Did the Bush Administration really believe that Iraq had WMD's?

Question

If they did, then wouldn't massing 200,000 troops in Kuwait (a vital oil conduit for the West and a sworn enemy of Saddam ) while steadily beating the war drums for two months, have to go down in history as the most reckless and assinine military stategy ever?

Nobody's answering the second part of my question...if he had them, don't you think that would be the time for him to use them??
As far as Congress. etc , believing the same, if they did, it was based on intelligence provided by the administration , and you will recall that then, as now, anyone who questioned it was under suspicion of not being a "true American."
Bin Laden and 19 of 20 highjackers were Saudi, so let's not bring up 9/11, or I'll have to point out that this administration's response was a dream come true for a group of 200 or so terrorists who, as a result of our reckless and racist response, now have the sympathy of hundreds of millions of Muslims who feel under attack.

Answer 1

Of course not! They only said that lie over and over until it became their truth.

There were very few countries that believed that Iraq had WMD because most looked at the impossibility given the inspecotrs that had been there (granted, off and on) for 10 years +.

The Iraq war was started because:

1. Iraq has OIL.
2. Bush stated in early 2002 that he wanted Sadam outta there because Sadam tried to "kill )his) daddy."
3. Bush was told by a god that he should spread democracy throughout the world.

Aren't those the best reasons of all? The rest are lies, or damned lies, depending on how you look at them.

Answer 2

sure, i'm advantageous they have been frightened approximately Saddam's conflict mongering procedures, and his longing for conflict weapons. they actually had to get the excellent international in contact in bringing Saddam down on the time, and if Mondale were elected in 2000 this is probably what might have happened. advantageous many Dems went alongside with Bush's exaggerated fears of Iraq's WMD. the nice and cozy button is that are troops had routed the Taliban in Afghanistan and have been busy rounding up our genuine enemy the terrorists in the hills and mountains, whilst the UN had our lower back coated with this is inspectors in Iraq. many of the international replace into sympathetic to our reason. that one and all replaced while at Dumb, Dumbs insistence we invaded Iraq. We then misplaced a sturdy foot carry in Afghanistan. The Taliban is now returning whilst maximum of out troops are tied up in Iraq.

Answer 3

Look, this isn't Candyland where the path to the pot of golden chocolate is paved with color-indicated footstones.

The WORLD inferred Saddam's possession of WMD's in the 1980's (He used them, documented fact), and his proliferation of mobile labs for development of chemical/biological weapons material (if not the delivery system). Couple that with the sudden 'discovery' of Abu Nidal in Baghdad just before the invasion in 2003, and there was ample evidence (above and beyond Saddam's funding of Palestinian families who sent young men on suicide missions) that Saddam was pro-terrorist, anti-American, had oil revenues syphoned from the oil for food program into his own coffers and lived a life of luxury and calculated pin-prick retaliation on Allied planes and troops during the 1991-2003 post-war period.

The intelligence was from multiple sources, that POINTED to WMD programs still in operation. We had few assets on the ground to concur these claims, but given the post 9/11 environment, the ask questions first routine could have gotten more Americans killed. We couldn't allow that, it was asinine to think otherwise. You would not have been viewed as a very responsible leader, waiting for 110% proof while saran and anthrax mobile weapons were washing up on your docks.

The fact is that Saddam violated EIGHTEEN U.N. (not US) resolutions and in order to show that the UN meant what it said, force was required. The big nations stayed out (like France, Germany, Russia, because they had backdoor contracts with Saddam), but others who realized this man was a threat to Western/Capitalist nations did not stand for his continued obstinance.

Reckless and asinine is Napoleon forging into Russia in the dead of winter on horses. Asinine is Hitler doing the same thing 150 years later.

Deposing Saddam made the world better, unless you're president of his fan club. Then you have other issues that reckless and asinine can't begin to define.

Answer 4

Yes, as did high ranking folk on both sides of the aisle that
had privy to the same intelligence files that the Bush admin
did. -- I'm not qualified to analize military strategy, but do
know that the folks running the show for us DO very much
know what they are doing -- incidentally, would you explain
a viable strategy ?

Answer 5

We had them too, though, and our M1 tanks and each troop was prepared for chemical or biological warfare.

The world changed for many -- apparently not you -- after 9/11.

-- Saddam Hussein violated numerous United Nations resolutions following the first Persian Gulf War. Saddam's
military continuously shot at U.S. and British planes patrolling the Northern and Southern No-Fly Zones. He offered
$25,000 to families of homicide bombers. We know he possessed chemical and biological weapons because he used them during the Iraq/Iran war, and on his own people, the Kurds.

-- The October '02 National Intelligence Estimate concluded with "high confidence" -- the highest certainty allowed
-- that Saddam possessed stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons. All 16 intelligence agencies contributing to the NIE unanimously agreed on the chemical and biological weapons assumptions, with disagreement only on how far along Saddam was toward acquiring nukes.

-- Weapons inspectors found no WMD stockpiles, leading many Americans to feel that the president either lied or
cherry-picked intelligence to lead us into war. But the Robb-Silverman Commission concluded that the president didn't lie. The bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee's 511-page report concluded that the president did not lie.

The British Butler Commission, which examined whether Prime Minister Tony Blair "sexed up" the intelligence to make a case for war, concluded the PM didn't lie.

-- Kenneth Pollack, an opponent of the Iraq war, served as Iraq expert and intelligence analyst in the Clinton administration. Pollack writes that during his 1999-2001 tour on the National Security Council, " . . . the intelligence community convinced me and the rest of the Clinton Administration that Saddam had reconstituted his WMD
programs following the withdrawal of the UN inspectors, in 1998, and was only a matter of years away from having a
nuclear weapon. . . . The U.S. intelligence community's belief that Saddam was aggressively pursuing weapons of mass
destruction pre-dated Bush's inauguration, and therefore cannot be attributed to political pressure. . . . Other
nations' intelligence services were similarly aligned with U.S. views. . . . Germany . . . Israel, Russia, Britain,

China, and even France held positions similar to that of the United States. . . . In sum, no one doubted that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction."

-- Meanwhile, neighboring Iran defiantly pursues nuclear weapons. Bush reasoned that a free, democratic and
prosperous Iraq would destabilize Iran, accomplishing regime change without military force. This would encourage the rest of the Arab world to direct their grievances toward their own leaders, rather than against the "infidels."

-- We remain in Iraq because, as former Secretary of State James Baker put it, "[I]f we picked up and left right now
. . . you would see the biggest civil war you've ever seen. Every neighboring country would be involved in there, doing its own thing, Turkey, Iran, Syria, you name it, and even our friends in the Gulf."

-- Former Secretary of State and informal Bush adviser Henry Kissinger -- who knows something about the consequences of cutting and running -- wrote, "Victory over the insurgency is the only meaningful exit strategy."

-- The political aim of our Islamofascist enemies is a worldwide Caliphate, or Islamic world. Renowned Islam expert Bernard Lewis recently reiterated his support for the war: "The response to 9/11 came as a nasty surprise [to bin
Laden and his followers]. They were expecting more of the same -- bleating and apologies -- instead of which they
got a vigorous reaction, first in Afghanistan and then in Iraq. And as they used to say in Moscow: It is no accident, comrades, that there has been no successful attack in the United States since then. . . . [T]he effort is difficult and the outcome uncertain, but I think the effort must be made. Either we bring them freedom, or they destroy us."

True, 2,800 of our best have died. Any figure above zero is a tragedy. But America -- on both sides of the Civil War
-- lost more than 600,000 soldiers, or 2 percent of the country's population of 31 million. Of our country's 132
million, we lost more than 400,000 in World War II, or .3 percent of our population. In the Korean War, we lost
37,000, and the Vietnam War saw 58,000 dead.

Many people say that after failing to find stockpiles of WMD, Bush "switched" rationale for the war. Consider this
excerpt from a New York Times editorial about a speech Bush gave weeks before the coalition entered Iraq:

"President Bush sketched an expansive vision last night of what he expects to accomplish by a war in Iraq. Instead of focusing on eliminating weapons of mass destruction, or reducing the threat of terror to the United States, Mr.
Bush talked about establishing a 'free and peaceful Iraq' that would serve as a 'dramatic and inspiring example' to
the entire Arab and Muslim world, provide a stabilizing influence in the Middle East and even help end the
Arab-Israeli conflict."

Still confused? Please write back, and I'll try again.

Answer 6

Yep, sure did just like just about everyone in the house and senate did too. Oh and guess what?? There were demonrats that believed it too.

I for one though, believe that there was and is WMD's but I can think logically and think that Syria had their hands in helping to hide them.

Answer 7

I think it was a fair assumption, based on the fact a whole group of people were killed with nerve gas.

Now, they are using chlorine gas, I think that qualifies as a wmd.

Answer 8

Yes, as did most of the rest of the world including the Clinton administration. So, I guess they are all idiots in your mind.

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Answer 9

They believed that there were WMDs in Iraq. And that belief was vindicated by the chemical weapons we recovered and destroyed.

Answer 10

In my opinion, no. ShrubCheneyburtonScumsfeld, Inc. knew real Americans would never support the "Democracy Domino" theory and "Nation Building" justifications for the war, so they mis-led us with FEAR, instead.