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Still Smoke And Mirrors
Ray McGovern chaired National Intelligence Estimates during his 27-year career and had high respect for the expertise and dedication of INR analysts. Ray is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, which includes alumni from CIA, INR, and other intelligence agencies. He is now co-director of the Servant Leadership School, an inner-city outreach ministry in Washington, DC.
*snip*
In other words, the purpose of the estimate was not to inform an (already reached) decision on whether war was necessary. Rather, it was to enlist intelligence in the campaign to deceive Congress into thinking that Iraq posed such a threat that the legislative branch’s prerogative must be surrendered to the president, and—not incidentally—to make so persuasive a case to the nation that those who dared vote against the president would be highly vulnerable in the mid-term election of 2002. That worked, too.
Thanks to inspector David Kay’s refreshing honesty, we now know that Cheney’s charges, and the cognate conclusions of the estimate, were bogus.
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http://tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/9917
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