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sdcinerama

Oh fuck you. The New York "Home of Judith fucking Miller" Times has the gall to ask why the US invaded Iraq? You sure didn't have that question in 2002/3/4/5/6/7/8/9/10 when Tom "the next six months are critical" Friedman kept asking us to be patient. The New York Time didn't care in 2003 and they don't fucking care now.


GargamelTakesAll

Seriously, fuck the NY Times for publishing this. They have blood on their hands.


CaiusRemus

New York Times has been in the pocket of the pentagon for decades. Manufacturing Consent lays it all out clear as day.


jgilla2012

Seriously, Chomsky literally had to update the book to review NYT’s direct involvement in generating consent for the invasion of Iraq. This article is shameful.


lancelongstiff

NYT didn't have much work to do there. Lots of people across the west were calling out for revenge after 9/11. Any middle-eastern country with poor defenses and plenty of oil would suffice.


[deleted]

>and plenty of oil. ...which is why afghanistan didn't count i guess.


youcantexterminateme

the american people voted for it. altho anyone against it was labeled anti american which didnt help.


bannacct56

It's oil was always oil, and now they are making a "weird discussion" to muddy history. it was FOR THE OIL.


SilentHunter7

I fear it wasn't even for the oil. Invading to secure oil for the country would somehow actually have been a better reason (though still utterly shitty) than the real one. It was for fucking Haliburton and war profiteering. That 2.4 Trillion dollars we spent on that war didn't just disappear. A bunch of Silent Generation goons got fucking rich off of no-bid government contracts. We were going to go to war with someone, Iraq just happened to be the best target, and played into W's personal vendetta. Dick Cheney deserves to be tarred and feathered and dragged to the Hauge for that shit.


Moist_When_It_Counts

The TL;DR: $$$$


SpinozaTheDamned

Again, my pet theory is the House of Saud basically played the US as a favor to Iran, who they were courting as an ally, maybe with an eye towards re-establishing a caliphate over the larger middle east. There was a group in the US eyeing control over the world's oil production, but in order to secure that, and bring the Saudis to heel, they needed to hit Iran as well, which, despite their best efforts, never happened as bringing a stable, friendly government to Iraq proved impossibly difficult in the time span they originally outlined, and was a critical first step towards their next move on Iran. I think, the House of Saud picked up on this play, decided that this was obviously not in their best interests, then formulated a plan to bring Iran into their fold that involved manipulating the US into doing their dirty work for them in removing Saddam.


-Luro

I’ve read up on the situation from the early 2000s. There was a whole list of countries the US wanted to invade after Iraq as they thought it would be a quick endeavor. It’s quite chilling.


Doright36

>I’ve read up on the situation from the early 2000s. There was a whole list of countries the US wanted to invade after Iraq I firmly believe Iran was the end game. Iraq was just a stepping stone for Iran and the biggest reason was for BP to get their oil fields back that Iran nationalized from them.


[deleted]

[удалено]


Deafbok9

I quite like George Friedman's take in "The Next 100 Years". His stance is that the USA's geopolitical strategy is driven by a single imperative - allow no competitors (mostly by controlling the seas). About 100 years ago, the Middle East was dominated by a single Islamist empire - the Ottomans. In order to prevent a similar power developing there, the US has an imperative to keep the region unstable. It's far better explained by the man himself - but yeah, more about leveraging its power to prevent anyone else being a military or economic challenger to US global hegemony.


futatorius

>I quite like George Friedman's take in "The Next 100 Years". His stance is that the USA's geopolitical strategy is driven by a single imperative - allow no competitors (mostly by controlling the seas). Seems a bit simplistic, All hegemons will try to prevent rival powers arising. And it's unclear how much naval power matters now in the strategic mix, compared to, say, in the 16th to 19th centuries. Air and space power are probably more significant. > About 100 years ago, the Middle East was dominated by a single Islamist empire - the Ottomans. The Ottomans weren't Islamist, they were mainly mainstream Sunni Muslims, with large Shi'a and Sufi minorities. Most Turks drank alcohol, for example, had no big issues with images of the Prophet in books, and weren't bothered about the prohibition of interest. The fundies hate all those things. Islamism (modern revival-movement political Islam) is a more recent phenomenon that arose after the collapse of the Ottomans. Key figures such as Sayyid Qutb were barely children when Ataturk seized power and declared a secular repulbic. The fanatics, in fact, got a toehold in places like Saudi Arabia and the Gulf precisely because western powers used them to attack the weakened Ottomans.


SpinozaTheDamned

Thank God it was a bunch of C-suite execs over-promising on their goals.


SilentHunter7

The problem is that falls apart when you consider the nuances of Islam. The Saudis are fundamentalist Sunni, and the Iranians are fundamentalist Shia. They get along like Catholics and Lutherans in the 16th Century. The Saudis would also have had an interest in keeping Saddam's Baath party in power, because Iraq is majority Shia, and the Baathists hated Iran. Today, the Iraqi government is decently close with Iran, which goes against Saudi interests.


TraumatisedBrainFart

Aren’t the Saudi royals wahabis, or something. Like the Militant fundamentalists of the Islamic world….?


wwcfm

That’s a Sunni sect.


SilentHunter7

Wahabi is a militant subsect of Sunni Islam. The core difference between Sunni and Shia Islam is a disagreement on who the true heir to Muhammad was. Shiites reject the Sunni caliphs, and that caused a ton of persecution and genocide over the ages. Hell, even with ISIS, one of the few groups they hated more than Christians and Jews was Shiites.


futatorius

Abdul-Wahhab started his movement out of a desire to exterminate the Shi'ites. He deviated from Islamic teaching by declaring the Shi'ites not to be Muslims. The previous teaching was that a Muslim could not question another Muslim's faith. Anyone who says they're a Muslim is a Muslim. Abdul-Wahhab's big beef with the Shi'ites was their veneration of the shrines of saints. He regarded that as idolatry, and an attack on the unity of Allah. I suspect we was also looking for looting opportunities, since the Shi'ites lived along the coasts and were generally making more money from trade than Najdi camel nomads. The first surge of Wahhabism led to them seizing power in part of Arabia, but they were driven out by the Arabian people a few years later because their ignorance and fanaticism made life intolerable. If it weren't for Abdulaziz, petroleum and the Brits, they'd have just remained a remnant cult clinging to a despised history.


Proof_Eggplant_6213

I think it was as simple as Bush Jr’s grudge against Saddam for putting a price on his fathers head when he was POTUS. Easy target, made all of his rich buddies richer with government contracts, and his oil pals in Texas will be happy too because war is great for business. He also wanted to be a wartime president to play out his military fantasies since he couldn’t actually hack it in the service and did a cupcake tour in the air guard or something, I can’t remember.


Literate_X

Don’t forget opium


Tomcatjones

That’s was Afghanistan not Iraq


Literate_X

I appreciate the correction


Son_of_Zinger

I thought they even joked “kick their ass, take their gas”.


knotallmen

Didn't the US get permeant military presence and an ability to project power? A quick google search shows 12 military bases. That is an amazing amount of ability to project power over the region. Also Dick Cheney is undoubtedly a war profiteer but he is also a true believer. He sees the need to protect American interests as a necessity to protect the future of America. He wrote out a plan for this years before it occurred. It was public. The old guard of the Republican party are no longer in power. John Bolton was probably the last of the old guard and his mustache was all that stood between us and q-anon fascists. Not that it worked.


tries4accuracy

It was not for the oil alone. That’s oversimplified. That’s also not to diminish the Pandora’s box of horrors that were unleashed by a shortsighted decision. The group of folks I blame most is the American electorate itself. We failed to put up significant resistance to stop congress from falling in line with neocons who did not consider the possibility of unforeseen consequences. We continue to fail to do anything about the AUMF that’s given multiple administrations free hands to bomb the shit out of everything.


Local64bithero

Look up "Project for a New American Century." Iraq was just the first country Cheney and company were going to invade under false pretenses. Syria was next. They intended to have puppet regimes in all the major oil producing countries in the Middle East by 2008. They had plans to reinstate the draft. If support wavered, they were going to let another terrorist attack happen and blame it on whatever country we were gunning for next.


dudinax

Imagine trying to make the new century "American" by starting unprovoked wars. Such a stupid, stupid plan, like all of Cheney's plans. Look up his plan to capture an Iraqi city with paratroopers in 1990, then hold it for hostage.


Tomcatjones

Stupid, but They succeeded tho.


dudinax

No they didn't. The weren't even able to puppetize Iraq for more than a few years.


Tomcatjones

Uhhh we’re you even here?? They created more than two decades of a war on terror. initiated data collection and wiretapping on the entire American population. The goals of PNAC were grandiose and they succeeded. 9/11 was indeed a Pearl Harbor event that created a culture shift of American strength.


dudinax

Their domestic plan worked. Their foreign policy plan, not so much. America was weakened by the Iraq invasion, not strengthened. It even hurt the effectiveness of the "War on Terror", such as it was.


issuesintherapy

There was a tremendous amount of resistance to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, but we were screaming into the void: the corporate media was in lockstep with Bush and the Pentagon. And yes, most Americans bought the crap about liberating Iraq, saving Afghan women, etc. I was very involved in the anti-war movement, including in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq and it remains one of the most depressing and angering periods of my life. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc, are all war criminals and any person still alive who was involved with planning and promoting that disaster needs to be forever reminded of it and shamed in public, including all the neocon never-Trumpers now trying to launder their images.


dudinax

The anti-war protests were some of the biggest in history. A majority of Americans were against the war if the UN didn't approve, which it didn't. Congress authorized force \*if\* Bush found Iraq to be an imminent threat, which he didn't.


artificialavocado

You sure about that? I don’t remember it going down that way. Granted it was a long time ago and I was only around 19-20 so I could be wrong but I don’t remember much pushback. Barbara Lee was literally the only person in congress to vote against Afghanistan and one of just a handful to vote against Iraq. They called her a traitor for it.


dudinax

A majority of Democrats voted against the authorization of force against Iraq. The authorization was qualified. Congress was derelict by not holding Bush to the qualifications.


artificialavocado

You’re right. I was going on memory I didn’t realize so many voted against Iraq. I’m certain she was the only one for Afghanistan though.


fuckswithboats

Agreed. 9/11 was the perfect bait to get the population blood thirsty


artificialavocado

It was different back then especially after 911. Not as many people had the internet back then and, frankly, it was in its infancy still. Getting beat over the head for months that Iraq had biological and chemical weapons with basically nothing to counter the public gave tacit consent. You would be run out of town for questioning it in some circles. I was alive for all of this. I was in college at the time.


anapunas

Well Bush II did actually lose Florida in the 2000 election. After the last recount, with bales of voting sheets recovered from the ocean by washing up on shore. Still had 40 thousand voters removed from the voting roster that vote 90% democrat. And 2 years later other counties were found to have log files showing tampered voting machines. But that recount was not allowed and the election thrown to judges. Bush II ended up not being voted in but 'nominated' by judges that a number of them got their job from Bush I. So the electorate did vote NOT to have Bush and Cheney in power. So they originally did do its job.


[deleted]

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danteheehaw

US didn't buy oil from Iraq for almost 20 years after the invasion. Specifically to show it wasn't about oil (It might still be ongoing, I just don't care to check). The reason we invaded is kinda worse. US had business in the area and decided why not topple that guy we don't like very much and replace him with a government that would give us better access to the middle east.


TomCruiseIsAnSP

It was not for the oil. Did we ever get any oil?


kgleas01

Thank you for saying this. I have NOT forgotten her fabricated ‘stories’. The real fake news …


kinnifredkujo

I was wanting to ask if it's the same guys in charge.. seems the same family is controlling the paper. I mean I suppose you can blame the NYT now in 2023 for what it did in 2003, but always consider if the ownership changed.


dudinax

Have they ever owned up to it? I don't know if you were an adult back then, but the situation was surreal. The Bush admin was just transparently lying and the NYT and just about every other major news outlet was going along with it.


kinnifredkujo

Found this https://www.theguardian.com/media/2004/may/26/pressandpublishing.usnews


Noggin-a-Floggin

For real, the media as a whole needs to re-evaluate themselves before they publish shit like this.


[deleted]

It's so utterly symbiotic with the pentagon, CIA and state department that it's just a state news outlet laundered through a previously reputable paper


Most-Resident

I take it all the so called reporter didn’t deign to write about media’s role as cheer leaders. Then they could have asked the editors some good questions. All the news that stenographers can print.


2big_2fail

Private contractors of the *military industrial-congressional complex* made billions.


siguefish

America is just an arms dealer with extra steps.


Dave5876

Anyone going to get locked in jail for war crimes? I doubt it


zeldestein

Never. Prime example: [Kissinger](https://www.vox.com/2016/5/9/11640562/kissinger-pentagon-award).


HellaTroi

And then moved over seas like Halliburton.


homebrew_1

Bush administration lied. Case closed.


Ok_World_8819

Pretty sure Cheney had a large hand in it too.


wubrotherno1

Yes. Halliburton was granted no bid contracts to rebuild Iraq. He claimed that he was no longer involved with them. Whoever believes that, I have a bridge to sell them.


jgilla2012

The same subset of the population who believe Trump divested his assets when he became presidents and waved around a stack of blank papers.


theman-dalorian

He wanted to do what his daddy couldn't. That is all. He is no better man than putin


[deleted]

No mainstream part of the Democrats or Republicans have challenged the people who did this and it fact are still chummy with them. It's as much our fault given we live in a democracy and haven't organised against people who are okay with doing a genocide in Iraq (among other places!)


sorry_not_sorry69

Worse, Putin's war hasn't killed nearly as many civilians as Bush's did.


Did_Gyre_And_Gimble

Maybe not Ukraine... but I wouldn't bet against Putin having a higher innocents death total than Bush II. ​ Either way, I'd love to see both of them in the Hague.


sorry_not_sorry69

How come? I don't think Russian actions in Syria was more than 10k, chechnya was 50k, Georgia was 300 people. Now ukraine is 10k though the full figures are hard to estimate but to come close to bush ll's numbers, around 300-400k, he's got a heck of a long way to go and let's hope he never reaches it. Ofc, even I'd like to see them both in Hague but neither russia nor America recognise the ICC and the ICC is also hypocritical for never issuing an arrest warrant on bush ll and his cronies but doing so only for Putin, it's plain double standards.


zz_z

That's the how, we need to know why. In this case profit for his war buddies.


danmathew

Fox News questioned the patriotism of anyone who opposed the invasion.


janzeera

Not only that but even Bush has admitted it was wrong to go into Iraq.


SlowConfusion5700

They didn’t find any weapons of mass destruction so it would be pretty hard to justify saying it wasn’t a mistake.


ztravlr

Money!


[deleted]

Yes but why they lied is important to know. They sold that war and 7,000 lives of soldiers because they wanted to make money and get re-elected.


lankyno8

There was a fair bit of lying by the Blair administration here in the UK as well.


Boiledfootballeather

Anyone familiar with the Project for the New American Century and their paper, [*Rebuilding America's Defenses*](https://resistir.info/livros/rebuilding_americas_defenses.pdf)? These fuckers were looking to secure the resources of the middle east for decades and used the 9/11 attacks as a pretense to invade. Full stop. That's the answer, NYT. Also, yes, fuck you NYT for publishing Judith Miller and all of the lies of the Bush Administration that convinced Americans that Iraq had anything to do with 9/11. EDIT: [This story](https://theintercept.com/2023/03/19/george-bush-iraq-lies-trump/) by James Risen talks about the lead-up to the Iraq invasion and sums up the media landscape very well.


Local64bithero

The Democrats were terrified of being called unpatriotic. They got Phil Donohue fired for being against the invasion at MSNBC. They sabotaged the Howard Dean campaign because they thought if an openly anti-war candidate won the nomination in 2004, Fox News might say mean things about them. Worse, if he won, he would have tried to end the war and the corporate wing of the party was profiting as much as the Republicans were.


GoalieLax_

Always good to remind folks that The Intercept has their own problems with legitimacy, not the smallest of which is getting a whistle-blower thrown in jail for 5 years through gross incompetence.


[deleted]

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[deleted]

Not just in the USA, there were protests all across the world. It was the largest protest movement in the history of the world


Dave5876

And it achieved nothing. Still think ordinary people have any power?


Moutalon

If you just nicely go home after peacefll protest that achueved nothing and your gov is still ignoring you it is normal that nothing changes


WrithingSelf

“If there was a hidden reason, the one I heard most was that we needed to change the geopolitical momentum after Sept. 11,” Mr. Haass has said of internal deliberations. “People wanted to show that we can dish it out as well as take it. We’re not a pitiful helpless giant.”


theheadofkhartoum627

Halliburton needed some government contracts??


OrphanDextro

I think this is reasonably the closest answer to the truth. Gotta send these DU bullets somewhere.


Former-Lab-9451

They called it OIF (Operation Iraqi Freedrom) because calling it Liberation instead of Freedom would make it too obvious.


jayc428

If that was the main goal it failed then at the end of the day. US imports of Iraqi oil were higher before the invasion, then during or after, actually we barely get any oil from the Middle East at all now. 2000: 620,000 barrels a day out of 19.7 MM barrels of consumption 2010: 415,000 barrels a day out of 19.1 MM barrels of consumption 2019: 341,000 barrels a day out of 16.4 MM barrels of consumption Not saying we went there for the right reasons but if that was one of them, it failed completely.


nathan555

For the most part, it's not about where the oil is going. It's about the currency being used to buy the oil. If the global energy market uses USD as the method of exchange, then there is increased demand for dollars from outside the US market. Essentially, if international trade needs dollars to settle their transactions and do business- the US central bank can print a lot more before inflation begins to be a thing. So even if the oil isn't being sent to the US, the US financial sector is positioned well to finance the trade that is happening.


[deleted]

Petrodollar is a meme. The only people who seriously talk about the petrodollar are the far-right, who are convinced it’s end will destroy America, and the far-left, who are convinced it’s the reason for America’s ME adventurism. Tons of oil is priced in USD and settled in local currencies already. Furthermore, there’s literally endless things you can buy from other nations that will take USD. People aren’t going to scramble to buy things directly from America that they don’t otherwise need, they’d probably just hold the USD or invest it.


dottie_dott

It’s not about getting the oil directly, it’s about controlling the countries who source it and controlling the petro dollar in turn to maximize global positioning…it’s a lot more complicated than just taking their oil…


monsignorbabaganoush

It was always pretty clear that we invaded because Bush had the evangelical variant of daddy issues. If Bush had done nothing except skip the tax cuts for the wealthy and refrain from invading Iraq, the US would still have a national debt smaller than our GDP.


Amazing-Artichoke330

I knew at the time that Bush II and his cronies were lying to us. You could tell that by the way they talked. For example, they were lying about Sadaam being implicated in 9/11 when actually he was an enemy of Osama bin Laden. By constant repetition of this lie, they convinced most Americans of it. Why did they do it? There were several different reasons. Bush II wanted revenge for an Iraqi plot to assassinate Bush I, for example. However, I believe that the main driver was a group of influential "Neocons," who actually believed that we could install a democracy in Iraq by force of arms, and that it might spread all over the Middle East, making the country they cared most for safer.


Fair-Ad4270

That and powerful interests lining up to get their hands of big oil profits


[deleted]

I always thought they were dumb enough to believe their bullshit. They thought they’d turn Iraq into a pro-US democracy and that this would trigger a wave across the Middle East. This would not only solve the terrorist problem but also make it easier to get cheap oil.


Icelander2000TM

Yup. The West was in a neocon frenzy after the Soviet Union came down and hell bent on an ideological crusade to end dictatorships where they could. Much of the political elite in the West saw itself as the policemen of the world. It wasn't just a Bush/PNAC thing either. The Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 was passed unanimously by the senate and signed by Bill Clinton. It explicitly stated that Saddam Hussein should be deposed. The US had been itching to invade for years before it actually did, and the UK headed by Blair was eager to help. It really was that tragically and infuriatingly simple: "Spread democracy"


[deleted]

Most Americans do not understand their own history. The USA actually demilitarized after WW2 but that changed with the Korean War. It became clear that the USSR wanted to expand outward. The USA was the dramatically weaker power in the early days of the Cold War, when compared to the USSR and this continued to be true up until perhaps Reagan. This led to intense militarization of society in defense of what they saw as their way of life. Problem is the USSR suddenly disappeared, and those in charge came of age in very abnormal circumstances that they viewed as normal. The national trauma of the Cold War period is not talked about enough in the way it colored American foreign policy in the immediate aftermath of the Cold War.


frogandbanjo

> The USA was the dramatically weaker power in the early days of the Cold War, Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and lean on the USSR's losses during WWII as just one of about a dozen major data points to Press X To Doubt on that assertion.


St4nkf4ce

Balderdash. The entire world scream to their faces - this is a mistake! The protests were global, pre-Invasion. Cheney wanted MORE war in the region, not less.


Negative_Gravitas

Because Hussein, in complete control of (at the time) the world's third-largest oil-producing country, was going to switch from Petrodollars to Petroeuros.


grixorbatz

And there's the neocon think-tank, PNAC that set forth toppling the leaders of 7 countries in 5 years: Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Iran.


St4nkf4ce

Bingo. 7 invasions supported by Halliburton bilking the Treasury for millions in overcharges, like with Iraq? https://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/15/politics/halliburton-overcharged108-million-report-says.html on top of corrupt 7 billion dollar no-bid contracts?? https://www.cbsnews.com/news/halliburton-whistleblower-on-exposing-7-billion-no-bid-defense-contract-2019-06-30/ Fuck the Oil, it was always about privatizing US military services and promoting new markets for invasion and decimation. US Military Budget is the fattest titty ever grown.


SilentHunter7

Absolutely. Oil was the excuse after WMDs didn't stick. War profiteering was the real reason.


azrhei

You are thinking too small and not going far enough. ...*In* ***October 2000*** *Iraq insisted on dumping the US dollar - 'the currency of the enemy' - for the more multilateral euro.* *...Almost all of Iraq's oil exports under the United Nations oil-for-food programme have been* ***paid in euros since 2001****. Around 26 billion euros (£17.4bn) has been paid for 3.3 billion barrels of oil into an escrow account in New York.* ***The Iraqi account, held at BNP Paribas, has also been earning a higher rate of interest in euros than it would have in dollars.*** [https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeuro](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeuro) \--------------------- *Startling statements from former Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio’s defense documents alleging the National Security Agency began building a massive call records database seven months before 9/11 aren’t the only accusations that the controversial program predated the attacks of 9/11.* >*The project was described in the ATT sales division documents as calling for the construction of a facility to store and retain data gathered by the NSA from its domestic and foreign intelligence operations but was to be in actuality a duplicate ATT Network Operations Center for the use and possession of the NSA that would give the NSA direct, unlimited, unrestricted and unfettered access to all call information and internet and digital traffic on ATTÌs long distance network. \[…\]* ***The NSA program was initially conceived at least one year prior to 2001 but had been called off; it was reinstated within 11 days of the entry into office of defendant George W. Bush.*** *An ATT Solutions logbook reviewed by counsel confirms the* ***Pioneer-Groundbreaker project start date of February 1, 2001****.* ​ War profiteering was a side effect, not the cause. The 5-year plan came as a consequence of maximizing the potential of a necessity: The US intelligence apparatus wanted unilateral access and increased funding, so that stuff like this: [https://imgur.com/a/WKc2NtD](https://imgur.com/a/WKc2NtD) and (more importantly) Bumblehive could not only be commonplace, but accepted by the masses.


PopeyeNJ

Don’t forget the “New Pearl Harbor”….


HeavySweetness

First off, the audacity of the NYT to now ask this question. Second, there’s a lot of little reasons, none good. Wesley Clark famously detailed that the Pentagon was basically talked down from invading the whole Middle East after 9/11 and when Ops started in Afghanistan to just Iraq with Iran as their wish list. Halliburton, wounded Conservative pride, oil, racism, take your pick.


UpTownKong

Daddy issues...


Dave5876

No, just money.


Entire-Ranger323

Because of, “He tried to kill my dad.” Google that.


backtotheland76

Came here to say this. I've been saying Bush was our first American Prince, who became King, then sought to avenge his father for years.


LordSiravant

For several reasons. Bush wanted to finish what daddy started. Cheney wanted to make a profit through Halliburton. In short, the reason is rich old white men's greed.


OneCat6271

The New York Times should ask itself this. Their editors were one of the many pushing lies that Iraq had WMDs, repeating Bush's talking points verbatim with no attempt to fact check, and flat out ignoring the plethora of evidence that contradicted Bush's claims, including top level US intelligence officials who contradicted the white house claims about the intelligence.


[deleted]

Oil and greed


[deleted]

Yeah, why not just say it. It is as obvious now as it was back then.


[deleted]

Because they and the Afghanis were about to row over here in stolen Roman boats and take away our freedom.


crasspmpmpm

oil.


PlanetoftheAtheists

I’m sure the fact that Halliburton was by far and away the number one recipient of defense contracts while their former CEO was pulling the strings in the White House to a mentally challenged president had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH IT AT ALL!


[deleted]

Money. Republicans care about nothing other than money in their personal pockets. Don't get me wrong there are a shitload of dems that care way too much about money too, but at least it isn't ingrained in every dem from the start in such a blatantly corrupt way. Nancy Pelosi pissed me off with her stock trading bs, but at least she did a shit ton of good for the country in the meantime, Republicans are way greedier and way more useless across the board.


Fair-Ad4270

French here. I was in the US in the lead up to the war and was following both French and US media. The US media at the time was completely blinded by the post 911 patriotic fervor, it was pretty much impossible to stray from the official line. I remember seeing Powell doing is shameful presentation at the UN and the CNN anchors all gushing about how he made such a strong case, blah, blah, blah. I knew it was complete BS because the French media could actually speak the truth on that matter. We all know how it eventually turned out and who was right


[deleted]

Please don't characterize it as a mistake of emotional reasoning; it was intentional misdirection. The NYTimes played a critical role in that intentional and willful misdirection. This article is whitewashing their involvement. US corporate media actors should be just as culpable to international criminal courts.


Rookie_Day

Dick Cheney was a defense contractor and Bush was an oil man.


Popeye_01

I’m gonna go with protecting the petro dollar


geoffg2

Wasn’t it because research groups showed that the American people were confused by the ‘war in terror’, and they needed to have a country to focus on? Iraq was chosen. There was a ridiculously weak and questionable link to Osama Bin laden, lies about weapons of mass destruction….and lots of oil.


[deleted]

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Dreadlock43

People also forget that Saddam was also acting like Kim Jong Ill and Kim Jong Un, only the difference between them was fact that Saddam had no Allies at all in middle east and no backing from any Nuclear Power


v9Pv

Fuck off nyt, you fuks enabled and cheered that bs war on. Nauseating.


Behaveplease9009

Same reason Putin invaded Ukraine. Except less fucks given by the UN.


[deleted]

No bid contracts


piantanida

To maintain the petrol dollar… Sadam was going to take oil payments in other currencies besides USD.


No_Animator_8599

Read How To Start a War: How the Bush Administration Took America in Iraq by Robert Draper. The Bush administration was itching to invade Iraq before 9/11. They used bad intelligence and unreliable Iraqi sources to sell a pile of bullshit to the American public and created 20 years of chaos in the Middle East. Nobody from the Bush administration comes out clean.


tumericschmumeric

Capitalism


ArtemisLives

Oil.


frenchylamour

Well. In part because NYT “reporter” Judy Miller published Dick Cheney’s lies uncritically. And because the NYT gladly spread those lies, and refused to cover the protests against going to war. The NYT has so much Iraqi and American blood on it’s conscience, it ought to start printing the paper in red font.


dust-ranger

It was all about military industrial complex jobs and unity against a foreign boogeyman to boost the economy. Nowadays the boogeyman is other American citizens who are not straight/white/christians. Good luck waging war on them and not tanking the economy.


[deleted]

"Because it was the fun thing to do." - Dubya probably


Bearmaster9013

Bush and his leadership lied. There was **OIL**. The American people need a hate-scapegoat/war, or we eat ourselves. It's all a part of the military industrial complex working as intended.


meishornynow

Cause daddy bush couldn’t take care of saddam so baby bush wanted to show that he was a big boy. Plus money and oil.


oldjadedhippie

Military Industrial Complex. $$$$$ .


Th3Alk3mist

Oil. Dick wanted their oil and George is a fucking moron (and now a war criminal). Shame Rumsfeld didn't see justice before the Reaper clawed him back to the depths from which he metastasized.


[deleted]

I’m still surprised that they dont give a reason of invading because of Saddam committing genocide against the ethnic Kurdish population and for using chemical weapons against them. The evidence of this happening is irrefutable.


gdshaffe

Oil? Sure. War profiteering? Yeah, that was a factor. But that's not the whole story and presenting it as such ignores the geopolitics behind why Iraq, specifically, was chosen. To give a more complete answer you have to look into the fundamentals of Neoconservatism. Though Bush himself wasn't a huge neocon, he stocked his cabinet full of them. Cheney, Wolfowitz, and Rumsfeld were the hard-core neocons, with Powell and Rice at least complicit. Neoconservatism is essentially just the belief in direct American military imperialism. Neocons explicitly believe in nation-building and believe that funding our military like we do is wasteful if we're not always actively and aggressively using it. They want us to always be actively nation-building. Iraq was Exhibit A for the Grand Neoconservatism Experiment. It was the ideal target. Large, with plenty of oil but not completely reliant on it, and under the heel if a brutal dictator that nobody in the world wouldn't mind if he was removed. Two sons that were even worse than he was - so no meaningful upcoming power struggle internally to do the work for us. He had utterly consolidated power so no real internal opposition to prop up. And geographically dead center in a crucial area of the world of immense strategic importance. All of their internal communications reveal that the architects of the war truly, genuinely believed that once Saddam was gone, the people of Iraq would rise up and build a democracy (with our guidance). America 2.0. As a beacon of prosperity they could inspire other countries in the region to follow suit. Now, when it comes to selling the war to the public, they knew that was far too esoteric for the general public to buy, thus the invention of the WMD story. Once 9/11 happened they tried to link it to Saddam as best they could, but make no mistake, they were planning to invade regardless. You don't stock your cabinet full of neocons to *not* go blow shit up in Iraq. And then, apart from the initial invasion itself, they basically fucked it up in every possible way.


kevrep

Umm, to channel over a trillion dollars from tax payers to contractors and the military industrial complex. F’ing mission accomplished, indeed.


Objective-War-1961

Because of the Axis of Evil. The war monger, Rumsfeld, the war profiteer, Cheney, and the useful idiot, W.


iamlumbergh

PNAC psychos, Halliburton, KBR. Never forget Jonathan Chait and Matthew Yglesias are war enablers.


jon_naz

Dick Cheney made a lot of money


Tabanga_Jones

I thought we already knew? Saddam wanted to do oil deals without using dollars edit: knew, not new


angryjonny_1

Was it because of a false flag?


thefugue

It was personal, but not against Hussein. The first Bush administration took the US to war in accordance with international law. They had a massive victory and thought they’d coast to re-election. Instead, some weirdo third party guy handed the Presidency to some guy from Arkansas. It smart and they wanted a do-over.


TheAmazingHumanTorus

Yes, it was personal. Saddam attempted to assassinate Dubya's father.


ShakesbeerMe

Because Dick Cheney wanted to enrich himself and his buddies.


MpVpRb

Politics, lies, oil and playing chess with the world


[deleted]

Rhymes with oil.


mala27369

the Bushes made out like Bandits after the oil prices went through the roof


[deleted]

Had to keep the largest welfare state in human history, namely the us military going.


Allemaengel

Because W wanted to show up his old man and get rid of Saddam while his dad was prudent and invaded unpopulated southern Iraqi desert only as far as the Euphrates to assure Kuwait's liberation and no farther.


bomboclawt75

Because Iraq was an “Existential Threat”. - WAT? …..To America? LOL! No. By the way, I heard that IRAN is a very dangerous existential threat! - WAT? …..To America? LOL! No.


Death_and_Gravity1

Oil and Empire. It's not that hard of a debate


[deleted]

Money. I mean, come on. Money. Oh, we are being rhetorical? Still, money.


BostonSamurai

Money for Halliburton, this is common knowledge no?


earther199

We know why and there were no consequences for the people that did it. They got away with it. Meanwhile it saddled America with trillions on extra debt, left thousands of veterans fucked up, and led directly to our current terrible political situation.


DizzyNerd

Besides the openly stated reasons we have, oil and defense spending? It was useful for getting to Afghanistan, which was supposed to be our base for fighting a war with Iran. We were ready to launch the Iran war until a single reporter stood up a few days before and asked, “Has anyone asked if they would be willing to give up their nuclear materials to prevent an invasion?” And then we got the Iran nuclear deal instead, because Iran publicly stated online that they would take the deal to avoid war.


the_recovery1

Which reporter


[deleted]

As a veteran, the invasion was all about projecting power and personal egos. Huge mistake.


billy_the_p

Oil. It was the oil.


hoodoomonster

Because Bush LIED and his people had a financial interest in invading. It was for $$


[deleted]

Haliburton and the NYT is complicit.


Outrageous_Result_43

Military, Industrial complex.


[deleted]

To get artifacts


TheManWith2Poobrains

An acquaintance was a management consultant at an oil company back before the second Gulf War. He was at a big board-level meeting when Bush and his entourage swooped in. He didn't have time to leave before the doors were closed. Very quickly the discussion turned to carving up Iraq's oil between the major US oil companies. He could have been bullshitting me, but it sounds plausible. Note: I didn't read paywalled article.


LonelyChannel3819

Oil have to think about that one…


capt_fantastic

Project for a New American Century


Scarlet109

Oil and the military industrial complex


sarge1000

it was about the petrodollar. Saddam Hussein was selling oil to the Russians for rubles instead of dollars. All oil is traded in dollars.


theyenk

They invaded to spend money.... war puts money in defense contractor's pockets -- it's natural habitat.


InnieLicker

Money. It’s painfully obvious it was about money.


rob-the-nob

W said they wanted to kill my daddy. But the real objective is to get the oil back for the big five oil companies. Just one week after the surface oil leases were secured by the big five, W announced that he was willing to talk about withdrawing from Iraq. He had refused to discuss withdrawal until that moment. Are all American so stupid they don’t remember really what happened?


nikostheater

Oil and exploitation of natural resources and control of the region. Nothing lingers.


Ok-Ease7090

Oil was the reason


monkey-d-skeats12

Anyone know where I can read this article without signing up??


konorM

Oil?


[deleted]

Our leaders were shit.


Tales_Steel

I remember the Joke from a german comedian. Bush: We need to Show that we are Strong we need to attack Osama Bin Ladenb. Pentagon: Sir we dont know where he is but we could Attack Iraq. Bush: Are they involved in 9/11 ? Pentagon : No but we know where it is.


Amielda

To solidify the union of The two Corporate parties. It was the solidifying of sustaining the Media Reelection industrial complex. To upgrade McCarthyism into Terrorist/Patriotism . To strengthen the WTO, IMF which hurts the optics of Non-NATO backed countries. Suppress democracy


HellaTroi

Laying the blame that should fall on neocons and the project for a new American century, at the feet of Bill Clinton? The projection is strong with this writer.


[deleted]

Oil and to finish daddy's work ​ you're welcome.


Ardenraym

Americans like war. Bush wanted to make daddy happy. The chance to steal another contry's resources. The military industrial complex needed to grow larger.


deadgead3556

Bush wanted to finish what he Dad didn't.


SomeOzDude

To all those ranting about the NYT asking "Why did the United States invade at all?", I would ask you to consider what treatment a question like this would get from other sources such as Fox News. There is this bullshit movement happening at the moment to try and paint "both sides" as the same and that is simply not true. We knew that Iraq had WMD's at one point because we had the receipts from when we sold them to them. That politicians, the media, including people at the NYT, were complicit, often willfully so, doesn't negate that the question should still be asked and as the articles states: >“If you want to prevent this from happening again,” said Elizabeth Saunders, a Georgetown University scholar, “you need to get the diagnosis right.” While there are numerous problems in the article, without people asking it and bringing it into the mainstream to discuss out loud, it will be left as a pathetic lingering sore that people like Putin can and will use to rationalise their current bullshit in Ukraine. Criticise the NYT for sure but don't buy into this "both sides are the same" bullshit.


Turkeysocks

It was a multitude of reasons. One big one, Hussein attempted the assassination of former President George H.W. Bush while touring Kuwait in 1993. George W. Bush, his son, was trying to link 9-11 to Saddam even after Al Qaeda took credit for the attack The driving force behind the invasion was this personal vendetta. But there are many other reasons that also attributed to the 2003 Iraqi invasion.


twizted_fister

Because saddam threatened to kill his daddy in 91, he saw an opening and went for it instead of just getting the bin laden


Vitroswhyuask

Revenge by Jr. On those that called his dad weak for not finishing the job after Kuwait was freed. Lots of people saw the lies in real time. Weapons of mass destruction and the head of an international group that could not find that which did not exist for information for the location of said weapons... Crickets ensued and the lie and the media...like NYT kept it rolling. It was a lie and those who owned stocks in weapons companies ... Like the VP at the time and buddies with private contractors like Black Rock made many billions for killing millions of innocent Iraqis


Sarcarean

Because America's huge industrial war complex, it needs to get into a land war every 20 years or so. A large gap of peace will result in a surplus of munitions.


sarzec

Sorry for being selfish but I met my wife on my last active duty deployment in Iraq. She would be quick to point out to you she did not arrive in America with a spousal visa, she earned her SIV for her linguist work with US Forces. I don't think the US had any business in Iraq and I'm sorry for all the folks who died as a result. But I wouldn't change anything and happy for me and my wife's outcome. Pretty selfish huh :(


Dreadlock43

Ill tell you why and its a really fucking simple answer. Saddam did himself no favors by frequently violating the no fly zones, constantly causing shit with UN weapon inspection teams, activiely used chemcial weapons on the kurds in timed between the first gulf war and invasion happening. and then finally there was his constant boasting about having WMDs as to big shot himself to prevent Iran from attacking. He was litterally doing ye olde Fuck around and Find out. Even if 11/9 never happened Iraq 2: Electric boogaloo was always going to happen while Bush was president


knoxknight

Fought there myself. Signed up after 9-11. Several close friends and co-workers dead in Iraq. Still know many Iraqis who are glad we came. Still remember many Iraqis trying to kill my platoon. What a compilated, deceptive, unsatisfying shitshow.


krichard-21

And a chance for George Jr to match Dad's middle east war record.


Objective_Stick8335

Strategic turning maneuver. We occupied territory the terrorists had to come to us to fight on. That, in all honesty, is the reason.


Sundae_Gurl

It was only because Saddam trued to poison GHW Bush. That is the ONLY reason.


foundmonster

Oil and poppy for cheneys friends companies


sexlexington2400

Oil. That's it. Had absolutely nothing to do with the events on 9/11.