Islamic State, Refugee Crises Stem From Iraq Invasion

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The US invasion of Iraq in 2003 has created the problems the world is facing today, including the Islamic State rise and the migrant crisis in Europe, US Presidential candidate Lincoln Chafee said during a Christian Science Monitor Breakfast in Washington, DC on Monday.

“They were the ones that invaded Iraq and created all the problems we live with now,” Chafee said. “It all started with the invasion of Iraq.”

The presidential hopeful continued these problems include the Islamic State, Boko Haram, tensions between the Kurdish community and the Turks, as well as the migrant crisis in European countries.

“I mentioned the refugees flooding into Europe…what concerns me about that is the instability that leads to in these countries and the potential rise of right wing political parties. It’s all because of this mistake we made about invading Iraq,” he said.

Chafee served in the US Senate from 1999 until 2007, and was the only Republican senator to oppose the US war in Iraq in 2003.

The presidential hopeful told journalists he went to the CIA a month before the vote on invading Iraq in October 2002, and asked to provide evidence on weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq believed to have been held by late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

“There were 20 analysts. I was there by myself. And they didn’t have any [evidence]…They showed me the sparse evidence that they had, they looked down. It was their body language as much as anything that told me this was a false premise for going to war. There is some other reason whatever that is, but it’s not WMD,” he said.

A US-led coalition launched a military operation against Hussein's government in March 2003. According to the US leadership, the invasion, dubbed Operation Iraqi Freedom by the United States, aimed to eliminate WMD.

“It was a colossal mistake, and the ramifications we live with today are enormous,” Chafee said.

The Islamic State militant group has gained control of large areas of Syria and Iraq, and is notorious for brutality, including videotaped executions of foreign hostages and civilians.

Meanwile, Europe has been recently beset by major migrant crisis as thousands of people have fled conflict-torn countries in North Africa, the Middle East, and Central and South Asia. According to the United Nations data, 137,000 refugees crossed the Mediterranean Sea into Europe in the first six months of 2015.