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Look, back on the invasion of Iraq.
Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1991.
The United Nations Security Council gave any member nation the authority to expel Iraq from Kuwait, by force if necessary. The United States Congress gave President George H. W. Bush the authority to do just that. The President of the United States set about building a coalition of nations to commit their military forces to enforce the UNSC Resolutions. This coalition expelled Iraq from Kuwait.
In exchange for ceasing our ass-whipping, Saddam Hussein signed a cease-fire that contained several demands to which he unconditionally agreed. He then set about violating every one of them.
The United Nations and the coalition then spent the ensuing 12 years, passing more resolutions, launching sporadic attacks, and generally playing footsy with the Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussein who continued to violate the cease-fire agreement and all UNSC resolutions passed after the initial invasion of Kuwait.
In 1998, Saddam Hussein expelled (or caused the withdrawal of – depending on who you believe) UN weapons inspectors at a time when Iraq was known to have tons of chemical and biological weapons and their precursors and before any of those weapons could be secured and destroyed. This led to a limited military action (Operation Desert Fox) authorized by the Clinton administration – which, ironically enough, was executed under the original Authorization for use of military force in Iraq from 1991 and for which Clinton did not seek Congressional approval in 1998. All of this, of course, was after years of Saddam Hussein continually frustrating the U.N.’s efforts to account for Iraq’s weapons programs in what has, by many, been described as a farce of an inspections program. But, in any respect, between 1998 and 2002, there were no weapons inspectors in Iraq and there was no reason to believe Iraq had suspended or ceased such programs. In fact, it was the generally held belief that, if anything, in the absence of UN inspectors, Iraq stepped up its WMD programs. No one had the benefit of the forensic study done by Duelfer in which he determined Iraq was merely maintaining its capability until such time they were able to have sanctions lifted. By all outside appearances – and from statements made by Hussein, himself – there was no reason to believe he had either destroyed existing stockpiles (known to exist) or had ceased his pursuit of WMDs, including nuclear weapons.
So, comes 2001 and the terrorist attacks on the U.S.
The U. S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001, toppled the Taliban and sent al Qaeda scurrying. Much of them, al Qaeda trained and al Qaeda sponsored Musab al Zarqawi among them, ran to Iraq.
Now, tell me; in the climate that existed in 2002 and, considering the flagrant and defiant violations of every ing agreement from 1991 to 2002 by Iraq; who wouldn’t be in favor of invading Iraq. Not many were opposed and, by an act of Congress, President George W. Bush was authorized to resume hostilities for many and various reasons stretching all the way back to 1991.
All this belly-aching by the left is just a bunch of Monday morning quarterbacking…and, I assert, not much of it is even sincere. Because, if it were, there’d be legislation introduced in both houses of Congress to put a stop to this “Illegal war” and the “atrocious war crimes” of George W. Bush.
What I want to know is if any of you idiots on the left are lobbying your U. S. Representative or Senator to do just that or, are you just content to and complain?
