[NYTr] Aznar 2003 Connivance w/Bush on Iraq Big News in Spain

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

[See also story from Middle East Online:
Bush Told Aznar in 2003: You Wid Us or Agin Us, We're Hitting Iraq ]


Prensa Latina, Havana
http://www.plenglish.com

Bush-Aznar Conspiracy against Iraq Disclosed

Madrid, Sept 26 (Prensa Latina) Major details about a conspiracy
between Presidents George W. Bush (US) and Jose Maria Aznar (Spain) to
invade Iraq and get rid of Saddam Hussein were published in the Spanish
newspaper El Pais on Wednesday.

The two presidents met on Saturday, February 22, 2003, in Bush's
Crawford Ranch in Texas, where the US president briefed his Spanish
friend on Washington's decision to eliminate Hussein, according to the
minutes of the meeting.

On January 31, 2003, after a meeting with then British Prime Minister
Tony Blair, Bush had agreed to carry out a last diplomatic maneuver: a
second resolution at the UN Security Council to greenlight the invasion
of Iraq, but the plan failed.

The US president was aware of Blair's and Aznar's domestic
difficulties, including three million people demonstrating in several
Spanish cities against the invasion of Iraq.

"We need your help with our public opinion," Aznar told Bush, who
promised the Spanish president that "the resolution will be tailor made
to the extent I can help you. I don't care about the content," said the
minutes.

According to the document, Aznar replied, "That text would help us to
be able to cosponsor it and be its coauthors and get many people to
sponsor it." He promised to give European political coverage to Bush
along with Blair.

Aznar and his wife, Ana Botella, had traveled to the United State on
February 20. They stopped over in Mexico to try to persuade President
Vicente Fox (unsuccessfully) to support Bush.

Also present in the Texas meeting was then National Security Advisor
Condoleezza Rice, the National Security Council chief for European
Affairs, Daniel Fried, Aznar's advisor on international policy, Alberto
Carnero, and Spanish Ambassador to the US Javier Ruperez.

During the meeting, Bush and Aznar phoned Blair and then Italian
President Silvio Berlusconi.

The minutes of the meeting reveal threats to members of the UN Security
Council, a plot against the report on weapons of mass destruction
presented by inspector Hans Blix, and the goals of the Azores meeting
between Bush, Aznar and Blair on March 16, 2003.

On the Azores islands, the three politicians agreed on replacing the UN
Security Council and usurping its functions to declare the genocidal
invasion of Iraq on their own account and risk.

hr jg lma PL-20

                              ***

Bush Told Aznar in 2003: You Wid Us or Agin Us, We're Hitting Iraq

[Hardly a surprise, nor is it surprising that Aznar went along... He's
evaded corruption charges so far in Spain, and is enjoying a comfy
sinecure at a US university think-tank. Aznar's just another
light-weight pig poodle of Bush's. Rather than "threatened," in Aznar's
case it was more a case of bribery -- more carrots than sticks.-NYTr]

sent by MichaelP (activ-l)

Middle East Online - Sep 26, 2007
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=22372

BUSH THREATENED NATIONS NOT BACKING IRAQ WAR

Bush to Aznar: `We will be in Baghdad at the end of March'

Report: US president told former Spanish PM that America would invade
Iraq with or without UN backing.

MADRID - US President George W. Bush threatened nations with
retaliation if they did not vote for a UN resolution backing the Iraq
war, according to a transcript published Wednesday of a conversation he
had with former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar.

In the transcript of a meeting on February 22, 2003 -- a month before
the US-led invasion of Iraq -- published in the El Pais daily, Bush
tells Aznar that nations like Mexico, Angola, Chile and Cameroon must
know that the security of the United States is at stake.

He says during the meeting on his ranch in Texas that Angola stood to
lose financial aid while Chile could see a free trade agreement held up
in the US Senate if they did not back the resolution, the left-wing
paper said.

The confidential transcript was prepared by Spain's ambassador to the 
United States at the time, Javier Ruperez, the paper said.

Prior to the US-led invasion of Iraq on March 20, 2003, Washington 
unsuccessfully lobbied the 15 members of the UN Security Council for a 
second resolution paving the way for military action against Iraq if 
Saddam Hussein failed to comply with demands to disarm.

But during the meeting with Aznar, Bush made it clear the US would
invade Iraq by the end of March 2003 whether or not there was a UN
resolution to authorize it, El Pais reported.

"We have to get rid of Saddam. There are two weeks left. In two weeks
we will be ready militarily. We will be in Baghdad at the end of
March," Bush said in the transcript which was translated into Spanish
by the newspaper.

Victory would come "without destruction", he added.

The meeting between Aznar and Bush came just days after a massive
protest in Madrid by more than a million people against the invasion
which Aznar's conservative government backed.

Aznar tells Bush in the transcript that he needed Washington's help to
get Spanish public opinion behind the invasion. He adds that he is
worried by Bush's optimism.

"I am optimistic because I believe I am right. I am at peace with
myself," Bush responded.