Gautam Mukunda wrote: > What would you have to believe to believe that the > Bush Administration faked WMD evidence in order to > invade Iraq?
Actively faking the evidence is a long stretch but to believe that the Bush administration systematically, deliberately and consistently stressed any evidence/report [even those of doubtful veracity] which supported their plans and ignored any evidence/report which wasn't equally favourable doesn't stretch my imagination at all. On the contrary, the notion that the Bush administration went into Iraq *after* a dispassionate and objective assessment of the WMD threat is the one which stretches my credulity to the breaking point. > In other words, what would you have to > believe in order to believe that the Administration, > _knowing that Iraq had no WMDs_, invaded Iraq anyways > for other reasons? I don't see how the Bush administration could have *known* that Iraq had no WMDs. At that time, Iraq *was* a sovereign country, not under the control of the US. And the less said about the accuracy of US intelligence on Iraq, the better. Wouldn't you say so? Forget the Bush administration knowing that Iraq was free of WMDs *before* the war started, it knows no such thing after 2 and a half months of occupying the country. Perhaps the question above could be more accurately rephrased as 'What would you have to believe in order to believe that the Administration, _not knowing anything much for sure about the veracity of the Iraqi WMD threat_, invaded Iraq anyways for other reasons?' And the answer, for me, is very simple - all I would need to believe is that the Administration wanted to invade Iraq for those other reasons and knew that the psychological fallout of 9/11 rendered the WMD threat an effective political tool in the domestic arena. > You would have to believe that they invaded Iraq > knowing that, after the country was defeated, it would > be revealed that there was nothing there. Not really. All I would have to believe is that they might have expected to find at least some weapons [just about everybody did] and if they actually thought about the possibility that no weapons might be found [never underestimate the power of self-delusion], they would have dealt with the notion then as they are dealing with the reality now: the WMD might be hidden or spirited away. And anyway, that brutal, horrific dictator Saddam is out and what can anyone *do* anyway? > You would have to believe either that every other > government in the world was complicit in the deception > (despite, in many cases, opposing the war) _or_ that > the Administration was somehow able to trick every > other government in the world. Why would I have to believe that? Why couldn't I, instead, believe this scenario: that other than Tony Blair's, every other government in the world failed to be convinced that the Iraqi WMD threat was immediate and imminent, at least not based on the evidence at hand. [I might be wrong about John Howard...but the impression I have is that Blair shared the fervent belief and Howard acted on a pragmatic appreciation of the wishes of his two closest allies.] However, Iraq didn't have any allies and no other government cared enough about either Iraq or any of the endangered international institutions, laws and customs to pit its army against the US/UK coalition. No fancy conspiracy theory, just a pragmatic assessment of national interests and military reality. > You would have to believe that after expelling the > inspectors in 1998 Saddam Hussein _chose_ to destroy > the WMD that he already had, and then chose not to > tell anyone, maintaining the sanctions on his own > country. Why is this such a preposterous notion? Given what we know of Saddam - his government and its institutions, his country and his culture, his Saladin complex and his relationship with America , this notion is as likely as the other one: that he had stockpiles of WMD, which could either be unleashed, with devastating ferocity, against the West or which could be squirreled away secretly, quickly. Remember Saddam's son-in-law? The one who defected and told all about Saddam's secret weapons programme, the one who later went back to Iraq and was executed by Saddam Hussein? As far as I recall, the notion you find so incredible was a part of his official testimony. He gave the details of all the research and then went on to say that SH *had* destroyed almost all of his arsenal in the late 1990s. He also said that it was done in secret and that no records were maintained. Saddam's reasoning, as told by this guy, was that he had always denied the existence of WMD and any public destruction of them [or a record of the destruction] would prove him a liar in front of his people. > You would further have to believe that, after > expelling the inspectors, Saddam made no efforts not > to reconstitute them, despite his decades-long > attempts to acquire them, and his demonstrated > willingness to use them. If one is willing to consider as likely the notion that he had already chosen to destroy his existing stock, it would not require a separate leap of faith to assume that he also refrained from creating more weapons. The reason for disarming ought to suffice as the reason for staying disarmed. > That's what you _have_ to believe. If you don't > believe any one of those four things, then you > logically cannot believe that Iraq had no WMD and the > Bush Administration faked the evidence of it in order > to go to war with Iraq. > > If you _do_ believe those four things, then I'm not > sure that rational debate is possible, and so I'm > wasting my time. If you _don't_, then how can you > believe that the Administration lied its way to the war? Gautam, I know you are a supporter of the current administration but must you also emulate their 'either-or' mental attitude? Why *must* one either be willing to envision Bush & co hunched over in a dark basement forging crucial documents [or, in a more prosaic version, procuring the services of a forger] or else be willing to envision them as brave, true warriors who started the war to protect the innocent of Iraq from Saddam and the innocent of America from Saddam's WMDs? Why can't one chose one of the other, more realistic, options? Ritu GCU Possibilities Abound _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
