The sad truth about the Iraq war.

When the Bush administration changed the reason for the invasion of Iraq from "WMD" to "regime change" it was one of the few times they have been honest.

The call for regime change goes back to 1992 when Scooter Libby and Paul Wolfowitz, at the direction of then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, created a defense document calling for the removal from power of Saddam Hussein.

In 1999 the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm">in a letter to President Clinton, again called for regime change in Iraq. According to PNAC "the only acceptable strategy is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction. In the near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action as diplomacy is clearly failing. In the long term, it means removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power. That now needs to become the aim of American foreign policy."

Among the names that signed the letter to Clinton were those of Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld.

Paul Wolfowitz admitted that regime change was the real reason for the invasion http://ics.leeds.ac.uk/papers/vp01.cfm?outfit=pmt&requesttimeout=500&folder=339&paper=543">in an interview with Vanity Fair in 2003. According to Wolfowitz, WMD was something they could sell to the American people, something they could understand.

"The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy, we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason," Wolfowitz was quoted as saying.

Remember when Richard Clarke said that the Bush administration talked about how to use the September 11th attacks against Iraq? He knew what he was talking about. The invasion of Iraq had been planned by radical conservatives for many, many years.

On the 92 defense document. It was leaked to the press, and Poppa Bush was asked if this was official policy, he said it wasn't. Ergo, he basically said he wasn't on board with "the crazies".

He is a Bush afterall

that regime change would destabilize the Middle East and was a bad idea. So maybe it really was "the crazies".

and willing participant to regime change.

You think he changed his mind or just lied?

and it ruined his reputation and career. I don't feel sorry for him but I think they used him.

But I think Powell was a willing doormat...he thought he was "one of them" - and they didn't see it that way.

He thought that the various programs and initiatives mouthed by Our Great Leader could be "good" for the country (from a purely conservative, right-wing view point). But neither of them were "in" on the secret agendas. O'Neil and Powell (at the start) actually wanted to improve the country, better the nation (in their conservative way). That is why O'Neil left - he discovered that these neocons were not interested in improving the country or making a better nation; they were out to loot, rob, steal, and enrich themselves and their cronies at the expense of the country.

Powell must the lined up in the dock with Our Great Leader and all of his other minions at the World Court and tried for crimes against humanity, but I don't think that he started out to rape his own country and others; I think that came later. Either he was stupid and thought he could "control" events and so lessen the damage or he was gullible and stupid and just didn't realize who he was dealing with, or he got sucked into the possibility that he could be a part of the "Family" - which, of course, was the dumbest thing he could have believed...

KBR, etc. 4. permanent bases in the ME