Confidential memo reveals US plan to provoke an invasion of Iraq

[jimpeel]

Nope, it's from two days ago.

Yes. You are correct. It is a two day old reiteration of old news.

 

[spike]

In that case I'd expect you to have a link to this same memo being reported earlier.

Maybe you could address whether you approve of this sort of thing while you're at it.

 

[Gonz]

"Are you expressing your approval for these actions or not?"

Since that is not what happened, it is irrelvant.

As the story sits, I don't find sufficient evidence that either of them were acting out of malice. A UN colored U2...sounds like a smart-assed remark more than a strategy.

 

[jimpeel]

In that case I'd expect you to have a link to this same memo being reported earlier.

Yeah, about three years earlier. You really make this just too easy.

Well, here it is:

THE ITERATION:

SOURCE

Last Updated: Friday, 3 February 2006, 12:43 GMT

Blair 'made secret US Iraq pact'

The book details a meeting between President Bush and Tony Blair
Tony Blair and George W Bush decided to invade Iraq weeks earlier than they have admitted, a new book by a human rights lawyer has claimed.

The book by Philippe Sands says the two leaders discussed going to war regardless of any United Nations view.

And it suggests the US wanted to provoke Saddam Hussein by sending a spy plane over Iraq in UN colours.

Downing Street said on Thursday it did not comment on discussions that "may or may not have happened" between leaders.

THE REITERATION:

This is a discussion on Bob Woodward's book "Plan of Attack" Apr 11 2006, 06:09 PM

SOURCE

Not to diminish Woodward's considerable reporting talents and the many scoops he does present in the book, but reporting that February 15 had at some point been a potential start date if inspections had "exposed Saddam" (without saying whose start day it was) is not a substitute for reporting that Bush gave Blair a "penciled in" date of March 10.

The March 10 disclosure was not the only Manning memo element missing from Woodward's account of the Bush-Blair meeting--and perhaps not the most significant element absent from Woodward's rendition. The once-secret memo also noted that Bush and Blair had acknowledged that no WMDs had been found in Iraq; that Bush had raised the possibility of provoking a confrontation with Saddam Hussein; that Bush had discussed the possibility of assassinating Saddam; that Bush had said that it was "unlikely there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups"; and that Blair had agreed that sectarian warfare was improbable.

Woodward maintains that Plan of Attack in prior sections had covered most of this. But some of his examples are not fully on point. The fact that Blix had told the UN that no WMDs had yet been found and that US intelligence sources had told Woodward the same makes for a different story than Bush saying to Blair that no unconventional weapons had been unearthed and suggesting they might stage an event to convince the public that war was warranted. According to the Manning memo, one idea Bush had was to paint UN colors on an American U-2 spy plane that would fly over Iraq and (Bush hoped) draw fire from Iraqi forces.

And THAT is why I called your story a "reiteration of a reiteration". You Libs are always playing catchup. What's with that? Are you just not paying attention? Two authors wrote entire books about this and you sit there oblivious to that fact.

Maybe you could address whether you approve of this sort of thing while you're at it.

What "sort of thing?"

 

[Altron]

wow, mad props to dubya.

All these years I thought he was dumb enough to believe himself. I guess we're seeing a more shrewd and calculating side to him. Man I like a leader who knows how to get shit done.

 

[Cerise]

Yeeee-haw!