Remember folks when you read this ...THERE WERE NEVER NEVER any WMDs!!!

[Youch]

Funny. Republicans believed Bush when he said there were WMD's but refused to believe him when he said there were no WMD's. What changed? Did they suddenly believe he's a liar?

Ignoramous,
Why do you keep referring to people by political party? Seems very shallow to me....

WMD has always there. They were used on the Kurds. Libs at the time acknowledged this fact. Thus, your position is obviously one born from ignorance.

Wanna debate? Bring it....

 

[mudwhistle]

No. The dispute was over WMD's which includes chemical weapons. The Liberals crucified Bush over his claim that Saddam had WMD's. Bush was right.

Actually the Bush Administrations claim was that they had re-constituted the chemical, biological and nuclear WMD programs and was actively producing and stockpiling large quantities of WMD, not that he retained remnants of old munitions from the Iran/Iraq war.

We found large stockpiles.

We found evidence that he was trying to reconstitute his chemical and bio weapons programs.

Some of them ended up in Syria, but because the trail from Saddam isn't perfectly clear, or isn't published yet by the NYT it must not exist.

From the OP.......

All had been manufactured before 1991, participants said. Filthy, rusty or corroded, a large fraction of them could not be readily identified as chemical weapons at all. Some were empty, though many of them still contained potent mustard agent or residual sarin. Most could not have been used as designed, and when they ruptured dispersed the chemical agents over a limited area, according to those who collected the majority of them.

In case after case, participants said, analysis of these warheads and shells reaffirmed intelligence failures. First, the American government did not find what it had been looking for at the war’s outset, then it failed to prepare its troops and medical corps for the aged weapons it did find.

Yet you guys said it was all destroyed before it was found.

Funny thing is, I looked at brand-New M16s the Kuwaitis were carrying when I was over there. They hadn't cleaned them since they were purchased. They were in terrible shape. The hot weather and desert sands plays hell on everything they have, much less weapons they don't properly take care of, or stuff they might have buried instead of destroying as documented by inspectors.

President Bush didn't go to the nation and say Saddam was a threat to the worlds remaining superpower because he might have some old unusable munition that are deadly to handle buried or lost somewhere in Iraq now did he?

No.

He said he was hiding them from inspectors.

He also said that he still possessed the means to reconstitute his chemical programs and that he was attempting to start a nuke program so he could sell them to terrorists and use them against his neighbors, meaning Kuwait, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Israel.

Because he had invaded Kuwait and set the oilfields afire, poisoned thousands of Kurds with nerve-agents, and was assisting al Qaeda with material support and medical treatment to their fighters in Afghanistan, murdered hundreds of thousands of his own Shiite population, and was shooting at our aircraft, Bush said he was done fucking around with him.

 

[Lakhota]

Remember that Bush fired Saddam's army - the same army that would have known where those old, abandoned chemical munitions were buried and/or stockpiled.

The dispute concerns what many regard as the Bush administration's single biggest mistake in the first few months after Saddam Hussein's ouster—the order, in May 2003, to disband the Iraqi army.

It was a move that put 250,000 young Iraqi men out of a job, out on the streets, angry, and armed—and all but guaranteed the violent chaos to come.

Who disbanded the Iraqi army?

Bush: 'I can't remember why we disbanded the Iraqi army'

 

[mudwhistle]

Sure, that's why the UN left it there, because Saddam promised to be a good boy and never touch the stuff.

Fact is he never did, did he? He knew all hell would break loose if he did. Pappa Bush was really pissed off because we had no idea Saddam had a Manhattan Project style program for developing a nuclear weapon. Guess where he got the equipment to do that. Ronnie!

Yeah, Ronnie personally delivered it to him too.

Just like the way everything that happens in America has to be signed off personally by the president. Must be why nothing gets done now.All Obama does is play golf and fundraise. He doesn't have the time to work as hard as Reagan, GHWB, Clinton, or GWB.

Like I said earlier, our allies( well all sorts of companies from the allies) all sold duel use equipment and chemicals to Iraq after Raygun took Iraq off the list of nations who support terrorist.........So if you were a tax paying American in the 1980's you can say "And I Helped!".

So in effect, he misused the stuff we sold him.

Is that our fault?

Nope, since it was known that he was using them on Iran and against the Kurds during the time the West supported him, and no sanctions of any kind were ever placed on him for using them, yeah we are somewhat culpable.

Okay, so invading Kuwait was essentially the straw that broke the camel's back.

Turkey is acting like assholes, cutting off any chance of 4th Infantry Division from catching Saddam and the Russians in the act. Standing by and letting ISIS do whatever they want today.. They're our supposed allies. Think they'll like it if we sanction them?

Pakistan hid Bin Laden for years, has Obama sanctioned them yet?

 

[teapartysamurai]

The Secret Casualties of Iraq’s Abandoned Chemical Weapons

From 2004 to 2011, American and American-trained Iraqi troops repeatedly encountered, and on at least six occasions were wounded by, chemical weapons remaining from years earlier in Saddam Hussein’s rule.

In all, American troops secretly reported finding roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells or aviation bombs, according to interviews with dozens of participants, Iraqi and American officials, and heavily redacted intelligence documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

1. MAY 2004 Two soldiers exposed to sarin from a shell near Baghdad’s Yarmouk neighborhood.
2. SUMMER 2006 Over 2,400 nerve-agent rockets found at this former Republican Guard compound.
3. JULY 2008 Six Marines exposed to mustard agent from an artillery shell at an abandoned bunker.
4. AUGUST 2008 Five American soldiers exposed to mustard agent while destroying a weapons cache.
5. 2010 OR EARLY 2011 Hundreds of mustard rounds discovered in a container at this Iraqi security compound.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...casualties-of-iraq-chemical-weapons.html?_r=0

You KNOW liberals are NEVER going to admit they were wrong.

They will just keep repeating that Bush lied, regardless of the truth.

It isn't that Bush lied, it's that liberals lie. To be a liberal is to be a liar.

 

[mudwhistle]

Remember that Bush fired Saddam's army - the same army that would have known where those old, abandoned chemical munitions were buried and/or stockpiled.

The dispute concerns what many regard as the Bush administration's single biggest mistake in the first few months after Saddam Hussein's ouster—the order, in May 2003, to disband the Iraqi army.

It was a move that put 250,000 young Iraqi men out of a job, out on the streets, angry, and armed—and all but guaranteed the violent chaos to come.

Who disbanded the Iraqi army?

Bush: 'I can't remember why we disbanded the Iraqi army'

Saddam emptied the prisons and passed out arms to everyone. Eventually we kicked their asses. Obama let all of that go, pissed on the sacrifice and the loss by letting it all go. He didn't want to deal with it.

 

[mudwhistle]

Saddam had a strange habit of killing witnesses.

He shot family members who knew about his hopes for a nuke program. Who's to say he didn't bury all of this shit and then execute any witnesses he felt might be disloyal.

 

[BlindBoo]

The Secret Casualties of Iraq’s Abandoned Chemical Weapons

From 2004 to 2011, American and American-trained Iraqi troops repeatedly encountered, and on at least six occasions were wounded by, chemical weapons remaining from years earlier in Saddam Hussein’s rule.

In all, American troops secretly reported finding roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells or aviation bombs, according to interviews with dozens of participants, Iraqi and American officials, and heavily redacted intelligence documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

1. MAY 2004 Two soldiers exposed to sarin from a shell near Baghdad’s Yarmouk neighborhood.
2. SUMMER 2006 Over 2,400 nerve-agent rockets found at this former Republican Guard compound.
3. JULY 2008 Six Marines exposed to mustard agent from an artillery shell at an abandoned bunker.
4. AUGUST 2008 Five American soldiers exposed to mustard agent while destroying a weapons cache.
5. 2010 OR EARLY 2011 Hundreds of mustard rounds discovered in a container at this Iraqi security compound.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...casualties-of-iraq-chemical-weapons.html?_r=0

You KNOW liberals are NEVER going to admit they were wrong.

They will just keep repeating that Bush lied, regardless of the truth.

It isn't that Bush lied, it's that liberals lie. To be a liberal is to be a liar.

In other words, these shells weren't evidence of an active WMD program, which had been George Bush's justification for the war. They were simply old munitions that everyone knew about already and that were being left to degrade on their own.

Second, the Bush administration kept its discoveries secret. If any of this were truly evidence for an active WMD program, surely Bush and Dick Cheney would have been the first to trumpet the news. The fact that they didn't is pretty plain evidence that there was nothing here to back up their prewar contentions of an Iraqi WMD program.

Third, there's the specific reason these discoveries were kept secret. Chivers tells the story:

Participants in the chemical weapons discoveries said the United States suppressed knowledge of finds for multiple reasons, including that the government bristled at further acknowledgment it had been wrong....Others pointed to another embarrassment. In five of six incidents in which troops were wounded by chemical agents, the munitions appeared to have been designed in the United States, manufactured in Europe and filled in chemical agent production lines built in Iraq by Western companies.

No There s Still No Evidence There Was an Active WMD Program in Iraq Mother Jones

 

[Lakhota]

This article sums up how NaziCons were gasping and grasping at straws to exonerate Bush. They should have carefully read the entire NYT article before going off the deep end.

Sorry, But That NYT Story On Abandoned Munitions Doesn't Prove Bush Was Right About WMD

​

 

[MisterBeale]

The elites are laughing at you chattle. Really, they are.

==============
chattle..???
an item of tangible movable or immovable property except real estate and things (as buildings) connected with real property

what fuck is this supposed to mean ? CHATTLE ?????

You're a smart guy. You'll figure it out in a couple election cycles. Nothing changes, no matter what party is in power. You're still a slave, it doesn't matter what puppet they put in office.

 

[MisterBeale]

The elites are laughing at you chattle. Really, they are.

==============
chattle..???
an item of tangible movable or immovable property except real estate and things (as buildings) connected with real property

what fuck is this supposed to mean ? CHATTLE ?????

It's an OWSer....... Need I say more?

As if. I've been accused of being a Tea Partier far more often.

 

[mudwhistle]

Everybody on the face of the planet already know that Saddam had chemical weapons - for years prior to the invasion.

Everybody on the face of the planet already knew that Saddam had biological weapons - for years prior to the invasion.

What tipped the scales in favor of invasion was the third leg of the weapons triad - nuclear weapons.

Supposed yellow-cake uranium shipments from South Africa and highly advanced research and materials-processing facilities and knowledge-base.

Nobody went to war to take Saddam's chemical weapons away from him - that was old news, predating the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s.

Nobody went to war to take Saddam biological weapons away form him - that was old news, predating the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s.

People went to war to stop Saddam from developing and deploying nuclear weapons - a supposed new state of affairs.

Doesn't matter how the arguments for the casus belli were formalized, at the UN, or, more loosely, amongst the American People.

What DOES matter is the focus of the arguments leading up to the formalizing of the casus belli.

And that focus was nuclear weaponry - the NEW element in the weapons triad that could be made to serve as the flash-point for an alarm, sufficient to go to war over.

You know that just as well as I do, whether you choose to concede the point here or not.

Kondor, stop saying EVERYONE knew he had chemical weapons. You are double talking out of your ass right now.

You say chemical weapons are WMDs, and claim the left always knew he had those when the war started?

WRONG!!!!

For 15 years they claimed NOTHING was found. They did not limit it to NO NUCLEAR weapons. Are you really going to stick with that claim?

Chemical weapons ARE WMDS!

AND .... they only starting claiming that Sadaams Iraq had no WMDs AFTER it became fashionable as a means to attack George W.

Prior to that the Dems were right in line claimin Hussein had WMDs ... uh that's Sadam Hussein , not .. Barrack Hussein , he just has tools

Generally speaking, the Democrats were just as full of shit about Saddam, WMD's, etc., as the Republicans.

To the devil with partisan politics in this regard - what signifies is a false casus belli (nuclear weapons focus), and the price we paid as a result.

4000 of our kids are lying the ground because we got it wrong - or because we were lied to - take your pick - both perspectives may have some merit.

Lied to, bad intel OR he managed to hide them or destroy most of them b4 we got there ... he had plenty of warning.

But Nukes were never really a major part of the picture - it's just you tools trying to rewrite History again. It's a little more difficult when its Modern History isn't it ?

That's a lie Greenbean....it WAS about WMD'S, in the form of waking up to the smoking gun being a mushroom cloud....NUKES

it WAS about yellowcake....for NUKES

it WAS about NUKES that could hit us in 45 minutes...

It is you that has conveniently forgotten what we were being told by the administration at the time....

Problem is we remember what they said, not just what Democrats and their state-run press claims was said.

 

[mudwhistle]

Nolo contendere.

Finding chemical weapons there was no surprise.

Finding nuclear weapons (or precursor components) would have validated the 2003 casus belli for invading Iraq.

Unfortunately, that never happened.

Again,, chemical weapons are certainly WMDs. Also, saddam put out false information (most likely on purpose) that he was in the process of attempting to get nuclear materials. That was probably true. He saw Iran as a true threat and he knew he would be in real danger if Iran became a nuclear power.

Again, his two son in laws revealed what he was wanting to do and the reasons why he kept his infrastructure for WMD production.

This was also clearly revealed by UNSCOM the UN independent council.

These unusable, leaking shells with unstable contents were not wmds

They we're usable and it doesn't take much of a dosage to cause a reaction. There is usually some residual spillage when filling warheads. The trick is wearing protective gear when handling them.

Plus, according to the NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE, they were used.

So, he can shove that up his ass.

Not in their intended manner. Additionally, they weren't capable of causing mass destruction

Fire one of those babies into a large group of civilians or ground troops and it will cause mass destruction.

Couple of pressure-cookers fucked up the Boston Marathon.

 

[MisterBeale]

I can't believe this is even a topic, that people are even debating this.

The administration CONFESSED. It was all a ruse. It was a plan to just change the landscape of the middle east. They admitted that it was a pretext to get the world on board to invade, that Iraq had the potential to make and give WMD's to terrorists. Bush admitted that they found none.

Why are people debating this issue? Seriously?

 

[MisterBeale]

Bush said, I quote, "HE DIDN'T"

 

[mudwhistle]

The Secret Casualties of Iraq’s Abandoned Chemical Weapons

From 2004 to 2011, American and American-trained Iraqi troops repeatedly encountered, and on at least six occasions were wounded by, chemical weapons remaining from years earlier in Saddam Hussein’s rule.

In all, American troops secretly reported finding roughly 5,000 chemical warheads, shells or aviation bombs, according to interviews with dozens of participants, Iraqi and American officials, and heavily redacted intelligence documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

1. MAY 2004 Two soldiers exposed to sarin from a shell near Baghdad’s Yarmouk neighborhood.
2. SUMMER 2006 Over 2,400 nerve-agent rockets found at this former Republican Guard compound.
3. JULY 2008 Six Marines exposed to mustard agent from an artillery shell at an abandoned bunker.
4. AUGUST 2008 Five American soldiers exposed to mustard agent while destroying a weapons cache.
5. 2010 OR EARLY 2011 Hundreds of mustard rounds discovered in a container at this Iraqi security compound.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...casualties-of-iraq-chemical-weapons.html?_r=0

You KNOW liberals are NEVER going to admit they were wrong.

They will just keep repeating that Bush lied, regardless of the truth.

It isn't that Bush lied, it's that liberals lie. To be a liberal is to be a liar.

In other words, these shells weren't evidence of an active WMD program, which had been George Bush's justification for the war. They were simply old munitions that everyone knew about already and that were being left to degrade on their own.

Second, the Bush administration kept its discoveries secret. If any of this were truly evidence for an active WMD program, surely Bush and Dick Cheney would have been the first to trumpet the news. The fact that they didn't is pretty plain evidence that there was nothing here to back up their prewar contentions of an Iraqi WMD program.

Third, there's the specific reason these discoveries were kept secret. Chivers tells the story:

Participants in the chemical weapons discoveries said the United States suppressed knowledge of finds for multiple reasons, including that the government bristled at further acknowledgment it had been wrong....Others pointed to another embarrassment. In five of six incidents in which troops were wounded by chemical agents, the munitions appeared to have been designed in the United States, manufactured in Europe and filled in chemical agent production lines built in Iraq by Western companies.

No There s Still No Evidence There Was an Active WMD Program in Iraq Mother Jones

Saddam's weapons programs were put on hold during the inspection. The threat was stated several times that he had the means to restart his programs with the use of dual-use precursors and mobile facilities.

Saddam flew his MIGs to Iran during Desert Storm. I maintain that he shipped his shit to Syria to wait for the end of the inspection process and UN certification.

FYI, the UN was caught hiding missiles for Hamas in their schools in Gaza. They did the same in Somalia in 93'. This is what they do.

 

[kiwiman127]

Well, this threat turned out to be a fail!

 

[Indofred]

Why did it need to be secretly reported?

Because it's a load of old shit.
They were desperate to justify the American illegal invasion, so they would have splashed this all over the press ... if it was true.

Yeah, nothing ever happens in the universe unless it is reported by the MSM.

The government of the time was desperate to justify its war - but it kept this secret.
Yep, I'll believe that - not.

 

[Care4all]

Kondor, stop saying EVERYONE knew he had chemical weapons. You are double talking out of your ass right now.

You say chemical weapons are WMDs, and claim the left always knew he had those when the war started?

WRONG!!!!

For 15 years they claimed NOTHING was found. They did not limit it to NO NUCLEAR weapons. Are you really going to stick with that claim?

Chemical weapons ARE WMDS!

AND .... they only starting claiming that Sadaams Iraq had no WMDs AFTER it became fashionable as a means to attack George W.

Prior to that the Dems were right in line claimin Hussein had WMDs ... uh that's Sadam Hussein , not .. Barrack Hussein , he just has tools

Generally speaking, the Democrats were just as full of shit about Saddam, WMD's, etc., as the Republicans.

To the devil with partisan politics in this regard - what signifies is a false casus belli (nuclear weapons focus), and the price we paid as a result.

4000 of our kids are lying the ground because we got it wrong - or because we were lied to - take your pick - both perspectives may have some merit.

Lied to, bad intel OR he managed to hide them or destroy most of them b4 we got there ... he had plenty of warning.

But Nukes were never really a major part of the picture - it's just you tools trying to rewrite History again. It's a little more difficult when its Modern History isn't it ?

That's a lie Greenbean....it WAS about WMD'S, in the form of waking up to the smoking gun being a mushroom cloud....NUKES

it WAS about yellowcake....for NUKES

it WAS about NUKES that could hit us in 45 minutes...

It is you that has conveniently forgotten what we were being told by the administration at the time....

Problem is we remember what they said, not just what Democrats and their state-run press claims was said.

Oh, yes we do, remember what they said and the war drums beating with the media beating those war drums right along the President's and administrations side....Chris Matthews all goo goo gah gah over Bush at the time....Fox beating the war drums, the fake story planted by Judith Miller in the NYTimes, not reporting on what Powel and Rice had just said in January of 2001 that there were no wmd's that were a threat with Saddam, down to Cheney saying we here in the usa could have a mushroom WMD reach us .... in 45 minutes, and Condi with we don't want to wake up to the smoking gun being a mushroom cloud.... and all the fake and wrong yellowcake stories....and the administration trying to stop Plame's husband, Wilson from getting the truth out on their lies about Saddam trying to acquire yellowcake... and the Downing Street memo with them recording bush pushing the Iraq war before he even knew the results of the inspections....

PLEASE, trust me, I remember everything that went on and am getting sick to my stomach all over again....

I only WISH I could have this convenient memory lapse that you seem to be having...you're blessed, in a way....

 

[ChrisL]

Saddam had a strange habit of killing witnesses.

He shot family members who knew about his hopes for a nuke program. Who's to say he didn't bury all of this shit and then execute any witnesses he felt might be disloyal.

They've found mass graves all over the place in Iraq. I read it was up to 20 million of his own people that Saddam is suspected to have murdered.