At a recent Santa Barbara retreat set up by David Horowitz, I had the privilege and honor of meeting former Undersecretary Douglas Feith.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Feith
Whether for or against the Iraq War, one cannot overstate Mr. Feith’s relevance to the conflict. Along with Vice President Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, Mr. Feith played an instrumental role in the Iraq War. He is a Neocon, and I thank him for it.
Below are the remarks of Undersecretary Douglas Feith.
“There are two questions I am often asked. First I am asked why President Bush decided to go to war with Iraq. Then I am asked why I decided to write a book about it.”
“Iraq was an inherited problem. There were two choices. We could overthrow the regime, which was considered in 1991. Or, we could contain the danger.”
“Containing the danger was a worthwhile experiment. With the collapse of the U.S.S.R., we thought that the United Nations for once could actually protect people, not ignore them. Saddam Hussein then undid the containment measures, such as the No-Fly Zone, sanctions, and inspections.”
“In 1998, Saddam, Saddam announced his non-compliance. He threw out the inspectors. This was followed by tough talk from Nancy Pelosi, Carl Levin, Al Gore, Jay Rockefeller, and Bill Clinton. In December of 1998, Operation Desert Fox occurred. It was a three day bombing campaign.”
“U.S. forces were shot at daily in the No-Fly Zones. Containment was failing.”
“9/11 did not resolve the debate. At that time the debate was still open. After 9/11, the Iraq policy was reexamined.”
“If you murder enough people, you get rewarded by appearing before the U.N. General Assembly. This is a sympathy play. Having weapons of mass destruction is not good for sympathy.”
“The 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center was the terrorists looking for mass destruction. The building was supposed to fall into the next building, which would have created a row of dominoes knocking down building after building. Luckily, this did not occur.”
“It just so happens that the leading terrorist supproters are also the leading concerns in terms of nuclear proliferation.”
“So what should be the approach? Law enforcement? Retaliation? The purpose is to prevent the next attack.”
“At that point we were looking beyond the group behind 9/11. We were looking at more than Al Queda or the Taliban. This led us to the Axis of Evil.”
“We then debated the risks of removing Saddam vs leaving him in.”
“If we left him in, and we were attacked, critics would ask why President Bush left him in. The left could then say that they were tough, that they wanted to remove him, but that the President was weak. It would be his fault that Saddam attacked. They would be right.”
“President Bush was not determined to go to war upon being elected.”
“Contrary to what many think, Rumsfeld was the voice of caution, not Colin Powell, Richard Armitage, or George Tenet.”
“In my book, unlike others, I only used quotation marks for actual quotes. I hope I started a trend.”
“100% of the proceeds of my book are going to charities of veterans and their families.”
“The War on Terror strategy remains sensible, and the main goal has been successful for six years.”
“Bashing our political rivals does no good for our country. A serious and civil debate works best.”
After the speech, I had a chance to speak to Mr. Feith.
“Mr. Undersecretary, it’s an honor. I just want you to know that I will go to my grave believing that the Iraq War was the right thing to do. I don’t care if the President’s poll number approach zero, I believe it was right.”
Mr. Feith was obviously thankful for that comment, as anybody would be. I did not expect nor desire a lengthy conversation with him at that time. I just wanted to look in his eyes. Seeing a man’s face in certain situations absolutely matters. I asked him one question.
“Mr. Undersecretary, is President Bush the good, decent man I see on my television? You see him in real life. Is he the same man?
Mr. Feith replied very simply.
“I do know him personally. I have seen the personal side of him. Yes, he is a good, kind, decent man. He is the same person.”
As pleased as I was by his response, I was more pleased that he agreed to an interview by email. Yet even with that, I was even more pleased that he did not back down or give an inch to his critics. People should only do that when they are wrong. He is right, and should keep emphatically saying so. His critics will never give in, but this at least keeps his supporters motivated.
I said to several people in the room that night that two men had recently written books about President Bush and the Iraq War. The other man will quickly be relegated to the ash heap of history. Mr. Feith will not have that problem. He was too busy making history.
Saddam is gone, and the world is a far better place for it. It is impossible to be delighted about Saddam’s removal without giving the credit to the men who did it, that being our military. Everybody praises our troops, but those of us who believe in the truth know that praise and gratitude must also be given to those who gave the orders to do it to begin with.
President Bush gave the ultimate order, and his cabinet got the job done.
Thank you again Mr. Undersecretary. It was my honor.
eric
Beautiful Eric !
The ambience and the theme are definitely you.
I think the song is a little dorky, but that’s just me.
I’ve always said that looking back on Saddams history that he killed millions. Now, Some of those lives lost were due to conflicts with us and Iran. The legitimacy of those killings is debatable to some, and not so much for others.
But there is no debating the lack of legitimacy of the thousands maybe close to a million Iraqis he killed out of sheer monstrous convenience and social engineering.
Were we to allow two more decades of the same behavior ?
And was it not progressively escalating to point that in today’s world anything Saddam might of gotten away with could of very well made the holocaust look like a picnic?
This man was beginning to fit the profile of every murderous dictator we have ever seen. And could of quite possibly created a whole new standard of evil had he been allowed to continue.
WMDs are not and I believe were not really the issue at stake when it came to him and the invasion. The dots connected enough to give us reason to go in.
We needed a big fat headline reason to go in , something the whole country could digest.
Unfortunately that headline, which we banked on failed to be true.
That aside, there are ten truths that gave reason to go in for everyone stupid reason the left uses to critique the war
Ahhh… I see you’ve come over to the Dark (background) Side, Master Tygrrrr! AAAAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Like the new site. Very cool.
As for Feith, this is a man who wants to have it both ways. We certainly did not have to invade Iraq. There were plenty of other ways of dealing with them. Lord knows we only tried one endlessly failed strategy (the usual isolation, embargos, etc) that has really never worked anywhere ever in modern times. Heck, Castro is a walking corpse as he’s still the man in Cuba! But to invade Iraq was a huge mistake and Feith now knows it. But then he justifies his prior position with loony revisionism as if Saddam might have attacked America or given arms to anti-American terrorists, which most people around the world knew were canards then, and every sane person knows it now.
Feith may sleep a little easier with his little tell-all, just like all the tell-alls before and after served their writers (what, like 8 of them now?), but it doesn’t repair his legacy. He will forever be remembered, if at all, for serving to the detriment of his country and the world.
JMJ
Almost a million dead Iraqis is a canard ?
Mass graves, gassed Kurds ? 25,000 bucks for homicide bombers to kill americans ? attempting to assasinate a president ? 1600 shots at out planes ? fedding kids to lions ? Ahbu Garaib packed beyond capacity and then all inside killed due to complaints of overcrowding ? Invading Kuwait.
Canard you say ?
Funny, none of that seemed to bother the cons back when Saddam was our “friend.”
I do have and will never believe that the cons invaded Iraq for humanitarian purposes. It makes no sense.
JMJ
I notice you lost the comments form the earlier blogs.
Jersey that is like saying we didnt mention the dangers of the Soviet Union while they were helping us fight the Nazis. They were a necessary evil until they started getting too aggressive as they proved when they invaded Kuwait.
Has anybody noticed that Feith’s book hasn’t gotten near the publicity of Mclellan’s
This is where I make the point that libs are one dimensional thinkers.
The humantarian and resolution violations gave us the justification and license to go in.
The security reasons ( which are many) were the point behind it all.
One BB, two birds.
My biggest question that has never been answerd is :
‘where were all the human rights activists when Saddam was killing innocent people using barbaric methods ?
Where was Clinton ?
Funny, none of that seemed to bother Clinton back when Saddam was shooting at Americans, starving his country and killing anyone who looked wrong.
When he was our friend ?
Lots of people start out as friends Jersey, get over it.
America was watching as two teams played. One team was unfair to the other and created an advantage for themselves.
The cons jumped in to help the disadvantaged and the libs sat there drinking lattes` and acting as arm chair quarterbacks and said “you should of done this, not that, do this, that sucks, oh ! you guys effed it all up. you never should of gone in.
(But we support you)
I have to say, I am not a fan of wordpress. Just the same, I’ve updated my blogroll.
Parrothead, Feith got planty of attention and Iraq was never anything like the USSR.
Micky, Realists, from Left to Right, used to agree that invading Iraq would lead to an unteneble quagmire. Once the GOP took complete control, albeit not for long but far too long enough, “quagmire” became another word for “profit,” and so the Realists on the Right, not all but too many, suddenly thought it a good idea to get entangled in Iraq.
But times change. 9/11 happened and suddenly there was a real need to invade and stabilize Afghanistan, but nooooo, the profiteers decided Iraq was worth more (Ders oil in dem der deserts!). And just today it was reported that the Taliban have taken 18 towns in Kandahar province.
Amazing.
JMJ
Oh, and you do not “support” me anymore than I do you. There hasn’t been a serious threat to this nation since the South decided to kill for their precious, precious right to own slaves. Give it a rest, manly man.
JMJ
Who are these “realists”?
Profit ? Where ?
I see the largest embassey we have ever built being out up right smack in the middle of Bagdahd.
It makes a lot more sense and is back up by practical thought related to honest factual history that after 911 we could not let what looked like a repeat performance happen at the hands of Saddam.
Take your conspiracy thearies and stick right where I think global warming belongs. What you just said is about a looney as anything I’ve ever heard before.
There are way easier ways to make a “profit” than to engage in a war where the only real resource is the countries oil. Which by the way, so far, still belongs to iraqis,.
It also makes a lot more sense than your conveluted conspiracy to realize that we had to establish some stability in the middle east to ensure that the profit margins here at home stayed the same.
As far as the qugmire goes.
You jst contradicted yourself big time.
First you say the beggining of the war was excecuted poorly, and I agree with you and everyone who realizes that.
Now, you say it was all part of the plan ?
And the second contradiction is this.
Still, to this day you and the moonbats on the left keep saying what an idiot Bush is.
But he can orchestrate all this other stuff that no genius withan IQ of 250 could even think of doing.
This whole war was a corporate profit driven endeavor ?
Bush must be REALLY SMART !
Yea, and as far as the prisonors getting loose. there are no 18 towns in Kandahar. And its only reported, not confirmed.
Besides that , do your homework. It was the Canadians that let those guys go.
It was the republicans who rescued those slaves from the left.
I dont what you’ve been smoking but you might wanna do a tox screen on it.
The threat you say never existed killed 3000 people on 911 and many more before that.
Just how big must a threat be before you and the left deem it wiorth approaching ?
Oh , I know, it has to be 20 years in the future in the form of weather and myths.
If Bill Clinton actually approached the threat in Iraq and Afghanistan maybe we wouldnt even be having this conversation.
But no, what do you morons do. Pass a law that revisits the laws the first trade tower bombers were tried under where they were able to determine that we were tapping Al Quedas lines and then we lost them and access to intelligence that could of prevented 911. The recent decision by the SCOTUS is disaterous. In 94 a similar format allowed Al Queda to realize that we were listening in on them.
But like most liberals you guys like to recycle old failures and keep trying to make them work.
So dont talk to me about all the lives lost at the hands of Bush when its fact that more of our men died under Clinton during his term than did Bushs with 2 wars going on and that a lot of the 911 deaths can be attributed directly to Clintons dereliction of duty.
And since yer at with the man thing again, let me ask you why you focus on a mans manlyhood so often ?
And since you’ve said before that you are a feminist, how should I take that ?
Your thinking is flawed. And when you cant make sense out of or explain flawed thinking you make stuff up that cannot, has not, and never will be proven or was ever true. Your history also proves this.
This is why you guys keep loosing elections on an average of 7 out of 10.
ROTFLMAO
Yea !
Lets start war that cost trillions of dollars and thousands of lives just so a handful of guys( excluding the president) can make a few bucks.
Whooooowee.
If anyone truly thinks that they should also be packin their bags for France
Love the new domain! As a fellow blogger, I know that spreading the truth is not as easy as it seems. We often end up either preaching to the choir or alienating the ones we are endeavoring to enlighten. Still…..we plod along in the hope that someone somewhere will realize the truth when he/she sees it. Like you, I believe that Bush is a good and decent man. His one flaw has been not rallying Americans to the cause. In my opinion, this is due to his failure to communicate fully what all Americans should know……that the threat of Islam is perhaps the greatest challenge the United States has ever faced. His silence has allowed the Democrats’ appeasement of the enemy to be widely accepted by Americans, and it has created apathy in a people that should be eternally vigilant.
Please stop by Two Sisters (http://www.2sistersfromtheright.com) and read Rich Carroll’s new article. Like all his writings, this one is vivid and powerful. I hope the facts he presents finally sink into the brains of those who read his work so that they will exercise a little caution before voting mindlessly for the “hope” and “change” guy.
I think what I find most frightening is that most of the young people (the starry-eyed first time voters who are blindly supporting Obama) falling for Obama’s promises of “change” have NO idea what those changes will entail. I only hope they wake up before it’s too late.
Want to get to know President Bush…
“The Right Man” by David Frumm
I’ve read this book and its very revealing as to what goes on
inside the White House…you also learn the meaning of “back-stabbing”.
An excellent book by an excellent author…you’ll also learn a lot more
about the author…
I call it a ‘Must Read’ for those who claim to be ‘In-The-Know’
Testing (I hate registering heh)
Like the new look! Registering is a bit of a pain, but I certainly understand why one must do that (too many moonbats and spammers out there).
Testing, should I join the whaa train about registering and the music? It scared the s*** out of me this morning!
Well, at least I’m awake now…
wow, what a PITA to register and get logged in.
Now on to the topic…
“Conatinment” as a policy (the definition of which became very maleable under Clinton), was never more than a delaying tactic. A way of appearing to be “doing something” with out actually doing anything. That was one characteristic of the Clinton era foreign policy.
The fact is, we were going to end up in Iraq at some point, the question was just under what circumstances. Would it be a genuine civil war, with Uday and Qusay squabbling between themselves and everyone else, an all out war as Iran, turkey, Syria, and Saudi Arabia intervene, or one where we held some degree of control over what would transpire.
The decision was made to enact regime change, a carry over from the Clinton years, and to do so aggressively. We had waited 12 years for some sort of domestic option to emerge in Iraq. It didn’t happen. One thing Saddam was very good at, was identifying talent, and eliminating it before it became a threat to him. So that was no longer a viable option.
We had more than enough justification, and authorization to go in. The attempt on Bush 41 was enough, as that is an act of war (and it wouldn’t have mattered if it was Bush or Carter or Clinton). There was plenty of authoriation from previous UNSC resolutions going back to 1990 (pre-Desert Storm) for our actions. All the wrangling at the UN in 2002-2003 was nonesensical hand wringing, and attempts to pass the buck.
The invasion was the best option of a slew of bad options. Could we have waited? Perhaps another year or two, but no more. The time limit was running out. I shudder to think of what could have happened in Iraq had we just let it go…
You all might be interested in National Review TV’s interviews with Doug Feith this week. So far 3 out of 5 videos have been posted here: http://tv.nationalreview.com/uncommonknowledge
Congrats with new format. Have you updated on our blogroll.
Go Tiger!
Jersey,
You mised my point. I wasn’t comparing the USSR to Iraq merely pointing out that countries might start out as friends but as situations and realities change so do the relationships. In interpersonal relationships usually the folks you hate the most were our closest firends at one point. That is why the betrayal is so much worse. That is why so many people who were once in love can’t stand each other after divorce or break up.
Micky I have to respectfully disagree on one point. The war agianst Iraq was planned and executed flawlessly in record time with reocrd low casualties. The aftermath and rebuilding of Iraq and the war against many foreing invaders and some local insurgents is what was ill planned and executed. The democrats admitted that before they decided to blur the lines between the two. Remember the talking points of the 2004 election “George Bush won the War but failed to win the peace.” I think we cannot fail to remind people that there were two distinct missions. The first which was amazingly successful was the defeat of Iraq and regime change. The second which was not executed well in the beignning (and not a mission our military has ever been designed or trained for) was to stabilize and democratize Iraq i nthe aftermath of the war.
Parrot, you’re right.
I should been a little more descript in my definition of the beggining.
This is why I get so pi$$ed when the left mocks and misconstrues the “mission accomplished” banner. They know what the mission was that Bush was referring too. They’re just being childish by thinking they caught Bush in a huge lie. ( Yes right, 3 weeks and were done and outta here folks) Anyone that thinks that is possible has been watching way too much Rambo.
The initial invasion did go down pretty well and dont see how anyone could argue otherwise.
In relation to the last 6 years “the beggining” could invole a rather larger timespan.
I was refering more to the unpreparedness for the insurgency, the dismantling of Iraqi forces too soon and the almost immediate invasion by neighbors with a host of intentions.
Micky,
I fiugred that as we have touched this topic before. I just think we really need to remind folks that they were two distinct missions and the inital one was completed to near perfection. The democrats and the media like to blend them together and we need to counter that at every mention.
Great commentary as usual – and from the responses… Loving life in Iraq – we are, indeed, winning hearts and minds. There will be setbacks, but these people are coming together… my team is moving from our initial location because the units are self sufficient… as it was planned.
Like the new look. I didn’t even have to look in acronym finder to figure out what PITA meant as I, too, had fun registering… especially with SW Asia bandwidth…
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