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CounterPunch
February
19, 2003
The Origins of the
Bush Iraq War Plan
The
1998 Rumsfeld & Wolfowitz Memo to Clinton
by JASON LEOPOLD
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary
Paul Wolfowitz undertook a full-fledged lobbying campaign in
1998 to get former President Bill Clinton to start a war with
Iraq and topple Saddam Hussein's regime claiming that the country
posed a threat to the United States, according to documents obtained
from a former Clinton aide.
This new information begs the question:
what is really driving the Bush Administration's desire to start
a war with Iraq if two of Bush's future top defense officials
were already planting the seeds for an attack five years ago?
In 1998, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were
working in the private sector. Both were involved with the right-wing
think tank Project for a New American Century, which was established
in 1997 by William Kristol, editor of the Weekly Standard, to
promote global leadership and dictate American foreign policy.
While Clinton was dealing with the worldwide
threat from Al-Qaeda and Osama Bin Laden, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz
wrote to Clinton urging him to use military force against Iraq
and remove Hussein from power because the country posed a threat
to the United States due to its alleged ability to develop weapons
of mass destruction. The Jan 26, 1998 letter sent to Clinton
from the Project for the New American Century said a war with
Iraq should be initiated even if the United States could not
muster support from its allies in the United Nations. Kristol
also signed the letter.
"We are writing you because we are
convinced that current American policy toward Iraq is not succeeding,
and that we may soon face a threat in the Middle East more serious
than any we have known since the end of the Cold War," says
the letter. "In your upcoming State of the Union Address,
you have an opportunity to chart a clear and determined course
for meeting this threat. We urge you to seize that opportunity,
and to enunciate a new strategy that would secure the interests
of the U.S. and our friends and allies around the world. That
strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein's
regime from power."
"We urge you to turn your Administration's
attention to implementing a strategy for removing Saddam's regime
from power. This will require a full complement of diplomatic,
political and military efforts. Although we are fully aware of
the dangers and difficulties in implementing this policy, we
believe the dangers of failing to do so are far greater. We believe
the U.S. has the authority under existing UN resolutions to take
the necessary steps, including military steps, to protect our
vital interests in the Gulf. In any case, American policy cannot
continue to be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity
in the UN Security Council," says the letter.
The full contents of the Rumsfeld and
Wolfowitz letter can be viewed at http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm.
Clinton rebuffed the advice from the
future Bush Administration officials saying he was focusing his
attention on dismantling Al-Qaeda cells, according to a copy
of the response Clinton sent to Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Kristol.
Unsatisfied with Clinton's response,
Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Kristol and others from the Project for
the New American Century wrote another letter on May 29, 1998
to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Senate Republican Majority
Leader Trent Lott saying that the United States should "establish
and maintain a strong U.S. military presence in the region, and
be prepared to use that force to protect our vital interests
in the Gulf - and, if necessary, to help remove Saddam from power."
"We should take whatever steps are
necessary to challenge Saddam Hussein's claim to be Iraq's legitimate
ruler, including indicting him as a war criminal," says
the letter to Gingrich and Lott. "U.S. policy should have
as its explicit goal removing Saddam Hussein's regime from power
and establishing a peaceful and democratic Iraq in its place.
We recognize that this goal will not be achieved easily. But
the alternative is to leave the initiative to Saddam, who will
continue to strengthen his position at home and in the region.
Only the U.S. can lead the way in demonstrating that his rule
is not legitimate and that time is not on the side of his regime."
The letter to Gingrich and Lott can be
viewed at http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqletter1998.htm.
The White House would not comment on
the letters or whether Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz possessed any intelligence
information that suggested Iraq posed an imminent threat to the
United States at the time. The letters offered no hard evidence
that Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction.
The Clinton aide said the former President
believed that the policy of "containing Saddam Hussein in
a box" was successful and that the Iraqi regime did not
pose any threat to U.S. interests at the time.
President Clinton "never considered
war with Iraq an option," the former aide said. "We
were encouraged by the UN weapons inspectors and believed they
had a good handle on the situation."
Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Kristol, however,
disagreed; saying the only way to deal with Hussein was by initiating
a full-scale war.
"The policy of "containment"
of Saddam Hussein has been steadily eroding over the past several
months," Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Kristol wrote in their
letter to Clinton. "As recent events have demonstrated,
we can no longer depend on our partners in the Gulf War coalition
to continue to uphold the sanctions or to punish Saddam when
he blocks or evades UN inspections. It hardly needs to be added
that if Saddam does acquire the capability to deliver weapons
of mass destruction, as he is almost certain to do if we continue
along the present course, the safety of American troops in the
region, of our friends and allies like Israel and the moderate
Arab states, and a significant portion of the world's supply
of oil will all be put at hazard. The only acceptable strategy
is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able
to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction. In the
near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action
as diplomacy is clearly failing. In the long term, it means removing
Saddam Hussein and his regime from power."
Those alleged threats posed by Iraq and
the advice Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Weekly Standard Editor William
Kristol first offered the attention of the Clinton Administration
five years ago have now become the blueprint for how the Bush
Administration is dealing with the Iraq.
The existence of the Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz
"war" letters is just another reason to question the
Bush Administration's desire to go to war with Iraq now instead
of dealing with other pressing issues such as Al-Qaeda. Because
the letters were written in 1998 it proves that this war was
planned well before 9-11 and casts further doubt on the claims
that Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9-11 terrorist attacks.
Jason Leopold
can be reached at: jasonleopold@hotmail.com
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