Bullshit "bullshit".

Man with credibility problem interviewed by rabidly anti-US al-GUardian, recants tale told to American patrons in quest to gain new patrons.

1. We know Saddam had a viable WMD program--he produced and used them in wartime and in peacetime. This is not disputed.

2. We know he refused to cooperate with a decade of inspections, which certainly made it appear that he was hiding a WMD program.

Put those together and it doesn't bother me in the slightest that we took him out. He was a menace to his people, a menace to his neighbors, and a menace to the United States. It was right and good to conclude that he had a program, and the information from "Curveball" was icing on the cake. 1 and 2 above were sufficient. Play with fire, get burned.

After 9/11 it was apparent that our policy of waiting for evidence of prosecutorial quality was not wise. Easy to forget that now, which is a crime. And I care not for the protestations of the left now or at the time, for they who can never be bothered to take up arms against the enemy need not be consulted for their opinion as the the worthiness of the cause. You would think they could just say Thank You.

Good riddance. Perhaps this walking handjob of an informer can join his dictator in being silent.

Meanwhile, the fact that the vast majority of civilian casualties are caused by terrorist attacks is not mentioned by the learned mouthpiece of Jihad the UK, the Guardian.

If the ever-sorry British left wishes to flog itself for a colonial past by allowing itself to be conquered now, it should do so quietly, and far from me.

Rather than opinions, I offer this:

Do you really not remember that Iraq had a nuclear program - that the Israelis bombed? Do you think Israel would have done that to a milk factory?

Read about Iraq's nuclear program HERE.

Further: you may not recognize that Iraq is not a sandy desert scene from The Ten Commandments. It's industrialized. That means that the chemical agents to support a modern civilization were freely available. If you've never looked up what that means, you can see what it means in the USA by searching for the term, "ERG2008", the Emergency Response Guidebook, the guide for American and Canadian response to a release of one of the substances shipped by the millions of tons daily.

And not only did Hussein gas the Kurds, years after the Americans wiped him out, IEDs appeared with chlorine gas components. This is studiously ignored by people eager to claim date palms and sheep are Iraq's only inhabitants.

Does Iraq have a right to sovereignty? Yes. But people have to throw aside ignorance, and quit lying about the physical environment there.

Realize that one class of liar claims that the peaceful shepherds and date farmers of Iraq need the USA to appear with helicopter gunships to dictate their lives. Another class of liar claims that there are only date farmers and shepherds in Iraq, they cannot possibly have done anything whatsoever to anyone!

Quit using editorial sources. Study the objective data about Iraq's economy. Note the industrial capacity, population, demography and occupations of its people, and quit talking about them, should you have the tendency, as if they were a retarded child right there in the room who can't figure out you're talking about them. Quit using "two wrongs" to justify either position you might take about American action there. You're the dumb one if you do that.

It's amazing how much research you're willing to put into which carbs are good carbs, but how little effort you expend on stories that don't fit your narrative.

He was a menace to his people, a menace to his neighbors, and a menace to the United States.

He was a menace to his people, and his neighbors, but emphatically not to the U.S. Therefore, spending north of a trillion dollars to depose him and replace him with a fractious Islamist state was a bad idea.

That the government clung to the flimsy lies of Curveball is entirely consistent with what has been clear about the Iraq war for years: the U.S. government had already decided to go to war, and was looking for anything to support the narrative that Saddam was a threat to us.

My only hope is that the Iraq debacle teaches us to forever avoid elective warfare intended to remake a region in our image.

>> My only hope is that the Iraq debacle teaches us to forever avoid elective warfare intended to remake a region in our image.

I suspect the opposite is our reality. Never underestimate the power of denial.

It's amazing how much research you're willing to put into which carbs are good carbs, but how little effort you expend on stories that don't fit your narrative.

Not sure what you're looking for here. I read this story yesterday.

I'm sorry that Saddam was a horrible man and people were suffering in his country. George Bush pledged "no nation building," and I was for going after Osama Bin Laden, but not for becoming the world's policeman. The broken U.N. should be fixed and Western European countries should stop bragging about how they have such fantastic health care when it wouldn't be possible without our military (if they had to pay the actual costs for their own defense instead of counting on us...).

Therefore, spending north of a trillion dollars to depose him and replace him with a fractious Islamist state was a bad idea.

Care to reassess that statement in the light of Iranian nuclear ambitions? if you really think he'd be sitting on his hands doing nothing, well, I have bridge in Brooklyn for sale.

Cheap, too.

Nope, I don't care to reasses that statement. Deposing Saddam, an enemy of Iran, and replacing him with a friendly regime, has empowered Tehran to pursue its nuclear ambitions. Removing Saddam has been a huge boon to Iran's regional ambitions. I do not view a nuclear armed Iran as preventable at this point, and our disastrous war in Iraq is partially responsible.

"but emphatically not to the U.S."

Google USS Stark. Google "no fly zone." Google "Oil for Food." Google "Invasion of Kuwait."

Killing sailors and shooting at planes and bribing officials and disrupting oil supplies is evidently not a problem for you. Why not?

Killing sailors and shooting at planes and bribing officials and disrupting oil supplies is evidently not a problem for you. Why not?

USS Stark happened in what, 1987? Invasion of Kuwait, early 1990s, and Saddam's military never recovered from that war. Neither was relevant to the time when we chose to go to war in 2003.

A direct threat to the U.S. is in my mind needed to justify a war. Saddam posed no such threat, and that war was unjustified.

Christopher, how about the fact that Saddam tried to assassinate the standing president of the United States, which by itself is an act of war? Dubya only did what Clinton should have done years earlier. How conveniently we all forget that one. Anti war folks will always reach for any shred of doubt to avoid the necessary evils of the real world

Sorry ronc, you want to blame someone for not taking care of Iraq right the first time you're gonna have to blame Bush#1

Say what you will about Saddam, the man was hung.

Anti war folks will always reach for any shred of doubt to avoid the necessary evils of the real world

I'm not anti-war. I'm opposed to unnecessary wars. There's a difference. There was no imperative to remove Saddam Hussein from power, just a bunch of vague assertions that he might do something bad in the future that might harm us.

"Therefore, spending north of a trillion dollars to depose him and replace him with a fractious Islamist state was a bad idea."

Well, do be sure to mention that to the current Congress, where the House controls every dime of Federal spending, and the current President, who curiously doesnt have to answer questions about his "exit strategy" and is operating under exactly the same legal means as the previous fellow.

By the way - where did the trillion dollars go?

"Say what you will about Saddam, the man was hung."

Rather, he was hanged.

Well, do be sure to mention that to the current Congress, where the House controls every dime of Federal spending, and the current President, who curiously doesnt have to answer questions about his "exit strategy" and is operating under exactly the same legal means as the previous fellow.

I'm not sure your point here. Is it:

a. Complain to Congress about the Iraq war? – I did, back before we went in, and even got a form letter in response. My voice was heard!

b. That Congress is abdicating its responsibility to declare war or manage the budget? – I'm certain they are. That Congress has a role in this as well doesn't make it not folly.

c. That you think I feel differently about this now that Obama is the President? – I don't care who is President, the Iraq war was folly.

By the way - where did the trillion dollars go?

Fuel, munitions, equipment replacement, medical expenses, debt service, bribes, transportation, training Iraqis, etc. If you're really curious, you can dig through the appropriations bills. Because the Iraq war funding has been through special appropriations on top of the regular defense appropriations, it should be easy to do if you're so inclined. Did you have a point?

Yes, Christopher - and you missed it. This isn't a "me vs. you" in Championship Outrage.

It's just a call to everybody to pay attention.

For instance, you said, "...the Iraq war was folly."

Ahem. We're still there.

And when you start counting the money - you've noticed how to track it - you'll find a surprising amount of Americans getting that money; in fact, that's a major bone of contention for people eager to bust Dick Cheney. Even though Haliburton, to name just one offender living off the dying, started operation over there when Ron Brown was the Commerce Secretary (and not for a Bush). This is a call for consistency, too. Keep your principles across administrations, please!

Anyone want to take bets on how much time passes before this idiot gets sued by someone for "causing" the war?

====================

...100,000 civilian deaths....

This estimate includes deaths from insurgent activities and terrorist attacks that happened after the actual war.

Yes, Christopher - and you missed it. This isn't a "me vs. you" in Championship Outrage.

It's just a call to everybody to pay attention.

These are blog comments, Radwaste. This is no place for subtlety! However, I'm all in favor of more people paying attention, and less of championship outrage matches, which infuriate many and enlighten little.

Ahem. We're still there.

Correct. My verbiage was imprecise, but this post was about the bad information too many credulous politicians clung to in the run-up to the war, which was in the past.

Even though Haliburton, to name just one offender living off the dying, started operation over there when Ron Brown was the Commerce Secretary (and not for a Bush).

True. I intentionally didn't talk about Halliburton and other purported war profiteers; merely mentioning the name in many forums leads with near certainty to the sort of shouting matches that I find unproductive.

This is a call for consistency, too. Keep your principles across administrations, please!

That's fair. I'm also opposed to the Obama-led plan to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely propping up the Karzai kleptocracy, even though I supported that war originally. And if the current administration or its successors plans a new war on dubious grounds and fantasies of easy transitions and claims of resource wealth to pay for it, I'll oppose that, too.

But the big lesson of all of this – for me, at least – is the incredible difficulty of imposing a democratic government at the point of a gun. I agree we should pay attention. A little humility wouldn't hurt either.

"But the big lesson of all of this – for me, at least – is the incredible difficulty of imposing a democratic government at the point of a gun. I agree we should pay attention. A little humility wouldn't hurt either."

Well, do remember that humility gets you exactly nowhere in the Arab world. Their culture is very different from ours in that respect; traditionally, in their world, might makes right and the strong horse is the only horse that gets respect.

Let's be up front about what Iraq was all about. The idea was that, ultimately, if modernity could be brought to the Arab world than it would deny Islamic terrorists its sources of funding and sanctuary. If this were to work, it would be the ultimate solution to Islamic terrorism. Did it work? Still too soon to say, I think. Don't forget that Iraq was chosen in part because it is a fairly industrialized country, and its population was pretty well educated prior to Saddam. (As opposed to Afghanistan, which is still very backwards by comparison. The sole purpose of war there was to root out the Taliban and deny Al-Q its bases there; there is no hope of establishing a Western-style democracy there for the next half century at least.)

So what are the odds? Admittedly it's a gamble. I'm not ignorant of what I said two paragraphs ago; there are aspects of Arab culture that are still pretty barbaric. Maybe it will be possible for a younger generation that's tired of all that BS to finally bring some reforms, as we might (repeat, might) be seeing in Egypt. But really, what were Bush's other choices, and what are Obama's now or the next president's? If the region proves to be unreformable, then there would appear to be two: (1) seal off the region from the rest of the world, or (2) nuke it all. The first represents a vast commitment, one that may last for centuries and will cause vast suffering in the region, not to mention how unpopular in world opinion the country that undertakes its enforcement will be. The second option, well, I don't think I need to elaborate on that.

The thing is, the U.S. probably could (assuming that we get sufficient cooperation from Canada) go isolationist, seal off the borders, stop all immigration, sharply limit foreign visitors, and thereby insulate itself from imported terrorism. The economic costs would be nasty, but we could do it if we had to. Most of the rest of the world doesn't have this option. Europe, Russia, China and India do not have the ability to seal their borders, and places like Japan and Korea don't have enough natural resources to keep their current populations alive without international trade. Australia might could isolate and survive, but they'd be about the only one other than North America. So if we go isolationist, we will be leaving a whole bunch of our allies to their own devices. A day may come when that's what we have to do, but it basically stops the progress of Western civilization for probably 200-300 years.

Well, do remember that humility gets you exactly nowhere in the Arab world. Their culture is very different from ours in that respect; traditionally, in their world, might makes right and the strong horse is the only horse that gets respect.

Cousin Dave, what I'm referring to is the humility for us to recognize the limits of our own power. That while we can, if we choose, end the lives of everyone in Iraq, but that we can't easily force those people to make decisions about their government that we would like. They'll just hate us, too.

The idea was that, ultimately, if modernity could be brought to the Arab world than it would deny Islamic terrorists its sources of funding and sanctuary.

The idea that the U.S – a country of infidels – could accomplish this by invading a country divided by ethnicity, religion, and Islamic sect – seems like madness to me. There was never a likely roadmap to the sort of success you were seeking through Iraq.

I do not think our country's foreign policy should be predicated on the highly improbable transformation of deeply dysfunctional countries.

Christopher -

Please realize that with your soft bigotry of low expectations you are condemning 1/6th of the worlds population to death in a nuclear fireball.

Because if we don't kill off islamist expansionism, that's what we'll be left with if we don't want to hear about attacks every other week around the world as the islamists attempt to wipe out the infidel.

And I can tell you right now, any nuclear detonation in any Western city will bring hellfire down on the entire islamic world.

So our choices remain the same now as they did on 9/12/01, and the same as they did in 1979:

Reform, isolate, exterminate.

And if enough people like you bitch about the cost of reform, we'll skip right to the more economically viable "exterminate". Nukes are cheap, comparatively speaking.

When did he have time to convince the Russian, Chinese, Israeli, and all other national intelligence agencies?
Everyone thought Saddam had WMD's. It wasn't one guy convincing only one nation about them.

Brian, I don't see the bigotry in believing that people in other nations are likely to resist outside attempts to transform their societies. There is a great deal of antipathy to the US in the Muslim world; I think our efforts are as likely to backfire as bring about reform.

Christopher - the bigotry comes in with the assumption that Arabs are not capable of self-government, so the best we can hope for is a strongman that's benign to the outside world.

I happen to reject that line of thought. There are Arabs (and others) that are certainly hostile to self-government. They prefer a more malicious kind of dictator that goes around enslaving their neighbors.

Christopher - the bigotry comes in with the assumption that Arabs are not capable of self-government, so the best we can hope for is a strongman that's benign to the outside world.

I happen to reject that line of thought.

I happen to reject it as well, but I also think that self-government is hard to impose at gunpoint. We have a poor track record when it comes to meddling in other countries' governance; it seems better results obtain when the impetus for reform is internal.

Hey, drop WalMarts on 'em.

Even the most advanced civilization in history cannot stand the idea of being too far from a WalMart - once they get used to walking into the solid evidence of prosperity, they can't stop.

Voila! Instant consumer base. Government? Irrelevent - so long as the WalMart gets there and stays there. Need a bigger WalMart? Estuarine woodlands the only place to put it? No problem! Bring in the fill dirt! We need cheap stuff!

Two miles is too far in Aiken, SC, and three is too far in Cocoa, FL.

Around here, it's how you spell, "Allah". Allah doesn't lower prices every day. That's why so many in the US make the pilgrimage. Daily.

Good idea Radwaste. Dropping Wal-Marts is much more likely to be successful than propaganda pamphlets. Plus, the legendary Wal-Mart supply chain people can use a good challenge every now and again.

Let's be up front about what Iraq was all about. The idea was that, ultimately, if modernity could be brought to the Arab world than it would deny Islamic terrorists its sources of funding and sanctuary. If this were to work, it would be the ultimate solution to Islamic terrorism.

Absolutely correct. My main complaint is in implementation. It was too slow, and worried too much about "collateral damage". Also, far too weak a response to everything relating to that one cleric whose name escapes me, but it was the head of a particularly strong group, who spent months defying us.

Also, when the 4 contractors were murdered, burned, and their corpses hung from the bridge, the whole party going on around them should have been bombed.

On top of that, a bunch of people like to claim that the report on Iraq's WMD programs indicated that they no longer had any. This is not true. They found numerous RECENTLY destroyed facilities which indicated that there had been research with both biological agents and chemicals going on, including experimentation on human subjects.

They also found that Saddam's scientists had been lying to him, probably to protect their own skins. A lot of the time, they were siphoning off money instead of making the WMD materials they claimed they were. Remember all those "false alarms" where they found barrels of chemicals that set off the detectors, but were later determined to be "pesticides"? Did NO ONE else wonder why Iraq had enough pesticides to kill every insect on Earth several times over? I believe that those were the WMDs Saddam THOUGHT he had.