The months leading up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq are invariably described as the ?run-up? to the war, a term that always makes me imagine President George W. Bush and various White House and Pentagon officials sprinting, Chariots of Fire-style, toward Baghdad. One unlikely man attempting to slow them down was Brent Scowcroft, who had served as national-security adviser to Bush?s father, President George H.W. Bush. In a ?Face the Nation? appearance in August 2002 and a subsequent Wall Street Journal op-ed, Scowcroft warned against an invasion, saying that there was little evidence linking Saddam to terrorism, and that a war could prove expensive and bloody.

At the time, many speculated that Scowcroft was channeling his old boss, who may have wanted to send his namesake a message of caution. In a fascinating excerpt of a new biography of Scowcroft, posted on Foreign Policy magazine?s Best Defense blog, the political scientist Bartholomew Sparrow, of the University of Texas at Austin, writes that the essay ?wasn?t the elder Bush?s idea, ? and neither did the former president give his approval.? Though he and Scowcroft remained close and spoke nearly every day, Scowcroft ?wasn?t writing on behalf of his friend or anyone else.?

The excerpt also details the reactions of President George W. Bush and his national-security adviser, Condoleezza Rice. ?What is he doing?? the president asked Rice. ?Scowcroft has become a pain in the ass in his old age.? Compounding the awkwardness, Rice was a longtime protégé of Scowcroft. She called her mentor and ?berated him? for betraying not only the president but also his old friends in the current administration and the Republican Party, Sparrow recounts. Also, in a face-saving move, Rice publicly claimed not to have seen the essay before it was published, even though Scowcroft had faxed it to her private office number ahead of time. It is an interesting historical footnote ? but a footnote nonetheless. ?The die had already been cast,? Sparrow writes. ?The day before Scowcroft?s op-ed appears, in fact, Rice chaired an NSC meeting for the purpose of drafting a strategy for war against Iraq. ? Left unquestioned was its premise: that the United States should invade Iraq.?