[Peace-discuss] Bush's nuclear lies

[patton paul]

This article gives a good summary of the Bush administration's claims
about the alleged Iraqi nuclear weapons program and their refutation.
-Paul P.


Published on Wednesday, July 16, 2003 by the Washington Post
Bush Faced Dwindling Data on Iraq Nuclear Bid
by Walter Pincus


In recent days, as the Bush administration has defended its assertion in
the president's State of the Union address that Iraq had tried to buy
African uranium, officials have said it was only one bit of intelligence
that indicated former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was reconstituting his
nuclear weapons program.

But a review of speeches and reports, plus interviews with present and
former administration officials and intelligence analysts, suggests that
between Oct. 7, when President Bush made a speech laying out the case for
military action against Hussein, and Jan. 28, when he gave his State of
the Union address, almost all the other evidence had either been undercut
or disproved by U.N. inspectors in Iraq.

By Jan. 28, in fact, the intelligence report concerning Iraqi attempts to
buy uranium from Africa -- although now almost entirely disproved -- was
the only publicly unchallenged element of the administration's case that
Iraq had restarted its nuclear program. That may explain why the
administration strived to keep the information in the speech and attribute
it to the British, even though the CIA had challenged it earlier.

For example, in his Oct. 7 speech, Bush said that "satellite photographs
reveal that Iraq is rebuilding facilities at [past nuclear] sites." He
also cited Hussein's "numerous meetings with Iraqi nuclear scientists" as
further evidence that the program was being reconstituted, along with
Iraq's attempts to buy high-strength aluminum tubes "needed" for
centrifuges used to enrich uranium.

But on Jan. 27 -- the day before the State of the Union address -- the
head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported to the U.N.
Security Council that two months of inspections in Iraq had found that no
prohibited nuclear activities had taken place at former Iraqi nuclear
sites. As for Iraqi nuclear scientists, Mohamed ElBaradei told the
Security Council, U.N. inspectors had "useful" interviews with some of
them, though not in private. And preliminary analysis, he said, suggested
that the aluminum tubes, "unless modified, would not be suitable for
manufacturing centrifuges."

The next night, Bush delivered his speech, including the now-controversial
16-word sentence, "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein
recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

Of his October examples, only the aluminum tubes charge remained in
January, but that allegation had a subtle caveat -- he described the tubes
as merely "suitable" for nuclear weapons production. Without the statement
on uranium, the allegation concerning aluminum tubes would have been the
only nuclear-related action ascribed to Hussein since the early 1990s.

And the tubes had already been questioned not only by IAEA, but also by
analysts in U.S. and British intelligence agencies.

The idea that Iraq was acquiring tubes for a nuclear program became public
in September, shortly after the Bush administration began a campaign to
marshal public, congressional and U.N. support for authority to attack
Iraq if it did not disarm.

On Aug. 26, Vice President Cheney, the official most publicly vocal about
Iraq as a nuclear threat, began the campaign when he told a Veterans of
Foreign Wars audience: "Many of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire
nuclear weapons fairly soon. Just how soon we cannot gauge."

On Sept. 8, the New York Times disclosed that intelligence showed that
Iraq had "embarked on a worldwide hunt for materials to make an atomic
bomb" by trying to purchase "specially designed aluminum tubes" that
unidentified administration sources believed were for centrifuges to
enrich uranium.

The story referred to Bush "hardliners" who argued that action should be
taken because if they waited for proof that Hussein had a nuclear weapon,
"the first sign of a smoking gun may be a mushroom cloud."

That day, Bush national security adviser Condoleezza Rice appeared on
CNN's "Late Edition" and confirmed the Times story. She said the tubes
"are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge
programs." She also said, "The problem here is that there will always be
some uncertainty about how quickly he can acquire nuclear weapons, but we
don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

Cheney also confirmed the Times story that day, on NBC's "Meet the Press,"
saying that "we don't have all the evidence," but enough of a picture
"that tells us that he [Hussein] is in fact actively and aggressively
seeking to acquire nuclear weapons."

What neither Rice nor Cheney said at the time was that Baghdad's first
attempts to purchase the aluminum tubes, more than a year earlier, had by
Sept. 8 led to a fairly open disagreement in the U.S. intelligence
community on whether the tubes were for centrifuges or for artillery
rockets in Iraq's military program.

Analysts from the State and Energy departments said the tubes were too
long and too thick for centrifuges; CIA and Pentagon analysts said they
could be cut down and reamed out. Their debate was continuing as the
agencies were putting together the still-classified national intelligence
estimate on Hussein's weapons program.

In July, the United States had intercepted one shipment and obtained a
tube; it was coated with a protective chemical that would have had to be
removed if it were to be put to a nuclear purpose.

The intelligence estimate, completed in mid-September, reflected the
different views, but the final judgment sa that "most" analysts leaned
toward the view that the tubes had a nuclear purpose. When the British
dossier on Iraq's weapons program was published on Sept. 24, it referred
to the tubes, but noted that "there is no definitive intelligence that it
is destined for a nuclear program."

In his State of the Union address, Bush did not indicate any disagreement
over the use of the tubes. Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, however,
outlined the arguments involved when he spoke eight days later before the
Security Council, where inspectors already had challenged the U.S.
position on them.

On March 7, ElBaradei gave his final report to the Security Council before
his inspectors were removed from Iraq on March 18. His conclusion was that
"the IAEA had found no evidence or plausible indication of the revival of
a nuclear weapons program in Iraq." He also said the documents that gave
rise to the allegation that Iraq had tried to buy African uranium were
forged.

On March 16, Cheney appeared again on "Meet the Press" and reiterated his
views of the previous August about Hussein's nuclear program. "We know
he's been absolutely devoted to trying to acquire nuclear weapons, and we
believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." The war began
three days later.

 2003 The Washington Post Company