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News :: Government Secrecy : International Relations : Iraq : Nukes : Regime |
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WMD COMMISSION: US INTEL ON IRAQ WAS "DEAD WRONG" |
Current rating: 0 |
by Secrecy News
(No verified email address) |
31 Mar 2005
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Much of the media is simply repeateing the White spin on this report. Here is an analysis that reports the issues, instead of the spin. |
The Silberman-Robb Commission on WMD Intelligence released its
massive report today, which featured blunt criticism of U.S.
intelligence agencies and of nearly every aspect of the
intelligence production cycle. A copy is posted here:
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/wmdcomm.html
"We conclude that the Intelligence Community was dead wrong in
almost all of its pre-war judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass
destruction," the Commission stated in its letter of transmittal
to the President.
Contrary to some early media reports, the Commission did not
absolve the Bush Administration of mishandling or misrepresenting
intelligence on Iraq.
"We were not authorized to investigate how policymakers used the
intelligence assessments they received from the Intelligence
Community," the Commission Report said (page 8).
President Bush welcomed the report in a White House news briefing,
and commended its authors for presenting an "unvarnished" review.
http://www.fas.org/irp/news/2005/03/wh033105.html
But then the President stated inaptly that "in an age in which we
are at war, the consequences of underestimating a threat could be
tens of thousands of innocent lives."
The whole impetus for the Commission was the fact that
intelligence had *overestimated* the threat from Iraq, not
underestimated it. Thousands of Americans and many more
thousands of innocent Iraqis lost their lives or were seriously
injured as a result of the ensuing war.
On information policy, the Commission took a particularly
aggressive stance against unauthorized disclosures ("leaks") of
classified information, but also complained that *authorized*
disclosures have compromised intelligence sources and methods as
well (pp. 380-383).
Two examples of problematic authorized disclosures were offered:
Intelligence that is shared with foreign countries (though not
the general public), and public announcements of classified
satellite launches.
Of the various types of satellite launch information that are
sometimes disclosed, "time of launch and azimuth are probably the
most important for placing the payload in track and providing
clues to mission type, followed by booster type/configuration,"
mused Allen Thomson, an independent space policy analyst.
"There are things the government might do to make things more
difficult for analysts, particularly in the pre-launch period,
but I'm skeptical that they could preclude acquisition and
tracking of LEO [low Earth orbit] payloads by such measures
without going to a very great deal of trouble and expense," Mr.
Thomson said.
The Report's strong focus on "leaks" may be due in part to the
participation of Commission staff member James B. Bruce, an
unsurpassed hawk on leaks who in 2002 memorably stated that
"We've got to do whatever it takes -- if it takes sending SWAT
teams into journalists' homes -- to stop these leaks." See:
http://www.thememoryhole.org/cia-swat-journalists.htm
The Commission presented perfunctory passing criticism of the
classification system: "the rules governing classification of
national security information are antiquated and overly complex"
(p. 443) and cited "persistent incentives for
overclassification" (p. 546), but had no other insights or
recommendations to offer on the subject.
At one point, the Commission itself appeared to succumb to
mindless overclassification.
Referring (on p. 383) to a December 9, 2002 DCI Directive
concerning unauthorized disclosures, the Commission said in a
footnote (p. 386, footnote 35) that the Directive's "title [is]
classified."
The Directive in question is DCID 6/8 and its title is
"Unauthorized Disclosures, Security Violations, and Other
Compromises of Intelligence Information (SCI)." There is no
indication in other government sources that this innocuous title
is classified.
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the
Federation of American Scientists.
To SUBSCRIBE to Secrecy News, send email to
secrecy_news-request (at) lists.fas.org
with "subscribe" in the body of the message.
Secrecy News is archived at:
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Secrecy News has an RSS feed at:
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Copyright by the author. All rights reserved. |
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Honest Intelligence Needed |
by Ray McGovern
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
01 Apr 2005
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The latest commission looking into intelligence failures on Iraq reports a certain consistency in the performance of the intelligence community. We are informed that we also ''know disturbingly little about the weapons programs'' of other countries -- such as Iran. One might think this would counsel caution for a Pentagon planning to ''take out'' Iran's fledgling nuclear capability.
Think again. The recent reassertion of administration policy on preemptive war in the ''National Defense Strategy'' just promulgated by Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld, together with his well-known insistence that ''the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence'' suggest that Iran may well be the next target -- intelligence or no. The more so, since many of the malleable analysts who, according to the commission, were ''dead wrong'' about Iraq's ''weapons of mass destruction'' are now putting the finishing touches to a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran.
I find myself wondering if it is also the case that Vice President Dick Cheney has resumed his frequent visits to CIA headquarters -- this time to help the analysts come to the right conclusions on Iran?
The new NIE on Iran will be of little value if it does not include an objective assessment of:
• The likelihood that Iran would transfer nuclear materials to terrorists.
• The degree to which recent history may be driving any Iranian plans to acquire nuclear weapons. Iraq, after all, did not have them, and the United States invaded it; North Korea probably has a few, and the United States has done nothing.
• What it would take in the way of security guarantees, as well as economic incentives, to get Iran to agree to drop any plans it has for developing nuclear weapons?
• What is known about the strength of Iranian ``democratic forces?''
• The aftershocks to be expected in the wake of a U.S. or U.S./Israeli attack on Iran. How, for instance, do Pentagon planners expect the U.S. Navy to contend with Iran's formidable array of supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles, which already pose a threat to U.S. ships providing logistical support to American forces in Iraq?
• The wider international implications as Iran builds alliances on the energy front with key players like China, India, Russia and even Venezuela.
The long-awaited NIE may not address all these questions. And with quintessential politician Porter Goss as CIA director, and malleable functionary John Negroponte as national intelligence director, there is no guarantee that the estimate on Iran will be any less politicized than the one on Iraq's putative ''weapons of mass destruction'' six months before the war.
What seems clear is that an attack on Iran would make the debacle in Iraq seem like child's play. And yet chances appear good that the ever-narrowing circle of advisors around President Bush will persuade him to do just that, and for the same underlying reasons -- oil, Israel and a strategic presence in the region.
But, you say, such an attack would not conform to international norms of behavior. Neither, of course, did the attack on Iraq. A truly remarkable document, ''National Defense Strategy of the United States of America,'' just issued by the Pentagon asserts a U.S. right to go after regimes that do not ``exercise their sovereignty responsibly.''
Much will depend on whether the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran deals forthrightly with these key issues or whether intelligence analysts are again persuaded to take the course of least resistance and tell the vice president and president what will please -- as they did in the NIE, ''Iraq's Continuing Program for Weapons of Mass Destruction'' of Oct. 1, 2002. That was the worst NIE on record -- so far.
Ray McGovern, a 27-year veteran of CIA's intelligence analysis directorate, serves on the steering group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
© 2005 Miami Herald
http://www.miami.com/ |
