http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5329350.stm


Iraq war justifications laid bare
By Adam Brookes
BBC News, Washington


In a report issued on Friday, it also found that was little
or no evidence to support a raft of claims made by the US
intelligence community concerning Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction.

The 400-page report was three years in the making, and is
probably the definitive public account of the intelligence
used to justify the invasion of Iraq.

One starting point is this:

In a poll conducted this month by Opinion Research
Corporation for CNN, a sample of American adults was asked:
"Do you think Saddam Hussein was personally involved in
the 11 September terrorist attacks, or not?"

Forty-three percent of those polled answered yes, they
believed Saddam was personally involved.

Even though it is well-established that Saddam Hussein was
no ally of al-Qaeda, nor did he possess weapons of mass
destruction, the original justifications for the invasion
for Iraq linger on, often in ways that have strangely
mutated on their journey through politics and media.

Cheney claims 'untrue'

In fact, the intelligence agencies had been extremely
cautious in suggesting links between Saddam Hussein
and al-Qaeda.

It was Vice-President ***** Cheney who asserted most strongly
in public that Saddam Hussein's regime and al-Qaeda had an
operational relationship.

In a television interview in September 2003, he said there
was "a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda that stretched
back through most of the decade of the '90s... al-Qaeda sent
personnel to Baghdad to get trained... the Iraqis providing
bomb-making expertise and advice to the al-Qaeda organisation."

It was "clearly official policy" on the part of Iraq, he said.

Friday's report, issued by the Senate Select Committee on
Intelligence, provides another definitive statement that
that assertion is simply not true.

It says that debriefings conducted since the invasion of
Iraq "indicate that Saddam issued a general order that Iraq
should not deal with al-Qaeda. No post-war information suggests
that the Iraqi regime attempted to facilitate a relationship
with [Osama] Bin Laden.

"Saddam Hussein was distrustful of al-Qaeda... refusing all
requests from al-Qaeda to provide material or operational
support."

Administration confusion

The report supports the intelligence community's finding
that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - the man who was al-Qaeda's chief
operative in Iraq between the invasion and his death in June
this year - was indeed in Baghdad in 2002.

Was this an Iraqi link to al-Qaeda?

No, says the report. Far from harbouring him, Saddam's regime
was trying to find and capture him.

But the Bush administration has a way, still, of confusing
this issue.

As recently as 21 August this year, President Bush said that
Saddam "had relations with Zarqawi".

The Senate report is scathing of the intelligence community's
product concerning Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

"Post-war findings", it reads, "do not support the 2002
National Intelligence Estimate judgement that Iraq was
reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."

Nor do "post-war findings" support the 2002 NIE's assertions
that Iraq had chemical or biological weapons.

Political fallout

It remains to be seen if the Democrats can use the Senate
report to damage the Republican Party in the run-up to
Congressional elections in November by reminding the American
public of the intelligence debacle that preceded the invasion
of Iraq, and ascribing that failure to the leadership of the
Bush administration.

It is far from clear they'll be able to do so.

The president has been extremely active in the last week,
selling his successes in the "war on terror" in a series of
speeches; demanding Congress give him greater powers to fight
it; and announcing that the alleged mastermind of the 9/11
attacks will be brought to trial.

The Democratic Party still seems unable to find a concerted
critique of President Bush's handling of the "war on terrorism"
and the conflict in Iraq, without themselves appearing defeatist.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/5329350.stm
<snip>
The Democratic Party still seems unable to find a concerted
critique of President Bush's handling of the "war on terrorism"
and the conflict in Iraq, without themselves appearing defeatist.