-Caveat Lector-
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2367.htm
Lies of this war: Congressman Waxman challenges the President
compiled and edited
by Tom Engelhardt
As I read the following brave -- and evidently unreported --
letter/challenge sent to the President on the very eve of war by California
Democratic Congressman Henry Waxman, the Ranking Minority Member of
the Committee on Government Reform (which his website bills as "the
principal investigative committee in the House"), I was also trying to put
the lies about Iraq's nuclear program that Waxman highlights into some kind
of context. What came to mind was one of those just post-Cold War
"debates" that hit the press for a while: Was the United States, "the last
superpower," to be the lone "global policeman"? I was thinking about that
image -- no longer at question for this administration -- as I watched bits of
the present TV spectacle: tanks advancing in the desert to the
commentary of Ted Koppel, newsmen demonstrating how to put on and
take off gas masks, an American flag being raised (and then evidently
quickly lowered) over the town of Umm Qasir (no conquest here), the first
shots of kneeling and supplicant Iraqi soldiers surrendering, the burning
government buildings of Baghdad, those arrows advancing up floor-to-
ceiling maps, the generals beginning to speak from Centcom headquarters
and the former generals who have already been speaking for two-plus days
from newsroom headquarters, and so on.
What I realized was that "global policeman" is such an incomplete image,
even if (and here's an irony) you give it a slightly more militarized edge by
exchanging that "policeman" for the French term "gendarme." To begin to
make sense today, the image would have to be filled in something like this
way: First of all, as the Waxman letter indicates, the call from the "victim"
that sends the policeman out, gun drawn, to arrest the malefactor comes
from a distinctly self-interested party, and is based on lies, half-truths, and
manufactured information -- or put another way, the accuser/ "victim" (or
rather the possible future victim, as the Bush administration put it) turns
out to be the policeman, who in a slightly different guise, having made the
arrest, will soon don the robes of the judge. (We are, after all, planning to
put on our own war crimes trials for the Iraqi leadership, if the "alive" part
of "dead or alive" even turns out to apply, having already scotched any
participation in the ICC where such trials might be appropriate.) But let's
not stop there. Assumedly, having passed judgment, our policeman will
then don the garb of prison guard or executioner, and carry out the
sentence, and on the side, our judicial hero will also be profiting by the
situation, taking kickbacks from various of the participants, and then, of
course, let's not leave out the role of benevolent proconsul, and probably
several others I've forgotten. The truth of the moment is that we've taken
all the roles on the global stage for ourselves, except, of course, that of
the Evil One (and perhaps the grateful native). It's really a classic
Hollywood script and also the definition of imperial. Not everything
empires do is always an unmitigated evil, just as the departure of Saddam
Hussein will not be one. But empires, to my mind at least, are unmitigated
evils.
In that context, read Waxman's remarkable letter highlighting one of the
fraudulent, carefully manipulated underpinnings of our present war.
Interestingly, the friend who brought this letter to my attention did
LexisNexis searches for any articles on Waxman's challenge to the White
House under "major papers" or simply California news sources and found
zero mention. You might think that when, in the midst of war, a significant
member of the minority party in Congress challenges the administration's
explanation for why we acted, it might merit the odd line or two,
somewhere or other. After all, this letter is posted at Cong. Waxman's
website. When my service can make news, then we know we're all in
trouble.
March 17, 2003
The President
The White House
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President:
I am writing regarding a matter of grave concern. Upon your order, our
armed forces will soon initiate the first preemptive war in our nation’s
history. The most persuasive justification for this war is that we must act
to prevent Iraq from developing nuclear weapons.
In the last ten days, however, it has become incontrovertibly clear that a
key piece of evidence you and other Administration officials have cited
regarding Iraq’s efforts to obtain nuclear weapons is a hoax. What’s more,
the Central Intelligence Agency questioned the veracity of the evidence at
the same time you and other Administration officials were citing it in
public statements. This is a breach of the highest order, and the American
people are entitled to know how it happened.
As you know, I voted for the congressional resolution condemning Iraq and
authorizing the use of force. Despite serious misgivings, I supported the
resolution because I believed congressional approval would significantly
improve the likelihood of effective U.N. action. Equally important, I
believed that you had access to reliable intelligence information that
merited deference.
Like many other members, I was particularly influenced by your views
about Iraq’s nuclear intentions. Although chemical and biological weapons
can inflict casualties, no argument for attacking Iraq is as compelling as the
possibility of Saddam Hussein brandishing nuclear bombs. That, obviously, is
why the evidence in this area is so crucial, and why so many have looked
to you for honest and credible information on Iraq's nuclear capability.
The evidence in question is correspondence that indicates that Iraq
sought to obtain nuclear material from an African country, Niger. For
several months, this evidence has been a central part of the U.S. case
against Iraq. On December 19, the State Department filed a response to
Iraq’s disarmament declaration to the U.N. Security Council. The State
Department response stated: “The Declaration ignores efforts to procure
uranium from Niger.” A month later, in your State of the Union address,
you stated: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” Defense
Secretary Rumsfeld subsequently cited the evidence in briefing reporters.
It has now been conceded that this evidence was a forgery. On March 7,
the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed
ElBaradei, reported that the evidence that Iraq sought nuclear materials
from Niger was “not authentic.” As subsequent media accounts indicated,
the evidence contained “crude errors,” such as a “childlike signature” and
the use of stationary from a military government in Niger that has been out
of power for over a decade.
Even more troubling, however, the CIA, which has been aware of this
information since 2001, has never regarded the evidence as reliable. The
implications of this fact are profound: it means that a key part of the case
you have been building against Iraq is evidence that your own intelligence
experts at the Central Intelligence Agency do not believe is credible.
It is hard to imagine how this situation could have developed. The two
most obvious explanations — knowing deception or unfathomable
incompetence — both have immediate and serious implications. It is thus
imperative that you address this matter without delay and provide an
alternative explanation, if there is one.
The rest of this letter will explain my concerns in detail.
Use of the Evidence by U.S. Officials
The evidence that Iraq sought to purchase uranium from an African
country was first revealed by the British government on September 24,
2002, when Prime Minister Tony Blair released a 50-page report on Iraqi
efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction. As the New York Times
reported in a front-page article, one of the two “chief new elements” in
the report was the claim that Iraq had “sought to acquire uranium in
Africa that could be used to make nuclear weapons.” [1]
This evidence subsequently became a significant part of the U.S. case
against Iraq. On December 7, Iraq filed its weapons declaration with the
United Nations Security Council. The U.S. response relied heavily on the
evidence that Iraq had sought to obtain uranium from Africa. For example,
this is how the New York Times began its front- page article on December
13 describing the U.S. response:
American intelligence agencies have reached a preliminary conclusion that
Iraq’s 12,000 page declaration of its weapons program fails to account for
chemical and biological agents missing when inspectors left Iraq four years
ago, American officials and United Nations diplomats said today.
In addition, Iraq’s declaration on its nuclear program, they say, leaves
open a host of questions. Among them is why Iraq was seeking to buy
uranium in Africa in recent years. [2]
The official U.S. response was provided on December 19, when Secretary
of State Colin Powell appeared before the Security Council. As the Los
Angeles Times reported, “A one-page State Department fact sheet . . . lists
what Washington considers the key omissions and deceptions in Baghdad’s
Dec. 7 weapons declaration.” [3] One of the eight “key omissions and
deceptions” was the failure to explain Iraq’s attempts to purchase uranium
from an African country.
Specifically, the State Department fact sheet contains the following points
under the heading “Nuclear Weapons”: “The Declaration ignores efforts to
procure uranium from Niger. Why is the Iraqi regime hiding their uranium
procurement?” A copy of this fact sheet is enclosed with this letter.
The Iraqi efforts to obtain uranium from Africa were deemed significant
enough to be included in your State of the Union address to Congress.
You stated: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” [4] As the
Washington Post reported the next day, “the president seemed quite
specific as he ticked off the allegations last night, including the news that
Iraq had secured uranium from Africa for the purpose of making nuclear
bombs.” [5]
A day later, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told reporters at a news
briefing that Iraq “recently was discovered seeking significant quantities of
uranium from Africa.” [6]
Knowledge of the Unreliability of the Evidence
The world first learned that the evidence linking Iraq to attempts to
purchase uranium from Africa was forged from the Director General of the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Mohamed ElBaradei. On March
7, Director ElBaradei reported to the U.N. Security Council:
Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded, with the
concurrence of outside experts, that these documents — which formed
the basis for reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and
Niger — are in fact not authentic. We have therefore concluded that
these specific allegations are unfounded. [7]
Recent accounts in the news media have provided additional details.
According to the Washington Post, the faked evidence included “a series
of letters between Iraqi agents and officials in the central African nation
of Niger.” [8] The article stated that the forgers “made relatively crude
errors that eventually gave them away — including names and titles that
did not match up with the individuals who held office at the time the
letters were purportedly written.” [9] CNN reported:
one of the documents purports to be a letter signed by Tandjia Mamadou,
the president of Niger, talking about the uranium deal with Iraq. On it [is]
a childlike signature that is clearly not his. Another, written on paper from
a 1980s military government in Niger, bears the date of October 2000 and
the signature of a man who by then had not been foreign minister of Niger
for 14 years. [10]
U.S. intelligence officials had doubts about the veracity of the evidence
long before Director ElBaradei’s report. The Los Angeles Times reported
on March 15 that “the CIA first heard allegations that Iraq was seeking
uranium from Niger in late 2001” when “the existence of the documents
was reported to [the CIA] second- or third-hand.” The Los Angeles Times
quotes one CIA official as saying: “We included that in some of our
reporting, although it was all caveated because we had concerns about
the accuracy of that information.” [11] The Washington Post reported on
March 13: “The CIA . . . had questions about ‘whether they were
accurate,’ said one intelligence official, and it decided not to include
them in its file on Iraq’s program to procure weapons of mass
destruction.” [12]
There have been suggestions by some Administration officials that there
may be other evidence besides the forged documents that shows Iraq
tried to obtain uranium from an African country. For instance, CIA officials
recently stated that “U.S. concerns regarding a possible uranium
agreement between Niger and Iraq were not based solely on the
documents which are now known to be fraudulent.” The CIA provided this
other information to the IAEA along with the forged documents. After
reviewing this complete body of evidence, the IAEA stated: “we have found
to date no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of a nuclear
weapons programme in Iraq.” [13] Ultimately, the IAEA concluded that
“these specific allegations are unfounded.” [14]
Questions
These facts raise troubling questions. It appears that at the same time that
you, Secretary Rumsfeld, and State Department officials were citing Iraq’s
efforts to obtain uranium from Africa as a crucial part of the case against
Iraq, U.S. intelligence officials regarded this very same evidence as
unreliable. If true, this is deeply disturbing: it would mean that your
Administration asked the U.N. Security Council, the Congress, and the
American people to rely on information that your own experts knew was
not credible.
Your statement to Congress during the State of the Union, in particular,
raises a host of questions. The statement is worded in a way that suggests
it was carefully crafted to be both literally true and deliberately misleading
at the same time. The statement itself — “The British government has
learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of
uranium from Africa” — may be technically accurate, since this appears to
be the British position. But given what the CIA knew at the time, the
implication you intended — that there was credible evidence that Iraq
sought uranium from Africa — was simply false.
To date, the White House has avoided explaining why the Administration
relied on this forged evidence in building its case against Iraq. The first
Administration response, which was provided to the Washington Post, was
“we fell for it.” [15] But this is no longer credible in light of the
information from the CIA. Your spokesman, Ari Fleischer, was asked about
this issue at a White House news briefing on March 14, but as the following
transcript reveals, he claimed ignorance and avoided the question:
Q: Ari, as the president said in his State of the Union address, the British
government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant
quantities of uranium from Africa. And since then, the IAEA said that those
were forged documents —
Mr. Fleischer: I’m sorry, whose statement was that?
Q: The President, in his State of the Union address. Since then, the IAEA
has said those were forged documents. Was the administration aware of
any doubts about these documents, the authenticity of the documents,
from any government agency or department before it was submitted to the
IAEA?
Mr. Fleisher: These are matters that are always reviewed with an eye
toward the various information that comes in and is analyzed by a variety
of different people. The President’s concerns about Iraq come from
multiple places, involving multiple threats that Iraq can possess, and these
are matters that remain discussed.
Thank you [end of briefing]. [16]
Plainly, more explanation is needed. I urge you to provide to me and to
the relevant committees of Congress a full accounting of what you knew
about the reliability of the evidence linking Iraq to uranium in Africa, when
you knew this, and why you and senior officials in the Administration
presented the evidence to the U.N. Security Council, the Congress, and
the American people without disclosing the doubts of the CIA. In
particular, I urge you to address:
Whether CIA officials communicated their doubts about the credibility of
the forged evidence to other Administration officials, including officials in
the Department of State, the Department of Defense, the National
Security Council, and the White House;
Whether the CIA had any input into the “Fact Sheet” distributed by the
State Department on December 19, 2002; and
Whether the CIA reviewed your statement in the State of the Union
address regarding Iraq’s attempts to obtain uranium from Africa and, if so,
what the CIA said about the statement.
Given the urgency of the situation, I would appreciate an expeditious
response to these questions.
Sincerely,
Henry A. Waxman
Ranking Minority Member
Enclosure
[1] Blair Says Iraqis Could Launch Chemical Warheads in Minutes, New York
Times (Sept. 25, 2002).
[2] Threats and Responses: Report by Iraq, Iraq Arms Report Has Big
Omissions, U.S. Officials Say, New York Times (Dec. 13, 2002) (emphasis
added).
[3] U.S. Issues a List of the Shortcomings in Iraqi Arms Declaration, Los
Angeles Times (Dec. 20, 2002) (emphasis added).
[4] The President, State of the Union Address (Jan. 28, 2003) (online at
www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/01/20030128?19.html) (emphasis
added).
[5] A War Cry Tempered by Eloquence, Washington Post (Jan. 29, 2003).
[6] Press Conference with Donald Rumsfeld, General Richard Myers, Cable
News Network (Jan. 29, 2003) (emphasis added).
[7] IAEA Director General Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, The Status of Nuclear
Inspections in Iraq: An Update (Mar. 7, 2002) (online at
www.iaea.org/worldatom/ Press/Statements/ 2003/ebsp2003n006.shtml).
[8] Some Evidence on Iraq Called Fake; U.N. Nuclear Inspector Says
Documents on Purchases Were Forged, Washington Post (Mar. 8, 2003).
[9] Id.
[10] U.N. Saying Documents Were Faked, CNN American Morning with Paula
Zahn (Mar. 14, 2003).
[11] Italy May Have Been Misled by Fake Iraq Arms Papers, U.S. Says, Los
Angeles Times (Mar. 15, 2003).
[12] FBI Probes Fake Evidence of Iraqi Nuclear Plans, Washington Post (Mar.
13, 2003).
[13] IAEA Director General Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, supra note 7 (emphasis
added).
[14] Id. (emphasis added).
[15] Some Evidence on Iraq Called Fake, supra note 8.
[16] The White House, Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer (Mar. 14, 2003) (online
at www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030314-12.html)
(emphasis added).
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