Kay Resigns - Says No Stockpiles in Iraq
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| Fri, 01-23-2004 - 5:17pm |
Ex-U.S. Arms Hunter Kay Says No Stockpiles in Iraq
2 hours, 35 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - David Kay, who stepped down as leader of the U.S. hunt for weapons of mass destruction, said on Friday he does not believe there were any large stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons in Iraq (news - web sites).
"I don't think they existed," Kay told Reuters in a telephone interview. "What everyone was talking about is stockpiles produced after the end of the last (1991) Gulf War and I don't think there was a large-scale production program in the '90s," he said.
Kay said he believes most of what is going to be found in search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has been found and that hte hunt will become more difficult once America turns over governing the country to the Iraqis.
The United States went to war against Baghdad last year citing a threat from Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. No actual banned arms have been found.

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Renee
Renee
The weapons existed, even to a small degree, but nobody can account for them now..... a bit scary if you ask me.
Op-ed: Where's the Apology?
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/01/30/opinion/30KRUG.html?ex=1076043600&en=a852ab5154d8eefe&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE
George Bush promised to bring honor and integrity back to the White House. Instead, he got rid of accountability.
Surely even supporters of the Iraq war must be dismayed by the administration's reaction to David Kay's recent statements. Iraq, he now admits, didn't have W.M.D., or even active programs to produce such weapons. Those much-ridiculed U.N. inspectors were right. (But Hans Blix appears to have gone down the memory hole. On Tuesday Mr. Bush declared that the war was justified — under U.N. Resolution 1441, no less — because Saddam "did not let us in.")
So where are the apologies? Where are the resignations? Where is the investigation of this intelligence debacle? All we have is bluster from Dick Cheney, evasive W.M.D.-related-program-activity language from Mr. Bush — and a determined effort to prevent an independent inquiry.
True, Mr. Kay still claims that this was a pure intelligence failure. I don't buy it: the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has issued a damning report on how the threat from Iraq was hyped, and former officials warned of politicized intelligence during the war buildup. (Yes, the Hutton report gave Tony Blair a clean bill of health, but many people — including a majority of the British public, according to polls — regard that report as a whitewash.) (See following post)
In any case, the point is that a grave mistake was made, and America's credibility has been badly damaged — and nobody is being held accountable. But that's standard operating procedure. As far as I can tell, nobody in the Bush administration has ever paid a price for being wrong. Instead, people are severely punished for telling inconvenient truths. And administration officials have consistently sought to freeze out, undermine or intimidate anyone who might try to check up on their performance.
Let's look at three examples. First is the Valerie Plame affair. When someone in the administration revealed that Ms. Plame was an undercover C.I.A. operative, one probable purpose was to intimidate intelligence professionals. And whatever becomes of the Justice Department investigation, the White House has been notably uninterested in finding the culprit. ("We have let the earthmovers roll in over this one," a senior White House official told The Financial Times.)
Then there's the stonewalling about 9/11. First the administration tried, in defiance of all historical precedents, to prevent any independent inquiry. Then it tried to appoint Henry Kissinger, of all people, to head the investigative panel. Then it obstructed the commission, denying it access to crucial documents and testimony. Now, thanks to all the delays and impediments, the panel's head says it can't deliver its report by the original May 11 deadline — and the administration is trying to prevent a time extension.
Finally, an important story that has largely evaded public attention: the effort to prevent oversight of Iraq spending. Government agencies normally have independent, strictly nonpartisan inspectors general, with broad powers to investigate questionable spending. But the new inspector general's office in Iraq operates under unique rules that greatly limit both its powers and its independence.
And the independence of the Pentagon's own inspector general's office is also in question. Last September, in a move that should have caused shock waves, the administration appointed L. Jean Lewis as the office's chief of staff. Ms. Lewis played a central role in the Whitewater witch hunt (seven years, $70 million, no evidence of Clinton wrongdoing); nobody could call her nonpartisan. So when Mr. Bush's defenders demand hard proof of profiteering in Iraq — as opposed to extensive circumstantial evidence — bear in mind that the administration has systematically undermined the power and independence of institutions that might have provided that proof.
And there are many more examples. These people politicize everything, from military planning to scientific assessments. If you're with them, you pay no penalty for being wrong. If you don't tell them what they want to hear, you're an enemy, and being right is no excuse.
Still, the big story isn't about Mr. Bush; it's about what's happening to America. Other presidents would have liked to bully the C.I.A., stonewall investigations and give huge contracts to their friends without oversight. They knew, however, that they couldn't. What has gone wrong with our country that allows this president to get away with such things?
Majority feels Hutton report a whitewash: Poll
http://www.rediff.com/news/2004/jan/30uk2.htm
Majority of the people in Britain feel the Hutton report, which exonerated the Tony Blair government in connection with the suicide of weapons expert David Kelly was a 'whitewash', an opinion poll indicated on Friday.
According to the YouGov poll for The Daily Telegraph, the public expressed doubts about the report's one-sided verdict, which castigated the British Broadcasting Corporation for accusing the government of 'sexing up' a dossier on pre-war Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
Blair also secured an 'unreserved' apology from the broadcaster's governors. Fifty-six per cent of the people interviewed said Lord Hutton, as a member of the Establishment, was 'too ready' to sympathise with the government.
Only 34 per cent thought his report represented a thorough and impartial attempt to discover the truth about Dr Kelly's death. The poll also showed the BBC is still trusted more than the government.
YouGov found that 67 per cent trust BBC news journalists to tell the truth compared with 31 per cent who trust the government.
YouGov found that 67 per cent trust BBC news journalists to tell the truth compared with 31 per cent who trust the government.
That is a pretty sad statement especially since during the government investigation into the BBC's reporting, several of their own reporters admitted that they distorted the news....ulitmately leading to the removal of the two top men at BBC News.
I guess GW Bush's predecessor has been forgotten.
Bullying the CIA.......Thanks to the Clinton Administration and also the Torriceli principle, the CIA lost almost all of its human assets in the Middle East. They also lost all ability to "purchase" information from their sources, due to the Torriceli principle which would no longer allow the CIA to "do business" with "undesireables". It was widely known that Clinton did not like the CIA and until he appointed Tenet to head it up, you could tell his administration was doing everyting it could to strip the CIA of its ability to correctly do its job. Even the Kay report basically admits to that.
I want to know exactly where Bob Torriceli and Bill Clinton though the CIA was getting all of their juicy information? The local Boy Scouts?
Stonewalling investigations: Why not talk about Whitewater and how Hillary LIED about seeing any of the files and then telling her personal assistant to "get rid of" the files in question.
When they were located, guess what.....Hillary's fingerprints were all over them, and then her memory suddenly came back, and she admitted to seeing "some" of the files.
Gettingahandle
Ignorance is Nature's most abundant fuel for decision making.
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