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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tekboy who wrote (123003)	1/10/2004 10:17:54 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

One point it seems to me that Pollack, as a CIA guy himself, skated around: that if the Bush people distrusted CIA analysis and wished to bypass it, there was much in the agency's track record that could cause reasonable people to feel that way. Distrust of the CIA is not, in itself, enough to label someone as an ideologue who only wishes to see evidence that conforms with his own worldview. Has Pollack ever commented on the writings of Robert Baer? PS out of curiousity, can anyone think of any other player in the Iraq debate--on any side--so publicly and frankly admitting to having gotten important stuff wrong, and trying to draw honest lessons from the experience? Rumsfeld?

To: tekboy who wrote (123003)	1/10/2004 11:10:20 PM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

FORMER TREASURY SECRETARY PAUL ONEILL SAYS INVASION OF IRAQ WAS PLANNED IN THE FIRST DAYS OF THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION LONG BEFORE 9/11, IN AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW SUNDAY ON "60 MINUTES" drudgereport.com tekboy: great to have you posting again...IMHO, the Bushies were not honest with us about the Iraqi threat -- it's now quite clear that there was NO IMMINENT THREAT...Why did we have to spend over $150 Billion U.S. tax dollars and sacrifice hundreds of our young soldiers lives...? The President still has not made a compelling case for war to me and to many other Americans. U.S. credibility has been damaged around the world...I'm very disappointed in the leaders in Washington. -s2@WeWouldBeBetterOffWithGeneralClarkAsPresident.com ________________________________________ drudgereport.com Sat Jan 10 2004 09:12:37 ET The Bush Administration began laying plans for an invasion of Iraq including the use of American troops within days of President Bush's inauguration in January of 2001, not eight months later after the 9/11 attacks as has been previously reported. That is what former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill says in his first interview about his time as a White House insider. O'Neill talks to Lesley Stahl in the interview, to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, Jan. 11 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network. "From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go," he tells Stahl. "For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do is a really huge leap," says O'Neill. O'Neill, fired by the White House for his disagreement on tax cuts, is the main source for an upcoming book, "The Price of Loyalty," authored by Ron Suskind. Suskind says O'Neill and other White House insiders he interviewed gave him documents that show that in the first three months of 2001, the administration was looking at military options for removing Saddam Hussein from power and planning for the aftermath of Saddam's downfall, including post-war contingencies like peacekeeping troops, war crimes tribunals and the future of Iraq's oil. "There are memos," Suskind tells Stahl, "One of them marked 'secret' says 'Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq.'" A Pentagon document, says Suskind, titled "Foreign Suitors For Iraqi Oilfield Contracts," outlines areas of oil exploration. "It talks about contractors around the world from...30, 40 countries and which ones have what intentions on oil in Iraq," Suskind says. In the book, O'Neill is quoted as saying he was surprised that no one in a National Security Council meeting questioned why Iraq should be invaded. "It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying 'Go find me a way to do this,'" says O'Neill in the book. Suskind also writes about a White House meeting in which he says the president seems to be wavering about going forward with his second round of tax cuts. "Haven't we already given money to rich people," Suskind says the president uttered, according to a nearly verbatim transcript of an Economic Team meeting he says he obtained from someone at the meeting, "Shouldn't we be giving money to the middle?" O'Neill, who was asked to resign because of his opposition to the tax cut, says he doesn't think his tell-all account in this book will be attacked by his former employers as sour grapes. "I will be really disappointed if [the White House] reacts that way," he tells Stahl. "I can't imagine that I am going to be attacked for telling the truth." Developing...

To: tekboy who wrote (123003)	1/11/2004 12:58:46 AM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Given how heavily public opinion in favor of invading Iraq rested on Pollack, I'd really rather see the post-mortems coming from someone who doesn't need to cover his ass.

To: tekboy who wrote (123003)	1/12/2004 10:55:13 AM
From: carranza2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

PS out of curiousity, can anyone think of any other player in the Iraq debate--on any side--so publicly and frankly admitting to having gotten important stuff wrong, and trying to draw honest lessons from the experience? No, but the mistake was a reasonable one, given the facts that were known after Saddam kicked out the inspectors in 1998. Pollack makes this clear. From a political standpoint, of course, it doesn't matter to the Administration's opponents that Bush and his team made the same mistake. Despite the mistake, it is clear that Saddam could not be allowed to survive because it is clear that his intention was to obtain a nuclear bomb, something that may very well could have happened. I therefore see Pollack's justification for the war as remaining essentially unscathed, though one may argue about the war's timing. My reading of the tea leaves FWIW is that Bush wanted to push the Iraq agenda up the list because of re-election uncertainties. Bush after 9/11 may have concluded that it was imperative to go after Saddam during his first and possibly only term. There is no guarantee that a Demo President would have bitten the political bullet at a later and more dangerous time, particularly if Saddam would be then armed with a nuke. C2@likegoingtothedentistforarootcanalyougottadoitbutnobodylikesit.com