Journal DaytonCIM's Journal: We must put these lies behind us! 18
Bush adviser: Intelligence accusations 'flat wrong'
Monday, November 14, 2005; Posted: 4:05 a.m. EST (09:05 GMT)
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush's national security adviser defended the administration Sunday against accusations that it misled the nation about the need for war with Iraq as Democrats stepped up their attacks on the president's candor.
Stephen Hadley told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer" that those claims were "flat wrong."
"We need to put this debate behind us," he said. "It's unfair to the country. It's unfair to the men and women in uniform risking their lives to make this country safe."
Top Bush administration officials argued before the 2003 invasion that the regime of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons and was working toward a nuclear weapon.
Hadley said the intelligence Bush used for those arguments "was roughly the same intelligence that the Clinton administration saw."
"They drew the conclusion that Saddam Hussein was a threat to peace, that he had weapons of mass destruction. They acted against him militarily in 1998," Hadley said, referring to the administration of Bill Clinton, a Democrat.
Bush warned that Saddam's government could provide weapons of mass destruction to terrorists, like the al Qaeda network behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.
Those warnings spurred the House and Senate, with the support of many top Democrats, to authorize military action against Iraq. But no such weapons were found once Hussein's government collapsed in April 2003.
Two and a half years later, with more than 2,000 U.S. troops killed in Iraq and support for the war dropping sharply in recent months, Democrats have pounded the administration on the intelligence issue, and the White House has begun firing back.
On Friday, Bush said it was "deeply irresponsible to rewrite how that war began."
Former Sen. John Edwards, the Democrats' 2004 vice presidential candidate, wrote Sunday in The Washington Post that he had made a mistake in voting to give Bush the authorization to go to war.
"The argument for going to war with Iraq was based on intelligence that we now know was inaccurate," Edwards wrote. "The information the American people were hearing from the president -- and that I was being given by our intelligence community -- wasn't the whole story. Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war."
And Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean, who opposed the invasion as a 2004 presidential candidate, said Bush "misled America when he sent us to war." He told NBC's "Meet the Press" that Bush "left the impression" that Iraq was tied to the Sept. 11 attacks.
"He never actually came out and said just that," Dean said. "But in every speech he gave during the campaign and afterwards, he left the impression. He left the impression with 65 percent of the American people, who agreed that Saddam had something to do with 9/11. It was dishonest, what he did."
Hadley acknowledged that there was "an issue of our intelligence, and obviously we need to do a better job of our intelligence."
But he pointed out that investigations by the Senate Intelligence Committee and the bipartisan Silberman-Robb Commission found no evidence to support claims the administration twisted the intelligence to argue that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, as it claimed before the invasion of Iraq.
"Yes, we were all wrong in the intelligence," he said. "But to go back now and to argue that the president somehow manipulated the intelligence -- somehow misled the American people in a rush to war -- is flat wrong."
And Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona -- a member of the Silberman-Robb Commission -- said the accusation that Bush lied to Americans to sell the war is "a lie."
"Were there intelligence failures? Yes," McCain said. "Were they colossal? Yes. But they do not mean in any way that the president lied to the American people."
The renewed controversy over the war, and the related indictment of a top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, also have taken a toll on Bush's own popularity. Numerous recent polls have put his approval rating in the mid- to upper 30 percent range. Senior White House officials told CNN last week they were working on a "campaign-style" response to the criticism.
Poor Edwards (Score:2)
"Any decision about going to war against Iraq must reflect the fact that the clear and present danger to our national security is terrorism. The presence of al Qaeda operatives in Iraq and in so many countries in the Middle East and the rest of the world is troubling."
source [house.gov]
Re:Poor Edwards (Score:1)
And, really, the American right keeps making a big deal about what was said, but that's not so much the issue as what wasn't said. He did make a number of untrue statements, and some of his close advisors told some real whop
Re:Poor Edwards (Score:2)
What the heck are you talking about? Look at the source of that statement.
What's really confounding, however, is that he could be so brazen as to step out there and say "hey, okay, so we led you into a costly, deadly war on information that was almost entirely false, but you really shouldn't care".
Less confounding, IMO, than those who made statements like that quoted earlier, then turn around
Re:Poor Edwards (Score:2)
Washington, D.C. -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement today following a speech on Iraq by Secretary of State Colin Powell at the United Nations:
"The case for disarming Saddam Hussein is strong and well known, and Secretary Powell reiterated that case today. We all share the goal of eliminating weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and in other countries around the world.
"The question is whether war now is the
Re:Poor Edwards (Score:2)
I did. Had I been arguing "Pelosi was pro-war", you'd have a valid point, and the part you put in bold would be relevant. I wasn't, it isn't. Re-read her reference to "The presence of al Qaeda operatives in Iraq" and ask yourself if you can really claim to believe it was just the Bush administration inventing this notion out of thin air, as some claim. Now you come to mention it, there's something screwed up in her logic (according to he
Gotcha! (Score:2)
The interesting thing is that the Robb-Silverman report states that the PDB's were actually less nuanced and more alarmist than the information being given to the Senate at the time.
If Pelosi could make such grandious statements based on less alarmist information it's amazing that Bush was as restrained as he was.
But then we can just go ask George "Slam Dunk" Tenet about how solid the intelligence was.
Re:Gotcha! (Score:1)
You sir (Score:2)
The point of all of this was that the President made the best decision he could based on all of the information provided to him. Pointing to statements of the Dems who are shouting "Bush lied" merely shows that the President made a less alarmist conclusion from more alarmist data.
Bush is not blaming anyone for his decision he is only pointing out that a large portion of the people who are currently criticizing him are basing those critcisms on lies.
Re:You sir (Score:1)
I would call running around talking about mushroom clouds in Smalltown, USA because Iraq posed a (non-existant) threat "alarmist".
Bush is not blaming anyone for his decision he is only pointing out that a large portion of the people who are currently criticizing him are basing those critcisms on lies.
I didn't say he was, I said he's trying to shirk his share
Try this then. (Score:2)
Please point to ANY example of where the administration misconstrued the information it was being supplied by the intelligence community. Reconcile that example with the conclusions from the Robb-Silverman report, the Butler report, AND the SSCI report and THEN we can have a discussion.
Until that point you're just spouting off, taking items out of context, and ig
Re:Try this then. (Score:1)
This is an absolute load of cowdung. Not only was buy-in not complete across the board, almost all of the nations who DID buy in to this - including just about every major nation that followed the U.S. into war - expressed doubt about the necessity of war (Italy, for example). Not only that, there was (now clearly justified, though you americans wil
Astounding (Score:2)
The experts tell you something and you're wrong if you happen to believe it?!?!?
Please do explain how anyone was supposed to be clairavoyent and know for a fact that all of the information being presented to them as facts was wrong.
There are two main points here:
1) The decision was made based on the best information available at the time.
2) The burden belonged to Iraq to prove that they had in fact disarmed. Even Hans Blix pointed out that Iraq was failing in this task.
As for
Re:Poor Edwards (Score:2)
Washington, D.C. -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement today following a speech on Iraq by Secretary of State Colin Powell at the United Nations:
"The case for disarming Saddam Hussein is strong and well known, and Secretary Powell reiterated that case today. We all share the goal of eliminating weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and in other countries around the world.
"The question is whether war now is the only way to rid Iraq of these deadly weapons. I do
Not the point (Score:2)
The fact is that based on the information supplied to everyone the agreed conclusion was that Iraq possessed WMD's, was involved with terrorists (specifically AQ), and remained in material breach of it's UN obligations.
Now if the Dems want to agree on a debate about whether war was the proper way to go then I suppose they can but they also have to face the responsibility for punting their role in declaring war by ceding it to the President
"a lie" != "wrong" (Score:2)
Even assuming the accusation is false, it would seem that Mr. McCain needs learnin' on the difference between "wrong" and "a lie".
Re:"a lie" != "wrong" (Score:2)
No, I don't think he's the one who needs to learn that. At the very least, the accusation itself is closer to being a lie than the position it attacks, since there is no factual basis for it whatsoever; I'd say making a claim you know to have no factual basis qualifies as a "lie", wouldn't you?
Re:"a lie" != "wrong" (Score:2)
I guess you're assuming that said claim has no factual basis, which it doesn't. There's more than enough factual information that the Bush administration knew they were overselling the WMD claims.
If it comes down to
Re:"a lie" != "wrong" (Score:2)
Dubious at best.
If it comes down to interpretation of available information, then my statement stands as correct - this is a difference between "correct" and "wrong", not "truth" and "lie". McCain is simply using inflammatory language as a weapon.
You have part of a point there; it's possible those making the