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polly7

(20,582 posts)
Sun May 17, 2015, 03:37 PM May 2015

The Phony ‘Bad Intel’ Defense on Iraq

Jeb Bush’s stumbling start to his presidential bid has refocused attention on Official Washington’s favorite excuse for the illegal, aggressive and disastrous war in Iraq – that it was just a case of “bad intelligence.” But that isn’t what the real history shows, as ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern recalls.

By Ray McGovern
May 15, 2015 "Consortium News"

Presidential aspirant Jeb Bush this week may have damaged his chances by flubbing the answer to an entirely predictable question about his big brother’s decision to attack Iraq.


After some backfilling and additional foundering on Tuesday and Wednesday, Bush apparently memorized the “correct” answer. So on Thursday, he proceeded to ask the question himself: “If we’re all supposed to answer hypothetical questions: Knowing what we now know, what would you have done? I would not have engaged. I would not have gone into Iraq.”

It is a safe bet that, by Thursday, Iraq War champion Paul Wolfowitz, now a senior adviser to Jeb Bush, had taken him to the woodshed, admonishing him along these lines: “Jeb, you remembered to emphasize the mistaken nature of pre-war intelligence; that’s the key point; that’s good. But then you need to say that if you knew how mistaken the intelligence was, you would not have attacked Iraq. Got it?”

It was then-Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz — together with his boss Donald Rumsfeld, Vice President Dick Cheney and a string of neocon advisers — who exploited the tragedy of 9/11 to make war on Iraq, which they had been itching for since the 1990s. They tried mightily (and transparently) to link Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to the Sept. 11 attacks. Following their lead, the fawning corporate media played up this bum rap with such success that, before the attack on Iraq, polls showed that almost 70 percent of Americans believed that Saddam Hussein played some kind of role in 9/11.


Brimming with WMD:.........

Riding High, Wolfowitz Slips:........

The Downing Street Memorandum:..........

Challenging Rumsfeld:........

https://consortiumnews.com/2015/05/15/the-phony-bad-intel-defense-on-iraq/

Old news to everyone here, but interesting for me to read just how much the CIA doubted these claims, I had thought they were on board from the start.
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The Phony ‘Bad Intel’ Defense on Iraq (Original Post) polly7 May 2015 OP
always a kick for consortiumnews. grasswire May 2015 #1
IIRC, it was CIA data that Cheney reviewed and manipulated before it went to Bush Gman May 2015 #2
Cheney had his own 'shadow government' within the government, working on the lies, sabrina 1 May 2015 #3
People fault Obama for a lot of things Gman May 2015 #4

grasswire

(50,130 posts)
1. always a kick for consortiumnews.
Sun May 17, 2015, 03:48 PM
May 2015

Telling the truth for decades now, and on the right side of history.

Gman

(24,780 posts)
2. IIRC, it was CIA data that Cheney reviewed and manipulated before it went to Bush
Sun May 17, 2015, 07:33 PM
May 2015

And the CIA was with Cheney. Colin Powell doubted the data even as he gave his UN speech.

As a side note, I've always thought this makes Cheney the worst war criminal of all of them. Cheney and any others that assisted him.

sabrina 1

(62,325 posts)
3. Cheney had his own 'shadow government' within the government, working on the lies,
Mon May 18, 2015, 01:14 AM
May 2015

with Michael Ledeen and Wolfowitz among others whose name should go down in infamy.

I used to think we would see the day when all those war criminals would be held accountable.

Back when I still thought we were a free country with laws that applied to everyone.

Gman

(24,780 posts)
4. People fault Obama for a lot of things
Mon May 18, 2015, 02:15 PM
May 2015

The ACA didn't include single payer. TPP, and lots of others. But nothing compares to the failure to prosecute these war criminals not only here, but also at the International Criminal Court.

However, at the same time I also think that to do so would literally cause an armed rebellion by the right wing, the likes of which we have not seen since the civil war. Yes, I think they are that rabid.

I think Obama would have been very open to the idea prior to the election in 08. But I believe that after they, what I describe as showed him the film of the JFK assassination taken from behind the grassy knoll, there was no chance

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