On WMD
One argument I heard recently, is that Bush "misled" or "lied" to America concerning the reason(s) to go to war with Iraq. Besides pointing out that peace had never been declared after the first war, I would hold that he did not "lie".
First, if you examine the speeches he gave and the document drafted by the Senate declaring war (as a reminder the President does not have the power to declare war), WMD were not the sole reason for the war. But those who feel they were "lied to", have pointed out that the main reason for going to war was that we felt Saddam wanted WMD (which is supported by the Deuffler report), that the sanctions were failing (also supported by the same report), and finally that he when he got them he would not have much compunction against using them (supported by the fact they he had in fact used them against Iran and the Kurdish people in Iraq). After 9/11 Bush (and America) seemed to agree we didn't want to react after an attack. We needed to prevent one. They also argue that the case for WMD was in fact weaker in fact than how it was presented.
Well, the argument that "Bush lied" because he did not dwell on the points that did not support his case, I would say, .... duh! When has anyone, when trying to persuade has not emphasized points in support and de-emphasized those contrary (aside from perhaps Jesus as interviewed by Pontius Pilate)? To one arguing that the case made to the public did not give all the facts, well those facts were available to the Senate who did declare war. If those facts satisfied those 100 men, and they did by an large margin, who are we with our 20/20 hindsight to gainsay them? And what, are they complaining that no 1000 page report was publicly made available. That would involve releasing information that we wouldn't want made public at the time, who would read it besides those paid to?
Let's face it, Saddam played a "tricky" game trying to convince Iran he had WMD to keep them at an arm's length and hoped to finesse the French and Germans and through them the UN into keeping us at bay. He did manage to convince the world that he had WMD for at time, to his undoing.
As an amusing side-note, on the left one of the reasons for not going to war was the threat of WMD. As soon as few WMD are found, they are the reason also that we shouldn't go to war.
First, if you examine the speeches he gave and the document drafted by the Senate declaring war (as a reminder the President does not have the power to declare war), WMD were not the sole reason for the war. But those who feel they were "lied to", have pointed out that the main reason for going to war was that we felt Saddam wanted WMD (which is supported by the Deuffler report), that the sanctions were failing (also supported by the same report), and finally that he when he got them he would not have much compunction against using them (supported by the fact they he had in fact used them against Iran and the Kurdish people in Iraq). After 9/11 Bush (and America) seemed to agree we didn't want to react after an attack. We needed to prevent one. They also argue that the case for WMD was in fact weaker in fact than how it was presented.
Well, the argument that "Bush lied" because he did not dwell on the points that did not support his case, I would say, .... duh! When has anyone, when trying to persuade has not emphasized points in support and de-emphasized those contrary (aside from perhaps Jesus as interviewed by Pontius Pilate)? To one arguing that the case made to the public did not give all the facts, well those facts were available to the Senate who did declare war. If those facts satisfied those 100 men, and they did by an large margin, who are we with our 20/20 hindsight to gainsay them? And what, are they complaining that no 1000 page report was publicly made available. That would involve releasing information that we wouldn't want made public at the time, who would read it besides those paid to?
Let's face it, Saddam played a "tricky" game trying to convince Iran he had WMD to keep them at an arm's length and hoped to finesse the French and Germans and through them the UN into keeping us at bay. He did manage to convince the world that he had WMD for at time, to his undoing.
As an amusing side-note, on the left one of the reasons for not going to war was the threat of WMD. As soon as few WMD are found, they are the reason also that we shouldn't go to war.
posted by Mark at 10/21/2004 10:07:00 PM
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