Posted on 03/24/2008 9:40:29 AM PDT by FilmCutter
Bush's War Monday, March 24 and Tuesday, March 25, 2008 9 P.M. (check local listings) From the horror of 9/11 to the invasion of Iraq; the truth about WMD to the rise of an insurgency; the scandal of Abu Ghraib to the strategy of the surge-for six years, FRONTLINE has revealed the defining stories of the war on terror in meticulous detail, and the political dramas that played out at the highest levels of power and influence. Now, on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq invasion, the full saga unfolds in the two-part FRONTLINE special Bush's War, airing Monday, March 24, from 9 to 11:30 P.M. and Tuesday, March 25, 2008, from 9 to 11 P.M. ET on PBS (check local listings). Veteran producer Michael Kirk (The Torture Question, The Dark Side) draws on one of the richest archives in broadcast journalism--more than 40 FRONTLINE reports on the war on terror. Combined with fresh reporting and new interviews, Bush's War will be the definitive documentary analysis of one of the most challenging periods in the nation's history.
Following the broadcast,Bush's War comes alive online with free streaming video of the entire documentary and more than 100 video highlights of pivotal moments since 9/11. Watch a preview now at pbs.org/frontline/bushswar.
And in the middle of the war, yet. Walter Cronkite would be proud.
To think I could've been watching Dancing With the Stars...
The narrator just used the word “neocons”.
Of the actual participants in events, there is a heavy reliance on well-known Rumsfeld-Cheney adversaries such Richard Clarke, Richard Armitage, with no mention of the fact that they, and virtually everyone in this depiction of recent history, have axes to grind and their own sullied legacies to patch up. Few people actually close or aligned with Rumsfeld or Cheney appear to have been interviewed. Possibly because they knew how this was going to end up. ...
...Frontline takes a diversion into Guantanamo, where you will learn that the Cheney-Rumsfeld junta threw out the Geneva Conventions and authorized military tribunals, the turning on of lights, removal of religious materials, and other atrocities. I must have missed the part where they discussed the fact that the hated Crusader Gulag at Guantanamo does not actually violate the Geneva Conventions and that the people held there are unlawful combatants. Horror is expressed at what Gitmo might inspire our adversaries to do to our own soldiers. I must have missed the part where Frontline discusses what al Qaeda, Saddam Hussein, the Iranian regime and others actually have done to the civilians and soldiers they have seized. --------- "Frontline's 'Bush's War': Not About Bush or His War (PBS documentary)," Pajamas Media ^ | March 24, 2008 | Jules Crittenden
Speaking of Abu Ghraib:
* ARMITAGE & CACI : He is also a former board member for CACI International, the private military contractor, which "is being investigated by no less than 5 US agencies for possible contract violations" and "employed four interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison" in Iraq, one of whom was singled out by General Taguba in his report on abuses of Iraqi detainees at the prison.[3] (http://counterpunch.org/palmer06152004.html) ------------From Sourcewatch.org , http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Richard_Armitage
Here it is in black and white:
"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line."
- President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998
"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program."
- President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998
"Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face."
- Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998
"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983."
- Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb, 18, 1998
"We urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the U.S. Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of mass destruction programs."
- Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin, Tom
Daschle, John Kerry, and others Oct. 9, 1998
"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process."
- Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998
"Hussein has ... chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass destruction and palaces for his cronies."
- Madeline Albright, Clinton Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999
"There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has invigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of an ilicit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies."
- Letter to President Bush, Signed by Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL,) and
others, December 5, 2001
"We begin with the common belief that Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandated of the United Nations and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them."
- Sen. Carl Levin (D, MI), Sept. 19, 2002
"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country."
- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power."
- Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002
"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction."
- Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002
"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities.
Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..."
- Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002
"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the
authority to use force-- if necessary-- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security."
- Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9, 2002
"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years...We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."
- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002
"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years, every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do"
Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002
"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al Qaeda members .. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons."
- Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002
"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction."
- Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002
"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction... So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real."
Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003
Of course, beware the source on the latter as it is from The Nation writer Alexander Cockburn’s “Counterpunch,” the same bunch that spawned VIPS, which like Armitage was involved in the Plame leak flapathon.
I see Frontline forgot to mention Joe Wilson was employed by Aburdene, or his association with the al Amoudi clan :
1997 or later : (THE HEAD OF ROCK CREEK CORPORATION, LEBANESE BUSINESSMAN ELIAS ABURDENE, HIRES FORMER ADVISOR TO BILL CLINTON JOE WILSON - See NAAA)...but also the Rock Creek Corporation, an investment company controlled by Al Amoudi and chaired since 1997 by a Lebanese businessman very connected into the power circles of Washington, Elias Aburdene. Former adviser of the Franklin Bank National in Washington DC, Aburdene at the start of his accession to the head (position) of Rock Creek Corporation hired the ex - adviser to Bill Clinton for African affairs, Joseph Wilson IV. The latter had already met Mohamed Al Amoudi in 1997 at the time of a reception organized for the World Bank by Westar Group (LAW n.794). --- via Shermy
Now the narrator says "the war rhetoric was at full volume".
Writers featured so far have included the author of Fiasco and Pretext For War. They did have William Kristol on briefly. That was right after the narrator used the word "neocons", natch.
Paul R. Pillar, former deputy chief of counterterrorism at the CIA under Clinton. According to Paul R. Pillar of the CIA’s counter terrorism centre, “fewer Americans die from it [terrorism] than drown in bathtubs.”
10 posted on 02/10/2006 12:32:46 AM PST by kcvl [ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1
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[This may well be true- but Pillar needs to understand that it isn’t the constitutionally mandated role of government to prevent Americans from drowning in bathtubs. It IS the role of government to prevent Americans from getting attacked by terrorists.-—piasa]
The flippant Pillar- a bureaucrat since Carter’s time- was the guy who prepared the NIE; he is thought also to be the guy who unlawfully leaked it to the NY Times, though he denied being the leaker.
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This overeducated twit wrote in Security Management for May 2001, “Is the Terrorist Threat Misunderstood?” The title is autobiographical. He has claimed that terrorism cannot be defeated only controlled. If that is the case, what happened to the Molly Maguires, the Sydney Ducks, the Red Army Brigades, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the SS, etc., etc., etc.
12 posted on 02/10/2006 5:36:32 AM PST by gaspar
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To: fight_truth_decay
Pillar recommends that the intelligence community be granted autonomous status, like the Federal Reserve, so that they are not subordinate to the corrupting politicization of the ignoramuses who move into and out of the White House every few years. That way, their oracular pronouncements and policy preferences would be ritualistcally obeyed by their inferiors at the WH and Pentagon, without such unqualified nitwits as Dick Cheney or Don Rumsfeld being allowed to ask pesky questions about the sufficiency of their reporting and reasoning on al Qaeda-Saddam ties.
A more thoroughly asinine and blindly arrogant suggestion from a more self-important score-settling popinjay bureaucrat can hardly be imagined. Among many other idiotic aspects, it would require a neutering of the President’s explicit Constitutional authority as Commander in Chief.
13 posted on 02/10/2006 5:55:07 AM PST by Buckhead
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Pillar making claims about politicized intelligence is rich. In a column published September 27, 2004, Robert Novak identified Pillar as a speaker at a private dinner in California. Pillar’s “management team” at the CIA, where he was employed as the national intelligence officer on the Near East/South Asia desk, approved the appearance. According to Novak, the ground rules for the speech were based on the “Lindley Rule,” which holds that the speaker, his audience and the event are not to be disclosed, “but the substance of what he said can be reported.” That substance, apparently, was a harsh assessment of the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq.
Think about that: A senior, unelected CIA official—Paul Pillar—was given agency approval to anonymously attack Bush administration policies less than two months before the November 2, 2004, presidential election. That Pillar was among the most strident of these frequent critics—usually in off-the-record speeches to gatherings of foreign policy experts and business leaders—was well known to his colleagues in the intelligence community and to Bush administration policymakers. His was not an isolated case; CIA officials routinely trashed Bush administration policy decisions, often with official approval, in the months leading up to the Iraq War and again before the election. Pillar, who had complained to a CIA spokesman that someone had violated the ground rules by providing his name to Novak, simply got caught. -—— Paul Pillar Speaks, Again The latest CIA attack on the Bush administration is nothing new.
Weekly Standard ^ | 02/10/2006 4:15:00 PM | by Stephen F. Hayes
SEPTEMBER 27, 2004 : (NOVAK BRINGS UP PAUL PILLAR’S “WEST COAST MEETING”) A few hours after George W. Bush dismissed a pessimistic CIA report on Iraq as ‘’just guessing,’’ the analyst who identified himself as its author told a private dinner last week of secret, unheeded warnings years ago about going to war in Iraq. This exchange leads to the unavoidable conclusion that the president of the United States and the Central Intelligence Agency are at war with each other.
Paul R. Pillar, the CIA’s national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia, sat down Tuesday night in a large West Coast city with a select group of private citizens. He was not talking off the cuff. ————— “Is CIA at war with Bush?,” Robert Novak, Sun Times, 9/27/04 continued on http://pep.typepad.com/public_enquiry_project/2004/09/is_cia_at_war_w.html#more
hmmm...
SEPTEMBER 2004 midmonth : (REPORT : CIA COUNTERTERRORISM COMMITTEE SPENDING MILLIONS TO SUPPORT US LEFTWING ORGS?) The Washington Times reported last week that the CIA Counter Terrorism Committee has been spending millions of dollars supporting U.S.left wing organizations. Two big recipients were Dick Clark and Joe Wilson. It was reported by Bill Gertz and haven’t heard anything more and no other news organization covered the story. -——15 posted on 09/27/2004 3:01:23 PM PDT by subrosa sam | To 1
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Do you have a link for that thread ———Lancey Howard
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Links to “How the CIA Funds Anti-Bush Propaganda” By Bill Gertz., Washington Times, September 2004
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1215814/posts
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=15029
The media war traitors verses THE GOOD GUYS ...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1225718/posts post 93 by scarface367
28 posted on 10/02/2004 4:56:25 PM PDT by getgoing | To 23 |
Let me guess- was this CIA guy Ray McGovern, now of VIPS fame?
Interesting about Pillar. Figures the doc would lean so heavily on him in that section.
I can’t remember the name but it wasn’t McGovern. I think it started with a B. Bernhardt or something.
MARCH 2006 : (FORMER CIA OFFICIAL PAUL PILLER ... DISSING THE IRAQ/AL QAEDA CONNECTION) A former top CIA official said Thursday that despite the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Iraq is likely to be looking for weapons of mass destruction within the next five to 10 years. Paul Pillar, who until last year was in charge of intelligence assessments for the Middle East, said the CIA warned the Bush administration before the Iraq invasion in 2003 that a change of regimes would not necessarily solve any WMD problem.
In a speech at the Middle East Institute here, Pillar said Iraqis live in "a dangerous neighborhood," with rival countries pursuing weapons of mass destruction. So the CIA had warned that a future Iraqi government would likely want the very weapons Hussein was (wrongly) suspected of hiding, including nuclear weapons, he said.
"Iraq may turn once again to ... a WMD program," Pillar, who is retired from the CIA, said Thursday. "And wouldn't that be ironic?"
Pillar recently published an article in Foreign Affairs magazine that for the first time fully laid out the CIA's side of the battle with the Bush administration over Iraq intelligence.
Pillar charges that the administration never sought strategic assessments from the CIA about Iraq. He said in his article that the Bush administration made its decision to go to war and then "cherry-picked" items from intelligence assessments in an effort to justify the decision to the public.
The biggest discrepancy between the CIA's intelligence and the administration's line on Iraq was the claim by Bush that there was a relationship between Hussein and al-Qaida, Pillar wrote. There was no intelligence supporting that theory, Pillar said, but the administration wanted to capitalize on "the country's militant post-9/11 mood," he wrote.(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...------------------Official: Iraq may still seek WMDs Newsday ^ | March 9, 2006 | TIMOTHY M. PHELPS
So, what is the MEI?
It's been around for a long time, since Eisenhower's admin. It employs Joe Wilson as its adjunct scholar, and note that former Ambassador to Gabon, Joe Wilson [spouse of the "outed" CIA employee Valerie Plame and fomer spouse of the uranium-mining nation of Gabon's lobbyist in the US] is also a source used in the Frontline bit concerning the "16 words". The MEI is funded by some members of the Saudi royal family, at least recently, and is in opposition to Chalabi's INC. [Chalabi is not a Wahabbi.]
* MEI : The institute also receives funds from Saudi Arabia, which opposes the INC specifically and Bush's approach to regime change in Iraq in general. ------ http://216.239.37.104/search?q=cache:IRKdQ1Ptv7sJ:www.iht.com/articles/56717.htm+%22Middle+East+Institute%22+saudi+arabia+espionage&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
JULY 9, 2003 : (9/11 COMMISSION : FORMER STATE DEPT OFFICIAL MURPHY BACKS OUT FROM TESTIFYING - See SAUDI-BACKED MIDDLE EAST INSTITUTE------- see JOE WILSON) Meanwhile, a former State Department official [Mr. Murphy ] who, according to the book "The Death Lobby: How the West Armed Iraq," by Kenneth Timmerman, was sympathetic to a group that promoted trade with Iraq under Saddam Hussein, the U.S.-Iraq Business Forum, was suddenly removed from the commission's list of scheduled witnesses. Mr. Murphy said he had to withdraw due to a scheduling conflict. "They invited me, I accepted, but the original schedule called for the panel that I would be on to be the first of three that day and they had to change the program.I would have been on the third panel which was in a direct conflict with something I had long scheduled in Washington," Mr. Murphy said.
A former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, the Philippines, Syria, and Mauritania, Mr. Murphy also served as assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs in the Reagan administration. He serves on the board of governors of the Washington-based Middle East Institute, a think tank that accepts funding from members of the Saudi Arabian royal family. -- "U.S. Misunderstood Iraq Role In 9/11, Expert Will Testify (Laurie Mylroie)," The New York Sun | July 9, 2003 | ADAM DAIFALLAH
* MEI : Walker, the former assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, is president of the Middle East Institute in Washington, which promotes understanding with the Arab world. Its board chairman is former senator Wyche Fowler, ambassador to Riyadh in the second Clinton administration. Saudi contributions covered $200,000 of the institute's $1.5 million budget last year, Walker said. [Saudi Arabian Prince] Bandar has told associates that he makes a point of staying close to officials who have worked with Saudi Arabia after they leave government service. "If the reputation then builds that the Saudis take care of friends when they leave office," Bandar once observed, according to a knowledgeable source, "you'd be surprised how much better friends you have who are just coming into office." -----------http://www.la.utexas.edu/chenry/oil/press02/Oil%20for%20Security%20Fueled%20Close%20Ties%20(washingtonpost_com).htm
Wasn't ol' Bandar in the news for some financial monkey biz recently, or am I mistaken?
Unfortunately I fear no matter who we elect President we are going to get the Arabian candidate.
Half million dead under sanctions - Madeleine Albright on 60 minutes - “worth it”
http://pop.youtube.com/watch?v=lK_QshS2EW8
Thanks, I didn’t catch the name.
I only came in for a few minutes on Guantanamo prisoners and then internal issues between Rumsfeld, Cheney, and other members of the administration, but it confirmed my worst expectations — it seemed like a recapitulation of the MSM/Democrat/RINO versions of events without even a pretence of balance. Or at least there was no balance in the part I saw and I decided not to bother watching more.
I saw the execrable communist scumbag Michael Ratner treated with wholly unmerited respect. I saw Richard Clarke, Richard Armitage, as well as other libs like Cordesman, et al presented without any counter-balancing views. The limited part I viewed seemed very one-sided and it lost me for tomorrow night when I had thought I might watch the whole 2nd part. No thanks.
The general leading the force to free the captive enemy from the U.S. detention center in Guantanamo Bay, and inflict a humiliating defeat on the United States is so-called “civil rights” and “Constitutional” attorney Michael Ratner. It was Ratner who led the way in recruiting elite lawyers to defend the enemy combatants being interrogated at Gitmo. But Ratner is a long-time leader of two pro-Communist and anti-American organizations who have for decades have lent aid and comfort to America's enemies in the Cold War and beyond.
Michael Ratner is a lawyer who began his legal career in the late 1960s at the National Lawyers Guild, a Soviet created front group which still embraces its Communist heritage. He worked his way up through the NLG’s radical ranks to become its president, then moved on to hold the same position at the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), which share's the NLG's anti-American radicalism and was founded by pro-Castro lawyers Arthur Kinoy and William Kunstler. Among its many outrages, the CCR has defended domestic and international terrorists, and has honored Ratner's NLG colleague and convicted terrorist enabler Lynne Stewart, a modern Legal Left idol.
Since 9/11, Ratner and his comrades have attempted to extend undeserved “civil rights” on Islamist murderers with notable success. On this front, Ratner and the Legal Left have dealt America its few setbacks in the War on Terror.
...As the wreckage of the Twin Towers was still smoldering, Michael Ratner began planning his attack on America’s post-9/11 defense strategy. Realizing that it would take major legal clout to seriously subvert the War on Terror, Ratner began taking steps to attract major U.S law firms to his cause. First, he adopted a high public profile against the Bush administration’s reaction to 9/11 by savaging every facet of its plan to protect the U.S. from future attack. Working the “civil liberties” angle for all its worth, Ratner raged at the Patriot Act, railed against profiling techniques designed to ferret out Islamic terrorists in our midst, and opposed invading Afghanistan to hunt down and capture Osama bin Laden and his Taliban henchmen.
The mainstream press assisted Ratner by promoting him as a champion of civil rights while carefully hiding his lifelong radicalims from the American public. When the Islamists’ battleground changed, Ratner took a prominent role in antiwar movement by opposing Operation Iraqi Freedom. Ratner became a staple of antiwar, anti-Bush events. More importantly, he filed a series of high-profile nuisance suits against the Bush administration, one of which attempted to have Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld arrested and tried for “war crimes” by German courts.
... Ratner chose to sing Che’s praises in a 1997 book: "for many of us seeking to change our society, Cuba was a desirable model. And it was Ché Guevara, more than any other figure, who embodied both that revolution and solidarity with peoples fighting to be free from U.S. hegemony…Ché has remained my hero ever since."
In the same book, Ratner recounts a hiking trip he once took to retrace the path of Guevara: "Tears streamed down my cheeks, my energy was renewed and I completed the hike. To be like Ché: To be selfless, to make a family of one’s comrades, to give up comfort and material gain for the revolution, to risk and probably give one’s life to free humanity. "
......The George Soros-funded Open Society Institute, the Tides Foundation, and other leftist support groups began heavily funding Ratner and CCR’s anti-Bush, antiwar, anti-American agendas.------- "The Man Behind the Attack on Guantanamo," By Rocco DiPippo, FrontPageMagazine.com, June 16, 2005 front page mag
I watched, despite the inflammatory title. Actually, I thought you did a pretty good job, considering the principals did not participate in interviews. Clarke is becoming a self-parody; Wilson no longer has credibility.
Other than that, you showed the complexity of decision-making, and many difficult variables involving strong personalities in the highest offices of government. You did not portray the president as a bumbling fool, and for that I thank you.
It was a good reminder that the Oct. ‘02 resolution passed 77-23, and the president had 90% approval rating. So quickly we forget. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s episode.
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