Bush was warned there were no WMD says former CIA man ("60 Minutes")

[Peter Frank]

Bush was warned there were no WMD, says former CIA man

By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles
Published: 24 April 2006

The Central Intelligence Agency tried to warn the Bush administration on the eve of the 2003 invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein did not appear to have weapons of mass destruction but the warning was dismissed because the US political leadership was not interested in what the intelligence showed, according to a retired senior CIA operative.

The revelation, by the CIA's former European chief Tyler Drumheller, was broadcast on CBS's news magazine Sixty Minutes last night and added to the body of evidence that US and British leaders saw the weapons of mass destruction issue only as a selling point for a war they had already decided to wage for other reasons.

According to Mr Drumheller, Western intelligence services were told about Iraq's lack of chemical and biological weapons by Naji Sabri, a former Iraqi foreign minister. The CIA director of the time, George Tenet, took this information straight to President George Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney and other senior officials, but it made no impression on them.

The Central Intelligence Agency tried to warn the Bush administration on the eve of the 2003 invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein did not appear to have weapons of mass destruction but the warning was dismissed because the US political leadership was not interested in what the intelligence showed, according to a retired senior CIA operative.

The revelation, by the CIA's former European chief Tyler Drumheller, was broadcast on CBS's news magazine Sixty Minutes last night and added to the body of evidence that US and British leaders saw the weapons of mass destruction issue only as a selling point for a war they had already decided to wage for other reasons.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article359755.ece

[sweetheart]

1. Excellent, some light from inside the dark tower

CIA, i think should be an independent agency answering straight to
the american people. Its purpose would be to strategically inform
all persons in society, and to help them to become intelligent.
So much depends on the mission statement and the independence.

Like an independent central bank, an independent CIA..

[cantstandbush]

28. But you know, this case had already been proven but the dittoheads in

America just don't want to hear it. Bush is their God, he can do no wrong, and they would rather eat their own children than turn against Bush.

[primavera]

37. Including our very own petrified Dems in Congress

Hard for these sorts of crimes to raise much of an eyebrow when even the "opposition" party (ahem, excuse me while I burst into hysterical laughter) won't call for a so much as an investigation, much less a censure, and certainly no breath of the word "impeachment." God, and to think Clinton was crucified for a blow job, while the repukes are allowed to lie to Congress and the American people and commit mass murder without incuring so much as a disapproving frown. I swear, sometimes I wonder who is the greater menace - the murderous, lying sacks of shit in the White House, or the spineless, enabling Dems who pat the administration on the back for its crimes.

[pdurod1]

2. OK, what about Tenet and the "Slam Dunk" thing?

[BlueEyedSon]

3. "Can we fool the media, the public & congress?" "Sure, it's a slam-dunk."

[Ilsa]

8. That's the best explanation I've heard for Tenet's comment.

Woodward must have had a TIA or a fit of narcolepsy and made up the other crap, because I don't believe it, and I don't trust Woodward.

[indie_voter]

33. Yep. That is exactly what I think he was talking about

Can we convince the public? Slam Dunk.

[Peter Frank]

6. Good question - My guess is Tenet was corrupted prior to that statement...

Drumheller was the European CIA chief at the time, and was responsible for disseminating the intel first hand -- including the Niger/Saddam/Uranium/State of the Union hoax.

[Zorra]

18. Here's how it went:

Bu*h: "Mr. Tenet, I want you to tell me that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction, and that it is a slam dunk."

George Tenet: "But that would be a lie, sir."

Bu*h: "Mr. Tenet, as your Commander-in-Chief, I am ordering you to tell me that Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction."

Tenet: "Yes sir. Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction. It is a slam dunk, sir."

Bu*h: "Thank you, Mr. Tenet. That is now the offical administration line. Mr. Cheney will bring this information to the Office of Special Plans. That will be all, Mr. Tenet -oh, and one more thing, Mr. Tenet. There will be a very special retirement package waiting for you. Ari will deliver the details at your office."

Tenet: "Yes, Mr. pResident. Thank you, sir."

[Peter Frank]

21. Very well done... n/t

[Peter Frank]

4. Here's a short clip...

http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/videoplayer/newVid/small_player/vplayer2.shtml?id=1534824n

[CatWoman]

11. here's the entire segment

http://www.paulosnews.com/04232006-60Mins-Drumheller.mp4

[Peter Frank]

19. Thank you CatWoman, Great catch...

I couldn't find a full clip or the transcript.


BTW You told me that you lost Trinity ( :( my favorite; so expressive). is there another feline in your life?

Not to detract -- the clip you found is a hands down must see.

[leftchick]

5. what? the NYT hasn't seen this report yet?

???

[Peter Frank]

7. Dunno...

[Supersedeas]

50. the media is still catching up to the poll numbers and trying to decide

if they wanna pick up the Presnit or print the truth.

Corporate Media lagging behind American opinion...wonder that.

[lonestarnot]

9. Hearing it makes no difference to me. Knowing was first.

[Peter Frank]

10. Many of us knew it long ago, but the hard proof is now coming out...

...through the wimpy mainstream media, no less.

[lonestarnot]

12. From what I'm reading after 6-6-6, it may not matter.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

13. I must have missed something...

...obviously the date has some significance to numerologists and fundies, but what exactly are you referring to?

[lonestarnot]

16. I'll be back with the link.

[lonestarnot]

17. Here you go.... June 2 Nuke test bomb bigger than Hiroshima in Nevada

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x895089#895102

666 is the mark of the beast in the Bible.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

22. As far as I can tell...

...there's no actual information in that thread. Just a bunch of speculation based on nothing.

[lonestarnot]

45. Check out AAR Randi Rhodes. She's sharing info re bomb/nuke.

[AzDar]

14. Had me screaming obscenities at the teevee last night...WHAT

does it TAKE???? IMPEACH!!!

[Peter Frank]

24. Impeach who?...

The puppet or the puppeteers???

[Jane Austin]

35. Me, too.

I think I really annoyed Dearest Husband with my expressions of utter disbelief both that this guy (bush) has gotten away with this, to the possible extreme of the destruction of civilization, and that the Corporate Media has taken this long to present this story, this cogently.

Ed Bradley's producers put together a really clear story. Can you imagine if they had presented this story in September or October of 2004?

I am grateful that the story is finally getting out there, but I am depressed that it wasn't put together at least two years ago.

[Peter Frank]

65. It's taken time for some principal actors to...

...wrestle with conscience, retire & come forward.

[NJmaverick]

15. Why hasn't the main stream media picked this up?

This is a major revalation. It's the smoking gun that bush knew there were no WMDs.

[dennis4868]

20. Yeah....

but it is not a BJ in the oval office so it's really no big deal to the MSM.

[brentspeak]

23. It was on 60 Minutes

[NJmaverick]

64. True but this is a major story

It should have been picked up by all the major media outlets.

[Peter Frank]

25. Thank CatWoman for digging up video of the full segment...

This is a must-watch -- http://www.paulosnews.com/04232006-60Mins-Drumheller.mp4

(I'm looking for the transcript. If anyone finds it, please post.)

[Faryn Balyncd]

26. a major scoop

and josh marshall's analysis is excellent:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008284.php

[Peter Frank]

51. Good article - charles t...

...and welcome to the DU :hi:


I found this aspect particularly interesting:

<snip>Did the Robb-Silbermann Commission not hear about what Drumheller had to say? What about the Roberts Committee?

I asked Drumheller just those questions when I spoke to him early this evening. He was quite clear. He was interviewed by the Robb-Silbermann Commission. Three times apparently.

Did he tell them everything he revealed on tonight's 60 Minutes segment. Absolutely.

Drumheller was also interviewed twice by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (the Roberts Committee) but apparently only after they released their summer 2004 report.

Now, quite a few of us have been arguing for almost two years now that those reports were fundamentally dishonest in the story they told about why we were so badly misled in the lead up to war. The fact that none of Drumheller's story managed to find its way into those reports, I think, speaks volumes about the agenda that the writers of those reports were pursuing.

"I was stunned," Drumheller told me, when so little of the stuff he had told the commission's and the committee's investigators ended up in their reports. His colleagues, he said, were equally "in shock" that so little of what they related ended up in the reports either.

What Drumheller has to say adds quite a lot to our knowledge of what happened in the lead up to war. But what it shows even more clearly is that none of this stuff has yet been investigated by anyone whose principal goal is not covering for the White House.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/008284.php

[Vinca]

27. When I was watching this, all I could think of was how the loved ones

of soldiers who have died in Iraq must feel. How can you live knowing your son or daughter, husband or wife died because an egomaniac with daddy issues decided he wanted to be a "war" president? Why the hell is he still in the White House?

[Jane Austin]

36. As angry and depressed as I am about this information just now getting

out, I can only imagine what parents and spouses of those soldiers who have died or have had their bodies and minds destroyed by the stupidity of bush and his cohorts are feeling.

I just don't know how they can keep from acting out their grief.

[KansDem]

29. So, what do we do now?

Bush lied. Scores of thousands of people are dead. The US deficit is approaching $9 trillion.

Bush lied. The United States is now war-mongering nation that supports torture and the killing of innocents.

Bush lied. The Constitution has become toilet paper.

Bush lied. What do we do now?

[indie_voter]

30. No kidding. This is just ridiculous.

IMPEACH already.

[Peter Frank]

31. Indeed...

[tanyev]

49. Love the image of Constitution toilet paper. Sad but true.

[Peter Frank]

61. The saddest part is that...

...those wiping their asses with it are illegally in power.

[SOS]

32. Drumheller:

"Iraq was not an intelligence failure, it was a policy failure".

Enough talk of "intelligence". It was a POLICY failure.

[Peter Frank]

38. Douglas Feith (google him) cooked the books on the intel...

He led a 2 man operation under the Office of Special Plans, and developed his own pnac friendly intel -- which contradicted the bulk of CIA knowledge; and for which there was no vetting process before it found its way into major presidential speeches such as the State of the Union.

[Peter Frank]

39. I forgot to add that Feith's unit called itself...

...the Iraqi Intelligence Cell.

[katty]

48. Feith-indeed, he is one nasty, warmongering whimp

[coalition_unwilling]

34. It only took him 2490 dead U.S. soldiers and >150,000 dead

Iraqis before he summoned up the courage to speak up. This guy deserves absolutely no kudos, imho.

[Peter Frank]

40. I give him credit for coming out...

Better late than never. It takes allot of courage to do what he did -- in the face of this admin.

Look at the example he sets for others considering the same.

[coalition_unwilling]

52. Yes, but "60 Minutes" made it clear he had already retired. Contrast

his "example" with that of the alleged secret prison leaker Mary McCarthy. Allegedly, she went to Dana Priest at the Wash Post while still short of time for full retirement benefits.

McCarthy exemplifies the most noble tradition, imho, and is doing what Ellsberg has been imploring civil servants to do, i.e., speak out sooner rather than later, even if it means harm to one's career.

BTW: Since leaking the Pentagon Papers to the NYTimes and other papers, Ellsberg has never held a government post.

[Peter Frank]

60. Drumheller is to be lauded for his patriotism...

Sure, it would have been ideal for impact if Drumheller had publicly resigned in protest; I've always felt frustrated with by Powell for the same reason (but Powell still hasn't blown the whistle).

Can you imagine how difficult it was for Drumheller to speak the truth on 60 Minutes? I applaud his courage and patriotism.

Also keep in mind how many hundreds of people depended on him for their safety. A responsible bureau chief couldn't in good conscience just up & leave; and not make sure that his people were in good hands.

[coalition_unwilling]

67. You might have a point, I'll concede. But it smacks just a little

of "opportunism" to wait until retirement to speak out.

[wellst0nev0ter]

41. Too Little. Too Late.

I think they already had this report on the eve of the election, but after that bullshit Dan Rather memo scandal they were too chicken to even air it.

[DearAbby]

42. The Warning was dismissed...

...because the US political leadership was not interested in what the intelligence showed.

Well duh, the Downing Street Minutes, showed that they would not be interested, THEY WERE FIXING POLICY FOR THE WAR IN IRAQ...when are these people going to connect the dots? They WANTED THE WAR!

Come on, a journalist worth their salt, would start going back to the scandal de jour's of the past, and start connecting the dots, and win a Pulitzer Prize doing so...Any Takers?

[Az_lefty]

43. There can now be no doubt...

that bush lied us into a War! People need to wake the hell up and stop supporting this little monster.
:grr:

[rodeodance]

44. "added to the body of evidence"---this is key.

[Imagevision]

46. 60 minutes segment under oath warrants impeachment proceedings

[pat_k]

57. If we want other candidates to Wake Up and Stand Up for Impeachment,

. . .we need to go ALL OUT for the ones who are leading the way.

Check out the DU Challenge to keep the
Sheeler for U.S. Senate campaign's
"Be Patriotic! Impeach Bush" Billboard up.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1011338&mesg_id=1011338

[maine_raptor]

47. Here's a Point to Ponder:

The CIA's former European chief retires and goes public with what he knows about Bush and his interaction with the Agency. A member of the CIA's Inspector General leaks info to the WP about the Admins Human Rights's "problems". And we got someone out there that blew the NSA spying thing.


Are we witnessing an "intelligence revolt" here?

Did the over use of the phrase "faulty intelligence" piss off some folk Who Shall Be Pissed Off?

As Spock would say "Fascinating"

[coalition_unwilling]

54. Max Weber (the early 20th century father of sociology) would

probably call this a "revolt of the elites" or, more properly, a fracturing of the power elite. I do think the Rockefeller wing of the Republican party, long dominant, may now be rearing its head in revolt against the neo-con\evangelical axis of ignorance. The reason there has been so little congressional outrage on the Repuke side of the aisle, imho, is that the axis of ignornace has pretty much captured the electoral machinery of the party. But the civil service is an entirely different matter and tends to attract less ideological better educated cadre.

[maine_raptor]

63. Good Take

The folks in the trenches at the Agency(s) tend to be of the "Rockefeller" wing of the GOP. Much has been made over the years of "ivy league" recruiting by the CIA and others, but in fact quite a number of lesser known schools and universities are the places where new blood for the intelligence organizations come from.

Now the question will be if the new wave of leak stopping via prosecution will chill out some of the discontent. At what point will disgust over policy over ride fear of loss of employment and possible jail time.

[coalition_unwilling]

68. Daniel Ellsberg serves as proto-type for what will need to happen.

He has been repeatedly calling for massive leaking of classified information about plans for Iran. Ellsberg says his principal regret is that he waited too long to leak the Pentagon Papers. He has said that people within the civil service must now be prepared to sacrifice career and (newest proposal) pension in the interests of the public's right to know.

[IndianaGreen]

53. The House should be drafting Articles of Impeachment

Bush wanted his own personal war and the claim of WMDs was intended to frighten the sheep.

[pat_k]

58. We can help them Wake Up and Stand Up!

If we want other candidates to Wake Up and Stand Up for Impeachment, we need to go ALL OUT for the ones who are leading the way.

Check out the DU Challenge to keep the
Sheeler for U.S. Senate campaign's
"Be Patriotic! Impeach Bush" Billboard up.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1011338&mesg_id=1011338

[ClintonTyree]

55. Regime change.....

that was their "real" reason, right? :eyes: Or was it to establish a permanent military presence in the Middle East and steal Iraq's oil? Of course they'll never tell us that. Regime change. Odd, that a great percentage of Iraqi's would rather have Saddam back at this moment than be going through their current "regime change". At least they knew what to expect with Saddam. Bush blew everything to hell and now they have less than they did before. But now they have the "freedom" to die in a bloody civil war. :eyes:

[nolabels]

56. "regime change" starts at home

Vote out any S.O.B. that thinks we should still stay there, a unified message is very important.

[Peter Frank]

59. "Freedom is on the march."...

Except for American citizens. I wonder how the Patriot Act would fly in Iraq.

[Peter Frank]

62. Drumheller will be on Hardball today (MSNBC) - 5:00 PM & 7:00 PM...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12466646

[Peter Frank]

66. This aired on Tuesday... n/t