White House Silenced Experts Who Questioned Iraq Intel Six Months Before War

[urbsdad6]

Right off the bat I'm going to take heat for this post because it doesn't make the "A" list of approved information sites. You folks can run stories from FOX News (the penis of the Government) Yet because I choose alternative news and information sites I'm anti American. Go figure. Understand that this post is not meant to prove or disprove anything. It is more information that unless you live behind closed doors with a closed mind can be investigated and evaluated. I post in order to provide an alternative view. Yes my views are suspicious of the goings on of our Government but that doesn't mean everything I post is proof. It is more information to be assessed and digested.

The article and links can be found at:


http://www.antiwar.com/orig/leopold6.html

The main site that I found the link to the article is:

http://www.tvnewslies.org/news/#war

by Jason Leopold
June 12, 2003

Six months before the United States was dead-set on invading Iraq to rid the country of its alleged weapons of mass destruction, experts in the field of nuclear science warned officials in the Bush administration that intelligence reports showing Iraq was stockpiling chemical and biological weapons was unreliable and that the country did not pose an imminent threat to its neighbors in the Middle East or the U.S.

But the dissenters were told to keep quiet by high-level administration officials in the White House because the Bush administration had already decided that military force would be used to overthrow the regime of Iraq's President Saddam Hussein, interviews and documents have revealed.

The most vocal opponent to intelligence information supplied by the CIA to the hawks in the Bush administration about the so-called Iraqi threat to national security was David Albright, a former United Nations weapons inspector and the president and founder of the Institute for Science and International Security, a Washington, D.C. based group that gathers information for the public and the White House on nuclear weapons programs.

With the likelihood of finding WMD in Iraq becoming increasingly remote, new information, such as documents and interviews provided by Albright and other weapons experts, prove that the White House did not suffer so much from an intelligence failure on Iraq's WMD, but instead shows how the Bush administration embellished reams of intelligence and relied on murky intelligence in order to get Congress and the public to back the war. That may explain why it is becoming so difficult to find WMD: Because it's entirely likely that the weapons don't exist.

"A critical question is whether the Bush Administration has deliberately misled the public and other governments in playing a 'nuclear card' that it knew would strengthen public support for war," Albright said in a March 10 assessment of the CIA's intelligence, which is posted on the ISIS website.

John Dean, the former counsel to President Richard Nixon, wrote in a column this week that if President Bush mislead the public in building a case for war in Iraq, a case for impeachment could be made.

"Presidential statements, particularly on matters of national security, are held to an expectation of the highest standard of truthfulness," Dean wrote this week. "A president cannot stretch, twist or distort facts and get away with it. President Lyndon Johnson's distortions of the truth about Vietnam forced him to stand down from reelection. President Richard Nixon's false statements about Watergate forced his resignation."

In September, USA Today reported that "the Bush administration is expanding on and in some cases contradicting U.S. intelligence reports in making the case for an invasion of Iraq, interviews with administration and intelligence officials indicate."

"Administration officials accuse Iraq of having ties to al-Qaeda terrorists and of amassing weapons of mass destruction despite uncertain and sometimes contrary intelligence on these issues, according to officials," the paper reported. "In some cases, top administration officials disagree outright with what the CIA and other intelligence agencies report. For example, they repeat accounts of al-Qaeda members seeking refuge in Iraq and of terrorist operatives meeting with Iraqi intelligence officials, even though U.S. intelligence reports raise doubts about such links. On Iraqi weapons programs, administration officials draw the most pessimistic conclusions from ambiguous evidence."

In secret intelligence briefings last September on the Iraqi threat, House Minority Whip Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said administration officials were presenting "embellishments" on information long known about Iraq.

A senior Bush administration official conceded privately that there are large gaps in U.S. knowledge about Iraqi weapons programs, USA Today reported.

The concerns jibe with warnings about the CIA's intelligence information which Albright first raised last September, when the agency zeroed in on high-strength aluminum tubes Iraq was trying to obtain as evidence of the country's active near-complete nuclear weapons program.

The case of the aluminum tubes is significant because President Bush identified it during a speech last year as evidence of Iraq's nuclear weapons program and used it to rally the public and several U.N. countries in supporting the war. But Albright said many officials in the intelligence community knew the tubes weren't meant to build a nuclear weapon.

"The CIA has concluded that these tubes were specifically manufactured for use in gas centrifuges to enrich uranium," Albright said. "Many in the expert community both inside and outside government, however, do not agree with this conclusion. The vast majority of gas centrifuge experts in this country and abroad who are knowledgeable about this case reject the CIA's case and do not believe that the tubes are specifically designed for gas centrifuges. In addition, International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors have consistently expressed skepticism that the tubes are for centrifuges."

"After months of investigation, the administration has failed to prove its claim that the tubes are intended for use in an Iraqi gas centrifuge program," Albright added. "Despite being presented with evidence countering this claim, the administration persists in making misleading comments about the significance of the tubes."

Albright said he tried to voice his concerns about the intelligence information to White House officials last year, but was rebuffed and told to keep quiet.

"I first learned of this case a year and a half ago when I was asked for information about past Iraqi procurements. My reaction at the time was that the disagreement reflected the typical in-fighting between US experts that often afflicts the intelligence community. I was frankly surprised when the administration latched onto one side of this debate in September 2002. I was told that this dispute had not been mediated by a competent, impartial technical committee, as it should have been, according to accepted practice," Albright said. "I became dismayed when a knowledgeable government scientist told me that the administration could say anything it wanted about the tubes while government scientists who disagreed were expected to remain quiet."

Albright said the Department of Energy, which analyzed the intelligence information on the aluminum tubes and rejected the CIA's intelligence analysis, is the only government agency in the U.S. that can provide expert opinions on gas centrifuges (what the CIA alleged the tubes were being used for) and nuclear weapons programs.

"For over a year and a half, an analyst at the CIA has been pushing the aluminum tube story, despite consistent disagreement by a wide range of experts in the United States and abroad," Albright said. "His opinion, however, obtained traction in the summer of 2002 with senior members of the Bush Administration, including the President. The administration was forced to admit publicly that dissenters exist, particularly at the Department of Energy and its national laboratories."

But Albright said the White House launched an attack against experts who spoke critically of the intelligence.

"Administration officials try to minimize the number and significance of the dissenters or unfairly attack them," Albright said. "For example, when Secretary Powell mentioned the dissent in his Security Council speech, he said: "Other experts, and the Iraqis themselves, argue that they are really to produce the rocket bodies for a conventional weapon, a multiple rocket launcher." Not surprisingly, an effort by those at the Energy Department to change Powell's comments before his appearance was rebuffed by the administration."

Moreover, former scientists who worked on Iraq's nuclear weapons program and escaped the country also disputed the CIA's intelligence of the country's existing nuclear weapons program, saying it ended in 1991 after the first Gulf War. However, some Iraq scientists who supplied the Pentagon with information claim that Iraq's nuclear weapons program continues, but none of these Iraqis have any direct knowledge of any current banned nuclear programs. They appear to all carry political baggage and biases about going to war or overthrowing Saddam Hussein, and these biases seem to drive their judgments about nuclear issues, rendering their statements about current Iraqi nuclear activities suspect, according to Albright, who said he was privy to much of the information being supplied to the Bush administration and the CIA.

Another example of disputed intelligence used by the Bush administration to build its case for war is Iraq's attempts to obtain uranium from Niger as evidence of another secret nuclear weapons program. Bush, in his State of the Union Speech in January, used this information as an example of a "smoking gun" and the imminent threat Iraq posed to the U.S. But the information has since been widely discounted.

"One person who heard a classified briefing on Iraq in late 2002 said that there was laughter in the room when the uranium evidence was presented," Albright said. "One of (the) most dramatic findings, revealed on March 7, was that the documents which form the basis for the reports of recent uranium transactions between Niger and Iraq are not authentic."

Iraq's attempts to acquire a magnet production plant are likewise ambiguous. Secretary of State Colin Powell stated to the UN Security Council on February 5, 2003 that this plant would produce magnets with a mass of 20 to 30 grams. He added: "That's the same weight as the magnets used in Iraq's gas centrifuge program before the Gulf War." One US official said that because the pieces are so small, many end uses are possible, making it impossible to link the attempted acquisition to an Iraqi centrifuge program."

One piece of intelligence information that seemed to go unnoticed by the media was satellite photographs released by the White House last October of a facility in Iraq called Al Furat to support Bush's assertion that Iraq was making nuclear weapons there.

But Albright said that Iraq already admitted making such weapons at Al Furat before the Gulf War and that the site had long been dismantled.

In addition to Albright, other military experts also were skeptical of the intelligence information gathered by the CIA.

"Basically, cooked information is working its way into high-level pronouncements and there's a lot of unhappiness about it in intelligence, especially among analysts at the CIA," said Vincent Cannistraro, the CIA's former head of counter-intelligence, in an interview with London's Guardian newspaper last October.

Cannistraro told the Guardian that hawks at the Pentagon had deliberately skewed the flow of intelligence to the top levels of the administration.

Last October, Bush said the Iraqi regime was developing unmanned aerial vehicles, which "could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas."

"We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs for missions targeting the United States," Bush said.

U.S. military experts had confirmed that Iraq had been converting eastern European trainer jets into UAV's, but with a maximum range of a few hundred miles they were no threat to targets in the U.S.

"It doesn't make any sense to me if he meant United States territory," said Stephen Baker, a retired US navy rear admiral who assesses Iraqi military capabilities at the Washington-based Center for Defense Information, also in an interview with the Guardian last October.

In true Bush fashion, however, the administration had long believed it was better to strike first and ask questions later.

When Senator Dianne Feinstein, D-California, who sits on the intelligence committee, sent Bush a letter Sept. 17, 2002 requesting he urge the CIA to produce a National Intelligence Estimate, a report that would have showed exactly how much of a threat Iraq posed, Condoleeza Rice, the National Security Adviser, said in the post 9-11 world the U.S. cannot wait for intelligence because the Iraq is too much of a threat to the U.S.

"We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud," Rice said.


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Jason Leopold is the former Los Angeles bureau chief of Dow Jones Newswires. He is currently finishing a book on the California energy crisis.

Just as an aside what is the difference between this article and the articles posted by others posting the flip side?


Doc Urb

[Andy]

To say that there was contrary opinions in the intelligence community regarding WMD?s is to say there were experts on both sides of the issue. That?s a lot different from making a decision with no justification. Please remember the presidents of France, Germany, Russia and the Prime Minister of England had all made speeches acknowledging Iraq had WMD?s. Former President Clinton and several leading Democrat members of congress also made statements regarding Iraq?s possession of WMD?s.

Just prior to the war there was a joke going around: GW knows that Sadam has WMD?s. His father showed him the receipts. And yes, there is some truth to that.

If Mr. Albright had all this proof positive why didn?t he ask to testify before congress when it was debating a possible war with Iraq? If a man is positive of his facts after the fact but not before, shouldn?t we take what he says with a grain of salt?

Nancy Pelosi is a little to the left of center. Actually, she makes Ted Kennedy look like George Wallace. Quoting her is a little like quoting the Grand Master of the KKK. It probably weakens your entire case. Course that?s just my opinion.

You mentioned John Dean and his observations about Bush being, or acting, like LBJ and Nixon. Remember the Bay of Pigs? People wanted Kennedy removed from office for that one. Remember Truman firing Macarthur? Remember Truman refusing to win the war in Korea? Like LBJ he didn?t run for re-election for a damn good reason. Our history is rife with presidents making mistakes. If you feel Bush made an error in going to war with Iraq, please take a look at President James Poke, the Mexican-American War and the so called ?Spot Issue?. How about Tom Jefferson going to war in north Africa without a declarations of war? It was our first. Our current war is business as usual.

Stay healthy,
Andy

[Seascamp]

Well for goodness sake Doc. Are you into ?woe is me?, persecution frabba-dabba today or what?
Perhaps you are too far out in the lunatic fringe weed patch to recognize that you and you alone are your own worst enemy and are drawing fire because of your behavior. You own that behavior and no one else. Your stream of consciousness dissertations are exceptionally assertive, totally rude, insulting and presumptuous as all hell. If you want to talk down to people here like they are a bunch of ignorant nestlings with beaks wide open just waiting for your presumptuous juicy worm of knowledge to drop in, then be prepared for a mega backlash and counter battery fire. Post what you wish and express opinions, no problem, but you are light years beyond that fare and making yourself irrelevant.

Sorry to say, but you behave like some sort of leftist ?Billy Sunday? pitching around the lunatic fringe leftist radical stuff as if were the only true belief, way and light and damming and insulting non-believers. Too bad for you, eh, but no paint chips off my crash bars one way or another. Your last stream of consciousness rap crossed the line with me buster and I would just like to know on whose authority do you slam the knowledge and experiences of many people here with your insulting raps, and for what purpose?

Scamp

[BLUEHAWK]

So many of those articles and posts are mainly about attempting to impeach a President during time of war... mainly, almost exclusively.

In fact, I gotta say, it amazes me how many different kinds of attempts there have been and are... and though at times I despair of having to read or hear any more of that stuff, lately I have been getting the feeling that they aren't going anywhere.

Besides which, "what to do about Iraq" has been on the table since long before the current administration took office.

[Seascamp]

Well Blue, it?s always been a choice of grabbing the Mid-east hydra by the necks and start chopping off heads and simultaneously jumping into the media-leftist buzz saw/chipper. Or on the other hand, letting the mid-east hydra rampage and multiply and then being pitched into the media-leftist buzz saw/chipper, pick one. I could written the script for this a few years back and believe I so stated right here.

All that has really happened is that one vicious hydra has been severely challenged only to grow an equally vicious one right here at home. Anyone who served in Vietnam and watched all the domestic dynamics of the time could see this situation coming down the tracks long before it could seen or heard, no crystal ball needed. Stop watch accuracy, event by event and a lot of the same old players trying to put down the same old crap, right on schedule. D?j? frigging vu, eh.

Scamp

[BLUEHAWK]

Yup...

We recall way back, on PF, when there was still a question about whether we'd be going into Iraq a lot of the talk had to do with just that, didn't it.

I remember very well saying, and hearing from others, that we could count on this type thing coming at us sooner or later... and it started almost immediately.

I think we had our first "quagmire" thread while the guys were still massing in Kuwait... almost as if the 5th column and red front had it all geared up in advance to prey upon our reticent partisans.

Unlike the 60s though, this time I'm feeling a certain level of spunk amongst some of us to keep fighting them back here at home...

Our Marines and Army are taking the pointed end of this deal, and we cannot let them down.

Just taking that tiny step to, "This sucks allright, but let's get it done properly and promptly." would be nice.

[Seascamp]

Agreed mostly Blue, it will be a lot harder for the Leftists to amasses fortunes, build acting, media, writing and political careers from the act of debasing the troops this time around. But some like Durbin will try to ?Iron while the strike is hot? for their own selfish purposes and we may yet be served up a Senate hearing that gets the handle ?Sand Soldier?. And then I wonder if we?ll get another version of the epic Cambodian drama ?Seared in my mind?. It?s just like watching an old movie and I keep waiting to get pelted in the back of my head with ju ju bees.

These days I think there is a significant plurality that can sort the fly crap from the pepper and make sure our troops don?t get dipped in shit and rolled in mother oats again for the sake of some Leftist money making ?Brave New World? yadda, yadda, or other wondrous parasitic agenda.

Scamp

[Arrow]

I was frankly surprised when the administration latched onto one side of this debate in September 2002. -Albright-

I wonder how many times I'm going to have to invite my friends pete and repeat to this party.... For the sake of brevity I'll stick to the short list:

"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and th! e means of delivering them."
-- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002

"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."-- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
-- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002

"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."-- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002

"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force -- if necessary -- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
-- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002

"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years ... We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."-- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002

"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do"-- Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002

"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al Qaeda members ... It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."-- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002

"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction."-- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002

"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction ... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real..." Sen John F. Kerry (D, MA) Jan. 23, 2003

[Andy]

This was the exact point I was trying to make. Your using the exact quotes is so much more succinct and powerful.
The girl sure knows how to use google, much better than me.

Stay healthy kid,
Andy

[melody1181]

A bit off subject...I am just laughing about the penis of the government bit.