Administration of PNAC Fanatics! WP: US Shifts Rhetoric

[jackstraw45]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10756-2003Jul31.html

U.S. Shifts Rhetoric On Its Goals in Iraq
New Emphasis: Middle East Stability

By Dana Milbank and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, August 1, 2003; Page A14

As the search for illegal weapons in Iraq continues without success, the Bush administration has moved to emphasize a different rationale for the war against Saddam Hussein: using Iraq as the "linchpin" to transform the Middle East and thereby reduce the terrorist threat to the United States.

(cut)

"The great goal for the United States after 9/11 is worthy of a country of the importance and the power of the United States," the adviser said. "That goal is to see the spread of our values and to understand that our values and our security are inextricably linked, much as they were in Europe, but they are also linked in the Middle East."

(cut)

More recently, in a speech in London a month ago, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice compared the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon to Pearl Harbor.

(cut)

[Junkdrawer]

1. Important point: We're not going to leave Iraq "for a generation"

I remember Richard Perle a few days after the statue fell saying: "I see a very short mission for us in Iraq. We'll be leaving very shortly." As soon as he said it, I thought "Well, that must mean we're planning to stay for an awfully long time."

[Junkdrawer]

8. Here's the quote..

<snip>
"Much as a different Germany becomes a kind of linchpin for a Europe in which you will not have war, a different Iraq becomes a kind of linchpin for a different Middle East out of which these ideologies of hatred would not come," the official said yesterday.

"The reason I make the historical analogy is, it means it has to be a generational commitment. You can't say after a year, 'Well, this is hard.' You have to stay with it."
<snip>

[Loonman]

2. WTF!

Don't these bastards always say the Dems have no clear focus?

[jackstraw45]

3. PNAC: October 2001 - Argues for War on Iraq

http://www.newamericancentury.org/Schmitt-102901.pdf

Why Iraq?
If Saddam stays in power, the war on terrorism
will have failed. BY GARY SCHMITT

SHORTLY BEFORE getting on a
plane to fly to New Jersey from
Europe in June 2000, Mohamed
Atta, the lead hijacker of the first jet
airliner to slam into the World Trade
Center and, apparently, the lead conspirator
in the attacks of September
11, met with a senior Iraqi intelligence
official.

(cut)

In short, Iraq is both equipped
with dangerous weapons and out to
get the United States.

LIES LIES LIES

This is the crap that is leading our government

[ewagner]

4. Is anybody else

..as troubled about this as I am?

Specifically, this approach to the middle east is dangerous and short sighted. Done without a broad international consensus, this looks, feels and smells like colonialism.

Second, the repeated comparisons of 9/11 to Pearl Harbor bear an erie resemblence to the PNAC comments. It wouldn't take much for me to abandon my skeptical nature and put my tinfoil hat on!

[leesa]

22. Nothing tinfoil about it

They stated in writing that they needed this event to kick off their PNAC wet dreams. They made it happen. Why do people insist on believing The Bush Crime Family could not have done something like 9-11...they will clearly stop at nothing to attain their goals. What's 3000 people to them? They have already stated repeatedly that the number of soldiers deaths in Iraq are nothing.

[jackstraw45]

5. PNAC Article removed from their website

Wonder why the PNAC yanked this article from their site?

Thanks Google Cache:

http://216.239.51.104/search?q=cache:RFzZ7_wuAOsJ:www.newamericancentury.org/iraq_001.htm+%22In+Saddam%27s+Future,+a+Harder+U.S.+Line%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

In Saddam's Future, A Harder U.S. Line
Bush, Gore Depart From Clinton Policy

John Lancaster, Washington Post Staff Writer
The Washington Post
June 3, 2000

At the governor's mansion in Austin last year, a top foreign policy adviser to George W. Bush casually suggested to the Republican presidential candidate that "we ought to have been rid of Saddam Hussein a long time ago."

(cut)

Asked during a Jan. 26 candidates' forum about Saddam Hussein's staying power, George W. Bush warned that, "If I found in any way, shape or form that he was developing weapons of mass destruction, I'd take 'em out."

(cut)

Such language has helped create expectations within the Iraqi opposition that a Bush presidency would be considerably more hospitable to its goals than the current one. But an administration official who deals with Iraq policy said that Bush advisers may be getting ahead of themselves by suggesting that the United States should provide arms and air cover for an opposition military campaign.

"The preponderance of opinion among military experts seems to be that more U.S. military support would be required than proponents of the idea admit," the official said. "I don't dismiss it out of hand as crazy, but I'm not satisfied that the debate has been resolved."

[Bandit]

11. "If I found in any way ~ I'd take 'em out."

Notice it's always I ~ I ~ I with this guy. It is never we or the US but I will do such and such when he has never done anything. Always sending others out to do the dirty work.

[artr2]

6. Should be titled "Administration changes bullshit story AGAIN"

You have to have the mindset of a freeper to believe any of the "explanations" about anything from this mis-administration

[ewagner]

7. Trying to keep track

of all the reasons we have been given for going to war.....it's not easy....sort of like trying to pin jello to a wall.

[jackstraw45]

18. Seems to be okay with everyone by us

We seem to be the only ones outraged by the squandering of trust in US intelligence in front of the rest of the world.

The credibility of the US will be ZERO after the PNAC Neocons are done attempting to rule the middle east.

[never cry wolf]

9. methinks that the warhawks

PNAC petticoats are showing!!

[jackstraw45]

14. Yet the national media

is either silent or naive to this incredible takeover of our foreign policy by neoconservatives.

They are on their own "crusade" to conquer the middle east and spread our "values" of consuming oil for profit.

WTF!

[Kolesar]

10. We will not leave if the oil fields are not secured

Think: Shah Reza Pahlavi of Iran, installed by the US.

[jackstraw45]

12. PNAC Statement of Principles

Signed by, among others, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Libby Lewis (Cheney's Chief of Staff):

http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples.htm

American foreign and defense policy is adrift. Conservatives have criticized the incoherent policies of the Clinton Administration. They have also resisted isolationist impulses from within their own ranks. But conservatives have not confidently advanced a strategic vision of America's role in the world. They have not set forth guiding principles for American foreign policy. They have allowed differences over tactics to obscure potential agreement on strategic objectives. And they have not fought for a defense budget that would maintain American security and advance American interests in the new century.

We aim to change this. We aim to make the case and rally support for American global leadership.

(cut)

Does the United States have the resolve to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests?

(cut)

Our aim is to remind Americans of these lessons and to draw their consequences for today. Here are four consequences:

• we need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global
responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future;


• we need to strengthen our ties to democratic allies and to challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values;


• we need to promote the cause of political and economic freedom abroad;


• we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles.

(cut)

[Q]

13. A wall street journal editor is on CSPAN right now...

...explaining that Iraq is 'really' a success. (It's just so slow we don't notice it).

[Brotherjohn]

17. If it's that slow and if, as the article puts it, it's a years-long thing

... then how can we say it's a success this early? We won't know how much of a succes or failure it will be for years. Early signs, however, don't look good.

[Brotherjohn]

15. Oh, how noble! The Greatest Generation all over again! Problem is...

WWI and WWII were light years away from anything Iraq or terrorists ever did, including 9-11.

This unnamed official is saying that, like with WWI and WWII, using Pearl Harbor as an analogy, we HAD to go in and reshape Europe so that we would not be continually fighting wars and sacrificing Americans.

But WWII was not limited to Pearl Harbor. How egocentric of us to think it was (likewise, we are being very egocentric regarding 9-11; we are hardly the first country to lose thousands in an attack; it is simply the first time it has happened to us on our soil).

While our involvement in it may have been sparked by that attack, WWII was a war in which hundreds of thousands of Americans, and MILLIONS or Europeans died. And this was the second time these kinds of losses had occurred in the span of 30 years. The scale of what happened in Europe in the first half of the 20th century was orders of magnitude greater than the mid-east situation today. It merited a generational committment to prevent it from happening a third time.

Iraq does not even come close to WWI and WWII. That the administration is comparing the two reveals paranoia, war-mongering, and a frightening ignorance of recent history. Our committment in Europe post WWII was not without risks. But given what had happened already, we judged the risks to be worth it. In the case of Iraq, the risks FAR outweigh the (potential) benefits.

[leesa]

23. No kidding since Iraq was completely defenseless

[DrBB]

16. The Bait-And-Switch administration

Gee, how surprising. The PNAC plan gradually moves toward becoming the centerpiece of the explanation. First we'll tell 'em this, then we'll tell 'em that. Then, ultimately, when it's too late for anyone to say Hey wait a minute assholes, that's MY future you're mortgaging to the incomprehensible sectarian internecine swamp of Iraq and the ME--then we say, guess what we really have in mind....

And it'll only cost ya a couple trillion, plus an ongoing flow of boys in body bags. Now who could say no to that!

[jackstraw45]

20. Spread the word...

about the PNAC.

If you want to know what is on tap for 2004 (and beyond if Bu$h is elected), read their stuff.

The WMD, lies, deceit and crimes of this first term are all part of the plan, put in action at least since 9/11, to "crusade" into the middle east with the Cheney-Halliburton corporate agenda.

[Stephanie]

25. Many links for PNAC info here:

PNAC Links Archive

[Stephanie]

24. Bait-And-Switch sums it up precisely

The PNAC crew practices Straussian deception - they're convinced they have a RIGHT to lie to the masses, due to their innate superiority over us. Somebody remind Cheney he flunked out of Yale. Quick!

[jackstraw45]

19. Toles Cartoon on Administration "sources and methods"

[Junkdrawer]

21. Kick

:kick: