I note that the Niger part is not directly clear, nor is the French step clear. Italy seems to be supported.
From the article’s suggestions I would probably choose an Iraqi exile and specifically were I to name names, a Chalabi connexion.
Were the forgeries of Nigerian or Nigerien origins, I would expect they would get the current ministerial names right, if nothing else.
By the way, this is interesting and probably should be shared in related threads:
CIA Got Uranium Reference Cut in Oct.
Why Bush Cited It In Jan. Is Unclear
Washington Post 13 July 2003
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A48847-2003Jul12.html?nav=hptop_tb
Article continues on.
I am personally convined my friends in the Agency in MENA affaires are being set up for someone else’s mistakes. Leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.
All in all , it seems that we’ll never know for sure who faked the documents. But what we DO know for sure is that the CIA knew they were fake, AND, unless you believe in the fairy godmother, GWB and his gang knew that it was baloney. As Collounsbury points out, the CIA took the reference out of an earlier speech. It is quite obvious the government was grasping at anything and was just ACHING to use the FAKE intel at least ONE more time.
Seen today’s? (Check out the link in Collounsbury’s last post.)
There were phony documents. The CIA knew they were fake. Bush knew they were fake. The British know they were fake.
The British said and continue to say that they have definite evidence that Iraq sought African uranium. Their evidence has has nothing to do with the phony documents. I don’t even know if it relates to the same African country.
Even though one piece of evidence is phony, other related evidence may be true.
To the contrary. The fact that evidence had to be falsified strongly suggests that the facts behind the evidence are false.
One doesn’t need to falsify evidence of true claims. There can be a desire to falsify evidence before a court of law because they have such stringent rules of what constitutes evidence. But intelligence services don’t work like that. They are perfectly willing to build a case entirely of circumstatial evicence or even best guesses.
But a case built on forged evidence is far more likely to be false than true.
Friend December has seen the light but he is still getting his talking points from Condilisa Rice.
What are you saying December? That is was only a little lie? That the stuff about the aluminum tubes was true? That there were tactical or strategic qualities of biological agents and chemical agents? That Sadam was in bed with OSB? That Sadam really had the ability to have A-bombs in six months? That there is super-sesret information that demonstrrates all the stuff the President talked about in the State of the UNion Address but that the President in his wisdom chose to keep all that under his had and lie to us instead? What does one little lie signify? How about “I didn’t have sex with that woman?”
If there is a bunch of super secret and undisclosed evidence held in reserve this would be a very good time to break it out.
Which pretty much answers the question of who’s lying. Since Rice said the only changes sought by the CIA were to remove specific references to amounts of uranium and countries from which Iraq was seeking to obtain it, and that the agency did not object to the core of the assertion - that Iraq was seeking to procure uranium from Africa, she was either asleep during the month of October, or she’s a lying sack of shit.
What astounds me is that when they worked out this whole deal for Tenet to take the fall for Bush, it never occured to them that the stories wouldn’t add up. Or even scarier, that they didn’t care.:rolleyes:
Yes --Rice, Tenet, and Rumsfeld, who all agree. I have taken my talking points from statements by people who actually know the facts.
Uh, SG, the forged documents weren’t George Bush’s lie. They weren’t America’s lie. AFAIK the documents were forged by someone in Africa, perhaps for financial reasons.
Indeed Blowero, although we do have our little december getting his talking points from “those in the know”… charming. really charming.
When I publish a lie, knowing it to be a lie, it is my lie, no matter who originated the lie. I expect to be held responsible for what I say. Why should the Presided, his cabinet and staff be held to any lesser standard?
We have one of three things going on here. Either the President:
“AFAIK” seems to cover a multitude of sins.
I can’t take your money, so instead please donate it to your favorite church or non-profit organization.
Tenet could have prevented the bad information from being in the speech. He failed. That’s a pretty bad mistake. Now he may get the boot.
Bush didn’t lie. He read a few words that had been cleared by the CIA. A President has to trust his highest intel person. If you were President you would have done the same thing. I can’t believe the amount of hot air being generated over such a non-story. No wonder we have global warming!
Oh, please.
Tenet had already told him, months earlier, that that ‘intelligence’ wasn’t to be relied on. The White House kept coming back with it until they found a formulation that was technically true, so the CIA had to OK it, regardless of their reservations, since this was the Big Boss speaking.
Bush did indeed have to trust his highest intel person. He trusted Tenet to go along with the party line as soon as he had a remotely acceptable fig leaf. That’s what happened.
That’s how it works in this town - and in plenty of others, I’m sure, where power is the name of the game.
Tenet DID get it taken out of a speech the previous October. But the Administration RE-USED the already discredited info in the January speech. What new evidence came to light in the intervening time that all-of-a-sudden made it valid? Answer: NONE. Why are you ignoring this fact? I don’t think Tenet will get the boot now. I think he was afraid of getting the boot unless he caved to pressure from the Administration to change his story, which is what he did.
That’s the party line, all right. But the stories just don’t add up. Tenet had ALREADY TOLD THEM that the evidence was weak; yet they claim they were relying on him for the info. How does that makes sense to ANYONE? What is this, bizarro-world?
Just because you bought the whole spin they put on the story hook, line, and sinker (even though it makes no sense), doesn’t mean there’s no story there. Geez, do you just take everything the government says at face value?
Be gentle. Don’t ruin GOM. I find him charming just as he is, all wide eyed.
Nota bene, this was the best information about Saddam’s nucular program they had to present. This “other intelligence” we are now, months later, hearing mentioned and being asked to believe is, well, what? What is still so sensitive that it has to be withheld even now? Does it, dare I ask (and I dare), even exist?
Nota bene too, Rice and Rumsfeld are now primly admitting that this story didn’t rise to the level required of a speech that nobody but the Beltway insiders pays attention to anyway - but it was strong enough to start a war and get thousands of people killed over, huh?
I do admire the sheer artistry of the argument that the Bush apologists, including Rice herself, are now making - it wasn’t actually a “lie”, because he said “The British say they know that …”. Audacious or desperate? You make the call. Try explaining to any kindergartner that that makes it not a lie.
The bottom of it is still what many of us were saying a year ago, that the decision had been made for reasons unknown (but PNAC is a guide), and that more-publicly-presentable “facts” were being found to prop it up. Yes, it’s possible that the intellectually lazy, including you-know-who as well as his apologists on this board, actually believed they were right. That’s what laziness gets you, though.
Excuse me if this was pointed out and I missed it, but it’s worth looking at the precise phrasing of Bush’s remarks:
“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa”
He said that the British “learned” that Iraq tried to get the uranium. Not “claimed.” Even if he had said “claimed,” it would be Terl-logic, but he instead stated that the Nigerien connection was a fact of which the British had recently become aware.
That’s a rather curious reading of the situation. My understanding is that the SPECIFIC line about Niger was objected to by the CIA, but that they were okay with the rest.
That is just not true. In October Tenet objected to a single specific line, which was struck. That line was NOT included in the State of the Union address.
Now, the spin you guys are putting on it is that Bush kept trying, modifying, twisting, until he has something that could pass muster. But this is the way the administration says it went down:
White House: Hey, CIA - here’s what were going to say about your intelligence assessment in the State of the Union. Could you clear this please?
CIA: After going through it, we feel that the specific intel about this is not good enough for a presidential address, and we have redacted that line. Other than that, A-OK.
White House: Thanks, guys.
Now, maybe it did happen the way you guys say. Maybe Tenet was browbeaten into finally giving the OK, and is now being made the fall guy.
But, this being Great Debates and all, I would like a cite for that.
By the way, the British are sticking to this story. Their claim is that the forged documents were only one piece of intel out of many, and the others hold up just fine. Their formal assessment remains that Saddam was trying to purchase uranium from Africa - which is all that Bush said in the SOTU.
This is a major tempest in a teapot. You’re arguing about one line in a speech. BTW, most people consider the main case for invading Iraq to have been made by Colin Powell at the U.N. - and he didn’t mention a thing about African uranium purchases.
So, this doesn’t affect the justification for war, it was an intel error of one small piece of one package regarding one subject that was later ignored anyway. According to the White House, Bush didn’t know about it.
Time to find something else to attack Bush over - this dog won’t hunt.
Nope, I’m not - and I said as much on the previous page.
But he did mention the infamous WMDs.
Been there, done that, waiting for a refutation.
See, though, Sam, that is the thing. Of all the dissembling, of all the so-very-carefully worded, subtly accusatory statements, of the other lies and misstatements and erroneous intelligence about WMD, for some reason, this dog is hunting. I don’t know why this one in particular. Perhaps because it was made in a speech such as the State of the Union. Perhaps because there are many people coming forward with knowledge of the timeline along which disconfirmatory information was given to the administration. I don’t know. But the dog is hunting, and may even have something, or someone, treed. I do know that if this dog goes away, for whatever reason, there is a whole team pulling on leashes, itchin’ to flush stuff out of the bush.