Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul “Wolfowitz duly assured the House Appropriations Committee on March 27 [2003] that reconstruction would largely be covered by proceeds from Iraqi oil. Congress was told that oil revenues in Iraq could yield between $50 billion to $100 billion over the following two to three years. Wolfowitz argued, ‘There’s a lot […]
3/26/2003
President George W. Bush mentions the treatment of Iraq soldiers: “We are treating Iraqi prisoners of war according the highest standards of law and decency. Coalition doctors are working to save the lives of the wounded, including Iraqi soldiers. One of our servicemen said this about the injured Iraqis he treated: “We can’t blame them for […]
3/26/2003
On April 20, 2003, The Washington Times uncovered “a Pentagon memo to the coalition command written less than three weeks before American troops entered Baghdad [Iraq, on March 26, 2003], listing sixteen sites that were crucial to protect in order of importance; number two on the list was the Baghdad museum [the National Museum].” – […]
3/25/2003
After submitting the Wartime Budget, President Bush stated: “I’ve just met with our leaders here at the Pentagon, who are monitoring the course of our battle to free Iraq and rid that country of weapons of mass destruction [WMD]. Our coalition is on a steady advance. We’re making good progress… Our coalition is strong. It’s […]
3/25/2003
President George W. Bush requests more money for the War in Iraq: “America has accepted this responsibility. We also accept the cost of supporting our military and the missions we give it. Today, I’m sending the Congress a wartime supplemental appropriations request of $74.7 billion, to fund needs directly arising from the Iraqi conflict and our […]
3/25/2003
On March 25, 2003, President Bush signed Executive Order 13292, which “granted [Vice President Dick] Cheney the greatest expansion of powers in the history of the vice presidency. …If Cheney wanted to keep something secret, he could [now] classify it. If he wanted to leak information, or disinformation, to the New York Times or Washington […]
3/25/2003
“No WMD had been used or found in the first days of the invasion [of Iraq, which began on March 20, 2003]. The intense pace of [Army Major General James ‘Spider’] Mark’s intelligence team only got more frantic. The quality of the intelligence on the hundreds of remaining sites on the WMD site list was […]
3/24/2003
In Iraq, on March 24, 2003, “Saddam resurfaced to give a twenty-five-minute televised speech taunting the United States and proving reports of his death greatly exaggerated.” – Frank Rich, The Greatest Story Ever Sold, Page 80 […]
3/24/2003
In a speech to the House of Commons on March 24, 2003, U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair said: ” ‘We are now just four days into this conflict [in Iraq]. It is worth restating our central objectives. They are to remove Saddam Hussein from power, and to ensure that Iraq is disarmed of all chemical, […]
3/24/2003
“On 24 March, 2003 the Pentagon announced that it had awarded a contract to Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR), the engineering subsidiary of the multinational energy services company, Halliburton, for a sum that might total $7 billion. The contracts were to rebuild Iraq’s oil infrastructure and, controversially, to import fuel for the domestic Iraqi market. […]