Four things happened. First, the US launched the Iraq war without adding to American security one jot, and without doing the slightest damage to al-Qaeda and its allies. The cost in lives and treasure was immense.

The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimates the US has already allocated a total of $US751 billion to the Iraq war since the invasion began, or 69 per cent of all American spending on post-September 11 military operations.

This is about 1.5 million times more than al-Qaeda invested in the September 11 attacks. And 4418 US troops have died in Iraq, 232 times as many terrorists were sacrificed in attacking America on September 11. The biggest single return on the terrorists' investment was entirely self-inflicted by the US leadership.

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/terrorists-biggest-bonus-was-gained-when-the-us-invaded-iraq-20100913-1598b.html

The UK government and military leaders had "absolutely no idea" what to do after invading Iraq, a prominent veteran of the 2003 war has claimed.

Part of the problem was "obsequious" officers telling ministers what they wanted to hear, said Col Tim Collins.

And he called on the Iraq inquiry to recommend action to end this culture.

He was speaking as Sir John Chilcot's Iraq inquiry team visited an Army base in Tidworth, Wiltshire, to hear evidence from former front-line troops.

Col Collins, who gained worldwide fame for his eve-of-battle speech to his men in the Royal Irish Regiment, said his troops lacked a clear understanding of the reasons for war.

"I don't think anybody had any idea why it was we were going to do this," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

'Biblical' looting

He said the prime minister at the time, Tony Blair, and US President George W Bush had given Saddam Hussein "an offer he couldn't understand" and even the Iraqi dictator probably did not know what he was required to do to avoid war.

"I rather thought that there would be some sort of plan and the government had thought this through and I was clearly wrong," he said.

"When I gave my now notorious talk to the Royal Irish, I was trying to rationalise for those young men what was going on from my standpoint. As it turned out, it had a wider appeal because nobody had any idea why this was happening.

"It became very apparent to me shortly after crossing the border that the government and many of my superiors had no idea what they were doing."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11296829

from the second liar in command

In his memoirs, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair justified the 2003 invasion of Iraq by saying that he "may have been right" about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction. His argument was that even if Saddam Hussein did not have WMD at the time of the invasion, he intended to rebuild them. Paul Reynolds, world affairs correspondent for the BBC News website, examines this claim.

One of the charges against Tony Blair over the invasion of Iraq is that he exaggerated the evidence for WMD.

Is he now exaggerating the threat that Saddam Hussein would have posed if left in power? Or is there enough evidence to support him?

"I have often reflected as to whether I was wrong. I ask you to reflect as to whether I may have been right... But the true facts do provide the clearest possible basis to assess that he [Saddam] was indeed a threat ”

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Gus: no Tony... this is crap. The true fact was as clear as blood pudding. Only a deranged blood-thirsty fake catholic could think to go to war on such a flimflam...

As our Julia visits the Aussie troops in Afghanistan during the long weekend, the Bruce Petty cartoon for Monday 4 October in the SMH is simply brilliant, if not so sadly very disturbing... With his usual feverishly drawn lines, Petty takes us to the headquarters of war, with numerous dials and serious soldiers monitoring screens while piloting killing drones. The larger central monitor shows a picture of an IED, or Improvised Exploding Device. At the centre of the war room, a general with zillion decorations laments to his aide de camp: "WHY ARE WE ALWAYS AT WAR WITH PEOPLE WHO CAN'T AFFORD PROPER WEAPONS?"

The weight of this line is enormous. The psychology of war is instantly deflated with these few words. The question is self-answering (If we were at war with people who could afford proper weapons, we'd be all gone. Vanished). We would not be at war if our "enemies" could afford proper weapons.We always fight the weak and "helplerss"... In "of liberal (conservative) philosophy" I (hopefully sarcastically)  wrote:

Freedom [in the conservative philosophy] is highly valued and should be imposed on anyone who does not have the same rigourous ideal of freedom, unless they are powerful and have oil. These are our despotic Muslim friends. Saddam on the other hand was weak (that's why we lied he was strong, but we knew he was weak — otherwise we wouldn't have attacked him if he was strong) and had oil.

Yes — as I have written getting blue in the face since early 2002 (before this YD site existed)— when the idea of attacking Iraq because "it had weapons of mass destruction", was gathering momentum, THERE WAS NO WAY THAT SADDAM HAD WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION, BECAUSE IF HE HAD HAD, WE WOULD NOT (COULD NOT) ATTACK HIM (with an army on the ground) WITHOUT SEVERE (unacceptable) LOSS OF PERSONEL. Capice? The US generals knew that Saddam had no WMDs...

Blair, Bush and our horrible little Rattus were lying through their teeth. Ask Andrew Wilke...

Blair is now hidding behing the screen of catholic redemption and self-promoting righteousness of war even if Saddam had no WMDs — a shocking admission that our Blair-enamoured media makes us swallow like cream and honey. Bush is doing the motivation spruik-tour about dog poop while our Rattus, rejected by cricket, has been re-energising his gnarling heir, Abbott — and his lot of has-beens — to the point we — as a nation — nearly committed political suicide...

On this alone, may I congratulate the independents for their bravery in chosing to go with Labor.

See toon at top...

Iran has brokered a critical deal with its regional neighbours that could see a pro-Tehran government installed in Iraq, a move that would shift the fragile country sharply away from a sphere of western influence.

The Guardian can reveal that the Islamic republic was instrumental in forming an alliance between Iraq's Nouri al-Maliki, who is vying for a second term as prime minister, and the country's powerful radical Shia cleric leader, Moqtada al-Sadr.

The deal – which involved Syria, Lebanon's Hezbollah and the highest authorities in Shia Islam – positions Maliki as a frontrunner to return as leader despite a seven-month stalemate between Iraq's feuding political blocs.

It also positions Iran as a potent buffer to US interests at a time when America is looking to change its relationship with Iraq from military overlords to civilian partners.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/oct/17/iraq-government-iran-tehran-deal

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Gus: of course before the invasion of Iraq by our imbecilic liars-in-chief, Bush, Blair and Howard, one of the premises I — and many other people — raised was that the removal of Saddam for whatever dicky reason would shift Iraq towards Iran... Iraq was the buffer between Iran and the west. Now it is going, going, gone?... And after seeing the report by Paul McGeough on SBS dateline last night (17/10/10), one can see a country on tenderhooks where corruption is rife, where services have all but disappeared, where danger is ever increasing and where the Sunnis are turning their back to the US and going with Al Qaeda...