Kerry didn't say he would have gone to war knowing then what he knows now.
He said he would have voted to give the president authority. That's a very important distinction.
The U.S. was trying to get the UN to pass a resolution and make Saddam Hussein let the weapons inspectors into his country.
The only way to force his hand was with the "threat" of military force. Therefore Senator Kerry still would have voted the same way.
Then, after Sadam shocked us all and let the inspectors in, the use of force was no longer necessary.
But George W Bush didn't seem to care about that and went to war anyway.
The reason Kerry now supports sending more troops into Iraq if necessary is because Dubya has gotten us into a mess and we can't just cut and run....we have to have a stable government in Iraq before we pull out.
So the differences between the two are
1) Kerry would have voted to give the president authority to go to war if necessary, but if he was commander in chief would not have actually gone to war because we had weapons inspectors on the ground and force wasn't necessary.
2) Now that Dubya has gotten us into a royal mess, Kerry would tell the American people the truth about the situation in Iraq, rather than painting some rosy picture for us, and do what is necessary to stabalize things there.
3) Since most of the rest of the world is pissed off at us, because Dubya basically told the UN to go fuck itself ("you're going to be irrelevant" were the exact words) we need a new commander in chief with new credibility to go to our allies and get them to help shoulder some of the military and financial burden of rebuilding Iraq.
Most of our allies know that the right thing to do is to send troops and money into Iraq, because a stable middle east benefits them as well, but they don't want to do anything to help Bush get re-elected after the way he tried to bully them before. So a change in the Oval Office is necessary to get help from our allies.
Any more questions?
He said he would have voted to give the president authority. That's a very important distinction.
The U.S. was trying to get the UN to pass a resolution and make Saddam Hussein let the weapons inspectors into his country.
The only way to force his hand was with the "threat" of military force. Therefore Senator Kerry still would have voted the same way.
Then, after Sadam shocked us all and let the inspectors in, the use of force was no longer necessary.
But George W Bush didn't seem to care about that and went to war anyway.
The reason Kerry now supports sending more troops into Iraq if necessary is because Dubya has gotten us into a mess and we can't just cut and run....we have to have a stable government in Iraq before we pull out.
So the differences between the two are
1) Kerry would have voted to give the president authority to go to war if necessary, but if he was commander in chief would not have actually gone to war because we had weapons inspectors on the ground and force wasn't necessary.
2) Now that Dubya has gotten us into a royal mess, Kerry would tell the American people the truth about the situation in Iraq, rather than painting some rosy picture for us, and do what is necessary to stabalize things there.
3) Since most of the rest of the world is pissed off at us, because Dubya basically told the UN to go fuck itself ("you're going to be irrelevant" were the exact words) we need a new commander in chief with new credibility to go to our allies and get them to help shoulder some of the military and financial burden of rebuilding Iraq.
Most of our allies know that the right thing to do is to send troops and money into Iraq, because a stable middle east benefits them as well, but they don't want to do anything to help Bush get re-elected after the way he tried to bully them before. So a change in the Oval Office is necessary to get help from our allies.
Any more questions?
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