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The Weblog at The View from the Core - Wednesday, January 28, 2004
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"John Edwards' Inconsistency Regarding Privilege And Preferences" At Discriminations. Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 10:28:44 PM |
What David Kay Said Today "Senator Kennedy and I talked on several occasions prior to the war that my view was that the best evidence that I had seen was that Iraq indeed had weapons of mass destruction." An editorial at OpinionJournal today (embedded ellipsis in original): .... That Saddam had WMD was the consensus of the U.S. intelligence community for years, going back well into the Clinton Administration. The CIA's Near East and counterterrorism bureaus disagreed on the links between al Qaeda and Saddam which is one reason the Bush Administration failed to push that theme. But the CIA and its intelligence brethren were united in their belief that Saddam had WMD, as the agency made clear in numerous briefings to Congress. And not just the CIA. Believers included the U.N., whose inspectors were tossed out of Iraq after they had recorded huge stockpiles after the Gulf War. No less than French President Jacques Chirac warned as late as last February about "the probable possession of weapons of mass destruction by an uncontrollable country, Iraq" and declared that the "international community is right . . . in having decided Iraq should be disarmed." All of this was enshrined in U.N. Resolution 1441, which ordered Saddam to come completely clean about his weapons. If he really had already destroyed all of his WMD, Saddam had every incentive to give U.N. inspectors free rein, put everything on the table and live to deceive another day. That he didn't may go down as Saddam's last and greatest miscalculation.... Here is a transcript of David Kay's testimony today to the Senate Armed Services Committee (brackets in original): + + + + + As you know and we discussed, I do not have a written statement. This hearing came about very quickly. I do have a few preliminary comments, but I suspect you're more interested in asking questions, and I'll be happy to respond to those questions to the best of my ability. I would like to open by saying that the talent, dedication and bravery of the staff of the [Iraq Survey Group] that was my privilege to direct is unparalleled and the country owes a great debt of gratitude to the men and women who have served over there and continue to serve doing that. A great deal has been accomplished by the team, and I do think ... it important that it goes on and it is allowed to reach its full conclusion. In fact, I really believe it ought to be better resourced and totally focused on WMD; that that is important to do it. But I also believe that it is time to begin the fundamental analysis of how we got here, what led us here and what we need to do in order to ensure that we are equipped with the best possible intelligence as we face these issues in the future. Let me begin by saying, we were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here. Sen. [Edward] Kennedy knows very directly. Senator Kennedy and I talked on several occasions prior to the war that my view was that the best evidence that I had seen was that Iraq indeed had weapons of mass destruction. I would also point out that many governments that chose not to support this war -- certainly, the French president, [Jacques] Chirac, as I recall in April of last year, referred to Iraq's possession of WMD. The Germans certainly -- the intelligence service believed that there were WMD. It turns out that we were all wrong, probably in my judgment, and that is most disturbing. We're also in a period in which we've had intelligence surprises in the proliferation area that go the other way. The case of Iran, a nuclear program that the Iranians admit was 18 years on, that we underestimated. And, in fact, we didn't discover it. It was discovered by a group of Iranian dissidents outside the country who pointed the international community at the location. The Libyan program recently discovered was far more extensive than was assessed prior to that. There's a long record here of being wrong. There's a good reason for it. There are probably multiple reasons. Certainly proliferation is a hard thing to track, particularly in countries that deny easy and free access and don't have free and open societies. In my judgment, based on the work that has been done to this point of the Iraq Survey Group, and in fact, that I reported to you in October, Iraq was in clear violation of the terms of [U.N.] Resolution 1441. Resolution 1441 required that Iraq report all of its activities -- one last chance to come clean about what it had. We have discovered hundreds of cases, based on both documents, physical evidence and the testimony of Iraqis, of activities that were prohibited under the initial U.N. Resolution 687 and that should have been reported under 1441, with Iraqi testimony that not only did they not tell the U.N. about this, they were instructed not to do it and they hid material. I think the aim -- and certainly the aim of what I've tried to do since leaving -- is not political and certainly not a witch hunt at individuals. It's to try to direct our attention at what I believe is a fundamental fault analysis that we must now examine. And let me take one of the explanations most commonly given: Analysts were pressured to reach conclusions that would fit the political agenda of one or another administration. I deeply think that is a wrong explanation. As leader of the effort of the Iraqi Survey Group, I spent most of my days not out in the field leading inspections. It's typically what you do at that level. I was trying to motivate, direct, find strategies. In the course of doing that, I had innumerable analysts who came to me in apology that the world that we were finding was not the world that they had thought existed and that they had estimated. Reality on the ground differed in advance. And never -- not in a single case -- was the explanation, "I was pressured to do this." The explanation was very often, "The limited data we had led one to reasonably conclude this. I now see that there's another explanation for it." And each case was different, but the conversations were sufficiently in depth and our relationship was sufficiently frank that I'm convinced that, at least to the analysts I dealt with, I did not come across a single one that felt it had been, in the military term, "inappropriate command influence" that led them to take that position. It was not that. It was the honest difficulty based on the intelligence that had -- the information that had been collected that led the analysts to that conclusion. And you know, almost in a perverse way, I wish it had been undue influence because we know how to correct that. We get rid of the people who, in fact, were exercising that. The fact that it wasn't tells me that we've got a much more fundamental problem of understanding what went wrong, and we've got to figure out what was there. And that's what I call fundamental fault analysis. And like I say, I think we've got other cases other than Iraq. I do not think the problem of global proliferation of weapons technology of mass destruction is going to go away, and that's why I think it is an urgent issue. And let me really wrap up here with just a brief summary of what I think we are now facing in Iraq. I regret to say that I think at the end of the work of the [Iraq Survey Group] there's still going to be an unresolvable ambiguity about what happened. A lot of that traces to the failure on April 9 to establish immediately physical security in Iraq -- the unparalleled looting and destruction, a lot of which was directly intentional, designed by the security services to cover the tracks of the Iraq WMD program and their other programs as well, a lot of which was what we simply called Ali Baba looting. "It had been the regime's. The regime is gone. I'm going to go take the gold toilet fixtures and everything else imaginable." I've seen looting around the world and thought I knew the best looters in the world. The Iraqis excel at that. The result is -- document destruction -- we're really not going to be able to prove beyond a truth the negatives and some of the positive conclusions that we're going to come to. There will be always unresolved ambiguity here. But I do think the survey group -- and I think Charlie Duelfer is a great leader. I have the utmost confidence in Charles. I think you will get as full an answer as you can possibly get. And let me just conclude by my own personal tribute, both to the president and to [CIA Director] George Tenet, for having the courage to select me to do this, and my successor, Charlie Duelfer, as well. Both of us are known for probably at times regrettable streak of independence. I came not from within the administration, and it was clear and clear in our discussions and no one asked otherwise that I would lead this the way I thought best and I would speak the truth as we found it. I have had absolutely no pressure prior, during the course of the work at the [Iraq Survey Group], or after I left to do anything otherwise. I think that shows a level of maturity and understanding that I think bodes well for getting to the bottom of this. But it is really up to you and your staff, on behalf of the American people, to take on that challenge. It's not something that anyone from the outside can do. So I look forward to these hearings and other hearings at how you will get to the conclusions. I do believe we have to understand why reality turned out to be different than expectations and estimates. But you have more public service -- certainly many of you -- than I have ever had, and you recognize that this is not unusual. I told Sen. [John] Warner [chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee] earlier that I've been drawn back as a result of recent film of reminding me of something. At the time of the Cuban missile crisis, the combined estimate was unanimity in the intelligence service that there were no Soviet warheads in Cuba at the time of the missile crisis. Fortunately, President Kennedy and [then-Attorney General] Robert Kennedy disagreed with the estimate and chose a course of action less ambitious and aggressive than recommended by their advisers. But the most important thing about that story, which is not often told, is that as a result after the Cuban missile crisis, immediate steps were taken to correct our inability to collect on the movement of nuclear material out of the Soviet Union to other places. So that by the end of the Johnson administration, the intelligence community had a capability to do what it had not been able to do at the time of the Cuban missile crisis. I think you face a similar responsibility in ensuring that the community is able to do a better job in the future than it has done in the past. + + + + + Here is UN Resolution 1441. Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 09:58:39 PM |
"General Ordinary Person's Closing-Sale Stump Speech" Democrats in Self-Destruct Mode CXLIII The Weekly Standard's David Tell reports a speech by Gen. Wesley Clark in New Hampshire, Jan. 26 (emphasis in original). + + + + + .... Here's the thing in its entirety, just so's nobody thinks I'm being unfair: This is the final day of the week before the election. And New Hampshirites will go to the polls and they will vote and they will make the decision and it's gonna be a big part of who becomes the next president of the United States. I'm running for this office to bring a higher standard of leadership to Washington. I'm an outsider. I'm not part of the problems in Washington. I've never taken money from lobbyists. I've never cut a deal. I've never run for votes. I've never cut deals for votes. I'm not part of the problem that's gone wrong in this government. And I am someone who's put his life on the line to serve this country for my entire adult life. I was in one war I came home from on a stretcher with a Silver Star and a Purple Heart. My son was a lieutenant in the Army. I believe in our veterans. I believe in public service. And I led our forces in another war that saved a million and a half people. If you want someone to get us out of a war, you elect a general who's been in a war and knows how little can be accomplished by fighting. I'm the only person in this race who's ever done serious foreign policy and been where the rubber meets the road. I've sat at the negotiating tables. I've led forces and countries in conflict, so I know how to do it. And I'm a businessman. I've taught economics. I've been on the civilian side of government. I know how government works. I have the skills, the energy, the insight, the dedication, that can change this government. And there's one more thing I can say about myself unlike all the rest of the people in this race. I did grow up poor. My father died when I was not quite four. We had $424. My mother moved us to Arkansas. We moved in with her parents in a rented house. She was a secretary in a bank. And I was brought up to know the difference between what I want and what I need. I didn't go to Yale. My parents couldn't have afforded to send me there. I went to West Point. I paid my own way through college. I worked my way through. I worked for this country. And I'm running for this race in this race because I want to help Americans like me. I want each one of you here to go out and get your friends and neighbors and this is the final push, we need their support across this state and through this community. This is a time for change in America. The old ideas are gone. It's time that ordinary people took charge in this government and made it work for ordinary people. And I'm the ordinary person in this race. And I've got the skills and the dedication and heart to lead this country.Alert readers will have noticed that this, Gen. Ordinary Person's closing-sale stump speech, includes not a single word not one about what he'd actually do were he elected president.... + + + + + Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 09:36:35 PM |
"The Empty Chair" Fr. Rob's excellent homily, Sunday, complete with photos. Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 03:12:01 PM |
Can Kerry Run Away From His Past? Two articles this week about John Kerry's anti-war past. First, by Stephen Sherman at OpinionJournal, Jan. 26: .... Service in Vietnam is an important credential to me. Many felt that such service was beneath them, and removed themselves from the manpower pool. That Mr. Kerry served at all is a reason for a bond with fellow veterans; that his service earned him a Bronze Star for Valor ("for personal bravery") and a Silver Star ("for gallantry") is even more compelling. Unfortunately, Mr. Kerry came home to Massachusetts, the one state George McGovern carried in 1972. He joined the Vietnam Veterans Against the War and emceed the Winter Soldier Investigation (both financed by Jane Fonda). Many veterans believe these protests led to more American deaths, and to the enslavement of the people on whose behalf the protests were ostensibly being undertaken. But being a take-charge kind of guy, Mr. Kerry became a leader in the VVAW and even testified before Congress on the findings of the Investigation, which he accepted at face value. In his book "Stolen Valor," B.G. Burkett points out that Mr. Kerry liberally used phony veterans to testify to atrocities they could not possibly have committed. Mr. Kerry later threw what he represented as his awards at the Capitol in protest. But as the war diminished as a political issue, he left the VVAW, which was a bit too radical for his political future, and was ultimately elected to the Senate. After his awards were seen framed on his office wall, he claimed to have thrown away someone else's medals so now he can reclaim his gallantry in Vietnam.... Second, by Mackubin Thomas Owens at NRO yesterday: .... Kerry hooked up with an organization called Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW). Two events cooked up by this group went a long way toward cementing in the public mind the image of Vietnam as one big atrocity. The first of these was the January 31, 1971, "Winter Soldier Investigation," organized by "the usual suspects" among antiwar celebrities such as Jane Fonda, Dick Gregory, and Kennedy-assassination conspiracy theorist, Mark Lane. Here, individuals purporting to be Vietnam veterans told horrible stories of atrocities in Vietnam: using prisoners for target practice, throwing them out of helicopters, cutting off the ears of dead Viet Cong soldiers, burning villages, and gang-raping women as a matter of course. The second event was "Dewey Canyon III," or what VVAW called a "limited incursion into the country of Congress" in April of 1971. It was during this VVAW "operation" that John Kerry first came to public attention. The group marched on Congress to deliver petitions to Congress and then to the White House. The highlight of this event occurred when veterans threw their medals and ribbons over a fence in front of the Capitol, symbolizing a rebuke to the government that they claimed had betrayed them. One of the veterans flinging medals back in the face of his government was John Kerry, although it turns out they were not his medals, but someone else's.... In fact, the entire Winter Soldiers Investigation was a lie. It was inspired by Mark Lane's 1970 book entitled Conversations with Americans, which claimed to recount atrocity stories by Vietnam veterans. This book was panned by James Reston Jr. and Neil Sheehan, not exactly known as supporters of the Vietnam War. Sheehan in particular demonstrated that many of Lane's "eye witnesses" either had never served in Vietnam or had not done so in the capacity they claimed. Nonetheless, Sen. Mark Hatfield inserted the transcript of the Winter Soldier testimonies into the Congressional Record and asked the Commandant of the Marine Corps to investigate the war crimes allegedly committed by Marines. When the Naval Investigative Service attempted to interview the so-called witnesses, most refused to cooperate, even after assurances that they would not be questioned about atrocities they may have committed personally. Those that did cooperate never provided details of actual crimes to investigators. The NIS also discovered that some of the most grisly testimony was given by fake witnesses who had appropriated the names of real Vietnam veterans. Guenter Lewy tells the entire study in his book, America in Vietnam.... Stolen Valor made it clear why John Kerry's testimony in 1971 slandered an entire generation of soldiers. Kerry gave credence to the claim that the war was fought primarily by reluctant draftees, predominantly composed of the poor, the young, or racial minorities. The record shows something different, indicating that 86 percent of those who died during the war were white and 12.5 percent were black, from an age group in which blacks comprised 13.1 percent of the population. Two thirds of those who served in Vietnam were volunteers, and volunteers accounted for 77 percent of combat deaths.... If he believes his 1971 indictment of his country and his fellow veterans was true, then he couldn't possibly be proud of his Vietnam service. Who can be proud of committing war crimes of the sort that Kerry recounted in his 1971 testimony? But if he is proud of his service today, perhaps it is because he always knew that his indictment in 1971 was a piece of political theater that he, an aspiring politician, exploited merely as a "good issue." If the latter is true, he should apologize to every veteran of that war for slandering them to advance his political fortunes. (Thanks, Craig.) Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 08:17:41 AM |
"Who Was That?" "John Kerry." An actual, real Doonesbury cartoon strip from 1971. [Follow-up: More Kerry from Doonesbury.] Lane Core Jr. CIW P Wed. 01/28/04 07:36:12 AM |
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