A tantalizing passage in Wesley Clark’s 2007 memoir suggested that another war was part of a long-planned Department of Defense strategy that anticipated “regime change” by force in no fewer than seven Mideast states. Critics of the war often voiced suspicions of such imperial schemes, but this was the first time that a high-ranking former military officer has claimed to know that such plans existed.
The existence of that classified memo would certainly cast more dubious light not only on the original decision to invade Iraq because of Saddam Hussein’s weapons and ambitions but on the current efforts to justify and even instigate military action against Iran.
In “A Time to Lead: For Duty, Honor and Country,” published by Palgrave Macmillan last month, the former four-star general recalls two visits to the Pentagon following the terrorist attacks of September 2001. On the first visit, less than two weeks after Sept. 11, he writes, a “senior general” told him, “We’re going to attack Iraq. The decision has basically been made.”
Six weeks later, Clark returned to Washington to see the same general and inquired whether the plan to strike Iraq was still under consideration. The general’s response was stunning:
“‘Oh, it’s worse than that,’ he said, holding up a memo on his desk. ‘Here’s the paper from the Office of the Secretary of Defense [then Donald Rumsfeld] outlining the strategy. We’re going to take out seven countries in five years.’ And he named them, starting with Iraq and Syria and ending with Iran.”
While Clark doesn’t name the other four countries, he has mentioned in televised interviews that the hit list included Lebanon, Libya, Somalia and Sudan. Indeed, he has described this same conversation on a few occasions over the past year, including in a speech at the University of Alabama in October 2006, in an appearance on Amy Goodman’s “Democracy Now” broadcast last March, and most recently in an interview with CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room.” On “Democracy Now” he spoke about the meetings and the memo in slightly greater detail, saying that he had made the first Pentagon visit “on or about Sept. 20.”
Clark says he didn’t read the memo from Rumsfeld’s office. When the general first held it up, he remembers asking, “Is it classified?” Receiving an affirmative answer, he said, “Well, don’t show it to me.” He also says that when he saw the same general in 2006 and reminded him of their conversation, the officer said, “Sir, I didn’t show you that memo! I didn’t show it to you!”
- Iraq: Iraq has been experiencing severe droughts, particularly in the north and south, since early 2021. Crop and livestock production have plummeted, impacting vulnerable communities already affected by conflict and displacement. Dams on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers are causing growing water shortages for irrigation, threatening agricultural production and access to drinking water in towns and villages. The drought has serious implications for food security, as irrigated agriculture is compromised, and communities rely heavily on these crops.
- Syria: The 2006-2010 drought was the worst in 900 years affecting 1.5 million farmers and leading to rural-urban migration. The 2020-2023 drought was worse and is the second-worst on record in Syria, with 12.1 million Syrians facing hunger and 2.9 million at risk of food insecurity.
- Iran: An estimated 97% of Iran is affected by long-term drought, with 36.8 million people (46% of the population) facing challenges accessing drinking water. Since 2001 (to 2024), there have been 13 years of dry periods, causing more severe social, economic, and human damage than flood damage (Agricultural Drought Management in Iran). The drought in 2021 was described as “unprecedented” by officials, with a 52% decline in rainfall that year. Heavy rainfall often followed the droughts. In 2019, flash floodings affected 26 out of 31 provinces, resulting in at least 70 deaths, 12,000 km of damaged roads (36% of the national road network), and $2.2 billion in damages, mostly to the agricultural industry. In 2022, heavy rainfall caused floods and landslides across 26 provinces, resulting in at least 95 deaths, 200 missing persons, and many injuries. 2024 floods in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan have caused massive infrastructural damage, leaving hundreds of thousands of residents without critical supplies.
- Lebanon: According to NASA research, the recent drought in the Levant region, which includes Lebanon, from 1998 to 2012, was the worst of the past 900 years. The drought was 50% drier than the driest period in the past 500 years and 10-20% drier than the worst drought of the past 900 years. Lebanon’s water supply systems are on the verge of collapse, with over 71% of the population at risk of losing access to safe water.
- Libya: Libya faced a severe drought in 2021, particularly in the north, which affected agricultural production and led to food shortages. In November 2023, Libya was hit by devastating floods in coastal towns, including Derna, caused by Mediterranean storm Daniel. The floods broke dams and swept away entire neighborhoods. Due to droughts effect on agriculture and the water scarcity issues, Libya must import around 75% of its food.
- Somalia: The 2011 drought was one of the worst in Somalia’s history, with an estimated 260,000 deaths attributed to famine. The drought was exacerbated by conflict and political instability, leading to a delayed and inadequate international response. The 2020-2024 drought is also considered one of the worst in Somalia’s history, with over 1 million people displaced and without sufficient food and water. The drought has been ongoing since 2020, with four consecutive failed rainy seasons, and a fifth season expected to fail as well.
- Sudan: Since 2001, Sudan has been experiencing recurring droughts, floods, and political instability, leading to severe food insecurity and humanitarian crises. 1.9 million people in Sudan were affected by reduced agricultural and livestock production due to drought and water scarcity (UN OCHA, 2016). A severe drought in early 2019 was followed by catastrophic flooding in October 2019, affecting millions of people in South Sudan.
During the Blitzer interview, Clark backed off slightly, conceding that the memo “wasn’t [necessarily] a plan. Maybe it was a think piece. Maybe it was a sort of notional concept, but what it was, was the kind of indication of dialogue around this town in official circles … that has poisoned the atmosphere and made it very difficult for this administration to achieve any success in the region.”
Clark’s book also describes a telling encounter nearly a decade earlier with neoconservative eminence Paul Wolfowitz, the former deputy secretary of defense under Rumsfeld who resigned under a cloud of scandal from the World Bank last spring. In May 1991, according to Clark, he dropped in for a conversation with Wolfowitz, then the third-ranking civilian in the Pentagon, to congratulate him on the success of the Gulf War.
“We screwed up and left Saddam Hussein in power. The president [then George H.W. Bush] believes he’ll be overthrown by his own people, but I rather doubt it,” he quotes Wolfowitz lamenting. “But we did learn one thing that’s very important. With the end of the Cold War, we can now use our military with impunity. The Soviets won’t come in to block us. And we’ve got five, maybe 10, years to clean up these old Soviet surrogate regimes like Iraq and Syria before the next superpower emerges to challenge us … We could have a little more time, but no one really knows.”
The “Big Oil” wars being played out in 2001 by the world powers largely boiled down to the United States, China, and Russia fighting for control over Eurasian oil and gas resources ever since the former Soviet Union split up. Russia was adamant on keeping the Americans out of its Central Asian backyard. Russia aimed to increase European gas dominance whereas the U.S. wanted the European Union to diversify its energy supply, primarily away from Russian dominance. There were already three major Russian pipelines that were supplying energy to Europe, and Russia had plans for two new pipelines.
According to former Vice President Dick Cheney, Iraq’s oil and gas fields were a major U. S. “national security” issue. This is the same Dick Cheney who conceded that as Halliburton CEO he opposed unilateral sanctions on Iran, even though as Vice President he strongly supported them. Cheney explained that as a private sector official, he didn’t have any responsibility to be concerned about the impact of his company’s dealings with Iran. As he indicated when asked about the federal investigation into his illegal actions of breaking the sanctions, he said: “That’s a whole set of considerations that a CEO doesn’t have to worry about, that a private company doesn’t have to worry about.”
Cheney and Halliburton evaded U.S. law to do business deals with Iran. In 1995, President Clinton signed an executive order barring U.S. investment in Iran’s energy sector. To evade U.S. law, Halliburton set up an offshore subsidiary that engaged in dealings with Iran claiming that “what we do with respect to Iran and Libya is done through foreign subsidiaries totally in compliance with U.S. law.”
Cheney has been criticized for his leadership of Halliburton, including the company’s contracts for Iraq reconstruction and its overbilling for services in that country. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Justice Department investigated top officials, involving a consortium that included a Halliburton subsidiary which paid millions of dollars in bribes to win oil contracts in Nigeria. The Justice Department also accused Halliburton officials of taking $6.3 million in kickbacks in Iraq. The Pentagon also investigated whether the company overcharged U.S. taxpayers by more than $186 million for meals never served to U.S. troops abroad.
LOCATION OF OIL WARS
It is no coincidence that the worst war-torn countries also have large oil and gas resources. Big oil creates big wars that need loans from big central banks to feed the big war-machine. After the government is toppled and civil war ravages the country, fleecing the country is easy to do. The list below consists of war-torn countries that are being destroyed to gain profits for U.S. oil companies.
- Afghanistan – controls an oil/gas pipeline for Central Asian – Unocal’s proposed $7.6 billion, 1,040 mile-long TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India pipeline). China is also pushing for an alternative to TAPI with a Turkmenistan-Afghan-China pipeline.
- Iraq – The U.S. openly attacked Iraq to overthrow its government and take control of its oil. George W. Bush is quoted as saying “mission accomplished” for Iraq.
- Iran – Civil unrest began due to a threat to nationalize the oil/gas industry. The Turkmenistan-Iran gas pipeline, constructed in 1997, was the first new pipeline going out from Central Asia. Iran signed a $120 billion gas exploration deal with China. Iran also plans to sell its gas to Europe through its Persian Gas pipeline which can become a rival to the US Nabucco pipeline. It is also the key party in the proposed Iran-Pakistan (IP) pipeline which will sell gas from its mega South Pars fields to Pakistan and India. China has also shown interest in the construction of IP on the Pakistani side and further expanding it to China.
- Libya – Obama illegally attacked Libya and did not get congressional authorization for use of force or a declaration of war. Obama and Clinton instigated the Arab Spring which lead to civil war and the theft of Libyan oil.
- Israel – In June 2010, the Leviathan, the largest gas field in the Eastern Mediterranean that stretches from Egypt to Syria was discovered by Noble Energy. The natural gas reserves in that find that are in Palestinian, Lebanese Greece, Turkey, Cyprus and Syrian territorial waters are estimated to be 25 trillion cubic feet. Some experts are estimating that there might also be up to 600 million barrels of oil. That discovery is now causing enormous political and economic consequences.
- Syria – Obama illegally attacked Syria and did not get congressional authorization for use of force or a declaration of war. Russia and China have both vetoed every UN Resolution put forward by the United States to use military force against Syria. Syria is an integral part of the proposed 1,200 km Arab Gas Pipeline. Regime change was planned against Syria, Iraq, Libya, Lebanon, Somalia, Sudan and Iran over 20 years ago by the CIA. Turkey, Israel and the U.S. want an assured flow of gas through Syria and don’t want a Syrian regime which is not loyal to those three countries to stand in the way of the pipelines.
- Lebanon – part of the Leviathan, the largest gas field in the Eastern Mediterranean.
- Palestine – part of the Leviathan, the largest gas field in the Eastern Mediterranean. Continuous war with its competing oil nation of Israel.
- Greece – In 2010, the Greek Energy Ministry formed Greece’s Energean Oil & Gas to research the prospects for oil and gas in Greek waters. Preliminary estimates now are that total offshore oil in Greek waters exceeds 22 billion barrels in the Ionian Sea off western Greece and some 4 billion barrels in the northern Aegean Sea around $9 trillion dollars in estimated value.
Sources:
- https://www.salon.com/2007/10/12/wesley_clark/
