Dick Cheney had a crucial role in devising the scheme to invade Iraq. This plan began in the mid-nineties. Cheney, along with Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz, founded the PNAC (Project for A New American Century.) The organization’s purpose was to influence American foreign and defense policy. Their first major mission was to push President Clinton to invade Iraq. Here are excerpts from their Statement of Principles from June 1997 as posted on their website: [i]
June 3, 1997
American foreign and defense policy is adrift. Conservatives have criticized the incoherent policies of the Clinton Administration. They have also resisted isolationist impulses from within their own ranks…they have not fought for a defense budget that would maintain American security and advance American interests in the new century…
We aim to change this. We aim to make the case and rally support for American global leadership…
We seem to have forgotten the essential elements of the Reagan Administration’s success: a military that is strong and ready to meet both present and future challenges; a foreign policy that boldly and purposefully promotes American principles abroad…
Such a Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity may not be fashionable today. But it is necessary if the United States is to build on the successes of this past century and to ensure our security and our greatness in the next.
The above statement was signed by the following: Elliott Abrams, Gary Bauer, William J. Bennett, Eliot A. Cohen, Midge Decter, Paula Dobriansky, Steve Forbes, Aaron Friedberg, Francis Fukuyama, Frank Gaffney, Fred C. Ikle, Donald Kagan, Zalmay Khalilzad, Norman Podhoretz, Dan Quayle, Peter W. Rodman, Stephen P.Rosen, Henry S. Rowen, Vin Weber, George Weigel, I. Lewis Libby, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Jeb Bush, and Dick Cheney.
They failed at getting Clinton to agree with their war-mongering, but on September 20, 2001 the PNAC offered their proposal to President Bush:
We agree that a key goal, but by no means the only goal, of the current war on terrorism should be to capture or kill Osama bin Laden, and to destroy his network of associates… It may be that the Iraqi government provided assistance in some form to the recent attack on the United States. But even if evidence does not link Iraq directly to the attack, any strategy aiming at the eradication of terrorism and its sponsors must include a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. Failure to undertake such an effort will constitute an early and perhaps decisive surrender in the war on international terrorism. The United States must therefore provide full military and financial support to the Iraqi opposition. American military force should be used… (30)
The PNAC was well prepared for an Iraq invasion by the time 9/11 occurred. Cheney had brought in his radical buddies (many of who received contributions from oil companies) to control the Defense Department. Their ultimate purpose in taking Iraq was, “Iraq occupies some of the most strategically important and well-endowed territories of the Middle East… Whoever inherits Iraq dominates the entire Mid East,” said a Cheney assistant in 1996. With the fear of Iran or Syria overtaking Iraq in the near future, since Iraq was a crumbling society, and the desire to open new military bases in the region, the PNAC helped their president achieve their agenda.
We all remember the 2003 State of Union speech where we were warned of Iraq, but what about the 2001 address? Who remembers that one? Where Bush said,
“We will confront weapons of Mass destruction, the enemies of liberty…”
Mind you, this was all way before Iraq, way before Afghanistan, way before 9/11. It is quite evident that WMD was on Bush’s mind right from the beginning of his presidency.
What about Bush’s address to Congress and the nation on September 21, 2001 following the 9/11 attacks? Bush set the stage for war in the Middle East calling the 9/11 terrorist attack an “act of war,” while also conveniently mentioning how “America has no truer friend than Great Britain.” It is no coincidence that Great Britain would be the prominent nation to stand beside the BAD and all of their decisions, following the U.S. right into battle. Bush also went on to state how the “enemy… hates what they see… a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms, our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote…” Wait a minute! Who was Bush referring to? It sounds like hypocrisy at its best. After all, the BAD was not democratically elected, it was self-appointed. The BAD and the radical right-wing also do not respect other religions, they actually discriminate against them. The BAD also doesn’t like freedom of speech either, especially when it comes to reporters or Liberals asking questions. (There were more than several incidents where reporters were removed from the room for asking the wrong questions.) The BAD also doesn’t like the freedom to vote; for they stepped all over that freedom in 2000. (See Election 2004 for more on abuse of voting rights.) It seems to me that the BAD has a lot more in common with the “enemy” of our freedoms than any of us ever thought. After all, the BAD has already surpassed Osama Bin Laden’s death toll. Between the U.S. soldiers wrongfully killed in this wrong war and the innocent Iraqi and Afghanistan civilians, Bush is a far more dangerous than some angry and sickly man in a cave. And while Bin Laden may have been the one to plan the attack on America, Bush is the one who let it happen. Never forget it.
