Sumo Merriment

The War They Wanted, The Lies They Needed...


In case you haven't read this article in the July Vanity Fair...I'm pleased to announce that I am, for your pleasure of course, going to recount some of it for you. Musn't be forgetting how they tried to super-duper double-edged knife the Americans in the back with their lies regarding the all encompassing yellowcake uranium in Niger. And if they are capable of doing this to us...what else awaits us in the furture of la la land.

To trace the path of the documents from their fabrication to their inclusion in Bush's infamous speech, Vanity Fair has interviewed a number of former intelligence and military analysts who have served in the C.I.A., The State Department, the Defense Intelligence Agency (D.I.A.), and the Pentagon. Some of them refer to the Niger documents as "a disinformation operation," others as "black propaganda," "black ops," or "a classic psyops [psychological-operations] campaign." But whatever term they use, at least nine of these officials believe that the Niger documents were part of a covert operation to deliberately mislead the American public.

It's Rome we are in now...the Niger Embassy is the site of one of the great mysteries of our times. On January 2, 2001, an embassy offical returned there after New Year's Day and discovered that the offices had been robbed. Little of value was missing~~a wristwatch, perfune, worthless documents, embassy stationery, and some official stamps bearing the seal of the Republic of Niger. The consequences of the robbery were so great that the Watergate break-in pales by comparison.

It just so happens a few months after the robbery, Western intelligence analysts began hearing that Saddam had sought yellowcake~~a concentrated form of uranium which, if enriched, can be used in nuclear weapons~~from Niger. Next...a dossier purporting to document the attempted purchase of hundreds of tons of uranium by Iraq. Let's just say that these documents made their way from Italian intelligence to, at various times, the C.I.A., other Western intelligence agencies, the U.S. Embassy in Rome, the State Department, and the White House, as well as several media outlets. So then, in his January 2003 State of the Union address, Bush told the world, "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." Two months later,The U.S. invaded Iraq, starting a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people, cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and has de-stabilized irrevocably the Middle East. Since that time the world has learned that Bush's 16-word give-away was apparently based on the Niger documents, but also that the documents were forged.

For more than two years it has been widely reported that the U.S. invaded Iraq because of intelligence failures. Yeah right! It is far more likely that the Iraq war started because of an extraordinary intelligence success~~specifically, an effective campaign of disinformation, or black propaganda, which led the White House, the Pentagon, Britain's M.1.6 intelligence service, and thousands of outlets in the American media to promote the falsehood that Saddam's nuclear-weapons program posed a grave risk to the United States. And of course we all know about the additional stuff they tagged onto it. These forged Niger documents went through the hands of the Italian military intelligence service, SISMI, or operatives close to it, and that neo-conservative policymakers helped bring them to the attention of the White House. Even after information in the Niger documents was repeatedly rejected by the C.I.A. and the State Department, the hawkish neo-cons managed to circumvent seasoned intelligence analysts and insert the Niger claims into Bush's State of the Union address. By the time the U.S. invaded Iraq, this black-propaganda operation had helped convince more than 90 percent of the American people that a brutal dictator was developing W.M.D.~~and led us into war. I was not one of the 90% thank you very much.

Vanity Fair found at least 14 instances prior to the 2003 State of the Union in which analysts of the C.I.A., the state Department, or other government agencies who had examined the Niger documents or reports about them had serious doubts about their legitimacy~~only to be rebuffed by Bush administration officials who wanted to use the material. "They were just relentless," says Wilkerson, who later prepared Colin Powell's presentation before the United Nations General Assembly. "We would take it out and they would stick it back in. That was their favorite bureaucratic technique~~ruthless relentlessness." The accounts put forth by Wilkerson and his colleagues strongly suggest that the C.I.A. is under siege not because it was wrong but because it was right. Agency analysts were not serving the White House's agenda.

What happened was not just the catastrophic foreign-policy blunder in Iraq but also an ongoing battle for the future of U.S. intelligence. Top officials have been leaving the C.I.A. in droves~ including Porter Goss, who mysteriously resigned in May, just 18 months after he had been handpicked by Bush to be the director of Central Intelligence. Whatever the reason for his sudden departure, anyone at the top of the C.I.A. , Goss's replacement included, ultimately must worry about serving two masters: a White House that desperately wants intelligence it can use to remake the Middle East and a spy agency that is acutely sensitive to having its intelligence politicized.

So now that brings us up to date to the Brits monitoring some British citizens of Pakistani descent. Alledgedly they were going to use liquids that they could manipulate while in the air and set off destroying the aircraft and the people on it. Apparently as many as 10 planes, which of course would make a big splash in the news as well as put the fear of terrorism in the minds of most of the world. Thereby keeping fear alive and well in the minds of Americans especially thanks to them getting this information so timely after Lieberman was defeated of his Senate seat in the primary. The administration would like nothing less that to strike fear in us so that we will vote Republican...because as we all know that the conservatives have their eye on the ball and will be able to keep us safer than the Democrats. They've really proven that many times over haven't they?

So what I've been trying to prove here is that "they" cannot be trusted and the Niger business stands out like an elephant in the room frankly. Also knowing that they have lied many times over to get what they wanted out there (misinformation) or simply lying when all else fails. They make up baloney about the democrats wanting to "cut and run"...sure we want to stop the death and destruction of our soldiers to stop...and sure we want the Iraqi people to stop being blown up and needlessly slaughtered. The "cut and run" doesn't apply literally...but we must get out of there because we simply have no right to be there...never did. Thousands have needlessly died so that our administration could lie to us some more about giving them their freedom. Where is their freedom? Freedom to die because no place in Iraq is safe for it's people?

The conservatives are guilty of simply looking the other way. Our administration has done this so many times we've lost count. They make things up to try and focus our attention away from the lies and the situations that they get themselves into that are not legal according to the Constitution...that they have high-jacked as easily as any terrorist has us in the States. Our administration has looked the other way with what has happened with Lebanon and Israel. It just wasn't convenient to tell them to knock it off...because you're killing innocent men, women and children...they needed more time to get some political agendas taken care of first that benefitted them. They have blood on their hands. So when they were so determined to get freedom for the Iraqis...soldiers and civilians were dying for that cause...it makes me wonder why they haven't been so gung-ho for getting the freedom for the Lebanese or for the Israeli citizenry.

So you see...the lies told about other lies has me not so inclined to believe this business coming out of England...because our administration stands to benefit from it (more fear for us)...and Blair needs a boost...because his countrymen are clamoring for his blood. The plain fact is this...they need this new developement to hang it over our heads so we will think they are heros. They couldn't be more wrong. They've cried wolf too many times...I hope I'm wrong... because we are so screwed if we think they are going to do the right thing by us...they simply look the other way until it is the right political moment to pay attention. Well...it may be too late to pay attention to us now...Lamont's win over Lieberman proved that...and they can't stand it.





Craig Unger authored the Vanity Fair article...July

Posted by sumo on Sunday, August 13, 2006 at 12:11 AM | Permalink Return to Top