Did bad bookkeeping cause the Iraq war?

Post #117,000 by Another Scott 9/7/03 10:52:03 PM Reply	Did bad bookkeeping cause the Iraq war? [link\|http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-iraq-weapons-gaps,0,7430169.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines\|AP from Newsday] - the URL will change. Errors May Have Inflated Iraq Arms Claims By CHARLES J. HANLEY AP Special Correspondent September 7, 2003, 2:06 PM EDT No weapons of mass destruction have turned up in Iraq, nor has any solid new evidence for them turned up in Washington or London. But what about Baghdad's patchy bookkeeping -- the gaps that led U.N. inspectors to list Iraqi nerve agents and bioweapons material as unaccounted for? Ex-inspectors now say, five months after the U.S. invasion, that the "unaccountables" may have been no more than paperwork glitches left behind when Iraq destroyed banned chemical and biological weapons years ago. [...] It was always a "fragile assumption" to expect Iraq to provide a highly detailed, fully consistent and well documented account of all its weapons work, said U.S. defense analyst Carl Conetta. No military can do that, he wrote in a report recapping the Iraq inspections. A U.S. audit last year, for example, found the Pentagon had lost track of more than 1 million chemical-biological protective suits, said Conetta, of the Project on Defense Alternatives, a private think tank. In perhaps the most striking example, U.S. government auditors found in 1994 that almost three tons of plutonium, enough for hundreds of nuclear bombs, had "vanished" from U.S. stocks, because of discrepancies between "book inventory" and "physical inventory." It may very well be that bad bookkeeping is the explanation for the discrepancy in the amounts of weapons and materials. If so, it's another indication that US intelligence should have been better in determining the nature and extent of the threat from Iraq. But did it cause the war? I don't think so. What caused the war was lack of trust in Saddam. The US, the UN and others didn't believe that he had actually done what he claimed (destroyed all the weapons). The burden was on Saddam to provide evidence and build trust, and he failed in every opportunity to do so. My $0.02. Cheers, Scott.
Post #117,004 by jake123 9/8/03 12:09:38 AM Reply	Saddam could have accounted for them perfectly, with photos and witnesses, and that war would still have happened. --\n-------------------------------------------------------------------\n* Jack Troughton jake at consultron.ca \n [link\|http://consultron.ca\|http://consultron.ca] [link\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca] \n Kingston Ontario Canada [link\|news://news.consultron.ca\|news://news.consultron.ca] *\n-------------------------------------------------------------------
Post #117,022 by dmarker 9/8/03 8:04:13 AM Reply	How do you state the obvious All we have to say is that Scott Ritter was spot on & knew it. Those who wanted the war for reasons beyond WMD didn't want Scott Riter to be heard or believed. It is stunning how so many among us keep denying the obvious, but as long as we can say 'But Saddam was an evil man' we can still justify why the war took place & ignore the nagging doubts. Now we have the spectacle of an increasingly embattled president trying to tough it out - each speech keeps association 'war on terror' with 'invading Iraq' when it is plainly clear who is being terrorised and what the motives are. On top of this we have the further spectacle of US leadership trying to get other UN nations to now supply targets for the Iraqi & Arabs who keep using US & British for target practice. First you s... on them then when things go wrong, try to suck them in to become alterate targets. Bush knows that each dead US soldier is another little nail in his electoral coffin. Hmmmm, so what nations will be dumb enough to extract Bush from his own pile of s... I trust none will. Doug Marker
Post #117,044 by marlowe 9/8/03 10:50:56 AM Reply	Or maybe it wouldn't have. But no, that's inconceivable to you. It's always America's fault somehow, no matter how the other guy behaves. So why didn't Saddam keep better track? We know he was a meticulous record keeper in other matters. ---------------------------------------------------------------- DEAL WITH IT. Americans: a pack, not a herd. Never mind all the mass graves. Where's the nerve gas? [link\|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html\|http://www.angelfire...arlowe/index.html]
Post #117,046 by GBert 9/8/03 11:26:12 AM 9/8/03 1:00:25 PM Reply	Saddam's numbers good enough for Marlowe! "So why didn't Saddam keep better track?" You gotta be kidding me. HELLOOOOO? IS THERE ANYBODY HOME? This belongs in the PHB forum. <corrected typo> I'm not a complete idiot -- some parts are missing Edited by GBert Sept. 8, 2003, 01:00:25 PM EDT Expand All History
Post #117,059 by pwhysall 9/8/03 1:03:45 PM Reply	Give it up, Giovanni. He thinks us Europeans are all lefty pinko socialist Saddam-loving gun-hating gay-loving America-hating weirdos. Peter [link\|http://www.debian.org\|Shill For Hire] [link\|http://www.kuro5hin.org\|There is no K5 Cabal] [link\|http://guildenstern.dyndns.org\|Blog]
Post #117,066 by GBert 9/8/03 1:21:09 PM Reply	Yeah, I know .... You're right, he's as close to a bot as you can get without wasting valuable CPU cycles. He must think the same about most Americans, too (not that he'd admit that). It's a free country--and if you don't like it, you can shut the fsck up!
Post #117,062 by jake123 9/8/03 1:10:33 PM Reply	You've put words in my mouth I didn't say it was America's fault. In fact, calling this action "America's fault" is a nice way for various people to duck their own personal responsibility for their actions... a tactic favoured by former SS officers after the Second World War, I might add. There's actually a very small group of people whose fault this war is, and conflating that group with "America" helps them avoid their personal responsibility for the actions they took whilst gracing them with a gravitas they neither possess nor merit. --\n-------------------------------------------------------------------\n* Jack Troughton jake at consultron.ca \n [link\|http://consultron.ca\|http://consultron.ca] [link\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca] \n Kingston Ontario Canada [link\|news://news.consultron.ca\|news://news.consultron.ca] *\n-------------------------------------------------------------------
Post #117,085 by marlowe 9/8/03 3:01:03 PM Reply	Personal responsibility! It was, first and foremost, Saddam's fault, and the fault of his henchmen, for his predations upon his own subjects, his repeated attacks on neigboring countries, his [link\|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/iraq.html#terrorism\|support for terrorism] and his chronic attempts to acquire and hold on to weapons of mass destruction. Right? Right? (He also repeatedly flouted UN resolutions, in case you think the United Nations deserve any respect. Although, given the way they responded to said flouting, it's fair to say they don't deserve any.) Secondly, it is the fault of those who opposed to the bitter end any effort to put end to all the above. You know who you are. Accept your personal responsibility. The ghosts of Salman Pak expect no less of you. It is a credit to the American people that the great majority of us support the global war on terror, including the Iraq campaign. ---------------------------------------------------------------- DEAL WITH IT. Americans: a pack, not a herd. Never mind all the mass graves. Where's the nerve gas? [link\|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html\|http://www.angelfire...arlowe/index.html]
Post #117,088 by jake123 9/8/03 3:33:18 PM Reply	Personal responsibility? Here's a clue, Marlowe; citing yourself as an authoritative source doesn't work very well. It's those self-same henchman (who number in the thousands, not 51) who are now being recruited to do their old job; yo keep the Iraqi people in line for the regime in place. The fact that the boss is now American instead of Iraqi is not likely to make a huge difference to their methods. After all, the people at the top are looking for results. --\n-------------------------------------------------------------------\n* Jack Troughton jake at consultron.ca \n [link\|http://consultron.ca\|http://consultron.ca] [link\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca] \n Kingston Ontario Canada [link\|news://news.consultron.ca\|news://news.consultron.ca] *\n-------------------------------------------------------------------
Post #117,193 by marlowe 9/9/03 9:48:18 AM Reply	And here's a clue for you: try actually following the link. It leads to a whole list of links to various sources. But then, you never were much for thorough research. You and tangaroa. Opinionated, self righteous and above all, LAZY. Yes, you. ---------------------------------------------------------------- DEAL WITH IT. Americans: a pack, not a herd. Never mind all the mass graves. Where's the nerve gas? [link\|http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe/index.html\|http://www.angelfire...arlowe/index.html]
Post #117,196 by jake123 9/9/03 9:52:47 AM Reply	Yet Another Clue Your argumentation sucks. Ad hominem doesn't work either. You suck at your own game, and I see you still haven't addressed the central point, which is if the US "really" did this to get rid of the evil torturous murdering regime, why is your regime hiring the people who did the torturing and murdering for the first? --\n-------------------------------------------------------------------\n* Jack Troughton jake at consultron.ca \n [link\|http://consultron.ca\|http://consultron.ca] [link\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca\|irc://irc.ecomstation.ca] \n Kingston Ontario Canada [link\|news://news.consultron.ca\|news://news.consultron.ca] *\n-------------------------------------------------------------------
Post #117,027 by Silverlock 9/8/03 9:29:56 AM Reply	Lack of trust? Are you high? That war was planned for at least 10 years ago. Perle, Wolfowitz and William Kristol had the blueprints ready. All they needed was a "Pearl Harbor event" (their term, not mine) and they got one. ----------------------------------------- It is much harder to be a liberal than a conservative. Why? Because it is easier to give someone the finger than it is to give them a helping hand. Mike Royko
Post #117,035 by GBert 9/8/03 10:26:05 AM Reply	No, but it sure came in handy! I'm not a complete idiot -- some parts are missing
Post #117,107 by mmoffitt 9/8/03 5:25:41 PM Reply	Re: Did it cause the war. Agree, it didn't. What caused the war was "Saddam goin' afta mah daddy." bcnu, Mikem The soul and substance of what customarily ranks as patriotism is moral cowardice and always has been...We have thrown away the most valuable asset we had-- the individual's right to oppose both flag and country when he (just he, by himself) believed them to be in the wrong. We have thrown it away; and with it all that was really respectable about that grotesque and laughable word, Patriotism. - Mark Twain, "Monarchical and Republican Patriotism"
Post #117,117 by Ashton 9/8/03 5:45:28 PM Reply	Or in Shrubbish Ehss-Pan-Y'all:____ \ufffdal punte, Se\ufffdor!

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