Could we have gotten rid of Saddam without going to war?

[Mountainman]

So many people are saying that getting rid of Saddam is now justification for the war. After all the other 22 reasons proved to be bull shit the only thing left to them is "getting rid of Saddam."

I don't see how the cost of this war so far and the future costs (including the cost of lost opportunities here at home), in lives and dollars can possibly justify getting rid of one dictator. We could have used some clandestine method to get rid of him if that was so damned important

I also get pissed when I hear that Clinton and Gore believed Saddam had WMDs. That statement leaves out the passing of time since Clinton and Gore said anything about Saddam. We learned a lot more about him, that he was not a real threat to the U.S., in the years and months after Clinton left office.

You can't use either of those arguments to justify this war in MHO.

[NYC Liberal]

1. Cheney in '92:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/192908_cheney29.html

"And the final point that I think needs to be made is this question of casualties. I don't think you could have done all of that without significant additional U.S. casualties. And while everybody was tremendously impressed with the low cost of the (1991) conflict, for the 146 Americans who were killed in action and for their families, it wasn't a cheap war.

And the question in my mind is how many additional American casualties is Saddam (Hussein) worth? And the answer is not that damned many. So, I think we got it right, both when we decided to expel him from Kuwait, but also when the president made the decision that we'd achieved our objectives and we were not going to go get bogged down in the problems of trying to take over and govern Iraq."

[wtmusic]

2. History will show that we were far better off with Saddam in power

than a failed nation state which has abundant resources with which to finance nuclear weapons.

[western mass]

3. Nothing to do with Saddam.

The issue is that Bush is a liar. He willfully lied to the American people, and that makes him a traitor.

Case closed.

Everything else is beside the point.

[Fuzzy LaRue]

4. Clandestine Methods would not have worked.

There is no way that anyone could have gotten close enough to him to make it happen. He moved often, spend only a couple of days or sometimes just hours at a place. The only people with access to him were his inner circle. Members of his tribe, some of them childhood friends. The logistics of mounting this type of operation would have been insurmountable with no help inside Iraq. Clandestine methods would not have done it.

I am not saying the war was justified because he was basically unreachable. Supporting a coup or overthrow would have been the way to go, but we had tried these methods before and failed.

[bobbyboucher]

9. Is violence your only method?

Did he have to be killed? Or was it possible that he could have been forced to leave, with much international pressure.

[Inland]

11. I t could have been done, but Bush wanted an invasion. After all,

there is no need for a "clandestine" method if you are, like Bush, perfectly willing to tell the world that you want Saddam killed or removed, and are willing to invade to do it yourself.

But Bush didn't just want Saddam gone. He needed to take over. He wanted the control that only invasion would give him. Maybe he felt that it was because there was WMD to secure, or oil to secure, or bases, or maybe even he thought an occupation would lead to democracy. Regardless, he wanted this occupation. Not just saddam gone. There was a choice, and Bush made the bad one.

[quaker bill]

19. Clandestine methods were not necessary.

First, there was no demonstrable US interest to be served by removing Saddam.

The Soviet Union collapsed without an invasion. Saddam was never, not even in his wildest dreams, as large a threat as the USSR.

This war was entirely optional, there was never any real threat posed by Iraq. Bush just wanted to blow some stuff up for 9/11.

[DrWeird]

5. dupe

nt

[DrWeird]

6. We got rid of Milosevic...

without a full-blown invasion.

[bobbyboucher]

7. I believe we could have. However, if one's intent is profit

from oil and services related to oil, it is not an option.

[Warpy]

8. He's an old guy with lousy health habits

and he was living in a bad neighborhood. Likely he would have been dead within the decade.

What would have happened at his death? Nobody can say for certain, but there was enough intercultural hatred built up that civil war would have been likely, just as it is now, ahead of schedule.

His eldest son was not the more capable one, so no matter which one had been the anointed heir, if the other were still alive, a fight between them would have started the whole thing.

That's one of the problems with iron fisted dictators. They invariably leave a mess when they finally do the decent thing and die.

[KC21304]

10. I caught a snippet of Chris Matthews asking

someone who was saying we are better off without Saddam, if we could only have gotten one, would we be better off without Saddam or Osama. I think that is an interesting way to put it. If we would have stayed in Afghanistan we would most likely have gotten Bin Ladin.

To answer your question, I feel we would have found out he didn't have WMD without going to war, so we would have made him impotent, probably even in his own country.

[Disturbed]

12. Saddam and Oil.

Saddam would have been cleared of the Sanctions had the Blix team been able to complete their inspections. Right after that Saddam was going to sell Iraqi oil via the Euro which would screw over the USA. This was the main reason for his overthrow.

His sons and others within the power circle would have been easier assasination targets Perhaps steady killing off of the circle would have effectively nuetered Saddam but I doubt it.

Seems to me that the invasion had to be carried out if the US Govt. and the Oil Corps. couldn't abide with Saddam's plans of oil sales.

[ComerPerro]

13. Whenever someone gives me that line about Clinton

I remind them, quite quickly, that the main difference is that Clinton never invaded Iraq.

[gratuitous]

14. I've never heard of anyone living forever

So I'd have to say yes.

The larger question, however, is by what right the United States removed the leader of another sovereign nation. We certainly didn't have authorization from the UN. There's no constitutional provision that enables the executive to "take out" foreign potentates.

George W. Bush should be in the dock at The Hague.

[Hobarticus]

15. Saddam was CONTAINED...

Two-thirds of his country was heavily patrolled from the air.

One-third was controlled by the Kurds.

Iraq was watched, 24-7. Any earnest attempts to build WMD would have been found.

There is no good reason for his removal. We've created a massive power vaccum in the ME...God help us with what fills it.

[TahitiNut]

16. Even the greatest of his threat to his own nation was neutralized.

What I find astounding is the chutzpah of Repubublican partisans who continue to claim that Saddam gassed his own people and committed other atrocities ... and then they fail to acknowledge that was when he was a friend of those same Republican politicians who now proclaim how evil he was!! Well, birds of a feather still flock, I guess. :eyes:

[Hobarticus]

17. Zactly.

We SOLD them the damn gas to begin with...whose blood is on whose hands, at the end of the day???

[quaker bill]

18. Apartheid went away in South Africa and power changed hands

with out going to war. The Soviet Union collapsed without an invasion. It has been done and it can be done. These recent examples render arguments about the necessity of war to accomplish "regime change" completely baseless.