[pjnews] Dems Charge CIA Sabotaged Weapons Inspections

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The Independent [UK]
Democrats charge CIA sabotaged inspections and hid Iraq weapons details

February 14, 2003
By Andrew Buncombe

Senior democrats have accused the CIA of sabotaging weapons inspections in
Iraq by refusing to co-operate fully with the UN and withholding crucial
information about Saddam Hussein's arsenal.
Led by Senator Carl Levin, the Democrats accused the CIA of making an
assessment that the inspections were unlikely to be a success and then
ensuring they would not be. They have accused the CIA director of lying
about what information on the suspected location of weapons of mass
destruction had been passed on.

The row is of heightened significance given the Bush administration's
preparations to argue later today before the UN Security Council that the
inspections have run their course and it is now time to move to military
action.

France, Russia, Germany and other members of the Security Council are likely
to back a counter-proposal to increase the number of inspectors, providing
them, if necessary, with the support of armed UN soldiers, as a means of
avoiding a military strike.

The accusation of US sabotage emerged from a series of Senate hearings on
Capitol Hill. On Tuesday, George Tenet, the CIA director, told the armed
services committee panel that the agency had provided the UN inspectors with
all the information it had on high and moderate interest locations
inside Iraq ­ those sites where there was a possibility of finding banned
weapons. But Mr Tenet later told a different panel that he had been mistaken
and that there were in fact a handful of locations the UN inspectors may
not have known about.

Senator Levin, from Michigan, responded by saying the CIA director had not
been telling the truth. Citing a number of classified letters he had
obtained from the agency, he said it was clear the CIA had not shared
information with the inspectors about a large number of sites of
significant value.

He said the CIA had told him additional information would be passed to the
inspectors within the next few days.

Mr Levin pushed Mr Tenet on whether he thought the inspections had any
value. The CIA director replied: Unless [President Saddam] provides the
data to build on, provides the access, provides the unfettered access that
he's supposed to, provides us with surveillance capability, there is little
chance you're going to find weapons of mass destruction under the rubric
he's created inside the country ... The inspectors have been put in a very
difficult position by his behaviour.

Mr Levin said later he believed the CIA had, in effect, taken the decision
to undermine the inspections. When they've taken the position that
inspections are useless, they are bound to fail, he told The Washington
Post. We have undermined the inspectors.

Mr Levin has raised his concerns with the White House. In a letter to
President Bush, the senator asked that America provide the inspectors with
as much information as available.

He wrote: The American people want the inspections to proceed, want the
United States to share the information we have with the UN inspectors and
want us to obtain United Nations support before military action is used
against Iraq. 

© 2002 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=378163

[pjnews] bin Laden Rallies Muslims, Condemns Hussein

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http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=15176

TruthOut.com

Osama Rallies Muslims, Condemns Hussein
By William Rivers Pitt,

February 12, 2003

Osama bin Laden rose from the dead yet again on Tuesday to prophesy doom and
death for America. This is nothing new; he has been clawing his way out of
various burial holes for seventeen months now, and always manages to strike
fear into the American heart by way of the American media and the Bush
administration at exactly the moment when incredibly important shifts in
history are in the offing.

At this moment, George W. Bush stands almost completely alone in his desire
to make pre-emptive war on the nation of Iraq. Several key NATO allies ­
France, Germany and Belgium among them ­ have thrown sand into the gears of
battle by refusing to prepare Turkey for an immediate war they do not
support nor deem necessary. As this incredible state of affairs unfolded,
Americans found their ears ringing with orange-hued warnings of imminent
death. Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge went so far as to tell people to
load up on plastic sheeting and duct tape so as to bar their windows from
chemical attack, but the administration he calls home made sure to tell
people to live their lives normally and continue shopping.

And so it goes. This is fairly standard stuff within the American echo
chamber. Let there be one important piece of legislation, or one highly
embarrassing turn of events for the administration, and the word goes forth
that the sky is falling. We have been dealing with this politically
manufactured low-grade hysteria for many months now. Most Americans have
reached a suspended state of disbelief about it all, and won't be taking
these warnings seriously unless they see Osama bin Laden on their doorstep
in a black cassock with scythe in hand. Bush and Ashcroft will soon run out
of colors on the warning chart if this keeps up; the shade after red likely
exists somewhere in the fourth dimension, visible only to ultraconservative
war-hawks and media talking heads.

When the voice of Osama comes out of the television, however, things
suddenly become much more serious. The Bush administration may have
forgotten him entirely, but every single American still sleeps with visions
of burning towers and plummeting bodies projected on the backs of their
eyelids. Peter Bergen, noted terrorism expert, stated on CNN that such
messages from bin Laden usually herald new attacks. If the Orange Alert was
dubious on Monday, it was given new importance on Tuesday.

Secretary of State Colin Powell set the stage for this new bin Laden
statement early on Tuesday, much to the surprise of CIA Director George
Tenet. Powell, during testimony at a Senate Budget Committee meeting, let it
drop that the Middle East news network Al Jazeera had in hand a tape of
Osama bin Laden. Tenet, seated with the Intelligence Committee, had not
heard of this tape. One is left wondering at Powell's sources, especially
after the story unfolded.

Powell used the existence of this tape, and the words he claimed bin Laden
had said on it, to further tie Saddam Hussein to international terrorism. He
claimed bin Laden was clearly establishing a connection between himself and
Hussein on the tape, beyond all question. This nexus between terrorists and
states that are developing weapons of mass destruction, said Powell, can
no longer be looked away from and ignored.

The actual tape, played and translated live on every major cable news
channel, told a very different story. Osama bin Laden swore vengeance
against America if Iraq was attacked, and demanded that the Muslim world
stand in solidarity with the Muslim people of Iraq. In very clear words,
Osama bin Laden told the people of Iraq to rise up against both American
aggression and against socialist Saddam Hussein. If the translations that
were provided were reliable, there is no ambiguity in bin Laden's words on
the matter. So much, it seems, for Powell's case that Hussein and bin Laden
are working together.

And this is where it gets interesting.

An MSNBC.com report on the bin Laden tape carried the following sentence:
At the same time, the message also called on Iraqis to rise up and oust
Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who is a secular leader. This clearly
confirms the clarity of mind Osama bin Laden displayed in regard to Saddam
Hussein, and conforms to the recorded message heard by millions and millions
of people around the world.

Less than twenty minutes after this report appeared on MSNBC, that sentence
was deleted from the report. A few intrepid Internet news junkies, including
myself, preserved what is called a 'screen-grab' of the original article
before it was scrubbed. The version of the article currently in existence
has replaced the text above with this far more benign text: The taped
statement reflected Saddam, a secular leader, but made it clear that Saddam
was not the immediate target. A similar story line, bereft of the portions
describing