Afghanistan.. clear objective and exit strategy?

[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

I don't agree. I've read a ton on the subject and aside from a few random and useless artillery shells we really haven't found squat. The conclusion of the Duelfer Report was that Saddam destroyed his WMD in 1991.


This is the same game Cheney played with the Atta meeting in Prague. That because it hasn't been disproved it could have happened. This logic runs quite contrary to our own legal system.

To be quite matter of fact, there's really no evidence that supports the assertion. There was evidence of movement of something to Syria, but that we don't know if WMD were not there isn't evidence that there could have been.

Obviously, if the evidence has been removed, you will not be able to find it. That is the purpose of removing the evidence, which Saddam had 14 months to do. A report about not finding something (that has been removed) is inconclusively worthless, unless you want to use it as fodder for argument.

I love how you quote an ex-General - who's trying to sell books to Americans - about a claim for which there's no evidence...oh quite to the contrary...the evidence gathered indicates there were no WMD to smuggle!

I love how you can so cavalierly smear someone, who was ACTUALLY IN SADDAMS ADMINISTRATION and would have insights no UN inspector, searching with blinders for something that has been removed, could ever have, and who risks deadly reprisal for publishing his book. Where is your EVIDENCE that he is lying? If you say "the evidence gathered indicates there were no WMD", the VERY POINT OF HIS BOOK IS THAT THE EVIDENCE WAS MOVED!!! And . . . oh, the ton that you've read on the subject, were the purveyors of that ton PAID? Or did they publish for free? You seem to question the motives of those who make a living from what they say (Rush et. al.) when you don't like what they say, but if what they say is OK with you, then money does not seem to be an object.

You don't "spread" democracy, it has to be grown from within.
-spence

"Spread democracy"--I was using your words. I wouldn't have put it that way. Certainly, democracy cannot be "grown from within" a dictatorship. The dictatorship must first be overthrown. Furthermore, Bush never argued that Saddam had produced new stockpiles of WMDs, he argued for stopping him before he acquired them. Saddam never verified that he had destroyed what the UN presumed remained from his previous weapons program. Even the Duelfer report believed there was evidence that he wanted to restart his previous WMD programs after the war. Certainly, all the major NATO countries and many others in the UN believed Saddam had restarted the programs and thought he was farther along than he may have been. And Bush has enumerated several reasons for the invasion other than stopping Saddam from acquiring or producing, AGAIN, WMDs. The lie, told over and over, is that Bush lied about WMDs.