WSJ: A Media Intelligence Failure

[T]he 600-plus-page Robb-Silberman report on intelligence that was released yesterday. But one important conclusion worth noting, even on a quick reading, is that the report blows apart the myth that intelligence provided by Iraqi politician and former exile Ahmed Chalabi suckered the U.S. into going to war.

That myth was a media and antiwar favorite last year, before the U.S. and Iraq elections, and when all of Washington thought President Bush was a one-termer. CIA and State Department sources peddled the idea that an Iraqi defector code-named "Curveball" had planted bad information about Saddam's WMD....

The promoters of some version of this theory included Senator Ted Kennedy and Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee, as well as such prominent journalists as NBC's Tim Russert, reporters at the Los Angeles Times, Joe Klein of Time, and Evan Thomas and Mark Hosenball of Newsweek. "The ideologues at the Defense Department were warned by doubters at the State Department and CIA that Chalabi was peddling suspect goods," declared Newsweek....

Yesterday's bipartisan report shows that these writers were "bamboozled" by their own U.S. sources....

The report's larger conclusion is that the CIA's intelligence on Iraq was faulty almost from start-to-finish, never mind "Curveball." The attempt to finger Mr. Chalabi and "the ideologues" in the Pentagon was an exercise in blame-shifting to deflect attention from that enormous failure. It was also intended to tarnish Mr. Bush as he attempted to win re-election while also trying to defeat an insurgency that the CIA had never predicted.

Mr. Chalabi's vindication comes as he is playing a prominent role in negotiations to form a new Iraqi government. As for the media, we await their reports into how their own trusted, if usually anonymous, sources could have given them so much bad intelligence.

"'Media Intelligence' is an oxymoron." ~ norwaypinesavage

Speaking of oxyMORONS - here's ABC still bashing Chalabi:

ABC's White House correspondent, Terry Moran:

"The source for some of the most explosive charges, the report says, was a single informant, code named 'Curveball,' described by German intelligence officials as 'crazy' and a likely 'fabricator.' Curveball was the only source for the allegation Colin Powell made at the UN that Iraq had mobile biological weapons labs. Powell was never told of the German concerns." [end excerpt from item below].

Media Research Center:

"Nets Downplay or Skip How Panel Finds Intel Not "Politicized":

The report released Thursday, by the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, determined that "no analytical judgments were changed in response to political pressure," thus undermining a tenet of the left often repeated by the media.

But CBS's John Roberts ignored that finding and instead lamented how President Bush did not comment on "how he felt taking the nation to war on such flawed assumptions."

On NBC, David Gregory stressed how Bush "sidestepped any personal responsibility" for the bad intelligence. Gregory asked the co-chairmen of the commission: "Does the President of the United States bear ultimate responsibility for bad intelligence on his watch?"

While Gregory acknowledged that "the panel found no evidence the administration pressured intelligence analysts to reach any conclusions about Iraq," he noted that "the commission also avoided any judgment about going to war based on flawed information."

After Gregory, Andrea Mitchell focused a story on how "critics say the White House and Pentagon wanted to attack Iraq and were eager to accept intelligence that made their case."

CBS's Roberts highlighted a portion of the report which he portrayed as suggesting some presidential culpability: "The President's daily briefings leading up to the war? 'Disastrously one-sided,' 'selling intelligence to keep the "first customer" interested.'"

In contrast, ABC's Terry Moran quoted the panel's conclusion: "The report also clears the Bush administration of a damning charge. The commission 'found no evidence' that the intelligence on Iraq had been 'politicized.'"

On a night when the cable news networks covered nearly only Terri's Schiavo's death and the Pope's deteriorating health, the three broadcast network evening newscasts all ran full stories on the latest report on intelligence flaws. The MRC's Brad Wilmouth corrected the closed-captioning against the video for the March 31 stories:

-- CBS Evening News. John Roberts in an opening teaser: "I'm John Roberts. One of the most damaging intelligence failures in American history. That's what a presidential commission says about the case for war against Iraq."

Anchor Bob Schieffer set up the subsequent story: "A year ago, President Bush appointed a commission to find out how U.S. intelligence got it so wrong about Iraq and weapons of mass destruction. Today, the report came in and it is scathing. It calls this one of the most damaging intelligence failures in recent U.S. history, and says the harm to U.S. credibility will take years to undo. John Roberts at the White House has the details. John?"

Roberts began: "Well, Bob, as government reports go, this one was uncharacteristically harsh, and it has just about everyone down here in Washington saying something needs to be done and quickly. The report left little room for debate, concluding the intelligence agencies were 'dead wrong' in almost all of their prewar judgments about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Without comment about how he felt taking the nation to war on such flawed assumptions, President Bush agreed it's time to go to work."

George W. Bush at press briefing: "America's intelligence community needs fundamental change to enable us to successfully confront the threats of the 21st century."

Roberts: "Singled out for particular criticism was the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which made the case for war. 'Riddled with errors,' the commission said, adding much of the Iraq intelligence was 'either worthless or misleading.' And the President's daily briefings leading up to the war? 'Disastrously one-sided,' 'selling intelligence to keep the "first customer" interested.' Looking ahead, the report's assessment is bleak, suggesting we know disturbingly little about Iran and North Korea's nuclear programs, and that current intelligence tools are almost useless in rooting out biological weapons. The President promised to quickly review the report's 74 recommendations to reform intelligence. Congress says it'll up the pressure on agencies to change."

Senator Pat Roberts (R-KS): "There is still some self denial. This is going to be a catalyst to help us improve the intelligence reform bill and our overall oversight responsibility. It's ongoing."

From the White House lawn, Roberts concluded: "But reform won't come easily. The commission report paints a picture of lumbering bureaucracies resistant to change, and they worry that Congress didn't give the person who'll have to pull all of these agencies together, the new National Intelligence Director, the clout to end the relentless turf wars."

Schieffer then played a tape of a bit of q and a he had earlier with commission co-chairs Laurence Silberman and Chuck Robb. Schieffer raised how the report found that the FBI is not integrated with intelligence efforts and asked how the U.S. got to where our intelligence agencies were "dead wrong?"

-- NBC Nightly News. Anchor Brian Williams intoned: "Now to Washington and a scathing report by a presidential commission on American intelligence gathering which is highly critical of pre-war U.S. intelligence judgments on Iraq, and it said problems with this nation's spy agencies are all still too common. Here is NBC's David Gregory."

Gregory began: "The U.S. went to war in Iraq claiming Saddam Hussein threatened America with weapons of mass destruction. The President's hand-picked commission concluded today the intelligence behind that decision was, quote, 'worthless,' 'misleading,' 'dead wrong.' This morning, however, the President sidestepped any personal responsibility."

George W. Bush: "America's intelligence community needs fundamental change to enable us to successfully confront the threats of the 21st century."

Gregory: "Mr. Bush ordered an intelligence review when it was clear Iraq did not have the weapons programs detailed in the now-infamous 2002 national intelligence estimate. A chemical weapons capability, mobile biological production facilities, and a reconstituted nuclear weapons program."

Bush, January 21, 2003: "Saddam Hussein possesses some of the world's deadliest weapons."

Gregory: "The Chairman of the President's intelligence commission said today America's spy agencies failed to level with policymakers about their assumptions."

Judge Laurence Silberman, Commission Co-chairman: "But it was profoundly wrong not to tell policymakers how little evidence they had to support that."

Gregory, to Silberman and Robb: "Does the President of the United States bear ultimate responsibility for bad intelligence on his watch?"

Charles Robb, Commission Co-chairman: "The Commander-in-Chief is responsible for everything that happens on his or her watch."

Gregory: "Other findings, the report criticizes the 2002 intelligence estimate for relying in part on information from a Vanity Fair magazine article, and for relying on an Iraqi WMD source whose information was fabricated. The President said he's now considering the panel's key recommendations -- more authority for the director of national intelligence and the reorganization of the FBI to include more of a counter-terrorism function.

The panel found no evidence the administration pressured intelligence analysts to reach any conclusions about Iraq, but the commission also avoided any judgment about going to war based on flawed information. David Gregory, NBC News, the White House."

Williams introduced a second story on the topic: "We have more tonight on the fallout from the report and what role misleading intelligence may have played in the push to take this nation to war two years ago. Here with that, our chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell."

Mitchell asked, over post-9/11 pictures of Bush and top cabinet officials: "If the evidence of Saddam's weapons was dead wrong, does that mean bad intelligence took us to war? Or would the U.S. have attacked Iraq anyway? The President and his war council wondered immediately after 9/11 whether Saddam Hussein had been involved, according to the 9/11 Commission. The administration denies it, but critics say the White House and Pentagon wanted to attack Iraq and were eager to accept intelligence that made their case. Flynt Leverett opposed the policy inside the Bush White House."

Flynt Leverett, former National Security Council official: "WMD was useful as a way of getting agreement from other parts of the administration, and it was very useful in selling the war to the public."

Mitchell: "The result, Colin Powell unwittingly presented false evidence at the UN."

Colin Powell, February 2003 at UN: "Let me now turn to those deadly weapons programs."

Mitchell: "Does the intelligence failure on Iraq mean the U.S. could be vulnerable to other threats? The report says yes, that the CIA completely missed al-Qaeda's development of a virulent form of Anthrax, and that the U.S. knows far less than it claims about North Korea's nuclear weapons and Iran's."

David Albright, former UN Weapons Inspector: "Countries are much less willing to believe U.S. statements. They're much more willing to challenge statements."

Mitchell: "Commission member John McCain says that hurts America in diplomatic talks."

John McCain: "We're going to have to, one, be more concrete in our evidence, but also change the culture and the way that our intelligence agencies do business."

Mitchell: "Can the culture change? The President is counting on his new director of national intelligence, John Negroponte, but the commission said that headstrong agencies, like the CIA and the Pentagon, will try to run over him. If so, American presidents will still make decisions on war and terror based on intelligence that could once again be dead wrong. Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington."

-- ABC's World News Tonight. Fill-in anchor Bob Woodruff asserted: "The commission appointed by President Bush to investigate the intelligence he used to justify the invasion of Iraq issued its final report today. The verdict was harsh and unsparing. The report said U.S. intelligence agencies were, quote, 'dead wrong,' in nearly all of its pre-war judgments about Saddam Hussein.

Here's ABC's White House correspondent, Terry Moran."

Moran began, with text on screen: "The new report is a blistering indictment of virtually the entire intelligence community, calling U.S. analysis of pre-war Iraq and other matters 'nearly worthless,' 'dead wrong,' 'inexcusable,' and an 'egregious failure.'"

Judge Laurence Silberman, Commission Co-chairman: "I think we just want it to be accurate."

Moran, with points on screen: "On Iraq, the commission found that the U.S. had 'no fresh intelligence on Iraq's weapons programs after 1998' when UN weapons inspectors left the country. U.S. intelligence officials failed to question their bedrock assumption that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and they even dismissed evidence that contradicted it, and that the U.S. had only a handful of spies in Iraq and they were not credible. This deeply flawed intelligence was the basis for the administration's alarming and false case for war."

George W. Bush, September 26, 2002: "The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons."

Dick Cheney, August 26, 2002: "There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction."

Moran: "The source for some of the most explosive charges, the report says, was a single informant, code named 'Curveball,' described by German intelligence officials as 'crazy' and a likely 'fabricator.' Curveball was the only source for the allegation Colin Powell made at the UN that Iraq had mobile biological weapons labs. Powell was never told of the German concerns."

Colin Powell at UN, February 5, 2003: "We have first-hand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails."

Moran pointed out, with quotes on screen: "The report also clears the Bush administration of a damning charge. The commission 'found no evidence' that the intelligence on Iraq had been 'politicized.'"

Charles Robb, Commission Co-chairman at press conference: "If somebody has a member of the intelligence community that can say to us we changed our analysis based on a request or demand, or we believe we were improperly influenced to change it, we haven't heard from them."

Moran: "Instead, the problem was a rigid mindset."

Silberman, in sit-down with Moran: "The intelligence community finds it has found it very difficult to say, gee, we don't know. Instead of saying, 'We're 90 percent sure that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction,' they should have said, 'We really don't have very much evidence. We guessed this, but we really don't know.'"

Moran: "As for current threats on al-Qaeda, the report says there 'are critical intelligence gaps' about the terrorist group's weapons of mass destruction capabilities. And on Iran and North Korea's weapons programs, the commission's findings were classified except to say the U.S. has 'only limited access to critical information about these countries.'"

Moran concluded from the White House lawn: "Now, in this 700-page report the commission makes more than 70 recommendations from giving the new director of national intelligence strong powers to reforming the FBI. If those recommendations sound familiar, it's because they are. One thing, Bob, the panel says that U.S. intelligence has been very good at for years is resisting change."

The report's "overview" concluded: "Finally, we closely examined the possibility that intelligence analysts were pressured by policymakers to change their judgments about Iraq's nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons programs. The analysts who worked Iraqi weapons issues universally agreed that in no instance did political pressure cause them to skew or alter any of their analytical judgments. That said, it is hard to deny the conclusion that intelligence analysts worked in an environment that did not encourage skepticism about the conventional wisdom."

The report also stated, in the portion quoted by Moran:
"The Commission has found no evidence of 'politicization' of the Intelligence Community's assessments concerning Iraq's reported WMD programs.

No analytical judgments were changed in response to political pressure to reach a particular conclusion.

The Commission has investigated this issue closely, querying in detail those analysts involved in formulating pre-war judgments about Iraq's WMD programs.

These analysts universally assert that in no instance did political pressure cause them to change any of their analytical judgments."

For the report released by the Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction, go to: http://www.wmd.gov

Source: Media Research Center: http://www.mrc.org/cyberalerts/2005/cyb20050401.asp#2

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