Vets For Freedom: Truth About the Surge

The truth is: The American people don’t know the truth about the surge, or about anything having to do with this war. The case for the Iraq war was based on lies to begin with, and the lies and propaganda continue. I seriously doubt that either McCain or Obama have the full truth, either.

The American public was told that the mission in Iraq was to “disarm Saddam”. Well, it turns out that he didn’t have the WMD’s we were told he had, and Saddam was executed long ago…

At some point our mission became the transformation of Iraq into a Democratic country with a capitalist economy. We Americans don’t approve of such a mission, and never would have if we’d been told that this was the plan.

We know that part of the reason violence is down, is because we allowed ethnic cleansing to take place to a point where Sunni and Shia no longer live together, as they did live in peace before the war.

I’ve followed the stories of several Iraqi families who write (or used to) online. Most of them are suffering from depression. They’ve lost loved ones, they live in fear, they feel like they’ve lost their country. Even the Iraqis who supported the war, seem to want the Americans out.

We need a leader for this country who will tell us the truth, and who will end the wars…

McCain wants more wars.

Sheesh! Whose turn is it to play whack-a-mole? These two might want to visit the archives of anyone of our fine hosts here at FA. They will find sourced material that renders their opinions…..just opinions and generalizations,……just generalizations.

this is an OBVIOUS rightwing ONLY SITE and with Only ONE side permeating the pages You MATAHARLEY are the one not worth responding to, thus I won’t.
Get over yourself, your one sided lies and stop interpreting things to be what they are NOT

Oh how *shall* I sleep tonight with the overwhelming chagrin….

Haven’t a clue who you are, nor remember addressing you at all, #5. Unless, of course, you’re Xavier on a different computer.

I see posts #1 and 2, filled with opinion, and not based on fact.

I provide documentation to original source material with hotlinks. Hummm… who can back up why they formed their opinion more than the other? But then, perhaps reading is beyond ya’ll’s ability, eh? Perhaps I erred in providing material to the deficient in order to help them form a more informed judgment.

Not happy here? That’s okay. We don’t hold anyone hostage. We just ask for substantiation instead of talking points, masquerading as an opinion.

So ta ta… Don’t let the saloon’s swinging door to what has always been a conservative blog (although we have many regulars here who are not) hit you on the way out.

Dang, Missy… did I fergit to turn on that “sarcasm” button again??? LOL

I shall not sleep well. But most surely not for such a loser as #5. I’m expecting my grandbaby girl tomorrow, and excited beyond belief. Something I know you’ll get more than others here. We’re the “ol’ broads” with brains here. :0)

First and only, at this moment… This particular end of the family has a habit of “one egg in one basket”, so to speak. She’s going to be six just after Christmas, and we are “long distance”. grrrrrr…. I do not get to grab her close often. Thus my excitement. *almost* like a new baby, eh?

Cadence. How kewl a name! Agreed. Grandbabies bring perspective to things… what is important, and what is important fighting FOR.

That is a fun age, so much you can do together. My granddaughters loved lots of bling, feather boas and books at that age, in that order. And cookies, don’t forget cookies, they are always better at grandma’s house even if they aren’t.

These two aren’t my grandchildren, they are my nephew’s new little family.

I have six grandchildren, another coming in April and one great-grandson that I babysit almost every day. He will be one on the 29th, keeps me hopping. At times I think I’m getting a bit long in the tooth for child care, he opens cabinets and climbs, but, he always changes my mind.

“Truth” about the surge.

I hope the American people aren’t dull enough to fall for this…

Mata reads official reports, and thinks that “truth” can be found there.

Yes, Mata, I’ve seen the AUMF, and other reports. I’ve heard about the illegal missiles, etc, etc…

And ask any Iraqi whether Sunni and Shia lived in neighborhoods together & married each other. You give me some wise-ass comment about mass graves. Yes, yes, we know about Saddam killing the people who rebelled against him, that has nothing to do with the people living together.

The fact remains: the American people were misled. And we are not told the truth about what is going on in Iraq even today. Most Americans have figured this out, and we don’t need to be preached to about the “Truth” from a bunch of people who have swallowed the Bush Administration’s BS.

Oops:

“Despite years of discrimination against the Shia during Saddam’s era, mixed marriages between the country’s major groups, including the Kurds, have been very common. There are no official statistics, but prominent sociology professor Ihsan al Hassan, who has studied the subject, estimates that of Iraq’s 6.5 million married couples, 2 million are Sunni-Shia unions.”

http://www.newsweek.com.id/46871

Why Iraq Was Inevitable
http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/special-preview-br–why-iraq-was-inevitable-11456

Getting back to the video, Juca evidently thinks General Petraeus is a liar.

Meta
I wasnt about to embark upon a battle of wits with such an unarmed opponent, but after sleeping on it I thought better.
You claim there were actual ties to Al Qaida and Saddam but offer NO legitimate proof!
you can view the entire final report from the 9/11 Commission here and see for yourself that they concluded that is NOT TRUE!! http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/report/index.htm
as for your so called claim that we invaded Iraq for MORE reasons that WMD, and that WMD was the LEAST of our reasons, I emplore you again to look at the FACTS!!!
I will break it down for you ….oh..and I will be kind enough to use the information from the link YOU provided….(you obviously didnt really read it)
You state that WMD was only used in the 23 ’some odd’ whereas statements of the resolution 6-7 times. In fact it was the reason listed a total of 9 times and there are EXACTLY 23 whereas statements.
You also imply it wasnt our MAIN reason for invaded Iraq…YET IT WAS!!!
feel free to actually read it!

A break down of the WHEREAS statements in the resolution to go to war.
Public Law 107–243
107th Congress
Joint Resolution
To authorize the use of United States Armed Forces against Iraq.

#1 a history of 1990

#2 a history of 1991 (cease fire agreement)

#3 WMD

#4 WMD 1998

#5 WMD 1998

#6 WMD

#7 “…continuing to engage in brutal repression
of its civilian population thereby threatening international peace..”
“…refusing to release, repatriate,
or account for non-Iraqi citizens wrongfully detained..”
“…failing to return property
wrongfully seized by Iraq from Kuwait..”

(WHERE HAS IT BEEN PROVEN THIS HAS BEEN ACCOMPLISHED YET?? HAS THE ‘SURGE’ EVEN STOPPED THIS? WE ARE STILL BEING THREATENED, STILL FIRED UPONE AND NO ONE HAS BEEN ‘RELEASED’ NOR HAS ANY PROPERTIES?? **THIS WOULD IMPLY THE WAR IS NOT WORKING EVEN WITH THE SURGE!!!)

#8 WMD

#9 “…attempting in 1993 to assassinate former President
Bush and by firing on many thousands of occasions on United
States and Coalition Armed Forces engaged in enforcing the
resolutions of the United Nations Security Council;…”

(FORMER PRES. BUSH WAS NOT ASSASSINATED, and it had NOTHING
To do with the current situation. AND
THEY STILL FIRE UPON OUR FORCES LOCATED THERE.
THIS OBJECTIVE HAS NOT BEEN MET!)

#10 “…members of al Qaida….are
known to be in Iraq..”

****WHERE IS THE PROOF OF THIS? IT HAS BEEN PROVEN HOWEVER
THAT IRAQ HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE ATTACKS ON 9/11
It is stated in the final report “..bin Laden explored possible cooperation with Iraq…Iraq apparently never responded.. they do not appear to have resulted in a collaborative relationship. Two senior bin Laden associates have adamantly denied that any ties existed between al Qaeda and Iraq. We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States.”
But hey don’t take my word for it, you can download the entire report here

http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/report/index.htm

#11 “…Iraq continues to aid and harbor other international terrorist
organizations,…”
(AGAIN THERE IS NO PROOF OF THIS! NONE HAVE BEEN FOUND
THUS FAR)

#12 WMD

#13 WMD

#14 resolution supporting permission to attack should there be WMD

#15 authorization of congress for the President to us force
WE DID THIS ONE!

#16 history of what congress expressed in 1991 in regards to using force

#17 Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 explained “…that it should be the policy
of the United States to support efforts to remove from power
the current Iraqi regime and promote the emergence of a democratic
government to replace that regime..”
***We never did this in 1998 but you know, if we had reason we could..***

#18 “..September 12, 2002, President Bush committed the
United States to ‘‘work with the United Nations Security Council
to meet our common challenge’’ posed by Iraq and to ‘‘work
for the necessary resolutions,…… just demands of peace and security will be met, or action will be unavoidable’’;
***PRES. BUSH PROMISING TO ACT***

#19 WMD

#20 “…take the necessary actions against
international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including
those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized,
committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September
11, 2001, or harbored such persons or organization..”
***AGAIN WHERE IS THE PROOF THEY WERE HARBORING TERRORIST GROUPS? AGAIN IT WAS PROVEN THEY DID NOT AIDE IN THE ATTACK
ON 9/11***

#21 Explains the Presidents and Congress’s determination to do the above

#22 Again stating the Presidents right to act

#23 ”…it is in the national security interests of the United States
to restore international peace and security to the Persian Gulf
region: Now, therefore, be it”
**CLOSING STATEMENT**

As a typical one minded, self-centered, right-wing you twist things to benefit YOUR beliefs and discount everyone elses even if their’s is the TRUTH!

Popcorn anyone?

MIddle, you’ve stuck your whole arm into a hornet’s nest and you’re not even smart enough to realize it.

MIddle, have you ever heard of U.S. District Judge Harold Baer?

Probably not.

He disagrees with you in regard to Iraq having a connection to Al Qaeda and 9/11.

Just one of many inconvenient facts that refute your foolishness.

Scott
i appreciate your input and am willing to read anything that is authentic. However the situation you speak of does not prove that Saddam and Al Qaida had an agreement, a collaboration or support during the 9/11 attacks. Which is what Mata was saying.
The 9/11 commission concluded that NO such support from Iraq existed at that time. It acknowledged that Al Qaida did indeed try to make contact with Saddam and Iraq but that there remains NO proof they collaborated or supported each other in any fashion, most of all the attacks on the US on 9/11/2001
Whether or not I have been misled, remains to be seen, as it would not be our governments first time in doing so. However, I gathered my information from the FINAL 9/11 commission report and the ACTUAL Joint Resolution to use military force in Iraq.
If you have links to the things you discussed please feel free to post them, I would appreciate the opportunity to read them and determine where they tie into the current war, 9/11 and Bin Laden. As I notice the documents you speak of were part of something that took place PRIOR to the attacks on 9/11, which I do believe were the initial reason our government felt Saddam may have had a role in those attacks; although that assumption did not pan out in the end.
I also want to add, that I do not disagree with our taking out Saddam, the world is certainly a better place because of it, what I am disagreeing to is our reasons for staying in Iraq once WMD was proven to be faulty information and our failure to spend our resources on the capture of Bin Laden.
Our reasoning for invading Iraq was based on bad information, false information…well we all know that can happen! I thnk we reacted correctly at the time….its since then we have failed to put OUR country first and STOP BIN LADEN.
thanx again Scott..i look forward to reading those documents…

MIddle

The first link is the one from the ABC story. However you can find all five volumes of the Pentagon Report here. Volume I is the Executive Summary of the rest, and is 11.8MB in size. So it takes a while to download. I saved a copy to my hard drive to avoid those when I like to go there for reference.

Mata…I could care less how many BOOKS you’ve read, as books are NOT fact they merely the authors interpretation of he/she believes to be the facts.. So if other peoples opinions are your ammo I will only need to sit and wait..as it will be inevitable that you hang yourself.:)

I see… so the 911 Commission report isn’t a book filled with opinions and analysis like the Pentagon Report?? Only it’s filled with analysis sans the latest documentation and translations of the Harmony/ISG documents…. so it’s still dated.

What you say about “other people’s opinions” is rather absurd. Unless you have those Harmony/ISG docs yourself, and can read the various languages and know the references to the people via code and rank, what the heck are you forming your opinion on but books, news articles and other people’s opinion?? At least my opinions are based on updated events and source documentation.

My statement to you was merely to point out that WMD was in FACT the MAIN reason for our invasion of Iraq, which you dont seem to believe, but the FACTS are it WAS. You implied it was a minimal reason among many, yet it was the MAIN reason among FEW

Since when is 9 a majority of 23? And would you like to prove that were no WMDs, when even the UNMOVIC documents he had proscribed missiles, acquired AFTER 1998, plus chemical weapons stashes? You are aware that Georges Sada states unequivocally that Saddam did have a WMD program, and that most was shipped to Syria just before the coalition’s arrival? How do you explain Saddam hiding his Russian nuke scientists from IAEA reviews and inspections?

You are only looking at a few pieces of the puzzle, and picking out what you want to believe. Just expand your horizons a little more, and open your mind to the updated data before you settle in on old judgments.

Middle, the authorization to use force was largely about WMD, but the war itself was not (WMD was but one of many reasons). I think we might be able to agree there. Further, when it comes to WMD, it’s not so much “bad information” as it was a lack of information. From 12/98-1/03 the US didn’t have a single human intel asset inside Iraq. Not one (that’s inexcusable imo).

re the ties to 911 and the 911 Commission report…there’s a few things here. First, the report was done in 2004 long before post-war intel was even started to really be looked at. However, you’re both right and wrong re Saddam/AQ/911. There is still debate about direct involvement-the 911 Commission said there was no evidence, but the Sen Intel Com phase I investigation into pre-war Iraq intel (which also said ‘no evidence’) was clear in saying that the issue needs to remain open because the ‘no evidence’ was the result of abyssmally little intel gathered. That Sen Intel Com report was really good (although really confusing for many) in that it listed the dates and names of the intel products/reports/pamphlets that looked into the question of direct collaboration between the regime and AQ groups. Point here is ‘no evidence’ was because there was almost no evidence gathered and looked at. LATER, when the captured docs were started to get looked at, 911 Commission members came out and said the matter of regime ties needs to be re-examined. It was, and the assessment was put in the Iraqi Perspectives Project reports I and II.

“John Lehman, a 9/11 commissioner, spoke to The Weekly Standard at the time the report was released.”There may well be–and probably will be–additional intelligence coming in from interrogations and from analysis of captured records and so forth which will fill out the intelligence picture. This is not phrased as–nor meant to be–the definitive word on Iraqi Intelligence activities.””

Upon seeing just a glimpse of the 18% of the millions of documents and thousands of hours of tapes captured from Saddam’s regime, 911 Commission member, Sen. Bob Kerrey (D) said,

“This is a very significant set of facts,” former 9/11 commissioner, Mr. Kerry said yesterday. “I personally and strongly believe you don’t have to prove that Iraq was collaborating against Osama bin Laden on the September 11 attacks to prove he was an enemy and that he would collaborate with people who would do our country harm. This presents facts should not be used to tie Saddam to attacks on September 11. It does tie him into a circle that meant to damage the United States.”

Other 911 Commission members have spoken out as well and made clear that the lack of evidence cited in their report was a reference to a lack of evidence gathered. That word, “gathered” come directly from the CIA reports and other intelligence agency reports regarding Saddam’s Ties upon which the 911 Commission was using to make its assessments.

“Bin Ladin was also willing to explore possibilities for cooperation with Iraq, even though Iraq’s dictator, Saddam Hussein, had never had an Islamist agenda—save for his opportunistic pose as a defender of the faithful against “Crusaders” during the Gulf War of 1991. Moreover, Bin Ladin had in fact been sponsoring anti-Saddam Islamists in Iraqi Kurdistan, and sought to attract them into his Islamic army.53″
-911 Comm pg61

“To protect his own ties with Iraq,Turabi reportedly brokered an agreement that Bin Ladin would stop supporting activities against Saddam. Bin Ladin apparently honored this pledge, at least for a time, although he continued to aid a group of Islamist extremists operating in part of Iraq (Kurdistan) outside of Baghdad’s control. In the late 1990s, these extremist groups suffered major defeats by Kurdish forces. In 2001, with Bin Ladin’s help they re-formed into an organization called Ansar al Islam.There are indications that by then the Iraqi regime tolerated and may even have helped Ansar al Islam against the common Kurdish enemy.54 With the Sudanese regime acting as intermediary, Bin Ladin himself met with a senior Iraqi intelligence officer in Khartoum in late 1994 or early 1995. Bin Ladin is said to have asked for space to establish training camps, as well as assistance in procuring weapons, but there is no evidence that Iraq responded to this request.55 As described below, the ensuing years saw additional efforts to establish connections.”
-911 Comm final report pg 61

INDIRECT Saddam/AQ/911 ties is something entirely different. The 911 Commission’s final report (I believe it’s like pg42 or something) lists the reasons that UBL and AQ declared war on the US. They were:
1) the presence of US forces in Saudi etc (forces which were there to wage war on Iraq
2) the US war on Iraq
3) US support for Israel which was seen as the reason for the US pressure on Saddam (and in some ways that’s true. The US likely wouldn’t have cared too much about Iraq except that Saddam threatened our oil, then he threatened Israel. Between 911 and 3/20/03 literally thousands of Israelis were killed by suicide bus bombers often wearing vests identical to those found at Baghdad University by the hundreds when US Marines were taking Baghdad. I’ve pics if you want em)

These three reasons were why UBL and AQ decided to start killing Americans. If not direct ties to 911 attacks, the attacks were at the very least a fragmentary effect of the unfinished 1991 war on Saddam. More specifically, the attacks were authorized (per 911 Commission) immediately after the Desert Fox strikes on Iraq, and done (per AQ) in retaliation for those strikes.
http://www.aim.org/aim-report/aim-report-media-reports-connect-saddam-to-9-11-plot-march-a/

I cited the stuff re regime ties that was pre-Bush admin because I wanted to point out what you apparently recognize already: that the intel at the time pointed to that kind of relationship.

Iraqi Perspectives Project Reports
http://www.jfcom.mil/newslink/storyarchive/2006/ipp.pdf

MORE HERE
http://www.floppingaces.net/2007/04/18/saddams-ties-to-al-quedadebunk/

Also, I have LOTS of information on this in txt and doc format if you want it. Just email me
smalensek@neo.rr.com

MIddle,

What you fail to acknowledge regarding the 9/11 Commission Report is that the Commission itself was a partisan effort. Jamie Gorelick for example had no business whatsoever on the Commission once it was discovered that her actions created obstacles between the FBI and CIA.

Have you read the draft reports regarding the relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda?

The drafts were much more strongly worded but partisanship and the overwhelming desire to CYA prevented the wording from appearing in the final edition.

There is a massive amount of information contained in the archives of this very site. If you are interested AT ALL in an honest pursuit of the truth it can be found right here.

I want to bring to your attention again the ruling by Judge Harold Baer that I mentioned in post #23 just in case you missed it.

Federal judges don’t generally issue rulings unless there is, at minimum, a preponderance of evidence to support the decision.

Jenny, he only opposes the war unless he’s elected. In that case, he wants us to support him and the war he’ll lead. As to the 50yrs comment….I wonder if you’ve been misled or are misleading? Did you see the entire McCain quote, or just an Obama ad that edited it for political propaganda’s sake?