The Wall Street Journal calls “Days of Fire; Bush and Cheney in the White House” by Peter Baker. “A journalistic miracle: [Baker] has written a thorough, engaging and fair history on the Bush- Cheney White House.”
The following excerpts are incident during Bush’s first and third year in office.
FIRST YEAR:
“Bush decided to make Mexico his first foreign destination, a sign of commitment to America’s southern neighbor and a trip he could take without worry since his experience in Texas had left him with a working understanding of the place…
About an hour into the meeting with {president Vincente] Fox, Bush noticed that [Condoleezza] Rice had been called away, then [Colin] Powell and finally Karen Hughes. ‘What’s going on here?’ Bush asked, clearly irritated. Rice whispered in his ear that something was happening in Iraq.
American and British war planes were bombing radar and command-and-control facilities around Baghdad in response to what the military considered an escalated threat to aircraft patrolling no-fly zones. Bush was stunned. How had this happened with his knowing in advance?…
Aides advised him not to let on that he did not know about it and to use the word ‘routine’ to describe it….
From there, the president flew to his Texas ranch. On television were scenes of bombing in Baghdad.
‘I’m going to call Dick,’ the restless president said.
Cheney came on the line and told the president that this was a good action that would reinforce American resolve against Saddam Hussein.
Rice was struck that in a moment of uncertainty the first person Bush thought to consult was Cheney.”
THIRD YEAR:
“Then, even as American troops were trying to contain [Moqtda al-] Sadr’s fighters, four security contractors from the private Blackwater firm were ambushed and killed in Fallluah, the Sunni-dominated city in Anbar province west of Baghdad where Abu Musab all-Zarqawi and a-Qaeda followers were based….
The marines resisted suggestions for a full-fledged assault on the city, arguing for a more targeted approach, rather than risk further alienating the population….
[Defense Secretary Donald] Rumsfeld asked whether the effort should be low intensity or high intensity, and the high-intensity president interrupted. As [Lieutenant General Ricardo] Sanchez remembered it Bush delivered a sharp tirade. ‘Kick ass!’ Sanchez recalled Bush saying. ‘If somebody tries to stop the march to democracy, we will seek them out and kill them. We must be tougher than hell.’’
He went on: ‘Our will is being tested, but we are resolute. We have a better way. Stay strong! Stay the course! Kill them! Be confident! Prevail! We are going to wipe them out. We are not blinking.’…
Along with stirring the Sadr hornet’s nest without capturing him, the Fallujah debacle led Sanchez to call those days in March and April ‘a strategic disaster for America’s mission in Iraq.’ Taken together, he said, ‘our actions had undeniably ignited a civil war in Iraq.’ ”
