The leading candidate for the Republican nomination for President of the United States is George Bush, Junior, Governor of Texas and the son of former president George Bush.
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Therefore, we have a right to ask him about the sins of his father.
The reason why George Bush was considered a weak president and the reason why history will not speak kindly of President George Bush was due to one horrible error which President Bush made. He let Saddam Hussein off the hook.
Because of this, millions have died. Because of this, the world has remained on the brink of war and nuclear holocaust ever since.
Yet, George Bush remains unrepentant. George Bush still maintains that he did the right thing by allowing Saddam Hussein to remain in power. He has said so again and again in commentary pieces he has had published ever since.
During the 1990-1991 Gulf War, Saddam Hussein posted his entire military force either in Kuwait or on the border between Kuwait and Iraq. Saddam Hussein did not leave any military force behind to protect Baghdad.
Saddam Hussein apparently for some unknown reason believed that his army would defeat the United States Army. "It will be the mother of all battles," Saddam Hussein said. The US military would never get past the forces he had amassed at the border, and therefore it was unnecessary to protect Baghdad is what Saddam Hussein believed.
This proved to be an error. Saddam Hussein apparently thought that the US forces would be restricted to using the main roads. He did not think about the fact that Iraq also has a long desert border with Saudi Arabia. No roads are there. Only barren trackless desert, desert which almost no man can cross.
Unless that man is equipped with tanks and armored personnel carriers, that is.
The US Army streamed right across the border between Saudi Arabia and Iraq, almost ignoring Kuwait, and entering the heartland of Iraq without opposition. Within hours, the Iraqi Army was outflanked, surrounded and literally crushed.
Crushed because, in addition to going around and behind the Army of Saddam Hussein, the US forces also drive right over top of them. The Iraqi Army was hunkered down in foxholes along the border. The US tanks drove right over top of them, crushing them and burying them alive.
Only a few hours after Operation Desert Storm had started, the US Army was 30 miles from Baghdad. There was no military force at all between the US Army and Baghdad. The only army Saddam Hussein still had was far from Baghdad and still on the border with Kuwait. The US Army had only to walk into Baghdad and take over. Not a shot would have been fired. There was nobody to stop them.
What did President George Bush, out great and fearless leader, do? What orders did he issue at this great turning point, this watershed in history?
President George Bush told the US forces to stop. "Withdraw from Iraq", was the order which came down from President George Bush. "We do not want to destabilize the regime of Saddam Hussein", said out fearless President.
US military leaders were stunned. We had won the war. It is true that few American lives had been lost in the war, even though tens of thousands of Iraqis had been killed. But what was the point of fighting the war if we were going to hand the victory back to Saddam Hussein?
However, the central point of the US Military command structure is that orders must be obeyed without question. The generals expect that their troops will obey their orders. By the same measure, the generals must also obey the orders given by their Commander in Chief, President George Bush.
The top military commanders, including General Norman Schwartzkoff and General Colin Powell, have ever since been repeatedly asked about this. "Why would you obey such a stupid order. Don't you have a mind of your own? You were in actual charge of the US Military, not that idiot who happened to be sitting in the White House. Why did not you just ignore the words of that fool and take Baghdad and kill Saddam Hussein or place him in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City?"
Their answer has been, and quite correctly, that President George Bush was their commander-in-chief, and the orders of the boss must be obeyed.
We are now faced with the prospect of another Bush presidency. Is it not time that George Bush Junior was asked some hard questions about this scandalous episode in his father's presidency?
Sam Sloan