there's always hope.

You CAN read!!

i know, right!?

as a general proposition i agree with you that we tend to rebuild nations we invade (although we're doing a pretty crappy job with afghanistan) but even listing democracy as one of the reasons we went into iraq is misleading--the bush administration was not pushing the liberation of the iraqis as a primary reason for the invasion. liberals and conservatives alike would have balked at the suggestion that we were there for humanitarian reasons--bush won over the middle to support his war by raising the threat of mushroom clouds over american cties.




but the intelligence community was not unanimous, in the us or abroad, that iraq had wmds. piece by piece, a picture is emerging of real dissent within the intelligence community about those claims. for instance, the germans believed "curveball," their most damning source, wasn't reliable and his information couldn't be verified.

[/quote]Also, just about anywhere we have an embassy in Africa is under attack, not occassionally, but every day. One of my friends served in some country on the west coast of africa...I can't even remember which one now...and i watched video of an almost daily routine of them getting their flack jackets on and preparing to be attacked. It's not a major attack, no, but it is an attack and it is daily. less people means less casualties...however, more people in one area does not necessarily mean that the threat of dying in combat in any one of those african countries is less likely.[/quote]

i don't doubt what you heard from your friend, but i'd have to see some evidence before i can concede that these attacks are anything like what we face in iraq. i guess i just disagree with the notion that what we're facing over there isn't that bad--it's a war zone for chrissakes. saddam's army wasn't shit compared to the insurgency.

weren't the sanctions imposed on Germany after WWI a major factor in Hitler's rise? or Chamberlain's policy of appeasement? It's just as easy to say that they were responsible for Hitler's existance as it is to say that FDR and Truman are responsible for his defeat.

ummm 4-10%

yeah, i think "insurgent" was mostly spin by the bushies to make people think all the iraqis wanted us around, which many clearly didn't.

I would venture on sort of but not really. Maybe blame some of it on one of the fellow nominees for worst presidents ever Woodrow Wilson. However, American domestic political climate pretty much dictated the isolationism that had marked are hemisphere.

I think Lend-lease is the masterstroke that Gar should be focusing on. That and somehow becoming the domiant figure in Churchill relationship.

My view on the war is that sure we know now that the intelligence was bad. We didn't know it before the invasion. We were relying on it and the fact that Hussein was thumbing his nose at the world, not cooperating with UN inspectors, etc.

Taking the position that the intelligence was wrong, thus we shouldn't have gone to war is kind of like second guessing pinch hitting Barry Bonds for Mario Mendoza after Bonds struck out.

You give me intelligence saying some other world thug leader with the same disrespect for human life and human rights has WMD, and I'll support the same decision all over again.

Does it concern me that our intelligence was so crappy? Sure, but as much as I hate Bush, I'm not gonna pin that on him. You don't have your intelligence go to shit over night.

yeah but what about when the rest of the world and many of our own agencies are telling us it's not credible before we even attempt to use it?

I seriously don't remember the rest of the world telling us our intelligence was not credible. I remember people not wanting to go to war as quick as we did, but I don't remember anyone calling our intelligence BS.

I know some of the hearings and investigations after the fact have turned up individuals who questioned the legitimacy of the intelligence. But how high were those questions communicated? I don't think that those concerns/doubts made it up the chain of the command. Again, I think that's a problem with the intelligence organizations and not the command level decisions that were based on the intelligence provided.

You seriously don't remember Hans Blix? Like the #1 Iraq investigator?

Am I the only person that
1) knew this war was inevitable
2) knew it would be a disaster
3) knows its never REALLY going to end

I mean, this thing was obviously a trumped up political war, and his backfired dramatically for both parties, but their entrenchment and orthodoxy prevents them from solving the real problems...what we need here is leadership, just not that trumped up BS liberal leadership guys like FDR would want..more like "Staying the course," or "Not cutting and running." That and a better, less intrusive economic policy.

I don't have time to look for sources, but Germany told us the claims were bullshit from day one. I'll try to look more into it later.

Sure the president isn't directly responsible, but in that regard you can't hold the president accountable for ANYTHING other than maybe the war on gay marriage.

yeh, i don't remember this either, but maybe that's just me.

the debate about intelligence gets even more twisted when in come the allegations that bush planned on invading iraq pre-911. if that's at all true, i'm curious how they gathered intelligence. did they gather stuff that worked only in their favor? did they plan it pre-911 on the same information or did they dredge up this stuff in retort to 911? i think that bit confuses me.

I love this part. It's when we get to say whatever the hell we want, but we don't need any sources. Nope, we can just spout shit like "to state a fact, we won the war" and "a majority of the insurgents are foreign." As for your assertion that it's just as dangerous in some West African country as in Iraq:

http://icasualties.org/oif/
Dec '05: 17 US Fatalities
Nov '05: 84
Oct '05: 96

Etc., etc. I showed you mine, now show me yours. And until then, why don't you just STFU. Go to Iraq, talk to some of our boys, and ask them whether we won the war there. All the semantics in the world about where the enemy comes from don't make any difference; this is a war.

yeah, but look how much we've improved this month!

Well they killed 10 in one attack the other day, so the insurgents are taking a break for a couple. You know, it's all about dem quotas.

If the average holds constant, the number will add up to over 100 by December 31.

From your source:

"We do believe that the major players are in Zarqawi's network, and that's why we're focusing our operations against him," Lynch said in a recent interview. "We believe that the most lethal piece of the insurgency here is the terrorist and foreign fighters. And it's because of the level of violence they're willing to go to to accomplish their objective, which is to derail the democratic process and discredit the Iraqi government."

Although this article is in opposition to the statement from me about a majority of insurgents being foreign, the above quote is more along the lines of what I am trying to communicate.

Even if I were to concede on the argument of the number of foreign insurgents, there is wide agreement from your source and many others that the foreign insurgents are not necessarily directly involved in the attacks, rather are in charge of training the domestic "insurgents". There is a high liklihood that the reason not many foreign insurgents are captured or killed is because they are not actively fighting, although possibly present within Iraq at this time. You don't see Zarqawi doing car-bombings, for example. He is a leader and so goes down the chain...so you possibly have thousands of well-trained, ill-equipped domestic insurgents doing the work of foreign insurgents. If there were no al-qaeda, or abu sayyaf, or any other terror cell organisations influencing the domestic insurgents, what type of fight would there be? Hardly any I would assume. The domestic insurgents would have no financial backing, no training, and no chance. So, essentially, you cannot have an insurgency without the foreign influence, local and abroad.

I will, for the sake of a fair debate, agree with you that the majority of insurgents captured or killed are domestic. Even I am capable of admitting to receiving false information from trusted sources. However, further examination proves that the numbers are anything but conclusive in referrence to foreign insurgents. And, it is highly doubtful that foreign insurgents are not the main resource used and by domestic insurgents.

In referrence to the idea that the war is a war. I do not argue with that. I believe that the war that is geographically in Iraq at the present time is a war. However, that war was going on long before "Operation Iraqi Freedom". The terrorist war has simply become more complicated with the introduction of Iraq. It has given more reason for terrorist groups to attack. I will not argue with that claim either. However, my comments about the war for Iraq will stand. The war for Iraq has been won. We have removed Saddam from power and are int he process of introducing a constitution and a new independant country within those borders. But, there were essentially two wars taking place at the same time. The war for Iraq and the war on terrorism. It will be a long time before any major success will be seen in the war on terrorism, if ever. But, I do not beleive that we can do nothing about the terrorism that exists in a global sense. But, where we go, they will go. And where they go, we will go.

I see very little link between terrorism and Iraq. Despite what Bush has or did claim linking bin Laden and Iraq...it is quite obvious they were far separate from each other in the realm of terrorism.

And in referrence to "talk to some of our boys"--I do. I have 5 close friends of mine that were or are still in Iraq. Not a single one of them claims that what we are doing is wrong, pointless, or useless, or that we would benefit from withdrawing. You see, I spent most of my life very close to Norfolk, VA. It is the largest naval base in the world. If I ventured a guess, I would say that close to 50% of the people I come into contact with out here are military. My friends are all distraught that people over here want them to leave. I get into multiple arguments with them over this. I am not a supporter of war, by any means. However, tehre is little that can be done about that at this time. I have stopped arguing that war is bad because it's too late. That boat has sunk. Are you active military? Do you have family and friends in Iraq? Are you continually hearing first hand information from that area? How many of "our boys" have you spoken with?

It's not a competition really, but my beliefs and arguments are not formulated out of my imagination. I could post my future instant messaging conversations here if that would help you understand the information I am getting from the military I personally know over there.

Just because I hold a different belief than you and argue from a different perspective does not mean that I am unfounded in my claims.

The issue of fighting in other parts of the world...

I am not saying that the intensity is equal. What I was attempting to argue there was that we have people all over the world facing very similar dangers and threats. The argument that u.s. soldiers dying in Iraq seems to avoid the notion that they are not dying and fighting in other parts of the world. u.s. soldiers are facing violent threats all over the world and just because they are dying in Iraq doesn't overshadow that they are dying in other places. I mean, if you want me to, I can go through and try and find all the times in the past few years where american soldiers were injured, maimed, kidnapped, or killed outside of Iraq. It would take time and you'd have to allow for that. Especially because the focus in the media is never on those parts of the world so I would have to dig. And, since I have to put my trust in the Washington Post...I will try and find them for you...but,I think I will ask to PM them to you because it may be way after this thread is dead. Cool?

I'm not pro-war nor pro-Bush, though that is hard for some people to believe. I can even give enough reason for avoiding an Iraq invasion without using "Blood for Oil", "WMD", "Al Qaeda", "9/11", "faulty intelligence", "Halliburton", "chickenhawk", "lie" or "curveball".

Now, what I would like to know, is if the intelligence was always faulty, or did it suddenly become faulty in 2002? I don't remember any hassles over the legitimacy of claims concerning Hussein and WMD in the late 1990s. In fact, Congress passed Public Law 105-35 in 1998, and Clinton signed it.

From the law: Whereas Iraq's continuing weapons of mass destruction programs threaten vital United States interests and international peace and security: Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Government of Iraq is in material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations, and therefore the President is urged to take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations.

SOURCE: Public Law 105-235 Passed House 407-6; Passed Senate by Unanimous Consent

That same year, Congress passed (360-35/Unamimous Consent) the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998. The goal of this legislation: "it should be the policy of the United States to seek to remove the Saddam Hussein regime from power in Iraq and to replace it with a democratic government."

Also: "Urges the President to call upon the United Nations to establish an international criminal tribunal for the purpose of indicting, prosecuting, and imprisoning Saddam Hussein and other Iraqi officials who are responsible for crimes against humanity, genocide, and other criminal violations of international law.

Expresses the sense of the Congress that once the Saddam Hussein regime is removed from power in Iraq, the United States should support Iraq's transition to democracy by providing humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people and democracy transition assistance to Iraqi parties and movements with democratic goals, including convening Iraq's foreign creditors to develop a multilateral response to the foreign debt incurred by the Hussein regime."

SOURCE: Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 Passed House 360-38; Passed Senate by Unanimous Consent

The 2002 resolution authorizing military force against Iraq even borrowed from the 1998 law:

Whereas in Public Law 105-235 (August 14, 1998), Congress concluded that Iraq's continuing weapons of mass destruction programs threatened vital United States interests and international peace and security, declared Iraq to be in ``material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations'' and urged the President ``to take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations''

SOURCE: Public Law 107-243 Passed House 296-133; Passed Senate 77-23

If you take a look at the Yeas & Nays, there's a pretty definite pattern of Democrat legislators who voted for the first two but not the third. At the same time, there are several Senators who voted for the third, if not all three: Sens. Reid, Kerry, Harkin, Dodd, Lieberman, Schumer, Edwards, Rockefeller, et. al.

Now, seeing that Lieberman & Clinton don't surf the "Blood for Oil" wave, is someone able to reasonably articulate why this isn't political posturing? If not, do you accept the line that "Dumya" was able to dupe suave political intellectuals like Senators Kerry, Schumer & Edwards? At the same time, what did the group of Congressmen who voted for the 1998 resolutions learn so that they were informed enough to vote against the 2002 resolution?

My feeling is that Democrats have taken to rekindling the flames of 1968 because resurrecting the Anti-War Movement is much easier than carving out an economic policy that doesn't hate it when anyone is able to bank a little cash.

No, you can and I do hold him responsible for holding prisoners at Guantanamo Bay for years without charging them with any crime, for the Patriot Act and the administration's utter disregard for personal privacy and civil liberties, for the rapid growth in spending on his watch, and lots of things that probably bother you but not me that he's done or permitted to be done. And if you would disagree with the decision to go to war even if the intelligence had been correct, you can hold him accountable for that. I just think its silly to hold him accountable for poor intelligence. As Fu ably points out, we've apparently been wrong for a long time on that score.

[quote="Elvis Fu"]I'm not pro-war nor pro-Bush, though that is hard for some people to believe. I can even give enough reason for avoiding an Iraq invasion without using "Blood for Oil", "WMD", "Al Qaeda", "9/11", "faulty intelligence", "Halliburton", "chickenhawk", "lie" or "curveball".

Now, what I would like to know, is if the intelligence was always faulty, or did it suddenly become faulty in 2002? I don't remember any hassles over the legitimacy of claims concerning Hussein and WMD in the late 1990s.



I bumped this thread up to reply to this.
In December of 1998, the United States and the United Kingdom bombed Iraq for four days in which they targeted the no-fly zones and supposed weapons plant sites. I believe this was sited by Blix and in other intelligence as the primary reason we have yet to find any actual WMD's. The UN Weapons Inspectors assumed all the remaining functional WMD's were destroyed at that time and any upstart plants were disabled.

sorry, but of all this, what sticks out is: who here is able to bank a little cash?

that's because we blow all our $$$ on music and movies and other shit we don't need.