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Politics : Baghdad Bush Should Be Court Martialed -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DOUG H who wrote (72)	4/10/2004 8:50:23 AM
From: redfish	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 211

I'm certainly in no position what the admin knew or didn't know at any particular moment. I think you have to look at each particular claim made by the administration. Let's look at the Iraqi drones first. The Claims: "We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad areas. We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVS for missions targeting the United States." George W. Bush Cincinnati, Ohio Speech October 7, 2002 "UAVs outfitted with spray tanks constitute an ideal method for launching a terrorist attack using biological weapons," Powell said during his speech. "Iraq could use these small UAVs, which have a wingspan of only a few meters, to deliver biological agents to its neighbors or, if transported, to other countries, including the United States." Powell said there is "ample evidence" that Iraq has dedicated much time and effort to developing and testing spray devices that could be adapted for UAVs. "And of the little that Saddam Hussein told us about UAVs, he has not told the truth," Powell said. In the arms declaration Iraq submitted to the U.N. Security Council in December, the country said its UAVs have a range of only 50 miles. But Powell said U.S. intelligence sources found that one of Iraq's newest UAVs went 310 miles nonstop on autopilot in a test run. That distance is over the 155 miles that the United Nations permits, and the test was left out of Iraq's arms declaration. Officials tell Fox that there is solid intelligence that Iraq has tested many different types of sprayers on these drones to disperse chemical and biological weapons. President Bush addressed the threat in October in Cincinnati, making his first big case outlining Iraq's defiance. "We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could be used to disperse chemical and biological weapons across broad areas," Bush said in preparation for a congressional vote authorizing the use of force against Iraq. "We're concerned that Iraq is exploring ways of using these UAVs for missions targeting the United States." foxnews.com The Truth: Huddled over a fleet of abandoned Iraqi drones, U.S. weapons experts in Baghdad came to one conclusion: Despite the Bush administration's public assertions, these unmanned aerial vehicles weren't designed to dispense biological or chemical weapons. The evidence gathered this summer matched the dissenting views of Air Force intelligence analysts who argued in a national intelligence assessment of Iraq before the war that the remotely piloted planes were unarmed reconnaissance drones. ----------------------------- But the Air Force, which controls most of the American military's UAV fleet, didn't agree with that assessment [that the drones were intended to deliver wmds] from the beginning. And analysts at the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency said the Air Force view was widely accepted within their ranks as well. Instead, these analysts believed the drones posed no threat to Iraq's neighbors or the United States, officials in Washington and scientists involved in the weapons hunt in Iraq told The Associated Press. The official Air Force intelligence dissent is noted in the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq's weapons programs, parts of which were declassified last month as the Bush administration tried to defend its case for war. "We didn't see there was a very large chance they (UAVs) would be used to attack the continental United States," Bob Boyd, director of the Air Force Intelligence Analysis Agency, said in an AP interview. "We didn't see them as a big threat to the homeland." Boyd also said there was little evidence to associate Iraq's UAVs with the country's suspected biological weapons program. Facilities weren't in the same location and the programs didn't use the same people. Instead, the Air Force believed Iraq's UAV programs were for reconnaissance, as are most American UAVs. Intelligence on the drones suggested they were not large enough to carry much more than a camera and a video recorder, Boyd said. Postwar evidence uncovered in July in Iraq supports those assessments, according to two U.S. government scientists assigned to the weapons hunt. "We just looked at the UAVs and said, 'There's nothing here. There's no room to put anything in here,"' one of the scientists said. The wingspan on drones that Iraqis showed journalists in March measured 24.5 feet and the aircraft were built like large, white model airplanes. The U.S. scientists, weapons experts who spoke on condition of anonymity, reached their conclusions after studying the small aircraft and interviewing Iraqi missile experts, system designers and Gen. Ibrahim Hussein Ismail, the Iraqi head of the military facility where the UAVs were designed. None of the Iraqis questioned are in U.S. custody. While the weapons hunters can't be sure they've recovered all of Iraq's UAVs, the evidence amassed so far, coupled with the interviews, has led them to believe that none of the drones are designed for unconventional weapons. Iraqis involved in the program have insisted the drones were for reconnaissance and electronic jamming. Some UAVs were kept north of Baghdad. Weapons hunters found some drones in better shape than others with the most important finds located at a facility in the capital, the U.S. scientists said. Weapons hunters hauled them back to their base on the outskirts of the Baghdad International Airport where the parts were analyzed. The unproven U.S. assertion regarding Iraq's UAV programs is one among many. sunherald.com Did Bush know about the Air Force's conclusions regarding the drones when he made his claims? There is no way to know. But at the very least, it appears that US intelligence was used selectively and in an unquestioned manner to bolster the case for war.