If Gore Had Won, Would the US be in Iraq?

It’s an interesting question, and Roger L. Simon says without a doubt, Gore would have invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, and US foreign policy would not look much different than it does now.

You may not believe me, but I don’t even think it’s much of a stretch, certainly no grand fictional scheme à la Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America in which Lindbergh defeats Roosevelt in the election of 1940 and the U. S. opts out of World War II. The Clinton-Gore administration wasn’t the least bit afraid to use force. Erratic about it - maybe. Insecure about it - maybe. But pacifist? Ask Milosevic.

This entry was written by Greg Farries and posted on Wed Oct 3, 2007 at 11:54 am and filed under American Politics, Foreign Policy & Military, War. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

Comments (4) to “If Gore Had Won, Would the US be in Iraq?”

  1. Luke wrote:

    I disagree. If Gore had won, they would’ve done what Clinton did - bombed the Hell out of Iraq and run. Or a quick invasion, puppet government and run. It’s been America’s strategy for decades, and it doesn’t work - the new government becomes just like the old one within a few years.

    Bush is trying something new in Afghanistan and Iraq. He’s sticking around to stabilize the country while an accountable government is put into place. It’s a long and costly process, and it keeps the turmoil in the public eye, but we’ll see if it works.

    Posted on 03-Oct-07 at 6:21 pm | Permalink

  2. dalton wrote:

    Did you get my note, Greg?

    Posted on 03-Oct-07 at 7:35 pm | Permalink

  3. cherenkov wrote:

    My take: Gore would have went into Afghanistan, but not Iraq. Afghanistan is a no-brainer, but the invasion of Iraq required a lot of fancy intelligence manipulation and word smithing to justify. There was no compelling reason to go into Iraq in 2002. The Bush administration went into Iraq because they WANTED to go into Iraq. It was part of their foreign policy plan.

    Posted on 03-Oct-07 at 9:43 pm | Permalink

  4. Dalton wrote:

    Very, very weak argument. Stripped to the basics, his point is:

    1) Bill Clinton used force.

    2) Al Gore made a speech criticizing Bush I for ignoring Saddam’s links to terrorism.

    3) Some democrats wanted to see Saddam out of power.

    Not a very compelling argument, but I don’t think it was meant to be.

    Posted on 04-Oct-07 at 6:34 am | Permalink

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