Did Bush Invade Wrong Country?

[Skyweasel]

The problem when you conduct a raid (I would not call Iraq a "war") is, historically raids are conducted to gain plunder. Part of why you are willing to go and spend all the money to do the raid in the first place is you are going to haul back gold, loot, women, what-have-you.

In this case the plunder is the oil, but the fact that the entire adventure has now emboldened a resistance, emboldened Al Qaeda wherever they really are, is problematic at least. Because the oil is now going to be subject to continous attacks, those who are sent to work the oil are already experiencing threats to their lives. So it's become far more risky, and it was already assumed by petroleum geologists that getting Iraq back up to full production would take several years. Now the timetable is completely uncertain.

Meantime the U.S. has its military stretched thin and our debtload has become ominous. I worry personally, about having our personnel so spread out, committed to this foolishness in Iraq. We are more vulnerable than ever.

 

[poopsicle]

Why didn't we attack Venezuela?

They have a shitload of oil and natural gas, their president is more of a threat to freedom than Hussein was, and they are and we already have an entire network there to their West to fight another natural resource battle.

Venezuela NEXT!!!

 

[ChuckSims]

Bush has his eye on Iran. If he drops any further in the polls, Bush will declare war on Iran. Attacking Venezuela would not be smart. Bush would lose the Hispanic vote.

 

[JackDee]

uncle moneybags,

points well taken, i am taking an extremist stand here on the numerous lesser qualities of the u.s. to illustrate a point, of course reality is a much more balanced affair, but some aspects need to be pointed out in extremis to some of the right wing supernationalist hawks here who ll take no criticism for their country and would rather see all the rest of humanity oblitarated from the map before they pass any judgment or their own doings.

 

[PatPatriot]

From newsmax.

Here are a few of the Intelligence Committee's findings that Couric and her media brethren apparently missed:


The CIA's judgment that Saddam Hussein, if sufficiently desperate, might deploy terrorists with a global read - [including] al Qaida - to conduct terrorist attacks in the event of war, was reasonable.
The CIA's assessment on safehaven - that al Qaida or associated operatives were present in Baghdad and northeastern Iraq in an area under Kurdish control - was reasonable.
The CIA's examination of contacts, training, safehaven and operational cooperation as indicators of a possible Iraq-al Qaida relationship was a reasonable and objective approach to the question.
The CIA reasonably assessed that there were likely several instances of contacts between Iraq and al-Qaida throughout the 1990s, but that these contacts did not add up to an established formal relationship.
The CIA's assessment that Iraq had maintained ties to several secular Pakistani terrorist groups and with the Mujahidin e-Khaliq, was supported by the intelligence. The CIA was also reasonable in judging that Iraq appeared to have been reaching out to more effective terrorist groups, such as Hizballah and Hamas, and might have intended to employ such surrogates in the event of war. [END OF EXCERPT]

Though not specified in the report's Conclusion section: Saddam gave safe haven to 1993 World Trade Center bomber Abdel Rahman Yasin, notorious Palestinian terrorist Abu Nidal, Achille Lauro hijacker Abu Abbas and Khala Khadr al Salahat, who furnished Libyan agents with the Semtex bomb that destroyed Pan Am Flight 103.

Then there's al Qaida kingpin Abu Musab al Zarqawi, who was admitted to a Baghdad hospital run by Uday Hussein before the Iraq war - not to mention a Mukahbarat document uncovered last December placing lead 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta in Baghdad two months before the 9/11 attacks.

Though Newsweek immediately challenged the document as "a probable forgery," soon-to-be Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said at the time the evidence was convincing.

"We are uncovering evidence all the time of Saddam's involvement with al Qaida," he told the London Telegraph. "But this is the most compelling piece of evidence that we have found so far. It shows that not only did Saddam have contacts with al-Qaeda, he had contact with those responsible for the September 11 attacks."

Of course, the folks at NBC were never particularly receptive to evidence tying Saddam to 9/11. When Dr. Allawi broached the topic with Tom Brokaw in an interview earlier this month, the NBC anchorman tried to shut him down.

"Prime minister, I’m surprised that you would make the connection between 9/11 and the war in Iraq," the distressed Brokaw insisted. "The 9/11 Commission in America says there is no evidence of a collaborative relationship between Saddam Hussein and those terrorists of al Qaida."

Whatever you say, Tom.


Editor's note: