|
|
| |
How to make google ad Rows
1. Use a google-doc row type
2. set the security level (SL in lower left) to 7652. "2" => Don't show in edit mode.
|
|
| |
"As long as Saddam Hussein is in power, I am convinced that he will pose a threat to our security"
South Carolina Republican Debate, February 15, 2000
As long as Saddam Hussein is in power, I am convinced that he will pose a threat to our security. "The New York Times" reported just a few days ago that administration officials worry that Saddam Hussein continues to develop weapons of mass destruction.
|
|
| |
"[Saddam] surely possesses such [biological] weapons"
Speech: From Crisis to Opportunity: American Internationalism and the New Atlantic Order, February 2, 2002
Dictators that harbor terrorists and build these weapons are now on notice that such behavior is, in itself, a casus belli. Nowhere is such an ultimatum more applicable than in Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
Almost everyone familiar with Saddam's record of biological weapons development over the past two decades agrees that he surely possesses such weapons. He also possesses vast stocks of chemical weapons and is known to have aggressively pursued, with some success, the development of nuclear weapons. He is the only dictator on Earth who has actually used weapons of mass destruction against his own people and his neighbors. His regime has been implicated in the 1993 attacks on the World Trade Center. Terrorist training camps exist on Iraqi soil, and Iraqi officials are known to have had a number of contacts with Al Qaeda. These were probably not courtesy calls.
Americans have internalized the mantra that Afghanistan represents only the first front in our global war on terror. The next front is apparent, and we should not shirk from acknowledging it. A terrorist resides in Baghdad, with the resources of an entire state at his disposal, flush with cash from illicit oil revenues and proud of a decade-long record of defying the international community's demands that he come clean on his programs to develop weapons of mass destruction.
A day of reckoning is approaching. Not simply for Saddam Hussein, but for all members of the Atlantic community, whose governments face the choice of ending the threat we face every day from this rogue regime or carrying on as if such behavior, in the wake of September 11th, were somehow still tolerable. The Afghan campaign set a precedent, and provided a model: the success of air power, combined with Special Operations forces working together with indigenous opposition forces, in waging modern war.
|
|
| |
"The celebration of freedom in the streets of liberated Baghdad... will be a reminder"
Senator John McCain’s Speech to the American Jewish Committee, May 9, 2002
The United States government went on record in support of regime change in Iraq in 1998, with passage of the Iraq Liberation Act. Successive Administrations have failed to implement this law. I'm glad the Bush Administration has now resolved to act. Support for broad-based Iraqi opposition forces must be a central part of this effort.
Failure to act against this regime while we still have the freedom to do so would be morally wrong. Europe slept in the 1930s. We must not.
The celebration of freedom in the streets of liberated Baghdad will serve as a counterpoint to the state-directed Arab media's distortion of the Palestinian conflict. It will be a reminder to other Arab tyrants that the United States is a natural ally of Arab people who aspire to freedom.
|
|
| |
"The threat is abundantly clear..."
Statement on the floor of the Senate regarding the bipartisan resolution authorizing the President to do what is necessary to defend the United States against Saddam Hussein, October 2, 2002
Congress must debate the question of war with Iraq. It is appropriate and right for the people of the United States to have their voices heard in this debate through their representatives in Congress. But as the President has said, the nation must speak with one voice once we determine to take a course that will most likely send our nation's young men and women to war.
There is a reason why the Constitution vests shared power in the President and the Congress on matters of war. But there is also a reason why the Constitution recognizes the President of the United States as Commander in Chief. Limiting the President's ability to defend the United States, when Congress and the President agree on the nature of the threat posed to the United States by Iraq, is unwise.
No resolution tying the President's hands or limiting the President's ability to respond to a clearly defined threat can anticipate the decisions the President will have to make in coming weeks and months, with American forces deployed overseas on his orders, to defend American security. We cannot foresee the course or end of this conflict, even though to most of us the threat is abundantly clear, and the course of action we must pursue is apparent. That's why there is one Commander in Chief, not 535 of them. Restricting the President's flexibility to conduct military action against a threat that has been defined and identified makes the United States less capable of responding to that threat.
Thanks to the President's leadership over the past few months, the Congress has been moving steadily to support the President's determination to hold Saddam Hussein accountable to the world. I urge all my colleagues to renew their efforts to come together on one resolution – to show the world we are united with the President to enforce the terms of the Gulf War cease-fire and prevent Saddam Hussein from threatening our and the world's security ever again.
|
|
| |
"Our technology, particularly air-to-ground technology, is vastly improved"
CNN, December 9, 2002, cited in "John McCain's real war record," Salon.com, January 17, 2008
...McCain argued that better technology meant fewer troops were going to be needed in Iraq. "Our technology, particularly air-to-ground technology, is vastly improved," McCain told CNN's Larry King on Dec. 9, 2002. "I don't think you're going to have to see the scale of numbers of troops that we saw, nor the length of the buildup, obviously, that we had back in 1991."
More info
Salon.com, January 17, 2008
"John McCain's real war record"
by Mark Benjamin
In fact, lately former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has become quite the punching bag for McCain on the campaign trail. Part of the McCain mantra, whether recited on the stump or to reporters on his campaign bus, is that he knew that Gen. David Petraeus' surge of troops would work better than Rumsfeld's light footprint approach. It's his way of supporting the war while criticizing the way it was executed by the Bush administration without ever uttering the word "Bush." It is also meant to be proof of the gravitas McCain would bring to the job of commander in chief. "I have the knowledge and experience and judgment, as my support of the Petraeus strategy indicated, and my condemnation of the previous Rumsfeld strategy," said McCain in a Jan. 9 NBC "Today" show interview. "No other candidate running for president did that on either side."
But to buy into the McCain-knows-best version of the Iraq war, you have to ignore a lot of history. McCain was among the most aggressive proponents of a preemptive strike against Saddam Hussein, cosponsoring the resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq. He also expressed full faith in the way it would be executed -- a war plan conceived and executed by Rumsfeld.
In the period leading up to the war, McCain sounded, at times, less like a straight-talking maverick and more like the neoconservative former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. "It's going to send the message throughout the Middle East that democracy can take hold in the Middle East," McCain said about the war on Fox's "Hannity & Colmes" on Feb. 21, 2003. He seemed to think Iraq would be a cakewalk, predicting that the war "will be brief."
He also sounded like Wolfowitz's boss, Donald Rumsfeld, as far back as late 2002. Despite all his talk now about more troops, as the war drums built toward a crescendo, McCain argued that better technology meant fewer troops were going to be needed in Iraq. "Our technology, particularly air-to-ground technology, is vastly improved," McCain told CNN's Larry King on Dec. 9, 2002. "I don't think you're going to have to see the scale of numbers of troops that we saw, nor the length of the buildup, obviously, that we had back in 1991." It was pure Rumsfeld.
|
|
| |
"I have no qualms about our strategic plans.
Hartford Courant, March 5, 2003, cited in "John McCain's real war record," Salon.com, January 17, 2008
"I have no qualms about our strategic plans," he told the Hartford Courant in a March 5 [2003] article, just before the invasion. "I thought we were very successful in Afghanistan."
More info
"John McCain's real war record," Salon.com
But even back then, not everyone was so sure that the war would be brief or that Rumsfeld's smaller force would be sufficient. On Feb. 25, 2003, then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki famously warned the Senate Armed Services Committee that "several hundred thousand" soldiers would be needed to take and hold Iraq. Rumsfeld publicly disagreed with Shinseki's estimate.
If McCain shared Shinseki's position, he didn't say so at the time. "I have no qualms about our strategic plans," he told the Hartford Courant in a March 5 article, just before the invasion. "I thought we were very successful in Afghanistan."
|
|
| |
"When the people of Iraq are liberated, we will have written another chapter in [our] glorious history"
Senate floor, March 19, 2003, cited in "John McCain's real war record," Salon.com, January 17, 2008
...when the people of Iraq are liberated, we will again have written another chapter in the glorious history of the United States of America.
More info
"John McCain's real war record," Salon.com
And while he was quiet about Shinseki, McCain shouted down some naysayers who proved to be much more prescient than he. On the cusp of the invasion, West Virginia Democrat Sen. Robert Byrd took to the Senate floor on March 19, 2003, to denounce the war. It was a speech that predicted the future debacle so accurately that it now seems that the senior senator from West Virginia had a crystal ball in his Senate desk. "We proclaim a new doctrine of preemption which is understood by few and feared by many," Byrd warned. "After the war has ended, the United States will have to rebuild much more than the country of Iraq. We will have to rebuild America's image around the globe."
McCain pounced, taking to the Senate floor to predict that "when the people of Iraq are liberated, we will again have written another chapter in the glorious history of the United States of America."
|
|
| |
"The Iraqi people will greet us as liberators"
NBC, March 20, 2003, cited by "McCain: ‘I Was The Greatest Critic’ Of The Iraq War Over The Last Four Years," ThinkProgress.org, August 18, 2007
But I believe, Katie, that the Iraqi people will greet us as liberators.
More info
McCain: ‘I Was The Greatest Critic’ Of The Iraq War Over The Last Four Years, ThinkProgress.org, August 18, 2007
Yesterday on CNN, host Kiran Chetry suggested to Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) that he’s been unfairly “painted as being a huge supporter of the president’s Iraq strategy. Is that an accurate portrayal?” she asked.
McCain responded that “life isn’t fair” because, in reality, he’s been “the greatest critic of the initial four years” of war:
It’s entertaining, in that I was the greatest critic of the initial four years,
three and a half years. I came back from my first trip to Iraq and said, This
is going to fail. We’ve got to change the strategy to the one we’re using now.
But life isn’t fair.
The “greatest critic” who claimed the war would “fail”? Nobody heard that from McCain when he was busy campaigning for Bush’s reelection in 2004 and praising the President’s leadership. Here’s a sampling of what the “greatest critic” of the war was telling us in the months and years after the invasion:
“But I believe, Katie, that the Iraqi people will greet us as liberators.”
[NBC, 3/20/03]
“It’s clear that the end is very much in sight.” [ABC, 4/9/03]
“There’s not a history of clashes that are violent between Sunnis and Shiahs.
So I think they can probably get along.” [MSNBC, 4/23/03]
“This is a mission accomplished. They know how much influence Saddam Hussein
had on the Iraqi people, how much more difficult it made to get their
cooperation.” [This Week, ABC, 12/14/03]
“I’m confident we’re on the right course.” [ABC News, 3/7/04]
“I think the initial phases of it were so spectacularly successful that it
took us all by surprise.” [CBS, 10/31/04]
“I do think that progress is being made in a lot of Iraq. Overall, I think
a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the
course. If I thought we weren’t making progress, I’d be despondent.”
[The Hill, 12/8/05]
|
|
| |
"A year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course"
The Hill, December 8, 2005, cited by "McCain: ‘I Was The Greatest Critic’ Of The Iraq War Over The Last Four Years," ThinkProgress.org, August 18, 2007 [see above]
“I do think that progress is being made in a lot of Iraq. Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course. If I thought we weren’t making progress, I’d be despondent.
|
|
| |
"Iran... continues its deadly quest for nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them"
"An Enduring Peace Built on Freedom: Securing America's Future," Foreign Affairs, November/December 2007
Iran, the world's chief state sponsor of terrorism, continues its deadly quest for nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. Protected by a nuclear arsenal, Iran would be even more willing and able to sponsor terrorist attacks against any perceived enemy, including the United States and Israel, or even to pass nuclear materials to one of its allied terrorist networks. The next president must confront this threat directly, and that effort must begin with tougher political and economic sanctions. If the United Nations is unwilling to act, the United States must lead a group of like-minded countries to impose effective multilateral sanctions, such as restrictions on exports of refined gasoline, outside the UN framework. America and its partners should also privatize the sanctions effort by supporting a disinvestment campaign to isolate and delegitimize the regime in Tehran, whose policies are already opposed by many Iranian citizens. And military action, although not the preferred option, must remain on the table: Tehran must understand that it cannot win a showdown with the world.
More info
"Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities," National Intelligence Estimate, November 2007
We judge with high confidence that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program
• We assess with high confidence that until fall 2003, Iranian military entities were working under government direction to develop nuclear weapons.
• We judge with high confidence that the halt lasted at least several years. (Because of intelligence gaps discussed elsewhere in this Estimate, however, DOE and the NIC assess with only moderate confidence that the halt to those activities represents a halt to Iran's entire nuclear weapons program.)
• We assess with moderate confidence Tehran had not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007, but we do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.
|
|
| |
Buildup of American forces in Iraq is the only viable option - "I have no plan B"
New York Times, April 15, 2007
Senator John McCain said that the buildup of American forces in Iraq represented the only viable option to avoid failure in Iraq and that he had yet to identify an effective fallback if the current strategy failed.
“I have no Plan B,” Mr. McCain said in an interview. “If I saw that doomsday scenario evolving, then I would try to come up with one. But I cannot give you a good alternative because if I had a good alternative, maybe we could consider it now.”
|
|
| |
"We can now look ahead to the genuine prospect of success"
Opening remarks at Senate hearing - testimony of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker, April 8, 2008
For while the job of bringing security to Iraq is not finished - as the recent fighting in Basra and elsewhere vividly demonstrated - we are no longer staring into the abyss of defeat, and we can now look ahead to the genuine prospect of success. Success - the establishment of a peaceful, stable, prosperous, democratic state that poses no threat to its neighbors and contributes to the defeat of terrorists - this success is within reach.
Testimony of General Petraeus, April 8, 2008
"There has been significant but uneven security progress in Iraq," Petraeus told the Senate Armed Services Committee today in Washington. "The progress made since last spring is fragile and reversible."
|
|
http://zfacts.com/p/925.html | 01/18/12 07:18 GMT
Modified: Mon, 14 Apr 2008 16:51:10 GMT
|
|
