Analytical

Bill's Brain
"Damn the consequences, give me the pen!"
Lewis Morris, signing the Declaration of Independence

Creative

This conclusion comes as no surprise to those who closely followed the Bush administration’s activities prior to the Iraq invasion. When Bush took office in 2000 he brought with him a group of self-described “neo-conservatives” (or “neocons”) who were determined to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein as part of their larger agenda of asserting global US military dominance and gaining control of strategic natural resources. This agenda included establishing a significant US military presence in the Gulf region and taking control of Middle Eastern oil reserves. Iraq was just the first country they targeted for “regime change,” and there are several more on their list. The names of this motley neocon crew, many of them members of the right-wing think tank Project for the New American Century, are familiar ones; Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, John Bolton, Douglas Feith, Richard Perle, Lewis Libby, Elliot Abrams, and even the president’s brother, Jeb Bush.

From the day that Bush took office and the neocons took control of the Pentagon they began working to carry out their plan. An important part of that plan included establishing their own “intelligence” operations in the Pentagon, creating the “Office of Special Plans” (OSP) under Douglas Feith to develop what I call “neocon-intelligence” or “neo-intel” for short. These operations were completely under their control, and were independent of the CIA and other established intelligence organizations. This neo-intel operation was used to generate much of the bogus (“dead wrong”) “intelligence” that was used to convince the American people and United Nations that Saddam Hussein was a threat and that Iraq therefore needed to be invaded in a preemptive attack. This attack and subsequent occupation would allow the neocons to advance two of their major goals, fortifying the US military presence in the Gulf region by building several US military bases in Iraq (reportedly a dozen or more), and gaining control of Middle Eastern oil by privatizing Iraq’s oil industry and taking the world’s third largest oil reserves out of Saddam’s hands.

Because the neocons’ operation worked outside of the government’s “real” intelligence organizations, it was not subject to oversight by those organizations. The bogus neo-intel from the OSP often went straight into Bush’s and Cheney’s speeches without being checked and verified by the CIA or other legitimate intelligence organization. This caused many disputes between the CIA and the White House over accusations that Bush and Cheney made in their speeches in the months before the invasion. In many cases CIA intelligence contradicted the information coming out of the OSP, but it didn’t matter to Bush, Cheney or the other neocons. They were determined to launch a war of conquest in the Middle East and they were willing to say and do anything to make it happen.

It is now known that much of the neo-intel about Saddam’s alleged weapons came from the now-discredited Ahmad Chalabi, who reportedly has close ties to Iran and is suspected of sharing US security information with Iranian officials. It is no secret that Iran and Iraq have been enemies for many years, the two countries have fought long and bloody wars. It is also believed that some of the bogus information came from persons working with the Saudi Arabian government. Both Chalabi and the Saudis wanted to see Saddam Hussein overthrown and so they were more than happy to tell the neocons what they wanted to hear, that Saddam had frightful quantities of WMDs, he posed a grave threat, and he should be overthrown immediately.

As we now know, it was all lies.

Bush and his neocon crew were eager to find any “evidence” or accusation to support their plan of overthrowing Saddam, and Saddam’s enemies were equally eager to feed them false “intelligence” to help achieve that goal. Some have suggested that Bush and the neocons were duped or misled by bad intelligence, but the evidence suggests that’s not the case. There were too many instances where Bush and Cheney were told by the CIA and other intelligence organizations that their accusations against Saddam were questionable or likely wrong, but they continued to repeat them. Bush and the neocons took a “don’t ask, don’t tell” approach to the accuracy and truthfulness of the information that was being fed to the OSP by Chalabi and other sources. As long as it supported their agenda they didn’t question it.

And now, three years later, a commission has studied that intelligence and concluded – surprise! – it was “dead wrong.” No kidding. To Bush and the neocons it never mattered whether the intelligence was right or wrong. All that mattered was that they could find sources who would tell them what they wanted to hear, sources who would help them make a case against Saddam Hussein and mislead a majority of the American people (and hopefully the United Nations too) into believing that he was an imminent threat and that a preemptive attack on Iraq was justified.

And unfortunately, in spite of all the efforts in recent years to reform and improve US intelligence operations, including the creation of a new National Intelligence Director (NID), there’s a real danger that a similar “intelligence failure” could happen again. Why? Because Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and like-minded Republicans in Congress made certain that the new NID position would have no authority over their neo-intel operations in the Pentagon.

When the National Intelligence Director position was first proposed by the 9/11 Commission the idea was that the NID would have oversight over all US intelligence operations, including those in the CIA, FBI, and the Pentagon. Bush and the neocons quickly realized that if the NID had authority over Pentagon intelligence it would threaten their ability to continue using their neo-intel operations inside the Pentagon to create more bogus “intelligence” for use against the other countries that they’ve targeted for regime change. If the NID were given authority over Pentagon intelligence operations it would mean that information from their Pentagon “Office of Special Plans” could no longer find it’s way into presidential and vice presidential speeches without first being scrutinized (and if the past is any indication, frequently discredited and rejected) by the NID.

This posed a significant threat to their agenda, so Bush, Rumsfeld and the other neocons refused to support the creation of the NID position until the Director’s authority was scaled back to exclude their “Special” Pentagon neo-intel operations. The reason that was given publicly for excluding Defense Department intelligence operations from NID oversight (even though the Department of Defense controls 80% of the known US intelligence budget) was that it “might deprive troops on the battlefield of vital information.” This of course was a complete smokescreen, but true to form Congressional Republicans invoked the image of “supporting the troops” and then pushed through changes that advanced their own agenda but in fact did nothing to support the troops. In reality the limitations on NID oversight are actually harmful to the troops because they increase the likelihood that they will be injured or killed in yet another military conflict that is justified using “dead wrong” intelligence.

So where does all of this leave the United States today? I’m sorry to say that it leaves us in substantially the same position as we were in during the run-up to the Iraq war. The neocons still have their own neo-intel operations in the Pentagon and the new NID has no authority over them. The “intelligence” that they produce, no matter how flawed, faulty, or fraudulent, is still not subject to review or verification by another independent intelligence agency. Information from the OSP can still flow directly into speeches by the president, vice president, or other administration official and be presented as “facts” which are used to justify additional military action to further the neocon agenda.

In some ways US intelligence is actually worse off now than it was before the Iraq war. Before the war the major neocon influence was limited to the Pentagon and the executive branch. The CIA was largely independent, and was dedicated to providing real, credible intelligence. Now the CIA has been purged of everyone who wouldn’t march in lock-step with the Bush/neocon agenda and staffed with people more friendly to the neocon mindset. This assures that when the neocons present more “dead wrong” intelligence to support their next misadventure, no one at the CIA will question them.

For more information:
Project for the New American Century - Home
    Rebuilding America's Defenses - Project for the New American Century report (pdf)
List of neoconservatives – Wikkipedia