Lickszz Posted June 29, 2003 Share Posted June 29, 2003 No matter what the claims by witnesses and the conclusions reached by Commons Enquiries and Select Committees about Saddam's alleged Weapons of Mass Destruction, it is beyond doubt that the world was told he had them ready and waiting to attack the West. The question is were Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Powell, Blair, Straw and Hoon lying when they made their repeated claims over many months about the threat from Iraq's Nuclear Chemical and Biological weapons? Cast your vote NOW! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phanerothyme Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 I don't know whether they were lying or not, and I doubt I will ever know unless one of them confesses in The Mirror. Deniability is their watchword. The are bang to rights on distorting the intelligence reports - it definitely happened, the question is where and by whom and for what reason? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaBouncer Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 I'd like to say they weren't lying but I'm unsure. In any case, I feel that Saddam is better out of power than in power. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaBouncer Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 *Deleted by Dabouncer* Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaBouncer Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 *Deleted by DaBouncer* Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
halevan Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 No, they were not lying, that vicious thug was a threat to the world as we all know and giving him even more time after all those years when he was let off the hook, would have been a big mistake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
max Posted June 30, 2003 Share Posted June 30, 2003 IMO there were no lies. Every politician constantly keeps his/her eye on 2 things: the electorate and history. Everybody thought maggie lied about the Belgrano but history has partially justified her actions. No politician wants to go down in history as having lied to the electorate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lickszz Posted June 30, 2003 Author Share Posted June 30, 2003 I'll now add some my thoughts to this: Although I believe that Saddam did have WMD I am not sure Iraq was as much as a threat as people were led to believe. It is imperative that these weapons are found as at the moment Blair is under great scrutiny and pressure to justify Iraq and are relying solely on WMD to be found to get them out of there predicament. If America loses Blair as its allie in the next campaign, will the other coalition countries follow suit? I think so, once bitten twice shy! It's much to early to write the history of this war yet, as to many things still to be analysed. I don't like Alister Cambell and hope he gets sacked. These behind the scenes man who pull the strings make far too many decisions and are accountable to nobody except the prime minister. Cambell seems to be lying his head off. Why won't the committee be allowed to see the original dosier, as opposed to the one that was released? It seems to me that this is because certain things were elaborated and changed to make Iraq seem more of a threat. For this military campaign to be a justified success WMD will need to be found before it can be seen as such, otherwise it will limit America going to war with international approval, when the next war roles around. A common thought is that WMD could be planted if none are found. No , I honestly do not think so. The CIA was supposedly where the WMD info came from and Bush has sent the very same man to Iraq to take over the search for WMD. In my opinion Bush has done this to make a scapegoat and sacraficial lamb to hand over to the worlds media if none are found. I think Bush himself believes that none are going to be found which is why he arranged to send this very man. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phanerothyme Posted July 1, 2003 Share Posted July 1, 2003 as Hans Blix said: [how can there be] 100% certainty about the existence of WMD and 0% certainty about their location. WMD was the excuse required to deliver enough of a multilateral mandate. Britain mucked in because this was a good chance for some low risk,high visibility projection of miltary force - lots of navy, airborne and army action. Other countries were bribed, cajoled and threatened - or like the spanish and australians - begging to get in for some international prestige. Once the Americans had the agreement of what it needed, it gave up on the UN, easily scapegoating France who, let us remember, never vetoed anything. This was essentially a window of opportunity for the US to add Iraq to the list of 120 or so nations that currenty enjoy US military visitors. And Open up virtually untapped, gigantic oilfields to the free market - possibly even outside opec. The invasion had to happen before the heat of the summer, and had to be as quick and devastating as possible. Everything that happened diplomatically in the period from September to March was predicated on that fact - without it being explicitly mentioned, other than pundits. WMD was a good card to play, but backfired as a combination of Iraqi incooperation and a real lack of wepaons failed to reveal any smoking guns. We went in anyway because Iraq was not disarming itself of marginally illegal tactical missiles quickly enough (with quarter of a million unfriendly troops on the borders...) As has been posted, anyone of responsibilty will have 100% deniability on any massaging of fact required to egg parliament into 'approving' the war, but the fact that it happened is undeniable - the scare story was just that. Iraq? A loose cannon and oppressive regime? Certainly. A threat to the UK requiring HM forces in defence of the realm? mmmmm And has been exhaustively, repeatedly, pointed out elsewhere, why is Iraq so special, amongst all the other unpleasant WMD weilding regimes out there? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chinaski Posted March 27, 2010 Share Posted March 27, 2010 I'd like to say they weren't lying but I'm unsure. In any case, I feel that Saddam is better out of power than in power. They were lying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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