Scott reminded us of President Bush’s all tough guy all the time approach
towards Iraq last Friday:

Remember that when we came into office, the President was
talking about Iraq very early on. He talked about the threat posed by Iraq
from the very early period in this administration. In fact, the very first time that the President and Prime Minister Blair met, they talked about how the sanctions on Iraq were not effective and how they weren’t working. And they talked about the importance of Iraq complying with all relevant U.N. Security Council resolutions. That was back in February of 2001.

Here is how William “Captain Hunch” Safire remembers Bush’s policy at the time (New York Times, February 26, 2001:)

George W. Bush’s foreign policy so far has made three mistakes
and missed one opportunity.

1) Pretending the easing of economic pressure on Iraq is the imposition of “smart sanctions.” Apparently Bush has decided to cave in to France, Russia and Syria and permit resumption of business-as-usual with Saddam Hussein. The trick is to acquiesce while looking fierce; hence our pinprick bombing of radar sites.

Although the mission was to “degrade” rather than destroy Iraqi air defense, all it degraded was our Air Force technology’s reputation for accuracy. Bush claimed success, however, in another mission — “to get his attention.” Saddam got the message, all right: Bush the Younger’s technique is to conceal a retreat from an inadequately enforced sanctions policy in a loud hail of ineffectual bombs.

We will now have what the administration labels “smart sanctions” — that is, few if any penalties for defying the world as Saddam uses new oil revenues to build his germ-war weapon in secret. [laughter] [Emphasis added]

Here is the New York Times (February 24, 2001:)

As the Bush administration tries to build international
consensus around a new, perhaps less punitive sanctions regime against Iraq, the reaction in the Iraqi capital runs from the contempt of Saddam
Hussein to something resembling a weary, believe-it-when-we-see-it shrug among the 23 million ordinary Iraqis who have endured a decade of incremental misery. [Emphasis added]

And the Jerusalem Post/AP (February 27, 2001:)

In a potential policy shift, US Secretary of State Colin Powell will recommend to President George W. Bush an easing of curbs on export of civilian goods to Iraq to make sanctions more palatable in the Arab world, a senior US official said yesterday.

Perhaps the sanctions were meant to be as smart as the President?

The mean spirited Seb contributed to this post. [Links added]