Here are some more statements:
(This one thanks to Sandnsea)
"I think the administration has behaved quite clumsily and haphazardly on a lot of foreign policy fronts," Kerry said in an interview with editors and reporters.
Kerry, who has taken the lead among Democrats in breaking out of the party's post-Sept 11 reluctance to criticize Bush on foreign affairs, said he believed a power struggle in the Bush team was at least partially responsible for mixed signals sent to both Israel and the Palestinians.
"It's a most incredible display in my judgment of a kind of amateur hour, and the reason is there is no one person in charge," Kerry said. "Colin Powell is not being allowed to be secretary of state, in my judgment. They restrain him."
Kerry also questioned the tough message directed at Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, accused by Bush of belonging to an "axis of evil" and developing chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Bush has said he will use all available tools to unseat the Iraqi leader.
"The rhetoric has been a huge mistake, the rhetoric is way ahead of the possibilities," Kerry said. "Frankly, that just makes us look silly and strengthens him to some degree."
http://www.dawn.com/2002/07/19/int3.htm “If we are to put American lives at risk in a foreign war, President Bush must be able to say to this nation that we had no choice, that this was the only way we could eliminate a threat we could not afford to tolerate.”
http://www.mail-archive.com/ctrl@listserv.aol.com/msg95577.html
A couple days later (29th), the President gave his State of the Union address. Kerry’s press release said of Bush:
“He talked about keeping Americans safe, but has too often practiced a blustering unilateralism that is wrong, and even dangerous, for our country. He talked about holding Saddam Hussein accountable, but has too often ignored opportunities to unify the world against this brutal dictator.”
http://kerry.senate.gov/bandwidth/cfm/record.cfm?id=189997 Most recently, in Will Pitt’s article, Kerry said:
“This was the hardest vote I have ever had to cast in my entire career,” Kerry said. “I voted for the resolution to get the inspectors in there, period. Remember, for seven and a half years we were destroying weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. In fact, we found more stuff there than we thought we would. After that came those four years when there was no intelligence available about what was happening over there. I believed we needed to get the weapons inspectors back in.
I believed Bush needed this resolution in order to get the U.N. to put the inspectors back in there. The only way to get the inspectors back in was to present Bush with the ability to threaten force legitimately. That’s what I voted for.
The way Powell, Eagleberger, Scowcroft, and the others were talking at the time,” continued Kerry, “I felt confident that Bush would work with the international community. I took the President at his word. We were told that any course would lead through the United Nations, and that war would be an absolute last resort. Many people
I am close with, both Democrats and Republicans, who are also close to Bush told me unequivocally that no decisions had been made about the course of action. Bush hadn’t yet been hijacked by Wolfowitz, Perle, Cheney and that whole crew. Did I think Bush was going to charge unilaterally into war? No. Did I think he would make such an incredible mess of the situation? No. Am I angry about it? You’re God damned right I am. I chose to believe the President of the United States. That was a terrible mistake.”
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"He talked about keeping Americans safe, but has too often practiced a blustering unilateralism that is wrong, and even dangerous, for our country. He talked about holding Saddam Hussein accountable, but has too often ignored opportunities to unify the world against this brutal dictator." 01/28/2003 Response to President Bush's State of the Union
http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000003144&keywo ...
"I firmly believe that Saddam Hussein is a brutal dictator who must be disarmed. But I also believe that a heavy-handed approach will leave us to carry the burden almost alone. That's why I was one of the first Democrats to speak up and urge President Bush to go to the United Nations - because even a country as great as the United States needs some friends in this world.
The President says that war should be a last resort. He says it; I mean it -- because I know the cost of war. I have seen it with my own eyes. If I am commander in chief, I won't just have the perspective that comes from sitting in the Situation Room. I'll have the perspective that comes from serving on the front lines. And I tell you this: the United States should never go to war because it wants to; it should go to war only because it has to."
03/14/2003
http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000003617&keywo ...
I am here today to reject the narrow vision of those who would build walls to keep the world out, or who would prefer to strike out on our own instead of forging coalitions and step by step creating a new world of law and mutual security.
I believe the Bush Administration's blustering unilateralism is wrong, and even dangerous, for our country. In practice, it has meant alienating our long-time friends and allies, alarming potential foes and spreading anti-Americanism around the world.
Too often they've forgotten that energetic global leadership is a strategic imperative for America, not a favor we do for other countries. Leading the world's most advanced democracies isn't mushy multilateralism—it amplifies America's voice and extends our reach. Working through global institutions doesn't tie our hands—it invests US aims with greater legitimacy and dampens the fear and resentment that our preponderant power sometimes inspires in others.
In a world growing more, not less interdependent, unilateralism is a formula for isolation and shrinking influence. As much as some in the White House may desire it, America can't opt out of a networked world. We can do better than we are doing today. And those who seek to lead have a duty to offer a clear vision of how we make Americans safer and make America more trusted and respected in the world. 01/23/2003
http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000003082&keywo ...
"I find myself angered, saddened and dismayed by the situation in which this nation finds itself tonight. As the world's sole superpower in an increasingly hostile and dangerous world, our government's obligation to protect the security of the United States and the law abiding nations of the world could not be more clear, particularly in the aftermath of September 11.
Yet the Administration's handling of the run up to war with Iraq could not possibly have been more inept or self-defeating. President Bush has clumsily and arrogantly squandered the post 9/11 support and goodwill of the entire civilized world in a manner that will make the jobs ahead of us -- both the military defeat and the rebuilding of Iraq -- decidedly more expensive in every sense of that word.
Even having botched the diplomacy, it is the duty of any President, in the final analysis, to defend this nation and dispel the security threats - threats both immediate and longer term - against it. Saddam Hussein has brought military action upon himself by refusing for twelve years to comply with the mandates of the United Nations. The brave and capable men and women of our armed forces and those who are with us will quickly, I know, remove him once and for all as a threat to his neighbors, to the world, and to his own people, and I support their doing so.
My strong personal preference would have been for the Administration -- like the Administration of George Bush, Sr. -- to have given diplomacy more time, more commitment, a real chance of success. In my estimation, giving the world thirty additional days for additional real multilateral coalition building -- a real summit, not a five hour flyby with most of the world's powers excluded -- would have been prudent and no impediment to our military situation, an assessment with which our top military brass apparently agree. Unfortunately, that is an option that has been disregarded by President Bush." Statement of Senator John Kerry Regarding President Bush's Announcement on Iraq 03/18/2003
http://www.vote-smart.org/speech_detail.php?speech_id=M000003667&keywo ...
In back-to-back speeches, the senators, John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, said they had come to their decisions after the administration agreed to pursue diplomatic solutions and work with the United Nations to forestall a possible invasion.
"I will vote yes," said Mr. Kerry, a possible presidential candidate in 2004, "because on the question of how best to hold Saddam Hussein accountable, the administration, including the president, recognizes that war must be our last option to address this threat, not the first, and that we should be acting in concert with allies around the globe to make the world's case against Saddam Hussein."
Mr. Hagel said the administration should not interpret his support or that of others as an endorsement of the use of pre-emptive force to press ideological disagreements.
"Because the stakes are so high, America must be careful with her rhetoric and mindful of how others perceive her intentions," Mr. Hagel said. "Actions in Iraq must come in the context of an American-led, multilateral approach to disarmament, not as the first case for a new American doctrine involving the pre-emptive use of force."
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/10/politics/10IRAQ.html?ex=1074920400&e ...
The Massachusetts senator has stood by his vote last fall for the Iraq resolution in the face of criticism from anti-war Democrats and rival Howard Dean, a former Vermont governor who opposed the U.S.-led war. Kerry qualified his support Monday, saying it was the correct vote "based on the information that we were given."
"The president promised to build the international coalition, to do this as a matter of last resort, to go through the United Nations process and respect it," he said. "And in the end, it is clear now that he didn't do that sufficiently. And I think in that regard, the American people were let down."
Kerry said he voted for the resolution with the understanding that the administration would build an international coalition before attacking Saddam Hussein's forces.
"It seems quite clear to me that the president circumvented that process, shortchanged it and did not give full meaning to the words 'last resort,"' Kerry said in a 20-minute conference call with reporters.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/07/21/n ...
John Kerry's Statement on Iraq Before the War
http://www.independentsforkerry.org/uploads/media/kerry-iraq.html