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Bush wants to release the Saddam files but his intelligence chief stalls
THE WEEKLY STANDARD ^ | 03/20/2006 | Stephen F. Hayes

Posted on 03/11/2006 9:22:21 AM PST by kimosabe31

On February 16, President George W. Bush assembled a small group of congressional Republicans for a briefing on Iraq. Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley were there, and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad participated via teleconference from Baghdad. As the meeting was beginning, Mike Pence spoke up. The Indiana Republican, a leader of conservatives in the House, was seated next to Bush."Yesterday, Mr. President, the war had its best night on the network news since the war ended," Pence said."Is this the tapes thing?" Bush asked, referring to two ABC News reports that included excerpts of recordings Saddam Hussein made of meetings with his war cabinet in the years before the U.S. invasion. Bush had not seen the newscasts but had been briefed on them.

Pence framed his response as a question, quoting Abraham Lincoln: "One of your Republican predecessors said, 'Give the people the facts and the Republic will be saved.' There are 3,000 hours of Saddam tapes and millions of pages of other documents that we captured after the war. When will the American public get to see this information?

"Bush replied that he wanted the documents released. He turned to Hadley and asked for an update. Hadley explained that John Negroponte, Bush's Director of National Intelligence, "owns the documents" and that DNI lawyers were deciding how they might be handled.

Bush extended his arms in exasperation and worried aloud that people who see the documents in 10 years will wonder why they weren't released sooner. "If I knew then what I know now," Bush said in the voice of a war skeptic, "I would have been more supportive of the war.

"Bush told Hadley to expedite the release of the Iraq documents. "This stuff ought to be out. Put this stuff out."

(Excerpt) Read more at weeklystandard.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: 109th; bush; intelligencesummit; iraq; iraqdocs; negroponte; pence; prewardocs; saddam; saddamtapes; saddamtapesdocs; stephenhayes; wmd
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To: One_who_hopes_to_know
hmmm....maybe someone with access to the governing directives can help me here, but I still disagree.

If DOD classifies something, they are the only ones that can change the classification level. If DOJ classifies something, only they can declassify, etc.

There are time limitations, whereby an item is automatically declassified after a certain amount of time unless reclassified by the original classifying authority, but otherwise I think only the original can decide it is no longer required to be classified.
161 posted on 03/11/2006 6:52:22 PM PST by tongue-tied
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To: tongue-tied
http://neds.daps.dla.mil/Directives/dirindex.html

http://www.dtic.mil/whs/directives/

For some reason, I cannot remember the number of the instruction. (Beer?) But here are the DON and DOD sources to look it up.
162 posted on 03/11/2006 7:03:45 PM PST by tongue-tied
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Furor Erupts Over Recordings of Saddam

The Defense Department now appears to be working on the directorate to make other Iraq files public as well. A February 6 letter from Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld to Senator Santorum, a Republican of Pennsylvania, said Mr. Rumsfeld is working with the director of national intelligence, John Negroponte, to release Iraqi files sought from the Harmony database, which catalogs material on terrorism secured since September 11, 2001.

Mr. Rumsfeld wrote, "You should know that Mr. Negroponte has lead responsibility within the US government for this material. As such we have been working with his office to establish the best path forward.

More

163 posted on 03/11/2006 7:15:35 PM PST by TexKat
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To: tongue-tied
True DOD and DOJ do not mess in each others business.

However both DOD and DOJ report to the President. They are his departments.
164 posted on 03/11/2006 7:47:00 PM PST by One_who_hopes_to_know
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To: TampaDude

What's to keep Negroponte from putting the docs through the shredder and claiming that he doesn't know where they are?

This tactic worked so well for Hillary.


165 posted on 03/11/2006 7:50:45 PM PST by Muzzle_em ("Mayor Nagin, what about those buses?")
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To: FreeReign
Here's a possibility: Bush talked to Negroponte. Negroponte told Bush that it's not advisable not to realese the documents at this time. Bush then said okay let's not release the documents.

Sounds good to me. In ten years, people will say "why wasn't this released then?" Not taking into consideration the security/time perspective. I doubt any American is squirming over what could be in those documents; but I bet there are many others that are.

166 posted on 03/11/2006 8:03:47 PM PST by World'sGoneInsane (LET NO ONE BE FORGOTTEN, LET NO ONE FORGET)
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To: TexKat
Hopefully this means that they have located most of the missing WMD (including the older stuff the UN wanted destroyed). I don't think the US executive branch is doing this to cover Germany and France's involvement. After all, that is 'Old Europe'. We certainly cannot be expecting any help out of the drunken Russians. Iran will never let the the Russians 'use' them. After all, are we not being told that the Russians supplied Saddam Hussein (Iran's true 'Great Satan') with WMD ?

Perhaps we are simply dealing with a 'Never Acknowledge Loose Nukes' rule found deep within that thick government book titled 'Keeping the Serfs Happy and Productive'.

167 posted on 03/11/2006 10:04:56 PM PST by justa-hairyape
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To: FreeReign
Really, and just why do you think he opposes the release of these documents? Don't say intelligence information could be compromised. Read Mad_Tom_Rackham's post # 79 again. Your argument has been nullified. Article | Excerpt | Negroponte: "These documents have provided, and continue to provide, actionable intelligence to ongoing operations. . . . It would be ill-advised to release these materials without careful screening because the material includes sensitive and potentially harmful information." See above. What exactly don't you understand?

What part of "redacting" don't you (and Negroponte) understand? Negroponte may be a "Cold War Hero", he may even be a juke box hero, but in this matter he's acting like a CIA/CYA a-hole.

168 posted on 03/11/2006 11:27:41 PM PST by pawdoggie
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To: Echo Talon
"I think the tapes would make Russia look the worst. Thats just my opinion from what I have heard so far from the tapes."

I have long thought that President Bush and President Vladimir Putin were secretly cooperating as allies in the weapons sanitation operation of Iraq. This event did take place. Putin helped the United States to rid Iraq of these weapons which could have been used against our troops or even worse, with the unstable nature of Saddam, used as a doomsday event to kill everyone in the region. Thus, Putin used his ties with Saddam to convince him to let go of the weapons. Perhaps he convinced Saddam that the weapons were worth too much to be lost in a faulty strategy designed to kill Americans. Perhaps Saddam was convinced that he could ride out the invasion hidden in a spider hole until the insurgence could drive the Americans back out and regain control. Saddam thought he could then come back to power and his friends, the Syrians, could return his weapons. The overall results saved American lives and insured the success of our overthrow of the Saddam regime. We owe lots of thanks to President Vladimir Putin. Not our scorn.

The above explains why this has been kept under wraps. Putin may want to help us in other efforts, such as Iran, and to reveal his part in helping the United States may not be a good thing. However, if the true story about Saddam's WMDs is revealed, it means that the Soviets will play a more direct part in the effort to defang Iran. I predict the Soviet's part in the plan will happen soon. The Soviets have much to risk with a nuclear Iran. I predict that the true story about Saddam's WMDs is being planned for release soon to get the American public's support for the next step in our War On Terror (WOT): action against Iran. Because this will be an expensive and complicated effort, we need all the support we can get.

There is also, what I call the Honeypot Strategy: The WMDs are being closely monitored. The "bears" attracted to the honeypot can also be closely monitored. The nature and identity of the "bears" drawn to the honeypot is intelligence information that has major importance. To make the "bears" think we don't know anything about the WMDs makes them do what "bears" want to do with picnic baskets.

169 posted on 03/11/2006 11:46:19 PM PST by jonrick46
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To: TampaDude

While Bush is at it he should release by Executive Order the Barret report, Full "behind the closed door" testimony from the 9-11 commish, what was in Berger's pants information, what was the so terrible evidence we did not get to see when Billy Boy Clinton was impeached, ChinaGate. Give to us Mr. President, we the taxpayers have the right to know these things. Let the shit hit the fan, now please.


170 posted on 03/12/2006 7:31:10 AM PST by Squat (Deport the illegals now! Turn Home Depot's into the prisons to hold the illegals!.)
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To: jonrick46

Well, we will see i'd like to know how closely those weapons are being monitored! LOL


171 posted on 03/12/2006 8:19:35 AM PST by Echo Talon
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To: pawdoggie
What part of "redacting" don't you (and Negroponte) understand? Negroponte may be a "Cold War Hero", he may even be a juke box hero, but in this matter he's acting like a CIA/CYA a-hole.

What part of "careful screening" are you too dopey to get?

172 posted on 03/12/2006 9:39:48 AM PST by FreeReign
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To: tsmith130
This new position raises two obvious questions:

You're wrong. Negroponte's position is not new.

The above two statements are not mutually exclusive.

If you can't ignore what the writer of this article wants you to think and look straight at the facts, then you are to easily lead.

173 posted on 03/12/2006 9:47:40 AM PST by FreeReign
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To: FreeReign

First I wouldn't call it decpetion and second his motives could be -- god forbid -- national security as he states.

His motives might very well be national security, but which nation?

The President wants them released. Are you saying that he has less of a worry over national security than Negroponte? Besides, it's not as if these are tapes of U.S. intelligence where the infomation release would be directly harmful to U.S. assets. This is Iraq/Hussein information, the only assets that may be compromised are people who worked with Hussein, or items that should have long been investigated by us already.

If the President wants them released, he should just do it. Negroponte works for him, not the other way around. This is just stupid.


174 posted on 03/12/2006 10:01:14 AM PST by kenth (¿Bebí lo que?)
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To: kenth
The President wants them released. Are you saying that he has less of a worry over national security than Negroponte?

No, I'm not saying that nor do the facts as outlined in the article point to that conclusively.

The president says he wants the docs released. He didn't say how and he didn't say when.

Subsequent to the President's remark, Negroponte says that they should be released after they are carefully screened.

Tell me how you know from the timing of both of those statements and the content of those statements that the President and Negroponte are now not in agreement?

175 posted on 03/12/2006 11:11:12 AM PST by FreeReign
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To: FreeReign
Negroponte:These documents have provided, and continue to provide, actionable intelligence to ongoing operations. . . . It would be ill-advised to release these materials without careful screening because the material includes sensitive and potentially harmful information. What part of "careful screening" are you too dopey to get?

The logic flaw here, amigo, is that on the one hand your Cold Warrior hero says that all or part of the documents are of of "historical importance" only, and in the next breath says that they need "careful screening" because we're still getting "actionable intelligence" out of them. I've "sanitized" intelligence information before, have you? It's not rocket science, and it doesn't take that long to determine whether it contains "actionable intelligence" and/or references to sources and means, or whether it's "historical" only. When your Commander in Chief is suffering major credibility problems with the American people in time of war, it takes a real "Colonel Flagg" type jerk to defend the practice of hiding "historical" intelligence information which could vindicate the President "behind the green door". Especially when the Clintonoid (dis)Information Agency is already leaking like a sieve on a weekly basis. Now, since I answered your question, answer me this: are you John Negroponte, are you related to John Negroponte or are you just naturally obtuse?

176 posted on 03/12/2006 12:40:21 PM PST by pawdoggie
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To: FreeReign
"Bush told Hadley to expedite the release of the Iraq documents. "This stuff ought to be out. Put this stuff out."

Your comment: "The president says he wants the docs released. He didn't say how and he didn't say when." What part of "expedite" don't you understand?

177 posted on 03/12/2006 12:45:01 PM PST by pawdoggie
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To: pawdoggie
Tell me how you know from the timing of both of those statements and the content of those statements that the President and Negroponte are now not in agreement?

The logic flaw here, amigo, is that on the one hand your Cold Warrior hero says that all or part of the documents are of of "historical importance" only, and in the next breath says that they need "careful screening" because we're still getting "actionable intelligence" out of them.

Negroponte's (or his office's) full quotes follow. The earlier quote;

In his first quote, Negroponte didn't say "historical importance only". The word "only" is your word. Negroponte did say "historical importance", yes, "information that changes postwar analysis of Iraq's weapons", no. That's "A" = "yes", "B" = "no".

Then Negroponte says the following;

In his second statement, Negroponte says "actionable intelligence to ongoing operations", yes. That's variable "C".

I'll ask you a question: Are you going to be dumb enough to try and make an argument that, "information that changes postwar analysis of Iraq's weapons", "B" is equal to "actionable intelligence to ongoing operations", "C" or are you going to be smart enough to see that what is implied in the article is without basis?

178 posted on 03/12/2006 1:36:18 PM PST by FreeReign
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To: FreeReign

BTW, notice how you've quietly moved off of your first dopey statement.

179 posted on 03/12/2006 1:40:32 PM PST by FreeReign
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To: pawdoggie

The word "expedite" means to hasten. It doesn imply when and it doesn't impy how.

Are you going tell me with a *straight face* that the President would imply when using the word "expedite" that all reasonable security measures should be bypassed. If not are you going to document where Negroponte said that the documents should not be put out as fast as possible and meeting all security needs?

180 posted on 03/12/2006 1:51:12 PM PST by FreeReign
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