CLARKE IN 92: BUSH WAS LAX ON IRAQ

The Washington Post (BRIEF EXCERPT ONLY, IN COMPLIANCE WITH COPYRIGHT LAW AND LAT/WP VS FR] | JUNE 5, 1992 | R. Jeffrey Smith

[Wallaby]

Memo Says U.S. Was Lax on Iraq; 'No One Was Paying Attention' to Arms [EXCERPT] The Washington Post R. Jeffrey Smith, Washington Post Staff Writer FIRST SECTION; PAGE A1 June 5, 1992, Friday, Final Edition A senior State Department official concluded in a secret memorandum after Iraq invaded Kuwait that "no one was paying attention" to blocking Iraq's purchase of Western equipment for weapons of mass destruction during the previous decade, according to a copy obtained by The Washington Post. [According to Clarke's memo,] "no one was paying attention" to blocking Iraq's purchase of Western equipment for weapons of mass destruction during the previous decade. . ." The official, Assistant Secretary of State Richard A. Clarke, made the claim in a memo declassified yesterday and provided to Congress along with 53 other State Department documents concerning U.S.-Iraqi relations that were requested by a congressional committee investigating U.S. policy toward Iraq before the Persian Gulf War. The documents, which were made available to The Post by a U.S. official, provide fresh details about the administration's monitoring of Iraq's nuclear and chemical weapons programs and the controversial U.S. pre-war push to ease controls on high-technology exports as part of an attempt to cultivate better relations with Iraq before it invaded Kuwait in August 1990.

(snip) President Bush last night defended the effort toward better relations with Iraq against this congressional criticism, saying that the United States tried to work with Saddam "on grain credits and things of this nature to avoid aggressive action. And it failed. . . . " "That approach, holding out a hand, trying to get him to renounce terrorism and join the family of nations, didn't work," Bush told a White House news conference. "And the minute he moved aggressively, we moved aggressively and set back aggression." One undated memo summarizing U.S. nonproliferation activity aimed at Iraq indicates that the Bush administration moved slowly to constrain Iraq's mass-destruction weapons programs after a Iraqi long-range missile launch in 1989 caught officials by surprise. The memo states that Clarke sought in an interagency meeting that December "to get at why U.S. intelligence didn't know Iraq had such capabilities beforehand and to galvanize the interagency community into more effective [action] against the Iraqi missile program." (snip) Clarke's memo referring to Washington's record of failure on the issue was written after the invasion. . . (snip)

[Howlin]

Please watch Keith Olberman tonight (or the rerun); it's at the very beginning. Wayne Downing nails it.

[jwalsh07]

Clarkes Motive For Dissing Bush Is Below:

[faithincowboys]

I'M STARTING TO THINK CLARKE IS AN AGENT FOR A FOREIGN GOVERNMENT!!

[Will_Zurmacht]

This guy is toast!
He'll be lucky to land a think tank gig when this is over...no one will want to touch him. Hope he sells a lotta books, he's gonna need the money.

He's still qualified for "Media Consultant",though, which is where we'll probably see him in a few years. Trot him out twice a year to opine on some issue he knows nothing about, then roll him back to Bethesda.

[AF68]

Is Senator Flip-Flop going to come out swinging with this dreck tommorrow? Will this counterfeit hero take the pathetic peanut man's lead and call President Bush a liar?

[Indy Pendance]

We all know what this is about, besides book sales. It's Anyone But Bush.

[BlueAngel]

Yes, I saw that segment and want to see it again. The "unbiased reporters" met with Kerry in someone's apartment.

Some of the names were, Howard Fineman, Jonathan Alter, Eric Alterman and a bunch of others. Sickening!

O'Reilly's show was really good tonight. I hope everyone catches the rerun.

[cyncooper]

Well!

[Spotsy]

This Clarke outburst is non-partisan. It is a full-blown ego problem as Wayne Downing asserts.

And the mainstream media thinks it is legitimate news. So, we are made to pay the price for a man acting out his psychological problems.

[Indy Pendance]

I rarely watch tv. What station is he on and what time?

[Howlin]

Exactly. Even Wayne Downing says he was upset because he had no ACCESS at this White House like he did at the Clinton White House. After reading this, this guy is beginning to remind me of The Get-Ready Man in James Thurber's My Life and Hard Times.

"...the Get-Ready Man, whom James Thurber wrote about in his memoir, My Life and Hard Times. A cartoon figure, really: the bearded, crazed doomsayer, the street preacher who appears out of nowhere and interrupts everybody's routine and makes such a spectacle of himself that he overshadows his own message. Thurber's Get-Ready Man lived in Thurber's hometown, Columbus, Ohio, but we've all seen his like somewhere."

[cyncooper]

You should see Dan Abrams on MSNBC right now. Actually I watched for a bit and his hammering of Barbara Comstock grew boring. He was insisting that Clarke would have to be a big fat liar to write this book and be disagreed with.

Well, YEA DAN, that's the point.

Barbara was probably the most restrained Bush spokesperson I saw all day (I'm not sure if she's officially with them or not). The rest basically would have more or less agree with his "unthinkable" premise. She was too reticent and unwilling to say that, and preferred to call it a different "interpretation".

[Will_Zurmacht]

Oh for Goodness sakes....Back in the good old days, Clinton was serviced in his own residence buy a young woman.

Now Democrats are forced conduct their liasons in sleazy apartments with...ugh, male reporters...

The question on everyones minds...Did Fineman smoke the cigar afterwards?

[Howlin]

MSNBC. It was on at 8 p.m. here in EST. Repeat at midnight.

[Mo1]

It's on Lexis-Nexis. Any newsroom could pull it up.

And the fact they didn't says alot

[blam]

"OMG.....CNN has drug out BOB GRAHAM and HIS conspiracy theory!"

Graham thinks he has a chance to be Kerry's VP.

[Indy Pendance]

Thanks, the last tv I watched was the Westminster Dog show. How sad is that?

[Spotsy]

Wesley Clark now saying that it doesn't matter what Clinton did -- this is ALL about Bush's qualifications for reelection!

And this is why the Dems cannot be trusted with national security.

[Miss Marple]

Update on Medea Benjamin and Code Pink, from the Dennis Miller Show. She is not backing Nader, but is concentrating on getting Bush out (which means she is supporting Kerry).

So, Code Pink, hooked up with ANSWER and other commie groups, is backing Kerry.

Also, interestingly, she used the Clarke line that Bush went after Iraq and ignored Al Qaeda.

[Spotsy]

He was insisting that Clarke would have to be a big fat liar to write this book and be disagreed with.

Why Dan Abrams has a television show, I will never understand. Gosh Dan, just because it's in print doesn't make it true!