Goss agrees that Cheney and Rice mischaracterized intelligence reports before war
Rep. Porter Goss, whose nomination as CIA Director was approved today by the Senate Intelligence Committee, had some interesting things to say about the Bush administration’s interpretation of available intelligence before the war in Iraq. From the NYTimes article:
In hearings on Monday, Mr. Goss said that some prewar statements by senior Bush administration officials might well have overstated available intelligence about the threat posed by Iraq.
Under sharp questioning from a Senate Democrat, Mr. Goss said he agreed that statements by Vice President Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice that linked Iraq to the Sept. 11 attacks; to Al Qaeda; and to an active nuclear weapons program appeared to have gone beyond what was spelled out in intelligence reports at the time.
Mr. Goss's concession could fuel further Democratic criticisms that Mr. Bush and his advisers overstated the threat posed by Iraq before the war. Democrats failed this year to persuade Republicans to include conclusions related to the administration's use of intelligence in the Senate Intelligence Committee report on Iraq that was completed in July.
Each example on which Mr. Goss commented was raised by Senator Levin. They included a December 2001 statement in which Mr. Cheney said that a meeting in Prague between a Sept. 11 hijacker, Mohammed Atta, and an Iraqi official had been "pretty well-confirmed" and a separate statement by Ms. Rice in September 2002 saying, first, that aluminum tubes being imported by Iraq "are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs" and, second, that "we know" that Iraq provided some training to Al Qaeda in chemical weapons development.
All three of those assertions have since been discredited, and recent reports by the independent Sept. 11 commission and the Senate Intelligence Committee suggested that all three exceeded the intelligence available at the time.
In each case, Mr. Goss cautioned that he did not know what information Mr. Cheney and Ms. Rice had used as the basis for their statements. He said he still believed that Iraq had provided some unspecified training to Al Qaeda, though he declined to elaborate.
But he said of Mr. Cheney's public assertion on Dec. 9, 2001, about Mr. Atta and the meeting with an Iraqi official in Prague, for example: "I don't think it was as well confirmed perhaps as the vice president thought. But I don't know what was in the vice president's mind, and I've certainly never talked with him about this. So I don't know how he came to that conclusion." Mr. Goss said that Ms. Rice's Sept. 8, 2002, statement about the aluminum tubes appeared to have been "an exaggeration," compared with the findings spelled out in a national intelligence estimate at the same time. He said Ms. Rice's Sept. 25, 2002, statement linking Iraq to training for Al Qaeda, if it were based solely on the evidence that has been made public to date, would have been in a category in which "I would feel obliged to ask the national security adviser what in fact was the basis for that statement."
In hearings on Monday, Mr. Goss said that some prewar statements by senior Bush administration officials might well have overstated available intelligence about the threat posed by Iraq.
Under sharp questioning from a Senate Democrat, Mr. Goss said he agreed that statements by Vice President Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice that linked Iraq to the Sept. 11 attacks; to Al Qaeda; and to an active nuclear weapons program appeared to have gone beyond what was spelled out in intelligence reports at the time.
Mr. Goss's concession could fuel further Democratic criticisms that Mr. Bush and his advisers overstated the threat posed by Iraq before the war. Democrats failed this year to persuade Republicans to include conclusions related to the administration's use of intelligence in the Senate Intelligence Committee report on Iraq that was completed in July.
Each example on which Mr. Goss commented was raised by Senator Levin. They included a December 2001 statement in which Mr. Cheney said that a meeting in Prague between a Sept. 11 hijacker, Mohammed Atta, and an Iraqi official had been "pretty well-confirmed" and a separate statement by Ms. Rice in September 2002 saying, first, that aluminum tubes being imported by Iraq "are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs" and, second, that "we know" that Iraq provided some training to Al Qaeda in chemical weapons development.
All three of those assertions have since been discredited, and recent reports by the independent Sept. 11 commission and the Senate Intelligence Committee suggested that all three exceeded the intelligence available at the time.
In each case, Mr. Goss cautioned that he did not know what information Mr. Cheney and Ms. Rice had used as the basis for their statements. He said he still believed that Iraq had provided some unspecified training to Al Qaeda, though he declined to elaborate.
But he said of Mr. Cheney's public assertion on Dec. 9, 2001, about Mr. Atta and the meeting with an Iraqi official in Prague, for example: "I don't think it was as well confirmed perhaps as the vice president thought. But I don't know what was in the vice president's mind, and I've certainly never talked with him about this. So I don't know how he came to that conclusion." Mr. Goss said that Ms. Rice's Sept. 8, 2002, statement about the aluminum tubes appeared to have been "an exaggeration," compared with the findings spelled out in a national intelligence estimate at the same time. He said Ms. Rice's Sept. 25, 2002, statement linking Iraq to training for Al Qaeda, if it were based solely on the evidence that has been made public to date, would have been in a category in which "I would feel obliged to ask the national security adviser what in fact was the basis for that statement."
posted by JFH @ 1:28 PM
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