“Cannot disagree with most of what you posit. Just have the concern that the current armed forces are made up, mostly, of men and women from less advantaged backgrounds while others, including ourselves, go about our daily lives agonizing about the loss of life and limb while the major risk to our safety is venturing out into the traffic.”

I think if you look, you’ll see that today’s military is far and away the most balanced in terms of where the troops come from, and that a conscription military has historically ALWAYS exacerbated the divide and packed them military with people who are from disadvantaged backgrounds (hence the aged misperception that the US military consists of primarily the poor and disadvantaged, etc.). This ain’t grandpa’s Vietnam army anymore. Nope. These men and women are the best ever (and that’s not just my assessment either-pros say it as well, across the board).

Re the Korean/Taiwan/China/Japan scenarios…

I’ve gotta disagree. The Chinese are in an even better position to support a conventional war on the Korean peninsula than they were in the 1950’s particularly because of the Taiwan scenario you describe. As to losing Japan’s support…I seriously doubt it for there is zero evidence of that at all.

I also strongly disagree with the complete misconception that Saddam’s Iraq had no allies. Syria, Russia, Iran, even Belarus, North Korea, and Libya all supported Saddam’s regime directly and substantially and we need not even mention the diplomatic alliance that served Iraq well at the UN.

“Doubt that anyone would argue that 7 months does not a rush make. But your naiveté is showing when you contend that “almost no rhetoric from President Bush before that…” As I pointed out his Inaugural Address was a start; then the February 2001 comment in a news conference with a visiting dignitary; followed by frequent comments throughout 2001/2002 with much of the rhetoric getting stronger and stronger. You can classify these as “mentions”, which you do for it fits your argument, but as an observer during that time I noticed an increasing argument for war with Iraq, emerging.”

They are in fact ‘mentions’ and not a diplomatic runup for if they are not the very example of a ‘mention’, then nothing is. Besides, if you look at the timeline, the Bush Admin was still pursuing peaceful efforts through the UN and directly with Iraq to get inspectors into Iraq and resolve the unresolved disarmament issues. It wasn’t until the 91202 diplomatic push began, that the regime finally agreed. 3 sentences (or even 3 paragraphs) in a 9 month period hardly constitutes a push for war.

“I have little argument to attacking an enemy without notice.”

Yet, you argue that President Bush was putting Saddam on notice from January 2001-March 2003. That’s hardly without notice. You can’t have it both ways.

“Just felt compelled to inform you, I do not now nor ever have, considered Bush, omnipotent or omniscient: Quite the contrary….”

Vs.

“there are many references to things wrong in this world that can clearly be laid at W’s feet.”

Please, I’m eager to see some examples.

“You have read the NIEs. Would you sign up to read another if you’d heard from staff or fellow Senators that there was nothing new?”

If I was about to vote to authorize a war, if my political career was at stake as well, if my Presidential ambitions were at risk, and most importantly, if it was my job….then yes. I’m a mere citizen, and I read as much on the subject of the war as possible. Shouldn’t our political leaders at a time of war? Or does monotony and lack of alliteration in the NIEs excuse them from being responsible for reading them and making critical votes from informed standpoints?

Bad intel vs Bush Lied

Bad intel is supported by the truth

Bush lied has been investigated formally by a dozen bi-partisan and often independent (even international) investigations, and in each case, it was bad intel (weak, limited, out-dated due to a lack of intel gathering for 5 yrs 12/98-11/03).

“The continuation of sanctions were not however of the utmost importance. The continuation of inspections in an ongoing mode was tantamount.”

If the continuation of sanctions was not of the utmost importance, then how could inspections be continued? I think you’re confusing “sanctions” and “inspections” with different things. Most of the sanctions were weapons related, and the inspections were mere verification of Iraqi claims of which the Iraqis NEVER complied-even today, even with the US occupying the country, UNMOVIC had to close its books with a great number of unresolved disarmament issues forever unresolved. Some say the answers to these remaining UNMOVIC questions rests in the convoys that clogged roads to Syria, or the cargo planes that left Saddam Intl from June 02-Mar02, or even in the Russian ships that left Basra under Russian Navy escort. Inspections were useless unless Saddam’s regime worked to demonstrate cooperation, and they did not. Some will make the case that in March 03 they were, and while I disagree with that, the obvious conundrum is that if it were the case, then the obvious cause would be (as fmr French President Chirac has said) the credible threat of American military invasion; something Saddam never believed would happen until it was too late per the ISG report.

“The timing of your argument seems suspect. The son-in-laws defected in 1995. It is not my recollection that during that time the UN was about to give him a pass. There were still many unresolved issues at that time.”

You are incorrect. Dr Butler (who at the time was head of the UN’s UNSCOM weapons inspectors affirms this claim in his book, The Greatest Threat. Additionally, Dr Hans Blix was then head of the IAEA and was prepared to give Iraq a clean slate. The defection in April 95 led to a crisis in which Russia moved to lift sanctions in support of Iraq, but other members refused. In protest, Iraq rejected UN 986, as the son-in-laws defected and UNSCOM was led to a treasure trove of docs etc at the infamous chicken farm find.

“For Mr. Blix or anyone associated with the inspections process to assume “confidence” in Saddam’s compliance would have been terribly naïve.”

Exactly. Therein lies the crux of the matter. Inspections were about building “confidence,” and Saddam worked against building confidence rather than working towards it. Inspections were not about hunting down weapons. They-per Dr Blix and others-were about building confidence. If it was impossible to build confidence, then it was impossible for inspections to succeed.

“I suppose it’s reasonable to count the start of the war as the start of hostilities but in reality you can’t start a war until you have your military resources in place. Now the argument was that these logistical moves were merely to put pressure on Saddam and send a message. They seemed to work in getting him to allow inspectors back in. My conclusion, after the abrupt halt Bush called to the inspections, after only 2 ½ months, and then the ensuing attacks, is that the moves to locate the military were actually the start of the war.”

I would disagree, but for discussion’s sake, let’s presume that you’re correct: when troops are moved to Iraq, the war is on. If that’s the case, then the pre-war rhetoric you cited earlier as having started in the SOTU 1/02 would have already given Saddam 9 months of notice, warning, diplomatic pressure to either comply with the 1991 cease-fire agreement and associated UN resolutions, or face attack. 9 months of diplomacy that clearly failed. If on the other hand one wants to make the argument that the war began, then there were inspections (ie, not war), then there was war, it seems pretty clear that if the regime hadn’t built up confidence in 2 ½ months, it was never going to (ie, no confidence=useless inspections).

“There was a dispute as to the range of the missiles in question and in either case they were not sufficient to reach the US.”

No one ever said they were. The thing is that they were in range of US assets, and they were specifically banned by the UN. Since the purpose of inspections was to build confidence, building these missiles after being specifically told by the UN on several occasions not to do so, their construction is yet another example of working counter to inspections. Were the al Samoud and al Fatah missiles threats to NYC? Only if shipped, but that was never the question. The question was were they illegal? Simple answer is yes.

“May have been wrong about the NIE specifically but there were numerous reports put out on the Iraq/al Qaeda relationship by the CIA, the DIA, etc. which support my original contentions. Yes, there also was testimony to Congress by intel officials, interestingly, not always consistent with the findings in the various reports.”

Of this I am acutely aware

“The leaking of an Iraqi “footprint”, following such an attack would not require a lot of verification before a launching of retaliation would occur.”

One cannot rest the security of a nation on a policy that hopes someone will defect and warn us of an attack. That’s not security. That’s dreaming. As to the verification idea, I ask again…then why do states (including Saddam’s) sponsor terrorists? Your own words:

“States sponsor terror instead of using their own special forces because generally sponsoring countries receive no retribution for such sponsorship if it’s made up monetary or moral support. When providing their own troops or offering sanctuary to terrorist’s troops the retribution risk becomes much greater.”

Btw, yes, I do refer to Ansar, and if you read the SSCI Phase II report on the matter, you’ll notice that it’s claims are based on a single, interim DIA officer, and completely disregard any and all contrary intel gathered from captured docs as well as detainees. If one looks at the confirmed authentic docs, as well as the interviews with detainees, we see very clearly that Ansar had in fact become Saddam’s enforcement tool in the N, and an AQ branch. I have an in depth rebuttal to the Phase II rpt , but going through some web hosting issues right now. Will have to revise my link-sorry

“You are absolutely correct; no one believed Saddam was anything but secular, including I’m sure UBL. In Saddam’s paranoid world of suspicion about coups and assassinations, at best it would have been tenuous to have UBL and his group inside the Iraqi borders.”

That’s an interesting response since in most cases the anti-war talking point is that the many high level meetings between the regime and AQ leaders were conducted to keep tabs on each other of which putting an AQ group in (for example) N Iraq with IIS control would have done the trick nicely-as would training AQ at IIS camps controlled by the IIS and Saddam Fedeyeen. Of course, until March 2003, the intel at the time was quite contrary to this idea. If we look back to the Clinton Admin and so forth we can see consistent Clinton Admin reporting as well as gross msm reporting that Saddam and AQ were joining forces (particularly around the 12/98-3/99 period when the 911 plot was authorized to be set in motion per the 911 Commission).

Link

“No matter how you look at it a marriage of Saddam and UBL would have been one fraught with debilitating problems for each. Again the SSCI Phase II report concludes no interest on the part of Saddam to embrace a union, especially within Iraq’s borders.”

No more debilitating than Saddam’s relationship with other Islamic extremist groups, or UBL’s relationship with other secular govts.

“This is the second time you have hinted that we went to Iraq to draw al Qaeda in to fight our fight there. I really hope you are wrong. I have long resisted buying into the “all about oil” argument simply because, even though I have strong feelings about Dubya’s motives, I never believed we, as a nation, could be that callous. To suggest that we would encumber the Iraqi people and subject them to the death and mayhem that knowingly would occur in this scenario is beyond the pale. We have, as a nation, done many bad or stupid things in our history but this idea would be heinous and place us at the very bottom of any human rights evaluations.”

I hope you’re not falling into one of those argumentative positions where as each casus belli is listed it’s tossed into a canned response, “We went to war for X” No, wars don’t happen like that. They almost never occur for a single reason. My position on Iraq is that yes, ONE of the MANY reasons was to choose the battleground against AQ on land of our choosing. It’s no different than invading Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia to fight the Afrika Corps, or Italy, all in response to a Japanese attack. Japan never had terrorist training camps in Berlin, and the SS didn’t train in Tokyo. Look, the war was set in motion because a missile had longer range than the UN wanted, or because of a daddy complex, or because 911 was a Bush/CIA plot or Saddam’s IIS was really behind it. The war happened for a number of reasons, and yes, one of them was to draw in terrorists to a battlefield of our choosing-if that decision had other potential benefits, then the sum of the benefits would be calculated against the sum of the risks, and the decision made. Now some like to argue that the Bush Admin knew the war was going to last years, or decades, or that they knew it would cost a lot in blood, or a lot in treasure, or whatever, but the fact of the matter is that war is less predictable than hurricane, a tornado, or even a thunderstorm. Once the conditions are met, critical mass and momentum take over. It’s a war that should have been fought to conclusion in 1991, and because it wasn’t, it’s costing more now (all battles that follow periods of procrastination in a war have always been more expensive in the long run; history is full of these examples).

“As I said, you seem to ascribe too much credence to the ramblings of these idiots. They will include in their grievances any and all acts they believe might anger their brethren and motivate more and more recruits to join the great jihad. I, therefore, discount all of their rantings.”

To discount their ramblings out of hand or because they don’t support a political argument (and in the end, I believe that’s where the disagreement rests), is to ignore the causes of the war as they relate to the enemy, and as a result focus only on the causes of the war on America’s part; we fight ourselves, rather than confront the enemy’s political will as they themselves profess it. Whether it’s Rudy G blowing off those AQ statements and saying that they fight us purely because they hate our freedom. Or maybe it’s W’s ranting that we’re attacked because we have liberty and they have nothing. It doesn’t matter. The reason for the war with Islamic Holy Warriors and those who support them has never been clearly defined. Instead, at every opportunity, professional lawyer politicians from both sides of the aisle have formed their own themes and promoted them rather than ascribing even a little to the ramblings of these idiots. They cannot be discounted out of hand.

After all, 9/10 Al Queda members are not killers.

They’re promoters.

What do they promote?

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I too think that government service should be required for all citizens (be it military, political, environmental, law enforcement, or other), but “democratizing” the war effort can be done far more efficiently by our leaders, and I think the cost in quality that comes with conscription isn’t worth the little gained by “democratization.” In fact, if everyone had military training, there might even be MORE inclination to wage war/less risk aversion. It’s impossible to say.

Cannot disagree with most of what you posit. Just have the concern that the current armed forces are made up, mostly, of men and women from less advantaged backgrounds while others, including ourselves, go about our daily lives agonizing about the loss of life and limb while the major risk to our safety is venturing out into the traffic.

Ya know Vice President Cheney was a military leader sans uniform, and when he was, he was damn good at it. Bush did learn to fly fighter planes at a time when it was even more dangerous than today, so I give him some credit. Rummy served I believe. In the end, I wonder if it’s better to have Grants or Lincolns? Ultimately, the argument over service is a fully moot one for the future as NONE of the half dozen leading candidates for President served…except Sen McCain of course. As such, to jibe about Clinton or Bush or Hillary or Obama or Cheney is really irrelevant and merely a double-edged play at gotcha politick.

My mistake with the Rummy reference, you are correct he served in the military. Agree it is a moot point now and in the future and perhaps even in the recent past. Was responding to Mike America’s, typically conservative, comments about Clinton, while omitting other current players and their less than honorable actions as well. True, Cheney served as Secretary of Defense and served well but his “draft” years behavior should argue inclusion in any discussion of current politicians and their military activities during that period. Let us not forget that Clinton served as President and served well, notwithstanding some character flaws regarding sexual behavior.

Will give Bush some credit for learning to be a pilot, not a mean task as I understand it, but, again, when bringing up the issue of service during Vietnam it should be remembered that the National Guard was a sanctuary sought by many to avoid the likelihood of serving in Vietnam. It very quickly became a refuge available only to those with political connections.

Again, agree with you, but it is disingenuous for anyone to bring up Clinton and not mention members of the current administration.

Might I point out that North Korea has a 48hr, 5,000,000 man reserve force as well as one of the largest most well-equipped forces in the world (including the largest number of special forces of any two countries on the planet). A conventional war on the Korean Peninsula is a very real threat. So too is a conventional confrontation with China (see also Taiwan), and I submit that the presence of nuclear weapons actually makes a large scale conventional war even more likely as no one would want to go too far and push the other into using nukes (See also US/PRC fighting in Korea)

You might, and you will. I disagree that a Korean Peninsula war is a very real threat. China is not going to allow it and very possibly would start a simultaneous action against Taiwan should we even start adding troops in Korea. The Taiwan issue is also a very scary scenario. First of all, we do not currently have military forces sufficient to fight conventional wars against either of these opponents. Even with help from the South Koreans our force levels would be hard pressed to counter manpower forces of the magnitude of North Korea’s especially with the likelihood that China, if they put Taiwan on the back burner, might very well involve their troops to such an undertaking. This is now, and was, even before their increased capabilities, China’s sphere of influence and I doubt they will sit idly by while we attempt military action against North Korea. There is even the possibility that our ally Japan would oppose such action. These considerations are to a great extent why North Korea is being handled diplomatically. Iraq conveniently had no such allies.

The good news – I alluded to before — is that China is quickly gaining economic strength and consistent with current wisdom; countries that have more to lose often go to great lengths to avoid warlike confrontations. This eases the Taiwan situation somewhat and the Korean in that they have aided diplomatic efforts, but I don’t think they will give us carte blanche in their area of the world.

As long as conventional war is in stalemate the use of nuclear weapons is highly unlikely. The risk intensifies should one side or the other begin to gain the upper hand. At that point the question of nuclear weapons comes into play and could end in tremendous destruction on both sides. I am not be too worried about North Korea’s nuclear capability since its use against the continental US seems remote. However, on the battlefield as well as South Korea’s exposure could be another issue.

It would seem to me that we have evolved in this world to the point that any issues affecting the major world powers will have to be decided by diplomacy. There are still a few Iraq’s around where diplomacy does not have to be in play but our experience there should have taught us that you only undertake these ventures with significant involvement of other world powers and albeit unfortunate, that kind of support will only come if the country to be attacked has performed some dastardly action. The concept of preemption, while on its face seems wise and fair, is anathema to the civilized countries of the world and probably correctly so unless the level of knowledge of the potential threat is so clear that there is no doubt that military action is the only answer. Therein lies our mistake with Iraq.

I believe the number would be a ratio. For example, if US losses were 5x that of the number of Al Queda killed in Iraq, then it’d clearly not be the battlefield of our choice. On the other hand, the fact is that it is nearly the opposite with at least 15,000 Al Queda killed in Iraq (not insurgents, but actual Al Queda and Al Queda affiliate groups).

Once again, this response was to an inane semantic dispute I was having with Curt. Was not intended to address the al Qaeda presence in Iraq nor the numbers killed.

“WOW, I’m flattered. And I can see the confusion. In many cases people have argued that President Bush decided to attack Iraq in October 2001 (as you discovered), but this isn’t my own ranting. It’s Bob Woodward’s. It’s also the claim of many who point to the Downing Street Memos (their site has a great chronology btw). SO, that’s why sometimes I’ll describe it as 17months rush to war. Other times-again, as you so well discovered-I make the rush to war less for the exact same reasons you point out. The Jan 2002 SOTU speech merely mentions Iraq, but if one wants to say there was a rush to war, and it began with the axis of evil comment, then the rush to war was 15 months. I MYSELF CHOOSE 91202 as the starting point for the 7 month rush to war since there was almost no rhetoric from President Bush before that (a mention is not a full-on diplomatic, military, and rhetorical rush/push). The point is….seven months is not a rush, and those who say it’s a rush are mistaken. A rush is like when President Clinton bombed Iraq in 1993 without notice, or when he bombed Iraq in 1995 without notice, or when he bombed Iraq in 1998 without notice, or when he invaded Haiti with just 3wks notice, or when he began bombing Kosovo with only a few weeks notice, or when he bombed Bosnia with less than a month’s notice on all three occasions. Those are rushes to war….not seven months imo

Doubt that anyone would argue that 7 months does not a rush make. But your naiveté is showing when you contend that “almost no rhetoric from President Bush before that…” As I pointed out his Inaugural Address was a start; then the February 2001 comment in a news conference with a visiting dignitary; followed by frequent comments throughout 2001/2002 with much of the rhetoric getting stronger and stronger. You can classify these as “mentions”, which you do for it fits your argument, but as an observer during that time I noticed an increasing argument for war with Iraq, emerging.

I admitted I was being sarcastic about “right after the UN speech” but the real rush was after getting military resources in place and finally getting the inspectors back into Iraq, he abruptly called off the inspections and “rushed to war”. There was a lot of speculation at the time that should we wait longer we might have to postpone, for as much as a year, the actual invasion because of the summer heat. I recall debates around the office at the time, that we couldn’t afford to keep all those resources in the area for a year; it would cost too much: Little did we know.

An interesting bit of literary whimsy, changing your starting point to fit the circumstances…lol. Veracity would seem to yearn for more consistency.

I have little argument to attacking an enemy without notice.

Bush Derangement Syndrome is when people blame W for everything and anything; yes, many people do blame him for all that “happens on his watch” as if he were omnipotent and omniscient.

Just felt compelled to inform you, I do not now nor ever have, considered Bush, omnipotent or omniscient: Quite the contrary….

Actually, the SSCI did have the same intelligence-and more-than the President, and their own investigations as well as several other independent and bi-partisan investigations have all made that very clear. The problem is that Democrats on those committees didn’t go to all the meetings. They blew them off. And most members of Congress deliberately chose not to read the classified NIE of 10/2/02. Specifically, only about a half dozen senators and a handful of Reps signed in to read the assessment. They made their rhetoric based on their own previous (often pre-Bush Admin) reports and intel reports as well as their own independent investigations of the intel (see also H Clinton, and others).

I realize at various points and upon request the SSCI can and does get as much intelligence as the President. On a day to day basis it is my understanding they get summations of what the administration got. You have read the NIEs. Would you sign up to read another if you’d heard from staff or fellow Senators that there was nothing new?

Yes, sanctions were irrevocably collapsing. The Duelfer Report shows that very clearly. So too does the last UNMOVIC report, the various Volker Oil For Food reports, and even the Sen Intel Com reports on Iraq intel. Sorry man, but no amount of statesmanship was gonna make inspections work again (as if they ever did-remember, Saddam was about to be given a clean slate until his son in laws defected; ie, it was defections not inspections that worked). Even Blix (in his book, Disarming Iraq) and Ritter (in his book, Endgame) both explain that inspections couldn’t work for two basic reasons (one really imo)
inspectors were not intended to be weapons hunters. They were supposed to be witnesses and verifiers to Iraqi disarmament. Weapons hunting was never their role.
The purpose of inspections wasn’t to hunt down and find weapons, but to build political “confidence (something Blix goes into great detail about). “Confidence” is a sort of diplomatic speak for trust. The idea is that if the disarming nation consistently demonstrates good faith, honesty, and serious effort at disarming, then those tasked with verifying the disarmament can convey “confidence” that the disarming nation has disarmed.

Now, Saddam’s regime acted AGAINST the will of the inspection process since it began. They did so again from the start of GWB’s admin, again post 911 when they shot down a Predator monitoring WMD sites ON 911, again after GWB approached the UN on 91202, again in December 02 when they violated UN1441 by not providing a full disarmament declaration, again with various impediments in Jan and Feb 03. By acting against the inspection process rather than with it and for it, they reduced confidence and made it impossible.

You mention in the next section about the greed of some of our allies. Presume this was related to the dipping into the Oil for Food program coffers; a program that was an offshoot of the sanctions. Is it not possible that those same allies would have been happy for the sanctions to be continued? The continuation of sanctions were not however of the utmost importance. The continuation of inspections in an ongoing mode was tantamount.

The timing of your argument seems suspect. The son-in-laws defected in 1995. It is not my recollection that during that time the UN was about to give him a pass. There were still many unresolved issues at that time.

We all understand the rules inherent in the inspections compliance outline. However, many of the discoveries of violations and the uncovering of items not divulged by Saddam and his minions would imply that the inspectors were in fact “hunting”. When the inspectors did return in January, 2003 they set about chasing down locations that we directed them to based on our many precise intelligence estimates (for instance Colin Powell’s mobile chemical labs). Does not this exercise constitute “hunting”? There is no doubt that had Iraq complied fully with the treaty agreements the whole inspections exercise would have been, shall we say, a “slam dunk”. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that Saddam was going to feint, sandbag, play games and bullshit as much as he could to make the exercise difficult. These distractions, while costly, were not sufficient cause to put Americans in harms way.

As I have stated, Hans Blix, himself, told the UN in his speech on the UNMOVIC Report of March, 2003 that Iraq was more active and even proactive in complying than they had ever been. Much of the concern at that time as previously was the lack of documentation of the destruction of materials that subsequently have been determined to have been destroyed.

For Mr. Blix or anyone associated with the inspections process to assume “confidence” in Saddam’s compliance would have been terribly naïve.

Some things can be said with certainty since history is often 20-20. Saddam was not interested in peace and surely never would have revealed as required his WMD setup. We know this from the Duelfer Report as well as various others I can list as well if you desire. As to the rest of the world…they all have their own reasons, and greed outweighs stupidity in almost each one. Btw, the military buildup for invasion began in 9/02 (another reason I prefer to point to that as the start of the 7 month “rush to war” (Man, what’s “taking one’s time” then?)

Saddam was not what one would call a peacenik for sure. However, he never really desired a war with the US or a coalition of the world. Sure he was bellicose in his proclamations about the US and his assurances that his armies could overcome any adversary but I don’t think he really wanted to test his hypotheses. He did want to appear resolute and strong in the eyes of the Arab world both from an aspect of generating fear but also a resulting respect based on that fear.

He had, in fact, revealed much of his WMD setup prior to the return of inspectors in 2003. Admittedly, many of those revelations came after his son-in-laws defected but nevertheless he had revealed a great deal so the statement, “surely never would have revealed as required his WMD setup” might appear to be too absolutist.

He certainly had thrown a cog in the process by establishing dual-use facilities, which were not a violation of his treaties, and which did leave him with a capability to restart WMD programs if he could get his history behind him. It seems to be the final determination of many of the reports, especially the SSCI Phase II report, that he had intentions to do so. They also conclude, however, that he had intended to destroy all his old WMD and thought he had done so. His best scenario for going forward would be to get sanctions and inspections lifted leaving him options in the future. One of the stumbling blocks was that some of the destruction had occurred with no documentation and that fact left a hole in certification complicated further with minimal findings in 2003 which were thought reasonably to be oversights on the part of his own personnel.

Once again, right after the UN speech and the subsequent resolution, Bush began the logistics of getting military resources in place. I suppose it’s reasonable to count the start of the war as the start of hostilities but in reality you can’t start a war until you have your military resources in place. Now the argument was that these logistical moves were merely to put pressure on Saddam and send a message. They seemed to work in getting him to allow inspectors back in. My conclusion, after the abrupt halt Bush called to the inspections, after only 2 ½ months, and then the ensuing attacks, is that the moves to locate the military were actually the start of the war.

Oh wait…hunting WMD wasn’t part of their tasking. Sorry. You’re right about inspectors only being in Iraq for a few months, but they verified very little during that time OTHER THAN the truth that Saddam was deliberately and illegally making missiles etc that he wasn’t allowed to make (again, counter to the process of building confidence).

I have already satisfied the “hunting” and “confidence” arguments…lol. There was a dispute as to the range of the missiles in question and in either case they were not sufficient to reach the US.

Now, Art, you got into the NIE a bit, and I think you’re off quite a bit. Let’s try and clear some things up. The NIE was put out to Congress on 10/2/02. Members were pre-notified to make arrangements to read it. Only a few signed in to do so. Hundreds (Dems included) chose not to even look at it. On 10/4/02, a shortened, declassified version came out. Many Dems had their staffers skim it, then went along since it was consistent with the reporting for the previous 12 yrs. However, you are very incorrect about the NIE making any sort of claims re ties to Al Queda. Also, the specific “threats to our homeland” were from comments made by intel officials made to Congress-not in the NIE. Democrats like Sen Rockefeller repeated these threats as well, and so too did Clinton-era intel and defense officials (names and quotes avail upon req).

May have been wrong about the NIE specifically but there were numerous reports put out on the Iraq/al Qaeda relationship by the CIA, the DIA, etc. which support my original contentions. Yes, there also was testimony to Congress by intel officials, interestingly, not always consistent with the findings in the various reports. Won’t bother to relive the rhetoric issues again.

Not at all. According to the last UNMOVIC report and the Duelfer Report (as well as 3 others I can list) not all the WMD has been accounted for. The idea that there were “no wmd” is misleading. It suggest that there never were any, or that everything was destroyed, and he was compliant with the UN. He was not compliant, everything was not destroyed, and there was a WMD threat uncovered…just not in the form of perishable, degradable, vulnerable stockpiles. Again, you’ve suggested that if weapons verifiers stayed in Iraq, Saddam would have submitted evidence to answer all these questions and build confidence, but we know he would not as he wanted to retain the image of being a WMD threat, and since inspectors were there to monitor and verify…not hunt.

I believe it would be more than naïve to suggest that there never were any WMD. Have addressed most of your arguments here earlier. Saddam did face the dilemma that he desired to have the Arab world, plus Israel, think that he still had an arsenal of WMD. There was a fear on his part that should it be proven that his arsenal was gone then Iran may attempt military action against him. It was a part of his Kabuki dance with the inspections. He did not harbor world domination aspirations only Arab world domination but after the costly draw (?) with Iran and the humiliation of Kuwait am not convinced that he actually desired more war but wanted to maintain the fear of the region of Iraq and its capabilities.

On the contrary, Saddam’s regime was setup with 7 different intelligence agencies and was a totalitarian dictatorship where very little if anything got out and leaked.

At yet with all that there were, by your own admission, defections, some significant, some not, but all with stories to tell. Real world would have it that he couldn’t take the chance that an attack on the US or any other major country could go on without a tie back to Iraqi involvement. The leaking of an Iraqi “footprint”, following such an attack would not require a lot of verification before a launching of retaliation would occur.

And yet he did give them sanctuary, did work with them, US Marines killed them and occupied their training camps, and Saddam-like any other state sponsor of terror did have something to gain by sponsoring terror….why do state’s sponsor terror rather than use their own special forces?

I presume again your reference is to Anser al-Islam. I refer you to the SSCI Phase II report again. The final analysis was that while Anser al-Islam had loose ties to al Qaeda they were not a branch of it and they operated in an area of Iraq where Saddam had no control after the Gulf War.

States sponsor terror instead of using their own special forces because generally sponsoring countries receive no retribution for such sponsorship if it’s made up monetary or moral support. When providing their own troops or offering sanctuary to terrorist’s troops the retribution risk becomes much greater.

The question is a good one that perhaps some of our own previous administrations could answer.

This is one of my favorite myths. Yes, there were religious differences, but UBL doesn’t care about things like that. He worked with the CIA, with the Pakistani ISI, with the Iranians on Khobar Towers, and AQ is working with Sunni and Shia in Iraq now. No one for a moment believed Saddam’s claims to have rediscovered his roots to Mohammed, but he built more Mosques than any other Arab leader in the past 1000 yrs. He built the largest Mosque (or was starting) outside of Saudi. He even had a Mosque built on a man-made lake with an island in the shape of his fingerprint to reinforce the image that he was all about Islam. Nah, you make far too much out of UBL’s religious façade. He’s a killer-not a Muslim, and like all criminals his motive/excuse is just that and nothing more. Just because someone has a motive doesn’t mean the motive was riteous or even devout. If he were really religious and not a killer, he wouldn’t be killing people or having their heads sawed off.

No doubt UBL will work with whomever to achieve objectives he has set his sights on. There would have to be concern on his part however, that setting up housekeeping in Iraq would force him to always be on his guard that Saddam, having him close at hand, would not turn on him and either capture or kill him and his followers.

You are absolutely correct; no one believed Saddam was anything but secular, including I’m sure UBL. In Saddam’s paranoid world of suspicion about coups and assassinations, at best it would have been tenuous to have UBL and his group inside the Iraqi borders.

It is easy in our world of Judeo/Christian values to presume anyone of UBL’s character must be a killer or criminal but many experts acknowledge that the Wahabbi sect of Islam embraces very extreme views towards nonbelievers including very barbaric methods of dealing with them. Even if you are correct UBL must maintain his allegiance to his version of Muslim beliefs in order to continue the growing number recruits that come to him because they believe in that version. No matter how you look at it a marriage of Saddam and UBL would have been one fraught with debilitating problems for each. Again the SSCI Phase II report concludes no interest on the part of Saddam to embrace a union, especially within Iraq’s borders.

My verbal rally for war statement was regarding GWB not Saddam.

That IS the common belief, but if one reads the results of the Sen Intel Com investigations into pre-war intel, the problem wasn’t that intel was conjured up. It was that no intel was presented. To this day, the CIA has flat out refused to investigate and form a conclusion regarding pre-war ties to AQ. Here we are SIX YEARS after 911, and they still won’t look into it and form a conclusion. Instead, whether it’s:
9/21/01 PDB
Iraqi Support for Terrorism 2002
Iraqi Support for Terrorism: Interpreting A Murky Relationship
Iraqi Support for Terrorism 2003
Or any other CIA publication…..there are no conclusions made. The reports always say it could be a threat and it could not. They may or may not. The agency was bureaucratically risk averse/paranoid before 911 and even more so after 911. Think of it this way, for a CIA analyst to write a report saying, “Gosh, we were all wrong on 911, and the US/Saddam war had a huge effect in helping cause the 911 attacks” (or) “We’ve been too busy with Kosovo etc for the past 5 yrs, and we missed a close relationship between Saddam and AQ since out of the entire agency we haven’t had a single asset in Iraq for 4yrs.” Think about it…those are career killers.

Having learned more about intelligence estimates, reports, analyses in the last six years than I likely ever wanted to know, it has been my observation that seldom do they present conclusions on anything. Most of the time it’s, we see this, we hear that, we assume whatever but we don’t really have any earthly idea. They do often refer to their findings as assessments; could that be “..a rose by any other name…”?

I believe that the CIA has eaten crow frequently since 911. My understanding is that the CIA employees are a very dedicated, patriotic group. Their job is often plagued by some knowing but not enough knowing to establish certainty. They rely heavily on the interpretation of their customers coupled with other intel reports to discern the most likely scenario. I doubt they would, given what they did posture, be reluctant to clarify the issue. It may be that the point is moot now and the resource required to relook may have better payoffs going forward. As I mentioned they did in fact rewrite their assessments of the prewar intel after the SSCI Phase II report was established.

No, according to ONE interim DIA official, and even then…the DIA refused to form a conclusion and said (like the 911 Commission members) that the issue should be re-examined (not blown off or closed as opponents of the war would try to do so as to bolster politick at the expense of fact and new-found evidence). According to interviews with those captured there, according to the late Zarqawi, and others….there was a relationship. Ansar had become an AQ camp in 98/99 and was Saddam’s enforcement arm in the N.
http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/05/the_missing_link.php

The DIA also didn’t form conclusions, per se, but their assessment was as I presented it in the post you are responding to.

Scott? Do you really offer the “the missing link” link as proof of anything? The site would at first glance seem to be a right wing nut site but I could be wrong. Nevertheless they suggest this coup in finding the missing link to al Qaeda and Iraq via Anser al-Islam. They present this gopher, oops sorry courier, who by his own admission was to know nothing about the info he was delivering to Anser, yet he possesses all this knowledge about the funding, the managing and the strong ties between Iraqi officials and this group. And they got him and everyone else ignored him. Hmmm, wonder why?

If this guy had any credibility, Dick Cheney would adopt him and bring him here and run him around to every Sunday morning news show available, starting with Fox News Sunday. Give me a break! There is very good reason that the CIA nor anyone else wanted to interview this guy and it had nothing to do with some grand conspiracy of suppressing information.

Again, the SSCI Phase II report wraps up this issue fairly well and it seems to be the latest report issued so presume they had access to all the others, since they reference most of them.

…AND when there IS a battlefield that draws them in, you get more (like you said). Whether it’s fishing, or hunting, a football or baseball game, or a battle…the first rule is to fight on ground of your choosing. You go to your fishing hole, you hunt in your tree stand, you like the home field advantage, or you choose a field where your most effective resources can be most effective. Me, I say use law enforcement (and we are), use the CIA (and we are), use the FBI (and we are), and use the military (and we are).

This is the second time you have hinted that we went to Iraq to draw al Qaeda in to fight our fight there. I really hope you are wrong. I have long resisted buying into the “all about oil” argument simply because, even though I have strong feelings about Dubya’s motives, I never believed we, as a nation, could be that callous. To suggest that we would encumber the Iraqi people and subject them to the death and mayhem that knowingly would occur in this scenario is beyond the pale. We have, as a nation, done many bad or stupid things in our history but this idea would be heinous and place us at the very bottom of any human rights evaluations.

Sorry man, but the ones nabbed in NYC were not the ring leaders. They were left there by Yousef to be bagged while he got away. The amateurs got bagged by FBI, the pros got away.

I realize Yousef was captured by the Pakistanis, more than likely with CIA input. I stated I understand once out of the country the CIA is more apt to be involved. The FBI did provide a lot of information around the world though, as well.

I should be chastised though for not realizing that only the ringleader(s) counts. All those others captured by law enforcement are merely pawns and of course any one that knows anything about Chess knows pawns count for very little. They can only capture any other piece that comes into there attack zone and upon promotion can be upgraded to any other Chess piece on the board except a King. Other than that they just get in the way.

Infidels who were there to attack Iraq
According to the 911 Commission (as well as the joint House/Sen 911 investigation and others) UBL also cited the US attacks on Iraq as well as Israel
Yeah, as I said, the Israel bit is mandatory if 2/3 of your leadership is Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Please, let’s be clear, I never said that UBL had an affection or worried about Saddam or anything of the like. The two could hate each other, but still use each other. See also US French, or US Russia, or Russia China.

As I said, you seem to ascribe too much credence to the ramblings of these idiots. They will include in their grievances any and all acts they believe might anger their brethren and motivate more and more recruits to join the great jihad. I, therefore, discount all of their rantings.

We have probably beat this to death and since we have a significant disagreement on both our choice of references and/or the validity we attach to each, we appear to be at an impass. Even though I know in your heart you know I’m right…lol

Have enjoyed and look forward to the next one.

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I’ve fixed your earlier comment Art and deleted your attempt to fix it. For quotes just put in a the bracket that is above your comma on the keyboard then the word blockquote and then the other bracket which is above your period on the keyboard. Then place the section you want quoted and then do the same blockquote but instead put /blockquote in between the brackets.

Thanks Curt. It is always refreshing to know at my age one can still learn. LOL

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I’ve fixed your earlier comment Art and deleted your attempt to fix it. For quotes just put in a the bracket that is above your comma on the keyboard then the word blockquote and then the other bracket which is above your period on the keyboard. Then place the section you want quoted and then do the same blockquote but instead put /blockquote in between the brackets.

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Hi Art,
Welcome back!

Reinstituting it currently would tend to democratize the process that puts so many lives at risk.

I too think that government service should be required for all citizens (be it military, political, environmental, law enforcement, or other), but “democratizing” the war effort can be done far more efficiently by our leaders, and I think the cost in quality that comes with conscription isn’t worth the little gained by “democratization.” In fact, if everyone had military training, there might even be MORE inclination to wage war/less risk aversion. It’s impossible to say.

Interesting in your rant about “draft dodgers” you omitted Cheney, Bush, Rummy et al. Am sure it was merely an inadvertent oversight.

Ya know Vice President Cheney was a military leader sans uniform, and when he was, he was damn good at it. Bush did learn to fly fighter planes at a time when it was even more dangerous than today, so I give him some credit. Rummy served I believe. In the end, I wonder if it’s better to have Grants or Lincolns? Ultimately, the argument over service is a fully moot one for the future as NONE of the half dozen leading candidates for President served…except Sen McCain of course. As such, to jibe about Clinton or Bush or Hillary or Obama or Cheney is really irrelevant and merely a double-edged play at gotcha politick.

The probability of our entering a war with China or any other country with armies sufficient enough to fit your definition of “major combat” is quite low. The manpower parity and the fact that most of those kinds of foes also have nuclear weapons would preclude entering a war with them other than in self defense.

Might I point out that North Korea has a 48hr, 5,000,000 man reserve force as well as one of the largest most well-equipped forces in the world (including the largest number of special forces of any two countries on the planet). A conventional war on the Korean Peninsula is a very real threat. So too is a conventional confrontation with China (see also Taiwan), and I submit that the presence of nuclear weapons actually makes a large scale conventional war even more likely as no one would want to go too far and push the other into using nukes (See also US/PRC fighting in Korea)

Though you may find fault with it, surprise, surprise, there is no doubt that the death rate would be much higher in Iraq were it not for medical advances. How many more?

I believe the number would be a ratio. For example, if US losses were 5x that of the number of Al Queda killed in Iraq, then it’d clearly not be the battlefield of our choice. On the other hand, the fact is that it is nearly the opposite with at least 15,000 Al Queda killed in Iraq (not insurgents, but actual Al Queda and Al Queda affiliate groups).

Let me lead off with a slight (?) disparity I ran across. On a Howard, something or other website, where you are listed as a contributor and you wrote a treatise on January 7, 2007 proclaiming that Howard Dean began his antiwar rant at least three months before GWB unleashed his threats

WOW, I’m flattered. And I can see the confusion. In many cases people have argued that President Bush decided to attack Iraq in October 2001 (as you discovered), but this isn’t my own ranting. It’s Bob Woodward’s. It’s also the claim of many who point to the Downing Street Memos (their site has a great chronology btw). SO, that’s why sometimes I’ll describe it as 17months rush to war. Other times-again, as you so well discovered-I make the rush to war less for the exact same reasons you point out. The Jan 2002 SOTU speech merely mentions Iraq, but if one wants to say there was a rush to war, and it began with the axis of evil comment, then the rush to war was 15 months. I MYSELF CHOOSE 91202 as the starting point for the 7 month rush to war since there was almost no rhetoric from President Bush before that (a mention is not a full-on diplomatic, military, and rhetorical rush/push). The point is….seven months is not a rush, and those who say it’s a rush are mistaken. A rush is like when President Clinton bombed Iraq in 1993 without notice, or when he bombed Iraq in 1995 without notice, or when he bombed Iraq in 1998 without notice, or when he invaded Haiti with just 3wks notice, or when he began bombing Kosovo with only a few weeks notice, or when he bombed Bosnia with less than a month’s notice on all three occasions. Those are rushes to war….not seven months imo.

Sorry about the partisan blinders but your arguments sure seem like an out of the closet conservative.

If so, then it’s only because the liberal/progressive/new Dems have driven out any moderates (see also Joe Lieberman and the attacks on the DLC).

No one is saying that all that is wrong in this world is because of W. But then again there are many references to things wrong in this world that can clearly be laid at W’s feet.

Bush Derangement Syndrome is when people blame W for everything and anything; yes, many people do blame him for all that “happens on his watch” as if he were omnipotent and omniscient.

Kerry would not have had the same level of access to information as Clinton, Gore, Bush, Cheney because he wasn’t on the Senate Intelligence Committee and wouldn’t have had the security clearance for raw data. Even the Senate Intelligence Committee does not always get the complete raw data from the intelligence community that the President sees.

Actually, the SSCI did have the same intelligence-and more-than the President, and their own investigations as well as several other independent and bi-partisan investigations have all made that very clear. The problem is that Democrats on those committees didn’t go to all the meetings. They blew them off. And most members of Congress deliberately chose not to read the classified NIE of 10/2/02. Specifically, only about a half dozen senators and a handful of Reps signed in to read the assessment. They made their rhetoric based on their own previous (often pre-Bush Admin) reports and intel reports as well as their own independent investigations of the intel (see also H Clinton, and others).

The sanctions were not “irrevocably collapsing”, they were collapsing but 911 gave us the impetus to resurrect inspections with renewed vigor to making them work and to continue sanctions until they could be completed. Further a strong argument was viable that inspections must continue even if sanctions were lifted to insure that Saddam did not re-embark on creating WMD. He was a bad guy. The world new he was a bad guy and the final summations of the inspection teams, including the ISG, and the SSCI, along with the revised pre-war estimates of the CIA, would have provided that an ongoing inspection regime was vital to holding him in check. It would have required statesmanship which W and his administration might have maintained had he not been hell bent to begin his ill-fated pre-emptive war.

To state that inspections “could not work post 98” is to buy into someone else’s view, which was belied by the moderate success being realized in the 2 ½ months before W pulled the plug to rush to war.

I love that Rush to war line. I laugh every time.

Yes, sanctions were irrevocably collapsing. The Duelfer Report shows that very clearly. So too does the last UNMOVIC report, the various Volker Oil For Food reports, and even the Sen Intel Com reports on Iraq intel. Sorry man, but no amount of statesmanship was gonna make inspections work again (as if they ever did-remember, Saddam was about to be given a clean slate until his son in laws defected; ie, it was defections not inspections that worked). Even Blix (in his book, Disarming Iraq) and Ritter (in his book, Endgame) both explain that inspections couldn’t work for two basic reasons (one really imo)

inspectors were not intended to be weapons hunters. They were supposed to be witnesses and verifiers to Iraqi disarmament. Weapons hunting was never their role.
The purpose of inspections wasn’t to hunt down and find weapons, but to build political “confidence (something Blix goes into great detail about). “Confidence” is a sort of diplomatic speak for trust. The idea is that if the disarming nation consistently demonstrates good faith, honesty, and serious effort at disarming, then those tasked with verifying the disarmament can convey “confidence” that the disarming nation has disarmed.

Now, Saddam’s regime acted AGAINST the will of the inspection process since it began. They did so again from the start of GWB’s admin, again post 911 when they shot down a Predator monitoring WMD sites ON 911, again after GWB approached the UN on 91202, again in December 02 when they violated UN1441 by not providing a full disarmament declaration, again with various impediments in Jan and Feb 03. By acting against the inspection process rather than with it and for it, they reduced confidence and made it impossible.

In the area of human relations it is seldom true to state that something absolutely cannot work. Signs were that W’s military buildup in the area had gotten Saddam’s attention and the level of cooperation far exceeded that existing prior to 98. Jesus! Most of the whole world desired regime change but they didn’t desire it enough to join in what many of them realized was a rather stupid undertaking.

Some things can be said with certainty since history is often 20-20. Saddam was not interested in peace and surely never would have revealed as required his WMD setup. We know this from the Duelfer Report as well as various others I can list as well if you desire. As to the rest of the world…they all have their own reasons, and greed outweighs stupidity in almost each one. Btw, the military buildup for invasion began in 9/02 (another reason I prefer to point to that as the start of the 7 month “rush to war” (Man, what’s “taking one’s time” then?)

The UNSCOM reports were troublesome but were also issued in a cloud of continuing uncertainty, yes, primarily due to Saddam’s sandbagging, but nevertheless were a summation of couldas, might bes and maybes. The 3/6/03 UNMOVIC reports were more of the same; were submitted after the inspectors returned to Iraq for only 2 ½ months; and with the codicil by Hans Blix that Iraq was being more active, and even proactive, in cooperation than they had ever been in the past. Though the October 2002 NIE made statements alluding to a possible threat to our homeland and very questionable ties to al Qaeda, they were predicated on very questionable sources and skimpy, at best, intelligence. All of the issues referred to in the UNSCOM, UNMOVIC and CIA reports were largely dispelled in the SSCI, released in June 2006; so much so that the CIA modified their prewar presumptions in the 2002 NIE. And the SSCI report was very consistent with the ISG report.

I’m glad you recognize the “sand-bagging” which of course is counter to the inspection/verification process. Remember, UNMOVIC was
United
Nations
Monitoring
Observation
Inspection
Hunting
Commission

Oh wait…hunting WMD wasn’t part of their tasking. Sorry. You’re right about inspectors only being in Iraq for a few months, but they verified very little during that time OTHER THAN the truth that Saddam was deliberately and illegally making missiles etc that he wasn’t allowed to make (again, counter to the process of building confidence).

Now, Art, you got into the NIE a bit, and I think you’re off quite a bit. Let’s try and clear some things up. The NIE was put out to Congress on 10/2/02. Members were pre-notified to make arrangements to read it. Only a few signed in to do so. Hundreds (Dems included) chose not to even look at it. On 10/4/02, a shortened, declassified version came out. Many Dems had their staffers skim it, then went along since it was consistent with the reporting for the previous 12 yrs. However, you are very incorrect about the NIE making any sort of claims re ties to Al Queda. Also, the specific “threats to our homeland” were from comments made by intel officials made to Congress-not in the NIE. Democrats like Sen Rockefeller repeated these threats as well, and so too did Clinton-era intel and defense officials (names and quotes avail upon req).

Now we all know hindsight is 20-20, but much of that later revealed would have been revealed earlier had not we intervened, kicked out the inspectors and started a war.

Not at all. According to the last UNMOVIC report and the Duelfer Report (as well as 3 others I can list) not all the WMD has been accounted for. The idea that there were “no wmd” is misleading. It suggest that there never were any, or that everything was destroyed, and he was compliant with the UN. He was not compliant, everything was not destroyed, and there was a WMD threat uncovered…just not in the form of perishable, degradable, vulnerable stockpiles. Again, you’ve suggested that if weapons verifiers stayed in Iraq, Saddam would have submitted evidence to answer all these questions and build confidence, but we know he would not as he wanted to retain the image of being a WMD threat, and since inspectors were there to monitor and verify…not hunt.

The man was an egocentric, vile, butcherous, manipulative asshole. What he was not was stupid or suicidal. While W always couched his alarms about Iraq with the proviso “without footprints”, reality is that seldom are there not footprints. Even if no physical proof could be found, Saddam was experienced enough in his own country, let alone anyone outside his ability to control, to know that someone, somewhere would leak “footprint” information and then he and his regime would be toast.

On the contrary, Saddam’s regime was setup with 7 different intelligence agencies and was a totalitarian dictatorship where very little if anything got out and leaked.

There was nothing to be gained for Saddam by arming al Qaeda or providing them sanctuary, especially if he were not going to be able to claim involvement.

And yet he did give them sanctuary, did work with them, US Marines killed them and occupied their training camps, and Saddam-like any other state sponsor of terror did have something to gain by sponsoring terror….why do state’s sponsor terror rather than use their own special forces?

Further, given the religious/philosophical differences between he and al Qaeda he knew that he could eventually become their target even if he consented to give them aid.

This is one of my favorite myths. Yes, there were religious differences, but UBL doesn’t care about things like that. He worked with the CIA, with the Pakistani ISI, with the Iranians on Khobar Towers, and AQ is working with Sunni and Shia in Iraq now. No one for a moment believed Saddam’s claims to have rediscovered his roots to Mohammed, but he built more Mosques than any other Arab leader in the past 1000 yrs. He built the largest Mosque (or was starting) outside of Saudi. He even had a Mosque built on a man-made lake with an island in the shape of his fingerprint to reinforce the image that he was all about Islam. Nah, you make far too much out of UBL’s religious façade. He’s a killer-not a Muslim, and like all criminals his motive/excuse is just that and nothing more. Just because someone has a motive doesn’t mean the motive was riteous or even devout. If he were really religious and not a killer, he wouldn’t be killing people or having their heads sawed off.

The verbal rally for war, as I mentioned, started from the beginning of W’s tenure.

Nope. Immediately after Desert Storm is when Saddam switched to Islamic rhetoric rather than secular.

His increasing vitriol was less predicated on UNSCOM or UNMOVIC reports than on his own vendetta at first and the CIA’s NIE’s later.

Nope. Sorry. There was far more anti-American rhetoric leading up to Desert Fox and immediately after than there was in the post 91202 runup.

Sure there was passing reference to the former when it fit his agenda but he depended on the CIA to provide an intelligence basis for warmongering. It will be likely beyond our lifetimes before we ever find out just what influence the administration had on the CIA output, however, even if there was none, it makes sense that the CIA, reeling from accusations of ineptitude over 911, was more than willing to provide that which they deemed this administration wanted to hear. Missing in all this, or better yet purposefully ignored, was the realization that we had no really valid intelligence, nor did anyone else, on Iraq. Therefore most of what was conjured up was based on highly questionable sources. These sources had their own agendas, ranging from political asylum to dreams of grandeur in returning to Iraq and gathering riches and power from a deposed dictatorial regime.

That IS the common belief, but if one reads the results of the Sen Intel Com investigations into pre-war intel, the problem wasn’t that intel was conjured up. It was that no intel was presented. To this day, the CIA has flat out refused to investigate and form a conclusion regarding pre-war ties to AQ. Here we are SIX YEARS after 911, and they still won’t look into it and form a conclusion. Instead, whether it’s:
9/21/01 PDB
Iraqi Support for Terrorism 2002
Iraqi Support for Terrorism: Interpreting A Murky Relationship
Iraqi Support for Terrorism 2003
Or any other CIA publication…..there are no conclusions made. The reports always say it could be a threat and it could not. They may or may not. The agency was bureaucratically risk averse/paranoid before 911 and even more so after 911. Think of it this way, for a CIA analyst to write a report saying, “Gosh, we were all wrong on 911, and the US/Saddam war had a huge effect in helping cause the 911 attacks” (or) “We’ve been too busy with Kosovo etc for the past 5 yrs, and we missed a close relationship between Saddam and AQ since out of the entire agency we haven’t had a single asset in Iraq for 4yrs.” Think about it…those are career killers.

As for al Qaeda pre-war, if you are referring to Anser al-Islam, the ties were tenuous at best and Anser was not a branch of al Qaeda but merely had a relationship, according to the DIA. There is no argument that we have killed many al Qaeda in Iraq.

No, according to ONE interim DIA official, and even then…the DIA refused to form a conclusion and said (like the 911 Commission members) that the issue should be re-examined (not blown off or closed as opponents of the war would try to do so as to bolster politick at the expense of fact and new-found evidence). According to interviews with those captured there, according to the late Zarqawi, and others….there was a relationship. Ansar had become an AQ camp in 98/99 and was Saddam’s enforcement arm in the N.
http://pajamasmedia.com/2007/05/the_missing_link.php

Anytime you can enjoin the enemy on a battlefield you are going to kill and /or apprehend many more than law enforcement will yield in a comparable period of time simply because there are more available. No one argued that law enforcement was the only tool but in the absence of a common battlefield law enforcement is the best you have going. When dealing with terrorists residing in or fleeing to other countries often the CIA will be our best bet in seeking apprehension.

YEP!

…AND when there IS a battlefield that draws them in, you get more (like you said). Whether it’s fishing, or hunting, a football or baseball game, or a battle…the first rule is to fight on ground of your choosing. You go to your fishing hole, you hunt in your tree stand, you like the home field advantage, or you choose a field where your most effective resources can be most effective. Me, I say use law enforcement (and we are), use the CIA (and we are), use the FBI (and we are), and use the military (and we are).

To your point about the 93 bombings, except for those apprehended overseas and the possibility that CIA provided some intelligence the main characters were apprehended by FBI and local law enforcement in the US.

Sorry man, but the ones nabbed in NYC were not the ring leaders. They were left there by Yousef to be bagged while he got away. The amateurs got bagged by FBI, the pros got away.

Not quite sure who “their” refers to but I’ll take a stab that it was Bin Laden et al. You place an awful lot of veracity in the yammerings of nut cases. Iraq was never “their” casus belli. They will use every confrontation, disagreement, uproar between western civilization and the Islamic world to scream revenge, increase their recruitment and attempt to send in more suicide martyrs. There real casus belli was, according to Bin Laden, the existence of infidels on the holy lands of Saudi Arabia.

Infidels who were there to attack Iraq
According to the 911 Commission (as well as the joint House/Sen 911 investigation and others) UBL also cited the US attacks on Iraq as well as Israel

Let us never forget the age, old casus belli; our support for Israel. Bin Laden, et al. could have given a hoot about Saddam and if they were so worried about their Arab brethren in Iraq they should have been working to take him out.

Yeah, as I said, the Israel bit is mandatory if 2/3 of your leadership is Egyptian Islamic Jihad. Please, let’s be clear, I never said that UBL had an affection or worried about Saddam or anything of the like. The two could hate each other, but still use each other. See also US French, or US Russia, or Russia China.

Why do states sponsor terrorist attacks instead of conducting them themselves?

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Not sure what happened there.

First part seemed fine and then structure seemed to go to hell.

Was copy/pasting out of MS Word, is that a problem?

I was previewing and after making a couple of corrections I ended up hitting POST.

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Hey Lame: Sorry, but I don’t read giant run on paragraphs. Want to try and edit that screed for readability?

After you get the readability thing down we can work on clarity and intellectual integrity.

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I’m BAAAaack!

Sorry for the delay but had some other things to do and did a little bit of research. Chances are nobody is still reading this particular blog entry but I’ll post anyway.

First to Mike’s America:

So, I take it that Art A Layman is all for bringing back the draft?

Isn’t this the funniest thing? Lefties, who grew up listening to aging hippies brag about burning their draft cards, going to Canada or like Bill Clinton, screwing the ROTC and taking off for Oxford are now all in favor of a draft

As I stated if we were to consider wars against China or any country with significant armies we would have to have a draft to attain the necessary levels of manpower to support such an engagement. Reinstituting it currently would tend to democratize the process that puts so many lives at risk. Statements or proposals offered by politicians always have a political aspect to them. That does not preclude a sincere intent on the part of the politician but does leave open a door which those wearing partisan blinders can then attempt to close.

Interesting in your rant about “draft dodgers” you omitted Cheney, Bush, Rummy et al. Am sure it was merely an inadvertent oversight.

By the way, I wasn’t listening to aging hippies, though not a hippie, I am of that generation.

And since I mentioned Clinton, it’s good to recall that it was his Administration that gutted the U.S. military and left it so weak.

I believe if memory serves me that the beginnings of defense budget cuts actually started with GHW Bush in 1991. Clinton continued and maybe improved on them but the prevailing wisdom at the time was with the collapse of the old Soviet Union the Defense Budget could be pared down. There were many Reps who held to this view.

Even one of your heroes, Rummy, was more interested in beefing up technology than manpower.

Curt, oh yes Curt:

The probability of our entering a war with China or any other country with armies sufficient enough to fit your definition of “major combat” is quite low. The manpower parity and the fact that most of those kinds of foes also have nuclear weapons would preclude entering a war with them other than in self defense. The advent of China’s entry into the world economy, and quickly rising near the top, makes it unlikely that they would see any advantage to starting a war with us.

All in all what we are engaged in here is a semantic argument of little import in the grand scheme of things. I will agree that by military definition your description of major combat is much more germane than mine. It would seem to me, however, that to wake up every morning faced with the possibility of meeting death or severe maiming on the fields of my workplace would extrapolate to significant if not major combat.

Though you may find fault with it – surprise, surprise – there is no doubt that the death rate would be much higher in Iraq were it not for medical advances. How many more? Who the hell knows, but it is a factor. If you are arguing that we have not yet reached a level of deaths and injuries to warrant ending this fiasco, then first, I would like to know what that level is and second, that position would be absurd on its face and ignorant in its depth.

If you are going to pose statistical data to support your argument be a little more sophisticated. Simple averages say little and are the tools of those who want to hide behind numbers. Try doing an average fighting force versus the number of deaths versus the time involved. It will still turn out that Vietnam was more deadly than Iraq but I am sure by a slimmer margin.

The rest of your lunatic ravings do not warrant a response. Note: I never said that “terrorism is worse now that we are in Iraq” but I should have.

Ah and finally Scott:

Let me lead off with a slight (?) disparity I ran across. On a Howard, something or other website, where you are listed as a contributor, you wrote a treatise on January 7, 2007 proclaiming that Howard Dean began his antiwar rant at least three months before GWB unleashed his threats. But then in response to my earlier post you stated:

17 month rush to war argument? Oxymoron alert, but if you want to make the case that telling someone you’re going to attack them for 17months is a rush, then please cite some other historical examples where an enemy was told they’d be attacked for 17months before they were.

Now given the start of the war was sometime around mid March 2003 this would place your chronology as starting around October, 2001. Actually in his Inaugural Address in January, 2001 he made reference to weapons of mass destruction and how we won’t countenance them. Now there were a few countries he could have been implying but surely Iraq would have been one of them. Then February, 2001 he made a definitive statement about possible war with Iraq and his frequent remarks after that seemed to crescendo, like a Leonard Bernstein orchestration, to “letting the dogs out”.

The point being, you can’t have it both ways. Either your Howard statement is correct, in your mind, or your response to me is. It can appear that you bend the facts to meet your arguments.

“”some”…not really a firm standard there. Quite the contrast in response to your earlier statement,

You may have made a small point about bipartisan and rhetoric. But the Dems didn’t make the decision to start a war. GWB, with the neocons pulling his strings did.” So which is it-let’s firm it up-do Dems bear responsibility for promoting the war, authorizing it, supporting it, and since taking Congress deliberately choosing to continue it? Firm it up, or do we defer to nuance and caveats?

You are suggesting that I apply precision to a subject that defies exactness. How do I determine the % of blame that Clinton and the Dems should bear? As I have previously stated, there are many reasons for rhetoric, one of which is not necessarily to drive action. Shame on Clinton, et al., for not realizing that a group of zealots would come along, take action, and then suggest that they were only following Clinton’s dictates.

You seem to imply that the Dems should bear an equal or greater share. I fail to see how a rational person could come to that conclusion. Words convey messages, actions convey reality. It would seem apparent that Clinton’s intentions were to use airpower only when threatening action. It was common knowledge in American governmental circles (see Cheney’s 1994 interview, again) that invading Iraq would only open a Pandora’s Box. The only scenario where an invasion made sense was with a large coalition, providing sufficient manpower, similar to the Gulf War, which would enable closing borders, preventing looting, providing cover for a rapid search for WMD and deterring neighbors from covertly entering the action. This was possibly doable if haste were not a factor. It matters little what Clinton’s or the DLC’s platform stated; the actions were commenced by W and other than cover he could have cared less what Clinton said or thought.

It would be a far better world if politicians spoke only truth along with the courage of their convictions. Alas that is not the nature of politics. Ergo we must all learn to discern for ourselves the relevance of their speeches and whether or not they make sense. As I stated before there is safety in numbers and better to get on the band wagon than be a lone, principled dead end politician. Fact is, many Dems, including Joe Biden, attempted to put an amendment on the resolution for war that stated the W would have to come back to the Congress before actually starting a war with Iraq. The amendment failed and in the current fervor of the American public, rallying behind, an as yet unknown, idiot, those who opposed the blank check given to W opted to cower. This certainly gives them fault but not entire or even equal fault.

I voted for President Clinton both times, and am not a fan of President Bush’s. Careful with the partisan blinders. I seek only accountability where free passes, excuses, and finger pointing remain. As I said, every time I hear, “This administration” I know that the alleged problem is W, and that’s ignorant. It pretends that all that is wrong in the world (or whatever one puts in the blank after this administration) can be fixed by voting for any Dem. Yawn, the election’s over. Besides, Gore promised in 98 that there’d be no more diplomacy with Saddam-just attacks. Dems saw as much OR MORE intel than W, and still promoted the war. Whether it was Gore, Bush, Kerry, Clinton, it doesn’t matter. After 911, the Unresolved Disarmament Issues (commonly spun down to “wmd”) could not be left unresolved indefinitely, and since sanctions were irrevocably collapsing, since inspections never really worked on their own and couldn’t work post 98, I think there was no other option but regime change (as desired by the Democrats from 96+), but by invasion since all other methods had been tried and failed.

Sorry about the partisan blinders but your arguments sure seem like those of an out of the closet conservative. No one is saying that all that is wrong in this world is because of W. But then again there are many references to things wrong in this world that can clearly be laid at W’s feet. Kerry would not have had the same level of access to information as Clinton, Gore, Bush, Cheney because he wasn’t on the Senate Intelligence Committee and wouldn’t have had the security clearance for raw data. Even the Senate Intelligence Committee does not always get the complete raw data from the intelligence community that the President sees.

The sanctions were not “irrevocably collapsing”, they were collapsing but 911 gave us the impetus to resurrect inspections with renewed vigor to making them work and to continue sanctions until they could be completed. Further, a strong argument was viable that inspections must continue even if sanctions were lifted to insure that Saddam did not re-embark on creating WMD, especially given the number of dual-use facilities he maintained. He was a bad guy. The world new he was a bad guy and the final summations of the inspection teams, including the ISG, and the SSCI, along with the revised pre-war estimates of the CIA, would have provided that an ongoing inspection regime was vital to holding him in check. It would have required statesmanship which W and his administration might have maintained had he not been hell bent to begin his ill-fated pre-emptive war.

To state that inspections “could not work post 98” is to buy into someone else’s view, which was belied by the moderate success being realized in the 2 ½ months before W pulled the plug to rush to war. In the area of human relations it is seldom true to state that something absolutely cannot work. Signs were that W’s military buildup in the area had gotten Saddam’s attention and the level of cooperation far exceeded that existing prior to 98. Jesus! Most of the whole world desired regime change but they didn’t desire it enough to join in what many of them realized was a rather stupid undertaking.

Hmmm I had never seen UNSCOM reports dismissed out of hand before. That’s new. Would you say that there was nothing of concern/threatening in the 3/6/03 UNMOVIC reports as well then? Seems like the problem’s not Mr Butler (particularly since the points I raised from his book were 6-yrs later corroborated by the findings of the Iraq Survey Group as reported in the Duelfer report.

The UNSCOM reports were troublesome but were also issued in a cloud of continuing uncertainty, yes, primarily due to Saddam’s sandbagging, but nevertheless were a summation of couldas, might bes and may bes. The 3/6/03 UNMOVIC reports were more of the same; were submitted after the inspectors returned to Iraq for only 2 ½ months; and with the codicil by Hans Blix that Iraq was being more active, and even proactive, in cooperation than they had ever been in the past. Though the October 2002 NIE made statements alluding to a possible threat to our homeland and very questionable ties to al Qaeda, they were predicated on very questionable sources and skimpy, at best, intelligence. Many of the issues referred to in the UNSCOM, UNMOVIC and CIA reports were largely dispelled in the SSCI, released in June 2006; so much so that the CIA modified their prewar presumptions in the 2002 NIE. And the SSCI report was very consistent with the ISG report.

Now we all know hindsight is 20-20, but much of that later revealed would have been revealed earlier had not we intervened, kicked out the inspectors, and started a war.

As to the reports of pre-war ties to AQ, I recognize the fear of reading books from people like Stephen Hayes, so may I suggest some of the personal accounts that fill Borders shelves and pages upon pages at Amazon? They’ll confirm that US forces found and killed thousands of Al Queda in Iraq (making it much more effective than law enforcement).

And on the topic of law enforcement (apologies for jumbling up the discussion), I agree law enforcement is a great tool for fighting terror, but it is not the only tool, AND it’s not the only tool being used (see also KSM capture). And that reference to the 93 bombers…flawed. CIA got them-not law enforcement, and one (Yasin) actually fled to Iraq where he was put on a pension by Saddam, given a house, did an interview with Leslie Stahl, and then disappeared after being grossly clearly by Saddam. Yep, law enforcement is critical, but it’s not the only tool, and (to paraphrase Speaker Pelosi) when you go to war, you go with everything you’ve got and you don’t hold anything back. To me, that means cops when cops are needed. Border patrol when border patrol is needed, air strikes when appropriate, and…well, sometimes it takes as soldier.

At the time of the unraveling of reason by W, I had a schedule tying me up for 16 to 18 hours each and everyday, with some flex on weekends. I had been on that schedule from the mid-nineties and continued until Feb of this year. I did not have the time to read many of the varied books and texts that were published in that time frame. To read them now would be a poor investment of time since much that was written on this subject around that time has been judged wrong or inaccurate. I have read the summaries of some of these reports and did read the full SSCI report: You should try it.

Even W himself has admitted there was no real proof of a connection between Iraq and al Qaeda before the war. VP Cheney seems to be having a harder problem with that concept but then he’s an even bigger basket case.

According to the SSCI report there was some admiration from Saddam for al Qaeda for pulling off an attack on a common enemy but Saddam had no real commonality of purpose with al Qaeda other than a disdain for the US. Saddam was always very unlikely, and was, later, proven to be adamant, about not sharing his WMD knowledge with anyone other than his own Iraqis and those were only a select few.

The man was an egocentric, vile, butcherous, manipulative asshole. What he was not was stupid or suicidal. While W always couched his alarms about Iraq with the proviso “without footprints”, reality is that seldom are there not footprints. Even if no physical proof could be found, Saddam was experienced enough in his own country, let alone with anyone outside his ability to control, to know that someone, somewhere would leak “footprint” information and then he and his regime would be toast.

He had two viable military opponents in the Middle East: Israel and Iran. No other ME country had the military force, equipment or desire to take on Saddam. Even Israel was content to let us continue our no fly zones and to merely keep a wary eye out for something we might miss. The only problem with that mode from Israel is that they, from time to time, like to prod us with questionable intelligence and we give their intelligence great credence.

There was nothing to be gained for Saddam by arming al Qaeda or providing them sanctuary, especially if he were not going to be able to claim involvement. Further, given the religious/philosophical differences between he and al Qaeda he knew that he could eventually become their target even if he consented to give them aid.

The verbal rally for war, as I mentioned, started from the beginning of W’s tenure. His increasing vitriol was less predicated on UNSCOM or UNMOVIC reports than on his own vendetta at first and the CIA’s NIE’s later. Sure there was passing reference to the former when it fit his agenda but he depended on the CIA to provide an intelligence basis for warmongering. It will be likely beyond our lifetimes before we ever find out just what influence the administration had on the CIA output, however, even if there was none, it makes sense that the CIA, reeling from accusations of ineptitude over 911, was more than willing to provide that which they deemed this administration wanted to hear.

Missing in all this, or better yet purposefully ignored, was the realization that we had no really valid intelligence, nor did anyone else, on Iraq. Therefore most of what was conjured up was based on highly questionable sources. Many of these sources had their own agendas, ranging from political asylum to dreams of grandeur in returning to Iraq and gathering riches and power from a deposed dictatorial regime.

As for al Qaeda pre-war, if you are referring to Anser al-Islam, the ties were tenuous at best and Anser was not a branch of al Qaeda according to the DIA. There is no argument that we have killed many al Qaeda in Iraq. Anytime you can enjoin the enemy on a battlefield you are going to kill and/or apprehend many more than law enforcement will yield in a comparable period of time simply because there are more available. No one argued that law enforcement was the only tool but in the absence of a common battlefield law enforcement is the best we and the world have going.

When dealing with terrorists residing in or fleeing to other countries often the CIA seems to be our best bet in seeking apprehension. To your point about the 93 bombings, except for those apprehended overseas and the possibility that CIA provided some intelligence the main characters were apprehended by FBI and local law enforcement in the US. It is clear that often law enforcement will need or use intelligence help from CIA and others

After Afghanistan and Iraq it is doubtful there are many venues where we will send in troops to capture or fight terrorists. While no argument that soldiers are and can be an important resource over the long haul it will become more and more of a law enforcement issue.

Problem with that…is it didn’t work, but the current strategy has prevented dozens of 911 attacks. Besides, Iraq was their primary and secondary casus belli against the US before W was even a candidate.

Not quite sure who “their” refers to but I’ll take a stab that it was Bin Laden, et al. You place an awful lot of veracity in the yammerings of nut cases. Iraq was never “their” casus belli. They will use every confrontation, disagreement, uproar between western civilization and the Islamic world to scream revenge, increase their recruitment and attempt to send in more suicide martyrs. Their real casus belli was, according to Bin Laden, the existence of infidels on the holy lands of Saudi Arabia and them was us. But then that was on Wednesday and by Friday the wind had likely shifted. Let us never forget the age, old casus belli; our support for Israel.

Bin Laden, et al. could have given a hoot about Saddam and if they were so worried about their Arab brethren in Iraq they would have been working to take him out. But, then the Sunni/Shia issues arise.

I think at this point I’ll post this to see if anyone is even still interested. If so, I’ll finish my response.

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A lot of people just don’t understand the modern military. more troops > more capability. You need better troops. If we need more troops/more people to enlist, then pay em what they deserve. Give every pfc 50k a yr and another 10gs for every rank up. Give em better housing, better benefits, shorter deployments, you’d see enlistment rise.

Right now, I have to agree. It’s only for sake of political argument that people advocate a draft-not for sake of a more capable military.

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“we ain’t gonna get in one of the wars you mentioned, China et al, with a volunteer military force.”

So, I take it that Art A Layman is all for bringing back the draft?

Isn’t this the funniest thing? Lefties, who grew up listening to aging hippies brag about burning their draft cards, going to Canada or like Bill Clinton, screwing the ROTC and taking off for Oxford are now all in favor of a draft.

Of course we all know the reason why they want the draft returned. It’s so they could complain about how unfair compulsory service is.

And since I mentioned Clinton, it’s good to recall that it was his Administration that gutted the U.S. military and left it so weak.

I wonder if Art A Lame supports increasing defense budgets in the amounts necessary to return manpower levels to pre-Clinton days?

Something tells me the answer is NO!

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