President George W Bush asked military leaders in November 2001 about "options" in Iraq, US national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said on Sunday, despite Washington’s public claims of the search for a diplomatic solution. Bush asked Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld about possible actions in Iraq just two months after the September 11 attacks, while the United States was embroiled in the war in Afghanistan, she said. A new book said Bush began planning to attack Iraq in December two years ago despite repeated comments Washington was seeking a diplomatic way out of the standoff with Baghdad.The book, entitled "Plan of Attack" by Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward says that Bush met repeatedly with General Tommy Franks, then head of US Central Command, and his war cabinet in late 2001 — three months after the September 11 terror attacks on the United States — to plan a US war in Iraq. At the same time, administration officials publicly insisted that diplomatic efforts designed to avoid war were still under way.