Did Rumsfeld Lie?

[Tony]

Rumsfeld claimed that he never said he knew where WMD's were.


http://www.defenselink.mil/transcripts/2003/t03302003_t0330sdabcsteph.html

Here is a transcript of the entire interview, for those that want to read it. Here is the relevant data:

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Finally, weapons of mass destruction. Key goal of the military campaign is finding those weapons of mass destruction. None have been found yet. There was a raid on the Answar Al-Islam Camp up in the north last night. A lot of people expected to find ricin there. None was found. How big of a problem is that? And is it curious to you that given how much control U.S. and coalition forces now have in the country, they haven't found any weapons of mass destruction?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Not at all. If you think -- let me take that, both pieces -- the area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat.

What else do you expect from the most propagandistic administration in US History? Facts are irrelevant, it's all about "staying on message" and this message is "Bush/intellijunt deesine/christians/amerika, good. Freedom/libruls/thinking for yourself, bad". It's amazing how many self described "skeptics" still swallow that excrement.

 

[Tricky]

Perhaps he didn't lie about knowing where they were. That's a little iffy. But he said they existed. Even with weasel words, he can't escape the recordings on file of him declaring that Iraq had WMDs. If he issued qualifiers, they were quiet and puny and so were inconsequential.

Of course, there is also the possibility that he believed they existed. A person can be mistaken without being a liar (something I have told to those trying to spring the religious trap of "liar, lunatic, lord" on me.)

But if he isn't a liar, then he is incompetent. Frankly, I'd prefer a liar.

 

[peptoabysmal]

You didn't include this from Rummy's response:

I would also add, we saw from the air that there were dozens of trucks that went into that facility after the existence of it became public in the press and they moved things out. They dispersed them and took them away. So there may be nothing left. I don't know that. But it's way too soon to know. The exploitation is just starting.

It is clear that Rumsfield believes there is something there.

This site was suspected of producing ricin, something that Saddam and Bin Laden both had a deep affection for (and the KGB used).

This, to me, is a lot scarier than anything Rumsfeld has said:

As described in a lengthy report released Friday at the Pentagon, Iraqi documents captured by U.S. troops say the Russians collected information about U.S. troop movements and battle plans at the outset of the invasion by tapping sources inside the American military. And they say the intelligence was passed to Saddam.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11995121/

Russia tied to Iraq's missing arms

Is it possible that the most embarrassing thing for this administration is that the Russians made fools of us? It offers a better explanation of the missing WMD than any other I've heard. There is at least one definite case of missing WMD from Iraq, the known quantities of HMX and RDX has gone missing from al Qaqaa according to the UN. (Remember, Kerry made an issue of it in his campaign?) Do you believe the "explanation" that 300 tons of power was taken by looters?

Photos point to removal of weapons

edited to add: technically HMX and RDX are MMD, but have little other use than in thermonuclear wepons.

 

[Art Vandelay]

It's funny how you bushites think that Rummy is talking about something else when answering a question about WMD's. Oh well, whatever keeps your heros on a pedestal.

Rumsfeld was asked about the areas the coalition controlled not having WMD. He answered by implying that the areas where he expected to find WMDs were elsewhere, and saying that he knew WHERE THE AREAS WHERE HE EXPECTED TO FIND WMDs are. Apparently, a "bushite" is anyone who doesn't believe every single accusation, no matter how absurd. Do you believe that Hitler invented Tay Sachs disease? If not, I'm going to call you a Hitlerite.

The fact is, this just shows how stupid and/or dishonest the liberals are. Now that the war isn't going as well as hoped, they're all claiming that they were against it from the start. Then, when people ask why they voted for it, they have to come up with an excuse. They were lied to! They never would have voted for it if they had known the truth! Let's think about this for a minue. Let's say you're a liberal senator. Your president comes to you saying that you should vote to start a war. You are opposed to it, except that he says the country has WMDs. That's the ONLY REASON you would vote for it. Without that reason, you are VEHEMENTLY opposed to this war. Aren't you going to make absolutely sure that the president is on the record saying that he knows where the WMD are? If his Secretary of Defense says that he knows where "they" are, aren't you going to INSIST that he restate his claim WITHOUT pronouns, so that it's COMPLETELY CLEAR what he's claiming? Even if you think it's clear what he's saying, should you make ABSOLUTELY SURE?

These are LAWYERS we are talking about! Their entire livelihood is words. They deal with meaning and ambiguities for a living. And they can't even figure out that there's more than one way to interpret a pronoun? Puh-leeze. Either they are complete idiots, or they deliberately avoided getting a clear answer so that afterwards they could say "Gee whiz, we had no idea it could mean anything but this!"

 

[jj]

I wish you luck in this, and perhaps Clause will help by once again trying to change the subject to...well, to anything other than Rumsfeld.

Two points:
1) It is not "argumentum ad populum" to ask what the common understanding of the language somebody uses is.

2) I'll be a substitute (would that be sanity) Claus and change the subject now:

ROVE
discuss

 

[thaiboxerken]

Not only did the Bush administration say that the knew that Saddam has WMD's, they even described the weapons and the capabilities. Liberals aren't saying that they were opposed to the war all along. However, without the WMD claim and the implications that Saddam had ties with Al Queda and the 9/11 attacks, there would've never been support for the war from the left.

 

[thaiboxerken]

If his Secretary of Defense says that he knows where "they" are, aren't you going to INSIST that he restate his claim WITHOUT pronouns, so that it's COMPLETELY CLEAR what he's claiming?

I don't know why the interviewer didn't ask him to clear that up. It's pretty obvious that "they" refers to WMDs, since the sentence before he is talking about WMDs and the question he is answering is about where WMDs are.

The majority of people understand that he is claiming to know where the WMDs are, although he is giving an understandably vague location for them.

 

[headscratcher4]

It all depends on what the definition of "is" is.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Such semantic nonsense didn't work on conservatives when Clinton used them, yet... hmmm.

 

[Ziggurat]

The majority of people understand that he is claiming to know where the WMDs are, although he is giving an understandably vague location for them.

The majority of people have not read Rumsfeld's entire response (how do I know that? Because nobody ever quotes his whole response, including you). Why are we supposed to assume majority opinion is accurate in a case when the majority base their conclusions on incomplete data?

But you knew that. You knew you were posting incomplete data, because I already told you that cropping his response created a false impression, and rather than have the honesty to let people decide for themselves how to interpret his whole response, you continue with selective quoting. Why would that be? Why wouldn't you want other posters to see his whole response and judge for themselves? And you want to criticize someone else's honesty? You're pathetic.

So since you can't be bothered with even a little bit of intellectual honesty, here's the WHOLE question and response. I am removing paragraph breaks in Rumsfeld's response, because this was a spoken (not written) reply and I think they create a false impression. But I'm TELLING you that, so you can judge yourself. That's called being honest in a debate. Try it sometime.

MR. STEPHANOPOULOS: Finally, weapons of mass destruction. Key goal of the military campaign is finding those weapons of mass destruction. None have been found yet. There was a raid on the Answar Al-Islam Camp up in the north last night. A lot of people expected to find ricin there. None was found. How big of a problem is that? And is it curious to you that given how much control U.S. and coalition forces now have in the country, they haven't found any weapons of mass destruction?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Not at all. If you think -- let me take that, both pieces -- the area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat. Second, the [audio glitch] facilities, there are dozens of them, it's a large geographic area. It is the -- Answar Al-Islam group has killed a lot of Kurds. They are tough. And our forces are currently in there with the Kurdish forces, cleaning the area out, tracking them down, killing them or capturing them and they will then begin the site exploitation. The idea, from your question, that you can attack that place and exploit it and find out what's there in fifteen minutes. I would also add, we saw from the air that there were dozens of trucks that went into that facility after the existence of it became public in the press and they moved things out. They dispersed them and took them away. So there may be nothing left. I don't know that. But it's way too soon to know. The exploitation is just starting.

[audio glitch] is subsequently transcribed as "criminal".

Now, let me engage in a little highlighting of my own:

SEC. RUMSFELD: Not at all. If you think -- let me take that, both pieces -- the area in the south and the west and the north that coalition forces control is substantial. It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed. We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat. Second, the [audio glitch] facilities, there are dozens of them, it's a large geographic area.

This statement can be read as the bolded sections all refering to the same thing: areas where WMD's were though to have been kept, not the WMD's themselves. Follow that up with Rumsfeld's explicit statement that the WMD's may have already been removed from those places, and there's absolutely no inconsistency between his initial statement and his recent response to McGovern. Ergo, no reason to conclude that Rumsfeld lied in his response to McGovern.

You were wrong before, you couldn't defend your claim, and starting a new thread isn't going to make you right.

 

[thaiboxerken]

THe majority opinion IN THIS POLL. No wonder you have problems seeing that Rummy claimed to know where WMDs were.

It's funny how you have to merge paragraphs to try to make it seem as if Rummy is talking about criminal facilities and not WMD's. Also, Rummy "knew" that the crimina facilities were were the WMD's were kept. It's the same thing as claiming knowledge of where the WMD's are.

Alas, no WMD's were found.. nor was there any evidence that they existed or were produced.

Strange, the justifications for Bush's war on Iraq haven't panned out. There were no ties to Al Queda and no WMD's.

 

[Jocko]

Strange, the justifications for Bush's war on Iraq haven't panned out. There were no ties to Al Queda and no WMD's.

You're only half right, Ken. Wanna guess which half?

 

[Ziggurat]

I don't know why the interviewer didn't ask him to clear that up. It's pretty obvious that "they" refers to WMDs, since the sentence before he is talking about WMDs and the question he is answering is about where WMDs are.

Time for another reading lesson. Stephanopoulos isn't asking where the WMD's are, he's asking why they haven't been found. And Rumsfeld's answer STARTS by talking about AREAS. The sentence you refer to is this one:

"It happens not to be the area where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed."

Let's do that little thing we call parsing. What's the subject of the sentence? "It". What does "It" refer to? It refers to something mentioned in the sentence before that, namely the area coalition forces control. So the subject is an area. What's the verb? "be", or more broadly "not to be". What's the object? "the area". The object of the sentence is modified by a conjunction "where weapons of mass destruction were dispersed". But the conjunction modifies "area", not the other way around. So it's inaccurate to say that the sentence is about WMD's. It is about areas, with WMD's serving only as a (past tense) modifier for one of those areas. You will get spanked repeatedly on parsing until you learn how to do it yourself.

Furthermore, the sentence immediately FOLLOWING what you claim is Rumsfeld's lie ("Second, the [audio glitch] facilities, there are dozens of them, it's a large geographic area.") Is EXCLUSIVELY about areas (or facilities, if you prefer), and makes no mention of WMD's at all. If you want to talk merely about proximity of the sentence in question to other words and terms, you still lose.

 

[Ziggurat]

It's funny how you have to merge paragraphs to try to make it seem as if Rummy is talking about criminal facilities and not WMD's.

I merge paragraphs that were created arbitrarily in the first bloody place, but TOLD you about it. You, on the other hand, actually CUT most of Rumsfeld's response completely without mentioning that sordid little detail. You really think you've got the upper hand? How stupid do you think I am? As stupid as you are?

Also, Rummy "knew" that the crimina facilities were were the WMD's were kept. It's the same thing as claiming knowledge of where the WMD's are.

Pop quiz time: what's the difference between "were" and "are"?

TENSE!

Rumsfeld claimed knowlege of where they had once been. He claimed no knowledge, and specifically stated he did NOT have any such knowledge (funny, but you cut that part, wonder why?), of where the alleged WMD's were at the time of the interview. Like I said, you're going to get schooled repeatedly until you improve your reading skills to at least tell the difference between past and future tenses. Jeeze, what the hell do they teach kids these days?

 

[thaiboxerken]

You're only half right, Ken. Wanna guess which half?

Both.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Pop quiz time: what's the difference between "were" and "are"?

TENSE!

Rumsfeld claimed knowlege of where they had once been

We know where they are. - Rummy

 

[Jocko]

Both.

Okay, let's add remedial math to remedial grammar and remedial logical thought. You're gonna have a very full summer school schedule, Ken.

Are you really saying that you believe there was no connection between AQ and Iraq? I just wanna make sure we're clear on this point.

 

[Jocko]

We know where they are. - Rummy

*Sigh*. You're talking about facilities again, Ken. Check the transcript, please.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Almost 70% of the people in the poll disagree. I think most of those polled speak and understand english.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Are you really saying that you believe there was no connection between AQ and Iraq?

Saddam and AQ, no.