One more cat just jumped out of the CIA bag. This time the disclosure came during a debate on the "war on terrorism" at Oxford University in England.
Acceding to a report from Oxford Nov. 15 in the Ottawa Citizen, former CIA director James Woolsey acknowledged that "in the past, some 'tyrants' in the Middle East were kept in power because the United States relies on their oil reserves." He was evidently alluding to the Shah of Iran and the leaders of Saudi Arabia and other oil principalities.
"One of the reasons we don't have more democracies in the Middle East." Woolsey continued, "is because we have regarded the Middle East as our gas station." But that's all changed now, the newspaper quoted him as saying, and "the United States is now committed to ending undemocratic regimes in the Middle East, and will pursue this objective with both diplomacy and force."
The former spy chief criticized the U.S. for not overthrowing Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 1991 and, according to the newspaper account "predicted Mr. Saddam's regime in Iraq will be the first Middle Eastern dictatorship to be overthrown. When this happens, he said dictators in nearby states such as Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia will get 'nervous.'"
"I want them nervous," he said. "I want them to know that for the fourth time in 100 years, Britain and the United States are on the march."
The Iraqi ambassador to the UK also addressed the meeting. "As events unravel," he declared, "it becomes clear that [Washington has] a hidden agenda. Through the war on terror, it is clear that the United States wants to become the gatekeeper of oil reserves in the Middle East. The American war on terror has created, and will create, more problems than it has solved."