Coulter advocated U.S. invasion of Iran ... and China

Summary: On Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, Ann Coulter suggested that the United States should invade Iran and China.

In defending the Bush administration's invasion of Iraq during an appearance on the March 13 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes, right-wing pundit Ann Coulter suggested that the United States should invade Iran and China in order to pre-empt any threat those nations may pose. Coulter made her remarks during a conversation with co-host Alan Colmes and Richard Aborn, managing director of risk-management firm Constantine & Aborn Advisory Services, about the Bush administration's discredited claim that former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. When Aborn suggested that Coulter's rationale for invading countries before firmly establishing that they represent a serious threat "would mean we need to go into Iran" and "we should go into China," Coulter responded: "Yeah!"

This week, the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council failed to reach an agreement on a statement intended* to pressure Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program. The measure failed to win the support of either China or Russia. Representatives of the countries that support the measure -- including the United States, France, and Britain -- said they may put it before the full 15-member security council, despite the disapproval of the other two permanent members.

From the March 13 edition of Fox News' Hannity & Colmes:

COLMES: Let me give you an example of where I believe we were misled.

You had [Vice President] Dick Cheney on [NBC's] Meet the Press saying Saddam Hussein reconstituted his nuclear program. That was not true. He said it a couple of times. We heard from [President] George W. Bush, he's a threat that we must deal with as quickly as possible. It turned out not to be true --

SEAN HANNITY (co-host): That's what [Sen. John] Kerry [D-MA] said.

COLMES: We heard, "imminent threat," "immediate threat," over and over and over again from this administration. That turned out not to be true. So, is that not a misleading of the American public?

COULTER: How about the rape rooms, did that turn out to be true?

COLMES: Now, but, you're avoiding my question.

ABORN: We're not -- we're not invading countries.

COLMES: The very specific things I just mentioned? Were they true or not true?

COULTER: No, I'm not avoiding. OK. Then, let me ask you another question. How about right now? You have a lunatic running Iran, who's running around claiming he has a nuke. When do we wait? Do we wait for a city to be taken out?

COLMES: But, wait a minute. You're not responding to my very -- I gave you a very specific thing --

ABORN: But that's a much a different -- again. That's a much different argument. Ann. Ann, you are --

COULTER: No, it's not, because we're not going to know. We're not going to know, as [Secretary of State] Condoleezza Rice said, until a city is gone. Now liberals want to say we won't do anything, and if we go in --

COLMES: So, that we can wait until everybody else, until they're gone?

ABORN: That would mean we need to go into Iran. We should go into China. This is not an intellectually honest argument.

COULTER: Yeah!

ABORN:. Well, then, you're -- you hear what they're talking about --

COLMES: I gave you specific reasons we were --

COULTER: OK. But America, listen to this: Democrats will not take out a threat, they will wait for an American city to be bombed. Pay attention to that.

COLMES: I guess, we're just going to have to go and invade every country.

ABORN: You can resort to insult, it doesn't get you anywhere.

*Correction: This item originally stated incorrectly that the U.N. Security Council "voted on a resolution designed to pressure Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment program." But the council did not vote on a resolution; as The Washington Post reported, members of the panel failed to reach an agreement "on a proposed statement pressuring Iran to suspend its nuclear enrichment efforts."

—A.D.