Many thanks to our Friends at Earth Family Alpha for finding it first. Been down so long, feels like up to us.
Bush Says U.S. Pullout Would Let Iraq Radicals Use Oil as a Weapon
By Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, November 5, 2006; Page A06
GREELEY, Colo., Nov. 4 — During the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, President Bush and his aides sternly dismissed suggestions that the war was all about oil. “Nonsense,” Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld declared. “This is not about that,” said White House spokesman Ari Fleischer.
Now, more than 3 1/2 years later, someone else is asserting that the war is about oil — President Bush.
As he barnstorms across the country campaigning for Republican candidates in Tuesday’s elections, Bush has been citing oil as a reason to stay in Iraq. If the United States pulled its troops out prematurely and surrendered the country to insurgents, he warns audiences, it would effectively hand over Iraq’s considerable petroleum reserves to terrorists who would use it as a weapon against other countries.
“You can imagine a world in which these extremists and radicals got control of energy resources,” he said at a rally here Saturday for Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.). “And then you can imagine them saying, ‘We’re going to pull a bunch of oil off the market to run your price of oil up unless you do the following. And the following would be along the lines of, well, ‘Retreat and let us continue to expand our dark vision.’ “
Read the entire, remarkable story here.
