“The White House is developing a detailed plan, modeled on the postwar occupation of Japan, to install an American-led military government in Iraq if the United States topples Saddam Hussein, senior [Bush] administration officials said today [October 11, 2002]. The plan also calls for war-crime trials of Iraqi leaders and a transition to an elected civilian government that could take months or years. Officials say they want to avoid the chaos and in-fighting that have plagued Afghanistan since the defeat of the Taliban. Mr. Bush’s aides say they also want full control over Iraq while American-led forces carry out their principal mission: finding and destroying weapons of mass destruction. For as long as the coalition partners administered Iraq, they would essentially control the second largest proven reserves of oil in the world, nearly 11 percent of the total. A senior administration official said the United Nations oil-for-food program would be expanded to help finance stabilization and reconstruction.”
– David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt, “U.S. Has a Plan To Occupy Iraq, Officials Report,” The New York Times, Oct. 11, 2002