“Between October and December 2001, [Defense Department official Mike] Maloof and [neoconservative scholar David] Wurmser, who called themselves ‘Team B,’ combed through a decade of CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) files looking to find hitherto-overlooked connections, particularly between Saddam’s regime and al-Qaeda. …Once they had completed their analysis, Maloof and Wurmser presented their findings […]
Category: quotes
8/15/2002
“When Jalal Talabani and other Iraqi opposition leaders had gone to Washington to confer with [Secretary of Defense Donald] Rumsfeld and [Vice President Dick] Cheney in August 2002, he had warned about the potential for looting. There were many poor people in Baghdad, he cautioned, and they were likely to take the law into their […]
8/15/2002
“C.I.A. interrogators used waterboarding, the near-drowning technique that top Obama administration officials have described as illegal torture, 266 times on two key prisoners from Al Qaeda, far more than had been previously reported. The C.I.A. officers used waterboarding at least 83 times in August 2002 against Abu Zubaydah, according to a 2005 Justice Department legal […]
8/14/2002
In a revised paper titled ‘Iraq: Goals, Objectives, Strategy’ that she circulated to the Principals, (the members of the National Security Council other than President Bush), on August 14, 2002, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice stated: ” ‘Free Iraq in order to: *Eliminate Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMD), their means of delivery and associate […]
8/14/2002
According to an August 14, 2002, article in The Los Angeles Times: “…in August [2002], [Attorney General John] Ashcroft disclosed a plan that ‘would allow him to order the indefinite incarceration of U.S. citizens and summarily strip them of their constitutional rights and access to the courts by declaring them enemy combatants.’ ” – Peter […]
8/14/2002
“In mid-August [14] 2002, top Bush administration officials drafted a top secret document for the president to sign, laying out the goal of the [Iraq] war. Blandly titled ‘Iraq: Goals, Objectives and Strategy,’ the document outlined the broad goals for a military operation. It asserted that a free Iraq would eliminate the threat of WMD, […]
8/14/2002
On August 14, 2002, National Security Advisor Condoleezza “Rice chaired a principals meeting in Washington. The group approved for the president’s [Bush’s] signature a top secret document, entitled ‘Iraq: Goals, Objectives and Strategy,’ which laid out broad goals for a military operation that sought both to win a war and to transform a nation. The […]
8/13/2002
Former CIA Director George Tenet discussed a paper the CIA published regarding possible consequences of the Iraq war: “Dated August 13, 2002, it was titled, ‘The Perfect Storm: Planning for Negative Consequences of Invading Iraq.’ The paper provided worst-case scenarios that might emerge from a U.S.-led regime-change effort. The summary said that following an invasion: […]
8/10/2002
On August 10, 2002, “Germany’s [Chancellor] Gerhard Schroeder pledges flatly that ‘Germany will not participate’ in U.S.-led military action against Iraq because ‘we need more peace, not more war.’ ” – Lawrence F. Kaplan and William Kristol, The War Over Iraq, Page 89 […]
8/10/2002
President George W. Bush, when asked if the American people are prepared for the casualties of war: “Well, I think that that presumes there’s some kind of imminent war plan. As I said, I have no timetable. What I do believe the American people understand is that weapons of mass destruction in the hands of leaders […]