“On October 30 [2002], Oil and Gas International revealed that the Bush administration wanted a working group of twelve to twenty people to (a) recommend ways to rehabilitate the Iraqi oil industry ‘in order to increase oil exports to partially pay for a possible U.S. military occupation government,’ (b) consider Iraq’s continued membership of OPEC [Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries], and (c) consider whether to honor contracts Saddam Hussein had granted to non-American oil companies.”
– Dilip Hiro, “How Bush’s Iraqi Oil Grab Went Awry,” The Nation, Sep. 26, 2007