Something has to be done with the CIA

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: Ultra Quiet

Originally posted by: Ldir

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Originally posted by: Bowfinger
They can solve the problem nicely if they just keep Cheney and Rumsfeld away from Langley.

Yes, because the Clinton Administration's consistent citation of intelligence data to support the Iraq = WMD conclusion was...ehhh...the fault of Cheney and Rumsfeld?

Dear Doofus,

Clinton is old news. Clinton is not president. Clinton did not doctor intelligence. Clinton did not invade Iraq. Dubya is president. Dubya's keepers did doctor intelligence. Dubya did invade Iraq. Please pull your head out of Dubya's ass.

Love,
People who can read

Dear fvcktard
Please explain how it is that Clinton and his keepers arrived at the same conclusions as this administration wrt to Iraq. Were Willy's keepers doctoring intelligence too? Is it your contention that every time there is a new President, we should do a data dump and start from scratch or should we take what we have learned in the past and mold it into a comprehensive body of knowledge. Please bring you stand-by brain cell on line before attempting to answer. Oh and BTW please your head out of you own ass, I hear your bf is kinda horny.

Love,
People aren't driven by hatred, can read without moving their lips and actually understand what they are reading.

Ummm..Clinton didn't invade Iraq based on the Faulty Intel, that's a big difference.

 

[tcsenter]

Clinton is old news. Clinton is not president. Clinton did not doctor intelligence. Clinton did not invade Iraq. Dubya is president. Dubya's keepers did doctor intelligence. Dubya did invade Iraq. Please pull your head out of Dubya's ass.

Hmmm, that is interesting.

So when the Clinton Administration, citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD, passed in 1998 the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change the official policy of the United States, and continued to cite the Iraq WMD threat to the day he left office in 2001, that was based on 'real undoctored intelligence'.

But when Bush cited the same intelligence information supporting the same conclusions, it magically became 'doctored and made-up intelligence'?

Wow, neato, groovy, far-out!

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Clinton is old news. Clinton is not president. Clinton did not doctor intelligence. Clinton did not invade Iraq. Dubya is president. Dubya's keepers did doctor intelligence. Dubya did invade Iraq. Please pull your head out of Dubya's ass.

Hmmm, that is interesting.

So when the Clinton Administration, citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD, passed in 1998 the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change the official policy of the United States, and continued to cite the Iraq WMD threat to the day he left office in 2001, that was based on 'real undoctored intelligence'.

But when Bush cited the same intelligence information supporting the same conclusions, it magically became 'doctored and made-up intelligence'?

Wow, neato, groovy, far-out!

I wouldn't put it pass the Clinton Administration to doctor up the Intel either.

 

[tcsenter]

I wouldn't put it pass the Clinton Administration to doctor up the Intel either.

You stinker, you!

 

[UltraQuiet]

Ummm..Clinton didn't invade Iraq based on the Faulty Intel, that's a big difference.

Yes Red that is a difference but it does not address the questions that were asked.

 

[rudder]

Originally posted by: Dari
First the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Then poor intelligence on Iraq? WTF were these spies doing in the 1990s?

They were figuring out what thier mission was after communism collapsed in the late eighties.

 

[UltraQuiet]

Ummm..Clinton didn't invade Iraq based on the Faulty Intel, that's a big difference.

Yes Red that is a difference but it does not address the questions that were asked.

 

[UltraQuiet]

Ummm..Clinton didn't invade Iraq based on the Faulty Intel, that's a big difference.

Yes Red that is a difference but it does not address the questions that were asked.

 

[robh23]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

Originally posted by: robh23

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

Originally posted by: robh23

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

One question for you, why didn't Bush sell the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq on those arguments you presented instead of the fictitious Stockpiles of WMDs?BTW, there is no proof that Hussiem harbored members of Al Qaeda. The only terrorist group in Iraq that had ties to Al Qaeda was located in Kurd Controlled Northern Iraq and there is no verifiable links between them and the Iraqi Baath Government.

so you are buck and family from downtown arcansas or new york or london and bush says it would be really nice to the iraqi people for us to spend half a trillion getting rid of saddam and loseing just a few thousand young men doing it. he would get trashed in the election, no one gives a sh!t about anyone else. also the argument is too fanciful for most people to believe, its way easier to just scare poeple with a justifiable threat.

Actually if Bush had actually been able to sell his excellent adventure in Iraq on those arguments his Administration would have to be doing the major spin and pass the buck game they are doing now.

the alqaida group operated in a war situation with the kurds, they kurds and ussf attacked them, they entered iraq via baghdad. i remember saddam on 9/13/01 on tv celebrating the american losses, then retracting the statements a few days later.

Entered Iraq via Baghdad???

yeah

you. the alqaida that the kurds and americans wiped out atthe start of the war were friends with saddam. you must have a goldfish memory if you dont remember that.

Actually if Bush had actually been able to sell his excellent adventure in Iraq on those arguments his Administration would have to be doing the major spin and pass the buck game they are doing now.

yeah like i said he couldnt because he wouldnt have got it to stick, second i said there were other reasons ill let know what some of them are.
first it sets a precedent, and america cant be going after every dictator, its easier to do business with the incumbent than change him for a better one.
second they dont want to give extraterritoriality and global jurisdiction to human rights laws, since if they do more than a few GI's would be in deep sh!t, and possibly bush himself a few years down the line.
third it just shows up their hippocracy; they do business with the saudis whilst going after a former dictator/ ally who turned sour, its too easy for aljazeera and other detractors to say they are only doing it for the oil.

also now the GI's screwed up the peace and there is a people's insurgency it would make the claim that they went in for the iraqi people look like a grade A backfire, and a very expensive one.

in short although the human rights issues are some of the real reasons they just play into bushes' and blair's iresponsible and cheap talking enemys' hands.

finally there is the alqaida perspective. that is: no removal of saddam; no progress on the reasons for the popular arab support of alqaida, which i listed above, and you just cant, say as a leader of the world, 'we will invade country x because its a block to our war with a third party'. the liberal-atti would have eppileptic fits.

wmd, immediate threats and war on terror worked, it got the consent required, and thats that, now stop bitching and accept that was the best course of action. you think clinton and albright wouldnt have done the same, then you are wrong, they arent stupid they wanted saddam and alqaida gone, but they didnt have the opportnity and didnt get behind it enough; it was a bad situation that they tried to ignore for too long - and thats what you people want to do now.

you should let the people who are strong deal with it, but you shouldnt let the dumb ones screw it up like has happened in iraq.

at the end of the day it was the GI's who gunned civillians down, and its them who are dying now, so relax its their problem not yours.

they only way the war on terror can really be one is to give the state dept more voice, but bush doesnt care or possibly understand that so brace yourself for a drawn out and bloody conflict...

 

[Vic]

Meh. There's nothing the CIA (or any other spy agency in the world) likes better than to be considered incompetent. In their line of work, it makes things much easier when they are underestimated.

 

[Bowfinger]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
So when the Clinton Administration, citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD, passed in 1998 the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change the official policy of the United States, and continued to cite the Iraq WMD threat to the day he left office in 2001, that was based on 'real undoctored intelligence'.

But when Bush cited the same intelligence information supporting the same conclusions, it magically became 'doctored and made-up intelligence'?

Wow, neato, groovy, far-out!

Aluminum tubes?

Uranium from Niger?

WMD-laden UAVs attacking the U.S.?

WMD trailers?

Powell's big show for the U.N., with all the 8x10 color glossy photographs with circles and arrows?*

"Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities used for the production of biological weapons."?


and of course, your favorite big lie:

The alleged connection between Iraq and 9/11/2001?


Please show me where these were Clinton's intelligence.

(By the way, this whole blame-Clinton argument completely ignores the extent to which Bush and his minions distorted intelligence, cherry-picked the pieces they wanted, discarded counter-evidence, ignored the consensus analysis in favor of their own worst-case interpretations, and generally overstated the certainty and consequence of the evidence we had, be it Clinton-era or new. It ignores Blix's reports and Scott Ritter's corroborating reports about the damage from Clinton's 1998 bombings -- before which, Iraq did have WMD materials. It also ignores the fact that five-year-old intelligence is too moldy to be treated as gospel. And, finally, it neatly ignores the fact that Clinton did NOT try to spin this evidence into a case for invading Iraq. But hey, those are only facts (not assertions). Don't let that get in the way of a good diversion from the Bush administration's actions.)



-----------------------
*All together now:

You can get the intel you want on Cheney's Langley jaunt.
You can get the intel you want on VP Dick's Langley jaunt.
Walk right in it's around the back,
Just a few lies to sell the big attack.
You can get the intel you want on Cheney's Langley jaunt.

(with apologies to Arlo Guthrie)

 

[tcsenter]

And again, the facts remain indisputable:

Clinton cites Iraq WMD threat throughout his tenure until the day he left office in 2001.

Clinton Administration lobbies for and, with the help of Democratic allies in Congress (e.g. John Kerry), passes the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change in Iraq the official policy of the United States, militarily if required; citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD.

Several Western countries with capable intelligence assets from the mid-90s right up to the invasion are, without exception, of the belief WMD still remain in Iraq and the Hussein regime never has (and never will) relinquished its attempt to rebuild the WMD programs that were severely disrupted by UN inspectors following the first Gulf War.

There was no palpable dissent within the international community on these fundamental questions. The debate was entirely over how much Iraq still possessed and how fast it was rebuilding its WMD programs, not on the fundamental questions. As Kay makes perfectly clear, this was the consensus even among UN weapons inspectors right up to the invasion.

Kay admitted the weapons inspections were effective only in light of information made possible by the invasion. It was impossible to determine until now how effective UN inspections were because the Hussein regime continued to be fundamentally deceptive, restrict or stall access, covertly monitor their activities to predict where inspectors would go next, and generally behave as though it had something to hide right up to the invasion.

 

[UltraQuiet]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
And again, the facts remain indisputable:

Clinton cites Iraq WMD threat throughout his tenure until the day he left office in 2001.

Clinton Administration lobbies for and, with the help of Democratic allies in Congress (e.g. John Kerry), passes the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change in Iraq the official policy of the United States, militarily if required; citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD.

Several Western countries with capable intelligence assets from the mid-90s right up to the invasion are, without exception, of the belief WMD still remain in Iraq and the Hussein regime never has (and never will) relinquished its attempt to rebuild the WMD programs that were severely disrupted by UN inspectors following the first Gulf War.

There was no palpable dissent within the international community on these fundamental questions. The debate was entirely over how much Iraq still possessed and how fast it was rebuilding its WMD programs, not on the fundamental questions. As Kay makes perfectly clear, this was the consensus even among UN weapons inspectors right up to the invasion.

Kay admitted the weapons inspections were effective only in light of information made possible by the invasion. It was impossible to determine until now how effective UN inspections were because the Hussein regime continued to be fundamentally deceptive, restrict or stall access, covertly monitor their activities to predict where inspectors would go next, and generally behave as though it had something to hide right up to the invasion.

Two comments to add:

1. No one is "blaming" the Clinton admin. It is being used as corroborating testimony. See the Ken Pollack article for more infio.
2. What is the basis for continuing to use Scott Ritter as "proof" of anything. He left Iraq in '98, said right after that they had probably destroyed most of the WMD but Saddam could regenerate it quickly if not watched, and he hasn't been in the inspections/intel loop since. So exactly how does he know in 2002 that there isn't any WMD in Iraq. Answer: he doesn't but it isn't stopping him from making pronouncements to the contrary. Oh and by pure coincidence he has a book coming out at the same time. How he ever managed to write that book I'll never know withas much time as he apparently spent in chat rooms and Burger King.

 

[DealMonkey]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
And again, the facts remain indisputable:

Clinton cites Iraq WMD threat throughout his tenure until the day he left office in 2001.

** Doesn't matter - he did not invade Iraq.

Clinton Administration lobbies for and, with the help of Democratic allies in Congress (e.g. John Kerry), passes the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change in Iraq the official policy of the United States, militarily if required; citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD.

** Big deal - putting our little dreams on paper means something? Saddam clearly didn't give two craps about it.

Several Western countries with capable intelligence assets from the mid-90s right up to the invasion are, without exception, of the belief WMD still remain in Iraq and the Hussein regime never has (and never will) relinquished its attempt to rebuild the WMD programs that were severely disrupted by UN inspectors following the first Gulf War.

** Again, doesn't matter. Those other countries didn't invade either.

There was no palpable dissent within the international community on these fundamental questions. The debate was entirely over how much Iraq still possessed and how fast it was rebuilding its WMD programs, not on the fundamental questions. As Kay makes perfectly clear, this was the consensus even among UN weapons inspectors right up to the invasion.

** Again, didn't attack. Maybe because they didn't really know what was going on in Iraq? Intel is just another word for our best guess.

Kay admitted the weapons inspections were effective only in light of information made possible by the invasion. It was impossible to determine until now how effective UN inspections were because the Hussein regime continued to be fundamentally deceptive, restrict or stall access, covertly monitor their activities to predict where inspectors would go next, and generally behave as though it had something to hide right up to the invasion.

** The old shoot 'em in the head and check their pockets after their dead routine. Wow, that's so enlightened of us. Maybe we should try that with North Korea. We can check 'em for nukes after they're all dead.

 

[Spencer278]

Originally posted by: Ultra Quiet

Originally posted by: Ldir

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Originally posted by: Bowfinger
They can solve the problem nicely if they just keep Cheney and Rumsfeld away from Langley.

Yes, because the Clinton Administration's consistent citation of intelligence data to support the Iraq = WMD conclusion was...ehhh...the fault of Cheney and Rumsfeld?

Dear Doofus,

Clinton is old news. Clinton is not president. Clinton did not doctor intelligence. Clinton did not invade Iraq. Dubya is president. Dubya's keepers did doctor intelligence. Dubya did invade Iraq. Please pull your head out of Dubya's ass.

Love,
People who can read

Dear fvcktard
Please explain how it is that Clinton and his keepers arrived at the same conclusions as this administration wrt to Iraq. Were Willy's keepers doctoring intelligence too? Is it your contention that every time there is a new President, we should do a data dump and start from scratch or should we take what we have learned in the past and mold it into a comprehensive body of knowledge. Please bring you stand-by brain cell on line before attempting to answer. Oh and BTW please your head out of you own ass, I hear your bf is kinda horny.

Love,
People aren't driven by hatred, can read without moving their lips and actually understand what they are reading.

So bush was using 4+ year old intelligence. I think I missed the part of the bush war speech about clintion knew where the WMD are. I also don't recall any * next to bushes claims stating to the effect I haven't bothered to find any new intelligence. Maybe Saddam was scared by clinton so he got ride of the weapons and bush was a litle slow in figuring it out.

 

[seawolf21]

Let the finger pointing begin!

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/01/30/sprj.nirq.wmd/index.html

 

[Pliablemoose]

Holy crap, you guys ought to be writing textbooks for Georgia:|

Clinton didn't trust the military or the intelligence community & essentially disembowled them during his 8 years in office, and you blame the Bush administration for faulty/poor intelligence?

 

[Spencer278]

Originally posted by: Pliablemoose
Holy crap, you guys ought to be writing textbooks for Georgia:|

Clinton didn't trust the military or the intelligence community & essentially disembowled them during his 8 years in office, and you blame the Bush administration for faulty/poor intelligence?

So it is Clinton's fault Bush lied about the WMD because Clinton was smart enought to knew bad intel and if Clinton was a dumd as bush he would have invaded iraq?

 

[chowderhead]

To bring honor and respect back to the White House, GWB is now spinning away any personal responsibility for relying on faulty intel and shadowy advisors.

Just who ordered the invasion of Iraq? was it the CIA?
NO. It was our so-called President - GWB. The era of personal responsibility is over!

"There's an old saying in Tennessee ? I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee ? that says, fool me once, shame on ? shame on you. Fool me ? you can't get fooled again." ?GWB

 

[Dman877]

The real problem is we have very few friends in that part of the world. Can't even buy em.

But it wasn't the CIA's fault in Iraq, all they told Bush was that they couldn't proove Saddam DIDN'T have WMD. well it's kind of hard to prove any country doesn't have wmd now isn't it.

 

[Dman877]

Originally posted by: Genesys

They can solve the problem nicely if they just keep Cheney and Rumsfeld away from Langley.

the problem never would have happened if Clinton hadn't been voted into office...TWICE! Once was bad enough, but 8 years of military disarmerment and laxidasical handling of the CIA!

Yes, we definitely need more bombs and tanks to combat terrorism.

 

[Moonbeam]

CIA

Bad boys, whatcha want, whatcha want,
Whatcha gonna do when Director Tenet's Agents come for you.
Tell me, whatcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do? Yeahhh?

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

When you were eight
And you had bad traits
You go to school and you learn the golden rule
So why are you acting like a bloody fool
If you get hot you must get cool

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

You chuck it on that one
You chuck it on this one
You chuck it on mother and
You chuck it on you father
You chuck it on you brother and
You chuck it on you sister
You chuck it on that one and you chuck it on me

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

Nobody naw give you no break
Police naw give you no break
Soldier man-a give you no break
Not even you idren naw give you no break

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

Why did you have to act so mean?
Don't you know you're a human being,
Born of a mother with the love of a father,
Reflections come and reflections go
I know sometimes - you want to let go, hey, hey, hey
I know sometimes - you want to let go, wohh!

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

Your too bad.

Your too good.

Your too bad

Your too good.

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

You chuck it on that one
You chuck it on this one
You chuck it on mother and
You chuck it on you father
You chuck it on you brother and
You chuck it on you sister
You chuck it on that one and you chuck it on me.

Bad boys bad boys
Watcha gonna do, whatcha gonna do
when they come for you
Bad boys, bad boys
Watcha gonna do, watcha gonna do
when they come for you

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: seawolf21
Let the finger pointing begin!

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/01/30/sprj.nirq.wmd/index.html[/q

Linked for my convenience

 

[Bowfinger]

Originally posted by: tcsenter
And again, the facts remain indisputable:

Clinton cites Iraq WMD threat throughout his tenure until the day he left office in 2001.

Clinton Administration lobbies for and, with the help of Democratic allies in Congress (e.g. John Kerry), passes the Iraq Liberation Act making regime change in Iraq the official policy of the United States, militarily if required; citing Hussein's continued effort to develop WMD and the extreme likelihood Iraq still possesses unknown quantities of WMD.

Several Western countries with capable intelligence assets from the mid-90s right up to the invasion are, without exception, of the belief WMD still remain in Iraq and the Hussein regime never has (and never will) relinquished its attempt to rebuild the WMD programs that were severely disrupted by UN inspectors following the first Gulf War.

There was no palpable dissent within the international community on these fundamental questions. The debate was entirely over how much Iraq still possessed and how fast it was rebuilding its WMD programs, not on the fundamental questions. As Kay makes perfectly clear, this was the consensus even among UN weapons inspectors right up to the invasion.

Kay admitted the weapons inspections were effective only in light of information made possible by the invasion. It was impossible to determine until now how effective UN inspections were because the Hussein regime continued to be fundamentally deceptive, restrict or stall access, covertly monitor their activities to predict where inspectors would go next, and generally behave as though it had something to hide right up to the invasion.

And again, you ignore the issues and try to divert attention away from the Bush-lite administration. Kindly show me where I asserted Clinton had no intelligence re. Iraq having WMDs. You can't because I didn't. That Clinton had intelligence is obvious and irrelevant. That other countries had intelligence is equally obvious and irrelevant. Would you also like me to stipulate that the sun rises in the east?

The real issue is what each President did with that intel, and how Bush's minions trumped up both Clinton-era intel and more current intel to support their predetermined agenda. Whatever the Clinton administration believed about Iraq, they didn't lie about their intel to Congress and the American public, and they didn't consider Iraq so threatening that it justified an invasion. Whatever other countries believed about Iraq, most didn't consider it so threatening that it justified an invasion, even when the U.S. tried to buy or extort their support.

No, that dishonor belongs to Bush. Spin it to your heart's content, but Bush and his minions willfully manipulated intelligence data and analysis to justify their lust to invade Iraq. While Clinton may have provided some of the thread, Bush wove it into a tapestry of lies.


Now, will you go back and address the points I raised, or should I just chalk this up as another example of your lack of credibilty?

 

[Bowfinger]

Originally posted by: Ultra Quiet
Two comments to add:

1. No one is "blaming" the Clinton admin. It is being used as corroborating testimony. See the Ken Pollack article for more infio.
2. What is the basis for continuing to use Scott Ritter as "proof" of anything. He left Iraq in '98, said right after that they had probably destroyed most of the WMD but Saddam could regenerate it quickly if not watched, and he hasn't been in the inspections/intel loop since. So exactly how does he know in 2002 that there isn't any WMD in Iraq. Answer: he doesn't but it isn't stopping him from making pronouncements to the contrary. Oh and by pure coincidence he has a book coming out at the same time. How he ever managed to write that book I'll never know withas much time as he apparently spent in chat rooms and Burger King.

1. You may not be blaming Clinton, but some people are trying to do exactly that. He is an easy distraction from the real issues of how the Bush administration manipulated intel, be it Clinton-era or something more current.

2. I mention Ritter because he and his team were the source of most of Clinton's best, direct intel. As much as any one person, Ritter is the first-hand authority on what Iraq did and did not have right up until the 1998 bombings. He is also uniquely positioned, at least among public sources, to assess what happened with Iraq's WMDs during and since 1998. Since people keep suggesting Clinton's intel mitigates Bush's claims, it seems appropriate to include Ritter's views when discussing Clinton-era intelligence.

Ritter's views sharply contradict the worst-case scenarios crafted by Cheney and Rumsfeld. Ritter's view are also largely consistent with Blix's findings, both of whom have proved to be pretty accurate since the invasion. In short, Ritter and Blix serve to refute those who claim there was no dissenting views or that Bush did the best we could with the intel we had.