[Shasown]

Originally Posted by letmein

No, the Neocons did, the CIA did not. The Right wing was looking for a way to go to war with Iraq the first day they set foot inside the White House in 2001. They let Osama bin Laden go, and ignored Afghanistan. Saddam Hussein agreed to let inspectors in before the invasion in 2003. The US said that this was a setup. These morons were hell bent on invading.

With all this being said, it is very easy for someone to conclude that the powers that be had some hand in 9/11 to get what they wanted. I personally don't believe this, but see it as a self-fulfilled prophesy. They always screamed that government didn't work, and they made it so. They let 9/11 happen, and then saw it as an opportunity to do what they always wanted to do, no matter how illegal it was. There was always a silver lining in their incompetence. They should all be in prison for war crimes.

Again thats only part of the truth, Saddma Hussein did allow inspectors in quite often between the end of the first gulf war and the start of the second. But then at other times escorted them out of his country, a few times at gunpoint.

To the weapons inspectors it appeared that Iraq was only tokenly complying with the inspection requirements in order to prevent further sanctions or bombings etc. The Iraqi authroities deliberately hampered and misled the inspectors throughout the inspection regime.

They disposed of their own records of the disposal of outlawed weapons and materials consequently the actual amount of materials could never be effectively verified. When further questioned about disposal locations methods etc, they would often become unco-operative and then hours later the inspectors would be expelled from the area or even the country.

There was very little the US could have done prior to 9/11 particularly to prevent it occuring, they didnt have effective intelligence about it.

However it did prove a god send for GW to remove both the Taliban and Hussein. Both of which he was already trying to do.

His administration was already in communication with the Taliban to effect the removal of Al Qaeda and its training and support network from Afghanistan, 9/11 provided him with the reason to remove the Taliban from government in Afghanistan and deal with Al Qaeda.

The paranoia in the US in general but particularly in both the Senate and Congress allowed him to push consent for the invasion of Iraq through both houses especially after rumours were circulated about Hussein's UAV capability and also his "support" for AQ. Naturally those rumours werent started by his administration.

Both the UK and the US administrations presented flawed information and reports to their own governments and also the UN. Whether or not that was deliberate is open to interpretation.