Why did we go into Iraq?

[headsplice]

I posted this on another forum, but since you folks are generally smarter than they are, or at least more vocal about your opinions, I thought I'd give you a chance to respond:
I read this post by Digby and it got me thinking:
The leaders of our government lied to us. As a result, our soldiers are in a foreign country dying and not getting anything real accomplished except pissing away shit tons of money and thoroughly irritating off a bunch of people who have shown a willingness to bring the noise back to US soil and US civilians.
So, why isn't anyone beyond 'crazy liberals' standing up and saying, "What the fuck happened here?"

[Undertoad]

"For instance, what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began? You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary."

That's from this precious Downing St memo: the Brits, even the skeptical author of the memo, believe that Saddam has WMD and is willing to use them proactively against innocent bystanders.

The memo does not say what you think it does, especially in light of the timetable of 2002-2003. The word "fixed" does not mean what you think it does and the whole thing is the opinion of one person.

Your Digby says "It's true that there have been many hints --- the biggest of which is that, uh, there weren't any fucking WMD --- but this is clear proof that they lied prior to that." Why does he fail to acknowledge the WMD reference in the Downing St memo? Because he can't see it - it's invisible to him, because to acknowledge it would weaken his point of view.

Don't listen to people like that.

[Happy Monkey]

Your red quote says that Rumsfeld told them Saddam had WMDs, and the Brits asked questions using that premise.

"fixed" in this case means cherry picked and massaged.

It is not an opinion memo, it is the minutes of a meeting.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Your red quote says that Rumsfeld told them Saddam had WMDs, and the Brits asked questions using that premise.

The memo does not suggest any such thing. The quote is speculation by Brit military.

"fixed" in this case means cherry picked and massaged.

It does not. The paragraph tells us that they wanted to use military force and now sought intelligence to justify that approach.

That's a subtle difference, but it's important.

If the US administration wanted to cherry-pick and massage the intelligence, this would not be the subject of a British government meeting with memos.

If any of the Brits in this meeting felt the Americans were lying, chrry-picking or massaging, the meeting would be quite different.

It is not an opinion memo, it is the minutes of a meeting.

And that section of the memo is the minutes reporting the opinion of one person.

Nice try HM, but your own bias is showing in your interpretation.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

The memo does not suggest any such thing. The quote is speculation by Brit military.

Sorry. I indeed read it wrong there.

It does not. The paragraph tells us that they wanted to use military force and now sought intelligence to justify that approach.

That's a subtle difference, but it's important.

What is the difference? Making a decision and then asking for intelligence to justify it is the very definition of cherry picking and massaging.

And that section of the memo is the minutes reporting the opinion of one person.

Well, I guess you can always dismiss any report as the opinion of the author. But that was "C's" report on his meeting.

[headsplice]

None of which answers my question.
There are serious consequences for what the United States government, as a whole (including the Democrats that voted for war) has done. We have, literally, done exactly what al-Qaeda has told the Islamic world do. That is, invade a sovereign Middle Eastern nation under a pretext (and the Downing Street Memo is just more of a growing body of circumstantial evidence that the reasons given for invading Iraq were all bullshit) to secure a supply of oil.
Long story, short: we blew it. Badly. Yet we still persist in maintaining the illusion, at least at home, that things are going well. They are not. Sure most of the country isn't against us like in Vietnam. But most of the country isn't happy with the way we're acting while we're there.
So, why is no one calling foul on the way the war was originally justified? Or, for a lesser standard: someone give me one reason that the Administration still uses today that it started with in 2002: WMD's? Not a snowball's chance in Iraq. Free Iraq? Not one of the originals, sorry. Links to terrorists: sorry, not true and never was (pre-war). Topple Saddam because he's a bad guy: *ahem* BS.

[lookout123]

could you please go back in American history and pick which wars we entered for solely the justifications given to the american public. while you're at it, try to match up the justification that was commonly used at the end of the war with the ones circulated before the war.

i am not saying that you shouldn't be indignant, but it is important to remember that the government has to sell any action it wants to take to the public. quite often the real motives won't excite the masses into support for the plan, so more palatable arguments are used. something about the lowest common denominator.

welcome to gov't by the people, for the people... don't it just suck?

[tw]

Originally Posted by headsplice

None of which answers my question.
There are serious consequences for what the United States government, as a whole (including the Democrats that voted for war) has done. We have, literally, done exactly what al-Qaeda has told the Islamic world do. That is, invade a sovereign Middle Eastern nation under a pretext (and the Downing Street Memo is just more of a growing body of circumstantial evidence that the reasons given for invading Iraq were all bullshit) to secure a supply of oil.

You have gotten far closer to the truth than some of your replies. They need step back and see the big picture. Point one is a group called Muslim Brotherhood whose existence dates back to the 1400s. Their enemies are secular Arabic governments. They victims include Sadat of Egypt. They tried to take out Hussein of Jordan and nearly took out Assad of Syria. One of their great enemies was Saddam of Iraq.

One branch of the Muslim Brotherhood is Al Qaeda. But to confuse the issues, many (including some here) have even denied the existence of the Muslim Brotherhood - so as to put a single face to the enemy. That propaganda enemy is called Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda did this and that and ... wait? Who attacked the WTC in 1993? Another branch of ... the Muslim Brotherhood. Not Al Qaeda. Why did we suddenly become the enemy of so many branches in the Muslim Brotherhood?

Now we introduce another concept. What is the purpose of war? To return a conflict to the negotiation table. The most stupendous military victory can be lost if the political side does not plan for the peace. It is why war is fought with a strategic objective. It is why plans for the 'peace' settlement are made often before the first major battles are even fought. Informed political leaders are taught the lessons of history - including the most simple of facts from Sze Tsu's 500 BC book "Art of War". An informed neocon administration would have clearly understood that the police and army are never disbanded. But that is the difference between those who learn from history verses extremists who want to fix history with a political agenda.

When FDR and Churchill planned WWII, they established up front the strategic objective: unconditional surrender. If you don't appreciate why that simple phrase was so divisive to what the world would become, then you have not yet learned from history. Many meetings even at the highest levels were conducted to plan for the peace including Yalta, Tehran, etc. Therefore WWII was a victory because political types prepared for and executed an unconditional surrender.

How to not fight a war - no strategic objective - was Vietnam. The war was created on lies - no smoking gun. It had no strategic objective. It had no objectives from which political types could plan for the peace. Same is true in Somalia.

[To be continued in a next post]

[tw]

[continued from the previous one post]

Now that we have introduced concepts that history students should well understand, we go to the Kuwait rescue war. The strategic objective was so painfully obvious that only a fool would call for a move onto Baghdad. The liberation of Kuwait was a phenomenal military victory rarely ever seen in history. And then when Schwarzkopf asked the political types for the terms of Iraqi surrender, well, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc were all back in Washington drinking champagne. They never bothered to plan for the peace.

Politicians literally threw away one of the world's most amazing military victories. Saddam moved on to massacre thousands - as even the US Army sat five miles away watching. Saddam then attempted to restart his weapons of mass destruction programs knowing full well his borders contained enemies who would hang him if he did not - especially Iran.

Back up a bit. What did we promise the Arab world after the Kuwait rescue? We promised to leave. We did not. The no fly zone and fully staffed US military bases dotted Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf countries, etc. We even located one full naval fleet headquarters right in Arab countries. And so in 1991, Muslim Brotherhood saw a new threat to the Arab world and Islam. Previously, Americans were not targets. They most definitely were now. We lied. US did not leave the holiest of Islamic countries.

The first attack was in 1993 on WTC 1. Technically, the 1st Tower should have collapsed upon the second tower. Due to construction superior to what was on paper, WTC 1 did not collapse. That faction of the Muslim Brotherhood disintegrated as this nation's #1 anti-terrorist investigator broke open the entire network - that faction of the Muslim Brotherhood.

Another faction was attempting to liberate Yemen from communists when they too saw the American's lie. Bin Laden was nothing more than a support operative who promoted himself as a great leader. His successes were mostly fictional. Only a few followed him until America lied about leaving. Suddenly bin Laden had credibility when he focuses on that American lie. And so an obscure radical faction, eventually forced to flee first to Sudan and later to Afghanistan, somehow managed to coordinate two simultaneous attacks on US embassies.

The US knew something was coming. The US just assumed it was coming elsewhere and made preparations elsewhere. As devastating as those attacks were, it harmed few Americans but harmed many native Kenyans and Tanzanians. The blow was that bin Laden, up to this point nothing more than a suspected money man, could be patient enough and sophisticated enough to get low intelligence extremists to be so destructive. Suddenly bin Laden was a new Muslim Brotherhood threat - and was doing something new - targetting America.

There were other Muslim Brotherhood groups. The attack on Kobe Towers. The massive Millennium New Years Day attacks that Clinton stopped by properly warning government officials AND empowered government anti-terrorists to stop those attacks. Clinton took the threat very seriously and promoted Richard Clark's anti-terrorist group to senior White House levels. We found the bomb intended for LAX in WA because the fat, black Custom officer was told to watch for suspicious activity (Clinton would read his PDBs). She called for backup and chased down a suspect who, in turn lead to suspected bombings in Montreal, Times Square New Years Eve, the Radisson Hotel in Amman Jordan, and others. The only attack not discovered (by empowered little government employees permitted to do their job) was the attack on the destroyer USS The Sullivans. That attack failed because terrorists put too much explosives in the boat; the boat sank.

Notice how terrorism fails when a president reads his PDBs and understands them.

Well now we get a president who does not read his memos AND ignored warnings that became known as 11 September. At least five separate FBI teams were on the trail of the 11 September plot. All were forced by senior officials to stop their investigations for various reasons. This administration had other political agendas. Two agents in Chicago who discovered the money trail were literally yelled at, "You will not open a criminal investigation." But the neocons had mistakes in history to fix. Even Richard Clark's anti-terrorist group was demoted from senior level where the bureacracy would first negotiate their recommendations.

Meanwhile, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfovich and other neocons who drank champaign instead of planning for Saddam's surrender realized how they would go down into history. They returned to office still viewing the world in terms of cold war adversaries. The anti-terrorist committee group was even removed from the White House since terrrorism was not part of that agenda. The nation's #1 anti-terrorist investigator (who broke the 1993 WTC attack and identified the USS Coles attackers) was driven from government service. First agenda was to fix the Saddam problem they had created. The terrorism that the mistake made was not considered strategically important. Even the 11 September Commission report makes it obvious.

When bin Laden created 11 September, these White House neocons needed a way to put their Iraq invasion plans back on track. As the UK memo points out, the US intended to attack Iraq long before - which is why neocons were looking for anything to blame Saddam for 11 September. The found gullible Americans who would even belive lies and myths about WMDs - and still today spin some details to prove they were right.

As a result of neocon political agenda, the US military never made a serious attempt to get bin Laden. Furthermore, any attempt was half baked - ill planned afterthoughts - that in Tora Bora literally violated military principles for such combat. Many good soldiers died there due to no long term planning at the highest levels.

The president's Jan 2002 State of the Union Address was rigged so that we would assume Saddam and bin Laden was a same enemy. Something like 70% of Americans intially fell for that lie. Bin Laden is still free because we never sent even one division to get him. The agenda was Saddam - to fix mistakes that neocons created in 1990. Even the UK memo noted that agenda. The attack on Saddam was a done deal long before we were moving troops. Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfovich, etc had to fix their reputations - their 1990 mistake. Previously the US was not regarded as an enemy. The neocons mistake even turned Muslim Brotherhood attention against the US.

Now this is long. It cannot be put in to a sound byte. Therefore many readers have long since given up - looking for simpler reasons. There is no simpler answer. The Iraq invasion was planned and intended by the same neocons who also intend to fix the world - part of their larger plan that even includes complete mistrust of the Russians and Chinese (remember the shooting war we almost started with China over a silly spy plane? Thank Colin Powell for finally stifling the American neocons who were openly advocating war with China).

The other two neocon invasion targets are Iran and North Korea. (Why was Syria not put on the list? Syria was a secret ally of the US providing substanical intelligence information about Saddam et al - until we lied about and attacked Sadam.) Only incompetent leaders in both countries would not be building nuclear weapons. America, a country that now condones torture, also intends to unilaterally attack both nations. We said so in the strategic objective defined in January 2002 - the axis of evil. Many did not really believe the US would abandon a well proven doctrine of containment to do what Tojo and Hitler did - unprovoked and unjustified war on another sovereign nation without either a declaration of war or the approval of the UN.

Now that we unilaterally attacked a sovereign nation (Pearl Harbor style), you can damn well bet Iran and N Korea are building numerous defensive WMDs as any responsible nation would do.

There is no mystery to all this - unless you have a political agenda. Extremists will nit pick these lessons of history to no end. Some are still trying to justify their support of a lie about WMDs. But as evidence continues to come forth - from aluminum tubes that were never appropriate for WMD production, to the various factions of Muslim Brotherhood, and latest is a memo written for Tony Blair - this administration intends to fix the world pre-emptively. This administration has decided to force democracy on other nations as part of a larger plan. And yes, even the Caspian Sea Oil pipeline was strategically located based upon a geo-political plan that has been making Russia's Putin very nervous. Don't fool yourself. This administration has a game plan that included fixing their mistakes, getting more oil (instead of innovating), making allies only for our strategic interests, and masking it all with some nonsense about righteousness, Christian values, and democracy.

We know where they intend to go. Troop movements and military base construction has long been in progress for a future Iran invasion. Why do we have so many bases in all those Kha-stan nations in Central Asia? Under George Jr, we intend to fix the world as if it were a white man's burden - and so that we can get more oil - a strategically necessary entity for a country that advocates more consumption, fixing the world by force, less scientific innovation, and more active military-geo-political solutions (pre-emption) in direct opposition to the well proven strategy of containment (prevention).

Believe me. This is the very abridged version.

[mrnoodle]

There is a certain segment of the population who believes that anything that happens in the middle east is an oil-grab. We would have gotten much more oil (since there would've been less sabotage) at a much lower price by making nice with Saddam.

It's not about WMD anymore, obviously. It is about liberating a country from an oppressive regime, but with a payoff for the West. By having a secular, democratic buffer smack in the middle of the region (a great strategic location for military as well), we actually fix lots of potential problems. If Syria decides to use the Palestine/Israel conflict to make a major move against the filthy Zionists, we can kick them in the butt and simultaneously block aid from Iran. For that matter, we've thrown a big monkey wrench in the Shiite plan to utterly consume the middle east. Saddam was too secular for them as it was....now that Satan himself has taken up residence, they're worse off than ever. Damn, what if this democracy thing catches on? Lots of white-bearded religious leaders are going to lose alot of political clout.

No, it's not about WMDs. We get it. Bush perpetuated bad info. But it's not as much about oil as it is about a bunch of forward-looking geopolitical maneuvering. I think.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

By having a secular, democratic buffer smack in the middle of the region (a great strategic location for military as well), we actually fix lots of potential problems.

Actually, instead of "secular, democratic buffer", I'd substitute "huge US military base". If it got too democratic, they might vote us out.

If Syria decides to use the Palestine/Israel conflict to make a major move against the filthy Zionists, we can kick them in the butt and simultaneously block aid from Iran. For that matter, we've thrown a big monkey wrench in the Shiite plan to utterly consume the middle east. Saddam was too secular for them as it was....now that Satan himself has taken up residence, they're worse off than ever.

Who's worse off? A US presence in the Middle East is exactly what the terrorist leaders need to ramp up recruiting, and military action isn't effective against terrorism.

No, it's not about WMDs. We get it. Bush perpetuated bad info. But it's not as much about oil as it is about a bunch of forward-looking geopolitical maneuvering. I think.

This is exactly what the Project for the New American Century was advocating. Take out Iraq, and build up a military presence in the heart of the Middle East. At the time, connections drawn between the PNAC and its members in the administration were considered to be nutty conspiracy theories. Now the PNAC line is being used as justification after the fact... Weird.

[mrnoodle]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Who's worse off? A US presence in the Middle East is exactly what the terrorist leaders need to ramp up recruiting, and military action isn't effective against terrorism.

The shah and his cronies are. Our presence does make for juicier propogandizing and recruitment tactics, no question. But for the larger goal of establishing one big Islamic superpower with the head in Tehran, it's a backbreaker. Now, instead of using terrorism in conjunction with backroom deal-making to achieve their goals, the Shiites will have to distance themselves from the terror cells they created to get any policymaking to go their way.

And while military action can't answer every terrorist act tete-a-tete, it is effective. Once the tanks come in, it's a war of attrition -- regardless of what kind of war the terrorists would like to wage, we can kill them faster than they can kill us, and eventually they won't have the numbers to be effective. That's not counting the effect that running water, electricity, new schools, hospitals and women voting have on the message of the terrorists.

Every day the NY Times/al Jazeera runs an article talking about the US' failure in Iraq. Every day the death toll rises as more employment lines are bombed by terrorists. Yet every day, the lines fill up again, with more and more Iraqis banding together to take control of their country's future. If one is killed, two more dry their tears and come to stand in his/her place. As more Americans see what's actually occurring in country (thanks to the blogosphere and other non-big-media sources), fewer of them give credence to the obvious political partisanship of the "traditional" media.

All of this can be filed away under "Good Thing".

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

Now, instead of using terrorism in conjunction with backroom deal-making to achieve their goals, the Shiites will have to distance themselves from the terror cells they created to get any policymaking to go their way.

Why? They've always been "wink wink nudge nudge" distanced from the terror cells officially. Why wouldn't they continue this arrangement now that the cells are getting an influx of new recruits?

And looking at the recruitment numbers, I don't think we're the ones who benefit in a war of attrition. Israel certainly hasn't, despite their military advantage.

[mrnoodle]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Why? They've always been "wink wink nudge nudge" distanced from the terror cells officially. Why wouldn't they continue this arrangement now that the cells are getting an influx of new recruits?

There has always been an "everyone does it" mentality in the middle east in regards to terrorism, and it's a shaky foundation. If even ONE country takes an official (and unofficial) stand against terrorism as a matter of policy, the rest have to follow suit. Why? For the same reason that the school bully loses his playground mojo after one person stands up to him.

And looking at the recruitment numbers, I don't think we're the ones who benefit in a war of attrition. Israel certainly hasn't, despite their military advantage.

Israel hasn't gotten serious yet. They came close when they barricaded Arafat in his compound, but they just couldn't pull the trigger on it. May God have mercy on whoever twists Israel's tail hard enough to make it really bite. People seem to see the US as Israel's attack dog, but it's the US that has kept Israel from reducing the whole middle east to a slagheap. At least that's the impression I have.

[Undertoad]

Maybe you weren't aware that the original foreign policy of regime change, by use of military force if necessary, was initiated by President Clinton.

Perhaps you didn't know that it was Clinton's CIA head who called the WMD a "slam dunk" before the Downing Street memo.

Perhaps you didn't concern yourself, pre-war, with the fact that sanctions were a failure as a policy and that the UN became more interested in preserving the status quo than in solving the problems involved, possibly due to corruption.

Maybe you weren't paying attention when the Saudis changed their own stripes to actively pursue al Qaeda.

Maybe you didn't care that a lot of the anti-war rationales worldwide were due to oil contracts given to the various Hussein supporters.

Could it be the administration's non-WMD rationales were very much a part of the stated pre-war justification and that all those rationales are forgotten or ignored by your sources?

Did you not pay attention to Saddam's support for other terrorists or the link to the 1993 WTC bombing, or are those thing not really relevant to you?

Sorry for the stupid attitude I take here, I can't help myself, I would not be an asshole in real life.