Reply #103: The problem is that in an age of war and more wars [View All]

[Tinoire]

there is a reason those charges are thrown at Clark and they were thrown well BEFORE, YEARS before, Clark ever entered the race. It was not Clark-bashing- it was horror at what was going on and that horror doesn't get erased just because Clark wants to be President.

What I find absolutely intriguing is that Clark bombed and you know why. Why is there still such an intent effort on getting Clark pushed in when it's apparent he has been anathema to most of the Left for years?

And how do you think it would look to the world if after tossing Bush out we replace him with someone many people in the world consider a war criminal?

We are not stupid. We watch. We listen. We research and we judge from there. The louder the propaganda, the deeper some of us are going to dig. Do not get offended if you don't like the words used against Clark or any other candidate. Focus on the actions. Focus on why people are saying that and what they object to. Try to focus on why we're not buying the argument that the best successor to Bush is a General who waged a war as illegal as the one against Iraq.

My general impression of Clark is that he's a brilliant man and in his heart probably a good man who has America's best intentions at heart. But the America Clark supports is Imperialist America.

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There's no requirement to have any doctrine here. I mean this is simply a longstanding right of the United States and other nations to take the actions they deem necessary in their self defense.

Every president has deployed forces as necessary to take action. He's done so without multilateral support if necessary. He's done so in advance of conflict if necessary. In my experience, I was the commander of the European forces in NATO. When we took action in Kosovo, we did not have United Nations approval to do this and we did so in a way that was designed to preempt Serb ethnic cleansing and regional destabilization there. There were some people who didn't agree with that decision. The United Nations was not able to agree to support it with a resolution.

There's no question that Saddam Hussein is a threat... Yes, he has chemical and biological weapons. He's had those for a long time. But the United States right now is on a very much different defensive posture than we were before September 11th of 2001... He is, as far as we know, actively pursuing nuclear capabilities, though he doesn't have nuclear warheads yet. If he were to acquire nuclear weapons, I think our friends in the region would face greatly increased risks as would we.

And, I want to underscore that I think the United States should not categorize this action as preemptive. Preemptive and that doctrine has nothing whatsoever to do with this problem. As Richard Perle so eloquently pointed out, this is a problem that's longstanding. It's been a decade in the making. It needs to be dealt with and the clock is ticking on this.

I think there's no question that, even though we may not have the evidence as Richard (Perle) says, that there have been such contacts (between Iraq and al Qaeda). It' s normal. It's natural. These are a lot of bad actors in the same region together. They are going to bump into each other. They are going to exchange information. They're going to feel each other out and see whether there are opportunities to cooperate. That's inevitable in this region, and I think it's clear that regardless of whether or not such evidence is produced of these connections that Saddam Hussein is a threat.

Our President has emphasized the urgency of eliminating these weapons and weapons programs. I strongly support his efforts to encourage the United Nations to act on this problem. And in taking this to the United Nations, the President’s clear determination to act if the United Nations can’t provides strong leverage undergirding further diplomatic efforts.


STATEMENT OF GENERAL (RETIRED) WESLEY K. CLARK U.S. ARMY - BEFORE THE HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ON SEPTEMBER 26, 2002.
FULL TRANSCRIPT: http://www.iraqwatch.org/government/us/hearingspreparedstatements/hasc-092602.htm#WC


Wesley Clark to the US Congress on September 26, 2002