"The chairman of the British Joint Intelligence Committee in 2001 told investigators Monday that elements of the Bush Administration were pushing for regime change in Iraq in early 2001, months before the 9/11 attacks and two years before President George W. Bush formally announced the Iraq war." - Sean McBride from Bookmarklet

"Interestingly, the head of Britain's Intelligence Committee told investigators that then-Secretary of State Colin Powell appeared to be in charge of US policy on Iraq until the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. "Up till then we felt that dealing with the State Department, we were dealing with the people who were forming the policy," Ricketts said." - Sean McBride

"elements of the Bush Administration" = neoconservatives, who used 9/11 essentially to stage a coup against Powell and the State Department and to launch the Iraq War as the first stage of World War IV. Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, Lewis Libby, etc. -- *not* oil industry leaders, I am betting. - Sean McBride

Neoconservatives have a different agenda for oil domination. Texas oilers eventually won out. As far as Iraq goes, it seems safe to say that no one wanted to leave control of Iraq's oil to the people who live there. - Cole Jolley

Cole -- I can't think of a single oil industry leader who is agitating for an Iran War. Come to think of it, Iran War ringleaders consist of the same neoconservatives and PNAC members whose names were so prominent in the pages of the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal in promoting the Iraq War. - Sean McBride

Think of it this way: neocons would like to dislodge OPEC and assert US/Israeli dominance in the region. Texas oilers are happy to do business with whomever. As long as they get a big slice and whomever isn't going to create another Venezuela in the crescent. - Cole Jolley

Cole -- that formulation makes a good deal of sense. But keep in mind that Texas oil barons like James Baker and George H.W. Bush were highly skeptical about the Iraq War (for reasons of realistic self-interest), and they think that an attack on Iran would be utterly mad -- which puts them in sharp conflict with neoconservatives and Christian Zionists. Oil industry leaders are allergic to ideological crusades -- they are all about cost/benefit analysis, carefully calibrated risk/reward ratios. George W. Bush, the Christian Zionist prosecuting a holy war against Gog and Magog, was a failure in the world of business. - Sean McBride

Any Iran War also pits Neo_cons against the free traderes since China is opposed to attacking their main OIL supplier. Given China owns USA INC I'm guessing the cooler heads prevail but the dialogue about ASTAN leads me to believe that the 101st Typewriter Brigade has little grasp of reality when it comes to armed conflict and global reality. - WarLord