Re: a dumb query? pls humor me

[judd@wadsworth.org]

On  9 Mar, Roberto C. Sanchez wrote:
> On Fri, Mar 09, 2007 at 03:33:08PM -0500, judd@wadsworth.org wrote:
>> 
>>      The Brits were worried until we told them that "the intelligence
>> will be fixed around the policy", remember.  And the reports which
>> congress saw (both parties), were the "fixed" ones.
>> 
>>      Congress certainly could have questioned the intelligence;
> 
> Correct.  They *could* have but they chose not to.  They have security
> clearances.  They have the ability to hold closed-door and/or
> classified hearings.  Yet they did not.
> 

     I certainly hold congress accountable for passing the resolution.
And, as you're aware, there are different levels of security clearance.
I don't think that all members of congress have the same level as, say,
the members of the intelligence committee.  And remember, the majority
party pretty much controls the agenda, and the Republican majority
pretty much gave the Bush administration everything that they wanted.
A matter as grave as going to war should be beyond partisan politics.
I hold all members of congress accountable for not looking deeper at
what they were being told.

>> there
>> was some conflicting evidence available publicly that they should
>> have been aware of.
> 
> Such as?
> 

    For example, those infamous Aluminum tubes.  There was plenty of
evidence available that they were not really suited for use in 
centrifuges, but were exact matches for parts in 81 mm (I think)
rockets.

> 
>>      Lastly, it's hardly "liberal revisionist history", since some of
>> the people who spoke out about the distorting of intelligence that
>> was going on at the time  were conservatives.
>> 
> Like whom?
> 

     A few that come to mind:

	Karen Kwiatowski, a lieutenant colonel (now retired) in the
Air Force, who worked in the pentagon working on Near East South Asia
issues.  The Office of Special Plans was created in the same office.
She was a lifelong republican (recently switched to libertarian),
and writes a column for the American Conservative magazine.  She has
written how the OSP stovepiped raw data, bypassing the intelligence
analysts, and how the people in her office were told, in 2002, that
they would be given talking points, and that all their memos would 
support these points.  If they wrote otherwise because the intelligence
didn't the points, the memos were returned for editing until they fit
the policy. 

	General Anthony Zinni, who was at one time in charge of Centcom.
He was a strong Bush/Cheney supporter in 2000.  He was shocked when 
Cheney started making statements about Iraq's "nuclear program",
claiming that they were supported by Centcom intelligence.  Having
seen the same intelligence, Zinni said that it in no way supported
Cheney's statements.

       Scott Ritter, former marine and former team leader for 
UNSCOM until 1998.  Another Republican who voted for Bush in 2000.
By 2002 he was an outspoken critic of the Bush administrations 
WMD claims.

	I have also heard statements from some ex-cia analysts.
I don't know for sure, but I think that most intelligence types
are to dome degree right of center. 

-Chris
   
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|   Christopher Judd, Ph. D.                      judd@wadsworth.org   |
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