Truth? No Thanks, It Just Gets In The Way

"The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. Our intelligence sources tell us that he has attempted to purchase high strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production. Saddam Hussein has not credibly explained these activities. He clearly has much to hide."
Bush's State of the Union speech, January 27, 2003

Investigative reporter Seymour Hersch's article in this week's The New Yorker notes that thereafter, the story fell apart.

"On March 7th, Mohamed ElBaradei, the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in Vienna, told the U.N. Security Council that the documents involving the Niger-Iraq uranium sale were fakes. “The I.A.E.A. has concluded, with the concurrence of outside experts, that these documents . . . are in fact not authentic,” ElBaradei said.

One senior I.A.E.A. official went further. He told me, “These documents are so bad that I cannot imagine that they came from a serious intelligence agency. It depresses me, given the low quality of the documents, that it was not stopped. At the level it reached, I would have expected more checking.”

The Bush administration concedes that the documents are bogus but claims the fraud was not committed by Americans. Hersh didn't find the culprits, but he suggests that evidence points to British intelligence officials. He quotes an unnamed "former Clinton administration official" and a "former American intelligence officer" who claim that the Brits have leaked bogus information about Iraq to the British media for years.

According to Slate, CIA analysts are now trying to cover their ass by saying they communicated significant doubts to the administration about the evidence backing up charges that Iraq tried to purchase uranium from Africa for nuclear weapons, charges that found their way into President Bush's State of the Union address, a State Department "fact sheet" and public remarks by numerous senior officials.

In a letter sent to Bush last week, Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) asked for a full accounting of "what you knew about the reliability of the evidence linking Iraq to uranium in Africa, when you knew this, and why you and senior officials in the administration presented the evidence to the U.N. Security Council, the Congress, and the American people without disclosing the doubts of the CIA."

Colin Powell once again, relishes his role of the dupe. He told a U.S. Congressional budget subcommittee two weeks ago that U.S. officials received the information in what he called "good faith." He said they were made available to U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq, but that they did not come from the United States. Mr. Powell also said the information came from other sources, which he did not identify.

Senator John Rockefeller, the senior Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee asked the FBI on Friday to investigate fake documents the United States used as evidence to the United Nations of alleged Iraqi efforts to acquire uranium from Niger.

"As you know, the International Atomic Energy Agency has recently determined that some of the intelligence documents provided to it by the United States are forgeries," Rockefeller wrote in a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller.

"These documents were provided to the IAEA as evidence of Iraqi efforts to procure uranium from the Republic of Niger. I am writing to request that the Federal Bureau of Investigation investigate this matter,"

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that the FBI is making any investigations of the matter. At least not publically.

According to the Voice of America, a spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation indicates the FBI may look into the forgery of the documents.

But the spokesman suggests there will not be a "formal investigation" but rather just laboratory analysis of the phony evidence. He tells VOA the falsification, especially since it was apparently carried out abroad, was probably not a violation of any criminal statutes in this country. Apparently, the President going before the world to justify the attack of another country based upon false documentation is not a "violation" of any criminal statutes in this country either.

If the Bush Administration is looking for additional documents to justify their invasion of Iraq, they should probably just perform Google searches in the future. After all, if they aren't going to bother examining the credibility of "evidence" they use to make false accusations, even something like Revelation 13 can be useful. Revelation 13 is a web site that claims by using Biblical prophecy, one can fully understand the danger that Iraq and Saddam Hussein has been for the world, and why a war with Iraq is necessary.

Allegedly, if a woman carries her baby high in the uterus and her stomach has a round appearance, the chances are excellent she is expecting a clone of Saddam Hussein.