IRAQ: It was all predicted

IRAQ: It was all predicted

The former CIA official who coordinated
U.S. intelligence on the Middle East until last year has accused the Bush administration
of "cherry-picking" intelligence on Iraq to justify a decision it
had already reached to go to war, and of ignoring warnings that the country
could easily fall into violence and chaos after an invasion to overthrow Saddam
Hussein. … "It has become clear that official intelligence was not relied
on in making even the most significant national security decisions, that intelligence
was misused publicly to justify decisions already made, that damaging ill will
developed between [Bush] policymakers and intelligence officers, and that the
intelligence community's own work was politicized," Pillar wrote. … …
Intelligence
'Misused' to Justify War, He Says

Of the many things in the article stressed above, is that the intelligence
community thought Saddam Hussein was contained. The same could never be said
for Iran. I'm just sayin'… Paul R. Pillar coordinated Iraqi intelligence all
of the 15 agencies, working in intel for 28 years and is the first intel officer to come
out and slam the Bush administration openly and unforgivingly. Pillar says with authority and with the
experience and access to back him up, what has been written about for years.

Bush and Cheney wanted to go to war in Iraq and nothing was going
to stop them, especially intelligence that could be molded to suit their purpose.
But as Pillar describes, the efforts were always subtle, because the intelligence
experts aren't exactly willing patsies. But important intel was misused, nevertheless.

It's going to make some in Congress deliciously uncomfortable, because the Senate
Republican Policy Committee just issued a statement declaring "it is actually
the critics who are misleading the American people," and that it is a "myth"
that Bush and Cheney "misued" intelligence to justify the war.

If the entire body of official intelligence
analysis on Iraq had a policy implication," Pillar wrote, "it was
to avoid war — or, if war was going to be launched, to prepare for a messy
aftermath."

Pillar describes for the first time that the intelligence
community did assessments before the invasion that, he wrote, indicated a
postwar Iraq "would not provide fertile ground for democracy" and
would need "a Marshall Plan-type effort" to restore its economy
despite its oil revenue. It also foresaw Sunnis and Shiites fighting for power.

Pillar wrote that the intelligence community "anticipated
that a foreign occupying force would itself be the target of resentment and
attacks — including guerrilla warfare — unless it established security and
put Iraq on the road to prosperity in the first few weeks or months after
the fall of Saddam."

I simply do not know how President Bush and Vice President Dick
Cheney can look our troops in the eye. No wonder our president doesn't want to show the flag-draped coffins, prefers to hide the funerals. It's easier to pretend they simply don't exist than face the horror you have unleashed on our heroes.