The CIA operation that should have prevented the Iraq war

[Barrett808]

Source: AFP

The CIA operation that should have prevented the Iraq war
by Jacques Charmelot
Mon Feb 4, 6:06 PM ET

AMMAN (AFP) - When Saad Tawfiq watched Colin Powell's presentation to the United Nations on February 5 2003 he shed bitter tears as he realised he had risked his life and those of his loved ones for nothing.

As one of Saddam Hussein's most gifted engineers, Tawfiq knew that the Iraqi dictator had shut down his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programmes in 1995 -- and he had told his handlers in US intelligence just that.

And yet here was the then US secretary of state -- Tawfiq's television was able to received international news through a link pirated from Saddam's spies next door -- waving a vial of white powder and telling the UN Security Council a story about Iraqi germ labs.

"When I saw Colin Powell I started crying. Immediately. I knew I had tried and lost," Tawfiq told AFP five years later in the Jordanian capital Amman.

Now in his fifties, a round-faced man with a small moustache and lively eyes behind delicate spectacles, Tawfiq described how the CIA set up an elaborate operation to recruit Iraqi weapons scientists and then ignored the results.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080204/wl_mideast_afp/iraqspyciaweapons

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:banghead:

[baldguy]

1. Except the Bush Regime didn't want to prevent the Iraq War.

They wanted to start it.

[Supersedeas]

12. almost like there is a news dump today, being super Tuesday

[Demeter]

2. A Lot of People Cried That Day

A lot more started crying after.

When will there be enough misery to stop the crime?

[LynnTheDem]

3. Funny how yet again it's "blame the CIA"...when it was the CIA who said

CIA to Bush: 'No clear Evidence of WMD'
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/120103A.shtml

Why the CIA thinks Bush is wrong
The president says the US has to act now against Iraq. The trouble is, his own security services don't agree.
http://www.sundayherald.com/28384

CIA in blow to Bush attack plans
The letter also comes at a time when the CIA is competing with the more hawkish Pentagon, which is also supplying the White House with intelligence on the Iraqi threat.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,808970,00.html

House 'exaggerating Iraqi threat'
Bush's televised address attacked by US intelligence
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,807286,00.html

[AlphaCentauri]

4. Do as I Say, Not as I Do n/t

[leveymg]

7. Those are valuable links to counter those who said the IWR was passed because they were"lied to "

Anyone who wanted to know, and who was brave enough to stand up againt the tide, certainly had plenty of support for asserting that the Aministration's case for war was filled with holes.

[Barrett808]

9. Yes, thanks for posting these. n/t

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

5. I thought that's what the CIA was for.

to secretively take out the bad guy's.

[Drum]

6. I guess "our" bad guys are immune.

:(

[ursi]

8. I remember screaming and crying ...we were all lied to ...

[AwakeAtLast]

10. Super Tuesday KICK

:kick:

[damntexdem]

11. I don't think that they ignored the results -- rather they ...

very carefully suppressed them.

Can't let the truth threaten an administration's war plans, after all.