The American Empire and 9/11 - Journal of 9/11 Studies

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ombs.” 75 When the Taliban refused, the Americans reportedlysaid that “military action against Afghanistan would goahead . . . before the snows started falling in Afghanistan,by the middle of October at the latest.” 76Given the fact that the attacks on New York andWashington occurred on September 11, the U.S. military hadtime to get logistically ready to begin the attack onAfghanistan on October 7.Iraq: Some key members of the Bush-Cheney administration---including Paul Wolfowitz, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, DonaldRumsfeld, and Dick Cheney himself---had in the late 1990sbeen active members of an organization, the Project for theNew American Century (PNAC), that advocated attacking Iraqto remove Saddam Hussein, establish a strong militarypresence, and control the oil. 77 PNAC’s Rebuilding America’sDefenses, released late in 2000, reiterated the idea of apermanent military presence in the Gulf region, saying thatthe “unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediatejustification,” but “the need for a substantial Americanforce presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of theregime of Saddam Hussein.” 7875 Julio Godoy, “U.S. Taliban Policy Influenced by Oil,” Inter PressService, Nov. 16, 2001.76 This according to Niaz Naik, the highly respected Pakistanirepresentative at the meeting, as reported in George Arney, “U.S.‘Planned Attack on Taleban,’” BBC News, Sept. 18, 2001. According to astory in the Guardian, “Threat of U.S. Strikes Passed to Taliban WeeksBefore NY Attack” (Sept. 22, 2001), one of the American representativesconfirmed that this discussion of military action did occur.77 See Paul D. Wolfowitz and Zalmay M. Khalilzad, “Saddam Must Go,”Weekly Standard, Dec. 1997; PNAC, “Letter to President Clinton on Iraq,”Jan. 26, 1998 (www.newamericancentury.org); and PNAC, “Letter toGingrich and Lott,” May 29, 1998 (www.newamericancentury.org). Thesigners of the latter two letters included Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld.78 The Project for the New American Century, Rebuilding America’sDefenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century, September2000 (www.newamericancentury.org), 14.26
Immediately upon taking office, both Paul 0’Neill andRichard Clarke have revealed, the Bush administration wasintent on taking over Iraq. The only question was “finding away to do it,” as O’Neill put it. “The terrorist attacks ofSeptember 11,” said Bob Woodward, “gave the U.S. a newwindow to go after Hussein.” Although no Iraqis were amongthe alleged hijackers, the Bush administration was able touse 9/11 as a pretext to attack Iraq. Given the state offear created of fear created in the American psyche by 9/11,the administration needed only to fabricate evidence thatSaddam was acquiring nuclear weapons while also suggestingthat he had been involved in 9/11. 79Increased Military Spending: A second possible motive wasprovided by PNAC’s more general goal of increasing America’smilitary superiority sufficiently to establish a global PaxAmericana. This goal had already been asserted in the 1992draft of the “Defense Planning Guidance,” written byWolfowitz and Libby under the guidance of Cheney, who wascompleting his tenure as secretary of defense.In 2000, Wolfowitz and Libby were participants inPNAC’s project to produce Rebuilding America’s Defenses, inwhich this goal showed up again. This document alsocontained an idea perhaps derived from Brzezinski’s book:After saying that the desired Pax Americana “must have asecure foundation on unquestioned U.S. military preeminence”and that such preeminence will require a technological79 For Paul O’Neill, who was secretary of the treasury and hence amember of the National Security Council, see Ron Susskind, The Price ofLoyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of PaulO’Neill (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004), and O’Neill’s interview onCBS’s “60 Minutes”(www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/09/60minutes/main592330.shtml). RichardClarke, confirming O’Neill’s charge, said: “The administration of thesecond George Bush did begin with Iraq on its agenda” (Against AllEnemies, 264). Woodward’s statement is in his Bush at War (New York:Simon & Schuster, 2002), 83. I have discussed the way in which 9/11 wasmorphed into a pretext to attack Iraq in “Imperial Motives for a NewPearl Harbor” (in Christian Faith and the Truth behind 9/11).27
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