Study: Bush, Other Officials Issued Hundreds of False Statements Before Iraq Invasion

Alright, enough of this crap Wutang. I've been through that report and you are grasping at straws. You just can't handle the truth or you are a disinformation agent.

One of the first things I looked at, is the links the report provides for descriptions of the people involved. Every single one except for Ari links either to the White House website itself or the State Department website. In other words, they are presenting these people in their best possible public light, right up front, according to what the friggin White House itself says.

Now I ask you, why would they do that, rather than link to any myriad of other possible websites that give tainted, even lightly tainted, descriptions of these people if there was this evil malice and political bias that you proclaim? THEY DIDN'T. They linked to the best possible sites these people could have asked for- the governments'. But no that means nothing.

Go ahead Wu, click on some links, here's the page:
Page containing descriptions of Subjects

Next, I started spot checking the validity and authenticity of the phrases that they were analyzing, such as this one from Dick Cheney:

]On August 26, 2002, in an address to the national convention of the Veteran of Foreign Wars, Cheney flatly declared: "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us." In fact, former CIA Director George Tenet later recalled, Cheney's assertions went well beyond his agency's assessments at the time. Another CIA official, referring to the same speech, told journalist Ron Suskind, "Our reaction was, 'Where is he getting this stuff from?' "

That is from their report, and indeed it can still be found, right on the White House website itself here, and I will include the paragraph from the WH page:

Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us. And there is no doubt that his aggressive regional ambitions will lead him into future confrontations with his neighbors -- confrontations that will involve both the weapons he has today, and the ones he will continue to develop with his oil wealth.

There is no doubt eh? Uh huh. When staff themselves are saying "where does he get this stuff?" Why is it unreasonable, for the purposes of the report to include supporting evidence of what they are researching? Especially, specific supporting evidence such as the staff comment? I find that to be pretty valid, myself. But even without that comment, Cheney's statement can be classified as false. Because their was plenty of doubt, per intelligence.

Continue to fool yourself, or go collect your undeserving check WuTang, because you aren't fooling me. It just takes one, Wutang. Just one. If an administration is clearly going to twist evidence to fit their policy, instead of twisting their policy to fit the evidence, they do not deserve the trust of the American people.

Mod Note: Courtesy is Mandatory -- Please Review

[edit on 24-1-2008 by chissler]

Oh boy, getting hot in here.

It's easy to get frustrated with people who stick their thumb in their ears. But just remember, that's all their doing. Fooling themselves.

We ALL KNOW that Bush and his people were lying. As I said earlier in the thread, every clear-minded American knew that we had been lied to after months and months went by and no WMD's were found.

We knew we were hearing sensationalistic BS when Bush kept mentioning mushroom clouds etc.

Unfortunately, there are still plenty of people who refuse to acknowledge the lies that sent us to Iraq, and are STILL leaning the excuse that Saddam was a bad man, 9/11 9/11 etc.

It's a charade. We are not being fooled. They're fooling themselves.

Keep up the good fight.

Rome is burning and some folks want to check sources

If you don't know whats going on by now... you don't want to know... or don't care.

And just in case you didn't hear me, watch this. Here's video of those statements:

Google Video Link

Originally posted by Leo Strauss
Rome is burning and some folks want to check sources

If you don't know whats going on by now... you don't want to know... or don't care.

Dude, that's the most succinct way of putting it I have heard in a long time. Star, and can I use that as a sig?

Five pages and I don't think anyone has clued onto the fact that the article contains a statement that is factual incorrect.

The statement in question

It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."

While no current stockpiles of WMDs were found older WMDs that date back pre Gulf War were found.

source

Now I am sure that the legions of Bush haters will excuse this oversight to suit there political beliefs . Personally I am inclined to take the rest of the article with a grain of salt.

I don't subscribe to the faith based movement that revolves around the notion that Iraq had current stockpiles of WMDs . Instead I prefer to deal with the facts at hand .

[edit on 24-1-2008 by xpert11]

[edit on 24-1-2008 by xpert11]

reply to post by xpert11


If you bothered to check the records you will note that our government supplied Iraq with WMD's. That's why we were so darn sure he had them!

Remember the Iraq Iran war. Remember the photos of Don Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam??


He was our buddy then I think.

Originally posted by Leo Strauss
Remember the Iraq Iran war. Remember the photos of Don Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam??

Yep that photo made my blood boil and still does.

He was our buddy then I think.

That is true . Saddam mistake was that he didn't stay on the side of US interests in the ME region.

A note to those who want to put Bush on trial for War Crimes. International Law is victor justice in a thin disguise .

Besides if a simply Google search puts a pot hole in the case against Bush any case based on idea that Bush idea would be threaded in court. That is if the the verdict hasn't been decided already which seems to be the case.

reply to post by xpert11


Actually, those weren't sanctioned. They were not WMD's, they were chemical weapons - granted they call them WMD's.

Iraq was only sanctioned to quit producing and trying to produce WMD's.

Originally posted by Leo Strauss
If you bothered to check the records you will note that our government supplied Iraq with WMD's. That's why we were so darn sure he had them!

Remember the Iraq Iran war. Remember the photos of Don Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam??

*CHACHING*

Hear that? It's the New World Order cashing in on Americas short attention span!

Unfortunately, most people do not know or have willingly forgot Americas manipulation of middle eastern politics. Saddam was in power because of OUR CIA, the same headed by George Bush Sr.

The truth is whacky.

reply to post by Sublime620


Can you provide a source that excludes chemical weapons from the definition of Weapons of Mass Destruction ?

Cheers xpert11.

reply to post by xpert11


You know, I'm looking for that right now because I knew I'd have to back it up. No success yet, so consider it retracted until I do.

Until then, which if it's not soon it's never, here's a source I did find that explains our reason for going to war - at least officially:

Source

*Edited to add:

Can't find. Retracted. May have been misread.

Did find this last night also:
Source

But according to Scott Ritter, UNSCOM Weapons Inspector in Iraq for 7 years, Sarin has a shelf life of five years and as of the writing of "What Team Bush doesn't want you to know" in 2002, any Sarin that hadn't been found would have been "useless, harmless, goo." (p. 33) And from BBC News,

Source

Furthermore, says this Defense Department report, “The chemical munitions found in Iraq after the [first] Gulf War contained badly deteriorated agents and a significant proportion were visibly leaking.” The shelf life of these poorly made agents were said to be a few weeks at best -- hardly the stuff of vast chemical weapons stores.

Source

A Pentagon official who confirmed the findings said that all the weapons were pre-1991 vintage munitions "in such a degraded state they couldn't be used for what they are designed for."

Sorry about the bad info before though. I knew the second I said it I needed to source it.

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Sublime620]

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Sublime620]

reply to post by Sublime620


The definition used in the study does in fact include chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons under their definition of rhetoric that relates to WMDs (kind of confused me as I thought Saddam had his own Chemical weapons?). Anyways, the first quote in my first post has their official definition.

In response to True American, I will have to go through your exact link, and hopefully show you (if not through other parts of this study) that they leave out large parts of interviews from their database to skewer the results (which is exactly what they say they don't do on their Methodology). Need time

reply to post by WuTang


I understand that. What I meant when I said that is most people think nuclear devices when they hear WMDs.

Also, as posted above, the chemical weapons were pre first invasion. Not usable.

What I got confused about was I posted that having Chemical weapons wasn't sanctioned by the UN. That was a brain fart by me. What I had read and mistranslated was that being capable of producing them was not.

i.e. Saddam did not have usable weapons and was not building them, however, he was always ready to jump start the program if the UN Sanctions were lifted.

[edit on 24-1-2008 by Sublime620]

reply to post by Sublime620


No worries I am sure that I have had my fair share of brain explosions on the board. The points you raised about the Chemical Weapons that were found not being in a usable state is indeed well worth noting.

Cheers xpert11

Originally posted by Ahabstar
To err on the side of caution in what I asked would have meant to not have engaged Iraq despite the intel that was presented from multiple agencies and nations on the grounds that they might have been wrong.

They knew there were no WOMD PRODUCTION capability ( don't see why anyone but the US government would have given them any as it did with biological and chemical agents in the 80s') as they deliberately fabricated the stories of non compliance with weapon inspections. If one looks at the records it's evident that the reported breaches of inspection agreements were nothing of the sort and that it normally had to do with inspectors trying to inspect buildings that were not on the lists ( and normally they were allowed to enter any ways) or that the gates to some installations were opened ten minutes late while the guards tried to establish what was going on. The worlds intelligence agencies all well understood that there were no WOMD left and the fact that some were willing to pretend otherwise just means that their various governments saw profit ( political or economic) in helping the American regime to establish some legitimacy for their aggressive intent.

The absolute why's of engaging Iraq go beyond possible WMD. No, we were not told the full reasons of why Iraq. And if people limit their suggestions to money and Iraqi oil then they won't debate you hard on that. Nor will they openly admit the other stronger reason because the people would not have gone for it.

The Iraq war is about crushing a rival social systems ( or other peoples in the region might get the idea that you could at least demand economic power if political power), ensuring that the world's markets do not become flooded with the abundant oil supplies of various countries and creating yet another staging base to further suppress the Democratic forces in the region. Those are in my opinion the important reasons but there are many other side benefits if you do not mind sacrificing political standing ( since he lost both elections he clearly does not care about what the people want) and a few tens of thousand American lives.

I clearly see it because I studied what happened and can deduce what mostlikely would have happened had we not gone into Iraq. Most of what I can tell you is all here on ATS. One thing I won't mention because I haven't seen it here and would fall under national security protocals in times of war.

So your a 'insider'! They say that to be a great propagandist you must not only believe what you are saying but be largely ignorant of the facts.

Here goes. Had we limited the WOT to just Afganistan then Saddam would have made a grab for Saudi Arabia. The Saud family only remains in power so long as they can hold Mecca and the other Islamic Holy Sites.

The Saudi family only holds power because the US assists in in killing off the democratic opposition that always arises against tyrannical rule. Why SH would dream of invading Saudi-Arabia , beside the fact that his armed forces were completely unable at the time, i don't know but i suppose that sort of information falls under the rubric of 'national security'!

If the Saud family losses that power which is backed by the US then we no longer have any voice in OPEC pricing and production (not that we have much of a voice now).

OPEC has not determined oil prices for a very long time and even before that the ME people had very little input into the pricing structure. As with all exploitative economic practices it's always best to attempt blaming someone far down in the production line for high costs at the end.

Saddam's Iraq had the definate military might to take every country in the region with the exception of Iran.

Iraq could not even defeat the very weakened and un-modernized Iranian army of the early 1980's so how they would have the capacity to do much harm post gulf war is once again any one's guess. The only 'neigbhour' that 'feared' Iraq were in fact the USA!

Iran does support Al Qaida by haboring within borders.

Please provide us with some evidence of that. Then proceed to provide us with some actual evidence that AL-nonsense were involved in 9-11.

Iran also opposes Israel which the US must support.

Why must the US support Israel and why didn't the US support Israel until relatively recently?

Thus no Iran-US cooperation to keep Iraq in check.

The US supplied both Iran and Iraq with arms trough intermediaries and that at least partly explains why neither should could win outright.

Turkey did not want to be involved with the US directly but made passive agreements.

Turkey has almost always sided with the highest bribe(r) and or those who would allow it to proceed with it's genocidal actions against it's own Kurdish population.

Now with Saddam taking Suadi Arabia, Kuwait, (Syria, Palenstine and Jordan--could either join them or be taken) there would be absolutely no way in the world that Israel could have been told, begged or bribed to stay out of it as was done in both the Gulf War and the current Iraq war.

So despite the fact that the well oiled Israeli war machine could hardly defeat those countries Iraq would have? Why do we care what happens to Israel? Why don't we withdraw our funds and see if it can survive in the mess it has create for itself and it's citizens trough terrorising it's native populations as well as it's neighbours?

And to keep Iran out of it Saddam would give or take Israel for Iran.

Since everything seems possible in your mind...

That is just the political aspect of it. Adding in the religious factor of the factions only complicates the matter as somewhat fair divisions between the traditional family tribes and sects would have to happen to keep things from breaking down.

The 'tribes' had no problem with each other before the US started bombing religious buildings and blaming it on this or that religious party thus setting the groups up against each other. The tribal excuse is just another way to blame the victims for foreign aggression for the results of the violence visited upon them.

But with Israel in the mix other countries outsid of the Middle East would become involved, thus truely WWIII.

Israel is quite invulnerable with it's current nuclear arsenal so non of it's neighbours are going to invade Israel proper until they have suitable ABM defenses ( and those are never a 100% sure thing so prepare to write off some cities) or nukes of their own to at least keep Israel from resorting to nukes right from the start. As to a world war three i don't really see it happening because of Israel as leaders use treaties to engage in wars they wish to fight. Since the US is in my opinion going to lose world war three they are not going to start one by employing Israel as excuse.

The causality and death tolls today would be laughable compared to what that would have been.

So that's ok then? 2-3 Million Iraqi deaths were just OK according to you?

Saddam only had to keep Iran appeased or convinced that the US would come in and get Iran. Since Iran would not allow airspace to the US for the WOT it is doubtful that they would have allowed it to attack Saddam.

The US were simply not ready to provide Iran with a suitably large bribe ( check Pakistan and Turkey and the other kingdoms) to allow it access to it's airspace but i am quite confident that if the US were willing to somewhat normalize relations with proper bribery Iranian airspace would not have been a big deal . No one wants to get bombed back into the stone age but sadly most countries never had a choice given that they were simply not willing to give up their socialist ideals or democratic practices.

Other option, engage Iran. The option was there for all to see in the Axis of Evil speeches. Iraq, Iran and North Korea.

Korea was never a serious choice as it had nukes and a army that had proven itself against 'modern' forces before. Since North Koreans have proven that they can defend themselves the only serious option were in fact the Iraq that were largely laid waste by two wars and more than ten years of terrible sanctions and terror bombing.

Our case for hitting Iran was actually stronger than for Iraq. But the risks and time until relative control was less with Iraq.

Iran actually had the capacity to fight back and inflict casualties on the quite weakened US forces ( which had been in a downward spiral since the gulf war) so that was never a serious option unless Iran could be properly encircled thus proving build up and staging areas all around it.

Remember the NIE reports states high confidence that the Iranian nuclear weapon program halted in fall of 2003. Iraq war started March 2003. NIE doesn't state 100% positive.

And since they knew there were no nukes in Iraq they could attack Iraq first without nukes suddenly appearing in the Iranian arsenal...

Now for the first up to six months of Iraq, Iran kept their heads down and mouths mostly quiet while they still worked on warhead development according to NIE. Now as a kid I would sometimes have to halt building a model car when I didn't have enough model glue to finish assembly.

Poor you!

Continued

The absolute what if is what if we did nothing and hoped that campaign in Afganistan was enough.

The invasion of Afghanistan were ready to go before 9-11 happened and i still believe that the 9-11 attacks were staged by the rival block ( Russia-China-India etc) to send Bush and co a message not to come play in their back yard. What Bush and the gang did was to simply employ that obvious show of US weakness to sell the planned war to the US public....

That Al Qadia did not retreat into Iran and the mountians of Pakistan where we didn't have permission to follow.

Well the Taliban did retreat back into Pakistan as that's where they came from and got their direct funding! Taliban essentially means 'student' , as far as i remember, and they were originally drafted from religious schools in Pakistan to fight for the CIA against the USSR in Afghanistan. How could the US not have permission to follow when they are the one's funding the Taliban trough the Pakistani intelligence and secret police forces?

No wait, they did do that. And Saddam started talking smack when Bush started poking him with the rhetoric stick.

Saddam saw the writing on the wall and all he had was rhetoric that could not and would not have changed ANYTHING! The US were going to crush Iraq and there was little SH could do beside giving 'inspiring' speeches to urge his citizens to resist. Seems to have worked too.....

And wasn't there that threat of Al Qadia to hit Mecca?

Bush and co made up a new lie every few hours so that's certainly a possibility i just havn't heard of.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of things I'd love to give W a good old fashioned ass kicking about. Pounding the propaganda drum on what was the best intel at the time isn't one of them. But ultimately making the descision to enter Iraq at the right time and removing Saddam was in the best intrests of the world.

How was it in the best interest of the world or for that matter you? Why do you care what's best for the world? Is there any chance i can convince you to mind your own damn business and stop supporting those who ostensible want to 'save the world' from itself by means of bombing it into submission? Humanity does not need your type of 'help' so please keep it to yourself.

But if the Saud family had been overthrown/Mecca hit and you think we would be paying less that $5/gal for gas in the US now....well, you should know better.

The world is practically floating on oil and if you think the invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan had anything to do with increasing supplies to the world market you just don't understand anything about economics, geopolitics or for that matter the history of the world.

Yeah you are right I must be joking. I mean a small determed force couldn't acomplish much of anything.

Not really, no.

1979 63 beheaded after the two week capture, all except Mahrous bin Laden, Osama's older half-brother, because of the bin Laden's ties to the Saud royal family.

OK! So when the US rained death on the Vietnamese people in the 60's and 70's how many Vietnamese Americans or 'agents' from Vietnam managed to sneak into the US and hold people or buildings hostage? When the US starved and bombed to death a million Iraqi's in the 90's how many Iraqi agents were employed to terrorize Americans in the US mainland? Should we make a complete lists that include all the hundreds ( or more likely thousands) of individual acts of terror that could have inspired small groups to seek revenge? Your making a mockery of common sense and the historic record.

I mean what are the odds that one lone man could hold the Washington Monument hostage for 10 hours in the Regan era 1982? Norman Mayer

Because the US paramilitary forces ( SWAT and the rest of the alphabet soup internal terrorist groups) are so incompetent that they can not get one guy killed or cornered in ten hours? Don't you think these few instances are rather proof of deliberate manipulation of the US public than a true indication of the threat of small groups? What were all the small groups with REAL grievances doing while this guy sat around for a hour?

Not to mention 19 hijackers in 2001, if you are so inclined.

At least one of the planes were observed doing a spiral descent pattern, into the WTC, that is quite impossible for a human being to emulate. Those planes may or may not have had people on board but they were most certainly not being piloted by human beings.

I could go on for days of small groups can do, but that would lead to the conclusion of fear monger, sociopath or historian.

Please go ahead as you serve as perfect example of what happens when people buy the media line and then seek to validate the propaganda against observed reality.

The point of it was that Saddam didn't have to win, he only had to engage and push Israel into action to make the whole Middle East flashover.

So where is the evidence that SH was suicidal? Where is the evidence that he ever intended to get involved in a war against the USA or really anyone else after the first gulf war?

With US UK and Israel to take the heat. Kicking an anthill. The hit in Saudi Arabia would have been a feint, and more than likely not a uniformed military operation.

bah!

And while Osama was by birth a Saudi he was quite opposed to the US (and all western influences) in Saudi during the Gulf War and afterwards.

He was not opposed to western influences ( please stop repeating the official western line) but in fact to western occupation forces, western bribery, Western coup's, bribery and terrorism in general. OBL is in my opinion a far more honest and just man than those who pretend to defend the American people from foreign enemies. It's not that that should serve as a compliment to OBL but rather as a criticism of just how base and inhuman the actions of Bush and the US national security state is.

And the whole Iraq War after the regime change has been that of a security force, not an occupying force. There is a world of difference.

It must be comfortable when one's world view corresponds so closely to those who are engaged in trying to propagandize you. Maybe they have a place for you somewhere in their machinery of terrorism and death? You really should apply....

Stellar

Originally posted by v01i0
I guess both dems an' reps all got same info, coming from CIA and/or NSA. And they got the info from shifty characters. What's funny, at least in Rumsfeld, is that he chooses what he wants to believe when it comes to the info delivered by CIA. Back in 80's he didn't believe CIA's intel saying that Soviet's were not accelerating their military capacity and breaking the treaties, instead he claimed contrary.

Well he was in fact lying then as the USSR were accelerating their military buildup and were in fact breaking treaties; his always been a liar.

And now with Iraq he chooses to believe every most ridicule "evidence" he is presented. Where is that Rummie of 80's that questioned integrity of CIA's intel

I have no idea if he actually believes anything he says but what i do know is that he benefits by the lies he tells. All you can be sure of with such a character is that they are likely saying what they were told to say and that they are rewarded for towing the line and worked out of system very quickly when they do not.

Stellar

reply to post by StellarX


have you ever thought of joining the "Thread Killers?"

search for thread killers V2

apart from the cherrypicking, nice job.

I always prefer dialogue or try to at least - but I also understand that some people want to address individual points..

I prefer dialogue, because addressing individual points can sometime be seen as being misleading - quotes taken out of context, that kind of thing.

But like I said, that's just MY opinion.

Otherwise

reply to post by TrueAmerican


OK, I don't know what had you so offended with my post, and frankly I was a little offended from yours. Either way, I would like to refute what you have said, as I really feel you don't understand what I am trying to say. This misunderstanding is really just polarizing this into an anti/pro GB thread which, as I have stated numerous times, I DO NOT DESIRE. I am leaving my opinions on that issue out of this thread, and I would really like to discuss the CPIs Study, and more importantly research methods.

I've been through that report and you are grasping at straws. You just can't handle the truth or you are a disinformation agent.

Sir, I hope to prove to you that the CPI are the ones who grasp the straws. I assure you I am no dissinfo agent.

...the links the report provides for descriptions of the people involved. Every single one except for Ari links either to the White House website itself or the State Department website.

Now I ask you, why would they do that, rather than link to any myriad of other possible websites that give tainted, even lightly tainted, descriptions of these people if there was this evil malice and political bias that you proclaim? ...But no that means nothing.

OK, now I don't know why you opened with this, as it is one of your weaker points (the condescending tone must help the reader see that I am wrong...).
Why would they do this? So that people who don't agree with their research methods can have it thrown in their face as proof they are wrong?(Joke) Seriously, it adds a sense of authenticity to their report. The white house website is considered an official source, and at least the CPI had the courtesy to use it. They wouldn't link to some clearly left wing biased bios of said people, as they do desire to be taken seriously. That doesn't make them any more or less biased in their research. No research data came from the peoples bios. In fact, it has very little to do with the Study at all (don't most Americans already know most of basic info about these eight people?). If I were to make a Study of White House rhetoric that concluded flying spaghetti monster was the most common phrase, would links to the White House bios of the people I researched be proof that my conclusions were true? This is straw grasping Sir.

As for your example, did you look at transcripts on both the White House page and the studies' page? I would link the material the study uses in their DB, but unfortunately they don't have static pages for each set of data (this also shows me biased research). It came up in this search. If you look you will notice they omitted the 5 or 6 paragraphs of the speech where Cheney talks about Iraq. This goes against their supposed methodology. Although your example is much less inflated than mine (where they omitted 2/3 of the relevant data), it still goes to show that the CPI doesn't even stick to their own methodology, in order to inflate the frequency incidents (I was curious if you picked it as the one with the least omitted info, or if this was random?).

continued~~~