Clinton: Iraq War Is A “Big Mistake”
Ugh…
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – Former President Clinton told Arab students Wednesday the United States made a “big mistake” when it invaded Iraq, stoking the partisan debate back home over the war.
Clinton cited the lack of planning for what would happen after Saddam Hussein was overthrown.
“Saddam is gone. It’s a good thing, but I don’t agree with what was done,” Clinton told students at a forum at the American University of Dubai.
The gall of this man to go abroad, to the very region of the world where we are fighting the enemy, and undermine our foreign policy. He is a former president for crying out loud.
Plus, Clinton certainly didn’t think that removing Saddam from power was such a “big mistake” back in 1998. That year Congress passed the Iraq Liberation Act which authorized the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. President Clinton signed the legislation and made a speech in favor of it while he bombed Iraq four days later. Here’s the video of that speech.
Here’s a transcript:
Earlier today, I ordered America’s armed forces to strike military and security targets in Iraq. They are joined by British forces. Their mission is to attack Iraq’s nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors.
Their purpose is to protect the national interest of the United States, and indeed the interests of people throughout the Middle East and around the world.
Saddam Hussein must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
I want to explain why I have decided, with the unanimous recommendation of my national security team, to use force in Iraq; why we have acted now; and what we aim to accomplish.
Six weeks ago, Saddam Hussein announced that he would no longer cooperate with the United Nations weapons inspectors called UNSCOM. They are highly professional experts from dozens of countries. Their job is to oversee the elimination of Iraq’s capability to retain, create and use weapons of mass destruction, and to verify that Iraq does not attempt to rebuild that capability. The inspectors undertook this mission first 7 1/2 years ago at the end of the Gulf War when Iraq agreed to declare and destroy its arsenal as a condition of the ceasefire.
The international community had good reason to set this requirement. Other countries possess weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles. With Saddam, there is one big difference: He has used them. Not once, but repeatedly. Unleashing chemical weapons against Iranian troops during a decade-long war. Not only against soldiers, but against civilians, firing Scud missiles at the citizens of Israel, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Iran. And not only against a foreign enemy, but even against his own people, gassing Kurdish civilians in Northern Iraq.
The international community had little doubt then, and I have no doubt today, that left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will use these terrible weapons again.
Nuclear arms? Biological weapons? Weapons of mass destruction? This sounds a lot like the case for war in Iraq that President Bush laid out. Democrats are all but calling President Bush’s case for war a lie. Was Clinton’s case for war a lie then as well?
Or are there some double standards in play here?
