Can an oldfag who was paying attention during the build up to Iraq tell me if people thought they were serious five or six months before the invasion started? How many people were saying "oh this is just bluster and posturing, they'll calm down soon and Saddam will make a deal".
I can't imagine how much shit is going on at the executive level right now, but what's filtering down to the public sure seems like a serious attempt to persuade the public that war might really be needed.
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No one was saying that. Everyone knew that Dubya wanted Saddam's head for daddy. Also shock and awe was just that. There was no build up, or missile strikes beforehand. Bombing starts and then troops are on the ground immediately.
In short, Trump is nothing like Dubya.
So the simple fact that we're discussing it shows that there's not a serious, quiet push to get us into another war?
reminder that neocons always do false flags to get into more wars.
expect drumpf to do a false flag this week.
Well there is definitely a push for war behind the scenes, with always the same characters. So far, there hasn't been any indication that Trump is on board with any of it. If anything, he is following the Bill Clinton playbook of missile diplomacy which is more of a message. Clinton didn't really cause any change because of his missiles, and I don't think Trump's will either. It is all just to be able to say you did something and that you weren't Obama.
This documentary is exactly about that:
youtube.com
So it's just Wag the Dog.
>narrated by Sean Penn
What's different about North Korea compared to Iraq is China.
China wants the buffer state to stay in some fashion and certainly doesn't want a pro-US unified Korea on its border.
Iraq had no friendlies on its frontier, so it was a lot easier to get a war going there.
SEATO wants Kimmy gone but the China Equation makes this a game of 64d chess.
Yes if you believe the chemical attacks were fabricated.
I don't think it makes a difference at this stage. Assad used them before so he doesn't really have a case for saying "oh we would never do such a thing".
""Moderate rebels"" used them too.
Sure, the window for finding a 'good guy' in Syria closed years ago. But Assad doesn't have much of a case for not using chemical weapons.
Yes you are right, ultimately it makes no difference. I was more saying that in the context of how you perceive Trump's decision making.
What helped push iraq war was 9/11, people we out for blood and still freaking out about terrorism.
I dont think they could pull that now
ss
Just to add, I also remember there was a period of months where Saddam's agreed to inspections by Hans Blix of the IAEA. The media always portrayed Saddam as lying and hiding these weapons. We were hot off the heels of 9/11, had already "conquered" Afghanistan, and there was no stopping the war on terror. War with Iraq was palpable, but there was no buildup to shock and awe. Once the missiles were fired, regime change had begun.
Korea actually have WMDs.
9/11....
what will be Blumpf's "Gulf of Tonkin" false flag to get us into war?
Yes, and they will use them. VX is a terrible weapon and no one wants to see shells full of it land on Seoul.
no he didnt.
The US is always running up to a war. Trump is in serious political danger. It looks like China has decided to step up and manage North Korea, that means you can expect more military intervention in Syria.
Keep in mind, the State does not persuade the public. The State goes to war and bills your grandchildren.
There was a repeated, public push by the president and republicans to justify military intervention in Iraq. They were doing that for months before operations started in 2003. "Saddam Hussein will disarm or we will disarm him" and the like. I suspect you will see a similar pattern for future cases unless some sort of event spurs the US to immediate action.
People were dead serious about Iraq being a threat and it wasn't just the administration.The media itself was backing an invasion just like how they now are looking for any reason to invade Syria. The thought of war had them practically foaming at the mouth. It wasn't just the Colin Powell UN briefing but all these other bullshit stories like the mobile WMD factories that were supposedly being used to evade weapons inspectors. They would show mock illustrations of exactly what they looked like and had leaked conversations from the Iraqi military supposedly talking about hiding weapons. The actual invasion itself was fucking televised with live embedded reporters who had such a huge hardon. There was a supposed red line where after they crossed it Saddam was going to unleash his WMD stockpile, they even had a countdown timer running as they advanced of how long until they crossed the line. The reporters were all ready to orgasm as the destruction was unleashed and then nothing happened leaving them blueballed. It was such a bizarre spectacle to watch, the initial invasion before it turned to shit was treated like a Reality television show.
They looked like they were serious months out.
It was a little different - Now EVERYONE is like;
>OMG PLS AMERICA STOP THE EVIL DICTATOR
Back then America was begging people to allow them to fuck up Iraq. Blair had to put on the charm to get Britain on board.
Basically it was the opposite of now - Everyone was trying to restrain the U.S. because it was obvious they were going to start a war, evidence or not.
Remember the Freedom Fries episode?
Yes it is. They want Russian interests to be on board with the US's. Same with Afghanistan and Iraq. Syria is the only thing stopping that from happening. A central bank in every nation and every nation becomes One. This isn't hard to understand, it was and is their primary goal.
Eh...Unlike Syria though the rest of the world didn't buy it. The U.N. said Dubya was full of shit and to hold off.
People like Blair were celebrated for being able to convince their country to go along with it.
People like Christopher Hitchens also went out and said;
>The WMD's are a bold faced lie
>BUT...Saddam is a piece of shit and must be taken out
Blair didn't convince any one. He fucked up everything, ignored people telling him to stop and then fucked up everything even worse.
I think a lot of that is obfuscation. The EU and UN don't have much influence at all in these kinds of decisions. Russia's military is a generation behind and their major source of funding is struggling. The only real question for Syria is when the war will be most effective as a domestic tool and what kind of concessions China will get for standing by when it happens.
What happened was daddy Bush was embarrassed by the 1st gulf war and Saddam was taunting him.
Bush W and his friends, the Saudis, were still freaked out the oil would get hurt/stolen. Cheney's Haliburton wanted in on the action, so they all went after Iraq
Saudis did okay, Haliburton made billions and daddy Bush's honor restored
Most of you guys don't realize it was John Bolton and Cheney who originally said Saddam had WMD's.
The CIA, under pressure from the Bush Administration at the time, just rolled with it.
He couldn't have fucked it up too badly, he held onto power for, what, four more years after the invasion and Labour held on for another three. Yes, yes, he resigned and everyone displayed an appropriate amount of disappointment.
Still, England went to war and Tony Blair is worth 60m pounds. Sounds to me like everyone who matters got exactly what they wanted.
>Remember the Freedom Fries episode?
kek, yes
>The CIA, under pressure from the Bush Administration at the time, just rolled with it.
Incorrect. The CIA, recognizing an opportunity when presented with one, opted to support a narrative which would significantly increaser their power and funding while at the same time massively destabilize a region they had trouble infiltrating.
You don't seem to understand British politics. Both are parties are exactly the same. We vote for whichever group screwed us over previous's opposite. So you get 10 years of labour, 10 years of conservatives and repeat infinitely
>He fucked everything up
No one (important) called him on it until long after. His speech was getting praise from all corners when it happened.
I got the sense that most people thought Iraq Afghanistan what's the difference
He was the guy who put the final nail in the coffin DESU. He was neo con through and through and now we have a non-white country in the way thanks to him.
My point wasn't that there is a fundamental difference in parties, its that you can't say someone "fucked up" when their actions neither upset the status quo nor had real negative consequences for themselves or their team.
More or less. I could be mistaken, as I was still a young kid back then
the same john bolton who is now #2 foreign secretary under trump and runs the state department
really activates my almonds
That's the thing though. Buffer states are obsolete now and NK is becoming a huge burdon on China both diplomatic wise and economic wise. thousands of Koreans cross illegally into China every year (china's mexico) wich the government is pissed about since china is so overpopulated. They get 0 return on any money they pump into NK and only get threats of violence from their "ally." With China moving 150,000 troops to the NK border and the recent meeting between Xi and Trump, it's only a matter of time before the entirety of the planet gets tired of kims shit and collectively works together and wipes him out.
You do understand there is such a thing as fucking something up and then not being held responsible for it correct?
>Be a baby sitter
>Force a little boy to wear a dress any time I look after him
>He starts to think he's a tranny
>His parents feel so special for having a tranny kid
>Media interviews him and he tells them how great I am
>Everyone around me thinks it's great
>Kid is now fucked in the head and will suicide in 20 years but by then I'll be out of the picture and got mine.
This is the situation we're looking at but in politics. Blair fucked the country, it's never going to recover and cemented that civil war must happen to reclaim it.
the dissenting voices were few and far between, the USA was still very much pissed off and not in the mood to be fucked with by a piss ant dictator we had already kicked the shit out of and wasn't complying. It wasn't debated, it was a matter of he will comply or else and the nation was almost entirely on board. The post war iraq regret was nowhere to be seen before we went in.
Not even true. We had anti war protests all over the place before going in. No one wanted to deal with a shit hole with nothing but sand.
Whenever the last state of the union address before the Iraq invasion happened is when I knew 100% we were going to war
It was different, the writing was very much on the wall back then. The US was ramping up the opposition to Saddam for a long time. It got to ridiculous heights with claims that Saddam could attack a western country with WMDs within a 40 minute timeframe. Iraq was also more diplomatically isolated than Syria, Russia would never come to Saddam's aid like they did Assad's. Both Iran and the Saudis hated him. Also there was the precedent of the first Gulf War and the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.
Trump's strike on Assad was far less expected, and was a huge about-turn compared to the lead up to the Iraq war. The US strategy isn't as obvious now as in 2003 and there are far more obstacles to intervention.
Not ruling out an intervention, but this is a different situation.
I wouldn't say that. It just seemed that way bc of the media
When did Assad use chemical weapons?
It was clear almost a year out that the US wanted an excuse to go to war, and it was clear to most critical thinkers that the evidence being presented by the US/UK was flimsy as fuck. Even most Normie's were against it. If I remember correctly, UK polling showed 60% against the war, and the Stop The War March remains the largest protest march recorded in UK history.
None of that made the slightest difference. The corporate media spilled the government line and censored as much of the descent as they could. They only reported dissent when it was impossible to ignore, e.g. when Robin Cook (RIP) resigned. The very small number of journalists who broke ranks were hauled over the coals. Andrew Gilligan was one of the UK's best known journalists: He's now consigned to the periphery. His employer, the BBC, was then neutered.
Take this as a cautionary tale. Any and all attempts to dissuade the US from getting the war it now wants will be utterly futile. It doesn't matter how much 'truth' you might uncover, because 'truth' is meaningless. It's their narrative that counts, and mainstream history will record their narrative.
Final thought: Don't mistake me for a pacifist. The narrative is designed to conceal a deeper truth; one that has little relationship to the 'truth'. These wars are not fought FOR energy, or FOR land, or FOR $. Those are merely variables in a geostrategic equation. They are 'unit' classes in an RTS. The only true objective is to defeat one's competitors, for that is what they inevitably are. Life really is as predatory as the Theory of Evolution says it is, but the fragile masses must be spared that reality for the good of society.
My contempt for the PTB lies in my conviction that they're playing the game badly. China is the final boss, and to defeat China, one needs Russia on one's side. The West has decided that the best way to get Russia on its side is to subdue it and make it the West's vassal. That strategy is doomed to fail.
>no build up
you sure you weren't a tadpole when GW2 happened? The US and UK placed troops and materiel in neighboring states months ahead of shock and awe. Do you think the entire coalition was air dropped into Iraq on a days notice?
Most historically illiterate shit I've seen on here for a while...
>what was Yugoslavia?
You're retarded
We knew Bush was serious. Even before 9/11, his administration was pushing to attack Iraq. 9/11 forced him to postpone his plans and focus on Afghanistan first, but before very long they were trying to connect it to Iraq by any tenuous thread they could find.
I saw a graphic of some terrorist HQ, depicting an entire mountain hollowed out into a fucking military base
It was like it was straight out of a shitty sci-fi movie
I member.
Feels exactly the same. Retards everywhere claiming strawmen arguments.
>don't agree
>you're unpatriotic
>you're terrorist lover
>you're appologist
>you're hippie
etc...
use of manipulative symbolism is also off the charts.
>fags
>more flags
>politicians in front of flags
>historical flag stories
>heros in front of flags
Generally, people are very easy to manipulate. It's sad.
>no build up
I remember seeing green Humvees, APCs and Tanks getting painted tan and getting loaded on Trains headed to Norfolk back in the summer of 2002.
I think America could have toppled Assad cheaply and easily in 2011. Whether we should have is another argument, but I think it's pretty uncontroversial to say that the Obama/Clinton doctrine in Syria was a worst of both worlds compromise. We should either have let Assad do what he would, or knocked him out, because either would have prevented the "refugee crisis", and retarded the development of ISIS
I used to buy the "moderate rebel" meme but after the Muslim brotherhood raped the pooch in Egypt, and the clusterfuck that is Libya, I don't think those fucking sandmonkeys can handle anything other than brutal dictatorship, the system under which they have lived for millennia