Quote:
|
Originally Posted by aceventura3
How about this: I make no connection between our invasion of Iraq and 9-11. Do you?
|
ace...if you have read anything I posted about the subject in the last year, you know that I said repeatedly that there was no connection between our invasion of Iraq (at least you properly called it an "invasion" ) and al Queda. It was a bullshit question you posed simply to avoid the more important issue of overall policy in the region
And yet, as late as today, Bush still makes a connection between our invasion/occupation of Iraq and 9/11 attack by al Queda:
Quote:
There's a debate in Washington about Iraq, and nothing wrong with a healthy debate. There's also a debate about al Qaeda's role in Iraq. Some say that Iraq is not part of the broader war on terror. They complain when I say that the al Qaeda terrorists we face in Iraq are part of the same enemy that attacked us on September the 11th, 2001. They claim that the organization called al Qaeda in Iraq is an Iraqi phenomenon, that it's independent of Osama bin Laden and that it's not interested in attacking America.
(what follows in the rest of the article is the standard propaganda)
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php...eda_Connection
|
DoD officials have said on numerous occasions that the so-called al Queda in Iraq possess little capacity to act outside the region and pose little real danger to the US homeland.
As to your IBD article, if you follow the actions of tribal leaders in Iraq, they have demonstrated on numerous occasions that they will make short term deals with anyone to save their positions...and then run to the other side when conditions change.
And the article propagates the fallacy that al Queda is the greatest threat to the stability of Iraq and the region when, again, numerous DoD and intel officials have said repeatedly that while al Queda in Iraq may still cause harm to US forces..the real danger is the sectarian divide and de facto civil war that unleashed religious extremists like al Sadr on the Shiia side and insurgent leaders on the Sunni side...as a result of our invasion.
Quote:
U.S. intelligence analysts, however, have a somewhat different view of al-Qaeda's presence in Iraq, noting that the local branch takes its inspiration but not its orders from bin Laden. Its enemies -- the overwhelming majority of whom are Iraqis -- reside in Baghdad and Shiite-majority areas of Iraq, not in Saudi Arabia or the United States. While intelligence officials have described the Sunni insurgent group calling itself al-Qaeda in Iraq as an "accelerant" for violence, they have cited domestic sectarian divisions as the main impediment to peace.
In a report released yesterday, Anthony H. Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies warned that al-Qaeda is "only one part" of a spectrum of Sunni extremist groups and is far from the largest or most active. Military officials have said in background briefings that al-Qaeda is responsible for about 15 percent of the attacks, Cordesman said, although the group is "highly effective" and probably does "the most damage in pushing Iraq towards civil war." But its activities "must be kept in careful perspective, and it does not dominate the Sunni insurgency," he said.
The article also described recent war games if/when we remove our troops...its not pretty, but neither is the current scenario...and the result is not a haven for al Queda:
What is perhaps most striking about the military's simulations is that its post-drawdown scenarios focus on civil war and regional intervention and upheaval rather than the establishment of an al-Qaeda sanctuary in Iraq.
For Bush, however, that is the primary risk of withdrawal. "It would mean surrendering the future of Iraq to al-Qaeda," he said in a news conference last week. "It would mean that we'd be risking mass killings on a horrific scale. It would mean we'd allow the terrorists to establish a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they lost in Afghanistan."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...071601680.html
|
Bush just wont let go of the bullshit argument about al Queda in Iraq and the need to fight them there, so we dont have to fight them here.
And you still havent addressed how, as a result of the Bush (your) ME policy, the ME is less stable now....the terrorist threat is greater...and our reputation as a nation is at its lowest.