Reply #16: what did she know, and when did she know it?

[riverwalker]

http://cosmicwheel.blogspot.com/2008/01/why-hillary-needs-to-distract-from-her_18.html

<snip> Hillary--according to her own explanation--was briefed on all the information that the various U.S. intelligence agencies had--including what did not make it into the NIE--and had access to even more information than the Bush administration. That means that before she decided to vote for the IWR, she knew at least the following:

The NIE never said that Iraq was an imminent threat to the U.S.
The Air Force concluded that Iraq’s UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles) posed no threat to Iraq’s neighbors or the U.S.
The Defense Intelligence Agency concluded that 1) A substantial amount of Iraq's chemical warfare agents, precursors, munitions, and production equipment were destroyed between 1991 and 1998 as a result of Operation Desert Storm and UNSCOM (United Nations Special Commission) actions; 2) Iraq retains all the chemicals and equipment to produce the blister agent mustard but its ability for sustained production of G-series nerve agents and VX is constrained by its stockpile of key chemical precursors and by the destruction of all known CW production facilities during Operation Desert Storm and during subsequent UNSCOM inspections; and 3) In the absence of external aid, Iraq will likely experience difficulties in producing nerve agents at the rate executed before Operation Desert Storm.
The Department of Energy and State Department vigorously dissented on many of the key claims that Iraq had WMD, particularly in regard to aluminum tubes to reconstitute a nuclear program.
The information in the NIE showing that Iraq had WMD had not been independently verified by an operative responsible to the United States. Most of the alleged intelligence came from Iraqi exiles or third countries, all of which had an interest in the United States' removing Hussein, by force if necessary. <more>