Posted on 02/16/2011 9:35:31 AM PST by Sopater
LONDON – An Iraqi man whose testimony the United States used as a key evidence to build a case for war in Iraq says he is proud that he lied about his country developing mobile biological warfare labs.
The Guardian newspaper published an interview Wednesday with Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi, who has been identified as the informer called "Curveball," whose claims about weapon labs formed part of then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's speech to the U.N. Security Council in 2003, shortly before the war began.
The Guardian quoted al-Janabi as saying: "I had the chance to fabricate something to topple the regime. I and my sons are proud of that."
Although some intelligence agents were skeptical of Curveball's story, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee reported in 2004 that the Central Intelligence Agency "withheld important information about Curveball's reliability" from analysts dealing with the case.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
“I didn’t know that GWB was Iraqi.”
I’m sure it was tempting for Yahoo to insert GWB instead of Iraqi.
No, he was born in Saudi Arabia. There was a birth announcement in one of the Riyadh papers, so that confirms it.
How very Muslim of him. The ends justify the means, right?
Something seems very odd about this story...I find it hard to believe that our intelligence community would take the word of one person in regards to WMD.
and why is he coming out now to profess this???
Didn’t Hussein (the other one) USE WMDs agains the Kurds? so at some point, Iraq DID have WMDs.
I was in the navy for 21 years, and I was near Baghdad, in the Triangle of Death, in a marine infantry battatlion, Sept. 2004-Mar. ‘05. In the spring of 2004, I heard, on the Fox News Channel and CNN, that Americans found proof that Iraq had WMD’s.
While I was in Iraq, I didn’t complain about being American presence, in Iraq. After I returned to the U.S., I’ve heard many people, who haven’t served, in the miliary, complain about the war.
This is something that has gone down the memory hole. During the invasion (thank God for the embedded reporters) they ran across a chemical plant that was not on any map. The plant manager was an Iraqi general, it was secured by an Iraqi battalion. The plant was surrounded by barbed wire fence and guard towers. The reporters told us it was a plant manufacturing nerve agent.
Then, a couple of days later, the newsies came back and told us, no, come to find out, its not nerve agent. Its agricultural pesticide.
A few days later they captured an Iraqi Army ammo dump, and in the ammo dump were barrels of nerve agent. Then, the next day, they came back and said, no, again, our bad, its not nerve agent, its agricultural pesticide. This actually happened a couple more times, on one occasion the reporters got sick from exposure to the chemical. And in each case, after initially reporting that it was nerve agent, they came back later to correct themselves, agricultural pesiticide.
Agricultural pesiticide is nerve agent. If you spread it on Iranians or Kurds, its nerve agent. If you dilute it and spread it on your fields, its pesticide. But for me, if its manufactured by an army general and stored in ammo dumps, its correct to report it as nerve agent.
My question then and my question now, is who had the power to make WMD disappear by simply renaming it? And with Bush’s presidency hanging by a thread, how is it that this sleight of hand was allowed to stand? You could say, something similar happened with the whole Plame/Wilson affair, where Libbey was convicted for something Richard Armitage said, and both Armitage and Powell and the prosecutor agreed to remain silent until after the conviction. You could say something similar happened with the whole Niger uranium story, where everyone agreed Bush lied even though the Iraqi visits to Niger were public knowledge (and you’ll note no one ever has asked where Libya got its uranium).
Something similar happened when they posited the notion that there was no connection between Bin Ladin and Saddam, even though Bin Ladin was recruited by Egyptian Islamic Jihad, who formed his inner circle, and EIJ was on Saddam’s payroll. Another truth hiding in plain sight everyone has agreed not to notice.
I remember these reports too, and then suddenly buried or rescinded. I found it extremely odd. Till the day I die, I will always believe that Iraq had WMD till Saddam regime was destroyed. They were removed, destroyed, stolen and hidden by neighboring countries, politic enemies of Bush, or by terrorist. I keep hoping one day they will find a forgotten abandon underground warehouse filled with old anthrax shells.
Marron,
That was an excellent response. Thank you for having a great memory.
I hope everyone who read that will share it with others who think this curveball is valid. it’s a distraction. but we should never forget that Bush thought he was doing the right thing going to Iraq and he had the UN and many countries who agreed. The world is better off without Saddam and his monster sons.
Stephen Hayes at the Washington Times did extensive research about Saddams WMD, and what was found in underground bunkers.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.