White House: U.S. 'Exhausted' Iraq War Alternatives

Reuters ^ | 11-06-03

[Brian S]

Thu November 6, 2003 01:45 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Thursday said the United States had exhausted peaceful alternatives to war with Iraq, as it sought to play down reports it had rejected a last-minute Iraqi offer to avert an invasion.

"The United States exhausted every legitimate and credible opportunity to resolve this peacefully with Iraq ... Saddam Hussein had ample opportunity to comply," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters.

He declined to say whether Bush was aware of the reported Iraqi offer to disarm and turn over a top al Qaeda operative in custody in Iraq.

Bush has faced criticism from Democrats that he was overeager to go to war with Iraq and exaggerated the Iraqi threat to make a case for the invasion.

ABC News reported on Wednesday that a middle man between Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's intelligence chief and Pentagon advisors said he laid out a possible peace deal but the offer was spurned by Washington.

Imad Hage, a prominent Lebanese-American businessman, told ABC that in February and March of this year he helped convey an Iraqi offer to open negotiations.

The United States launched war to oust the Iraqi president on March 20, Iraqi time, after the expiration of a 48-hour deadline for Saddam to go into exile.

Bush had accused Saddam of failing to meet U.N. disarmament demands, but Hage was quoted by The New York Times on Thursday as saying Saddam's former chief of intelligence, Gen. Tahir Habbush, had insisted Iraq had no unconventional weapons and was willing to "open everything" to U.S. inspectors.

Hage also met with Richard Perle, former chairman of the Defense Policy Advisory Board and an influential advisor to top Pentagon officials.

Perle was quoted as saying he was prepared to meet with Iraqi officials to discuss their offer, but was told by the CIA not to do so.

[Brian S]

Has anybody seen a interview with Perle on this issue yet?

[Burkeman1]

I really don't know what to make of this story. Need more info before I could even offer an opinion.

[Tai_Chung]

Daniel Pearl used a back-channel in Pakistan to get information for his story. You saw what that brought him.

[weegee]

Bush had accused Saddam of failing to meet U.N. disarmament demands, but Hage was quoted by The New York Times on Thursday as saying Saddam's former chief of intelligence, Gen. Tahir Habbush, had insisted Iraq had no unconventional weapons and was willing to "open everything" to U.S. inspectors.

The offer stood for Saddam to step down because of the obstacles he had already put in the way of inspections. Tnis was just another offer to "inspect" sites.

Saddam was in possession of illegal weapsonry (which was used in Gulf War II). Saddam violated the peace conditions of Gulf War I by continuing to stockpile illegal weapons and making efforts to obtain biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons (whether he was able to manufacture such weapons or not).

This is a non-story.

[cwb]

As someone pointed out, ths story is several months old and it is only now getting played every hour on my radio news-breaks?

[nuffsenuff]

Democrats using diversionary tactics to keep attention away from the memo.

Typical.

And unfortunately, it'll probably work.

I hate liberals.

[DustyMoment]

I concur, it is a non-story. Bush made it clear that Saddam had to come into compliance with the UN resolutions in order for US-led coalition troops to back off. IF we believe the former Iraqi general, SH was trying to negotiate a settlement.

That was a deal-breaker, NOT a deal-maker.

[weegee]

Might as well be discussing the Japanese that tried to prevent the Pearl Harbor attack...

[livius]

Why are they even bothering to respond to this? Bush has consistently rejected little back room deals in dealing with dictators/terrorist states. Saddam was not complying with the demands of the UN, not just our demands.

It is clear as day that this is an attempt to distract attention from the treasonous behavior of the Dems on the intelligence committee.

[cwb]

Yep. And it's just fascinating how the media works hand-in-glove with the DNC. Oh, I forgot...we have a conservative media.

[pawdoggie]

The Bush Administration also spurned the "peace feeler" put forward by Iraqi camel trader Mahmood bin YaYa, who told Administration officials that he had a "pipeline" to Saddam's barber through his cousin twice removed. Someone should swing for this. Bush's lies again exposed!

[oceanview]

there was a thread running earlier about the Mansur district bombing attack on Saddam. In that report, it mentioned how many top iraqis we had cooperating with us as part of the invasion. I don't blame the CIA one bit for not accepting some crooked back channel deal, we could not stab those people in the back who were set to help us.

Perle has shown himself to be a self absorbed idiot who should shut up, his 15 minutes of fame are over.

[meenie]

According to Perle he was ready to meet the Iraqis and discuss the situation, but was told not to by the CIA. This lends credence to the story that the CIA was making the decisions to go to war with Iraq. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, President Bush has insinuated that he had faulty intelligence from the CIA before attacking Iraq. Now the question becomes, who is making the deisions in the White House?

Is it the CIA, Rumsfeld, Perle, Cheney, Feith, Bush, Powell, Rice or none of the above? In any chain of command, it seems logical that pink slips would be handed out to individuals who disagree or fail to follow the policy of the person in charge. So far there is no indication that there is anybody in charge. Perle's story could well be true, based on that theory.