Reply #31: Great post! But W wanted Iraq even before he "won" the election

[mistertrickster]

in 2000.

See my article, "DUBYA THE MAGNIFICIENT."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/articles/02/10/23_dubya.html

Questioned at a presidential primary debate in December 1999, Bush said, '''If I found in any way, shape or form that he was developing weapons of mass destruction, I'd take 'em out. I'm surprised he's still there.''

Brit Hume, one of the two journalists questioning Mr. Bush and the other five candidates for the Republican presidential nomination, asked, ''Take him out?''

Mr. Bush answered, ''The weapons of mass destruction.''' (New York Times, 4 Dec. 1999).

Despite his "clarification," a lot of listeners believed-and still believe-Mr. Bush was referring as much to "him" as to "them." Ultimately, it makes little difference, as Mr. Bush well knows-our military can't take out the weapons without controlling the man who controls the weapons.

On other occasions the Bush campaign was even blunter. Then lead foreign-policy adviser, Condoleezza Rice declared in June of 2000: "Regime change is necessary." Other Bush campaigners who are now major players in drafting Iraqi policy had already mapped out plans on how Saddam Hussein could be overthrown. "Both Mr. Perle and Robert Zoellick, a former top aide to Gov. Bush's father, advocate specific steps to oust Saddam." (The Wall Street Journal, 28 June 2000) They recommended carving out chunks of Iraq militarily which would humiliate Saddam Hussein and provide a base for operations. Such a plan would force him to attack, and his massed forces could then be annihilated.

Even as far back as 1998, Paul Wolfowitz, now Deputy Secretary of Defense, and fellow Bush campaign advisers Richard Armitage now Deputy Secretary of State, Dov S. Zakheim and the aforementioned Mr. Perle wrote an open letter to former President Clinton "urging the administration to recognize a provisional government of Iraq headed by the INC," the opposition group, the Iraqi National Conference. (The Washington Post, 3 June 2000)