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NEW YORK - Former Treasury Secretary Paul OÂ’Neill charges in a new book that President George W. Bush entered office in January 2001 intent on invading Iraq and was in search of a way to go about it.

OÂ’Neill, fired in December 2002 as part of a shake-up of BushÂ’s economic team, has become the first major insider of the Bush administration to launch an attack on the president.

He likened Bush at Cabinet meetings to “a blind man in a room full of deaf people,” according to excerpts from a CBS interview to promote a book by former Wall Street Journal reporter Ron Suskind, “The Price of Loyalty.”

To go to war, Bush used the argument that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction and had to be stopped in the post-Sept. 11, 2001, world. The weapons have never been found.

“From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go,” O’Neill said in the “60 Minutes” interview scheduled to air on Sunday. “For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do, is a really huge leap.”

CBS released excerpts from the interview on Friday and Saturday.

The former treasury secretary and other White House insiders gave Suskind documents that in the first three months of 2001 revealed the Bush administration was examining military options for removing Saddam Hussein, CBS said.

“There are memos,” Suskind told CBS. “One of them marked ’secret’ says ’Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq.”’

Another Pentagon document entitled “Foreign suitors for Iraqi Oil Field Contracts” talks about contractors from 40 countries and which ones have interest in Iraq, Suskind said.

Bent on war?
OÂ’Neill was also quoted in the book as saying the president was determined to find a reason to go to war and he was surprised nobody on the National Security Council questioned why Iraq should be invaded.

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

White House spokesman Scott McClellan rejected OÂ’NeillÂ’s remarks.

“We appreciate his service. While we’re not in the business of doing book reviews, it appears that the world according to Mr. O’Neill is more about trying to justify his own opinions than looking at the reality of the results we are achieving on behalf of the American people,” he said on Saturday.

O’Neill also said the president did not ask him a single question during their first one-on-one meeting, which lasted an hour. The president’s lack of engagement left his advisers with ”little more than hunches about what the president might think,” O'Neill told “60 Minutes.”

Suskind’s book, whose full title is “The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill,” uses interviews with O’Neill, dozens of White House insiders and 19,000 documents provided by O’Neill.

OÂ’Neill, who was fired due to disagreements over tax cuts, spent a difficult two years in Washington, joining the Bush administration with a background as a no-nonsense corporate executive.

Copyright 2004 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters.

It figures eh?

   

Laconfir I was just reading it on Michael Moores site and was going to post it . Ya beat me to it. Makes you stop and think doesnt it. Bush and his henchmen were planning this probably even before he got into office. Hell of a story from Oniel wasnt it.

   

But the war had nothing to do with oil.

There's plenty of evidence that plans for the invasion of Iraq went way back to the first Bush administration. George I wasn't quite as evil as his progeny though, and turned it down. PNAC, who does nothing that isn't directly related to greed and feels they should be allowed to rule the planet, wanted this war and saw 9-11 as the perfect excuse.

   

...that people, especially those that were once in powerful postions suck as this guy, are actually giving more and more proof to the evils Bush has committed... Get me a meeting with him and I'll subpeona (well try) him to an International Court Hearing for his crimes... Anyone know how many there have been?

   

Check with Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch...they keep track of these things.

   

Don't forget to watch 60 minutes tonight.

   

This isn't really a shocking relevation, an invasion was considered under the Clinton administration more than once but were shelved in favor of airstrikes.

   

...

   

Yea but it's kinda funny how this stuff is coming out pre - election instead of back when it could've helped prevent a war. Kinda makes me wonder about the credibility of the source...

   

...but the only reason nobody did bring this up before is because of elections.. At least the most probable reason.. And anyone that did bring it up was probably not a politician... In which case people would question their credibility... lol... I'm wondering what type of lies both sides are going to fabricate to win this election.. Personally, if you look at what Bush as lied about, and thats pretty much everything, you'd expect the Democrats and his other opponents not to have to lie, but, lieing is a part of politics now...

   

Removing Saddam was not something new for any adminastration.

   

The other administrations chose not to start illegal wars though, t_link.

There were people speaking out long before the election. The closer we got to war, the louder they spoke, but most of the mainstream media didn't carry it. If they did, it was buried on the back pages. That people are still speaking shows the seriousness of the crimes.

   

Lid Blown Off O'Neill/Suskind Hoax

   

So a document does exist showing that the Bush Administration was planning what to do with Iraqi oil well before the illegal invasion? Given the Bush ties to PNAC, Wesley Clark's statements that they immediately wanted Iraq tied to 9-11, the assortment of lies the Bush regime put forth pushing for an illegal invasion of Iraq, and the fact that there was no sign of the US being able to get oil from Iraq in the near future without the invasion, I think it's still pretty clear that Bush wanted a war with Iraq and would have done anything to get it.

Toss in the illegal amendments made to Iraqi law since the invasion and it becomes quite clear that this breach of international law was being planned since well before Bush was appointed to the White House.

   

http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/01/12/oneill040112

   

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