IRAQ WAR: ITS GETTING BETTER AND BETTER

Newsweek: Lost Opportunity?

On the eve of the invasion of Iraq, Defense officials were offered a secret, back-channel opportunity to talk peace with Saddam

A key member of a secret Bush administration intelligence unit arranged a meeting earlier this year between a top Pentagon official and a wealthy Lebanese-American businessman who was trying to set up back-channel talks with senior aides to Saddam Hussein to avert a war in Iraq, NEWSWEEK has learned.

NY TIMES: Iraq Said to Have Tried to Reach Last-Minute Deal to Avert War

As American soldiers massed on the Iraqi border in March and diplomats argued about war, an influential adviser to the Pentagon received a secret message from a Lebanese-American businessman: Saddam Hussein wanted to make a deal.

Iraqi officials, including the chief of the Iraqi Intelligence Service, had told the businessman that they wanted Washington to know that Iraq no longer had weapons of mass destruction, and they offered to allow American troops and experts to conduct a search. The businessman said in an interview that the Iraqis also offered to hand over a man accused of being involved in the World Trade Center bombing in 1993 who was being held in Baghdad. At one point, he said, the Iraqis pledged to hold elections.

Spiegel: Saddam wollte Last-Minute-Frieden


Es ging um demokratische Wahlen, Waffenkontrollen und die Auslieferung eines Terroristen. In Geheimverhandlungen mit dem Pentagon wollte Saddam Hussein US-Medienberichten zufolge den Irak-Krieg in letzter Minute verhindern. Doch der Deal platzte. Kongressabgeordnete prüfen nun, ob Bush den Frieden leichtfertig aufs Spiel setzte.

ABC: Possible Deal Aborted?

A possible negotiated peace deal was laid out in a heavily guarded compound in Baghdad in the days before the war, ABCNEWS has been told, but a top former Pentagon adviser says he was ordered not to pursue the deal.