[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 12]
[House]
[Page 15791]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                 WAR IN IRAQ: MANUFACTURED CATASTROPHE

  (Mr. KUCINICH asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. KUCINICH. Mr. Speaker, this administration deliberately took this 
Nation into a war against Iraq based on false premises. Iraq had 
nothing to do with 9-11, with al Qaeda's role in 9-11, with the anthrax 
attack on this Nation; did not represent an imminent threat to the 
United States, had no usable weapons of mass destruction. That is why 
the weapons of mass destruction cannot be found.
  This deception made America less secure. It cut the United States off 
from the world community. It violated the U.S. Constitution, it 
violated the U.N. charter, it violated the Geneva Convention; and it 
continues to cost, because we are now losing our men and women in 
combat on a regular basis. We continue to lose them. It has cost the 
lives of countless innocent Iraqis. It has cost the taxpayers of this 
Nation over $100 billion, and it has cost tens of billions of dollars 
in damage to Iraq. It has strengthened religious fundamentalists in 
Iraq who now threaten the freedom of women in Iraq's society.
  This manufactured catastrophe called ``foreign policy'' represents 
not only a failure of truth, a great credibility gap, but, more than 
that, America faces a crisis of legitimacy of this administration 
itself, which lied to the American people to get approval for a war.

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