It WAS NOT a failure of intelligence!

[wadestock]

http://www.emergencyemail.org/homeland07092004.asp

Yes...we had a breakdown of intelligence and all that. I’m sure the dream team is very comfortable with the whole thing and hopes that the average American is confused and/or thinks that intelligence should take the fall.

Here’s the real breakdowns in logic that are not making their way to the center of the debate.

Logic Breakdown #1 – That Iraq had “reconstituted” it’s WMD, and that this could be DELIVERED to our shores.....

There was a huge assumption that after the inspectors left, that Iraq must have "reconstituted" their WMD….and perhaps even a nuke program. We know now that these were all pure 100% assumptions…..with no basis WHATSOEVER in fact. No significant program to “reconstitute” WMD has been found.

Truth is….years of EFFECTIVE inspections AND disarming (more weapons destroyed in the disarming AFTER Desert Storm than Desert Storm itself) completely took away Iraq’s ability to DEPLOY WMD. BTW….it also effectively reduced his military to one which was clearly second class to key neighboring countries.

Thus we must recognize that there is no grey area in the LIE to the American public which attempted to sell the notion that WMD could be brought to our shores….and THUS….Iraq was an eminent threat. Be very careful to note that the critical part of this LIE was to say that WMD could actually be DELIVERED to our shores. It is particularly troubling that we find absent in this analysis the fact that inspections during the 90s did SPECIFICALLY AIM to take away Iraq's capability to DELIVER WMD….in other words….bulldozers did go in and plow these systems into the ground….something that has been very narrowly reported on. So without this deployment capability….exactly what was the eminent threat to the US? Many have recently started to draw the obvious analogy to JFK and the Cuban Missile Crisis. In other words, we didn't have any specific intel to show that Iraq had reconstituted their DEPLOYMENT capability…..hey….show us the photos of the stuff that's going to be SHOT at us.

The specific lies were:

a. Nukes were being developed and could be DEPLOYED. This assumes either a missile capability that was completely implausible or a portable nuke device which was equally implausible. Both would have been many many years away and easily detectable way before they reached an eminent threat level.
b. There was a potential UAV (Unmanned Arial Vehicle) capability that could deliver WMD to our shores. An outright lie and possibly a purposeful devious tactic since most people don’t understand the capabilities of UAVs. It is also a complete insult to our intelligence to think that a country around the globe would deploy UAVs against us rather than to simply ship parts and/or do the major construction of the weapon right here.

So in this regard….there should have truly been NO CONFUSION in terms of the fact that WMD was NO DIRECT THREAT to the shores of the US….even if SADDAM had been spending money in labs to keep things going. Conclusion: Even assuming the reconstitution of WMD….there was no threat to the “shores of the US”.

Well you say….I’ve left out the important point that cans of anthrax or other insidious WMD could have been whisked off through the hands of terrorists and found their ways to the shores of the US.

But is ALL OUT WAR the way you deal with that threat?

NO….you resume inspections….backed by force if necessary….if you’re so worried about that…..
You don’t necessarily have to take over the country do you? In other words….if this was the threat….then we would have been back to the issue of reinforcing inspections. A CONCLUSION WHICH COULD HAVE BEEN VERY EASY TO MAKE IF YOU REMOVE THE ABOVE LIES.

Now if you’re really paying attention you’d note that the anthrax that was spread around quite curiously to campaign headquarters and so forth around the time of 911 was of “US lab grade level”….and couple this with the fact that we gave the stuff to Saddam in the first place and it hadn’t being historically used against us….there’s really not a big reason to start an all out war over that. Don’t you find it a bit odd that there hasn’t been a real stink over any of this?

Logic Breakdown #2 – How do you fight terrorism effectively?

Point is….if you can’t even recognize the threat or get that part of the problem straight….how the hell can you effectively fight terrorism? No surprise is it…. that the Admin has this 100% wrong.

Put aside the deployment mechanisms and the nukes as being a threat to us in the first place. First let's take nukes off the table. We don't have any threat from any country in terms of nukes being used against us. We've used them and we'd nuke anyone that deployed against us….everyone in the world knows that. Yes perhaps someone might nuke Israel….but that shouldn't mean we'll go to war around the world to deal with that. And the transportation of a portable nuke or dirty nuke into the US is 1000 times more difficult than for any terrorist group to consider other readily available chemical alternatives. Conclusion: Nukes are not the threat that the neocons make them out to be. They have a nuclear paranoia in this regard.

So what’s left….what other WMD are we afraid of that warrants a global WAR?
Why the sudden belief that NATIONS have WMD that are a threat to us?

HELLO…..That WASN’T the lesson of 911. 911 taught us that low tech….and a low number of people….NOT NATIONS….can do enormous damage. "WMD" doesn't take “national level” resources to develop. A team of a few people can fly a Cessna filled with readily available chemical weapons over NY and kill millions of people. Or small pox could be spread so quickly that it could kill 50M in a few months. The bombing in France now tells us that “synchronized explosives” deployed in backpacks or a variety of ways can potentially kill thousands of people at a time if deployed correctly. There are many other insidious possibilities that we are not being keen to focus our sites on.

Bottom line is….this Admin got it really wrong on why Iraq was a threat to the US…..but what is even more troublesome is the fact that we have it so completely wrong in terms of understanding what the threat is…..or how we should fight it.

The neocon rationale can be reduced to one simple phrase…..”hey, it’s better that we’re taking the fight to them over there so they won’t fight us over here!”

What kind of nonsense is that? What we're fighting over there is Israel type street fights with terrorists who will perpetuate the street fight forever just like they are in Israel.

What does that have to do whatsoever with the "new 911" that may be on the drawing board right now? Problem is….we don’t in any way, shape or form reduce our odds of another 911 by invading Iraq and becoming involved in a perpetual terrorist street fight.

The truth is staring us right in the face. Rumsfeld was hot on the war the day after 911. Bush met with Tenet in Dec 02….just before he went on a rampage to sell the war in early 03 and said “is that all you have”. They wanted the war, and they sold the war with LIES.

This war is about establishing a permanent presence in the middle east for our national intentions. That’s what it’s about….and it’s inspiration was born from reckless greed, dirty deals, and immoral behavior.

There's so much pure BS involved here, so deep and so insidious….. it would be impossible for ANYONE to truly unravel it….or even come close to understanding it. With that in mind….Michael’s representation of some of the key points of this atrocity in Fahrenheit 911 is really dam impressive.

[Fenris]

1. Well, it a failure of intelligence of sorts...

But he was born that way, so it's hard to call that a failure.

[porphyrian]

3. Right.

Technically, he exceeded his genetic predisposition for failure on a number of functions, so I don't think it's fair to just point out the failure of his intelligence.

[Solly Mack]

2. Of course it's the lies

and not "bad intel"

[frylock]

4. "september 11 was a triumph for the intelligence community"

I just finished Robert Baer's "See No Evil", and in the preface he states, and I quote:

The other day a reporter friend told me that one of the highest-ranking CIA officials had said to him, off the record, that when the dust finally clears, Americans will see that September 11 was a triumph for the intelligence community, not a failure.

For whatever that's worth.

[wadestock]

5. You could check this out....

http://www.fpa.org/topics_info2414/topics_info_show.htm?doc_id=100339

An interview with Baer....I just got through reading the interview...it's pretty long...but worth the read.

[frylock]

6. thanks for the link..

I'll check that out.

[wishlist]

7. BushCo rushed to war because they KNEW they had a weak case that

could be discredited and fall apart if they waited any longer or gave inspectors more time in which no WMD's would be found. Plus Bush was getting anxious for the economy and stock market to get back on track again and knew they had to rush ahead for there to be sufficient time for everything to fall into place before the election. Bush was not misled by bad intel, he had cynical ulterior motives all along and eagerly misused the bad intel.