Hubris: Selling the Iraq War

[Jamie_B]

This was done last night based on the book, it was REALLY good.

 

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/26315908/

[|Numbers|]

Looks like it was an intelligence breakdown.  Not necessarily an Administration problem.  The senate Intel committee voted UNANIMOUS and was made up of 9 Republicans and 8 Democrats receiving the same flawed Intel as the administration received.  In the last link provided it is discussed in further detail the pressure within the CIA as internal.  Whether any outside pressures were applied is not clear.  It is clear that many on the senate Intel committee did not read the report (Rockefeller laughing and saying there was 511 pages).  In the end, the US would have gone to war regardless of what anyone had to say, what Intel was provided, or who was the sitting President. IMHO.  Clintons statement regarding Obama illustrate this (2008); (Clinton himself could have been at war back in 1998, see notes below).

 

http://www.factcheck.org/2012/09/bill-clinton-give-me-a-break/

 

Clinton, Jan. 8, 2008: It is wrong that Senator Obama got to go through 15 debates trumpeting his superior judgment and how he had been against the war in every year, enumerating the years, and never got asked one time, not once, well, how could you say that when you said in 2004 you didn’t know how you would have voted on the resolution, you said in 2004 there was no difference between you and George Bush on the war

 

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2013/02/18/rachel_maddow_special_hubris.html

 

In Part 4 of Hubris

...many on the Senate Intelligence Committee not reading the flawed National Intelligence Estimate, resulting in an overwhelming vote to give President Bush a free hand with Iraq.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senate_Report_on_Pre-war_Intelligence_on_Iraq#Committee_membership_at_the_time_of_the_investigation

 

Committee membership at the time of the investigation

 

The following nine Republicans were members of the Committee at the time the investigation was launched: Committee Chairman C. Patrick Roberts (R-KS), Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT), R. Michael DeWine (R-OH), Christopher S. "Kit" Bond (R-MO), C. Trent Lott (R-MS), Olympia J. Snowe (R-ME), Charles Hagel (R-NE), C. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA), and John W. Warner (R-VA).

The following eight Democrats made up the rest of the Committee: Vice-Chairman John D. "Jay" Rockefeller IV (D-WV), Carl Levin (D-MI), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Ronald L. Wyden (D-OR), Richard J. Durbin (D-IL), B. Evans "Evan" Bayh III (D-IN), Johnny R. "John" Edwards (D-NC), and Barbara A. Mikulski (D-MD).

On June 17, 2004, Senators Roberts and Rockefeller announced that the completed report had been unanimously approved by the Committee's members,

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/09/politics/09TEXT-IRAQ-INTEL.html?ex=1118635200&en=9a4aaaccd18175f2&ei=5070&ex=1117598400&en=34db54cb5d6c9b93&ei=5070&pagewanted=all&position=

 

Before the war, the U.S. intelligence community told the president, as well as the Congress and the public, that Saddam Hussein had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and if left unchecked, would probably have a nuclear weapon during this decade.

 

This was a global intelligence failure.

 

ROCKEFELLER: The fact is that the administration, at all levels -- and to some extent us -- used bad information to bolster its case for war.

 In short, we went to war in Iraq based on false claims.

 

QUESTION: And you are now saying it was political pressure. Then why did you vote for the report?

ROCKEFELLER: That's me. (LAUGHTER) Because there are 511 pages in the report.

 

ROBERTS: Well, let me just say this: I think that the president of the United States -- and I'm not speaking for him; he can speak for himself, obviously -- but he more than anyone knows the value of intelligence. And he more than anyone is going to have very strong support for reform within the intelligence community. He made very declarative statements, there's no question about it. He made a case to go to war. We all did. Look at the statements that we've all made -- some of the people who are now being so terribly critical.

 

We believed it. But the information was wrong. What he said was what he got from the intelligence community, and what he got was wrong.

 

Rockefeller: ...going back to 1998 in a letter to Bill Clinton, saying, The time for diplomacy has ended and now is the time for the use of military force.

 

Roberts:  I think it would have been based more on something like Kosovo or Bosnia. President Clinton indicated we should have certainly intervened in regard to Rwanda. You can make the same case, if you go back several decades, to Cambodia. You can make the same case in World War II in regards to the Holocaust. I stood on a hill, in a place called Hilla in Iraq, where there was a grave site that contained 18,000 bodies that were being unearthed one by one.

.

[Jamie_B]

The intell report itself said much of it was suspect info and not reliable. It wasn't an intel problem, it was a the administration wanted a war with Iraq and they were going to have it problem.

[|Numbers|]

The intell report itself said much of it was suspect info and not reliable. It wasn't an intel problem, it was a the administration wanted a war with Iraq and they were going to have it problem.

 

Which items were suspect and not reliable (prior to invasion/war) besides the infamous Niger Uranium story ? Which in itself is not clear.  Note:  The Intel community produced the 90 page NIE on Iraq's WMD not the administration.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niger_uranium_forgeries

 

In October, 2002 the Intelligence Community (IC) produced a classified, 90-page National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq's WMD programmes which cited reports that Iraq began "vigorously trying to procure" more uranium from Niger and two other African countries

 

The specific mention of yellowcake and Niger was not in this speech. There are many reports of a struggle about this, saying the Niger uranium claims were initially in this Cincinnati speech but taken out by the insistence of the CIA Director George Tenet.

 

Specifically, CIA director George Tenet and United States Secretary of State Colin Powell both cited attempts by Hussein to obtain uranium from Niger in their September testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

 

George Tenet has admitted that making the claim was a mistake, stating, "The president had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound. These 16 words should never have been included in the text written for the president."[4]

 

Wilson told The Washington Post anonymously in June 2003 that he had concluded that the intelligence about the Niger uranium was based on the forged documents because "the dates were wrong and the names were wrong." However, the relevant papers were not in CIA hands until eight months after Wilson made his trip. Wilson had to backtrack and said he may have "misspoken" on this.[34] [35] The Senate intelligence committee, which examined pre-Iraq war intelligence, reported that Wilson "had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports."[34][35]

 

who forged the documents?

 

They were obtained by a "security consultant" (and former agent of the precursor agency to SISMI, the SID), Rocco Martino, from Italian military intelligence (SISMI).[36]

 

forgeries were produced by "a couple of former CIA officers who are familiar with that part of the world who are associated with a certain well-known neoconservative who has close connections with Italy." When Horton said that must be Ledeen, he confirmed it, and added that the ex-CIA officers, "also had some equity interests, shall we say, with the operation.

 

In September 2004, the CBS News program 60 Minutes decided to delay a major story on the forgeries because such a broadcast might influence the 2004 U.S. presidential election. A CBS spokesman stated, "We now believe it would be inappropriate to air the report so close to the presidential election." This decision closely followed the Killian documents controversy.[50]

 

Removal of known yellowcake

 

In 2008, the United States facilitated shipping yellowcake (refined uranium ore) out of Iraq. This yellowcake had been stockpiled prior to the first Gulf War, and was declared to the International Atomic Energy Agency and under IAEA safeguards.[52] More than 550 tons of yellowcake was removed from Iraq and eventually shipped to Canada.[53]

 

The link I provided in the previous posts outlines the Intel community;  I'll post it here.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/09/politics/09TEXT-IRAQ-INTEL.html?ex=1118635200&en=9a4aaaccd18175f2&ei=5070&ex=1117598400&en=34db54cb5d6c9b93&ei=5070&pagewanted=all&position

 

... in the committee's view, the intelligence community did not accurately or adequately explain the uncertainties behind the judgments in the October 2002 national intelligence estimate to policy-makers, both in the executive branch and here on Capitol Hill. Intelligence analysts are charged with interpreting and assessing the intelligence reporting and with clearly conveying to policy-makers the difference between what they know, what they don't know, what they think, and then making sure that the policy-makers understand that difference. As the report details, they did not do this with respect to the October 2002 NIE.

[Jamie_B]

All the info coming from the "curveball" source, which we had not even interviewed and relied on German interviewing. 

 

Watch the video.

[Khatmandude]

Those in power wanted war, they got it.  Doesn't matter what the Intel community, or any world leader would have said......if those in power wanted that war, it was going to happen.  They did, and it did. 

[Homer_Rice]

Folks need to go to the level of geopolitics to understand why the Iraq War happened. As an example, here is one guy's take on why all the craziness in Africa these past few years. Well worth the read if one wants to begin to make sense of the strategic moves being made by nations.

[|Numbers|]

Folks need to go to the level of geopolitics to understand why the Iraq War happened. As an example, here is one guy's take on why all the craziness in Africa these past few years. Well worth the read if one wants to begin to make sense of the strategic moves being made by nations.

 

The article makes some solid points.  Not sure about the mention of Clinton/Hollande as being totally clear to me.

 

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/02/15/the-wests-war-against-african-development-continues/

 

The Democratic Republic of Congo, for example – whose mines produce tens of billions of mineral resources each year – were only, in one recent financial year, able to collect a paltry $32million in tax revenues from mining due to the proxy war waged against that country by Western-backed militias.

 

Three of its members – Nigeria, Gabon and South Africa – had voted in favour of military intervention at the UN Security Council, and its new chairman – Jean Ping – was quick to recognize the new Libyan government imposed by NATO, and todownplay and denigrate his predecessor’s achievements. Indeed, he even forbade the African Union assembly from observing a minute’s silence for Gaddafi after his murder.

 

It is instructive to note that the same newspaper had also accused Libya of “resource nationalism” – that most heinous of crimes for readers of the Financial Times, it seems – barely a year before NATO’s invasion. Of course, ‘resource nationalism’ means exactly that – a nation’s resources being used primarily for the benefit and development of the nation itself (rather than foreign companies)

 

http://www.democracynow.org/2003/8/25/50_years_after_the_cias_first

 

In 1953, the CIA and British intelligence orchestrated a coup d’etat that toppled the democratically elected government of Iran. The government of Mohammad Mossadegh. The aftershocks of the coup are still being felt.

 

In 1951 Prime Minister Mossadegh roused Britain’s ire when he nationalized the oil industry. Mossadegh argued that Iran should begin profiting from its vast oil reserves which had been exclusively controlled by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. The company later became known as British Petroleum (BP).

 

For the most part we should not be involved in Africa (with the exception of administrative assistance and protection of life for instance).  The resource nationalism mentioned reminds me of Iran in 1953.  IF, as stated in the link of the article you provided prove that al Qaeda is existing in those countries then the protection of life is important and should be assisted. 

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/20/us-france-qaeda-hostages-idUSBRE89J09Z20121020

 

Speaking for the first time since he was made head of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) earlier this month, Yahya Abu Hammam said Hollande had been ratcheting up rhetoric against the group.

 

"He has promised his people that he will free the hostages without negotiations with the jihadists," Hammam said in an interview published by the Mauritanian news agency ANI.

 

"I want to send a message to the relatives of the French hostages who are with us: The decision of war that Hollande seemed to have taken means that he has signed for their execution and he must be responsible for his decisions."

 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/29/us-algeria-usa-mali-idUSBRE89S0UC20121029

 

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pressed regional power Algeria on Monday to support an Africa-led military intervention in northern Mali, a senior U.S. official said.

 

Clinton's one-day visit comes amid mounting international pressure on Algeria over the crisis in Mali, where a March military coup was followed by a revolt that has seen Tuareg rebels and Islamist militants, some linked to al Qaeda, seize control of the northern two-thirds of the country.

 

Paris had until now considered Ansar Dine among the al Qaeda-linked groups and refused to negotiate with them.

 

IMHO, it took much longer than I expected for "western nations" to become involved after Qadaffi uttered nationalization in 2009.  (in Iran it only took 2 years).  The downfall of Qadaffi has fueled al Qaeda groups according to the article.  With Qadaffi in power the problem with al Qaeda was not on the surface.

[oldschooler]

They had me at hello. 

[Jamie_B]

They had me at hello. 

 

 

:lol: