British Memo: Bush Was Set on War

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Posted on Mar 27, 2006

The New York Times gets a closer look at a UK official’s memo that indicates Bush was set on an invasion of Iraq regardless of a U.N. resolution or the outcome WMD issue.

News of the memo originally surfaced in January in a British book.

N.Y. Times:

LONDON—In the weeks before the United States-led invasion of Iraq, as the United States and Britain pressed for a second United Nations resolution condemning Iraq, President Bush’s public ultimatum to Saddam Hussein was blunt: Disarm or face war.

But behind closed doors, the president was certain that war was inevitable. During a private two-hour meeting in the Oval Office on Jan. 31, 2003, he made clear to Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain that he was determined to invade Iraq without the second resolution, or even if international arms inspectors failed to find unconventional weapons, said a confidential memo about the meeting written by Mr. Blair’s top foreign policy adviser and reviewed by The New York Times.

“Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning,” David Manning, Mr. Blair’s chief foreign policy adviser at the time, wrote in the memo that summarized the discussion between Mr. Bush, Mr. Blair and six of their top aides.

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TAGS: hussein invasion resolution u.n. unconventional weapons wmd

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By JP, March 27, 2006 at 8:31 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

This allegation demands investigation to a degree beyond any other allegations about the buildup to war:

“Faced with the possibility of not finding any (WMD) before the planned invasion, Mr. Bush talked about several ways to provoke a confrontation, including a proposal to paint a United States surveillance plane in the colors of the United Nations in hopes of drawing fire, or assassinating Mr. Hussein.”

“Two senior British officials confirmed the authenticity of the memo, but declined to talk further about it, citing Britain’s Official Secrets Act, which made it illegal to divulge classified information.”

Why is this not getting all manner of attention?

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