DebateGate
General Category => 3DHS => Topic started by: BT on October 19, 2006, 02:42:57 AM
-
George W. Bush's "admission" and the Tet analogy
The President has apparently made news by "accepting" the Iraq-Vietnam comparison. Drudge has linked, and lefty blog Think Progress is making a big deal of it. Here is what President Bush said:
Stephanopoulos asked whether the president agreed with the opinion of columnist Tom Friedman, who wrote in The New York Times today that the situation in Iraq may be equivalent to the Tet offensive in Vietnam almost 40 years ago.
"He could be right," the president said, before adding, "There's certainly a stepped-up level of violence, and we're heading into an election."
Here's what Think Progress said he said:
President Bush is right to finally admit that violence in Iraq has reached a tipping point, and that the U.S. is not winning the war as he has claimed.
That is, of course, not what the President said. He merely agreed that there was an appropriate comparison to be made between the Tet offensive and the violence we are seeing in Iraq today. I agree. The question is, what was the lesson of Tet (the all-out offensive of the Viet Cong in early 1968, at the time of the "Tet" new year holiday in Vietnam)?
At the time the media perceived and promoted the Tet offensive as a great victory for the enemy. In an age when the network anchors deployed truly awesome power, Walter Cronkite destroyed Lyndon Johnson's chances for re-election when he editorialized that we were "mired in stalement". President Johnson declared "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost middle America," and withdrew from the 1968 presidential campaign.
Tet, however, was not a military disaster for the United States. Quite to the contrary, history has revealed that the Tet offensive was in fact a crushing defeat for the Viet Cong, and effectively required that the Communists conquer the South by invasion from the North, rather than by civil insurgency. The Viet Cong were only able to turn a military disaster into strategic victory by persuading the American media that the United States was mired in stalement. With the domestic political support for the war fading fast, the United States decided to withdraw from Indochina, even though it would take Nixon and Kissinger another four years to accomplish it.
The summary of the Wikipedia entry on the Tet offensive captures the current view of military historians, even if it is quite different from the conventional wisdom of the Boomer editors and producers who set the agenda in the mainstream media:
The Tet Offensive can be considered a crushing military defeat for the Communist forces, as neither the Viet Cong nor the North Vietnamese army achieved any of their tactical goals. Furthermore, the operational cost of the offensive was dangerously high, with the Viet Cong essentially crippled by the huge losses inflicted by South Vietnamese and other Allied forces. Nevertheless, the Offensive is widely considered a turning point of the war in Vietnam, with the NLF and PAVN winning an enormous psychological and propaganda victory. Although US public opinion polls continued to show a majority supporting involvement in the war, this support continued to deteriorate and the nation became increasingly polarized over the war.[1] President Lyndon Johnson saw his popularity fall sharply after the Offensive, and he withdrew as a candidate for re-election in March of 1968. The Tet Offensive is frequently seen as an example of the value of propaganda, media influence and popular opinion in the pursuit of military objectives.
Not surprisingly to me but shocking to many, the President obviously knows more history than his interviewer. When President Bush "accepts" the analogy of the surge in violence in Iraq to the Tet offensive in Vietnam, he is not "accepting" that Iraq is an unwinnable struggle against a noble enemy. He is saying that victory or defeat in Iraq will not be a function of the amount of violence that the enemy is able to do during any given period, but our will to keep fighting notwithstanding that violence. In that one regard, Iraq is dangerously similar to Vietnam, which fact the mainstream media would know if the typical editor read military history instead of the journalism pretending to be history that fills the bestseller lists.
http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2006/10/george-w-bushs-admission-and-tet.html
-
How can we gague the enemys endurance?
-
It would be better if we had a better handle on our own endurance.
The desire to cut and run is a symptom of our endurance level as it is a political solution to a military problem.
-
The difference being that General Westmoreland declared the enemies' capabilities to launch such an offensive were destroyed.
Also, I think this is a dangerous perversion of history. Let's not start blaming the American people for what is going on in Iraq or what took place in Vietnam. The public did not lose the Vietnam War and the public is not at fault for the failures in Iraq.
-
The public is the one urging cuttting and running, is it not? That seems to be what polls indicate. Withdrawal at some date certain.
-
<<The difference being that General Westmoreland declared the enemies' capabilities to launch such an offensive were destroyed.>>
Bingo! That is EXACTLY what I wanted to say when I read the article, and you beat me to it.
The Tet offensive destroyed whatever confidence the public had still retained in the integrity and honesty of its leaders. After the constant drumbeat of "light at the end of the tunnel" and the "enemy" was breathing its last gasp, the Tet offensive showed the American public exactly what its political and military leaders were, at the very highest level: Liars, Bullshit Artists and Con Men. Their willingness to continue to follow these leaders was fatally eroded.
Leave it to the conservatives to try to obscure this point by re-framing the debate 180 degrees in another direction: "Tet Offensive: Military Defeat or Victory? Psychological Defeat or Victory?" and then proceed to argue those completely irrelevant points with thousands of words of completely pointless bullshit.
Not only is Bush hoping to capitalize on the upsurge in violence by making a comparison to a "reinterpreted" Tet Offensive, there isn't even the remotest comparison between an up-tick in the number of attacks and explosions in Iraq on the one hand and Tet's huge, sweeping territorial gains, temporary as they might have been, on the other hand. The former can be seen only on bar graphs or tables of numbers and the latter could be visualized as changing colours on a map or the televised images of firefights on the Embassy's lawns.
-
The public is the one urging cuttting and running, is it not? That seems to be what polls indicate. Withdrawal at some date certain.
Remembering back, the American people never wanted to go into Iraq in the first god damned place. If you want people to be resolved and stay the course, it is best not to tell them that you are conducting a "war on terror" and then have it turn out that you were a god damned liar and then start telling people who want to correct your lies and mistakes that they are "helping the enemy".
It will wind up that W and the gang will be remembered as something akin to Nixon and/or Hitler.
-
Remembering back, the American people never wanted to go into Iraq in the first god damned place.
You remember wrong. Upwards to 80% of the American People were in favor of toppling Saddam.
It has only been in the past year that the numbers shifted from for the war to against it.
-
Tet's huge, sweeping territorial gains, temporary as they might have been, on the other hand.
That's pretty funny.
That war was lost when the will was lost. Same as this one will be.
-
That war was lost when the will was lost. Same as this one will be.
You speak as though Vietnam was going really well until the American people turned against it. It was not. Tet was a battle against the Vietcong, fighting against the NVA had hardly even taken place. Moreover, the people of "South Vietnam" weren't overwhelmingly pleased with the United States presence there. Let's not forget that the soldiers in Vietnam weren't all that damned thrilled to be there either. Yeah, there were some hardliners who really believed in "defeating communism," but was that the real majority of troops on the ground in Vietnam?
This lovely perversion of history that Vietnam was going great until the treasonous protesters at home lost the war is a modern spin. Remember it was a Republican President that was elected largely on his promise to end the war in Vietnam (peace with honor and Vietnamization were Nixon's babies).
Is Iraq going down a similar road?
I don't know. Americans are demanding. Bush did himself no favors with "Mission Accomplished" and rumours of bringing troops home by Christmas (spin those all you want, but people saw what they saw). The truth of the situation hurts. Afghanistan is a mess. Musharraf warned us many times that it would be and it is. We will only ever control a small section of Afghanistan, but the rural mountain regions belong to the Taleban. Look at Pakistan. As strong of a military as they have, they know that they will never control the autonomous mountainous Northern region. If they leave one another alone, it works better for all.
Iraq is even worse. Notice the language of officials has changed from "terrorists" to "sectarian violence." Sectarian violence is a dangerous game. Ask the British about Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland was small so Iraq is a similar situation only magnified many times and with more porous borders for arms flow. "Winning" takes a hell of a lot stronger techniques than I believe we're willing to render. It also takes a lot less political spin and using the war as a political tool to spin the "war on terror." We've got to get over the stupidity that you cannot talk to the different factions.
Bush put us in a situation where we cannot win. Frankly we should either cut and run (or whatever dumb political catchphrase works) or fight a real war with victory as the objective, not re-election and political vaguery.
-
<<That war was lost when the will was lost. Same as this one will be. >>
The "will" was obtained in the first place by lies like the "attacks" in the Tonkin Gulf and was lost when the Tet Offensive showed the entire country that their leaders had been lying and bullshitting them since Day One.
THIS war, different lies of course, but same basic story. As the leaders' optimistic promises ("greeted as liberators," "just a few dead-enders," "Mission Accomplished") grow increasingly threadbare, and the proclaimed rationale shifts almost minute by minute (WMD, promoting "democracy," fighting terrorism, whatever the reason-of-the-month happens to be this monty) belief in the leadership reaches the vanishing point.
I would say that in Viet Nam, the lying bastards started off with pretty much 100% on their side, and no organized anti-war movement in place, in this war (despite BT's 80% figure, which I find hard to believe) I'd say the country was pretty well divided at the outset and as the lies of the leadership inevitably come to the surface, that vanishing point is more quickly reached. One lesson the administration seems to have learned from Viet Nam is to minimize casualties and restrict them as much as possible to the permanent underclass - - hillbillies, Hispanics, green card wannabe's, etc., who nobody with any influence gives a shit about. Another lesson was to avoid using a draftee army. The middle class votes - - so keep their kids out of it. This had the expected retardant effect on the anti-war movement which was so brilliantly active in the Sixties.
-
"This lovely perversion of history that Vietnam was going great until the treasonous protesters at home lost the war is a modern spin. "
[][][][][][][][][][][][][]
This spin got a lot of RPM when General Giap said it was so in his book.
-
We fight wars, ideally, so we can have our freedoms and our voices in governing the country, not the other way around.
-
The Gulf of Tonkin lie didn't lose the will of the American People in Viet Nam. Nor did the direct involvment of the NVA during Tet do it.
Pictures like this did.
(http://dawgnetnews.com/archive/040913/pictures/kim.jpg)
and this:
(http://www.vietnamwar.com/vietcongofficershootsman.jpg)
-
So? Do they portray a distortion of the overall reality?
-
This spin got a lot of RPM when General Giap said it was so in his book.
Giap also said that America had the better weapons technology, but Vietnam had the better soldiers.
He also said that:
The people in the White House believed that Americans would definitely win and there is not chance of defeat. There is a saying which goes, "If you know the enemy and you know yourself, you would win every single battle." However, the Americans fought the Vietnamese, but they did not know much about Vietnam or anything at all about the Vietnamese people. Vietnam is an old nation founded in a long history before the birth of Christ. ... The Americans knew nothing about our nation and her people. American generals knew little about our war theories, tactics and patterns of operation. ...
During the war everyone in the country would fight and they [would] do so following the Vietnamese war theory. We have a theory that is different from that of the Russians and that of the Americans. The Americans did not understand that. They did not know or understand our nation; they did not know our war strategies. They could not win. How could they win? As our president said, there was nothing more precious than independence and freedom. We had the spirit that we would govern our own nation; we would rather sacrifice than be slaves.
So I don't think he was putting the entire loss on the hands of the war protesters Plane. In fact, he seems to put much of it on the military and the Pentagon brass and White House.
-
Domer asks: So? Do they portray a distortion of the overall reality?
Not necessarily. But they were effective tools of "the anti-war movement which was so brilliantly active in the Sixties."
When you think of the Iraq War what picture comes to mind?
-
Is Iraq "winnable"? What is "winning"? If we win win, at what cost will it be. I pay these mother-fuckers to think about these things (and to share their ideas), not to blindly "push on because the Big Fool says so." What are the geopolitical costs of a redeployment? Is there a strategy beyond Iraq to win the War on Terror?
-
I think that's an excellent set of questions Domer.
Also, does Giap's point apply here as well? The White House seems sure of victory. We are certainly technologically superior to any enemy in Iraq. But do we really know Iraq? Do we know the tactics, theories, the people?
I hear things like "Islamofascism" (and no I'm not going to go off on that again) and administration folks grouping all of the terrorists together into one mold, and I'm not so sure. I hear the terms change from "Saddam loyalists" to "terrorists" to "sectarian violence" and again, I'm not so sure.
Are we even fighting to win? Or just fighting not to lose?
-
Are we even fighting to win? Or just fighting not to lose?
Right now we are biding time.
-
Is Iraq "winnable"? What is "winning"? If we win win, at what cost will it be. I pay these mother-fuckers to think about these things (and to share their ideas), not to blindly "push on because the Big Fool says so." What are the geopolitical costs of a redeployment? Is there a strategy beyond Iraq to win the War on Terror?
If this a government of the people by the people and for the people, what are your answers to those same questions?
-
<<The Gulf of Tonkin lie didn't lose the will of the American People in Viet Nam. Nor did the direct involvment of the NVA during Tet do it. >>
Tet was the turning point. The Gulf of Tonkin lie was the start of a continuous chain of lies. I mentioned it in particular only because it was the first big lie and it set the stage for all the lies that followed.
The war was maintainable only because a certain critical mass of the U.S. public still had some basic level of faith in their leaders. When Tet occurred, it was kind of like the moment when the little boy in the crowd says "But the Emperor has no clothes" and the scales drop from a lot of eyes. Suddenly they see what until then they did not want to see: the "Emperor" was naked, the trusted leaders were liars and con artists.
From that point it was all downhill. The photographs you posted were just additional hammer-blows to the government's credibility. What had been portrayed as a noble and worthwhile crusade was irredeemably exposed for the criminal atrocity that it actually was.
But I would still have to say the turning point was the Tet Offensive - - that really opened a lot of eyes.
-
Winning in Iraq (Whatever that means) will not cause a victory to the "War on Terror".
It seems improbable that they will win miliotarily in Iraq. After all, there are 22,000,000 Iraqis and the US and thye UK have well under 200,000 troops. The Iraqi military ranges from barely competent to hideously wimpy.
Tet was a psychological victory of the Viet Cong and NVA over the US, if not a military one.
The Iraq War, like the Vietnam War, is a war of an occupying force, which everyone knows, must someday leave, over a native insurgency, which everyone knows, is bound to stay. The US cannot win this militarily. There could be a political solution that is less than a total train wreck for the USW, but they will need better and more flexible diplomats than the clowns Juniorbush has hired.
-
"It seems improbable that they will win miliotarily in Iraq. After all, there are 22,000,000 Iraqis and the US and thye UK have well under 200,000 troops. The Iraqi military ranges from barely competent to hideously wimpy."
Most of these Iriquis are looking out for themselves , that is why we have a lot more of them volenteering to be police and army than are volenteering to be suicide bombers.
-
<<Most of these Iriquis are looking out for themselves ,>>
That's one of your problems right there. A guy who is looking out for himself (a) lets the Americans do the heavy lifting and tries to keep out of the line of fire; (b) knows that the Americans will be gone one day and he will have to face a lot of pissed-off Iraqis much the same as the Vichy loyalists had to face a lot of pissed-off Frenchmen only with this difference: the pissed-off Iraqis tend to take out their anger on the traitors' families as well as the traitors themselves, and favour executions with gruesome tortures rather than a clean shot to the back of the head and consequently (c) tries to build up a little favour bank with various Resistance figures just in case the day comes when he needs a friend in that camp.
If you recall your last quagmire, the local puppet army (about whom the American commanders of the time had pretty much the same words of qualified praise and the same grandiose expectations ("Vietnamizationi") as we have been hearing about this "new Iraqi army" but in the best of times they were running on a desertion rate of about 10%, which tended to escalate fairly sharply every time the shit got a little closer to the fan.
You would have to be crazy to think that you will get a committed, motivated, diligent and dedicated military force serving the interests of the foreign invaders of their country, invaders who, at this point, look to be responsible for over half a million Iraqi deaths. This is not the kind of reliable force you would want watching YOUR back and I don't care what fucking bullshit the American military has to say about them, common sense tells me not to believe a word of it.
-
We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.
-
<<We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.>>
The whole world recognizes America's pursuit of a criminal aggression for exactly what it is. Your attempt to portray it as an honourable attempt to keep a promise is ludicrous. Nobody is fooled. Your excuses are increasingly pathetic.
-
"the pissed-off Iraqis tend to take out their anger on the traitors' families as well as the traitors themselves, and favour executions with gruesome tortures rather than a clean shot to the back of the head and consequently (c) tries to build up a little favour bank with various Resistance figures just in case the day comes when he needs a friend in that camp."
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
So we need to be meaner?
-
We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.
So we should "bide our time" and follow the current strategy of not trying to win the war (or whatever the hell it is we are doing over there) to keep our promise to the Iraqis and the world?
Won't that cause the same problem with the troops that Vietnam did? Who wants to die in a lost cause so that we "keep our promise?" That's a real morale booster you and Bt have stumbled upon.
Some of you may die out there today, but know that you die so that we can bide our time and keep the president's promises. That's a sabre-rattler for sure.
-
The current strategy is to maintain enough order in country so that Iraq can take over that responsibilty eventually.
That takes time.
or should we just turn our backs on those millions of voters who risked life and limb to help form their new government?
-
The current strategy is to maintain enough order in country so that Iraq can take over that responsibilty eventually.
So it is Vietnamization, only in Iraq?
-
<<So we need to be meaner?>>
(plane, in response to my comment that the Iraqi Resistance was merciless to traitors and collaborators)
Well, that was the Nazi's conclusion. Did it help them? Do you want to be like them? (The last was a rhetorical question - - I know you want to be like them.)
-
So it is Vietnamization, only in Iraq?
Close enough.
-
"the pissed-off Iraqis tend to take out their anger on the traitors' families as well as the traitors themselves, and favour executions with gruesome tortures rather than a clean shot to the back of the head and consequently (c) tries to build up a little favour bank with various Resistance figures just in case the day comes when he needs a friend in that camp."
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
So we need to be meaner?
<<So we need to be meaner?>>
(plane, in response to my comment that the Iraqi Resistance was merciless to traitors and collaborators)
Well, that was the Nazi's conclusion. Did it help them? Do you want to be like them? (The last was a rhetorical question - - I know you want to be like them.)
You seem to think that getting more Natzi like is working well for the Iriqui Resitance , but you don't think we are mean enough to match them?
-
<<You seem to think that getting more Natzi like is working well for the Iriqui Resitance , but you don't think we are mean enough to match them?>>
Oh, yes I do. But I don't think you took my meaning. I referred to the savagery of the Iraqi Resistance towards traitors and their families, not as a factor in their success, but as a consideration that you appear to have neglected in assessing the value of the Iraqis who volunteer out of self-interest (your explanation) to serve in the quisling army. I was merely pointing out that self-interest would diminish their effectiveness as collaborators, since it would lead them to curry favour with the very forces they were supposed to be fighting. I believe you mistook my reference to that savagery as a reason for the success of the Resistance, which wasn't my intention at all. Savagery alone won't explain anyone's success in that conflict since all sides are equally savage.
-
Cut and Run.
The official GOP apologist's smear mantra.
Lets just keep staying the course, even though there is *none*. What we have in Iraq today is anarchy. The government we continue to prop up simply does not function.
I find it very funny that Baker's commission has came up with two proposals which I mentioned a few years ago.
Partitioning Iraq- creating multiple city states- give the major players their own piece.
Involving neighboring countries in keeping the order- they have the most to benefit, since they have to directly live with it.
Not suprisingly, Team Bush continues to reject these ideas despite their own repeated and thorough failures.
-
<<I find it very funny that Baker's commission has came up with two proposals which I mentioned a few years ago.>>
Baker's a piker. The Wall Street Journal's guest editorial today (some guy from Johns Hopkins) came up with at least half a dozen. None a them any good as far as he could see, except that a simple Saigon-type exit was ruled out because he figured it would result in several hundred thousand being killed in communal massacres. Besides, ditching the helicopters might block the Strait of Hormuz.
I figure the best option for the U.S. is to ask Saddam to take it back off their hands. Ahmedinejad might do it for them, but they'd have a lot of amends to make to him and his country first. The Nazi solution came in for careful consideration, but I think it'll cost too much money. God knows they have no objection to it on moral grounds.
All in all, as I surveyed the God-awful mess I felt a certain sense of warped vindication. They elected the Smirking Chimp to lead them and now they must live with the results. Of course, they didn't really "elect" the Chimp, the election was probably fixed, again, this time in Ohio, but that's hard to prove and may not even be the case. Even if the elections were fixed, they deserve Bush by not opposing him in numbers sufficient to overcome any Republican cheating at the polls. In any event, the situation for them can only get worse. More strutting punks will have to die, more hundreds of billions will have to drain from their treasury, more civil liberties and safeguards will have to be sacrificed to the needs of the national security state. Neighbour, you are truly fucked. And you did it all to yourself.
-
http://billmon.org/archives/002843.html
-
Good to see billmon realizes he was part of the problem and contributes little to the solution.
-
What I got from billmon's post was that the anti-war movement was at fault for not showing enough militancy, not blocking the troop trains, not organizing mass actions. Not being as creative in finding the techniques of these times for stopping the war the way the students of the 1960s were creative in finding the techniques of those times. Time moves on and what worked in 1968 isn't working in 2006
But failure to stop a crime is not equivalent to being a party to the crime.
The problem is Bush and the neocons around him. No way is billmon part of that problem. It's not wrong to try and fail. To care and not be able to do anything. It's only wrong when you don't try and don't care.
-
" It's only wrong when you don't try and don't care. "
[][][][][][][][][][][]
So what would our nation be guilty of if we saw the tyrany and slavery of Iraq and never did anything?
-
No way is billmon part of that problem.
Sure he is . He admitted as much himself. He turned the war into a wedge issue for partisan gain.
He did the same thing he blasted Bush for doing. I just hope he can overcome all the guilt he must feel.
-
<<Sure he [billmon] is [a part of the problem] . He admitted as much himself. He turned the war into a wedge issue for partisan gain.
<<He did the same thing he blasted Bush for doing. I just hope he can overcome all the guilt he must feel. >>
He's too hard on himself. I didn't say billmon didn't think he was part of the problem, I said I DON'T THINK billmon is part of the problem.
And he's too easy on Bush. I don't blast Bush for turning the war into a wedge issue for partisan gain. That's a very minor sin, probably the least of his many. I blast him for being a liar, a war-monger, a mass murderer and a torturer.
Billmon better get a grip, a sense of perspective.
-
Cut and Run.
The official GOP apologist's smear mantra.
Lets just keep staying the course, even though there is *none*. What we have in Iraq today is anarchy. The government we continue to prop up simply does not function.
I find it very funny that Baker's commission has came up with two proposals which I mentioned a few years ago.
Partitioning Iraq- creating multiple city states- give the major players their own piece.
Involving neighboring countries in keeping the order- they have the most to benefit, since they have to directly live with it.
Not suprisingly, Team Bush continues to reject these ideas despite their own repeated and thorough failures.
-----------------------------
Hi Syrmark, good to see you.
"Bush: I won't change strategy in Iraq"
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061021/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_iraq_9
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/21/AR2006102100308.html
"We will not pull our troops off the battlefield before the mission is complete," he said.
http://www.slate.com/id/2125910/
The Sunk-Cost Fallacy (from 2005 but still relevant)
-
<<So what would our nation be guilty of if we saw the tyrany and slavery of Iraq and never did anything?>>
So now you want to pretend that the U.S. went into Iraq because they saw the tyranny and slavery of Iraq and wanted to do something about it?
That is such bullshit I don't even need to answer your question. It is compeltely irrelevant because it bears no relationship whatever to what has happened between the U.S. and Iraq.
-
<<So what would our nation be guilty of if we saw the tyrany and slavery of Iraq and never did anything?>>
So now you want to pretend that the U.S. went into Iraq because they saw the tyranny and slavery of Iraq and wanted to do something about it?
That is such bullshit I don't even need to answer your question. It is compeltely irrelevant because it bears no relationship whatever to what has happened between the U.S. and Iraq.
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
Thank you , I aim to please.
Do you still assert that the reason for our presence is to "controll ' oil?
The will of the American people was recruited with the idea of deposeing a tyrant and setting an enslaved people free.
I do not discount the will of the American people .
-
Responding to Plane:
http://www.news.uiuc.edu/news/04/0510war.html
Bush administration has used 27 rationales for war in Iraq, study says
Andrea Lynn, Humanities Editor
217-333-2177; andreal@uiuc.edu
5/10/04
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — If it seems that there have been quite a few rationales for going to war in Iraq, that’s because there have been quite a few – 27, in fact, all floated between Sept. 12, 2001, and Oct. 11, 2002, according to a new study from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. All but four of the rationales originated with the administration of President George W. Bush.
The study also finds that the Bush administration switched its focus from Osama bin Laden to Saddam Hussein early on – only five months after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States.
In addition to what it says about the shifting sands of rationales and the unsteady path to war in Iraq, what is remarkable about the 212-page study is that its author is a student.
The study, “Uncovering the Rationales for the War on Iraq: The Words of the Bush Administration, Congress and the Media from September 12, 2001, to October 11, 2002,†is the senior honors thesis of Devon Largio. She and her professor, Scott Althaus, believe the study is the first of its kind.
For her analysis of all available public statements the Bush administration and selected members of Congress made pertaining to war with Iraq, Largio not only identified the rationales offered for going to war, but also established when they emerged and who promoted them. She also charted the appearance of critical keywords such as Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein and Iraq to trace the administration’s shift in interest from the al Qaeda leader to the Iraqi despot, and the news media’s response to that shift.
“The rationales that were used to justify the war with Iraq have been a major issue in the news since last year, and Devon’s study provides an especially thorough and wide-ranging analysis of it,†Althaus, a professor of political science, said.
“It is not the last word on the subject, but I believe it is the first to document systematically the case that the administration made for going to war during critical periods of the public debate.
“It is first-rate research,†Althaus said, “the best senior thesis I have ever seen – thoroughly documented and elaborately detailed. Her methodology is first-rate.â€
Largio mapped the road to war over three phases: Sept. 12, 2001, to December 2001; January 2002, from Bush’s State of the Union address, to April 2002; and Sept. 12, 2002, to Oct. 11, 2002, the period from Bush’s address to the United Nations to Congress’s approval of the resolution to use force in Iraq.
She drew from statements by President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Policy Board member and long-time adviser Richard Perle; by U.S. senators Tom Daschle, Joe Lieberman, Trent Lott and John McCain; and from stories in the Congressional Record, the New York Times and The Associated Press. She logged 1,500 statements and stories.
The rationales Largio identified include everything from the five front-runners – war on terror, prevention of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, lack of weapons inspections, removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime, Saddam Hussein is evil, to the also-rans – Sen. Joe Lieberman’s “because Saddam Hussein hates us,†Colin Powell’s “because it’s a violation of international law,†and Richard Perle’s “because we can make Iraq an example and gain favor within the Middle East.â€
With regard to the administration’s shift from bin Laden to Saddam, Largio found that Iraq was “part of the plan for the war on terror early in the game.â€
For example, in his State of the Union speech on Jan. 29, 2002, President Bush declared that Iraq was part of the war against terrorism because it supported terrorists and continued to “flaunt its hostility toward America.†He also claimed that Iraq allowed weapons inspectors into the country and then threw them out, “fueling the belief that the nation did in fact plan to develop weapons of mass destruction,†Largio wrote.
In the same speech, the president called Iraq, Iran and North Korea an “axis of evil,†a phrase that would “ignite much criticism†and add “to the sense that the U.S. would embark on a war with the Hussein state,†Largio wrote.
“So, from February of 2002 on,†Largio said, “Iraq gets more hits than Osama bin Laden. For President Bush the switch occurs there and the gap grows over time.â€
Largio also discovered that it was the media that initiated discussions about Iraq, introducing ideas before the administration and congressional leaders did about the intentions of that country and its leader. The media also “brought the idea that Iraq may be connected to the 9-11 incident to the forefront, asking questions of the officials on the topic and printing articles about the possibility.â€
The media “seemed to offer a lot of opinion and speculation, as there had been no formal indication that Iraq would be a target in the war on terror,†Largio wrote. Oddly, though, the media didn’t switch its focus to Iraq and Saddam until July of 2002.
Yet, “Overall, the media was in tune with the major arguments of the administration and Congress, but not with every detail that emerged from the official sources.â€
“As always, hindsight is twenty-twenty,†Largio wrote in the conclusion to her thesis. “However, there are questions surrounding nearly every major rationale for the war.
“People may wonder, why are our men and women over there? Why did we go to war? Were we misled? In this election year, these questions deserve answers. And though this paper cannot answer these questions definitively, it can provide some insight into the thinking of the powers-that-be during the earliest stages of war preparation and give the American people a chance to answer these questions for themselves.â€
Because Largio’s thesis addresses questions of “great public importance,†Althaus said, and “does so in such a detailed manner,†he arranged to have it posted on a public Web site. Largio will graduate on May 16, and will attend law school at Vanderbilt University.
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,650198804,00.html
Bush's rationale for war shifting
By Tom Raum
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — President Bush keeps revising his explanation for why the United States is in Iraq, moving from narrow military objectives at first to history-of-civilization stakes now.
Initially, the rationale was specific: to stop Saddam Hussein from using what Bush claimed were the Iraqi leader's weapons of mass destruction or from selling them to al-Qaida or other terrorist groups.
But 3 1/2 years later, with no weapons found, still no end in sight and the war a liability for nearly all Republicans on the ballot Nov. 7, the justification has become far broader and now includes the expansive "struggle between good and evil."
Bush's changing rhetoric reflects increasing administration efforts to tie the war, increasingly unpopular at home, with the global fight against terrorism, still the president's strongest suit politically.
Republicans seized on North Korea's reported nuclear test last week as further evidence that strong U.S. leadership is needed.
"We can't tolerate a new terrorist state in the heart of the Middle East, with large oil reserves that could be used to fund its radical ambitions, or used to inflict economic damage on the West," Bush said in a news conference last week in the Rose Garden.
When no weapons of mass destruction were found in Iraq, Bush shifted his war justification to one of liberating Iraqis from a brutal ruler.
After Saddam's capture in December 2003, the rationale became helping to spread democracy through the Middle East. Then it was confronting terrorists in Iraq "so we do not have to face them here at home," and "making America safer," themes Bush pounds today.
"We're in the ideological struggle of the 21st century," he told a California audience this month. "It's a struggle between good and evil."
Vice President Dick Cheney takes it even further: "The hopes of the civilized world ride with us," Cheney tells audiences.
Except for the weapons of mass destruction argument, there is some validity in each of Bush's shifting rationales, said Michael O'Hanlon, a foreign policy scholar at the Brookings Institution who initially supported the war effort.
"And I don't have any big problems with any of them, analytically. The problem is they can't change the realities on the ground in Iraq, which is that we're in the process of beginning to lose," O'Hanlon said. "It is taking us a long time to realize that, but the war is not headed the way it should be."
Andrew Card, Bush's first chief of staff, said Bush's evolving rhetoric, including his insistence that Iraq is a crucial part of the fight against terror, is part of an attempt to put the war in better perspective for Americans.
The administration recently has been "doing a much better job" in explaining the stakes, Card said in an interview. "We never said it was going to be easy. The president always told us it would be long and tough."
"I'm trying to do everything I can to remind people that the war on terror has the war in Iraq as a subset. It's critical we succeed in Iraq as part of the war on terror," said Card, who left the White House in March.
Bush at first sought to explain increasing insurgent and sectarian violence as a lead-up to Iraqi elections. But elections came and went, and a democratically elected government took over, and the sectarian violence increased.
Bush has insisted U.S. soldiers will stand down as Iraqis stand up. He has likened the war to the 20th century struggles against fascism, Nazism and communism. He has called Iraq the "central front" in a global fight against radical jihadists.
Having jettisoned most of the earlier, upbeat claims of progress, Bush these days emphasizes consequences of setting even a limited withdrawal timetable: abandonment of the Iraqi people, destabilizing the Middle East and emboldening terrorists around the world.
The more ominous and determined his words, the more skeptical the American public appears, polls show, both on the war itself and over whether it is part of the larger fight against terrorism, as the administration insists.
Bush's approval rating, reflected by AP-Ipsos polls, has slid from the mid-60s at the outset of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 to the high 30s now. There were light jumps upward after the December 2003 capture of Saddam, Bush's re-election in November 2004 and each of three series of aggressive speeches over the past year. Those gains tended to vanish quickly.
With the war intruding on the fall elections, both parties have stepped up their rhetoric.
Republicans, who are also reeling from the congressional page scandal, are casting Democrats as seeking to "cut and run" and appease terrorists.
Democrats accuse Bush of failed leadership with his "stay the course" strategy. They cite a government intelligence assessment suggesting the Iraq war has helped recruit more terrorists, and a book by journalist Bob Woodward that portrays Bush as intransigent in his defense of the Iraq war and his advisers as bitterly divided.
Democrats say Iraq has become a distraction from the war against terrorism — not a central front. But they are divided among themselves on what strategy to pursue.
Republicans, too, increasingly are growing divided as U.S. casualties rise.
"I struggle with the fact that President Bush said, 'As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down.' But the fact is, this has not happened," said Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., a war supporter turned war skeptic.
The Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sen. John Warner of Virginia, said after a recent visit to Iraq that Iraq was "drifting sideways." He urged consideration of a "change of course" if the Iraq government fails to restore order over the next two or three months.
More than 2,730 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the war, most of them since Bush's May 2003 "mission accomplished" aircraft carrier speech. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have died.
Recent events have been dispiriting.
The United States now has about 141,000 troops in Iraq, up from about 127,000 in July. Some military experts have suggested at least one additional U.S. division, or around 20,000 troops, is needed in western Iraq alone.
Dan Benjamin, a former Middle East specialist with the National Security Council in the Clinton administration, said the administration is overemphasizing the nature of the threat in an effort to bolster support.
"I think the administration has oversold the case that Iraq could become a jihadist state," said Benjamin, now with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. "If the U.S. were to leave Iraq tomorrow, the result would be a bloodbath in which Sunnis and Shiites fight it out. But the jihadists would not be able to seek power."
Not all of Bush's rhetorical flourishes have had the intended consequences.
When the history of Iraq is finally written, the recent surge in sectarian violence is "going to be a comma," Bush said in several recent appearances.
Critics immediately complained that the remark appeared unsympathetic and dismissive of U.S. and Iraqi casualties, an assertion the White House disputed.
For a while last summer, Bush depicted the war as one against "Islamic fascism," borrowing a phrase from conservative commentators. The strategy backfired, further fanning anti-American sentiment across the Muslim world.
The "fascism" phrase abruptly disappeared from Bush's speeches, reportedly after he was talked out of it by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Karen Hughes, a longtime Bush confidant now with the State Department.
Hughes said she would not disclose private conversations with the president. But, she told the AP, she did not use the "fascism" phrase herself. "I use 'violent extremist,"' she said.
-
I can't remember what I may have said that required this.
But I know that each time a single accusation against President Bush's honesty can be shown to be a fantasy , two other fictional accusations can be pointed to , or an hundred.
Could you pick one and let me stay on that one ?