[Vision2020] Phrase "Intelligence Failure" a Whitewash

[Ted Moffett]

There was no intelligence "failure" on Iraq WMDs before the 2003 invasion.
"Orchestrated deception" is a more accurate phrase.

A well researched analysis of the campaign of deception of the Bush
administration to justify the invasion of Iraq is at the URL below:

http://projects.publicintegrity.org/WarCard/
-----------------
At the URL below is my Vision2020 post discussing the pending Iraq invasion
from Jan. 20, 2003.  I knew then based on my research that the intelligence
regarding Iraq WMD cast credible doubt on the extent of and danger to the US
posed by alleged Iraq WMD in 2003:

http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/2003-January/000218.html
-----------------
In response to what I think is an obscurantist view of the intelligence
evidence available to the public before the 2003 Iraq invasion, I wrote a
response to Chas (whoever they are... they don't sign their full name to
their posts) on Vision2020, Jan. 26, 2008, presenting evidence that the Iraq
intelligence on WMDs was not fundamentally faulty, but was known before the
invasion to shed doubt on the Bush administration's claims.  There was a
deliberate propaganda campaign to manipulate and fabricate intelligence to
justify invading Iraq:

http://mailman.fsr.com/pipermail/vision2020/2008-January/051236.html

Chas wrote:


> Our mental
> filters sorted the WMD news to match whatever "truth" we had already
> decided.  None of, of course, were in a position to know anything, but
> we spouted our opinions anyway.


My analysis of the WMD threat posed by Iraq and Saddam in late 2002 early
2003 was based on credible statements from Iraq weapons inspectors and those
working in intelligence on this subject.  These sources presented evidence
that there were serious doubts about any significant Iraq WMD capability for
nuclear, biological or chemical weapons.

The Bush administration depicted the WMD threat from Iraq at a high
probability and immanent (the repeated warnings of the "mushroom cloud over
American" made by Bush, Condi Rice, et. al.), justifying an invasion based
on the dangerous doctrine of pre-emptive war.  It was argued we could not
let diplomacy, weapons inspections, sanctions, economic engagement, military
containment etc. be the approach to the Iraq problem, due to a dangerous
immanent threat to US national security from Iraq WMDs.

The US in 2002 before the invasion was engaging in ongoing military flights
over Iraq air space, conducting bombing runs on military related facilities,
and enforcing the protectorate for the Kurds in the north, so the situation
in early 2003 clearly involved an ongoing military containment of Saddam.
Iraq's military was in a shambles after they were repelled from Kuwait, and
the economic sanctions, weapons inspections and military containment were
keeping Iraq from rebuilding its weapons capabilities.

Of course no one could state with certainty that Iraq was not hiding
WMDcapability.  But the Bush administration's push to invade
Iraq was based on "evidence" of various kinds that has been exposed to be
fabricated or sourced from unreliable testimony, questionable evidence that
was filtered through the Bush administration's already assumed goal of
invading Iraq, a goal Bush expressed before the 9/11 attacks:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/09/60minutes/main592330.shtml

And what happened at President Bush's very first National Security Council
meeting is one of O'Neill's most startling revelations.

"From the very beginning, there was a conviction, that Saddam Hussein was a
bad person and that he needed to go," says O'Neill, who adds that going
after Saddam was topic "A" 10 days after the inauguration - eight months
before Sept. 11.

"From the very first instance, it was about Iraq. It was about what we can
do to change this regime," says Suskind. "Day one, these things were laid
and sealed."

As treasury secretary, O'Neill was a permanent member of the National
Security Council. He says in the book he was surprised at the meeting that
questions such as "Why Saddam?" and "Why now?" were never asked.

"It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The
president saying 'Go find me a way to do this,'" says O'Neill. "For me, the
notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever
we decide to do, is a really huge leap."

And that came up at this first meeting, says O'Neill, who adds that the
discussion of Iraq continued at the next National Security Council meeting
two days later.

He got briefing materials under this cover sheet. "There are memos. One of
them marked, secret, says, 'Plan for post-Saddam Iraq,'" adds Suskind, who
says that they discussed an occupation of Iraq in January and February of
2001.
------------------------------
Based on his interviews with O'Neill and several other officials at the
meetings, Suskind writes that the planning envisioned peacekeeping troops,
war crimes tribunals, and even divvying up Iraq's oil wealth.

He obtained one Pentagon document, dated March 5, 2001, and entitled
"Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield contracts," which includes a map of
potential areas for exploration.

"It talks about contractors around the world from, you know, 30-40
countries. And which ones have what intentions," says Suskind. "On oil in
Iraq."
------------------------

Here are two of the well credentialed sources I read in 2002,
Iraqweapons inspector Scott Ritter (former Marine intelligence officer
who voted
for Bush in 2000) and UN 2002-3 (in Iraq months before the invasion) weapons
inspection team leader Dr. Hans Blix, which should have led anyone
investigating this subject to doubt the Bush administration claims of a high
probability of significant WMD capability in Iraq that posed a national
security risk to the USA:

Pitt, William R. *War On Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to
Know*2002, Context Books, New York. ISBN
1-893956-38-5<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Booksources&isbn=1893956385>

Quote from former Iraq weapons inspector Scott Ritter:

There's no doubt Iraq hasn't fully complied with its disarmament obligations
as set forth by the Security Council in its resolution. But on the other
hand, since 1998 Iraq has been fundamentally disarmed: 90-95% of Iraq's
weapons of mass destruction capacity has been verifiably eliminated... We
have to remember that this missing 5-10% doesn't necessarily constitute a
threat... It constitutes bits and pieces of a weapons program which in its
totality doesn't amount to much, but which is still prohibited... We can't
give Iraq a clean bill of health, therefore we can't close the book on their
weapons of mass destruction. But simultaneously, we can't reasonably talk
about Iraqi non-compliance as representing a de-facto retention of a
prohibited capacity worthy of war. (page 28)

-------------------

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/02/09/wirq09.xml

Dr Blix headed the UN team searching for Saddam Hussein's weapons from
November 2002 until they were pulled out in March 2003 on the eve of war.

The inspectors warned the UK and US governments that there was no "smoking
gun" evidence of weapons caches. London and Washington were also told that
Iraqi weapons unaccounted for might well no longer exist.

He said the British and American intelligence services placed too much
weight on what Iraqi defectors told them. He also blamed the "spin" then
given to the information.

-------------------

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/mar2004/nf20040326_0596_db028.htm

Blix lays part of the blame for the White House's fervent belief in the
continued existence of Iraqi WMD on intelligence failures, which he
describes as "monumental." But he mainly fingers the arrogance and apparent
resolve of Administration hawks -- including Vice-President Dick Cheney,
Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and weapons
inspector David Kay -- to ignore evidence that didn't support their policy
objectives.
-------------------

Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett

------------------

More discussion of the Iraq WMD propaganda is in the article below:

By Francis T. Mandanici

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is expected to testify before the House
Oversight and Government Reform Committee on April 18 concerning her
involvement in the claims that the Administration made prior to the war that
Iraq had sought uranium for nuclear weapons.  Chairman Henry A. Waxman of
that committee in a letter to Rice dated April
9<http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20070409102522.pdf>has asked
Rice to testify as to whether she knew why President George W.
Bush in his 2003 State of the Union Address cited forged evidence about
Iraq's efforts to procure uranium from Niger and whether she knew before
that Address about the doubts that the CIA and State Department had raised
concerning the veracity of that uranium claim.  Waxman has also asked Rice
to explain her January 23, 2003 op-ed article.  In that article entitled Why
We Know Iraq Is Lying, which Rice wrote when she was the National Security
Advisor for President Bush, she stated that Iraq had lied in its prewar
declaration to the United Nations about weapons of mass destruction because
Iraq's declaration "fail[ed] to account for or explain Iraq's efforts to get
uranium from abroad."

In a report that I have written that is based on a review of the public
record and entitled *The Uranium Grounds For Impeachment And For A Special
Counsel: A Report To
Congress*<http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/downloads/uraniumreport.pdf>,
I note that during the pre war period of January 20 to 29, 2003,
Administration officials publicly stated at least five times that Iraq had
sought uranium for a nuclear weapon.  A few days later on February 4 the
American government turned over to the UN the documents in support that
claim.  During that nine day period not only did President Bush make such a
claim in his State of the Union report to Congress but he also made the
claim in another report to Congress that he was required to submit pursuant
to the resolution that Congress had passed in October 2002 that authorized
him to start the war.  In addition to Rice's op-ed article, then Secretary
of State Colin Powell and then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld made
similar public statements that Iraq had sought uranium for a nuclear
weapon.  Vice President Richard Cheney's Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, was
in charge at the White House for producing papers arguing the case that Iraq
had weapons of mass destruction.  Vice President Cheney's office viewed
attacks on the Administration's uranium claims as a direct attack on the
credibility of Vice President Cheney.

The uranium claims were false.  Prior to the war UN weapons inspectors in
Iraq found no weapons of mass destruction nor found any evidence that Iraq
had sought uranium as the Bush Administration had claimed.  In early March
2003, the UN stated that the documents that it had received that allegedly
supported the uranium claim were forgeries.  A few weeks later President
Bush started the war.  After the start of the war, the Iraq Survey Group
issued a report to the CIA Director stating that Iraq did not possess a
nuclear device, had ended its nuclear program in 1991, and that there was no
evidence that Iraq sought uranium from abroad after 1991.

The uranium claims that President Bush and his officials made were not only
false but also fraudulent since when they made the statements they intended
to deceive Congress and did not mention all the warnings that the American
Intelligence Community had issued about the weakness of the claims, which if
revealed would have made the uranium claims worthless.  A few months prior
to the Administration's uranium claims CIA officials in October 2002 not
only informed Rice but also her deputy Stephen Hadley that the evidence on
the uranium claim was weak.  CIA Director George Tenet personally told
Hadley that President Bush should not make the claim because the reporting
on it was weak.  In January 2003 prior to any of the statements, the State
Department told the CIA that the documents behind the uranium claim were
probably a hoax and a forgery.  Prior to the State of the Union Address the
CIA told the White House that it had several concerns about the fragmentary
nature of the intelligence on the uranium claim in the draft of the State of
the Union Address.  The White House then changed the draft to cite the view
of the British government that Iraq had sought uranium without mentioning
the concerns of the CIA.   Furthermore, as reported in the press, the
National Intelligence Council issued a memo to the White House in January
2003 that stated that the uranium claim was baseless.  Also the National
Security Council in January 2003 believed that the nuclear case against Iraq
was weak.

The motive for making the false and fraudulent uranium claims prior to the
war was to scare Congress into believing that Iraq was a nuclear threat and
thereby thwart any efforts by Congress to repeal or modify the Congressional
resolution that had empowered President Bush to use military force in Iraq.
After Congress passed the war resolution in October 2002, Iraq allowed UN
weapons inspectors to reenter Iraq but by January 2003 the UN inspectors had
found no weapons of mass destruction.  At the time of the above uranium
claims in January 2003, there was pending a Congressional resolution filed
January 7 that sought to delay the start of the war to allow the UN
inspectors to finish their inspections.  Also 130 Members of Congress on
January 24 sent President Bush a letter basically requesting that he agree
to any request by the UN for further time to finish weapons inspections.  On
January 27 the UN's chief nuclear weapons inspector, Mohamed ElBaradei,
publicly stated that UN inspectors had found no evidence that Iraq had
revived its nuclear weapons program and he basically asked for a few more
months to finish weapons inspections because he said such inspections "could
help us avoid a war."

To overcome the fact that UN weapons inspectors had not found any weapons of
mass destruction and therefore Iraq was not a nuclear threat, the
Administration resorted to the equivalent of yelling fire in a crowded
theatre not because there was a fire but to create panic and fear.
President Bush and his said senior officials twisted the untrue uranium
reports into unquestioned evidence that would scare Members of Congress into
believing that Iraq was an imminent nuclear threat because it was secretly
seeking the fuel for a hidden nuclear bomb.

As mentioned in my report, under the statute 18 U.S.C. § 1001 it is a felony
to make false and fraudulent statements to Congress.  Under the statute 18
U.S.C. § 371 it is a felony to conspire to defraud Congress, which includes
conspiring to obstruct its functions, such as the function that Congress had
prior to the war to consider whether to repeal the war resolution or modify
it so as to delay the start of the war at least until UN weapons inspectors
finished their inspections.  Under the law in order to show that a defendant
had knowledge that his or her statements were false or fraudulent it is not
necessary to produce direct evidence.  Considering the nature of fraud, the
law allows such knowledge to be proven by circumstantial evidence.

My report provides the circumstantial evidence to prove that President Bush
knowingly made false and fraudulent statements to Congress and thereby
violated 18 U.S.C. § 1001; and that he, Vice President Cheney, Secretary
Rice, Secretary Powell and Secretary Rumsfeld knowingly were involved in a
tacit agreement to make false and fraudulent statements to deceive Congress
into believing that Iraq was a nuclear threat and thereby they violated 18
U.S.C. § 371.

Rice will have a difficult time explaining to the committee that although
intelligence officials had told her that the evidence on the uranium claim
was weak she still made the claim in her op-ed article, and furthermore
despite that warning to her President Bush still made the uranium claims in
his reports to Congress, which were reports that Rice as the President's
National Security Advisor would have been involved in preparing.  In light
of my report and the public record, Rice will have difficulty explaining
that what she did was not fraudulent and therefore not a crime.

Even if Rice ignores the committee's request to testify, the public record
contains enough evidence of criminal conduct to prompt the committee to
request the Justice Department to appoint an outside Special Counsel
pursuant to the Department's current regulations, 28 C.F.R. §§ 600.1-7.  In
September 2005, forty Members of Congress asked United States Attorney
Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate whether the Administration's false and
fraudulent uranium claims violated the above criminal statutes.  Six months
later Fitzgerald responded that he did not have the authority to investigate
the matter.  Since we now know that the Administration was lying and why it
was lying, the time has come for Congress to demand that the Justice
Department appoint an outside Special Counsel.

------------------------------------------

Vision2020 Post: Ted Moffett
On 12/3/08, Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com> wrote:

> He's also continuing to tell the lie that Hussein wouldn't let in the
> inspectors:
>
> http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/120108c.html
>
> The article above documents some of the other times he's said this, and I
> can't get over how he repeats it.  It's absolutely amazing, and he doesn't
> get called on it.
>
> Sunil
>
>
> > To: vision2020 at moscow.com
> > From: thansen at moscow.com
> > Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2008 13:35:19 +0000
> > Subject: [Vision2020] Say What?
> >
> > "The biggest regret of all the presidency has to have been the
> > intelligence failure in Iraq. A lot of people put their reputations on
> the
> > line and said the weapons of mass destruction is a reason to remove
> Saddam
> > Hussein. It wasn't just people in my administration; a lot of members in
> > Congress, prior to my arrival in Washington D.C., during the debate on
> > Iraq, a lot of leaders of nations around the world were all looking at
> the
> > same intelligence. And, you know, that's not a do-over, but I wish the
> > intelligence had been different, I guess."
> >
> > - George W. Bush
> >
> >
> >
> > Seeya round town, Moscow.
> >
> > Tom Hansen
> > Moscow, Idaho
> >
> > "For a lapse Lutheran born-again Buddhist pan-Humanist Universalist
> > Unitarian Wiccan Agnostic like myself there's really no reason ever to go
>
> > to work."
> >
> > - Roy Zimmerman
> >
> >
> >
>
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