"I've been through the Pentagon, right after 9/11. About 10 days after 9/11, I went through the Pentagon, and I saw Secretary Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz. I went downstairs just to say hello to some of the people on the Joint Staff who used to work for me, and one of the generals called me in. He said, “Sir, you’ve got to come in and talk to me a second.” I said, “Well, you’re too busy.” He said, “No, no.” He says, “We’ve made the decision we’re going to war with Iraq.” This was on or about the 20th of September. I said, “We’re going to war with Iraq? Why?” He said, “I don’t know.” He said, “I guess they don’t know what else to do.” So I said, “Well, did they find some information connecting Saddam to al-Qaeda?” He said, “No, no.” He says, “There’s nothing new that way. They just made the decision to go to war with Iraq.” He said, “I guess it’s like we don’t know what to do about terrorists, but we’ve got a good military, and we can take down governments.” And he said, “I guess if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem has to look like a nail.” So I came back to see him a few weeks later, and by that time we were bombing in Afghanistan. I said, “Are we still going to war with Iraq?” And he said, “Oh, it’s worse than that.” He reached over on his desk. He picked up a piece of paper. And he said, “I just got this down from upstairs” — meaning the secretary of defense’s office — “today.” And he said, “This is a memo that describes how we’re going to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran.” I said, “Is it classified?” He said, “Yes, sir.” I said, “Well, don’t show it to me.” and I saw him a year or so ago and I said: "Remember that?" he said: "Sir, I didn't show you that memo! I didn't show it to ya!""
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Wesley Clark, Democracy Now — Gen. Wesley Clark Weighs Presidential Bid: “I Think About It Every Day”, (2 March 2007)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/United_States
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
United States
802 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by United States →
Related Quotes
"U.S. President Barack Obama has nominated Korean-American Jim Yong Kim, the president of Dartmouth College, as the ne…"
"The law of nations knows of no distinction of color, and if an enemy of the United States should enslave and sell any…"
"Protect every citizen, including the millions of people of foreign birth who will flock to our shores to become citiz…"
"The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of…"
"Sixty years ago, at dawn on June 25, the Korean War broke out when Communist North Korea invaded the Republic of Kore…"
"That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from al…"
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and d…"
"The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted."
"I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be? How can any one who abhors the oppression of negroes, be in…"
"It is a truism that America has become a more diverse country. It is also a beautiful thing to watch. Visitors from o…"