The Biggest Most Damaging Bush Lie!
It is amazing how quickly people forget what the former president stated leading up to the invasion of Iraq, and throughout it. The worst and most leading lie, in my opinion, was that Al Qaeda was being supported by Saddam Hussein. "Evidence from intelligence sources, secret communications and statements by people now in custody reveal that Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including members of Al Qaida.", State of the Union Address 1/28/2003.
The video can be seen here (click on 2003)
http://www.c-span.org/executive/stateoftheunion.asp
Al Qaeda in Iraq was not formed until late 2004 when mostly Sunnis, who were lead by foreign fighters, came to Iraq to gain combat experience against the American military. To date, not a shred of evidence connecting Hussein to Al Qaeda, or any other known terrorist organizations, have been revealed. I came to realize, while I was serving in Iraq, that Saddam had accomplished something that foreign militaries had failed to do in Iraq for centuries. Our country, and others like it, failed to bring stability to a strongly divided ethnic region. Saddam was able, by force, to make the Christians, Kurds, Sunnis, and the Shiites get along with each other, which we have not been able to do. Hussein and his two sons were horrible cruel people, I will not argue against this. However, the thing that was worst about overthrowing Saddam, and turning him over to the Iraqi government for what they called a "trial", was that we had the best deterrent to Iran in place. Saddam kicked the Iranians asses for years, and he probably disliked the Iranians more than the U.S. I often sat out in the desert on patrol wondering "If we had to invade somebody, why did we not invade Iran?'. I guess there is not any good answer to any of these questions...
This past week I recently had an epiphany. I believe that we tortured all of these Talibanis, and Al Qaeda members in hope of making them confess to being linked and tied to Saddam Hussein. If you look back at when the torture was authorized by the Bush administration, and when they were desperately in need of a justifications for the invasion of Iraq, they directly coincide with each other. Bush, Chenney, I can't wait until you are both dead or you are in prison!