Ok this will be a long post and a long read, my quotes from the 911 report will be in italics so you can see the exact wording of the report.
EDIT : Here get it yourSelf, read it, then form an opinion.
www.9-11commission.gov...
Edit:It seems that the proof of the intent of G. W. Bush announced before hand goes unchallenged in this thread. Iraq was not a legit war because of
no WMD, yet that is not all that Bush said. I have laid out the proof and yet....silence............
THE PLAN IS LAIDOUT PLAINLY
(1) First, what did Bush say he would do after 911? And to whom does he directly refer? Well he made a speech that lined out our strategy and just
what that strategy was..
Having issued directives to guide his administration�s preparations for war, on Thursday, September 20, President Bush addressed the nation before
a joint session of Congress. �Tonight,� he said, �we are a country awakened to danger.� The President blamed al Qaeda for 9/11 and the 1998 embassy
bombings and, for the first time, declared that al Qaeda was �responsible for bombing the USS Cole.� He reiterated the ultimatum that had already
been conveyed privately. �The Taliban must act, and act immediately,� he said. �They will hand over the terrorists, or they will share in their fate.�
The President added that America�s quarrel was not with Islam: �The enemy of America is not our many Muslim friends; it is not our many Arab friends.
Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists, and every [emphasis mine] government that supports them.� Other regimes faced hard choices, he
pointed out: �Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make: Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.�
President Bush argued that the new war went beyond Bin Ladin. �Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there,� he said. �It will
not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped, and defeated. �The President had a message for the Pentagon: �The hour is
coming when America will act, and you will make us proud.� He also had a message for those outside the United States. �This is civilization�s fight,�
he said. �We ask every nation to join us.�
So as you can see, here Bush says that this is a much bigger war than just al Qaeda and Afghanistan. It is a fight against global terrorism. Keep in
mind that this was long before the Iraq war. He asks for the nations of the world to join this fight, but he states very vividly, that the choice is
theirs. You either join in this fight or you join the terrorists and share in the wrath that is to come.
So now that this is clear, and most here would agree that the war with Afghanistan was the right thing to do at this time. Even most countries of the
world agreed. Pakistan had one tough choice and if asked, I can post just what the ultimatum given to them was but that is not in the scope of this
thread at this time.
THE IRAQI QUESTION
Many seem to believe that Iraq was in GW Bush's sights long before 911 and in some degree this is correct, but it also was in Clinton's before
him.
What Iraqi / 911 non-connection does the 911 report refer to? Well lets step back a second and look at the time in the first weeks after 911. What was
the Presidents reaction and interest in Iraq? Well I find this very telling of the man and his assessment of the situation. Let me start with a
meeting to discuss the options and targets.
On September 20, President Bush met with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, and the two leaders discussed the global conflict ahead. When Blair
asked about Iraq, the President replied that Iraq was not the immediate problem. Some members of his administration, he commented, had expressed a
different view, but he was the one responsible for making the decisions.
-The Czech report alleging an April 2001 Prague meeting between Atta and an Iraqi intelligence officer.
-The Polish report that personnel at the headquarters of Iraqi intelligence in Baghdad were told before September 11 to go on the streets to gauge
crowd reaction to an unspecified event.
-Arguing that the case for links between Iraq and al Qaeda was weak, the memo pointed out that Bin Ladin resented the secularism of Saddam Hussein�s
regime.
- no confirmed reporting on Saddam cooperating with Bin Ladin on unconventional weapons
So did the President actually now want to go after Iraq? Well this is quite telling also. General Franks had something already in mind, yet the
President says no.
Franks told us that he was pushing independently to do more robust planning on military responses in Iraq during the summer before 9/11�a request
President Bush denied, arguing that the time was not right. (CENTCOM also began dusting off plans for a full invasion of Iraq during this period,
Franks said.) The CENTCOM commander told us he renewed his appeal for further military planning to respond to Iraqi moves shortly after 9/11, both
because he personally felt that Iraq and al Qaeda might be engaged in some form of collusion and because he worried that Saddam might take advantage
of the attacks to move against his internal enemies in the northern or southern parts of Iraq, where the United States was flying regular missions to
enforce Iraqi no-fly zones. Franks said that President Bush again turned down the request.
But as noted earlier, some within the administration wanted to attack Iraq also. Why? Well just who were these people? Well let�s have a look,
Within the Pentagon, Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz continued to press the case for dealing with Iraq. Writing to Rumsfeld on September 17 in a memo
headlined �Preventing More Events, �he argued that if there was even a 10 percent chance that Saddam Hussein was behind the 9/11 attack, maximum
priority should be placed on eliminating that threat. Wolfowitz contended that the odds were �far more� than 1 in 10, citing Saddam�s praise for the
attack, his long record of involvement in terrorism, and theories that Ramzi Yousef was an Iraqi agent and Iraq was behind the 1993 attack on the
World Trade Center. The next day, Wolfowitz renewed the argument, writing to Rumsfeld about the interest of Yousef�s co-conspirator in the 1995 Manila
air plot in crashing an explosives-laden plane into CIA headquarters, and about information from a foreign government regarding Iraqis� involvement in
the attempted hijacking of a Gulf Air flight. Given this background, he wondered why so little thought had been devoted to the danger of suicide
pilots, seeing a �failure of imagination� and a mind-set that dismissed possibilities.
There are many more instances in which the President struck down an attack on Iraq. So Lets go back to that day, Sept. 11th.
On the afternoon of 9/11, according to contemporaneous notes, Secretary Rumsfeld instructed General Myers to obtain quickly as much information as
possible. The notes indicate that he also told Myers that he was not simply interested in striking empty training sites. He thought the U.S. response
should consider a wide range of options and possibilities. The secretary said his instinct was to hit Saddam Hussein at the same time�not only Bin
Ladin. Secretary Rumsfeld later explained that at the time, he had been considering either one of them, or perhaps someone else, as the responsible
party
Well it looks like Rumsfeld was attempting to get as much information together as quickly as possible to find out just who had committed this horror.
Camp David would be were the policy was made.
According to Rice, the issue of what, if anything, to do about Iraq was really engaged at Camp David. Briefing papers on Iraq, along with many
others, were in briefing materials for the participants. Rice told us the administration was concerned that Iraq would take advantage of the 9/11
attacks. She recalled that in the first Camp David session chaired by the President, Rumsfeld asked what the administration should do about Iraq.
Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz made the case for striking Iraq during �this round� of the war on terrorism.
Again Mr. Wolfowitz was heavily in favor of attacking Iraq at this point. Just what did this man have against Iraq? At this point the President is not
concentrating on Iraq, he is concentrating on Afghanistan and just how to depose of the Taliban.
A Defense Department paper for the Camp David briefing book on the strategic concept for the war on terrorism specified three priority targets for
initial action: al Qaeda, the Taliban, and Iraq. It argued that of the three, al Qaeda and Iraq posed a strategic threat to the United States. Iraq�s
long-standing involvement in terrorism was cited, along with its interest in weapons of mass destruction. Secretary Powell recalled that Wolfowitz�not
Rumsfeld�argued that Iraq was ultimately the source of the terrorist problem and should therefore be attacked. Powell said that Wolfowitz was not able
to justify his belief that Iraq was behind 9/11. �Paul was always of the view that Iraq was a problem that had to be dealt with,� Powell told us. �And
he saw this as one way of using this event as a way to deal with the Iraq problem.� Powell said that President Bush did not give Wolfowitz�s argument
�much weight.� Though continuing to worry about Iraq in the following week, Powell said, President Bush saw Afghanistan as the priority.
It seems that again Mr. Wolfowitz wanted to strike Iraq quickly. Iraq had indeed been a problem for a long while and was supporting terror, but to
claim that Iraq was at the root of the terrorist problem? What would make him think this? What did he know or not know? He seems pretty adamant about
Iraq.
]President Bush told Bob Woodward that the decision not to invade Iraq was made at the morning session on September 15. Iraq was not even on the
table during the September 15 afternoon session, which dealt solely with Afghanistan. Rice said that when President Bush called her on Sunday,
September 16, he said the focus would be on Afghanistan, although he still wanted plans for Iraq should the country take some action or the
administration eventually determine that it had been involved in the 9/11 attacks.
I will love to continue this as I am sure most here have not read any of the 911 report. I find it very interesting and would highly recommend
everyone buy a copy. It will give you a better picture of this war that we face.
As noted at the beginning, President Bush laid out what the plan was. �Our enemy is a radical network of terrorists, and every [emphasis mine]
government that supports them.� The report tells of many of the al Qaeda�s connections with the whole Islamic fundamentalist movements and Iraq�s
involvement in the network of world terror. This war is not against just Afghanistan or Iraq, it is a war on the whole network of terror. This would
include nations that harbor, fund, or support terrorists.
So then Saudi Arabia comes to my mind, how about yours? Well the 911 Report does a pretty decent job of telling how the Saudis helped the United
States, as does Pakistan.
Coming�.Part II The alliances that are and those that weren�t�..
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