Bush Sold the War on WMDs, Not Regime Change

[steve2470]

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000920906


With embarassing new revelations on WMDs emerging, and Bush poll numbers slipping, the president's supporters in the press argue that he actually sold the war to the public on the basis of freedom for the Iraqis, not on a WMD threat to Americans. A look at Bush's final messages to the public and to Congress just before the war began prove otherwise.

By Greg Mitchell

(May 15, 2005) -- Ever since it became apparent, almost two years ago, that Saddam Hussein held no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq—-the most prominent reason offered by the Bush administration for going to war against him—-defenders of the U.S. invasion and occupation in the media have flailed away, attempting to uphold the president’s honor.

First they claimed the weapons would still be found in Iraq. Months later, bitterly disappointed, they reluctantly admitted they had been proven wrong, but suggested that the WMDs must have been spirited out of the country, to Syria, or maybe in Michael Moore’s backyard.

When that fantasy went nowhere, they claimed that, well, that wasn’t Bush’s only, or even his main, declared point in going to war-—he had highlighted others, such as getting rid of a brutal dictator and bringing freedom to the Iraqi people. That’s what he was really after. He did not sell the war to the American people and the press primarily on the chemical, biological and nuclear WMD threat.

<snip>

[Poiuyt]

1. I'm guessing that if Bush had said in his State of the Union speech that

he wanted to sacrifice 1600+ Americans to bring freedom to Iraq, even though Saddam wasn't a threat to us or his neighbors, he wouldn't have gotten too far.

[FreedomAngel82]

6. Right

Fear worked and was the best thing to do. I believe on Bill Maher's show this past Friday night Gordan Vidol talked about that and said how they used fear to sell all their policies from the Iraq war to the Real ID act.

[havocmom]

2. Yep, and there is plenty of video to remind everyone with.

Maybe FSTV could do a marathon of members of the junta doing the WMD mantra. Would be good to record and send to everyone we know and blast the MSM with it.

[Rob H.]

3. If I remember right

Bush's reasons vacillated between WMDs and the claim that Saddam was supporting al Qaida (nevermind that bin Laden regards Hussein as an apostate). When neither of those two claims panned out, then it was about regime change--and it only became about regime change after no weapons were found.

Try to tell that to a Bush supporter, though. They look at you as if you've suddenly sprouted a second nose in the middle of your forehead. Then they insist that you're the one who's misinformed. :eyes:

[KittyWampus]

4. "Regime Change" Is Illegal, Unethical & Immoral.

[Straight Shooter]

5. Polls many months before war indicated NO for humanitarian reasons.

I wish I had saved the link, but the credible-source news article I read contained results of polls of Americans, and the majority of those polled clearly DID NOT support any military action for humanitarian reasons, including removing a brutal dictator.

rove and bush have cleverly twisted the rationale for the war, but the truth is, Americans just don't support military interference unless we are in danger, ourselves.

I cannot understand Repubs supporting this regime change meme, anyway. Aren't Repubs the party of personal responsibility? If so, then aren't the Iraqis personally responsible for how they live and who rules them?

I don't mean to sound hard-hearted. I support interference in extreme cases for humanitarian reasons. But for crying out loud, Saddam only rose to such a level of brutal power because of our complicity in it.

[stellanoir]

7. prior to that

when I was throwing sh*t at the TV was during *'s '02 SOTU "axis of evil" speech. I was enraged.

So he manipulated intelligence to go after Hussein , who had committed most of his atrocities when he was our puppet., and had long ago retreated into his palaces and was happily writing romance novels.

So we invaded a sovereign nation with a bogus casus belli and meanwhile the two other phantom boogie monsters have been so inspired, as to go nuclear.

Brilliant strategy George.

That would be for no living being on the planet except your sleazy and most oily war profiteers.

I'm so saddened by this. And never thought we'd sink so low.

[Colorado Blue]

8. Wasn't it sort of implied to be both? I remember clearly,

before we attacked Afghanistan to chase Bin Ladin around, there were lots of films on CNN about the Taliban, so forth. There was a particularly affecting piece about the oppression of Afghan women, with Christiane Amanpour, that was really very moving.

I think similar things were going on with Iraq. There were words to one effect, about WMD's, but movies about the oppression of the Iraqi people going on as well.

It was kind of subliminal background music, as it were.

And the fact is, there were probably SEVERAL motives. I think Bush & Co. had wanted Saddam for a long time - probably since Gulf War I, in fact.

[gulliver]

9. I wonder how many Republicans think Bush lied and are glad.

I'll bet there is a sizeable contingent of GOP who are glad Bush stretched the truth and failed his duty to due diligence. I'll bet there are bunch of freep-types who think some Arab country just needed shot up and they are glad Bush bypassed the stinkin-thinkin peaceniks.

[LynnTheDem]

10. Poll: Vast majority of Americans say "humanitarian" is not justification

Only 27 percent of respondents said they think that countries have the right, without UN approval, to overthrow another government that is committing "substantial violations of its citizens' human rights," although another 41 percent said that intervention could be justified if the violations were "large-scale, extreme and equivalent to genocide."

In the case of Iraq, however, only 32 percent of respondents believed both that human rights abuses equivalent to genocide justified intervention and that such extreme violations were occurring under Hussein's rule.

Asked, "Do you think that there are other governments existing today that have human rights records as bad as that of Iraq under Saddam Hussein?" an overwhelming 88 percent said there are.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1114-06.htm

And for the nutjob minority who think bush sold his illegal invasion on "regime change", are they aware that war for "regime change" is ILLEGAL under US law and the United States Constitution?

[Poiuyt]

12. I wasn't aware of that

Where in the Constitution does it say that? Wouldn't that be grounds for impeachment? And wouldn't it be nice if someone framed a question to Bush the way you stated it?

[LynnTheDem]

13. USC allows for ONLY TWO legal means to wage wars;

1. Self-defense from imminent or occuring attack.

2. Through signed & ratified treaties; ie the UN Charter, which itself allows only 2 legal means of waging wars; self-defense from occuring or imminent attack, and thru UN agreement.

The UN said NO to any invasion of Iraq, and the UN charter very clearly prohibits preemptive strikes and "regime change". Under international law & the UN Charter, bush's invasion is clearly illegal. As the US signed & ratified the UN Charter, the US Constitution holds bush's invasion to be illegal, as such signed & ratified treaties are "the law of the land".

As bLiar's own attorney general warned blair, in print, "regime change" is ILLEGAL PERIOD under the UN Charter.

As America & the UK have signed and ratified the same UN Charter, and as the US Constitution calls such Charters "the law of the land", bush violated the US Constitution.

Articles of Impeachment have been drawn up over this point, and the chances of Congress impeaching bush are:

Snowball <----------------->Hell

Edit to add: illegal under US law;

Congress specifically made the IWR authority subject to the War Powers Act of 1973.

The Iraq resolution was clear. “Nothing in this joint resolution supersedes any requirement of the War Powers Resolution.”

Accordingly, the War Powers Act was the law of the land at the time Bush decided to go to war in Iraq.

The WPA requires "clear" evidence of an "imminent" threat (by Iraq, in this case) to justify war. The WPA does NOT allow for "regime change".

[tabasco]

11. Rewriting history.

The easily-manipulated flag-waving morons have a memory of about five seconds and will believe every word.