There is much to be found about the lead-up to that speech, quote:

…As of 01/31/2003, a memo catalogued 38 claims to which State Department Analysts objected; so 28 claims were removed from the draft or altered, per the State Dept. report in the Senate report released Friday which included scathing criticism of the CIA and other US intel agencies.

Powell and Wilkerson spent 4 days and nights at CIA conference room with then Dir. George Tenet trying to ensure the accuracy of the presentation.

[Apparently Powell and Wilkerson did not know then that “Curveball”, whose “information/intelligence” was the main source for the allegations in Powell’s speech, was a known liar by CIA analysts and had never been briefed by the CIA. George Tenet did not see fit to enlighten Powell in that regard.]

snip

The CIA rejected requests for the initial versions of the Powell presentation on grounds they were internal working documents and not finished products; and the Rebublican controlled committee did not seek access to a 40-plus page document that was prepared by Vice President Dick Cheney’s office and submitted to the State Dept. speechwriters detailing the case the administration wanted Powell to make.

Per the Senate report, the idea for the speech originated in Dec. 2002, when the NSC instructed CIA to prepare a public response to Iraq’s widely criticized 12,000 page declaration of having no banned weapons.

Bush’s speech given the week before 03/14/2003:

In [Bush’s] prime-time press conference last week which focused solely on Iraq, he mentioned 9//11 eight times and Saddam Hussein many more, often in the same breath. GWB never pinned blame for the attacks directly on Saddam H….

IMO, there will be no final chapter to the Dark Road down which the lies of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, the clandestine arm of the CIA and their PNAC enablers led America and the world. The Killing Fields and human slaughter houses prisons will continue, reducing the world’s population of “useless eaters” (Kissinger’s words) thereby leaving more for the bloated bellies of the rich and powerful, as well as feeding their insatiable lust for ever more power and money.

In my backwards search the news events back then show me the garden path down which we were led. In this Huffpo piece, Liz Cheney still claims a link between Saddam and 9/11.

In that article is the link to the October, 2002 joint Senate & House Resolution entitled, “Authorization for the Use of Military Force Against Iraq”.. Included therein:

…Whereas, members of Al Qaida, an organization bearing responsiblity for attacks on the United States, its citizens, and interests, including the attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001 are known to be in Iraq….

[Reminder, one of those legal eagles in my prior comment stated that the “Whereas(s) bear no legal weight, so this statement is again reworded in the body of the Resolution under Sec. 2 (2).

Regarding the “note” to UN Secty Gen’l advising we would not be a member of the ICC:

Neither Bush nor Powell announced [it]. [They] gave it to Mark Grossman (Foggy Bottom’s Apparatchik, Under Secretary of State) made a speech to the Center For Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in DC. On the same day [05/06/2002], Undersecretary of State, John Bolton, delivered a terse letter to UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, announcing that the U.S. would “not become a party” to the ICC Treaty, and would recognize “no legal obligation arising from its signature on Dec.31,2000″

[emphasis mine; see next comment re Powell’s UN speech]

Afghanistan is Vietnam all over again, and in my opinion will conclude the same way with multiple thousands dead and wounded and the country devastated. 58,000 American soldiers died in Vietnam and untold numbers of Vietnamese – and a mountain of debt for us; but the weapons makers and sellers are bloated with riches but ever greedy for more.

And for what? The Afghan war was on the planning boards back in the mid to late 1990s. The military/industrial/financial complex want that oil and the great pipeline, and they’re going to get it come Hell or high water and they care not for humans. Just Google: Pipelineistan. [The Russians, Chinese, India, Pakistan, Iran have concluded agreements on pipelines and work has begun on some of them. That race is what has caused this massive assault there; the controllers in DC fear that the US will lose out on the oil and other resources. And they will tell any lie constructed in any way to sell it to the American people.

Sorry to paint such a gloomy picture, but I’m pretty old, remember much and read extensively on the greedy entities that determine the course of our government’s actions.

They then had to connect the dots with 9/11 and Iraq – which they had already decided to invade.

And that coincides with the need to torture. (and to avoid international sanction)

You’ve really connected the dots!

So for the sake of the Commander’s War Presidential Codpiece, human beings had to suffer.

(Thanks for linking back to this!)

Bottom line is that Bush’s authorization to go to war in Afghanistan, S.J. Resolution 23 dated 09/18/2001 per testimony of Mr. Michael Glennon [others agree]: quote:

The central conclusion that emerges from these words [in S.J.Res 23] — which represent the only substantive provision of this statute– is that all authority that statute confers is tightly linked to the events of September 11. The statute confers no authority unrelated to those events.

Mr Glennon [Prof. of Law and Scholar in Residence, The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars] also quotes John Yoo:

…It [S.J. Res 23] does not therefore, reach other terrorist individuals, groups, or states that cannot be determined to have links to the Sept.ll attacks.

[emphasis mine]. I deduce that Bush/Cheney wanted that link between Saddam and 9/11 and/or Al Qaeda. They weren’t getting it from any captives. If they could not establish that link they would have to go to congress for authorization to attack Saddam. So…aye God, they’d manufacture it by planting info into tortured detainees.

So, IMHO, this Senate hearing (chaired by Feingold) at which Yoo testified on 04/17/2002, decided Bush/Cheney’s course; Bush opted out of International Criminal Court 05/06/2002 [19 days ]; and you spot the longest interrogation the same day, 05/06/2002; and the tapes for May 2002 are largely withheld. In torturing the lies out of the detainees, Bush/Cheney committed war crimes so they had to avoid the ICC.

Whatcha think? I thought to write an Oxdown, but every paragraph of all the witnesses cries out, “take me, take me”, and besides, this is your bailwick.

Did something come out in that session that spurred Bush to send the note to UN Secty Gen’l on 05/06/2002 opting out of the International Criminal Court? I’m going to try to find the video of that hearing and listen closely. [It may be a dead end, but worth a try].

Somehow I can’t shake the idea that the 2 events are connected.

Now that you’ve pointed that out, neither can I!

I well recall that happening. And thinking at the time that it was not a good sign!