Weapons of mass destruction

[surfpunk]

I remember seeing little pieces of this information on the net back in it's time. I do remember all the hell the Dem's gave Bush about going to war with Iraq over the WMD"S. Not a word now about the WMD"S getting into the Muslim Brotherhood's hands. http://www.nysun.com/foreign/iraqs-wmd-secreted-in-syria-sada-says/26514/ and http://www.camharris.us/2012/07/iraqi-wmds-finally-found.html

[SocalDinar]

Related article out today

Syria's chemical weapons: How Saddam Hussein let the genie out

09 August 2012

Anthony Tucker-Jones warns that the precedent for chemical warfare, with appalling results, was set by Saddam Hussein

While some have dismissed the potential threat posed by Syria's Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), they have very short memories when it comes to the dangerous precedent set by Iraq under Saddam Hussein.

History now widely accepts that the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was based on a blatant lie; Saddam Hussein had no residual WMD - contrary to claims made by 'sexed up' British intelligence dossiers.

This is not quite true; Saddam Hussein held a major stockpile of biological and chemical weapons up to and even after the 2003 invasion.

The reality is that thousands of chemical weapons were discovered in Iraq post-2003. Some escaped detection and were transported through Iran and Pakistan into Afghanistan and used against NATO forces.

Such was the legacy of Saddam's WMD that on 16 May 2004, in the al Baya neighbourhood of western Baghdad, two American bomb disposal experts were poisoned by an al-Qaida IED consisting of a 155mm shell containing up to four litres of deadly Sarin gas. Luckily they escaped with their lives and prevented the shell from exploding, otherwise the gas could have covered a dozen blocks, killing hundreds if not thousands.

Alarm bells should have rung around the world that here was clear evidence that there were still WMD in Iraq and that Osama bin Laden's acolytes had almost successfully deployed them against US troops. It should have been a landmark event, but instead it became a historical footnote, as it did not fit the conventional wisdom of the western liberal media.

This was the first time a non-state group had used chemical weapons on the battlefield and will not be the last. By 2010 it was reported that al-Qaida had conducted at least 100 chemical attacks on coalition forces in Iraq using mainly nerve and mustard agents.

Since 2003, Coalition forces have located and destroyed over 500 chemical weapons, many of which were 155mm shells. In contrast, Saddam's intelligence apparatus is believed to have buried up to 10,000 chemical warheads.

It is now very convenient to forget that Saddam had absolutely enormous chemical and biological weapon stockpiles that were only partially destroyed under UN auspices at Al Muthanna during the 1990s.

A decade earlier he had systematically used these against the Iranian Army and the rebellious Kurds. Upward of 100,000 Iranians were exposed to chemical weapons with 44,000 fatalities; the Kurds suffered 20,000 casualties.

After the Iran-Iraq War, Saddam still held 21,000 chemical warheads. In 1991, after the first Gulf War, he declared less than half this number to the UN. It later emerged that Iraq had stockpiled 100,000 'special munitions' during the Iran-Iraq conflict.

The UN completed the destruction of 15,000 chemical munitions (in fact it destroyed double this number of munitions and related components) in 1994.

Two years later the UN oversaw the destruction of the Al Hakim biological weapons production facility, however it claimed that there were another 30,000 chemical/biological shells still unaccounted for.

Ironically the invasion of Iraq in 2003 far from preventing Saddam's WMD from falling into terrorist hands actually accelerated the process. This lesson should be ignored at our peril.

Today all eyes are on troubled Syria, which has the largest WMD stockpile in the Middle East. No one in their right mind wants them used or dispersed as a result of the chaos engulfing the country.

Behind the scenes, contingency planners must be hoping for the best and fearing the worst.

http://www.defencemanagement.com/feature_story.asp?id=20502

[wpsmit]

well, I have always believed that he had them. And anyone who believes he didn't, let's just call them "liberals".

[cajunrescuemedic]

I worked in Iraq for 3 years as a contractor in medical and security supporting our troops. I can tell you of 2 incidents where weapons of mass destruction were discovered in Iraq. In both instances, a roadside improvised explosive device (IED) was used. They were both bombs that had saren gas in them. If they actually knew what they were doing, they could have easily taken out a whole base of soldiers and contractors. Why this never made the news I don't know. Even before that happened, we had already figured out that the news media was reporting what they wanted to report...and it was also not necessarily the truth.

[cbs71]

I worked in Iraq for 3 years. I can think of 2 incidents where weapons of mass destruction were discovered in Iraq. Both instances were an improvised explosive device (IED) were used. Both of them had used bombs that had saren gas in them. If they actually knew what they were doing, they could have easily taken out a whole base of soldiers and contractors. Why this never made the news I don't know. We (the soldiers and contractors) had already figured out that the news media was reporting what they wanted to report...and it was also not necessarily the truth.

Well yeah, news today is all propaganda. They are not going to tell us what we "really" need to hear and that is why we have to get news ourselves and not just rely on the local news channels. If anyone has netflix, check out "gashole" among others and see what our leaders have done to keep us down as a nation. It's sickening. There are other documentaries on netflix but I can't remember all of them but "gashole" would be a good start.

[skinz]

Well yeah, news today is all propaganda. They are not going to tell us what we "really" need to hear and that is why we have to get news ourselves and not just rely on the local news channels. If anyone has netflix, check out "gashole" among others and see what our leaders have done to keep us down as a nation. It's sickening. There are other documentaries on netflix but I can't remember all of them but "gashole" would be a good start.

Read more:

I'll check that out; sounds interesting.

[Carrello]

I remember seeing little pieces of this information on the net back in it's time. I do remember all the hell the Dem's gave Bush about going to war with Iraq over the WMD"S. Not a word now about the WMD"S getting into the Muslim Brotherhood's hands. http://www.nysun.com/foreign/iraqs-wmd-secreted-in-syria-sada-says/26514/ and http://www.camharris.us/2012/07/iraqi-wmds-finally-found.html

surfpunk, do you mean these WMDs? (see article below). And the next time you talk with a military person that lost a loved one in the "war", or a soldier that lost a limb or their mind, one of those people that will never have a real life again, and some men that will never be able to hold their wife or children because they lost their arms, or a man that will never play baseball with their son because they lost their legs, you can remind them there were no WMDs and send them to this YouTube piece where President Bush jokes about it. Really funny: www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvliUuXjbL4. And then you can send them to this hilarious piece where President Bush admits there were no WMDs and that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11: www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_A77N5WKWM. Those silly Democrats

Thursday, Sep 6, 2007 04:16 AM PDT

Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction

Salon exclusive: Two former CIA officers say the president squelched top-secret intelligence, and a briefing by George Tenet, months before invading Iraq.

By Sidney Blumenthal!:

On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam’s inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail. Tenet never brought it up again.

Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD.

On April 23, 2006, CBS’s “60 Minutes” interviewed Tyler Drumheller, the former CIA chief of clandestine operations for Europe, who disclosed that the agency had received documentary intelligence from Naji Sabri, Saddam’s foreign minister, that Saddam did not have WMD. “We continued to validate him the whole way through,” said Drumheller. “The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming, and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy.”

Now two former senior CIA officers have confirmed Drumheller’s account to me and provided the background to the story of how the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted in order to justify it. They described what Tenet said to Bush about the lack of WMD, and how Bush responded, and noted that Tenet never shared Sabri’s intelligence with then Secretary of State Colin Powell. According to the former officers, the intelligence was also never shared with the senior military planning the invasion, which required U.S. soldiers to receive medical shots against the ill effects of WMD and to wear protective uniforms in the desert.

Instead, said the former officials, the information was distorted in a report written to fit the preconception that Saddam did have WMD programs. That false and restructured report was passed to Richard Dearlove, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), who briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair on it as validation of the cause for war.

Secretary of State Powell, in preparation for his presentation of evidence of Saddam’s WMD to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, spent days at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., and had Tenet sit directly behind him as a sign of credibility. But Tenet, according to the sources, never told Powell about existing intelligence that there were no WMD, and Powell’s speech was later revealed to be a series of falsehoods.

Both the French intelligence service and the CIA paid Sabri hundreds of thousands of dollars (at least $200,000 in the case of the CIA) to give them documents on Saddam’s WMD programs. “The information detailed that Saddam may have wished to have a program, that his engineers had told him they could build a nuclear weapon within two years if they had fissile material, which they didn’t, and that they had no chemical or biological weapons,” one of the former CIA officers told me.

On the eve of Sabri’s appearance at the United Nations in September 2002 to present Saddam’s case, the officer in charge of this operation met in New York with a “cutout” who had debriefed Sabri for the CIA. Then the officer flew to Washington, where he met with CIA deputy director John McLaughlin, who was “excited” about the report. Nonetheless, McLaughlin expressed his reservations. He said that Sabri’s information was at odds with “our best source.” That source was code-named “Curveball,” later exposed as a fabricator, con man and former Iraqi taxi driver posing as a chemical engineer.

The next day, Sept. 18, Tenet briefed Bush on Sabri. “Tenet told me he briefed the president personally,” said one of the former CIA officers. According to Tenet, Bush’s response was to call the information “the same old thing.” Bush insisted it was simply what Saddam wanted him to think. “The president had no interest in the intelligence,” said the CIA officer. The other officer said, “Bush didn’t give a **** about the intelligence. He had his mind made up.”

But the CIA officers working on the Sabri case kept collecting information. “We checked on everything he told us.” French intelligence eavesdropped on his telephone conversations and shared them with the CIA. These taps “validated” Sabri’s claims, according to one of the CIA officers. The officers brought this material to the attention of the newly formed Iraqi Operations Group within the CIA. But those in charge of the IOG were on a mission to prove that Saddam did have WMD and would not give credit to anything that came from the French. “They kept saying the French were trying to undermine the war,” said one of the CIA officers.

The officers continued to insist on the significance of Sabri’s information, but one of Tenet’s deputies told them, “You haven’t figured this out yet. This isn’t about intelligence. It’s about regime change.”

The CIA officers on the case awaited the report they had submitted on Sabri to be circulated back to them, but they never received it. They learned later that a new report had been written. “It was written by someone in the agency, but unclear who or where, it was so tightly controlled. They knew what would please the White House. They knew what the king wanted,” one of the officers told me.

That report contained a false preamble stating that Saddam was “aggressively and covertly developing” nuclear weapons and that he already possessed chemical and biological weapons. “Totally out of whack,” said one of the CIA officers. “The first [para]graph of an intelligence report is the most important and most read and colors the rest of the report.” He pointed out that the case officer who wrote the initial report had not written the preamble and the new memo. “That’s not what the original memo said.”

The report with the misleading introduction was given to Dearlove of MI6, who briefed the prime minister. “They were given a scaled-down version of the report,” said one of the CIA officers. “It was a summary given for liaison, with the sourcing taken out. They showed the British the statement Saddam was pursuing an aggressive program, and rewrote the report to attempt to support that statement. It was insidious. Blair bought it.” “Blair was duped,” said the other CIA officer. “He was shown the altered report.”

The information provided by Sabri was considered so sensitive that it was never shown to those who assembled the NIE on Iraqi WMD. Later revealed to be utterly wrong, the NIE read: “We judge that Iraq has continued its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in defiance of UN resolutions and restrictions. Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of UN restrictions; if left unchecked, it probably will have a nuclear weapon during this decade.”

In the congressional debate over the Authorization for the Use of Military Force, even those voting against it gave credence to the notion that Saddam possessed WMD. Even a leading opponent such as Sen. Bob Graham, then the Democratic chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who had instigated the production of the NIE, declared in his floor speech on Oct. 12, 2002, “Saddam Hussein’s regime has chemical and biological weapons and is trying to get nuclear capacity.” Not a single senator contested otherwise. None of them had an inkling of the Sabri intelligence.

The CIA officers assigned to Sabri still argued within the agency that his information must be taken seriously, but instead the administration preferred to rely on Curveball. Drumheller learned from the German intelligence service that held Curveball that it considered him and his claims about WMD to be highly unreliable. But the CIA’s Weapons Intelligence, Nonproliferation, and Arms Control Center (WINPAC) insisted that Curveball was credible because what he said was supposedly congruent with available public information.

For two months, Drumheller fought against the use of Curveball, raising the red flag that he was likely a fraud, as he turned out to be. “Oh, my! I hope that’s not true,” said Deputy Director McLaughlin, according to Drumheller’s book “On the Brink,” published in 2006. When Curveball’s information was put into Bush’s Jan. 28, 2003, State of the Union address, McLaughlin and Tenet allowed it to pass into the speech. “From three Iraqi defectors,” Bush declared, “we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs … Saddam Hussein has not disclosed these facilities. He’s given no evidence that he has destroyed them.” In fact, there was only one Iraqi source — Curveball — and there were no labs.

When the mobile weapons labs were inserted into the draft of Powell’s United Nations speech, Drumheller strongly objected again and believed that the error had been removed. He was shocked watching Powell’s speech. “We have firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails,” Powell announced. Without the reference to the mobile weapons labs, there was no image of a threat.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell’s chief of staff, and Powell himself later lamented that they had not been warned about Curveball. And McLaughlin told the Washington Post in 2006, “If someone had made these doubts clear to me, I would not have permitted the reporting to be used in Secretary Powell’s speech.” But, in fact, Drumheller’s caution was ignored.

As war appeared imminent, the CIA officers on the Sabri case tried to arrange his defection in order to demonstrate that he stood by his information. But he would not leave without bringing out his entire family. “He dithered,” said one former CIA officer. And the war came before his escape could be handled.

Tellingly, Sabri’s picture was never put on the deck of playing cards of former Saddam officials to be hunted down, a tacit acknowledgment of his covert relationship with the CIA. Today, Sabri lives in Qatar.

In 2005, the Silberman-Robb commission investigating intelligence in the Iraq war failed to interview the case officer directly involved with Sabri; instead its report blamed the entire WMD fiasco on “groupthink” at the CIA. “They didn’t want to trace this back to the White House,” said the officer.

On Feb. 5, 2004, Tenet delivered a speech at Georgetown University that alluded to Sabri and defended his position on the existence of WMD, which, even then, he contended would still be found. “Several sensitive reports crossed my desk from two sources characterized by our foreign partners as established and reliable,” he said. “The first from a source who had direct access to Saddam and his inner circle” — Naji Sabri — “said Iraq was not in the possession of a nuclear weapon. However, Iraq was aggressively and covertly developing such a weapon.”

Then Tenet claimed with assurance, “The same source said that Iraq was stockpiling chemical weapons.” He explained that this intelligence had been central to his belief in the reason for war. “As this information and other sensitive information came across my desk, it solidified and reinforced the judgments that we had reached in my own view of the danger posed by Saddam Hussein and I conveyed this view to our nation’s leaders.” (Tenet doesn’t mention Sabri in his recently published memoir, “At the Center of the Storm.”)

But where were the WMD? “Now, I’m sure you’re all asking, ‘Why haven’t we found the weapons?’ I’ve told you the search must continue and it will be difficult.”

On Sept. 8, 2006, three Republican senators on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence — Orrin Hatch, Saxby Chambliss and Pat Roberts — signed a letter attempting to counter Drumheller’s revelation about Sabri on “60 Minutes”: “All of the information about this case so far indicates that the information from this source was that Iraq did have WMD programs.” The Republicans also quoted Tenet, who had testified before the committee in July 2006 that Drumheller had “mischaracterized” the intelligence. Still, Drumheller stuck to his guns, telling Reuters, “We have differing interpretations, and I think mine’s right.”

One of the former senior CIA officers told me that despite the certitude of the three Republican senators, the Senate committee never had the original memo on Sabri. “The committee never got that report,” he said. “The material was hidden or lost, and because it was a restricted case, a lot of it was done in hard copy. The whole thing was fogged up, like Curveball.”

While one Iraqi source told the CIA that there were no WMD, information that was true but distorted to prove the opposite, another Iraqi source was a fabricator whose lies were eagerly embraced. “The real tragedy is that they had a good source that they misused,” said one of the former CIA officers. “The fact is there was nothing there, no threat. But Bush wanted to hear what he wanted to hear.”

Continue Reading

Sidney Blumenthal, a former assistant and senior advisor to President Clinton, writes a column for Salon and the Guardian of London. His new book is titled "How Bush Rules: Chronicles of a Radical Regime." He is a senior fellow at the New York University Center on Law and Security.

http://www.salon.com/2007/09/06/bush_wmd/

[Maggie123]

Thank You Carrello I am worried that all this is being brought up in order to justify more senseless wars.

"Let's tie Suddam's WMD's to Syria and Iran! It worked so well the first time...".

BTW, check out the sponsers (stakeholders) for the website that one of these articles came from.

It's all a bunch of defense contractors that support the site. Think they might have an agenda?

http://www.defencema...ry.asp?id=20502

[SocalDinar]

Thank You Carrello I am worried that all this is being brought up in order to justify more senseless wars.

"Let's tie Suddam's WMD's to Syria and Iran! It worked so well the first time...".

BTW, check out the sponsers (stakeholders) for the website that one of these articles came from.

It's all a bunch of defense contractors that support the site. Think they might have an agenda?

http://www.defencema...ry.asp?id=20502

GM Maggie

Big money to be made in wars. Sad but true. The Large corporations and the people that work for them are all part of that food chain.

The Small city I live in has many defense contractors and AF base. People that profit here are easily swayed if it puts beans on their tables.

I can remember Powells speech and where I was at the time. I had no problem believing him as did Congress.

GM Carrello,

I to feel the sorrow for all the sacrifices our Service men and women have made. Not just the physical wounds but the physiological and emotional as well.

I make it a point to thank each and every Man or Woman in Uniform I see. Each and everyone without fail will thank me for my support back

I wish I could give more

[Maggie123]

Wow, Thank You SocalDinar That was an unexpected and most gracious response.

A very "Good Day" to you Sir! I do honor you and all those that have served.

[cooked]

Not sure why someone is neging Carello and Maggie but I got ya covered. Can't even express an opinion anymore.

[uncirculd]

Those WMD's did and do exist. There were both Dem's and Rep's fighting this battle in the media saying Iraq "HAS" WMD's and Saddam must be stopped. The majority of them rallied on this and then proceeded to rally the citizens. It was hypocritical for those who voted yes to the Iraq invasion and then criticize it and say they were lied to. That's NOT true. The information was available to them and they heard it, then you have the ones who never show up in congress and pretend they were not informed. What I have to say to them is GO TO WORK AND DO YOUR JOB AND DON'T PLAY DUMB AFTER THE FACT. Dem's and Rep's alike. (again this 2 party system is no good for me)

I was so disgusted at Nancy Pelosi saying she had no clue, when she was in the circle of the briefing. That's sick. They all do this. It's not just her and can't blame the Dem's, the only reason they changed their view is to rally support for Obama to have control of the Whitehouse, because the war in Iraq started rapidly losing the citizens support and it didn't become a cut and dry war. Collateral damage was becoming more than expected for all nations that went with us.

That's just politics. The war was just a tool for 2008 elections. Like right now, the republicans are using the welfar and jobless America to get in the Whitehouse. Again, politics. All I can say to this notion of the America 2 party system is that it is as Nostrodamus said: The Eagle Will Fall Within. Why? Because this 2 party system has divided the citizens of America and they don't think outside those boxes anymore. Sheeple to the 2 party system.

The Ron Paul views and the Tea Party gave me hope that maybe America can see that is ain't all about Dem's and Rep's. Those 2 party's have taken the wealth of America with( their personal laws, personal voted raises, pension, and best healthcare) and putting the citizens after them. This is done with our tax money and a tax code that only benefits them. Not one of them had money when they became a public servant.

Neither of them has fixed the tax code to be fair. Neither of them will run on this. The reforms needed for our political program is to take away the "money".

No more raising funds. All candidates get "equal air time". None gets more than the other. No money allowed to be paid for their speeches. No raising funds. Have you seen how much money is being raised?? That's not coming from us citizens, that is coming from "RICH" folks. Both of them Dem's and Rep's. So thinks about this when you go vote, that money is buying votes. So which ever is the richest Dem's or Rep's that's who's gonna be President.

Not our votes. Money buys propaganda for them whether true or false it's put out, and sad to say many Americans believe what ever is put out and don't research for themselves. Remember these are voters. Subject to the invasion of politics in your home to scare you about their opponent. Each saying they are looking out for you when they are looking out for themselves in money and "power".

Say your friend Joe has been educated on world affairs, geography, cultural histories, politics, American History (not what is being re-written), and wants to make the US a better place. A fighter and community serviceman who takes every opportunity to help the community and expects nothing in return. That's who I want to vote for. That person is just not running in this election and never will as long as we have this 2 party system that "DIVIDES" us.

There are WMD's all over the world and sitting in our own back yards. Pesticides can be a WMD. Contaminated vaccines are WMD's. No one wants war, war is death. War says to me, many will die and it's true in all cases.

Being President of the US is the worst job in the World. I have tried to place my self in their shoes and I gave myself a headache. Think of a newly elected President and their first day of briefing. Do you think that almost everyone of them wished they didn't get the job? Somehow I think so. After 4 years they figure it's not so bad and want to do it again. I think they get this false sense of personal security but in the end people will hate the President for things he may not had a choice in. The lesser of the 2 evils is a very hard decision. We don't know that choice till we are President. Thank God I will never know. I believe every President runs on what they say, once in the position of President it all changes.

I guess I get on this soapbox because we are raping the world of resources. We don't bother to hold our own and use new technologies, instead we use up the world's resources while we hoard ours. And since we do this, we force our rules on them and pretty much conquer them. We maneuver ourselves to where it's our way or the highway. Sometimes I think we are not right.

What keeps my hopes up, is that every drop of blood my brothers and sisters left in a foriegn country has given me this right to be free and express my opinion without persecution. They are the very meat and potatoes of what an American is.

Sacrifice and love.

[Maggie123]

Not sure why someone is neging Carello and Maggie but I got ya covered. Can't even express an opinion anymore.

Thanks Man!

I thought neg's were for people that are disrespectful...

[cris]

I worked in Iraq for 3 years as a contractor in medical and security supporting our troops. I can tell you of 2 incidents where weapons of mass destruction were discovered in Iraq. In both instances, a roadside improvised explosive device (IED) was used. They were both bombs that had saren gas in them. If they actually knew what they were doing, they could have easily taken out a whole base of soldiers and contractors. Why this never made the news I don't know. Even before that happened, we had already figured out that the news media was reporting what they wanted to report...and it was also not necessarily the truth.

Yep...The Liberals had their Agenda & Headlines to think of.

They certainly wouldnt want the actual truth to get out to the public.

[Maggie123]

"All I can say to this notion of the America 2 party system is that it is as Nostrodamus said: The Eagle Will Fall Within. Why? Because this 2 party system has divided the citizens of America and they don't think outside those boxes anymore. Sheeple to the 2 party system.

The Ron Paul views and the Tea Party gave me hope that maybe America can see that is ain't all about Dem's and Rep's. Those 2 party's have taken the wealth of America with( their personal laws, personal voted raises, pension, and best healthcare) and putting the citizens after them. This is done with our tax money"

Thanks Uncirculd I can agree whole heartedly with you on this part.

I do not agree that the threat of Suddam using WMD's against us was the real reason we declared war on Iraq, any more than I believe he had anything to do with 911. Remember that part?

I don't believe that it was humanitarian either.

[Carrello]

GM Maggie

Big money to be made in wars. Sad but true. The Large corporations and the people that work for them are all part of that food chain.

The Small city I live in has many defense contractors and AF base. People that profit here are easily swayed if it puts beans on their tables.

I can remember Powells speech and where I was at the time. I had no problem believing him as did Congress.

GM Carrello,

I to feel the sorrow for all the sacrifices our Service men and women have made. Not just the physical wounds but the physiological and emotional as well.

I make it a point to thank each and every Man or Woman in Uniform I see. Each and everyone without fail will thank me for my support back

I wish I could give more

GM SoCal, you are a good man. Gratitude and compassion are admirable traits in a human being, and you possess both.

Carrello

[cbs71]

I'll check that out; sounds interesting.

Please do.

[zigmeister]

Sometimes I think there is an innate flaw in the human race that needs to be against the other in order to strive. To win over the other, to hate the other, to undermine the other and the list goes on and on. There are factions that keep this mentality alive to keep the people separate, not just here in the US but globally. Keeping people separate from the other keeps the herd in control. However if they should unite they would find their commonalities hard to refute and loose the taste to dehumanize the other. A better world this would be without the struggle of the fight I think.

[desimo]

First of all, if Iraq was able to bury a MIG in the sand they would be able to have buried canisters. Second, Iraq had so much heads up on when any attack was going to happen that they could have walked the canisters anywhere. Third, Iraq had an underground system which rivaled the NY City subways. Fourth, before people go bring Bush back up again on this matter they need to stop, shut up and start looking at Iran. Iraq and Syria had close connections. Iran and Syria have close connections. Iran and Venezuela have close ties and while everyone seems to be watching Iran no one seems to be watching Venezuela and Venezuela has an easier task of striking America. People need to stop being so dang political and party puppets and start getting their heads out of their butts and look at the reality of the situation. America IS AT A REAL THREAT. We are being torn about internally and threatened externally.

[uncirculd]

"All I can say to this notion of the America 2 party system is that it is as Nostrodamus said: The Eagle Will Fall Within. Why? Because this 2 party system has divided the citizens of America and they don't think outside those boxes anymore. Sheeple to the 2 party system.

The Ron Paul views and the Tea Party gave me hope that maybe America can see that is ain't all about Dem's and Rep's. Those 2 party's have taken the wealth of America with( their personal laws, personal voted raises, pension, and best healthcare) and putting the citizens after them. This is done with our tax money"

Thanks Uncirculd I can agree whole heartedly with you on this part.

I do not agree that the threat of Suddam using WMD's against us was the real reason we declared war on Iraq, any more than I believe he had anything to do with 911. Remember that part?

I don't believe that it was humanitarian either.

Yeah Maggie, I think we all know the "oil" was it. It don't matter what President was in office we are bound to rape those countries of their oil and preserve ours. It's just what we have been doing.

Sometimes I think there is an innate flaw in the human race that needs to be against the other in order to strive. To win over the other, to hate the other, to undermine the other and the list goes on and on. There are factions that keep this mentality alive to keep the people separate, not just here in the US but globally. Keeping people separate from the other keeps the herd in control. However if they should unite they would find their commonalities hard to refute and loose the taste to dehumanize the other. A better world this would be without the struggle of the fight I think.

My friend Zig what you are explaining is called love. The lack of.

[hi-five]

Whether you are on one side or the other of our 2 party political system, there is one issue that is the most important in my opinion. Freedom is what is important to me. I was told years ago by a family member who was the Attorney General's right hand man under the Reagan admin., that the greatest threat to the US citizen is the systematic and intentional removal of our personal freedoms.

What I see as the crucial issue in this next election is whether or not the government will continue to be allowed to take over more and more of our country's major means of production. If the government is allowed to take over more and more of our means of production, then we will have a country where the government controls 1) making the laws, 2) interpreting and enforcing the laws, and now 3) the means of production (which historically has been the role of the private sector). If this happens, then the government will have absolute authority, and we as citizens will have lost our freedom.

I appreciate so much the sacrifice many (my family included) have made in fighting for our country's freedom. They have kept our country great at the expense of their own comfort, their own lives, and the welfare of their own families. They have done the ultimate in keeping our country safe. The fear I have is the enemy within. And the only way to fight is by voting.

[one2one]

from Google search---Wikipedia :

During the regime of Saddam Hussein, the nation of Iraq was believed to have weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Hussein was internationally known for his use of chemical weapons in the 1980s against Iranian and Kurdish civilians during and after the Iran–Iraq War. It is also known that in the 1980s he pursued an extensive biological weapons program and a nuclear weapons program, though no nuclear bomb was built.[citation needed]

After the 1990-1991 Persian Gulf War, the United Nations located and destroyed large quantities of Iraqi chemical weapons and related equipment and materials throughout the early 1990s, with varying degrees of Iraqi cooperation and obstruction.[1] In response to diminishing Iraqi cooperation with UNSCOM, the United States called for withdrawal of all UN and IAEA inspectors in 1998, resulting in Operation Desert Fox. The United States and the UK asserted that Saddam Hussein still possessed large hidden stockpiles of WMD in 2003, and that he was clandestinely procuring and producing more. Inspections by the UN to resolve the status of unresolved disarmament questions restarted from November 2002 until March 2003,[2] under UN Security Council Resolution 1441, which demanded Saddam give "immediate, unconditional and active cooperation" with UN and IAEA inspections, shortly before his country was attacked

[cajunrescuemedic]

"All I can say to this notion of the America 2 party system is that it is as Nostrodamus said: The Eagle Will Fall Within. Why? Because this 2 party system has divided the citizens of America and they don't think outside those boxes anymore. Sheeple to the 2 party system.

The Ron Paul views and the Tea Party gave me hope that maybe America can see that is ain't all about Dem's and Rep's. Those 2 party's have taken the wealth of America with( their personal laws, personal voted raises, pension, and best healthcare) and putting the citizens after them. This is done with our tax money"

Thanks Uncirculd I can agree whole heartedly with you on this part.

I do not agree that the threat of Suddam using WMD's against us was the real reason we declared war on Iraq, any more than I believe he had anything to do with 911. Remember that part?

I don't believe that it was humanitarian either.

I do agree with you about the 2 party system. With all this mudslinging, nothing is being done. It's past time for us to start handing out pink slips to the politicians in Washington.

I don't know the real reasons why we invaded Iraq. What I understand is that there were many, many terrorist training camps that were operating with Saddam's blessing. If this is true, then hopefully many lives were spared worldwide, not just here in the US. Unfortunately with our open borders, if a whole family can just waltz across our borders and enter illegally, then so can a well financed terrorist group.

[nugghunter]

Well yeah, news today is all propaganda. They are not going to tell us what we "really" need to hear and that is why we have to get news ourselves and not just rely on the local news channels. If anyone has netflix, check out "gashole" among others and see what our leaders have done to keep us down as a nation. It's sickening. There are other documentaries on netflix but I can't remember all of them but "gashole" would be a good start.

ZEITGEIST Is another good one on netflix if you are in to govt conspiracy documentaries.

[uncirculd]

Sometimes I think there is an innate flaw in the human race that needs to be against the other in order to strive. To win over the other, to hate the other, to undermine the other and the list goes on and on. There are factions that keep this mentality alive to keep the people separate, not just here in the US but globally. Keeping people separate from the other keeps the herd in control. However if they should unite they would find their commonalities hard to refute and loose the taste to dehumanize the other. A better world this would be without the struggle of the fight I think.

My friend Zig what you are explaining is called love. The lack of.