O'Neill: Plan to Hit Iraq Began Pre-9/11

[HARDCORE]

By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 11, 2004; Page A13


CRAWFORD, Tex., Jan. 10 -- Former Treasury Secretary Paul H. O'Neill charged in remarks released Saturday that President Bush began planning to oust Saddam Hussein within days of taking office and before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.




Providing firsthand testimony bolstering a longtime contention of White House critics, O'Neill told Lesley Stahl of CBS News for a segment to be broadcast on "60 Minutes" Sunday night that preparations to oust Hussein long predated Bush's articulation of his preemption doctrine in June 2002, when he said the United States must strike looming enemies before the worst threats emerge.

"From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go," O'Neill said, according to CBS. "For me, the notion of preemption -- that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do -- is a really huge leap."

Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean said the revelation underscores the continuing importance of examining "the true circumstances of the Bush administration's push for war."

A senior administration official said O'Neill's "suggestion that the administration was planning an invasion of Iraq days after taking office is laughable. Nobody listened to him when he was in office. Why should anybody now?"

However, other administration officials did not deny that contingency plans were made for a post-Hussein Iraq, and pointed out that "regime change" had been the official policy of the United States since President Bill Clinton said in 1998 that containment of the Iraqi president was no longer sufficient and a change of leadership was necessary.

O'Neill gave the interview in connection with Tuesday's publication of "The Price of Loyalty," by Ron Suskind, who interviewed O'Neill after he was fired by Bush in December 2002. Suskind, who won a Pulitzer Prize as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, talked to O'Neill nearly daily for a year beginning in 2003. O'Neill is quoted in the book as saying that in early discussions at a National Security Council meeting he attended, no official questioned why Iraq should be invaded.

"It was all about finding a way to do it," O'Neill said. "That was the tone of it. The president saying, 'Go find me a way to do this.' "

According to a CBS news release, Suskind says in the book that O'Neill and other White House insiders gave him documents that show that in the first three months of 2001, the administration was examining options for removing Hussein and planning for the aftermath, including such details as peacekeeping troops and war crimes tribunals.

Suskind said one Pentagon document discussed contractors in 30 or 40 countries that might be interested in Iraq's oil.

The Treasury Department issued a statement saying officials there had not provided any classified documents to O'Neill. Administration officials expect to conduct investigations.

[Gimpy]

back and wait for all the "Bushies" to start "whacking" at this honest and honorable man for telling the truth!

[reeb]

My Own Opion:

I have stated all along that Bush is out for "retaliazation " against Hussim ( sp ) for reason of making threats against his daddy.

I will " Stir the pot of beans again ".

Just why all the sudden did the USA give up on Bin and go after Saddam?

I dont like polotics, and never will ( bunch of crooks ).

enough from my Butt !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[HARDCORE]

Gents -

Bush (in the beginning) had the makings of a good leader, I do not understand what went wrong, or even if it can be rectified!? :cd:

VERITAS

[SEATJERKER]

...back room politics, callit what ever you like, but again getting rid of Iraq's former leader was the right thing to do, by all means nesc,...

...The job should have been finished in 91, or back as far as 45 when we should have gone straight to Moscow, but we didn't, so along comes the baggage that must be swept up along the way,...

..."person's as Sadam" are he!! bent on greed, and power, and there wasn't anyone that survived long enough in that country to"challenge him, and as this Nation "partied it's way through the last CIC, and enjoyed 8 years of supposed growth, and "good times, the bad guys sat around conjouring up new ways to kill us off, AND THEIR STILL TRYING,...

...Now as the world turns today, we're still hunting the other sand flea, and we'll get him to, but for 8 years "we sat around letting them run amok with our limp wristed forgien policy, and no balls approach, I for one would rather have ANY military man in the White house, Dem, or Rep, doesn't matter to me, as long as whoever is in there is willing to take a stand on what is RIGHT for the world as a whole, if it means fighting this war the way it has gone so be it, I'm not one for the "let's see how it goes method" and that's what I feel I saw during the last run through the White house term, I met the man twice, and his wife, and I feel that they are good people, I feel that they didn't stand up for what the world was facing, and took the ostrich approach, well it didn't work, and the world just passed on the "current mess" to the present administration, I feel that there was so much that President Clinton could have done to "oust" the bad guys but just plain flat out didn't, because he didn't want to offend anybody, yes I'm a registered Dem, and although it doesn't mean a thing until you hit the voting booth, it's what happens out side the voting booth that matters, don't call me a hawk either, I don't want war anymore then the rest of you, but it's where we are TODAY,... yesterdays were left to slip away without doing what should have been done, and now that it's here finish it, go after them with all we have, or we're not going to have anything left afterwards, timing was everything, and by the former administration inability to grab the bull by the horns, now we have a tiger by the tail, call it "ranting" if you must, but we all know that Sa dam didn't give a rat's a$$ about the Un, or what anyone threatened, the only thing that mattered was actions, and pre 9/11 , or not, he had to go,...

...If this Nation is to survive, and I mean survive, we must look to what we know will curtail evil, and lock it down, and that has been the "Toby Keith" method which is to put a boot, and thensome up your a$$, and show them that we will not tolorate evil, from encroaching upon our shores either by phyical attacks, and or mental ones, evil has nothing but time to sit back, and wait until you lower your guard, and it will pounce, I for one will not sit back, and wait for that to happen,...

...I'm not happy that we all are sitting here heaving volleys at each other when evil is sitting there laughing at us just waiting for us to tire, and lower our eyelids to rest,...

...so get the he!! off the Dem/rep issues, and start thinking of AMERICA again, not just who looks better in the papers,...

...the issues are, Is America prepared in every sense of the word to protect itself here in this Nation against what seems to be an inevitable attack, stocks of food, and medicine, stocks of supplies to assist in heating, and survival of our brothers, and sisters who haven't made the nesc arrangements of protection, I believe that every house should have a wood stove for heat already in place in the nothern states, etc, every home should have the means to protect itself, first aid supplies, generators for minimal electic needs, firearms, ammunition, waterproof matches, tabs to purify water, etc,...

...get off the soap boxes, and look to preserve what might come to be, and know that it's us against them,...

...

[HARDCORE]

SEAT JERKER -

call it,...

...back room politics, callit what ever you like, but again getting rid of Iraq's former leader was the right thing to do, by all means nesc,...

"No one can add to that!"

VERITAS

[SuperScout]

As part of the administration's economic recovery plan, an across-the-board tax cut was proposed, similar to the one that worked so well during the Kennedy presidency, and in the Reagan presidency. Economic history is easier to write about than to create, but the legacies of the previous tax cuts are all on the positive side - more jobs, greater governmental revenues, more properity, and a stronger economy. Paul O'Neill was opposed to any such proposal from the very beginning, and despite reams of supporting documentation, economic logic, and political good sense, he continued to oppose this very proven and positive plan to revitalize our economy. O'Neill continually bumped up against Wall Street, not just as a contrarian and opponent of growth policies, and generally acted as such an obstructionist and nay-sayer that the President fired him, certainly within the realm of political, economic and good common sense. The opinion of him on Wall Street was really never very high, and is even lower today; he had gained some reputation as a tough banker, but not much of a forward thinker. Now, the positive benefits of the tax cuts are being borne out daily, proving O'Neill and other pessimists incorrect.

Two points: I fault the President and his selection process for not properly vetting O'Neill in the first place, where his negativity and off-the-wall ideas should have been uncovered, and his de-selection assured. Secondly, I fault O'Neill for not having the courage of his convictions, and offering his resignation much earlier if he couldn't support the President and his economic recovery plan. There were many times in our respective military careers where we may have questioned the game plan of the boss, but we executed it nonetheless. Naturally, we didn't have the luxury at the time of simply resigning, but we knew we were part of the team, and as team players, did our best. A Cabinet official does indeed have the luxury of either supporting the plans of his boss, or tendering his resignation. It's called personal ethics and integrity. Now, sadly for Mr. O'Neill, his lack of either appears to be the driving impetus for his wanting to sell his book.

[HARDCORE]

POINTS WELL TAKEN!

VERITAS

[Andy]

When I was in the military and perhaps even more so with the police we were forever making contingence plans. These plans including possible ?enemies?, logistics, personal, and with the police, financial resources.

If Bush et al did not have plans in place for a preemptive attack on Iraq, Iran, N. Korea and at least a dozen other places I would find a hell of a lot of fault with him. If, for example, the drug lords in Columbia seized the government and took all foreign nationals hostage and the U.S. did not have a plan to counteract this situation, it would seem they weren?t doing their job. Hence if the current administration didn?t have a plan, from day one, to take out Saddam something would have been wrong.

It?s no big deal because any president worth his salt would have plans in place but Clinton also had the military work out plans to attack Iraq, just in case.

Once upon a time when McKinley was president he was totally unprepared for an incident called the Boxer rebellion. Americans died in China, more than were necessary because he was clueless. FDR knew there would be a war with Japan yet he let the American troops in the Philippians wither and die due to lack of good planning. We don?t want that sort of thing happening again, do we?

Stay healthy,
Andy

[HARDCORE]

GOOD POINTS ANDY!! :re:

VERITAS