WHAT HE SAID: Ed Koch speaks for me.
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September
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- WHAT HE SAID: Ed Koch speaks for me.
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12 comments:
By-and-large, I agree with much of that as well. But, re: WMD in Irag, Koch's sez " ... Hans Blix of the UN said there were."
Bullshit. Show me a cite on Blix stating that WMD were, or likely were, in Iraq after 2000. In the 90s, yes, but not after 2000, not in 2002, not in 2003.
The revisionism on regarding unanimous or widespread consensus, even in the intelligence community, on the presence, or likely presence, of WMD in Iraq in 2003 is even more alarming than the speciousness of the arguments presented at the time.
There's some pretty extensive evidence in Pollack's THREATENING STORM that virtually all Western gov'ts agreed that WMDs were almost certainly being produced and warehoused in Iraq. He specifically cites German and French intelligence to that effect, compounding their cowardice/financial motivations for stalling any corrective action against Saddam.
Here's something interesting, Kev:
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JIM LEHRER: So was it clear to you and your inspectors and clear to others that you talked to at the time that there probably were no weapons of mass destruction there to be found?
HANS BLIX: No, that is going too far. I mean we...there were lots of question marks. You see, there were lots of things that were unaccounted for. We knew that they had had quantities of mustard gas and anthrax and other things, and they could not tell us with any evidence of where it had gone. Therefore, it was labeled unaccounted for. However, there was a tendency on both the U.S. side and the U.K. side to equate unaccounted for with existing. And that was an error.
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Even Blix says there were large quantities of WMD unaccounted for...! And I found this in four nanoseconds on Google!
CITE:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/international/jan-june04/blix_3-17.html
Deon't overlook the rest of his quote there. "However, there was a tendency on both the U.S. side and the U.K. side to equate unaccounted for with existing. And that was an error. "
There are many reasons why it would be unaccounted for, many reasons why Iraq would not provide evidence. What's not present in that Blix quote is 'when' we 'knew' there were quantities of WMD 'existing'. In many cases, the known quantities were produced in the 90s, and there was mixed evidence of any current capacity to produce in the early 00s, let alone anything actually 'existing'.
Back to Koch, "...Sheehan has the right to state her opinion in a country she believes shouldn't be defended." Argh. I'm willing to support the defense of our country. I'm not willing to support the neo-con pre-emptive offense as defense strategem. Afghanistan, in response to 9/11, I could accept. Iraq, couldn't, still don't.
That said, I also find it distasteful to read something like Koch's argument - "We had a right to go in. We're did what we set out to do. Fuck their civil war shit. Time to get out. They can ask the UN for help. Not our problem. Too much American blood would be spilled if we have to stay til the Iraqi Army stands up." Pathetic. If we are justified in unilateral action in taking out a regime, we must accept responsibility for filling the void. While I disagree with the original decision, and see reason to doubt many of the strategies used while there, Bush's rhetoric, at least, acknowledges the obligation and responsibility that goes along with the intial decision.
The problem I have with America is we're far too impressed with the spectacle of "Shock and Awe" and not quite committed enough to the boring day-to-day grind. We've, or are becoming, the Nation of Sensation.
This may surprise you, Scott, but I'm with Kevin in that I believe we have an obligation to clean up before we leave Iraq. Koch's cut-and-run argument (shared by many-a-liberal peacenik these days) does not hold water from a national security perspective: We've created a petri dish for terrorism over there. If we just leave it to fester, there's more of a chance that it will come back to bite us in the ass. I heard McCain say this, and I definitely agree.
But the really BIG question for Scott is, what were you doing reading the Jewish World Weekly? Oy vey!
Remember, it'sextremely hard to prove a negative. Add in the political dimension, and there's plenty of rational explanation for Iraqi behavior even if they didn't have and couldn't produce WMDs. There was as much incentive for them to be defiant as there was to be compliant, if not moreso.
Put me in the George Bush 41 camp:the WMD evidence was no smoking gun and the path to war Bush 43 pursued was rushed, arrogant, and ill-conceived.
But back to Cindy - her being overwrought makes her unsympathetic, not wrong, just as Bush being steadfast makes him resolute but not right.
Scott, does any other line in the lnk you cited vaguely support the notion that Hans Blix believed there was evidence to support WND in Iraq as of late 2002, early 2003? 'Cause having read it, there are many points that support my point that Koch's quote of whichever talking head he quoted is bullshit.
Much of what's been presented as intelligence supporting WMD wouldn't have gotten a passing grade in Mr. Snyder's 8th grade history papers.
Kev, you initially said:
"Show me a cite on Blix stating that WMD were, or likely were, in Iraq after 2000."
I believe the Blix quote I cited is consistent with what the Bush camp said all along: In a post-9/11 world, it's no longer good enough to wait for a smoking gun. If it quacks like a country harboring WMD, we're gonna treat it like a country harboring WMD.
Some other moments in that interview where Blix seems more in line with Bush than with the "there were emphatically no WMD and everyone knew it" crowd:
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JIM LEHRER: So was it clear to you and your inspectors and clear to others that you talked to at the time that there probably were no weapons of mass destruction there to be found?
HANS BLIX: No, that is going too far. I mean we...there were lots of question marks.
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JIM LEHRER: Did you come away from that whole experience with an impression as to why that was lacking in Washington and in London?
HANS BLIX: Well, it's clear that 9/11 had very much to do with it. I think Mr. Rumsfeld said that the situational evidence had not changed very much at 9/11, but they saw it all, all the evidence in a different light. They were more suspicious.
(Blix next talks about "witch hunts," but that kind of judgement is not supported by the fact that he earlier states that massive stores of WMD were unaccounted for. It's not a "witch hunt" per se if you have evidence that the witch was practicing witchcraft the day before yesterday.)
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BLIX: So by April-May, I think it was pretty clear to me that there weren't any weapons of mass destruction. (In other words, Blix says he wasn't convinced there weren't any weapons of mass destruction until months AFTER we went in. And Kev, are you trying to tell me that if I told you, here's a million bucks, bet whether or not Iraq is harboring WMD stores, you or anyone else would have bet against it. Name another country in material breach of U.N. resolutions you could say that about in the world at that time, one country who had invaded )
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JIM LEHRER: But had you had the expectation that there would be weapons found?
HANS BLIX: Well, if you had asked me in December 2002, what is your gut feeling, I would have said I'm not here to have any gut feelings. I'm here to inspect. But as we went into more inspections in January, then I became... and we didn't find any weapons, I became more skeptical.
(I read this whole exchange as Lehrer repeatedly trying to get Blix to say the Bushies were crazy for thinking there were WMD in Iraq, and every single time Blix refuses to do so. Even in the above, the guy doesn't become "skeptical" until awfully late in the game, does he?
Whether we leave or stay, the only "obligation" is that Bush and anyone who stood behind him be made to pay a heavy political price for the disaster that he has created. He is a coward for constantly running from any confrontation with political Islam, because, you know, God (or Allah forbid) that the Christian right or the Saudi royal family might be offended by something Bush does. Just because Cindy Sheehan and ANSWER are too stupid to point this out is no excuse.
Scott, let's say, through your credit card transactions and retail store records, I can prove you bought a six-pack of beer two weeks ago. I ask what happened to it. You say, you drank it. I say, prove it. Account for the beer. What evidence can you bring forward that you drank the beer? If you drank it in that first week, the containers are trashed or recycled. I'm assuming you don't keep a written log of what you consume, so you've got no proof you consumed it. I say you're stockpiling. You've hidden that sixer for a rainy day. And you can't prove you haven't, even if you grant access to let me check 700 locations in your house, car, work, etc. Because it's so damn tough to prove a negative, if I'm convincing enough in my suspicion that you're stockpiling, especially if you've stockpiled before, say, like back in your college days, well, some just might believe me. Even if it's reasonable to assume that you drank it in that first week and put the empties out.
>Even in the above, the guy doesn't become "skeptical" until awfully late in the game, does he?
from the same article:
"And in January 2003, we had performed quite a lot of inspections to sites which were given by intelligence and they had not shown any weapons of mass destruction, so we began to be doubtful."
Bottom-line - the only way the WMD argument in support of Iraq begins to make sense is in the neo-con Wolfwitz/Perl/Rumsfeld led pre-emptive strike paradigm wherein 'all evidence is viewed in a different light' and the hint of suspicion is just cause for war.
I'm no UN scorekeeper, but I'm fairly confident that countries other than Iraq have likely been in material breach of a security council resolution and we have not invaded unilaterally.
JD, my family stood beside me even when I did dumb ass stuff. They helped me deal with the consequencs of my actions. Whether we like it our not, Bush is our President, and we, not just Bush and the neo-cons, we went to war. We do have an obligation to stability in Iraq, whether under national security premises or under, well, just not being a dick on the global stage premises.
Oh, and Go Nittany Lions!
Kev, we have clearly opened up a can of worms, not just in Iraq but the entire Middle East region, and we have no clue as to how to "stabilize" the situation. I have to say that talking of "stability" in Iraq is just as much a case of hope rearing its ugly head as was the Dems trusting Bush to do the right thing the first time around.
Kev, if the guy in your analogy was a habitual drunk driver who had run over countless pedestrians in his car we wouldn't take his word for it about the six-pack, would we? Was there a presumption of guilt with Saddam? You bet your ass. As there should have been.
BTW, I'm against the "cut and run" strategy.
Anybody see Abizaid on MEET THE PRESS? Impressive man.
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