   Scott Ritter and others speak out on intel failures
  Im simply amazed this guy still doesnt get any press coverage in US media sources.Anyway here is a realplayer media source of him speaking out against David Kay's allegations that the missing WMD are nothing but an intelligence failure.linkageBasically he says that from his contacts with US/UK/Israeli intelligence, the intelligence community knew WMD did not exist and intelligence was distorted and fabricated by the Blair/Bush admins to make a case for war.I myself distinctly remember Rice and Powell making comments in 2001 that Saddam Hussein was not even a threat to his immediate neighbors. What the hell happened from 2001 and 2002 to change their minds? Did the CIA change their minds? Ray McGovern brings up this point in the link below:Ray McGovern (retired CIA analyst) linkageRitter and others were right on the WMD. Will they be right about this as well?Probably not as long as the Bush adminstration gets to hand-pick the commission to investigate itself in this matter.Regardless of what conclusions are arrived at by this commission (which we can be sure wont issue a report till after the election) we can all comfortably sit back and still back the Bush adminstration! Why?Cause hey we got rid of Saddam Hussein!And...the Iraqi people just *luvs* us cause we are giving them a unELECTED democracy!!!    *does the happy dance*[edited by - Cyberstorm on February 5, 2004 3:59:41 PM]
  he gets to pick his own commitee??why arnt you americans rioting? that would make the investigation on blair look like absolute truth...really who comes up with this stuff? isnt it supposed to be an independant investigation? this is getting more and more like some circus!... ;quote:Original post by Eelco  why arnt you americans rioting?Dude. Do you even read the news?;quote:Original post by CyberStorm  I myself distinctly remember Rice and Powell making comments in 2001 that Saddam Hussein was not even a threat to his immediate neighbors. What the hell happened from 2001 and 2002 to change their minds? Did the CIA change their minds? Here''s something to consider:quote:The first official army history of the Iraq war reveals that United States forces were plagued by supply shortages, radios that could not reach far-flung troops and virtually no reliable intelligence on how Saddam Hussein would defend Baghdad. While it is well known that many army units ran low on fuel and water as fast-moving armoured forces raced towards the Iraqi capital, the study offers vivid new details of a supply system nearing collapse.So, our army was ready to fall apart at the seams, and yet we STILL were able to take the entire country in two months.I''d love to know how anyone with a brain that actually works could possibly consider Hussein a threat to anyone.Other interesting tidbits:The 45-minute claim used by both Bush and Blair was actually referring to conventional munitions, and had nothing to do with WMD''s of any type.UK intelligence knew before the war that Iraq had no WMD''sIsrael''s Mossad agency probably knew Hussein didn''t have WMD''sBiggest political fuckup I''ve ever seen, and lots of heads should be rolling for it. But noone cares about this, and everyone is aflutter about Janet Jackson''s nipple and Gay marriages instead. ;  So it wasn''t all about oil! It was simply a zionist conspiracy! That makes so much sense. NitzanMember, New Zionist Oil Mafia ;Confronting the Theocracy of Evil by Scott Ritterquote:...Others were less skeptical. The Chair of the Select Committee on Defense, Bruce George, listened patiently as I took apart Tony Blair''s case for Iraq''s retention of WMD, piece by piece, in the back of the Member''s cafeteria. When I finished, George shrugged his shoulders. "I still believe that this war was justified over the issue of WMD," he said, "if for no other reason than Saddam''s ongoing intent to acquire them in the face of UN inspections.""Intent?" I asked, incredulously. "What intent? No one has made a case that Saddam was attempting to either hold on the hidden WMD, or reacquire new capabilities."George was taken aback by my words. "Certainly you can''t be saying you don''t believe Saddam wanted WMD?" he asked."What I believe and what I know are two different things," I replied. "Our two nations went to war because our respective leaders said they knew Iraq possessed WMD, that they knew Saddam intended to acquire WMD. It has turned out that there has been no WMD found in Iraq, and no hard evidence to sustain any ongoing acquisition of WMD by Saddam.""Yes, we know that," George repeated. "But we also know that Saddam intended to get these weapons in defiance of the UN, and for that reason he had to be removed.""How do you know this?" I asked. "On what basis can you back this up?""Because," George said, with a smile, "Saddam is evil."And with that, the discussion ended.I had come face to face with a phenomenon I have come to describe as the ''theocracy of evil.'' Going beyond mere political ideology, the theocracy of evil encompasses a faith-based value system that embraces a simplistic ''good versus evil'' opposition. If Saddam is evil, such thinking holds, then evil must be confronted, and such niceties as fact and fact-based logic no longer apply. As such, WMD became simply an enabling issue -- something designed to focus the attention of the public while those in charge pursued the broader agenda of confronting evil. The ''theocracy of evil'' establishes a deeply ingrained mindset that may be the reason why the U.S. intelligence community failed to accurately assess Iraq''s WMD capabilities; why Congress failed to adequately debate the issue of Iraq before voting to go to war; and why the American public willingly allowed itself to be drawn into a war without demanding more proof to back up the Bush administration''s allegations. If Saddam is evil, such thinking holds, then he surely intends to acquire WMD, and as such every bit of data collected regarding Iraq must be assessed with that assumption foremost in mind.President George W. Bush repeatedly used the bully pulpit of the presidency to preach the ''theocracy of evil'', most notably on Jan. 20, 2003, during his State of the Union address. "Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror," the President said. "States like these and their terrorist allies constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger." ...The pervasiveness in America today of the ''theocracy of evil'' has led to a widespread ''ends justify the means'' mentality that may prove fatal to a democratic institution founded on the principle of the rule of law. Andrew Mackinlay has made it clear that as far as he is concerned, democratic principles will trump the ''theocracy of evil'' in Great Britain. "Politics be damned," the influential member of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs said to me during my stay in London. "If it turns out that the Blair Government lied or misrepresented fact to make its case for war, then the defense of democracy requires nothing less than coming to a full accounting over what transpired, regardless of the consequences. I''m certain my constituents would demand nothing less of me."Looking at the political landscape in the United States today, I wonder if there are politicians today from either major party who are willing to do the same in defense of American democracy, or constituents with the courage to demand it. ;  Don''t you just love it when the media censors itself?It''s all Rupert Murdock''s fault, in the end. 