Today, we officially find out what many people in this country already knew - and what I suspect the Bush/Cheney regime already knew - namely that there never were any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Chief weapons inspector Charles Duelfer, after completing an 18 month inspection, concluded that there were no WMDs in Iraq prior to the US invasion. There were no chemical weapons. There were no biological weapons. There were no nuclear weapons. There were no facilities to produce these weapons. There were no means to acquire these weapons. There was nothing but the intent by Saddam Hussein to acquire them at some point in the future, once the crippling UN sanctions had been lifted.
But that wasn't what the American people and the world body were told. We were assured by the Bush/Cheney regime that Saddam Hussein possessed massive stockpiles of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons, that he had the means of delivering those weapons, and that he planned to either use them himself or supply them to terrorists - namely Al Qaida - almost immediately. Steadfast in this belief and waving the American flag, King George II marched the US military into Iraq. But Bush was wrong, and over a thousand Americans - and thousands more Iraqis - have paid for that mistake with their lives. But the question begs - was it a mistake?
Keep in mind that, over the last decade, Iraq has been one of the most watched nations in the world. There were UN weapons inspectors on the ground in Iraq. There were US war planes and spy planes patrolling the skies over Iraq on a daily basis; in fact, 2/3 of Iraq's air space was designated as a "no-fly zone" for Iraqi planes, leaving the US Air Force in almost complete control of Iraq's skies. Furthermore - and this is a point that most people don't understand, despite the numerous spy shows and movies - the US has numerous spy satellites constantly circling the earth, satellites whose cameras are so good that they can practically count the freckles on your nose. I find it impossible to believe that there wasn't at least one - probably several - of these satelites monitoring Iraq all the time. Yet, with all of this surveillance going on, the President was mistaken about the presence of WMDs in Iraq? Forgive me, but my daddy didn't raise no fool. President or not, you can't piss on this boy's shoes and try to tell him it's raining!
There were no weapons of mass destruction, and I firmly believe that the Bush/Cheney regime knew that full well before they invaded Iraq. Unbelievably, though, they continue to stick to their story, even in the light of the Duelfer report. Faced with a mountain of evidence to the contrary, both Bush and Cheney still insist that the WMDs were there. This reminds me of that old saying, "My mind is made up; don't try to confuse me with the facts." But, sadly for us, this goes well beyond simple denial. If Bush and Cheney can refuse to acknowledge, in the presence of mounting evidence and official reports, that the number one reason for taking the US into war was - at the very least - based on erroneous intelligence, then they are too ignorant to govern this nation.
And that's being generous. Because, if they aren't simply too ignorant to see the facts on the ground, then the only other explanation is criminal intent. Bush and Cheney did one of two things: they either took us to war because they were too ignorant to except what UN officials, Iraqi leaders, and their own advisors were telling them both then and now; or they took us to war intentionally, in violation of international law, with full knowledge that the WMDs didn't exist, in order to secure Iraq's oil wealth for US companies.
Those are the choices as I see them. And if it were me, I think I'd much rather be labeled an idiot who made blunders through ignorance than a criminal who commited crimes with intent.
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