TheAgitator.com
Immimnent
Thursday, March 18th, 2004Andrew Sullivan continues to hammer away at the “imminent” meme, the argument from the pro-war side that it’s a slander to say Bush administration officials ever indicated Iraq posed an imminent or immediate threat. Sullivan writes:
Rumsfeld never said that the threat from Iraq was imminent, or immediate, but that he could not know for sure.
Yesterday’s Washington Post recounts Thomas Friedman confronting Rumsfeld on Meet the Press:
“Right here it says,” Friedman said, ” ‘Some have argued’ — this is you speaking, ‘some have argued that the nuclear threat from Iraq is not imminent, that Saddam is at least five to seven years away from having nuclear weapons; I would not be so certain.’ ” Friedman said that was “close to imminent.”“Well, I’ve tried to be precise,” Rumsfeld said, “and I’ve tried to be accurate.”
” ‘No terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people,’ ” Friedman quoted Rumsfeld as telling Congress in September 2002, ” ‘and the stability of the world than the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq.’ “
Here are a few other Rumsfeld quotes, from the handy new website Iraq on the Record
“Now, transport yourself forward a year, two years, or a week, or a month, and if Saddam Hussein were to take his weapons of mass destruction and transfer them, either use himself, or transfer them to the Al-Qaeda, and somehow the Al-Qaeda were to engage in an attack on the United States, or an attack on U.S. forces overseas, with a weapon of mass destruction you’re not talking about 300, or 3,000 people potentially being killed, but 30,000, or 100,000 . . . human beings.”Source: Secretary Rumsfeld Live Interview with Infinity CBS Radio, Infinity-CBS Radio (11/14/2002).
“[N]o terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people than the regime of Saddam Hussein and Iraq.”
Source: Testimony of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, Senate Armed Services Committee (9/19/2002).
“Iraq poses a threat to the security of our people and to the stability of the world that is distinct from any other.”
Source: Donald Rumsfeld Addresses the Conference of Army Reserve Operators, Defense Department (1/20/2003).
Here are two from President Bush:
“On its present course, the Iraqi regime is a threat of unique urgency. . . . it has developed weapons of mass death.”Source: President, House Leadership Agree on Iraq Resolution, White House (10/2/2002).
“Today the world is also uniting to answer the unique and urgent threat posed by Iraq. A dictator who has used weapons of mass destruction on his own people must not be allowed to produce or possess those weapons. We will not permit Saddam Hussein to blackmail and/or terrorize nations which love freedom.”
Source: President Bush Speaks to Atlantic Youth Council, CNN (11/20/2002).
And here are a few more.
Of course, in my opinion, this is all beside the point. If the Bush administration never believed the threat to be imminent, they shouldn’t have invaded in the first place.
But it seems pretty clear to me that though they may never have used the word “imminent,” they did use “urgent” and “immediate,” and they certainly attempted to instill in our minds the idea that Saddam had both the capability and the means to kill thousands of Americans very quickly.
Right. These semantic games from the party that (correctly) chided Clinton for attempting to parse the definition of “is”.
The logic is astounding: we never said that the threat of Saddam Hussein was imminent, but the invasion had to be done quickly, because the threat was, well, immediate.
I’m eager to debate the pro-war crowd on this point. Please don’t be silent on this topic, Rich Casebolt, Ms. Dani, and Michael! Perhaps it’d just be best to concede this point and carry on?
It must be nice supporting a party that has a snowballs chance in hell of ever holding a major public office.
You libertarians just get to sit back and criticize, criticize, criticize…..
Its frankly beginning to bore the shit out of me.
>>It must be nice supporting a party that has a snowballs chance in hell of ever holding a major public office.
I’m sure next you’ll lecture us about the pointlessness and futility of opposing one party systems in countries with dictatorships.
Not a substantive post on this issue of “imminence,” Michael, and not correct even on its merits. Both Radley and the libertarians who post in the comments section give credit where credit is due and provide many positive policy recommendations for the nation’s and the world’s ills.
Rich Casebolt, Ms. Dani, anyone else care to try on the question of imminence, or do you concede the point that the Iraq War was sold to the American people as a war that had to be prosecuted quickly because Saddam Hussein was an imminent/immediate/time-sensitive threat?
Why is imminence important if a threat is inevitable? I mean, shouldn’t you attack when you are strong and they are weak?
If I were Bush this is what I would say:
“Yes I did imply imminent danger, but I was mistaken. Next question.”
Who cares whether he said it, implied it, or not.
I happen to understand and accept the real reasons we are there. I did not have to be “sold” on it.
Reasons (not in order of importance):
1. Oil – A shitty reason but a damn good one. (Think Nooooo Gas)
2. Military positioning – Kuwait is nice and all but its just too damn small.
3. Democracy – The cure for islamic hatred is Freedom. (Think back to West and East Berlin, the Russians had to build a wall to keep its people in.
The point being, adn yes Clinton did set the precedent for this, is that Bush did not say imminent neither did his staff. He said immediate. There is a difference. Semantics, yes, but still a difference.
If Saddam had opened his “doors” and let everyone see what he actually had or didn’t have as far as weaponry went, then maybe Bush wouldn’t have taken the attitude that this was an immediate threat. Transparency on Saddam’s part would have prevented all of this, but he wasn’t willing to be that so what were we to do?
I believe Saddam did not have what he said he had as far as WMD. I believe he was a dillusional dictator, and he lied to us, his own country, world leaders, everyone, he lied to himself. What was Bush supposed to believe?
If your neighbor across the street says that he has missiles pointed at your house and has already proven that he hates you and wants you dead, and disregards anyone’s request to come over and talk about it, what would you do if you had the opportunity to run over and take him down? Would you sit at home twiddling your fingers and hope that he would come to his senses someday?
Roach writes:
“Why is imminence important if a threat is inevitable? I mean, shouldn’t you attack when you are strong and they are weak?”
An attack by Saddam Hussein on the United States was hardly “inevitable,” Roach. If it had been, I’d likely support your position.
Michael writes:
“If I were Bush this is what I would say:
‘Yes I did imply imminent danger, but I was mistaken. Next question.’”
I appreciate your honesty, Michael. Unfortunately we can’t just say “next question” that quickly — we’d have to next know why the intelligence was faulty, and specifically, if anyone in our intelligence community intentionally manipulated the intelligence to lead the country to war under false pretenses. There is evidence that this may have been the case, and it needs to be look at carefully by the American people, the press, and the Congress. This is what’s taking place now, and it should take place. But first we have to continue debating this point to resolution (that the Bush Administration never stated or clearly implied that the threat was imminent).
I believe we are almost at clarity on this issue, but I await further input from those who may disagree.
MattG, what we agree on is that there must have been an intelligence breakdown or manipulation of some sort if the intelligence is what led Bush to believe that the threat was immediate. So if that’s the case, then why are we still harping on Bush and his admin and their having called the threat immediate rather than imminent? He responds to the intelligence he is given. He doesn’t perform the intelligence research himself. The problem would lie with the CIA and whomever else was involved in the intel gathering. Go after them. THEY said the threat was real and immediate to Bush. Bush just decided to act upon the info he received. And if I received that info, I would have responded in pretty much the same way. Protect our country, that is Bush’s #1 priority as it should be for all Presidents.
This is just another attempt on Radley’s part and many others to decry foul on Bush because they have nothing else to use.
Whether Bush has ever lied to us as POTUS we’ll never know; what we do know is that he has never been caught, which is more than we can say for Kerry.
Rumsfeld and Bush said those things because Saddam made sure they believed those things. I blame Saddam of course, all of this is completely his fault.
Ms. Dani writes:
“The point being, adn yes Clinton did set the precedent for this, is that Bush did not say imminent neither did his staff. He said immediate. There is a difference. Semantics, yes, but still a difference.”
Quickly we are at the crux of the matter. Ms. Dani has stipulated that the Bush Administration painted Saddam Hussein as an “immediate” threat to the United States, so what is the difference between an “immediate” and an “imminent” threat?
I think most people would see no significant difference between these two, and my Webster’s New World backs this point up: “immediate” is “not separated in time; acting or happening at once; without delay; instant” while “imminent” is “likely to happen without delay; impending”. Again, I fail to see a significant difference.
Unless someone can come up with a serious rebuttal to the point that the Bush Administration presented Saddam Hussein as an immediate and imminent threat, I think this point should be conceded and we should move on to debating the war on other points. Frankly I don’t see a real argument against this and the semantic debate is strained. If there are further substantive points, though, I am open to hearing and debating them. Otherwise, let’s wrap this point up.
Ms. Dani and Tom,
I think we’ve reached consensus. The reason that commentators such as Radley continue to stress that Saddam was presented to the American people as an imminent/immediate threat is that administration officials such as Donald Rumsfeld and pro-war commentators such as Andrew Sullivan continue to deny it.
Ergo: if we have reached agreement that Saddam was thus presented, then this thread is over. The next step would be to investigate the possible reasons for this error in intelligence, and there are several possibilities, which are probably familiar to all by now: our intelligence was simply wrong because intelligence sometimes is; our intelligence was wrong because Saddam lied about his capabilities, and we had no reason to disbelieve him; our intelligence was wrong because pro-war intelligence people in the Office of Special Plans manipulated it as a casus belli; our intelligence was wrong because Bush himself, or someone else in his Administration (Rove, Cheney, whoever) wanted a war and saw in the intel what he wanted to see.
There are many possibilities, some honest mistakes, others dishonest and dishonorable. As a nation, we should be looking into the intelligence failure in an honest way, and we are. But pro-Operation Iraqi Freedom commentators and administration officials must stop claiming that Saddam was not presented as an immediate or imminent threat, since he clearly was, both in spirit and letter. That much appears to be resolved.
MattG, I agreed with most everything you said until this, “our intelligence was wrong because Bush himself, or someone else in his Administration (Rove, Cheney, whoever) wanted a war and saw in the intel what he wanted to see.”
The rest of your case was factual and rational. This one statement alone is on what you are basing your conclusion that Bush purposefully deceived you and I in order to goto war with Saddam. This is conjecture. You hid this statement in the rest of your argument hoping that it would be accepted as fact along with the rest of your statements. I don’t accept it.
I concede that Bush made the case to the American people that the threat was immediate or imminent or whatever the hell you want to call it, but I will not concede that he made up the intelligence in order to do so. There are no facts to prove that.
Andrew Sullivan should have been a lawyer.
Whatever words were used, the Bush Administration “sold” the war, scaring people into buying the deal.
As to what would have happened if we had not gone to war, that’s speculation, fantasy. Call your TV psychic.
The same people who sold the war based on the immediate threat are now speculating about the horrors that would have happened, now that there’s little, if any, evidence that the immediate threat existed. The threat was really there, you just can’t see it.
They like to make stuff up. They talk to God. It’s all there. You just can’t see it.
Chip Gibbons said “The same people who sold the war based on the immediate threat are now speculating about the horrors that would have happened”.
If you are referring to when pro-war people say “If Gore had been in office, oh my! the horrors that would have happened…” I am one of those, but I’ve never thought that in reference to going to war with Saddam. It’s always been in reference to 9/11 and fighting back against the terrorists specifically.
And subsequently, if Gore HAD been in office and had to deal with the economic struggles we experienced due to and after 9/11, I’m almost sure that at least 75% of our paychecks would be going to welfare programs now instead of the crappy %30 we are paying.
Ms. Dani,
If you’ll re-read that part of my post, you’ll see that I was only presenting those four scenarios as possibilities for the intelligence failure. I have no evidence that Bush saw what he wanted to see in order to lead the nation into war; all four scenarios were indeed conjecture on my part.
Which scenario, if any, is correct? That’s what we need to find out. I don’t pretend to know, but I’ll follow it closely along with the rest of the country.
I should add, if Bush sold the war, but for a variety of reasons thought it was the right thing to do, why does it really matter if their public presetation and their most private feelings were not identical? Isn’t their duty to use their best judgment to do what they think is best? Why does the war’s justification hinge upon what was said in a particular speech?
I think the war was right because I think if Saddam got nukes at some point down the road–and that was his goal–we’d be much much worse off. He’s be undeterrable. He could support various terrorist with near impunity. He could leak nukes to AQ or others. He could jack around world energy supplies and cow his neighbors into submission.
It would be bad all around and stopping it was a reasonable foreign policy goal. If he happened to torture his own people, not comply with UN inspections, and defeating him might allow a reasonably liberal regime to take shape etc. These are simply all the more reason to take him out. I think, btw, this was the basic thinking of the Bush admin.
MattG, I concur and will also be watching. It won’t change my mind about Bush being the best candidate we have at this time, but I want to know the truth none the less.
“Imminent threat,” “WMDs,” all catch phrases… selling points! Newsflash folks, every war must be sold. None of these, including “Liberating Iraq,” (from a pure humanitarian perspective) are why we went, and it’s still a brilliant move.
Refuting the war on these simple ideas makes you as gullible as if you actually think that’s why we’re there.
Roach writes:
“I should add, if Bush sold the war, but for a variety of reasons thought it was the right thing to do, why does it really matter if their public presetation and their most private feelings were not identical? Isn’t their duty to use their best judgment to do what they think is best? Why does the war’s justification hinge upon what was said in a particular speech?”
This is a wholly different subject for a different thread, Roach. But let’s run with the ball anyway, since I’m curious to see if anyone else here would care to pick it up.
You’re introducing the idea of the “noble lie,” which is indeed a tenet of neoconservative thought. Indeed, Paul Wolfowitz famously let it slip last year that Weapons of Mass Destruction and alleged Saddam links to Al-Qaida and 9/11 were “bureaucratic reasons” for starting the war, which is an astonishing thing to say, and gives fodder to those who believe that the Office of Special Plans manipulated the intelligence as a casus belli.
Roach, hypothetically (i.e. not talking specifically about George W. Bush and Operation Iraqi Freedom) are you saying it’s OK for a president to lie (or greatly blur details to the point where statements are lies in all but name) to his electorate to send the country to war, if the real reasons for the war are, in the president’s view, sufficient moral or political justification for the war, but if those reasons would not suffice to convince the populace of the war’s justness?
MattG — I do want to respond to this, but I have to do my part in the global economy right now.
I’ll be back …
Rich,
Tell me about it…I’ve gotten nothing done today at all…
Time to make the donuts…
‘Imminent’, ‘WMD’. I really hope the administration was misleading the people in their speeches (this can be solved during the elections). The alternative is better than having a totally incompetent intelligence agency.
I understand bombing the Chinese embassy by mistake ’cause you got an old map, or not getting Osama ’cause there’s no intel on the ground, but a 30bil spy satellite system should be able to locate WMD manufacturing and storage facilities (or not).
Good luck with your war.
MattG –
I agree that we need to find out why our information wasn’t better before the war. But Bush in the State of the Union Address used the term “imminent” in a very specific way, which is why I’m upset at the charges.
Bush never claimed to know exactly what Iraq had. In the State of the Union speech, he said that some were saying that we shouldn’t attack Iraq unless we knew that we were facing an imminent threat. But, given uncertainty, there’s a chance of error either way – they might have had more or they might have had less than we thought they had. (Now we know that it was less, not more, but the fact that he said we couldn’t be sure, and we clearly weren’t sure, certainly doesn’t invalidate his argument).
Bush argued that, since we couldn’t know for sure how close Iraq was to being able to launch a chemical, biological or even nuclear attack, we should err on the side of caution. He argued that the case was urgent, and that we should go in immediately rather than waiting until the threat was imminent. I can recall several in his administration repeatedly using the example of the first Gulf War, when we found out only afterwards that Iraq was much closer to nuclear capabilities than the US had suspected.
The way Bush was using the term “imminent”, it meant that we knew for sure that he had these capabilities, and Bush never argued that we were sure of what he had. The argument was that we knew that Saddam had used WMD in the past, that he wanted them and was actively trying to get them now (which turned out to be true), that he wasn’t fully cooperating with inspectors and acted as if he was hiding something.
Bush never said that the threat was imminent. He said that if we wait too long, trying to make sure that the threat is imminent, we might miscalculate. Therefore, it’s better to go in now, immediately, before this becomes imminent.
There’s something solid behind the debate over the term “imminent” – Bush didn’t lie. He didn’t know exactly what Iraq had and didn’t have, and he didn’t say that he knew. He said that there was risk.
By the way, my weather man said yesterday that it was going to rain, and it didn’t. He lied!
I find it rather odd that all the googling and Nexus searching in the world can’t turn up a single instance when the word “imminent” was uttered in reference to Iraq by the Bush admin. in the lead up to the war.
It’s almost as though they had a meeting:
“OK, here’s our talking points…blah blah WMDs…blah blah liberation….blah blah centrifuge. But NEVER, under ANY CIRCUMSTANCE, is the word ‘imminent’ to pass your lips.
If things don’t go like we think they ought, we’ll get some useful idiot democrat to start harping about how we said it was an ‘imminent threat’, and we can point out that we never said it was ‘imminent’”.
I don’t like conspiracy theories either, but seriously folks…don’t you find it a little strange that so much attention has been given to one word that was apparently never used?
Ann,
You write that “Bush didn’t lie” about Saddam Hussein being an “imminent threat”. Maybe, maybe not — I don’t allege it, but I don’t see that you can categorically deny the possibility, either.
But we do know that the information that he presented to the country was simply wrong — see here http://atrios.blogspot.com/2004_03_14_atrios_archive.html#107957746331142482
for the speech Bush delivered to the nation 1 year ago yesterday. It does not stand up well; almost every paragraph contains something we now know to not be true.
So no, I don’t necessarily accept the “Bush lied us into war” meme, either. But “Bush wanted a war and saw what he wanted to see in the intelligence” is, you must admit, a reasonable possibility to explain the intelligence failure. Whether it’s true or not, we will discover in the weeks and months to come.
Regarding the “imminent threat” discussion, it wasn’t only in the State of the Union address that he and other administration officials presented their case. In many other statements, as chronicled by Radley and elsewhere, both Bush and other high-ranking members of his staff were not so careful with their language.
For years it was correct to say Iraq had WMD, wring hands and do nothing more. Clinton did it, the UN did it, Congress did it, the Europeans did it. It was the PC thing to do. While we talked and wrung our hands Iraq citizens were murdered with WMD, US embassies and ships were blown up and we watched as our leaders did nothing. Now George W. Bush stands up and says enough is enough, you will go no further. And that small portion of our population who can only wring their hands start complaning about efforts to defend us from destruction. Why don’t you whiners just pack up and leave.
It is really a sad commentary on the pro-war side that they are still holding on dearly to the notion that the CIA and intelligence community was entirely to blame, and Bush merely repeated what he was told about Saddam’s weapons capability. I guess you can fool some of the people all of the time.
Tenet has made clear that his intelligence estimates did not unequivocally support the administration’s stance concerning Saddam’s production and maintenance of vast stockpiles of WMD’s.In fact, if you read his recenttestimony in front of the Senate committe, he says specifcally that he has corrected administration officials on thier incorrect pronouncements regarding Iraqi WMD’s and even said that their statements did not “comport” with what was contained within his intelligence estimates. We know this because Cheney to this day still holds out those two supposed mobile weapons labs as evidence of WMD’s when our own intelligence has specifically discredited that thoery.
In addition, what about the aluminum tubes that were thought to be components of nuclear weapons? or the unmanned flying drones that Rummy warned could be used to spread biological weaponry over the continental US? The funny thing is these examples were discredited PRIOR to our commencement of war. This is what happens when you rely on the word of an interested party–Chalabi—in order to collect evidence for intervention, when our own intelligence experts were disagreeing with him. If that is not a clear abuse of the public trust, I don’t know what is.
And, as a special note, remember Condi’s excuse when it was clear that they couldn’t entirely pass the blame on the “15 words” relating to the uranium claim in the SOU? She and the president didn’t fully read the national intelligence estimate. Yes that was the excuse. Our president, ladies and gentlemen.
This really should not be a partisan issue. I’m pretty sure Radley is no Democrat. You either accept the fact that the threat from Iraq was purposefully and systematically exaggerated the threat, or you don’t.
I mean doesn’t it even raise any suspicion among you when David Kay volunteered to the Senate oversight committeethat he didn’t believe the administration manipulated the intelligence reports—when his only task was to locate WMD’s, and not to comment on the actual use of intellegence reports? Why would he make such a comment that was so far outside the scope of his investigation, if not to cover someone’s ass?
Rich, Ms. Dani: Yes, it’s okay to hate the Democrats, loathe Bill Clinton, piss on the DNC and STILL think Bush misled you on the war. No one is going to take that right away from you.
Okay, you’re going to have to weed through some misspellings and typos in that last post. Sorry. Was in a hurry.
MattG you ask a very serious and important question. I’d say no, it’s not OK to lie. It’s kind of a “consent of the governed” issue. But I do think if there are 5 reasons and he thinks they’re important in the order A B C D, but sells and emphasizes them in the order D B A. That would be fine. I think there’s a difference in rhetorical emphasis and lying, and I think that’s what transpired here.
MattG -
You’re right, I shouldn’t say that Bush didn’t lie. What I meant to say is that there’s no evidence that Bush lied (and I don’t believe that he did, but that’s opinion).
My point is that Bush never claimed to know with absolute certainty exactly what Iraq had. Even when the administration made general statements (as did others on both sides) about Saddam’s having WMD, it was clear that this was their estimate, based on the intelligence they had at the time. They said repeatedly that we should not wait until we were 100% sure, because it might be too late, which is very different from saying that we’re already sure.
Professor X- on Tenet’s testimony, I think you need to read more closely about him having to correct the administration. At least one of the three cases was a difference of opinion between the CIA and the Pentagon, when neither side had proof. With all three, the correction was not “we know that this is incorrect”, it was “the intelligence community is still unsure on this”.
It’s a luxury of intelligence gatherers or inspectors such as Hans Blix or “concerned citizens” such as ourselves to say that the intelligence is unclear, so we should all wait and look only at what we know for sure. If intelligence isn’t 100% certain, it’s safer to ignore it. But I was impressed when Tony Blair talked about the position he was in and said basically, “if you had seen what we were seeing, you too would have felt the need to act” (not an exact quote).
Bush was in a position of responsibility, and he didn’t necessarily have the luxury of waiting and waiting and waiting for better intelligence. At some point, you have to make a decision, knowing that you may turn out to be wrong. It’s OK to go back and review with the benefit of hindsight, but it’s important to be fully aware that of the difference between what we know now and what Bush can reasonably be expected to have known then.
One last time – Bush didn’t say that he knew that Saddam had stockpiles of WMD. He said that there were indications that he might, and that it was too big a risk to ignore. There’s a difference.
I can’t believe people still believe we went to Iraq for WMDs. Do you REALLY think the Bush administration, or any member of Congress for that matter, actually thought Saddam was going to launch an attack against the U.S.?
These are all just justifications for doing what we needed to in Iraq, to start changing the way things work in the Middle East.
I love how this is such a controversial issue, yet everybody agrees that Saddam needed to go. As if all of you guys would just be A-O-K with this whole thing if they had just found some of those mysterious WMDs.
Ann writes:
“My point is that Bush never claimed to know with absolute certainty exactly what Iraq had. Even when the administration made general statements (as did others on both sides) about Saddam’s having WMD, it was clear that this was their estimate, based on the intelligence they had at the time.”
But Bush actually did claim certainty, Ann, as this paragraph from his speech to the nation on the eve of the war (3/17/03) shows:
“Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised.”
That was an expression of certainty, and it was incorrect. There really isn’t any wiggle room here, Ann (and this was not the only expression of such certainty). Again, presuming that the president did not simply lie, the question we are left with is, why was the intelligence wrong? Hopefully, we’ll know soon enough.
I love it.
If a Cop shoots a suspect because he feel that he “might of had a gun” because the suspect said he did, nevermind the fact that the suspect never went for said gone and frisking by other officers failed to produce a gun, he would be brought up on charges, probably fired and face criminal liability.
But a President goes to war because another countries leader liked to pretend he was a big man and important to the world, claiming he had “Weapons of Mass Destruction”, and yet prior searches by Teams trained to do so had turned up no weapons and the other countries leader wasnt particularly in a position to use them even if he had them and we are supposed to go, oh well, nevermind, he was a bad guy and so deserved to get popped?
I dont think so. Regardless of what benefits there are in getting Saddam out of Iraq, the reasons we were given are wrong. Period. To try and defend it in hindsight and start changing the tune is bullshit. We went to war becuase Iraq posed an immediate, if not imminent threat, and yet now we find, surprise surprise that that threat was over rated. Somebody needs to get fired. If not GWB then some people in the Intelligence community. When intel is that wrong and people die for it someone is supposed to take the blame, and amazingly no one is.
Guess old GWB never heard the expression “The Buck stops here.” For him its more like, “The Buck stops over there, well maybe not there, I never said there, just in that general area, rather that there are indications that the Buck should stop there…”
MattG –
I certainly agree that we need to figure out what happened. And I wish that Bush would talk more openly about this. Clearly, either things were not as he expected, or else he misled us. I think it was the former but agree that it had to be one of the two.
Ms. Dani, you ask:
“If your neighbor across the street says that he has missiles pointed at your house and has already proven that he hates you and wants you dead … Would you sit at home twiddling your fingers and hope that he would come to his senses someday?”
Well, if you’re a libertarian that’s what you’d do! You’d say that we have to prove that the threat from our neighbor is imminent, and in the meantime we have to live uneasily until we have absolute proof that our evil neighbor means us harm. And if your neighbor did attack you, then you’d have to ask yourself what you did to provoke the attack. You’d have to wail on and on about how your “head of the household” failed you by not preventing the attack, but at the same time you’d have to bitch that your “head of the household” is being too aggressive in his response to the attack.
A brief summary of libertarian comments on terrorism:
Case #1: A terror attack occurs
Libertarian Response: Say that our government has taken insufficient action to protect us. State boldly that our government is at root to blame for the attack.
Case #2: We vigorously kill terrorists
Libertarian Response: Say that we are inciting further attacks against us. Also say that we are going about things all wrong, treating the act of terror as a military instead of as a criminal action.
Case #3: We preemptively attack and destroy a regime that we perceive to be a potential threat to us
Libertarian Response: Bitch loudly and repeatedly that the attack was completely unjustified, because the regime didn’t pose an “imminent” threat to us.
So when you’re a libertarian you really do get to have your cake and eat it, too.
Michael writes:
If I were Bush this is what I would say:
“Yes I did imply imminent danger, but I was mistaken. Next question.”
–
And I’d stand up and applaud. Occasionally a politician will demonstrate that publically taking resposibility for a mistake/bad judgement/brain fart/whatever, more often than not, results in the matter being quickly dismissed and everyone moving on. Why, oh why, do so few of them learn from these examples?
Some pseudo-random thoughts:
T — when you start the firing, you can start with the Democrats who have consistently voted to emasculate our intelligence capabilities (often because they feared having to explain the actions of a strong, confident America to their elitist friends worldwide).
MattG — first, I agree we need to get to the bottom of this.
How do you propose to do that, however, in a way that prevents the Democrats from turning the process into a political circus with themselves as the ringmasters, rendering it ineffective?
And, how do you do this without significantly inhibiting the work our Executive Branch still needs to do?
As for WMD imminence, what I got from Bush’s speeches is that Saddam didn’t yet have the capabilites (in either payloads or delivery systems … and that includes the willingness of terrorist allies) to deploy those kinds of weapons beyond his own borders, therefore the threat was not “immediate”.
However, Bush (and I) believed now was still the time to take him out, because:
1> His history and present behavior indicated that he was motivated to put himself in a position to be able to deploy such weapons, when it was to his advantage — and there were no checks-and-balances within the Iraqi system to delay, much less prevent, Saddam from seeing his wishes carried out.
2> Anything short of a nationwide proctoscopy would be inadequate to determine when/if he would be ready to deploy those weapons, until after the first one was deployed — and Saddam, unlike Nelson Mandela, refused to subject himself to that level of “examination” willingly. Nothing short of armed invasion would be required to perform this … the “frisking” by weapons inspectors, based on the statements by Hans Blix and others, simply left too much doubt as to Saddam’s capabilities.
3> One weapon, if deployed, would bring massive disruption, not only to the target area, but to the entire world, as fear would become an obsession for people worldwide.
4> Once the first weapon was deployed, the leverage of WMD could easily paralyze (or at least partially inhibit) the decision-making process, not only at the UN, but even within the Oval Office, because the fear of more mass casualties would lead to a lot of second-guessing — and sniping by the poltical opposition. Hesitation, however, could also lead to even more casualties, in a classic damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don’t scenario.
Actually, I was not too worried about a nuclear capability in Iraq (that is sufficiently complicated to preclude quick and deeply-hidden development), nor was I too worried about bioweapons (most mass-deployable ones are so slow and easily countered, once detected, that they are only effective if covertly applied — and once the first bug was unleashed, the world would be on notice).
My big worry was the development of chemical weapons, particularly sticky nerve agents like VX. Saddam had the petrochemical infrastructure to not only do this, but to do so relatively quickly and hide them in plain sight. These agents act very quickly, and it is quite difficult to defend a large civilian population against multiple, simultaneous applications.
Bottom line — I concede nothing.
Bush was absolutely right in his judgment … Saddam was not a threat that day, but we could not be sure beyond a very reasonable doubt that he would be ready … and willing … within days or weeks, because he was not honestly and openly dealing with us.
A man with his history and motivations, in control of a national infrastructure with the resources to produce WMD, could not be trusted in this day of global tranportation, instant news, and suicide terrorists, to keep any WMD genie in his possession in the bottle.
The moral relativism of the Left has denigrated the importance of character and honesty in our evaluations of others, to the point that we leave men like Saddam in power, even after their previous brutal acts show they cannot be trusted with resources and infrastructures capable of producing WMD … simply because they haven’t gotten around to using them on us, yet.
The refutation of this relativism by the President is one of the primary reasons the Left has a visceral hatred of him … and why they refuse to acknolwedge the common-sense judgment he has made in Iraq, for it shows the bankruptcy of their reasoning.
There are many reasons why we didn’t find the WMD we thought were there … from the blurred vision our intelligence apparatus, thanks to its starvation by politicians Left and Right, to the extra time Saddam & Sons (and their Russian and Syrian friends) had to move any and all out of Iraq, or even out of existence.
However, to think that leaving Saddam in place, given his history and the absence of a completely-comprehensive, sustained mechanism of observation of Iraq’s internal operations by leaders we could trust, would never result in the strengthening of terrorism, or Iraq producing WMDs for his deployment, in the forseeable future is simply beyond reason. Since we didn’t have this comprehensive ability of observation, there also was no way to determine when such deeds would be executed by Iraq before the fact — it could be days, weeks, months, or years, but left to himself, Saddam would make it happen.
WMD or no, he had to go down. The world refused to exercise that sound judgment … yet many on its surface are so resentful of American strength, prosperity, and the resolve that is derived from correctly perceiving absolute truth, that many others seek to turn those attributes into tar and feathers for the American Eagle.
Honestly, I never thought that Saddam was a threat to the island or the monkey butlers. But I do know there was alot of page refreshing from a Iraqi location off the beach cam whenever Ms.Eccleston was sunning herself…
To Rich Casebolt –
Your “pseudo-random thoughts” are excellent! You did a great job of describing some of the reasons (beyond human rights violations) for getting rid of Saddam.
The fact that we haven’t found stockpiles of WMD was a surprize to most of us. For me, another surprize was the extensive international market for nuclear and other parts and technology. I don’t think the Bush administration has gotten enough credit for its progress in unravelling that, and it’s largely due to our “liberation” of Iraq.
We now know that Iraq paid for missiles from North Korea, and that there was active trade through Libya, Pakistan, etc. And we’ve gotten more proof that China was a big supplier to Pakistan, among others. If Saddam was still in power, even with Hans Blix hanging around,wouldn’t this extensive market still be open to terrorists?
From the anti-war crowd, it sounds like all they can see is the now-seemingly-discredited “selling points” Bush used to hype hysteria in support of the invasion. Whether they appeared credible to decision-makers at the time is a minor departure.
Devil’s Advocate-style question: How believable a selling point would have been necessary? A Yom Kippur-like invasion of Isreal? Four or five armored divisions rolling over the Saudi border? A mushroom cloud over Paris/London/New York?
All rhetorical, yes, but what must be examined is the trip-line, i.e., how serious a threat is needed to be unanimously judged credible?
I’m still waffling on this thing, since all I get is Cable/Network media, which is as useful as blueberry pie in a housefire. Any insight as to what would have been “real” would be appreciated.
It is amazing we are talking about the imminent threat Iraq was while the person who supposedly attacked our nation, Bin Laden is still free. Recall our Presidentâ??s comments on 9/17/01, days after the attack on our nation, â??I want justice, and thereâ??s an old poster out Westâ?¦ I recall, that said, â??Wanted, Dead or Alive.â??â? With all our advanced technology and military might we canâ??t find one man who is apparently in the same place he has been for years.
There is evidence that the Bush administration would rather have Bin Laden free rather than defeated. Days after the hijackings, while no airplanes were allowed to fly in US airspace the president authorized an airplane to fly around the nation to pick up Bin Laden relatives and other Saudi Arabians. Fifteen of the nineteen hijackers were Saudi Arabian but the president decided to ignore this fact and let these individuals fly home to safety without being questioned about their possible involvement in the attack on our nation.
Also, rather than finishing the mission of tracking down Bin Laden, â??Dead or Aliveâ?, the President and his administration chose to commit over 130,000 US troops to invade Iraq whom the president recently stated had nothing to do with the attack on our nation.
Nazi commander Herman Goering once stated, “Of course, the people don’t want war. But after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it’s a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to greater danger. It works the same way in any country.”
So what is the Presidentâ??s bidding? Part of it appears to be that he would rather have us all living in fear of being attacked.
JAB:
The arugument that “since we didn’t get Bin Laden FIRST, Bush must be misleading us” is old, tired … and invalid. (Same with moving those Saudis out of the country … could it be that they weren’t involved, and our government wanted to protect them from an irrational backlash from some of our own wackos?)
First, the political and logistical realities in Afghanistan precluded flooding that nation with American troops. We learned that from the Soviet debacle in the 1980′s — the rugged, landlocked territory compels us to deal with the locals, who understandibly want a significant say in what goes on.
(This is good, by the way, as long as they keep their heads on straight, which they seem to be doing. They are truly taking ownership of the problems within Afghanistan, and putting structures in place that will reduce the chance of that nation being hijacked again by Islamofascists.)
Besides, heavy armor and massive forces are not that useful for finding the Osama needle in the Afghani haystack — you don’t need them for that. We put the forces we need in to do what we first needed to do — rob bin Laden of the leverage and support of the Taliban and the Afghani infrastructure they controlled, and kill or capture as many Al Quada as possible. That has done more to reduce the threat of terrorism than the actual capture of bin Laden will. (Don’t get me wrong — I still want his head on a pike. However, it is not the only prudent objective we need to pursue).
Your implication is that our objectives should be limited to “justice”; i.e. limit our efforts only to nabbing those who have already bloodied us, and then back off from pursuing all those who seek to do the same … simply because they haven’t bloodied us, yet.
That objective is inadequate … our objective must be to establish and maintain a geopolitical environment where terrorism has no “return on investment” — an environment where we, in a sustained and resolute way, act to either turn nations and people away from terrorism … or destroy them ruthlessly if they persist.
I have described why this needed to be done re: Iraq in my last post on this thread. I have described why this must be pursued worldwide, in other posts and other threads.
Leaving Saddam in control of the Iraqi infrastructure, as we act to achieve the above objectives (or even just to get bin Laden, for that matter) would have been very risky — he would have been highly motivated to gamble even more than he historically had, because he would have seen opportunities to strike us or our friends when we were distracted.
We are turning governments away from terrorism (though dissident elements in their governments have not let us finish the job yet) in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan (with the side benefit of Pakistan and India behaving civilly with each other). Libya is cooperating with us. Afghanistan and Iraq are making sure their nations are protected from being hijacked for use by terrorists — and the leadership in those nations that consorted with terrorists has been uprooted and almost reduced to insignificance.
We are acheiving the objective described above.
The “war only for justice/get bin Laden first, before anyone else” tack indicates to me that you are more worried about the potential actions of America, than the actions of those who persistently seek to deny people their inalienable rights by physical force and psychological leverage.
Looking at the historical record, I would say that such worry is based upon misplaced reasoning … even when you consider the foreign-policy blunders we have made in the past.
Maybe you’re not this way, but I have ran into many with your view — and they also seem to have a greater fear of CEOs that might shred some paper, than of thugs who have shredded people.
Be sure that your reasoning is not clouded by wealthist prejudice or moral equivalence, which are both common in these discussions. Those kinds of flawed thinking can lead one to fear America more than terrorism, because it is led by someone who simply believes rich guys and poor guys should have the same rights and responsibilites …
… and is willing to think, then make a decision, instead of asking everyone else (even those who would like to diminsh us) if it’s OK.
I’ve got one for you “serious consequences” and “war”. Remember this argument anyone? If Bush would have shut his yap and took control of the situation in Iraq without all the WMD speeches we wouldn’t be talking about this. Instead we would be talking about why the US would ever defer to an organization that is proving to be as corrupt as Saddam. I think if our supposed allies are playing both sides of the fence then the situation is pretty immimnent.
Rich, it was not soldiers and armor that were pulled out of Afghanistan and other theaters for Iraq. It was linguists and other rare resources.
“Those kinds of flawed thinking can lead one to fear America more than terrorism,because it is led by someone who simply believes rich guys and poor guys should have the same rights and responsibilites …”
I’d like to think you’re kidding with that last bit, but I suppose not, huh.
Nimon — two comments:
1> I didn’t know about the linguists — do you have more details?
Usually, however, the “why didn’t we invade Afghanistan like Iraq?” argument is framed in a way that casts dispersions upon the motives of the Administration, simply because the force structures were different.
Two different battles, two different force structures for sound military and diplomatic reasons — but they are still in the same war.
2> I am NOT kidding about the disdain of many for Bush because he doesn’t share their wealthist prejudices … and unfortunately, your comment smacks of wealthism as well.
Show me where Bush gives more rights to the rich, or demands less responsibility from them, than from the little guys like you and me.
OTOH, the Democrats, in both rhetoric and policy, show me that they see all wealthy people that do not submit to the intellectual and moral “superiority” of the Left — regardless of how they got/keep/use their wealth, or the effects such activities have on society as a whole — exactly the same.
The Dems see the wealthy as a hybrid creature — a cross between a sheep (that can be shorn for a while), and a leech (that must be crushed).
Even worse, they numb ordinary people to their need to “think like businessmen” and execute, with discipline, the sound planning and preparation that would prevent much of the poverty our social programs end up attempting to deal with.
When are the politicians — on either side — going to tell us little guys the truth about our responsibility in this society — a responsibility to be wise and productive that is equivalent to the rich man? When we get 250 million plus people engaged in problem solving, instead of the elites presuming to put the responsiblity on themselves and the rich alone, we can do less complaining and more solution-finding!
A search on ?shortage of linguists? and ?Arabic? should yield many articles. The shortage is an old problem, but the allocation of linguists is based on priorities set by the administration.
As for (2), from where I stand Bush appears to embrace the privilege of wealth and power more than any president since I started paying attention (Carter), and that?s saying something after Clinton?s self-centeredness. As a most basic example, the Bush administration has repeatedly demonstrated a ?stop asking questions, trust us, and do what we say? attitude, and seems to consider our checks and balances to be a nuisance. That?s not what I call equal rights and responsibilities for rich and poor. It?s more of an aristocracy.
?When are the politicians — on either side — going to tell us little guys the truth about our responsibility in this society??
Supply and demand. If we don?t demand it, it?ll won?t be supplied. As long as we keep voting for the lesser of two evils, we?re not likely to kick evil out of office.
Why is it that so many of you in the pro-war camp claim that the govt never made any specific assertions about what weapons Saddam was suspected of having and therefore never lied?
Does no one remember the presentation that Sec of State Powell made to the UN chock a block full of photos of suspected sites, activities, and replete with assertions of the types of systems (delivery and otherwise) that the Iraqi regime was hiding? I do. That presentation put me in the “pro-” camp (albeit only briefly)
But it was a fabrication.
Garth:
Lying involves intended deception — you know it is wrong, but you say it anyway. Do you have proof that those documents/photos were fabricated?
OTOH, from what I see, what this Administration did was make a judgment call, based upon the evidence available. The fact that they were wrong on many of the particulars was, in no way, proof of lying — or even of fundamentally bad judgment (see my posts above on this thread).
What it does indicate is that our intelligence systems are inadequate for the present geopolitical conditions — a problem that can be laid as much or more upon the political Left, as it can upon this Admistration.
The real beef many of those that are accusing the President of lying have, is that he was willing to make a decision on Iraq at all — for they fear an America with strength, resolve, and moral clarity in its leadership.
Nimon:
I will check the linguist situation out, but consider this — in Afghanistan, the locals demanded both a quicker and a greater role for themselves. We knew that in Iraq, we would have to do more of the work the locals are doing in Afghanistan, so it does make sense to shift resources there.
As for Bush embracing the privelege of wealth and power — I don’t see anything Bush has done topping the shutdown of flight ops at LAX for a high-dollar haircut aboard AF One.
What you perceive as arrogance, I perceive as getting down to business and focusing on the management of the Executive Branch — instead of making his appearance his first priority, and letting that affect the conduct of the peoples’ business.
I also see a somewhat-justified disdain for a post-Watergate press corps that views dirt and sensationalism as the fastest path to a Pulitzer, and/or has a wealthist mindset that colors its journalism.
I am also seeing a lot of libertarians and conservatives with a “purist” mindset, bash this Administration for not being as open as they think they should. The way these people are straining at every gnat (lack of press conferences, details in the Patriot Act) reminds me of the preachers a few years back who were ranting about backwards-masking as a significant threat — when I found that I could separate the garbage from the gold (in terms of feeding your head), just by listening to the albums frontwards.
I assert that we will be able to tell when an Administration is adopting oppression as policy, in time to do something about it, without subjecting them to the equivalent of a continuous, real-time proctoscopy that will slow down the legitimate work they do. Our checks and balances are adequate for the task.
Actually, one of the first signs we should look at is how the public policies of an Administration — or a potential Administration — seek to reach into our day-to-day life. Another is how such an entity places value upon the character and history of those it has to deal with, at home and abroad.
The first sign indicates the capacity for true oppression, the second indicates the soundness of the judgment, of any Administration.
Perhaps that is the biggest difference between us. As absurd as the haircut incident was, I find hiding the machinations of government from public scrutiny far more dangerous.
Nimon — then did the dealings of Clinton and Gore re: China make you just as nervous?
I saw many people “on my side of the fence” take their nervousness about the government during that Adminisration, to the point of irrationality in the 1990′s — the whole black-helicopter-UN-takeover-let’s-form-a-militia frenzy.
They didn’t get what I stated above — you can tell a lot by listening to the record “in the normal direction”, instead of obsessing about the hidden “lyrics” — and that is why I am more concerned about the open proposals of the Democratic Party, than I am of what may be going on behind the scenes at the White House today.
The Dems, in the name of compassion, are doing more to build an infrastructure for fascism (albeit unintentionally, for the most part) than the GOP is with its pro-business/serious-security stance, due to the Dems’ exuberance for inserting government in many places where, IMO, it is structurally incapable of advancing solutions.
As for keeping the machinations of government out of the bright lights of scrutiny you want to see, keep in mind that such illumination benefits the sniper as much or more as the watchdog.
There comes a point where an insistence on openess becomes counterproductive with respect to good government — especially when you are dealing with enemies that are so morally bankrupt, they will turn your openess, your compassion, and your sense of fairness into weapons that can kill you.
Again — listen to the record frontwards. The GOP pushes policies like less government involvement and tax cuts — policies that work against the consolidation of power required to establish oppression or fascism. That, along with common sense about those who would kill us, gives me confidence that this Administration will not abuse our rights when it is behind closed doors.
Yes, but then so do the dealings of the Bush family with China.
Currently the GOP is in control of the government. I see larger government and significant consolidation of power, not the opposite.
Nimon — I consider the Bush-China relationship on the same level as the Bush-Saudi relationship; it’s there, but I don’t see enough evidence of possible malfesiance when I play the record “frontwards” to have a significant concern.
This stands in stark contrast to the whole John Huang/Charile Trie/monks with money/”no controlling legal authority” shennagians that was seen during Clinton-Gore. Add to that their relativist world view, and I am far more nervous with them than with Bush-Cheney.
There are two reasons why the government is growing larger — the same reasons that caused the defecit to grow under Reagan:
1> Our national-security/defense infrastructure was mismanaged after the fall of the Soviet Union, so significant repair work had to be done. Add to that the shift in emphasis from diplomacy to resolute force (a shift I think was long overdue), and it makes sense to spend more in this area.
Also, national-security/defense is the proper purview of the federal government … in contrast to a lot of other areas the federal government is now involved in.
2> Problem is, so many of our leaders (primarily Democrat, but some GOP) play to the wealthist prejudice of the masses, that it is politically risky for this Adminstration to compensate for the necessary national-security spending by cutting other areas that are neither necessary in terms of societal effect, nor the proper purview of the federal government in the first place.
The Administration is caught in a dillemma when it comes to protecting our inalienable rights. Like Reagan, they have chosen to give some ground today on the sound fiscal principles that they know protect our right to pursue happiness, so that they can assure their ability to protect our right to live …
… in the hope we can live long enough for the masses to come to their senses about the pursuit-of-happiness issues a little later.