Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
What's the REAL reason for the Iraq war?
Topic Started: Aug 5 2005, 10:27 AM (195 Views)
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
http://www.oilempire.us/iraqoil.html

Iraq's oil fields are the second largest on Earth

and have the largest unexplored fields anywhere



introduction - updates and blog - all files - chapters
newsletters - slideshow - dictionary
oilempire.us homepage - www.permatopia.com

9/11 Cheney's crime, not a failure - the American Reichstag Fire
peak oil the real connection between Iraq and 9/11
World War IV "the war that will not end in our lifetime"
fascism and Homeland Security, the war on freedom
media manipulates minds, left gatekeepers, psyops
stolen elections ballot machines, lone gunmen, plane crashes
Bush - oil we are saying, give impeachment a chance

permatopia: permaculture solutions to Peak Oil
and climate change - toward a sustainable civilization

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=4124

Blix says war motivated by oil
07:46 AEST Thu Apr 7 2005

AP - Former UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix has said that oil was one of the reasons for the US-led invasion of Iraq, a Swedish news agency reports.
"I did not think so at first. But the US is incredibly dependent on oil," news agency TT quoted Blix as saying at a security seminar in Stockholm.
"They wanted to secure oil in case competition on the world market becomes too hard."
Blix, who helped oversee the dismantling of Iraq's weapons programs before the war, said another reason for the invasion was a need to move US troops from Saudi Arabia, TT reported.
Competition over oil is creating tension between the United States and China, Blix said, suggesting nuclear power as a more environmentally friendly source of energy.
"I believe the greatest threat in the long term is the greenhouse effect," said Blix, who's become a vocal critic of US leaders since he retired from the UN last year.He defended the United Nations, despite recent scandals including allegations of corruption in the oil-for-food program for Iraq.
"The criticism is, in my view, a revenge from American political circles for the defeat over Iraq," Blix was quoted as saying.
©AAP 2005



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/2933557.stm
Israel eyes Iraqi oil
By Simon Wilson
in Jerusalem
An Israeli minister says he wants to reopen a pipeline which has been closed for more than fifty years to bring Iraqi oil through Jordan to Israel's Mediterranean coast.
A spokesman for the infrastructure minister, Joseph Paritzky, said the move would cut fuel costs in Israel and help regenerate the port city of Haifa.
There has been no official comment yet from Jordan, but any suggestion that Israel might benefit from the fall of Saddam Hussein is likely to enrage many people in Arab countries.
The pipeline was built after Britain took control of Iraq, Jordan and what was then British mandate Palestine after the First World War.
The section from Iraq to Jordan is still functioning, but the route from Jordan to the port of Haifa, which is now in Israel, was cut in 1948 when the British pulled out.
Controversial
The Israeli infrastructure ministry says reopening the pipeline would give easy access to Iraqi oil, cut fuel costs in Israel and help regenerate Haifa which has suffered badly in Israel's economic recession.
At the moment this appears to be a personal initiative by the infrastructure minister who is from the secular Shinui Party, rather than any official policy of Ariel Sharon's coalition government.
In any case, Jordan may find it difficult to align itself publicly with a project which would cause outrage in much of the Arab world.




http://www.newscientist.com/hottopics/iraq...%20the%20crisis
By Fred Pearce New Scientist 29/01/2003
Iraq has the second largest proven reserves of oil in the world, behind only Saudi Arabia. 112 billion barrels lie below the country's desert sands, together with another probable 220 billion barrels of unproven reserves. What's more, the US Department of Energy says, "Iraq's true resource potential may be far greater, as the country is relatively unexplored due to years of war and sanctions."
This, plus the fact that "Iraq's oil production costs are among the lowest in the world, makes it a highly attractive oil prospect," says the department's latest country analysis. No wonder many critics believe that the campaign to topple Saddam Hussein is really a battle for Iraq's oil.



quoted from
http://www.mymethow.com/~joereid/oil_coup.html
The Oil Coup: Bush's Master Oil Plan?
A Cyber Research Resource


September 5, 2002
The Guardian
The real goal is the seizure of Saudi oil
Iraq is no threat. Bush wants war to keep US control of the region
Mo Mowlam
What is most chilling is that the hawks in the Bush administration must know the risks involved. They must be aware of the anti-American feeling throughout the Middle East. They must be aware of the fear in Egypt and Saudi Arabia that a war against Iraq could unleash revolutions, disposing of pro-western governments, and replacing them with populist anti-American Islamist fundamentalist regimes. We should all remember the Islamist revolution in Iran. The Shah was backed by the Americans, but he couldn't stand against the will of the people. And it is because I am sure that they fully understand the consequences of their actions, that I am most afraid. I am drawn to the conclusion that they must want to create such mayhem.
Why is he so determined to take the risk? The key country in the Middle East, as far as the Americans are concerned, is Saudi Arabia: the country with the largest oil reserves in the world, the country that has been prepared to calm the oil markets, producing more when prices are too high and less when there is a glut. The Saudi royal family has been rewarded with best friend status by the west for its cooperation. There has been little concern that the government is undemocratic and breaches human rights, nor that it is in the grip of an extreme form of Islam. With American support it has been believed that the regime can be protected and will do what is necessary to secure a supply of oil to the west at reasonably stable prices.
Since September 11, however, it has become increasingly apparent to the US administration that the Saudi regime is vulnerable. Both on the streets and in the leading families, including the royal family, there are increasingly anti-western voices. Osama bin Laden is just one prominent example. The love affair with America is ending. Reports of the removal of billions of dollars of Saudi investment from the United States may be difficult to quantify, but they are true. The possibility of the world's largest oil reserves falling into the hands of an anti-American, militant Islamist government is becoming ever more likely - and this is unacceptable.
The Americans know they cannot stop such a revolution. They must therefore hope that they can control the Saudi oil fields, if not the government. And what better way to do that than to have a large military force in the field at the time of such disruption. In the name of saving the west, these vital assets could be seized and controlled. No longer would the US have to depend on a corrupt and unpopular royal family to keep it supplied with cheap oil. If there is chaos in the region, the US armed forces could be seen as a global saviour. Under cover of the war on terrorism, the war to secure oil supplies could be waged.
This whole affair has nothing to do with a threat from Iraq - there isn't one. It has nothing to do with the war against terrorism or with morality. Saddam Hussein is obviously an evil man, but when we were selling arms to him to keep the Iranians in check he was the same evil man he is today. He was a pawn then and is a pawn now. In the same way he served western interests then, he is now the distraction for the sleight of hand to protect the west's supply of oil.
- Mo Mowlam was a member of Tony Blair's cabinet from 1997-2001
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,786332,00.html

brief history of Saudi Arabia (politically) and their oil reserves
http://www.asponews.org/ASPO.newsletter.021.php





denials of oil angle in Iraq conflict hard to believe
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0312-12.htm

When President Bush says "We have no territorial ambitions; we don’t seek an empire," he is telling half a truth. Certainly the United States isn’t looking to make Iraq the 51st state. But that’s not the way of empire today -- it’s about control, not about territory. ....
The key is not who owns the oil but who controls the flow of oil and oil profits. ....
In a world that runs on oil, the nation that controls the flow of oil has that strategic power. U.S. policymakers want leverage over the economies of our biggest competitors -- Western Europe, Japan and China -- which are more dependent on Middle Eastern oil. From this logic flows the U.S. policy of support for reactionary regimes (Saudi Arabia), dictatorships (Iran under the Shah) and regional military surrogates (Israel), always aimed at maintaining control.
This analysis should not be difficult to accept given the Bush administration’s National Security Strategy report released last fall, which explicitly calls for U.S. forces to be strong enough to deter any nation from challenging American dominance. U.S. policymakers state it explicitly: We will run the world. Or, in the words of the first President Bush after the first U.S. Gulf War, "What we say goes."
Such a policy requires not only overwhelming military dominance but economic control as well. Mao said power flows from the barrel of a gun, but U.S. policymakers also understand it flows from control over barrels of oil.



presidential press conference with Ari Fleischer, Feb 6, 2003
questions by Helen Thomas

Q Since you speak for the President, we have no access to him, can you categorically deny that the United States will take over the oil fields when we win this war? Which is apparently obvious and you're on your way and I don't think you doubt your victory. Oil -- is it about oil?
MR. FLEISCHER: Helen, as I've told you many times, if this had anything to do with oil, the position of the United States would be to lift the sanctions so the oil could flow. This is not about that. This is about saving lives by protecting the American people --
Q We will not take over the oil fields, are you saying that?
MR. FLEISCHER: The oil fields belong to the people of Iraq, the government of Iraq, all of Iraq. All the resources --
Q And we don't want any part of that?
MR. FLEISCHER: -- of Iraq need to be administered by the Iraqi government. And any action that is taken in Iraq is going to be taken with an eye toward the future of Iraq. And that involves the protecting of infrastructure, providing humanitarian aid. And that needs to be done by the Iraqi people.
Q There are reports that we've divided up the oil already, divvied it up with the Russians and French and so forth. Isn't that true?
MR. FLEISCHER: What's the source of these reports that you cite?
Q They're all over the place.
MR. FLEISCHER: Can you be more specific?
Q That we have just -- we will take the oil fields and then we will parcel out the oil.
MR. FLEISCHER: But you cited some reports. I'm just curious about -- if you can be more specific about the source of these reports that you're citing here today.
Q -- have you been reading the newspapers?
MR. FLEISCHER: Can you be more specific? Anywhere in particular?
Q Senator Lugar said it.
MR. FLEISCHER: No, there's no truth to that, that we would divide up the oil fields. As I --
Q Your own people have said something -- but I'm sorry I can't pinpoint it.
MR. FLEISCHER: As I indicated, the infrastructure of Iraq belongs to the people of Iraq. And that is going to be respected.
Q Why should you decide what is their infrastructure or their government?
MR. FLEISCHER: Obviously, if the regime changes there will be a new government. And the government will represent the people of Iraq.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/20.../ma_273_01.html

"Controlling Iraq is about oil as power, rather than oil as fuel," says Michael Klare, professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College and author of Resource Wars. "Control over the Persian Gulf translates into control over Europe, Japan, and China. It's having our hand on the spigot."



March 11, 2003
The Gangs of DC - Bush Bruisers Cast Eyes on the Pearls of the Orient
By CHRIS FLOYD
http://www.counterpunch.org/floyd03112003.html

The ultimate goal is not Iraq--that bombed, blockaded state partially controlled by a witless thug whom the gang once succored--but domination of the world's oil supplies in the coming century, when the surging nations of China and India will reach their economic peak. These vast entities could eventually tilt the imbalance of world wealth away from the Anglo-American elites who have for so long held the high and palmy ground of privilege. But the voracious economies of the Asian behemoths will require unstinting draughts of the oil reserves now locked under the sands of Iraq and Saudi Arabia. There is oil elsewhere, yes--but nowhere else in the world are there reserves deep enough to satisfy the thirsts of China and India as they come into their own.



George Monbiot http://www.monbiot.com
In the Crocodile’s Mouth
Blair is appeasing Bush partly in order to get a share of the world’s diminishing supplies of oil
By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 5th November 2002
Tony Blair's loyalty to George Bush looks like slow political suicide. His preparedness to follow him over every precipice jeopardises Britain's relationships with its allies, conjures up enemies all over the world and infuriates voters of all political colours. And yet he never misses an opportunity to show what a trusting friend he is.
There are several plausible and well-established explanations for this unnatural coupling. But there might also be a new one. Blair may have calculated that sticking to Bush is the only way in which our unsustainable economy can meet its need for energy.
Britain is running out of time. According to the Oil Depletion Analysis Centre, the UK's North Sea production has been declining since 1999. Nuclear power in Britain is, in effect, finished: on Saturday, the EU revealed that it had prohibited the government's latest desperate attempt to keep it afloat with massive subsidies. But, partly because of corporate lobbying, partly because of his unhealthy fear of "Mondeo man" or "Worcester woman", or whatever the floating voter of Middle England has now become, Tony Blair has also flatly rejected both an effective energy reduction policy and a massive investment in alternative power. The only remaining way of meeting future energy demand is to import ever greater quantities of oil and gas.
And here the government runs into an intractable political reality. As available reserves decline, the world's oil-hungry nations are tussling to grab as much as they can for themselves. Almost everywhere on earth, the United States is winning. It is positioning itself to become the gatekeeper to the world's remaining oil and gas. If it succeeds, it will both secure its own future supplies and massively enhance its hegemonic power.
The world's oil reserves, the depletion analysis centre claims, appear to be declining almost as swiftly as the North Sea's. Conventional oil supplies, it suggests, will peak within five or ten years, and decline by around two million barrels per day every year from then on. New kinds of fossil fuel have only a limited potential to ameliorate the coming crisis. In the Middle East, the only nation which could significantly increase its output is Iraq.
In 2001, a report sponsored by the US Council on Foreign Relations and the Baker Institute for Public Policy began to spell out some of the implications of this decline for America's national security. The problem, it noted, is that "the American people continue to demand plentiful and cheap energy without sacrifice or inconvenience". Transport, for example, is responsible for 66% of the petroleum the US burns. Simply switching from "light trucks" (the giant gas-guzzlers many Americans drive) to ordinary cars would save nearly a million barrels per day of crude oil. But, as the president's dad once said, "the American way of life is not up for negotiation".
"The world," the report continues, "is currently precariously close to utilizing all of its available global oil production capacity". The impending crisis is increasing "U.S. and global vulnerability to disruption". Over the previous year, for example, Iraq had "effectively become a swing producer, turning its taps on and off when it has felt such action was in its strategic interest". If the global demand for oil continues to rise, world shortages could reduce the status of the US to that of "a poor developing country".
This crisis, the report insists, demands "a reassessment of the role of energy in American foreign policy ... Such a strategy will require difficult tradeoffs, in both domestic and foreign policy. But there is no alternative. And there is no time to waste." By assuming "a leadership role in the formation of new rules of the game", the United States will prevent any other power from exploiting its dependency and seizing the strategic initiative.
The US government has not been slow to act upon such intelligence. Over the past two years, it has been seizing all the Caspian oil it can lay hands on, cutting out both Russia and Iran by negotiating to pipe it out through Azerbaijan, Georgia and Afghanistan. Last week, though all the sages of the British and American right insisted during the Afghan war that it couldn't possibly happen, the presidents of Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Pakistan met to discuss the first of the Afghan pipelines. American soldiers have now been stationed in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Georgia, all of which are critical to the Caspian oil trade. According to the security firm Stratfor, "the U.S. military presence will help ensure that a majority of oil and gas from the Caspian basin will go westward -- bypassing the United States' geopolitical rivals, Russia and China." The reason why Vladimir Putin is so determined to keep Chechnya under Russian control, whatever the cost to both the Chechens and the Russians may be, is that Chechnya is one of the last available routes for Caspian oil.
The US has been playing the same game in the Middle East. A recent report by the Brookings Institution notes that "U.S. strategic domination over the entire region, including the whole lane of sea communications from the strait of Hormuz, will be perceived as the primary vulnerability of China's energy supply." Last month a senior US general, Carlton Fulford, visited Sao Tomé and Principe, the islands halfway between Nigeria and Angola, to discuss the possibility of establishing a military base there. Both nations see the base as a threatening staging post, which the US could use to help gain exclusive access to West African oil. Earlier this year, George Bush negotiated a "North American Energy Initiative" with Canada and Mexico. The US is hoping to extend the arrangement to the rest of the Americas, which could help to explain the coup which nearly toppled Venezuela's president in April.
Oh, and there's the small matter of the one nation in the Middle East whose oil production could be substantially increased, with the help of a little external encouragement. Last week the leader of the exiled Iraqi National Congress met executives from three major American oil companies, to start negotiations about who gets what once the US has taken over. This carve-up would mean cancelling the big contracts Russia and France have struck with Saddam Hussein. Lord Browne, the head of BP, warned that Britain might also be squeezed out of Iraq.
The United States, in other words, appears rapidly to be monopolising the world's remaining oil. Every government knows this. Ours appears to have calculated that the only way it can obtain the energy required to permit the men and women of Middle England to stay in their cars is to appease the United States, whatever the cost may be. Britain's role in the impending war is that of the egret in the crocodile's mouth, picking the scraps of flesh from between its teeth.
In 1929 the novelist Ilya Ehrenburg observed that "the automobile can't be blamed for anything. Its conscience is as clear as Monsieur Citroen's conscience. It only fulfills its destiny: it is destined to wipe out the world." Our struggle over the next few months is to prove him wrong.
5th November 2002



http://www.kunstler.com/mags_diary6.html
James Howard Kunstler - Clusterfuck Nation
January 31, 2003
Commentator Jim Minter on the Energy Resources list-serve makes some excellent points about the looming Iraq war vis-a-vis oil. Note, Minter is not a war hawk. he is just trying to explain what is really behind our policy.

Iraq has a lot of oil that is soon to be needed in the global oil market. It doesn't matter to this market whether American, British, French or Russian companies pump and sell it. It's a global market! Iraqi oil doesn't even need to come to the U.S. Even if Iraqi oil only went to Europe it would increase the global supply and lower the global price. Oil companies are multi-national. Their investors are international. Don't trap yourselves into old-think nationalism. As we slide deeper into this decade, global oil consumers need Iraqi oil.
Saddam has out-waited us--at terrible cost to the Iraqi people--but nevertheless shutting off Iraqi oil from the global market will soon hurt global consumers worse than it hurts Saddam's regime. Why? GLOBAL OIL PRODUCTION IS AT PEAK, as Matthew Simmons, Colin Campbell, Jean Laherrère and other knowledgeable experts have shown... as the highest levels of U.S. and British decision-makers know from their highly-classified briefings. And so, because global oil production peaks in this decade, Iraqi oil must re-enter the global mainstream--and soon! Saddam can't have those profits. It's as simple as that. The global community cannot afford to have the profits from the very imminent massive pumping of Iraqi oil funding the arsenal of that maniac. That regime has got to go
It's a stark picture and I suppose the best "humanitarian" face we can candidly put on it goes something like this: "The goal is to see peace and stability come to Iraq and the oil-producing Middle East while the global economy pumps its oil. The aim of the global community is to set up a 'democratic, market-economy regime' in Iraq with the oil revenues going to build a stable, secular and prosperous society in Iraq. The Iraqi people can select whomever they please to help them quickly develop their oil, and God bless them (though guess who has the best oil technology?).
Oil directly fuels more than a third of the American economy, most specifically our entire transportation system. That includes the auto/truck industry (everything from manufacturing to repair to insurance) road building and maintenance, all commerce and industry (trucking delivers everything and even the few trains left are diesel), air transport, and every facet of our daily lives from commuting to tourism. There is no substitute fuel for our present transportation system. None. Nada, Zilch. That has been conclusively and finally demonstrated to exhaustion on this Energy Resources Web Site. But even if those lame, low-net transportation-fuel substitutes touted by a few stubbornly-giddy techno-cornucopians were viable, none can claim that their pet schemes can be put on-line in time to provide an alternative-fueled transportation system for America in this decade... or even the next decade. Without our petroleum transportation system, the U.S. economy dies. Also having trans-continental economies, Canada and Australia are in the same boat. Next in transportation vulnerability are Europe and Japan.
Oil is also the base feed stock for our petro-chemical industry and possibly half of all the non-edible, physical products we now consume. There are some substitute feed stocks in some products, but they are not likely to be as cheap or as usable as oil stock is presently. Oil products also drive much of our non-transportation machinery, in addition to heating and powering a chunk of our built-infrastructure. Here, at least, petroleum products can be almost totally replaced, though not always swiftly or efficiently... and rarely, cheaply. We can run our buildings, if not our cars, on something besides petroleum. However, our modern agricultural system is totally petroleum-dependant. So is our forestry and fishing.
Bottom line: Our transcontinental economy is built upon the cheap transportation provided by petroleum. For the foreseeable future there is no alternative. If oil fails totally, which is not likely, we fail totally. But [as we advance into the future and] oil becomes restricted and expensive, we enter the same "stagflation" of inflation-with-recession that we experienced after the last oil crisis in the mid-70s. Simply put: Without petroleum the U.S. faces catastrophe; with constrained supplies or expensive supplies of petroleum we only face disaster.
The rapid flow of Iraqi oil into the global bloodstream for the next dozen-or-so years will not, of course, alleviate the total decline in global petro-stocks. But rapidly pumping Iraqi oil can push forward in time the "felt effects" of the global "Hubbert Peak" decline. Pumping Iraq and Saudi Arabia at ever-accelerated rates can for a time cover the decline of the North Sea and the North Slope, the continental U.S., and other aging oil fields. Of course, as many here at Energy Resources have already pointed out, this reckless course of blindly fueling the growth of oil consumption only assures that when the supply/demand crunch finally does arrive, it will be more precipitous and more catastrophic than the sane and sensible "soft path down" proposed by our late guru, Howard T, Odum and many others.
I am NOT advocating or defending the impending war to depose Saddam -- just explaining why it is going to happen and why no amount of outrage and righteous indignation is going to stop it. I think the world's oil gluttony is deplorable. I do not think that consuming nations have a right to other people's resources. What I am trying to explain is the relentless logic of our blind consumption. We are at Peak but we do not understand it. We have been lied to by our corporations and our government. Our news media has been credulous, blind, corrupted and stupid. And so the momentum of our economy and our society is going full-tilt to business-as-usual, which means getting all the petroleum we can pump into our transportation bloodstream because our economy and our society shrivel without it. It is far too late to change course. We do not even know that we need to. What's more we don't want to know, and most of us wouldn't make the hard decisions to begin changing our personal lifestyles if we did know.

Where I depart from Minter's view is that the takeover of Iraq and its oil may not be an orderly process. The operation itself my turn into a protracted military clusterfuck. Assuming that we eventually conclude it, I am not convinced that we could control either the far-flung terrain of the oil fields or the oil drilling equipment on it, not to mention the extremely vulnurable pipelines, terminals, and refineries. What's more, I'm inclined to believe that our Iraqi adventure will unleash Jihad-o-rama, which may topple the Saudi regime and bring lasting disorder to much of the Middle East.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
The strategy makes sense. As the world's largest consumer of petroleum, we would want to control as many sources as possible and prevent possible enemies access.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
Is that why Tony Blair and a vast majority of congress also agreed the war in Iraq was necessary?
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
The administration sold the war by telling congress that Saddam had WMDs and an attack is imminent. The words "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud" was used to scare both they and the American people into supporting them.

As the Downing Street memo has shown, this was a joint effort between the Bush and Blair administration.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
Dr. Noah
Aug 5 2005, 11:59 AM
The administration sold the war by telling congress that Saddam had WMDs and an attack is imminent.  The words "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud" was used to scare both they and the American people into supporting them.

As the Downing Street memo has shown, this was a joint effort between the Bush and Blair administration.

So you are saying Congress is a mindless body that does not hold up its primary responsibly of executive over sight. Now that is a problem I must agree.


The downing street memo proves that Blair (in his own words) believed there where WMDs in Iraq. Why would a liberal administration such as the Blair administration (one that was best friends with the Clinton administration) want to do such an underhanded thing?
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
Did I say congress is a mindless body? I don't believe I stated that. The adminstration used lies and fear to convince them to give them permission for a pre-emptive strike.

The Blair administration knew as the Bush administration knew that the intelligence was false and a reason would be needed to sell the war to America. I have no idea why the Blair administration would do this, I was very surprised.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
Dr. Noah
Aug 5 2005, 12:05 PM
Did I say congress is a mindless body?  I don't believe I stated that.  The adminstration used lies and fear to convince them to give them permission for a pre-emptive strike. 

The Blair administration knew as the Bush administration knew that the intelligence was false and a reason would be needed to sell the war to America.  I have no idea why the Blair administration would do this, I was very surprised.

It is congresses' exact job not to be convinced of an executive plan because of lies and fear. I can understand one or two congressmen and woman succumbing to this but most of them? That’s hard for me to believe.


Downing Street memo
 
what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began? You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary.


Sounds to me like Blair thought their where WMDs.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
Most of America believed it too. I don't find it that hard to believe. Fortunately, Boxer was the sole representative who didn't allow the administration to deceive her.

Blair made several public statements as Bush did regarding the possibility of WMDs, but as the Downing Street memo shows, the intelligence was manufactured around the policy.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
Dr. Noah
Aug 5 2005, 12:22 PM
Most of America believed it too. I don't find it that hard to believe. Fortunately, Boxer was the sole representative who didn't allow the administration to deceive her.


I am sorry to say but I can not believe the conspiracy theory that a sole representative was the only one not tricked. It appears to unbelievable to me and its far more likely that most of them just felt it was right after doing their jobs of executive over sight correctly.


Quote:
 
Blair made several public statements as Bush did regarding the possibility of WMDs, but as the Downing Street memo shows, the intelligence was manufactured around the policy.
the word manufactured was not used. I know you wished it was but it was not.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
who
Have light saber. Will travel.
We have been down this road too many times. The intelligence of the US, the UK, and Russia all were in agreement. It now appears that the intelligence on nuclear WMDs was incorrect. We still do not know about chemical and biological. The evidence could be buried in the sand or be in Syria. Shall we move out of the past into the present?

It seems almost everyone agrees that the biggest threat are WMD in the hands of terrorists. We now face a similar problem with Iran and N. Korea. What will we do?

From a personal standpoint, I find it curious that we have not seen any more terrorist attacks in the US. I believe they could use bombs as they did in the UK. Why have they not done so? This is just speculation but I suspect that they are trying to lull us into a false sense of security. I believe they want the next attack in the US to be bigger than 9/11. If things continue as they are, I suspect nukes, dirty bombs, or other WMDs to be unleashed in NY, DC, and LA within the next 5 years.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dr. Noah
Sistertrek's Asian Correspondant
I must say, I am really enjoying debating issues without all the personal attacks and name calling we have seen in this forum lately. Good show everyone! :clap:
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
who
Have light saber. Will travel.
Dr. Noah
Aug 5 2005, 11:52 AM
I must say, I am really enjoying debating issues without all the personal attacks and name calling we have seen in this forum lately. Good show everyone! :clap:

I agree. I prefer discussion to debate.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
Dr. Noah
Aug 5 2005, 12:52 PM
I must say, I am really enjoying debating issues without all the personal attacks and name calling we have seen in this forum lately. Good show everyone! :clap:

on this I must agree with you.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
WolfsLoveRage
Cadet 4th Year
Al though I would like to say we are doing this strictly for the people of Iraq we are of course not and you would be ignorant to think it was all for the people. How ever people strictly thinking it is just for the oil are also ignorant.
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
Dandandat
Member Avatar
Time to put something here
WolfsLoveRage
Aug 5 2005, 10:32 PM
Al though I would like to say we are doing this strictly for the people of Iraq we are of course not and you would be ignorant to think it was all for the people. How ever people strictly thinking it is just for the oil are also ignorant.

I agree
Offline | Profile | Quote | ^
 
ZetaBoards - Free Forum Hosting
Fully Featured & Customizable Free Forums
Learn More · Sign-up Now
« Previous Topic · Politics and World Events Forum · Next Topic »
Add Reply

Tweet
comments powered by Disqus