Lack of accountability, too late or not?

[ivwshane]

So we are coming up on the 10 anniversary of the Iraq war and we still have a party changing the reasons for the invasion in the first place (from wmd's to liberation) and we have had more people come out saying not only was the war based upon shaky evidence at best or outright lies at worst but also that it was something persued by the Bush administration. No accountability has been taken, no investigation has been called for and no official answers have been provided for the reasons why we pushed for an invasion of Iraq.

Also this week, more tapes from LBJ have been released and this little nugget was in it:

http://parallelnarratives.com/audio-lbj-and-nixon-on-vietnam-and-1968-presidential-election/

1) LBJ was furious with Nixon, audiotapes of telephone conversations now show, over the likelihood that Nixon meddled with Johnson’s attempts to get negotiations moving to bring the Vietnam war to a swift conclusion in 1968. In a heated diatribe, when referring to Nixon’s actions during the waning days of the ’68 presidential campaign, LBJ tells Senate Republican leader Everett Dirksen, “This is treason (click here to listen) .” In a separate, historically key conversation, LBJ directly warns Nixon that his “people” appeared to be bent on sabotaging LBJ’s peace overtures to Hanoi. In a conversation on November 3, 1968, two days prior to the presidential election, Johnson confronted Nixon on the issue, but Nixon told LBJ point-blank, “I’m not trying to interfere.”

The mp3 audiotape of Nixon and LBJ talking is linked here. I urge you to listen. It’s 15 minutes of historical gold:

Phone call between LBJ and Richard Nixon – November 3, 1968

Hindsight, surprise, has pretty much shown that Nixon was being less than truthful with the old man on that day. What we know is that Nixon had campaigned on the promise that he had a “secret plan” for ending the war; meanwhile, GOP activists worked behind the scenes to convince Vietnamese diplomats that “Nixon will do better by you” if they only delayed peace talks until Nixon was in office (whether Nixon orchestrated this subterfuge is the rub of the dispute in the phone conversation between the two titans and has been contentious ever since). A Nixon supporter, Anna Chennault, apparently played a key role:

So basically we have presidential candidate Nixon interfering with peace talks in order for the current president and democrat party to look bad so that he can win the presidency on his "I know how to end the war" campaign. Of course we know what happened and how things turned out, the war didn't end and thousands more people list their lives.

So why didn't this info come out before the election? Well apparently the wiretapping the FBI did to get this information was done illegally.

All three are some pretty serious issues and I could only imagine that they would be considered crimes in today's enviornment but nothing happened and it appears nothing will happen.

What do you guys think about this? Should there be any accountability? Nixon and LJB are dead so not much you can do there but someone being dead hasn't stopped medals from being handed out.

It just seems like the checks aren't working and things are being swept under the carpet and nothing seems to have consequences.

 

[Craig234]

I've mentioned the Nixon treason before. I've seen a pretty clear case of what happened, with LBJ spending his lame duck months pursuing the peace treaty, only to have the government shocked that the South Vietnamese refused to go along, with Nixon persuading South Vietnam to do so on the grounds he'd offer them a better deal. Treason indeed.

It's clear that peace would have helped Humphrey in the election - where historians agree would have gone to Humphrey if it had happened slightly later already. It worked.

Why LBJ didn't reveal it? I've seen speculation the reason was that he felt it would be a crisis for the American people to learn a presidential candidate had done that.

He wasn't exactly close to Humphrey either.

Humphrey had been loyal to LBJ at a cost to himself by not coming out openly against the war, letting Nixon be the 'peace candidate'.

Nixon's secret plan to end the war, as I understand it, was a ploy to convince the North Vietnamese he was crazy and would use nuclear weapons; it didn't work.

It's unfortunatel that the actual history of this is not better known, adding to Nixon's already terrible history.

Of course, the Nixon administration - and then Ford - was the birth of the Neoconservative movement and the Cheney/Rumsfeld team with people like Wolfowitz.

Next up, take a look at what "Team B" was under Ford - as the Neocons fought against the CIA to fight against peace in the cold war.

 

[Craig234]

We really have not had any accountability on the Iraq war.

It was run disastrously after the first few weeks, which is all on Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney.

Put aside the wrongful reasons - IMO largely because Bush wanted to be a 'war president' to boost his low ratings - and the evil plans to install right-wing policies under a puppet that fell apart. Just look at the polices they did and the prices. It's too much to list really. So let's pick five to mention.

- Rumsfeld throwing out the State Department planning for post-war Iraq and asking to get to be in charge, and then running it incredibly incompetently with successive leaders put in charge of the country who went from briefly not bad to terrible, with no idea what they were doing.

- Disbanding the Iraq Army - a trusted institution, turned instantly into a massive insurgency filled with people who couldn't feed their families - but had guns

- Disbanidng the entire civil service, barring all Baath party members

- Installing Americans in charge of rebuilding the country who were kids with no experience, taken from applications to a right-wing Washington think tank

- Losing tens of billions of dollars for reconstruction, including $20 entrusted of Iraqi money entrusted to the US

How did it go?

Saddam was gone - good.

We had hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed. In 2000, 17% of Iraqis lived in slums. By years after the war 53% lived in slums. Iraqis still don't have reliable electricity or water.

Iraq's economy is $100 billion; it's estimated that $40 billion goes into money laundering corruption. Iraq is ranked as the second most corrupt country in the world now.

Nevermind the uncontrollled looting in the aftermatch of the invasion that wiped out the priceless museums and national history to the earliest days of civilization, because the only building Rumsfeld could be bothered to put guards on was the oil ministry, making excuses that 'freedom is messy'.

Nevermind how they put the war off the budget to hide its cost and misrepresent the deficit.

Nevermind they fired the general who pointed out they were lying about the expected cost of the war and placed it at $50 billion - a politically unacceptable number - when it's turned out to cost from 2 to 3 trillion. The disgraceful administration for wounded veterans waiting over a year for a response for care.

Strategically, it's interesting - sometimes democracy means we get enemies, that's freedom, but we gave Iran a major new ally.

It's not all bad - Iraqis have a better chance for freedom today. But at a far higher price than it should have been to them and us.

 

[ivwshane]

So the question remains; what can/should we do about it?

 

[beachchica]

And yet, despite campaign promises to the contrary, we're still in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When will you guys let go of the idea of war being a partisan issue? Everyone wants to blame who started it but they are all too eager to forget when their guy votes for it and continues it.

 

[randomrogue]

Honestly what can we do about it? Contact your representative and demand hearings? That's not in their best interests. It's nasty business when politics goes bad on such a large scale.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

When will you guys let go of the idea of war being a partisan issue? Everyone wants to blame who started it but they are all too eager to forget when their guy votes for it and continues it.

This is a false equivalence. And a particularly pernicious and frustrating one at that.

The war in Afghanistan did have extensive bipartisan support because of the direct links between the people there and 9/11. And Obama specifically campaigned on wanting to focus greater attention there.

But Iraq? Please. Obama quite famously not only opposed it from the start but what he said he feared would happen, did.

Ending a war in progress is a lot more difficult than just not starting it in the first place. The entire thing was a fabrication of neocons in the Bush administration, then sold to Congress and the American people based on a bunch of hysteria and lies, and then pathetically and corruptly mismanaged.

Not a partisan issue? All I need to do is ask myself: "Would President Gore have launched a war of choice on Iraq?" The answer is not merely "no" but "it never would have even come up".

And even in 2008, every time Obama brought up withdrawing from Iraq, he was derided by the right and especially by his GOP opponent, who said we should have no timetable for withdrawal and even infamously said that he would be okay if we kept troops in Iraq for a hundred years.

Then there's the wardrum beating for Iran, nearly all of which is coming from the right.

So the reason why people say the warmongering is a partisan issue, is because it is.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

This is a good read: Eve of Destruction -- What it was like to oppose the Iraq War in 2003.

Money quotes:

I found fellow dissenters to the war in two curious places: the CIA and the military intelligentsia. That fall, I got an invitation to participate in a seminar at the Central Intelligence Agency on what the world would be like in fifteen or twenty years. I went out of curiosity—I don’t like this kind of speculation—but as it turned out, much of the discussion was about the pending invasion of Iraq. Except for me and the chairman, who was a thinktank person, the participants were professors of international relations. And almost all of them were opposed to invading Iraq.

In early 2003, I was invited to another CIA event: the annual conference on foreign policy in Wilmington. At that conference, one of the agency officials pulled me aside and explained that the purpose of the seminar was actually to try to convince the White House not to invade Iraq. They didn’t think they could do that directly, but hoped to convey their reservations by issuing a study based on our seminar.
...
I had a similar experience when I talked to Jon Sumida, a historian at the University of Maryland, who specializes in naval history and frequently lectures at the military’s colleges. Sumida told me that most of the military people he talked to—and he had wide contacts—were opposed to an invasion. I confirmed what Sumida told me a year or so later when I was invited to give a talk on the Iraq war at a conference on U.S. foreign policy at Maryland. A professor from the Naval War College was to comment on my presentation. I feared a stinging rebuttal to my argument that the United States had erred in invading Iraq, but to my astonishment, the professor rebuked me for not being tough enough on the Bush administration.


These dissenters were entirely right about the war, and nothing that has happened since then has weakened their case. The United States got several hundred thousand people killed to install a regime that may eventually prove to be as oppressive as Saddam Hussein’s, is closely allied to the Iranian government, and has proven as likely to give oil contracts to Chinese firms as to American firms. And oh yes, Iraq didn’t have “WMDs” after all—a ridiculous acronym that the administration and its supporters used to equate the possession of chemical or biological weapons with the possession of nuclear weapons.

PS In case anyone is curious, this is what it looks like when someone who backed the Iraq War is actually honest about it years later:

I was an integral part of the problem. I drank deeply of the neocon Kool-Aid. I was also, clearly countering the trauma of 9/11 by embracing a policy that somewhere in my psyche seemed the only appropriate response to the magnitude of the offense. Prudence, skepticism left me. I’d backed Bush in 2000. I knew Rummy as a friend. And my critical faculties were swamped by fear. These are not excuses. These are simply part of my attempt to understand how wrong I was – and why.

 

[werepossum]

The Iraq war was sold based on several reasons. For some reason, progressives seem congenitally unable to count beyond one, but that doesn't change the fact that Bush laid out several (eight if memory serves) to Congress and to the country. Pretending this particular one was "the" reason but now we're outraged because we've really learned that particular one was "the" reason is just silly. As far as Craig's list, let us not forget that it was Paul Brenner of the State Department who banned all Baath Party members from serving in the government and disbanded the military, not General Garner.

If you really want to see accountability in government, we should restructure the way wars are funded. My preference would be that every use of force be funded with a special tax levied on everyone. I think people would pay attention if forced to see their own money being used rather than some nebulous future payment on borrowed money - although admittedly the idea that Americans are more concerned about a few bucks a week than about people being killed is not an attractive assumption.

 

[werepossum]

This is a false equivalence. And a particularly pernicious and frustrating one at that.

The war in Afghanistan did have extensive bipartisan support because of the direct links between the people there and 9/11. And Obama specifically campaigned on wanting to focus greater attention there.

But Iraq? Please. Obama quite famously not only opposed it from the start but what he said he feared would happen, did.

Ending a war in progress is a lot more difficult than just not starting it in the first place. The entire thing was a fabrication of neocons in the Bush administration, then sold to Congress and the American people based on a bunch of hysteria and lies, and then pathetically and corruptly mismanaged.

Not a partisan issue? All I need to do is ask myself: "Would President Gore have launched a war of choice on Iraq?" The answer is not merely "no" but "it never would have even come up".

And even in 2008, every time Obama brought up withdrawing from Iraq, he was derided by the right and especially by his GOP opponent, who said we should have no timetable for withdrawal and even infamously said that he would be okay if we kept troops in Iraq for a hundred years.

Then there's the wardrum beating for Iran, nearly all of which is coming from the right.

So the reason why people say the warmongering is a partisan issue, is because it is.

Hmm. If only there were some mechanism whereby Democrats could indicate their feelings on a war. Some sort of vote . . .

 

[Charles Kozierok]

The Iraq war was sold based on several reasons. For some reason, progressives seem congenitally unable to count beyond one, but that doesn't change the fact that Bush laid out several (eight if memory serves) to Congress and to the country. Pretending this particular one was "the" reason but now we're outraged because we've really learned that particular one was "the" reason is just silly.

People focus on the WMDs issue for a good reason: it was the primary casus belli for the Iraq War. Your sneering simply doesn't reflect the reality of what happened back then.

The other "reasons" were simply cover to try to sell the war by making it appear as if there were other bases for it, or other potential benefits to be gained. And many of those, if not most, turned out to be bullshit as well.

But if you want, go ahead and lay out these supposed "several reasons" that you're portraying as being equal partners in the runup to the War. I will enjoy responding.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

Hmm. If only there were some mechanism whereby Democrats could indicate their feelings on a war. Some sort of vote . . .

This was during a time when the right had done a good job of whipping the country into a frenzy, and portraying anyone who wasn't in favor of the war as being a traitor.

Despite that, 133 members of the House voted against the resolution. 126 of them were Democrats, or roughly 95%. Over 50% more Democrats voted against the resolution than voted for it.

And yes, the 81 Democrats who voted for it share in the blame for the disaster that ensued. However, they did not come up with the idea for the war, nor push it relentlessly, nor ignore and suppress evidence and opinions suggesting it was a mistake.

Oh, and the Republicans? 215 yes votes, 6 no votes.

So, for those keeping score, that's 97% of Republicans voting yes, and 39% of Democrats.

Your "point" further proves the ridiculousness of claiming that the Iraq War was not a partisan issue.

I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history. I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaida. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars.

-- Barack Obama, 2003

 

[Fern]

This was during a time when the right had done a good job of whipping the country into a frenzy,....

The right?

lol.

Do you people honestly not remember all the remarks by Democrats?

“This December will mark three years since United Nations inspectors last visited Iraq. There is no doubt that since that time, Saddam Hussein has reinvigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to refine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer- range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies.” — From a December 6, 2001 letter signed by Bob Graham, Joe Lieberman, Harold Ford, & Tom Lantos among others

“Whereas Iraq has consistently breached its cease-fire agreement between Iraq and the United States, entered into on March 3, 1991, by failing to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction program, and refusing to permit monitoring and verification by United Nations inspections; Whereas Iraq has developed weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and biological capabilities, and has made positive progress toward developing nuclear weapons capabilities” — From a joint resolution submitted by Tom Harkin and Arlen Specter on July 18, 2002

There are many more examples: http://www.rightwingnews.com/quotes...ed-about-wmd-so-did-these-people-version-3-0/

Yeah, I know it's a righty blog. But I'm too lazy to source all the quotes and google to find them reported by a respected site. This blog handily gathers such Democrats' remarks in one place.

And yes, the 81 Democrats who voted for it share in the blame for the disaster that ensued. However, they did not come up with the idea for the war, nor push it relentlessly, nor ignore and suppress evidence and opinions suggesting it was a mistake.

Oh, and the Republicans? 215 yes votes, 6 no votes.

So, for those keeping score, that's 97% of Republicans voting yes, and 39% of Democrats.

Your "point" further proves the ridiculousness of claiming that the Iraq War was not a partisan issue.

This kind of amuses me.

Under Obama I've seen the media proclaim this or that bill as having "bipartisan support" if even just one Repub votes for it. Here we have 81 Democrats voting for it and it isn't bipartisan, but partisan.

I think you also forget that under the Clinton admin our policy was regime change in Iraq. E.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Liberation_Act

And your claim that "they did not come up with the idea for the war" is particularly amusing given the quotes by Democrats.

My, what short memories Americans have.

For all the above reasons - namely too many members of both parties were deeply involved in calling for war against Iraq - nothing is going to happen. And this is by far much to the Democrats' favor. They have a done a great job of selling Iraq to the public as "Bush's war" and hiding their own involvement. The Dems in politics have NOTHING to gain by seriously revisiting the Iraq war for purposes of accountability. Nothing.

Fern

 

[Charles Kozierok]

The right?

lol.

Do you people honestly not remember all the remarks by Democrats?

I believe I already acknowledge that some Democrats went along with this. However, they were, as I also pointed out, going based on information that had largely been provided to them by the Bush administration -- information we later found out was largely contaminated through either deliberate or unintentional coloring and omissions. And those Democrats were opposed by other Democrats, whereas support for the war was close to unanimous among Republicans.

I've provided numbers.

Yeah, I know it's a righty blog. But I'm too lazy to source all the quotes and google to find them reported by a respected site. This blog handily gathers such Democrats' remarks in one place.

Assuming they are all accurate, of course.

I checked one out at random and it did seem accurate. However, the story also quoted several Democrats who were opposed to the war.

No Republicans.

Also, several of the quotes on that page were from well before the war, and are therefore of dubious relevance -- and several are from Lieberman, who on foreign policies issues was a DINO (at best).

All in all, it's not really news and not the smoking gun you seem to think it is. I mean, I could dig up dozens of quotes from Democrats opposing the war -- think you could do that for Republicans?

Under Obama I've seen the media proclaim this or that bill as having "bipartisan support" if even just one Repub votes for it. Here we have 81 Democrats voting for it and it isn't bipartisan, but partisan.

First, what the media does or does not do is of no relevance to this discussion. I'm not responsible for abuses of terms such as "bipartisan".

That said, yes, I will say the resolution had bipartisan support. What it really didn't have was bipartisan opposition. Again, I have provided the numbers; they are what they are, and they aren't going to change.

And also, once again, even if a bunch of Democrats allowed themselves to go along on this little joyride to hell, that doesn't change the fact that it was concocted and sold to them and the American people by the Bush administration, which bears the lion's share of the blame for the ensuing mess.

I think you also forget that under the Clinton admin our policy was regime change in Iraq. E.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Liberation_Act

Oooo, calling for "regime change". It's words on paper. Who cares?

US policy towards Cuba has been "regime change" for decades. Have we invaded them?

I'll ask you directly: do you think that President Gore would have invented and launched this war?

And your claim that "they did not come up with the idea for the war" is particularly amusing given the quotes by Democrats.

How so? Even if I accept your cherry-picked, unsourced quotes, they don't demonstrate in any way, shape or form that Democrats created this war.

My, what short memories Americans have.

My memory is crystal clear. The war started on my birthday and I can remember exactly where I was when I heard that the assault had begun.

I can also remember the discussions leading up to it, and how, with a handful of exceptions, the only voices opposing it were on the left. And how the right mocked, denigrated and marginalized those voices, suggesting they were foolish and pessimistic and unpatriotic.

When they were, in fact, correct. And the basis for the war turned out to be a sham, deliberately constructed and exaggerated to justify the unjustifiable.

The problem isn't "short memories". It is deliberate historical revisionism, such as pretending that the war was not primarily about an exaggerated/falsified WMD thread, or cherry-picking quotes from a handful of Democrats to suggest both parties were equally to blame when it is blindingly obvious that they were not.

They have a done a great job of selling Iraq to the public as "Bush's war" and hiding their own involvement. The Dems in politics have NOTHING to gain by seriously revisiting the Iraq war for purposes of accountability. Nothing.

Once again, even though they were involved, it is known as "Bush's war" for the plain and simple reason that it was Bush's war. He pushed for it, he hyped it to hell and beyond, he underestimated the cost and the impacts of undertaking it, and he ignored or suppressed every contrary opinion.

As for the Democrats calling for accountability, well, of course not -- they're cowards.

 

[fskimospy]

I remember this quite well because I was there ten years ago, and man was I pissed. I think it is very difficult to argue that we would have invaded Iraq under a President Gore. Additionally, not many people know the history of the intelligence leading up to the war. For example, the NIE that Bush relied upon that said Iraq had WMD was commissioned by the senate, not the administration. Ie: they had decided to go to war because Saddam had WMD and didn't even bother to ask for an authoritative opinion on if it was true.

Craven Democrats voted for that war, but lets avoid revisionist history here. Bush wanted it, Bush got it.

 

[ivwshane]

A little more detail on the LBJ tapes.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21768668

 

[Fern]

I believe I already acknowledge that some Democrats went along with this. However, they were, as I also pointed out, going based on information that had largely been provided to them by the Bush administration -- information we later found out was largely contaminated through either deliberate or unintentional coloring and omissions. And those Democrats were opposed by other Democrats, whereas support for the war was close to unanimous among Republicans.

I've provided numbers.



Assuming they are all accurate, of course.

I checked one out at random and it did seem accurate. However, the story also quoted several Democrats who were opposed to the war.

No Republicans.

Also, several of the quotes on that page were from well before the war, and are therefore of dubious relevance -- and several are from Lieberman, who on foreign policies issues was a DINO (at best).

-snip-

The drum beat for war with Iraq started under the Clinton admin. That's why quotes from 1998 are relevant.

I do not know how old you are, but there were many vociferous war hawks in the Democratic party back in the late 1990's and early 2000's. The 2000 campaign was filled with politicians of both sides proclaiming what a threat Saddam was and how tough they would be. Many Democrats were quite strident in their remarks because they didn't want their party to be seen as weak on national security.

In terms of accountability what the Repubs said is of little-to-no importance. It won't be them pushing for accountability from Bush et al. It will be Democrats and their own words will be used mightily against them should they attempt any thing of the sort.

As for the Democrats calling for accountability, well, of course not -- they're cowards.

Well, I think declining political suicide is more wisdom than cowardice. I also don't think the vast majority of the American public has any desire to re-litigate the Iraq war. The Watergate hearings took forever and were about one single break-in occurring on just one night. Any serious effort at the Iraq war would dwarf Watergate by light years.

-------------------------

Much of what concerns the lead up to war with Iraq involves intelligence. That's an inherently 'messy' subject but more importantly, I think, is the tendency of people to put too much faith in our intelligence capabilities. I long ago gave up on that myth. Back during the Cold War the CIA constantly produced estimates showing how strong the USSR was. When they fell people were surprised. I wasn't. I visited parts of the Eastern block back during the time of the USSR. I was astonished at what I saw. They weren't strong, they were weak. They were poor. They were laughably inefficient. Their products, indicative of manufacturing strength, were horrible. I could go on, but I will tell you that to this day I can still remember standing in Eastern Germany and thinking to myself how terribly wrong we had it.

I can see the CIA (honestly) getting it just as wrong with Iraq.

And my own problems with Iraq are centered on what occurred after the war, after the Iraq troops were defeated; the lack of a good exit strategy and the poorly conceived and executed attempts at 'Nation Building". I do think those issues merit much study and analysis to help prevent repeating such mistakes, but I do not think they are criminal or impeachable matters. And as for accountability, the Republican Party has has, and is, paying a steep price.

Fern

 

[Fern]

BTW: The one person who really got it right was Sen Robert Byrd.

Fern

 

[Fern]

-snip-
Craven Democrats voted for that war, but lets avoid revisionist history here. Bush wanted it, Bush got it.

I think you're missing the point.

The subject is accountability. Not 'guilt'.

You have some idea of how Washington works. To seek the accountability the OP desires is fraught with danger for the Democrats, so much so it just isn't going to happen.

And revisionism works both ways. To try to pretend that there weren't many Democrats out making brash public statements about what a danger was Saddam was and his WMD program isn't feasible. There's simply too much in the public record.

Fern

 

[Craig234]

Fern is playing word games about the inconsistent use of the word 'bi-partisan', while ignoring the actual issue - bottom line, Democrats as a party did not want to go to war with Iraq, while Republicans as a party did - whether directly or willing to fall in line behind Bush/Cheney.

Clinton's policies were far short of starting a war. He was in fact pressured to - by the Republican Neoconservatives in a letter they wrote to him asking him to start a war, from the group they had formed called 'Project for a New American Century', a list of signers most of whom went on to make up the Bush administration when he became president. Clinton declined - despite the fact Saddam was not cooperating on inspections.

Al Gore wasn't about to start a war in Iraq. Many Democrats did believe the information some were pushing that Saddam had WMD; that was not the same thing as supporting war. Even when the war vote authorization was pushed by Bush, shortly before the elections to put maximum pressure on Democrats, the minority who voted for it generally noted Bush's promise is was not a vote for war but only to provide him leverage to get Saddam to allow the inspectors back in. But a majority of Democrats still voted no.

House Democrats put up an alternative version of the authorization for a vote which required Bush to work through the UN and to ask Congress for an additional vote before using force. It did not pass - with Republicans opposing it - but Democrats voted in favor of it by 147-60.

One article comments on the split among Democrats, including their leader Gephardt's confused mixing of this war with 9/11:

As one of the last speakers in the House, Mr. Gephardt, who opposed the last gulf war, argued that Sept. 11 had ''made all the difference'' and that Mr. Hussein had to be stopped from developing weapons of mass destruction.

''The events of that tragic day jolted us to the enduring reality that terrorists not only seek to attack our interests abroad, but to strike us here at home,'' he said.

But only a minority in his caucus followed his lead and his second-in-command, Nancy Pelosi of California, the minority whip, took the other side. Ms. Pelosi, a senior member of the intelligence committee, pointed to a C.I.A. letter declassified this week that judged that Mr. Hussein was not likely to use his weapons against the United States but could lose his restraint if faced with an American-led force.

She said attacking Mr. Hussein would turn the country away from what should be its true national security focus -- the terrorist threat. ''There are many costs involved in this war, and one of them is the cost of the war on terrorism,'' she said.

Many Democrats said they agreed that Mr. Hussein was a dangerous tyrant. But they expressed fear of giving Mr. Bush so much power, or argued that by striking a nation that has not struck first, America could lose its moral standing. They also said Mr. Bush had not presented a definitive case that Iraq was an imminent threat.

The vote for authorization was a 'bi-partisan vote' as that term is used - but most Democrats voted against it, so it would not have passed if up to Democrats, even with Bush as President fighting for it - much less if the man actually elected president had been in the office, Al Gore.

Any attempts to claim anything close to equivalency between the parties is incorrect. It is correct to note that a large minority of Democrats joined with Republicans.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

And revisionism works both ways. To try to pretend that there weren't many Democrats out making brash public statements about what a danger was Saddam was and his WMD program isn't feasible. There's simply too much in the public record.

This is absurd.

I already said multiple times that I acknowledge that some of the Democrats voted for the war.

But what I also said, and that you aren't responding to, is that virtually all of the opposition to the war also came from Democrats. The Republicans were all in favor, with the exception of a handful of people, all of whom were marginalized.

You also continue to conflate voting for a resolution supporting the war with proposing and selling the war in the first place.

I notice you didn't answer my question about whether we would have had an Iraq invasion under Gore. The reason for that strikes me as self-evident.

The bottom line, which is not going away, is that this was in fact Bush's war. He wanted it. He proposed it. He drummed up support for it. He scared people into thinking it was necessary.

Do the Democrats who voted for the war share some of the blame? Yes.

Do they bear the majority of the blame? No.

Oh, and while we're on the subject -- would the resolution have passed even if every single Democrat had voted against it? Almost certainly, since they had almost a majority even in the vote that occurred, and would have gotten a few of the absent votes to show up if they were needed.

Your entire argument is a diversion.

 

[Charles Kozierok]

House Democrats put up an alternative version of the authorization for a vote which required Bush to work through the UN and to ask Congress for an additional vote before using force. It did not pass - with Republicans opposing it - but Democrats voted in favor of it by 147-60.

Good point that I neglected to make; thank you.

One article comments on the split among Democrats, including their leader Gephardt's confused mixing of this war with 9/11:

Of course, that "confusion" was an intended result of a deliberate propaganda campaign by the Bush administration to tie this to 9/11 as part of their trumped up casus belli. Of course, there was no connection at all, and in fact, our invasion actually strengthened Al Qaeda in the area. Another fact that the right passes over for obvious reasons.

 

[Craig234]

I've said this before, but I'll repeat it for this thread.

I don't think the issue is a simple 'yes or no' on the war.

There are issues such as the legality of the war - put those aside. Put aside the phony reason of WMD. Just consider Saddam was a brutal dictator.

First, if Bush had kept his word and let the inspectors complete the inspections, we'd have found they did not have WMD, and Iraq was not a threat to the world with them. It would have left him in charge, which is bad for the Iraqi people, but Bush could have been successful at pushing for the resolution, using it as he said he would, and getting the inspections completed that Clinton had failed at. It would have made the Republicans look good compared to Democrats who voted no.

But then consider we did go to war.

If we had just done the invasion to overthrow him; if we had left the civil service and army intact; if we had transitioned quickly to a legitimate (not Chalabi) Iraqi government and given them a lot of control over reconstruction; if we had followed the state department plan for post-war operations; if we had not pursued terrible incompetence like putting kids who had applied to AEI in charge of the country...

The war effort could have been far more successful. Bush and the US would have come out looking a lot better.

The war was a great success for a couple interests: Bush being a 'war president', boosting his approval; and the defense contractors who profited.

Hopefully Iraq will eventually do better.

Unfortunately, as reporter Richard Engel said, it's now 'basically three countries who are not at peace', the Sunnis, Shia and Kurds.

One other note on the legacy - I've seen Iraqis say that they had never been asked if they were Shia or Sunni before the war; they mostly lived together no problem.

Since the war, they are greatly at odds and have almost completely segregated the country, little is left where they live together.

The Sunnis now say the leader is resembling Saddam more and more, in his use of the security forces, and are concerned he will use them against the Sunnis.

 

[EagleKeeper]

It is also stated that paybacks are hell.

In the OP, IFs exist all over.
A path had to be taken and it was.

A saying is Lead, Follow or Get out of tbe way. Just do not stand then wondering what IF!

We had been standing around for 10 years, accomplishing nothing. Some would expect another 10-20 years of being jerked around should suffice

 

[Whiskey16]

In the OP, IFs exist all over.
A path had to be taken and it was.

A saying is Lead, Follow or Get out of tbe way. Just do not stand then wondering what IF!

An inane and machismo point being, wars are to be fought because you say so.

No, the hard lessons that the USA continues to fail to learn are, that more often than not, war is optional and the wisest choice for security is not to initiate or engage in most of them.

Prime examples are being that of the USA-Vietnamese war and of the previous invasion to conquer Iraq.

Due to the cultural lack of honest accountability in the USA and lacking a mature political climate to permit reflection, an inquiry as to the invasion of Iraq will not occur. Though equally culpable in the crime and strategic blunder, the United Kingdom has at least demonstrated the fortitude to examine itself:

At its launch Sir John Chilcot, Chairman of the Inquiry, explained:
"This is an Inquiry by a committee of Privy Counsellors. It will consider the period from the summer of 2001 to the end of July 2009, embracing the run-up to the conflict in Iraq, the military action and its aftermath. We will therefore be considering the UK's involvement in Iraq, including the way decisions were made and actions taken, to establish, as accurately as possible, what happened and to identify the lessons that can be learned. Those lessons will help ensure that, if we face similar situations in future, the government of the day is best equipped to respond to those situations in the most effective manner in the best interests of the country."

The USA lacks the strength and moral character to do the same, and this is why it will lead into the perpetuation of continued future acts of high transgressions of international crime and black-eyed failure.

It is also stated that paybacks are hell.
..
We had been standing around for 10 years, accomplishing nothing. Some would expect another 10-20 years of being jerked around should suffice

Jerked around? Saddam Hussein was touching you? Blowback is hell. States that do not represent threats to your own do not warrant 'pre-emptive' attacks, let alone invasion, nor do the imperialist (be clear of what it was, a hand-off from France's attempted retention for stewardship of its Indo-China) meddling for chess-board playmanship that certainly failed to encourage stability and peace in a region.

The key point that EagleKeeper neglects to learn of history, is that some wars are not simply unjust, but for pragmatic strategic positions and costs to one's own state, some wars are simply not to be fought.