Fair.org on Clark's stand on invasion of Iraq

[realFedUp]

http://www.fair.org/press-releases/clark-antiwar.html

MEDIA ADVISORY:
Wesley Clark: The New Anti-War Candidate?
Record Shows Clark Cheered Iraq War as "Right Call"

September 16, 2003
The possibility that former NATO supreme commander Wesley Clark might
enter the race for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination has been the subject of furious speculation in the media. But while recent coverage of Clark often claims that he opposed the war with Iraq, the various opinions he has expressed on the issue suggest the media's "anti-war" label is inaccurate.

Many media accounts state that Clark, who led the 1999 NATO campaign
against Yugoslavia, was outspoken in his opposition to the invasion of
Iraq. The Boston Globe (9/14/03) noted that Clark is "a former NATO
commander who also happens to have opposed the Iraq war." "Face it: The
only anti-war candidate America is ever going to elect is one who is a
four-star general," wrote Michael Wolff in New York magazine (9/22/03). Salon.com called Clark a "fervent critic of the war with Iraq" (9/5/03).

To some political reporters, Clark's supposed anti-war stance could spell trouble for some of the other candidates. According to Newsweek's Howard Fineman (9/8/03) Clark "is as anti-war as Dean," suggesting that the general would therefore be a "credible alternative" to a candidate whom "many Democrats" think "would lead to a disaster." A September 15 Associated Press report claimed that Clark "has been critical of the Iraq war and Bush's postwar efforts, positions that would put him alongside announced candidates Howard Dean, Sen. Bob Graham of Florida and Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio as the most vocal anti-war candidates." The Washington Post (9/11/03) reported that Clark and Dean "both opposed the war in Iraq, and both are generating excitement on the Internet and with grass-roots activists."
-snip-

After the fall of Baghdad, any remaining qualms Clark had about the wisdom of the war seemed to evaporate. "Liberation is at hand. Liberation-- the powerful balm that justifies painful sacrifice, erases lingering doubt and reinforces bold actions," Clark wrote in a London Times column (4/10/03). "Already the scent of victory is in the air." Though he had been critical of Pentagon tactics, Clark was exuberant about the results of "a lean plan, using only about a third of the ground combat power of the Gulf War. If the alternative to attacking in March with the equivalent of four divisions was to wait until late April to attack with five, they certainly made the right call."

continued

[realFedUp]

1. dupe, please close

sorry, didn't see the other.

[IranianDemocrat]

2. dupe and flamebait.

eom

[FatbackSlim]

3. Too factual to be flamebait

Although it is a dupe.

[Terwilliger]

4. flamebait? cant stand the heat get the fuck out of the kitchen!

[IranianDemocrat]

5. The article is spin and you get the fuck out of the kitchen.

He said one certain military tactic was the "right call", not the whole war like the articel's title implies.

[Terwilliger]

7. You dont have the information

they do

Print your own newspaper or be quiet aqlready. You Clarkites are seriously fucked up.

[DoveTurnedHawk]

9. Oh Terwilliger, I Had Such High Hopes for You

Alas. Sorry you feel this way.

DTH

[StandWatie]

11. because they don't believe you over Clark himself

This is what has bugged me about the "Draft Clark" bullshit since it started. He's the post-modern candidate, his followers make up whatever they think he believes in and project it onto an authority figure and then believe that he believes it.

[Terwilliger]

14. Yes, and I know about your posting history at Free Republic

when you were agreeing with Freepers, do you think Clark's name came up?

[DoveTurnedHawk]

16. Oh, Brother

Whatever, Ter.

DTH

[Terwilliger]

29. shall I post some of the more choice posts?

maybe your Clark loving friends wouldn't think so much of you anymore.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

13. If I Said Operation Barbarossa Was

a military success does that mean I supported the Nazi invasion of Russia?

[Terwilliger]

15. (probably)but Clark is a military general...he's not anti-war in any sense

[StandWatie]

17. He said Bush and Blair should be proud

That is not sitting around analysing troop movements.

[Bread and Circus]

26. Terwillinger....

Two questions:

What if Clark f***s Bush up? Then who's
f***ed up?

Terwillinger, your hatred of Clark and his
supporters is just jealousy disguised. You
piggy back onto every anti-Clark thread you can
find just to spread ill will. It's petty and
destructive.

[Terwilliger]

27. what if?

you sound confident

[Lefty48197]

6. The article is a discredited slam

Please stop being fooled by it. BTW, did you get the email that said Bill Clinton had Osama in custody...

[deutsey]

8. I think FAIR is pretty reliable

although I can't vouch for what they say here.

[DoveTurnedHawk]

10. Read the Title, Then Read the Context of the "Right Call" Quote

A more dishonest title I can scarcely imagine.

DTH

[deutsey]

20. I like Clark but

I'd like to know: have the sources FAIR cites been debunked?

[Terwilliger]

12. discredited?

by what?

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

23. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Terwilliger]

30. you're supporting Clark...why should you need more humiliation?

[Julien Sorel]

34. LOL

Come on sweety. Take the dress off and come up with an argument.

[Terwilliger]

19. Im sorry, there's nothing to discredit here

"Record Shows Clark Cheered Iraq War as "Right Call" "

and that's exactly what he said!

[Julien Sorel]

22. Like I said, fingerpainting.

[StandWatie]

24. I am quite capable of reading

if you have some way to put his remarks about opponents of the war being silenced and his cheery view of a cowed middle east bowing before the US/UK juggernaut into a different context I'd love to hear it.

Until then I know you know how to read also and will assume you aren't serious and you are just bullshiting about your pet candidate.

[Julien Sorel]

25. If you want to take Lady Terwilliger's spot, be my guest.

First, show me where he said this:

if you have some way to put his remarks about opponents of the war being silenced and his cheery view of a cowed middle east bowing before the US/UK juggernaut I'd love to hear it.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

28. This Board Trips Me Out

While we're shooting ourselves in a circular firing squad the Republicans practice Leninist party discipline and eat our lunches....


on edit-

*With this attitude we'll never beat*... but I think some folks here like it that way... Sad....

[Julien Sorel]

31. Nawww, it's just a couple of the usual fringists.

I'm having fun, personally. They'll get tired of this garbage after a while and find something else to whine about. The best thing is, this stuff has absolutely no play with Main Street -- it's just the marginalized fanatics who care, and the slanderous nature of this is so obvious it doesn't have legs to help them spread their poison.

[StandWatie]

32. any other candidates that you call "circular firing squad" on?

Fuck that, the same rabid Clark people who have talked shit on everyone else's war record want to say this FAIR article is picking on him unfairly? It's his own words!

[DoveTurnedHawk]

33. Point Out One Instance Where Any Clarker "Talked Shit" on Anyone Else's

War record, please.

DTH

[Wendec]

36. Double Posting

As much as I dislike repeated posts, here's my take on the Fair article vs. other sources. BTW, I'm a Clark supporter who: 1) did her homework before deciding who to support; 2) doesn't agree with my fellow supporters who trash other Dem candidates; and 3) takes serious issue with your allegation that I'm f****d up because we don't support the same person.

Following is the text of my post on another Fair thread.

I just don't believe they did a thorough job on this. As early as October 2002, Salon was portraying Clark as in opposition to the U.S. policy towards Iraq. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2002/10/17/zinni/index.html
That's well before the January snippets cited in Fair. Frankly, I have never had a problem with Fair, but to cite extremely brief quotes, with no context, always raises my suspicions regardless of the source.

Likewise, a March 1, 2003 American Prospect article portrays Clark as very antagonistic towards the Bush Iraq policy. http://www.prospect.org/print/V14/3/tomasky-m.html

In a January 22 edition of Crossfire (one day after one of the quotes cited in the Fair article), Paul Begala defended Bianca Jagger's anti-war position by citing Clark as one of several generals who agreed with her.

I don't have tapes of CNN from January, so I can't specifically refute the quotes, but it seems to me that the general body of work on Clark's position more than demonstrates that he has been consistent. That body of work begins in October 2002. I didn't even bother to cite more recent statements. Sorry, but I neither see nor buy the inconsistency theory.

[lazarus]

35. dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=348850&mesg_id=348850&page=

[FubarFly]

37. Thanks for posting this.

I'm glad to see Clark's war stand be put into a different perspective. FAIR is a reputable organization and everything said here is an actual quote. As a cable war correspondant at a time of frenzied nationalism it is only natural that Clark said things that were pro-war, and supportive of the admistration. Otherwise, he wouldn't have been invited back. There will be plenty more choice Clark quotes surfacing in the near future. I recommend that Clark supporters have Clark's more skeptical and caution advising quotes ready, so that the next time something like this pops up, we can get a more complete perspective.

Quotes like this look bad in hindsight:


"As time wore on, Clark's reservations seemed to give way. Clark explained on CNN (1/21/03) that if he had been in charge, "I probably wouldn't have made the moves that got us to this point. But just assuming that we're here at this point, then I think that the president is going to have to move ahead, despite the fact that the allies have reservations." As he later elaborated (CNN, 2/5/03): "The credibility of the United States is on the line, and Saddam Hussein has these weapons and so, you know, we're going to go ahead and do this and the rest of the world's got to get with us.... The U.N. has got to come in and belly up to the bar on this. But the president of the United States has put his credibility on the line, too. And so this is the time that these nations around the world, and the United Nations, are going to have to look at this evidence and decide who they line up with."

But can be put into perspective by an interview like this, taken four days into the invasion:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/03/24/clark/index_np.html

You're unlikely to hear Clark the candidate speak up on CNN, now that we're in the middle of war. But when Salon spoke to Clark just before Operation Iraqi Freedom commenced, he didn't shy away from criticizing Bush foreign policy. "I don't think the case has been made well," Clark told Salon about a war with Iraq. "It's been made very poorly."

--snip--

How would that have worked naturally into the work against Iraq?

Because you would have built a case why you needed to take action against Iraq.

So you think the case has been made well then?

I don't think the case has been made well. It's been made very poorly


But it could have been made?

I believe it could have been made. Although the element of urgency was always missing.

You've referred to the campaign against Iraq as "elective surgery"; I imagine that means that you support disarming Saddam in principle, just not with the same urgency the Bush administration feels.

My view on it was and has been that at some point you're going to need to take actions to deal with the problem of Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction. But those actions didn't have to necessarily be military and they didn't have to be now. It's the administration that chose to do this set of actions at this time. And the reason they've had problems persuading people of the necessity for doing it has been because they couldn't address the urgency.


---

Put into perspective we can see that Clark supported strong action because he viewed Saddam as a threat. But he preferred the action taken to not be unilateral, and also appropiate based on the evidence at hand. He was also willing to consider non-military solutions. He thought that b*sh's hand was forced and standing down wasn't an option, but there was more than one way to deal with Saddam.

I hope next time we can respond to facts with facts instead of resorting to unsavory tactics like attacking the messenger with childish namecalling.