Bush Knew Iraq Info Was False

CBS News ^ | 7/10/03 | CBS News

[NYC Republican]

CBS) Senior administration officials tell CBS News the President’s mistaken claim that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa was included in his State of the Union address -- despite objections from the CIA.

Before the speech was delivered, the portions dealing with Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction were checked with the CIA for accuracy, reports CBS News National Security Correspondent David Martin.

CIA officials warned members of the President’s National Security Council staff the intelligence was not good enough to make the flat statement Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa.

The White House officials responded that a paper issued by the British government contained the unequivocal assertion: “Iraq has ... sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” As long as the statement was attributed to British Intelligence, the White House officials argued, it would be factually accurate. The CIA officials dropped their objections and that’s how it was delivered.

“The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa,” Mr. Bush said.

The statement was technically correct, since it accurately reflected the British paper. But the bottom line is the White House knowingly included in a presidential address information its own CIA had explicitly warned might not be true.

Today at a press conference during the President’s trip to Africa, Secretary of State Colin Powell portrayed it as an honest mistake.

“There was no effort or attempt on the part of the president or anyone else in the administration to mislead or to deceive the American people,” said Powell.

But eight days after the State of the Union, when Powell addressed the U.N., he deliberately left out any reference to Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa.

“I didn’t use the uranium at that point because I didn’t think that was sufficiently strong as evidence to present before the world,” Powell said.

That is exactly what CIA officials told the White House before the State of the Union. The top CIA official, Director George Tenet, was not involved in those discussions and apparently never warned the President he was on thin ice.

Secretary Powell said today he read the State of the Union speech before it was delivered and understood it had been seen and cleared by the intelligence community. But intelligence officials say the director of the CIA never saw the final draft.

[NYC Republican]

Some more red meat for the DemocRats. Doesn't look good.

[nwrep]

This could be hugh. It could lead to John Conyers asking "What did he know and when did he know it?" It could lead to some nastiness and ultimately a Republican defeat.

[swilhelm73]

Their unnamed source isn't Terance Wilkinson by any chance is it?

http://www.mrc.org/realitycheck/2003/fax20030710.asp

[The Old Hoosier]

Wait a minute, how did this article get this headline, anyway?

[Support Free Republic]

She wants to look her best for her subjects.
>	Make a fashion statement. Donate Here By Secure Server Or mail checks to FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794 or you can use PayPal at Jimrob@psnw.com
STOP BY AND BUMP THE FUNDRAISER THREAD- It is in the breaking news sidebar!

[CedarDave]

Doen't take long for Dim talking points to show up at the alphabet networks. Only good news is that Dan Blather's ratings are so low, few people may have seen it.

[The Louiswu]

Gotta find/kill Sadam or Osama fast and get this story on the back burner

[PhiKapMom]

Over here! Now CBS has picked up on the bogus story. Hard for me to fathom this all came from Thompson. I smell a planted story here that Thompson ran with and others are following suit.

Note that Tenant said he had no knowledge -- this smells!

[HassanBenSobar]

This is so dumb. Iraq was trying to buy uranium from anyone, anywhere since the eighties. Read 'Saddam's Bombmaker'. Even if the info on Africa was wrong, the point is, Saddam was doing everything in his power to get a bomb, and what he needed most was weapons-grade uranium!

[Shermy]

"Doesn't look good."

Especially since it's spreading to "Africa" rather than "one letter from Niger."

Where did the info come from? Bush needs to expose it. But he seems too busy promoting the taxayer funds for pharmaceutical companies scam (his Africa "AIDS" bailout) to notice.

[Grampa Dave]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/943322/posts

It is getting better. Check this out [Truthout trying to hide stealing a fraudulent article]


Posted on 07/09/2003 6:26 PM PDT by William McKinley


I am having a back and forth with Japan Today regarding their publishing of an article which appeared in Capitol Hill Blue that has subsequently been exposed to be false.

Japan Today did not get the article from Capitol Hill Blue though. They got it from Truthout.org, a leftist propaganda outfit.

I wanted to see if Truthout.org even had the story up on their site. I went to their main page, Truthout.org and checked. Nothing. I noticed a search box up at the top. So I took a phrase from the original article, sought significant quantities and hit search.

Bingo.

Here is what the resulting page looked like:

---

Search results for 'sought and significant and quantities'
Refine search:

---

Documents 1 - 10 of 18 matches. More 's indicate a better match.

---

t r u t h o u t - Iraq Attacks Wound Seven U.S. Soldiers
... threat posed by Saddam in the run-up to the war. And the White House acknowledged Bush was incorrect when he said in January that Iraq recently had sought significant quantities of uranium in Africa. (In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070903D.shtml 07/08/03, 11552 bytes
t r u t h o u t - Robert Scheer | A Diplomat's Undiplomatic Truth: They Lied
... uranium connection as a major justification for rushing the nation to war: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium in Africa." What the president did not say was that the British were relying on their intelligence white paper ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070903C.shtml 07/08/03, 12192 bytes
t r u t h o u t - White House Admits Lying About Iraq Nukes
... weeks of denial, the White House Monday finally admitted President Bush lied in his January State of the Union Address when he claimed Iraq had sought significant quantities of uranium in Africa. The acknowledgment came as a British parliamentary commission questioned the reliability of ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070903A.shtml 07/08/03, 24043 bytes
t r u t h o u t - US Ambassador: 'Nuclear Report Ignored' By Administration
... . Bush, in his State of the Union speech on Jan. 23, declared that "the British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." After Bush's speech, Wilson said he contacted the State Department, noted that the ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070803E.shtml 07/07/03, 15966 bytes
t r u t h o u t - The Selling of the Iraq War
... choice about the most important question a nation faces: whether or not to go to war. That is exactly what the Bush administration did when it sought to convince the public and Congress that the United States should go to war with Iraq. From late August 2002 to mid-March of this year ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070703A.shtml 07/06/03, 55335 bytes
t r u t h o u t - Diplomat: British Ministers Knew Evidence was Forged
... office of the Vice-President, Dick Cheney. During eight days in Niger he discovered it was impossible for Iraq to have been buying the quantities of uranium alleged. "My report was very unequivocal," he said. He also learnt that the signatures of officials vital to any transaction ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/070103B.shtml 06/30/03, 12799 bytes
t r u t h o u t - 10 Appalling Lies We Were Told About Iraq
... to the occasional lie of expediency but, in fact, almost never told the truth. What follows are just the most outrageous and significant of the dozens of outright lies uttered by Bush and his top officials over the past year in what amounts to a systematic campaign to scare the bejeezus ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/062903G.shtml 06/28/03, 16884 bytes
t r u t h o u t - Serious Questions for Tony Blair
... was attempting to build nuclear weapons that could pose a threat to the West. The Government has stood by reports that Iraq "sought the supply of significant quantities of uranium from Africa". British officials say the intelligence was based on multiple sources, despite the IAEA ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/062703G.shtml 06/26/03, 13840 bytes
t r u t h o u t - Byrd: 'The Road to Coverup is the Road to Ruin'
... the President who appears to me to be intent on revising history. There is an abundance of clear and unmistakable evidence that the Administration sought to portray Iraq as a direct and deadly threat to the American people. But there is a great difference between the hand-picked intelligence that was ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/062503A.shtml 06/24/03, 22919 bytes
t r u t h o u t - Rep. Waxman | Forged Iraq WMD Evidence
... on This Week, you repeated this statement, claiming that you made multiple inquiries of the intelligence agencies regarding the allegation that Iraq sought to obtain uranium from an African country. You stated: George, somebody, somebody down may have known. But I will tell you that when ...
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/061303B.shtml 06/13/03, 19626 bytes

---

Those who hate president Bush need to be very careful what they post in efforts to discredit him, when their cites are tainted meat!

[NativeNewYorker]

Is it just me, or is the press covering itself in flourescent paint on this one?

[MJY1288]

Unbelievable isn't it?

The liberal media is on the war path

[The_Media_never_lie]

You made a good point. If Iraq indeed was trying to buy uranium but this story was not true, then the President acted in good faith, right? Then what is the problem? Democrat-Bath Party defenders looking for ammunition?

[ValenB4]

Readers of Antiwar.com knew this well before the war broke out. This information was out there. But no one wanted to hear it. But now the media is determined to destroy Bush, who deservedly has it coming.

[William McKinley]

CIA officials warned members of the President’s National Security Council staff the intelligence was not good enough to make the flat statement Iraq tried to buy uranium from Africa

I wonder if any of the CIA officials was named Terrance J. Wilkinson.

Don't you just love unnamed sources?

[lelio]

For all the libs bellyaching on this I'm a little angry that one part of government isn't talking to another. The documents were known forgeries before the prez brought it up in his speech.
I always thought it was immaterial if Iraq had WMD or not, they were a bad player and should of been taken out. But by going out on a limb like this the administration is weakening any future enterance into foreign affairs as everyone will wonder if they've done their fact checking.
Newt was on Hannity this afternoon talking about this, trying to make it seem like the democrats are beating up on the intelligence organizations, and that they are always going to be put in a bad light because they're either withholding something or putting put forgeries. Newt's barking up the wrong tree: the docs were known fakes yet someone didn't do their homework and inform Bush.

[PhiKapMom]

Question! Clinton bought a summer home in N. Ireland according to my local news. Do we have an extradition treaty with N. Ireland?

[CedarDave]

Go home -- your rock is awaiting your crawling under it.