Americans coming to their senses....DON'T TRUST BUSH!

Post-9/11 Era Forum

It has been two months since the United States and Britain went to war against Saddam Hussein, and coalition forces have yet to discover convincing evidence of the weapons programs that President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair said were its primary cause.

Some of those who supported the war beforehand did so solely on the basis of ending tyranny. The mass graves found throughout Iraq, and widespread stories of torture and atrocity, come as no surprise to those who had studied or endured the Baathist dictator's regime. Those who opposed the war for any reason ought to be doing some soul-searching about the kind of horrors they were prepared to leave in place.

But it is true that Hussein represented only one of many thuggish regimes, and that the United States is not about to go to war against them all. I supported this war because I believed Bush and Blair when they said Iraq was manufacturing and stockpiling weapons of mass destruction. Such weapons in the hands of al-Qaeda and other terrorist organizations that shared Hussein's hostile designs made such a threat a defense priority - or so the argument went.

Early this month, the U.S. military announced that it had found three mobile laboratories that were most likely designed to manufacture chemical or biological weapons, the types of labs that Secretary of State Colin L. Powell referred to in making his argument for war before the U.N. Security Council. The discoveries were suggestive but hardly convincing evidence of the specific, tangible threat repeatedly outlined by the President. With the authors of Iraq's illicit-weapons program now in custody, we should expect to see soon, or to have seen already, the facilities and stockpiles we and most of the rest of the world believed Hussein possessed.

They may yet be found, but it is beginning to look as though the skeptics in this case were right. If so, I was taken in by this administration, and America and Great Britain were led to war under false pretenses.

Events have moved so swiftly, and Hussein's toppling has posed so many new pressing problems, that it would be easy to lose sight of this issue, but it is critically important. I can imagine no greater breach of public trust than to mislead a country into war. A strong case might have been made to go after Hussein just because he posed a potential threat to us and the region, because of his support for suicide bombers, and because of his ruthless oppression of his own people. But this is not the case our President chose to make.

Truth in public life has always been a slippery commodity. We expect campaigning politicians or debating journalists to pitch and spin. Facts are marshaled to support arguments and causes; convenient ones are trumpeted and inconvenient ones played down or ignored. This is the political game.

But when the President of the United States addresses the nation and the world, I expect the spinning to stop. He represents not just a party or a cause, but the American people. When President Bush argued that Hussein possessed stockpiles of illicit and deadly poisons, he was presumably doing so on the basis of intelligence briefings and evidence that the public could not see. He was asking us to trust him, to trust his office, to trust that he was acting legitimately in our self-defense. That's something very different from engaging in a bold policy of attempting to remake the Middle East, or undertaking a humanitarian mission to end oppression. Neither of these two justifications would have been likely to garner widespread public support. But national defense? That's an argument the President can always win.

I trusted Bush, and unless something big develops on the weapons front in Iraq soon, it appears as though I was fooled by him. Perhaps he himself was taken in by his intelligence and military advisers. If so, he ought to be angry as hell, because ultimately he bears the responsibility.

It suggests a strain of zealotry in this White House that regards the question of war as just another political debate. It isn't. More than 100 fine Americans were killed in this conflict, dozens of British soldiers, and many thousands of Iraqis. Nobody gets killed or maimed in Capitol Hill maneuvers over spending plans, or battles over federal court appointments. War is a special case. It is the most serious step a nation can take, and it deserves the highest measure of seriousness and integrity.

When a president lies or exaggerates in making an argument for war, when he spins the facts to sell his case, he betrays his public trust, and he diminishes the credibility of his office and our country. We are at war. What we lost in this may yet end up being far more important than what we gained.

Your main point is well taken, and I do not disagree. But I personally hestitate to judge so quickly the fruits of our overall mission in Iraq. After all, the war in Iraq was just one major battle fought in the greater war on terrorism, and the wheel is still in spin. I suspect that one goal of the Bush administration is to defuse hostilities throughout the Middle East and indeed throughout the Muslim world. I think everyone knows that outside agitators have tried to use the Palestine-Israel conflict as a false pretext and unsupported justification for terrorism against the West. There is no military solution possible in this this conflict of ideologies, so I think the Bush administration would be wise to keep military successes in the war on terrorism a closely guarded secret until the Road Map for Peace becomes a reality. There are plenty of other, humanitarian, successes to fill pages of Arab, Indonesian, and Filipino newspapers. Just my thoughts on the subject...

Comments?

If we don't trust Bush, how can we trust Amerian. Bush is American people elected president of the country, the most demorcated country in the world.

zhangten -- did you trust Bill CLinton? You can download an interview of him saying in his own words that he was sending a military order to attack weapons of mass destruction facilities in IRAQ, INCLUDING ATOMIC.

The Tyrant, (FORMER leader of Iraq) admitted in his own words that they "had" weapons of mass destruction at one point, though they claim they no longer do.

Iraq's nuclear program is real. They were required by international law to provide proof of their dismantling, and they did not.

That justifies the war it's self.

Saddam however, is also a known funder of terrorist states, and was undoubtedly an intimidating repressive presence in the middle east. With him gone, the middle east can have another reason to calm down.

That justifies the war.

Saddam -- read his biography on any websight you can find it --

That justifies the war.

I don't trust President Bush because he made the right decision. That decision was a no-brainer. I trust president Bush because of everything else he's done to support peace in the middle east, and at home.

Originally posted by sayzak21
zhangten -- did you trust Bill CLinton? You can download an interview of him saying in his own words that he was sending a military order to attack weapons of mass destruction facilities in IRAQ, INCLUDING ATOMIC .

Ok well you are either misinformed or deliberately trying to misinform. The Atomic Energy team that the UN sent to Iraq found NO evidence of ANY program for nuclear energy or weaponry. They further found that the USA evidence purporting such claims were FORGERIES and blatant ones at that.

The Tyrant, (FORMER leader of Iraq) admitted in his own words that they "had" weapons of mass destruction at one point, though they claim they no longer do.

Iraq's nuclear program is real. They were required by international law to provide proof of their dismantling, and they did not.

That justifies the war it's self .

nope... see above... you are telling falsehoods here.

Saddam however, is also a known funder of terrorist states, and was undoubtedly an intimidating repressive presence in the middle east. With him gone, the middle east can have another reason to calm down.

That justifies the war.

Absolutely, Saddam funded suicide bombers against Israel... this was horrible and should have been condemned... it is however a part of the larger Arab vs Israelie conflict and has no relation to Al- Queda attacks against west. Since this was also no part of USA justification presented to UNSC and rst of world it therefore cannot be considered as justification after the fact!

Saddam -- read his biography on any websight you can find it --

That justifies the war.

HUH? No book no matter what it espouses it a legal justification for international war, invasion and occupation. The UN has strict rules governing what constitutes a legal justification for war.

I don't trust President Bush because he made the right decision. That decision was a no-brainer. I trust president Bush because of everything else he's done to support peace in the middle east, and at home.

Believe it or not I applaud his efforts right now in putting pressure on Israel and Palestine to come to terms. That does not excuse prior deeds in any fashion. A murderer may later save someone's life.... that does not acquit them of the murder.{ my own analogy.. don't freak out neo-cons }

rowdy -- everything I said was based on what I saw. They are facts. I didn't just "hear" all that. I saw on T.V. what those people said. On more than one channel. On more than one occasion.

You are either un-educated or in denial.

By the way -- my comment about Saddam's biography was to point out how vicious he is. (which, alone, gives me chills, enough to feel that the war was justified)

We also hav not found Saddam since the war ended, does that mean he doesn't exist?

Don't you think its a little premature to start jumping to conclusions?

The same people who are daming Bush for lack of weapons, are probably the same people who were claiming that we were getting "bogged down" after a couple weeks of fighting. They will be proven wrong... Again.

No, I don't think it is early. Powell said that we knew exactly where to find the WMD. Why can't we go to them now? I believe the Powell was mislead by others in the administration who were pushing the war. Now we are hearing that Chemical Ali, who we took all the credit for killing during the war is not dead at all. Seems like this administration cannot do anything right.
The day after Bush signs the tax cut, it is on the news that lower income people will not get any cut at all. The cuts will go to the Big Republican Contributors who paid to get Bush elected in the first place. Bush does repay his debts. Consider Lay, and other Bush buddies who have not had to pay for their stock scandels, but the Democratic Martha Stewart will be the scapegoat. Come on people, open you eyes and ears!

Don't you think its at all possible that the weapons were moved? I don't know about you, but if I was trying to get away with having bio/chem weapons, and I heard Powell say that he knew where they were, I'm pretty sure I would move them. I know its a novel idea, and the thought might have escaped him, but why isn't that a possibility?

And of course he we go with the class warfare... blah blah blah, can't you guys come up with anything new? It's always republicans backing their rich gazillionare friends, while the noble democrats are left defending the honor of the working man... is that how its supposed to go? It might not seem fair to you, but to me if somone doesn't pay taxes, how are they supposed to get a tax cut? But I shouldn't say that, that would make me a mean spirited, evil, greedy republican.

Legally, the United States [was] operating under international law, under Security Council Resolution #1441 (and its 15 predecessors, to the same effect), which have kept the Gulf War of 1991 not quite closed. In international law, Saddam [was] obliged to disarm, and to prove that he had disarmed (as other nations have been, from South Africa to members of the former USSR), simply as a condition of his remaining president, and as a condition for closing the first Gulf War.

It was the solemn obligation of the U.N. and of the United States to oblige him to disarm by force, if he did not do so willingly, even before the dramatic events of September 11, 2001. One of the reasons for going to war under traditional just-war theory is to restore the rule of international law. For peace is not a feeling. It is the work of political action, mediated by law, to secure the minimum conditions of international justice and order. War is sometimes morally obligatory to restore the tranquility of international order.

September 11, 2001, provided another traditional reason: self-defense. We know from captured files and film in Afghanistan how eagerly al Qaeda has been seeking chemical and biological weapons that would wreak maximal destruction on civilian populations. We know from defectors and past admissions of Saddam and past work of U.N. investigators that Saddam had immense stores of such weapons, many of which have never yet been accounted for. Even before one has any knowledge of actual cooperation between Saddam and Osama bin Laden's forces (or other terrorist groups), one can form a realistic judgment of probabilities. What Saddam has is the weapons, but not a delivery system; what al Qaeda has is the delivery system but not the biological weapons.

— Michael Novak, winner of the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion in 1994.

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June 6, 2003 is the 59-year anniversary of D-Day. To all the combat soldiers, officers, airmen and navy men of Britain, Canada and the United States who participated in the invasion of Normandy, France in 1944, and to all those men and women of the then-French underground, including the French, Brits and Scandinavians—to all these heroes, most of them mere children then, who made the supreme sacrifice—we all, those now living and those yet to be born, owe our profound gratitude.

Technically, the Gulf War did not end with a Peace Treaty, but with a Cease Fire, that Cease Fire had conditions, those conditions were violated by Saddam... not only Bush, but Clinton, and the international community all recognized this fact. The question was not, Is he in violation?, but What do we do about it? This war was was not illegal because the actions of Saddam voided the Cease Fire, continuing a war that began a decade ago.

And lets not forget, if Saddam was so innocent, why wasn't he open, and up front about everything. This all could have been avoided. The burden of proof was on Saddam to show tht he disarmed, and he did nothing.