On September 12, 2002, “more than three dozen senators were invited to the Pentagon for a briefing by [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld on weapons of mass destruction. One of those attending, Sen. Max Cleland [Democrat] of Georgia, was surprised to find Vice President [Dick] Cheney and CIA director [George] Tenet also waiting there. ‘It was pretty clear that Rumsfeld and Cheney are ready to go to war,’ Cleland wrote later that day in a note to himself. ‘They have already made the decision to go to war and to them that is the only option.’ ”
– Thomas E. Ricks, Fiasco, Page 60