I think that Iraq was on Mr. Bush's mind the day he took office. On day one he put a target on Saddam's head and was ready to use any excuse to finish his daddy's job.
His father, however, knew the consequences of a march on Bahgdad. That is why we stopped short of Saddam in 91, we had a clean victory and Sr. quit while he was ahead.
Jr., however, wanted blood. He was convinced that Saddam would one day become the next great tyrant. Like Johnson in 64, Bush was ready to pounce at the first sign of any aggression. The perfect reason to declare open-ended war fell into his lap on an early September Monday morning.
It has been reported that just hours after the planes hit Bush was heard asking his advisors if Iraq was involved. He was asking very leading questions of his advisors, including donald rumsfeld, who both wanted to pin 9/11 on Saddam before the towers even hit the ground.
But some would say they were smart, they went for the easy win first. They needed to prove to the public that America could lead a successful nation-building war. Of course I wouldn't call Afghanistan rebuilt when 95% of their economy is from the sale of opiates (I am against prohibition, but Bush isn't). Even today, after the supposed elections and overthrow of the taliban, the only way an afghan woman can make any kind of living is to work in the opium fields.
We all saw the buildup for war. He and his messengers (condie, rumsfeld, right wing puppet congressmen) had us all believing that we were about to be nuked. The sad thing is that the public at large bought right into it. I must say he even got me wondering just what Mr. Saddam had up his sleeve. I suppose that's why I was rather exited to watch the war on tv, I just wanted to see what this guy had. I watched the sabre rattling in the weeks leading up to 'shock and awe'. It was entertaining to watch these two morons square off. I thought Saddam would have had more of a back bone though. I expected to see a tienemen square scene in Bahgdad, but right away I could tell once we entered the capitol that something was wrong.
If Bush had been right, I have no doubt that Saddam would have used those weapons on American soldiers. But they never existed. Just like the second attack at the gulf of Tonkin. It never happened. LBJ however did not lie himself, rather his advisors lied to him. True, Johnson was willing and ready to pounce should a tit-for-tat opportunity present itself. He believed the second attack on a stranded US cruiser was just such an opportunity. His advisors knew of his willingness to declare war and fed him intel that would lead him in that direction. LBJ wanted to look strong on defense and strong against communism going into a tough 1964 election. He knew that he would be judged to the standard of 'what would JFK have done?' in the public eye. Once he had blindly accepted the attack as truth and declared war, it wasn't long before the conflict spiraled out of his control. "For all I know, they're shooting at whales" Johnson said the next year about the war that was now out of his control.
The rhetoric leading up to Iraq was different. The intel was 'misread' by everyone in the administration, so either everyone is lying or everyone is that dumb. I think they were seeing what they wanted to see. As soon as any intel came across that would give a glimmer of hope to uniting the country behind a war surfaced, they took it as fact because they wanted to. It suited their political end.