Forum Discussion

Dueling articles... Turns out ousting Saddam really was a huge victory in the War on Terrorism:

--snip--

direct contacts between high-ranking Iraqi regime officials and both Osama bin Laden and Ayman Zawahiri (bin Laden's top deputy);

an apparent payment of hundreds of thousands of dollars by Iraq to Zawahiri in 1998;

elaborate mentions of Iraq in bin Laden's infamous 1998 fatwa calling for the murder of all Americans, anywhere they could be found — the fatwa that presaged the bombing of the U.S. embassies five months later;

an Iraqi al Qaeda member held in Guantanamo Bay, charged with traveling to Pakistan with an Iraqi Intelligence official in August 1998 (the same month the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed) to study the possibility of bombing the American and British embassies there;

the attempt by Iraq to recruit jihadists in the late 1990s to bomb an American target, Radio Free Europe, in Prague;

the continued insistence to the 9/11 Commission by top Clinton officials (including President Clinton himself) that the retaliatory strike against the al Shifa pharmaceutical factory in Sudan following the embassy bombings was justified by intelligence indicating that the target was home to a joint chemical weapons venture of Iraq, al Qaeda and Sudan;

the Clinton administration so convinced of an asylum arrangement between Iraq and al Qaeda that its top counter-terrorism official, Richard Clarke, opined to National Security Adviser Sandy Berger in 1999 that bin Laden would "boogie to Baghdad" if things became too hot for him in Afghanistan (it wouldn't, after all, have been a first: Saddam was already harboring one of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers);

the still open allegation that Mohamed Atta met with an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague in April 2001, during the plotting stages of the 9/11 attacks;

the still unexplained presence of an Iraqi intelligence operative, Ahmed Hikmat Shakir, at the initial January 2000 planning meetings in Kuala Lampur for the 9/11 attacks;

the recent revelation that Saddam's regime was, since at least 1994, conducting training for thousands of terrorists — training which, from 1998 forward, drew in thousands of jihadists from outside Iraq;

the recent revelation that Saddam's son Uday ordered preparations in 1999 for a wave of "special operations, assassinations, and bombings, for the centers and traitor symbols in London, Iran and the self-ruled areas [Kurdistan]"; and

the exercises in January 2003 — on the eve of the U.S. invasion — known as "the "Heroes' attack," which was designed to prepare regional terror units to fight exactly the kind of insurgency war that has been waged against coalition forces for the last three years.

Now, the intelligence haul has produced another notable disclosure — which is startling only if you continue to gulp the popular Kool-aid that depicts Iraq as nothing more than a disastrous Bush blunder. About a week ago, Morrissey (crediting Iraq scholar Laurie Mylroie) published a striking memorandum, apparently authored by an Iraqi air-force general in March 2001.

--snip--

link: http://www.nationalreview.com/mccarthy/mccarthy200604170640.asp

so what does this have to do with Bushes lies about WMDs to start a war?
Or do you simply enjoy topic switches because you can not argue the original topic?
Raises the "cut and run" card.

You always ask what the connection is with Iraq and terrorism...There is plenty. And the article also covers the uranimum story (which is brought up in yours), showing that Bush's claim was well-founded.

I did not ask about the connection between Iraq and terrorism. What my post said is this:

Bush claim that the CIA gave him the wrong information.
This article shows that the CIA tried to give him the right information, which said that that that IRAQ had no WMDs, then he ignored it and then told the American people the exact opposite of that while sayign that CIA gave him credible intelligence that Iraq has WMDs.

I did not even mention terrorism in that post.
May I ask? Did you read it thoroughly?

Your implication is that there is no real US interest in the War in Iraq. And you have demanded in other posts what the connection to terrorism is.

I had just read that article before I came to the forum, and was going to share it with the readers (you), and saw your post where my snippet fit very well, especially since my snippet talks about the uranium story that is mentioned in your snippet. SO... May I ask? Did you read my post, my snippet, or even your own snippet thoroughly?

Basically your story says: Saddam is a bad man and he tried to do bad thing.
I do not deny that. And that he had some WMDs and try to use some and he tried to have some connections to terrorists.
Its not hard to see that Saddam is a horrible person.

What I do not believe is that this was the reason why we went to war.
There are plenty of dictators to go around.
North Korea already has WMDs and is a horrible, horrible regime.
Besides naming them as one of them Axis of Evil and occasional attempts at talks. I do not see Bush doing anythin to remove that threat. There is genocide at Darfur and I barely ever heard Bush mention that (he did a couple of times). More over, words are cheap.

If Bush was a freedom fighter that he claims to be he would try to do something about it.

As for your story.
I read it and I actually seen some of those bits before.
However the topic that I started was "CIA gave Bush intelligence, and Bush ignored it". You can post that story in another topic as I do here and see if people will want to discuss it. I do not believe it was relevant to this one.

>Your implication is that there is no real US interest in the War in Iraq
I am not really sure what that sentence mean. What do you mean by interest?

>And that he had some WMDs
Just to be clear I was reffering to the pre first guld war ones.

WMDs was never the only reason, but it was probably the one talked about the most. We did find some, though not in huge stockpiles. It's a big country to search, above and below ground. It's like saying "I'll take my car to Idaho and you have to find it. And by the way, it might be buried in the ground, or maybe I hid it in another state. Go find it." We have heard from former Iraqi officials that some WMDs were taken to Syria in commercial airplanes.

The difference between Iraq and the bad countries others with weapons is that Iraq had defied the UN terms of the Persian Gulf War for 10+ years, and the UN wasn't enforcing it. The old joke is something like "Stop or I'll... ask you to stop again!" Iraq had their chance and we believed that they were developing the WMD's that they weren't allowed to.

The countries like N. Korea and Iran still have a diplomatic process we haven't exhausted yet, and seem to be just rattling their sabers. Though I personally wouldn't mind seeing us take some action in those two countries sooner than later.

As for Darfur, I do know that we are freezing assets of anyone that threatens the peace process or stability in the region. That's action, though maybe not the action you'd prefer. But we are not the world's police. We should use our military where it is in our interests. (By that I mean the country poses a threat to us)

So getting back on topic:
How does your commentary relates to CIA telling Bush we do not believe there is WMDs and bush saying to American people there is? I guess he has some super-duper spying powers? Which as it turns out failed him.

>WMDs was never the only reason
It was advertised by Bush as the main overwhelming reason.

>It's a big country to search, above and below ground.
you of course know that even the Bush administration have now admitted there are no WMDs in Iraq, right?

>The difference between Iraq and the bad countries others with weapons is that Iraq had defied the UN terms of the Persian Gulf War for 10+ years, and the UN wasn't enforcing it.

Wait, I thought according to Bush UN is irrelevant and that we will go at it alone if necessary. North Korea is a lot bigger threat for example.

>The countries like N. Korea and Iran still have a diplomatic process we haven't exhausted yet, and seem to be just rattling their sabers.
The diplomatic process is a total stand still.

>As for Darfur, I do know that we are freezing assets of anyone that threatens the peace process or stability in the region.

Right. the dying men, the raped women and the starving and displaced children will be glad to hear that.

>We should use our military where it is in our interests. (By that I mean the country poses a threat to us)
OUR interests? Who is our? BushCo and the oil companies?