Bush Ignores Major Pre-War Intelligence

We had house guests this weekend – fun! – so I was away from the computer. A story emerged last week that was big enough, and repulsive enough, to warrant mention better-late-than-never.

A report issued last week, and detailed in the Washington Post, made it clear that intelligence assessments presented to the White House in 2003 prior to the start of the war painted a very different picture than the refrain presented nonstop by Bush and Company.

Months before the invasion of Iraq, U.S. intelligence agencies predicted that it would be likely to spark violent sectarian divides and provide al-Qaeda with new opportunities in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a report released yesterday by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Analysts warned that war in Iraq also could provoke Iran to assert its regional influence and "probably would result in a surge of political Islam and increased funding for terrorist groups" in the Muslim world.

The intelligence assessments, made in January 2003 and widely circulated within the Bush administration before the war, said that establishing democracy in Iraq would be "a long, difficult and probably turbulent challenge." The assessments noted that Iraqi political culture was "largely bereft of the social underpinnings" to support democratic development.

More than four years after the March 2003 invasion, with Iraq still mired in violence and 150,000 U.S. troops there under continued attack from al-Qaeda and Iraqi insurgents, the intelligence warnings seem prophetic. Other predictions, however, were less than accurate. Intelligence analysts assessed that any postwar increase in terrorism would slowly subside in three to five years, and that Iraq's vast oil reserves would quickly facilitate economic reconstruction.

Far from being “greeted as liberators,” we knew well in advance that the drive to Baghdad would be very different than actually “winning the war.” We knew that our very presence would cause many of the outcomes against which we were supposed to be fighting. We knew… and Bush ignored it all. As Steve Benen over at TPM put it:

In other words, the White House managed to reject what intelligence agencies got right and embrace what the agencies got wrong. How exquisitely true to form.

Bush has repeated until he is blue in the face that he acts because he “listens to the intelligence.” However, like any truth that the President utters, it is only part of the truth wrapped in a lie. Bush only listens to the intelligence that confirms that which he has already decided. He ignores the rest. No intelligence, right or wrong, actually is used to craft any decisions because they have already been made based on the world according to Bush. As a result, over 3000 Americans are dead, over 25,000 Americans are critically injured, and up to 1,000,000 Iraqis have been killed. Bush is The Decider… of death.

Postscript: It is important to note that this intelligence assessment was not the conclusion of a lone analyst or even of one branch of the intelligence community. Rather, it was the collective report of the US intelligence establishment that was sent to the White House.

Most of the information in the report was drawn from two lengthy assessments issued by the National Intelligence Council in January 2003, titled "Principal Challenges in Post-Saddam Iraq” and "Regional Consequences of Regime Change in Iraq," both of which the Senate report reprints with only minor redactions. The assessments were requested by Richard N. Haass, then director of policy planning at the State Department, and were written by Paul R. Pillar, the national intelligence officer for the Near East, as a synthesis of views across the 16-agency intelligence community.

Postscript 2: Regarding why a report of this nature is only now coming to light, I can’t put it any better than did Steve Benen at TPM.

Following up on an earlier post for a moment, it may seem odd that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is just now, in mid-2007, producing a rerport on the White House ignoring warnings about Iraq in 2003. The war is already in its fifth year. Where has this information been? And wouldn't it have been a lot useful before, say, before the 2004 presidential election?

Let's take a stroll down memory lane. The Senate Intelligence Committee began a comprehensive investigation on the use (misuse) of pre-war intelligence towards the end of 2003. Initially, the committee was prepared to release one authoritative document on the intelligence, what it said, and how it was handled.

With the 2004 presidential election looming, and Bush's chances for a second term in doubt, then-Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) decided to split the report in two -- Phase I would document how wrong the intelligence community was (which was released quickly), while Phase II would report on how the White House used/misused/abused the available information.

And that's when the stonewalling began. First Roberts said publicly that he'd "try" to have Phase II available to the public before the 2004 election. He didn't. Roberts then gave his word, in writing, that members of the Senate Intelligence Committee would have a draft report on controversial "public statements" from administration officials. That didn't happen either. Then Roberts indicated that he might just give up on the second part of the investigation altogether, because, he argued, there was nothing left to learn.

Under pressure to release Phase II before the 2006 elections, Roberts agreed to release subparts of the report, which documented what Ahmed Chalabi and other well-paid Iraqi exiles told the administration before the invasion, but nothing about the White House's mistakes.

In January 2007, after the Senate changed hands, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) agreed that it was finally time to take this investigation seriously.

As for why Rockefeller and committee Dems decided to release the report on a Friday afternoon before Memorial Day weekend ... well, I can't figure that one out.

30 May 2007