...and no less an authority than Alan Greenspan confirms it.
The neocons are in full retreat. What will they do now that their patron saint of the Ayn Rand school has turned against them, firmly and comprehensively?
If only... if only he had spoken up when he was in a position to potentially exert a real effect.
reported from Harpers.org:
Still the most disturbing piece of the Greenspan book may be his discussion of the Iraq war. According to a rather sensationalized report in this morning’s Times (London), Greenspan says that the claims that the Iraq War was about weapons of mass destruction were always a deception. The war was planned and fought to protect American interests in Gulf oil, and to extend those interests into Iraq:
However, it is his view on the motive for the 2003 Iraq invasion that is likely to provoke the most controversy. "I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil," he says. Greenspan, 81, is understood to believe that Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East.
This immediately brings to mind Paul O’Neill’s similar suspicions—including his reminder of Dick Cheney’s dismissal of admonitions of the need for fiscal prudence during cabinet meetings, and his discovery one day of Cheney amid maps of the Iraq oilfields, which he appeared to be dividing up for foreign development.
And the consensus view that O’Neill and Greenspan seem to share—that the Iraq War was essentially an oil grab—allows us to view some other developments in Iraq in a different context. For instance, the successful deal struck by the loyal Bushies at Hunt Oil for the Kurdish fields.
OK, repeat after me.
No Blood For Oil.
It seemed so obvious at the time.
We all knew what the real reason was for Bush's Crusade. Nice to have it confirmed by a saint of conservatism. Too bad not a SINGLE FREAKIN' ONE of those people had the guts to step up when it really mattered.
Easy to speak out when you have a fat advance check from a New York publisher to cash.
American blood continues to be shed for the oil oligarchy.
When will the freakin' Congressional Dems wake the heck up?
A kleptocracy is in charge in the White House.