TPM: Forget the Truth

http://tableforone.tpmcafe.com/blog/tableforone/2007/jun/11/forget_the_truth

Table for One
Forget the Truth
By Peter Eisner and Knut Royce | bio

The Bush White House was never really preoccupied with the question of whether or not Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. It wasn’t until “late 2002,” virtually on the eve of the U.S. invasion, that the administration ordered the CIA to shift priority on WMD intelligence collection to Iraq from North Korea and Iran, according to an internal CIA report.

The administration’s belated concern appears to have been driven by two contemporary events. The White House at the time was narrowly focused on rallying public support for war by invoking the specter of mushroom clouds, and any supportive “intelligence” would be useful. That would also serve as backup ammunition to discredit inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency, reintroduced into Iraq after a four-year hiatus, if they were to conclude there was nothing there.

The decision to invade had been made months earlier. There would be no show-stoppers. No matter that the belated emphasis on discovering Iraq’s alleged banned weapons produced nothing, or that the IAEA also came up with blanks.

Now, four years after our troops cakewalked (as wars go) into Baghdad, the White House still has not admitted that the decision to invade and occupy Iraq was one of the most monumental blunders in American history. Nor has it admitted that all this pre-war talk of Iraq’s doomsday weapons was nothing but a crass, yet very effective, sales pitch.

On the other hand, top CIA officials who oversaw the production of the disastrous intelligence conclusions have publicly conceded that the agency blundered badly. In his new book, “At the Center of the Storm,” George Tenet, who devotes half of the book to Iraq, offers modest personal mea culpas. He had been too preoccupied, he says, with chasing al Qaeda and “didn’t pay enough attention to another gathering storm”—Iraq. And when he briefed the White House, where officials were grossly amplifying CIA’s reporting on Iraq’s alleged weapons, Tenet admits he should have done “a better job of making sure they knew where we differed and why.” His deputy at the time, John McLaughlin, has not written a book and has been more reluctant to accept personal responsibility. But he has, on several occasions, admitted that “mistakes” were made.

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spoken by bush, cheney and others in his administration. It would not have made any difference what tenet may have done differently. bush wanted to be a war president and if he had to lie to make it so, so be it. Remember how saddamm kicked the inspectors out. Just another lie. Lying is a conservative value used to get what ya want, damn the consequences.