Farnaz Fassihi Quotes

The war in Iraq, clearly has not turned out in the way that was hoped.

Faced with the collapse of Iraq into something like Lebanon - or worse, Somalia - the Bush administration opted for a new counterinsurgency strategy. Violence was reduced because, for the first time since the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, Iraqis felt that there was a force capable of dominating the situation and ensuring basic order.

Three years into the war, tens of thousands of American troops remain targets of a growing Iraqi insurgency.

I think the Iraq War is not particularly tailored to American interests.

I have no doubt that our military would decisively defeat Iraq’s forces and remove Saddam. But like the proverbial dog chasing the car down the road, we must consider what we would do after we caught it. I am especially worried about the extreme difficulty of occupying Iraq with its history of autocratic rule, its balkanized ethnic tensions, and its isolated economic system. Our regime might be rejected by the Iraqi people, leading to civil unrest and even anarchy.

We had Iraq contained. They couldn’t hurt their neighbors; they couldn’t hurt us. They would fire at our planes now and then but they never hit anything. They were not involved in 9-11. I advised that a small force could take Iraq, but it would take a huge force to prevent the Sunnies and the Shiites from killing each other….I told that to the Joint Chiefs, but I don’t think they were consulted. The President made the decision.

We have defeated Saddam Hussein and Iraq. The good news is Iraq is ours, and the bad news is Iraq is ours.

The Gulf War was like teenage sex. We got in too soon and out too soon.

Tony Blair took us to war in Iraq on the basis of the supposed threat of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.

When Americans invade Iraq, Bush says, we will be greeted as liberators by the Iraqi people, proving that taking out Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do.

Had the decision belonged to Senator Kerry, Saddam hussein would still be in power today in Iraq. In fact, Saddam Hussein would almost certainly still be in control of Kuwait.

I, not for the first time, would like to say that I never took a pro-Iraq position during the Gulf War.

Once we destroyed the Saddam regime, we knew there was going to be a civil war.

I thought Iraq was the wrong war at the wrong time and have been fighting to get the Administration to stop its failed policy and bring our troops home.

First of all, Saddam did not win the war, even though he says he did, I mean, you know, that's a joke and everybody in the world knows it.

For instance, I was a little surprised that the Shiites didn't rise up against Saddam and the Baath party across most of the country when the Americans moved in March and April of 2003.

I mean, we're going to probably debate the Iraq war for at least as long as I'm alive.

The Gulf War was finished off properly. Make no mistake about it.

While everybody was tremendously impressed with the low cost of the conflict, for the 146 Americans who were killed in action and for their families, it wasn't a cheap war. And the question in my mind is how many additional American casualties is Saddam worth? And the answer is not very damned many

The initial [Iraq] war was won in about 6 weeks, but the peace was lost soon thereafter.

The 2003 invasion of Iraq by U.S. and coalition partners stands as one of the greatest blunders in American history. The Islamic State, also known as ISIL or ISIS, rose out of the the chaos, throwing the region into turmoil that hasn't been equaled since the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

At the end of the day, Iraq was a part of the fight against terrorism.

The war in Iraq was unwinnable.

The Invasion of Iraq is unwise, immoral and illegal.

It was pretty clear in 2002 to anyone in the intelligence community that is where we were headed.[To war with Iraq].