“With the Pentagon now under Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz–both of whom had also long believed that Saddam Hussein should have been toppled during the first Gulf War–the war planners were given free rein. What was needed, however, was a pretext–perhaps a major crisis. ‘Crises can be opportunities,’ wrote [advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney, David] Wurmser in his [January 1, 2001] paper, calling for an American-Israeli preemptive war throughout the Middle East.”
– James Bamford, A Pretext for War, Pages 268-269