Yeah that was what I was trying to go for with this: that he went from providing a scapegoat to the scapegoat himself.

Are you saying they SHOULD have planted weapons?

I also think its a logical fallacy to say "we never found them therefore we should never have gone in." IF you believe that was justification to go in, its the fact that we thought they MIGHT have been there that going in was related to. Ie it supposes the US's actions were wrong based on knowledge they wouldn't have known was wrong at the time.