Powell in UK interview says U.S. "unaware of Iraq war doubts" (!)

It's breaking news, so there's no direct URL...


http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/portal/main.jhtml;jsessionid=UTLF4CADGGVZ3QFIQMGCFFOAVCBQUIV0?view=HOME&grid=P13&menuId=-1&menuItemId=-1&_requestid=253668


U.S. 'unaware of Iraq war doubts'

The US administration was not aware of doubts about secret intelligence used to justify the war with Iraq, former US Secretary of State Colin Powell has insisted.

Earlier this week, President George Bush accepted responsibility for going to war on intelligence much of which "turned out to be wrong".

Mr Powell told the BBC in an interview with Sir David Frost, due to air on News 24 tomorrow, that he was "deeply disappointed in what the intelligence community had presented to me and to the rest of us".

"What really upset me more than anything else was that there were people in the intelligence community that had doubts about some of this sourcing, but those doubts never surfaced up to us," he said.

Mr Powell also said he believed America could not afford to keep all its troops in Iraq beyond next year but that a mass pull-out would now be a "tragic mistake".

A defiant President Bush this week declared: "We cannot and will not leave Iraq until victory is achieved." He also refused to be held to political timetables.

In an interview to be broadcast by BBC News 24 tomorrow, Mr Powell said that would certainly be "a matter of years".

"I don't think that the Unites States military at its current strength can sustain this level of deployment for an extended period of time.

"So one way or the other, I think a draw down will begin in 2006.

"But essentially just to walk away, to say that we're taking all of our troops out as fast as we can would be a tragic mistake. It's going to be years. We've invested a great deal in this country, and the Iraqi people deserve democracy and the freedom that they were promised when we got rid of Saddam Hussein and we have to stay with them... until they decide that they can get it now on their own, they don't need us any longer."

Say it ain't so, Colin, haven't you shilled for these honkey pigs long enough ? You stood alone against their jingoist bullshit at the time to the extent you felt you were able, why backpedal now and tar yourself with their Neanderthal empire boy shit ?