The Glenn and Helen Show: Douglas Feith
Douglas J. Feith served as Undersecretary of Defense for Policy from 2001 through 2005. His new book, War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism,
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Listen to this podcast (27:25) or download (15.7 MB) The The Glenn and Helen Show: Doug Feith on War and Decision (lofi version 4.7 MB). Free show subscription available at iTunes.
Neoconservatives, like Feith, hi-jacked the Bush presidency shortly after 9/11 and deceptively used that tragic event to launch an illegal preemptive war against Iraq. This is a war they wanted as far back as 1998, and as we clearly know now, Iraq had nothing to do with the 9/11 attack.
Bush’s foreign policy team was dominated by neoconservatives. These senior officials all belonged to neoconservative groups PNAC (Project for New American Century) and/or the IASPS (Institute for Advanced Strategic & Political Studies).
Cheney (VP-PNAC Member), Rumsfeld (Secretary of Defense-PNAC Member), Wolfowitz (Deputy Defense Secretary-PNAC Member), Abrams (White House Staff-PNAC Member), Libby (Cheney’s Chief of Staff-PNAC Member), Bolton (State Department), Perle (Defense Policy Chair-PNAC & IASPS Member), Feith (Under Secretary of Defense-PNAC & IASPS Member) and Wurmser (Cheney Staff, Middle East adviser-PNAC & IASPS Member).
Feith’s new book is nothing more than the same old lies we hear over and over. Feith and his cronies should be writing these books from a prison cell.
Feith is a lot more serious than ‘same old lies’.
A lot of people have become comfortable with invective and a sort of hate speech as a way of talking about the war and Saddam and all that. It’s a shame.
Saddam had nothing to do with the 9/11 attack, and Cheney should not have been implying that he did. As a point of history, it was Cheney, not Bush himself, who pushed this idea (talking about a meeting in Europe between al-Queda and Saddam’s agents). This indicates to me that they knew it was a weak story.
Feith says they had a plan for post-war Iraq, but he doesn’t say what it was. Was it a good plan? I’ve glanced at his web site and it doesn’t go into detail. I may have to read the book.
The Bush plan to install democracy in Iraq has seemed a “Bridge too Far” to many people; Perhaps there was no other option? Bush clearly would have been pilloried if he had installed another dictator. Another such bridge might have been the decision to prevent future attacks; The only methods available for this involve warfare. Perhaps it was a bridge too early.
Peter Robinson has a new interview with former Undersecretary of Defense Doug Feith posted up on Uncommon Knowledge program today. It looks like it should be the start of a good series. He mentions where to find a lot of the intelligence original documents that decision makers used in going to war.
http://tv.nationalreview.com/uncommonknowledge/post/?q=ZjM2ZDU2ZWY4ZDI3ZmJmYTM4MzVlODE3MTQ2ODdjMGU=
Maybe we should have completely sewed up Afghanistan and got a real declaration of war for Iraq and used our heads instead of engaging in intellectual wargame scenarios? Oh well, too little time to think and plan.
DrKrbyLuv:, I really appreciate your candor, and know exactly how you feel, however did you read the book, and are you able to expose the lies that you claim.