CIA didn't get disputed documents until February 2003 after Bush claim

[Pikku]

When the Bush administration issued its pre-war claims that Iraq had sought uranium in Africa, the CIA had not yet obtained the documents that served as a key foundation for the allegation and later turned out to be forged, U.S. officials say.

The CIA didn't receive the documents until February 2003, nearly a year after the agency first began investigating the alleged Iraq-Africa connection and a short time after it assented to language in President Bush's State of the Union address that alleged such a connection, the officials said.

Without the source documents, the CIA could investigate only their substance, which it had learned from a foreign government around the beginning of 2002. One of the key allegations was that Iraq was soliciting uranium from the African country of Niger.

Even as the CIA found little to verify the reports, Bush administration officials repeatedly tried to put them into public statements. Sometimes CIA succeeded in getting the information removed.



http://www.boston.com/dailynews/197/wash/CIA_didn_t_get_disputed_docume:.shtml

HmmmMMMMmmmm....

[Qutzupalotl]

1. Funny thing...

this is just now being revealed AFTER Tenet's closed-door meeting ...

[expatriot]

2. okay, let's tear this apart people....

I know there are a lot of people who have a good conceptual map of the timeline on this, I don't really have an intuitive hold on it but I know this just wreaks of desparate revisionist history.

[Qutzupalotl]

9. This part is significant...

"When the Niger claim first arose, the CIA sent a retired diplomat to Africa to investigate in February 2002. The diplomat, Joseph Wilson, reported finding no credible evidence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger."


So they had doubts about it when Wilson returned. Tenet removed the reference from an October 2002 speech, but someone put it back in the SOTU. This story is just more cover for why they didn't remove it, but it doesn't satisfy.

[underpants]

17. Link to TIME Magazine TIME LINE

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=103&topic_id=1448&mesg_id=1448&page=

[w4rma]

35. Two timelines from the Dean Campaign (Uranium/Niger and WMDs)

Uranium and Niger: Pattern of Deceit (Timeline)
http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/PageServer?pagename=niger_timeline

THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION AND WMDs: THEN AND NOW
http://www.deanforamerica.com/site/PageServer?pagename=bush_wmd_summary

[tibbiit]

3. What does this mean

In the scheme of things?

Confused:)
tib

[Yentatelaventa]

6. It means trouble

If true it removes the barb from the hook.

[salin]

12. Don't see how it could be true

never mind- re-read and answered my own speculation. edited by salin.

[kysrsoze]

39. It means absofuckinglutely nothing....

The Boston whatever? Come on, people! Don't swallow this shit! We've already seen too much mainstream press that refutes this ridiculous claim. WTF?

[I AM SPARTACUS]

4. Hardly an excuse, even if true...

...took 'em a YEAR to get essential documents clarifying whether a member of the Axis of Evil was pursuing nukes??? it would be polite to call THAT something like "gross and negligent incompetence"...

[MidwestTransplant]

5. THIS MAKES PERFECT SENSE

Robin Cook (former UK Foreign Minister) had said that the UK had not shared this intelligence with the US. Assuming the CIA didn't get the docs until March, what in the world was the White House basing these claims on? How did they know about these docs if the CIA didn't? This really makes one wonder what must have been going on.

The when the Ambassador and the General went to Niger in Aug and Sept. 2002 it was to check up on claims alone. Personally I think this makes the admin. look worse.

[Pikku]

11. Sounds like the fake documents

were commissioned by someone who needed to back up their claims.

It also sounds like this tidbit coming out right now means that the CIA is beginning to leak. Just a hunch.

[Frances]

18. Exactly what I've been saying

n/t

[LeftCoast]

7. They may not have had the documents

but they had Wilson (? - the diplomat who went to Africa to check out the story) telling them at least a year before the SOTU that the info was bogus. Look, the info was SO bad that just based on the signatures alone, they could tell it was a fake.

I don't see this as an excuse.

[JoFerret]

10. There was also

the four star general who preceded Wilson and who reported to General Richard Myers.

[expatriot]

8. okay, now i get it....

[expatriot]

13. this is b.s.

to cover their butt the administration is trying to make it look like the CIA didn't get the doc in "feb." which can be later stated to be the beginning of feb. when questions come out why powell didn't use the allegation in the un on feb 5th... but Tenet said that the CIA was 'investigating the african connection' for a year... so they were aware of the idea of african-uranium allegations... british dossier states the doc. as evidence in OCTOBER... it was reported in the media, the administration had the dossier, everyone had the dossier except the CIA? there is a HUGE gap... that they can not cover up.

[Peachhead22]

14. They made the claim without evidence?

They made the claim without documentation to back it up, but two anecdotal reports refuting it? WTF? Then what DID they base it on?

[snippy]

38. Brilliant observation. They have asserted their own incompetency.

I think this claim sounds like a Mary Matalin lie. But regardless of whether they are lying again you have stated the relevant analysis.

[sandnsea]

15. Don't let the documents divert the issue

The fact is Wilson reported that there was no basis to the Niger uranium story. The Bush Administration intentionally referred to British Intelligence because the CIA wouldn't back up the uranium claim. They knew the information was suspect and deliberately ignored it in order to hype the war. They were wrong and the fact that documents were forged only backs up the CIA's suspicion in the first place.

I think the Administration gets away with everything because there is SO MUCH WRONG, so much to sort out, not because there's nothing there in the first place.

[Frances]

23. Didn't I read that

the CIA said take Niger out of the State of the Union speech?

And Bush put it back in--just added British said this.

Then Bush ordered CIA to take the fall.

What a wimp!

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

16. Setting up plausible deniability but what's new?

They got them within a week or two of SOTU address approximately and they were debunked within DAYS by the IAEA. Why would our own intelligence not be able to debunk such obvious fakes?

Whether they had the dicuments, they surely had to know whose sig was on them given the level of sharing between Brits and US...again, this puts it back on the Brits ..not a smart move.

Any ass with google could have verified that a certain diplomat was long gone.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

20. I wanna see Perle's fingerprints on the Italy papers..I am waging money

they are there somewhere.

[Frances]

24. Me too

I have been saying the same thing. I am really glad others are starting to see how Bush's gang had a lot to gain by forging these documents. And the fact that they are blaming the forgeries on an underpaid African has Rove's fingerprints all over it. I have learned from past experience to put my antenna up when the culprit is a poor black man.

[hang a left]

19. BS

This will not fly, wait and watch the op/eds tomorrow

[alcuno]

21. I could be wrong, but this seems WORSE.

I think people are reading this the wrong way. Wilson never said that he was the one with the documents; checking their validity. He was checking out the story and concluded that it was highly improbable. Second, read the article. It says that the CIA won't reveal WHERE the documents came from. Which office had them and then passed them along to the CIA after the SOTUS. Vice-President? The Cabal at the Pentagon?

[underpants]

26. Notice that Wilson never filed a WRITTEN report

Okay this is based on a TIME Mag article I read. He gave verbal briefings, they surely didn't want anything in hard copy. The truth is irrelevant.

[kainah]

34. In fact, Wilson specifically said that he did NOT see the documents

And the British have ALWAYS discounted these documents. It seems pretty clear to me that Wilson investigated the rumors that sprang from what evidence the Brits thought they had. And when none of it panned out, someone decided a nice solid piece of evidence was needed. And so they forged the documents. I absolutely believe that person will be tied to Cheney's office.

[democrat in Tallahassee]

22. Then how did they tell them not to use it in October? ????

just wondering

[alcuno]

25. I think the forgeries are being confused with Amb Wilson's info

The CIA would have told them to take it out of the speech because a) info from Wilson and b) they hadn't seen the documents.

[Jackpine Radical]

27. Don't lose it on this one, people.

Remember--the CIA had sufficient doubts about the Niger story to make the WH pull it from an Oct 2002 speech. It then reappeared in the SOTU on Jan 28 2003. Then Powell dropped it from his UN speech on about Feb 5. Then the funny doc shows up and gets blown out of the water. Like somebody tried to bogus up some documentation to support the SOTU claim, only did a TERRIBLE job of it. Maybe they hired some freelance Italian forger to do the job & he cobbled something really bad together out of leftover letterhead for the stupid Yanks.

[punpirate]

28. I believe Tony Blair's visit to the ranch...

... in August, 2002, figures prominently in this.... That's when they got together and worked on what they would say to the public. And Tony's coming tomorrow to help get their stories straight.

Both the U.S. and UK know, probably to the pound, what Niger's annual production of yellowcake is, and where it goes. Both administrations knew it was bullshit from the start. Very likely, one of the INC exiles knew that Iraq had tried to obtain the stuff from Niger in the `80s, made the claim that the effort was still ongoing, and that's all that Cheney and his Office of Special Plans needed.
When Wilson's mission for Cheney didn't pan out, it didn't stop them from using the lie. Italy has denied providing the document. France has denied that they were involved, and recent suggestions that the UK couldn't have supplied it to the U.S. because of intelligence restraints is lame. In better times, there would be a whistleblower, somewhere, who would speak to the origin of the document. The worst case scenario? The OSP forged the document to perpetuate the lie and gave it to Tony Blair in August, 2002.

Cheers.

[grasswire]

29. David Gergen on Hardball

....just said that Wilson reported orally to the CIA on the return from his trip.

So this is probably a colossal hedge.

Maybe they didn't receive written evidence until later. But the oral report was given TO the CIA.

[punpirate]

36. According to Google...

... this is three hours old:

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,465137,00.html

Someone in the administration is saying that Cheney wanted the mission to Niger, I think. Haven't read the whole thing.

Cheers.

[grasswire]

30. there's something else, too

Remember that Tony Blair crowed about the IAEA report that allegedly showed nuclear activity? After that same visit? Bush had given him that information. It was bogus.

That was the same trip.

Gawd, I wish I had nexis access.

[grasswire]

31. from a story about that 2002 visit

Speaking on the plane to Camp David, Mr Blair said: "We have got to see this in the light of experience. Why did the inspectors go? It was because the inspectors found they couldn't do their work. Whatever weapons inspection regime is put in has to be one that's very effective."

A dossier detailing the nuclear threat posed by Saddam is expected to be published within two weeks. Mr Blair, who was due at Balmoral to meet the Queen today after flying back to Britain in the early hours of the morning, is resisting the recall of Parliament but will brief the key Commons select committees on defence and foreign affairs this week.

A senior Government official said the dossier would give details for the first time of the efforts made by Saddam to obtain nuclear weapons and to increase the range of the missiles to deliver them.

"What is new in the dossier," said the official, "is that despite the Gulf War, despite the policy of containment, he is continuing to try to develop these weapons and the judgment you have to make is whether people take that threat - and he has shown he will use them - sufficiently seriously to take action now."

Much of the dossier, which is described as "quite a big document", will cover old ground. The official admitted that there were "huge gaps" in intelligence because weapons inspectors had been kept out of Iraq for four years. But he said that there was new, "highly suspicious" evidence showing new building work at Iraqi nuclear plants.

That is unlikely to be enough to convince the sceptics among Mr Blair's Labour MPs. Their opposition to military action was reinforced by remarks yesterday by Colin Powell, the US secretary of state, that it could take Saddam another decade to obtain nuclear weapons.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/09/08/wirq08.xml

[grasswire]

32. another tidbit

At a joint press conference with Mr Blair, President Bush said: "A report came out of the International Atomic Energy Agency that they were six months away from developing a weapon. I don't know what more evidence we need."

The Prime Minister said it showed there was a "real issue that had to be tackled - the policy of inaction is not one we can responsibly adhere to".

Mr Bush said: "It threatens the US. It threatens Britain. The battlefield has changed. We are in a new kind of war."

[kainah]

33. Which raises the intriguing question of

WHO CREATED THE FORGED DOCUMENT?

[peterh]

37. This doesn’t make sense at all

The CIA is saying they didn’t get the docs until Feb. and the IAEA said they got the docs in Feb. from Washington. Who distributed the docs….the State Dept? And when did they get them? There’s some holes here and I think the right questions can fill them.

<http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=425096>

The Italian documents were provided to the IAEA in February by the US. It took the agency just 10 days to conclude they were not genuine.


<http://www.examiner.com/headlines/default.jsp?story=071403b_iraqintel>

Those items were highlighted in a State Department fact sheet distributed Dec. 19 together with several pieces of newer intelligence, such as a charge that Iraq was trying to purchase uranium from Niger. It also included a mention of mobile laboratories for a biological weapons program and an allegation that Iraq was involved in a secret missile program.
U.N. nuclear inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which tried unsuccessfully to get evidence to support the uranium claim when the British alluded to it in September, now asked Washington to share what it knew on Niger.
Six weeks later, supporting documents were handed over to the U.N. inspection office in New York and within weeks, the IAEA was able to determine that the documents were forged. U.N. officials say they repeatedly asked Washington and London to provide any further evidence to support the charge.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

40. Now that I think of it

Makes perfect sense that they didn't get the docs prior to Feb ( as in purposely avoided it) as they would have had to turn them over to the IAEA and the IAEA debunked the aluminum tubes at light speed as well.

[Star]

41. From the Yahoo article

The CIA declined to say how the agency eventually obtained the documents. Officials at several other U.S. agencies, including the State Department, declined to say whether another U.S. government agency possessed or viewed them before Bush's speech last January.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20030716/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/iraq_uranium

So what other agency could have been holding onto (or producing) these papers? OSP anyone?