Why did we have a second Iraq war in the first place?

Because a trusting Bush I Administration, sensitive to world opinion, let Saddam stay in power, hoping that it would be around to contain him, which it never had the chance to do after its 1992 electoral defeat.

Because the negligent Clinton administration let the ‘contain Saddam’ strategy sytematically unravel, culminating in the expulsion of the inspectors in 1998.

After that, the murderous tyranny of his regime continued and we had no reliable intelligence (in retrospect ) re his WMD program, while the sanctions mainly hurt poor Iraqis by destroying their economy, which was one of the facts Osama bin Laden cited to justify 9/11.

If a negligent Congress sows the seed corn in Iraq for an al Qaeda takeover and/or a radicalized Shia regime and/or a pan Arab civil war following Iraq’s breakup and/or a Turkish invasion of Kurdistan- well, there will be a 3rd war, possibly more, and there will be [b] [color=red] HELL TO PAY [/color] [/b] for any Congressman or Senator who contributed to this outcome.