“The White House inserted a far-reaching sentence [making a case to pursue military action against Iraq] into a letter from Ambassador John D. Negroponte, the chief United States envoy to the United Nations, to the Security Council last Sunday [October 7, 2001], senior [Bush] administration officials said. …The letter put the Security Council on notice that the United States might be forced to retaliate against other state sponsors of terrorism if it turned up new evidence, stating, ‘We may find that our self-defense requires further action with respect to other organizations and other states.’ ”
– Elaine Sciolino and Patrick E. Tyler, “Some Pentagon Officials and Advisers Seek to Oust Iraq’s Leader in War’s Next Phase,” The New York Times, Oct. 12, 2001