Feith is still a village idiot.

Douglas Feith explains to us that George W. Bush didn't make a choice to invade Iraq. In fact, George W. Bush only responded to the necessity of invading Iraq. It wasn't something that Bush could choose to do or not to do.

Then Feith goes about explaining to us all the mistaken and idiotic reasons why Bush chose to invade Iraq. He even provides a July 2001 memo from Rumsfeld. It's funny how things get declassified when its convenient.

Here's Rummy's memo:

"The U.S. can roll up its tents and end the no-fly zones before someone is killed or captured. . . . We can publicly acknowledge that sanctions don't work over extended periods and stop the pretense of having a policy that is keeping Saddam 'in the box,' when we know he has crawled a good distance out of the box and is currently doing the things that will ultimately be harmful to his neighbors in the region and to U.S. interests – namely developing WMD and the means to deliver them and increasing his strength at home and in the region month-by-month. Within a few years the U.S. will undoubtedly have to confront a Saddam armed with nuclear weapons.

"A second option would be to go to our moderate Arab friends, have a reappraisal, and see whether they are willing to engage in a more robust policy. . . .

"A third possibility perhaps is to take a crack at initiating contact with Saddam Hussein. He has his own interests. It may be that, for whatever reason, at his stage in life he might prefer to not have the hostility of the United States and the West and might be willing to make some accommodation."

Feith also reveals a bit more about pre-9/11 thinking within the administration.
In the months before the 9/11 attack, Secretary of State Colin Powell advocated diluting the multinational economic sanctions, in the hope that a weaker set of sanctions could win stronger and more sustained international support.

More on the story.