Jun 20, 2025, 1:47 AMWith America threatening Iran over WMDs, I have 4 questions:
1) Where are Saddam Hussein's WMDs?
2) What consequences did officials face when the WMDs weren't found?
3) Why should proponents of the Iraq invasion, such as Sean Hannity, be trusted now?
4) Is Iran stronger or weaker as a result of the Iraq War?
@aj Hans Blix investigated, reported, told the truth. Nobody cared. Nobody wanted the truth. Inconvenient.
Fuckers.
@aj 5) given the quagmires Iraq (left) and Afghanistan (right) turned into, why should we expect Iran (middle, much larger population) to go any different?
Jun 20, 2025, 9:23 AM@aj The fact that these aren't the questions raised by mainstream media seemingly anywhere in the world? That's how we got here in the first place...
Your 2nd question is key. When Bush II's casus belli for Iraq War II (the non-existent WMDs) became obvious that should have lead to his impeachment & should have lead to widespread meaningful reform in the mainstream media.
Instead everyone in power moved on as if nothing had happened, thus laying the foundation for Trump & American fascism.
This isn't a retrospective judgment. Many of us understood that we were witnessing the collapse of the 1st American Republic 25 years ago.
Jun 20, 2025, 12:39 PM@Dave_Goldsmith Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Blair, Wolfowitz... None faced any criminal sanctions.
The Pentagon never had to seriously answer for its intelligence failures in Iraq.
There was no clear out. No reform. No reckoning.
Fox News' Iraq War shills, like Sean Hannity, faced no consequence.
Ultimately, other than a few low-ranking troops at Abu Ghraib, the biggest consequences were to Chelsea Manning for the "crime" of being s whistleblower.
When Daesh emerged from factions of the old Iraq army, the media studiously avoided pointing out how that blowback was connected to the Iraq invasion.
Nor was there any reflection on how Iraq eventually became basically a client state of Iran as a direct result of the invasion.
And now the US is talking about an invasion of Iran.
As if Vietnam and Iraq and Afghanistan never happened.
And there's no mention of Mohammad Mosaddegh.
No mention of US support for the coup that overthrew Mosaddegh in favour of the Shah.
No mention of why the Iranian people had enough of the Shah and eventually overthrew him.
No mention of the Iran–Contra Affair.
No mention of the US backing Saddam Hussein in the Iran–Iraq War.
And no mention that the real challenge for the US won't be overthrowing the Iranian government.
It will be the nation building that follows.
It will be building legitimacy for the new US-backed regime in Iran following a war initiated by Israel.
@aj @Dave_Goldsmith He is always lying, but Trump says no more nation building. Is there any thought beyond pre-emptively bombing the crap out Iran? I don’t see it and the logistics of invasion are daunting, plus Russia would not like a US puppet on its doorstep. The Shia Sunni divide remains even with regime change.
Immoral, destabilizing, and potentially a stumble into nuclear devastation. But if Trump decides that it makes him look tough and reverses his unpopularity—it won’t—bombs away.
Another question you could ask:
Did dropping the MOAB end the Afghanistan war on US favorable terms?