"Forged Letter Was Used to Justify Iraq War"

We need to get over this...

No matter what happened.. the fact of the matter is that we r in war now. We need acknowledge that the check & balances failed and we were duped. But now we need to concentrate on winning the war. The enemy doesn't any sophisticated weapons but has the will to endure this war for a long time, we have sophisticated weapons & the soldiers have the will but the politicians & the public have no will.. we cannot act like wimps if we want to win this war. War is tragic, bloody & hell... and sometimes that's the only choice left. We can only choice left... we fight hard or else be ready to loose the nation we all love.

So what is Suskind's conclusion as to why Bush would do this? Was he just bored, and needed an excuse to spend a trillion dollars and sacrifice the lives of thousands of American defenders?

CC, this isn't a war, this is an occupation. Remember how Bush told us that we won the war back in 2003.

John, Bush has wanted to invade Iraq even before he was elected, according to some sources. He never approved of the way his father handled the first Iraq war. There were many reasons, including oil.

Oh, and CC..."We need to get over this"? Get over the fact that we were lied to time and time again? I'm all for forgiveness, but Bush hasn't even admitted he deceived us. And look at the consequences of this--millions of lives lost or changed forever, trillions of dollars down the drain that could have been better spent.

Why did Bush do it?

A lot of people would like the answer to that one. I've never been able to figure it out unless it was for personal ego gratification and maybe some oil.

Nippy: Bush and McCain are hawks. They love a good war. It's the closest to playing cowboys and Indians that they could come.

I heard an interview on television with him and he talked about this. Amazing.

Thanks for spreading the word, Carla. Centrist Citizen is wrong; we do not need to get over this. We need to stay on this until we impeach and imprison everyone who lied us into a war and killed innocent people.

Ron Suskind, claims....The alleged forgery....The author also claims....

Just what some people wanted to hear. Frankly, it's hogwash!

There are hundreds of impeachable offenses by this Administration but it's too late to lock the barn door now. Live with it.

We are not in a war and have not been in a war this century. We have occupied a couple of nations with our military. Terrorism isn't a military problem it's a police problem, and a small one at that in comparison with, say, traffic accidents.

The "War on Terror" is a propaganda device designed to keep your attention while the pick-pockets steal your money.

I m no fan of Bush & am angry that he lied & deceived us. But what will impeachment get us? Call it war, occupation of anything else.. in the end we have to crush the resistance to secure a safer future for Iraq.

CC: "Crush the resistance?" Do you really think that is possible? And at what expense? How much of the future of this country, and your children's future (assuming you have them or want them), are you willing to invest?

Ivan: Just the response that I would expect from the owner of the group "John McCain for President". Thanks for stopping by...

Carla G.: From the beginning I personally believed that we would go to war for reasons more personal to Mr. Bush. But I find you too gullible in believing this story that he ordered the CIA to forge the "forged" document. It smacks of a politically motivated theory at best. You may believe it if you wish but I don't think it is honest to get on a pulpit and start shouting "scoundrel, scoundrel!" so repeatedly. Politics is a nefarious endeavor at best and "all things are fair in love and war." I don't trust either side in this issue of pointing fingers. But I can remember that all too many cowardly Americans were pointing fingers at the government, the CIA, etc., over the attack on 9-11. They wanted action... and I mean BLOOD action. Well, they got it, right or wrong. And now we're paying for it while those who chanted so loudly at the government for "failing to protect" them have turned their backs on the same government for doing what they all wanted in the first place.

Too gullible, Donald? Why do you consistently come across as some patronizing elder? I do think that perhaps we as a nation were too "gullible" believing that Bush had the best interests of the country (and world) in mind and not his own egotistical self-interests.

As far as this book...it is not the first time that this story has surfaced. This guy is not a paid pundit or one of the sleazy Corsi or Coulter types. He is a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist.

As far as 9/11, I was not one of those wanting "blood action". We don't invade a country because of a terrorist attack. Besides, most of the terrorists came from Saudi Arabia. Why didn't we invade and attack them?

19 guys from Saudi Arabia attack us. We attack Iraq. Still does not compute.

Carla, what should b done abt all those resistance fighters in Iraq who r not ok with our occupation. If we leave tomorrow, they will topple the govt we installed. The end result will b worse than where we r now.

I thought that the letter was forged after the invasion as "proof" that we'd done the right thing afterall.

Carla G.: Good response. I'm sorry if, in stating my views, I come across as a "patronizing elder." I am undoubtedly an elder person than you in years but I do not rely on that but on my opinions, which are open to change at any moment that I can be shown differently. I am so skeptical of anything that has to do with politics, though, that I cannot accept something just because it is wrapped in "prestige." The Pulitzer Prize means nothing to me, only that a number of pretentious "authorities" judged the work worthy of a prize. As I mentioned before (and was criticized for doing so), there is an old Persian adage that say, "An ass bearing gold is still an ass." This does not necessarily refer to one's posterior, as so many assumed. But if the shoe fits, wear it.
In short, although I had much the same opinion as is being voiced now about the lack of justification for the war on Iraq, I am not "fool enough" (as I see it) to start dreaming up all kinds of fanciful "boogie man theories" about going after oil, the big company conspiracy and all sorts of really bizarre dreams for political justification.
Our biggest weakness as Americans is our terrible naivete about the world and our place in it. We think that because we don't want to wear a veil, all women in the world don't want to wear the veil. Which is nonsense. There are Muslim women who don't see this in way most Muslims see this (in French Morocco, the daughter of the Sultan staged a women's Lysistrada type revolt against wearing the veil) but most Muslims -- unfortunately -- see the wearing of the veil as a duty before God. The fact that there is nothing in the Koran to justify this stand is as meaningless as the fact that there is nothing in the Bible to justify much of what Christians vehemently swear is "straight from God."

Bush a cowboy? Hell, he's not even a REAL TEXAN!

Donald: What does Muslim women wearing a veil have to do with all this? I'm really trying to figure it out. I do value your life experience, but I'm not all that much younger. I've been around for almost 60 years myself. And of course I had many lifetimes before this. :-)

Jim G,

I do agree that we should not get involved in how other countries r run or who runs them. But we r past that point now, we already waged the war and have caused a mess out there. Don't u think leavin would cause more chaos?

I m all for departure if one can show me a good plan that will not cause more death & destruction.

Right, Jim, and of course we're criticizing the Russians for doing the very same thing in South Ossetia and Georgia.

CC: More death and destruction? I think that's what has been going on over there since we invaded them. We got in the midst of a civil war we had no business being in. It has now turned into an occupation that McCain says he'd like to maintain for 100 years. No one seems to want to pull the plug. Maybe they're afraid that people will see this as another Vietnam. Hmmm...

Donald, IF you were to research the history of the PNAC you would understand the motives behind what the neocons have been doing.

Carla,

I don't think it become another Vietnam but another Afghanistan from where attacks will launched on our interests in the region. It will a base to topple regimes who r allied to us in the region. It would cause chaos & not to forget.. raise the price of gas to whooping levels.

Carla G.: What has the Muslim wearing of the veil have to do with "all this." I was making a point of the naivete and ignorance of Americans when it comes to foreign affairs. We just assume that all people think like us or have the same values. They don't. We think they should naturally want to be the same kind of political "democracy" that we are. They don't. They have seen how our democracy (which isn't really a democracy at all) has destroyed us morally so much that even we don't like to be like "us." Just by force of arms and new "tubes of toothpaste" we're going to get the Iraqis to see the error of their ways and become an non-religiously based government. This shows a gross ignorance of Islam and the way they and most of the rest of the world thinks. THEY DON'T WANT TO BE LIKE US. GOT THAT? How much planer can I state it? Even we don't want to be "like us." At least I -- along with a whole lot of other Americans -- don't want to be like us. Isn't that what this whole "finger pointing" is about? Why "we'll vote in a new and fresh approach and things will change. You'll see." B___ S___! Just pray that things don't get worse. If you think "the Bush administration and his cronies" are bad you better start praying long and hard. I don't trust any politician in this partisan political system. Its designed to ensure that special interests prevail and the public be damned. "Oh, I'll do this for the people... and I'll do this for the people, etc., etc., etc." Well, don't make any bets on it.

"McCain says he'd like to maintain for 100 years" Oh spare me. He said no such thing you and others have been trumpeting that since two seconds after he said it. Screaming "see! see! see! I told you he wanted an endless war. He's just like Bush see! see! see!" when all he was saying was that he thought we should stay till both the Iraqi people and American soldiers would be safe when we withdrew from the country.

"Maybe they're afraid that people will see this as another Vietnam."
Killing fields? Could be. Who would you point your finger at if we pull out and ethnic cleansing started?

I absolutly love how Bush is responsible for so much that has gone wrong in the world. I wonder if he has his own Mini-Me running around the White House.

Personally when I was unloading tanks and hummers fro the first gulf war I was pissed that we didn't finish wiping up the desert with Saddam then and I knew we'd be back because the pompous, arrogant a** would keep giving us and the world the finger because he like many believed that the US was full of crap and wouldn't actually follow through with what we said we would do that we'd just add one more sanction OOooooo.

I think for years we were like a joke I heard once about unarmed Bobbies chasing a crook and yelling STOP!!!!! or .......... I'll say stop again.

Donald, this war isn't about rescuing Muslim women from wearing a veil. And I completely understand that not everyone wants to live the way we do. Where did I say that they did?

Carla G.: Why are you so defensive? I didn't say that the war was about rescuing Muslim women. I said that many Americans assumed that as soon as we "liberated" Afghanistan the people, freed from a repressive regime would want to be like us. Again, I'm not saying or implying that you were or are one of those. What I'm trying to get over -- apparently not very successfully -- is that this sort of naivite makes our government (no matter who or what party is in power) do things for very unrealistic expectations and purposes. I don't think that "oil" was the driving force or even an important consideration. I think it was for political trump card playing purposes to make the American public (who, aided and abetted by our miserable news media people, had been clamoring for action of some kind and criticizing ad nauseam every government agency for letting those upstart Arabs fly planes into the Twin Towers). Now every American (well, almost every American considering the amount of "told you so" comments appearing on this and other "posts" of Gather) claims to have known that this "oil grab" and political manipulation was going on. I'm not attributing any of this to you personally, but you seem to be well ensconced on the "band wagon" of "Bush" detractors. Which to me, regardless of how much justified, is overblown for political reasons that are as distasteful to me as the charges that are real. We keep thinking that all we have to do is "throw the bastards out" and put a new "bastard" in and everything will be just rosy. I'm more disturbed by the "band wagon" than those on it.

Jim G,

I don't think the Iraqis r ready for it. The militias are stronger than the government. And also the military is more organised & in charge compared to the central govt. When that happens coups take place.. do we want another military dictator in Iraq?

Donald,

yes u right.. we cannot force our morals, views & form of govt on Iraq or Afghanisatn. We American r being short-sighted when we think we can. We got rid Taliban.. n guess what the women still wear the veil. They did so before the Taliban came into power & do so after they gone. We need to understand that veil was not a Taliban invention but has been part of their culture for hundreds of years atleast.

Centrist Citizen: Yes. It is a problem of our isolated culture to think that everyone should naturally want to be like us. The problem is that we, at least religiously, are far, far behind the Muslims. We equate our TV culture to Christianity but TV wasn't invented until years after Christ came (or Muhammad for that matter). We need to think globally or lose our chance to survive. We have increased our destruct capacity far beyond our religious, moral and ethical standards. But we are as intransigent as the rest of the world in this respect. People are naturally suspicious of change, which is one of the reasons that so few people at the time of Christ saw in Him what we do now. It is time to move on, though. But these changes that are required are far more fundamental and far reaching than just "throwing out the bastards" entrenched politically and electing more of the same who only talk differently in order to gain the power they covet.

Donald,

This mite sound dumb but what do u mean by "We equate our TV culture to Christianity but TV wasn't invented until years after Christ came (or Muhammad for that matter)."

And why would say "we, at least religiously, are far, far behind the Muslims". I don't really get it.

Centrist Citizen: I think one thing we Americans can't understand realistically is that Islam is in its "dark ages" now with there being (as in the days of the Inquisition in Spain) two vehemently opposed "churches" of Islam, the Shiah and the Sunni. In American we think that such a situation is long past historically and we have outgrown it (the Huguenots, etc.) but even we -- in Ireland, for instance -- have not outgrown it. The rift between the Shiia and Sunnis, is at least as big and violence prone as it ever was between the Catholic Church and the rest of the so called Christian world.
Nothing effective politically can be done about this situation no matter how "modern" we think we are. In America, where we think we are "separated politically from religion" (but aren't totally in reality) we assume that this is "the way to go." Unfortunately, this is not the view of the rest of the world, particularly in Islamic countries. Even in England, we have a church state. We are the dissenters here, and we expect that everyone naturally wants to be like us. How naive and unrealistic. But that's OK. Go ahead and vote someone new into office and think that things are going to change. Then four years later, when the turmoil and attacks continue, blame whomever you elected and "throw the bastard out" to replace him/her with someone new.

Centrist Citizen: In answer to your question about Islam being advanced over Christianity, I will try to present this as follows:

First, Islam came some 600+ years after Jesus. Christians, who are too prejudiced to consider anything but their own view, don't realize that much of the Koran is about the same stories in the Bible and is an "up-dated" view of religion from that in the Bible, just as Christians consider the New Testament as an up-dated view of the Old Testament. Second, Islam points out quite correctly that the Christian view of Jesus as being the incarnation of God (actually contrary to what Jesus said, Himself) is not true and is a form of blasphemy. Jesus spoke for God (as Muhammad did) but was not God, Himself. This is only one of the ways that Christians have distorted Christianity for their own limited self interests. There are other things about Islam that are advanced over the Bible from a spiritual point of view.

The problem is (again) that prejudice gets in the way of being fair and open about this subject. The Muslims of today (just as corrupt -- almost -- as Christians in their view of what their own religion is about) have made such a mess of things that they have made it impossible for people outside of Islam to even give IT a "fair hearing." At every turn -- just as with Christians with regard to Christianity -- Muslims are "shooting themselves in the foot." Islam forbids the drinking of alcohol whereas Christians make it a point of their sacraments. And we are seeing the disastrous effects of this problem everywhere in our society, especially on our highways. There are many other examples but they are hard to appreciate because of the actions of the Muslims in their own "bastardization or religion process."

I m not sure I can agree with they r more advance than us.. to tell u the truth, i don't know much abt them to begin with & secondly I m sure the belive in my faith is too strong to swayed by Islam.

I mite agree with u that Muslims take their religion more seriously as in they practise it more than we do. I m not sure abt the exact numbers but they don't have a the single mother issue in their countries to the extent we have. sadly, we don't even practise the 10 commandments :(

CC: Did you know that there are three versions of the "Ten Commandments"? Which one do you follow? :-)

Carla, I wanted to ask this question long time ago. I found lots of Bible versions too to the extent that I stopped to use it to maintian my views.

Centrist, Muslims abused their religion too just to achieve their personal interests. They do as who insult and tell lies "Half the verse". But, still there are wonderful Muslims, lots of them. Actually, I didn't meet except a few bad. The problem is that the evil nowadays in stronger and the good is silent.

I liked your article, Carl although you're so late. We knew all these info before the war, but you didn't trust us or even just listen.

Mary: "The problem is that the evil nowadays in stronger and the good is silent."

That could be said of the U.S. also, until recently. Many more of us are speaking out now. We don't like the direction that some people have been taking this country--many of them considering themselves to be the "religious right".

10 4 u...

The "Religious right". All the people thought that they're religious right even sluts.

Centrist Citizen: You say, "I belive in my faith is too strong to swayed by Islam." This, I can understand and appreciate. But I wonder if you realize how hypocritical this sounds? I mean, didn't the Jews listening to Jesus say the same thing for the most part? If you don't know much of anything about Islam how can you honestly think that you believe in something else "too strong to be swayed" by it? And this is particularly disingenuous when you consider that Jesus, Himself promised that there would be others from God to follow Him (St. John, chapter 16 as but one example).

This is what bothers me about so called modern Christians (not that Muslims are not guilty of the same thing), this exclusivity "knee jerk" response to something new coming along as promised in their own scriptures. Sad but true. Oh well, what's new?

You won't win, Tony whatever you do. You'll just lose more and more if you stayed because they won't let you to win. You misunderstood the whole situation from the beginning and now all of us are paying for one or two governments' fault and lies.

Winning at what cost? And how do you define "win"? These are questions that need to be asked and answered. This country has a national debt of $53 trillion and growing daily. We spend $10 billion a month to fight this "war" in Iraq. Our children and grandchildren will be paying for this.

You're right, Carla... All of us will be paying.

this has been denied by everyone the book claimed had anything to do with it including the named sources.

keep digging I guess

Of course they'll deny it, Charles. Do you think they'd say, "Hey, yeah we lied!"?

Now, Tony, no name-calling. We don't want to stoop to the level of some of the others on here.

Why did Bush invade Iraq? That's easy. To one-up his father and because Cheney wanted US control of Iraq's oil. They thought the people would be so grateful they would give us control.

By the way, how can an invading and occupying third party (us) 'win' a civil war between two or more other factions? We won already when we accomplisthed what we said we were going in for - to bring down Hussein. The government we installed is not really representative but might be a beginning for a republic form of government. The rest is up to the Iraqis and the sooner we get out the sooner they will solve their problems. We need to concentrate on saving Our Country the USA.

Pretty simple. Follow the dollars. Who made profit on our dead soldiers?
The profiteers are the ones who instigated it all.
It is NOT too late to impeach. If not impeachment, then war crimes.

It is the duty of the nation to call out illegal activities, albeit for profit and gain.
Perhaps especially then.

I wish Dubya had a plan to get us out of Iraq.
He sure had a plan to stay out of Vietnam.

And Donald? I thought all life was sacred? Is it just children less than 1 day old?

Wilka

Apparently, the Bush Administration and Iraqi leaders have outlined a troop withdrawal plan that will have the U.S. out of Iraq by 2011.

This 'forged letter' allegation does not hold up to scrutiny, there was never any document produced, and "confidential sources" inside any organization are always suspect.

A little defensive aren't you, Tony?

Tony, you do seem to have an attitude and foul talk chip on the shoulder way about you. If you were "on the other side of the fence" I would have surely called you on it long ago, but someone needs to speak back "their" language on occasion.

Nothing that comes out about this administration surprises me anymore. :-(

I agree, Kokomo. They've driven this country off into the ditch.

If I had a penny for every time the White House has misused the CIA since said CIA was officialized, I'd be a penny-bazillionaire many times over. Of course when we're talking about an organization of sneaks and double-sneaks, hmmmm - just begging to be "mis-used," if you ask me!
Corporatocracy - CIA - economic hit men - Jackals - MKultra / mind-control / subliminal [war criminal]messaging via videogames etc - School of the Americas / torture training at Ft. Benning - Bush #1 in CIA and then in White House - scary...

Are we ready for a real clean-out YET, dear USA?

Of course all the legalistic probes & coverups etc can never accomplish such a clean-out. The only way is to continue unblocking the spiritual growth potential of the whole.

In the meantime, praise & gratitude for the simple harmonious beautiful ordinary life of walking in nature and gardening and singing and sharing with friends and family.........It's the little simple good things that count, big-time.

Thanks for stopping by, Carolion.

//It's the little simple good things that count, big-time.//

Yes, that, and which chad you punch in the election booth.

Good one, Julia!