When have I stated blogs are all "partisan hackery"? Some certainly are, but this blog has numerous indepedent references that came be checked out. There are numerous blogs on the left that behave the same way and are not partisan hackery. I don't have a problem with use of blogs as sources, only the use of blogs WITH NO SOURCES as sources. Seems like a fairly simple distinction.

Arles: So many people are either mentioned in the memo or were at the meeting. Find one who says the memo isn't true and I'll be willing to listen. Until then you're just pulling shit out of the air.

What if the Abu Ghraib pictures are fake? Have you thought about that? Will the Left stop at nothing?

Arles, how does typing it on a computer (given the restrictions you named on it) make it more authentic? Believe it or not, lots of people in the world still use typewriters. AND NONE OF THIS CHANGES THE FACT THAT BLAIR ADMITTED THE MEMO HAD BEEN WRITTEN.


Why would Blair let it go? He saw the memo HUNDREDS OF TIMES IN THE PRESS. And we was asked point blank about it during a press conference and didn't say anything about the discrepancies.

And I see you have returned to your previous argument. In other words, you have adopted the Bubba strategy - throw as much shit as possible and see what sticks. If nothing does, pretend you didn't say anything at all.

Have you thought about stop trying to deflect the issue and actual read the questions on the behavior of Mr. Smith in regards to this memo - and how they differ in such contrast from how the other 6 (content verified) memos?

Arles: Find one person who was involved in the meetings that says the memo is fake. It should be easy. Until you can find just one person that says the content is not accurate you're just making shit up.

Because you have a date associated with the file's creation that could be crossreferenced against Smith's claim that he received this memo with the other 6 that the Butler Commision verified. If that date showed he received the memo 6-8 months later (as much of the evidence and his actions suggest), then it adds more questions on the memo's credibility. Again, why would Smith hold onto the memo in silence for months after reporting on the first 6 memos?

I am not disputing that the memo was written. I'm questioning the content in the version presented by Smith.

Because he couldn't comment on the original because its classified. Or, perhaps he realized the memo was just one person's unsubstantiated opinion on a meeting and didn't think it was all that important to keep in the news.

There's nothing wrong with having multiple arguments regarding the implications of the memo. My stance is very simple. I think there are serious questions around the creation of the memo by Smith and its content. But, even if you buy the content as being 100% legit, the memo comes back to only providing the unsubstantiated opinion of one person with corroborating evidence or accounts of others also present to legitimize his stance. Again, I didn't think this was all that difficult to follow - but I guess I was wrong.

Hey, find one person on FOFC that says definitively you don't wear ladies underwear. It should be easy if you don't. :rolleyes:

Usually the burden of proof is on the person making the claim not the people disputing it.

Arles: AND YOU ARE THE ONE CLAIMING THE MEMO IS FAKE!!!

So, the BOP is on Bush for the Al Qaeda/Iraq connection and the WMD's? Could this reporter just say, "he had some bad intell" and everything would be ok with you? Interesting.

Nice ad hom at the end. You seem to have trouble with the fact that Blair could have said the memo was false. This is true whether or not it was classified. Your new claim is that he probably didn't think it was a big deal demonstrates that you haven't followed this issue at all. It was a MAJOR issue going into the British elections. And Blair (like Bush with the National Guard allegations) could have easily had someone in his camp say the memo, as presented, was fake. But strangely, that never happened. Huh.

Sorry Arles, but your position carries no weight nor logic. Not when Rumsfeld himself said that the people being captured were "unlawful combatants" and therefore not subject to Geneva.

And I have provided ample reason to question the authenticity of the memo. Let' summarize:

1. In his original story in September 2004, Smith cited only 6 documents (but not the Downing Street one). Smith has since said he received each of the memos at the same time yet didn't publish the Downing Street memo contents until May 1, 2005. Why would Smith not cite the Downing Street Memo back in September 2004 if he had it? Why wait 8 months before releasing it?

2. If not to conceal the date of the file's creation, why did Smith create the DSM on an old-syle typewriter? And why didn't he do the same with the other 6 memos that were also typed out to protect the source?

3. Why did the Daily Telegraph story involving the first 6 memos print actual renditions of the Jack Straw memo and the Manning memo when Smith said all originals were returned and photocopies were destroyed for the Downing Street and the other 6?

4. Why did the Butler commision cite each of the 6 other memos but not mention the Downing Street memo once in the entire report?

5. Why did the other 6 memos starkly contrast the DSM when they stated:

This is enough to cast some doubt over not only the authenticity of Smith's claims involving the memo but also the seemingly unfounded conclusions reached in the memo. Maybe I am the only one here who is curious on these issues. And, to be completely frank, I'm fine with that as I think each is legimitate.

Of course the burden is on the administration for WMD and Iraq/Al Qaeda. At this point, they seem to be wrong on both accounts and it has hurt the US credibility. But, that's not the same as saying Bush lied to the American people and took us to war on "fixed" facts. The intel used by Bush (as given to him by Tenet) seemed to be flawed in many cases, as well as much of the international intel. We should learn from it and try our best to make sure the Intel we give to our president and/or nation is given better vetting. But, Bush is certainly culpable for the actions of the US and had has paid a price for the info used to support the case for WMD not being correct.

You win Arles. I found the original unedited copy of the memo.




SECRET AND STRICTLY PERSONAL - UK EYES ONLY

DAVID MANNING
From: Matthew Rycroft
Date: 23 July 2002
S 195 /02

cc: Defence Secretary, Foreign Secretary, Attorney-General, Sir Richard Wilson, John Scarlett, Francis Richards, CDS, C, Jonathan Powell, Sally Morgan, Alastair Campbell

IRAQ: PRIME MINISTER'S MEETING, 23 JULY

Copy addressees and you met the Prime Minister on 23 July to discuss Iraq.

This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents.

John Scarlett summarised the intelligence and latest JIC assessment. Saddam's regime was tough and based on extreme fear. The only way to overthrow it was likely to be by massive military action. Saddam was worried and expected an attack, probably by air and land, but he was not convinced that it would be immediate or overwhelming. His regime expected their neighbours to line up with the US. Saddam knew that regular army morale was poor. Real support for Saddam among the public was probably narrowly based.

C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through diplomatic action, justified by the clear and inour opinion indisputable conjunction of terrorism and WMD. Remember, the intelligence and facts were NOT being fixed around the policy. The NSC has patience with the UN route. There was a whole lot of discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.

CDS said that military planners would brief CENTCOM on 1-2 August, Rumsfeld on 3 August and Bush on 4 August.

The two broad US options were:

(a) Generated Start. A slow build-up of 250,000 US troops, a short (72 hour) air campaign, then a move up to Baghdad from the south. Lead time of 90 days (30 days preparation plus 60 days deployment to Kuwait).

(b) Running Start. Use forces already in theatre (3 x 6,000), continuous air campaign, initiated by an Iraqi casus belli. Total lead time of 60 days with the air campaign beginning even earlier. A hazardous option.

The US saw the UK (and Kuwait) as essential, with basing in Diego Garcia and Cyprus critical for either option. Turkey and other Gulf states were also important, but less vital. The three main options for UK involvement were:

(i) Basing in Diego Garcia and Cyprus, plus three SF squadrons.

(ii) As above, with maritime and air assets in addition.

(iii) As above, plus a land contribution of up to 40,000, perhaps with a discrete role in Northern Iraq entering from Turkey, tying down two Iraqi divisions.

The Defence Secretary said that the US had already begun "spikes of activity" to put pressure on the regime but all of these were in no way related to a military strike, because Bush is reluctant. No decisions had been taken, ya got that!

The Foreign Secretary said he would discuss this with Colin Powell this week. It seemed clear that Bush had most certainly not made up his mind to take military action. But the case was thicky thick thick. Saddam was threatening his neighbours, and his WMD capability was enormous, I mean fuckin huge. We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. Remember, Bush is reluctant to go to war.

The Attorney-General said some boring stuff about Saddam and laws. Probably meant to say "Saddam is a law breaker."

The Prime Minister said that Mr. Bush told him it would make a big difference politically and legally if Saddam refused to allow in the UN inspectors. Regime change and WMD were linked in the sense that it was the regime that was producing the WMD. There were different strategies for dealing with Libya and Iran. If the political context were right, people would support regime change. The two key issues were whether the military plan worked and whether we had the political strategy to give the military plan the space to work.

On the first, CDS said that we did not know yet that the US battleplan was the best ever. The military were continuing to ask lots of questions but should shut up and do their duty.

For instance, what were the consequences, if Saddam used WMD on day one, or if the WMD got sent to Syria, or if the clear Iraq/ Al Queada connection reared its head, or if Baghdad did not collapse and urban warfighting began?(If this happens we'll just kick some urban ass!) You said that Saddam could also use his WMD on Kuwait. Or on Israel, added the Defence Secretary.

The Foreign Secretary thought the US would not go ahead with a military plan unless convinced that it was a winning strategy. On this, US and UK interests converged. But on the political strategy, there could be US/UK differences as Mr. Bush is a far greater politician than anyone ever. There is no US resistance, and we should explore discreetly the ultimatum. Saddam would continue to play hard-ball with the UN.

John Scarlett assessed that Saddam would allow the inspectors back in only when he thought the threat of military action was real.

The Defence Secretary said that if the Prime Minister wanted UK military involvement, he would need to decide this early. He cautioned that many in the US did think it worth going down the ultimatum route and that negotiations and diplomacy should be tried and tried and tried even though Saddam is a "butthead". It would be important for Bush to set out the political context to the wimpy Franco-Democrats.

Conclusions:

(a) We should work on the assumption that the UK would take part in any military action. But we needed a fuller picture of US planning before we could take any firm decisions. CDS should tell the US military that we were considering a range of options.

(b) The Prime Minister would revert on the question of whether funds could be spent in preparation for this operation.

(c) CDS would send the Prime Minister full details of the proposed military campaign and possible UK contributions by the end of the week, but we must all remember that a military strike is the last option and Mr. Bush is extremely releuctant..

(d) The Foreign Secretary would send the Prime Minister the background on the UN inspectors, and discreetly work up the ultimatum to Saddam.

He would also send the Prime Minister advice on the positions of countries in the region especially Turkey, and of the key EU member states.

(e) John Scarlett would send the Prime Minister a full intelligence update. And it will blow your fucking mind!

(f) We must not ignore the legal issues: the Attorney-General would consider legal advice with FCO/MOD legal advisers.

(I have written separately to commission this follow-up work.)

MATTHEW RYCROFT

While Rumsfeld's claim may or may not be legally accurate, it doesn't really matter to me. I disagree with his premise and think that we should treat any group we capture in accords with Geneva (from a human treatment/torture standpoint). But, again, this statement was made back in 2002 and it appears that the military has taken a much different stance on Gitmo and all actions against prisoners being abused/tortured not in accordance to the Geneva have been investigated (with numerous charges being filed).

I don't think we will ever find a convenient papertrail of activitiy linking Osama Bin Laden to Saddam Hussein or e-mail traffic (Hell, Al Qaeda learned years ago that satellite phones were unsecure for their purposes). Not unless we find a Tigris Street Memo from one of Saddam's inner-circle. :)

But the link between Saddam Hussein and his monetary support for terrorism abroad is clear enough and good enough in my opinion. And Iraq and Palestine were the only two nations (sic) that celebrated Al Qaeda's strike on the WTC's and the Pentagon. And Iraq was handing out tremendous sums of money to suicide bomber families in Palestine.

And if they weren't working together before, they sure found that they were made for each other in a hurry (Al Qaeda in Iraq since the fall of Baghdad). Just as we suspected they would (albeit with relation to using Iraq's WMD's and Al Qaeda's Global Reach--not in bombing Iraqi citizens and soldiers into submission). It was an enlightening new event in the world--terrorist global reach towards America. The Al Qaeda was going to be Saddam Hussein's long range SCUD missile.

I think that was made clear enough in the hearings that the goal of global strike and nuclear weapons program was the first order of business from Saddam Hussein the second UN Sanctions were repealed.

It's not pretty no matter how you look at it when it comes to Iraq.

And pales in comparison to the money flowing from Saudi Arabia to support terrorism. Why don't we attack them? Heck, it even pales in comparison to money sent from U.S. donors to the IRA to fund terrorist activities.


You're aware that the footage of Palestinians celebrating in the streets turned out to be stock footage from the 90s, right?


It is to laugh. Just listen to yourself. Al Qaeda gets into Iraq when? Yeah, when Saddam gets booted out. Heck of a Saddam-bin Laden connection there....


That's the only part of your post that isn't utter conjecture and fantasy.

To second Flere's comment on this, support for terrorism and support for al-Qaeda are completely separate issues: the first does not imply the second. As Flere mentioned, we've turned a blind eye to our citizens' funding of the IRA. We are currently harboring fugitives responsible for anti-Cuban terror bombings. We've supported terror groups in Nicaragua, Angola, Afghanistan, etc. All of our support for terrorism does not imply our support of or connection to al-Qaeda (well maybe except for the Mudjahedeen--but that was before Osama turned on us)...

god only knows what Arles will accept as evidence or not. If a blog meets his needs suddenly theyre credible, when they dont they're partison hackery. A memo (the content) doesnt exist unless the person it's written about says its true (which again leads the opening that arles could pick out parts)....all of a sudden Arles got silly.

For the credibility of blogs, it's more a function of reading their conclusions and supporting evidence. Some blogs make crazy conclusions based on little to no evidence. But, as a whole, I enjoy reading blogs from both the left and the right.

Fixed it for ya :D

Guys, I have some terrible news. I was looking through my personal library, and it turns out my copy of Hamlet is a fake. That's right, a fake. It says it right on the cover that it was written by Shakespeare, but do you know what it says in tiny letters on the first page? "Oxford Univ. Press"! They weren't even around when Shakespeare lived (supposedly, I couldn't find a 'real' source that has his death date, just Internet fakes). And, get this, it turns out that typewriters, let alone computers, weren't even around in Shakespeare's time! At first I figured he just had really great handwriting, but now I am SURE that it was typed! I was completely hoodwinked, and I encourage all of you to see what kind of 'fake' books you have. Good thing for the wingnut blogs, or else we would never have been aware of this widespread epidemic of 'fakes'.

Flere,

Saddam Hussein funded terrorism. Select Saudi citizens fund terrorism. A huge difference as far as what our government can do. But we work with the Saudi government to help round up a lot of Al Qaeda and terrorists all the time....why should we invoke regime change when Diplomacy is working in Saudi Arabia?


The Palestinian footage was fake? Are you saying our media mislead us with those images? If that is indeed true, it's another notch in the media telling us a story they want us to hear and there is nothing we can do about it.


Why is Al Qaeda better and moving around in Iraq than the US...I mean, if they got there at the same time.

Here is a question for anybody who knows the answer. Name the countries that Al Qaeda was in before the fall of Saddam Hussein's Baath Party. Let's pick September 2001 for instance. Where did they reside?

It's working? That's news.

Why should we invoke regime change when sanctions & inspections were working in Iraq?


Sort of like you using it to mislead people.


Suspected Al-Qaeda attacks since 9/11:

• 4/11/2002 Explosion at ancient synogogue in Tunisia leaves 17 dead, including 11 German tourists.
• 5/2002 Car explodes outside hotel in Karachi, Pakistan, killing 14, including 11 French citizens.
• 6/2002 Bomb explodes outside American Consulate in Karachi, Pakistan, killing 12.
• 10/2002 Nightclub bombings in Bali, Indonesia, kill 202, mostly Australian citizens. Suicide attack on a hotel in Mombasa, Kenya, kills 16.
• 5/2003 Suicide bombers kill 34, including 8 Americans, at housing compounds for Westerners in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Four bombs kill 33 people, targeting Jewish, Spanish, and Belgian sites in Casablanca, Morocco.
• 8/2003 Suicide car bomb kills 12, injures 150, at Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, Indonesia.
• 11/2003 Explosions rock a Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, housing compound killing 17. Suicide car bombers simultaneously attack two synagogues in Istanbul, Turkey, killing 25 and injuring hundreds. The following week a British bank in Istanbul is bombed.
• 3/2004 Ten terrorists bombs explode almost simultaneously during the morning rush hour in Madrid, Spain, killing 202 and injuring more than 1,400. A Moroccan affiliate of al-Qaeda claims responsibility.
• 5/29–31/2004 Terrorists attack the offices of a Saudi oil company in Khobar, Saudi Arabia, then take foreign oil workers hostage in a nearby residential compound. After a stand-off, three of the four assailants escape, leaving 22 people dead, all but three of them foreigners.
• 6/11–19/2004 Terrorists kidnap and execute Paul Johnson, Jr., an American, in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Nearly a week after his capture, photos of his body are posted on an Islamist website. Saudi security forces find and kill four suspected terrorists, including the self-proclaimed military leader of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia, after they are seen dumping a body.
• 12/6/2004 Militants, believed to be linked to Al-Qaeda, drive up to the U.S. consulate in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, storm the gates, and kill 5 consulate employees, none of whom were American. Saudi security forces subdue the attackers, killing four.

Looks like Al-Qaeda haven't lost their ability to attack international targets to me, Dutch.

The idea that we have Al Qaeda holed up in Iraq and have thus protected ourselves from Al Qaeda attacks on American soil is laughable at best and farcical at worst.

Ah, thanks, that's the sort of thing I was hoping for.

So Al Qaeda was everwhere and bombing everywhere EXCEPT in Iraq (...hmmm, and Iran)? Of those countries listed, none are state-supported sponsors of terrorism.

So what about places that harbored Al Qaeda - Which regimes harbored Al Qaeda? Did they bomb those regimes? Afghanistan is certainly the only one that publicly harbored Al Qaeda - and the Taliban never was bombed. Interesting, neither was the Baath Party.

Dutch, note the dates.

I don't get the "But look at what Assholes Saudi Arabia have been" argument when it comes to Iraq. Yes Saudi private citizens and even the Saudi Royal family have been funding islamic fundamentalists....How does that mitigate the fact that Saddam's reign needed to be brought to an end? Even as dirty as the Saudis are, they weren't/aren't considered a rogue state.



I'm not aware of that at all. I know that I read first hand accounts of reporters describing the celebrations. I'm fairly certain I also heard an interview of a Palestinian businessman on NPR recounting the joy that he felt, and the celebration in his establishment.



I don't want to really dispute this notion, but I'd say technically it could be claimed they were there at least when the U.S. got into Afghanistan, possibly before, but they definitely provided refuge for Al Zarqawi(or however you spell his name) when he was wounded in Afghanistan. I will however dispute that the U.S. ever came out and claimed that Iraq was behind 9/11 in any way. The closest I think you can come are Cheney's contensions about the ties in response to the September 11th commision's report, well after the invasion had taken place. As I can recall, exactly NONE of the administration's well catalogued reasons for war in Iraq was the notion that Iraq had been behind September 11th in any way.

Diplomacy IS working in Saudi Arabia. They have cracked down more on Islamic fundamentalists in the past year and half than ever before in their history.



As for sanctions and inspections working in Iraq.


I would contend that they weren't working. Yes even in light of the fact that no WMDs were found because;
-Look at the Oil for Food Scandal.... The only people hurt by the sanctions were the people.
-Iraq continued to screw with the inspections through the date that the inspectors were finally recalled. People forget that two months before the war, Blix stated that the Iraqis hadn't even begun to come to grips with the fundamental conclusion that they needed to disarm.
-All of the investigations in postwar Iraq have concluded that Iraq at least wanted to get back into the WMD and Nuclear arenas as soon as they could.

So yes the sanctions apparently did work, but as soon as they were lifted Saddam would have been a problem again, and as long as they weren't lifted, the people would have continued to suffer.

The reasonable solution as concluded years before the invasion was regime change.

Point out where I claimed that. When you find that you can't, respond without taking my words out of context.

Context: Dutch claimed that once Baghdad fell, Hussein & Al Qaeda found a way to work with each other (see above for Dutch's exact quote).

I'm incredulous at this. If it takes a U.S. invasion of Iraq to force Saddam Hussein (a noted secularist known for torturing and killing fundamentalists) and Al Qaeda to work together, then maybe the best way to keep them apart would be to not attack Iraq.


It may not have been a reason that Colin Powell brought to the U.N., but the Bush Administration drove the Iraq-Al Qaeda connection very hard. Why? A simple use of the transitive property.

Al Qaeda = 9/11
If Saddam Hussein = Al Qaeda, Saddam Hussein = 9/11

Huh? The sanctions & inspection regime were intended to make sure that Saddam did not develop WMD. Did he develop WMD?


Or, alternatively, an effective multilateral solution to weapons proliferation. But that would be hard, of course.

Invading Iraq has done nothing to solve the long-term problem of WMD proliferation. North Korea still have their weapons (and an insane head of state). Pakistan still have their nukes (and a fundamentalist Islamic government). Iran still has a weapons program. WMD material continues to go missing, including a lot of very basic supplies that the U.N. had identified in Iraq and the U.S. failed to secure.

Interesting You say you aren't claiming that...then you proceed to claim exactly that. Well you don't do so directly, you veil it by saying that Bush was tricking people with fundamental mathematics. For what it is worth I certainly felt that you were insinuating that the administration had directly tied Iraq to September 11th. I don't even feel it is worth going back to identify exactly what you said that gave me that idea, being that you went ahead and essentially made that claim here in the previous post.

....

I'll also contend that the administration wasn't driving the "Saddam=9/11 theory in as much as the administration was driving the "Saddam might eventually avail himself to an offer from some terrorist organization to launch an attack on the United States using his assets(Chemical, Biological, or Nuclear)" theory. That WAS an actual claim made by the administration as well as a stated reason to invade Iraq, unlike your Saddam=9/11 assertion.

I'm not sure I buy your logical reasoning here. Here you are basically saying:

1. Al Qaeda does not attack sponsoring states/organizations
2. The Baath Party was not attacked, therefore..
3. The Baath Party must therefore be a sponsor of al Qaeda.

That is a quite a leap. Al Qaeda has not attacked the Chinese or the Bahamas either, but that certainly does not make them Al Qaeda sponsors.

Dutch, we've discussed the topic of Saddam's sponsorship of Al Qaeda in previous threads. Yes, the Iraqis have sponsored several terrorist organizations during the Baath regime. But most of these organizations were either Palestinian groups or groups attempting to undermine the fundamentalist government of Iran. I doubt that Saddam would ever allow Al Qaeda to operate within his borders--Saddam was a secularist who was deathly afraid of the influence of Islamic fundamentalism. Any association with Al Qaeda would have been more trouble than it was worth for Saddam.

Again, just because a state has sponsored a terrorist group before does not imply that the state will sponsor a terrorist group in the future. Terrorism brings the risk of negative consequences for the sponsor, so a state will only do so if the state believes that the sponsorship serves their policy interests better than other policy choices. We've sponsored terrorist organizations in the recent past, does that mean that we are predisposed to sponsoring Al Qaeda or any other terrorist organizations in the future? No, the decision to support the Contras, UNITA, or Al Qaeda, are policy calculations for us. It is no different for Iraq, or any other state...

splitting hairs...

Obviously if people connected those dots Bush and Co. would've been ok with it. They knew what they were doing. Lay out some stuff, use some cool words (which we've hammered the editor of the Environmental study on the same type of behavior), and let the "people" make the connections. That way, if the shit hits the fan we can claim we never ACTUALLY said Saddam executed 9/11. Its silly, they sold it to you, me, and everyone else.....I just wish they wouldn't have hung their hats on the WMD/nuclear option.

You are correct. We should have done nothing but work diplomatically to get Rogue nations to stop producing arms. Do we keep the sanctions on Iraq in place during this time? Saddam wasn't going to be dealt with diplomatically any more than North Korea has been. The difference is that Kim Jong Il can effectively defend himself...Saddam couldn't. If you reversed the defensive positions of Iraq and North Korea, Bush might have invaded NK, if enough reasons existed. The reason we are dealing with North Korea diplomatically is because they aren't three days away from being incapable to defend their capital.

Just because it is hard, doesn't make it right.

It's the affirming the consequent logical fallacy.

It also remains a GOOD argument when you consider that everybody agrees that, regardless of what Saddam actually had in his possesion, he had never stopped coveting these weapons.

Flasch,

To me the deal is just that, the didn't sell that particular item. They didn't ever claim that Saddam was behind September 11th. It wasn't even EVER alluded to. There are no dots to connect, outside of the conspiracy theorists who crave to see Bush in the most sinister light possible.

The only dots the administration put between Saddam and Terrorism was the thought that he might someday hook up with a terrorist organization under the "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" principle. The administration definitely stated that theory, yet people still insist that the administration was really alluding to a connection with 9/11. Its just that it didn't actually happen that way.

You are arguing 2 different things. At first you say that the administration only said that the only connection between Saddam and terrorism was a possible future connection, but that is obviously untrue. Just look at Dutch's statements on how he thinks Saddam was funding terrorism. Secondly, you say that the administration never explicitly connected Saddam to 9/11, which nobody here is saying they did.

It may or may not have been in this exact thread and it may not have been you, but people on this forum have definitely accused Bush et al. of exactly that.

First of all, I'm not saying that the Admin said that the only connection between Saddam and terrorism was a "possible future connection". Not my position at all. The administration said a number of times that Saddam had connections with terrorist organizations prior to even September 11th. It was fairly common knowledge that Saddam was funding Palestinian Terrorists, and paying rewards/bounties to the families of palestinian Suicide bombers. That was widely reported, and pretty much common knowledge for anyone paying attention. My position is that in the months before the invasion of Iraq, the only cause for war given by the administration that was related to terrorism was that Saddam and a terror organization might ally against the U.S. as a common enemy. My position is that I don't believe the administration directly or indirectly tied Saddam to September 11th to "sell" the war.



I would say that Dutch is correct that Saddam was on the record supporting terrorism before the invasion.

Secondly, a lot of people here ARE saying that the administration led the public to believe that Saddam was linked to September 11th in the days/months before the invasion. The simple matter is, it didn't happen. There was no shell game or indirect application of the transitive theory by the administration regarding Saddam and September 11th. You are correct that no one is saying that they directly did it, but a lot of you are skirting around the issue saying that they misled the public through subtle manipulation.

if you read the quotes from Bush above how can you say he wasn't trying to infer thatSaddam = Al Qaeda = 9/11? Its exactly what he was saying/ "not" saying with a wink and a nod.


um...thats pretty close to inferring theyre one in the same.


ok....im sold that was pretty close to saying that theyre working together right?

Glen none of the statements except one talk about the two in the future working together, ALL of them talk about the past and the present. So you're somehow reading something that isn't there.

Glen, were they NOT saying this stuff, because they DIDNT want to sell it, to sell the war? Of course they did!! I just quoted it. This is simple. The hits are there, you just have to admit it and qujit trying to hide the fact that they did it...especially when the read americans can see it.

Exactly. As has been shown, after invading Iraq, the inspections & sanctions worked at keeping Iraq from producing arms.

Of course, what's richly ironic about your comments on Rogue nations is a cursory look at Pakistan, a state that's leaked WMD information to other rogue states and organizations. Apparently they're OK, because Bush sells them fighter jets! :D

No. Take a look at those quotes I posted. There was no "someday" about it. Bush et. al. state explicitly that there were Saddam-Al Qaeda contacts.

Very, very true.

The Bush Administration never explicitly connected Hussein to 9/11 (except Cheney, but the rest of the administration distanced themselves from his remarks quickly).

However, as I've posted, the Bush Administration implicitly connected Hussein to 9/11, by connecting him to Al Qaeda.

Bush Apologists see the quotes I posted above as an example of the Administration showing "what could happen", and that's certainly true. But the Administration had another goal at the time, and that was to go to war with Iraq. Demonizing Saddam in the light of 9/11, by making whatever connections possible to Al Qaeda that they could, served this purpose fully.

Bush Apologists aren't going to agree with me on this, but that's only understandable, as they've taken everything else this Administration has said as the Gospel Truth.

I'd like to see some links where people accused the Administration of explicitly connecting Hussein to 9/11.

?

You seem to be struggling with the difference between EXPLICITLY and IMPLICITLY (and Flasch seems to be struggling with INFER and IMPLY ;) ).

Oh no, I understand. I was just trying to show how incredibly silly this argument is. Apparently you don't think it's silly.

No, I think it is silly, but probably for very different reasons. I have no doubt that the Bush administration (like the Clinton administration) enjoys being "cute" with language to imply things that aren't explicitly said. 70-80% of the American public believed Saddam was connected to 9/11 - they didn't get that impression watching American Idol. The administration capitalized on the misperception it created and now we all live with the consequences.

I must have been part of that 20-30% who didn't think he was connected - directly, anyway. Oh sure, he may have given some money to some kind of terrorist organization that gave money to so-and-so that paid for one of the hijackers plane tickets.

Really, I thought this was a war more about the intelligence we and every other nation had at the time about WMDs and the fact that he had been giving the world the finger for over 10 years. His terrorist support was just icing on the cake.

OK I'll type slowly maybe that will help.

I'm saying that the administration proclaimed that Saddam had past and current ties to terror organizations, including Al Qaeda. I don't believe it is difficult to prove that those ties existed.

I'm also saying that the administration actively proclaimed that Saddam, given his ties to terror organizations, might someday ally with a terror organization to attack the United States.

It just seems easier to believe that the dots the administration connected between Saddam and Terrorism show the future potential threat which the admin talked about, rather than the Saddam was behind 9/11 conclusion that people are drawing.

Regarding the 70%-80% of people believing that Saddam was connected to 9/11...I don't buy it. I believe it is most likely the result of either bad polling practices/interpretation or a poll designed to generate that result. Perhaps it was done by the University of Maryland(I think it was University of Maryland in any case) group that posted absurd numbers about Bush supporters believing ridiculous notions in the run up to the election.

Edit: Oh I also agree exactly with what CraigSca said above. The invasion of Iraq wasn't packaged and sold as part of the war on Terror until after the invasion when the resistance reared its ugly head. Now if we were to be discussing the legitimacy of that proclamation by the administration, then I suspect there would be some common ground.

Can you document that somehow? Because I think that is incorrect. Saddam never had any connection to Al-Q, his only connection to terrorism was to support Palestinians, which every other country in the area does.

Bullshit.


Source (The White House)

Washington Post, actually. But I assume you won't believe any poll not commissioned by Fox News, right?

Here is a write-up of the Maryland study. By the way, a simple check on the web confirms these statistics in other polls taken at the time.

xwww.pipa.org/OnlineReports/ Pres_Election_04/Report10_21_04.pdf

You may want to get your facts straight.

That study shows that 20% of Bush supporters believed that Iraq was directly involved in 9/11 (vs. 8% of Kerry supporters). However, it showed that 75% of Bush supporters thought that either they were directly involved OR gave substantial aid and support to Al Quada (to allow them to carry out the attacks).

What I find funny is that AFTER the 9/11 commission published their report (which stated that there were no material links between Iraq and Al Quada), 56% of Bush supporters thought that the report said there were!

Looking back at the archives of this board (which unfortunately do not extend to 2002 and 2001), I found some interesting quotes from early 2003 (right around the time hostilities began) about Iraq and this thread seemed as good as any to post them. I left out the overtly racist posts that really were prominent during that time, but I thought these quotes represent something of a time capsule:

detroit fan said: "The US gov will show us the smoking gun when the time is right. You don't think that Saddam has not been supporting al Qaeda? This man is Hitler reborn."

In response to my statement that Iraq was far from the worst human rights offender, rkmsuf said: "I don't believe the core of the issues revolve around human rights issues."

In the same thread rkmsuf said: "We've spent the better part of 10 yrs trying to diplomatically solve the issue of Iraq and terrorism...it got us the rubble of the Twin Towers..."

Tarkus said: "Finally, if you think this movement [the invasion] against Iraq is solely motivated by Saddam I believe that's a mistake. This movement against Iraq is about 9/11."

Tarkus said: "No, the answer is because Iraq has and is developing weapons of mass destruction that they will one day either threaten us with or give to those that will. It's not about human rights violations within a particular country at this point."

jamesUMD said: "We have established that some of the 9/11 highjackers met with Iraqi Intelligence agents in the months leading up to the event. I think what we do know in conjunction with what the Intelligence community knows, we have the proof. "

Dutch said: "What have they been doing since 1991? Who's keeping pressure on Saddam? You? No. How about, me? I've spent already 3 years of my life in this part of the world "keeping the pressure" on him. The status quo got us Al Qaeda. Somethings got to give. When he makes his nuke, he's not going to check in with the U.S. Army before he exports it to Al Qaeda."

ACStrider said: " Like I said, the administration has information which suggests that Iraq has supported Al-Quaieda...doesn't necessarily equate them, but according to the Bush doctrine, those who support terrorists are just as guilty as those who are."

Fido said: "Its not about Sadam being a Dictator - there are FAR worse than him. Its about self preservation. If he were to get a nuclear weapon into the hands of Al Queda, and they were to get it into the country (not really that tough, put it on a boat and detonate it in a harbor). How many thousands if not millions of Americans woudl die? How about chemical or biological weapons? Are we to sit idly by and not do anything to protect ourselves?"

mrskippy (I know, he is too easy to pick on, but I couldn't resist) said: "It is believed that Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden have a strong relationship. Some believe Iraq may have supplied bin Laden with materials for 9/11 and the anthrax attacks."

jamesUMD said: "The easy assumption would be that Bush's advisors are equally as inept as some would assume George Bush to be. I really do not think this is the case. We may joke about the government, and how illogical or stupid they are, but I think that they have a much better, and informed understanding of the situation than we could ever have. There is a reason that our forefathers chose a representative democracy. Everyone can have an opinion on every subject regardless of their knowledge of that subject. I would rather have a group of informed decision-makers map out the best course of action, over the mass opinion of the uninformed any day."

Arles said: "Also, to the length of the war. I don't know of anyone that gave an physical length in the administration. Some people said things like "easy" and "it shouldn't be that long". Now, the first Gulf War is viewed as one of the easiest and shortest wars in history. In that conflict, it took 43 days and had 300 US casualties. So, if that's your reference point for "easiest", then I would say an "easy or short" war would be 1-2 months with 500-800 casualties. And, the current conflict should fall pretty close to those numbers."

Strangely, a year later he said: "I guess my question is what was your expectation for this Iraqi war? It seems to me that much of the media and some of the citizens felt this would be a 4-5 month "skirmish" with few lives lost and a completely changed Iraq in a year. I don't know that the expectations people had for this were realistic. Again, going into a country like Iraq and uprooting its regime and completely changing its form of government is a pretty big undertaking. And to think it would take less than a year and with only a handful of lives lost seems unrealistic to me. And maybe that's the difference. We live in a soundbite nation and expect immediate results on everything - including war."

Arles said: "If we oust Sadaam and liberate the Iraqi people, I would think that hatred would subside a great deal, wouldn't you?"

Arles said: "As thousands and thousands of Al Quada members continue to plot and ploy in the US, with monetary and political backing from organizations like the Taliban and Sadaam Hussein? I certainly don't want to live like that."

Arles said: " We attack Iraq because we believe their government allows terrorist training camps, supplies arms and other actions that are national security matters."

CamEdwards said: "Are there other countries with worse human rights abuses? Yes, and we deal with them in other ways. This, bottom line, is not a war of liberation. It's a great side effect, but that's not why we're there."

stkelly52 said: "Whatever evidence that the US has, it must be VERY convincing. THe US high ups don't seem to have a doubt in their minds. I am certain that what ever he says will have the rest of the UN quite certain as well."

Dutch said: "The only way this [Powell's speech before the UN] is "unmoving" is to assume that Powell is part of an vast network of lies and conspiracy that stretch far and wide and Hussein is America's 'patsy'. Or it's the simple, cruel, truth."

Tarkus said: "I do find it interesting that many of the anti-war posters here have not been heard from lately. Maybe they just got tired of getting shouted down because there are more pro-war folks. Or maybe there are other more obvious reasons. Any way you look at this war it's a good thing.... I don't think there's a chance the Iraqi people as a whole won't be jubilant that the coalition forces have ousted Saddam."

sabotai, using his crystal ball, said: "I think we should go to war with Iraq. I think we should have awhile ago. But to be honest, I'm not sure is Bush's reasons for going to war are honest. IOW, I think he's using this whole weapons of mass destruction as kind of a smoke screen for the real reasons he wants to go to war. I'm not sure what those reasons are, it's really more of a feeling I get, plus lookign at how swiftly he moved his focus from Al-Quida to Iraq. He seemed to make that jump out of no where."

More grist for the mill. Including more information on the University of Maryland pollsters the Bush Apologists hate. From the Christian Science Monitor, 3/14/2003.

John - Excellent post. Thanks for doing that research.

I find this sequence in particular very disturbing:

Is it more or less of a leap than Bush invaded Iraq to trade American Blood for Oil to line Halliburton's pockets in order to pay big dividends to Cheney which somehow gets Bush re-elected?

C'mon, I'm working with reasonable suspicion--AT LEAST.

Ouch! Totally beaten by your own posts.

the side effect of the sanctions did NOT work. They did not punish Saddam and only succeeded in punishing the people of Iraq. The inspections, in hindsight, seemed to be working but the sanctions were not.

I can't help myself, because this is so easy to debunk.

You'll note from the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq:


And then there's Bush's letter to Congress before the invasion:

I hate to beat a dead horse, but is there any more proof that you need about someone's partisan hackery than repeating the same doublethink as the administration? I'll admit that my statements today do not bear much of a resemblance to my statements in 2003, but I admit that I was wrong. The Bush apologists instead try and revise history, and I think that has been obvious in this thread.

We are at war with Eurasia. We have always been at war with Eurasia.

Perhaps you have misunderstood?

John: Do you have copies of the original posts? How did two posts from different days end up on the same page? And how do we know Arles even typed these? Maybe it was you posing as Arles so you could set him up later.

No, I think its safe to assume that Arles was always right and his critics always wrong.

Why is this one of the anti-Bush/pro-Saddam/pro-Al-Qaeda crowd "Posts of the Decade"?

You might want to try something like a /sarcasm marker. Last time I tried parody in this thread, Arles kind of missed it. :p

Huh? I never said "Posts of the Decade" but thanks for referring to me as "pro-saddam" and "pro-al-qaeda."

I thought it was interesting for the statement that "the status quo [policy against Saddam] got us Al Qaeda" - unless I'm missing something.

The only documentation I can provide would be the September 11th report and the statements made by several of the commisioners in the aftermath of its release. According to those sources there had been a dialogue of some sort between Al Qaeda and the Iraqi Government(Saddam Hussein). Those contacts didn't constitute a meaningful relationship, but the contacts themselves aren't being denied as far as I know. Then certainly once we had gone into Afghanistan, there was the bit about Al Zarqawi(sp?) being given refuge in Iraq, and treated in an Iraqi hospital for wounds he received in Afghanistan.

I think it should be pointed out that Arles thought the war would be short and sweet going into it. The Bush Administration never said any such thing.

Both arguments are equally fanciful, since very little evidence exists to support either assertion. In fact, most evidence that does exist is contrarian:

Osama - Saddam link?
Saddam was a survivalist, not an idealogue, who would never host AQ because he
(1) was scared to death of religious fundamentalism
(2) was already under the watchful eye of the US air surveilance

AQ is self-financing, they don't need what little money Saddam would be able to muster as Iraq's economy continued to decline. WMD's are a different matter. It is not clear whether Saddam still had WMD's by the late 1990s. But if Saddam did have WMD's, why would he give them to AQ? That would only seem to invite certain retaliation. Remember, Saddam's primary focus was on surviving; he wouldn't do anything that would invite his certain demise. If that were the case, he would have loaded the scuds bound for Jerusalem in the 1990 war with chemical warheads...

Blood for Oil?
As for the blood for oil stuff... the links are just as tenuous, since we don't get our oil from the middle east. It had very little to do with oil at all, since Russia (production) and China (consumption) are the primary levers on the world oil market these days.

As for Haliburton, a no-bid contract was awarded, but to think that thoughts of a possible contract had a bearing on the initial decision to go to war--well, that is patently ridiculous. Remember, the administration did little planning for the aftermath of the war: I don't see how they could have really thoroughly considered how much post-war infrastructure rebuilding they would need to do, so I doubt they had much of an idea beforehand about how much they would need Haliburton. In fact, Haliburton is actually losing money with its Iraq operations--so it even seems possible that the administration either did not know how much it needed to spend, or actually tried to get Haliburton to low-ball so as not to arouse suspicion of impropriety (I don't know which, if any, is the case).

I think that the commentary on this board from both the pro- and anti- war crowd slips into analysis based on faulty logic and fanciful assertions with alarming frequency. In my posts on foreign policy topics, I try my best to come up with conclusions based on good-old logical hypothesis testing. Not sure if I do a good enough job sometimes (though this is a fake sports sim message board afterall), but that is where I am coming from...

Actually I believe Zogby is pretty much the standard for accuracy in polling nowadays.

No, but it was directed more at Arles.

Did you actually read the Joint Resolution or just post the bits above out of context.


The resolution pretty well makes it clear that the government felt that Saddam was supporting International terrorism, and that he was harboring terrorists. They reference the congressional resolutions authorizing force against nations that harbor terrorists as well as those that participated in the attacks of September 11th. It doesn't make the case that Saddam played any role in September 11th.

Oh?



Edit: How could I forget?

Well, that's an interesting reading of the document.... As I said before, the Bush Apologists are going to believe what they want to believe, despite the evidence.

I was just looking up old quotes (to post something similar to what flere already posted), and found this:

Meet the Press, March 16, 2003.

Kind of a kick in the face to the revisionists who say that everyone in the world thought Saddam had WMD's, isn't it?

....Glen is right, actually, they did find that one guy who killed the wheel chaired American on that ship in the MEd. so they were harboring international terrorists. I believe that was Islamic Jihad but I could be way wrong there. Anyways, splitting hairs....they said "international terrorism" and a few sentences later bush would say international terrorism includes Al Qaeda so that means A = C...but I digress, the IRA is not affiliated with Al Qaeda yet we consider them International Terrorists so it really doesn't hold water. Like Clinton ( :) ) by choosing their words and being as cloudy and murky as possible they leave it up to you to decide. Luckily for them, most Americans thought that Bush and co. We're talking about Saddam and 9/11...most that that Saddam and Al Qaeda were linked (i mean what is a relationship anyways? - everyone has a relationship [so thats again a cloudy word])....I think if the Right would simply admit the fault and move on, most American's would be cool with it (I know I would as I still am glad we knocked Saddam out) but I think that theyre afraid that by admitting to the obvious (at least to most American's) that that will be immediately followed by a call to bring the troops home. I know Im against that so to me its simply quibbling and trying to deny the obvious (obvious in that poll #'s support it along with the quotes documented)

That Meet the Press is hilarious, everyone should read it. Here is another excerpt:

For the record, oil production today in Iraq is under 2 million barrels a day, 20% lower than it was before the war, and the war in Iraq currently has cost us $180 billion. I think it is clear that the people out there that are saying that none of these things could have been foreseen, that everyone thought the same as the administration, are completely revising history.

I don't think I am completely a Bush Apologist, as there are plenty of things the President has done, that I completely disagree with. As for the Maryland Pollsters(PIPA). I think they are pretty biased in their interpretation of poll results....

He asserts that it is the administration connecting these dots..which I find odd since they really weren't doing so overtly, as many Bush haters have said.

The numbers this group has come up with in the past seem to be as phony to me as the Poll during the California Recall election that showed Cruz Bustamante ahead of Ahnold by some 20 points. Polls aren't inherently unbiased unless those conducting them take pains to do so. The PIPA group doesn't really seem all that interested in remaining non-partisan, therefore I question the validity of some of their work.

I stand corrected in that members of the Administration did, as you illustrated, say that the war would be relatively short. The president routinely said the matter would take years and cost thousands of lives. This makes me really regret*not* previously stating that the war was in fact over in a short period of time. It is simply the security of Iraq that our troops are now working on. In other words...The shooting war is over(mission accomplished) we are now in a police action. It is just that in this case police work/security is being done by the millitary.

Fair enough, however I would be willing to bet that the admin. would never state that it is a "police situation" as it would leave the door open for opponents to start the "bring our troops home" talk...eventhough what you said is accurate.

It is stated in plain english that Saddam was Harboring terrorists. It was stated that Congress was authorizing the use of force on Iraq because, among other reasons...they had authorized the use of force on nations that were harboring terrorists.

It is easier to read what the document explicitly states, than to read into it what you are trying to. Just because September 11th is mentioned in the Resolution, doesn't mean that Iraq is being linked to September 11th. Rather the authorization to use force on Iraq partly relies on the previous resolution authorizing force against nations that would harbor terrorists or actually aided in the September 11th attacks.

I think you are correct with that assertion. Rather than call it police work or law enforcement, the admin is lumping it in with the "war on Terror". I'm not exactly happy with that characterization, although it is more true today that it was two years ago when they first started making the claim.

we agree

If you would have looked at the context (too much to ask - I guess), you would have seen I was talking about the military campaign to remove the regime. There's no real baseline (outside of WWII - which took decades) for the process of building a major nation from losing a war and regime change to the point of self-sufficiency - which seems to be what you were inferring.

Again, we have a smenatics issue and a lack of context. The military effort to remove Saddam was fairly quick. The effort to help create a new regime was going to be much more difficult and time consuming. It seems to me that John is making no attempt to look at the context of these posts and differ between

A) the military effort to remove Saddam (I stated it should take a few months and a couple hundred casualties).

B) the total US and world effort to help take Iraq from a dictatorship to a self-sufficient democratic form of government (which I stated would be a tough road).

But, hey, why bring context into such a fun game of cherry picking statements :rolleyes:

dola, to help with the context, the original post I responded to dealt with the apparant "quagmire" that the battle for Baghdad could turn into:
My response was tailored towards this assault to remove Saddam and was not implying the rebuilding of Iraq and entire democratic form of government would be "easy or short".

The second comment was in response to the act of building a new Iraq nation and removing the regime. So, with the proper context provided, I stand by both statements that the effort to remove Saddam from power was not going to be akin to "vietnam" (as one of the original posters alluded to). But, that the effort to take a leaderless Iraq that dealt with tyranny for decades and turn it into a self-sufficient and representative government was going to be a tough road.

I think those Navy boys did a great job, no matter what the Dem's tell us.

Ive never disagreed with that sentiment...All of our military have done a great job of Warring...not such a great job of policing but I think its a task they were not trained properly for. Not their fault and I wish them God speed.

EDIT:

Just remember its Bush that cut a lot of stuff for the VA, Veterans and Bases.

The mission those Navy Boys accomplished had nothing to do with what you are suggesting. The banner was for their part in toppling Saddam Hussein and they did a marvelous job without *.

The hard-line Democrats use that sign against the military for political gain. They should be ashamed of themselves.

I can say I agree 100% with an entire statement by Flasch. What is the world coming to? ;)

There should be a 'Spin of the Month' award.

Garbage, and the admin. started reacting to the reaction in due course, flipping it this way and that. AT first defending it, then saying it was someone without permission, then distancing and now trying to forget it happened...so how do you come up with your point of you that the Right SPECIFICALLY put that up (or the navy put that up, ["Mission Accomplished"], in a specific reference to the NAVY ONLY, leaving all other branches out. c'mon....thats ridiculous...I guess it's too bad for the Army, air Force, Marines, Coast gaurd, etc. They apparently did not accomplish the mission, according to Dutch [tongue in cheek].

As a member of the Air Force, I was glad to see it. Morale Boost. The speech he gave underneath that sign specifically stated that toppling Saddam wasn't the end. That there was much hard and dangerous work still to be done and with many challenges.

That's not spin.

In any event, everybody blames hard-line Democrats for spinning it unethically. The problem these days with the Dem's is they are so busy defending those hard-liners instead of distancing themselves from them.

"Gitmo is a Russian Gulag" would win--no?

*looks around*

I'm sorry. I must be in the wrong place.

*slowly backs out*

oh that's what it means now? funny, before it somehow meant "we got saddam" but obviously that has changed. just because they never explicitly said what the banner was for, it's pretty obvious what it was meant to portray and it certainly wasn't "the shooting war is over"

I wouldn't call them hard-line democrats as much as I would say idiots with a mic. Its not like normal republicans haven't tried to distance themselves from their "hard-liners". I just think there are a lot of people on both sides of the aisle who have become too full of themselves, and I have no problem putting them in their place. Unfortunately, its the outspoken idiots who become the public sees and then become the face of the party (and then for some reason are actually promoted by the party to power (see DeLay and Dean).

Lets face it, both parties have been given huge opportunities to step up on various issues and they completely blow it by putting these blowhards in front of the mic. Look at the dems, they have decent support on the war, but the leadership has no idea what to do. They just want to say whatever will get people talking, even if they're not talking about the right things. They need to understand that there can be soundbites that don't have to take an extreme psycho postion, and the populace will still hear it. McCain and company closer to the middle seem to understand that... its a shame the rest of the jackasses are the ones not listening.

The fact of the matter is that no one spelled out exactly what that banner meant, but it is pretty reasonable to believe it was applicable to the situation at hand. He was celebrating on a ship that was returning from a successful campaign to overthrow a foreign capital. For the sailors in that battle group, the war was over. I have pretty well always maintained that the war in Iraq ended with the capitulation of the Iraqi government. From that moment on our soldiers weren't fighting a war, they were essentially enforcing the rule of law...or trying to do so. I sometimes get flack for referring to "post war" Iraq, but in reality that is what it is.