Responding to Kennedy on Iraq II: "The Rush to War"

2. The "rush to war"

Kennedy says:

There's no question this was the administration that rushed to war.

What constitutes a rush to war? The phrase itself has become commonly used.

James Taranto in OpinionJournal has a piece tracing the use of the phrase. The earliest example that he gives is from a headline in The Nation
on August 7, 2002.

After giving a few more examples, Taranto writes:

You get the idea. By the time the liberation of Iraq begins in earnest, perhaps a month from now, critics of the Bush administration will have spent at least six months complaining about the "rush to war." But half a year's preparation is no rush; it's more of a saunter. (In comparison, it was less than four weeks after Sept. 11 that the first bombs fell on Afghanistan.)

In actuality, the war began on March 20, 2003--about 8 months later.

At the time of Taranto's piece, there were "6,570 pages containing the phrase and the word Iraq." If you do a search today, you'll find about 252,000.

Taranto notes, "'Rush to war' is not an argument; it is a slogan, a substitute for thought"

See also:

Responding to Kennedy on Iraq I: "Imminent Threat"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq III: "Iraq & Al Qaeda"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq IV: "WMD"
Responding to Kennedy on Iraq V: "Niger"

Technorati Tag: Iraq War.