From The Observer, 4/3/05:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1451138,00.html

US relied on 'drunken liar' to justify war

'Crazy' Iraqi spy was full of misinformation, says report

Edward Helmore in New York
Sunday April 3, 2005
The Observer

An alcoholic cousin of an aide to Ahmed Chalabi has emerged as the key
source in the US rationale for going to war in Iraq.

From The Observer, 4/3/05:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,1451138,00.html

US relied on 'drunken liar' to justify war

'Crazy' Iraqi spy was full of misinformation, says report

Edward Helmore in New York
Sunday April 3, 2005
The Observer

An alcoholic cousin of an aide to Ahmed Chalabi has emerged as the key
source in the US rationale for going to war in Iraq.

According to a US presidential commission looking into pre-war
intelligence failures, the basis for pivotal intelligence on Iraq's
alleged biological weapons programmes and fleet of mobile labs was a
spy described as 'crazy' by his intelligence handlers and a
'congenital liar' by his friends.

The defector, given the code-name Curveball by the CIA, has emerged as
the central figure in the corruption of US intelligence estimates on
Iraq.

Despite considerable doubts over Curveball's credibility, his claims
were included in the administration's case for war without caveat.

According to the report, the failure of US spy agencies to scrutinise
his claims are the 'primary reason' that they 'fundamentally misjudged
the status of Iraq's [biological weapons] programs'.

The catalogue of failures and the gullibility of US intelligence make
for darkly comic reading, even by the standards of failure detailed in
previous investigations.

Of all the disproven pre-war weapons claims, from aluminium centrifuge
tubes to yellow cake uranium from Niger, none points to greater levels
of incompetence than those found within the misadventures of
Curveball.

The Americans never had direct access to Curveball - he was controlled
by the German intelligence services who passed his reports on to the
Defence Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon's spy agency.

Between January 2000 and September 2001, Curveball offered 100
reports, among them the claims of mobile biological weapons labs that
were central in the US evidence of an illicit weapons programme, but
subsequently turned out to be trucks equipped with machinery to make
helium for weather balloons.

The commission concluded that Curveball's information was worse than
none at all.

'Worse than having no human sources,' it said, 'is being seduced by a
human source who is telling lies.'

Although the defector has never been formally identified, it appears
he was an Iraqi chemical engineer who defected after UN inspectors
left the country in 1998.

In the aftermath of the US-led invasion, Iraqis whom Curveball claimed
were co-workers in Saddam's alleged biological weapons programme did
not know who he was.

He claimed he'd witnessed a deadly biological weapons accident when he
was not even in Iraq when it was meant to have happened.

After September 2001, his claims were given greater credibility
despite the fact that he was not in Iraq at the time he claimed to
have taken part in illicit weapons work.

His information was central to an October 2002 National Intelligence
Estimate that concluded Iraq 'has' biological weapons, and was widely
used by President Bush and ***** Cheney to make their case for war.

It now appears there were problems with Curveball from the start, but
the intelligence community was willing to believe him 'because the
tales he told were consistent with what they already believed.'

In May 2000 doubts about his credibility surfaced when he was examined
for signs that he had been exposed to biological agents.

While the results were inconclusive, a US official was surprised to
find Curveball had a hangover and said he 'might be an alcoholic.'

By early 2001, the Germans were having doubts of their own, telling
the CIA their spy was 'out of control'.

But warnings were dismissed.

Intelligence analysts who voiced concern were 'forced to leave' the
unit mainly responsible for analysing his claims, the commission
found.

At every turn analysts were blocked by spy chiefs and their warning
never passed on to policy-makers.

The commission's report is unlikely to renew confidence in America's
intelligence network as it attempts to uncover evidence of WMDs in
Iran and elsewhere.

The report concludes that US intelligence agencies remain poorly
coordinated, have resisted reform and produce 'irrelevant' work.

____________________________________________________________

Have you read this?


From The Washington Post, 6/5/03:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/­wp-dyn/articles/A15019-2003Jun­4.html

By Walter Pincus and Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writers

Thursday, June 5, 2003; Page A01

Vice President Cheney and his most senior aide made multiple trips to
the CIA over the past year to question analysts studying Iraq's
weapons programs and alleged links to al Qaeda, creating an
environment in which some analysts felt they were being pressured to
make their assessments fit with the Bush administration's policy
objectives, according to senior intelligence officials.

With Cheney taking the lead in the administration last August in
advocating military action against Iraq by claiming it had weapons of
mass destruction, the visits by the vice president and his chief of
staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, "sent signals, intended or otherwise,
that a certain output was desired from here," one senior agency
official said yesterday.

Other agency officials said they were not influenced by the visits
from the vice president's office, and some said they welcomed them.

But the disclosure of Cheney's unusual hands-on role comes on the
heels of mounting concern from intelligence officials and members of
Congress that the administration may have exaggerated intelligence it
received about Iraq to build a case for war.

While visits to CIA headquarters by a vice president are not
unprecedented, they are unusual, according to intelligence officials.

The exact number of trips by Cheney to the CIA could not be learned,
but one agency official described them as "multiple."

They were taken in addition to Cheney's regular attendance at
President Bush's morning intelligence briefings and the special
briefings the vice president receives when he is at an undisclosed
location for security reasons.

A spokeswoman for Cheney would not discuss the matter yesterday.


Harry