The Torture Case against the Bush Administration

Background 

The idea of prosecuting the former US president, George W. Bush, for the murder of American soldiers in Iraq, originally came from the former prosecutor, Vincent Bugliosi. In his powerful thought and explosive book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder, Bugliosi presents a weighty and thoroughly researched criminal case against President George W. Bush, proposing that he should be put on trial in America for the murder of about 4000 US soldiers who went to war in Iraq. The book has a set of legal mechanisms and concrete evidence that links President Bush to the unfortunate war in Iraq, through his false and malicious fabrication. The Iraq war did not only cause death to American soldiers, but also killed more than 100,000 innocents children, women and men from Iraq (Fisher and Biggar 687-707). Furthermore, the war cost America over one trillion dollars, which contributed less to the ending of the war. Additionally, the war significantly contributed to adverse international relations between the US and other Western countries. Being a prosecutor with a great interest in seeking justice, Bugliosi delivers a neutral argument without any political alignment and intentions, relying on facts and a clear objectivity. In a critical denunciation of the former President Bush and his administration, The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder further outlines criteria, which are groundbreaking legal framework of holding senior government officials to account for any action while in office. 

Stuck on a paper?

Order an original, fully referenced and formatted paper.

Write my paper

Evidence against President George Bush

In his argument, Bugliosi contends that President Bush maliciously misled the Congress and the rest of the Americans about the evidence that he claimed, which authorized going to Iraq to overthrow the then Iraqi president, Saddam Hussein (Dolan and Cohen 54). The book, therefore, states that under the rules guiding felony and murder, the demise of American soldiers and the Iraqi people since the beginning of the war, to some extent, contributed to the second –degree murder (MacDonald 476). Bugliosi further proposed that any Attorney General from any of the 50 states, including District Attorneys in America, has a jurisdiction and sufficient grounds to institute a criminal proceeding against President Bush for the murder of any of the soldiers or all soldiers living in their states. He contends that if the prosecution is to be instituted, then the imposition of the death penalty should be sought based on the grounds of the magnitudes of the alleged crimes against George W. Bush, and impeachment would be drastically insufficient.

According to Bugliosi, the strongest evidence that can be used against Bush is his speech alleging that Iraq posed an inevitable danger to the security of America and asserted that with the numerous weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein would attack the United States at any time. Shortly after those claims by Bush, the National Intelligence Estimates refuted the claims and opined that while Iraq may have weapons of mass destruction, they did not intend to use them for any purposes except self-defense or use them if the United States threatened to attack them (Pfiffner 33). Furthermore, Bugliosi claims that President Bush and his administration edited the White Paper, which contained the classified version of the National Intelligence Estimates, which was given out to Congress and the rest of the Americans. According to Schmidt and Williams, the paper was doctored in a way that painted the Iraqi threat imminent than it was ideally (211). Bugliosi further asserts that when the original National Intelligence Estimate’s report was doctored, the American intelligence members categorically distanced themselves from the bloated and inaccurate CIA’s conclusions, claiming that the opposing comments regarding the threat that Iraq posed to the United States were deliberately scrapped from the White Paper. In most parts of his book, Vincent Bugliosi made accuses on Bush of being heartless and inconsiderate about the death and suffering of United States soldiers. The former prosecutor even referred to Bush as “Whimper” and “disgrace.” He further claimed that the former President openly dared the Iraqi to start the war on the American soldiers. Through his investigations, Bugliosi asserts that Bush spent much time of his Presidency at a variety vacation spots like Camp David and his ranch in Texas.  

Any topic. Any deadline.

Our certified writers can do
an A-level paper for you.

Write my paper

In January 31, 2003, Bush together with Tony Blair, the then British Prime Minister, had a meeting at the White House, and through a memo that contained the summary of their discussion, Bugliosi asserts that both Bush and Tony Blair doubted that any chemical, nuclear or biological weapons could be found in Iraq (Hakki 95). Furthermore, Bugliosi states that both Bush and Tony were worried on getting some justification to start the war that other nations would agree with. Bush, in particular, was worried that the UN inspectors had failed to get concrete evidence that would link Saddam Hussein to the Weapons of mass destruction (Gardner 57). Bush even went ahead and proposed possible ways to be used to provoke the war with Hussein. One of the ways being, wrongly painting U-2 reconnaissance aircraft with UN colors and flying them in Iraq; escorted with fighter jets, with the intention that if Saddam brought them down, he would be in a breach of the UN resolutions and through that, the war would be justified. Essentially, Bush was strategizing to create war rather than preventing it.

According to Bugliosi’s book, the Bush administration reportedly piled undue pressure on the National Intelligence Agencies to provide them with conclusions that Saddam Hussein was directly involved in the September 9 Al-Qaeda attacks. Their intention was to trigger the war as they had always intended (Haas 74). On October 7, 2002, Bush made a speech claiming that they are aware that Iraq and Al Qaeda terrorists’ network consider America as their common enemy. He further asserted that Iraq and Al Qaeda were enjoying a good relationship that dates back to a decade, and that Iraq trains Al Qaeda on bomb, poisons and deadly gasses making technology. However, in 2003 September 17, Bush admitted that he lacked the evidence that could link Saddam Hussein to the September 11, to the contrary, several months later, he daringly continued to suggest even without showing the evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11, attacks. Bugliosi concluded that Bush’s trickery traits could be identified a lot with murder case, the concrete evidence of administration betrayal (Ismail, Yousef and Berkowitz 160), Notably, on the account that Bush faked intelligence report on weapons of mass destruction, and his baseless claims that Saddam Hussein could be linked to the September 11, 2001, bomb attacks; he stands a chance to be tried for murder of innocent American soldiers by sending them to war which could not have taken place in the first place.

Boost your grades with a new guide on A+ writing

Learn everything you need about academic writing for free!

Incorrect email. Please check it and try again.

Get it

By continuing, you agree to the Terms & conditions & Privacy policy

Time to excel in writing! The download will start within seconds.

Download

To convict the former US President, Bush, with the first-degree murder, an offense that attracts the death penalty, a state court will have to establish and rule that Bush indeed deliberately planned the murder of US soldiers in the guise of war. On the other hand, he could be charged with a lesser homicide, but only after the determination of the judge that the war in Iraq was executed contrary to the US law. However, the allegations of conspiracy could only be water tight if that conspiracy could be established between the Iraqi insurgents and Bush (Hakki 14). Nonetheless, Bugliosi managed to establish all these grounds on trial of Bush by providing concrete evidence to prove his allegations. Given the fact that he has experience in dealing with cases relating to matters of law and order, also by serving as the Deputy District Attorney with numerous convictions to his name and even publishing bestselling books and articles to his name, he knew exactly what it could take to bring a successful case against Bush. 

Bugliosi, however, did not touch the issue of the death of more than 100,000 Iraqi people during the war in his quest for the trial of Bush. The reason being, even if it could be established that Bush was directly responsible for their death, he could only stand prosecution for the demise of 4000 US soldiers in the war. Intrinsically, American courts lack jurisdiction to prosecute the former President for the massive loss of life in Iraqi, not because they were not Americans but because they were killed in Iraq, which is a foreign nation. However, supposed that they had been killed in the United States, irrespective of their nationality, American courts would have had a competent jurisdiction to hear and determine the case. Vincent Bugliosi consequently concluded by making a clarion call for the United States of America to work together and support the great nation it once was, and can be again. He believes that the first step to achieving this goal is to bring those responsible for the war in Iraq to justice