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Bush, where are those pesky NBC weapons?

  
  

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Outlaw
00:03 / 17.05.03
On the subject of the NBC weapons.

The "N", Nukes, are pretty much stable at whatever environmental condidtions. Only a humid environment can cause problems, as any metals will oxidize in that environment. However getting the fissionable materials is always fun. No one seems to be selling them and making them is double tough.

The "B", biological, are like any other little bugs, they have limited shelf lives when exposed to extreems, like 140 degrees in the shade. Since Iraq has had only intermitent power for the last 10 years, I think their bioweapons are most likely dead bugglies. Keeping a bioweapons program going in that uncertain environment is probably not feasable so they may have wanted to make them, but couldn't store the results so they were content to study and look for a 140 degree stable bugglie.

The "C", chemical, again are not shelf stable at 140 degrees. Making them is real nasty, not basement MacGyvering in any sense. Thus I suspect what they had turned to hair gel real quick.

Now, I went along with the idea that they had them (B's and C's). After all, the US gave them away like prizes in a box of Crackerjacks. However I failed to take into account the effect the daily bombings had on theinfrastructure of Iraq. We were led by the media to assume Iraq was basicly a second world country will all the amenities of "civilized" people. However as we have found out they were just barely a thrid world country with occasional forays into the late bronze age. So I think we were schnookered by Bush and his minions.

The sad thing is, they are using the reasons we gave to NOT go to war, as reasons to stay in Iraq now. Kinda makes me feel like a dope. All while we were arguing against the war, we were building the case to stay in Iraq for the forseable future to "rebuiild" them.

Who would have thought Bush and his miniosn were so slick, thats what Democrats usualy do...

Outlaw
 
 
Salamander
02:47 / 17.05.03
I've almost come to the point of washing my hands of the whole thing, the american populace don't seem to care, even in the face of blatant evidence that Bush was wrong, forget whether he lied, he was plainly wrong. But not only does noone seem to care, they seem to have forgotten the whole thing, like they're sleep walking. It doesn't make me sick though, it just makes me sad.
 
 
Outlaw
19:54 / 17.05.03
It certainly does make one depressed. To watch an entire society go dowwn the same road so many others have in the past while insisting they are really the good guys dont you see.

I suppose the Romans were the same way "Don't you see Macedonia, we are saving you from the scourge of the Asians. They have iron weapons, we have to disarm them."

Blech...

I hate knowing whats going on. I wish sometimes that I could have half my brain removed so I could vote Republican or Democrat and sleep at night.

Outlaw
 
 
GreenMann
10:50 / 21.05.03
British and Americans particularly must feel like many Germans did when their government was working minorities to death in labour camps.

It's like...we know crimes against humanity are being commited in our name, and even bigger lies told to cover them up, but we are powerless so we try to forget such horrible things or give government the benefit of the doubt.
 
 
Outlaw
13:44 / 21.05.03
I always thought that the people of Germany were full of shit when in the documentaries made in the 70's and 80's they would say "It was as if we all had fallen asleep." They knew, they supported it. My little brother supports the war, he thinks Bush is the friggin' second coming. I told him that in 50 years when they do the documentaries of the rise of the american hitler he will be one of the folks saying "Shazam! It was like we all jest feld asleep."

He didn't laugh.

Outlaw
 
 
GreenMann
12:29 / 22.05.03
Yeah, i agree with that take on it too.

What still shocks me is that the majority of people+the media seem to have accepted Blair's huge lie about WMDs, perhaps in a similar way that Germans accepted their government's line that Jews were being transported to Poland to "work"

Blair was banging on+on for months+months about the mortal danger we were all in from Iraqi WMDs, with such grave warnings, whipping up a frenzy of fear and warmongering, all to invade and occupy a country that couldn't even defend its own air space, let alone attack us.

Now, everyone seems to have completely forgotten Blair's huge whoppers about WMDs and other lies such as his promise for a 2nd UN resolution (remember that?).

It used to baffle me how Germans could have swallowed The Big Lie the way they did, but now i am actually living under that mass psychology it is no longer a mystery but a murderous reality.
 
 
Salamander
12:55 / 22.05.03
Yeah it sucks.
 
 
Outlaw
14:07 / 22.05.03
Nationalism is the disease we are discussing here. The willingness to say "My country, right or wrong" and "we are the bestest in the world!"

Thats what leads us to this problem. People get butt stupid when the flag is waved in their faces.

Outlaw
 
 
bjacques
16:19 / 22.05.03
Well, the UN just gave the UK and US free rein to run Iraq. I still don't think anybody's asked the Iraqis used to a welfare state (though a murderous one) what they'll think of laissez-faire capitalism and foreign ownership of anything worth having. If the occupiers are slow to clean up the toxic dumps, local troublemakers can have fun with them.

Europe won one round at least--the cellular phone system will be GSM, not one of the bullshit proprietary "standards" of the big US carriers.
 
 
Morlock - groupie for hire
11:25 / 23.05.03
Given that Iraq's infrastructure will hav eto be rebuilt pretty much from scratch, I can't help but wonder what will happen once building is complete. Sure, most of the funding comes straight out of oil sales (neat trick, how to run a profit without actually spending any money), but I've got visions of Bechtel and co. coming out with statements along the line of "We built it, it's ours. Welcome to Iraq, Inc."

Threadrot, sorry.
 
 
GreenMann
13:18 / 23.05.03
It just seems to get worse+worse: Angloamerica is raping+looting Iraq live on TV, from the comfort of your armchair.

Blair is Bush's slippery lawyer and a fraud who could argue his way out of a paper bag. He has successfully lied through his teeth for his neocon master and conned the public here and in the states no end and, as long as he gets away with such whoppers, he will carry on pulling the wool over everyone's eyes and, shockingly (for me if no-one else), will continue getting away with it each+every time, on key stuff like WMDs, the so-called Iraq-Al Qaeda connection, a 2nd UN resolution etc etc.

Even his critics say that, whatever his faults, "Blair is sincere". I disagree. I believe he knows exactly what he's lying about, and is in it up to his neck. He might be a charlaton, but he is not stupid and MUST know the war was for US control of oil and better security for Israel, thus Blair's 'roadmap' role.

At one of his creepiest moments Blair, complete with emotionally charged quivering lip, condemned Iraq as "bestial" for the alleged "torture+execution" of UK soldiers, which we discovered later was also Blair bullshit.

"Moral" Blair? I can't think of a more inappropriate discription!
 
 
Eloi Tsabaoth
13:03 / 28.05.03
Rumsfeld says Iraqis may have destroyed WMDs prior to war.

While he asserted Tuesday that "we don't know what happened," Rumsfeld said, "It is also possible that they (Saddam Hussein's government) decided that they would destroy them prior to a conflict."

Rumsfeld made the remark in response to a question following a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations. He was asked to explain why allied forces have not found the weapons of mass destruction that were President Bush's initial rationale for invading Iraq.

Rumsfeld said it was known that Iraq had sizable chemical warfare programs and had used chemical weapons on the Iranians and its own people. He said evidence may yet turn up as the search moves farther afield.

Those cunning bastards, they'll go to any lengths to make the US look bad... first they hide the WMDs, then they destroy the WMDs, it's almost as if they never existed...
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
05:11 / 29.05.03
What, you mean the fiends destroyed them? After we asked them to and everything?
 
 
Funktion
05:30 / 29.05.03
Ok. Where to begin.

First,
On Iraq and the WMD's.
I think it pretty safe to say that Saddam and co. WERE trying to develop WMDs around 1998-2000. It makes logical sense for them to do so. They put down a Kurdish uprising using WMDs and the US and UN and international community didnt really do shit to them because of it. Also, they had to expect a Republican Pres like Bush might gun for them (in a pre-9/11 world). Given those two factors and the personalities of Uday and Qusay it very much makes logical sense for them to be trying to develop WMDs. Now, come 9/11 I believe (and this is only my theory) Saddam was crafty to foresee the US invade Iraq so they either destroyed the any potential WMDs or got them out of the country.
I agree with most that think Bushadmin completely bullshitted the US people into thinking Saddam was a current WMD threat when surely some knew they weren't really a threat for WMDs.

On Bush,
First, George W. Bush is not as stupid as people make him out to be. I am not saying he is a genuine Kip Thorne of politics but the guy IS crafty. Watch the video of Bush done by Nancy Pelosi'
s daughter and you'll see that. Now, remember Ronny Raygun, the Teflon President. Why was he the "Teflon President"? Because nothing ever stuck to the guy. Iran-Contra? the S+L Scandal? reagan evaded the blame and more for all of it because he was Teflon. Bush,Jr. has learned alot from Reagan. From the start he has emphasized how he delegates authority and somewhat embellished the image of him being an idiot. Why? Because he really is Corky as President? No. Because he and his family are aware of the potential power that lies in Bush never really being accountable for anything if everyone believes "he is too stupid to be President". It is alot easy for a future Republican to pardon any shady dealings of the executive appointees, ala Bush Sr and the participants of Iran-Contra, than for the President himself to pass the buck(or the Lewinsky, just ask Clinton).
Learn from Sun-Tzu people, don't underestimate Bush and his administration.

And no one is talking about this either:

As Bushadmin discusses the problems of WMD proliferation, the Executive branch and Pentagon has proposed two new nuclear bomb designs (the first new designs since the Cold War). One is a mega-Nuke that doesn't even need mentioning. The second is a less than 5 kiloton mini-Nuke that is truely more dangerous. Designed for use in small spaces this mini-NUke could very well be used on a Syria or N. Korea in the new future and that prospect is truly scary. It is very, very dangerous for the US government to be developing nuclear weapons to be used as conventional warfare...
 
 
Salamander
13:17 / 30.05.03
The two biggest popular misconceptions about our leaders is that they are dumb and that they mean well.
-J.R. "Bob" Dobbs
 
 
Baz Auckland
13:13 / 31.05.03
WMD just a convenient excuse for war, admits Wolfowitz

The Bush administration focused on alleged weapons of mass destruction as the primary justification for toppling Saddam Hussein by force because it was politically convenient, a top-level official at the Pentagon has acknowledged.

The extraordinary admission comes in an interview with Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Defence Secretary, in the July issue of the magazine Vanity Fair.

Mr Wolfowitz also discloses that there was one justification that was "almost unnoticed but huge". That was the prospect of the United States being able to withdraw all of its forces from Saudi Arabia once the threat of Saddam had been removed

Straw and Powell had serious doubts over claims of Iraqi weapons

Jack Straw and his US counterpart, Colin Powell, privately expressed serious doubts about the quality of intelligence on Iraq's banned weapons programme at the very time they were publicly trumpeting it to get UN support for a war on Iraq.

Given horrible statements like these, along with the continued controversy of the lack of weapons... will this (at the least) have any effect on the American elections? From the papers, it seems like Blair and other European leaders are in trouble over this, but will Americans care that the administration is admitting it made the whole thing up?
 
 
Hieronymus
14:49 / 31.05.03
Not unless anyone calls them on it, loudly enough. And so far, from the press to the Dems, nobody has a single spine between them.

*sigh*
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
20:59 / 01.06.03
Not that this is the important point of it all (especially for all the people who've died) but...

...how are "we" gonna view this when it's history? When people look back on "Gulf War II- Electric Boogaloo" what will they see? My gut instinct is it's gonna be like the Kennedy thing. Nobody believes LHO did it all by himself, and that the US government was lying to at least some extent, but nobody cares because, fuck it, it's the past. (Insert Bill Hicks reference here.) I'd like to think that history will judge Blair/Bush, but I have a horrible feeling history won't give a shit.
 
 
We're The Great Old Ones Now
21:53 / 01.06.03
Well, that kinda depends on the consequences, don't it. But ponder this - we'll use the oil in Iraq in ten to twenty years, and that means unless we ration, we'll use all of it fifty...

Which means, I guess, that you and I stand a good chance of finding out what comes next.
 
 
Morlock - groupie for hire
12:12 / 02.06.03
...but I have a horrible feeling history won't give a shit.

More accurately, perhaps, "we" will edit the facts to support the opinions of the time. If, 40 years from now, the US Government is still seen as the world's policeman etc, people will focus on the fact that an undeniably nasty character was removed from power. The flipside is that if USG ever loses that faith, people will no doubt be falling over themselves trying to dig up all those skeletons "hidden" for so long. Perhaps even going so far that some of the good bits are forgotten about simply because the monster will be less convincing otherwise.

It's happened before, some people have already started - the "deck of weasels" is a particularly crude example.
 
 
fluid_state
01:12 / 03.06.03
not that you can't find these easily, but:

...conjured an anthrax dump from thin air
Australian intelligence agencies made it clear to the Government all along that Iraq did not have a massive WMD program
"I'm not reading this," he declared. "This is bulls---."(Colin Powell)
Hee hee. Colin said "bullshit".

A chronological list of quotes regarding the WMD justification, which may be more appropriate in the "Lies of the Day" thread...

I hate it, but I tend to agree with maominstoat. History probably won't give a shit, because it'll be written in the States, or by those who will choose to follow their example. Perhaps at best, a far future generation will look back at the people of this time with pity, that we were manipulated so expertly, and without a chance.
 
 
SMS
05:24 / 03.06.03
Regarding the Wolfowitz comment:
No, it’s a misquote. In fact, the full quote you can see on our website where the whole interview is there. What I was trying to explain – there’s a complicated situation. We had, in fact, three concerns about Iraq, from the beginning, and it’s repeated in Colin Powell’s statement in the UN. One was weapons of mass destruction, about which I’ve never seen as unanimous a view in the intelligence community on almost any issue. Second was the Iraqi connection with terrorism, about which there is a range of views, although everyone agrees that there is a connection there. And the third was Iraq’s mistreatment of its people, which has unfortunately never been in any doubt. But in many ways, it’s the first two reasons that were crucial, and as I said in that interview, there is really a fourth reason, which is that connection between weapons of mass destruction and terrorism. That’s the axis the President originally was talking about in his State of Union message, is that connection between terrorism and weapons of mass destruction. It’s complicated, it’s not a simple issue, but when people say our rationale keeps changing, its not that keeps changing. We’ve had all three of those reasons from the beginning but people who often choose to focus exclusively on the weapons of mass destruction piece of it.
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
08:20 / 03.06.03
Good lord, what a piece of backtracking. It's not even whether he said that WMD were chosen as the thrust of the argument for the war for 'bureaucratic reasons' that's the chief problem (though I must say that, to me, what Wolfowitz says there sounds like a lot of rubbish... there was a great deal of emphasis laid on weapons of mass destruction - why else was the fake connection with nuclear material even used?). Would the war have been justified even if the Ba'ath regime had turned out to have some mobile laboratories? I don't believe it would have been. You can't justify actions in retrospect.

Also, intelligence was clearly not unanimous on the subject. Moreover I believe Rumsfeld has been making it fairly clear that WMD are not especially important - convenient if they find them, not a problem if they don't.

The connection of WMD with terror - if that really was a reason, and there really were WMD (which seems quite possible, and even likely) the operation cannot be called a success. Where are those WMD now? What about all this looting and unrest in Iraq? I hear quite frequently about potential looting of nuclear power plants. Even if that's just a rumour, it can't be said that coalition actions and coalition presence in Iraq has prevented terrorists from gaining access to materials which they would otherwise have had... and again one has to ask, if terrorism is the main concern, why on earth isn't the US trying to have a pop at Saudi Arabia?

I doubt that the mistreatment of the Iraqi people had anything to do with it, frankly. I believe that Wolfowitz also said (in the original interview) that one of the chief reasons was so that the US could move its troops out of Saudi Arabia into a more receptive area - so maintaining a substantial power base in the Middle East. Let'a face it, Wolfowitz and other members of PNAC aren't exactly reticent about what their plans for the world are and have written it into the National Security Strategy - I don't think we need to look a great deal further than power strategies and geopolitics.
 
 
FinderWolf
14:23 / 03.06.03
In today's Yahoo headlines -- scary stuff.

Powell was under pressure to use shaky intelligence on Iraq: Report

Fri May 30, 8:42 PM ET


WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Secretary of State Colin Powell (news - web sites) was under persistent pressure from the Pentagon (news - web sites) and White House to include questionable intelligence in his report on Iraq (news - web sites)'s weapons of mass destruction he delivered at the United Nations (news - web sites) last February, a US weekly reported.

US News and World Report magazine said the first draft of the speech was prepared for Powell by Vice President Richard Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, in late January.

According to the report, the draft contained such questionable material that Powell lost his temper, throwing several pages in the air and declaring, "I'm not reading this. This is bullshit."

Cheney's aides wanted Powell to include in his presentation information that Iraq has purchased computer software that would allow it to plan an attack on the United States, an allegation that was not supported by the CIA (news - web sites), US News reported.

The White House also pressed Powell to include charges that the suspected leader of the September 11 hijackers, Mohammed Atta, had met in Prague with an Iraqi intelligence officer prior to the attacks, despite a refusal by US and European intelligence agencies to confirm the meeting, the magazine said.

The pressure forced Powell to appoint his own review team that met several times with Central Intelligence Agency (news - web sites) Director George Tenet and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice (news - web sites) to prepare the speech, in which the secretary of state accused Iraq of hiding tonnes of biological and chemical weapons.

US News also said that the Defense Intelligence Agency had issued a classified assessment of Iraq's chemical weapons program last September, arguing that "there is no reliable information on whether Iraq is producing and stockpiling chemical weapons."

However, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told Congress shortly after that that the Iraqi "regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons, including VX, sarin, cyclosarin, and mustard gas," according to the report.
 
 
fluid_state
23:46 / 03.06.03
in regards to the extended Wolfowitz quote:

One was weapons of mass destruction, about which I’ve never seen as unanimous a view in the intelligence community on almost any issue.

Okay, there's a truckload of quotes and sources flat out refuting this claim of unanimity. You'll find them through this thread, I'm sure.

Second was the Iraqi connection with terrorism, about which there is a range of views, although everyone agrees that there is a connection there.

Okay, it's less documented in US media, but Iraq's connection to terrorism/Al-Queda is unproven in the first case and ideologically ludicrous in the second.

And the third was Iraq’s mistreatment of its people, which has unfortunately never been in any doubt.

don't get me started.
 
 
SMS
03:50 / 04.06.03
He didn't say terrorism/al Qaeda. He said terrorism. Iraq had connections to terrorism.
 
 
Nietzsch E. Coyote
06:32 / 04.06.03
How? what connection to "terrorism"? Does that word have any meaning anymore?
 
 
Nematode
16:16 / 04.06.03
Here's a paranoid thought: Given the mess that Tony Blair is now in, is it possible that he was set up by the Americans who would be happier with a pro NAFTA Conservative party in power than New Labour who are likely to get further involved in the formation of a European superstate? I mean probably not but it's funny how it's worked out, eh?
 
 
Morlock - groupie for hire
16:44 / 04.06.03
Interesting how Wolfowitz seems quite happy to admit that the two main justifications for "Operation Iraqi Freedom" have nothing to do with Iraqi freedom.

Nematode, as long as the US gets away with this whole thing I suspect Our Tone will be able to weasel himself out of every corner. Acting on availabel intelligence, tried to moderate response, couldn't leave our bestest buddies to act alone, blah blah blah.
 
 
fluid_state
20:34 / 04.06.03
Dept of Defense treanscript, Paul Wolfowitz.
-"Look, the primarily difference -- to put it a little too simply -- between North Korea and Iraq is that we had virtually no economic options with Iraq because the country floats on a sea of oil."
Which makes perfect sense, assuming Iraq was a credible threat in the first place. It's that one tiny assumption, though, that seems to be the problem. No WMD in Iraq, so far. WMD in America, at a site that supposedly ceased bio-warfare production around '69. Maybe Iraq had their WMD shipped to Maryland by FedEX. If they kept the receipt, they may be eligible for a refund...

(oh, and sorry about the terrorism/Al-Queda mixup. Don't know how that could have happened. Apples and ... green apples, I guess)
 
 
Nematode
21:23 / 05.06.03
Yeah probably, but he really looks like an out and out liar for the first time, and he seemed to have such integrity..........
 
 
Salamander
04:33 / 06.06.03
yeah but our best leaders have always been good liars, he just seems honest. He is in no way honest, like I'm to believe that some how, Saddam was "corupted" by his oil money, yet Bush Sr. or Jr. haven't been bent to criminality by their vast oil fortunes? These are Rich men people, behind every fortune there's a crime.
 
 
Francine I
05:04 / 06.06.03
"He didn't say terrorism/al Qaeda. He said terrorism. Iraq had connections to terrorism."

I'm not clear on whether or not you personally believe Iraq had connections to terrorism. In case you do, it'll be necessary for you to demonstrate why, beings as no convincing connection has yet been revealed, and there is on consensus within the so-called "intelligence community" regarding Iraq's connection to the new-school buzzword "terrorism". Which terrorists? Where? Who decided they were terrorists? It used to be you should know these things before strutting off to war. Do you know these things? If you don't, then why bother defending Wolfowitz, who's been after Iraq since 1991?
 
 
Nematode
21:44 / 06.06.03
The secret of Tony Blair's success is/was his apparent honesty. He came to power after the very slow decline of a bloated and manifestly corrupt conservative party. Tony came to power bright eyed and bushy tailed promoting himself as a modern politician with integrity and a sense of personal morality. He was able to sell us the idea of going to war with Iraq on the basis that he believed in it utterly and the we were to trust him as a leader. He pushed that line to virtual breaking point in the crucial weeks prior to the war when there was the massive demonstration of over a million in London, crucial resignations and a vote in parliament in which the loyalty of his party was by no means certain. In many ways TB is his integrity. He has few other qualities. Throughout the run up to the war I found him irresistably reminiscent of Squealer from Animal Farm. Now it appears that he was a liar. In all similar situations prior to this he managed to distance himself from accusations of sleaze and spin but not this time and I am not convinced that he will weather this one. He may survive the next few weeks or months but his people and perhaps more importantly his party are now aware of his mendacity and it will be very hard to believe anything that comes out of his mouth from now on. Unfortunately his schtick was that we were to believe him he had a vision, he wasn't yet another dodgy pocket lining politician but as it turns out.....he was, so the essence of the Tony Blair brand has been subverted, he's a liar and that is'nt very good news for him. No wonder he looked so sweaty in the run up to the war.
 
 
SMS
14:48 / 09.06.03
I'm not clear on whether or not you personally believe Iraq had connections to terrorism. In case you do, it'll be necessary for you to demonstrate why, beings as no convincing connection has yet been revealed

I would consider financial support for Palestinian suicide bombers to be a connection to terrorism.

Why bother defending Wolfowitz, who's been after Iraq since 1991?

The alternative is letting ourselves twist his words whenever we like. If there is ambiguity, we can assume the worst. For every decision he makes, we can assume the worst motivations, because we have already established that he's bad... he's been advocting WAR, after all.

Yes, al Qaeda and terrorists are like green apples and apples, but I think it's important. The Bush administration seems to see terrorism as, maybe not monolithic, but as an evil that needs to be fought in all its forms. He has said that he sees the problem as one similar to piracy, and that it can be severely diminished.

I don't want to get into the different definitions of terrorism right now, except to acknowledge that it is often unclear precisely what is meant by it. I do think this is a problem if the plan is to fight terrorism in all its forms, but I also think that some terrorist organizations plainly are terrorist organizations, just as some wrong acts plainly are wrong acts.
 
  

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