Calls for New Push Into Iraq Gain Power in Washington
By Elaine Sciolino and Alison Mitchell
WASHINGTON, Dec. 2 — When President Bush told Saddam Hussein last week to submit to weapons inspections or else, he bolstered the spirits of a coalition of conservatives, cold warriors and Iraqi exiles determined to persuade the administration to overthrow the Iraqi leader once and for all.
... the outsiders are formidable warriors. They come armed with credentials derived from years in government, an ability to articulate their message in the media and access to power. Even in the world of Washington politics, their connections are unusually strong. ...
The outsiders work through various power centers, including the conservative American Enterprise Institute, and such opinion journals as The Weekly Standard. But much of their campaign is ad hoc. ...
Perhaps the group's most important power base is the Defense Policy Board, a bipartisan group of national security experts that meets in a room just outside the office of the secretary of defense. Its 18 members include former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger; former Secretary of Defense Harold Brown; Adm. David E. Jeremiah, the former deputy chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; former Vice President Dan Quayle, former Defense and Energy Secretary James R. Schlesinger, Mr. Gingrich and Mr. Woolsey.
Under the chairmanship of Richard Perle, a former assistant secretary of defense in the Reagan administration and perhaps the most influential of the outsiders, the board has assumed a quasi-official status. ...
[Full text: http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/03/international/middleeast/03IRAQ.html?pagewanted=print]
Carl
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