03-31-2005, 12:25 PM | #1 | ||
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OT - Presidential Commission: Iraq Intelligence 'Dead Wrong'
Link: Report: Iraq Intelligence 'Dead Wrong'
Quote: "The U.S. intelligence community was "simply wrong" in its assessments of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities before the U.S. invasion, a presidential commission said Thursday. "We conclude that the intelligence community was dead wrong in almost all of its prewar judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction," said a letter from the commission to President Bush. "This was a major intelligence failure." Full Text: WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. intelligence community was "simply wrong" in its assessments of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities before the U.S. invasion, a presidential commission said Thursday. "We conclude that the intelligence community was dead wrong in almost all of its prewar judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction," said a letter from the commission to President Bush. "This was a major intelligence failure." The panel -- called the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction -- formally presented its report to Bush on Thursday morning. Bush praised the commission for presenting an "unvarnished look at our intelligence community." He said the report's recommendations were "thoughtful and extremely significant," adding that the "central conclusion is one that I share --America's intelligence community needs fundamental change to successfully confront the threats of the 21st century." The commission lists numerous intelligence shortcomings and makes more than 70 recommendations in the almost 600-page report. The report calls for a complete transformation of the intelligence community, which it described as "fragmented, loosely managed and poorly coordinated." "The 15 intelligence organizations are a 'community' in name only and rarely act with a unity of purpose," the panel said in its overview of the report. The report also expressed misgivings about U.S. intelligence on Iran, North Korea, China and Russia, but it said most of those findings were classified. "We can say here that we found that we have only limited access to critical information about several of these high-priority intelligence targets," the report said. An October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate warned that Iraq was pursuing weapons of mass destruction, had reconstituted its nuclear weapon program and had biological and chemical weapons. The Bush administration used those conclusions as part of its argument for the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. But the Iraq Survey Group -- set up to look for weapons of mass destruction or evidence of them in the country -- issued a final report saying it saw no weapons or no evidence that Iraq was trying to reconstitute them. The commission's report said the principal cause of the intelligence failures was the intelligence community's "inability to collect good information about Iraq's WMD programs, serious errors in analyzing what information it could gather and a failure to make clear just how much of its analysis was based on assumptions rather than good evidence." "The single most prominent a recurring theme" of its recommendations is "stronger and more centralized management of the intelligence community, and, in general, the creation of a genuinely integrated community, instead of a loose confederation of independent agencies." The panel urged Bush to give broad authority to John Negroponte when he is confirmed as the director of national intelligence. "It won't be easy to provide this leadership to the intelligence components of the Defense Department or to the CIA. They are some of the government's most headstrong agencies," the report warned the president. "Sooner or later, they will try to run around -- or over -- the [director of national intelligence]. Then, only your determined backing will convince them that we cannot return to the old ways." The report also called for changes at the FBI, including the creation of a new National Security Service that would merge the agency's counterterrorism and counterintelligence divisions. After the intelligence failures in Iraq, Bush appointed the nine-member commission led by Laurence Silberman, a senior federal appellate court judge and a Republican who was in the Nixon and Ford administrations, and former Sen. and Virginia Gov. Chuck Robb, a Democrat. |
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03-31-2005, 12:26 PM | #2 |
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dola...
And while this is usually when Dutch comes in and says that "everyone thought Iraq had WMD," he's wrong. This report is a kind of bitter vindication for those of who argued that the rush to war was overlooking some serious concerns about the intelligence. Now it matters only as a lesson for the future. Last edited by NoMyths : 03-31-2005 at 12:26 PM. |
03-31-2005, 12:27 PM | #3 | |
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03-31-2005, 12:28 PM | #4 |
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you really get off on this, eh Bry?
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03-31-2005, 12:29 PM | #5 |
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does the sacrificial lab always have to die?
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03-31-2005, 12:38 PM | #6 |
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Bush gets what he wanted - a Presidential Commission to tell him that it was all the CIA's fault.
Reading the summaries, I have two conclusions (which aren't new, but hey!): 1. Given that this Commission says the intel was bad, the CIA hasn't done much to rectify the situation (of intel-gathering) and current intel on threats from places like Iran, Syria and North Korea is probably also bad, will Bush take a step back from the sabre-rattling and let cooler heads prevail? Should he (this question directed at the Bush supporters)? 2. I still don't buy it. What the Commission doesn't go into is how Cheney and his cronies set up shop in the Pentagon in the summer of 2002 and leaned on the CIA to produce results to their liking. Not to mention that Tenet clearly wanted to deliver for Bush, to make up for the 9/11 fiasco (and possibly otherwise). It's a chicken-and-egg scenario - Did Bush go to war because of faulty intelligence, or did Bush get faulty intelligence because he wanted to go to war? Anyway, for those of you who don't have me on your "ignore" list already, feel free to flame away. |
03-31-2005, 12:38 PM | #7 |
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One point that seemed to escape many of the 'doves' pre invasion Iraq was that the lack of good intel was part of the reason *for* going to war. Saddam wanted us to be unsure of his WMD capabilities, and that, added to his known predatory tendencies, fed the whole cycle of UN resolution/kicking out the inspectors/etc.
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03-31-2005, 12:39 PM | #8 | |
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03-31-2005, 12:45 PM | #9 | |
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So, we give up the lives of 1500+ American servicemen and countless Iraqis, spend billions of dollars, and get ourselves entangled in the 21st century's Vietnam to what? Gather some intel? That's pretty weak, if you ask me. Besides, even a cursory look at statements from the IAEA, as well as the State Department's in-house intelligence unit, and also even some CIA statements, all from 2001-2003, indicate significant doubt to complete belief that Iraq lacked WMD. In retrospect, Bush & Cheney ignored the correct analyses, which also stood on firmer historical ground, and went with the more speculative analyses, which have turned out to be wholly and completely incorrect. Last edited by flere-imsaho : 03-31-2005 at 12:50 PM. |
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03-31-2005, 12:47 PM | #10 | |
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I don't know. Obviously, this should give the President as well as the entire country pause the next time something like this occurs. However, what if the intelligence IS right bout Iran, Syria and North Korea and we do nothing because we are too scared that the intelligence may be incorrect? It was also my understanding that the CIA is trying to add more feet in the street to increase the accuracy of intelligence post-9/11.
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03-31-2005, 12:51 PM | #11 | |
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03-31-2005, 12:53 PM | #12 | ||
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By that argument, though, we should be invading a short list of 5, and a long list of 15 countries. I would hope that this would spur our leaders to ask for a better quality of evidence before making these decisions. One could argue that now that we know what went wrong, we can evaluate future evidence in that light. Quote:
The Commission addresses this and comes to some very scathing conclusions. Let's just say that to be safe we shouldn't listen to anything that comes out of the CIA for the next 3-5 years or so. |
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03-31-2005, 12:55 PM | #13 | |
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1. Iraq had violated about 17 different UN resolutions in the last 4 years. 2. Our policy of 'containment' had been an abysmal failure, as seen in #1. 3. Iraq had a history of funding, housing and supporting terrorist groups. 4. Saddam had a long and detailed history of genocide and appalling human rights violations. Even before you get to the question of WMD's that's a pretty terrific list of reasons to go to war, without even getting into the geopolitical considerations of a) destabilizing a region that badly needed destabilizing, and b) potentially moving our bases out of Saudi Arabia, and into Iraq, thus easing one concern even moderate Muslims shared with Al-Qaeda. The big blunder of the Bush administration was in not properly making the case for war in Iraq. But the case for war was a slam-dunk, and remains so even in retrospect. |
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03-31-2005, 12:57 PM | #14 | |
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Quite. For instance, we could have used the manpower currently tied up in Iraq to continue the hunt for Bin Laden in Afghanistan and provide extra help for that country as it recovers from the Taliban years. We could have used our post-9/11 goodwill to spur international developments in anti-terrorist measures within financial networks. We could have concentrated more on whatever the heck North Korea is up to. We could have stopped the genocide in the Sudan. We could have stepped in to avert Robert Mugabe's pillaging of Zimbabwe. Instead we're getting Americans killed as they watch Iraq lurch it's way towards becoming a theocratic state, while providing ample recruiting fodder for all fundamentalist Islamic terrorist organizations. |
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03-31-2005, 01:08 PM | #15 | |
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1. So now we go to war with any nation that has UN resolutions against them? You sure you wanna go down that road? 2. Not really. See: Iraq military 3. Do you really want to go down that road? Because for some reason I don't think that Iraq's government would be #1 on that list. 4. Genocide and human rights violations...are happening all around us and war doesn't seem to be an option in those situations. PS - The case for war was a slam dunk? Wow. |
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03-31-2005, 01:10 PM | #16 | ||||||||
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They've got nothing on Israel, though. How about North Korea? Quote:
Colin Powell disagrees with you: Quote:
Heck, even Dick Cheney disagreed: Quote:
Even CIA reports in 2002 (before Cheney's summer @ the Pentagon), disagreed. Quote:
So does Pakistan, and we just cleared the way for them to buy F-14s. Heck, so do significant portions of the Irish-American community in the Northeast U.S. Quote:
Interesting. I don't see us doing anything in Sudan or Zimbabwe at the moment. We continue to do nothing in North Korea. We do nothing about Saudi Arabia. And this Administration continues to violate human rights on a regular basis with regard to suspected terrorists and "enemy combatants". Quote:
Ah, the geopolitical argument. I'll bet you good money that the fundamentalist theocracy that rules Iraq in about 3 years isn't going to let us have air bases over there, and it'll be loads of fun when newly-invigorated fundamentalist groups force even more concessions on the Saudis due to our mishandling of the whole situation. We've also managed to set back moderate movements in Jordan, Egypt, Iran and Syria by several decades. Quote:
The case for war was questionable at best, and, in retrospect, is now exposed for the outrageous fiasco it is. Last edited by flere-imsaho : 03-31-2005 at 01:11 PM. |
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03-31-2005, 01:12 PM | #17 | |
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3. Yes I do. And so does your President. |
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03-31-2005, 01:13 PM | #18 | |
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So, you're completely OK with invading every country that breaks any U.N. resolution? If so, your President is going to need a bigger army. |
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03-31-2005, 01:15 PM | #19 | |
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Same question, then. Given the way this Administration defines "terror", I'd say we've got about 100 countries to invade. Better get crackin! |
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03-31-2005, 01:16 PM | #20 | |
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Actually #3 was about regimes that support and fund terrorism. |
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03-31-2005, 01:16 PM | #21 | |
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oh. old clowns make me sad. guess everybody has their thing.
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03-31-2005, 01:27 PM | #22 | |
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I don't have the inclination to go over all of this with you, since some of it is clearly nonsense. (Putting Israel and North Korea together, for example). But a few points: 1. The bases that we are building in Iraq right now are not going anywhere, regardless of what anybody in Iraq thinks. That country is OCCUPIED, and the occupation will likely last at least 10 years (barring unforeseen political developments.) 2. Colin Powell recently authored an article largely agreeing with me. It was on newstands in one of the foreign policy journals. Powell's concerns were/are in the details of the occupation. 3. There were no significant moderate movements in those countries you mentioned. Those were all good places for an American to go visit if he wanted somebody to throw rocks at his head. 4. You'll get no argument from me on the Administration's human rights violations - I think Rumsfeld should resign, if not be criminally prosecuted. But that has nothing to do with the justification for the war in the first place. |
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03-31-2005, 02:26 PM | #23 | |||||
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Israel: Has broken U.N. Resolutions. North Korea: Has broken U.N. Resolutions. Really, this isn't a difficult concept. Quote:
Oh good, so we'll continue to be an unwanted "occupier" in a Middle Eastern country? I'm sure that'll excite the locals to no end. Al-Qaida never had a better recruiting tool. As for "unforeseen political developments", I refer you to Iran, 1979. If Iraq becomes a theocratic state, or if popular sentiment continues to be that the U.S. soldiers should go home at some point, I'm not sure these bases are going to have a lot of longevity. Quote:
I've quoted Powell, you haven't. Provide proof that Powell's completely hunky-dory about the situation and we'll talk. Also, I hate to break it to you, but Powell's concern about the occupation was critical and central to his views about the war. He didn't divorce the two from each other, as hawks such as Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz & Cheney did. Unlike them (who had little or no military experience), he didn't think it would end with a quick invasion, and so was concerned with the occupation, and what it would cost America. That's the central point. Don't be so quick to dismiss it. Quote:
Untrue. Although one must speak in terms of relativity, moderate elements had appeared in Jordan and, to a certain extent, one can view Khatemi as a "reformer" in Iran. Sure, they had a long way to go, but they were growing moderate movements. Also, U.S. tourism to Iran, pre-2002, was certainly relatively healthy. You misunderstand these countries greatly. Quote:
If one of the chief architects of the Iraq war has, by your admission, critical problems with human rights and, by extension, international law, I'd say it says a lot about the justification of the war in the first place. |
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03-31-2005, 02:51 PM | #24 |
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http://www.foreignaffairs.org/200401...tnerships.html
"It is an unfailingly effective applause line for critics of any U.S. administration to charge that the president has no vision for the world, that he has no strategy. Every trouble is attributed to this failing, as though the world would otherwise be perfectly accommodating to U.S. purposes. Unfortunately, this criticism has come close to being true in some administrations. But it is not true in the present one. President George W. Bush does have a vision of a better world. And he also has a strategy for translating that vision into reality. I know -- I was present at its creation." -Colin Powell |
03-31-2005, 02:56 PM | #25 | |
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/makes mental note to add to "List of Things To Do to Piss Fritz Off" |
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03-31-2005, 02:56 PM | #26 |
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fritz does not like ot read long posts (ahem, flere-imsaho), but at least they were not posted in a red handscript font.
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03-31-2005, 03:06 PM | #27 | ||
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Your quote doesn't address the original question of containment and how, in 2001, both Powell and Cheney felt the policy of containment was working and why they changed their minds so quickly. Remember, we began discussing this because of your statement: Quote:
You've still not proven that statement. |
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03-31-2005, 03:12 PM | #28 |
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I was under the impression it was self-evident by the 16 or so UN resolutions Iraq's behavior had generated. Your point about containment was that it made them easy to conquer, when the idea behind containment was to make Iraq behave. They had utterly failed to behave. Also, pre-9/11, the current Administration was pursuing an isolationist foreign policy. What the left does with Wolfowitz and the other hawks is say "See, they've had imperialist designs on the Middle East since the 80's!" when what really happened was after 9/11, Bush et al. crafted a new foreign policy which, in effect, said, "Ok Paul Wolfowitz (and Sandy Berger and many others) you were right all along."
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03-31-2005, 03:12 PM | #29 | |
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Sweet, when are we going to Saudi Arabia? I highly doubt that Iraq was the #1 breeding ground for terrorism (or #1 funders of terrorism). Not that Saddam didn't, but certainly not the worst offender, it seems. Last edited by rexallllsc : 03-31-2005 at 03:16 PM. |
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03-31-2005, 03:19 PM | #30 | ||
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St. cronin, I wouldn't even bother discussing this with them.
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03-31-2005, 03:25 PM | #31 | |
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Well considering the rest of the posts here - thinks like "we shouldn't believe the CIA for the next 3-5 years" - why would ANYONE think that "taking more time and care" would have done ANYTHING in the equation? Was that even possible? You're given a set of data - you can only react and make decisions based on the data you have. It sounds like the CIA in general was broken and has been for a great many years. Is one to think that they would have changed their minds give some more time to think about it?
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03-31-2005, 03:26 PM | #32 | ||||
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Israel and Turkey, to take two examples, are or have been, in violation of at least as many U.N. resolutions. Israel would be in violation of even more if the U.S. didn't veto so many that came up to the Security Council. So, violation of U.N. resolutions doesn't seem to be an automatic ticket for invasion, as you claim. Quote:
Not according to the IAEA, who found them in compliance. Tell me, do you still believe the "Iraq can strike in 45 minutes" claim? Quote:
My quotes from Cheney & Powell are post-9/11. Quote:
Right about what? That there were Islamic terrorists in the Middle East? Wow. Stunning. If they "crafted" any foreign policy, it was a foreign policy which sought to redress the "wrongs", as they saw them, of a) Saddam not playing ball after getting help from the U.S. in the 80s and b) George H.W. Bush not invading Iraq in 1991. A foreign policy created on the basis of a grudge. |
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03-31-2005, 03:30 PM | #33 | |
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So many things to pick on, so little time. This is an incredibly ignorant view of the relations between Saddam and US during the 80's. The 'help' Saddam got was no more, or less, than Iran got during THEIR WAR WITH EACH OTHER. I forgot which Reagan official was quoted as saying: "We want them both to lose." Nobody ever expected Saddam to play ball. |
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03-31-2005, 03:31 PM | #34 |
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I can't wait until 2004 rolls around so we can vote this jerk out of office. Oh wait
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03-31-2005, 03:36 PM | #35 | ||
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So little ways to defend your points, you mean. Quote:
You've done nothing to indicate to me you have anything more than a cursory understanding of Middle Eastern history or politics, so I'll take that as a compliment. |
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03-31-2005, 03:40 PM | #36 |
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FIrst of all you can't even talk about the US relationship with Iran, Iraq, or anybody else pre 89 without realizing that the US ONLY foreign policy concern at the time was the Great Bear. Nothing else mattered.
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03-31-2005, 04:07 PM | #37 | |
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Jeez, talk about simplistic ways to look at the history of foreign policy. |
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03-31-2005, 04:31 PM | #38 | |
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And an extremely incorrect one. |
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03-31-2005, 04:37 PM | #39 | |
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There, fixed that for ya
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04-01-2005, 10:25 AM | #40 | ||
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04-01-2005, 10:53 AM | #41 | |
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You know me too well, it's almost like we are repeating ourselves. The UN proved Iraq had WMD's. The US Administrations during the 1990's proved Iraq had WMD's. What do you want me to say? Our Intelligence collecting does have a lot to answer for, I agree. It appears much of their info was dated, recylced, rehashed. The Democrats (or the left) would have had no better success in deciphering the ammount of information the intelligence community would have given them if they were in charge. Remember, it was Kerry who said he would have done the same thing, only, much better. ("Read my website for further details." - John Kerry-D, Mass.) Information is power. Information combined with technology is the high ground in today's fight. We all make decisions based on the information that is before us. A smart bomb does no good if it has no target. If we continue to hand-cuff the intelligence communities to a wall in a back room in the Pentagon, they will keep recylcing the same information they got last week. In this case, years ago. We have no proof that Saddam destroyed those massive ammounts of CNB weapons and agents that the UN inventoried. None. Not one bit. Where we failed was determining what actually happened to it. Where did it go? Where was it buried? Who controls it now? The only way to do that is walk our "holier than thou" political asses downstairs to the Intel dungeon, break out our keys, and unlock the intel community from the dungeon wall. They need to be free of political sniping to do their job. It may be dirty, it may be ugly, but they are the only ones that can actually find out the truth through the wave of political lies and deceit. But don't cut them free until proper reform is done. The communities could use a good house-cleaning and a re-focus on their missions first. I fear a lot of the information that has been given to our Presidents over the last 15 years has been based on a lot of assumptions. We assumed the WMD were still in Iraq. But that opens up a great set of questions. We have proven that we have found no proof of Iraq's WMD's. Did the UN really inventory massive quantities of nerve agents such as VX? Did Iraq really destroy them? Did Iraq hide them? Did Iraq move them to another country? Who controls the inventory now if they did in fact exist and they were not destroyed? We really have proven nothing. We can not prove they existed, but that does not mean that they didn't. We couldn't prove that Saddam Hussein was alive before we captured him. Did that mean he was dead? Of course not. We cannot prove that Osama Bin Laden is alive. Does that mean he is dead? The end result, in my estimation, is that given the information that President Bush received (faulty, outdated, innacurate as it may or may not hav been), I think he had no choice but to make a decision. That was his job. I think Republicans agree with the decision he made and Democrats disagree. Where is the news in that? |
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04-01-2005, 11:09 AM | #42 | |
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Ron Paul, a Repuiblican in the US House, says...
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So much for all Republicans agreeing. Last edited by Tekneek : 04-01-2005 at 11:12 AM. |
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04-01-2005, 11:24 AM | #43 | |
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Just nonsense. American troops aren't leaving anytime soon, unless Nader or Perot or somebody like that gets elected in 08. |
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04-01-2005, 11:26 AM | #44 | |
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Did you even read that? Ron Paul is a Republican, and he did write what I quoted. If you want to question his record, I suggest you do some research. |
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04-01-2005, 11:30 AM | #45 |
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I did read it. What I was calling nonsense was this: "Civil war could ensue upon the departure of American troops." That's just political posturing. US troops are going nowhere.
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04-01-2005, 11:31 AM | #46 | |
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His statement is a hypothetical. It does not attempt to declare that the troops will leave, but says that civil war could ensue when they do leave. I don't see the nonsense in it. |
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04-01-2005, 11:34 AM | #47 | |
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Well, then I suppose if my aunt had balls, she'd be my uncle. |
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04-01-2005, 11:35 AM | #48 | |
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And your point is? |
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04-01-2005, 11:44 AM | #49 |
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My point is that as long as Iraq is unstable US troops are not leaving; his implication that troops leaving will sink Iraq into a Civil War is at best nonsense.
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04-01-2005, 11:45 AM | #50 | |
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It doesn't have to seem unstable at the time that the troops leave. Seemingly stable situations can and do collapse into civil war all over the planet when long standing, and unresolved, rivalries and disputes are under the surface. Unless you have a crystal ball that is telling you a definite truth, you're just speculating. If you do have the crystall ball, why are you hanging around here when you know the future? Surely there are a lot better things you could be doing with that knowledge. Last edited by Tekneek : 04-01-2005 at 11:47 AM. |
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