be picked, it's 18-4 they're gonna get picked!

[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[nicky g]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Iraq delivers a 1400 page report detailing the elimination of WMDs--in Farsi. Q

[/ QUOTE ]

Surely Arabic?

[/ QUOTE ]

Picky, picky, picky.

If there are nits to be picked, it's 18-4 they're gonna get picked!

[img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

[/ QUOTE ]

John and I are on the same side of this debate. I'm just curious as to why it would be written in Farsi if it was.

[John Cole]

Nicky, I know Iraq has few speakers of Farsi, but for some reason I thought the report was written in Farsi. I'm probably wrong.

[Felix_Nietsche]

1. Iraq used mustard gas on the Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War.
2. Iraq used Chemical/Bio weapons against the Kurds.
3. Israel takes out the Iraq nuclear facilty.

Then after the first Gulf War Saddam kicks out all the weapon inspectors and claims that he MAGICALLY got rid of all his WMD....without showing any proof that he did so. Sorry, but excuse me if I don't take Saddam's word for it. Assuming that Iraq had stockpiles of Chem/BIO weapons was a reasonable conclusion and every other intelligence service in the world agreed upon.

My personal belief is Iraq destroyed their remaining stockpiles (which wasn't much) and put their WMD in hibernation mode with the plan to resurect their WMD program after the sanctions were lifted. The second Gulf War screwed up their plans....

[andyfox]

1. Iraq used mustard gas on the Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War.
2. Iraq used Chemical/Bio weapons against the Kurds.
3. Israel takes out the Iraq nuclear facilty.

How long ago did these things happen?

[bilyin]

According to Bush, it is neither a lie nor a mistake. He said it is the right thing to do. Since we all know that is a lie, therefore he must be lying all along.

[pankwindu]

Rice basically revealed the lie on Meet the Press this morning. The real reason all along was never the WMDs, it was to reshape the Middle East.

From the transcript :

[ QUOTE ]
SEC'Y RICE: I'm quite certain, Tim, that when the American people see every day what they see on their screens, which is violence and, of course, the deaths of Americans and coalition forces, it's very difficult to take. We mourn every sacrifice. But the fact of the matter is that when we were attacked on September 11, we had a choice to make. We could decide that the proximate cause was al-Qaeda and the people who flew those planes into buildings and, therefore, we would go after al-Qaeda and perhaps after the Taliban and then our work would be done and we would try to defend ourselves.

Or we could take a bolder approach, which was to say that we had to go after the root causes of the kind of terrorism that was produced there, and that meant a different kind of Middle East. And there is no one who could have imagined a different kind of Middle East with Saddam Hussein still in power. I know it's difficult, but we have ahead of us the prospect, and I think the very good prospect of a foundation for a democratic and prosperous Iraq that can solve its differences by politics and compromise, that becomes an anchor for a Middle East that is changing.

If you look at Lebanon and you look at the Palestinian territories and you look at what is going on in Egypt, this is a Middle East that is in transformation to something far better than we have experienced for the last 60 years when we thought that we could ignore democracy and get stability and, in fact, we got neither. So yes, it's long, and yes, it's hard, but if we quit now, we are not only going to condemn generations of people of the Middle East to despair, we are going to condemn generations of Americans to continued fear and insecurity.

[/ QUOTE ]

[andyfox]

This is not news. In 1998, Wolfowitz wrote in the New Republic that "toppling Saddam is the only outcome that can satisfy the vital U.S. interest in a stable and secure Gulf region." [emphasis added]

[pankwindu]

Yes, old news to some, but not all. It's quite clear that the PNAC folks have wanted a presence in the Middle East for years, and since Clinton wouldn't accomodate them, they had the plan ready on Day 1 of the Bush/Cheney reign. They simply thought that WMDs would be the best way to sell the war to the public. If they didn't outright lie, then at minimum they exaggerated and spun. In my book, that is as bad as lying, especially regarding matters of national security.