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That Bush is now running his entire campaign on the fallacy that he and Cheney in particualr have been repeating in spite of all evidence to the contrary. That fighting the war in Iraq is fighting terrorism. They are still trying to assert the link between AL Qeada and Saddm that everyon and all intelligence indicated never existed.
In fact, I certainly hope that the Kerry campaign points out that when Osama bin Laden issued the tape to the Iraqi people just prioir to the invasion, calling for resistance to the AMerican invader fist as being the prime duty of Iraqi Muslims, he followed this up with the assertion that Iraqi Muslims, once the U.S. Infidel was repulsed, must immediately kill Saddam Hussein and replace his non0Islamic, secular Government with an Islamic State. Harly sounds like Osama was prepared to work with Saddam.
Next, it is certainly necessary to point out all of the reasons attacing Saddam may have been eventually necesary, in order to deal with his brutal government, Saddam should have waited while we dealt with the primary threat to our national security, Al Qaeda, and in particular, its leadership. Just as the attacks of September 11th had a deep psychological effect on the U.S., the capture and removal of Bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri would have a deep psychological effect on terrorists, particualrly Al Qaeda.
If Bin Laden is the heart and soul of Al-Qaeda, its spiritual pole star, then Zawahiri is certainly the mind of the organization. To lop these two heads off the beast of terrorism would be a profound and crippling blow against Al Qaeda.
IN fact, if we compare Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda's leadership, we can easily see that Al Qaeda was clearly the imminent danger, while all evendence indicates that Saddam was well boxed in, a great deal of bark, but no bite whatsoever.
The history of Saddam is a history of failure. With suprtior military force, he fought a war against Iran, trying to take its oil fields, and failed. This fight was a draw which yielded not one advantage to Saddam. His attack on Kuwait was put down in six weeks by the will of the united world under the banner of the United Nations, led by the U.S. His attempt to assasinate a U.S. President was uncovered so soon that it barely went beyong the planning stage, and he was caught very easily, which makes one suspect that this was more the bluff and bluster of a bully trying to intimidate by threatening actions he had no ability to actually perform. Saddams attempt to build a reacto to process nuclear grade fissile materials barely got off the ground before it was blown to bits by the Israelis.
The bad intelligence, from equally bad sources, that he was developing other weapons of mass destruction have been priven to be lies that were known lies at the time. The fact that no WMD's were found in Iraq indicate one thing very clearly. That the methoods being used to contain Saddam were very effective in keeping him from being a threat to the U.S. Not only did he not have WMD's, he was totally unable to develop them given the co-operation between the U.S. Britain, and the U.N. Not only did he not have WMD's, all evdence indicates that the infrastructure of Iraq was so falling to pieces that Iraqi industry was completely unable to even start developing WMD's of any kind on a massive scale.
So what we have in Saddam is a tyrant who cold brutalize his own people, but who constituted not one iota ot threat to the U.S.
No on the othe hand, Al Qaeda was quite sucessful at its atempts to attack the U.S. or U.S. Interests overseas.
Al Qaeda Actions:
World Trade Center in 1993
Attacks in November 1995 in which 5 Americans are killed in A car boming in Riyadh.
June 1996, Khobar Towers, 19 dead
1998, co-ordinated bombinga at 2 U.S. Embassies, several hundred killed
October of 2000, the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, 17 dead.
November of 2000, Al Qaeda linked terroists kill a British citizen in Riyadh because they mistake him for an American.
September 11th 2001. World Trade CEnter, Pentagon hit over 3000 dead.
October 2002, French Oil Tanker bombed in Yemen. One dead.
December 2002. Abdul Razzak Kamel Al Qaeda terrorist, ruhes into a
Baptist missionary hospital and slaughterd three U.S. aid workers.
Lets not forget the night club bombing in Bali.
The kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl .
There have been bombing and other killings througout Afghanistan and Pakistan that have been related to both the Taliban and Al Qaeda that are simply too numberous to count.
Given the numerous faiulures of the Bush Administration to capture Osama Bin Laden, or Ayman Al Zawahiri, or Mullah Omar, and the numerous occasions in which it woul have been easy to capture them, but where the orders were to wait and negotiate the surender of Mullah Omars troops (while the Mullar slipped away, once on a motorcycle, another time dressed as a woman in a burka, one must question the actual degree of effort made by the Bush Administration to capture the leaders behind the events of 9/11 and all the terrorist activities before and after. When one considers that had these people been captured, and brought to trial, Bush would have little left to run on, as the terror, would be greatly diminished.
In fact when looks at Saddam Hussein, and Osama bin Laden adn his close supporters several facts jump out at you.
1. Saddam has had a pattern of failure after failure, He has been stopped from accomplishing his goals regarding gaining control of the oil fields of his neighbors. He has failed in his plan to assasinate GEorge H.W. Bush. He was unable to obtain or deveop WMDs.
The one word that describes Saddam Hussein is FAILURE.
Looking at Osama and Al Qaeda, another word somes to mind, and is is not failure, but success. They have succeed at virtually every attack theyhave planned, They have sucessfully attacked U.S. interests and killed Americans both inside the United States and outside of it.
There is no evidence of a link between Saddam and Al Qaeda, in fact, there is a lot of evidence to indicate that Al Qaeda wanted saddam dead, and his regime gone and replaced.
Yet, the current administration has spend a fifth of a trillion dollars to overthrow a nation that posed no direct threat to the U.S., in order to capture a rather nasty leader who posed no threat to the U.S. or the rest of the world, who was being well contained by the U.N. under the same terms that they fought and ended the Gulf War.
Osama, and Al Qaeda, have been left free to plan their next attack on U.S. soil, and this is an advantage to George Bush. While they are free, Bush and the Republicans can milk the terror card for all its worth. Devoting many billions to keep and control Iraq, and devoting much much less to capture those who make terror real.
Into one of the most difficult terrains in the world, the Bush Administration only sent a few hundred troops to try to prevent Osama Bin Laden from escaping from Afghanistan. SUch a small searhc insured that Osam would easily escape.
Had the resources spent on Iraq, and capturing Saddam been spent to go into Afghanistan and hunt down the Al Qaeda leadership, we could easily state that there had been real successes in the war on terror. Such a blow would allow the U.S. to say that it was well on the way to "WINNING" the way on terrorism.
THe priorities of the BUsh Administration are so twisted that they have not only not waged the war on terrorism, they have virtually ignored it. Creating terrorism where it did not exist.
They are still trying to assert that fighting Saddam is fighting the war on terror, a war which in fact, the Bush Administration has not only failed to engage in to the degree necessary, but have in fact, avoided.
A few months after the Taliban had been overthrown in Iraq a video of Osama, and the lieutenants who helped plan the events of 9/11 was found. Osama and his compainions were laughing gleefully at their success.
They are laughing still. While the American voters is being diverted from their real danger, many believe that this president is keeping them safe from terrorism. A dangerous belief.
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