Articles

"The Lies That Led to War," By Juan Cole, Salon, May 19, 2005

• This article provides analysis of the Downing Street Memo and cites other sources of evidence for Bush's early decision to go to war:
• "On May 6, Knight Ridder reporters Warren Strobel and John Walcott said that a former high official in the U.S. government told them that Dearlove's remarks were 'an absolutely accurate description of what transpired' during his visit."
• "I was in the studio with Arab-American journalist Osama Siblani on Amy Goodman's 'Democracy Now' program on March 11, 2005, when Siblani reported a May 2000 encounter he had with then-candidate Bush in a hotel in Troy, Mich. 'He told me just straight to my face, among 12 or maybe 13 Republicans at that time here in Michigan at the hotel. I think it was on May 17, 2000, even before he became the nominee for the Republicans. He told me that he was going to take him out, when we talked about Saddam Hussein in Iraq.' According to Siblani, Bush added that 'he wanted to go to Iraq to search for weapons of mass destruction, and he considered the regime an imminent and gathering threat against the United States.' Siblani points out that Bush at that point was privy to no classified intelligence on Iraqi weapons programs and had already made up his mind on the issue."
• This article also cites "The Price of Loyalty," by Paul O'Neil:
  "Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill described to Ron Susskind in 'The Price of Loyalty' the first Bush national security meeting of principals on Jan. 30, 2001. He writes that after Bush announced he would simply disengage from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and 'unleash Sharon,' he made it clear that Iraq would be a priority. 'The hour almost up, Bush had assignments for everyone ... Rumsfeld and [Joint Chiefs chair Gen. H. Hugh] Shelton, he said, "should examine our military options." That included rebuilding the military coalition from the 1991 Gulf War, examining "how it might look" to use U.S. ground forces in the north and the south of Iraq ... Ten days in, and it was about Iraq.'

• This article also cites Richard Clarke:
  "Clark related that on the evening of Sept. 12, 2001, Bush 'grabbed a few of us and closed the door to the conference room. "Look," he told us, "I know you have a lot to do and all ... but I want you, as soon as you can, to go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam did this. See if he's linked in any way...'" When Clarke protested that it was clearly an al-Qaida operation, Bush insisted, 'Just look. I want to know any shred ... Look into Iraq, Saddam.' According to Clarke, Bush said it 'testily.'

• "Clarke reveals that Rumsfeld was already, on the afternoon of Sept. 12, 'talking about broadening the objectives of our response and "getting Iraq.'" Although early accounts of National Security Council meetings after the attacks highlighted the role of Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in pressing for an immediate war on Iraq, it has become increasingly clear that he was only one such voice, and hardly the most senior."
• This article also cites Christopher Meyer:
  "Astonishingly, the Bush administration almost took the United States to war against Iraq in the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11. We know about this episode from the public account of Sir Christopher Meyer, then the U.K. ambassador in Washington. Meyer reported that in the two weeks after Sept. 11, the Bush national security team argued back and forth over whether to attack Iraq or Afghanistan. It appears from his account that Bush was leaning toward the Iraq option."

• And Christopher Meyer in Vanity Fair:
  "Meyer spoke again about the matter to Vanity Fair for its May 2004 report, 'The Path to War.' Soon after Sept. 11, Meyer went to a dinner at the White House, 'attended also by Colin Powell, [and] Condi Rice,'
  where 'Bush made clear that he was determined to topple Saddam. "Rumors were already flying that Bush would use 9/11 as a pretext to attack Iraq," Meyer remembers.' When British Prime Minister Tony Blair arrived in Washington on Sept. 20, 2001, he was alarmed. If Blair had consulted MI6 about the relative merits of the Afghanistan and Iraq options, we can only imagine what well-informed British intelligence officers in Pakistan were cabling London about the dangers of leaving bin Laden and al-Qaida in place while plunging into a potential quagmire in Iraq. Fears that London was a major al-Qaida target would have underlined the risks to the United Kingdom of an "Iraq first" policy in Washington.

• "Meyer told Vanity Fair, 'Blair came with a very strong message -- don't get distracted; the priorities were al-Qaida, Afghanistan, the Taliban.' He must have been terrified that the Bush administration would abandon London to al-Qaida while pursuing the great white whale of Iraq. But he managed to help persuade Bush. Meyer reports, 'Bush said, "I agree with you, Tony. We must deal with this first. But when we have dealt with Afghanistan, we must come back to Iraq.'" Meyer also said, in spring 2004, that it was clear 'that when we did come back to Iraq it wouldn't be to discuss smarter sanctions.' In short, Meyer strongly implies that Blair persuaded Bush to make war on al-Qaida in Afghanistan first by promising him British support for a later Iraq campaign.
• This article also cites "Plan of Attack" by Bob Woodward:
  "Bush asked Cheney for an Iraq war plan on Nov. 21 [2001]."

• This article also cites the Independent:
  "On Nov. 26 [2001] the Independent reported that Bush had called Saddam Hussein 'evil' and demanded that he accept U.N. weapons inspectors."

• This article also cites Newsweek:
  "On Nov. 27 [2001]Howard Fineman of Newsweek reported a conversation with Bush aboard Air Force One in the wake of the successful Afghanistan campaign. 'He wants to avoid the more profound mistakes his dad made...: his failure, at the end of the Gulf War, to stop -- once and for all -- Saddam Hussein in
  Iraq from threatening the world with weapons of mass destruction.'"

• This article also cites Gen. Tommy Franks' memoirs:
  "Nov. 27, 2001, was a significant date. Gen. Tommy Franks in his memoirs reveals that he received an unexpected call from Rumsfeld. 'General Franks, the president wants us to look at options for Iraq.' Franks
  knew exactly what the call portended. 'Son of a bitch, I thought. No rest for the weary.' There would be another war. The die had already been cast."

• And again Newsweek:
  "On Dec. 31 [2001] Newsweek reported, 'In principle, Bush and his national-security team have decided that Saddam has to go, U.S. officials say. "The question is not if the United States is going to hit Iraq; the question is when," says a senior American envoy in the Middle East.' The article notes Bush's oft-stated caution that no final decision had been made, but dismisses it on the basis of insider information. The main credit for this article was given to Christopher Dickey and John Barry, but Sami Kohen is listed as reporting from Turkey. Since a U.S. ambassador is quoted, and Kohen was the only one of the coauthors in the Middle East, he is likely the one who got the quote. Was his source Ambassador W. Robert Pearson?"

• This article also cites Sen. Bob Graham's memoirs:
  "Former Sen. Bob Graham of Florida says in his memoirs, 'Intelligence Matters,' that on Feb. 19, 2002, he visited the U.S. Central Command. Franks revealed to him that the command was no longer engaged in a war in Afghanistan. Graham was taken aback. Franks told the stunned senator, 'Military and intelligence personnel are being re-deployed to prepare for an action in Iraq.' The implementation phase had already begun."

• Again Vanity Fair:
  "In April 2002, Tony Blair went to see Bush at his Crawford, Texas, ranch. Vanity Fair reports that Blair stressed the need to get the backing of the United Nations for an Iraq war if he was going to swing Parliament behind it."

• And a source citing a transcript from a White House phone call:
  "By late July or very early August 2002, according to Vanity Fair, Blair had called Bush. A senior White House official who saw the transcript remarked, 'The way it read was that, come what may, Saddam was going to go; they said they were going forward, they were going to take out the regime, and they were doing the right thing.'

• And again Woodward:
  "It was also in midsummer 2002 that Franks asked Rumsfeld for $750 million to begin making preparations in Kuwait toward an Iraq war. The request, reported in Woodward's 'Plan of Attack,' provoked a good deal of controversy. Many in Congress felt that no specific appropriation had been made for such preparations, and the money was essentially taken from Afghanistan appropriations without congressional approval."

• This article also cites sources for Bush Administration claims that a decision had not yet been made, after (as shown by other evidence) it in fact had been made. These include comments by Cheney in California on Aug. 7, 2002; comments by White House spokesman Ari Fleischer as reported by CNN on Aug. 26, 2002; comments by Cheney on "Meet the Press" on Sept. 8, 2002; comments by Fleischer at a White House press conference on Dec. 17, 2002.

"Tomgram: Mark Danner on the British Smoking-Gun Memo," By Tom Engelhardt, TomDispatch.com, May 15, 2005
http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=2486
This article introduces and makes available online the following from the New York Review of Books.


"Secret Way to War," By Mark Danner, the New York Review of Books, June 9, 2005

• This article quotes the following paragraph from the Downing Street Memo and provides the analysis that follows:"'C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.'
  "Seen from today's perspective this short paragraph is a strikingly clear template for the future, establishing these points:
  1. By mid-July 2002, eight months before the war began, President Bush had decided to invade and occupy Iraq.
  2. Bush had decided to 'justify' the war 'by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD.'
  3. Already 'the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.'
  4. Many at the top of the administration did not want to seek approval from the United Nations (going 'the UN route').
  5. Few in Washington seemed much interested in the aftermath of the war.
  "We have long known, thanks to Bob Woodward and others, that military planning for the Iraq war began as early as November 21, 2001, after the President ordered Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to look at 'what it would take to protect America by removing Saddam Hussein if we have to,' and that Secretary Rumsfeld and General Tommy Franks, who headed Central Command, were briefing American senior officials on the progress of military planning during the late spring and summer of 2002; indeed, a few days after the meeting in London leaks about specific plans for a possible Iraq war appeared on the front pages of the New York Times and the Washington Post."

• This article also cites the following sources of evidence:
  Bob Woodward, Plan of Attack (Simon and Schuster, 2004), p. 162.
  Woodward, Plan of Attack, pp. 177–178.
  "Chirac Makes His Case on Iraq," an interview with Christiane Amanpour, CBS News, March 16, 2003.
  Hans Blix, Disarming Iraq (Pantheon, 2004), p. 86.