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Feith: Did The Bush Administration
Ever Say Iraq Would Be Easy? ‘Absolutely Not’
Think
Progress
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Douglas Feith, former Undersecretary of Defense and an architect
of the Iraq war, has been hitting the media circuit to promote
his new book — and to continue blaming others for the
war, defending former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and
distorting former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s
record.
Yesterday, he appeared on the Brian Lehrer show, on WNYC.
Lehrer brought up the so-called “Parade of Horribles”
Feith discusses in his book, and asked why the American public
was only told that the war “would be a cakewalk.”
Feith insisted no one from the administration had said that:
LEHRER: The public was never told that the Parade of Horribles
were considered possibilities. Instead we were told it would
be a cakewalk. Were you–
FEITH: You weren’t told that by the
administration. Absolutely not.
When Lehrer played a clip from Meet the Press in which Vice
President Cheney claimed the U.S. would be “greeted
as liberators” in Iraq, Feith dismissed it as “one
of the more optimistic comments” but said that others,
“especially” Rumsfeld, “were a lot more
reserved than that.” He also insisted that “the
initial reaction of many of the Iraqis was to greet us as
liberators.”
(Article continues below)
Listen to it here.
In fact, as everyone knows, the Bush Administration and its
allies declared repeatedly that the war would be relatively
easy, quick, and painless:
Press Secretary Ari Fleisher: “My point is, the likelihood
is much more like Afghanistan, where the people who live
right now under a brutal dictator will view America as liberators,
not conquerors.” [10/11/02]
White House Chief of Staff Andy Card: “I think the
Iraqi people would welcome freedom with jubilation.”
[1/26/03]
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld: “The people will
be enormously relieved and liberated.” [3/20/03]
Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz: “The Iraqi
people understand what this crisis is about. Like the people
of France in the 1940s, they view us as their hoped-for
liberator. They know that America will not come as a conqueror.”
[3/11/03]
Vice President Dick Cheney: “I’m confident
that our troops will be successful, and I think it’ll
go relatively quickly…Weeks rather than months.”
[3/16/03]
National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice: “I do
not mean that we will need to maintain a military presence
in Iraq as was the case in Europe.” [8/7/03]
Chairman of the Defense Policy Board Richard
Perle: “And a year from now, I’ll be very surprised
if there is not some grand square in Baghdad that is named
after President Bush. There is no doubt that, with the exception
of a very small number of people close to a vicious regime,
the people of Iraq have been liberated and they understand
that they’ve been liberated. And it is getting easier
every day for Iraqis to express that sense of liberation.”
[9/22/03]
It looks like Feith can add “lying” to the list
of his post-White House activities.
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INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
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