It's irrelevant because he wasn't a member of the Bush Administration and didn't participate in the stove-piping and cherry picking. End of story. What? No - you asked what the Bush administration should have done. I said they should have made judgments based on ALL available intelligence and not solely the kind that it wanted to see. That's a very simple and obvious answer. If you can't understand it then you don't have sufficient background in what occurred.
Take a step back: as illustrated, there was a wide-spread consensus that a widespread danger lurked. Do you want me to list all the names? I think the cherry-picking went on when it came to illustrating their justification but isn't that really after the decision is made? What background am I missing?
A danger of what lurked, there was no nuclear program for saddam to sell a nuke to some terrorists. what danger TO THE US or even Israel did Saddam present?
Take a step back - who cares what a bunch of minority party senators believed when the Bush Administartion, which had access to more intelligence, including contrary intelligence, did not base their actions on their views. It's irrelevant whatever XYZ senator said - the President made the decision to go to war on his own. Congratulations - you just torpedoed your own argument. You're damn right that they did this. They made an irresponsible decision to go to war regardless of what the intelligence said and then used it in a post-hoc fashion as justification. I could start but I don't have all day. I don't think it matters as you've already conceded the major point above.
1. There was intel that he was some uncertain time away from having nuclear capabilities and he already had and had already used bio-chemical weapons 2. Saddam admitted promoting that posture to keep Iran at bay. Better to assume him a liar?
No such thing happened. How high do you think the intel reports could be stacked? How much was in accord? The rest not. From which pile would you expect them to pull to justify their plan? Nothing is torpedoed. That is what anyone does. I bet you left some things off your resume. Same principle.
There was a way to keep him from getting nukes, and see through his bluff about what weapons he had. And it didn't involve war. It's called inspectors and they were doing just that.
Again - you're effecitvely admitting that they made a decision solely on what they wanted to believe rather than an impartial judgment. I have a problem with that, especially given the cost of this mistake - evidently you don't.
No, that's not what I said. I'm "guessing" that the majority of intelligence supported the existence of WMDs since that is what most of the decision-makers from the White House through the Senate and beyond to world opinion believed. See the earlier-referenced quotes. I'm saying that they chose particular elements of the intel that most boldly illustrated the Administration's conclusion. Some of that was, in retrospect, flawed. That is after-the-fact of war-planning. You act as if they knew for certain exactly which pieces of intel were flawed and which were not and still treated them unequally (meaning to prefer the flawed).
"In making the case for war, the administration repeatedly presented intelligence as fact when it was unsubstantiated, contradicted or even nonexistent." -- Sen John D. Rockefeller, June 2008 "There has been some debate over how 'imminent' a threat Iraq poses. I do believe Iraq poses an imminent threat. I also believe after September 11, that question is increasingly outdated. . . . To insist on further evidence could put some of our fellow Americans at risk. Can we afford to take that chance? I do not think we can." -- Sen John D. Rockefeller, October 2002 pretty much sums up the entire debate right there, and 90 percent of the threads in the D&D since.
most of the people on this sight who oppose this war opposed it in 03. don't make bust you over the head with the search function.
It is what you said. They knew which ones supported their position and which ones didn't. THe ones that did were treated with greater weight, particularly by the Office of Special Plans, while those that didn't were discarded, also by the OSP. This has been established, validated and documented. You don't have a good background in thsi as I had suspected previously.
Pretty much sums up when the Bush Administration had made its decision to invade Iraq and why the justifications were all post-hoc and trumped up, as the report chroncles:
Once you've made a decision it doesn't matter what you throw away. The decision they made was not out of line with what was generally presumed to be the case.
Yes it does. Legally and logically. What was presumed to be the case was presumed to be the case by reason of the deliberate exclusion of contrary data. I have a problem with that, especially given the cost of this mistake - evidently you don't.
When and where are you filing suit? You're a lawyer right? BTW, what exactly does you coversheet prove. I saw both "Day of the Condor" and "War Games." Is what is on the inside any more than useful contingency planning? You don't know that. Is that why you want to "protect" Rockefeller?
^I do know that. I have not slept under a rock - instead I have followed the last 5 years worth of evidence which has indicated that that is exactly what occurred - a fact that you have already conceded in any event. As I said before - you obviously don't have much factual background on this, you haven't cited any, and your continuing participation in this conversation serves only to highlight your ignorance in this area.
Did not. Who uses the conflicting evidence to justify their decision? Nobody. Every bit of intel is suspect. The intel reports that end up being true are not glowing in the dark; they look like every other report. You make a decision and move forward. Sure there was a stout inclination to go after Iraq, but there was intel to justify that decision. See (again) the long list of politicos who agreed before the fact that we couldn't afford to sit around twiddling our thumbs regarding Iraq. There was intel pointing to WMD. Others thought the same. Saddam furthered those impressions.
My exact thoughts. The article embraces The Republican Talking Points wrt Iraq: The whole world thought that Sadam had WMD (except for the UN weapons team, old Europe, etc). Congress thought that Sadam had WMD since they used the same intell as the President (except they actually only used the intell that the Admin stove piped). The US intell is broke, since they give such bad advice (except for the people who gave good advice and were marginalized / fired / retired).
