Originally Posted by: schmange> the real reason Iraq got beat up again was because he was still trying
> to get a pair of brass knuckles (and some other nasty implements).

There was never any real proof that Iraq was trying to get any 'nasty implements'. Bush 'claimed' that they were trying. But he also said there were WMD's in Iraq too which was either an unforgivable error, or a purposeful lie.
Bush lost any credibility he had when the so called 'WMD's' never materialized.[/quote]
Bush definitely lost credibility, however Iraq did have WMD programs and Bush's inability to communicate this is easily his single greatest failing as President.


First (and this is a doozie), documents seized after the fall of Baghdad proved that Saddam had been secretly negotiating to buy missle systems from North Korea as recently as the spring of 2003. [David Kay Report, New York Times]

Also, since the fall of Baghdad, it has become apparent that Iraq wasn't in fact trying to aquire a gas centerfuge for Uranium enrichment as Colin Powell had claimed at the UN because they already had one. It was burried in a barrel with weapons plans in head Iraqi weapons scientist, Mahdi Obeidi's back yard so that it could be hidden from UN inspectors while the inspections process went on. [Mahdi's book on the subject]

Finally, we come to a lot of really shady goings-on ranging from SA-2 rocket motors with UN inspection tags and radioactive scrap metal suspiciously turning up then disapearing from Middle Eastern and European scrap yards [UNMOVIC report] to "organized looting" of equipment used for the manufacture of nuclear weapons [New York Times] to Russian military units destroying or removing incriminating documents and arms from Iraq [Washington Times] -- It's really no wonder it seems to most peole that Iraq was WMD program free; in the last few weeks before and just after the start of the invaision, the infrastructure behind Saddam's missle, nuclear, biological and chemical programs was scattered all across the Middle East and Europe. And the only way to find this out is to trudge around the jerkwater PDF archives of the UN website or to scour conservative newsgroups looking for those precious few magic mushrooms atop that steaming heap of cow manuer... because you're certainly not going to find it on the TV.

So, yes, Iraq probably didn't have WMDs at the time we invaded. But they had all of the machinery they needed to start production just as soon as the UN, influenced by bribed officials and member nations, lifted sanctions and turned it's back for good. Since Saddam never once abandoned his especially militaristic take on Arab Nationalism, the stragetic implications of this are just as bad as if he was ready to push the button at any time he chose. VX artillery shells and nuclear tipped missles would have made for a great [u]propogandic[/u] victory, but in the end it's just that; I'll take "saving (at the least) 400,000 lives but looking bad" over "doing nothing and well-liked" any day.



[QUOTE=schmange]I sometimes wonder how people would feel if the situation was reversed.
For instance... Iraq claims that the U.S. is stockpiling weapons so they bomb the Whitehouse and arrest the President. Then they take over Washington with armed patrols and stay there for the next ten years pretending to look for weapons that never existed in the first place.

What would make that any different than what the U.S. is doing right now?

If the American Government ever truely conducted itself as Saddam's regime did, I hope somebody would step in like the US did in Iraq. Imagine if the international community had stopped Germany from re-arming after World War I or Japan had been prevented from embarking on its conquest of the Pacific.

That would be something like 30 or 40 MILLION deaths that would have been prevented.