What? The NY Times lead editorial today has this amazing paragraph:
This page agreed with the president's conviction that there were world-threatening weapons in Iraq, if not the manner in which the United States went to war. We still tend to believe they are there. Iraq certainly had biological and chemical weapons, and a program to create nuclear ones, at one point. If everything were indeed destroyed, Saddam Hussein put his nation through years of crippling economic boycotts and brought on the ruin of his regime for no good reason. On the other hand, it no longer seems totally inconceivable that the government was so corrupt and out of touch with reality that it was not even capable of operating rationally when its survival was at stake.
(Usual caveat that I'm not defending Saddam, blah blah, but) Don't you think that if all of the so-called WMD's had been destroyed, and the regime was concerned with its survival, that it might have claimed that it had no WMD's anymore? Maybe it would have invited the US Congress to come inspect for themselves, bringing as many experts along with them as they wanted. Doesn't it seem likely that, even though previous inspection teams included spies who were more interested in Saddam's whereabouts than they were in WMD's, that Saddam would nevertheless permit UN inspectors to return to his country, with free access to any site they chose? And if the inspectors found things they thought were technically in violation, like El Samoud missiles, that Iraq might agree to destroy them, even if they did not agree that they were in violation?
Well, Iraq did all of those things. What seems totally inconceivable at this point is that there was anything at all that Saddam could have done, even including live self-immolation on CNN, that would have stopped the US-led invasion of Iraq. There were two brutal regimes involved here--Saddam's and Bush's. Of the two, Saddam's acted more rationally. As has been reported, Bush said back in March 2002 "F*** Saddam. We're taking him out." None of the "debates" in Congress or in the UN, nor anything that Saddam did or might have done, was apparently going to affect that in the slightest. And in the finest American tradition of blaming the victim, the Times says that Iraq's "government was so corrupt and out of touch with reality that it was not even capable of operating rationally when its survival was at stake." He "brought on the ruin of his regime for no good reason?" Because he said didn't have WMD's when maybe he really didn't? What has to be clear (and I'm sure it is) to leaders all over the world--from Assad in Syria to Kim in N. Korea to Castro in Cuba to Chirac in France--is that once Bush decides to target a country, there is nothing (like evidence or truth or actions to deal with his alleged reasons) that is going to stop him. Furthermore, it is clear that our embedded media will support him, no matter what.
This page agreed with the president's conviction that there were world-threatening weapons in Iraq, if not the manner in which the United States went to war. We still tend to believe they are there. Iraq certainly had biological and chemical weapons, and a program to create nuclear ones, at one point. If everything were indeed destroyed, Saddam Hussein put his nation through years of crippling economic boycotts and brought on the ruin of his regime for no good reason. On the other hand, it no longer seems totally inconceivable that the government was so corrupt and out of touch with reality that it was not even capable of operating rationally when its survival was at stake.
(Usual caveat that I'm not defending Saddam, blah blah, but) Don't you think that if all of the so-called WMD's had been destroyed, and the regime was concerned with its survival, that it might have claimed that it had no WMD's anymore? Maybe it would have invited the US Congress to come inspect for themselves, bringing as many experts along with them as they wanted. Doesn't it seem likely that, even though previous inspection teams included spies who were more interested in Saddam's whereabouts than they were in WMD's, that Saddam would nevertheless permit UN inspectors to return to his country, with free access to any site they chose? And if the inspectors found things they thought were technically in violation, like El Samoud missiles, that Iraq might agree to destroy them, even if they did not agree that they were in violation?
Well, Iraq did all of those things. What seems totally inconceivable at this point is that there was anything at all that Saddam could have done, even including live self-immolation on CNN, that would have stopped the US-led invasion of Iraq. There were two brutal regimes involved here--Saddam's and Bush's. Of the two, Saddam's acted more rationally. As has been reported, Bush said back in March 2002 "F*** Saddam. We're taking him out." None of the "debates" in Congress or in the UN, nor anything that Saddam did or might have done, was apparently going to affect that in the slightest. And in the finest American tradition of blaming the victim, the Times says that Iraq's "government was so corrupt and out of touch with reality that it was not even capable of operating rationally when its survival was at stake." He "brought on the ruin of his regime for no good reason?" Because he said didn't have WMD's when maybe he really didn't? What has to be clear (and I'm sure it is) to leaders all over the world--from Assad in Syria to Kim in N. Korea to Castro in Cuba to Chirac in France--is that once Bush decides to target a country, there is nothing (like evidence or truth or actions to deal with his alleged reasons) that is going to stop him. Furthermore, it is clear that our embedded media will support him, no matter what.
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