News Did the Bush Administration Lie or Make Mistakes About WMD Claims?

[schwarzchildradius]

Were the Bush claims of WMD the result of deliberate fabrications of reality high up in the Bush 'cabal,' or were they based on shoddy work by the CIA and buttressed by Rumsfeld's assumptions?

 

[Zero]

They either lied to themselves, or they lied to us...which denotes a higher unworthiness for office?

 

[drag]

Greetings !

Originally posted by schwarzchildradius
Were the Bush claims of WMD the result of deliberate fabrications of reality high up in the Bush 'cabal,' or were they based on shoddy work by the CIA and buttressed by Rumsfeld's assumptions?

I do not see why would a person want to participate in this
poll as long as it includes only the above two answers
and thus clearly misleading and biased. If you want
to make an objective poll you should add the abvious
third possibility. Thanks.

Live long and prosper.

 

[enigma]

The search isn't over, but if nothing does turn up, then I'll have to go with lies.

(Hope that something does turn up...)

 

[schwarzchildradius]

I do not see why would a person want to participate in this poll as long as it includes only the above two answers...

You're right, I thought about that a little later after posting.. if it should have 3 options - 1)lies, 2)mistakes, 3)everything Bush said is factually true, then the 3rd option is not as rigorous as the 1&2, because it has no possibility of being correct. Unless you're talking about a parallel universe or sth.

_____________
"Accept the result of a free election" --M.Gorbechev 1989

 

[russ_watters]

3

(though that's not how I would word the 3rd option)

 

[FZ+]

I thought 3 was all of the above...

Only joking...

 

[Raven]

I didn't vote. In a way, I agree if FZ if he means what I'm about to write below.

The way I see it, the Bush Administration had an agenda and believed they were doing the right thing. They interpreted the data they were given to their advantage and flew with it regardless of how shabby the evidence may have been (I say because if they had strong evidence it would have been disclosed to the public and the UN). So in short, I believed they believed there were WMD's in Iraq, they lied to make it seem to be an urgent issue and to justify the war, but in the end I believe they would have made a mistake with the assumption that WMD's exist in Iraq.

Yes, the latter statement is a belief not a fact. Of course I'll retract it if and when WMD's have been found. It's just that I highly doubt it will be found at this point since we have not yet found significant evidence to suggest that it does exist.

 

[schwarzchildradius]

Okay, Russ, you word the 3rd option. Keep in mind that US soldiers are dying every day in Iraq.

 

[Zero]

Anyone who thinks Bush has been giving us facts is *edited for Physics Forums guidelines against personal attacks*.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by schwarzchildradius
Okay, Russ, you word the 3rd option. Keep in mind that US soldiers are dying every day in Iraq.

And what, pray tell, does that fact have to do with Saddam and WMD? Misdirection?

 

[schwarzchildradius]

No, not misdirection, what is it? You're implying that the WMD witch hunt has nothing to do with US soldiers dying in Iraq. That's not what the president said! He said that Iraq was on the verge of destroying us with WMD and that we had an obligation to stop him. He might not have been lying, but then again, he was demonstratably lying about Iraq's nuclear weapons. Certainly it is possible that Saddam's cronies dumped VX into the Tigris & Euphrates on the eve of the invasion. But the nuclear weapons Bush spoke of never existed. The US soldiers are doing an excellent job in Iraq, given their predicament of having only a skeleton crew, abandoned by the air force and Navy, and being given an assignment of indeterminate length in a hostile country. How dare Bush and his apologists justify the continued loss of US soldiers' lives by instituting no less than a police state in Iraq. Let's look at how moral and honorable the Russians are compared to Bush.

 

[kat]

Originally posted by schwarzchildradius
But the nuclear weapons Bush spoke of never existed. The US soldiers are doing an excellent job in Iraq, given their predicament of having only a skeleton crew, abandoned by the air force and Navy, and being given an assignment of indeterminate length in a hostile country. How dare Bush and his apologists justify the continued loss of US soldiers' lives by instituting no less than a police state in Iraq. Let's look at how moral and honorable the Russians are compared to Bush.

I don't remember Bush ever saying that nuclear weapons actually existed, I remember them speaking about thinking they had acquired some equipment that would help in developing and were attempting to gather materials TO develop nuclear weapons...can you give me a link, quote, something that shows them stating they existed? I can't believe I would have missed that...

 

[drag]

Originally posted by kat
I don't remember Bush ever saying that nuclear weapons actually existed, I remember them speaking about thinking they had acquired some equipment that would help in developing and were attempting to gather materials TO develop nuclear weapons...can you give me a link, quote, something that shows them stating they existed? I can't believe I would have missed that...

If there was any talk of this then it probably regarded
nuclear materials like readioactive waste and so on.
Such materials were in fact found, or to be precise - what
was left of them after the local Iraqi population stole
most of them, unaware of the danger. These could, amongst other
sources, be the remains of the Iraqi nuclear plant that was bombed
by Israel. Also, these could, amongst other thing's, have found
their way into the hands of terrorists like the Al-Qaeda training camps that were at the north of Iraq and then could've been
used to attack targets with dirty nuclear bombs in dense
population centers around the world. (Not that making
a dirty bomb is such a complex or difficult task for a
terrorist organization of this scale.)

Peace and long life.

 

[Zero]

Originally posted by drag
If there was any talk of this then it probably regarded
nuclear materials like readioactive waste and so on.
Such materials were in fact found, or to be precise - what
was left of them after the local Iraqi population stole
most of them, unaware of the danger. These could, amongst other
sources, be the remains of the Iraqi nuclear plant that was bombed
by Israel. Also, these could, amongst other thing's, have found
their way into the hands of terrorists like the Al-Qaeda training camps that were at the north of Iraq and then could've been
used to attack targets with dirty nuclear bombs in dense
population centers around the world. (Not that making
a dirty bomb is such a complex or difficult task for a
terrorist organization of this scale.)

Peace and long life.

Funny...we knew this site existed, and yet no troops were assigned to secure the nuclear materials.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by Zero
Funny...we knew this site existed, and yet no troops were assigned to secure the nuclear materials.

And the thousands of other sites as well (not to mention the museums...).

I'm sure you know from your time in the service that when fighting a war, you fight the enemy military and you secure sites of tactical interest FIRST. Only when the war is won (or is far enough away that the tactical threat is low) do you start securing sites of low military value. Its just not a good idea to pull combat troops away from a site of high military value with a known threat to protect a site of unknown value against an unknown threat. Thats a wonderful way to lose wars and get people killed.

And yes, I know, we secured the oil wells. Since many of the oil wells were wired with explosives, NOT securing them would have been a huge tactical and strategic mistake.

 

[Zero]

Are you claiming that a nuclear plant wasn't worth securing for months, and that troops should have had to stumble across it? You really can't be serious! Nuclear sites should have been a #1 priority, for obvious reasons...that is, if Bush ever really thought they had a nuclear program, which is becoming less probable daily.

 

[kat]

Originally posted by Zero
Are you claiming that a nuclear plant wasn't worth securing for months, and that troops should have had to stumble across it? You really can't be serious! Nuclear sites should have been a #1 priority, for obvious reasons...that is, if Bush ever really thought they had a nuclear program, which is becoming less probable daily.

Months?

The fence and 12-foot concrete wall around the three storage buildings for radioactive material had huge gaps, and U.S. Marines found the main gate open when they arrived April 7.

I would think that this:

Iraqi soldiers guarding Tuwaitha left on March 10, before the war started, and civilian guards abandoned the site March 20, the day before American ground forces entered Iraq from Kuwait

MIGHT indicate that items may have been removed prior to the military guards leaving and the civilian guards taking over guard duties.

http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/special_reports/iraq/story/909154p-6331478c.html

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I can't vote yet. I am still holding out for the possibility that I'm all wrong about Bush. Oh gees I'm cracking myself up again. ...

 

[Zero]

Originally posted by kat
Months?

I would think that this:
MIGHT indicate that items may have been removed prior to the military guards leaving and the civilian guards taking over guard duties.

http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/special_reports/iraq/story/909154p-6331478c.html

Sorry, Kat...I guess I accidentally included the time up until now, since the officer on teh scene said he still(as of when I read the article) didn't have enough men to actually secure the site.

 

[schwarzchildradius]

(http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/special_reports/iraq/story/909154p-6331478c.html courtesey of Zero)

43: The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed in the 1990s that Saddam Hussein had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, had a design for a nuclear weapon and was working on five different methods of enriching uranium for a bomb.

That might have been justification for war, in 1990

43: The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.

That is a full of sh1t statement.

Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production.

as is that, those tubes were for rocket fuel, and they knew it
http://www.jsonline.com/news/nat/ap/jan03/ap-bush-text012803.asp