Why Iraq?

The news says OFL is “taking aim” and “firing back” at Democrats as he defends his war policy. Here is something he said yesterday:

The truth is that investigations of intelligence on Iraq have concluded that only one person manipulated evidence and misled the world — and that person was Saddam Hussein. In early 2004, when weapons inspector David Kay testified that he had not found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, he also testified that, “Iraq was in clear material violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441. They maintained programs and activities, and they certainly had the intentions at a point to resume their programs. So there was a lot they wanted to hide because it showed what they were doing that was illegal.”

Saddam fooled us all! He wanted the world to think he had banned weapons. He and his terrorist minions all wanted to make US look bad, so they created all kinds of evidence to draw the US into Iraq and make US look bad on the world stage! I’ll bet Saddam is even the one who fabricated the badly forged documents to make it look like he had tried to get yellow cake from Niger.

Well, it worked alright. Saddam drew us into Iraq with his lies and tainted intelligence. He and his terrorist minions figured we’d get in there, Saddam would hide down in a spider hole for a while, the terrorists and insurgents would drive US out of Iraq— just as they drove US out of other places back when we had some other president —and Saddam would emerge victorious once again to rule over his terrorist kingdom and push the “resume” button on his immense WMD production facilities. The conveyors would begin rolling, churning out chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, long range missiles and unmanned aircraft, empowering the kingdom to spread its terrifying terrorist tendrils out into every area of the world.

But his plan fell apart almost before it started. It failed to account for OFL‘s steadfast resolve and commitment to victory! Now Saddam sits in jail, his terrorist empire a shambles replaced with democracy; flourishing with freedom and flowers. How painful it must have been that day down in his cold and lonely spider hole while the multitudes cheered and his statue toppled in Baghdad!

[That’s my straw man for the day. Click ‘more’ to read the rest of the post, serious stuff included.]

Well, OFL laid out his case for why the Iraq war was the right thing to do. He ran the familiar yet constantly evolving gauntlet of justifications:

• Defend freedom from terrorists.
• Terrorism is bad.
• Terrorists are evil (but not insane.)
• Terrorists seek “a totalitarian empire that denies all political and religious freedom.”
• Terrorists state their intentions on video and audio tapes and the internet.
• Terrorists want the US and other Western countries out of the Mid East.
• Terrorists want us to leave Iraq so they can take the country over and make it a “a terrorist sanctuary.”
• The terrorists want to control a country so they can then “establish a radical Islamic empire that reaches from Indonesia to Spain.”
• We cannot dismiss the terrorists goals no matter how crazy.
• We cannot back down from the terrorists.

OK, so maybe there are terrorists in Iraq now— drawn to the instability of a power void, as a moth is drawn to the flame —who wish to establish “a terrorist sanctuary.” If this is true, it would be a good reason to ensure that security will be provided for before we withdraw from the country. But why did we invade and destabilize Iraq in the first place?

…we gave Saddam Hussein a final chance to comply with the United Nations Security Council resolutions, ordering him to disclose, disarm, or face serious consequences. When he refused, we had a choice: Do we take the word of a madman and forget the lessons of September the 11th, or do we take action to defend our country?

Let’s just say, hypothetically, that Iraq had no viable stockpiles of WMD and that their ability to manufacture new ones was crippled. Would it even be possible to disclose or disarm? Or would the effort to prove a negative be perceived as a refusal to disclose and disarm worthy of serious consequences?

Reasonable people can disagree about the conduct of the war, but it is irresponsible for Democrats to now claim that we misled them and the American people. Leaders in my administration and members of the United States Congress from both political parties looked at the same intelligence on Iraq, and reached the same conclusion: Saddam Hussein was a threat.

Well, Fair Reader, back then even Your Montag was rabid with the scary-as-shit “intelligence” that was floating around at the time. Even Your Montag had reached the conclusion that Saddam was a threat and was calling for his head. Even so, do you know what Your Montag thought was irresponsible back then? A full scale unilateral invasion of a sovereign country. (Or a bilateral invasion, or an invasion with a fake coalition of the willing, for that matter.) Setting aside the question of whether the administration and members of congress actually got a look at the same intelligence, Your Montag blames the Democrats in congress every bit as much as the administration, if not more for relinquishing their Constitutional war powers and the responsibility that goes with them.

Yes “irresponsible” is the word for it. However, it’s all the other words OFL got wrong here. We should figure out exactly what happened with the intelligence and why all the caveats, qualifiers and disclaimers that the intelligence agencies claim were included in their assessments were apparently stripped from the rhetoric the public got, and possibly the intelligence estimates congress saw. And yes, it must all come out. If some shitbag lied, Your Montag wants to know it. If some dumb-as-shit representative or senator was too stupid to realize they were being duped, (think of Jar-Jar Binks,) Your Montag wants to know about that too.

The truth is that investigations of intelligence on Iraq have concluded that only one person manipulated evidence and misled the world — and that person was Saddam Hussein. In early 2004, when weapons inspector David Kay testified that he had not found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, he also testified that, “Iraq was in clear material violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441. They maintained programs and activities, and they certainly had the intentions at a point to resume their programs. So there was a lot they wanted to hide because it showed what they were doing that was illegal.”

Saddam fooled us all! He wanted the world to think he had banned weapons. He and his terrorist minions all wanted to make US look bad, so they created all kinds of evidence to draw the US into Iraq and make US look bad on the world stage! I’ll bet Saddam is even the one who fabricated the badly forged documents to make it look like he had tried to get yellow cake from Niger. It was he who allowed the Alliance to know the location of the shield generator. (Oh wait, that’s two Star Wars references in one post. Disregard that.)

Well, it worked alright. Saddam drew us into Iraq with his lies and tainted intelligence. He and his terrorist minions figured we’d get in there, Saddam would hide down in a spider hole for a while, the terrorists and insurgents would drive US out of Iraq— just as they drove US out of other places back when we had some other president —and Saddam would emerge victorious once again to rule over his terrorist kingdom and push the “resume” button on his immense WMD production facilities. The conveyors would begin rolling, churning out chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, long range missiles and unmanned aircraft, empowering the kingdom to spread its terrifying terrorist tendrils out into every area of the world.

But his plan fell apart almost before it started. It failed to account for OFL‘s steadfast resolve and commitment to victory! Now Saddam sits in jail, his terrorist empire a shambles replaced with democracy; flourishing with freedom and flowers. How painful it must have been that day down in his cold and lonely spider hole while the multitudes cheered and his statue toppled in Baghdad!

…some Democrats who voted to authorize the use of force are now rewriting the past. They are playing politics with this issue and they are sending mixed signals to our troops and the enemy. And that’s irresponsible.

OK, we went over this above already. But since to OFL it bears repeating, so I too shall repeat:

Do you know what Your Montag thought was irresponsible back then? A full scale unilateral invasion of a sovereign country. (Or a bilateral invasion, or an invasion with a fake coalition of the willing, for that matter.) Your Montag blames the Democrats in congress every bit as much as the administration, if not more, for relinquishing their Constitutional war powers and the responsibility that goes with them.

Your Montag, ever generous, applauds those who admit mistakes, take responsibility when they err and seek the truth of why.

White House: President Delivers Remarks at Elmendorf AFB on War on Terror