The Iraq Thread 2

[theavonlady 2]

Yes and the intelligence view during Clinton and under TBA was that Sadam was not a threat. Otherwise Clinton would have invaded or TBA would have the day they were elected.

Clinton believes Iraq had weapons of mass destruction: Portugal PM.

On the one hand, this article states:

Former US president Bill Clinton said in October during a visit to Portugal that he was convinced Iraq had weapons of mass destruction up until the fall of Saddam Hussein, Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso said.

On the other hand, it ends with:

An influential Washington think-tank (the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) said Thursday the Bush administration "systematically" inflated the threat from Iraq's weapons programmes in a bid to strengthen its push for military action against Iraq last year.

It sounds like Clinton had no doubts, in which case, why didn't he go to war? It doesn't sound like he thought that Saddam possessed no more than three mustard gas shells.

As for the Carnegie Endowment, just the other day they stated:

Joseph Cirincione of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said Kay's resignation and his statement to Reuters implicitly contradicted both Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

"Kay is a very careful man who chooses his words with great precision. He is trying to set the record straight and be true to his profession," he said.

Seems like some people want to have their cake and eat it, too.

/avon goes off for a tea and cake break

[Acecombat 0]

Interesting to see the Portuguese PM quoting Billy was he ...... (ah forget it)

Walkers right however if the intelligence community had found the WMD threat then they would have gone in before its just tha TBA exaggerated it a LOT on the basis that Saddam could attack america or th world (perhaps ) with them and created a paranoia since people are suffering from it in large doses after 9/11 the ruse worked ....

[Balschoiw 0]

Meanwhile in Iraq:

BBC on downed helos and such.

Quote[/b] ]On Saturday, six US soldiers died in separate attacks in Iraq:

One died from wounds sustained when insurgents attacked his armoured vehicle with a rocket-propelled grenade in the town of Baiji, north of Baghdad

Three were killed in Khaldiya, west of Baghdad, after an improvised car bomb blew up at a US checkpoint

Two died when a roadside bomb detonated as their convoy drove near the flashpoint town of Falluja.

An earlier attack in Samarra also left four Iraqis dead and dozens injured.

While Jack Straw has taken some pills as it looks.

War "more" justified now claims Straw.

A terrrible nerd

[walker 0]

Hi Avon

It is like this.

When the US cabinet has a defence meeting there is a standard part of the agenda that gives a list of iminent threats to the nation.

This is done as a threat assesment by the CIA Pentagon and other Military and Foriegn offices.

Every nation friend or foe and every organisation is threat assessed by whole bunch of criteria. The UK is on that list (we have atom bombs) Israel is on that list even little old amnesty international but those are probably not considered an imediate threat.

The threat of Sadam was that the US sold him WMD and the UN could not find all that the US expected him to have. The US never had any real figures for it or how much got used on Iran or their own people when Rumsfeld was shaking his hand but they used the precautionary principle and said what is the maximum the Iraqis could have manufactured.

Those are the figures used but they are not real they just a best guess calculation of a worst case scenario.

The next factor is delivery system. The plain fact is that the Iraqis have never had more than battle field delivery systems for Chemical weapons capable or reaching a few tens of miles and a few tens of rockets capable of dlivering enough to knock out say one city within a thousand miles. A tertiary delivery system would be terrorists which Sadam has never realy supported (too afraid they might be used on him)

The final factor is political will. Sadam would never have used WMD on the US or its allies. He was far more interested in staying in power. His own Bath party would have killed him if he had ever considered winding the US up to the point where they turned Iraq into a Nuclear wasteland.

The overall threat assesment was along the lines of keep an eye on him but he was not an imediate threat.

TBA new Sadam was not a threat but they needed a bogey man they could get as they had failed to get Bin Laden. So they put in a bunch of amatuers and set them to work to cherry pick rumours, inuendo, hearsay and down right lies from original intelligence source material.

Normaly intelligence goes through trained analysts who cross reference it and search back to original source. Look for corroborating facts, doccumetation, multiple sources etc.

Donald Rumsfeld's private Secret Service did none of that but even that was not enough they then reworded the reports.

In the UK John Scarllet did the same at the behest of TBA2

Like I said Garbage IN Garbage OUT.

And the proof it was garbage?

No WMD.

TBA and TBA2 programed their own Garbage production machines hence that is the "Political Gotcha"

Kind Regards Walker

[bn880 5]

I agree with Walker, there are confirmed reports that there was a push by the Whitehouse to point fingers at Iraq and bring up WMD issues, else you were not doing your job.

David Kay is obviously not clued in on this intel either.

[Acecombat 0]

OMG what the f**k is this dude HE IS ON S-O-B liar this straw guy

STRAW said:

Quote[/b] ]"We were never saying that Saddam Hussein posed an imminent threat to the United Kingdom," he told the programme.

STRAW said:

Quote[/b] ]"Our judgment was, and my judgment remains, that Saddam Hussein did indeed pose a threat to Britain's security, as to the European Union's and the rest of the world.

Talk about goddamn hypocrisy and he got away with this in a mere SECONDS of one another probably , didnt the reporter ask him what he was blabbering?

[theavonlady 2]

The threat of Sadam was that the US sold him WMD and the UN could not find all that the US expected him to have.

Didn't the UN expect Iraq to have it, too, especially when Iraq kicked inspectors out for a period of 4 years?

And speaking of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, they're beginning to appear as some of the biggest blunderers themselves. From CNN, September 2002:

"Iraq continues to possess several tons of chemical weapons agents, enough to kill thousands and thousands of civilians or soldiers," said Jon Wolfsthal, an analyst with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

More:

"The concern is they either have on hand -- or could quickly re-create the capability to produce -- vast amounts of anthrax, tons of material, compared with the several grams of material that literally shut down the U.S. postal system last year," said Wolfsthal, the deputy director of Carnegie's Non-Proliferation Project, which does research and analysis on the spread of weapons of mass destruction.

And from the same article, read VP Chenney's words very carefully:

Vice President Dick Cheney has pushed for a pre-emptive strike, warning that the "risk of inaction is far greater than the risk of action."

You can go on with your cliche's like "private secret service". I don't see a reason to buy it.

I'll follow the Carnegie Endowment's suggestion to listen to Mr. Kay's words very carefully. And he's not saying anything like what you're conjuring up here.

BTW, why the blame on the US for supplying Iraq? Wasn't it Germany?

Expurgated portions of Iraq's December 7 report to the UN Security Council show that German firms made up the bulk of suppliers for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs. What's galling is that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and his minions have long known the facts, German intelligence services know them and have loads of information on what Saddam Hussein is hiding, and Schroeder nonetheless plays holier than thou to an easily manipulated, pacifist-inclined domestic audience.

Interestingly, in that same column, the German's, too, thought that Iraq was packed with WMDs:

Friedbert Pflueger, foreign policy spokesman of the main opposition Christian Democratic parties and an embittered critic of Schroeder's and Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer's Iraq policy, last Thursday accused the red-green coalition government of deliberately keeping the German and world public uninformed of BND (German foreign intelligence service) evidence and assessments on the continued existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). "If we trust our [intelligence] services, and I do, then we know that there exist weapons of mass destruction in Iraq," said Pflueger, and referred to a November 13, 2002, BND briefing of members of parliament's foreign affairs committee in which relevant information was disclosed. As a member of parliament, added Pflueger, he was bound by his secrecy oath not to pass on such information, but challenged Schroeder to make it public forthwith. This was necessary, he said, "so that Herr Schroeder cannot continue to spread the impression that the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq is a figment of George W Bush's imagination".

[theavonlady 2]

I agree with Walker, there are confirmed reports that there was a push by the Whitehouse to point fingers at Iraq and bring up WMD issues, else you were not doing your job.

David Kay is obviously not clued in on this intel either.  

But you are.................. of course.

[Acecombat 0]

Hy Avon you need your memory refreshened here you go:

http://www.thememoryhole.org/corp/iraq-suppliers.htm

Go there and get the full list of companies Germany wasnt alone n it.

More here:

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/03/02/IN123519.DTL

Quote[/b] ]Embarrassed, no doubt, by revelations of their own complicity in Mideast arms proliferation, the U.S.-led Security Council censored the entire dossier, deleting more than 100 names of companies and groups that profited from Iraq's crimes and aggression. The censorship came too late, however. The long list -- including names of large U.S. corporations -- Dupont, Hewlett-Packard, and Honeywell -- was leaked to a German daily, Die Tageszeitung. Despite the Security Council coverup, the truth came out

Phyllis Bennis, author of "Before and After," notes that "the highest quality seed-stock for anthrax germs (along with those of botulism, E. coli, and a host of other deadly diseases) were shipped to Iraq by U.S. companies, legally, under an official U.S. Department of Commerce license throughout the 1980s." A Senate Banking subcommittee report in 1994 confirmed that shipments of biological germ stock continued well into 1989

Uncle Sam at your service.

[walker 0]

Hi Avon

The US Intelligence threat assesment of Sadam was that he was not an imediate threat.

It is a fact; other wise TBA would have invaded when they were elected.

As you asked this is how the US sold Sadam the WMD

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-528574,00.html

Rumsfeld Shook Sadam's hand on the deal you may have seen the film.

Kind Regards Walker

[theavonlady 2]

Hy Avon you need your memory refreshened here you go:

http://www.thememoryhole.org/corp/iraq-suppliers.htm

Go there and get the full list of companies Germany wasnt alone n it.

I never said Germany was alone. According to the articl I linked to, German companies made up the bulk of suppliers, according to an Iraqi report submitted to the UN Security Council.

To detail this point, your Memory Hole link points to this Guardian article as reference.

In fact, according to the Guardian, it may have been the US that intentionally leaked the UN report details:

There were suspicions among UN diplomats of an American-inspired leak designed to embarrass Germany. "This is not news," the diplomat said. "One would guess that this is more mischievous than generally revealing."

Oh, BTW, thanks for the link!

[theavonlady 2]

The US Intelligence threat assesment of Sadam was that he was not an imediate threat.

It is a fact; other wise TBA would have invaded when they were elected.

Just like Al Queda was assumed not to be a threat throughout both the Clinton and Bush administrations.

That only enforces even more a pattern of immense intelligence blunders in the US and not the conspiracy hype you're spinning.

Quote[/b] ]As you asked this is how the US sold Sadam the WMD

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-528574,00.html

Rumsfeld Shook Sadam's hand on the deal you may have seen the film.

I've seen it and I'm not arguing about it. (Can't see The Times article, however. Requires registration).

[denoir 0]

Didn't the UN expect Iraq to have it, too, especially when Iraq kicked inspectors out for a period of 4 years?

I see Avon that you continuing your style of making up facts if the truth doesn't fit.

The UN inspectors were not kicked out of Iraq. They left on their own accord because they weren't happy with the cooperation of Iraqi officials.

[theavonlady 2]

Didn't the UN expect Iraq to have it, too, especially when Iraq kicked inspectors out for a period of 4 years?

I see Avon that you continuing your style of making up facts if the truth doesn't fit.

The UN inspectors were not kicked out of Iraq. They left on their own accord because they weren't happy with the cooperation of Iraqi officials.

Thank you for correction. I erred.

Did I err anywhere else here on a more relevant point or have you finished your nit-picking?

[denoir 0]

It's very relevant as it's implying that Iraq was actively sabotaging the UN inspections. And this was extensivly used as an argument for the war.

What puts the final nail in the coffin for Bush & Blair is that they're still repeating the same lies. By now even a mentally challanged sheep understands that Iraq was never the threat that they said it. FFS, Bush mentioned David Kay's investigation only a couple of days ago, implying that they had uncovered relevant evidence. A claim that was obviously firmly denied by Kay himself when he resigned last friday.

[theavonlady 2]

It's very relevant as it's implying that Iraq was actively sabotaging the UN inspections. And this was extensivly used as an argument for the war.

LOL! There are three relevant points here:

1. You yourself say they left because of poor Iraqi cooperation.

2. There was no inspection or supervision process over those 4 long years, with the prior assumptions of weapons quantities and Saddam's intentions in place.

3. I'm not disagreeing with what you're saying, specifically "this was extensively used as an argument for the war".

[denoir 0]

1. You yourself say they left because of poor Iraqi cooperation.

And this was a wrong assumption from the part of the inspectors (or better to say the nations that demanded their withdrawal until Iraq comes clean). Iraq limited their access to presidential palaces, citing national security and that it was the original deal. Wrong assumptions were made that Saddam had chemical processing plants in his bedroom.

Quote[/b] ]2. There was no inspection or supervision process over those 4 long years, with the prior assumptions of weapons quantities and Saddam's intentions in place.

Again, the wrong assumptions were made. I can understand why, but this becomes very serious when you start killing people over it by going to war. The last round of inspection under Blix had full access everywhere and did not find any evidence of WMD. This should have cast some doubts about the previous assumptions that were made. Instead Bush & Co pushed for an immidiate war, before the inspections were complete.

Quote[/b] ]3. I'm not disagreeing with what you're saying, specifically "this was extensively used as an argument for the war".

Then why are you calling it irrelevant then?

[theavonlady 2]

Then why are you calling it irrelevant then?

Because whether the UN was kicked out or left for lack of cooperation (and I'm not arguing about that), Iraq brought further suspicion on itself, and not just the US' but the UN as a whole.

Tons of wrong asumptions were made. Which is exactly David Kay's point in highlighting a major failure in the US security and intelligence system.

edit: Must go - bye!

[walker 0]

Hi Avon

For when you get back I suggest you look up via a search The Office of Special Plans and Donald Rumsfeld.

That explains how the risks were miss assesed that it was not an Intelligence Failure that it was a failure due to The Office of Special Plans Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service.

I know a lot of the Pentagaon CIA and other Inelligence people are very pissed at TBA for blaming them for the failure of US intelligence reports when they did not write them. It was after all The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service that wrote the failed intelligence. I know the CIA has already warned TBA off on that.

The extraordinary gall of TBA and TBA2 or any one else blaming the main stream intelligence community who put their lives on the line, for failures caused by using The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service and a castrated John Scarllet to filter the intel to TBA and TBA2's contrived reality is sickening.

Rumour has it that members of The Office of Special Plans are being "resigned" or sent to work in far off places as we write. They are trying to hide them before the elections.

In the UK the Military Intelligence have warned off TBA2 as well:

http://www.sundayherald.com/39548

Kind Regards Walker

[bn880 5]

I agree with Walker, there are confirmed reports that there was a push by the Whitehouse to point fingers at Iraq and bring up WMD issues, else you were not doing your job.

David Kay is obviously not clued in on this intel either.

But you are.................. of course.

Hell yeah, it's not exactly secret info in 2004.

[denoir 0]

Hell yeah, it's not exactly secret info in 2004.  

No kidding. Last time any lies were so transparent and easily spotted was when Fredric and his Fifteen Frolicing Fornicators claimed that their show "Fabulous thing that rhymes with "luck" " was "family entertainment".

[Balschoiw 0]

Quote[/b] ]"Fabulous thing that rhymes with "luck" " was "family entertainment".

You saved my day denoir

[walker 0]

Hi all

With another three US soldiers killed in Iraq

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53077-2004Jan27.html Bringing total US dead to 6 on Tuesday

Another three US soldiers are MIA

http://www.tribnet.com/news/story/4671204p-4625368c.html

Coalition casulties have once again topped 40 this month and inocent Iraqis die in in unknown numbers as Paul Bremmer censors that news.

And all for what so that TBA and TBA2 can cover up the fact that the miserable failure George Bush cannot find Bin Laden.

Sick of these politicians Walker

[NavyEEL 0]

Hi all

With another three US soldiers killed in Iraq

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53077-2004Jan27.html Bringing total US dead to 6 on Tuesday

Another three US soldiers are MIA

http://www.tribnet.com/news/story/4671204p-4625368c.html

Coalition casulties have once again topped 40 this month and inocent Iraqis die in in unknown numbers as Paul Bremmer censors that news.

And all for what so that TBA and TBA2 can cover up the fact that the miserable failure George Bush cannot find Bin Laden.

Sick of these politicians Walker

What do US soldiers dying in Iraq have to do with finding bin Laden? And oh by the way, it's not

Bush who is out looking for bin Laden--it is the intelligence community and our military. Bush gave the order, he doesn't carry out the mission.

Coalition casualties and even civilian casualties are to be expected in war, particularly in a war where it is often unknown whether someone is hostile or friendly until it is too late. The deaths in this war are still far less than any previous action and are quite acceptable, considering the amount of land that was covered in the process.

[walker 0]

What do US soldiers dying in Iraq have to do with finding bin Laden?  And oh by the way, it's not

Bush who is out looking for bin Laden--it is the intelligence community and our military.  Bush gave the order, he doesn't carry out the mission.

Dear NavyEEL

If you look back over my last few posts you will see the reason I say it is TBA, TBA2 and obviously as leader of TBA by extension George Bush Jr's failure with regard to not finding Bin Laden that caused GW2 and simultaneously reduces the possibility of finding Bin Laden. In particular look at my post in the following section of this thread.

http://www.flashpoint1985.com/cgi-bin....st=4395

To summarize the miserable failure George Bush, TBA and TBA2 failed their nations in the following ways.

After a successful campaign in Afghanistan removing the Taliban TBA frittered away that victory by diverting needlessly to a second front; Iraq.

TBA did so because they were failing to capture Bin Laden and needed a victory for election year.

So in the US TBA set up The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service that cherry picked doubtful  rumors, innuendo, hearsay and down right lies from original intelligence source material to give an excuse for a needless war on Iraq.

In the UK they got a castrated John Scarllet, due to retire and wanting his knight hood or whatever, to do the same.

As result the intelligence stream that was reaching TBA and TBA2 was totally polluted, and the garbage intel' was the very effluent TBA and TBA2 were producing. Garbage IN Garbage OUT.

The intel on the hunt for Bin Laden was soon coming a poor second to the sewage coming from TBA's and TBA2's own rear ends as TBA and TBA2 devoured their own feces to try and come up with false intel on non existent WMD and false links between Sadam and Al Qaeda.

There has been no failure of intelligence that is myth put out by TBA and TBA2 to blame someone else for the war on Iraq and the failure to find Bin Laden.

TBA has not been listening to intelligence for over two years they have been listening to The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service.

TBA2 has not listened to intelligence on Iraq for over a year it has been listening to castrated John Scarllet on Iraq it has even allowed a Newspaper Editor and his lackeys to decide how the intelligence reports should be written. It is almost as bad as what The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service has done to the intelligence that was getting to TBA.

The CIA, Pentagon and other professional intelligence analysts have not been able to speak to the US President for all that time instead they have to go and speak in meetings with The Office of Special Plans, Rumsfeld's Amateur Private Secret Service who often don't want to hear their reports as they dont jell with what TBA wants to hear.

As consequence TBA and by extension George Bush took its eye off the ball. Afghanistan and the war on terrorism has taken second place as TBA searched for an easy victory to; whit attacking an easy target, Iraq to oust a tin pot dictator in time for the next US elections.

To buy this with coalition and innocent Iraqi lives and then blame the failures on the Intelligence community as TBA and its apologists are doing now is sick.

Annoyed walker