"Those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it" -- George Santayana
Almost five years into the invasion and occupation of Iraq, we are now focused rightfully on extricating ourselves from the quagmire there, saving more lives from being lost and trying to repair the harm done our reputation and moral standing in the world. But, as the Presidential election of 2008 approaches, let us keep fresh in our minds and never forget the lies of the Republican administration in power that took us down this disastrous path. We have to remember in order to make sure that it never happens again. Those on the GOP side who still support this misadventure in Iraq need to be held accountable; we owe it to the young men and women coming home in flag draped coffins.
Let's take a look at the facts . . .
The Downing Street memo, minutes of a Tony Blair meeting with senior advisers in July 2002, nearly eight months before the war began has proved that the White House, as the head of British intelligence put it, was determined to fix "the intelligence and facts" around it’s predetermined policy of going to war in Iraq. We now know the president knew that the intelligence he cherry-picked was wrong, but used it anyway to sell us the war.
There were no WMD's in Iraq nor was their a connection between the 9-11 highjackers, Al Qaeda and Iraq. George W. Bush and his administration, namely Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell and Rice made their case for war with Iraq to the American people and the world in a series of strongly worded accusations. They said with no ambiguity that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and were a clear and present danger to the United States.
To be fair, at first it was hard to ascertain with reasonable certitude whether such accusations were the truth, lies, biases, or whether Bush and his administration were simply not competent. That’s why many well meaning Democrats extended their faith in what this administration told them; it was unimaginable that the any administration would intentionally deceive Congress. Authorizing the right to take military action is one thing, taking it when there were other options for peace still available is another. Now we know that there were a series of deliberate deceptions. The Congress, the people of the United States and the world were deceived and we went to war under false pretenses, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of American soldiers and Iraqi citizens and emboldening terrorists like never before. Let there be no doubt, this is George Bush's and the GOP's war.
After the indictment of Scooter Libby and the outing of Valerie Plame, the world got a peek at just what this administration would do to attack and destroy people speaking the truth about Iraq who they considered their enemy. The case for war was made based on a number of speeches Bush made including his State-Of-The-Union address and Collin Powell's ill-advised presentation to the United Nations. Let’s look at the facts again and not at the hyperbole as the Bush administration’s justification for war is stripped naked for all to see.
Here are the specifics:
BUSH LIE: The administration said that Iraq had chemical weapons and that satellite photos of buildings, bunkers, and trucks showed secretive movement to hide missiles and chemical/biological weapons. The US said that trucks at two sites were decontamination vehicles for use with chemical weapons.
THE TRUTH: The facts say otherwise. These sites had been inspected about 500 times by U.N. inspectors and Hans Blix reported that his inspectors found no evidence that contraband had been evacuated. Norwegian U.N. inspector Jorn Siljeholm also told AP that he had followed up on similar intelligence and found that the vehicles were ordinary fire trucks and water trucks, that's all. Since that time of course, there have been no reports of anything being found.
BUSH LIE: This administration also said that Iraq had VX a nerve agent where a single drop on the skin is fatal within minutes.
THE TRUTH: In fact, most of the 4 tons of VX Iraq was supposed to have was destroyed in the 1990's under U.N. supervision. Iraq tried to prove before the war began that the rest had been destroyed by chemically analyzing soil samples at the VX dump site. British experts indicated that pre-1991 VX probably would have degraded to a safe compound by now, and there has been no post-war report that VX has been found.
BUSH LIE: The US also said that by conservative estimates, Iraq had a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agents and a CIA report from October, 2002 made a similar statement without specific evidence.
THE TRUTH: A DIA report from September, 2002 said that there "is no reliable information on whether Iraq is producing and stockpiling chemical weapons." No such weapons were used against US troops and none have been reported to have been found.
BUSH LIE: Powell also said to the UN that Iraq had chemical weapon shells and warheads, namely unused 122-mm shells designed to carry chemical agents. Powell said these might be the "tip of the iceberg".
THE TRUTH: No reports indicate that additional shells or warheads have been found. Those found through U.N. inspections were from the 1980's and were empty, still in crates and never used.
BUSH LIE: The Bush administration in addition made the case that the Iraqis dispersed rocket launchers and warheads holding biological weapons to the western desert, hiding them in palm groves and moving them every one to four weeks.
THE TRUTH: Nothing has been reported found, after months of searching by U.S. troops in the desert. Iraqi presidential science adviser Lt. Gen. Amer al-Saadi suggested the story of palm groves and weekly-to-monthly movement was lifted from an Iraqi general's written account of hiding missiles in the 1991 war.
BUSH LIE: The US said Iraq had stockpiled biological weapons like Anthrax and were getting ready to use them. Iraq declared that it produced 8,500 liters of anthrax before 1991 and U.N. inspectors estimated it could have made up to 25,000 liters. Powell said that none has been "verifiably accounted for".
THE TRUTH: No anthrax has been found. A confidential DIA report from September, 2002, said that the agency believed Iraq had biological weapons but had no information on types, quantities, or readiness for use. Three weeks before the war began, Iraq reported that soil samples confirmed its contention that a particular site had been used to dispose of anthrax stocks, and it supplied a list of witnesses to verify quantities. The war began before these witnesses could be interviewed.
BUSH LIE: The US also reported that defectors reportedly described mobile biological weapons factories using trucks and train cars. Powell displayed an artist's conception of one. After the war two semi-trailers were found which the Bush administration says were such labs.
THE TRUTH: The Iraqis say they were used to manufacture hydrogen for artillery weather balloons. Various U.S. and British intelligence teams disagree with identification of these as mobile labs. One of the most credible reports came from a Defense Intelligence Agency engineering team, which concluded that the trailers were in fact small-scale hydrogen factories. Records in England showed that British Marconi sold the same type of equipment in the trailers to Iraq in 1987 for production of hydrogen.
BUSH LIE: Powell showed a video of an Iraqi Mirage F-1 simulating delivery of anthrax by spraying from a belly tank. He said that four tanks were unaccounted for and that Iraq was building small unmanned aircraft (drones) for delivery of chemical and biological weapons.
THE TRUTH: U.N. inspectors reported that the Mirage video predated the 1991 war, the Mirage was destroyed in that war, and 3 of the 4 spray tanks were destroyed in the 1990's. No drones have been found with the capability to deliver chemical weapons. The known Iraqi drones are small, with an 8-meter wingspan.
BUSH LIE: Powell said "classified" documents found at a nuclear scientist's Baghdad home were dramatic confirmation of intelligence saying prohibited items were concealed this way.
THE TRUTH: U.N. nuclear inspectors later said the documents were old and irrelevant, some administrative material and some from a failed and well-known uranium enrichment program of the 1980s. Powell also said that, "We have no indication that Saddam Hussein has ever abandoned his nuclear weapons program." Mohammed El Baradei reported to the United Nations Security Council that the International Atomic Energy Agency had "to date found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear weapons program in Iraq." Since then no additional evidence has been reported to support a current or recent nuclear program. Former Iraqi nuclear scientist Imad Khadduri reported that Iraq's nuclear program was shut down in 1991.
BUSH LIE: Of course there is the now infamous attempt to acquire uranium from Africa. This item was not part of Powell's presentation to the U.N., its best known presentation was by George Bush in his 2003 State of the Union address. It is included here for convenience in producing a single reference for the most important points of the Bush administration's WMD assertions. "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
THE TRUTH: This claim was based on forged documents portraying an attempt by Iraq to buy uranium from Niger. The documents were easily identified as a forgery, the IAEI reached this conclusion only hours after it was granted access to the documents. Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson went to Niger at the request of Vice President Cheney's office and the CIA in February, 2002, a year earlier to investigate the validity of this source. He reported that U.S. ambassador Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick felt that she had already refuted these claims in reports to Washington based on her factual knowledge.
BUSH LIE: The US also contended that aluminum tubes purchased by Iraq were for use in centrifuges for uranium enrichment, for nuclear weapons.
THE TRUTH: IAEA inspectors, Energy Department experts, and the State Department's intelligence bureau did not believe this was likely. Substantial modification would be needed to adapt the tubes to centrifuge use, but their specifications precisely match those used in for the Italian Medusa 81 artillery rocket. Identically matched characteristics include alloy, length, diameter, wall thickness, and anodized coating. IAEA inspectors observed a factory in Iraq which was using these tubes to manufacture artillery rockets.
BUSH LIE: Multiple intelligence sources indicted that Iraq was trying to buy magnets for use in uranium-enrichment centrifuges.
THE TRUTH: IAEA inspectors traced about a dozen types of imported magnets to their end users. Neither the inspectors nor post-war investigators have found magnets for use in centrifuges for uranium enrichment.
BUSH LIE: Intelligence sources say Iraq has a secret force of up to a few dozen prohibited Scud-type missiles, a program to build newer missiles with 600-mile range, and had put a roof over a rocket test stand to block view from spy satellites.
THE TRUTH: No Scud-type missiles have been found. In the 1990s U.N. inspectors accounted for all except two Scuds formerly possessed by Iraq. No program to build new, longer-range missiles has been found. The Iraqis reported that the roofed test stand had been converted from vertical firing to horizontal firing and was roofed for the obvious reason, things get very hot in the sun.
BUSH LIE: Iraq was violating a U.N. resolution by rejecting U-2 reconnaissance flights according to Powell's United Nations presentation.
THE TRUTH: Iraq did object to U-2 over flights at the time of Powell's presentation. However, it authorized U-2 over flights 5 days later, on February 10, 2003. U-2 reconnaissance flights began on February 17, about a month before the war started.
BUSH LIE: US says that Iraq was violating a U.N. resolution by rejecting private interviews with scientists by U.N. inspectors. Powell suggested that scientists withheld information on weapons of mass destruction due to fear of Saddam Hussein's regime. When interviews with scientists began news reports typically indicated that the scientists themselves had requested presence of Iraqi "minders". Fear of the regime probably was involved, but by early March 12 scientists had been interviewed privately.
THE TRUTH: Since Saddam Hussein was deposed all known reports indicate that scientists have continued to insist that no WMD programs had been active for a minimum of several years, with most shut down in 1991. One former Iraqi nuclear scientist who defected to Canada in 1998, Imad Khadduri, has always insisted that the nuclear program never recovered from the 1991 war, and was stopped at that time.
(Factual reporting and information for the above was obtained from Charles Hanley of the Associated Press and from many other sources.)
