Former Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney was interviewed by the Miller Center at the University of Virginia on March 17-18, 2000. He discussed the build-up to the first Gulf War, when he rejected Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell’s original war plan. “Cheney ordered a rewrite that envisioned a left hook to cut off Iraqi forces. Worried about ‘bugs and gas,’ Cheney also ordered contingency plans to use tactical nuclear weapons if Iraqi forces employed biological and chemical weapons. The notion was so sensitive that Powell later had the study destroyed. As for the war itself, Cheney argued against asking Congress for permission, but the president [George H.W. Bush] disregarded him and won authorization. Cheney later admitted he had been wrong.”
– Peter Baker, Days of Fire, Page 41