(Warrior Editorial 2006) - We are in the midst of a DemocRat
slur campaign and offensive against the Iraq war plan. Their hidden hatred is obvious.
Attack the President who defeated their love children - Gore and Kerry. DemocRats and
their Liberal pansies in the media will never forget that loss. They push their agenda -
even though it aids the terrorists, demeans U.S. Troops and weakens the security of the
United States. The yellow bellied spineless traitors in the liberal media refuse to
release both sides of every issue. They cater to the stories from their DemocRat allies.
Their goal is to win back the majority in the House and Senate and then the Presidency.
Most radio and TV stations get their news from a handful of sources or only one -like AP
Associated Press. The local newscasters almost always read the material verbatum. It's
either because of their ignorance or fear of their job security. They are indirectly
spineless fools. It's always one sided and repeated over and over until the puke is
dripping from their lips - Hatred for Bush, condemn the Troops for mistreating terrorists,
pull out of Iraq because Bush did not have a plan. Liberal media executives and their
hired fools keep pushing their news trash to the public. They are true Terrorists Allies.
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WHO SAID THAT?
What if Saddam fails to comply (with UN sanctions), or we take some ambiguous third route
which gives him yet more time to develop this (WMD) program? He will
conclude that the international community has lost its will… [that] he can go right
on and do more to rebuild an arsenal of devastating destruction. And some day, I
guarantee you, he’ll use this arsenal.
Answer: President Bill Clinton in February 1998.
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WHO SAID THAT?
The United Nations believes that Saddam Hussein may have produced as much as 200
tons of VX (nerve gas)… we face a clear and present danger… terrorists
who bombed the World Trade Center in New York City had in mind the destruction and deaths
of 250,000 people….
Answer: Clinton Defense Secretary William Cohen on November 15, 1997.
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WHO SAID THAT?
The world hasn’t seen, except maybe since Hitler, somebody quite as
evil as Saddam Hussein. If you don’t stop a horrific dictator before he gets started
too far, he can do untold damage….
Answer Clinton Secretary of State Madeline Albright on February 20, 1998.
----------------------------
WHO SAID THAT?
“For the last eight years, American policy towards Iraq has been based on the tangible
threat that Saddam poses to our security. “Even a contained Saddam was
harmful to stability and positive change in the region” That threat is clear.”
Answer: Clinton National Security Council advisor Sandy Berger in December 1998 speech at
Stanford.
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DemocRat Congresswomen compares
Osama bin Laden to America's Founding Fathers
Sen. Patty Murray isn't the only Democrat on Capitol Hill who has kind words for
mass-murdering terrorist Osama bin Laden: Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, likens him to our
Founding Fathers. "If you think back to our founding as a country, we are a country
of revolution," Kaptur told the Toledo Blade. Many religious people who had fled
repression in other countries helped America "cast off monarchical Britain" in
1776, she said, such as the patriot militia Green Mountain Boys. "One could say that
Osama bin Laden and these non-nation-state fighters with religious purpose are very
similar to those kind of atypical revolutionaries that helped to cast off the British
crown," the 11-term Toledo Democrat claimed. Kaptur spoke at an appeasement workshop
for Toledo Catholic leaders titled "Preaching and Teaching Peace in the Face of
War,"
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War critics either downplay, skim over, or completely ignore this historical context. The
prior administration’s beliefs and policies towards Iraq were consistent with the
threat assessment motivating our war with Saddam. They would have you think that it all
began with Bush, who was driven to war by neocon zealots who hijacked US foreign policy.
They do not tell you, for obvious reasons, that the Clinton administration in November
1997 launched a public campaign to build support for a possible war against Iraq. The do
not mention that on October 31, 1998, President Clinton signed the Iraq Liberation Act,
which stated that it should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to
remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power.
And, that in 1998, Congress authorized President Clinton to use US armed forces pursuant
to UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 678 to achieve implementation of UNSCRs 660-667.
Saddam was then on his way to setting the Guinness World Record for most resolutions
violated. Wanting to indict President Bush, Donald Rumsfeld and senior Pentagon officers
for “an invented war,” as former top planner Lt.Gen. Newbold now puts it, they
dare not admit that the Bush administration was, in fact, looking at the threat posed by
Iraq in much the same way its predecessor did… the difference being that while Bill
dallied, W. took on the threat.
As President Bush said in his January 28, 2003 State of the Union speech:
Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists
and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike?
If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words,, and all
recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein
is not a strategy, and it is not an option.
In a speech the following month, the President said:
In Iraq, a dictator is building and hiding weapons that could enable him to dominate the
Middle East and intimidate the civilized world – and we will not allow it. This same
tyrant has close ties to terrorist organizations and could supply them with the terrible
means to strike this country – and America will not permit it…the danger must be
confronted…if it does not (fully and peacefully disarm per UN resolutions), we are
prepared to disarm Iraq by force. Either way, this danger will be removed.
The critics allege that Iraq was a diversion from the real war on terror. They refuse to
acknowledge the proven links that existed between Saddam’s regime and al Qaeda as
documented by Stephen F. Hayes in his book The Connection and in his Weekly Standard
articles on this subject. In his September 8, 2003 article “Saddam’s Al Qaeda
Connection” Hayes wrote about a letter by CIA Director George Tenet that declassified
CIA reporting on WMD and Iraq’s links to Al Qaeda… “We have solid reporting
of senior level contacts between Iraq and Al Qaeda going back a decade,” Tenet
wrote… “we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of Al Qaeda
members…we have credible reporting that Al Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq who
could help them acquire WMD…”
Captured documents recently translated revealed that thousands of radical Islamists
trained in camps at Samarra, Ramadi and Salman Pak four years prior to Operation Iraqi
Freedom. Those documents and others can be found here and here.
Now let’s look at some of the text of House Joint Resolution 114, passed October 12,
2002, which listed the indictments against Saddam’s regime. They make a convincing
argument that the Butcher of Baghdad was not being kept in his “box” as the war
plan critics allege.
Whereas Iraq, in direct and flagrant violation of the cease-fire, attempted to thwart the
efforts of weapons inspectors to identify and destroy Iraq’s weapons of mass
destruction stockpiles and development capabilities, which finally resulted in the
withdrawal of inspectors on October 31, 1998…whereas the current Iraqi regime has
demonstrated its continuing hostility toward, and willingness to attack, the United
States, including by attempting in 1993 to assassinate former President Bush and by firing
on thousands of occasions on United States and coalition armed forces engaged in enforcing
the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council….
HJ Res. 114 contains much more, of course, including the fact that Saddam used WMD on
neighboring countries and on his own people. As for WMD, both the Duelfer and Kay reports
concluded that while Saddam might not have any large stockpiles, he retained, he planned
for, the ability to reconstitute WMD programs as soon as all inspectors left.
Then there was the matter of Saddam’s programmatic deception and concealment efforts.
As Duelfer wrote in his report:
Iraq was never able to convince us that they had stopped concealment, and in fact, we were
convinced of the opposite, that they still retain weapons.
We need to remember here that Saddam began his Guinness Book UNSCR violations record right
after we expelled his army from Kuwait. He signed a cease-fire agreement in 1991 promising
to destroy all his WMD.
All of this historic context, all of these facts, are ignored by the war plan critics. I
am reminded of a comment by an Iraqi, frustrated by the WMD debate, who opined that
“Saddam Hussein himself was a weapon of mass destruction.” Through it all, the
US worked with the UN, then formed a coalition to liberate Iraq, putting the lie to
charges that President Bush acted unilaterally.
The carping critics erect a rhetorical, if not imaginary, entity so they can bash it with
charges of “not enough troops” and other hindsight insight. The perfect war plan
devised by omniscient planners has never existed. And as Donald Rumsfeld has acknowledged
on several occasions, no plan, however perfect, survives first contact with the enemy. But
since tactical flexibility was inherent in the plan, commanders on the ground adapted to
changing circumstances. And now, a little over three years later, we see the tremendous
success that Coalition and Iraqi forces have achieved.
President Bush put it this way in an April 10 speech at Johns Hopkins University:
We have learned from our mistakes. We’ve adjusted our approach to meet the changing
circumstances on the ground; we’ve adjusted depending upon the actions of the enemy.
By pursuing a clear and flexible strategy in Iraq, we helped make it possible for Iraqis
to choose their leaders and begin to assume the responsibilities of self-government and
self-defense.
The most recent war plan critic is retired Lt. Gen. Greg Newbold, who, up to four months
prior to the launch of OIF, was the Pentagon’s top planner. He left in part due to
his opposition to the plan. He now alleges that other top Pentagon officers who opposed
the plan did not speak up, that they are culpable for an “invented war.”
At an April 11 press conference Joint Chiefs chairman, Gen. Peter Pace answered Newbold
and other like-minded critics about how the process worked building up to Iraq:
First of all, once it became apparent that we may have to take military action, the
Secretary of Defense asked Tom Franks, who was the commander of Central Command, to begin
doing some planning, which he did. Over the next two years, 50 or 60 times, Tom Franks
either came to Washington or by video teleconference, sat down with the Secretary of
Defense, sat down with the Joint Chiefs and went over what he was thinking, how he was
planning. And as a result of those iterative opportunities and all the questions that were
asked not once was Tom told, “No, don’t do that; no, don’t do this; no, you
can’t have this; no, you can’t have that.” What happened was, in a very
open roundtable discussion, questions (were raised) about what might go right, what might
go wrong, what would you need, how would you handle it, and that happened with the Joint
Chiefs, and it happened with the Secretary. And before the final orders were given, the
Joint Chiefs met in private with General Franks and assured ourselves that that plan was a
solid plan and that the resources that he needed were going to be allocated.
That agreement on resources having been reached, the Joint Chiefs went to Rumsfeld and
then to President Bush, assuring them about the plan and the necessary resources. Pres.
Bush asked specific questions about whether the proper amount of resources had been
allocated.
He did that with us and then again when all the combatant commanders were in from [around]
the globe well before a final decision was made.
Gen. Pace stressed the fact that there was every opportunity for anyone with qualms or
disagreements to speak their minds. He concluded: I wanted to tell you how I believe this
system works, and I wanted to tell you how I have observed it working for five years,
because the [critical] articles that are out there about folks not speaking up are just
flat wrong.
There are some who choose to believe that Saddam never presented a threat to America or
the Middle East, that he was safely contained in his “box,” that he had no
connections with Al Qaeda or other terrorist groups, that neocon zealots hijacked US
foreign policy, that the war plan was fatally flawed due to silent top ranking officers
and “Pentagon dictator” Donald Rumsfeld, that the liberation of Iraq was an
invented war, and that the Saddam-Iraq chapter of our history began with President Bush,
are entitled to their opinions.
They are refuted by the facts which they and their media allies refuse to acknowledge.
John B. Dwyer is a military historian and a frequent contributor.
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5414
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