Posted on 10/02/2004 9:43:55 PM PDT by ambrose
Bush Aides Gave One-Sided View of Iraqi Data -- NYT
October 2, 2004
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Bush administration officials, in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq, gave a one-sided view of the case for believing Saddam Hussein had a nuclear arms program that ignored the doubts of their own experts, the New York Times said on Saturday.
The newspaper made the charge in an article about thousands of high-strength aluminum tubes ordered by Iraq that leading administration officials said were intended for use in uranium centrifuges.
"As the only physical evidence the United States could brandish of (Saddam's) revived nuclear ambitions, they gave credibility to the apocalyptic imagery invoked by President Bush and his advisers," said the article on the newspaper's Web site.
It referred to remarks by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice in September 2002 in which she said the tubes, a shipment of which were intercepted in Jordan in June 2001, were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs."
The paper said that before she made the remarks, "she was aware that the government's foremost nuclear experts had concluded that the tubes were most likely not for nuclear weapons at all."
It said the Energy Department experts believed the tubes were probably intended for small artillery rockets, as Iraq itself maintained.
"Senior administration officials repeatedly failed to fully disclose the contrary views of America's leading nuclear scientists," the Times said, citing Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Colin Powell by name.
"They sometimes overstated even the most dire intelligence assessments of the tubes, yet minimized or rejected the strong doubts of their own experts. They worried privately that the nuclear case was weak, but expressed sober certitude in public.
"The result was a largely one-sided presentation to the public that did not convey the depth of evidence and argument against the administration's most tangible proof of a revived nuclear weapons program in Iraq," the paper said.
A White House spokeswoman had no immediate comment.
But the campaign of Democratic presidential contender John Kerry jumped on the report, issuing an ad that said: "Here's something new about George Bush -- newspapers report he withheld key intelligence information from the American public so he could overstate the threat Iraq posed. Bush rushed to war. We're paying the price. It's time for a fresh start."
The times story said the theory that the tubes were intended for a centrifuge was largely promoted by one analyst at the CIA, a relatively junior staffer who had a background in mechanical engineering and operating U.S. centrifuges.
President Bush has cited Iraq's purported cache of weapons of mass destruction as the reason for deposing Saddam. No weapons have been found.
If George W. Bush said "I think we should give Iran Nuclear fuel" he would have been run out of town, but the partisan media gives the Traitor Kerry a pass
The fact they don't do it now to Kerry is just more proof of what Hypocrites they are
YOU HERE THAT MEDIA/PRESS YOU ARE BLEEPING HYPOCRITES!!!
ZERO.
The MSM has lost their credibility with us years ago, and their losing their credibility with the average Americans now.....THEIR DAYS ARE NUMBERED
It was one thing for US to know the MSM's days were numbered;
But when CBS and Rather got caught , John Q Public's eyes opened for the first time...No one likes to be made a fool.
The NYT is upset that Saddam isn't continuing to fill his mass graves at the rate of 16,000 people a year. They need to get over it.
Fox News has been killing them lately, and when FOX NEWS can get more viewers on Cable than Dan Rather can muster in Prime Time.....They're in deep doo doo :-)...... I love it :-)
I think that was everybody who gets it first reaction. I expect Gwen Ifill to be out to get Cheney. All of her friends in the MSM won't allow her to do anything else.
To: ambrose
Ummmm .. Didn’t Kerry also say that we should give iran nuclear fuel ??
14 posted on 10/3/2004, 1:04:11 AM by Mo1
And after becoming Obama’s sec of state after Hillary, Kerry got his wish. The Uranium One deal with Russia opened the way for Russia to send the stuff to Iran with Obama’s discrete blessing.
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