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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dayuhan who wrote (100849)	6/9/2003 6:51:51 AM
From: Sig	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

<<<Of course it's too early to reach conclusions, but the currently available information seems to be pointing in a certain direction. As I've said before, all the administration has to do to head off that conclusion is to release the information on which their conclusions and allegations were based. Why do you suppose they won't do that? >>> Several reasons come to mind 1. The Iraqi WMD programs were supported by imports from many different and sometimes friendly Nations in devious and sometimes illegal ways. To avoid starting a conflagration , worsening our relationships with those countries, and divulging how we got the info and who "talked", I do not expect many of the specifics to be presented by the Administration. The CIA, FBI, or DOD who know the details would be reluctant to talk, noting that Powell in his presentation of photos, stated that the aerial surveillance photos were purposely made 20 times as 'fuzzy' as the originals 2. Big wars are obsolete This war on Terror will be won by obtaining information, by sources,insiders or spies we dont want to discuss, by cooperation with as many Nations as possible, and by technical means or device we wont want to disclose to the public. 3. If the WMD's were moved to Syria (or elsewhere) just before the war, it would not be wise to step in and prove that they were or to disclose their location until our relationship with Syria is clarified and decisions made as to how the situation will be handled. Therefore I expect the Administration to produce adequate evidence of the existence of Iraqi WMD programs to convince the common citizen without going into the debatable details of our secret weapons/surveillance programs or foreign affairs agreements. . Sig

To: Dayuhan who wrote (100849)	6/9/2003 2:11:36 PM
From: Nadine Carroll	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 281500

As I've said before, all the administration has to do to head off that conclusion is to release the information on which their conclusions and allegations were based. Why do you suppose they won't do that? I can think of a few reasons offhand. First, this administration loves secrecy, so they wouldn't want to release intelligence in any case. Second, they may have excellent reasons not to release it - the intelligence they have, if it's any good, will touch on not only what Saddam had, but what he did with it. And that means how much of it was shipped to Syria, which is certainly the subject of an ongoing investigation, and a subject where we do NOT want to tip our hand to Bashar Assad. Third, they are not ready - they have a ton of Iraqi documents that they have yet to sort through, why use iffy intelligence when you have documents in hand? Fourth, so much of this current yammer is totally political - I was listening to Howard Dean giving a "Bush Lied about the War!" speech yesterday and I swear I heard enormous relief in his tone that he now had a stick to use on Bush and nobody could accuse him of being unpatriotic - that mere evidence is unlikely to satisfy anybody until it dies down. I mean people who can argue with a straight face that Bush lied about Saddam ever having chemical weapons are pretty much immune to evidence.