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Originally Posted by djtestudo
Clinton, as much of an idiot as he was for doing/saying what he did, was still the president and as such it can be assumed that he was privy to the same quality of intellegence as the present administration. Therefore, if he is coming out and saying that there are WMDs in Iraq, then that shows that Bush didn't "lie", like the accusations say.
Just like many on the right post quotes from Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy, and others who are now coming after Bush for starting a war "under false pretenses". If they saw the intellegence and believed it, how can they go after the president for it?
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Clinton's CIA director, George Tenet, refuted some of your points, just three weeks after Bush took office in 2002. Powell and Rice made statments in 2001 that were identical to what Tenet said:
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http://www.usembassy.it/file2001_02/alia/a1020708.htm
07 February 2001
Text: CIA's Tenet on Worldwide Threat 2001
.............IRAQ
Mr. Chairman, in Iraq Saddam Hussein has grown more confident in his ability to hold on to his power. He maintains a tight handle on internal unrest, despite the erosion of his overall military capabilities. Saddam's confidence has been buoyed by his success in quieting the Shia insurgency in the south, which last year had reached a level unprecedented since the domestic uprising in 1991. Through brutal suppression, Saddam's multilayered security apparatus has continued to enforce his authority and cultivate a domestic image of invincibility.
High oil prices and Saddam's use of the oil-for-food program have helped him manage domestic pressure. The program has helped meet the basic food and medicine needs of the population. High oil prices buttressed by substantial illicit oil revenues have helped Saddam ensure the loyalty of the regime's security apparatus operating and the few thousand politically important tribal and family groups loyal.
There are still constraints on Saddam's power. His economic infrastructure is in long-term decline, and his ability to project power outside Iraq's borders is severely limited, largely because of the effectiveness and enforcement of the No-Fly Zones. His military is roughly half the size it was during the Gulf War and remains under a tight arms embargo. He has trouble efficiently moving forces and supplies-a direct result of sanctions. These difficulties were demonstrated most recently by his deployment of troops to western Iraq last fall, which were hindered by a shortage of spare parts and transport capability........
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Quote:
http://www.state.gov/secretary/forme...s/2001/933.htm
Press Remarks with Foreign Minister of Egypt Amre Moussa
Secretary Colin L. Powell
Cairo, Egypt (Ittihadiya Palace)
February 24, 2001
(lower paragraph of second Powell quote on the page)
.............but for the purpose of keeping in check Saddam Hussein's ambitions toward developing weapons of mass destruction. We should constantly be reviewing our policies, constantly be looking at those sanctions to make sure that they are directed toward that purpose. That purpose is every bit as important now as it was ten years ago when we began it. And frankly they have worked. He has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbors.................
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Quote:
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIP.../29/le.00.html
...........KING: Still a menace, still a problem. But the administration failed, principally because of objections from Russia and China, to get the new sanctions policy through the United Nations Security Council. Now what? Do we do this for another 10 years?
RICE: Well, in fact, John, we have made progress on the sanctions. We, in fact, had four of the five, of the permanent five, ready to go along with smart sanctions.
We'll work with the Russians. I'm sure that we'll come to some resolution there, because it is important to restructure these sanctions to something that work.
But in terms of Saddam Hussein being there, let's remember that his country is divided, in effect. He does not control the northern part of his country. We are able to keep arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt.
This has been a successful period, but obviously we would like to increase pressure on him, and we're going to go about doing that..............
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The article linked here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/03/in...er=rssuserland
and other links displayed in my post earlier today, persuasively indicate that congress did not have access to the comprehensive, and contradictory intelligence information that the Bush administration had access to before congress had to make the decision to vote for authorization for a possible war in Iraq.....
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...05&postcount=3
It does take time to examine these details. The alternative is to listen to Bush's Nov. 11 speech or Ken Mehlman's statements on Russert's "Meet the Press", yesterday. Bush and Mehlman are both "on message" concerning the intelligence information that congress was privy to....the problem is that what those two are saying is not backed up by news reporting, including the WaPo reporting on Nov. 11:
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...111101832.html
Asterisks Dot White House's Iraq Argument
By Dana Milbank and Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, November 12, 2005; Page A01
President Bush and his national security adviser have answered critics of the Iraq war in recent days with a two-pronged argument: that Congress saw the same intelligence the administration did before the war, and that independent commissions have determined that the administration did not misrepresent the intelligence.
Neither assertion is wholly accurate...........
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