Anyone know about Cheney's think tank?
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| Sat, 10-30-2004 - 10:07pm |
Besides calling for the U.S. to "remove Saddam Hussein's regime from power" (1997 letter to Clinton), PNAC published (RAD, 9/2000) a document, based upon Cheney's work, calling for the U.S. to use a smoke screen excuse of "unresolved conflicts" for "immediate justification" of invading Iraq, in order to achieve their primary goal: The "desire for a permanent role in the Gulf" to oversee "U.S. interests" and to secure our status as "world's only superpower." http://cryptome.org/rad.htm
PNAC calls for the United States to "fight and decisively win multiple (four or more), simultaneous major theater wars" as a "Core Mission". The neo-conservative belief is that the U.S. should be fighting four or more wars at the same time, in order to prove its military "credibility" to the world.
Michael Ledeen, prominent neo-conservative spokesman and primary advisor on foreign affairs to Bush’s “most powerful aide”, Karl Rove (Washington Post, 3/10/03), calls for a "revolution": “No stages. This is a total war. We are fighting a variety of enemies… And all this talk about, well, first we are going to do Afghanistan, then we will do Iraq. That is entirely the wrong way to go about it… Creative destruction is our middle name and we threaten everybody's stability… stability is not what we want and stability is not what the United States is about. We are one great revolutionary society in the world and we want revolution… If we just let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy, but just wage a total war... our children will sing great songs about us years from now. (American Enterprise Institute,
http://www.aei.org/events/filter.,eventID.364/transcript.asp)
PNAC's document calls for significant budgetary allocations for defense spending to enable their plans, but recognizes the difficulty in getting Congress to go along with these changes: Their document, published just one year before the attacks of 9/11, prophetically acknowledges that without a "catastrophic and catalyzing event... like a new Pearl Harbor", Congress is not likely to pass the necessary budget increases to fund the group's goals. Immediately following 9/11, Congress quickly passed a $40 billion defense package for fighting the war on terror. And President Bush, in alignment with the neo-conservative document, wrote in his journal on the eve of 9/11/01: "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today" (as reported to the Washington Post, 1/27/02). Ted Koppel, the only mainstream media anchor to touch the story, described PNAC in his March 5, 2003 broadcast with the following statement: "Take away the somewhat hyperbolic references to conspiracy... and you're left with a story that has the additional advantage of being true."
I tend to resist hyperbole and conspiratorial thinking, but I think Ted Koppel's words capture it well... this story is true, so you don't need to use hyperbole. In my opinion, most Americans would not have approved of the war if they realized the neo-conservative agenda that underlies the Bush Administration's actions in Iraq. I also don't think most Americans would have endorsed the invasion if they knew that the Bush Administration's charges against Iraq were exaggerated and unfounded. (U.S. News and World Report, June 9, 2003; 9/11 Commission 7/6/04; October 21, 2004 report by Senator Carl Levin.)
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I haven't specifically read about PNAC but I am aware of Wolfowitz and others and their neo-con vision.
Carrie, Mom of Alex & Anna
I agree-- it is scary. I think it sounds so radical that it would be easy to lump in the far-fetched file and simply disregard, which is how they've been able to operate without much exposure. The neo-cons think on a level and in a way that transcends how most Americans think. I tend to be quite skeptical when I hear anything that sounds too outrageous, but having read their document myself, there's no denying what they're trying to accomplish.
This is very long but worth the read ...
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/03/24/timep.saddam.tm/index.html
First Stop, Iraq
By Michael Elliott and James Carney
Monday, March 24, 2003 Posted: 5:49 PM EST (2249 GMT)
How did the U.S. end up taking on Saddam? The inside story of how Iraq jumped to the top of Bush's agenda -- and why the outcome there may foreshadow a different world order
"F___ Saddam. we're taking him out." Those were the words of President George W. Bush, who had poked his head into the office of National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
It was March 2002, and Rice was meeting with three U.S. Senators, discussing how to deal with Iraq through the United Nations, or perhaps in a coalition with America's Middle East allies. Bush wasn't interested. He waved his hand dismissively, recalls a participant, and neatly summed up his Iraq policy in that short phrase.
The Senators laughed uncomfortably; Rice flashed a knowing smile. The President left the room. A year later, Bush's outburst has been translated into action, as cruise missiles and smart bombs slam into Baghdad.
But the apparent simplicity of his message belies the gravity at hand. Sure, the outcome is certain: America will win the war, and Saddam will be taken out. But what is unfolding in Iraq is far bigger than regime change or even the elimination of dangerous weapons.
The U.S. has launched a war unlike any it has fought in the past. This one is being waged not to defend against an enemy that has attacked the U.S. or its interests but to pre-empt the possibility that one day it might do so. The war has turned much of the world against America. Even in countries that have joined the "coalition of the willing," big majorities view it as the impetuous action of a superpower led by a bully. This divide threatens to emasculate a United Nations that failed to channel a diplomatic settlement or brand the war as legitimate.
The endgame will see the U.S. front and center, attempting to remake not merely Iraq but the entire region. The hope is that the Middle East, a cockpit of instability for decades, will eventually settle into habits of democracy, prosperity and peace. The risks are that Washington's rupture with some of its closest allies will deepen and that the war will become a cause for which a new generation of terrorists can be recruited.
How did we get here? In one sense, this war is easy to explain. Saddam Hussein is a brutal dictator who hates America and has shown a wicked fondness for acquiring and using weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). Since Sept. 11, 2001, the U.S. has been acutely aware of what can happen when powerful weapons fall into the hands of those with no compunction about their use and no sympathy for those they kill.
Put those facts together, and you can argue that Saddam's days were numbered from the moment the attacks on New York City and Washington happened. But that suggests a fatalistic inevitability to the story and ignores the dramatic shifts in opinion and influence among Washington's key players. In truth, this war is just as much about an idea--that Iraq is but the first step in an American-led effort to make the world a safer place.
For some in the Administration, the principles that have shaped policy on Iraq are generally applicable; they could be used with other nations, like Iran or North Korea, that have or threaten to acquire terrible weapons. The least understood story of the Iraq crisis is how the idea behind it took root and eventually brought America to the edge of Baghdad. In this battle march of an idea, there are four central players: President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell and--least known to the general public--Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz.
One by one, these men signed on to the imperative of taking on Iraq and its weapons, and sending a message to the world. This story does not start where one might suppose, on the day last year when Bush identified Iraq--with Iran and North Korea--as part of the "axis of evil." Nor does it start with the horrors of Sept. 11. The confrontation with Iraq can be traced to 1991 and the end of what some Administration officials have since last fall called "the first Gulf War"--the one waged and won by the President's father.
SOUNDING THE ALARM
When senior advisers of the first president Bush--including Powell, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Cheney, then Secretary of Defense--gathered in the Oval Office on Wednesday afternoon, Feb. 27, 1991, they agreed that their military and political objectives in the Persian Gulf had been met. Saddam's forces, which had invaded Kuwait seven months before, had been routed.
General Norman Schwarzkopf, commander in chief of Operation Desert Storm, concurred in the judgment. Bush had a clear goal for the war: it was not to topple Saddam, much less to march on Baghdad, but to drive the Iraqi army out of Kuwait. The President had assembled a grand coalition, including armies from many Arab states, behind that aim, and he was not inclined to deviate from it.
"Bush was a firm believer in sticking with his word," says a former senior aide. "It was his word and his promises that got that coalition together. There was never any doubt in his mind that the war had to end and we couldn't go to Baghdad."
None of the four men--Bush, Powell, Cheney and Schwarzkopf--most closely identified with the decision to cease hostilities at midnight, Feb. 27, has ever publicly disowned it. Indeed, of the broader top echelon of decision makers at the end of Gulf War I, only one has cast doubt on how it was concluded--and at the time, nobody asked his opinion.
But his misgivings about the cease-fire 12 years ago have arguably had more of an effect on global politics than the certainties of those who are sure they were right. That man was Paul Wolfowitz, then Under Secretary for policy in the Pentagon, the third-ranking civilian under Cheney.
He was 47 at the time and already a fixture in the Washington policy village, one of those men who spend their
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Carrie
Proudly voting for...
Carrie, Mom of Alex & Anna
Carrie, Mom of Alex & Anna
But with all these stories, I take the time to read through them, reasearch them before I make up my mind....and so that is what I'll do. Thanks for bringing this to our attention, I have not read too much on this but I will now.
My personal belief is that the Bush Administration's neo-conservative goal of deposing Saddam Hussein was more readily accepted by many Americans because of our vulnerability after 9-11, and the understandable need to catch a "bad guy". With bin Laden on the loose and more difficult to apprehend than expected, many Americans were feeling so powerless and so in need of a sign that we could take care of ourselves and defend ourselves. Shifting the war on terror to a more "apprehendable" fixture (Saddam Hussein) provided a more attainable focus. And of course, gave the neoconservatives the perfect opportunity to get their foot in the Gulf door. The "Pearl Harbor" that PNAC was hoping for was now at hand.
ITA that the Bush Administration has used fear (and the deliberate use of misinformation and "terror alerts" to maintain an elevated state of fear) in order to bolster support for their objectives and the administration in general.
Carrie, Mom of Alex & Anna
I wonder why there is so much silence on this very disturbing news story?
Lbmlbmlb says she doesn't buy into conspiratory thinking. Nor do I... but, in the words of Ted Koppel who reported on this story on 3/5/04. "Take away the somewhat hyperbolic references to conspiracy... and you're left with a story that has the additional advantage of being true." Nightline transcript: http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/ThePlan.htm
What about the Cheney-inspired document's call for the U.S. "to fight and decisively win multiple (four or more) simultaneous Major Theater wars" in order to prove our credibility? Doesn't this bother any Bush supporters?
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