The UN, US and Iraq IV

Saddam could have prevented the war in a multitude of ways.

McGentrix wrote:

Saddam could have prevented the war in a multitude of ways.

Do you honestly believe that since Bush started the drums this was an option? Heck the admin wanted to skip all the pleasantries and go to war a long time ago.

In any case the ability to avoid a happenstance is an argument that needs to be considered with other scenarios.

If the victim doesn't exist the crime can be avoided.

If the woman didn't have such big boobs she wouldn't have been raped...

Saddam's ability to avoid the war (which I do not believe to have existed) is really not a vindication of the decision to invade Iraq.

He still could have surrendered in the eleventh hour or as we commenced, instead he gave battle commands. He knew all of his humanitarian crimes would come home to roost so he chose defiance, or hiding as it would seem. We did not make him choose the routes he has taken, a surrender would have halted our bombs.

Has Saddam upped and left the country accepting exile, still think we would have invaded?

I will use as a reference a US government site so as to avoid the source discrediting.

On March 17, 2003, Colin L. Powell gave a briefing in Washington, D.C. at 10:48 a.m. EST. He spoke of the decision to not seek a UN resolution and in carefully phrased diplo-speak blamed France.

Powell was laying the groundwork for Bush's speech and made it very clear that the demand Bush would make for Saddam to leave the country did not mean that their invasion would be halted. Only that they allege that it would be peaceful.

This allowed Bush to state more emphatically that there'd be "no war" if Saddam left.

Laymen started up with the "It's all in Saddam's hands" line while anyone following it recognized that the planned mission would continue and that the demand issued to Saddam would not change the war plans.

Here is a verbatim quote from Powell's briefing:

"President Bush will address the nation and the world on the situation as we now see it. In his speech, he clearly will issue an ultimatum to Saddam Hussein that the only way to avoid the serious consequences that were built into 1441 is for Saddam Hussein and his immediate cohort to leave the country and to allow this matter to be resolved through the peaceful entry of force and not a conflict."

You can find it here:

http://usinfo.state.gov/regional/nea/iraq/text2003/0317pwl.htm

It's quite clear that there was no offer to halt the march to war. Only to postulation that it would be a "peaceful entry of force" (an oxymoron is there ever was one) if Saddam left.

Frankly I'm tired of the argument that Saddam could have avoided war by leaving once the 48 hour ultimatum was issued. It represents a very selective approach to the information coming right out of the horses' mouths.

Secretary Powell: I think the time for diplomacy has passed. I think that's pretty clear. That's what the leaders were saying in the Azores yesterday. And we used last evening and this morning to consult broadly around the world. We did, the British did, the Spanish did. A lot of people have been talking to each other this morning and overnight, and it became clear that it would be best at this time to withdraw the resolution, and I can think of nothing that Saddam Hussein could do diplomatically. I think that time is now over. He had his chance. He's had many chances over the last 12 years, and he has blown every one of those chances.

Thank you.

More of "What the Papers Say" in a Guardian overview which has Le Figaro (France), Libération (France), Gulf News, The Daily Star (Lebanon), The Indian Express and Daily Nation (Kenya).

The UN could have prevented the war by making demands of Hussein. But the UN (led by that wonderful world leader Chirac) decided that the US was wrong and decided not to support our action. So be it.

Has Saddam upped and left the country accepting exile, still think we would have invaded?

Had Saddam truly given the UN inspecters the help and freedom they requested, still think we would have invaded?

Had Saddam been a sane, rational man who cared for his people and fellow human beings, still think we would have invaded?

I don't.

So, at the very least that strategy was partially working. Considering the inspectors were only granted five months or so by the Americans we'll never know whether it would've done the trick. (In fact, if "the trick" was to rid Iraq of WMD, there might have been nothing to achieve, considering none seem to have been there).

Yes, for its demands to be fulfilled the UN needed the US military threat to brandish. The "trick" only worked as a UN/US co-operation - one providing diplomacy and inspections, the other the military threat to back them up. The US pulled out of this co-operation.