Posted on 03/15/2006 9:02:25 PM PST by bnelson44
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has created a website where it will post documents captured in postwar Afghanistan and Iraq. The website is hosted by the Foreign Military Studies Office Joint Reserve Intelligence Center at Fort Leavenworth and will be updated continuously with new documents.
The first batch of materials, released late Wednesday, includes nine documents captured in connection with Operation Iraqi Freedom and 28 documents previously released on February 14, 2006, in conjunction with a study of those documents conducted by analysts at West Point. Sources on Capitol Hill and within the intelligence community tell The Weekly Standard that hundreds of new documents will be made available in the coming days, including 50-60 hours of audiotapes from the Iraqi regime.
ODNI officials will concentrate their early efforts on making available audiotapes and videotapes that have come from the former Iraqi regime. Twenty-five Arabic language translators will be hired to review these recordings for potentially sensitive information before they are posted. According to officials familiar with the DOCEX program, the U.S. government has in its possession more than 3,000 hours of recordings from the Iraqi regime. Among the collection: recordings of meetings between Saddam Hussein and other regime leaders; videotapes of speeches that Saddam thought would be important; audio and video of Saddam's meetings with foreign leaders; videotapes from conferences sponsored by the regime; and even videotapes of regime-sponsored brutality.
Materials made public in the first wave of the release will be those least likely to raise objections from the intelligence community and U.S. allies. Negroponte plans to include many of the documents labeled "NIV"--for No Intelligence Value--in this first group of materials.
But Pete Hoekstra (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, insists that documents relevant to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 will be released in short order. "There may be many documents that relate to their WMD programs. Those should be released," says Hoekstra. "Same thing with links to terrorism."
Among that next batch may be the approximately 700 documents that served as the foundation for a fascinating study by the Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia. Analysts from the Institute for Defense Analysis reviewed thousands of documents for that two-year study of the Iraq War from the perspective of Iraqis. Declassified excerpts of their final report were published in a highly illuminating article in the forthcoming issue of Foreign Affairs. And the full report will be published as a book in the coming months.
It is hard to say what, exactly, to expect with the coming release of documents. There will be documents that lend support to those who opposed the war in Iraq and, to be sure, documents that bolster the case for those who supported the war.
Importantly, after years of questions about the threat from the Iraqi regime, we will now be able to get some answers. How close were the French and the Russians to the former Iraqi regime? What kind of information was being passed to the Iraqis on the eve of war in early 2003? What is the real story of Iraq's WMD programs? Why did Saddam's military leaders and scientists fabricate their reports on the progress of those programs? Which terrorist groups had an active presence in Baghdad? How many Palestinian Liberation Front jihadists did the Iraqi regime train each year? How effective was Saddam Hussein in deceiving UN inspectors throughout the 1990s? What did Saddam Hussein privately tell Yasser Arafat when the Palestinian leader came to Baghdad? And what were the Western targets of the "Blessed July" martyrdom operation that was being planned as U.S. troops crossed into Iraq in March 2003?
There are still outstanding process questions that must be answered, too. Who determines which documents will be released and which ones will be kept secret? And what are the criteria for blocking the release of material thought to be sensitive?
Another critical issue is authenticity. A caveat on the website reads: "The US Government has made no determination regarding the authenticity of the documents, validity or factual accuracy of the information contained therein, or the quality of any translations, when available." Determining which documents are authentic and which are not will be an incredibly important task. This will be difficult task too, since many of the documents have no known chain of custody. There was a bustling black market for forged documents in Baghdad after the war. How will we determine which documents are real and which documents are not? Some documents listed in the HARMONY database have warnings: "DIA suspects inauthentic." Will those documents be included in the release? Will the warnings? Will we learn why the DIA suspected that the document might not be authentic? Has forensic document authentication been done on any of the documents? Which ones?
In the end, the Iraqis themselves will provide answers to many of those questions. And Iraqis will probably be central to our understanding of these documents and the history they represent. This is true not only because they understand the language of the documents, but also because they understand better than anyone the culture that produced them.
In that spirit, we will be eager to hear from the "Army of Analysts"--particularly those who read Arabic--that former intelligence officer Michael Tanji wrote about here two days ago. If John Negroponte makes good on his promise of a comprehensive document release, then millions of papers, audiotapes, and other media will be posted in the coming months. As we've seen, that's an overwhelming amount for the U.S. government, to say nothing of a magazine.
Let's get started.
Stephen F. Hayes is a senior writer at The Weekly Standard.
Wonder if the Iraq the Model guys would translate? Worth a try...I'll alert them to the website, if they haven't already been alerted.
Thank you for the ping, Calpernia. We're leaving on vacation for 10 days starting tomorrow and I hope when we return the Republicans in Congress have gotten smart and understand they need to make sure these tapes are given wide distribution as I'm quite sure they will support the administration's arguments why the war in Iraq was/is im portant.
The MSM and rats in Congress will ignore these reports.
Their bloggers and seminar callers will call this a trick to save GW.
Then they will have another attempted electronic coup like the Plame lies ready to go. Whatever this latest attempted electronic coup is, it has been simmering in the rat blogs for weeks if not a month. Of course the NY Slimes will make these lies page one and editorial one in an attempt to keep Americans from knowing about these documents.
Thanks for the ping. This thread had the link to the site where the documents can be seen by ordinary Americans.
http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/products-docex.htm#iraq
Very important.
Hence is why I pinged you.
I noticed in a large amount of the articles on this from the MSM that they had a broken link with the article.
So we need to get this out to our lists.
Enjoy your vacation.
bump
The Bush Administration very clearly understands the power of the new media....
After the impeachment hearings, House Impeachment managers gave a party to freepers which was shown on C-Span. The party was to thank freepers for their activism.
I'd love to see that kind of activism again with regard to these tapes.
Congressional Republicans are abandoning the President and running from their votes regarding the war in Iraq. Just as these tapes are surfacing and they should be running TOWARD the president and supporting him 100%.
If freepers could organize and find a way to push this issue, I think we could be as successful as we were with Clinton's impeachment.
I'll send this article with the working links to my e-mail list today. Yesterday I wrote to Senator Roberts, Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee and told him how vital I thought it was for Republicans to ensure the word gets out and to get back to supporting the administration. Today I'll write Ken Mehlman.
Have a good week, Calpernia.
Ken Mehlman, Chairman, RNC
310 First Street, SE
Washington, DC 20003
(202) 863-8500
E-mail: Info@GOP.com
Senator Pat Roberts
Chairman, Senate Intelligence Committee
109 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-1605
DC Phone: (202) 224-4774
DC Fax: (202) 224-3514
E-mail: http://roberts.senate.gov/e-mail_pat.html
Congressman Peter Hoekstra
Chairman, House Permanent Select
Committee on Intelligence
H-405 U.S. Capitol Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Phone (877) 858-9040 Toll-Free
(202) 225-4121 Office
Email intelligence.hpsci@mail.house.gov
bttt
I would like to be on your ping list, please.
"LA LA LA LA, I can't hear you. I'm not looking. LA LA LA LA, Bush lied LA LA LA LA, quagmire quagmire LA LA LA LA."
MSM
I admit, the UN/UNESCO/NGO stuff has me very confused with our current administration.
But I'm going to help in every way I can to get this doc site out.
You jerk! I was totally unprepared to see that and spat coffee!
darn it....need paper towels.
Why would you believe Negropointe to be anti-Bush? That is the opposite from the truth.
Thank you. I can't tell you how vitally important I think it is.
Include me. Thanks.
bump for later
Yes, John and Tierney!!
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