Dick Cheney (nailed on house floor) on Baghdad, quote from 1991: MUST SEE THIS!

Appearing on ABC's This Week, Cheney was asked why Operation Desert Storm had not gone "all the way" to remove Saddam Hussein from power. "I think for us to get American military personnel involved in a civil war inside Iraq would literally be a quagmire," Cheney replied. "Once we got to Baghdad, what would we do? Who would we put in power? What kind of government? Would it be a Sunni government, a Shia government, a Kurdish government? Would it be secular, along the lines of the Baath party, would it be fundamentalist Islamic? I do not think the United States wants to have U.S. military forces accept casualties and accept responsibility of trying to govern Iraq. I think it makes no sense at all." Dick Cheney 2001

Charles Gonzales just read that quote on the house floor. It was awesome!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_B._Cheney

linky?

:)

http://gonzalez.house.gov/display2.cfm?id=10136&type=News%20Room

Cheney made that statement in 1991, NOT in 2001. But the hypocrisy still rings true.

I think it makes no sense at all.

I hope some professional "reporters" ask the Vice President this question.

I hope they ask him about:
1) The civil war inside Iraq that would literally be a quagmire;
2) Once we got to Baghdad, what would we do?
3) Who would we put in power?
4) What kind of government?
5) Would it be a Sunni government, a Shia government, a Kurdish government?
6) Would it be secular, along the lines of the Baath party, would it be fundamentalist Islamic?
7) Why now can the United States have its U.S. military forces accept casualties and accept responsibility of trying to govern Iraq?

The media should be all over this like flies on shit on a hot, summer day...

CEO of Halliburton, arranged the modern contractor system, and guaranteed profits for himself and his cronies.

THAT made it worthwhile.

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

Long ago in the olden days before the military/industrial/prison complex bought up all the media, there were reporters who would have asked Cheney these questions. I wonder if these 1991 comments have been posted here at DU before.

:shrug:

:mad:

That's their convenient answer to everything.

Our useless corporate media.

And you are correct to offer a very appropriate counter to that slogan. It's disgusting how the media lets them get off the hook if they just repeat the senseless slogan, "911 changed everything." What's with that? Might as well say, "Git 'er done!"

Well, 911 didn't change everything. Stupid is still stupid.

I noticed you're getting off to a good start here at DU. I like what you've got to say, Mr. Ected.

Lasher

NOT Iraq's.

out of office, and they couldn't risk starting the real war without having plenty of years after of being in power to reap the benefits.

They just don't think past their nose.

They decided that the climate in America was ripe to accept the price of US casualties and being entrenched in quagmire thanks to 9/11. They went in and ousted Saddam knowing full well they were creating an unstable nation that would plummet into a civil war, one in which the US military would be fighting.

What I've never been able to understand is how they thought they could keep the majority of Americans terrorized to a point that wouldn't question them?

had with all the oil bigwigs?

Just sayin'...B-)

This should be all over the news but I doubt it will.

This refutes their claim of ignorance that they didn't fully understand about the religious factions.

Al Franken used to play a tape of Bill Kristol on NPR where he said there was no evidence of Sunni, Shia tensions.

He just didn't tell his money-making monkey about them...

He called this Pop Sociology.

I could not find the quote, as google was overwhelmed with Wolf Blitzer's interview with Cheney from a few weeks back where Blitzer had repeated the "in a box" quote back to Cheney.

I could not find the original quote, however.

I did find this one, however:

September 16, 2001
TIM RUSSERT : Do we have any evidence linking Saddam Hussein or Iraqis to <9/11>? VICE PRESIDENT CHENEY: No....

http://www.motherjones.com/mb/mt-search.cgi?tag=Cheney&blog_id=2

Gotta love it!

He's reflecting on the first Gulf War here:
<snip>
I think that the proposition of going to Baghdad is also fallacious. I think if we were going to remove Saddam Hussein we would have had to go all the way to Baghdad, we would have to commit a lot of force because I do not believe he would wait in the Presidential Palace for us to arrive. I think we'd have had to hunt him down. And once we'd done that and we'd gotten rid of Saddam Hussein and his government, then we'd have had to put another government in its place.

What kind of government? Should it be a Sunni government or Shi'i government or a Kurdish government or Ba'athist regime? Or maybe we want to bring in some of the Islamic fundamentalists? How long would we have had to stay in Baghdad to keep that government in place? What would happen to the government once U.S. forces withdrew? How many casualties should the United States accept in that effort to try to create clarity and stability in a situation that is inherently unstable?

I think it is vitally important for a President to know when to use military force. I think it is also very important for him to know when not to commit U.S. military force. And it's my view that the President got it right both times, that it would have been a mistake for us to get bogged down in the quagmire inside Iraq.
<snip>

go here for complete speech in April of 1991 http://web.archive.org/web/20041130090045/http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/pubs/soref/cheney.htm

snip
Going to Baghdad, Cheney said in 1992, would require a much different approach militarily than fighting in the open desert outside the capital, a type of warfare that U.S. troops were not familiar, or comfortable fighting.

"All of a sudden you've got a battle you're fighting in a major built-up city, a lot of civilians are around, significant limitations on our ability to use our most effective technologies and techniques," Cheney said.

"Once we had rounded him up and gotten rid of his government, then the question is what do you put in its place? You know, you then have accepted the responsibility for governing Iraq."
snip

article here http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/192908_cheney29.html

Therefore, since what Cheney said then has proven to be true and what he says now is clearly a lie, the sane Cheney of then has effectively delcared his present self insane and thereby signed his own committments papers right in the Congressional Record.

What are they waiting for? Take him away.

Just like those levies.

Just like those planes hitting the buildings.

No way he could have predicted.