Will anyone hold up their hands and say we made a mistake? I doubt it. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-21786506
It is much easier to look back and say, this or that was wrong. When dealing with national security a decision must be made and it must be one that covers all possibilities. Very often in the world of information gathering, sources that are almost certainly bad must still be considered when making a decision. Sometimes a leader must act as an actual leader and make a tough decision that may make him look bad, especially to a biased media. If we're wrong we look bad, if we're right we stopped a terrible disaster. I'm sure they were more concerned with stopping a disaster than saving face with the media later.
It seems Iraq war is not the case of "not keeping a good face", of "making tough national security decisions" or of "false intelligence". Because "they" knew exactly that there are no WMD in Iraq, "they" used deliberate lies to justify the aggression, "they" totally disregarded their countries' national interests (well, except for USA's interests maybe, but I am not sure even in that), and the only possible outcome of the war was very predictable - prolonged suffering, death, instability, another nest for muslim terrorists - and it happened. And why? Totally no profit, except for some bloody oil for some unknown benefactors, who, I am sure, had enough oil to drown them in it infinite amount of times =[
Sergio I respect your opinion, but I think it is based on what you've read and not what you've seen. My unit was there in 90/91 when we pushed Iraq out of Kuwait and the proof was there. We did not only push them out, but we exacted a heavy price on Baghdad too. The amount of chemical weapons he used on his own people is horrific by itself. I'm not sure if people choose not to believe the mass graves were real or what they tell themselves, but the bottom line is it was a tough decision made to protect America and not to pander the media. It's sad that what the media says is what is accepted as the truth without question. The truth is, even as the media hated to show, the areas that were finally examined by the search teams DID have a residue of the chemicals that had been moved. We were dealing with a man who had been hiding and moving these same weapons for 12 years, it's obvious he would get good at hiding them. I spent two weeks of my life chasing a group of scuds that were expertly moved about. We have to keep in mind that many of the inspections were held off and areas were restricted. In short, we were not allowed to search the areas until they were ready to be searched.
Yea, exactly. He had chemical weapons earlier. He used them in distant past. But he had not them during the last war. Because, finally he agreed to what UN demanded. Now, where is the profit in agreeing to UN, if one gets killed after it? So if someone has WMD, he will not give it up, and if one has no WMD, he will try to get it ASAP, because being a good guy does not help, only being sufficiently dangerous does. Well, for me it was always obvious, and last Iraq war is just another proof. Furthermore, even if there would be WMD in Iraq, they could not pose such a threat as the current boiling snake nest of fanatical suicide bombers, a snake nest USA&Company made. And this is very sad.
Myself, I see what you call the current Iraq war as merely a continuation of a job we left unfinished, but that is just my personal opinion. Of course he agreed with the UN, the UN bought him the time he needed to secure the WMD and set up the protocols needed to prevent the inspectors from looking where they actually were. Remember it was the UN that OK'd his selling of the food and medicine that was sent to help the people of Iraq, completely negating the embargoes in place. The suicide bombers are made by religious extremists taking advantage of young and uninformed minds in order to impose their beliefs and doctrines on others, not by a group of countries protecting their interests abroad.
To my best understanding, Hussein cooperated insofar as he allowed the U.N. to destroy his remaining stockpiles of WMD. But he interfered with the U.N. when they tried to confirm there were no further stockpiles that he was still concealing, probably to maintain their credibility as a threat to his enemies. This, plus his attempts to acquire new technology, caused the U.S. to decide it could no longer tolerate having him in power. So, in accordance with the U.N. regulated cease-fire agreements from the '91 war, we removed him from power. That the Russians, among his other friends, disagreed with this decision is irrelevant, as they had not acted to alleviate this situation before it fell to the U.S. and it's allies to do so. Remember, it was the Russians that provided the original WMD in the first place.
When I say Scud I'm referring to a specific missile, the R-11, a Soviet theater-range weapon that was manufactured by the Votkinsk Machine Building Plant from 1959 to 1984. The Scud was his main means of deploying said WMD.
Well, we're getting another lesson on what happens when some piece of crap gets his hands on WMD's from North Korea and Syria. Hussein used them on his own people and on Iran. The Syrians have already used them on their own people. And North Korea is threatening it's neighbors with nuclear attack. I'm sure the U.S. isn't going to have to get very involved in Syria as other nations have already stepped up to the plate on that one. It would be nice if some North Korean general would pull out his service pistol and solve North Korea's problems, but that hasn't happened yet. We're a pretty interested and opinionated bunch. What do you think should be done in these situations?
I'm ruminating on all this and am going to look up some facts this weekend. Too shattered to think at the moment. I'd say the fact that we can discuss this intelligently is something positive.
