Bush Didn't Mislead on War, Adviser Says (Hadley Hits Back)

AP via Yahoo ^

[indianrightwinger]

Bush Didn't Mislead on War, Adviser Says

By DOUGLASS K. DANIEL, Associated Press Writer Sun Nov 13,10:16 PM ET

WASHINGTON - While admitting "we were wrong" about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, President Bush's national security adviser on Sunday rejected assertions that the president manipulated intelligence and misled the American people. ADVERTISEMENT

Bush relied on the collective judgment of the intelligence community when he determined that Iraq's Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, national security adviser Stephen Hadley said.

"Turns out, we were wrong," Hadley told "Late Edition" on CNN. "But I think the point that needs to be emphasized ... allegations now that the president somehow manipulated intelligence, somehow misled the American people, are flat wrong."

Republican lawmakers and other officials who appeared on Sunday news shows echoed Bush's Veterans Day speech in which he defended his decision to invade Iraq.

Bush said Democrats in Congress had the same intelligence about Iraq, and he argued that many now claiming that the information had been manipulated had supported going to war. The president also accused his critics of making false charges and playing politics with the war.

Democratic Party chairman Howard Dean rejected the criticism on Sunday and said, "The truth is, the president misled America when he sent us to war."

Appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press," the party chairman disputed Bush's claim that Congress had the same information — the president withheld some intelligence and some caveats about it, Dean said — and that two commissions had found no evidence of pressure being placed on those within the intelligence community .

In fact, Dean said, how the administration handled the intelligence it received has yet to be determined by a Senate committee.

Contending that the president has not been honest about the size of the deficit as well as the war, Dean said, "This is an administration that has a fundamental problem telling the truth."

Hadley said Bush received dissenting views about the accuracy of intelligence and relied on the collective judgment of the intelligence community as conveyed by the CIA director. The national security adviser criticized those who continue to claim that Bush manipulated the intelligence and made misleading statements.

"It is unworthy and unfair and ill-advised, when our men and women in combat are putting their lives on the line, to relitigate an issue which was looked at by two authoritative sources and deemed closed," he said. "We need to put this debate behind us."

Sen. John McCain (news, bio, voting record), R-Ariz., said Democrats have a right to criticize the war but that it was disingenuous to claim that Bush lied about intelligence to justify it.

"Every intelligence agency in the world, including the Russians, the French ... all reached the same conclusion," McCain said on CBS' "Face the Nation."

In a column for The Washington Post, former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., said he was wrong to have voted to give Bush the authority to go to war and called the intelligence on which he made that decision "deeply flawed and, in some cases, manipulated to fit a political agenda."

"The information the American people were hearing from the president — and that I was being given by our intelligence community — wasn't the whole story," wrote Edwards, the Democratic nominee for vice president in 2004. "Had I known this at the time, I never would have voted for this war."

Hadley said issues about the accuracy of U.S. intelligence have not impaired the administration's ability to pursue its policies regarding the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea.

"We've been able to move our diplomacy forward at the same time we're taking the steps we need to do to improve our intelligence," he said.

Asked why people should believe U.S. claims about the nuclear plans of Iran given the failure of intelligence about Iraq, Hadley said there has been international consensus about Iran.

[indianrightwinger]

Good follow through. Now, the WH should simply go on the offensive and state that the only non-wacko Dems criticizing the President using baseless lies are the ones that are trying to wiggle out of their original vote in favor. The wackos like Kennedy always will lie, so no point countering them.

[msnimje]

Hadley went on, saying, "But I agree with the Democratic Senators that they have no intelligence." :0)

[Just Lori]

In fact, Dean said, how the administration handled the intelligence it received has yet to be determined by a Senate committee.

Oh REALLY? You mean there's a committee investigating the 2 previous committees? What committee is this?

[indianrightwinger]

LOL!!

The Dems DUmmies are being set up by the WH before the 2006 elections, and they don't even know. I see this playing out like 2002 and 2004.

Give them enough rope to hang themselves. Then ask the quesiton about their plan for National Security. Empty answer and election loss. I have seen that movie before.

[Berlin_Freeper]

I just can't understand why the illegal missiles Saddam swore he did not have, yet did have were never considered or promoted as "The Smoking Gun".

If someone could explain that to me I would be grateful.

Fact is, WMD is the easy part, you can make that in months or buy it on the Russian black market and have it shipped within 6 to 8 weeks.

The really hard part is the missiles to deliver the stuff. Those you have to spend years developing and you just can't buy hundreds or thousands of them on the black market without notice.

We were absolutely right that Saddam was a WMD threat, he already was producing the missiles in the hundreds and eventually thousands, and he swore he did not have them and by his signed agreements was never supposed to have them.

[Loyal Buckeye]

Time for a poll which you will never see:

Do you believe Pres. Bush or the Democrats would better protect the U.S. against terrorists?

[go-ken-go]

Are they admitting that there weren't any WMD at all, or what? I think they go to far with that point. Doesn't anyone in the Administration think that the WMD were moved out of country? I do.