I just watched Larry King's 1999 interview with Gerald Ford. When he was president I was young & didn't

Question

realize that he was a man who had great integrity & deep faith in God. Few presidents wld have pardoned Nixon & it prob lost him the election. He did it to heal the country. And he was a man who lived his faith. Were he president now we would not be at war, as he stated in an interview recently released. Actually I doubt that any other living president wld have us at war. Pls tell us how you view Bushs' decision in this respect. Do you believe that we should have attacked Iraq & why.

Answer 1

There is a certain amount of misinformation in the previous answer. Desert Storm ended as it did for two reasons, one the action was under UN auspices and to remain "legal" in that situation, the war had to end when Sadam Hussein agreed to accept the UN santions against Iraq, whigh he did. If he had been smart, he would have done so much sooner leaving the allied build up with nothing to do and keeping his own armed forces intact. The second reason was that the Saudi Arabians were providing the bulk of the financing for Desert Storm and at that time did not want Hussein removed as the Iraqi president, while he was intensley disliked and untrusted by the Saudi Government, he was a buffer between themselves and Iran who the feared even more.
On to the meat of the question, the one thing about the current war i disliked from the beginning is the fact that we attacked first, never have American Armed Forces attacked first our policy has always been to defend, never attack first. That policy has been our moral high ground since we became a nation. We have built up a lot of trust from other nations with that policy and much of that was thrown away by this action.
I am not trying to be contradictory but I also feel that Sadam Hussein had to be removed from power and by whatever means, execution certainly works, be prevented from returning to power. I felt that the longer whatever authority, UN, world opinion or other authority waited to do this, the more difficult it would be. This is something that had to be done, the end does not justify the means and other ways may have been found to accomplish the goals going to war should have been the absolute last option.

Answer 2

I think it was a day late and a dollar short the attack on Iraq. We pulled out of Desert Storm to hide the reasons we were there to begin with. Subsequently that is why The Old Man Bush lost to Clinton. The Bush family is both business partners and friends with many of the Arabs involved in that war. Ford was very aware or the policies of the Bush family and did not agree what so ever, with their policies.