Do you suppose that the US could have been purposely tricked by Shiites into causing regime change in Iraq?

Question

I saved a May 12, 2003 letter to the editor which strongly suggests that Iraqi Shiites purposely fed false intelligence to the US and Britain, that they basically tricked these powerful nations into... first removing the weapons inspectors ...then invading Iraq ... and getting rid of the Baath party. What do you think? Were we tricked into using our soldiers and our resourses to do someone else's (Iraqi Shiites' and possibly Iran's) dirty work?

Thank you for taking the time to answer, edborden1. Really, I'm not "trying" anything here, and I remember all those things that you list. I also remember much of what the Bush administration presented to the puplic concerning inttlligence received from inside Iraq. More than 3 years ago I thought that this letter was interesting enough to clip out of a news paper. (I did not write the letter nor do I know the person who wrote it.) I am asking what people think of the idea. The facts are that the US and other nations invaded Iraq largly based on intelligence received, and there has been regime change.

Answer 1

Interesting idea. All I'll say though is that the Shiites and Iran weren't the only ones in the Middle East with an interest in getting rid of the Baath party. And some of these others have far more influence on US foreign policy than Iran or the Shiites in Iraq do.

Answer 2

Why does everyone forget that Bush really only wanted to do was finish the job that he daddy couldn't? Saddam and the Ba'athist really did need to be taken out as well as his sons. The intelligence may have been flawed or bad but ultimately it was the best that we had from satellite pictures and everything else. Saddam was playing around for much too long with the inspectors. Now Iran is supporting the insurgents in an attempt to slow Coalition Forces just enough to allow them to create Nuclear weapons. Once they get them it would be way to difficult to actually remove another evil regime. Look at what happened with North Korea. So back to the question... No the Shiites didn't trick us. Bush (and a lot of his advisers) wanted to take Saddam out and finish a decade old feud.

Answer 3

Nothing's impossible and who knows the real facts in that part of the world. Still, in my mind, the overriding factor that got us into Iraq is the accusation that Saddam had a contract on George Herbert Walker Bush, and George II is getting revenge.

Answer 4

Nice try, do you remember Iraq invading Kuwait? Do you remember the U.N. resolutions? Do you remember Iraq shooting numerous missiles at Nato jets patroling the U.N. Mandated no-fly zones? Do you remember the U.N. weapons inspection teams being blocked from seeing several locations?

Answer 5

tepec , got it right, G,W,B, and the ,C,I,A, were told by the Israeli mossad that Iran had all of these weapons and biological etc, deliberately knowing differently , so we got rid of Israels worst enemy and they didn't fire a shot nor lost a man, SLICK

Answer 6

possible but not likely.