Setting the record straight

[AUloggerhead 2,507]

OK, then. Where is she wrong in THIS article? What are the half-truths and innuendo here? What did she write that isn't credible?

{...sigh...} Just for you, Al. I'll start with the first sentence you highlighted:

... According to the 500-man American team that spent hundreds of millions of dollars looking for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, there aren't any and have not been any since 1991. ...

What 500-man American team? Is she talking about the UNSCOM inspection team? You know, sanctioned by the UN & made up of inspectors of various nationalities? The UNSCOM team spent 7 years playing cat & mouse with SH's regime never ever getting full cooperation from the Iraqis. By the UN resolutions, the Iraqis were required to account for their WMD and the inspection team was there to monitor the destruction. It was never the intent to have the inspectors go out & "find" the WMD for destruction. Even Scott Ritter made the claim that by 1998 about 90-95% of Iraq's WMD were verified as destroyed. Still, that would imply about 5-10% of Iraq's WMD were not. Correct?

So, there. Molly Ivins used some half truths & innuendo to make a declarative statement posing as factual and proved herself hopelessly wrong on four issues in that one sentence: the makeup of the inspection team, their mission, the absence of complete 100% verification of the destruction of Iraqi WMD and the date. She's just plain wrong.

O.K.? You know, I could pick apart her whole column but I haven't the heart for it. Been there, done that, bought the t-shirt. I'll make you a deal: you don't quote Molly Ivins on this forum anymore and I won't quote Bill O'Reilly. Deal?

[Tiger Al 0]

Molly Ivins is an Austin based Bush Hater for decades. She openly brags about how much she hates Bush. It is useless to argue with closed minded, narrow minded, hatred filled columinists.

Ivins is to the left as the Libertarians are to the right. Extremeists thjat desreve no rebuttals , only sympathy. Ivins starts lying as soon as she fires up the PC.

Where did she lie in this case?

[Tiger Al 0]

What 500-man American team?

Isn't it great when you can jump to a conclusion, in this case, UNSCOM, and then just rip it to shreds! Makes you feel good, huh? If you'd read my response to Tigermike you would've seen which group she was talking about. The Iraq Survey Group, formerly headed by Dr. David Kay, is the group responsible for finding the WMD's now. Remember, he said in his testimony on Jan 28, "It turns out that we were all wrong” and “I believe that the effort that has been directed to this point has been sufficiently intense that it is highly unlikely that there were large stockpiles of deployed, militarized chemical weapons there.” THAT'S the group she was talking about.

Even Scott Ritter made the claim that by 1998 about 90-95% of Iraq's WMD were verified as destroyed. Still, that would imply about 5-10% of Iraq's WMD were not. Correct?

Couldn't you also come to the conclusion that the 5-10% were UNVERIFIED? Unverified doesn't mean they weren't destroyed. Nor does it mean they were. Hans Blix said, before the start of the war, that he needed to do some interviews because within the 12,000 plus documents he acquired there were some inconsistensies that needed to be followed up on. He felt that it was only a matter of getting the proper documentation and not that the items in question were still viable.

[DKW 86 7,867]

Ivins and Blumenthal are just nuts that need no response.

Would you bother to respond to Lyndon Larouche? Would you respond to a John Bircher? (Heck , I would just blush in embarassment!)

Al, Donut, there are just some extremists out there that are just a waste of time.

Ivins, Malveaux, Blumenthal, Carvell, any Skinhead-Nazi Group are it for me on the Left.

On the Right, Anyone from Birch, Most Libertarians, TBN, most of the Real nutzy Right Wing Religious Zealots too, they are just a waste of time.

It gets to many here that we can admit that there are nuts on our side. But yet there is never any admission like that from the Left, no matter how Silly or extreme their side gets.

[Tiger Al 0]

Ivins and Blumenthal are just nuts that need no response.

Would you bother to respond to Lyndon Larouche? Would you respond to a John Bircher? (Heck , I would just blush in embarassment!)

Al, Donut, there are just some extremists out there that are just a waste of time.

Ivins, Malveaux, Blumenthal, Carvell, any Skinhead-Nazi Group are it for me on the Left.

On the Right, Anyone from Birch, Most Libertarians, TBN, most of the Real nutzy Right Wing Religious Zealots too, they are just a waste of time.

It gets to many here that we can admit that there are nuts on our side. But yet there is never any admission like that from the Left, no matter how Silly or extreme their side gets.

An ad hominem argument, or argumentum ad hominem (Latin, literally "argument against the man [or person]"), is a fallacy that involves replying to an argument or assertion by attempting to discredit the person offering the argument or assertion.

You really don't have a response, do you? Bush has painted you guys into a corner that you can't get out of without getting really messy!

First, we were gonna roll into Iraq and just stumble all over them. Then, we didn't find them because there was a war going on and they didn't have time to look for them. They'll show up, though. "Mission Accomplished!!!"-Now it will only be a short time and we'll show those weapons to the world. I guess Saddam must've hidden them real good. We are, after all, talking about a country the size of California. We're still looking...they're here somewhere! David Kay calls it quits. Says we must've all been wrong.

Not ALL of us.

[DKW 86 7,867]

Al thuis thread was focusing on Ivins et al. How many times do you have to hear that the Intel was bad? How many times? It was bad for Clinton, it was bad for Bush, it was bad for Blair.

[Tiger Al 0]

Al thuis thread was focusing on Ivins et al. How many times do you have to hear that the Intel was bad? How many times? It was bad for Clinton, it was bad for Bush, it was bad for Blair.

What about the intel that we were getting for the three months prior to attacking? How can that be easily dismissed? UNMOVIC was running around Iraq at the administration's direction and couldn't find any WMD's where they (UNMOVIC) were told they'd be. How can you dismiss that as bad intel? If nothing else, it should've been a big red flag that the intel was bad before we started lobbing bombs, don't you think? Or, do you?

[TitanTiger 21,068]

The intel was bad for Clinton and Bush. However, the fault lies completely with Bush. When are you going to learn how this game is played, David?

It's just like the recession. The stock market starts heading down in March 2000. By election time, we're in full blown slowdown mode. Before one Bush policy makes it through Congress, we're officially in recession (by the latest estimate). Does this reflect on Clinton's policies and leadership? BZZZZZZT! Wrong thought. Rules of this game are: Bush gets the blame. All other answers are unacceptable.

Here's another one: Clinton unilaterally fires missiles into the Sudan and Afghanistan. He also bombs and sends troops into Bosnia and Kosovo. He does both without the backing of the UN. Bush sends troops into Afghanistan and Iraq without the backing of the UN. Both acted unilaterally? BZZZZZZT! Wrong again. Only Bush gets that label. Rules of the game, you see.

It takes a while, but you get used to it.

[CCTAU 3,470]

OK Al, I was trying to be nice to you but I will go ahead and tell it like it is.  Your entire article is  Typical ranting from the left. 

Do you feel better now? 

Four posts and you still haven't addressed the facts. "Typical ranting from the left" sounds cute (Is that Rush or Sean?) but it says nothing.

I've wasted my time reading this already and I am still looking for "the facts" ..any facts to address????

[Tiger Al 0]

The intel was bad for Clinton and Bush.  However, the fault lies completely with Bush.  When are you going to learn how this game is played, David? 

It's just like the recession.  The stock market starts heading down in March 2000.  By election time, we're in full blown slowdown mode.  Before one Bush policy makes it through Congress, we're officially in recession (by the latest estimate).  Does this reflect on Clinton's policies and leadership?  BZZZZZZT!  Wrong thought.  Rules of this game are:  Bush gets the blame.  All other answers are unacceptable.

Here's another one:  Clinton unilaterally fires missiles into the Sudan and Afghanistan.  He also bombs and sends troops into Bosnia and Kosovo.  He does both without the backing of the UN.  Bush sends troops into Afghanistan and Iraq without the backing of the UN.  Both acted unilaterally?  BZZZZZZT!  Wrong again.  Only Bush gets that label.  Rules of the game, you see.

It takes a while, but you get used to it.

Alright, I'll say it again and you try to read it...very...slowly...Titan.

Forget for the moment about any intelligence before 12/2002. From this point until 3/20/2003 weapons inspectors from UNMOVIC were inside Iraq verifying, documenting and being directed by the US to various sites in the country where they were told weapons stockpiles existed. Every place they went turned up NOTHING. NO WMD's!

Now, remember the intelligence that the administration used to send UNMOVIC to all those sites? Remember all of the pretty satellite pictures Powell used at the UN? Remember Rumsfeld saying we knew EXACTLY where the WMD's were? We told UNMOVIC to go to all of those places and they turned up nothing. Where did the weapons stockpiles go? Did they just disappear? You think they were sent out of the country? Why in God's name would we have stopped paying attention to them before we had them in our possession? Why, if Saddam had them, would he not have used them when we were amassing on his border? Isn't that THE reason he had them, for protection against a superior force?

C'mon, Titan. Don't fumble the ball now. I thought YOU, more than most any of the others, would discuss this thoughtfully and then you start talking about recessions and Clinton and stock markets. You're bigger than that. You're not about making excuses so why start now?

[DKW 86 7,867]

Titan, you are right. I was stupid for ever thinking a Dem had an open mind.

Forget for the moment about any intelligence before 12/2002.

Yeah Titan, just dismiss 12 years of Intel, for no apparent reason, and just focus on the less than three months of Intel that fits Al's point du jour.

This is just pathetic. Put your brain in nuetral and repeat: "I hate Bush, blame all on Bush" till you head is mush.

[Tiger Al 0]

Titan, you are right. I was stupid for ever thinking a Dem had an open mind.

Forget for the moment about any intelligence before 12/2002.

Yeah Titan, just dismiss 12 years of Intel, for no apparent reason, and just focus on the less than three months of Intel that fits Al's point du jour.

This is just pathetic. Put your brain in nuetral and repeat: "I hate Bush, blame all on Bush" till you head is mush.

So it tells you nothing that our best intelligence was wrong and we knew it before we started a war? It tells you nothing when Bush said that he'd use war only as a last resort and when he saw all of his reasons vanishing in front of him he had UNMOVIC withdrawn and attacked before too many people realized that the weapons had long been destroyed? Wise up, David.

[TitanTiger 21,068]

Yep, it was all Bush's master plan to go in and start a war based on intel he knew was completely false so that once we got there and there were no WMDs to be found, he could look like an idiot. YOU wise up, Al.

[Tiger Al 0]

Yep, it was all Bush's master plan to go in and start a war based on intel he knew was completely false so that once we got there and there were no WMDs to be found, he could look like an idiot. YOU wise up, Al.

Did not Paul O'Neill say himself that in the first security council meeting the administration held they were discussing how to get rid of Saddam? Remember, he said that Bush said, "Find a way to do it."

I think Bush and the others honestly thought this was going to be such a cakewalk AND their story was so good that no one would question them once it was done. What happens here with dissenters is mild compared to what they do to them. Does Valerie Plame ring a bell? It's turned out to be anything but a cakewalk and the press has finally come out of its' coma.

[AUloggerhead 2,507]

Isn't it great when you can jump to a conclusion, in this case, UNSCOM, and then just rip it to shreds! Makes you feel good, huh? If you'd read my response to Tigermike you would've seen which group she was talking about. The Iraq Survey Group, formerly headed by Dr. David Kay, is the group responsible for finding the WMD's now. Remember, he said in his testimony on Jan 28, "It turns out that we were all wrong” and “I believe that the effort that has been directed to this point has been sufficiently intense that it is highly unlikely that there were large stockpiles of deployed, militarized chemical weapons there.” THAT'S the group she was talking about.

Sorry, my bad. Reading comprehension & stuff. You asked me to find the half truths & innuendo in her column. I was reading her writing and it was misleading as usual (which actually proves my point but, ... I digress.)

I saw: inspection team, 100's of million dollars spent & nothing found since 1991. Naturally, I thought of the only inspection team around in 1991 which was UNSCOM. Still, the fact that she made the leap from "doubt about Iraqi WMD pre-war in 2003" to "hasn't been any WMD in Iraq since 1991" DOES prove what I said about her. No rational person should take what she wrote as gospel.

Let's cut to the chase. I'm no fan of Ivins due to reasons already stated. You linked her column to give credence to your argument that: Bush lied about Iraqi WMD. That's what this is all about. Correct?

Here's a reasoned, well-thought out column for you to ponder: Justifiable Mistake

... So it is time to admit that the war was premised on a mistake. Had I known then what I know now, I would have opposed it. Next question: Does that mean the war itself was a mistake? Yes. But it was a special kind of mistake: a justified mistake.

A policeman shoots a robber who has killed in the past and who brandishes what seems to be a gun. The gun turns out to be a cellphone. The policeman expects a thorough investigation (and ought to cooperate). In the end, if he is exonerated, it is not because he made no mistake but because his mistake was justified. Reasonable people, facing uncertainty, would have thought they saw a gun.

George W. Bush and the CIA thought they saw a gun. So did French President Jacques Chirac, who last February warned of Iraq's "probable possession of weapons of mass destruction." So did Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, a former Vermont governor, who last February said, "My personal belief is that Saddam may well possess anthrax and chemical weapons. That being the case, he must be disarmed." 

If reasonable people thought Saddam possessed forbidden weapons, that was because Saddam sought to give the impression that he possessed them. He may have believed he possessed them. (His fearful and corrupt scientists, Kay hypothesized, may have been running a sham weapons program.) For four years after the 1991 Persian Gulf War, Iraq successfully hid its chemical weapons program. When a defector blew the whistle, weapons inspectors were stunned at the extent of Saddam's deception. The Iraqis responded not by coming clean but by redoubling their efforts to obstruct and intimidate—for example, interfering with inspectors' helicopter flights and, at one point, firing a grenade into their headquarters. No one could have failed to conclude that Saddam was hiding the truth. ...

As a direct result of his duplicity & obfuscation, SH sits in jail out of power & facing certain execution from the 25 million Iraqis he brutalized for decades. This is a good thing, no?

[Tiger Al 0]

...a robber who has killed in the past and who brandishes what seems to be a gun...

And...FREEZE

It is at this point right here where UNMOVIC stood between 12/2002 and 3/2003, as opposed to a split second. Before the policeman fires his weapon, time stands still and he can see with perfect clarity that the gun is not a gun, but a cellphone. For those three months, time stood still as UNMOVIC was telling the world that Iraq had no WMD's where we thought we knew they were. Sure, maybe they did and we just hadn't found them yet. Then, what's the harm in looking some more? UNMOVIC had access to anywhere they wanted to go for the first time ever. Why shoot while all we see is a cellphone?

The gun turns out to be a cellphone.

[Tigermike 3,657]

Where did she lie in this case?

Her 2nd paragraph;

there aren't any and have not been any since 1991.

[AUloggerhead 2,507]

And...FREEZE

It is at this point right here where UNMOVIC stood between 12/2002 and 3/2003, as opposed to a split second. Before the policeman fires his weapon, time stands still and he can see with perfect clarity that the gun is not a gun, but a cellphone. For those three months, time stood still as UNMOVIC was telling the world that Iraq had no WMD's where we thought we knew they were. Sure, maybe they did and we just hadn't found them yet. Then, what's the harm in looking some more? UNMOVIC had access to anywhere they wanted to go for the first time ever. Why shoot while all we see is a cellphone?

You can't "FREEZE." Instant replay only happens in football on TV.

The information UNMOVIC provided between 12/02 & 3/03 was only one piece of a larger puzzle. That the UNMOVIC info was contradictary to the consensus of Western intelligence agencies (including France & Germany) one year before the war started (scroll on down to What We Thought We Knew) did not make it unassailable in the eyes of intelligence analysts. The UNMOVIC info was just one more piece of intelligence to consider. And by your own admission in another thread, Hans Blix still had some doubts and wanted to conduct some more interviews. The key word there is doubts.

If you want to say the threat to the US was non-existent and that Bush was wrong to go to war with the all the information available to us in the news, that's great. That's your right.

Bush made a judgement call on whether to invade Iraq & disarm SH based on the available intel, pure and simple. You can't fault him for being on the conservative side. (Well, I guess you can ... but you'd be wrong!)

[Tiger Al 0]

Where did she lie in this case?

Her 2nd paragraph;

there aren't any and have not been any since 1991.

Hans Blix said in an interview that he thought they were destroyed then. Do you have anything other than your assertion that she's wrong? Not that there's anything with your having assertions, I'm just wondering .

[Tiger Al 0]

The UNMOVIC info was just one more piece of intelligence to consider. And by your own admission in another thread, Hans Blix still had some doubts and wanted to conduct some more interviews. The key word there is doubts.

Again, it's a very important piece to consider. If you're told repeatedly where WMD's are located and repeatedly you find that there are no WMD's, isn't it common sense to suspect that the people who told you where the WMD's were might be wrong? If not, why not? (If I had a stock broker who was repeatedly wrong I'd stop using him.) If so, and you did suspect that they may be wrong, why would you proceed with a war based on known bad information when you could let UNMOVIC do its' job until it was able to a) Declare Iraq fully compliant, b ) Find hidden WMD's and proceed to war or c) Go to war because Saddam stonewalled for the last time.

Blix' doubts weren't that they had WMD's. He had to be able to account for everything before he could declare Iraq "in compliance." He felt like they were but he had to get some interviews because of paperwork discrepancies.

The UNMOVIC info was just one more piece of intelligence to consider.

Remember, the UNSCOM inspectors were withdrawn in 1998 prior to Desert Fox. They provided the bulk of on the ground intelligence that we had. Saddam accused them of being spies because, well, they were spying! All of the really "good intelligence" we had prior to 12/2002 was four years old or more. This is why UNMOVIC is so important. Now we have people on the ground in Iraq with total access to anywhere they wanted to go. We had a free peek into that country and the free peeks were saying that there were no WMD's.

So, back to your cop scenario. If the cop had a free peek into all of the suspects pockets, why would he shoot him after only looking through one? Maybe the cop didn't care at all if the suspect had a gun and to continue to look would show that all he had was a cellphone and a record.

[Tigermike 3,657]

UNSCOM only thinks that 90-95% were destroyed. That leaves 5-10% unaccounted for. Where is it?

UNSCOM encountered various difficulties and lack of cooperation by the Iraqi government and was eventually withdrawn. Despite this UNSCOM's own estimate was that 90-95% of Iraqi WMD's had been successfully destroyed before its 1998 withdrawal. After that Iraq remained without any outside weapons inspectors for five years. During this time speculations arose that Iraq had actively resumed its WMD programmes. In particular various figures in the second Bush administration went so far as to express concern about nuclear weapons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_product...ass_destruction

The Democrats and Weapons of Mass Destruction:

http://www.commondreams.org/news2004/0123-08.htm

[Tiger Al 0]

You're equating the term "unaccounted for" with "armed and ready to fire." The things that were unaccounted for were the chemical and biological weapons, which were produced pre-Desert Storm and would have deteriorated to the point of ineffectiveness, even if they did exist now. The sanctions were such that Saddam couldn't have reconstituted these programs. He couldn't get the materials necessary.

Hans Blix was pleading to get more time so he could get an accounting of what was unaccounted for. For all of the failures that UNMOVIC was experiencing with the goose chases the Bush administration was sending them on, they were having great success on the verification front and needed more time. Why do you think Bush wouldn't give it to them since he was concerned with the full disarmament of Iraq's WMD's?

[Donutboy 0]

The fatcs are this: The Bush administration came to the first cabinet meeting looking for a reason to invade Iraq. That's from one of their own cabinet members that was in attendance. It's been well-documented that this administration cherry-picked the information that they wanted to believe and ignored warnings that the information was sketchy at best. This administration went so far as to coerce the intelligence community to twist their information to fit their agenda. They even created their own intelligence agency to circumvent the established intelligence community and cherry pick information they wanted to hear instead of what was given to them. Here's a post that details the entire leadup to the war chronologically. As it shows, this administration at first was giving the American people the impression that Iraq was NOT a threat and that Saddam Hussein was in a box. After 9/11, we used the Americans willingness for justice to allow us to mount a campaign for a war with Iraq and basing it on our fears of the time. Each paragraph has links to the individual articles detailing each action. These links are not included below, but if you follow the link to this page, you can visit each individual link.

Neglecting Intelligence, Ignoring Warnings

January 28, 2004

Updated January 29, 2004

Download:  DOC,  PDF,  RTF

Former weapons inspector David Kay now says Iraq probably did not have WMD before the war, a major blow to the Bush Administration which used the WMD argument as the rationale for war. Unfortunately, Kay and the Administration are now attempting to shift the blame for misleading America onto the intelligence community. But a review of the facts shows the intelligence community repeatedly warned the Bush Administration about the weakness of its case, but was circumvented, overruled, and ignored. The following is year-by-year timeline of those warnings.

2001: WH Admits Iraq Contained; Creates Agency to Circumvent Intel Agencies

In 2001 and before, intelligence agencies noted that Saddam Hussein was effectively contained after the Gulf War. In fact, former weapons inspector David Kay now admits that the previous policy of containment – including the 1998 bombing of Iraq – destroyed any remaining infrastructure of potential WMD programs.

OCTOBER 8, 1997 – IAEA SAYS IRAQ FREE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS:  "As reported in detail in the progress report dated 8 October 1997…and based on all credible information available to date, the IAEA's verification activities in Iraq, have resulted in the evolution of a technically coherent picture of Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme. These verification activities have revealed no indications that Iraq had achieved its programme objective of producing nuclear weapons or that Iraq had produced more than a few grams of weapon-usable nuclear material or had clandestinely acquired such material. Furthermore, there are no indications that there remains in Iraq any physical capability for t he production of weapon-usable nuclear material of any practical significance." [source: IAEA Report, 10/8/98]

FEBRUARY 23 & 24, 2001 – COLIN POWELL SAYS IRAQ IS CONTAINED: "I think we ought to declare [the containment policy] a success. We have kept him contained, kept him in his box." He added Saddam "is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors" and that "he threatens not the United States." [source: State Department, 2/23/01 and 2/24/01]

SEPTEMBER 16, 2001 – CHENEY ACKNOWLEDGES IRAQ IS CONTAINED: Vice President Dick Cheney said that "Saddam Hussein is bottled up" – a confirmation of the intelligence he had received. [source: Meet the Press, 9/16/2001]

SEPTEMBER 2001 – WHITE HOUSE CREATES OFFICE TO CIRCUMVENT INTEL AGENCIES: The Pentagon creates the Office of Special Plans "in order to find evidence of what Wolfowitz and his boss, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, believed to be true-that Saddam Hussein had close ties to Al Qaeda, and that Iraq had an enormous arsenal of chemical, biological, and possibly even nuclear weapons that threatened the region and, potentially, the United States…The rising influence of the Office of Special Plans was accompanied by a decline in the influence of the C.I.A. and the D.I.A. bringing  about a crucial change of direction in the American intelligence community." The office, hand-picked by the Administration, specifically "cherry-picked intelligence that supported its pre-existing position and ignoring all the rest" while officials deliberately "bypassed the government's customary procedures for vetting intelligence." [sources: New Yorker, 5/12/03; Atlantic Monthly, 1/04; New Yorker, 10/20/03]

2002: Intel Agencies Repeatedly Warn White House of Its Weak WMD Case

Throughout 2002, the CIA, DIA, Department of Energy and United Nations all warned the Bush Administration that its selective use of intelligence was painting a weak WMD case. Those warnings were repeatedly ignored.

JANUARY, 2002 – TENET DOES NOT MENTION IRAQ IN NUCLEAR THREAT REPORT: "In CIA Director George Tenet's January 2002 review of global weapons-technology proliferation, he did not even mention a nuclear threat from Iraq, though he did warn of one from North Korea." [source: The New Republic, 6/30/03]

FEBRUARY 6, 2002 – CIA SAYS IRAQ HAS NOT PROVIDED WMD TO TERRORISTS: "The Central Intelligence Agency has no evidence that Iraq has engaged in terrorist operations against the United States in nearly a decade, and the agency is also convinced that President Saddam Hussein has not provided chemical or biological weapons to Al Qaeda or related terrorist groups, according to several American intelligence officials."  [source: NY Times, 2/6/02]

APRIL 15, 2002 – WOLFOWITZ ANGERED AT CIA FOR NOT UNDERMINING U.N. REPORT: After receiving a CIA report that concluded that Hans Blix had conducted inspections of Iraq's declared nuclear power plants "fully within the parameters he could operate" when Blix was head of the international agency responsible for these inspections prior to the Gulf War, a report indicated that "Wolfowitz ‘hit the ceiling’ because the CIA failed to provide sufficient ammunition to undermine Blix and, by association, the new U.N. weapons inspection program." [source: W. Post, 4/15/02]

SUMMER, 2002 – CIA WARNINGS TO WHITE HOUSE EXPOSED: "In the late summer of 2002, Sen. Graham had requested from Tenet an analysis of the Iraqi threat. According to knowledgeable sources, he received a 25-page classified response reflecting the balanced view that had prevailed earlier among the intelligence agencies--noting, for example, that evidence of an Iraqi nuclear program or a link to Al Qaeda was inconclusive. Early that September, the committee also received the DIA's classified analysis, which reflected the same cautious assessments. But committee members became worried when, midway through the month, they received a new CIA analysis of the threat that highlighted the Bush administration's claims and consigned skepticism to footnotes." [source: The New Republic, 6/30/03]

SEPTEMBER, 2002 – DIA TELLS WHITE HOUSE NO EVIDENCE OF CHEMICAL WEAPONS: "An unclassified excerpt of a 2002 Defense Intelligence Agency study on Iraq's chemical warfare program in which it stated that there is ‘no reliable information on whether Iraq is producing and stockpiling chemical weapons, or where Iraq has - or will - establish its chemical warfare agent production facilities.’" The report also said, "A substantial amount of Iraq's chemical warfare agents, precursors, munitions, and production equipment were destroyed between 1991 and 1998 as a result of Operation Desert Storm and UNSCOM (United Nations Special Commission) actions." [source: Carnegie Endowment for Peace, 6/13/03; DIA report, 2002]

SEPTEMBER 20, 2002 – DEPT. OF ENERGY TELLS WHITE HOUSE OF NUKE DOUBTS: "Doubts about the quality of some of the evidence that the United States is using to make its case that Iraq is trying to build a nuclear bomb emerged Thursday. While National Security Adviser Condi Rice stated on 9/8 that imported aluminum tubes  ‘are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs’ a growing number of experts say that the administration has not presented convincing evidence that the tubes were intended for use in uranium enrichment rather than for artillery rocket tubes or other uses. Former U.N. weapons inspector David Albright said he found significant disagreement among scientists within the Department of Energy and other agencies about the certainty of the evidence." [source: UPI, 9/20/02]

OCTOBER 2002 – CIA DIRECTLY WARNS WHITE HOUSE: "The CIA sent two memos to the White House in October voicing strong doubts about a claim President Bush made three months later in the State of the Union address that Iraq was trying to buy nuclear materials in Africa." [source: Washington Post, 7/23/03]

OCTOBER 2002 — STATE DEPT. WARNS WHITE HOUSE ON NUKE CHARGES: The State Department’s Intelligence and Research Department dissented from the conclusion in the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq’s WMD capabilities that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. "The activities we have detected do not ... add up to a compelling case that Iraq is currently pursuing what INR would consider to be an integrated and comprehensive approach to acquiring nuclear weapons."  INR accepted the judgment by Energy Department technical experts that aluminum tubes Iraq was seeking to acquire, which was the central basis for the conclusion that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program, were ill-suited to build centrifuges for enriching uranium. [source, Declassified Iraq NIE released 7/2003]

OCTOBER 2002 – AIR FORCE WARNS WHITE HOUSE: "The government organization most knowledgeable about the United States' UAV program -- the Air Force's National Air and Space Intelligence Center -- had sharply disputed the notion that Iraq's UAVs were being designed as attack weapons" – a WMD claim President Bush used in his October 7 speech on Iraqi WMD, just three days before the congressional vote authorizing the president to use force. [source: Washington Post, 9/26/03]

2003: WH Pressures Intel Agencies to Conform; Ignores More Warnings

Instead of listening to the repeated warnings from the intelligence community, intelligence officials say the White House instead pressured them to conform their reports to fit a pre-determined policy. Meanwhile, more evidence from international institutions poured in that the White House’s claims were not well-grounded.

LATE 2002-EARLY 2003 – CHENEY PRESSURES CIA TO CHANGE INTELLIGENCE: "Vice President Dick Cheney's repeated trips to CIA headquarters in the run-up to the war for unusual, face-to-face sessions with intelligence analysts poring over Iraqi data. The pressure on the intelligence community to document the administration's claims that the Iraqi regime had ties to al-Qaida and was pursuing a nuclear weapons capacity was ‘unremitting,’ said former CIA counterterrorism chief Vince Cannistraro, echoing several other intelligence veterans interviewed." Additionally, CIA officials "charged that the hard-liners in the Defense Department and vice president's office had 'pressured' agency analysts to paint a dire picture of Saddam's capabilities and intentions." [sources: Dallas Morning News, 7/28/03; Newsweek, 7/28/03]

JANUARY, 2003 – STATE DEPT. INTEL BUREAU REITERATE WARNING TO POWELL: "The Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), the State Department's in-house analysis unit, and nuclear experts at the Department of Energy are understood to have explicitly warned Secretary of State Colin Powell during the preparation of his speech that the evidence was questionable. The Bureau reiterated to Mr. Powell during the preparation of his February speech that its analysts were not persuaded that the aluminum tubes the Administration was citing could be used in centrifuges to enrich uranium." [source: Financial Times, 7/30/03]

FEBRUARY 14, 2003 – UN WARNS WHITE HOUSE THAT NO WMD HAVE BEEN FOUND: "In their third progress report since U.N. Security Council Resolution 1441 was passed in November, inspectors told the council they had not found any weapons of mass destruction." Weapons inspector Hans Blix told the U.N. Security Council they had been unable to find any WMD in Iraq and that more time was needed for inspections. [source: CNN, 2/14/03]

FEBRUARY 15, 2003 – IAEA WARNS WHITE HOUSE NO NUCLEAR EVIDENCE:  The head of the IAEA told the U.N. in February that "We have to date found no evidence of ongoing prohibited nuclear or nuclear-related activities in Iraq." The IAEA examined "2,000 pages of documents seized Jan. 16 from an Iraqi scientist's home -- evidence, the Americans said, that the Iraqi regime was hiding government documents in private homes. The documents, including some marked classified, appear to be the scientist's personal files." However, "the documents, which contained information about the use of laser technology to enrich uranium, refer to activities and sites known to the IAEA and do not change the agency's conclusions about Iraq's laser enrichment program." [source: Wash. Post, 2/15/03]

FEBURARY 24, 2003 – CIA WARNS WHITE HOUSE ‘NO DIRECT EVIDENCE’ OF WMD: "A CIA report on proliferation released this week says the intelligence community has no ‘direct evidence’ that Iraq has succeeded in reconstituting its biological, chemical, nuclear or long-range missile programs in the two years since U.N. weapons inspectors left and U.S. planes bombed Iraqi facilities. ‘We do not have any direct evidence that Iraq has used the period since Desert Fox to reconstitute its Weapons of Mass Destruction programs,’ said the agency in its semi-annual report on proliferation activities." [NBC News, 2/24/03]

MARCH 7, 2003 – IAEA REITERATES TO WHITE HOUSE NO EVIDENCE OF NUKES: IAEA Director Mohamed ElBaradei said nuclear experts have found "no indication" that Iraq has tried to import high-strength aluminum tubes or specialized ring magnets for centrifuge enrichment of uranium. For months, American officials had "cited Iraq's importation of these tubes as evidence that Mr. Hussein's scientists have been seeking to develop a nuclear capability." ElBaradei also noted said "the IAEA has concluded, with the concurrence of outside experts, that documents which formed the basis for the [President Bush’s assertion] of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger are in fact not authentic." When questioned about this on Meet the Press, Vice President Dick Cheney simply said "Mr. ElBaradei is, frankly, wrong." [source: NY Times, 3/7/03: Meet the Press, 3/16/03]

MAY 30, 2003 – INTEL PROFESSIONALS ADMIT THEY WERE PRESSURED: "A growing number of U.S. national security professionals are accusing the Bush administration of slanting the facts and hijacking the $30 billion intelligence apparatus to justify its rush to war in Iraq . A key target is a four-person Pentagon team that reviewed material gathered by other intelligence outfits for any missed bits that might have tied Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to banned weapons or terrorist groups. This team, self-mockingly called the Cabal, 'cherry-picked the intelligence stream' in a bid to portray Iraq as an imminent threat, said Patrick Lang, a official at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). The DIA was "exploited and abused and bypassed in the process of making the case for war in Iraq based on the presence of WMD," or weapons of mass destruction, he said. Greg Thielmann, an intelligence official in the State Department, said it appeared to him that intelligence had been shaped 'from the top down.'" [Reuters, 5/30/03 ]

JUNE 6, 2003 – INTELLIGENCE HISTORIAN SAYS INTEL WAS HYPED: "The CIA bowed to Bush administration pressure to hype the threat of Saddam Hussein's weapons programs ahead of the U.S.-led war in Iraq , a leading national security historian concluded in a detailed study of the spy agency's public pronouncements." [Reuters, 6/6/03]

[War Eagle 96 10]

Tiger Al & Dognut's arguments, in summary:

We should have believed Sadaam and we must blame America.

[Donutboy 0]

Tiger Al & Dognut's arguments, in summary:

We should have believed Sadaam and we must blame America.

No. Read the chronolgy and make your own assumptions. I see a calculated effort to invade a country and the use of cherry-picked information to justify it. I see nothing from you but denials. Do you have detailed information discrediting even one of the items in the chronolgy, other than he's a Republican and can do no wrong? I didn't think so.

BTW, no one is blaming America. America wasn't privvy to the information and didn't get to choose what to believe and what not to believe. All we knew were the lies that this administration fed us in an election year to try and make the opposition party seem unpatriotic if they didn't support the lies. Of course, what's a few hundred American lives when it can get you a political victory in an off-year election? RIGHT?