Kerry's Vote for the WAR
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| Mon, 09-06-2004 - 3:41am |
This from the book Plan of Attack, by Bob Woodward regarding Kerry's (and Kennedy's) stance on the vote to give Bush authority to go to war:
That afternoon, after two days of debate, the House passed a resolution authorizing the president to use the U.S. armed forces in Iraq "as he deems to be necessary and appropriate." The vote was a comfortable 296-133 - 46 more than the president's father had in 1991.
In the Senate, Edward M. Kennedy the Massachusetts Democrat made an impassioned plea to reject the resolution.
"The administration has not made a convincing case that we face such an imminent threat to our national security that a unilatera, preeimptive American strike and an immediate war are necessary. Nor has the adminitration laid out the cost in blood and treasure for this operaton," Kennedy said. He later added that Bush's preemptive doctrine announded to "a call for 21st Centry American imperialism that no other nation can or should accept."
Senator John F. Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat who would soon be running for president, said in a speech on the Senate floor he would vote for the resolution to use force in disarming Saddam because "a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a threat, and a grave threat to our security." In announcing his support, Kerry stated that he expected the President "to fullfill the commitments he has made to the American people in recent days--to work with the United Nations Security Council to adopt a new resolution.....and to act with allies at our side if we have to disarm Saddam Hussein by force."
But no Democrat or other critic had been able to gain much traction in the face of the president's repeated declarations about the threat posed by Saddam and the CIA's estimates that Saddam posessed WMD and might be on the verge of becoming a nuclear power.
In light of what we know now it is understandable why Kerry voted to give the authority with the caveats he did. Bush had no intention of working with the UNSC to adopt a resolution. Bush was not against it so much as Cheney was. He said it would take too long and wanted to do it right away and do it without UN approval.

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If you say so...
Oh well, at least you now know for sure you had no factual links to share.
(FYI: Joe Wilson is a liberal hack who worked for Al Gore and Tom Foley and was a member of the Clinton administration.)
The Butler report discredited him further:
From the report:
6.4 URANIUM FROM AFRICA
490. There has been significant controversy surrounding the reliability of Government
statements about Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa. We have therefore studied
this issue in detail.
491. Natural Uranium is a necessary starting point for all nuclear developments (whether for weapons or civil power) In the late 1970's, Iraq obtained large quantities of uranium ore from Niger, Portugal, and Brazil. By the mid 1980's, however, Iraq had become self sufficient in uranium ore, which was a by-product of indigenous phosphate mines at Akashat and purifying plants at Al Qaim and Al Jazira which extracted and purified the the uranium ore for subsequent use in nuclear enrichment processes.
492. In the course of the first Gulf war, the facilities involved in this indigenous route were severly damaged. Subsequently, The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) supervised the dismantlement of all the facilities that Iraq had built to process, enrich and fabricate uranium, and removed all potentially fissile material. Some unprocessed uranium ore was left in the country, but under IAEA safeguards and subject to regular inspections. Iraq would therefore have to seek imports of uranium or uranium ore if it wished to restart its nuclear programme covertly.
493. In early 1999, Iraqi officials visited a number of African countries, including Niger. The visit2 was detected by intelligence, and some details were subsequently confirmed by Iraq. The purpose of the visit was not immediately known. But uranium ore accounts for almost three-quarters of Niger’s exports. Putting this together with past Iraqi purchases of uranium ore from Niger, the limitations faced by the Iraq regime on access to indigenous uranium ore and other evidence of Iraq seeking to restart its nuclear programme, the JIC judged that Iraqi purchase of uranium ore could have been the subject of discussions and noted in an assessment in December 2000 that:
. . . unconfirmed intelligence indicates Iraqi interest in acquiring uranium.
494. There was further and separate intelligence that in 1999 the Iraqi regime had also made inquiries about the purchase of uranium ore in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In this case, there was some evidence that by 2002 an agreement for a sale had been reached.
495. During 2002, the UK received further intelligence from additional sources which identified the purpose of the visit to Niger as having been to negotiate the purchase of uranium ore, though there was disagreement as to whether a sale had been agreed and uranium shipped.
496. This evidence underlay the statement in the Executive Summary of the Government’s dossier of September 2002 that:
As a result of the intelligence we judge that Iraq has:
- tried covertly to acquire technology and materials which could be used in the production of nuclear weapons;
- sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa, despite having no active civil nuclear power programme that could require it . . .
and in Chapter 3 of Part 1 of the Government’s dossier that:
The main conclusions are that:
- Saddam continues to attach great importance to the possession of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles which he regards as being the basis for Iraq’s regional power. He is determined to retain these capabilities;
- Iraq continues to work on developing nuclear weapons,in breach of its obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty and in breach of UNSCR 687. Uranium has been sought from Africa that has no civil nuclear application in Iraq.
and:
Iraq’s known holdings of processed uranium are under IAEA supervision. But there is intelligence that Iraq has sought the supply of significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Iraq has no active civil nuclear power programme or nuclear power plants and therefore has no legitimate reason to acquire uranium
497. In preparing the dossier, the UK consulted the US. The CIA advised caution about any
suggestion that Iraq had succeeded in acquiring uranium from Africa, but agreed that
there was evidence that it had been sought.
498. The range of evidence described above underlay the relevant passage in the Prime
Minister’s statement in the House of Commons on 24 September 2002 that:
In addition,we know that Saddam has been trying to buy significant quantities of
uranium from Africa,although we do not know whether he has been successful.
499. We conclude that, on the basis of the intelligence assessments at the time, covering both Niger and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy
uranium from Africa in the Government’s dossier, and by the Prime Minister in the House
of Commons, were well-founded.
By extension, we conclude also that the statement in
President Bush’s State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that:
The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought
significant quantities of uranium from Africa,
was well-founded.
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