Juan Cole: Did Jeb Bush Just Commit a War Crime in Justifying the Iraq War?

[eridani]

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/05/13/did-jeb-bush-just-commit-war-crime-justifying-iraq-war

It is true that he doesn’t seem to have been very clear-headed in his answer. He blamed “the intelligence” for what he said was a consensus of himself and Hilary Clinton. But the question was not, would you have trusted intelligence agencies all over again, but rather would you still do it knowing what we know now. He said he would, even now.

We know now (actually we knew then) that there was no connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda or the attacks of September 11, 2001, and that Iraq had no nuclear weapons program.

But even before 9/11, in 1998, Jeb Bush signed the letter of the so-called “Project for a new American Century” trying to pressure Bill Clinton into an attack on Iraq. The signatories mostly came to power under W. and more or less made a coup.

The problem with his blaming “the intelligence” is that his brother, George W., actively disregarded or even dictated the intelligence. That is why he sourced the phony allegation that Saddam Hussain’s Iraq received uranium from the central African country of Niger to “British intelligence” in his 2002 State of the Union address. The CIA saw the same document and thought it was a forgery, and wouldn’t sign off on including it in a State of the Union speech. Moreover, the “intelligence” was being fixed around the policy, as the British head of MI-6, Sir Richard Dearlove, was disturbed to discover on a visit to Washington in summer of 2002.

As Lord Goldsmith tried to tell then British Prime Minister Tony Blair (who hid Goldstone’s cautions from his own cabinet), there are only three justifications for war in post-1945 international law. The first is self-defense, but Saddam Hussein had not attacked the United States. In fact, in the 1980s Saddam launched an illegal war of aggression on Iran, using chemical weapons, and the Reagan administration actively helped him pursue that war, as well as running interference for his chemical weapons use at the UN Security Council. So not only had Saddam not attacked the US but he had been a de facto US ally.

[brooklynite]

1. Hyperbolic and over the top...

Whatever you think about Jeb's idiot comment, he's not a Government official, and when he was he had no involvement in the Iraq War, so the answer is obviously no.

Come to think of it, this is what I expect from Common Dreams...

[yeoman6987]

3. War crimes for opinions.

Well I thought I saw it all.

[BeyondGeography]

2. Hey

Can I get a job writing the most OTT shit imaginable too?