Blog For Arizona

A Little Honesty

Phil Zelikow, either in an unaccustomed moment of candor, or suffering of a blow to the head, admitted that the Iraq war was launched to protect Israel, and had nothing to do with American security.

”Why would Iraq attack America or use nuclear weapons against us? I'll tell you what I think the real threat (is) and actually has been since 1990 -- it's the threat against Israel,” Zelikow told a crowd at the University of Virginia, where he is a professor of history, on Sep. 10, 2002.

Zelikow is currently the head of the 9/11 commission, was a member of Bush's transistion team, at which time he wrote a memo for Rice on reorganizing the NSC, and also served with Rice on the first Bush's NSC. Zelikow also served on W's President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board from 2001-2003. As such, he is in a unique position to know what Bush and his Neo-Con foriegn policy team's thinking was.

If you conclude, as do Richard Clarke, Gen. Shelton, Gen. Zinni, and others, that the Iraq war diverted needed resources and energy from pursuing terrorism, Zelikow's statements make clear that the White House compromised American security and endangered American lives for the sake of the strategic military position of Israel in the Middle East. That might be a legitimate trade-off, depending on your viewpoint, but I think most Americans would not agree to such a trade-off, or approve the means by which it was accomplished, if they knew the truth.

posted by Michael Bryan @ 3/30/2004 11:21:00 PM