Never thought I would agree 100% with FU Cheney.
This is what he said in 1994 when he was asked why the US did not invade Iraq in 1991.
"Because if we'd gone to Baghdad we would have been all alone. There wouldn't have been anybody else with us. There would have been a U.S. occupation of Iraq. None of the Arab forces that were willing to fight with us in Kuwait were willing to invade Iraq.
"Once you got to Iraq and took it over, took down Saddam Hussein's government, then what are you going to put in its place?
"That's a very volatile part of the world, and if you take down the central government of Iraq, you could very easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off: part of it, the Syrians would like to have to the west, part of it - eastern Iraq - the Iranians would like to claim, they fought over it for eight years.
"In the north you've got the Kurds, and if the Kurds spin loose and join with the Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey.
"It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.
"The other thing was casualties. Everyone was impressed with the fact we were able to do our job with as few casualties as we had. But for the 146 Americans killed in action, and for their families - it wasn't a cheap war.
"And the question for the president, in terms of whether or not we went on to Baghdad, took additional casualties in an effort to get Saddam Hussein, was how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? Our judgment was, not very many, and I think we got it right."
Wow!
1. Cheney said we would be all alone in Iraq. Check!
2. He said once Saddam is removed, there will be instability in Iraq. Check!
3. Cheney said that Kurdish autonomy would cause problems with Turkey. Check!
4. He also said we would find ourselves in a quagmire. Check!
5. He said that removing Saddam was not worth losing hundreds of American soldiers. Check!
As recent events have proved, Cheney was right about everything. Everything! I have seldom seen any set of predictions that came 100% true.
Sigh! If only Bill Clinton had taken the advice of Cheney, he would have NEVER invaded Iraq! ;-) |
