Salt Lake Tribune - Why we're there (Not good, Mr. President)

This ran in today's Salt Lake Tribune and is the 'official' opinion of the newspaper and its staff.

Why we're there

If American soldiers think they are in Iraq to avenge the attacks of 9-11, blame their commander in chief.
President Bush has repeatedly confused the war on terror with the war on Iraq. In his public statements, he has often linked Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, even though no solid evidence of collaboration between the two prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq has surfaced.


So if Americans in general and American troops in particular are mistaken in their belief that Iraqis participated in the attacks of 9-11, or that Saddam Hussein plotted with Osama bin Laden, it is probably because their president has fostered their confusion.
American troops thundered into battle a year ago with the cry "Let's roll" on their lips, a tribute to the passengers in an airliner who defied their hijackers in the skies over Pennsylvania on 9-11.

American forces flew Stars and Stripes that had fluttered over the World Trade Center site as they raced north toward Baghdad.
Those symbols were useful tools to promote American fighting spirit, but they were misplaced. Iraqis were not the terrorists of 9-11.

The coalition forces are in Iraq ostensibly to liberate the Iraqi people. American soldiers cannot do that if they believe that they are in Iraq to take vengeance for 9-11. That mistaken attitude also could contribute to the kind of contempt and dehumanizing that would allow American troops to abuse Iraqi prisoners.

MORE HERE:
http://www.sltrib.com/2004/May/05172004/opinion/opinion.asp

Forgot all about that.

Have to get right on it.



http://www.wgoeshome.com

Where were you in February of 2003 when this message might have done some good?

What's the Salt Lake Tribune's editoral board's ideological stance?

They've attacked Bush since I can remember and their cartoons really don't favor to Bush. But they've had some conservative streaks as well.