Reply #83: The US cannot veto a resolution involving the US! [View All]

[Devils Advocate NZ]

Certify or determine or whatever. Even without requiring any independent verification, if Bush determined that going to the UN was not going to work without actually going to the UN, then he would be discredited. Not only that, Bush* would appear to have such a weak case, that he was unwilling to make it to the world.

Bush DID have a weak case that he did not want to make to the world, which is why when he was finally forced to do so by international pressure HE LIED!

It was far better for him to say "we have secret information that proves Iraq is a threat, and we are going to act upon it" than for him to put forth the bullshit "case" that he eventually did. As it was, he was laughed out of the UN, figuratively speaking.

Impossible. The US has a veto on the Security Council. And int'l public opinion didn't stop the invasion. Int'l public opinion doesn't force Bush* to do anything

No, the US can not use it's veto on a resolution involving the US. If a resolution was put to the UNSC that forbid the UK and US from invading Iraq, the only permanent members able to participate in the vote, and therefore use their veto would have been France, Russia, and China. Do you think one of those nations would have vetoed it?

How international public opinion forced Bush to go to the UN, was that the Governments representing those people were sympathetic to the idea of such a blocking resolution. They had to be prevented from acting upon that sympathy, which, by the US presenting a case, they were. The UN was forced to consider the US case, and reject it, before any nation could propose a blocking resolution.

The UNSC then decided to send in the inspectors, which was the exact OPPOSITE of what Bush wanted, because they threatened to expose his lies, and did. Bush then said that the UN was lying, and told the inspectors they had to leave because he was going to invade. If Bush had not already gotten authorisation to invade Iraq, he would at that time have had to go to congress seeking that authorisation at which point the Dems could have pointed at the inspectors findings and said "you haven't made your case, in fact you have been proved wrong".

So in effect the resolution not only gave Bush full authorisation to attack Iraq, it also undermined the UN inspectors because Bush could safely ignore them without fear that their findings could be used to stop the war. The resolution basically said that it did not matter what Iraq did or said, or what the UN inspectors found or didn't find, Bush could invade Iraq.

That is what you have to consider when you make the claim that Kerry wanted Bush to go through the UN - the resolution made the UN irrelevant because Bush could ignore it and invade anyway - and Kerry voted for it.