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On one hand Rumsfeld et. al. implied / declared WMD were OK for Hussein to use on the Kurds, but later on removed him for allegedly hiding WMD. Since DC made t
by kareemm 13y ago
On one hand Rumsfeld et. al. implied / declared WMD were OK for Hussein to use on the Kurds, but later on removed him for allegedly hiding WMD.
Since DC made the argument that Hussein should have been removed because of his WMD use, you could make the same argument about the folks in the US govt who sponsored Hussein's original use of WMD against the Kurds.
- dctoedt 13y ago> Since DC made the argument that Hussein should have been removed because of his WMD use .... I'm not making that argument. I cite his WMD use as a factor that went into the thinking of the political leaders back then.
- glesica 13y ago> ...went into the thinking of the political leaders back then. But if the things you cite don't make logical sense, then those things must not have been actual considerations, or those considerations were made in bad faith.
- dctoedt 13y ago> But if the things you cite don't make logical sense, then those things must not have been actual considerations, or those considerations were made in bad faith. First, what some people regard as logical in 2014 didn't necessarily appear to be logical to the relevant decisionmakers in early 2003. Again, hindsight is 20-20. Second, watch out for the fallacy that there's only one acceptable ranking of values, and that anyone with a different ranking must be either stupid or evil. I take no position here on the merits of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, only that the level of self-righteous certitude among the people calling for C. Rice's head is faintly nauseating --- if unsurprising; I'm old enough to remember the similar certitude of some of the people who rioted against the Vietnam war. (My dad used to describe people like that in (quasi) anapaestic tetrameter: "Often mistaken but never in doubt.")