from: [Eric LC]
to: [Mark Wright]
date: Jan 3, 2023, 2:17 PM
subject: 20th anniversary of OIF is an opportunity to set the record straight
Mr. Wright and National Review,
I clarify the Iraq issue at Operation Iraqi Freedom FAQ by organizing the primary source authorities, i.e., the set of controlling law, policy, and precedent and determinative facts that define OIF's justification, to lay a proper foundation and correct for the prevalent conjecture, distorted context, and misinformation that have obfuscated the Iraq issue.
I am writing to advocate for the distinctive opportunity of the landmark 20th anniversary of Operation Iraqi Freedom to displace the prevailing false narrative and clarify OIF's justification to the public. It's likely the last realistic chance to set the record straight.
The 20th anniversary of OIF is only two months away. I hope you and other like-minded public expert authorities rally to this singular opportunity to correct the endemic conjecture, distorted context, and misinformation that have obfuscated the Iraq issue to the public.
The need for the public correction is more urgent than a dry reexamination of dusty history. It's a pivotal live matter of 'What's past is prologue'.
For example, recall that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov cited the prevailing false narrative of OIF as a keystone premise at the United Nations https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/09/1127881. When illiberal competitors like Russia and China promote an alternative international order that's inimical to American leadership of the free world, they're empowered at premise by [American] experts' misconceptions of OIF.
For example, the critical themes of FM Lavrov's speech mesh with the fundamental misconception of the Iraq intervention featured in University of Portland professor Jeffrey Meiser's "Introducing Liberalism in International Relations Theory", which I criticize at https://operationiraqifreedomfaq.blogspot.com/2022/08/clarification-of-iraq-issue-in-jeffrey-meiser-introducing-liberalism-in-international-relations-theory.html ...
...
Again, I hope you and other like-minded public expert authorities take up the distinctive opportunity of the landmark 20th anniversary of OIF to displace the prevailing false narrative and clarify OIF's justification to the public.
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from: [Eric LC]
to: [Mark Wright]
date: Jan 18, 2023, 11:08 PM
subject: Re: 20th anniversary of OIF is an opportunity to set the record straight
Mr. Wright,
To answer your question, I'm interested in displacing the prevailing false narrative and clarifying OIF's justification by realigning the Iraq issue with its primary sources: the bedrock law, policy, precedent, and facts that define the Iraq issue. That's my goal for the 20th anniversary of OIF.
Once OIF's justification is clarified to the public, I'm interested in holding to account every American expert -- every leader and pundit -- who's distorted the Iraq issue and speciously stigmatized the correctly decided, vital, paradigmatic mission with Iraq.
Once OIF's justification is clarified to the public and the expert fabulists are discredited, I'm interested in curing the harm they've caused with the false narrative, which has festered and metastasized as a pivotal premise of US policy and politics for two decades.
The way to achieve my goal for the 20th anniversary of OIF is to work with you to realign the Iraq issue with its primary sources as the universal foundation for all of National Review's commentary on OIF. Also, work with you to identify widely accepted yet false key premises, so your writers can correct them and stop being misled by them.
As far as submitting a rebuttal of the conventional wisdom, I could: see the selection at my Critical responses to leaders and pundits page and more in my Expanded list of responses to leaders, pundits, and other media. Tell me what you like. (Forewarned: I've correctively criticized several NR articles that have misrepresented the Iraq issue.)
But that wouldn't achieve my goal, which requires collective solidarity across National Review's commentary clarifying OIF's justification for the public.
---------------
from: [Eric LC]
to: [Mark Wright]
date: Jan 21, 2023, 7:41 PM
subject: Submission idea Re: 20th anniversary of OIF is an opportunity to set the record straight
Mr. Wright,
Before I share my submission idea, I reiterate from my 18JAN23 reply:
The way to achieve my goal for the 20th anniversary of OIF is to work with you to realign the Iraq issue with its primary sources as the universal foundation for all of National Review's commentary on OIF. Also, work with you to identify widely accepted yet false key premises, so your writers can correct them and stop being misled by them.
To that I'll add, no matter whether you and I work together in a communicative manner, regardless of whether I ever hear from you again, the OIF FAQ is available to you, your colleagues, and writers as a substantive corrective resource -- This is why the OIF FAQ exists.
My submission idea:
Yesterday, YouTube pushed to me the viral video of Mike Prysner's September 2021 ambush of President Bush https://youtu.be/ALYPqniYssM. It was reposted last month on Christmas Eve. Prysner's points insofar as OIF's justification are clarified by the OIF FAQ answer to "Did Bush lie his way to war with Iraq" and explanation of the link between 9/11 and OIF in my 10th anniversary post.
My idea is not a rebuttal addressed to Prysner's presumably scripted outburst. Rather, the video recalled this passage:
[T]he politics of war take a backseat for soldiers while they're engrossed with the tasks, conditions, and standards of the mission at hand, and keeping their men, their buddies, and themselves sound. But the why and the outcome of the war matter very much to veterans when they reflect on their experiences, contextualize them in narrative form, and weigh the consequences for their own lives, their families, their comrades, their country, the people over there, and the world.The idea, simply, is to set the record straight with the OIF FAQ's corrective content for the sake of Iraq veterans, including Prysner. As a veteran yourself, you could help finetune the idea.
What categorically separates 'good' wars from 'bad' wars is the prevailing narrative of the why and outcome. While the wars viewed as honorable in the zeitgeist are just as harsh in their ground and personal effects as the wars viewed as dishonorable, the prevailing narrative sets the contextual frame that colors the social value of a veteran's military service. For that reason, it's critical for the sake of Iraq veterans to correct the political distortions of the law and policy, fact basis or justification — the why — of Operation Iraqi Freedom, more so since the long-term outcome of their mission has been thrown off track. Setting the record straight in the zeitgeist is most important for the young children of our KIA in Iraq who will only ever know their father or mother through the prism of the cultural legacy of the Iraq War.
That said, I haven't decided that I'll submit an article that wouldn't be sufficient to achieve my goal for the 20th anniversary of OIF. Only that watching the Prysner video recalled a passage that suggests an idea I could be persuaded to write on.
---------------
from: [Eric LC]
to: [Mark Wright]
date: Feb 11, 2023, 1:20 PM
subject: Clarify the Iraq WMD issue for National Review's writers and readers
Mr. Wright,
To recall our 18JAN23 e-mail exchange, my interest in reaching out to you and National Review about the 20th anniversary of Operation Iraqi Freedom is to provide the OIF FAQ as a corrective resource and to work with you to relay a proper foundation for the Iraq issue with its primary sources, i.e., the controlling law, policy, precedent and determinative facts that define OIF's actual justification. This basic step is necessary for NR writers to correct the conventional wisdom, as you call it, which has distorted the Iraq issue with demonstrably false premises.
The Iraq WMD issue is only one part of the overall Iraq issue that has been distorted in the political discourse. But it is a main focus of the prevailing false narrative of OIF and therefore a useful starting point for setting the record straight.
To clarify, the Saddam regime's guilt on WMD was presumed in UNSCR 687 by the United Nations Security Council, decided in UNSCR 1441 by the UNSC, established as baseline fact by UNSCOM, confirmed by UNMOVIC for the procedural trigger for OIF, and corroborated ex post by the Iraq Survey Group. The determinative fact finding by UNMOVIC, ex post fact finding by ISG, and Operation Avarice are altogether rife with UNSCR 687 WMD violations.
Based on the Iraq WMD issue alone, the President's determination on Iraq was correct: Saddam was clearly guilty on WMD. We know now that at the decision point of Iraq's "final opportunity to comply" (UNSCR 1441) with its Gulf War ceasefire disarmament obligations, the Saddam regime did not disarm, never intended to disarm, always intended to rearm, and possessed an active WMD reconstitution program in violation of UNSCR 687.
Of course, Saddam's WMD threat was not weighed alone. Per the President and Congress, the unresolved standing threat of Iraq's UNSCR 687 WMD violations was assessed in combination with the unresolved standing threat of Saddam's UNSCR 687 terrorism violations, which were a procedural trigger for OIF in their own right.
Among Iraq's UNSCR 687 WMD violations, the Iraq Survey Group found ready covert terrorism-level biological and chemical WMD capability in the Iraqi intelligence services, which also managed Saddam's terrorism. At the same time, the Iraqi Perspectives Project, which conducted the post-war investigation of Saddam's terrorism, found that Saddam's "regional and global terrorism" (IPP), which included "considerable operational overlap" (IPP) with the al Qaeda network, was substantially greater than analysts thought before OIF. (Note: The substantial pre-war underestimation of Saddam's terrorism, relationship to al Qaeda, and corruption of Iraqi society explains why the initial post-war plan, otherwise credible, proved inadequate and the OIF peace operations were caught off guard by the Saddamist insurgency until the COIN adjustment.)
Yet in spite of Saddam's clear guilt on WMD, the common belief, validated by fundamentally misleading official sources such as the Silberman-Robb WMD Commission and CIA WMD retrospective, is that Iraq was wrongly accused of WMD and exonerated by UNMOVIC and/or ISG.
That belief is demonstrably incorrect on the law and facts and impractical vis-à-vis the UNSCR 687 disarmament process.
The belief is based on the false premise that the Iraq WMD issue pivoted on whether UNMOVIC and/or ISG proved that the pre-war intelligence estimates were predictively precise. In fact, the pre-war intelligence estimates—which were mainly based on the UNSCOM fact record in the first place—were not an element of the UNSCR 678-based casus belli, and there was no burden of proof on the UNSCR 678 enforcers. The Iraq WMD issue pivoted on whether the Saddam regime met its burden to prove "full and immediate compliance by Iraq without conditions or restrictions with its obligations under resolution 687 (1991) and other relevant resolutions and recalling that the resolutions of the Council constitute the governing standard of Iraqi compliance" (UNSCR 1441). The pre-war intelligence estimates did not constitute the governing standard of Iraqi compliance.
Practically speaking, the UNSCR 687 disarmament process was designed to verify whether Iraq accounted for all UNSCR 687-proscribed items and activities and presented all of it to UNSCOM/UNMOVIC and IAEA for elimination under international supervision pursuant to UNSCR 687, which Iraq never did. The UNSCR 687 disarmament process was not designed to prove the predictive precision of pre-war intelligence estimates like a crime-scene forensic investigation. Neither were the OIF invasion and occupation designed to implement the forensic conditions required for ISG to prove the predictive precision of pre-war intelligence estimates.
In effect, Iraqi counterintelligence had a long, practically free hand to rid evidence before and even during the Iraq Survey Group's investigation. According to ISG, the Iraqis used it. As David Kay reported to the Senate Armed Services Committee on January 28, 2004, "at the end of the work of the [Iraq Survey Group] there's still going to be an unresolvable ambiguity about what happened. A lot of that traces to the failure on April 9 to establish immediately physical security in Iraq -- the unparalleled looting and destruction, a lot of which was directly intentional, designed by the security services to cover the tracks of the Iraq WMD program and their other programs as well, a lot of which was what we simply called Ali Baba looting." (Notice Kay's inference that much, perhaps most, of the evidence was rid by Iraqi counterintelligence after the regime change.)
Even so, the Iraq Survey Group found a great deal of evidence of an active WMD program in violation of UNSCR 687, irrespective of the pre-war intelligence estimates. Yet what ISG found was only the scraps left over after Iraqi counterintelligence "sanitized" (ISG) presumably higher-value WMD evidence. Given the heavily qualified nature of its non-findings, ISG can't know the actual extent that the Saddam regime retained and reconstituted its WMD. As "extensive" (ISG) as they are, ISG's findings are correctly read as a floor only, not a complete account of Saddam's WMD.
For more depth and detail, the OIF FAQ base post clarifies the Iraq WMD issue and the overall Iraq issue in their operative context, i.e., the enforcement of the Gulf War ceasefire "governing standard [of] Iraqi compliance" (UNSCR 1441) per the 1991 and 2002 AUMFs pursuant to UNSCR 678.
For links to the law, policy, precedent, and fact findings that define OIF's justification, see the further reading section of the OIF FAQ base post. For exposition with samples and links, go here for the casus belli, here for UNSCOM/UNMOVIC and IAEA's fact record, here for the Iraq Survey Group's ex post investigation, here for the Iraq nuclear issue, here for the link between 9/11 and Iraq, here for the Iraqi Perspectives Project's terrorism findings, and here for the Saddam regime's human rights violations, which are sections of the OIF FAQ's 10th anniversary retrospective survey.
Critical feedback and questions are welcome.
from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Jan 13, 2023, 11:16 AM
subject: Re: 20th anniversary of OIF is an opportunity to set the record straight
Senator Lieberman,
Now that we're down to two months from the 20th anniversary of Operation Iraqi Freedom, I'm checking in with you again on the singular opportunity to displace the prevailing false narrative and set the record straight on Iraq. I hope AEI's project is developing apace, too.
I'll plug again the OIF FAQ corrective resource for you, AEI, and everyone else with this admin note on my methodology: "The Operation Iraqi Freedom FAQ utilizes issue-rule, fact pattern analysis and adapts the legal standard for primary sources, as opposed to the looser political science standard that allows primary source status for secondary expert sources".
Remember how the normal Republican presidential candidates paved the way for President Trump in 2015-2016 by refusing to "relitigate" (Jeb Bush et al) the Iraq controversy, which discredited GOP-proper and viscerally disgusted the GOP base? Well, the OIF FAQ clarifies the Iraq issue with legal method — in effect relitigating the Iraq controversy. Like the poet said, it's easy if you try.
---------------
from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Jan 18, 2023, 4:06 AM
subject: Re: 20th anniversary of OIF is an opportunity to set the record straight
Senator Lieberman,
Thank you. I hope it's convinced you to seize the singular opportunity of the 20th anniversary to clarify the Iraq issue to the public. And I hope you maximize the OIF FAQ's corrective content for that purpose, which is why it exists.
Not knowing what you read and didn't read, I'll point out that learning the entire OIF FAQ post, which synthesizes the primary sources to relay a proper foundation for the Iraq issue, is the minimum utilization of the OIF FAQ site to clarify the Iraq issue. The kernel of the OIF FAQ post is the answer to "Did Bush lie his way to war with Iraq", which focuses on the substantive aspect, and the answer to "Was Operation Iraqi Freedom legal", which focuses on the procedural aspect of the decision for OIF.
Critical feedback and questions are welcome.
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from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Feb 15, 2023, 9:56 PM
subject: Re: Clarify the Iraq WMD issue for National Review's writers and readers
Senator Lieberman,
Knowing what we know now, you (which is to say, Congress) and the President (Clinton and Bush) were demonstrably right on Iraq in the first place. The landmark 20th anniversary of OIF is a one-time shot, and likely the last realistic chance, to set the record straight. This is why the OIF FAQ exists.
I understand that wholly curing the prevailing false narrative with one bite is improbable. But if the OIF FAQ's corrective content is brought to bear with sufficiency, you should be able to counteract the specious "conventional wisdom" enough to at least reopen the case in the discourse for relitigation. Except this time with the Iraq issue properly realigned at foundation with its defining sources.
For reference, I posted my February 11th e-mail to Mark Wright at https://operationiraqifreedomfaq.blogspot.com/2023/01/20th-anniversary-of-OIF-is-an-opportunity-to-set-the-record-straight.html#wrightiraqwmd.
Note, I criticize the faulty premises of the Silberman-Robb WMD Commission's analysis at part five of https://operationiraqifreedomfaq.blogspot.com/2013/03/10-year-anniversary-start-Operation-Iraqi-Freedom-thoughts.html#intel and the Iraq Survey Group's faulty premises in the pre-sample exposition at https://operationiraqifreedomfaq.blogspot.com/2013/03/10-year-anniversary-start-Operation-Iraqi-Freedom-thoughts.html#duelferreport in my 10th anniversary retrospective post.
The basic flaws of the often-cited 05JAN06 CIA WMD retrospective are essentially the same as the basic flaws of the Silberman-Robb WMD Commission. I criticize "the CIA report is problematic for the Iraq issue because its analysis is fundamentally inapposite and factually suspect" in the first quote-and-comment part of my criticism of Samuel Helfont's 02FEB21 monograph on the Gulf War at https://operationiraqifreedomfaq.blogspot.com/2021/03/comment-on-samuel-helfont-the-gulf-wars-afterlife-dilemmas-missed-opportunities-and-the-post-cold-war-order-undone.html.
The supremacy of the myth that the Saddam regime was wrongly accused and exonerated on the WMD issue is an impressive feat of blatant misinformation against a decade-plus of plainly stated law and fact. Of course, the prevailing false narrative is composed of blatant misinformation throughout, not limited to the Iraq WMD issue.
Critical feedback and questions are welcome.
---------------
from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Feb 19, 2023, 3:21 AM
subject: Know the UK determination for OIF
Senator Lieberman,
The OIF FAQ's main table of sources includes a basic UK section. I recommend the lone work by a non-leader cited in the section, Carl Gardner, whose legal analysis of the British determination for OIF is a good UK-focused counterpart to the US-focused OIF FAQ answer to "Was Operation Iraqi Freedom legal".
Your stature is high enough where your advocacy can resonate in the UK where OIF's justification needs to be clarified at least as much as it needs to be clarified here.
Even if you don't mention the UK determination for OIF, the British perspective is still worth knowing because the US determination for OIF hewed true to the UK criteria for engaging the UN Security Council ahead of OIF. That's notable because the UK criteria for the 2003 determination entailed significantly greater engagement with the UNSC in response to the triggering UNMOVIC Clusters document than the precedential 1998 determination for Operation Desert Fox which reacted immediately to the triggering UNSCOM Butler report.
The UNSC's Gulf War ceasefire enforcers and Saddam's accomplices (Iraq Survey Group: "The [Saddam] Regime’s strategy was successful to the point where sitting members of the Security Council were actively violating the resolutions passed by the Security Council.") lined up the same for ODF in 1998 and OIF in 2003. Understanding what happened between the two factions per the UK criteria in the 10 days between the UNMOVIC Clusters document and determination for OIF is crucial for setting the record straight.
I discuss that period in the OIF FAQ answer to "Did Bush allow enough time for the inspections" and the OIF FAQ's historical context post, and touch on it in the #ultimatumoptions section of the OIF FAQ's 10th anniversary post. Suffice to say, the predominant conception of that 10-day period in the UNSC is a misconception like the rest of the prevailing false narrative of OIF.
When the Iraq issue is clarified, it's as Prime Minister Blair responded to the Chilcot report, "The undermining of the UN was in fact the refusal to follow through on 1441." That's an understatement, e.g[.], see my response to a chilling tweet from UNMOVIC inspector and IISS director, Michael Elleman.
More time wasn't needed for the UNSCR 1441 inspections, which had already gone overtime with the Clusters document. Timewise, Iraq never took the first required step to disarm, a verified total declaration, which was due within 15 days of UNSCR 687's adoption on April 3, 1991. Twelve years later, Saddam's accomplices wanted indefinitely more time to alter the governing standard and procedure from UNSCR 687, UNSCR 1441, etc. to accommodate Saddam's strategy. President Bush obeyed President Clinton's strict warning against that.
Along with my advice to know the UK determination for OIF, I recommend my Rebuttal of Prime Minister Brown's memoir argument against Operation Iraqi Freedom. Its scope approaches my expository posts. Gordon Brown's distortion of the Iraq issue is egregious and slanderously anti-American.
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from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Mar 8, 2023, 10:11 PM
subject: John McCain's "100 years" comment and the US-Iraq Strategic Framework Agreement
Senator Lieberman,
The singular opportunity of the landmark 20th anniversary of OIF to set the record straight on Iraq should be focused on the determination for OIF. However, you may face the question, "Do you think we should still be in Iraq". In my experience, it's a gotcha question that's often a rhetorical gambit from someone who's discomfited by my corrective take on the Iraq intervention.
I'm not put off by the question though. I view it as an opportunity to clarify the Iraq issue at its other end.
At the beginning of 2008, Senator McCain was excoriated for his "100 years" comment in a 03JAN08 New Hampshire town hall. Yet he simply meant he would uphold the basic SOP for American leadership of the free world with Iraq in terms of long-term conditions-based deployment of American forces with a host ally à la Korea, Japan, and Germany.
To that end, at the close of 2008, the US and Iraq adopted the conditions-based Strategic Framework Agreement.
Senator McCain's position should not have been controversial, yet it was harshly attacked by Democrats. Hence, I've hesitated to send you this e-mail. While you ran as an Independent when I volunteered for your Senate campaign in 2006, I understand you caucused with the Democrats until you retired.
When I clarify the Iraq issue at its other end, I criticize the Obama administration's irresponsible exit from Iraq as a contravention of the seminal American commitment to the welfare of the Iraqi people pursuant to UNSCR 688, the US-Iraq SFA, and the cardinal precedent — what was SOP — for American leadership of the free world. I'm infuriated that Obama officials, including President Biden, hold up their profoundly inhumane, still-compounding strategic blunder as a signature achievement.
So, I have a ready answer for "Do you think we should still be in Iraq". I wonder how you'll answer the gotcha question if the rhetorical gambit is used against your advocacy to set the record straight on OIF's justification.
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from: [Eric LC]
to: [Joe Lieberman]
date: Mar 10, 2023, 9:27 AM
subject: Re: John McCain's "100 years" comment and the US-Iraq Strategic Framework Agreement
Senator Lieberman,
I look forward to it. If I can help substantively, let me know.
Reading the transcript at "including President Biden", https://transcripts.cnn.com/show/se/date/2020-03-15/segment/03, it's chilling to recall the Democratic leadership pandering to Senator Sanders's patently false — and critically harmful — take on Iraq. [Notably, in 2008 and 2020, the Democratic leadership sidestepped Senator McCain's principled, strategic reasons for a standard long-term conditions-based deployment of American forces with Iraq by replacing McCain's normal position with a straw man and, mainly, inferring the peace operations with Iraq ought to be cut off because OIF was unjustified in the first place based on the specious assertion that President Bush lied his way to war and Saddam was exonerated.] That's the one that alienated you from the party you faithfully guided for decades over your resolute, principled position on Iraq. You're demonstrably right. They're demonstrably wrong.
Which is not to single out Democrats. Certainly enough Republicans, led by President Trump, are guilty of distorting the Iraq issue to the American public, too. I wish I could have reached out to Senator McCain for the 20th anniversary of OIF the same as I've reached out to you.
I can only recognize this opportunity to rectify the situation. I don't have the public expert authority to actually do it. You do.
See Comments on Joe Lieberman's "20 years on, it’s clear our collective memory of the Iraq War is simply wrong".