'UK would not have invaded Iraq if we knew what we know now'

[sabra]

Source: ANI

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has said that the UK would not have invaded Iraq in 2003, if it had been clear that the then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

When asked if he would still have supported the invasion of Iraq if he had known then what was known now, Miliband said: “Obviously there would have been no such decision”.

“If we had known then what we know now, if we''d have known that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, there would have been no UN resolutions and no vote in the House of Commons,” The Scotsman quoted Miliband, as saying.

His position appears to clash with comments made by then-British Prime Minister Tony Blair and then-Chancellor Gordon Brown, who have insisted that removing Saddam would “still have been the right decision”.

Read more: http://www.indianexpress.com/news/uk-would-not-have-invaded-iraq-if-we-knew-what-we-know-now/608812/

[LuckyLib]

1. "Who could have predicted that Bush/Cheney would lie to the world about WMDs?"

You didn't do your homework. Lots of voices said the US position against Iraq was BS. You didn't want to hear it.

[county worker]

2. It's so funny that DUers knew there were no WMDs but the UK government could not figure it out.

I don't believe this guy.

[JackRiddler]

17. No one could have predicted the financial crash, either...

Since by predicting it, or by saying there are no WMDs, you disqualify yourself from being heard.

[JuniperLea]

3. Interesting how so many of us knew better than the goverments of the UK and USA...

You could even say millions of us knew better...

[driver8]

4. What a crock of shit...

They were all in such a hurry to go to war, that they would have believed anything.

Sorry David, not buying it.

[mike_c]

5. we did "know then what we know now...."

It isn't so much a matter of knowing more now-- the UNSCOM team reported as early as the mid-1990s that Iraq was effectively disarmed. It's more a matter of the public relations effort in support of the war having failed, and left it exposed as utterly useless, a waste of life and treasure with zero redeeming worth-- unless you're a military contractor, in which case the money rolls in like never before. The wars against Iraq and Afghanistan are political wars fought to divert public funds into private hands, and sold to the public with fear mongering lies.

U.S. out of Iraq and Afghanistan NOW!

[tblue37]

10. You phrased it perfectly mike_c:

"political wars fought to divert public funds into private hands"

[Mugweed]

6. Maybe if they had read more Knight Ridder articles...

I know I got most of my debunking news from them. Could that be why they no longer exist?

[thesquanderer]

9. Knight-Ridder is still around, it's now McClatchy (n/t)

[Tempest]

7. They knew and committed murder to protect the secret

Dr. David Kelly was murdered by Blair's government because he knew they were lying their way into war.

And hopefully the truth will come out about his murder under a new government:

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0405/tories-reopen-probe-iraq-whistleblowers-death/

[DavidDvorkin]

8. A million dead Iraqis await your apology.

[Plucketeer]

11. What irony that...

...the very reasons used to justify removing Saddam, could be rationalized for having removed Bush/Cheney! If there were a huge statue of Bush, I'd be tempted to go throw a rope around it and pull it down with a truck!

[dipsydoodle]

12. Bollocks

He's just another one of that lying bunch of fuckers aka New Labour who will be consigned to history in a few weeks time.

[ladjf]

13. They knew. nt

[JDPriestly]

14. How could the government of a nation so steeped in knowledge and memory of

WWI, a war in which gas, a WMD, was used, a country that had to be well aware of the waves of soldiers killed when Iraq used poison gas against Iran in their war in a more recent time have remained unaware that there were no WMDs in Iraq as it watched the march of our troops across the Iraqi desert. I recall how some of our equipment had difficulty making it through the sand.

It takes waves of soldiers to confront WMDS -- waves of them. That is because poisons, for example, kill quickly and indiscriminately over a fairly good distance. Gas masks are protection, but only for so much time.

Had the Bush administration believed that our military might actually have to defend itself against WMDs, the administration would have sent in far larger numbers of troops. Surely the British military historians and strategists knew that. I knew it. I believed the propaganda about WMDs until I noticed that we were only sending in a relatively small number of troops. I was horrified. And I remember reading that there was some question about sending in so few troops. The people who decided to fight with the troops we sent in were either ignorant about military history (even more ignorant than I), or knew that there were no WMDs before they sent our troops in.

[Arctic Dave]

15. Setting up their war crimes defense story.

Not buying it at all asshat.

[Turborama]

21. Laying the ground for the lies that will be told in tomorrow's debate

The Liberal Democrats were the only party that voted against the illegal invasion of Iraq. No doubt Clegg will be hammering Brown and Cameron with that fact during tomorrow's foreign policy debate.

[mikeSchmuckabee]

16. Perhaps if they knew they had deployed a quarter million in the '20's

they might not have gone back.

Remember or doomed.

[City Lights]

18. Tony Blair disagrees.

He would have invaded Iraq anyway and would have found a way to justify the war to parliament and the public.

[T_i_B]

19. And this is the trouble

Blair wanted the Iraq war for the sake of the "special relationship" with George W Bush and the likes of David Miliband happily went along with it.

And now the same people who happily treated any questioning of Blair's Iraq policy with contempt are wanting our vote. Well I for one will treat their electioneering with the same contempt with which they treat the British public.

[Solly Mack]

20. Fuck him and his lies

[RFKHumphreyObama]

22. Miliband knew then what he claims not to know now

He knew it was a set up then and that Saddam had no WMDs and he and the other Labour MPs who voted for the same resolution nevertheless went and voted for the war anyway. Nothing like sending British soldiers into harm's way for the principles of diplomatic and political expediency

I will never forgive nor forget the British Labour Party's behavior on that issue. It has lost all credibility with me forever because of what it did during the Iraq War and I hope it suffers the consequences of its despicable actions for generations to come

[izquierdista]

23. Translation

"I'm too stupid to be an MP. Smack me over the head with a shovel and I'll use it to go shovel shit the rest of my career."

[Bragi]

24. Had he known he would get caught, he never would have done it /nt