Taguba Says Bush Committed War Crimes

Um, did I miss this or was it simply not covered in the news? General Taguba was a key player in the Abu Ghraib scandal, as he is the one who wrote the report on it to begin with.

ABC News Blog (not televised) Taguba: Bush Administration Committed War Crimes

USA Today Blog (not published) Taguba: Bush Administration Committed War Crimes

Here's Taguba's Preface to the report. Where is the coverage of some of this stuff???

More...Taguba Calls on Media to Go after Those Who Authorized Torture.

Bush Gave Up Golf to Show Solidarity with Troops

From Politico:

For the first time, Bush revealed a personal way in which he has tried to acknowledge the sacrifice of soldiers and their families: He has given up golf.

“I don't want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the commander in chief playing golf,” he said. “I feel I owe it to the families to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal.”

Bush said he made that decision after the August 2003 bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, which killed Sergio Vieira de Mello, the top U.N. official in Iraq and the organization’s high commissioner for human rights.

“I remember when de Mello, who was at the U.N., got killed in Baghdad as a result of these murderers taking this good man's life,” he said. “I was playing golf — I think I was in central Texas — and they pulled me off the golf course and I said, ‘It's just not worth it anymore to do.’"

Report: Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction

from http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/09/06/bush_wmd/print.html

Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction
Salon exclusive: Two former CIA officers say the president squelched top-secret intelligence, and a briefing by George Tenet, months before invading Iraq.
By Sidney Blumenthal

Sep. 06, 2007 | On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam's inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail. Tenet never brought it up again.

Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD.

On April 23, 2006, CBS's "60 Minutes" interviewed Tyler Drumheller, the former CIA chief of clandestine operations for Europe, who disclosed that the agency had received documentary intelligence from Naji Sabri, Saddam's foreign minister, that Saddam did not have WMD. "We continued to validate him the whole way through," said Drumheller. "The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming, and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy."

Now two former senior CIA officers have confirmed Drumheller's account to me and provided the background to the story of how the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted in order to justify it. They described what Tenet said to Bush about the lack of WMD, and how Bush responded, and noted that Tenet never shared Sabri's intelligence with then Secretary of State Colin Powell. According to the former officers, the intelligence was also never shared with the senior military planning the invasion, which required U.S. soldiers to receive medical shots against the ill effects of WMD and to wear protective uniforms in the desert.

Instead, said the former officials, the information was distorted in a report written to fit the preconception that Saddam did have WMD programs. That false and restructured report was passed to Richard Dearlove, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), who briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair on it as validation of the cause for war.

Secretary of State Powell, in preparation for his presentation of evidence of Saddam's WMD to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, spent days at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., and had Tenet sit directly behind him as a sign of credibility. But Tenet, according to the sources, never told Powell about existing intelligence that there were no WMD, and Powell's speech was later revealed to be a series of falsehoods.

Both the French intelligence service and the CIA paid Sabri hundreds of thousands of dollars (at least $200,000 in the case of the CIA) to give them documents on Saddam's WMD programs. "The information detailed that Saddam may have wished to have a program, that his engineers had told him they could build a nuclear weapon within two years if they had fissile material, which they didn't, and that they had no chemical or biological weapons," one of the former CIA officers told me.

On the eve of Sabri's appearance at the United Nations in September 2002 to present Saddam's case, the officer in charge of this operation met in New York with a "cutout" who had debriefed Sabri for the CIA. Then the officer flew to Washington, where he met with CIA deputy director John McLaughlin, who was "excited" about the report. Nonetheless, McLaughlin expressed his reservations. He said that Sabri's information was at odds with "our best source." That source was code-named "Curveball," later exposed as a fabricator, con man and former Iraqi taxi driver posing as a chemical engineer.

The next day, Sept. 18, Tenet briefed Bush on Sabri. "Tenet told me he briefed the president personally," said one of the former CIA officers. According to Tenet, Bush's response was to call the information "the same old thing." Bush insisted it was simply what Saddam wanted him to think. "The president had no interest in the intelligence," said the CIA officer. The other officer said, "Bush didn't give a fuck about the intelligence. He had his mind made up."

But the CIA officers working on the Sabri case kept collecting information. "We checked on everything he told us." French intelligence eavesdropped on his telephone conversations and shared them with the CIA. These taps "validated" Sabri's claims, according to one of the CIA officers. The officers brought this material to the attention of the newly formed Iraqi Operations Group within the CIA. But those in charge of the IOG were on a mission to prove that Saddam did have WMD and would not give credit to anything that came from the French. "They kept saying the French were trying to undermine the war," said one of the CIA officers.

The officers continued to insist on the significance of Sabri's information, but one of Tenet's deputies told them, "You haven't figured this out yet. This isn't about intelligence. It's about regime change."

The CIA officers on the case awaited the report they had submitted on Sabri to be circulated back to them, but they never received it. They learned later that a new report had been written. "It was written by someone in the agency, but unclear who or where, it was so tightly controlled. They knew what would please the White House. They knew what the king wanted," one of the officers told me.

That report contained a false preamble stating that Saddam was "aggressively and covertly developing" nuclear weapons and that he already possessed chemical and biological weapons. "Totally out of whack," said one of the CIA officers. "The first [para]graph of an intelligence report is the most important and most read and colors the rest of the report." He pointed out that the case officer who wrote the initial report had not written the preamble and the new memo. "That's not what the original memo said."

The report with the misleading introduction was given to Dearlove of MI6, who briefed the prime minister. "They were given a scaled-down version of the report," said one of the CIA officers. "It was a summary given for liaison, with the sourcing taken out. They showed the British the statement Saddam was pursuing an aggressive program, and rewrote the report to attempt to support that statement. It was insidious. Blair bought it." "Blair was duped," said the other CIA officer. "He was shown the altered report."

The information provided by Sabri was considered so sensitive that it was never shown to those who assembled the NIE on Iraqi WMD. Later revealed to be utterly wrong, the NIE read: "We judge that Iraq has continued its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in defiance of UN resolutions and restrictions. Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of UN restrictions; if left unchecked, it probably will have a nuclear weapon during this decade."

In the congressional debate over the Authorization for the Use of Military Force, even those voting against it gave credence to the notion that Saddam possessed WMD. Even a leading opponent such as Sen. Bob Graham, then the Democratic chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who had instigated the production of the NIE, declared in his floor speech on Oct. 12, 2002, "Saddam Hussein's regime has chemical and biological weapons and is trying to get nuclear capacity." Not a single senator contested otherwise. None of them had an inkling of the Sabri intelligence.

The CIA officers assigned to Sabri still argued within the agency that his information must be taken seriously, but instead the administration preferred to rely on Curveball. Drumheller learned from the German intelligence service that held Curveball that it considered him and his claims about WMD to be highly unreliable. But the CIA's Weapons Intelligence, Nonproliferation, and Arms Control Center (WINPAC) insisted that Curveball was credible because what he said was supposedly congruent with available public information.

For two months, Drumheller fought against the use of Curveball, raising the red flag that he was likely a fraud, as he turned out to be. "Oh, my! I hope that's not true," said Deputy Director McLaughlin, according to Drumheller's book "On the Brink," published in 2006. When Curveball's information was put into Bush's Jan. 28, 2003, State of the Union address, McLaughlin and Tenet allowed it to pass into the speech. "From three Iraqi defectors," Bush declared, "we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs ... Saddam Hussein has not disclosed these facilities. He's given no evidence that he has destroyed them." In fact, there was only one Iraqi source -- Curveball -- and there were no labs.

When the mobile weapons labs were inserted into the draft of Powell's United Nations speech, Drumheller strongly objected again and believed that the error had been removed. He was shocked watching Powell's speech. "We have firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails," Powell announced. Without the reference to the mobile weapons labs, there was no image of a threat.

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell's chief of staff, and Powell himself later lamented that they had not been warned about Curveball. And McLaughlin told the Washington Post in 2006, "If someone had made these doubts clear to me, I would not have permitted the reporting to be used in Secretary Powell's speech." But, in fact, Drumheller's caution was ignored.

As war appeared imminent, the CIA officers on the Sabri case tried to arrange his defection in order to demonstrate that he stood by his information. But he would not leave without bringing out his entire family. "He dithered," said one former CIA officer. And the war came before his escape could be handled.

Tellingly, Sabri's picture was never put on the deck of playing cards of former Saddam officials to be hunted down, a tacit acknowledgment of his covert relationship with the CIA. Today, Sabri lives in Qatar.

In 2005, the Silberman-Robb commission investigating intelligence in the Iraq war failed to interview the case officer directly involved with Sabri; instead its report blamed the entire WMD fiasco on "groupthink" at the CIA. "They didn't want to trace this back to the White House," said the officer.

On Feb. 5, 2004, Tenet delivered a speech at Georgetown University that alluded to Sabri and defended his position on the existence of WMD, which, even then, he contended would still be found. "Several sensitive reports crossed my desk from two sources characterized by our foreign partners as established and reliable," he said. "The first from a source who had direct access to Saddam and his inner circle" -- Naji Sabri -- "said Iraq was not in the possession of a nuclear weapon. However, Iraq was aggressively and covertly developing such a weapon."

Then Tenet claimed with assurance, "The same source said that Iraq was stockpiling chemical weapons." He explained that this intelligence had been central to his belief in the reason for war. "As this information and other sensitive information came across my desk, it solidified and reinforced the judgments that we had reached in my own view of the danger posed by Saddam Hussein and I conveyed this view to our nation's leaders." (Tenet doesn't mention Sabri in his recently published memoir, "At the Center of the Storm.")

But where were the WMD? "Now, I'm sure you're all asking, 'Why haven't we found the weapons?' I've told you the search must continue and it will be difficult."

On Sept. 8, 2006, three Republican senators on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence -- Orrin Hatch, Saxby Chambliss and Pat Roberts -- signed a letter attempting to counter Drumheller's revelation about Sabri on "60 Minutes": "All of the information about this case so far indicates that the information from this source was that Iraq did have WMD programs." The Republicans also quoted Tenet, who had testified before the committee in July 2006 that Drumheller had "mischaracterized" the intelligence. Still, Drumheller stuck to his guns, telling Reuters, "We have differing interpretations, and I think mine's right."

One of the former senior CIA officers told me that despite the certitude of the three Republican senators, the Senate committee never had the original memo on Sabri. "The committee never got that report," he said. "The material was hidden or lost, and because it was a restricted case, a lot of it was done in hard copy. The whole thing was fogged up, like Curveball."

While one Iraqi source told the CIA that there were no WMD, information that was true but distorted to prove the opposite, another Iraqi source was a fabricator whose lies were eagerly embraced. "The real tragedy is that they had a good source that they misused," said one of the former CIA officers. "The fact is there was nothing there, no threat. But Bush wanted to hear what he wanted to hear."


-- By Sidney Blumenthal

August Vacation

Civil Disobedience Idea #437: To protest both Bush's vacations and the Iraqi Parliament's, let all good war protesters go on strike for the month. You know, in Phoenix it gets to 118 degrees F very frequently in July and August.


Excerpt from Dan Froomkin today:

About That August Vacation

---

Fury continues to mount in Washington over the Iraqi parliament's plan to take the month of August off. Such a vacation would be a PR calamity for the Bush administration, one that Vice President Cheney tried to avert in May when he traveled to Iraq and urged members not to take a summer recess.

As I wrote in my May 10 column, several House Republican moderates turned on the president in a highly unusual White House meeting, warning Bush that his credibility was shot and that Republican defections were in the offing.

Here is video of Tim Russert describing the meeting to Brian Williams on NBC: "One congressman said, 'How can our daughters and sons spill their blood while the Iraqi parliament goes on vacation?' The president responded, 'The vice president is over there to tell them: "Do not go on vacation." ' "

Apparently, not everyone does what Cheney tells them to do.

At Friday's press briefing, Snow tried to make excuses for the parliament. "You know, it's 130 degrees in Baghdad in August," he said. That led ABC News's Martha Raddatz to point out that "it's 130 degrees for the U.S. military also on the ground."

But White House Watch reader Dan Flowers e-mailed me with a meteorological "fact check": " Weather Underground says the highest temperature last August was 118 F, and mean high temp was 112F. Not cool by any means, but not 130 F."

The Libby Commutation

Something about this event has really shocked me and disturbed me more than any Bush tactic of the past year. The last "event" was the troop escalation ("too little, too late" in my estimation) but Bush's commutation of Libby'sentence really goes beyond that. That was played out for the country to see. This whole affair has been occupying a different zone, one that was excruciatingly slow to play out, but there was some sense of justice, meager it be, at the end. OR SO I THOUGHT! I thought at least Bush would have the decency to wait until the end of his Presidency. But to come minutes after the announcement of the judicial review (or whatever it was that determined Libby's jail time could not wait for further appeals to go through)... this is SO sticking a finger in the eye of anyone who takes this country seriously.

So here our my suggestions for civil disobedience, because standing on a street corner with signs just ain't cutting it.

1. Storm the studios of your local news bureau. Geez, finally the blue state demographics pay off (NYC, we are waiting for you to take action!).

2. A general strike. I wonder why this hasn't come up yet. What would it be like if only the CEO's and top level managers reported to work?

3. Scoop up every PERJURY conviction in the country and demand Bush pardon any offenders who ALSO HAVE A FAMILY (like Libby).

If ever an action on the part of the Bush Admin called SPECIFICALLY for CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE, this is it, given the nature of the charge...flouting the legal system.

Bush Looked Into the Eyes of Chalabi and Saw His Soul

Bush Looked Into the Eyes of Chalabi and Saw His Soul
Remember the Tim Russert interview when he asked Bush how he was so sure that a democratic Iraq would not elect for an Islamic governement? Chalabi assured him. Yes, that was CHALABI.
washingtonpost.com


Religious Leaders Ahead in Iraq Poll U.S.-Supported Government Is Losing Ground
By Robin WrightWashington Post Staff WriterFriday, October 22, 2004; Page A01
Leaders of Iraq's religious parties have emerged as the country's most popular politicians and would win the largest share of votes if an election were held today, while the U.S.-backed government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi is losing serious ground, according to a U.S.-financed poll by the International Republican Institute.
More than 45 percent of Iraqis also believe that their country is heading in the wrong direction, and 41 percent say it is moving in the right direction.
Within the Bush administration, a victory by Iraq's religious parties is viewed as the worst-case scenario. Washington has hoped that Allawi and the current team, which was selected by U.S. and U.N. envoys, would win or do well in Iraq's first democratic election, in January. U.S. officials believe a secular government led by moderates is critical, in part because the new government will oversee writing a new Iraqi constitution.
"The picture it paints is that, after all the blood and treasure we've spent and despite the [U.S.-led] occupation's democracy efforts, we're in a position now that the moderates would not win if an election were held today," said a U.S. official who requested anonymity because the poll has not been released.
U.S. officials acknowledge that the political honeymoon after the handover of political power on June 28 ended much earlier than anticipated. The new poll, based on 2,000 face-to-face interviews conducted among all ethnic and religious groups nationwide between Sept. 24 and Oct. 4, shows that Iraqi support for the government has plummeted to about 43 percent who believe it is effective, down from 62 percent in a late-summer poll.
A senior State Department official played down the results. "When the interim government took over, the [poll] numbers were artificially high. It's very difficult to meet expectations when they're sky-high," he said on the condition of anonymity because the data are still being analyzed.
But in another blow, one out of three Iraqis blames the U.S.-led multinational force for Iraq's security problems, slightly more than the 32 percent who blame foreign terrorists, the poll shows. Only 8 percent blame members of the former government.
"We had convinced everyone -- Americans and Iraqis -- that things might change with the return of sovereignty, but, in fact, things went the other way," a congressional staff member said. "What's particularly damning is that the multinational force gets more blame than the terrorists for the problems in Iraq. It's all trending in the wrong way . . . and it's not likely we'll be able to change public sentiment much before the election. "
In positive news for the administration, the poll found that 85 percent of Iraqis want to vote in the January election.
Despite the current strife, about two-thirds of Iraqis do not believe civil war is imminent, the poll found. Asked if their households had been hurt by violence, injuries, death or monetary loss over the past year, only 22 percent of those questioned said yes -- a figure that surprised pollsters and U.S. officials.
With voter registration due to begin Nov. 1, the poll found that 64 percent of Iraqis are still unwilling to align with any party, which U.S. officials attribute to the legacy of the Baath Party. The most valuable indicators, officials say, may be the data on Iraq's politicians.
The poll found the most popular politician is Abdel Aziz Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). The group was part of the U.S.-backed opposition to Saddam Hussein and is now receiving millions of dollars in aid from Iran, U.S. officials say.
Hakim had 80 percent name recognition among Iraqis, with more than 51 percent wanting to see him in the national assembly, which will pick a new government.
Allawi had the greatest name recognition of any politician, with 47 percent of Iraqis supporting him for a seat in the new parliament. But rebel Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr came in a very close third, with 46 percent backing him for an assembly seat.
Ahmed Chalabi, once favored in Washington as a possible successor to Hussein, had wide national recognition, but only 15 percent want him in parliament -- and more than half oppose him.
The one factor that skews the poll, analysts said, is that Ibrahim Jafari, the Dawa Party chief and current vice president, was not included. He had the highest popularity rating in previous polls.
That may still be the case, since almost 18 percent of Iraqis surveyed by IRI said they were most likely to vote for Dawa candidates -- the largest backing among the top 11 parties listed. Dawa is another former U.S.-backed group supported by aid from Iran, U.S. officials say.
U.S. officials and Iraqi analysts believe candidates aligned with the Supreme Council and with Dawa are likely to capture the highest percentage of votes, giving religious parties an edge in forming a new government.
Iraqi President Ghazi Yawar, a Sunni leader of the country's largest tribe, was also omitted from the poll.
In an interview with Abu Dhabi television, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said yesterday that Iraqis want democracy and are unlikely to go "from one form of totalitarian state to another form of totalitarian state." Both U.S. officials and Iraq experts note that the rise of Islamic parties does not necessarily mean creation of an Islamic government or theocracy such as Iran's.
President Bush said Tuesday that he would be "disappointed" if free and fair elections in Iraq led to the seating of an Islamic government, but that the United States would accept the results. "Democracy is democracy," he said. "If that's what people choose, that's what the people choose."
The IRI, founded in 1983, is a private, nonprofit organization that has worked in more than 60 countries to advance democracy worldwide. With U.S. grants, it has been in charge of public opinion polls in advance of the election.
source:http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A52674-2004Oct21?language=printer

Bush Threatens to Veto $87 Billion Iraq Bill

Bush Threatens to Veto $87 Billion Iraq Bill
Bush counts on his supporters having no memory
White House Groans Over LoanWASHINGTON, Oct. 21, 2003The Bush administration threatened for the first time Tuesday to veto an $87 billion package for Iraq and Afghanistan if Congress converts any Iraqi rebuilding money into loans. White House officials issued the warning even though many lawmakers agree that the bill's final version is likely to bow to President Bush and omit any loans. By underscoring Mr. Bush's opposition to loans, the administration threat could make it easier for congressional Republican leaders to nail down enough votes to help the president prevail. The House bill included $18.6 to help Iraq rebuild its water supplies, health clinics and Army, and made the money a grant that country would not have to repay. The Senate included $18.4 billion but would require Iraq to repay about half — unless Saudi Arabia, Russia and other countries forgave 90 percent of the debt Baghdad ran up under Saddam Hussein's regime. Mr. Bush and a host of administration officials had repeatedly expressed their opposition to loans in recent weeks, but had not issued a veto threat before. A letter written Tuesday reiterated White House arguments, but contained the first such veto warning. "If this provision is not removed, the president's senior advisers would recommend that he veto the bill," wrote White House budget director Joshua Bolten. "Including a loan mechanism slows efforts to stabilize the region and to relieve pressure on our troops, raises questions about our commitment to building a democratic and self-governing Iraq, and impairs our ability to encourage other nations to provide badly needed assistance without saddling Iraq with additional debt," the letter said. Later this week, U.S. officials are hoping to get billions in pledges from foreign countries at an Iraq donors' conference in Madrid. So far, according to The New York Times, Japan has pledged $1.5 billion for next year and more in the future, Britain said it would donate $800 million, Spain nearly $300 million and Canada $260 million. The Pentagon estimates Iraqi reconstruction will require $55 billion. Were Congress to pass the Senate version of the reconstruction bill, countries could follow the U.S. example and provide loans rather than grants. In addition, U.S. officials are hoping to steer the donors' conference away from debt relief and toward grants. If the U.S. reconstruction plan links America aid to debt relief, it might be difficult to get donors to focus on new aid. Loan supporters say that with some of the world's richest oil reserves, Iraq should be required to eventually repay some U.S. aid. That is especially true with the United States facing record federal deficits, and many members of Congress hearing requests from their home districts for more funds for local roads and other projects. House-Senate bargainers hope to reach compromise on a final version of the bill next week. Both houses overwhelmingly approved similar bills Friday providing most of the $87 billion that Mr. Bush requested for U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and for rebuilding the two countries. The House vote was 303-125, while the Senate roll call was 87-12. The loans-vs.-grants debate concerns only a portion of the massive bill, which provide nearly $66 billion for U.S. troops in the field. Both chambers chopped nearly $2 billion off the $20.3 billion he requested for retooling Iraq's oil industry, its court system and the rest of its economy and government. Minutes before final passage, the Senate voted by voice to strip nearly $1.9 billion from that part of the bill, erasing money for ZIP codes, sanitation trucks and other items that some lawmakers had derided as frivolous. The House had already killed most of those same items. Senators also voted to add $1.3 billion for veterans' health care programs. The bills also contained rebuilding aid for Afghanistan; assistance for Pakistan, Jordan, and other U.S. allies; and cash for rewards for the capture of Saddam and Osama bin Laden.
As part of the $87 billion request for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, President Bush's $20.3 billion proposal for rebuilding Iraq includes:
$2.9 billion to repair the electrical system
$150 million for emergency communications system
$150 million for a new children's hospital in Basra.
$130 million for irrigation projects.
$125 million for railroads.
$100 million to protect witnesses
$100 million for war crimes experts
$100 million for housing
$99 million for prisons
$67 million for guards
$55 million for an oil pipeline repair team
$30 million for English classes
$9 million to modernize Iraq's postal system
$1 million for a museum on atrocities by Saddam's regime. AP
Reuters version
Tue October 21, 2003 01:01 PM ET By Vicki Allen
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Tuesday threatened to veto an $87 billion bill for military operations and reconstruction in Iraq if Congress keeps a Senate-passed provision to convert $10 billion of the package into loans.
The chairman of the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee meanwhile said he was confident the loan provision would be eliminated when a House-Senate conference meets to reconcile differences in their two versions, enabling a final measure to be sent to President Bush.
"I believe the House position will prevail. We are determined to support the president," said Rep. Bill Young, a Florida Republican.
But sentiment remained strong among lawmakers in both chambers to make Iraq repay a portion of the $20 billion Bush wants for Iraq's reconstruction from its future oil revenues.
White House budget director Joshua Bolten in a letter to the House and Senate appropriations committees said the president's senior advisers would recommend a veto if the loan was not dropped from the final bill.
"Including a loan mechanism slows efforts to stabilize the region and to relieve pressure on our troops, raises questions about our commitment to building a democratic and self-governing Iraq, and impairs our ability to encourage other nations to provide badly needed assistance without saddling Iraq with additional debt," Bolten said.
The Senate last week narrowly voted to make $10 billion of the package into loans, while the House narrowly defeated a similar measure pushed by Democrats. House Republican leaders had maneuvered to prevent a vote on a Republican loan plan.
The House later Tuesday was to take a nonbinding vote that Republicans acknowledged could put a majority on the record in support of the loans, as well as additional money for veterans' health care and improvements in the quality of life for U.S. troops in Iraq.
John Feehery, spokesman for House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican, said he did not feel that vote would be significant. "We're not going to send the president a bill he's going to veto," he said.
Young said he expected a final bill will be ready later this month to send to Bush, and said conferees will meet on next Tuesday on the bill.
While the bill could not be completed as hoped in time for international donors conference for Iraq on Thursday and Friday in Madrid, he said, the strong House and Senate votes last week for somewhat different measures demonstrate the United States will offer at least half of rebuilding money in grants and should encourage other donor countries.
"The United States is committed. Both houses have passed one version or another for a construction grant," said Young.
source:

Bush Looked Into Eyes of Chalabi

Bush Looked Into Eyes of Chalabi
From Feb 8 Meet the Press interview with Bush (Tim Russert the interviewer):
Russert: If the Iraqis choose, however, an Islamic extremist regime, would you accept that, and would that be better for the United States than Saddam Hussein?
President Bush: They're not going to develop that. And the reason I can say that is because I'm very aware of this basic law they're writing. They're not going to develop that because right here in the Oval Office I sat down with Mr. Pachachi and Chalabi and al-Hakim, people from different parts of the country that have made the firm commitment, that they want a constitution eventually written that recognizes minority rights and freedom of religion.
I remember speaking to Mr. al-Hakim here, who is a fellow who has lost 63 family members during the Saddam reign. His brother was one of the people that was assassinated early on in this past year. I expected to see a very bitter person. If 63 members of your family had been killed by a group of people, you’d be a little bitter. He obviously was concerned, but he -- I said, you know, "I'm a Methodist, what are my chances of success in your country and your vision?" And he said, "It's going to be a free society where you can worship freely." This is a Shiia fellow.
And my only point to you is these people are committed to a pluralistic society. And it's not going to be easy. The road to democracy is bumpy. It's bumpy particularly because these are folks that have been terrorized, tortured, brutalized by Saddam Hussein.
source:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4179618

3 out of 4 Bush Supporters

3 out of 4 Bush Supporters Still Believe Iraq Had WMD's :
The World According to a Bush Voter

By Jim Lobe, AlterNetPosted on October 21, 2004, Printed on October 25, 2004http://www.alternet.org/story/20263/

Do the supporters of President Bush really know their man or the policies of his administration?
Three out of 4 self-described supporters of President George W. Bush still believe that pre-war Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD) or active programs to produce them. According to a new survey published Thursday, the same number also believes that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein provided "substantial support" to al Qaeda.
But here is the truly astonishing part: as many or more Bush supporters hold those beliefs today than they did several months ago. In other words, more people believe the claims today –- after the publication of a series of well-publicized official government reports that debunked both notions.
These are among the most striking findings of a survey conducted in mid-October by the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) and Knowledge Networks, a California-based polling firm.
The survey polled the views of nearly 900 randomly chosen respondents equally divided between Bush supporters and those intending to vote for Democratic Sen. John Kerry. It found a yawning gap in the perceptions of the facts between the two groups, particularly with regards to President Bush's claims about pre-war Iraq.
According to the accompanying analysis offered by PIPA:
It is normal during elections for supporters of presidential candidates to have fundamental disagreements about values or strategies. The current election is unique in that Bush supporters and Kerry supporters have profoundly different perceptions of reality. In the face of a stream of high-level assessments about pre-war Iraq, Bush supporters cling to the refuted beliefs that Iraq had WMD or supported al Qaeda.
The survey probed each respondent's views at three separate levels: One, their personal belief about the two issues; two, their perception of what "most experts" had concluded about the same; and three, their knowledge of the Bush administration's claims on either WMDs or al Qaeda.
The survey found that 72 percent of Bush supporters believe either that Iraq had actual WMD (47 percent) or a major program for producing them (25 percent). This despite the widespread media coverage in early October of the CIA's "Duelfer Report" – the final word on the subject by the one billion dollar, 15-month investigation by the Iraq Survey Group – which concluded that Hussein had dismantled all of his WMD programmes shortly after the 1991 Gulf War and never tried to reconstitute them.
Nonetheless, 56 percent of Bush supporters are under the impression that the expert consensus is exactly the opposite – that Iraq had actual WMD. Another 57 percent think that the Duelfer Report itself concluded that Iraq either had WMD (19 percent) or a major WMD program (38 percent).
Only 26 percent of Kerry supporters, by contrast, believe that pre-war Iraq had either actual WMD or a WMD program, and only 18 percent said "most experts" agreed on the same.
Results on Hussein's alleged support for al Qaeda are similar. The contention – which has been most persistently asserted by Vice President Dick Cheney – was thoroughly debunked by the final report of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission earlier this summer.
Seventy-five percent of Bush supporters said they believed that Iraq was providing "substantial" support to al Qaeda, with 20 percent asserting that Iraq was directly involved in the 9/11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon. Sixty-three percent of Bush supporters even believe that clear evidence of such support has actually been found, and 60 percent believe that "most experts" have reached the same conclusion.
By contrast, only 30 percent of Kerry supporters said they believe that such a link existed or that most experts have concluded that it did.
Ironically, the only issue on which the survey found broad agreement between the two sets of voters was the role of the Bush administration in actively promoting the claims about Iraq's WMD and connections to al Qaeda.
"One of the reasons that Bush supporters have these (erroneous) beliefs is that they perceive the Bush administration confirming them," notes Steven Kull, PIPA's director. "Interestingly, this is one point on which Bush and Kerry supporters agree."
In regard to WMD, those majorities have actually grown since last summer, according to PIPA.
On WMD, 82 percent of Bush supporters and 84 percent of Kerry supporters believe that the administration claims that Iraq either had WMD or major WMD programs. On ties with al Qaeda, 75 percent of Bush supporters and 74 percent of Kerry supporters believe that the administration claims that Iraq provided substantial support to the terrorist group.
Remarkably, when asked whether the U.S. should have gone to war without evidence of a WMD program or support to al Qaeda, 58 percent of Bush supporters said no. Moreover, 61 percent said they assumed that Bush would also not have gone to war under those circumstances.
"To support the president and to accept that he took the U.S. to war based on mistaken assumptions likely creates substantial cognitive dissonance and leads Bush supporters to suppress awareness of unsettling information about pre-war Iraq," Kull says.
He added that this "cognitive dissonance" could also help explain other remarkable findings in the survey. The poll also found a major gap between Bush's stated positions on a number of international issues and what his supporters believe Bush's position to be. A strong majority of Bush supporters believe, for example that the president supports a range of international treaties and institutions that the White House has vocally and publicly opposed.
In particular, majorities of Bush supporters incorrectly assume that he supports multilateral approaches to various international issues, including the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (69 percent), the land mine treaty (72 percent), and the Kyoto Protocol to curb greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming (51 percent).
In August, two-thirds of Bush supporters also believed that Bush supported the International Criminal Court (ICC). Although that figure dropped to a 53 percent majority in the PIPA poll, it's not much of a drop considering that Bush explicitly denounced the ICC in the first, most widely watched presidential debate in late September.
In all of these cases, majorities of Bush supporters said they favored the positions that they imputed, incorrectly, to Bush. Large majorities of Kerry supporters, on the other hand, showed they knew both their candidate's and Bush's positions on the same issues.
Bush supporters also have deeply erroneous views regarding the extent of international support for the president and his policies. Despite a steady flow over the past year of official statements by foreign governments and public-opinion polls showing strong opposition to the Iraq war, less than one-third of Bush supporters believe that most people in foreign countries oppose the U.S. decision to invade Iraq. Two-thirds believe that foreign views are either evenly divided on the war (42 percent) or that the majority of foreigners actually favors the war (26 percent).
Three of every four Kerry supporters, on the other hand, said it was their understanding that the most of the rest of the world oppose the war.
Similarly, polls conducted during the summer in 35 major countries around the world found that majorities or pluralities in 30 of them favored Kerry for president over Bush by an average of margin of greater than two to one. Yet 57 percent of Bush supporters believe that a majority of people outside the U.S. favor Bush's re-election, while 33 percent think that foreign opinion is evenly divided.
On the other hand, two-thirds of Kerry supporters think that their candidate is favored overseas; only one percent think that most people abroad preferred Bush.
Kull, who has been analyzing U.S. public opinion on foreign-policy issues for two decades, says that this reality gap reveals, if anything, the hold that the president has over his loyalists:
The roots of the Bush supporters' resistance to information very likely lie in the traumatic experience of 9/11 and equally in the near pitch-perfect leadership that President Bush showed in its immediate wake. This appears to have created a powerful bond between Bush and his supporters – and an idealized image of the President that makes it difficult for his supporters to imagine that he could have made incorrect judgments before the war, that world public opinion would be critical of his policies or that the president could hold foreign policy positions that are at odds with his supporters.
In other words, Bush supporters choose to keep faith in their leader than face the truth either about their president or the world as it is.
© 2004 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/20263/
source:http://www.alternet.org/story/20263/

Dems on Iraq: What Kerry Voted For

UPDATE 2007: also, What Hilary Voted For

COMMENT: Personally, I don't hold anything against the Democrats who voted for this language. See John Dean and Alan Dershowitz books that explain how Bush didn't follow through.

Joint Resolution to Authorize the use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq. 

Whereas in 1990 in response to Iraq's war of aggression against and illegal occupation of Kuwait,
the United States forged a coalition of nations to liberate Kuwait and its people in order to
defend the national security of the United States and enforce United Nations Security Council
resolutions relating to Iraq; 

Whereas after the liberation of Kuwait in 1991, Iraq entered into a United Nations sponsored
cease-fire agreement pursuant to which Iraq unequivocally agreed, among other things, to eliminate
its nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons programs and the means to deliver and develop them,
and to end its support for international terrorism; 

Whereas the efforts of international weapons inspectors, United States intelligence agencies, and
Iraqi defectors led to the discovery that Iraq had large stockpiles of chemical weapons and a
large scale biological weapons program, and that Iraq had an advanced nuclear weapons development
program that was much closer to producing a nuclear weapon than intelligence reporting had
previously indicated; 

Whereas Iraq, in direct and flagrant violation of the cease-fire, attempted to thwart the efforts
of weapons inspectors to identify and destroy Iraq's weapons of mass destruction stockpiles and
development capabilities, which finally resulted in the withdrawal of inspectors from Iraq on
October 31, 1998; 

Whereas in 1998 Congress concluded that Iraq's continuing weapons of mass destruction programs
threatened vital United States interests and international peace and security, declared Iraq to be
in `material and unacceptable breach of its international obligations' and urged the President `to
take appropriate action, in accordance with the Constitution and relevant laws of the United
States, to bring Iraq into compliance with its international obligations' (Public Law 105-235); 

Whereas Iraq both poses a continuing threat to the national security of the United States and
international peace and security in the Persian Gulf region and remains in material an
unacceptable breach of its international obligations by, among other things, continuing to possess
and develop a significant chemical and biological weapons capability, actively seeking a nuclear
weapons capability, and supporting and harboring terrorist organizations; 

Whereas Iraq persists in violating resolutions of the United Nations Security Council by
continuing to engage in brutal repression of its civilian population thereby threatening
international peace and security in the region, by refusing to release, repatriate, or account for
non-Iraqi citizens wrongfully detained by Iraq, including an American serviceman, and by failing
to return property wrongfully seized by Iraq from Kuwait; 

Whereas the current Iraqi regime has demonstrated its capability and willingness to use weapons of
mass destruction against other nations and its own people; 

Whereas the current Iraqi regime has demonstrated its continuing hostility toward, and willingness
to attack, the United States, including by attempting in 1993 to assassinate former President Bush
and by firing on many thousands of occasions on United States and Coalition Armed Forces engaged
in enforcing the resolutions of the United Nations Security Council; 

Whereas members of al-Qaida, an organization bearing responsibility for attacks on the United
States, its citizens, and interests, including the attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001,
are known to be in Iraq; 

Whereas Iraq continues to aid and harbor other international terrorist organizations, including
organizations that threaten the lives and safety of American citizens; 

Whereas the attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, underscored the gravity of the
threat posed by the acquisition of weapons of mass destruction by international terrorist
organizations; 

Whereas Iraq's demonstrated capability and willingness to use weapons of mass destruction, the
risk that the current Iraqi regime will either employ those weapons to launch a surprise attack
against the United States or its Armed Forces or provide them to international terrorists who
would do so, and the extreme magnitude of harm that would result to the United States and its
citizens from such an attack, combine to justify action by the United States to defend itself; 

Whereas United Nations Security Council Resolution 678 authorizes the use of all necessary means
to enforce United Nations Security Council Resolution 660 and subsequent relevant resolutions and
to compel Iraq to cease certain activities that threaten international peace and security,
including the development of weapons of mass destruction and refusal or obstruction of United
Nations weapons inspections in violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 687,
repression of its civilian population in violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution
688, and threatening its neighbors or United Nations operations in Iraq in violation of United
Nations Security Council Resolution 949; 

Whereas Congress in the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution (Public
Law 102-1) has authorized the President `to use United States Armed Forces pursuant to United
Nations Security Council Resolution 678 (1990) in order to achieve implementation of Security
Council Resolutions 660, 661, 662, 664, 665, 666, 667, 669, 670, 674, and 677'; 

Whereas in December 1991, Congress expressed its sense that it `supports the use of all necessary
means to achieve the goals of United Nations Security Council Resolution 687 as being consistent
with the Authorization of Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution (Public Law 102-1),' that
Iraq's repression of its civilian population violates United Nations Security Council Resolution
688 and `constitutes a continuing threat to the peace, security, and stability of the Persian Gulf
region,' and that Congress, `supports the use of all necessary means to achieve the goals of
United Nations Security Council Resolution 688'; 

Whereas the Iraq Liberation Act (Public Law 105-338) expressed the sense of Congress that it
should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove from power the current
Iraqi regime and promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime; 

Whereas on September 12, 2002, President Bush committed the United States to `work with the United
Nations Security Council to meet our common challenge' posed by Iraq and to `work for the
necessary resolutions,' while also making clear that `the Security Council resolutions will be
enforced, and the just demands of peace and security will be met, or action will be unavoidable'; 

Whereas the United States is determined to prosecute the war on terrorism and Iraq's ongoing
support for international terrorist groups combined with its development of weapons of mass
destruction in direct violation of its obligations under the 1991 cease-fire and other United
Nations Security Council resolutions make clear that it is in the national security interests of
the United States and in furtherance of the war on terrorism that all relevant United Nations
Security Council resolutions be enforced, including through the use of force if necessary; 

Whereas Congress has taken steps to pursue vigorously the war on terrorism through the provision
of authorities and funding requested by the President to take the necessary actions against
international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations or
persons who planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on
September 11, 2001, or harbored such persons or organizations; 

Whereas the President and Congress are determined to continue to take all appropriate actions
against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations,
organizations or persons who planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that
occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such persons or organizations; 

Whereas the President has authority under the Constitution to take action in order to deter and
prevent acts of international terrorism against the United States, as Congress recognized in the
joint resolution on Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public Law 107-40); and 

Whereas it is in the national security of the United States to restore international peace and
security to the Persian Gulf region: Now, therefore, be it 

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress
assembled, 

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

This joint resolution may be cited as the `Authorization for the Use of Military Force Against
Iraq'. 

SEC. 2. SUPPORT FOR UNITED STATES DIPLOMATIC EFFORTS. 

The Congress of the United States supports the efforts by the President to 

(1) strictly enforce through the United Nations Security Council all relevant Security Council
resolutions applicable to Iraq and encourages him in those efforts; and 

(2) obtain prompt and decisive action by the Security Council to ensure that Iraq abandons its
strategy of delay, evasion and noncompliance and promptly and strictly complies with all relevant
Security Council resolutions. 

SEC. 3. AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF UNITED STATES ARMED FORCES. 

(a) AUTHORIZATION- The President is authorized to use the Armed Forces of the United States as he
determines to be necessary and appropriate in order to 

(1) defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq;
and 

(2) enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq. 

(b) PRESIDENTIAL DETERMINATION- In connection with the exercise of the authority granted in
subsection (a) to use force the President shall, prior to such exercise or as soon thereafter as
may be feasible, but no later than 48 hours after exercising such authority, make available to the
Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate his
determination that 

(1) reliance by the United States on further diplomatic or other peaceful means alone either (A)
will not adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing
threat posed by Iraq or (B) is not likely to lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations
Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq; and 

(2) acting pursuant to this resolution is consistent with the United States and other countries
continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist
organizations, including those nations, organizations or persons who planned, authorized,
committed or aided the terrorists attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001. 

(c) WAR POWERS RESOLUTION REQUIREMENTS- 

(1) SPECIFIC STATUTORY AUTHORIZATION- Consistent with section 8(a)(1) of the War Powers
Resolution, the Congress declares that this section is intended to constitute specific statutory
authorization within the meaning of section 5(b) of the War Powers Resolution. 

(2) APPLICABILITY OF OTHER REQUIREMENTS- Nothing in this resolution supersedes any requirement of
the War Powers Resolution. 

SEC. 4. REPORTS TO CONGRESS. 

(a) The President shall, at least once every 60 days, submit to the Congress a report on matters
relevant to this joint resolution, including actions taken pursuant to the exercise of authority
granted in section 3 and the status of planning for efforts that are expected to be required after
such actions are completed, including those actions described in section 7 of Public Law 105-338
(the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998). 

(b) To the extent that the submission of any report described in subsection (a) coincides with the
submission of any other report on matters relevant to this joint resolution otherwise required to
be submitted to Congress pursuant to the reporting requirements of Public Law 93-148 (the Wap
Xnwers Resolution), all such reports may be submitted as a single consolidated report to the
Congress. 

(c) To the extent that the information required by section 3 of Public Law 102-1 is included in
the report required by this section, such report shall be considered as meeting the requirements
of section 3 of Public Law 102-1.

Army War College Report

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Iraq invasion was "an unnecessary preventive war of
choice" that has robbed resources and attention from the more critical fight against al Qaeda in a
hopeless U.S. quest for absolute security, according to a study recently published by the U.S.
Army War College.

The Report (pdf)

The 56-page document written by Jeffrey Record, a veteran defense expert who serves as a visiting
research professor at the Strategic Studies Institute of the Army War College, represents a
blistering assessment of what President Bush calls the U.S. global war on
terrorism.

source