Second Draft Of History: A Revisionist Look At The Iraqi Invasion
By Anonymous, as told to Also Anonymous
AnonyLeak Press, 1,497 pp. Free
The text of this remarkable political memoir appears to be an unedited first draft by a highly-placed advisor in the George W. Bush White House. Apparently, this former insider roughed out what he imagined would be his best-selling account of his participation in the successful 2003 defeat of Iraq.
However, when the months immediately after the invasion revealed it to be fraught with ineptitude, corruption and utter failure, this same advisor attempted to rewrite his role in the fiasco – before becoming a defense industry lobbyist. Second Draft Of History: A Revisionist Look At The Iraqi Invasion presents his unabridged correspondence with his ghost writer, who apparently never replied to him but instead anonymously forwarded the documents to someone who apparently sent them to somebody else where they got stuck in a spam filter or something and anyway somehow the whole thing eventually wound up online.
Here is an excerpt from the never-before-published memoir:
Thanks for taking a pass at the first draft of my memoirs. Understand that it was just a rough, written years ago, so naturally I need to make a few tweaks. Here’s the first couple of pages. I put the file in revision mode for your convenience.
As one of George W. Bush’s closest advisors [an employee at the White House], I was critically involved in [witness to] the decisions made leading up to the invasion of Iraq. The triumphant [painful] foreign policy coup [episode] that followed that fateful decision was almost entirely the handiwork of the President, Vice President Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Scooter Libby and me [others]. In the intervening years, the rush to share credit [assign blame] by political Johnny-Come-Latelys [Monday Morning Quarterbacks] demands that I [history] set the record straight.
The first step toward war came when I [The President] first advised the President [me] that Saddam Hussein was in possession of Weapons of Mass Destruction. I remember it was 9:38 a.m. on July 16, 2002; the sun was peeking our from behind gray-white clouds, a warm breeze wafted across the Rose Garden from the northwest, and I was still gloating over the twenty bucks I’d won from Scott McClellan on last night’s 7-to-3 Yankee victory over the Red Sozx, when I walked into the Oval Office [don’t remember much about] that morning.
The President and his advisory team then asked me[George Tenant] if I [he] was certain of our intelligence.
“It’s a slam dunk!” I [he] exclaimed.
“It better be,” The President responded sternly. “Because I’m going to have to answer to the board of Exxon [American people].”
“Don’t worry about the oil [spread of freedom], sir.” I assured him. “It’ll be flowing from there [America] to here [the oppressed peoples of the Middle East] within months.”
“But Saddam? He’s unpredictable. If, God forbid, the U.N. weapons inspectors are right [wrong], our little scheme [the world as we know it] could go up in flames…”
“Believe me, sir,” I replied. “We’re as concerned about Saddam’s image [WMD] as you are. But h [He’s] still the bozo who invaded poor little Kuwait, calls us mean names and shoots rifles in the air like a convention drunk with a Super Soaker. People don’t like him. He’s even got a bushy moustache. A central casting Hitler!”
Later that summer, as the idea of military action was presented to the public, the President’s team spent a couple of minutes [weeks on end] discussing the details of the post-war scenario.
“Hey, why don’t we send over that clown from Cincinnati who held that big fund-raiser [America’s finest administrative minds],” I suggested.
Then Secretary of State Colin Powell [and I] questioned the wisdom of occupying a foreign country so torn by internal discord.
“It’s the Pottery Barn rule. You break it, you bought it,” he said [as I nodded my head in agreement].
“Forget the Iraqis,” Cheney countered with a sneer. “The road to Baghdad will be lined with rose petals.”
We all agreed [prayed for our troops].
“But we still need to take every precaution in preparing for the response of the Democrats [long-standing sectarian rivalries certain to be unleashed],” I cautioned.
That November, as protests from Congress sputtered out and war seemed a certainty, we all met again to enjoy the moment. We’d erased the Democrats’ one-vote margin in the Senate and cemented our control of the House! Creating a faux international crisis just before an off-year election was a political masterstroke certain to be admired for years to come. And I was proud to have been an integral part of the Republican Party’s new status as permanent majority party. It was all I could do to field the congratulatory phone calls from Tom DeLay, Bob Ney, Duke Cunningham, Mark Foley, and Larry Craig. But after all, we were going to be running Washington together for a long, long time.
Then I high-fived Wolfowitz, goosed Karen Hughes, and joined Rummy in an impromptu end-zone dance, bumping chests before spiking the bust of Lincoln from the credenza.
“Not so fast, guys,” Rove warned the room. “After we pancake what’s left of the Iraqis’ phony-baloney army, we’re gonna need a doozie of a P.R. blitz or the whole war effort will be a waste of American lives. Something that screams ‘Mission accomplished.’”
A hush fell over the Oval Office. This was serious indeed.
“Can you still fly a fighter jet, Mr. President?” I said with a confident twinkle.
Let’s cut this whole last section. Am currently reviewing some new notes I just discovered, so I can better remember this meeting.
The night the bombs began falling over Baghdad, I drove home past the dark, D.C. office buildings [which are home to some of our nation’s finest defense contractors, companies who toil tirelessly in anonymity to provide our troops and private security contractors with the multi-billion-dollar hardware they deserve, and who can not do their jobs without the lobbying efforts of those willing to give up years of public service to help others negotiate the labyrinth of governmental funding processes]. I knew that my [our country’s]future as an author, consultant, and political pundit was assured [hanging in the balance]. Deciding to celebrate [share my concerns] with my wife over a bottle of the finest limited release French [ordinary Utah] wine, I stopped at The Wine Shoppe, 7447 North Maple Drive, in Chevy Chase, conveniently located just off the Beltway. There Todd, the owner/sommelier, showed me selections from their world-class cellar. There was plenty of free parking and all major credit cards were gladly accepted.
No notes on this last bit. And feel free to mention my name to Todd, btw.
Anyway, that’s it for now. While you start these revisions, I’m skimming through the Hurricane Katrina chapter. Can you think of another euphemism for “underwater” besides “damp?”
The authors of Second Draft Of History: A Revisionist Look At The Iraqi Invasion have shown great courage in providing us with this important document, except for the original author, of course, who showed great stupidity in not erasing it. Also in invading Iraq. For exposing this first person account of perhaps the greatest foreign policy blunder in American history, we as Americans must give our heartfelt thanks to Anonymous, Also Anonymous and whoever it was who gave it to whoever it was who published it.
