"Lunacy!" Said Powell On Wolfowitz Iraq Plan

17 April 2004 "PKJ" Bob Woodward’s new book, “Plan of Attack”, to be released next week, could be the most damaging haymaker thrown yet at an administration reeling from a series of blows from former top insiders.

Woodward, famous for uncovering the Watergate Scandal, had written previously on President Bush following the events of 911, but this new book is set to shatter the last panes in the hall of mirrors at the Bush White House.

Quotes from Associated Press and the Washington Post:

Secretary of State Colin Powell believed Vice President Dick Cheney developed an "unhealthy fixation" on trying to find a connection between Iraq and the Sept. 11 attacks.

Bush in mid-2002 secretly approved the diversion of hundreds of millions of dollars meant for Afghanistan to projects that would set the stage for a massive deployment of U.S. troops to the Persian Gulf region. 

Woodward describes a relationship between Cheney and Powell that became so strained that they barely are on speaking terms. Powell believed Cheney was obsessed with trying to establish a connection between Iraq and al-Qaida and treated ambiguous intelligence as fact. 

Powell thought Cheney and his allies — his chief aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby; Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz; Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith; and what Powell called Feith's "Gestapo" office — had established what amounted to a separate government.

After being briefed by the CIA on Iraq’s WMDs: "Nice try," Bush said. "I don't think this quite — it's not something that Joe Public would understand or would gain a lot of confidence from." 

"Going into this period, I was praying for strength to do the Lord's will. ... I'm surely not going to justify war based upon God. Understand that. Nevertheless, in my case, I pray that I be as good a messenger of His will as possible. And then, of course, I pray for personal strength and for forgiveness."

Wolfowitz proposed seizing Iraq's southern oil fields to build a foothold from which opposition groups could overthrow Saddam. 

Powell dismissed the plan as "lunacy."

WOODWARD WILL TALK ON "60 MINUTES" THIS SUNDAY AT 8PM!