From: "Anthony Crifasi" <crifasi-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: RE: blood for oil: we had no choice
Date: Mon, 14 Jul 2003 17:30:17 +0000


Tudor Georgescu wrote:

> > "Look, the primarily difference -- to put it a little too simply --
> > between North Korea and Iraq is that we had virtually no economic
> > options with Iraq because the country floats on a sea of oil.
> >
> > In the case of North Korea, the country is teetering on the edge of
> > economic collapse and that I believe is a major point of leverage 
>whereas
> > the military picture with North Korea is very different from that with
> > Iraq."
>
>Anthony, one could equally say that the first phrase is the essence of
>Wolfowitz point (kind of a Freudian slip), while the second phrase masks 
>the
>first one. I think the Guardian reporter knows this very well, either at an
>explicit and aware level or by some kind of flair.

First, anyone who has read even a fraction of the Guardian knows what a 
liberal-leaning publication it is. So to present the above quote as clipped 
by the Guardian as indicative of some kind of insight into Wolfowitz, rather 
than the much more likely explanation given their left-leaning history, is 
pure wishful thinking.

Secondly, look at his words in the first phrase - "WE HAD NO ECONOMIC 
OPTIONS". Now I don't know what language the original interview was done in, 
or which translation is more accurate, but the phrase "we had no economic 
options" obviously indicates a comparison between two DIFFERENT kinds of 
options - economic and non-economic (i.e., military). So even if you focus 
only on the first phrase, he is still clearly talking about oil as an 
alternative option (i.e., economic) to the military option, not about the 
acquisition of the oil as the goal itself!

Geez, and I am the one accused of wishful thinking?

Anthony Crifasi

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