Iraq, In Books - Feith And Chalibi

By Cernig

Just a quick heads-up on two new books to add to the vast body of "he's to blame" literature about the Iraq war, which by now has come to be split into two distinct sub-genres. The first is by Douglas Feith and is of the "he's to blame, not me" sub-genre now perfected by ex-officials of the Bush administration. Emptywheel deconstructs the internal politics of the 900-page belated CYA. He ends with what should be the book-jacket blurb:

900 pages of Dougie Feith insisting that if only Ahmad Chalabi had been given control of Iraq, all of Dougie's dreams of flourishing democracy would have succeeded.

Which brings us neatly to Aram Roston’s “The Man Who Pushed America to War: The Extraordinary Life, Adventures and Obsessions of Ahmad Chalabi.” Muckraked digs into this example of the "he's to blame, exposed" sub-genre and finds, among other gems, that Chalibi supported McCain over Bush back in 2000 as the man most likely to deliver Chalibi's dreams of Iraqi rule.