From the PNAC report, "Rebuilding America's Defenses", dated September 2000:
"Indeed, the United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Suddam Hussein."
Signed by members of the current administration: Paul Wolfowitz, Eliot Cohen, I. Lewis Libby, Stephen Cambone, Devon Gaffney Cross, and Dov Zakheim (among others).