{"id":4220,"date":"2010-07-05T22:42:54","date_gmt":"2010-07-06T02:42:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/?p=4220"},"modified":"2010-07-06T00:24:45","modified_gmt":"2010-07-06T04:24:45","slug":"only-hope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/2010\/07\/05\/only-hope\/","title":{"rendered":"about<\/em> the road to Iraq: our only HOPE…"},"content":{"rendered":"
[see the road to Iraq…<\/strong><\/a>]<\/div>\n

The US Process<\/font><\/strong><\/u>: I’m embarrassed by the paucity of thought that went into the invasion of Iraq. I remember thinking when they began to discuss it publicly in Sepember 2002 thinking, "What are they talking about?" I got into an email debate with old highschool classmates about it and got slammed for even questioning why we were suddenly focusing on Iraq. Within a month, Congress had authorized the use of force. Again I was aghast that people like John Kerry and Hillary Clinton voted in favor of it.<\/p>\n

In retrospect, there are some things we didn’t really know at the time. In a then obscure office of the Department of Justice, two lawyers, Jay Bybee and John Yoo were rewriting the law as fast as it was passed. They invalidated the Congressional Mandate to work through the UN. Then, when the UN acted, they pronounced that the UN had no authority over the President. How they justified saying that is beyond my comprehension. I guess it was just over a year after 911 and we were still sufficiently crazy not to notice that Bush and Cheney were disdainful of the UN.  In retrospect, The UN was absolutely correct in not authorizing the use of force. It was doing exactly what it was founded to do, keep rogue states [us] from starting spurious wars. How was our invasion of Iraq any different from Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait? It wasn’t.<\/p>\n

We had a legitimate complaint that Hussein was ignoring the UN Mandates and a legitimate request that inspections be resumed. On the other hand, we had no real proof that Hussein was building WMD or that he was in league with al Qaeda. In fact, both of those complaints were dead wrong, and we actually knew that before we invaded. The true reason for our invasion was regime change –  not a valid reason to use military force. It was an illegal war. If there were a functioning world court, we would be tried and convicted of the Crime of Aggression. Here’s the whole process in the US again – one Congressional vote and two secret Memos that changed the laws without oversight or review – pitiful: <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
10\/02\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nUS CONGRESS: AUTHORIZATION FOR THE USE OF MILITARY FORCE AGAINST IRAQ<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nSUPPORT FOR UNITED STATES DIPLOMATIC EFFORTS. <\/strong><\/p>\n
The Congress of the United States supports the efforts by the President to–<\/div>\n
    \n
  • \n
    strictly enforce through the United Nations Security Council all relevant Security Council resolutions applicable to Iraq and encourages him in those efforts; and<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    obtain prompt and decisive action by the Security Council to ensure that Iraq abandons its strategy of delay, evasion and noncompliance and promptly and strictly complies with all relevant Security Council resolutions.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
    AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES – The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be necessary and appropriate in order to–<\/div>\n
      \n
    • \n
      defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq; and<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
    • \n
      enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq.<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

      <\/sup><\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

10\/23\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nOLC DOJ: AUTHORITY OF THE PRESIDENT UNDER DOMESTIC AND INTERNATIONAL LAW TO USE MILITARY FORCE AGAINST IRAQ<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nThe President possesses constitutional authority to use military force against Iraq to protect United States national interests. This independent constitutional authority is supplemented by congressional authorization in the form of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution. Using force against Iraq would be consistent with international law because it would be authorized by the United Nations Security Council or would be justified as anticipatory self-defense.<\/sup><\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
11\/08\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nUN Security Council: UNSR 1441
<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nThe UN Security Council unanimously passes this "last chance" resolution demanding that Iraq comply with international monitoring of his military programs with inspections.<\/sup><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
11\/08\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nOLC DOJ: EFFECT OF A RECENT UNITED NATIONS SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTION ON THE AUTHORITY OF THE PRESIDENT UNDER INTERNATIONAL LAW TO USE MILITARY FORCE AGAINST IRAQ<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nUnited Nations Security Council Resolution 1441 does not alter the legal authority, under international law, granted by existing U.N. Security Council resolutions to use force against Iraq.<\/font><\/sup><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

But beyond the manipulation of the laws and Congress, there are some things that are unconscionable – torturing prisoners to get them to say that al Qaeda and Iraq were in league, promoting the Niger Uranium Hoax as if it were fact, promoting the testimony of "curveball" who even the German interrogators didn’t believe, wiretapping the UN Security Council during their deliberations, having Colin Powell lie to the entire world in his UN speech, outing a CIA Agent to discredit her husband for telling the truth, "swift-boating John Kerry, wiretapping American civilians, throwing no-bid contracts to the VP’s former company, turning the DOJ into a political arm of their Party, irresponsibly cutting taxes to get votes, borrowing from China to pay the war debt, and all the many things we don’t yet know about  or I forgot to mention – the list is very very long. One wonders if it’s possible to ever really recover from that level of corruption. <\/p>\n

The UK Process<\/font><\/strong><\/u>: Before the Chilcot Inquiry, I thought Prime Minister Tony Blair had been pulled along by the Bush Administration, motivated by loyalty, or maybe by horror at 911. In England, they say it less sympathetically – that he was Bush’s Lackey. But the revelations of their Inquiry have me thinking about it differently. In each of his visits with Bush, Blair pledged his loyalty to the invasion:<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
04\/06\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nBUSH AND BLAIR MEET AT THE CRAWFORD RANCH<\/font><\/a> <\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nBush and Blair agree on Regime Change as the strategy for Iraq.<\/sup><\/font> <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
09\/08\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nBUSH AND BLAIR MEET AT CAMP DAVID<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nBush agrees to work through the UN. Blair agrees to stick with the US no matter what.<\/sup><\/font> <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
01\/31\/2003<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nBLAIR VISITS BUSH<\/font><\/a>
<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\nJanuary 31, 2003, Blair flew to Washington for a meeting with Bush. Manning records the president – in a minute previously disclosed – telling Blair that military action would be taken with or without a second security council resolution and the bombing would begin in mid-March 2003. The note records Blair’s reaction: "The prime minister said he was solidly with the president."<\/font><\/sup><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

So in spite of the fact that Blair seems to have been a voice of restraint, convincing Bush to work through the UN, he was himself solidly behind the idea of regime change from the start. He just had a more difficult force to deal with back home – mainly Lord Peter Goldsmith – England’s Attorney General.<\/p>\n

But there’s another issue that seems apparent in the Chilcot Inquiry. From my perspective, even Lord Goldsmith doesn’t occupy very high moral ground. He hid from looking at invading Iraq for itself based on British law and morality. Even as the voice of restraint, he based his legal decisions on the very vague and unenforceable international law. Until the eleventh hour, he tried to defer the decision to the United Nations. And when he finally caved in to the pressure from Blair, he still dodged the decision saying that the UN really meant it was okay. <\/p>\n

So while I do respect the British for struggling longer with the issue than we did, in the end they didn’t really grapple with it directly, instead Lord Goldsmith leaned on a US interpretation of the UN Resolution – an interpretation that was at first and last glance, clearly wrong. But that’s not all. They knew early on that President Bush was trumping up a reason to go to war…<\/p>\n\n\n\n
07\/23\/2002<\/font><\/strong><\/td>\nDOWNING STREET MEMO<\/font><\/a><\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
 <\/td>\n"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 military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.<\/span> The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime’s record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action."<\/font><\/sup> <\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n

… and they went along with him. There was even more. The British went along with the Niger Uranium Hoax even longer than we did, publishing a white paper claiming to have independent corroboration that Iraq was after or had purchased African Uranium ore – not at all true. And there was Dr. David Kelly<\/font><\/strong>, a British Scientist who had been a weapons inspector in Iraq. He softly blew a whistle claiming that they were "sexing up" the charges against Iraq. He was first publicly humiliated, and then died in what was called a suicide, but looks a lot more like a murder to many of us – including me. So in the end, it seems that the UK was as tawdry in it’s decision to invade Iraq as we were. Just because they were following our lead doesn’t excuse what they did.<\/p>\n

Redemption<\/font><\/strong><\/u>: I don’t think we can do it – what Obama wants us to do. Looking forward just leaves us open to repeat. We never looked back at how we ended up fighting in Viet Nam [The Gulf of Tonkin Incident]. It never happened. We went into a war that cost us 58,000 soldiers and lots more based on a provocation that never occurred. We didn’t look back, and now we’ve done it again in Iraq. We entered a costly, illegal war in Iraq for no valid reason. We can’t afford to simply move on as if it didn’t happen. We’ll do it again. And if we don’t address the Bush Administration’s folly, there are enough wrong-thinking forces in the country to put the same kind of crazy Administration back in the White House. The only buffer we have is to spread the truth far and wide. To paraphrase Obama, our only HOPE. At least the British are having a crack at it with the Chilcot Inquiry… <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[see the road to Iraq…] The US Process: I’m embarrassed by the paucity of thought that went into the invasion of Iraq. I remember thinking when they began to discuss it publicly in Sepember 2002 thinking, "What are they talking about?" I got into an email debate with old highschool classmates about it and got […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4220\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/1boringoldman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}