NIE Report: Iraq Was No Threat At All...and More.

Mr. C, it's not a new idea, but this is very well said. Kudos to you, sir. The truth will likely lie somewhere between those two views, mix them together.

Okay, I'm signing off. I get too testy.

MacB, yes, I confirm those tactics. Just don't bother, especially when you've got the Mr. C's et alia of the world available for discussion.

 

It has nothing to do with left, right, and middle. It has to do with the American track record in the Middle East. Fundamentalism was sparked and supported by the US to get the Soviets out of Afghanistan, this is now a blowback situation. The Iranian situation is a result of US meddling in their internal affairs. 9-11 is a result of American troops stationed in Saudi Arabia. Saddam Hussein existed because the US supported his rise to power and emboldened him by supporting his war with Iran. The Israeli/Palestinian situation is exacerbated because the US runs interference for Israel through the UN, favors them while negotiating as a supposed facilitator for peace, funds them as basically a welfare state, and also arms them. The spreading of fanatical forms of Islam is also on America's platter because we prop up the Saudi regime that funds that fanaticism. I don't know if it would be possible to screw up a region any more than what we've done with our involvement. All of these cases are examples of actions for short term interests that are having negative long term effects. Why anyone would believe that this latest side stepping the UN, preemptive war on "bad intel" won't be added to this impressive list is beyond me.

 

It didn't get us 9/11 from Iraq. I'm all for going after the organization behind 9/11. Let's take them out. But Germany, Denmark, Sweeden, and Spain, aren't on my list of countries to attack.

You may be asking why I listed those countries... The answer is like, Iraq, they had nothing to do with 9/11.

 

Mr. Clutch,

In addition to the points brought up by other posters, I wanted to offer this question (with a quote from you included):

If in fact "the right believes the US can help reform the Middle East, by toppling rogue regimes, spreading democratic values, and opening up their economies" then why did Bush not devise a plan to do these three things before entering Iraq?

Ideologically, it sounds good to do those three things, but based on what we were told before and what we've been told now, I don't think it's arguable that we went into Iraq with these things weighing most heavily in mind. And even if we did, then no matter where you stand politically, I think you'd have to agree that our insufficient planning (towards these goals) has mitigated any success we hoped for.

In short, I just don't buy it that we went in here to reform the Middle East; we had a plan of attack, but we didn't have plan of reform. That alone speaks volumes.


On a similar note, I encourage you to take a look at this review of a book on regime change. The reviewer, Ivo Daalder, served on the national security council in the 90's and is quite a moderate. I think this underscores our spotty record on regime change and reform through the Iran example (which MacBeth alluded to)

http://www.brook.edu/views/articles/daalder/20030723.htm

 

Macbeth, it's not that I want to adopt an "above the fray" approach. It's just that we seem to keep going aroud in circles. At some point we just have to come to an understanding of each others' positions and agree to disagree (not that we can't go into another thread and start a whole new argument).

I understand that you feel this war is wrong for many reasons. However, I think there are many long- term interests people are not looking at- mainly long- term security interests. How are we going to deal with an increasingly volatile Middle East, with an exploding population of young men, who have access to oil revenues and new technologies, and often follow extreme ideologies?

While you may consider "surrending what we stand for" a long- term interest, I think it's debatable whether we really are giving up our principles. Bush I agree, did not approach things the right way, but the principles behing the war were correct.

 

Because Bush did not believe in such policies...in fact, he at times criticized them. Members of his staff promoted such actions for a long time, but until 911, Bush did not agree. Apparently, it was a big enough jolt to almost completely reverse his foreign policy beliefs.

 

Did anyone ever consider that the WMD argument supplied by the Bush administration was a ploy to get public support instead of THE reason we were planning to invade Iraq?? Having spent the better part of my life living in Saudi Arabia, I have followed the events the past two years in the middle east as close, if not significantly closer, than anyone. I can tell you that the Arab World is a society where the thoughts of the masses can be easily controlled. In Saudi Arabia, not much outside of the Quran was taught to grade school students up until the early to mid-90's. As a result, very few Saudis are equipped with the knowledge to see things and analyze things for themselves. In fact, most Saudis don't believe they are in control of anything in their lives, instead believing that everything that happens, does so because God has pre-ordained it. A good example is the explanation a Saudi would give you for the way they drive (which is basically as fast as the car will allow, cops included. Saudi Arabia is one country where the cops will speed past you travelling more than 70 km/hr over the speed limit when they're not even in pursuit). A Saudi would tell you that if Allah wanted him to die in a car crash, Allah would have made his car lose control and crash. Therefore, I may as well drive as fast as I want to. On top of that, their law is the law of the Quran instead of two separate entities as we are used to in America. So if it is prohibited in the Quran, it is prohibited by Saudi law. Then you have the mosque. One of the most influential men in Saudi Arabia (and in the rest of the middle east for that matter) is the speaker at the local mosque. Almost everything that comes out of these men's mouths is taken as the word of God. I'm not saying all speakers at the mosques say bad, influential things about the west, but enough of them do and have been doing so for some time. The result is a very large segment of the Saudi population that believes that America is the devil and Americans are infidels. Now in the last decade, we've seen Arab people with these anti-west points of views organizing into well funded groups like Al-Qaeda. Now you have a largely ignorant people, that hate the west, that are now well-funded and trained to carry out their hatred towards the west in ways they were previously unable to. September 11th was only the second example, but by far the biggest statment to date, of these groups' hatred spilling over onto the American landscape.

So what I think is the Bush administration saw all the facts above that I saw in the time of lived in Saudi Arabia. They saw that a large faction of the uneducated Arab World now was organized and had the ability to carry out terrible attacks on our citizenry. Combine that with the fact that we are a free society that can not protect it's borders adequately to prevent such future attacks if we want to remain the free society that America has always been proud of. The Bush administration saw that America was a sitting duck. Being a sitting duck would not have been acceptable to our public or to the media as it damn well shouldn't be so the Bush administration started looking into actions they could take to try and delay the inevitable attack. The best one that they came across was Saddam Hussein and Iraq. In Iraq you had a ruthless billionaire dictator which the whole world all ready disliked and it just so happens that Iraq had the perfect geography-- it bordered Saudi Arabia to the south, Syria to the west, and Iran to the east, the three most problematic nations for the U.S. in the middle east, all three combining to finance the majority of the world's terrorism. Now here comes the part where those of you that want to bash Bush should be making your case. The U.S. decided that by occupying Iraq and maintaining a strong U.S. military presence there, they have a much stronger position at the bargaining table when it came time to try and achieve the goal America was trying to achieve (rid America of the threat of middle eastern born terrorism). The military action against Iraq was a message to Syria, Iran, and Saudi Arabia-- "We're in your backyard now and you see what we are willing to do to achieve our goals. It's your move now and we suggest you give extra thought to the military machine we have in the Iraqi desert just a few hundred kilometers away".

Now I think that is your justification for war in Iraq. Now imagine the President of the United States going to the United Nations or the people with that justification for the war. In our politically correct society, his administration and his plan would have gone down in flames. So the question is, did the administration do the right thing and it is maybe the toughest debate in the history of American politics. Is occupying a foreign land justified as a PRECAUTION against future domestic terrorism? While I'd say America has no right to occupy a foreign land without adequate proof, I'd also say there was no other way to get that proof without occupying the foreign land. So the administration's choice was (a) be a sitting duck by taking no action and be the good guy, or (b) be the bad guy, occupy Iraq, and just maybe delay and decrease the chances of another Septmeber 11th or something far worse. So Americans have to ask themselves is doing the nice thing the right decision here or is breaking all the old rules the correct course of action. I tend to think the Bush administration made the right move and I applaud them for being the rare administration that does the right thing and not the popular thing with regards to the country's well being.

 

I love this argument. Its makes absolutely NO sense.

Ridiculous. Fundamentalism was on the move BEFORE THE SOVIET INVASION of Afghanistan. Simply revisionism to say that we created it.

Ah, very interesting. So you counterfactually assume there would not have been fundamentalism in Iran absent US support for the Shah. Interesting since he was repressing fundamentalism all those years. One would think then, logically, that fundamentalism would have risen to power MUCH SOONER without the repression, not in its absence. Take Saudi Arabia for example, there is not a strict fundamentalist regime in power because the regime (allegedly 'propped up' by the US) has repressed the fudamentalists, as also in Egypt.

Let's take these two together...the reason being that it was TWO UN ACTIONS that let to 9/11. It was a UN intervention to remove Kuwait from Iraq. It was under UN auspices that US troops were in Saudi Arabia at all. It was a UN action in Somalia, which Osama is quoted verbatim is what made him decide we were (decadent) enough to take on. I wonder how the current Administration could EVER think acting through the UN might be to our disadvantage...

Let's just say 'load of crap.' Saddam was not propped up by just the US, but also by our enemies at the time, the Soviet Urnion, and by the Chinese, and by our 'allies' the French and other Europeans. Saddam was NOT a creation of US intervention. Let's take a short test. What kind of missles did Saddam use? Ah, the Scud (Chinese). What kind of tanks? Ah, the T-something or another (Soviet). What kind of fighter planes? Ah, the MiGs. What kind of anti-ship missle (like the one that hit the US ship in the Gulf? Ah, the Exocet (French). Gee, that sure is a picture of a US led arms buildup, isn't it?

Hmmm, who guaranteed Israeli survival vis-a-vis invading Arab countries by making them a nuclear power? The US? Ah, no. The French. Did the Arab world give a crap about the Palestinians before it became convenient to focus their populations on an outside issue like anti-americanism? Uh, no. They didn't give a crap about Palestinians before that.

Again, an interesting hypothesis. If we didn't prop up a regime that represses fundamentalists, what would happen? Can you say a 'fundamentalist regime.' So we are at a net zero loss even if your theory is true. Except we would have had a lot more years of a fundamentalist regime in Saudi Arabia. THAT sounds productive.

The good part is that most of the actions you talk about, like most of the rest of the US bashing crowd, center around actions taken a LONG time ago, like supporting the Shah. THAT was a different world, and at the time the risk posed by fundamentalists was DWARFED by the threat from the Soviet Union. Now that the USSR is gone, fundamentalists are next on the agenda. I find it so ironic that those who continually lambast US support for dictators like Saddam NOW lambast us for NOT supporting those dictators, but for in actuality REMOVING those dictators. THAT makes sense, lol.

 

I have had the exact same experience in threads about the war and threads about prohibition. It is just so much easier to make something up about somebody (anti-American, druggie) than to actually ... <gasp> ... do some research or open your mind.

I actually see you as fairly party neutral. You seem to be ver centrist and balanced in your analysis. I find you a refreshing voice. You say you weren't looking for it, but yay MacBeth anyway.

Agreed on both points.

 

Vik, I've been meaning to reply to this, I've just been to busy!

Why don't you think that reform weighed heavily in Bush's mind as we went into Iraq? While at times our military looks unprepared in Iraq, I think they were just taken off-guard by the difficulty of the situation. The Administration has repeatedly said they will stay as long as it takes. They are making sure a democratic government takes root in Iraq. They have restarted the Palestinain-Israeli conflict.

And if we didn't go to reform the Middle East, then what was it? I don't think the WMD's were the "real" reason.

That's an interesting link you gave me, and I completely agree that unintended consequences are the scariest part of this. But it's also fair to point out that the US accomplished it's original goal of stopping the spread of communism. Things potentially could have been much worse had a brutal communist government taken over. Also, you cannot blame the US for the conditions in place in the Middle East. It's not like the US policies automatically bred extremism and fundamentalism on there own- there was poverty and lack of freedom there long before the US was arrived.

I agree that many of our policies in the Middle East and other places have not had mixed results, but we have also had many successes in our history. But this has the potential to be a great success. We are not propping up a dictator, we are not using the CIA to sell arms to someone, and we are not making a Machiavelian decision to support one dictator to stop another. For those reasons and others, this is a very different situation than from the Cold War days.

 

Mr. C. very interesting. I don't even think 'reforming the ME or spreading democracy to the ME is a bad goal. I don't doubt that it is one of the reasons that the administration wanted so badly to go into Iraq.

I disagree with how the plan was put into action. I don't think the way to reform a region is by a pre-emptive attack on a country based on exaggerated, and in some cases false public reasons. It doesn't lend any credibility to the reformer, and any future plans from that party, no matter valid they might be will forever be looked on with skepticism.

I think a better idea would have been to play a more even role in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, discuss ending or changing the sanctions in Iraq, and be more consistent with supporting democracy in the region.

By being more consistent I mean not propping up oppressive regimes in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, etc. Especially don't hide and cover up 28 pages of Saudi deeds in 9/11 reports. By doing this public opinion of the U.S. in the region will change at the grass roots level, which is where it needs to change if we want a democracy to be successful. Instead it appears that some oppressive regimes are ok, and will be supported by the U.S., while others will be attacked, unprovoked.

Just starting by being tougher on Israeli oppression would be a huge start in changing public opinion. I don't say we do it, in order to give into terrorists, but that we do this because it's the right thing to do. Also if you want to 'sell' people on democracy, show them that it stands for justice above self interest, and lead by example and demonstrating the ideals you hope the ME to immulate.

 

Originally posted by HayesStreet
Ridiculous. Fundamentalism was on the move BEFORE THE SOVIET INVASION of Afghanistan. Simply revisionism to say that we created it.

The rise of the Mujahedeen and Bin Laden is on America's plate. Who gave them all these shoulder mounted Stingers that we're scared they'll start shooting our airliners down with? Revisionism my ass.

Ah, very interesting. So you counterfactually assume there would not have been fundamentalism in Iran absent US support for the Shah. Interesting since he was repressing fundamentalism all those years. One would think then, logically, that fundamentalism would have risen to power MUCH SOONER without the repression, not in its absence. Take Saudi Arabia for example, there is not a strict fundamentalist regime in power because the regime (allegedly 'propped up' by the US) has repressed the fudamentalists, as also in Egypt.

The result of our involvement in Iran is fundamentalism, support for terrorist organizations, and no relations. You're simply speculating with your crystal ball. I could do so likewise and say that Democracy might have been in Iran 20 years ago if not for our involvement. We see how they're progressing now without our involvement.

Let's take these two together...the reason being that it was TWO UN ACTIONS that let to 9/11. It was a UN intervention to remove Kuwait from Iraq. It was under UN auspices that US troops were in Saudi Arabia at all. It was a UN action in Somalia, which Osama is quoted verbatim is what made him decide we were (decadent) enough to take on. I wonder how the current Administration could EVER think acting through the UN might be to our disadvantage...

Which UN resolution dealt with stationing US troops in Saudi Arabia for a decade? I must have missed that one.

Let's just say 'load of crap.' Saddam was not propped up by just the US, but also by our enemies at the time, the Soviet Urnion, and by the Chinese, and by our 'allies' the French and other Europeans. Saddam was NOT a creation of US intervention. Let's take a short test. What kind of missles did Saddam use? Ah, the Scud (Chinese). What kind of tanks? Ah, the T-something or another (Soviet). What kind of fighter planes? Ah, the MiGs. What kind of anti-ship missle (like the one that hit the US ship in the Gulf? Ah, the Exocet (French). Gee, that sure is a picture of a US led arms buildup, isn't it?

I said he was supported and emboldened. Not propped up, not armed, but supported and emboldened. Having trouble reading are we? Shall I produce a nice photo op of Rumsfeld and Saddam or go over the Iraq/Iran war details?

Hmmm, who guaranteed Israeli survival vis-a-vis invading Arab countries by making them a nuclear power? The US? Ah, no. The French. Did the Arab world give a crap about the Palestinians before it became convenient to focus their populations on an outside issue like anti-americanism? Uh, no. They didn't give a crap about Palestinians before that.

Is that why all those French flags are burned in the streets all the time, because the Irsaeli attack choppers are French technology, because those weapons are French, because the tanks are French technology, because the French use their UNSC veto to stop action against Israel, because the French give them $3 billion a year? Just sounds like you want to argue about nothing. Whatever, who's got time for that but you.

 

Yes, we did support the Mujahedeen. Yes, fundamentalism was a problem before that (see North Africa or the Middle East). Yes, it is revisionist to say that the Mujahedeen encompasses all of fundamentalism. Yes, it is revisionist to assert that there would be no problem with fundamentalism absent our support of the Mujahedeen.

Ah, very interesting. So you counterfactually assume there would not have been fundamentalism in Iran absent US support for the Shah. Interesting since he was repressing fundamentalism all those years. One would think then, logically, that fundamentalism would have risen to power MUCH SOONER without the repression, not in its absence. Take Saudi Arabia for example, there is not a strict fundamentalist regime in power because the regime (allegedly 'propped up' by the US) has repressed the fudamentalists, as also in Egypt.

Except that taking a look at the populist movements in these countries, they are fundamentalist. So swapping regimes merely places fundamentalists in power. Fundamentalism is by far more likely an outcome, so you asserting democracy would have sprung up is reaching.

Let's take these two together...the reason being that it was TWO UN ACTIONS that let to 9/11. It was a UN intervention to remove Kuwait from Iraq. It was under UN auspices that US troops were in Saudi Arabia at all. It was a UN action in Somalia, which Osama is quoted verbatim is what made him decide we were (decadent) enough to take on. I wonder how the current Administration could EVER think acting through the UN might be to our disadvantage...

Right. Missed the UN led first Gulf War did you?

Let's just say 'load of crap.' Saddam was not propped up by just the US, but also by our enemies at the time, the Soviet Urnion, and by the Chinese, and by our 'allies' the French and other Europeans. Saddam was NOT a creation of US intervention. Let's take a short test. What kind of missles did Saddam use? Ah, the Scud (Chinese). What kind of tanks? Ah, the T-something or another (Soviet). What kind of fighter planes? Ah, the MiGs. What kind of anti-ship missle (like the one that hit the US ship in the Gulf? Ah, the Exocet (French). Gee, that sure is a picture of a US led arms buildup, isn't it?

Ah, 'supported and emboldened,' not 'propped up or armed.' That makes it much clearer, lol. You miss the point: other world powers (Soviet Union, France, China) were giving Saddam MORE support than we were. Absent our involvement with him he would still have gone down the same track. And let me point out how hilarious it is for you to use the EXACT SAME ARGUMENT about Israel (arms support). I guess its much more palatable when you're doggin' the US...

WTF? I guess I ain't got some big high falutin' important poe-zi-shun like ol Timing....and that must be cuz i ain't as edjumacated as he is.

 

Aide: Saddam Did Get Rid of Iraq WMD
By SLOBODAN LEKIC, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - A close aide to Saddam Hussein says the Iraqi dictator did in fact get rid of his weapons of mass destruction but deliberately kept the world guessing about it in an effort to divide the international community and stave off a U.S. invasion.

The strategy, which turned out to be a serious miscalculation, was designed to make the Iraqi dictator look strong in the eyes of the Arab world, while countries such as France and Russia were wary of joining an American-led attack. At the same time, Saddam retained the technical know-how and brain power to restart the programs at any time.

Both Pentagon officials and weapons experts are considering this guessing-game theory as the search for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons continues. If true, it would indicate there was no imminent unconventional weapons threat from Iraq an argument President Bush used to go to war.

Saddam's alleged weapons bluff was detailed by an Iraqi official who assisted Saddam for many years. The official was not part of the national leadership but his job provided him daily contact with the dictator and insight into the regime's decision-making process during the past decade and in its critical final days.

The official refused to be identified, citing fear of assassination by Saddam's paramilitaries who, he said, remain active throughout Iraq. But in several interviews, the former aide detailed what he said were the reasons behind Saddam's disinformation campaign — which ultimately backfired by spurring, rather than deterring a U.S. invasion.

According to the aide, by the mid-1990s "it was common knowledge among the leadership" that Iraq had destroyed its chemical stocks and discontinued development of biological and nuclear weapons.

But Saddam remained convinced that an ambiguous stance about the status of Iraq's weapons programs would deter an American attack.

"He repeatedly told me: 'These foreigners, they only respect strength, they must be made to believe we are strong,'" the aide said.

Publicly Saddam denied having unconventional weapons. But from 1998 until 2002, he prevented U.N. inspectors from working in the country and when they finally returned in November, 2002, they often complained that Iraq wasn't fully cooperating.

Iraqi scientists, including those currently held by the U.S. military, have maintained that no new unconventional weapons programs were started in recent years and that all the materials from previous programs were destroyed.

Both Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair have come under fire in recent weeks as weapons hunters come up empty and prewar intelligence is questioned.

The White House acknowledged recently that it included discredited information in Bush's State of the Union speech about alleged Iraqi attempts to purchase uranium - a key ingredient for nuclear weapons.

More importantly, no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons have been found.

Before the invasion, the British government claimed Saddam could deploy unconventional weapons within 45 minutes. The Bush administration insisted the threat was so immediate that the world couldn't afford to wait for U.N. inspectors to wind up their searches. Despite the warnings, Iraqi troops never used such weapons during the war.

Intelligence officials at the Pentagon, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said some experts had raised the theory that Iraq put out false information to persuade its enemies that it retained prohibited chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs.
"That explanation has plausibility," said Robert Einhorn a former assistant secretary of State for nonproliferation. "But the disposition of those missing weapons and materials still has to be explained somehow."

Iraq's claims that it destroyed stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons materials could never be verified by U.N. inspectors who repeatedly requested proof.

However, U.N. inspectors, who scoured Iraq for three and a half months before the war, never find any evidence of renewed weapons programs.

"The longer that one does not find any weapons in spite of people coming forward and being rewarded for giving information, etc., the more I think it is important that we begin to ask ourselves if there were no weapons, why was it that Iraq conducted itself as it did for so many years?" Hans Blix, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector, told The Associated Press in June.

Saddam's aide suggested the brinkmanship ultimately backfired because U.S. policy switched in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, from containing the Iraqi leader, to going after those who could supply terrorists with deadly weapons.

He described Saddam as almost "totally ignorant" of how Western democracies functioned and attributed his failure to grasp the impact of Sept. 11 to the fact that he increasingly surrounded himself with yes-men and loyalists who were not qualified to give him expert advice on economic, military or foreign policy matters.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto...30802/ap_on_re_mi_ea/saddam_s_bluff&printer=1

 

From the article: "Before the invasion, the British government claimed Saddam could deploy unconventional weapons within 45 minutes. The Bush administration insisted the threat was so immediate that the world couldn't afford to wait for U.N. inspectors to wind up their searches. Despite the warnings, Iraqi troops never used such weapons during the war."


I believe that what Bush actually said is that we weren't there for a scavenger hunt: show us what you have or show us records/proof of destruction of said weapons. Saddam did neither.

Another thing to point up: weren't our troops trained and prepared for Iraq to unleash WMD's? Is that just an extention of the lie? I don' think so...

 

Now we know that Saudi Arabia was at least indirectly resposible for 911. The missing 28 pages of the 911 repot showed this.

So we have Bush knowing that if any country was responsible for 911, it was Saudi Arabia not Iraq. However Bush continued to deceive about this.

Bush Used phony intelligence about Iraqi wmd to make the case for war.

Great. He wanted to invade Iraq before 911. 911 happened so it was used as an excuse to invade Iraq.

This will go down in the history books as one of the great frauds of all time.

 

I think its pretty enlightening to have someone on the inside say Saddam deliberately engaged in brinksmanship about WMDs. This only furthers the reasonableness of believing he DID in fact have WMD programs. He could easily have opened up to show he didn't have them, but instead decided to walk the wire and try and play both sides. Oops.

 

This only furthers the reasonableness of believing he DID in fact have WMD programs.

Hayes, you should feel duped not vindicated, even if you thought the war was lovely. As far as I know your primary stated reason for supporting the war was not long term desire to reform the Middle East, but your long standing theme that you are concerned about wmd, particuarly nuclear ones, where you want non-proliferation for countries the US doesn't approve of.

Perhaps you don't remember the little pre-war story about how Bush and gang covered up that the highest ranking Iraqi defector ever had told them that Sadam had destroyed the wmd in 1990-91?

They selectively used some of his statement to bolster the case for their war, but didn't release the part where he said the wmd were detroyed.

The defector was Sadam's son in law who later was executed when he returned.

Aren't you at all concerned about a sytematic effort to cook intelligence till the point where a very false conclusion is arrived at which then justifies a preemptive near unilateral attack against international law?

The way this debate is going we will soon have some of the pro-war guys claiming that we needed the war because Sadam killed his son in law.

BTW this constantly being revealed pattern of cooked intelligence and lying and deception about wmd and the threat from Iraq ,is something that happened in the last year or two and doesn't fit the typical motif of "hey the US had done bad things, but only more than say 20 years ago like Iran Contra for example, so it doesn't have to effect our view of the US as "the perfect City on the Hill", to quote Jorge.