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The war in Iraq was simply the son; BUSH 2 settling the score with Saddam for trying to kill his Dad in Kuwait after Gulf War 1 or Desert Storm. All of this could have ironically been avoided if at the end of Gulf War 1 BUSH 1 had not prematurely ended the fighting before our great U.S. military could finish the job. All of the Repblican Guard troops were massed at the flooded Euphrates river fleeing Kuwait after looting it and our M-1 Abrams tanks and Apache helicopters rolled up and had them surrounded and were just about to wipe the evil off the face of the earth and BUSH 1 said; "STOP, wait we have Kuwait back now so we need to stop the fighting." Then they believed Saddam that he would only use his helicopters for humanitarian purposes as he had them fly around and wipe out the local Iraqis resistance fighters in the north and the south that supported us and had to be abandoned by the CIA.
That was the BIGGEST geo-political blunder of the 20th century which we are still seeing the affects unfold!
I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but I think you're underestimating Bush Senior's knowledge of the geopolitical structure in Iraq. The British when drawing the map of Iraq during colonial times purposefully included three disparate ethnic groups into one country with the knowledge that they wouldn't band together to overthrow them. The son, being dependent on less wise/more gun crazy counsel didn't seem to consider that possibility when "giving people democracy."
The war in Iraq was simply the son; BUSH 2 settling the score with Saddam for trying to kill his Dad in Kuwait after Gulf War 1 or Desert Storm. All of this could have ironically been avoided if at the end of Gulf War 1 BUSH 1 had not prematurely ended the fighting before our great U.S. military could finish the job. All of the Repblican Guard troops were massed at the flooded Euphrates river fleeing Kuwait after looting it and our M-1 Abrams tanks and Apache helicopters rolled up and had them surrounded and were just about to wipe the evil off the face of the earth and BUSH 1 said; "STOP, wait we have Kuwait back now so we need to stop the fighting." Then they believed Saddam that he would only use his helicopters for humanitarian purposes as he had them fly around and wipe out the local Iraqis resistance fighters in the north and the south that supported us and had to be abandoned by the CIA.
That was the BIGGEST geo-political blunder of the 20th century which we are still seeing the affects unfold!
What was 'the job'? It was to roll back the Iraqi annexation of Kuwait and to substantially degrade Iraqi military capacity. That was accomplished.
The fantasy that drivin all the way to Baghdad is the very definition of mission creep. What would be the point? Let me guess - to set up a democratic Iraq that would be an American ally, and would serve as a shining beacon of democracy for the rest of the Middle East, which would see the terrific Iraqi example of liberty and rush to embrace it, with freedom cascading across the area. That was the fantasy in 2003. And you think that, somehow, it would have worked out better in 1991?
Desert Shield and Storm were executed to near perfection. I voted against GHW President Bush twice, but I'll give him his due - his managing of the crisis of 1990-91 was masterful. A real coalition was established. Almost all of our NATO allies were on board. Middle Eastern nations, such as Egypt and Syria, were even induced to make major commitments of their armed forces, placing them under American command. Clear and realistic objectives were defined, and adhered to.
And after? Iraq was permanently contained. You know, containment? The policy that, more than anything else, won the Cold War? And yet was a policy that was constantly attacked by the hawks who thought that perpetual military escalation was the solution.
Containment of Iraq was not dirt cheap. It cost roughly 3 billion dollars annually, and this cost was part of the argument made by the neocons in 2002-03 when they were building up their case for war. Remember how Iraqi oil was going to cover all the costs of the We'll-be-welcomed-as-liberators-and-Iraq-will-become-a-stable-democracy fantasy? Well, the war ended up costing over a trillion dollars. Now, I'm no economics major, but I did take fifth-grade math, and coughing up $1 trillion to avoid a $3 billion/year cost doesn't sound like a very sound investment to me. And that's before you factor in the 4000+ dead U.S. troops, the 30000+ wounded U.S. troops, and the fact that the region was completely destabilized - and that we ended up replacing the Hussein regime, a major check on Iran, with a pro-Iranian Shiite regime in Baghdad. Iran has ended up being the really big winner of the Iraq War. Brilliant...
The solution to blundering into a costly 21st century quagmire that resulted in a laundry list of bad outcomes - from lots of dead Americans, to a vastly improved strategic situation for Iran, to the Middle East as a whole become a much bigger mess than the substantial mess that it already was - is not to say "Hey, instead of waiting until this century, we should have blundered into that quagmire back in the 1990s!". It's to understand limits of hard power, to make reasonable and achievable goals, and stick to them. It's to never blunder into the quagmire in the first place. GHW Bush had it right. GW Bush had it completely and totally wrong. And how anyone can look at the last 25 years and come to any other conclusion is beyond me.
Here is an actual mistake that almost changed the world - save for a bright young Canadian officer...
Back around 1960 or so, a top secret site was opened just north of Thule, Greenland. The purpose of Site J was to run a radar that could see for 3,000 miles - directly into the Soviet Union - to warn NORAD of a nuclear launch toward North America.
Not long afterward, and with 99.9% confidence, Site J reported a massive Soviet missile launch toward North America. The rules called for the NORAD commander to be called first, but he was airborne over some flyover state - unreachable. The Deputy Commander of NORAD was a Canadian, so they called him. When the Joint Staff was emergently convened in Washington, he asked by telephone, "Where's Krushchev?"
He was in New York, preparing to address the UN.
The US bombers were recalled, the ICBMs were stood down, and NORAD went from Defcon "Oh, Sh*t" back to normal.
The mistake? The radar was so powerful that it saw beyond the required 3,000 miles into Russia. It saw 225,000 miles - all the way to the rising full moon.
Those weapons actually *did* exist. The problem is that there was so much stumbling and bumbling and delay that there was plenty of time for those weapons to be transported to Syria. There are sat photos showing the convoy. The Syrians later used some of those weapons on their own people, and gave up some of the remainder.
Their mission is to attack Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs and its military capacity to threaten its neighbors. Their purpose is to protect the national interest of the United States, and indeed the interests of people throughout the Middle East and around the world.
Saddam Hussein must not be allowed to threaten his neighbors or the world with nuclear arms, poison gas or biological weapons.
So here's the thing:
If the weapons of mass destruction "never existed", wouldn't the bombing of Iraq be Clinton's biggest mistake? I mean, as far as national policy, of course (ahem).
In terms of the scope of damage done and the loss of status as a good and decent country it's pretty hard to beat GW Bush's criminal invasion of Iraq. There has never been a worse mistake in American foreign policy. It's far worse than the mistake of Vietnam and that was horrendous stupidity. Who knows what the situation will be when the dust settles if it ever does but one thing is for sure. The USA will lose in every way because of it.
So here's the thing:
If the weapons of mass destruction "never existed", wouldn't the bombing of Iraq be Clinton's biggest mistake? I mean, as far as national policy, of course (ahem).
Most people also don't know about a certain facility, known to the IAEA, which was about to go on-line and would have been capable of producing 10 nuclear warheads per year. I became aware of it incidental to researching an investment in a uranium mining company. The problem is that the masses are not told of a lot of stuff, and they operate on guesswork without knowing any real details. Sometimes the details come out after the fact, sometimes they never do. Sometimes, the facts don't fit what people *want* to believe, and are disregarded.
On topic:
Biggest mistakes in recent history:
U.S. foreign policy since WWII, particularly proxy wars with the USSR and coincidental meddling with foreign governments and support of dictators/'puppets'/revolutionaries such as Osama bin Laden, Manuel Noriega and Saddam Hussein (and others); Iran/Iraq, Contras/Sandinistas, Afghanistan, Viet Nam (to name a few).
Creation of the 'state' of Israel, carved out of Arab territory.
Arguably, WWII was a huge mistake for Germany and Japan.
What was 'the job'? It was to roll back the Iraqi annexation of Kuwait and to substantially degrade Iraqi military capacity. That was accomplished.
The fantasy that drivin all the way to Baghdad is the very definition of mission creep. What would be the point? Let me guess - to set up a democratic Iraq that would be an American ally, and would serve as a shining beacon of democracy for the rest of the Middle East, which would see the terrific Iraqi example of liberty and rush to embrace it, with freedom cascading across the area. That was the fantasy in 2003. And you think that, somehow, it would have worked out better in 1991?
Desert Shield and Storm were executed to near perfection. I voted against GHW President Bush twice, but I'll give him his due - his managing of the crisis of 1990-91 was masterful. A real coalition was established. Almost all of our NATO allies were on board. Middle Eastern nations, such as Egypt and Syria, were even induced to make major commitments of their armed forces, placing them under American command. Clear and realistic objectives were defined, and adhered to.
And after? Iraq was permanently contained. You know, containment? The policy that, more than anything else, won the Cold War? And yet was a policy that was constantly attacked by the hawks who thought that perpetual military escalation was the solution.
Containment of Iraq was not dirt cheap. It cost roughly 3 billion dollars annually, and this cost was part of the argument made by the neocons in 2002-03 when they were building up their case for war. Remember how Iraqi oil was going to cover all the costs of the We'll-be-welcomed-as-liberators-and-Iraq-will-become-a-stable-democracy fantasy? Well, the war ended up costing over a trillion dollars. Now, I'm no economics major, but I did take fifth-grade math, and coughing up $1 trillion to avoid a $3 billion/year cost doesn't sound like a very sound investment to me. And that's before you factor in the 4000+ dead U.S. troops, the 30000+ wounded U.S. troops, and the fact that the region was completely destabilized - and that we ended up replacing the Hussein regime, a major check on Iran, with a pro-Iranian Shiite regime in Baghdad. Iran has ended up being the really big winner of the Iraq War. Brilliant...
The solution to blundering into a costly 21st century quagmire that resulted in a laundry list of bad outcomes - from lots of dead Americans, to a vastly improved strategic situation for Iran, to the Middle East as a whole become a much bigger mess than the substantial mess that it already was - is not to say "Hey, instead of waiting until this century, we should have blundered into that quagmire back in the 1990s!". It's to understand limits of hard power, to make reasonable and achievable goals, and stick to them. It's to never blunder into the quagmire in the first place. GHW Bush had it right. GW Bush had it completely and totally wrong. And how anyone can look at the last 25 years and come to any other conclusion is beyond me.
Maybe not the biggest mistake "ever," but in the context of World War II, deciding to bomb Pearl Harbor can be considered to be both a strategic masterpiece and a blunder of monumental proportions, both at the same time. The mistake came from the horrendous misreading of American will on the part of the Japanese leadership. They felt that if the U.S. was battered badly enough, we would just throw in the towel and sue for peace. But instead, we instantly became firmly united and filled with an unshakable resolve to beat Japan into submission, no matter the cost.
Later on, Admiral Yamamoto made another big blunder. When planning for the Battle of Midway, he thought that the U.S. was so badly spooked by our earlier setbacks that we would have to be goaded into battle. The Imperial Japanese Navy possessed overwhelming superiority over the U.S. Navy, but Yamamoto feared that if his entire fleet showed up at once, we would be too chicken to come out and fight. So instead, he scattered his forces all over the place, in hopes that we would only spot one of them and decide that it was worth taking on. But instead, we aggressively tore into the most important one and sank four of their carriers, all while their widely scattered "support" ships were too far away to do anything.
On a more localized level, I can think of at least two major Japanese warships that were done in by stupid mistakes. When the carrier Taiho was damaged by a single torpedo hit, fuel vapor from one of the tanks was released. Instead of containing the leak, the damage control officer ordered the vents to be run full blast, in hopes of clearing the air. But instead, doing this simply spread the fumes throughout the ship . . . and when the inevitable spark came, the resulting explosion sank the ship.
There was also the battleship Mutsu, riding peacefully at anchor when suddenly a huge explosion tore the ship apart and sent it under. They're not entirely sure what happened, but the most likely cause was someone smoking in the area where the high-explosive shells were stored. Oops.
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