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The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

nytimes.com

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Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#11

Post by acqq »

kyuudou wrote: post #5

Audience Member : Negrodamus, why is President Bush convinced there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Negrodamus : Because he has the receipt. - from Paul Moody's "Negrodamus" skit on Chappelle's Show More seriously, Western countries sold Saddam plenty of chemical weapons which were used to kill lots of Iranians during the particularly brutal Iraq-Iran war during the 1980s. The whole situation is complete mad…

> Technically there were still WMDs in Iraq

No:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_and_weapons_of_mass_destr...

"Iraq actively researched and later employed weapons of mass destruction (WMD) from 1962 to 1991, when it destroyed its chemical weapons stockpile and halted its biological and nuclear weapon programs as required by the United Nations Security Council.[1]"

What's sure is that at the time of 9/11, the U.S. had still significant quantities of chemical weapons that they just started to destroy a few years before:

https://www.cnbc.com/2013/09/23/destroying-chemical-weapons-...

"After the U.S. formally agreed in 1997 to destroy its 30,000-ton chemical arsenal, Newport's mission changed again" ... "Not until 2008 — 11 years after our visit and U.S. ratification of the chemical weapons ban—was the last of the VX eliminated."

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#12

Post by stevenwoo »

boublepop wrote: post #7
LatteLazy wrote: post #6

I don't understand why he went in the first place. It was clear to everyone it was BS. It should have been triply clear to someone in the DoE whose job includes knowing these things!? Based on this, the guy is either an idiot (unlikely) or just wilfully ignorant. Once he was in Iraq, and after he returned, he knew. That's be his own admission. So he spent his time running around and interrogating old men until they c…

> It was clear to everyone it was BS. That’s what a lot of republicans have been saying about climate change for decades. Sensible people don’t act based on “everyone knows” especially not when tasked with actually digging out facts.

This is unwarranted whataboutism. Conservatives around the world say this about climate change but that the vast majority of scientists can show the receipts - there is very little evidence against accelerating man made climate change. Contrast with the Iraq war justifications, even after they were shown to be false, the guys in favor of war kept on saying it was OK to go to war because "good intentions" matter more than facts. http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,463779,00.... https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-36712735

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#13

Post by acqq »

LatteLazy wrote: post #6

I don't understand why he went in the first place. It was clear to everyone it was BS. It should have been triply clear to someone in the DoE whose job includes knowing these things!? Based on this, the guy is either an idiot (unlikely) or just wilfully ignorant. Once he was in Iraq, and after he returned, he knew. That's be his own admission. So he spent his time running around and interrogating old men until they c…

It seems you aren't aware of what was happening at the time:

2003 Colin Powell's speech in the UN Security Council:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Counci...

A presentation with all the "proofs" which, only after the war started, were proven to be fakes.

Only in 2005, he admits:

https://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/09/politics/powell-calls-his...

"Powell Calls His U.N. Speech a Lasting Blot on His Record"

In between, there were a lot who wanted to believe. Including most of the politicians. And not only in the U.S.

Britain was more than willing to help and contributed with its own fake proofs, e.g. the February 2003 dossier:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Dossier

"much of the work in the Iraq Dossier had been plagiarised from various unattributed sources including a 13-year-old thesis produced by a student at California State University"

The thing is, J.D. Maddox is right when he writes:

"I’m struck by the power of our national momentum toward going to war — especially unnecessary ones — and alarmed that this momentum seems nearly impossible to halt."

It was true then, it's true now.

Edit, to answer LatteLazy's: ""UN Chief Inspector Hans Blix" rebutting the Powell speech. That's before the invasion and after the speech of course..."

Yes, that rebuttal surely existed (and some others too!), but has it influenced the politics of U.S. and allies in any way? Or the media? It effectively hasn't. Therefore: "the power of our national momentum toward going to war — especially unnecessary ones... seems nearly impossible to halt."

There were also the protests, in vain: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_the_Iraq_War

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#14

Post by MockObject »

Between the absence of WMDs (I'd never believed they were there) and the disinterest in stabilizing the country after the invasion, it became clear that the goal was to destroy a nation that had the recent history and continued potential to be a threat to our interests and allies in the region.

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#15

Post by LatteLazy »

boublepop wrote: post #7
LatteLazy wrote: post #6

I don't understand why he went in the first place. It was clear to everyone it was BS. It should have been triply clear to someone in the DoE whose job includes knowing these things!? Based on this, the guy is either an idiot (unlikely) or just wilfully ignorant. Once he was in Iraq, and after he returned, he knew. That's be his own admission. So he spent his time running around and interrogating old men until they c…

> It was clear to everyone it was BS. That’s what a lot of republicans have been saying about climate change for decades. Sensible people don’t act based on “everyone knows” especially not when tasked with actually digging out facts.

It's sort of hilarious that you choose that example...

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#16

Post by LatteLazy »

acqq wrote: post #13
LatteLazy wrote: post #6

I don't understand why he went in the first place. It was clear to everyone it was BS. It should have been triply clear to someone in the DoE whose job includes knowing these things!? Based on this, the guy is either an idiot (unlikely) or just wilfully ignorant. Once he was in Iraq, and after he returned, he knew. That's be his own admission. So he spent his time running around and interrogating old men until they c…

It seems you aren't aware of what was happening at the time: 2003 Colin Powell's speech in the UN Security Council: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Security_Counci... A presentation with all the "proofs" which, only after the war started, were proven to be fakes. Only in 2005, he admits: https://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/09/politics/powell-calls-his... "Powell Calls His U.N. Speech a Lasting Blot on His Re…

Fyi, Your own link has "UN Chief Inspector Hans Blix" rebutting the Powell speech. That's before the invasion and after the speech of course...

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#17

Post by smileypete »

acqq wrote: post #9
smileypete wrote: post #8

Destroying Iraq was a part of the 'neocon revolution' which really got it's legs after 9/11. This podcast helps give some insight: https://cafe.com/stay-tuned-the-paradox-of-dick-cheney-with-...

If you really want to learn more than from a single podcast, read slowly about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C... and check what were the functions before, then and after of the people who wrote the documents or were involved and also what they wrote. Especially a document: "Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century," September 2000. With the famous…

Thanks for that, some of the writing around the time is well worth a read too:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/05/12/selective-inte...

"In Congress, a senior legislative aide said, “Some members are beginning to ask and to wonder, but cautiously.” For now, he told me, “the members don’t have the confidence to say that the Administration is off base.” He also commented, “For many, it makes little difference. We vanquished a bad guy and liberated the Iraqi people. Some are astute enough to recognize that the alleged imminent W.M.D. threat to the U.S. was a pretext. I sometimes have to pinch myself when friends or family ask with incredulity about the lack of W.M.D., and remind myself that the average person has the idea that there are mountains of the stuff over there, ready to be tripped over. The more time elapses, the more people are going to wonder about this, but I don’t think it will sway U.S. public opinion much. Everyone loves to be on the winning side.”

EDIT: and don't forget the tubes...

https://www.nytimes.com/2002/09/08/world/threats-responses-i...

https://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/washington/us/the-nuclear...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_aluminum_tubes

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#18

Post by pier25 »

acqq wrote: post #9
smileypete wrote: post #8

Destroying Iraq was a part of the 'neocon revolution' which really got it's legs after 9/11. This podcast helps give some insight: https://cafe.com/stay-tuned-the-paradox-of-dick-cheney-with-...

If you really want to learn more than from a single podcast, read slowly about: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_C... and check what were the functions before, then and after of the people who wrote the documents or were involved and also what they wrote. Especially a document: "Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century," September 2000. With the famous…

We will probably never know what really happened in 9/11 but boy did Bush et al profit from the situation.

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#19

Post by toyg »

MockObject wrote: post #14

Between the absence of WMDs (I'd never believed they were there) and the disinterest in stabilizing the country after the invasion, it became clear that the goal was to destroy a nation that had the recent history and continued potential to be a threat to our interests and allies in the region.

... ironically ending up bolstering an already-active adversary in the region, Iran, by removing its “natural predator”.

Foreign-policy circles are full of people who think they are the smartest guys in the room, when they are anything but. Dr.Strangelove is alive and well.

Re: The Day I Realized I Would Never Find Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq

#20

Post by toyg »

ncmncm wrote: post #2

It was obvious to anybody who cared, before the invasion, that there were no WMDs. Hans Blix inspected every place suspected, and reported not only nothing, but not even a trace of anything, in the daily newspapers. I suspect Maddox was misled, like Powell, by relying only on classified material that amounted to summaries produced with deliberate bias. It is a fundamental problem: there is a thousand times as much cl…

Nobody was misled. Everybody knew, but their careers depended on going along with the fiction. Maddox says as much, between the lines. “Never during work hours”. During work hours you shut it, look for excuses, change subject...

It’s the banality of evil, cynically exploited by ruthless operators at the top.

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