Democracy Nows Inside Story On The Forged Niger Docs.

[go west young man]

Source: Democracy Now

In his January 2003 State of the Union address, President Bush declared the infamous sixteen words: “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” The claim was central to the administration’s claims that Saddam Hussein was seeking weapons of mass destruction and served as a basis for launching the Iraq invasion less than two months later. Bush’s declaration was based on an intelligence document that provided evidence about Iraq’s purchase of uranium from the African country of Niger. But there was one problem: the document was a fake. In a Democracy Now! broadcast exclusive, we speak with the authors of two explosive new books. Carlo Bonini is the Italian reporter who broke the Niger story. His new book is called “Collusion: International Espionage and the War on Terror.” Peter Eisner is a veteran foreign correspondent and is currently an editor at the Washington Post. His new book is “The Italian Letter: How the Bush Administration Used a Fake Letter to Build the Case for War in Iraq.”

Read more: http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/10/1321236

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This is what our mainstream media should have been figuring out. The entire affair is laid out nicely for all to see by Amy Goodman, Carlo Bonini, and Peter Eisner. The show can be watched in Real Player through the links available at the site.
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/10/1321236

[1932]

1. Eisner wrote a book about Manuel Noriega called America's Prisoner.

Every American should read it if you care to understand how the world works.

[otohara]

2. Ahhh...A News Show Not Obsessed w/ Don Imus

thank you Amy Goodman

[Supersedeas]

11. I'll second that.

[Junkdrawer]

13. Third.

:thumbsup:

[Gregorian]

3. Thanks. Good review. Very clearcut discussion.

This is the backbone of my experience in this forum. We heard the words in the SOTU, and were shocked. We saw Cheney spending time with the CIA. We saw the breakin for the letterheads. We saw Dr. Kelley dead. The circular information gathering. It's all here in this piece.

I still can't believe how long after these blatantly illegal acts, this administration has come. They really should be in jail. Half a million dead Iraqis?

Cheney knew those documents were fake. There is no doubt.

[go west young man]

10. Hopefully the investigation into Dr.Kellys death will be reopened.

The paramedics that initially tended to him said that things didn't add up. Especially in regards to the lack of blood at the site. There is so much more yet to be learned from all that has happened. Thank God for Waxman, Conyers and a Democratic Congress. Hopefully soon more will be revealed so that all those who have died will at least have some justice.

[grasswire]

4. excellent, thanks

I'm going to buy the book "The Italian Letter"

[caligirl]

5. Picked up my copy of The Italian Letter tonight.

[sicksicksick_N_tired]

6. Ah! And the neocon run CIA/NSA/ETC can't redact!!!

:rofl:

IF ONLY, the press, here, would do an expose.

Did I say, "press"?

My ERROR. IF ONLY the corporacrats would find their SOULS and BE A PRESS by doing an expose. But, they can't,...for the love of money and profit over integrity and honor.

When they DO FALL,...they will have no one but themselves to blame,...when they fall, as they will.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

7. We are well past the tipping point.

The actions of this maladministration will reverberate for many years after they are out of office. I expect that much time will be spent tearing those actions apart and issuing indictments, precedent regarding the indictment of those who were previously officials be damned.

It will make Iran Contra look like a Tupperware party.

[caligirl]

8. take a look at the Ledeen connection, Who got the forged letter to Martino in the 1st place?

"PETER EISNER: Yes, indeed. First of all, it was arranged by a gentleman by Michael Ledeen, who is a long-term operative in US circles that goes back at least to the Iran-Contra period. Michael Ledeen is a fellow of the American Enterprise Institute, the heart of neoconservatism in the United States, allied with Lynne Cheney, allied with various other people close as could be to the Bush administration. Ledeen set this meeting up. Ledeen set it up without advising the US embassy. Ledeen has a longtime relationship with Italy.

Ledeen, interestingly, very interestingly, had a relationship with the magazine Panorama, which was the target of the delivery of the Italian letter and its dossier in October 2002. As a matter of fact, Ledeen started writing a column in October of 2002 for the magazine Panorama, and yet, (a), Ledeen has been widely discredited in the US intelligence community. The person that he brought to the meeting in Rome, Manuchar Ghorbanifar, has been described for years by US intelligence as a serial fabricator. But Ledeen, close to the Bush administration, has said that Ghorbanifar is the most reliable and honest person that he knows. This cannot be separated from the fact that Chalabi himself is questioned as having been an Iranian agent. So there's a whole nexus of questions here that go beyond what one can really get without a series of subpoenas. '

[lala_rawraw]

9. i reported this...

about Ledeen and Panorama... he did not have direct involvement in the forgeries... he set up the meetings between the key players... his focus at the time, as it is now, has been regime change in Iran, which is why he was meeting with Ghorba.

[caligirl]

12. do you think chalabi could have forged it or might know who it is?

By the way, I wrote eisner an email and he wrote back,last week. I told him your writing was the first I had read on it a couple years ago. He said he was reading all along then and had the help of certain 'reputable sites' helping him write the story, I assume he meant his book. Just though you might like o know he knows you were writing about this then. He also responded to a follow up email i sent, saying he was continuing to try to get at who is responsible for the letter originally. Still connecting the dots.

Congrats on your neg biopsy. Just had that experience here, benign as well. Appendix tumor.

[Jack Rabbit]

14. Highly recommended reading

!!

[Junkdrawer]

15. Michael "Aluminum Tubes" Gordon to Amy: " I don't know if you understand how journalism works"....

AMY GOODMAN: Let me just ask something on that. Are you sorry you did the piece? Are you sorry that this piece --

MICHAEL GORDON: No, I'm not. I mean, what -- I don't know if you understand how journalism works, but the way journalism works is you write what you know, and what you know at the time you try to convey as best you can, but then you don't stop reporting.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, let me, let me --

MICHAEL GORDON: Can I answer your question, since you asked me a question?

AMY GOODMAN: Well, no, I wanted to get --

MICHAEL GORDON: No, wait a second, if you ask me a question -- I'm happy to answer all your questions, but what I'm trying to explain to you is one thing. That was what I knew at the time. It's true that it was the key judgment. It’s the same information they presented to Colin Powell, by the way, and it's what persuaded him to go to the United Nations and make the case on the nuclear tubes. I wrote the contrary case, giving the IAEA equal time. They disputed it. I don't have a dog in this fight. I didn't know what was the ultimate truth. When the IAEA came out in January and disputed it, I reported it.

AMY GOODMAN: Michael Gordon, let me just respond. We don’t -- we have limited time in the program, but I just --

MICHAEL GORDON: Well, then you should let me answer your questions.

AMY GOODMAN: I did.

MICHAEL GORDON: No, you haven’t let me answer your question.

AMY GOODMAN: Are you sorry then, that the New York Times was sorry that this piece appeared as it did on the front page of the New York Times.

:rofl: