[CLUE-Talk] The prism of our experience

[Timothy C. Klein]

* Randy Arabie (randy at arabie.org) wrote:
> On Thursday, 10 July 2003 at 10:52:33 -0600, Jeffery Cann <fabian at jefferycann.com> wrote:
> > >From the Boston Globe:
> > 
> > "The coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new 
> > evidence of Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass murder," Mr. Rumsfeld testified 
> > yesterday before the Senate armed services committee.
> >  
> > "We acted because we saw the evidence in a dramatic new light, through the 
> > prism of our experience on 9/11."
> >  
> > It was an about-face from a man who confidently proclaimed in January: 
> > "There's no doubt in my mind but that they [the Iraqi government] currently 
> > have chemical and biological weapons." (He was seconded in March by 
> > Vice-President Dick Cheney, who said of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein: 
> > "We believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.") 
> >  
> > +http://www.globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20030710.urums0710/BNStory/International/ 
> > 
> > All I can say is:  WTF?
> 
> Here's my view of the WMD issue.  I still believe the
> Hussein regime had an active WMD program well into last
> year.  Perhaps if the coalition had been able to act sooner,
> rather than give Hussein a 6-month period to hide the evidence,
> we would have found them by now.
> 

Ther are a lot of problems with this, at least to me.  GWB and his
administration spoke about disarming Saddam.  If simply threatening
invasion make him disarm, then their threats were effective.  There was
no need to invade -- the threat of WMD went away, let's move.  But we
did not move on, we invaded anyway.

> I don't accept your assertion that it was a lie.  I think
> WMD was the main reason.

The White House admitted that the Niger uranium link was wrong.  They
tried to put a nice spin on it, but I don't see any way around it on
that issue.  They lied, or someone was grossly incompetent.  Either way
we have a problem.   GWB mentioned that Iraq had attempted to buy
uranium from Niger.  But the documents the claim were based on were
easlily spotted forgeries.  More, the man dispatched to Niger to check
it came back and reported that the story was certainly bunk.  He asserts
that, at the very least, Cheney heard this.  This was *months* before
GWB gave his state of the union address.  And yet, in that speach, he
asserts that Iraq is trying to buy uranium from African countries.

Unless the adiminstration provides evidence of some other attempt from
another African country, I don't see how that is not a lie.

Tim
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== Timothy Klein || teece at silver_NO-UCE_klein.net   ==
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