MIA WMD WTF W?
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keywords: description: MIA WMD WTF W?"Missing in Action" "Weapons of Mass Destruction" "What the fuck?" "George W. Bush President of the United States of America"?
22 July 2005 -- Statement of Purpose 08 September 2003 -- Rice: "Tubes could only be used for" 23 July 2003 -- Niger uranium flip-flop "because the CIA didn't say take it out this time" 09 July 2003 -- White House Daily Breifing from Pretoria, South Africa 07 July 2003 -- Ari read the memo on Air Force One going to Africa -- WMD intel memo delivered to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell 06 July 2003 -- The New York Times OpEd by Ambassador Wilson 10 June 2003 -- INR analyst at CIA dicuss Wilson's intelligence-gathering trip source of the Plame memo 29 May 2003 -- BBC reports Iraq justification had been "sexed up" 20 March 2003 -- The invasion of Iraq begins 05 February 2003 -- Secretary of State Colin L. Powell's address to Security Council 22 November 2002 -- Another claim of an Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger 11 October 2002 -- Forged Niger documents 20 September 2002 -- Iraq WMD dossier published by Prime Minister Tony Blair 23 July 2002 -- DSM -- Facts being fixed 22 March 2002 -- Ricketts help Bush help the world see Sadam as WMD threat Mr Blair 18 March 2002 -- Paul Wolfowitz asks Christopher Meyer if they have anything about Atta and Iraq in Prague 14 March 2002 -- Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions 01 March 2002 -- Claims regarding Iraqi attemps to obtain uranium not credible (INR) 21 February 2002 -- Wilson Mission to Niger 17 September 2001 -- Begin planning military options for an invasion of Iraq 16 September 2001 -- Do we have any evidence linking ... Iraq to 9-11? No 12 September 2001 -- Bush asked Richard A. Clark "See if Saddam did this" 11 September 2001 -- Bush administration officials tried to implicate Saddam on 9/11/01 17 August 2001 -- Scientist w/ Energy Dept. raise doubts about aluminum tubes 29 July 2001 -- Condoleezza Rice Interview with Larry King 24 February 2001 -- Secretary Colin Powell gives press remarks in Cairo, Egypt 10 February 2000 -- ... we have no evidence ... that the Iraqis are ... reconstituting WMD 01 January 1990 -- Suggestions Comments 22 July 2005 Statement of Purpose I started this to help me gain a better understanding of the manipulation used by the Bush White House to initiate the war in Iraq.
This timeline I want to illustraight the conflicting logic used to manipulate our culture into a war.
Start at the bottom and work up!
David Barstow, William J. Broad and Jeff Gerth. “Skewed Intelligence Data in March to War in Iraq.” The New York Times. Available at:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/100304A.shtml
...a statement by Condoleezza Rice on Sept. 8, 2002, she said the tubes were “only really suited for nuclear weapons programs.”).
*EPF301 07/23/2003
Transcript: White House Daily Briefing, July 23
(President's schedule, reports of White House comments on Ambassador Wilson, Saddam Hussein/al Qaeda link, Iran/al Qaeda, Uday and Qusay Hussein/display of bodies, Niger/uranium issue/President's credibility, American troops stretched too thin?, Medicare meeting, Iraq reconstruction/contributions, President's meeting with President of Argentina, Iraq's WMD/questioning of prisoners, Liberia) (8590)
...
Q: All right. Just one quick question on the uranium-Niger thing. Can you just explain in a summary fashion as possible how it is that the President's foreign policy advisors and speechwriters took this claim out of the speech in October, after being warned about it by the CIA, and then put it in, in the State of the Union?
MR. McCLELLAN: That's correct, the CIA said, take it out, and it was taken out. And as we've already said previously, if they had said it on the State of the Union, we would have, as well. But Steve Hadley made it very clear yesterday in the briefing -- it was an extended briefing, he was very straightforward about it -- that he didn't have a recollection of it at the time. But when it came to his attention, he was very straightforward and disclosed that to you all publicly so that we could share that information with the public. It was important to do that, and we've been very straightforward about this all along.
...
This transcript wasn't availible through the White House website but AmericaBlog knew where to find it.
http://canberra.usembassy.gov/hyper/2003/0709/epf301.htm
...Q: What's the final language, Ari, your final position on the State of the Union speech and the uranium -- I know they were working on stuff last night, but I never got a chance to read it. ... Is this on the record?
MR. FLEISCHER: Yes, we're back on the record. After the speech, information was learned about the forged documents. With the advantage of hindsight, it's known now what was not known by the White House prior to the speech. This information should not have risen to the level of a presidential speech. There was reporting, although it wasn't very specific, about Iraq's seeking to obtain uranium from Africa. It's a classic issue of how hindsight is 20-20. The process was followed that led to the information going into the State of the Union; information about the yellow cake was only brought to the White House's attention later.
Q: Ambassador Wilson said he made a case months before that there was no basis to the belief --
MR. FLEISCHER: No, he reported that Niger denied the allegation. That's what Ambassador Wilson reported.
Q: Was that report weighed against other --
MR. FLEISCHER: And of course they would deny the allegation. That doesn't make it untrue. It was only later -- you can ask Ambassador Wilson if he reported that the yellow cake documents were forged. He did not. His report did not address whether the documents were forged or not. His report stated that Niger denied the accusation. He spent eight days in Niger and concluded that Niger denied the allegation. Well, typically, nations don't admit to going around nuclear nonproliferation.
Q: But he said there was a basis to believe their denials.
MR. FLEISCHER: That's different from what he reported. The issue here is whether the documents on yellow cake were forged. He didn't address that issue. That's the information that subsequently came to light, not prior to the speech.
...
Q: Ari, back on the State of the Union, is there anything that the White House, that the administration is going to do differently to prevent something like that from happening, like how a piece of information that does not rise to the level that should be included in a speech, that ends up being inaccurate --
MR. FLEISCHER: There's always a thorough vetting process. We'll continue to follow the vetting process. But it is the nature of events that information can later be discovered after a speech -- and when that happens, as is in this case, it's important to be forthright, which is what this administration has done -- to discuss it openly, and that's what this administration has done.
Q: When you talked about the contemporaneous reporting right before the speech, what exactly do you mean?
MR. FLEISCHER: There was the national intelligence estimate, intelligence community.
Q: So you had other reports about Niger and about the yellow cake from Niger.
MR. FLEISCHER: -- part of the intelligence community's reporting leading up to the speech --
Q: There wasn't a lot --
Q: Some British --
MR. FLEISCHER: -- which subsequently -- no, the President in the State of the Union cited the British report. But there had been an independent American report which in the instance of yellow cake, subsequently turned out not to be valid. But keep in mind, again, we've said that about the yellow cake for an extended period of time. This administration has been forthright.
Comments/Summary
In this transcript Ari Fleischer the White House press secretary, goes on record to admit the information in the State of the Union address about uranium and Africa should not have been included. Ari also makes note of what "information" the ambassador was able to confirm, and that had nothing to do with the forged documents. 07 July 2003 Ari read the memo on Air Force One going to Africa
'Hardball with Chris Matthews' for July 21
Read the transcript to the Thursday show
...
DAVID SHUSTER, NBC CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A witness who testified at the grand jury and lawyers for other witnesses say the memo was written in July of 2003, identified Valerie Wilson, also known as Valerie Plame, as a CIA officer, and cited her in a paragraph marked S for sensitive.
According to lawyers, former Secretary of State Colin Powell and undersecretaries, including John Bolton, gave testimony about this memo. And a lawyer for one State Department official says his client testified that, as President Bush was flying to Africa on Air Force One two years ago, Press Secretary Ari Fleischer could be seen reading the document on board.
The timing is significant, because the president's trip on July 7 was one day after Ambassador Joe Wilson's column was published criticizing the administration.
...
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8666472/
July 22, 2005
For Two Aides in Leak Case, 2nd Issue Rises
By DAVID JOHNSTON
This article was reported by David Johnston, Douglas Jehl and Richard W. Stevenson and was written by Mr. Johnston.
...
The investigators have been trying to determine who else within the administration might have seen the memo or learned of its contents....
Among those asked if he had seen the memo was Ari Fleischer, then the White House press secretary, who was on Air Force One with Mr. Bush and Mr. Powell during the Africa trip. Mr. Fleischer told the grand jury that he never saw the document, a person familiar with the testimony said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the prosecutor's admonitions about not disclosing what is said to the grand jury.
Mr. Fleischer's role has been scrutinized by investigators, in part because his telephone log showed a call on the day after Mr. Wilson's article appeared from Mr. Novak, the columnist who, on July 14, 2003, was the first to report Ms. Wilson's identity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/22/politics/22leak.html?pagewanted=print
WMD intel memo delivered to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell
Plame's Identity Marked As Secret
Memo Central to Probe Of Leak Was Written By State Dept. Analyst
By Walter Pincus and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, July 21, 2005; A01
...
The memo was delivered to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on July 7, 2003, as he headed to Africa for a trip with President Bush aboard Air Force One....
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/20/AR2005072002517_pf.html 06 July 2003 The New York Times OpEd by Ambassador Wilson
Searching for the link....
10 June 2003 INR analyst at CIA dicuss Wilson's intelligence-gathering trip source of the Plame memo Plame's Identity Marked As Secret
Memo Central to Probe Of Leak Was Written By State Dept. Analyst
By Walter Pincus and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, July 21, 2005; A01
A classified State Department memorandum central to a federal leak investigation...
written on June 10, 2003, by an analyst in the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), according to a source who described the memo to The Washington Post....
Almost all of the memo is devoted to describing why State Department intelligence experts did not believe claims that Saddam Hussein had in the recent past sought to purchase uranium from Niger. Only two sentences in the seven-sentence paragraph mention Wilson's wife....
The memo was drafted June 10, 2003, for Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman, who asked to be brought up to date on INR's opposition to the White House view that Hussein was trying to buy uranium in Africa....
It records that the INR analyst at the meeting opposed Wilson's trip to Niger because the State Department, through other inquiries, already had disproved the allegation that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger. Attached to the INR memo were the notes taken by the senior INR analyst who attended the 2002 meeting at the CIA.
Comments\Summary
It is the memo that results from this meeting and inevitably ends up taking a trip aboard Air Force One to Africa carried aboard by Secretary of State Colin Powell. On this trip to Africa is where Ari admits to a limited press corps that the information in the State of the Union should not have been included in this speech.
It is also is this memo that lead to the shut down of an entire covert CIA operation dedicated to the very topic the White House was having difficulty proving. This covert group under the cover of energy consultants infiltrated business and government targets in the middle east targeting the finance of terrorism and proliferation of WMD. These are the very people who would have best understood the capabilities of the Iraqi government, because they were the boots on the ground. This group was exposed by first publicly identifying one of it's NOC.(Non Official Cover) agents.
The agent is the wife of a very publicly known ambassador. Who used his contacts at the request of the CIA to confirm it would be difficult for Iraq to purchase uranium from Niger. Perhaps what is more astounding then the attention given to the ambassador and his wife is that the three page memo only makes mention of her in two sentences.
The bulk of this memo was intended to restate the position of the State Departments Intellegence Service (INR), that Niger was not selling uranium to Iraq. They had previously objected to the grounds of the ambassadors’ trip because they had already disproved allegations that Iraq was attempting to purchase the uranium.
It is not clear to me if these are the same analyst John Bolton attempted to get fired. It seems a man with Bolton's polarizing personality would be effective in intimidating underling analysts. Bolton is currently been nominated to become the ambassador to the United Nations. The nomination is stuck in committee because the White House has not forwarded requested materials with regards to Bolton’s work at the State Department.
This is not the first time the White House has attempted to gloss over the details in making claims about Iraq WMD capabilities. They had attempted to turn a pale of road apples into a bouquet of flowers before when they tried to connect aluminum tubes to the process of enriching uranium.
Condi Rice after an appearance on Larry King two months earlier where she was candid that we are able to keep weapons from Iraq/Saddam, on Sept 8, 2001 she said about the aluminum tubes:
...
"only really suited for nuclear weapons programs."...
This shift comes in contrast to an energy department publication which stated on August 17, 2001
...
A team of scientists at the Energy Department published a secret Technical Intelligence Note raising doubts about the aluminum tubes use in centrifuges. “[It] is credible but unlikely, and a rocket production is much more likely end use for these tubes.” This was concluded because the tubes were too narrow, too thick and had a special weather coating....
So against the advice of the experts we pay to advise Ms. Rice and the White House they decide that the details regarding the aluminum tubes are less important then pointing their finger at Iraq in making claims about WMD that had previously been disproven. 29 May 2003 BBC reports Iraq justification had been "sexed up"
The British Ministry of Defense's most senior biological weapons expert and adviser to intelligence agencies on Iraq, Dr Kelly was the anonymous source for BBC reports in May 2003 that a dossier used by the Blair Government to justify invading Iraq had been "sexed up." After being revealed as the BBC's source and grilled before a parliamentary inquiry, Dr Kelly was found dead in July 2003.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Iraq/Iraq-how-we-were-duped/2005/05/13/1115843375902.html?oneclick=true
From RawStory Timeline
http://www.rawstory.com/exclusives/muriel/path_of_war_timeline_613.htm
Comments\Summary
With a rear view perspective on the justification for war it looks suspect when the guy claiming you cheated up and gets suicided. Dr Kelly is the source for a story that used the term "sexed up" referring to it's attractiveness, over it's truthfulness.
June 12, 2003
Bush:CIA Did Not Share Doubt on Iraq Data
By: Walter Pincus
Washington Post
...
The Niger evidence was not included in Secretary of State Colin L. Powell's Feb. 5 address to the Security Council in which he disclosed some intelligence on Iraq's alleged weapons programs and links to al Qaeda because it was considered inaccurate, sources said....
http://www.independent-media.tv/itemprint.cfm?fmedia_id=1160fcategory_desc=Under%20Reported 22 November 2002 Another claim of an Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger
REPORT ON THE U S . INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY’S
PREWAR INTELLIGENCE ASSESSMENTS ON IRAQ
(U) On November 22,2002, during a meeting with State Department officials, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs Director for Nonproliferation said that France had information on an Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger. He said that France had determined that no uranium had been shipped, but France believed the reporting was true that Iraq had made a procurement attempt for uranium from Niger.
(...)On November 25,2002, The Naval ... -issued a very brief report (Alleged Storage of Uranium Destined for Iraq - that a large quantity of uranium from Niger was being stored in a warehouse in Cotonou, Benin. The uranium was reportedly sold to Iraq by Niger’s President. The report provided the name and telephone numbers for the individual, a West African businessman, who was responsible for coordinating the alleged uranium transaction and indicated that he was willing to provide information about the transaction. CIA’S DO told Committee staff that the businessman has never been contacted and the DO has not made an effort to determine whether this individual had any useful information. The DO told Committee staff that they saw no reason to contact him and noted that ‘‘no one even thought to do that.” The Defense Humint Service (DHS) and the Navy also told Committee staff that they
- 59 -
did not try to contact the businessman. The Navy told the Committee that because they were not further tasked regarding their report, they did not pursue the matter further. The DHS told Committee staff that because the DHS examined the warehouse on December 17,2002 and saw only what appeared to be bales of cotton in the warehouse, they did not see a reason to contact the businessman. The report on the DHS’s findings was not published until February 10,2003.
June 14, 2002 -- Date of last document from Niger, said 'Global Support meeting'
http://cryptome.org/niger-docs.htm
Comments\Summary
The Niger documents have been confirmed to be forgeries. This confirmation was only made public after the war had begun. It is now clear that the Intelligence Community was made aware of these documents as early as October 16, 2002; analyst as early as this date were questioning their validity. Despite knowing this the reference to uranium was included in the 2003 state of the Union address.
The media has been silent on the issue of who has benefited from these crafted documents and not done enough to highlight their orgins. The last Niger document existed prior to the July 23, 2002 “Downing Street Minutes” where the facts and intelligence “were” (past and present) in the process of being fixed, as Dr. Kelly put it were sexed-up.
These documents do tell a story of Iraq seeking to purchase Uranium from the African Country of Niger. Despite the contents of the documents, the Nigerians do not control or manage their countries uranium ore mining operation which is managed by France. (Note: There was an effort to quickly build a patriotic barrier between France and the US people at the onset of the war because of their opposition to it. This might be the reason why there was such a campaign. Credible information from France about the management of Nigerian uranium is likely the most compelling reason to run such a campaign.)
The reality is the Nigerians can make as many deals with whom ever they want, the bank has still got to cash that request for uranium. In this case the bank which handles the uranium is one operated by France. Iraq would have had to go to this French uranium bank that controls the export/delivery process of the uranium ore.
There have been many accounts in the media and news regarding the Niger uranium sales to Iraq. Many are ment to distract because unless the french wanted Iraq to have uranium; it would leave a paper trail. If that had been the case we also wouldn't be splitting hairs over the forgeries.
REPORT ON THE U S . INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY’S
PREWAR INTELLIGENCE ASSESSMENTS ON IRAQ
Page 58
Also on October 11,2002, the US. Embassy in Rome reported to State Department headquarters that it had acquired photocopies of documents on a purported uranium deal between Iraq and Niger from an Italian joumalist. The cable said that the embassy had State Department’s Bureau of Nonproliferation (NP) on October 15,2002, which passed a copy of the documents to INR.
(U) Immediately after receiving the documents, the INR Iraq nuclear analyst e-mailed IC colleagues offering to provide the documents at a previously planned meeting of the Nuclear Interdiction Action Group (NIAG) the following day. The analyst, apparently already suspicious of the validity of the documents noted in his e-mail, “you’ll note that it bears a funky Emb. of Niger stamp (to make it look official, I guess).”
(U) The N R Iraq nuclear analyst told Committee staff that the thing that stood out immediately about the documents was that a companion document -a document included with the Niger documents that did not relate to uranium -mentioned some type of military campaign against major world powers. The members of the alleged military campaign included both Iraq and Iran, and was, according to the documents, being orchestrated through the Nigerien Embassy in Rome, which all struck the analyst as “completely implausible.” Because the stamp on this document matched the stamp on the uranium document, the analyst thought that all of the documents were likely suspect. The analyst was unaware at the time of any formatting problems with the documents or inconsistencies with the names or dates.
(U) On October 16,2002, INR made copies of the documents available at the NIAG meeting for attendees, including representatives from the CIA, DIA, DOE and NSA. Because the analyst who offered to provide the documents was on leave, the office’s senior analyst provided the documents. She cannot recall how she made the documents available, but analysts from several agencies, including the DIA, NSA and DOE, did pick up copies at that meeting. None of the four CIA representatives recall picking up the documents, however, during the CIA Inspector General’s investigation of this issue, copies of the documents were found in the DO’S CPD vault.
The mention of this document is completely contextual it does not add anything new to the world’s consensus regarding the capacity and direction of Iraqi WMD programs at that time of it's publication. We have since it's publication been aware that both the British and American governments were troubled in publicly justifying the conflict. Even though privately each had already committed their respective countries.
We have found that previous to the documents publication within the "Downing Street Minutes", that the policy of war was set and that the facts and intelligence were in the process of being fixed as of the July 2002 timeframe. Since the facts to make the case were not in place before the planning begun it makes any new publications highly suspect. It is also suspect that the Dossier did not offer anything new to the argument that Saddam was capable of producing WMD.
Dossier Link:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/middle_east/02/uk_dossier_on_iraq/html/full_dossier.stm
Notably I have even found reports that the dossier was plagiarized from work of journalists and student papers.
REAL AUTHORS OF IRAQ DOSSIER BLAST BLAIR
Exclusive By Gary Jones And Alexandra Williams In Los Angeles
JOURNALIST Sean Boyne and student Ibrahim al-Marashi have attacked Tony Blair for using their reports to call for war against Iraq.http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/page.cfm?objectid=12620001siteid=50143
Mr Boyne, who works for military magazine Jane's Intelligence Review, said he was shocked his work had been used in the Government's dossier.
Articles he wrote in 1997 were plagiarised for a 19-page intelligence document entitled Iraq: Its Infrastructure Of Concealment, Deception And Intimidation to add weight to the PM's warmongering.
He said: "I don't like to think that anything I wrote has been used for an argument for war. I am concerned because I am against the war."
Additional Reports:
http://www.channel4.com/news/2003/02/week_1/06_dossier_sample.html
23 July 2002 DSM -- Facts being fixed
As originally reported in the The Sunday Times, May 1, 2005
SECRET AND STRICTLY PERSONAL - UK EYES ONLY
DAVID MANNING
From: Matthew Rycroft
Date: 23 July 2002
S 195 /02
cc: Defence Secretary, Foreign Secretary, Attorney-General, Sir Richard Wilson, John Scarlett, Francis Richards, CDS, C, Jonathan Powell, Sally Morgan, Alastair Campbell
IRAQ: PRIME MINISTER'S MEETING, 23 JULY
Copy addressees and you met the Prime Minister on 23 July to discuss Iraq.
This record is extremely sensitive. No further copies should be made. It should be shown only to those with a genuine need to know its contents.
John Scarlett summarised the intelligence and latest JIC assessment. Saddam's regime was tough and based on extreme fear. The only way to overthrow it was likely to be by massive military action. Saddam was worried and expected an attack, probably by air and land, but he was not convinced that it would be immediate or overwhelming. His regime expected their neighbours to line up with the US. Saddam knew that regular army morale was poor. Real support for Saddam among the public was probably narrowly based.
C reported on his recent talks in Washington. There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy. The NSC had no patience with the UN route, and no enthusiasm for publishing material on the Iraqi regime's record. There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.
...
The Defence Secretary said that the US had already begun "spikes of activity" to put pressure on the regime. No decisions had been taken, but he thought the most likely timing in US minds for military action to begin was January, with the timeline beginning 30 days before the US Congressional elections.
The Foreign Secretary said he would discuss this with Colin Powell this week. It seemed clear that Bush had made up his mind to take military action, even if the timing was not yet decided. But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbours, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran. We should work up a plan for an ultimatum to Saddam to allow back in the UN weapons inspectors. This would also help with the legal justification for the use of force.
The Attorney-General said that the desire for regime change was not a legal base for military action. There were three possible legal bases: self-defence, humanitarian intervention, or UNSC authorisation. The first and second could not be the base in this case. Relying on UNSCR 1205 of three years ago would be difficult. The situation might of course change.
The Prime Minister said that it would make a big difference politically and legally if Saddam refused to allow in the UN inspectors. Regime change and WMD were linked in the sense that it was the regime that was producing the WMD. There were different strategies for dealing with Libya and Iran. If the political context were right, people would support regime change. The two key issues were whether the military plan worked and whether we had the political strategy to give the military plan the space to work.
...
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/1
Comments/Summary
As of July 23, 2002 the British saw the war with Iraq set; specifically that Bush wanted to remove Saddam via force. With such desire already cast you would think that they already had settled upon a public justification, but they hadn't and instead they plotted to set the political context. The plan according to the Americans was to fix the intelligence and facts so that people would support regime change.
It seems that the Americans had begun what were termed "spikes of activity" in order to pressure Iraq.
The British knew Saddam/Iraq was not acting to threaten his neighbors, and his capacity for WMD was less then other "axis of evil" nations (Libya, North Korea, Iran). They also knew that "regime change" could not give them the legal authority and cover they needed. As they said “the case was thin”, as we have found out from their private conversations "the war was set", and "the intelligence and facts" did not support the needed legal justification for war.
Text of the Peter Ricketts Letter - March 22, 2002 memo from Peter Ricketts (Political Director, UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office) to Jack Straw (UK Foreign Secretary) providing Ricketts’ advice for the Prime Minister on issues of the threat posed by Iraq, connections to al Qaida, post-war considerations and working with the UN.
Confidential and Personal PR.121
From: P F Ricketts, Political Director
Date: 22 March 2002
CC: PUS
Secretary of State
IRAQ: Advice for the Prime Minister
1 You invited thoughts for your personal note to the Prime Minister covering the official advice (we have put up a draft minute separately). Here are mine.
2 By sharing Bush's broad objective" the Prime Minister can help shape how it is defined, and the approach to achieving it. In the process, he can bring home to Bush home of the realities which will be less evident from Washington. He can help Bush make good decisions by telling him things his own machine probably isn't.
3 By broad support for the objective brings two real problems which need discussing.
4 First, the THREAT. The truth is that what has changed is not the pace of Saddam Hussein's WMD programmes, but our tolerance of them post-11 September. This is not something we need to be defensive about, but attempts to claim otherwise publicly will increase scepticism about our case. I am relieved that you decided to postpone publication of the unclassified document. My meeting yesterday showed that there is more work to do to ensuer that the figures are accurate and consistent with those of the US. But even the best survey of Iraq's WMD programmes will not show much advance in recent years ont he nuclear, missile or CW/BW fronts: the programmes are extremely worrying but have not, as far as we know", been stepped up.
5 US scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and Al Aaida is so far frankly unconvincing. To get public and Parliamentary support for military operations, we have to be convincing that:
- the threat is so serious/imminent that it is worth sending our troops to die for;
- it is qualitatively different from the threat posed by other proliferators who are closer to achieving nuclear capability (including Iran).
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL
We can make the case on qualitative difference only Iraq has attacked a neighbour' used CW and fired missiles against Israel). The overall strategy needs to include re-doubled efforts to tackle other proliferators, including Iran, in other ways (the UK/French ideas on greater IAEA activity are helpful here). But we are still left with a problem of bringing public opinion to accept the imminence of a threat from Iraq. This is something the Prime Minister and President need to have a frank discussion about.
6 The second problem is the END STATE. Military operations need clear and compelling military objectives. For Kosovo" it was: Serba out, Kosovars back" peace-keepers in. For Afghanistan, destroying the Taleban and Al Qaida military capability. For Iraq, "regime change: does not stack up. It sounds like a grudge between Bush and Saddam. Much better, as you have suggested, to make the objective ending the threat to the international community from Iraqi WMD before Saddam uses it or gives it to the terrorists. This is at once easier to justify in terms of international law" but also more demanding. Regime change which produced another Sunni General still in charge of an active Iraqi WMD programmme would be a bad outcome (not least because it would be almost impossible to maintain UN sanctions on a new leader who came in promising a fresh start). As with the fight against UBL, Bush would do well to de"personalise the objective" focus on elimination of WMD, and show that he is serious about UN Inspectors as the first choice means of achieving that (it is win/win for him: either Saddam against all the odds allows Inspectors to operate freelyk" in which case we can further hobble his WMD programmes, or he blocks/hinders, and we are on stronger ground for switching to other methods),
7 Defining the end state in this way, and working through the UN, will of course also help maintain a degree of support among the Europeans, and therefore fits with another major message which the Prime Minister will watn to get across: the importance of positioning Iraq as a problem for the inernational community as a whole" not just for the US.
PETER RICKETTS
Comments/Summary
It was clear from a previous Downing document Ricketts letter to Straw March 22, 2002 that the British government was not satisfied that regime change would be a compelling enough reason to garner public support. They were postponing the publication that would help support the case for war, and although worried about Saddam they had no indication that he had reconstituted his WMD related programs.
Text of the Christopher Meyer Letter - March 18, 2002 memo from Christopher Meyer (UK ambassador to the US) to David Manning (UK Foreign Policy Advisor) recounting Meyer’s meeting with Paul Wolfowitz (US Deputy Secretary of Defense).
DAVID MANNING
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL
British Embassy Washington
From the Ambassador
Christopher Meyer KCMG
18 March 2002
Sir David Manning KCMG
No 10 Downing Street
1. Paul Wolfowitz, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, came to Sunday lunch on 17 March.
2. On Iraq I opened by sticking very closely to the script that you used the Condi Rice last week. We backed regime change, but the plan had to be clever and failure was not an option. It would be a tough sell for us domestically, and probably tougher elsewhere in Europe. The US could go it alone if it wanted to. But if it wanted to act with partners, there had to be a strategy for building support for military action against Saddam. I then went through the need to wrongnfoot Saddam on the inspectors and the UN SCRs and the critical importance of the MEPP as an integral part of the anti-Saddam strategy. If all this could be accomplished skilfully (sic), we were fairly confident that a number of countries would come on board.
3. I said that the UK was giving serious through to publishing a paper that would make the case against Saddam. If the UK were to join with the US in any operation against Saddam, we would have to be able to take a critical mass of parliamentary and public opinion with us. It was extraordinary how people had forgotten ho bad he was.
4. Wolfowitz said that he fully agreed. He took a slightly different position from others in the Administration, who were forcussed (sic) on Saddam’s capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction. The WMD danger was of course crucial to the public ase against Saddam, particularly the potential linkage to terrorism. But Wolfowitz thought it indispensable to spell out in detail Saddam’s barbarism. This was well documented from what he had done during the occupation of Kuwait, the incursion into Kurdish territory, the assault on the Marsh Arabs, and to hiw (sic) own people. A lot of work had been done on this towards the end of the first Bush administration. Wolfowitz thought that this would go a long way to destroying any notion of moral equivalence between Iraq and Israel. I said that I had been forcefully struck, when addressing university audiences in the US, how ready students were to gloss over Saddam’s crimes and to blame the US and the UK for the suffering of the Iraqi people.
5. Wolfowitz said that it was absurd to deny the link between terrorism and Saddam. There might be doubt about the alleged meeting in Prague between Mohammed Atta, the lead hijacker on 9/11, and Iraqi intelligence (did we, he asked, know anything more about this meeting?). But there were other substantiated cases of Saddam giving comfort to terrorists, including someone involved in the first attack on the World Trade Center (the latest New Yorker apparently has a story about links between Saddam and Al Qaeda operating in Kurdistan).
...
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/837
Comments/Summary
Wolfowitz is with the wheels of war already in motion is inquiring specifically about Atta meeting an Iraqi intelligence agent in Prague.
Text of the David Manning Memo - March 14, 2002 memo from David Manning (UK Foreign Policy Advisor) to Tony Blair recounting Manning’s meetings with his US counterpart Condoleeza Rice (National Security Advisor), and advising Blair for his upcoming visit to Bush’s Crawford ranch.
SECRET - STRICTLY PERSONAL
FROM : DAVID MANNING
DATE: 14 MARCH 2002
CC: JONATHAN POWELL
PRIME MINISTER
YOUR TRIP TO THE US
I had dinner with Condi on Tuesday; and talks and lunch with her an NSC team on Wednesday (to which Christopher Meyer also came). These were good exchanges, and particularly frank when we were one-on-one at dinner. I attach the records in case you want to glance.
IRAQ
We spent a long time at dinner on IRAQ. It is clear that Bush is grateful for your support and has registered that you are getting flak. I said that you would not budge in your support for regime change but you had to manage a press, a Parliament and a public opinion that was very different than anything in the States. And you would not budge either in your insistence that, if we pursued regime change, it must be very carefully done and produce the right result. Failure was not an option.
Condi’s enthusiasm for regime change is undimmed. But there were some signs, since we last spoke, of greater awareness of the practical difficulties and political risks. (See the attached piece by Seymour Hersh which Christopher Meyer says gives a pretty accurate picture of the uncertain state of the debate in Washington.)
From what she said, Bush has yet to find the answers to the big questions:
- how to persuade international opinion that military action against Iraq is necessary and justified;
- what value to put on the exiled Iraqi opposition;
- how to coordinate a US/allied military campaign with internal opposition (assuming there is any);
- what happens on the morning after?
Bush will want to pick your brains. He will also want to hear whether he can expect coalition support. I told Condi that we realiised that the Administration could go it alone if it chose. But if it wanted company, it would have to take account of the concerns of its potential coalition partners. In particular:
- the Un [sic] dimension. The issue of the weapons inspectors must be handled in a way that would persuade European and wider opinion that the US was conscious of the international framework, and the insistence of many countries on the need for a legal base. Renwed refused [sic] by Saddam to accept unfettered inspections would be a powerful argument’
- the paramount importance of tackling Israel/Palestine. Unless we did, we could find ourselves bombing Iraq and losing the Gulf.
YOUR VISIT TO THE RANCH
No doubt we need to keep a sense of perspective. But my talks with Condi convinced me that Bush wants to hear you [sic] views on Iraq before taking decisions. He also wants your support. He is still smarting from the comments by other European leaders on his Iraq policy.
This gives you real influence: on the public relations strategy; on the UN and weapons inspections; and on US planning for any military campaign. This could be critically important. I think there is a real risk that the Administration underestimates the difficulties. They may agree that failure isn’t an option, but this does not mean that they will avoid it.
Will the Sunni majority really respond to an uprising led by Kurds and Shias? Will Americans really put in enough ground troops to do the job if the Kurdish/Shi’ite stratagem fails? Even if they do will they be willing to take the sort of casualties that the Republican Guard may inflict on them if it turns out to be an urban war, and Iraqi troops don’t conveniently collapse in a heap as Richard Perle and others confidently predict? They need to answer there and other tough questions, in a more convincing way than they have so far before concluding that they can do the business.
The talks at the ranch will also give you the chance to push Bush on the Middle East. The Iraq factor means that there may never be a better opportunity to get this Administration to give sustained attention to reviving the MEPP.
http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/836
Comments/Summary
There are a few things that stand out in this memo about diner with Condi. Rice admits that they have yet to find the answers to the big questions; first big question is how to justify this action in the eyes of the international community.
There is one bit of text which I find oddly out of place.
"I think there is a real risk that the Administration underestimates the difficulties. They may agree that failure isn’t an option, but this does not mean that they will avoid it."
I think there is something I must be missing because the number one coalition partner is saying that the US may not avoid a failing situation. 01 March 2002 Claims regarding Iraqi attemps to obtain uranium not credible (INR)
The State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) sends a memorandum to Secretary of State Colin Powell stating that claims regarding Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium from Niger are not credible, according to a knowledgeable government official.
Chronology of Bush Claim that Iraq Attempted to Obtain Uranium from Niger,available at:
http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2003_09/Iraquraniumchronology.asp?print
Plame's Identity Marked As Secret
Memo Central to Probe Of Leak Was Written By State Dept. Analyst
By Walter Pincus and Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, July 21, 2005; A01
...
In a July 6 opinion piece in the New York Times and in an interview with The Washington Post, he cited a secret mission he conducted in February 2002 for the CIA, when he determined there was no evidence that Iraq was seeking uranium for a nuclear weapons program in the African nation of Niger.
...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/20/AR2005072002517_pf.html
17 September 2001 Begin planning military options for an invasion of Iraq
President Bush signed a 2½-page document marked "TOP SECRET" that outlined the plan for going to war in Afghanistan as part of a global campaign against terrorism.
Almost as a footnote, the document also directed the Pentagon to begin planning military options for an invasion of Iraq, senior administration officials said.
Glenn Kessler, “U.S. Decision on Iraq
Has Puzzling Past, Washington Post,
January 12, 2003
Vice President Dick Cheney was interviewed by Tim Russert following the terrorist attacks on September 11.
MR. RUSSERT: Do we have any evidence linking Saddam Hussein or Iraqis to this operation?
VICE PRES. CHENEY: No.
Dick Cheney’s interview with Tim Russert. 16 September 2001.
Available at:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/vicepresident/news-speeches/speeches/vp20010916.html
According to Richard A. Clarke, a former National Security Council Official: "On September 12th, I left the video conferencing center and there, wandering alone around the situation room, was the president. He looked like he wanted something to do. He grabbed a few of us and closed the door to the conference room. "Look," he told us, "I know you have a lot to do and all, but I want you, as soon as you can, to go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam did this. See if he's linked in any way."
Richard A. Clarke, Chapter 1, Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror (2004).
Former General Wesley Clark tells Tim Russert on Meet the Press that Bush administration officials tried to implicate Saddam Hussein in the September 11 attacks, beginning on the day of the attacks. Clark states:“There was a concerted effort during the fall of 2001, starting immediately after 9/11, to pin 9/11 and the terrorism problem on Saddam Hussein. Well, it came from the White House, it came from all over. I got a call on 9/11. I was on CNN, and I got a call at my home saying, ‘You got to say this is connected. This is state-sponsored terrorism. This has to be connected to Saddam Hussein,’ I said, ‘But–I’m willing to say it, but what’s your evidence?’ And I never got any evidence.”
“Media Silent on Clark's 9/11: Comments Gen. says White House pushed Saddam
link without evidence” FAIR. 20 June 2003. Available:
http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1842
A team of scientists at the Energy Department published a secret Technical Intelligence Note raising doubts about the aluminum tubes use in centrifuges. “[It] is credible but unlikely, and a rocket production is much more likely end use for these tubes.” This was concluded because the tubes were too narrow, too thick and had a special weather coating.
(In spite of this finding, in a statement by Condoleezza Rice on Sept. 8, 2002, she said the tubes were “only really suited for nuclear weapons programs.”).
David Barstow, William J. Broad and Jeff Gerth. “Skewed Intelligence Data in March to War in Iraq.” The New York Times. Available at:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/100304A.shtml
Condoleezza Rice is interviewed and she says, “We are able to keep
arms from [Saddam]. His military forces have not been rebuilt."
http://www.taemag.com/issues/articleID.18032/article_detail.asp
In his speech, he says, “He [Saddam Hussein] has not developed a significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project
conventional power against his neighbors.”
“Powell ‘01: WMDs Not ‘Significant,’”
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/09/28/iraq/printable575469.shtml
*EPF403 02/10/00
Transcript: Pentagon Spokesman's Regular Briefing, Feb. 10
(Iraq/WMD, computer hacking/DOD counter-measures, N.Korea/missiles) (4360)
Pentagon Spokesman Admiral Craig Quigley briefed.
...
Q: Can we stay on Iraq?
Q: Sure. Go ahead.
ADM. QUIGLEY: David?
...
Q: So one would think that you might be leaning a little more forward at this point with your level of concern -- not that the U.S. is about to go bomb the Iraqis -- but that your level of concern, I would think, would be going up right now?
ADM. QUIGLEY: Well, we've been concerned for some time, John. But again, I must say that we have no evidence to support that the Iraqis are specifically reconstituting a WMD capability.
Its past actions, its reconstituting or reconstruction and repair of buildings, all circumstantial and historical, if you will, none of which makes us feel very comfortable. But I would be remiss if I said that we could point to specific evidence of a reconstruction of that capability.
Q: So you are talking about intelligence, then. While the professor says they're building a large underground facility that may be doing offensive viruses, growing offensive viruses, you seem to be indicating that you don't have that because you have no evidence to support that they're reconstituting weapons of mass destruction.
ADM. QUIGLEY: Correct.
...
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