NEWSWEEK: WH repeatedly tried to push Atta-in-Prague, CIA always said No

[sabra]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14824384/site/newsweek/page/2/

<snip>

A former senior intelligence official who was in active service at the time confirmed to NEWSWEEK that the White House on multiple occasions had proposed inserting the Atta-in-Prague anecdote in speeches by both the president and Vice President Dick Cheney. The official said that the CIA usually objected to the White House proposals. Although Bush never mentioned the Atta anecdote, Cheney referred to it on several occasions�most recently in a TV appearance last weekend on NBC�s �Meet the Press� during which he conceded that the claim that Atta had a pre-9/11 meeting with an Iraqi spook had never been confirmed.

After the Czech intelligence report first surfaced, it became a holy grail for Bush administration hard-liners seeking evidence to justify a possible U.S. war in Iraq. Cheney and his aides in particular badgered intelligence officials for evidence confirming the Prague meeting and for other proof connecting Saddam to 9/11 and Al Qaeda, according to several former intelligence officials. As my NEWSWEEK colleague Michael Isikoff and his coauthor David Corn report in their new book �Hubris,� some top Pentagon and White House conservatives, including former Cheney chief of staff I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, were admirers of Laurie Mylroie, an eccentric author and academic who theorized that Saddam�s intelligence apparatus, rather than Osama bin Laden, was directing Al Qaeda attacks. While the administration, and particularly Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, put a lot of effort into trying to confirm Mylroie�s claims, they were never substantiated.

...

According to a chronology included by Democrats in their appendix to the Senate report, Cheney alluded to the purported Atta-in-Prague meeting at least three times between 9/11 and a year later, and Condoleezza Rice, then the national-security adviser, alluded to it cryptically right before the U.S. invasion of Iraq. In December 2001, Cheney had claimed: �It�s been pretty well confirmed that did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April, several months before the attack.�

On TV last Sunday, however, Cheney said: �We�ve never been able to confirm any connection between Iraq and 9/11.�
Host Tim Russert then asked him: �And the meeting with Atta did not occur?�

Cheney replied: �We don�t know. I mean, we�ve never been able to, to, to link it, and the FBI and CIA have worked it aggressively. I would say, at this point, nobody has been able to confirm ��

[Warpy]

1. People who read this board knew that

three and a half years ago, long before Stupid started bombing the people of Iraq in his war of corporate convenience.

We tried to tell all those folks in TV land that their pResident was lying his ass off, but nobody wanted to believe it.

I think we've all earned the right to say "I told you so."

[whistle]

2. How can this be cleared up? I think Cheney should be brought

...before the Senate and testify under oath regarding his continued position on this in every speech, every debate, every talk show appearance Cheney has made. If he believes this is true, then let him declare that fact under oath.

[Igel]

10. It can't be.

The CIA can't confirm it, the Cesi stand by the story. It's a question of whether the Czech intelligence folk are reliable.

In other news, Cheney goofed. He said Atta was in Czechoslovakia in 2001. There was no Czechoslovakia in 2001.

Czech Republic.

[MallRat]

3. And in other news, water is wet, and the sun rises in the east.

They've been flogging the Prague myth for years... at least the MSM is starting to call them on it.

[The Backlash Cometh]

4. Cheney feels far too comfortable using misinformation to his benefit,

then when's he caught, he blames someone else for providing him bad data.

Aren't these qualities what they look for in American CEOs?

[Supersedeas]

8. accountability!! Not from this administration...not from this Corp Media

[flyarm]

5. our retired cia spooks were sending letters out to all media about

this prior to * starting an illegal war of agression actually saying * was lying

they sent a letter to the white house asking * to tell the truth..

and they sent the letters to our media..no one covered it..period..

i hold our media accountable on this one folks..the CIA spooks were speaking through the retired guys...

and our mdia did not tell the truth, nor did this white house..and these facts were known by many of us before this war began!!

fly

[flyarm]

6. why didn't newsweek read the sunday herald??

they never got the story wrong!!..oh i know..newsweek had to be little lord pissy pants monica..i got it now!!

from my files..glad i kept all this...fly


this was in european papers ...but not in any US media..nope..not at all!!

fly

http://www.sundayherald.com/28384

Why the CIA thinks Bush is wrong
13 October 2002

Tenet did, however, leave the Bush conspiracists something to cling to. In his letter to Graham, he played up the alleged links between al-Qaeda and Iraq, saying: 'We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda going back a decade.
Credible information indicates that Iraq and al-Qaeda have discussed safe haven and reciprocal non-aggression ... we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of al-Qaeda members ... we have credible reporting that al-Qaeda leaders sought contacts in Iraq, who could help them acquire WMD capabilities ... Iraq has provided training to al-Qaeda members in areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.'


This was not a smoking gun, but it kept suspicions alive that Iraq might just pass terrorists WMDs any day now. Tenet's tentative connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda is a far cry from the findings of his counterparts in Europe. Try as it might, the UK has been unable to produce any evidence clearly linking Saddam to bin Laden, and the French have positively ruled out any connection. Jean-Louis Brugui�re, France's leading terrorist investigator, says years of investigation into radical Islamic terror groups have not produced a trace of evidence linking them to Iraq.

Brugui�re is an investigative magistrate empowered to view French domestic and foreign intelligence material. Much of the material he sees is passed on to the CIA and FBI by French intelligence. He says: 'We have not found any link between al-Qaeda and Iraq. Not a trace. There is no foundation to our investigations for the information given by the Americans.'

The French believe the secular nature of Saddam's regime deters him from getting into bed with the likes of bin Laden. It also makes cosying up to Saddam an anathema to the fundamentalists of al-Qaeda. Despite the admissions in the Tenet letter, the Senate voted 77-23 in the early hours of last Friday morning to authorise Bush to use force against Iraq. Earlier, the House of Representatives had voted the same way by a margin of 296-133.
It seems that most of the Senate listened to the US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's reply to claims that the White House was exaggerating the Iraqi threat.

[flyarm]

7. newsweek should have read letters by Veteran Intelligence Professionals ..

Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity


Newsweek should have read what we were reading prior to * starting an illegal war of aggression...or at least reported what our retired sppoks were saying..

fuck newsweek now..they have all that blood on their hands..to ever get redemption!

but no msm was covering what the spooks were saying..they were too busy giving little lord pissy pants blow jobs!

from my files...fly

also found here:
http://zfacts.com/metaPage/lib/030501-xCIA-WMD.pdf
Published on May 1, 2003 by CommonDreams.org
Intelligence Officers Challenge Bush
by Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
May 1, 2003
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
SUBJECT: Intelligence Fiasco




http://www.alternet.org/story/15127

Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity


Memo to the President

By Ray McGovern, AlterNet. Posted February 7, 2003.


An ad-hoc group of veteran CIA analysts gives the president a much-needed intelligence briefing. Tools


snip:

MEMORANDUM TO: President George W. Bush
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity

Mr. President:
Secretary Powell's presentation at the UN on Feb 5 requires context. We give him an A for assembling and listing the charges against Iraq, but only a C- in providing context and perspective.

What seems clear to us is that you need an intelligence briefing, not grand jury testimony. Secretary Powell effectively showed that Iraq is guilty beyond reasonable doubt for not cooperating fully with UN Security Council Resolution 1441. That had already been demonstrated by the chief UN inspectors. For Powell, it was what the Pentagon calls a "cakewalk."

The narrow focus on Resolution 1441 has diverted attention from the wider picture. It is crucial that we not lose sight of that. Intelligence community analysts are finding it hard to make themselves heard above the drumbeat for war. Speaking both for ourselves, as veteran intelligence officers on the VIPS Steering Group with over 100 years of professional experience, and for colleagues within the community who are increasingly distressed at the politicization of intelligence, we feel a responsibility to help you frame the issues. For they are more far-reaching and complicated than "UN v. Saddam Hussein." And they need to be discussed dispassionately, free of sobriquets like "sinister nexus," "evil genius" and "web of lies."

Flouting UN Resolutions

The key question is whether Iraq's flouting of a UN resolution justifies war. This is the question the world is asking. Secretary Powell's presentation does not come close to answering it.

[flyarm]

9. Some Spies Saw Through the Lies & Blew the Whistle

too bad Newsweek doesn't have real journalists who take their responsibility seriously..and didn't report the truth ...as the 'Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity,' were telling it before we had all our soldiers killed and maimed...

hey newsweek ..you have the blood of our troops dripping from your hands...and that of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi"s ..all while you were getting white house blow jobs!

fly


http://www.prwatch.org/node/2473

Some Spies Saw Through the Lies & Blew the Whistle

Source: Mother Jones, March 10, 2004
"When David Kay, the CIA's former chief weapons inspector in Iraq, announced earlier this year that his team had found no stockpiled weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, he touched off an explosion of blame, finger-pointing, denial, and hasty 'clarifications' about the extent and accuracy of the intelligence that the Bush Administration used to buttress its decision to invade Iraq. Kay's startling conclusion, though, came as no surprise to many analysts in the U.S. intelligence community -- particularly the members of a self-described 'movement' of some 35 retired and resigned high-level U.S. intelligence operatives. The group, 'Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity,' has produced some of the most credible, and critical, analyses of the Bush Administration's handling of intelligence data in the run-up to the March, 2003 invasion of Iraq."