Noreen Malone on Slow Burn and the Road to War in Iraq
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 21 May 2021
⏱️ 55 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Eighteen years have passed since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq deposed the despotic regime of Saddam Hussein and ushered in a bloody new chapter in that country's history—one that, in many ways, Iraq and the United States are still working their way through today. For its fifth season, the Slate-produced podcast Slow Burn is revisiting the lead-up to that fateful decision to invade. Scott R. Anderson sat down with host Noreen Malone to discuss the season thus far and what lessons that era can teach us for how to approach the challenges of our current moment....
Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/lawfare.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:29.0 | The elements within the Bush administration wanted to go with to war, |
| 0:37.0 | with Iraq from even before 9-11, certainly soon after 9-11. |
| 0:41.0 | It's the question of prominence, right? |
| 0:43.0 | So, it's like they were just searching around for a motive, |
| 0:47.0 | for a cause of war, one that you could say violated these international laws. |
| 0:53.0 | And WMDs fit the bill. |
| 0:55.0 | First, they tried connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda that didn't really work. |
| 0:59.0 | The CIA wasn't willing to fully back it. |
| 1:01.0 | And so then they turned to this other thing. |
| 1:03.0 | And I think some of it was just the irresponsibility with which they used intelligence. |
| 1:09.0 | You know, we're going to get into this in the later episode. |
| 1:13.0 | But there were these pieces of evidence. |
| 1:15.0 | It just really weren't evidence. |
| 1:17.0 | They were tenuous at best. |
| 1:19.0 | They were backed by defectors who had not been checked out. |
| 1:23.0 | They were wild guesses about what certain aluminum tubes could be used for. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Lawfare Institute, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Lawfare Institute and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.