In his new book The Age of Turbulence: Adventures in a New World, Allen Greenspan wrote, “I’m saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: The Iraq war is largely about oil.”
Greenspan retired in Jan. 2006 after more than 18 years as chairman of the Federal Reserve, the U.S. central bank, which regulates monetary policy.
He told The Washington Post that at the time of the invasion he believed, like President George W. Bush, that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction “because Saddam was acting so guiltily trying to protect something.”
But Greenspan’s main support for Saddam’s ouster was economically motivated, he said.
Greenspan, who in his memoir criticizes Bush and Congressional Republicans for abandoning fiscal discipline and putting politics ahead of sound economics, also expressed dismay with the Democratic Party in an issue of The Wall Street Journal published on Monday.
Greenspan said he was “fairly close” to former President Bill Clinton’s economic advisers, but added, “The next administration may have the Clinton administration name, but the Democratic Party… has moved … very significantly in the wrong direction.”
Greenspan, a self-described libertarian Republican, told the journal he was not sure how he would vote in the 2008 election.
“I just may not vote,” he said, adding, “I’m saddened by the whole political process.”
Greenspan, 81, believes Saddam Hussein posed a threat to the security of oil supplies in the Middle East.
However, Britain and America have always insisted the war had nothing to do with oil. Bush said the aim was to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction and end Saddam’s support for terrorism.
Greenspan’s 531-page book will do little to restore faith in the Bush administration’s claims of economic proficiency at a time when the markets are deeply unstable. He has harsh words for Bush, Vice-President Cheney, and the Republicans over their big spending and lack of financial discipline.
They are contrasted with former president Bill Clinton, whom Greenspan clearly admires.