Wolfowitz: ‘The Occupation Of Iraq Ended In June 2004′
Wolfowitz: ‘The Occupation Of Iraq Ended In June 2004′
At a Hudson Institute event today, Iraq war architects Paul Wolfowitz and Doug Feith, as well as Dan Senor and Peter Rodman, reconvened to celebrate Feith’s new book, War and Decision, which tries to explain the failures of the Iraq war as just failures of other people.
Wolfowitz said Feith’s book is “valuable” because it “demolishes” the “well-nurtured myths” about the Pentagon’s execution of the war. In his book, Feith claims the “chief” mistake in Iraq was “maintaining an occupation government for over a year.” Wolfowitz agreed, adding that the “occupation” in fact ended in 2004:
The fact is, however, that we did end up with an occupation authority for a full nine months, and I’m afraid that the label occupation sticks to us even to this day, although the occupation ended in June of 2004. Doug considers that the biggest mistake we made.
Watch it:
Wolfowitz was presumably referring to the June 2004 act of “officially” transferring sovereignty to the Iraqis when Paul Bremer, who ruled the country for 14 months, “snuck out of the country.” Left out of Wolfowitz’s definition of occupation are the over 150,000 troops still in Iraq who are, to this day, helping the Iraqi government squash its political enemies.
Wolfowitz also agreed with Feith in saying the level of resistance to coalition forces was “not anticipated by any office”:
As Doug does write: “What was not anticipated by any office as far as I know was the Iraqi regime’s ability to conduct a sustained campaign against coalition forces after it was overthrown.” … “I never saw,” Doug says, and I never saw either, “a CIA assessment to the Baathists after their ouster would be able to organized, recruit for, finance, supply, command, and control an insurgency let alone an alliance with foreign jihadists.
Wolfowitz’s memory seems selective. In May 2007, Walter Pincus reported that two pre-war intelligence assessments were produced by the National Intelligence Council titled “Principal Challenges in Post-Saddam Iraq” and “Regional Consequences of Regime Change in Iraq,” predicting that an occupation of Iraq “could lead to internal violence and provide a boost” to extremists and terrorists in the region.
But a senior Pentagon official reportedly dismissed them, saying the reports were “too negative” and that the papers “did not see the possibilities” the removal of Hussein would present.
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So what term describes since 2004 ? Puppet Government? Protectorate ? Sovereign govt but with a pistol pointed at its head ?
April 28th, 2008 at 4:48 pmWell, then, seems to me that the Mission is Accomplished and its time to get back to Dodge, USA rather than dodge the bullets as they come flying by because they love us so much.
Why do these idiots still provided a platform to spew this BS?
April 28th, 2008 at 4:50 pmIf our mission is accomplished, and we are no longer occupying Iraq, why in the h*ll are we still there?
Oh. Right. We’re waging a “War on Terror” — whatever that means.
Does Bushco and their sycophants actually use any terms that haven’t lost their literal meaning?
April 28th, 2008 at 4:54 pmHe just helped demolish our country and now wants to sell a book….more money. period.
Oh, and the myths……better hope they stay myths fella
April 28th, 2008 at 4:54 pmThese people need to be in jail. Then their rantings would get only the attention they deserve.
It is a sad indictment of our society that they dare appear in public (although, perhaps the Hudson Institute event would not qualify).
Has Bush EVER appeared in public? Hand picked studio audiences don’t count.
April 28th, 2008 at 4:59 pmThis coming from a man so corrupt that he was kicked out as the head of the World Bank for throwing sackfuls of money at his girlfriend.
What an expert!
April 28th, 2008 at 4:59 pmIT WAS OVER IN 2004?
HMMM….WATCHA STILL DOIN’ THERE WOLFY?
LOOKIN’ FOR A NEW JOB FOR YOUR WIFEY?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:03 pmrobbez_92107 Says:
This coming from a man so corrupt that he was kicked out as the head of the World Bank for throwing sackfuls of money at his girlfriend.
What an expert!
I was thinking if our main troll today (VOR) simply slept with Wolfowitz, he/she would get everything they ever wanted from a failed neocon dream. I mean, even dismal trolls need a little lovin’ once in a while.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:03 pm“Transferring sovereignty” to the Iraqis? First you can’t transfer any such thing.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:07 pmSecond, whatever Wolf thinks, if you spend the kind of human and monetary resources we have and continue in Iraq, there is no other definition than the word occupy.
I guess Paul can’t remember General Shinseki, or what he advised - you know, the bit about the need for several hundred thousand troops needed to secure and maintain a post-Saddam Iraq.
Oh, wait. Paul said that all those predictions were “outlandish,” and “wildly off the mark.” So he DID hear them. So much for the claim that no one could anticipate what we are facing now.
If you don’t recall, Shinseki was the Army Chief of Staff from 1999 to 2003. He was discredited by Wolfowitz, Rumsfield, et al, because he had the smarts and the guts to speak the truth and try to set the record straight. But, Paul and Don and this administration were hell-bent-for-leather to attack and used any kind of logic and reasoning they could cook up to invade Iraq, including the discrediting of anyone who spoke against them.
The rest, as they say, is history and has resulted in an apparently endless war that is bankrupting our country a billion dollars at a time.
Paul Wolfowitz is a liar and only trying to save his own hide. Don’t believe anything he says.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:08 pmThey better return all those letters that were sent to “Occupant”.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:08 pmStrat_92117:
April 28th, 2008 at 5:09 pmNow I’m going to have to spend my afternoon trying to scrub that mental image from my head…….
Brought to you the person who made the statement that
April 28th, 2008 at 5:11 pmthe war would cost only a few billion dollars beccause the oil profits would pay for it.
When will these fools go away??
April 28th, 2008 at 5:14 pmThanks, Wolfbane, we can now return all the troops home tomorrow…
April 28th, 2008 at 5:15 pmHis mouth and anus seem to be cross-wired judging by the amount of shit spewing forth from the former.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:20 pmL I E S .
It’s What They Do.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:22 pmThree hundred thousand armed foreign occupiers (USofA soldiers and Blackwater thugs) propping up a puppet regime in Iraq with no popular support at the point of a gun? Sounds like “sovereignty?” I don’t think so…
April 28th, 2008 at 5:28 pmStrat_92117:
Now I’m going to have to spend my afternoon trying to scrub that mental image from my head…….
I am sorry about that…I just want everybody to be happy.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:29 pmAnd what we’re doing now in Iraq is not an occupation?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:31 pmHow so?
WTF?
Is this the new English language?
I sure hope Jon Stewart gets ahold of this whopper!
I’m a bit curious if Wolfie said what it is that’s going on in Iraq if not an occupation? Does TP’s source have anything on that?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:33 pmTell that to the citizens of Iraq with a 104 acre American Embassy staring at them each and every day as a colossal symbol of that very Occupation and control…………… OH Yes, his statement is total BS………………………..
April 28th, 2008 at 5:35 pmI didn’t realise Wolfowitz was competing in the “Dumbest F***ing Guy On The Planet” contest…
I wonder what the prize will be. A cushy job at some conservative “think” tank, perhaps?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:35 pmNice to know. Now let’s recall the troops!
April 28th, 2008 at 5:38 pmHey, has anyone told that to the Iraqis yet? It’s just their imagination that we are occupying their country, isn’t it?
April 28th, 2008 at 5:39 pmA little less than 9 months to go, fellas. After that, the only mention of you idiots would come in a freshly printed indictment.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:51 pmSo I guess we call it Vichy Iraq now.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:51 pmI do not know about you, but I believe this people are inventing a new language and rewriting history! the danger of it all, is that, even, if one person believes this BS, that is a big “Zenith” for these wackos that truly believe in what comes out of their mind. I just can believe it! PARDON MY EXPRESSION, BUT ONLY THE MOST EXTREME OF IGNORANT PEOPLE COULD FOLLOW THESE
April 28th, 2008 at 5:57 pmCLOWNS!
If we were not still occupying Iraq, we would be gone. Why? Because the Iraqi people want us out and the duly elected government (the Parliament) want us out. The only people who don’t want us out is the puppet Maliki who is even now starting to say that we should be withdrawing troops.
As long as we have troops in their country, against their will, we will be occupying Iraq. If we are in a “war” in Iraq, perhaps someone can define who is the army we are fighting. And please don’t say the “terrorists” because that is ridiculous, especially since no one can seem to describe who and what is a “terrorist”.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:44 pmNashoba nowa Says:
Tell that to the citizens of Iraq with a 104 acre American Embassy staring at them each and every day as a colossal symbol of that very Occupation and control…………… OH Yes, his statement is total BS………………………..
And, don’t forget the numerous “un permanent” permanent bases we have built.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:45 pmSorry, but I could not let this go by. The post includes a link with the words “squash its political enemies,” when it is my understanding, “the awakening” was due to bribes, or putting the Iraqi “political enemies” on the American taxpayers payroll.
Oh, and the training and arming part too, doesn’t seem like “squash[ing]” to me.
So, how does arming and paying and training all parties of a multi-faceted civil war bring about peace, stability and Democracy in the Middle East? Just asking.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:52 pmOilfieldguy Says:
April 28th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
You’re right. “Eliminating”, “neutralizing”, or “marginalizing”, might be a better description than “squashing”, though it’s arguing semantics.
And? The biggest mistake made, aside from invading Iraq in the first place, is the continuing support to anyone who claims they won’t attack us. Even if the fragile alliances hold, supporting all sides in a civil conflict is guaranteed to bring continuing chaos. Current policy has zero chance of bringing Democracy, or stability, to anyone.
April 28th, 2008 at 7:01 pmBONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!
Revisionist History Alert! Revisionist History Alert!
BONG! BONG! BONG! BONG!
After the Bush puppet master Cheney and the Neo-Nitwits at PNAC with their faulty super brain Masters of the World mentality have cost America 4000+ lives, countless hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives and squandered nearly 800 thousand million dollars(well not really squandered if your among the politically connected or a corrupt contractor or a corrupt former or current Iraqi that can suck up to this administration and have Swiss bank accounts), they are trying to change history by exclaiming “It’s not my fault!”.
Too bad Wolfie. Too bad Dougie. Too bad Dickie. You guys screwed up big time and I’m going to do all that I can to hang the millstone of the Iraq fiasco around you necks. You broke it, now you get to keep it for all posterity to see.
Now, if we can only hang a big red toe tag on George W Bush that says “IMPEACHED for gross incompentence!” I can ride off into the sunset knowing all posterity will see the shrub for what he is, the worst president I’ve seen in my lifetime. Worst than Nixon.
“Trying to eliminate Saddam…would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him was probably impossible…. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq …. There was no viable “exit strategy” we could see, violating another of our principles. Furthermore, we had been consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-Cold War world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land.”
George H. W. Bush
April 28th, 2008 at 7:21 pmIf only his son could read.
OT -
April 28th, 2008 at 7:22 pmIs there a problem with the site?
Love this news site which is finally being updated. Link here
April 28th, 2008 at 7:31 pmPaul Wolfowitz is a certifiable whacko! What the heck is he drinking? Does he realize that he’s a disgraced thief? Does he recognize that he’s making an even larger buffoon of himself with statements like this? What planet is this guy living on anway? Must be the same “bubble of ignorance” he co-habiting with Chimpy.
April 28th, 2008 at 7:48 pmThese neofascists are getting themselves so tangled up in trying to articulate confusing jargon and misnomers that they’re totally bound up in their own bull$hit.
April 28th, 2008 at 7:49 pmWolfowitz, Feith, and their neocon co-conspirators who brought us this illegal, immoral war are nothing less than war criminals. They should be put on trial at the Hague and sentenced to life in prison.
They should serve their sentences at Gitmo, where they can do further harm.
April 28th, 2008 at 9:09 pmLet me get this straight: Think Progress opposes the crackdown on Sadr’s forces, because it’s perceived as political?
April 28th, 2008 at 9:50 pmCorrect, although I think you may be confusing “perceived” with “portrayed”. One implies a belief in the criticisms they are making.
Either way, yes. The crackdown on the 60000 RPG wielding, anti-government militia forces who carry out assassinations, and operate death squads is portrayed as being motivated by entirely political reasons.
Why, if Maliki had any different political posture or aims, that militia force would be treated no differently than it would be anywhere else in the world, by any other government, right ?
April 28th, 2008 at 10:37 pmIt just makes sense.
Wolfowitz also agreed with Feith in saying the level of resistance to coalition forces was “not anticipated by any office”:
In addition to the NIC report, some of us lowly citizens who had a bit of knowledge about the Middle East, knew in 2002 it wouldn’t work. We were sitting at our computer and kitchen table office, reading everything we could get our hands on, because a nephew had just finished college with ROTC money, and might be sent there (just returned from his fourth tour) and we were terrified of what we knew the background and history of the area to be and the inevitable outcome of such an unwise decision.
And they have continued to lie and show their ignorance - while OBL laughs his head off in a cave.
April 29th, 2008 at 12:38 amI hope Wolfowitz gets cancer!
April 29th, 2008 at 1:49 amIs anyone still not seeung why Iraq has turned out like it has for all this time. How Iraq was even decided to get invaded?
This rests it assured
April 29th, 2008 at 3:06 amIf the occupation of Iraq by US forces had truly ended in June 2004 as Wolfowitz is trying so feebly to claim, logic and common sense would suggest that we would’ve withdrawn most of our forces there by now or at least shifted most of them to Afghanistan — but not only have we not done this, we actually sent some 30,000 additional troops into Iraq last year. Has everyone forgotten about The Surge? I haven’t, but it would appear that Wolfowitz certainly has — remarkably selective (not to mention convenient) form of amnesia he’s suffering from, isn’t it? If the occupation ended in June of 2004, why the need for so many additional troops? For that matter, if the occupation ended in 2004, what reason do we have for needing to maintain such a sizable military presence there nearly four years later?
April 29th, 2008 at 10:55 amThese guys will be the ones who have done the most damage to America in history. These are the slimiest traitors of all time. You too Wolfowitz !!!
April 29th, 2008 at 12:20 pm