Posted on 01/10/2005 7:29:30 AM PST by areafiftyone
VATICAN CITY - The Italian cardinal sent by Pope John Paul (news - web sites) II last year to try to dissuade President Bush (news - web sites) from invading Iraq (news - web sites) said Monday the president promised that the U.S. operation would be "quick."
Cardinal Pio Laghi visited Bush at the White House on March 5, 2003, to relay the pope's position that dialogue, not arms, should be used to resolve the crisis over Iraq, which the United States accused of harboring weapons of mass destruction.
"When I went to Washington as the pope's envoy just before the outbreak of the war in Iraq, he (Bush) told me: `Don't worry, your eminence. We'll be quick and do well in Iraq,'" Laghi told Italian Catholic TV station Telepace, which was broadcasting the pontiff's annual address to diplomats.
When the United States went to war in Iraq, Laghi called the attack on Baghdad "tragic and unacceptable."
"Unfortunately, the facts have demonstrated afterward that things took a different course — not rapid and not favorable," the prelate told Telepace. "Bush was wrong."
Laghi was the Vatican (news - web sites)'s first envoy to Washington in the 1980s and established a friendship with Bush's father, former President George H.W. Bush.
Amen to that, brother.
Poor Mr. Bush. He makes so many people miserable. Hah!
I love it! Even if it's the Vatican - even though the pope is a rock.
Next!
Tack a 'd' onto intereste.
done
"You seriously think that we are fighting something in Germany/Japan?"
Read my post again and see if you can find where I wrote that we are fighting something in Germany/Japan.
In 177 you said we were fighting off werewolves. The "werewolves" were my ironic suggestion (168), because, of course, all werewolf activity in Germany stopped decades ago. In fact, it appears that there was none of that by 1947, if not 1946.
Whatever reasons we have today for staying in Germany and Japan are not analogous to our staying in Iraq, because in Iraq we do face insurgents.
At issue on this thread is the time it takes for us to pacify Iraq. The clock is still ticking on that one because Iraq is not peaceful. When our presence in Iraq becomes comparable to our presence in Germany or Japan, we will be able to say how long the Iraqi war lasted. But it surely did not last 30 days as was originally suggested, so Vatican's concerns are legitimate.
"In 177 you said we were fighting off werewolves."
No I did not. Read it again.
The president did not break his promise, his prediction was just wrong. For the cardinal to interpret what Bush told him about it being quick and the US would do well as a "promise," is ludicrous. The cardinal is a grump.
177, in its entirety
"Fighting werewolves?"
Keeping them away and doing a darn good job of it, too.
BTTT!
Right.
Keeping away is not fighting, keeping away is keeping away.
Are there any werewolves in Germany? No. Ergo, we must be doing a good job of keeping them away.
See #130.
That's an excellent point. One question I've always asked myself is this: If there was an Iraqi connection to Oklahoma City (as Jayne Davis and David Schippers have alleged), then why the hell has this administration refused to openly acknowledge it?
Don't know about you, but if I see the same relationship between the Iraqi government, Iraqi populace, and our troops, as I see between the German government, German populace and our troops, I would say the Iraqi war is over.
I don't care if you say the Iraq is over or not.
The feeling is entirely mutual, but I post for the benefit of the readers of the thread.
I am sure they all hang on your every word.
Why did this administration refuse to follow up on the thievery and vandalism created by the Clintons and their gang when they trashed the White House?
Strange things.
I think there is a kind of cameraderie among political figures. They go after each other in the public area, but really have some kind of personal esprit 'd corps among themselves that leads them in many cases to cover the foibles of their opponents. I think the Repubs are more guilty of this than the Dems.
US took the primary role, but we were not the only ones patrolling.
"Was it just a remarkable coincidence that Kofi Annan ordered Bill Clinton to launch missile strikes against Iraq in December 1998 just as the U.S. House of Representatives was convening to vote on those articles of impeachment?"
Hmmmmm. . .do you have documentation of the claim that Kofi 'ordered' Clinton to do so?
That's what the /sarcasm/ tag was all about. You were the one who claimed that it was the UN, not the United States, that was engaged in "military action" against Iraq in the 1990s.
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