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-- Surprise..look who showed up in Iraq
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| Bush's lighting trip to Baghdad has actually hijacked his troops' self-confidence and could also have the same impact on the American people. These people are led by a government of lies and today it acquires two new characteristics - fear and panic. |
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono Ahh...propaganda at its best. |
Bush's visit to Iraq boosted the morale... It didn't cause panic and fear...where did you get that boviene excrement from?
I get excited when I hear Bush speak! It makes me want to get up and do something!
Did you even watch what he had to say? The troops were rooting for him! They love Bush. ( and yes, They do. It's a fact that the majority of the military is conservative... My parents served,and most of my family has. So I know that for a fact, Further more.They know what's right,and they know what's wrong. )
You can jump all over me when I say this, but when the US invaded Iraq there was "compelling" evidence that not only were there WMD, but also strong ties to terrorist organizations. The article you posted used strong adjectives and cliches to make a visit to Iraq by the president seem like the downfall of the US in Iraq. If you remember, truthful or not, the president and his staff, along with Blair, gave the world several credible documents pertaining to WMD and terrorism in Iraq before invading. These, at least at the time, were considered facts, and some may still be. The article merely contained emotion skewed with misreported events to make a point to his interest, that's why I call it propaganda.
Also, I'd like to say that one of the "hats" of the president is commander in chief. I don't know why people see a problem with him visiting his own troops. It's like getting pissed off if the boss of some corporation decides to go talk with his employees, hoping to cheer them up. Hilary on the other hand, as a senator visiting troops, now that is a publicity stunt as she has no real "ties" with the troops. If senators did, I'd suspect all of them would have been over there by now.
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono You can jump all over me when I say this, but when the US invaded Iraq there was "compelling" evidence that not only were there WMD, but also strong ties to terrorist organizations. The article you posted used strong adjectives and cliches to make a visit to Iraq by the president seem like the downfall of the US in Iraq. If you remember, truthful or not, the president and his staff, along with Blair, gave the world several credible documents pertaining to WMD and terrorism in Iraq before invading. These, at least at the time, were considered facts, and some may still be. The article merely contained emotion skewed with misreported events to make a point to his interest, that's why I call it propaganda. |
Sorry, "dude," but a simple google search would have led you to the evidence GW put forth during both the State of Union address, as well as to the UN. Again, you can deny what is reported by our government, but I'd argue it's a lot more factual than some guy writing an inflamatory editorial telling us that Bush's visit to Iraq is going to be the downfall of the US.
Here, I'll skip the googling and get straight to the "evidence" we used to justify our attack.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB80/
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB80/ |
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono You can jump all over me when I say this, but when the US invaded Iraq there was "compelling" evidence that not only were there WMD, but also strong ties to terrorist organizations. The article you posted used strong adjectives and cliches to make a visit to Iraq by the president seem like the downfall of the US in Iraq. If you remember, truthful or not, the president and his staff, along with Blair, gave the world several credible documents pertaining to WMD and terrorism in Iraq before invading. These, at least at the time, were considered facts, and some may still be. The article merely contained emotion skewed with misreported events to make a point to his interest, that's why I call it propaganda. Also, I'd like to say that one of the "hats" of the president is commander in chief. I don't know why people see a problem with him visiting his own troops. It's like getting pissed off if the boss of some corporation decides to go talk with his employees, hoping to cheer them up. Hilary on the other hand, as a senator visiting troops, now that is a publicity stunt as she has no real "ties" with the troops. If senators did, I'd suspect all of them would have been over there by now. |
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono Sorry, "dude," but a simple google search would have led you to the evidence GW put forth during both the State of Union address, as well as to the UN. Again, you can deny what is reported by our government, but I'd argue it's a lot more factual than some guy writing an inflamatory editorial telling us that Bush's visit to Iraq is going to be the downfall of the US. Here, I'll skip the googling and get straight to the "evidence" we used to justify our attack. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB80/ |
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| CIA admits lack of specifics on Iraqi weapons before invasion Sun Nov 30, 3:41 AM ET Add World - AFP to My Yahoo! WASHINGTON, (AFP) - The US Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites) has acknowledged it "lacked specific information" about alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction when it compiled an intelligence estimate last year that served to justify the US-led invasion of Iraq (news - web sites). But it said that and other uncertainties surrounding the case had been fully presented to President George W. Bush (news - web sites) and other US policymakers in the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate, a document often referred to by members of the Bush administration as a basis of their claim that Iraq had an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction. US Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) told the UN Security Council last February that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and his regime were "concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction" and that their weapons programs "are a real and present danger to the region and to the world." However, an explanation issued over the weekend by veteran CIA (news - web sites) analyst Stuart Cohen, who was in charge of putting together the 2002 intelligence estimate and currently serves as vice chairman of the National Intelligence Council, made clear the case against Iraq, as presented by the CIA behind closed doors, was much less clear-cut and more nuanced. "Any reader would have had to read only as far as the second paragraph of the Key Judgments to know that as we said: 'We lacked specific information on many key aspects of Iraq's WMD program,'" Cohen wrote in an article posted on the agency's Web site. The document still concluded that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of the 150-kilometer (93-mile) limit imposed by the UN Security Council. It also said that Baghdad did not have nuclear weapons. Cohen said he still stood by those judgments. But he insisted the estimate he produced had "uncertainties" that "were highlighted in the Key Judgments and throughout the main text." Moreover, specialists from three US government agencies -- the State and Energy Departments and the Air Force -- vocally disagreed with at least some of the findings, according to the CIA analyst, who denied that these expressions of dissent had been somehow suppressed or buried in footnotes. "All agencies were fully exposed to these alternative views, and the heads of those organizations blessed the wording and placement of their alternative views," Cohen insisted. The veteran CIA analyst stressed that all major conclusions about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction had been drawn on the basis of information "overwhelmingly" gleaned from a combination of human intelligence, satellite imagery and communications intercepts. But made clear that in the murky world of intelligence, hard and unequivocal evidence was often hard to come by. "There is a reason that the October 2002 review of Iraq's WMD programs is called a National Intelligence Estimate and not a National Intelligence factbook," Cohen argued. "On almost any issue of the day that we face, hard evidence will only take intelligence professionals so far." http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...=1512&ncid=1480 |
Another interesting article from the NY Times today--mind you the Times is much more left of center for the most part.
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/01/i...print&position=
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| For the Iraqis, a Missile Deal That Went Sour By DAVID E. SANGER and THOM SHANKER ASHINGTON, Nov. 30 � It was Saddam Hussein's last weapons deal � and it did not go exactly as he and his generals had imagined. For two years before the American invasion of Iraq, Mr. Hussein's sons, generals and front companies were engaged in lengthy negotiations with North Korea, according to computer files discovered by international inspectors and the accounts of Bush administration officials. The officials now say they believe that those negotiations � mostly conducted in neighboring Syria, apparently with the knowledge of the Syrian government � were not merely to buy a few North Korean missiles. Instead, the goal was to obtain a full production line to manufacture, under an Iraqi flag, the North Korean missile system, which would be capable of hitting American allies and bases around the region, according to the Bush administration officials. As war with the United States approached, though, the Iraqi files show that Mr. Hussein discovered what American officials say they have known for nearly a decade now: that Kim Jong Il, the North Korean leader, is less than a fully reliable negotiating partner. In return for a $10 million down payment, Mr. Hussein appears to have gotten nothing. The trail that investigators have uncovered, partly from reading computer hard drives found in Baghdad and partly from interviews with captured members of Mr. Hussein's inner circle, shows that a month before the American invasion, Iraqi officials traveled to Syria to demand that North Korea refund $1.9 million because it had failed to meet deadlines for delivering its first shipment of goods. North Korea deflected the request, telling Mr. Hussein's representatives, in the words of one investigator, that "things were too hot" to begin delivering missile technology through Syria. The transaction provides an interesting glimpse into the last days of the Hussein government, and what administration officials say were Iraq's desires for a long-term business deal for missiles and a missile production plant. Bush administration officials have seized on the attempted purchase of the missiles, known as the Rodong, and a missile assembly line to buttress their case that Mr. Hussein was violating United Nations resolutions, which clearly prohibited missiles of the range of the Rodong. It also establishes that Syria was a major arms-trading bazaar for the Hussein government, in this case hiding an Iraqi effort to obtain missiles, they say. Investigators say Syria had probably offered its ports and territory as the surreptitious transit route for the North Korea-Iraq missile deal, although it remains unclear what demands the government in Damascus might have made in return. Further, according to United States government officials and international investigators, the Iraqi official who brokered the deal, Munir Awad, is now in Syria, apparently living under government protection. If it served as a middleman in this deal, as the documents suggest, Syria was acting in violation of Security Council resolutions even as it served on the Council and voted with the United States on the most important resolution before the war. In an interview in Damascus on Sunday with The New York Times, Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, was asked about the deal described in the Iraqi computer files and said, "This is the first time I have heard this story." He said Mr. Hussein "was never able to trust Syria, and he never tried and we never tried to make any relation between him and any other country because he did not trust us in the first place." For all its complaints about arms smuggling across the Syrian-Iraq border, Mr. Assad said, the United States had never cited specific cases, adding, "I told the Americans if you have any evidence that there is smuggling of weapons into Iraq, please let us know." International inspectors note that the missile deal gone bad appears to be the most serious violation that has been found so far. The investigators say they tripped upon it while looking for something far more nefarious � evidence of a continuing nuclear program, or an active effort to accumulate more biological or chemical weapons. "So far, there's really not much in that arena," said one official who has monitored the continuing search for weapons led by David Kay, a former weapons inspector who is now conducting the search for the Central Intelligence Agency. After spending tens of millions of dollars in a search that continues on the ground in Iraq to this day, the official noted, "We've learned this much: that Kim Jong Il took Saddam to the cleaners." The first clue of the North Korea-Iraq deal surfaced in public in October when Dr. Kay released preliminary findings of his inquiry into Mr. Hussein's program for developing unconventional weapons. Dr. Kay said his team had uncovered evidence that Iraq had negotiated a deal with North Korea to acquire missiles, a transaction that a senior administration official said was apparently never detected by American intelligence agencies. But when it came time for the North Koreans to deliver on the deal they demurred, according to an Iraqi account of the meeting in Syria that international inspectors found on an Iraqi computer hard drive. According to the files, the North Koreans said Iraq was under too much American scrutiny. Evidence amassed since the invasion of Iraq indicates the deal was for more than just missiles. "This $10 million was a down payment, and not just a straight purchase for Rodong missiles, but for Rodong technology," said one American official who has read documentation on the deal. "Saddam's intent was to get the expertise from the North Koreans and, potentially, open his own production line." If the American interpretation is right, it is unclear where Mr. Hussein might have built the production line or how it could have avoided detection by American satellites. The exact outlines of the deal remain unclear, the official said, "since the North Koreans ended up stiffing the Iraqis." The Iraqis were demanding their money back, "right up to the end," the official said. American investigators say they have been able to discern outlines of the murky deal. The $10 million was too much to buy simply a missile or two, American and international experts say, and too little for an entire production line, leading to the conclusion that it was a down payment. Investigators said information downloaded from Iraqi computer hard drives, at least one of which was obtained before the invasion of Iraq, allowed them to more specifically interrogate detained members of Mr. Hussein's inner circle. They, in turn, guided investigators deeper into the mountain of official documents seized during the war. "You do that, sort of a back-and-forth process," said one American official. "You find something on a computer disk or in the pile of documents slowly being translated. That makes you ask questions of the detainees. Then you bounce back to the documents and so forth. That's how you get the bigger picture." Administration officials say investigators found evidence of meetings between the Iraqis and North Koreans as least as far back as late 2001. One administration official said American intelligence had evidence that "the agents from North Korea flew into Syria � that's where the first meeting took place." Other officials said at least one round of talks was held in North Korea. The final session was held in Syria in February of this year, just before the war began, officials said. On that trip, according to the Iraqi account of the meeting in Syria, the Iraqis were also seeking night-vision goggles, ammunition and gun barrels � mostly through European middlemen. At that point, a huge American-British force had been built up on Iraq's southern borders, and it was clear that war was coming. What is also interesting about the shopping list, however, is "what's not on it," said one investigator. "Nothing nuclear, no dual-use items, nothing about weapons of mass destruction." American officials said the failed missile deal was brokered by an Iraqi firm called Al Bashair Trading Company, also spelled Al Bashir in some documents, which has been identified by American investigators as having had past involvement in arms trade for Iraq conducted with Yugoslavia. The company reported directly to the Iraqi military command, investigators said, and had close ties to one of Mr. Hussein's sons, Qusay, who was killed in a battle with American troops in July. The negotiations with the North Koreans were conducted by Munir Awad, the senior officer of Al Bashair, American and international investigators said. "Munir Awad is one of three men who personally oversaw the most sensitive transfers of money from Al Bashair to other front companies and governments and worked directly for Qusay Hussein," said one American official. "Awad is believed to be in Syria under the protection of the Syrian government." |
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| Originally posted by Shakka Another interesting article from the NY Times today--mind you the Times is much more left of center for the most part. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/01/i...print&position= |
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| Originally posted by WhoaNellie1487 No one else would stand up to terrorism... So America did something about it. |
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono If you remember, truthful or not, the president and his staff, along with Blair, gave the world several credible documents pertaining to WMD and terrorism in Iraq before invading. These, at least at the time, were considered facts, and some may still be. Truthful or not? I'd say, "not." I'd also say the credible documents were not so credible: http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto...q_cia&printer=1 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy...-2003Sep27.html [QUOTE]House Probers Conclude Iraq War Data Was Weak By Dana Priest Washington Post Sunday 28 September 2003 Leaders of the House intelligence committee have criticized the U.S. intelligence community for using largely outdated, "circumstantial" and "fragmentary" information with "too many uncertainties" to conclude that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and ties to al Qaeda. Top members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, which spent four months combing through 19 volumes of classified material used by the Bush administration to make its case for the war on Iraq, found "significant deficiencies" in the community's ability to collect fresh intelligence on Iraq, and said it had to rely on "past assessments" dating to when U.N. inspectors left Iraq in 1998 and on "some new 'piecemeal' intelligence," both of which "were not challenged as a routine matter." "The absence of proof that chemical and biological weapons and their related development programs had been destroyed was considered proof that they continued to exist," the two committee members said in a letter Thursday to CIA Director George J. Tenet. The Washington Post obtained a copy this weekend. |
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| Hans Blix: Iraq Destroyed WMD 10 Years Ago Reuters Tuesday 16 September 2003 SYDNEY (Reuters) - Former U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix now believes Iraq destroyed its weapons of mass destruction 10 years ago and that intelligence agencies were wrong in their weapons assessment that led to war. In an interview with Australian radio from Sweden, Blix said the search for evidence of biological, chemical or nuclear weapons would probably only uncover documents at best. "The more time that has passed, the more I think it's unlikely that anything will be found," Blix said in the interview, which was broadcast on Wednesday. "I'm certainly more and more to the conclusion that Iraq has, as they maintained, destroyed almost all of what they had in the summer of 1991," Blix said. In 1991, the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) found what it called a secret nuclear weapons program in Iraq. It spent the next seven years dismantling Baghdad's nuclear capability, until its inspectors were thrown out of Iraq. Before ordering the invasion that toppled President Saddam Hussein, President Bush referred to an imminent threat posed by Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as a prime justification for war. "In the beginning they talked about weapons concretely, and later on they talked about weapons programs...maybe they'll find some documents of interest," Blix said. |
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono Sorry, "dude," but a simple google search would have led you to the evidence GW put forth during both the State of Union address, as well as to the UN. Again, you can deny what is reported by our government, but I'd argue it's a lot more factual than some guy writing an inflamatory editorial telling us that Bush's visit to Iraq is going to be the downfall of the US. Here, I'll skip the googling and get straight to the "evidence" we used to justify our attack. http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB80/ |
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| Document 27 Similarly to Blix, he reported that "we have to date found no evidence of nuclear or nuclear related activities in Iraq," but that "a number of issues are still under investigation." ElBaradei also noted that a new document provided by Iraq contained "no new information," and expressed the hope that the newly established Iraqi commissions "will be able to uncover documents and other evidence that could assist in clarifying � remaining questions." Document 26: Blix noted that "so far UNMOVIC has not found any [weapons of mass destruction], only a small number of chemical munitions which should have been declared and destroyed." However, he also noted that many proscribed programs had not been accounted for, a matter that he characterized as being of "great significance." He specifically mentioned programs for the production of anthrax, VX nerve gas, and long-range missiles. He also noted the status of UNMOVIC investigations of the Al-Samoud and Al-Fatah missiles as well as casting chambers. With regard to Iraqi actions, he reported that Iraq had formed two commissions to search for relevant documents and that the National Monitoring Directorate had provided a list of 83 individuals who could allegedly verify destruction of chemical weapons and expresses his hope that Iraq will draw up a similar of individuals who participated in the destruction of biological warfare items. |
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| Mr Powell's team removed dozens of pages of alleged evidence about Iraq's banned weapons and ties to terrorists from a draft of his speech, US News and World Report says today. At one point, he became so angry at the lack of adequate sourcing to intelligence claims that he declared: "I'm not reading this. This is bullshit," according to the magazine. Presented with a script for his speech, Mr Powell suspected that Washington hawks were "cherry picking", the US magazine Newsweek also reports today. Greg Theilmann, a recently retired state department intelligence analyst directly involved in assessing the Iraqi threat, says that inside the Bush administration "there is a lot of sorrow and anger at the way intelligence was misused". |
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| On biological weapons, the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, told the UN Security Council in February that the former regime had up to 18 mobile laboratories. He attributed the information to "defectors" from Iraq, without saying that their claims - including one of a "secret biological laboratory beneath the Saddam Hussein hospital in central Baghdad" - had repeatedly been disproved by UN weapons inspectors. |
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| US Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) told the UN Security Council last February that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) and his regime were "concealing their efforts to produce more weapons of mass destruction" and that their weapons programs "are a real and present danger to the region and to the world." However, an explanation issued over the weekend by veteran CIA (news - web sites) analyst Stuart Cohen, who was in charge of putting together the 2002 intelligence estimate and currently serves as vice chairman of the National Intelligence Council, made clear the case against Iraq, as presented by the CIA behind closed doors, was much less clear-cut and more nuanced. "Any reader would have had to read only as far as the second paragraph of the Key Judgments to know that as we said: 'We lacked specific information on many key aspects of Iraq's WMD program,'" Cohen wrote in an article posted on the agency's Web site. The document still concluded that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of the 150-kilometer (93-mile) limit imposed by the UN Security Council. It also said that Baghdad did not have nuclear weapons. |
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| German Intelligence on Powell�s �Solid� Sources Bittner notes that, like their American counterparts, German intelligence officials had to hold their noses as Powell on February 5 at the UN played fast and loose with intelligence he insisted came from �solid sources.� Powell�s specific claims concerning the mobile laboratories, it turns out, depended heavily�perhaps entirely�on a source of the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), Germany�s equivalent to the CIA. But the BND, it turns out, considered the source in no way �solid.� A �senior German security official� told Die Zeit that, in passing the report to US officials, the Germans made a point of noting �various problems with the source.� In more diplomatic language, Die Zeit�s informant indicated that the BND�s �evaluation of the source was not altogether positive.� German officials remain in some confusion regarding the �four different sources� cited by Powell in presenting his case regarding the �biological laboratories.� Berlin has not been told who the other three sources are. In this context, a German intelligence officer mentioned that there is always the danger of false confirmation, suggesting it is possible that the various reports can be traced back to the same original source, theirs�that is, the one with which the Germans had �various problems.� Even if there are in fact multiple sources, the Germans wonder what reason there is to believe that the others are more �solid� than their own. Powell indicated that some of the sources he cited were Iraqi �migr�s. While the BND would not give Die Zeit an official comment, Bittner notes pointedly that German intelligence �proceeds on the assumption that �migr�s do not always tell the truth and that the picture they draw can be colored by political motives.� Plausible? Despite all that, in an apparent bid to avoid taking the heat for appearing the constant naysayer on an issue of such neuralgic import in Washington, German intelligence officials say that, the dubious sourcing notwithstanding, they considered the information on the mobile biological laboratories �plausible.� In recent weeks, any �plausibility� has all but evaporated. Many biological warfare specialists in the US and elsewhere were skeptical from the start. Now Defense Intelligence Agency specialists have joined their counterparts at the State Department and elsewhere in concluding that the two trailer/laboratories discovered in Iraq in early May are hydrogen-producing facilities for weather balloons to calibrate Iraqi artillery, as the Iraqis have said. Perhaps it was this DIA report that emboldened the BND official to go public about the misgivings the BND had about the source. Insult to Intelligence |
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| The real test of the government�s case against Saddam came in the testimony by Secretary of State Powell delivered to the United Nations on Feb. 5. Powell, the administration�s in-house moderate, was very wary of being set up for a fall by the administration hawks. Presented with a �script� by the White House national-security staff, Powell suspected that the hawks had been �cherry-picking,� looking for any intel that supported their position and ignoring anything to the contrary. Powell ordered his aides to check out every fact. And to make sure he would not be left hanging if the intel case against Saddam somehow proved to be full of holes, he gently but firmly informed Tenet that the DCI should come up to New York�and take his place behind the secretary of State at the U.N. General Assembly. (�I don�t think George looked too comfortable sitting there,� said a former top official, chuckling, in 41�s administration.) For four days and nights, Powell and Tenet, top aides and top analysts and, from time to time, Rice, pored over the evidence�and discarded much of it. Out went suggestions linking Saddam to 9-11. The bogus Niger documents were dumped. Powell did keep a hedged endorsement of the aluminum tubes and contended that Saddam �harbored� Al Qaeda operatives. His most compelling offering to the United Nations was tape recordings (picked up by spy satellites) of Iraqi officials who appeared intent on hiding something from the U.N. arms inspectors. Just what they were hiding was never quite clear. The almost round-the-clock vetting process in Tenet�s conference room at the CIA was tense and difficult, according to several participants. The debate over whether to include the purported links between Al Qaeda and Saddam went on right up to the eve of Powell�s speech. CENTCOM VERSUS CIA Powell�s presentation did not persuade the U.N. Security Council, but it did help convince many Americans that Saddam was a real threat. As the military began to gear up for an invasion, top planners at Central Command tried to get a fix from the CIA on WMD sites they could take out with bombs and missiles. After much badgering, says an informed military source, the CIA allowed the CENTCOM planners to see what the agency had on WMD sites. �It was crap,� said a CENTCOM planner. The sites were �mostly old friends,� buildings bombed by the military back in the 1991 gulf war, another source said. The CIA had satellite photos of the buildings. �What was inside the structures was another matter,� says the source. �We asked, �Well, what agents are in these buildings? Because we need to know.� And the answer was, �We don�t know�,� the CENTCOM planner recalled. When the military visited these sites after the war, they found nothing but rubble. No traces of WMD. Nor did Special Forces find any of the 20 or so Scud missiles, possibly tipped with chem-bio warheads, that were said by the CIA to be lurking somewhere in the Western Desert. The search is not over. While CENTCOM is pulling out its initial teams of WMD hunters, the Pentagon has created a whole new program to search sites, looking for the elusive WMD. It is disheartening that the military was unable to secure Saddam�s large nuclear-material storage site at Al Tuwaitha before the looters got there. Materials for a �dirty bomb� could have found their way by now into the hands of terrorists. |
This isn't meant to be a copout, but I think at this point we could go back and forth with different sources that can either prove or disprove what was has been said concerning Iraq. My point was only to show that at the time, we all had credible evidence that going into Iraq was the "prudent" thing to do (to borrow a term from another Bush). As we've seen, we can now argue if those "facts" were truthful, and come up with mixed results. However, in the strictest sense of the word, I do not believe that the invasion of Iraq is propaganda, or for that matter based on propaganda.
A previous poster used a middle eastern oriented article to show that Bush's visit was actually harmful, and maybe even a doomsday sign. I just wanted to show that it was propaganda. Unfortunatly, the middle east is rife with propaganda. In example, a current practice is to teach that the holocaust never happened, and that it was merely Zionist propaganda. When these sort of reports are given to the masses, either due to lack of journalistic integrity, or state-fed bull crap, it will be very difficult for the average middle easterner to form an unbiased view on "the West" and it's intentions. I think this is one major road block to a peaceful solution in the middle east.
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| Originally posted by NeoPhono This isn't meant to be a copout, but I think at this point we could go back and forth with different sources that can either prove or disprove what was has been said concerning Iraq. My point was only to show that at the time, we all had credible evidence that going into Iraq was the "prudent" thing to do (to borrow a term from another Bush). As we've seen, we can now argue if those "facts" were truthful, and come up with mixed results. However, in the strictest sense of the word, I do not believe that the invasion of Iraq is propaganda, or for that matter based on propaganda. A previous poster used a middle eastern oriented article to show that Bush's visit was actually harmful, and maybe even a doomsday sign. I just wanted to show that it was propaganda. Unfortunatly, the middle east is rife with propaganda. ... |
I once went to school with a fella who claimed that the Holocaust never happened. He wasn't middle eastern, though he was racist and hated Jews among other groups. Truly sad and infuriating.
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| there is a different perspective when looking from Arab, Muslim eyes. and that perspective may not align with Western morals or ideals - yet does that make it wrong? I certainly agree with DaveSaenz that a 3 hour visit under the shroud of night is a bit of a copout - and an insult to those Iraqis that may be on our side| |
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| Originally posted by MisterOpus1 If you're referring to Afghanistan (sp?), you've got no beef with me. But if you're referring to Iraq, then you're going to have to back up your assertions that they were involved in terrorism that was an imminent threat to us. Funny how Bush himself said there was no connection to Iraq and 9/11: |
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| Originally posted by WhoaNellie1487 I'm referring to both. Saddam, connected or not,is a terrorist. No one deserves to live with a ruthless man like that. We're just doing what's best for the Iraqi's/Iraq. (Just go back and read about the Spanish-American war. Same kind of situation.You'll see how they did benefit until Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba.) |
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| Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Ahh, so now we're into this war for Iraqi's benefit? I thought US policy for war was to protect our interests as well as our allies. Besides, I also thought we went to war because they posed an IMMINENT threat? Now we did it to free Iraq? Lock and step with Faux News. Am I speaking to Sean Hannity? |
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| Originally posted by WhoaNellie1487 There are many reasons, Helping the Iraqi's is one of these many reasons. Hmm, Review. F-O-X. Fox..(Just like on the movie You've got mail) Sean Hannity rocks.^_^ |
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faux Nom masculin (a) fake, forgery; le ~ falsehood |
I dig Nellie. He (or she?) doesn't back down from the majority (much more liberal) voices on this board. Gotta respect that. And yes, Sean Hannity is excellent. Alan Colmes on the other hand might be the ugliest human being alive. Well second ugliest next to Jimmy Carville.
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| Originally posted by Shakka I dig Nellie. He (or she?) doesn't back down from the majority (much more liberal) voices on this board. Gotta respect that. And yes, Sean Hannity is excellent. Alan Colmes on the other hand might be the ugliest human being alive. Well second ugliest next to Jimmy Carville. |
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