Reply #6: It's the neocons that prove his case [View All]

Richard Perle worked as a Likud party hack in the years before the infamous PNAC document came out, as did several other prominent neocons. The "make the world safe for Israel by deposing Saddam" plan was presented to Netanyahu in the mid 1990s. This is not tinfoil hat or jew-bashing stuff. The strongly-pro-Israel Wes Clark mentioned it in one of his Wespac events:

"Question: Why hasn't there been any discussion about PNAC, its signers -- many of whom are in the administration -- and how we see the plan for the Middle East written in the PNAC manifesto?

Clark: You're talking about the Project for a New American Century and how Richar Perle and Doug Feith and the rest maneuvered this country into executing Bibi Netanyahu's plan that the United States would attack and destroy Saddam Hussein and then conquor the Middle East for them. I don't know why there hasn't been a discussion on it.

Probably because when you get down to public opinion and you're trying to communicate ideas, that idea is going to get all convoluted in the press. It's out there for the people who know it. We need a really simple idea. And a simple idea is, "Iraq is a strategic mistake -- it was not part of the war on terror. The Bush administration as made us less secure and less safe as a result of going to Iraq." That's what we need to say."

Where I would disagree with the original post is his use of the word "simply". The greater-Israel crowd had their reasons, the Iranians had their reasons, the imperialists had their reasons, the Iraqi exiles had their reasons, the do-gooders had their reasons, the fear-mongers had their reasons and so on. But it was a factor.