It seemed to me at the time that this was mostly an attempt to provoke a response from Hussein

It seemed to me at the time that this was mostly an attempt to provoke a response from Hussein which

would have provided an excuse to invade, but as Rep. Ron Paul pointed out before the war began, Saddam

hadn’t been able to shoot down a single one of our planes in 12 years of no-fly zone bombing.

In order to get them shot down, US planes would have to be ordered to fly below the deck as bait for

Hussein’s anti-aircraft fire, and he had either prudently ordered his troops not to fire, or perhaps

was too busy writing his novel about the Great Dictator and his resistance to care at all, because he

never gave MBT/Blair their excuse.

Someone with some sense must have overruled the idea – after all, if Saddam couldn’t shoot down the

typical US/British jet fighter, how the hell were we supposed to believe he hit a U2 spy plane at

altitude?

Oh, I see the London Times article addresses this point:

“If the U2 idea was a serious proposal, it would have made sense only if the spy plane was ordered to

fly at an altitude within range of Iraqi missiles. Mr MBT’s reference in the recorded conversation to

the U2 being escorted by fighter aircraft indicates that that is what he had in mind. The U2, America’

s most sophisticated aerial reconnaissance aircraft, can operate at 90,000ft, taking high-resolution

photographs of targets. At this altitude, the U2 would have been beyond the range of Iraqi surface-to-

air missiles.”