good of you to point out the egg now lying on the bbc's face.

but what of the egg dribbling down bush's forehead and approaching his nose regarding the 'grave and gathering danger' presented by saddam and his wmd. in light of kay's statements/testimony, i'd say that the harm to the us intelligence community/administration through their faulty analysis is far more seroius, as a matter of national interest, than is the lack of effective reporting by the bbc.

there is a notable absence of conservative writers discussing this issue, with the exception of sullivan. why might that be? inconvenient?

dinesh,

1. The subject on this thread is BBC - stay on the topic

2. As has been indicated already on many occasions and in multiple places everybody believed that Saddam had WMD. This includes Blix, UN, Clinton, Blair, numerous others and perhaps Bush too. Consequently your dripping egg is owned by the intelligence gathering bodies and not Bush. Inconvenient, isn't it?

We've sure had some kind of intelligence failure and we need to improve. However, the US, UN, and the rest of the major nations of the world like the UK, France and Russia all believed these programs existed. Even Saddam admitted as much but did not even convince Hans Blix that the WMD were destroyed.

Kay also indicated he believed some of the components of this program were spirited out of the country before the war started. He also indicated that a WMD program existed and could have been quickly started once the heat of the UN sponsored "inspection" program ceased.

How long would it be before Saddam had these weapons if inspections ceased, two months, six months, one year? I don't know and I don't want to take those kind of risks. That's what preemption is all about.

Kaddafi believes the threat of US force is certainly credible and is disarming accordingly. Oh, and by the way, our intelligence services were surprised at the robust achievements of Kaddafi's WMD program.

The war in Iraq was never only about Saddam's WMD program. It's about enforcing cease fire agreements, removing a state sponsor of terrorism and, more importantly, beginning the democratization of the middle east. Iraq was a logical first step. Until state sponsors of terrorism are removed and replaced with societies were the population can be successful, we will never be safe.

Another factor which is never mentioned by the intelligence critics is how the Clinton administration degraded both the military and intelligence agencies. The military shrunk by one-third during his tenure and the intelligence agencies were treated with disdain. Clinton bought into the "end of history" arguments after the fall of the Soviet Union. Clinton was detested by the military and intelligence community with the same fervor that the academic and environmental community detests Bush.

as for staying on point, the point is that the the us and uk governments hyped intelligence regarding wmd capabilities of saddam in an effort to garner support for the war. they made other arguments justifying military intervention, but the pressing need to act immediately was justified by the "grave and gathering danger" (Read "imminent") presented by saddam. remember the "mushroom cloud" speech given by bush in hushed and sober tones? and while the bbc blew it by twisting facts to support a conclusion (a priori analysis i like to call it--a symptom of a plague that effects most political writing), it does not undermine the criticism which has been borne out by kay, et al. that the govt hyped the intelligence (whether by taking raw intelligence and extrapolating incorrectly, or by pressuring intelligence analysts to reach pre-determined conclusions).

i am including below a link to a website because which purportedly has a link to video of secretary of state colin powell speaking in 2001 prior to 9/11, stating that saddam's military threat had been contained and that "he has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction." i don't have video capabilities at this computer, so i don't know if this link is still working. but i am eager to hear what changed our estimation of saddam between the period when colin gave this speech and when bush led this nation to war. the events of 9/11 do not support this transformation of opinion. as has been clearly demonstrated, saddam did not have any connection to 9/11. rather the saudis did, but our government escorted bin laden's familiy memebers out of the country immediately after 9/11.

i think it is convenient to rewrite the story line post 9/11. unfortunately the facts don't fit that narrative.

the link to the site containing the link to the video is:

http://weblog.siliconvalley.com/column/dangillmor/archives/001374.shtml

oh, and by the way, i can't believe the 'democracy domino theory' is in play now. the domnino theory of communism led this country to 2 questionable wars (korea and vietnam) and ultimately proved a flawed theory. these are desperate arguments to support a war made after the fact. if democracy is so plausible for a place like iraq, why wasn't bush touting that in his campaign? why wasn't he using that rationale to support the war? this was a war of choice, not necessity, and my beef is that my couching it as a war of necessity, bush 1) discredited the war of necessity approach; and 2) misled the country.

and when are we going to attack syria, saudi arabia, libya, pakistan (musharraf gained power through a military coup, remember?), china, and many other african countries?

for democracy to take hold in a country, a civil society is required, among many other items. democracy generally does not flourish under military occupation (see the american colonies, colonial india, colonial indochina, nazi germany, cambodia). democracy is not something like viagra--take a pill and magically you have results. give me a break.

why wasn't he using that rationale to support the war?.

bush clearly stated that a democratized iraq was a necessary seconday gain.

iraq has a better chance of any mideast country in becoming a democracy for the following reasons: a secular tradition, a better educated population than their illiterate neighbors, kurds and shiites have a vested interest in not being victims again.

the failure of past administrations involving different people at a different time in history with a different set of circumstances is bogus reasoning on your part.

democracy generally does not flourish under military occupation (see the american colonies, colonial india, colonial indochina, nazi germany, cambodia).

three out of five of your examples are presently democracies. or did you not notice that glaring fact in your list of failures?

a necessary secondary gain? and what would the first be? wmd? flying planes into building? who had wmd? who flew planes into the wtc? gimme a break?

and the glaring fact missed by you is my point that military occupation must end before democracy begins. those 3 countries removed the military control over their countries prior to be democratized. did you miss that point? seeing as american troops are planning on being in iraq for the next 3-10 years, its plausible that those islamo-terrorists could see the american presence, not as a democracy building exercise but rather a military occupation. if the al-qaida were bent about our presence in saudi and garnered support for their hatred, i don't see how an indefinite presence in iraq won't foment that same danger.

gimme a break. all these post-war rationalizations for the most significant decision facing a nation. you guys would probably by the brooklyn bridge off this president if he offered to sell it to you.

Sorry Dinesh

Kay explicitly stated that the intelligence on the WMD in Iraq were not hyped by the CIA. That was part of his testimony in Congress on Wednesday.

seeing as american troops are planning on being in iraq for the next 3-10 years

Says who?

those 3 countries removed the military control over their countries prior to be democratized

Geez. Isn't that where Iraq is now? Saddam's military control is gone and there is a transistion going on? Or have you missed that? Or is your gist that America will be occupiers forever? And that is what historically America has done?

You babble. You use useless facts that don't even support(and contradict) your cause. What's your point? America is bad? You are good? Iraqis aren't as smart as you? They'll blow it? Democracy ONLY happens under your paradigm? What is your point besides the babbling?

The "Vindication" of Blair is that he didn't completely fabricate the claim that Hussein could mobilize weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes, someone in the intelligence community believed that to be true. Though it is awfully suspiscious that not even the US believed this claim when they had invented so many others.

As for the US being wrong about WMD intelligence, yes, many other countries suspected, even believed that Iraq had WMD, but they were all sufficiently unsure about it to not only NOT support a war against Iraw but to actively oppose such a war. That is the critical difference. You still have the rest of the world in the position of being right that the US went to war on its own initiative based on wildly incorrect beliefs about the facts on the ground.

That doesn't make anyone else in the world feel safer.

Frank:

Since you claim that other countries "were all sufficiently unsure about it [Iraq having WMD] to not only NOT support a war...but to actively oppose such a war," it should be a simple matter for you to provide a statement from, say, the German and French foreign ministries indicating that they opposed war

because they believed Iraq did not have WMD.

In fact, nobody opposed war for that reason. They opposed it for fear that WMD WOULD be used (by Iraq), they opposed it b/c they believed that Iraq's WMD could be contained, but no state said "They don't have WMD, why are you going to war w/ them?"

Unless you can provide evidence of said statement/commentary?

Dinesh:

Why in the world do you consider Korea "questionable"? We saved at least half the peninsula, arguably a majority of the population from suffering under an extended, family-run dictatorship. We did, after an extended time, bring democracy to them. We've helped them industrialize, we've helped them become a vibrant, independent nation that is NOT under the thumb of either China or Japan---a historical first, not seen in several hundred years.

What in the world makes Korea "questionable"??

Dean:

you make a good point about korea--given the success of south korea. i considered it questionable given the fact that the war was justified on the communism domino theory, which history has discredited (indeed, i recall that even our own intelligence community discredited the domino theory recently). again, a case of taking a thesis, and finding facts to support it. so, i use to as an example of the wrong-headedness of the communism domino theory, which has been recycled by this recyled administration into the democracy domino theory.

seems as if nobody wants to explain away colin powell's remarks in 2001. any takers? or is that just useless fact and babble?

and onescent, please spare me the reducto-thinking. i am not suggesting that america is bad. i am suggesting that the president manufactured a case that saddam had wmd in order to justify a military action, when 1) the intelligence was suspect; 2) his own secty of state acknowledge prior to 9/11 that saddam had been contained (oh, how all you just brush right over that). spare me the attitude, just b/c i think that the president played politics with war, and that he has a cadre of seemingly unquestioning supporters who don't have the integrity to say they may have been misled (can't even acknowledge the possibility) doesn't mean that i think america is bad and i am good. what's next, are you going to accuse me of being a communist and snitch on me to john ashcroft. please.

Korea was not justified at the time as part of a "domino theory." It was justified in the belief that this was naked aggression, and, w/ the memories of Munich fresh in mind, the need to stop said aggression at the outset.

So, no, there was no domino theory in play at the time.

As to your point about the President "manufacturing" evidence, however, I'll pose the same challenge to you that I did to Frank: Find evidence that any government (and I'll accept the UN as part of the government) questioned that Saddam had WMD. You can argue that the President took the worst case view of the available evidence, and we could debate whether that was appropraite or not (and we should also keep in mind that people were, at the time, accusing him of NOT taking reports of suicide pilots seriously enough), but your argument that the government systematically misled us on this subject? Yeah, I think it's a crock.

And, as you say, Powell's speech was pre-9/11. Ya know, a lot of outlooks changed that day. What might have been a faraway possibility wasn't so faraway anymore. So, what might be acceptable (say, a belief that "containment will be 90% likely to succeed") might both be downgraded (Hmm, maybe only 50% successful) and/or considered no longer acceptable.

Put it to you this way: Before a heart attack, you might have considered warnings to lose weight and eat right to be good advice, but being overweight by 25# not-too-bad. You sure you're gonna take that same view the day after you're in the ER after an episode of cardiac arrest?

If you don't think metrics, standards, and definitions of "acceptable" and "successful" changed after 9-11, well, I have to wonder if ANYTHING would make those things change for you.

dean: you are killing me. i have to prove that the govt questioned that saddam had wmd. i just quoted colin powell saying that saddam did not have any significant wmd capabilities, and was contained. and yes, 9/11 changed many things. unfortunately, it doesn't seem to have altered this country's view of saudi arabia and pakistan, countries which lead the world in many respects in their support of islamo-terrorism (remember that attack on the indian parliament, carried out by an islamic group with ties to the pakistan govt?). and while i appreciate the reassessment that may have occurred post 9-11, nobody, including you, has pointed to a single fact which could explain why we went from saying saddam was contained and had no significant wmd capabilities as colin did, to saying he was a grave and gathering danger. remember colin's speech at the un? remember the aluminium tubes? turned out not to be true-those weren't uranium enriching grade tubes. remember those 2 mobile labs kay and cheney pointed to? kay now acknowledges they were wrong about those. remember that mushroom cloud speech? nope--no capablities there (and the scientific, as opposed to political/intellgence community was saying at the time prior to the war that it would be near impossible for saddam to weaponize nuclear material. but we can't listen to them, b/c they don't fit into bush's neat little view of the world.

this country went to war on certain assumptions. those assumptions have proven to be false. we are owed an explanation. the politicization of this issue is sickening. this is war for god's sake. if the republicans impeached the clinton for lying under oath about sexual relations, what would they have done if he invaded iraq under the pretext that bush did? but apparently integrity isn't a plank in either party's platform.

dean:

my bad on using korea re the domino theory. i was wrong--that bunk theory emerged re vietnam. sorry. but it is still a tired theory and, like bad hairdos and bad music, it too shall be recycled.

but it is still a tired theory and, like bad hairdos and bad music, it too shall be recycled.

You theory of "tired" theories being recycled seems like a tired theory. The tired theories("domino") you've preposed so far haven't worked out. Quit while you are ahead, Dinesh.

i have to prove that the govt questioned that saddam had wmd.

Dinesh, when Hitler had Europe on its knees, Roosevelt did find a way into that war. Roosevelt would have found an entry without Pearl Harbor. It was the right thing to do. Some suspected then, and today, that Pearl Harbor was a set up to facilitate just that. I am not suggesting that's what Bush did. But, thirty years from now, if the face of the Mideast has changed to something good like Germany and Japan, terrorism is obliterated, and millions of Arabs are greatful, what idiot historian is going to condemn Bush for his actions? I doubt that there are any Iraqis who care how US forces got there. No concentration camp inmates declined liberation because just maybe Roosevelt set up Pearl Harbor.

Bush took a course of action with the facts and common sense at his disposal after 9/11. That he took action was far better than the inaction of Clinton which, in MHO, culminated in 9/11.

Sorry, Dinesh, common sense trumps academic theories with me anyday.

onecent:

your logic is interesting.....you are assuming that 30 years from now, the middle east will be a more stable place (despite the last say 2000 years of unrest, remember the crusades?), which therefore justfies all actions today.

the ends don't justify the means. being 'scared' into war by bush's rhetoric of 'grave and gathering danger' and 'mushroom clouds' strike me as disingenous and paternalistic. i don't believe democracy functions well when we are treated like subjects.

Clinton's inaction culminated in 9/11? oh, you are one of those people who believes saddam was connected to 9/11.

hey onecent, where's osama?

history matters.

thanks for not calling into question my patriotism and reporting me to ashcroft.