Friday, February 10, 2006

CIA's Paul Pillar: BushCo Cherry-Picked Info

WaPost: The former CIA official who coordinated US intelligence on the Middle East until last yr has accused the Bush admin of cherry-picking intelligence on Iraq to justify a decision it had already reached to go to war, and of ignoring warnings that the country could easily fall into violence and chaos after an invasion to overthrow Saddam. Paul Pillar, who was the natl intelligence officer for the Near East and S Asia from 2000 to 05, acknowledges the US intelligence agencies' mistakes in concluding that Saddam's govt possessed WMDs. But he said those misjudgments did not drive the administration's decision to invade: "Official intelligence on Iraqi weapons programs was flawed, but even w/ its flaws, it was not what led to the war,'' Instead, he says, the administration "went to war w/o requesting -and evidently w/o being influenced by- any strategic level intelligence assessments on any aspect of Iraq. It has become clear that official intelligence was not relied on in making even the most significant natl security decisions, that intelligence was misused publicly to justify decisions already made, that damaging ill will developed between Bush policymakers and intelligence officers, and that the intelligence community's own work was politicized.'' Pillar wrote. I'm sure Scotty the Lying Doughboy will try to discredit Pillar as "Partisan Paul"... that is if Scotty ever answers any question asked of him.
Posted by Tina :: 12:11 AM :: 0 Comments:

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