Italy’s spymaster confirmed Thursday that the disseminator of the forged Niger yellowcake documents was the long-suspected on-and-off Italian spy Rocco Martino, The New York Times reported. It’s nice to have one point settled in this complex story of how and why the forgeries — which were used by the Bush administration to justify the Iraq war — came into being.
But many questions remain. A recent three-part series in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica implicated the Italian government in the hoax, saying that Italy’s spymaster knowingly provided the forged documents to the United States. He was prodded, the anti-Berlusconi paper reported, by the prime minister, who was eager to supply the United States with intelligence on Iraq. But the FBI reportedly cleared the Italian government of any involvement in July.
And Italian lawmaker Massimo Brutti made a statement Thursday that Italian intelligence warned the United States in early 2003 that the documents were false — before President Bush gave his State of the Union address that included the faulty Iraq-uranium claim. But Brutti has since backed away from that statement, saying he was confused.
It seems as if every aspect of this story raises questions. Liberal blogger Josh Marshall has been asking many of them on his site Talking Points Memo. But it looks as if definitive answers will be hard to come by.
Posted by Melissa Cooley
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92 Comments
Melissa, Unless the Israeli Mossad’s involvement, who was not standing still during all of this, is brought out into the open, the truth will continue to be manipulated.
Right from the start, this Iraq war was all Israel’s deal. Saddam took on the Iranians in battle and beat them into submission. Israel needed Saddam’s fighting capacity to be neutralized and needed to force an American invasion.
Israel expansion into the oil fields is real. It’s on the drawing board. But as long as the American press won’t deal with it, it’s not fair to the American people to keep them in the dark.
The phony intelligence means the United States had no reason to go to war in Iraq. There was a real reason why America invaded Iraq, but that had to be kept secret. That explains the phony intelligence. The real reason was Israel. But President Bush didn’t want the American people to know that, so he knowingly lied about the phony intelligence. Karl Rove wrote the speech, Bush sure didn’t, he can barley talk.
Now the United States is going after Syria, for the flimsiest reason possible: To get to the bottom of the murder of a Ex-Lebanese Prime Minster. Why bother?
Of all the things going on in this world, that murder is of no consequence to the United States or anybody else, with the exception trouble-making Israeli greed for expansion.
Israel is currently at peace with Lebanon and Syria and out-guns both of them, so what’s the big deal?
In order to fire an artillery piece { cannon } you need to send up a balloon to see which way the wind is blowing { the wind will push the artillery shell while it is in flight, so your aiming needs to be compensated }.
To get the balloon to go up, you need to fill it with hydrogen { like they to do to kids balloons }.
The trailers next to the cannons made hydrogen. Every military man knows that. Bush was calling those hydrogen trailers ” portable biological weapons making machines ”
Any analyst looking at satellite photos of those trailers would instantly know that they were for making hydrogen.
Bush lied about that.
{ I guess his mommy never bough him a balloon on a string }
Ed
We found two of the ” portable biological weapons making machines “. They were truck mounted, roughly the size of 25 ft semi-trailer with a cargo body with a hard roof and roll up sides. They had been scrubbed clean with chlorine, inside and out so no one could prove what they had been used for. If you dig around the net you can find pictures of them in US military custody. I think that it was claimed that Iraq had purchased 8-10 of them.
This wasnt widly reported by the MSM so you might have missed it.
By the way the Britts still stand by their intel that showed Sadam trying to buy uranium from Africa.
Heckler, perhaps you are right about the MSM not stating that. But Powell fail to mention any U.S. custody in his speech to the U.N. about the need for an invasion. All he show were some pictures and said that they were believe to be moble labs for producing WMDs.
As to the Brits standing by their statements on yellow cake. I guess it depends on which Brits you listen to. Most now say they got their intel from the same source as the U.S.
Here is an excellent article into the niger forgeries. With a look all the way back to who the original forgers were.
http://www.amconmag.com/2005/2005_11_07/feature.html
correction to my post…. to who the original forgers likely were.
There’s not much point in arguing about “yellow cake”. That’s republicam mantra now because Bush said so. I heard Fred Barnes repeat as fact that Iraq had tried to buy yellow cake from Niger just last night on Faux News. Look at Heckler’s post. Good republican that he is, he’s bound and determined that the helium trucks were portable bio-weapons labs and that the British have conclusive evidence of yellow cake. Even Bush doesn’t push those lies anymore. But to admit that the administration was wrong about WMD would be like admitting that, well, Bush and company are a bunch of ethically challenged liars that started a war to prop up an administration that wasn’t going anywhere and needed the distraction to keep people from realizing that their real goal was to steal everything that isn’t nailed down and give it to their big business friends and contributors.
Fortunately, over half of Americans have figured out that the Bush Junta has lied to us, is ethically challenged, and is taking the country in the wrong direction. 35% job approval? Bush’s standings are approaching Saddam’s.
Nothing is going to convince the Hecklers, esods, and Joe Cs of the hard-core right that Bush isn’t the “Second Comming”.
R.D.Liebst
Powell mentioned them and I believe he said who sold them to Iraq. The only use for them IIRC was to make biological agents, whether they be for medical purposes or WMD purposes. If the purpose was medical though, why would they need to be mobile?
Something that a lot of people seem to forget about those forged uranium documents is that they were only one of multiple sources of intelligence on Sadams efforts to find uranium. Sadam already had 500 tons of the stuff, it was under seal by one of the international agencies. Someone sold it to him or gave it to him (France) it does not stretch ones imagination to think that he might not try to find more.
Heckler,read the link I sent
Read Joe Wilson’s report on his visit to Niger instead of the lies in his op-ed. It states the reason for the Iraqi’s visit to Niger was to buy yellow cake. In the report he claims the Niger officials told him they suspected that was the reason for their visit.
We found over 500 tons of yellow cake in Irag.
Ok, let me say again, 500 tons!
Of course you fail to mention that the 500 tons wasn’t “discovered” at the time of the invasion all. That material was under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for more than a decade.
A more cogent question might be why did the US and IAEA allow Saddam to keep this material for so long?
Heckler–
As XXX pointed out, the mobile weapons labs were long, long ago PROVEN to be hydrogen generation trucks for weather balloons.
Saddam absolutely, positively DID NOT HAVE 500 tons of uranium.
How do I know this? The president’s handpicked inspection team lead by Kay and then by Duelfer issued a report after two years.
They spun everything they could in Bush’s favor, but they couldn’t mention mobile labs or uranium because THEY DIDN’T EXIST.
See, that’s what really scary about you people. You’re so out of touch with reality you just believe whatever it’s convenient to believe.
We’ve been in Iraq for going on three years. The country is MORE chaotic now than when we went in. We lose more soldiers now everyday than during the second month of the invasion. We’ve had a test of your plan for Iraq.
It failed. It failed miserably.
Melissa, It’s great to have another WE contribute, but why must you persist in quoting liberal blogs? You’ve got to at least give the perception that you are objective. Do some homework. Find the corresponding conservative blog. The corresponding Libertarian blog (which is head and shoulders above the lib and cons blogs).
We already know you’re slant will be liberal. Show us something we don’t know, Melissa. Or that is surprising. I was fortunate to get a sneak preview of Goodnight, Goodluck and though Morrow was a liberal, he reported facts and not spin. Great movie.
Was this the yellow cake the “Only” reason for the Iraq War?
As far as I know, there is an encyclopedia of reasons why. Even the Clinton Administration gave compelling reasons to possibly go to war.
Saddam was a bad guy. Yes! War is not pretty and we all feel sorrow for our fallen soldiers, but we are basically in WW3 right now.
I want the US and its allies to do anything possible to stop Islamic Terrorist and take out all the bad guys and make this world safe again. I do not want to see another 9/11.
Wrong again, ID.
“We cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home.”
That’s not fact. That’s an opinion aimed at the heart of the McCarthy witchhunters.
But that explains a lot about the right-wing–if you can’t distingush between fact and opinion, it explains how Bush won re-election . . .
Brian,
Proves my point! Sadam’s supply of yellow cake was known and being monitored. This was the reason he was in Niger trying to get more!
Galahad writes:
“As XXX pointed out, the mobile weapons labs were long, long ago PROVEN to be hydrogen generation trucks for weather balloons.”
Well this solves the mystery! Of course this has to be the logical explaination! Weather balloons! Buying a bottle of hydrogen on the open market is so very hard these days! It is so cumbersome and you have to have one of those little dollys to move it around.
The obvious solution is to pay Germany 1.2 million marks for a portable hydrogen generator! Now, to cinch the story, if we could just find some of those balloons…..
My God people, do you actually believe weather balloons!
Yes. Because that’s what the knowledgable sources on the ground who inspected them believe.
Read the reports of Bush’s own men, not Rush/Sean/Fox spin and you’ll see what the facts are.
By the way, two-and-a-half years in Iraq, and the six mile drive from the airport to Baghdad is the most dangerous stretch of highway on the planet.
How long do have to look at a miserable failure before you see that it’s a miserable failure?
So I see esod argues from a fallacy of distraction called the “argument from ignorance”: because something is not known to be true, it is assumed to be false.
If something is not known to be true, but still fits your preconcieved notion, continue to believe even if proven false.
Sadam continued to work on his various nuclear programs up to the end.
The whole idea of “mobile hydrogen generators” is absurd!
Sadam had no use for hydrogen.
Sadam could buy it in bottles cheaply if he did have a use for hydrogen.
Nothing is more portable than hydrogen bottles.
Helium is used in weather balloons.
Sadam had no weather balloons.
Sadam had no weather stations.
The weather in the bunker never changes.
Heckler said:”The only use for them IIRC was to make biological agents”
Heckler, that’s just BS. It’s wrong. It’s a lie. It’s also symptomatic of how conservatives continue to reinforce a running falsehood. Repeating a lie over and over will never make it true. Helium generators don’t produce bio-weapons.
Heckler also said:”Something that a lot of people seem to forget about those forged uranium documents is that they were only one of multiple sources of intelligence on Sadams efforts to find uranium.”
It’s all been traced back to the same original source; the forged Niger documents. And the “500 tons” of yellow cake is a non-issue. As was stated up thread, we didn’t “discover” yellowcake in Iraq…it was known about and under control. “500 tons”? Get real!It’s time for reality to set in. Conservatives have been played for fools.
Esod,
Having been an engineer in the air sep. business, let me tell you why hydrogen is used in place of helium in some instances. Helium is rare in the atmosphere..a little more common in natural gas, but still a rarity and reasonably difficult to obtain. Hydrogen, on the other hand, is readily avaailable from oil refineries, the electrolytic decomposition of water, etc.
Germany didn’t use hydrogen because they wanted to, they used it because they had to..they had no economic sources for obtaining helium.
In addition, Iraq was under a total ban on imports, including helium. Why use it if you already can generate hydrogen in a snap by dedcomposing water with a little electrolyte in it?
I’m not claiming the trucks were H2 generators, only explaining why H2 might be used over helium.
Dear Brian,
The Germans used hydrogen because the U.S. was the only source for helium and we wouldn’t let them have any.
Hydrogen is easy to make and get. Dangerous to use in balloons.
Every weapons program that Sadam had in place since the first Gulf War had a cover story. Some of them more plausible than others. He was not restricted from importing helium.
Think about it. You can’t have helium, but we’ll let you import-state-of-the-art mobile hydrogen generators that can be converted to the manufacture of WMDs.
Your response on hydrogen and helium was informative, but useless in explaining the reason for Sadam’s “mobile hydrogen generators”.
Nice try though.
Isn’t that what I said? The Germans had no economic sources for helium production?
I’d suggest you look at UN Resolution 661, which imposed economic sanctions on Iraq, including a full trade embargo barring all imports from and exports to Iraq, excepting only medical supplies, foodstuffs, and other items of humanitarian need, as determined by the Security Council sanctions committee, which was also established by Resolution 661.
I can also convert a briefcase, a piece od pipe, and some detonation materials into a nuclear weapon. All I have to do is drive two masses of fissile material together in the pipe by expoding charges at both ends…a critical mass results and BOOM. In essence, one can convert almost any everyday object into some item used in a WMD. So what? I guess if we found a few dozen Samsonite attache cases we could include them in the WMD program.
One’s stand on issues should be, to as great an extent as possible, based on fact and only when absolutely necessary involve any extrapolation of fact or other conjecture.
XXX
You call me a liar. OK tell me what the two trucks were and cite a credible source.
XXX
What would be the use for 2 portable helium generators?
The helium/hydrogen argument has provided me with some decent chuckles.Please explain why Saddam needed hydrogen generators in the first place? Weather balloons? Maybe balloons for birthday parties? With cute sayings on them?It is my humble opinion that Saddam knew what was coming and prepared for it. But in no way am I trying to justify the invasion: it was dead wrong. Weapons of mass destruction or not, we should not have invaded.
Wow!
“I can also convert a briefcase, a piece od pipe, and some detonation materials into a nuclear weapon.”
An air-sep engineer and now a nuclear physicist!
Of course converting a brief case into a nuclear bomb would entail a little more sophistication than just finding an old pipe somewhere. You have the problem of acquiring the ‘fissile material’. But wait, Sadam had plans in place to enrich the yellow cake. You would either need plutonium or highly enriched uranium to fit it in a brief case. (Bomb grade is 98% or greater U235).
Then of course the geometry is so complex that you would need a computer to solve the problem. But wait! There is evidence that Sadam was either in the process of obtaining this information from Pakistan or already had it!
So, I’ll have to give you this one Brian my friend! If I discovered a Samsonite suitcase (let’s be real an attaché case is a little small) in the same place that a nuclear physicist was trying to solve the geometry problem and at the same time enrich 500 tons of yellow cake into bomb grade U235, I might suspect a bomb.
Or, maybe he was going to use the over one thousand caches of radioactive material that we found to make conventional ‘dirty bombs’ and deliver them with weather balloons filled with hydrogen generated in mobile trailers from Germany. (We did find plans for dirty bombs)
USA Today:
Final report: Iraq had no WMDs
The report resolves disputes about allegations made prior to the U.S. invasion:
• Aluminum tubes that the Bush administration alleged were for nuclear weapons production were, in fact, for making conventional artillery rockets.
• Iraq did not try to buy uranium overseas.
• The team found no evidence that Iraq was developing biological weapons trailers or rail cars. Two trailers found after the war were for producing hydrogen gas for weather balloons.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2004-10-06-wmd_x.htm
The only biological weapon around here is Heckler’s breath.
Yes, Galahad. Morrow expressed opinions. But, that wasn’t my point, was it? Your response, however, is exactly my point about today’s liberals vs the ‘58 liberals. The ‘Dan Rather distort the truth’ liberals of today are so far left, it makes the Morrow liberals of ‘58 look like social conservatives.
Hey Ed,
USA Today is owned by the JEWS!
esod,USA Today is not the only one. Don’t think Ed would want to see the Jewish Book of Lists.
QUICK!!! Go to Google, type in “failure”, then hit “I’m feeling lucky”, and see what comes up.Do it before those at google find out and take it off.
Esod,
Um, the attache case pipe bomb is not as difficult to put together as you think it is. In fact the plans are available on the web. After all the United States solved the problem of both the ballistic style of detonation and implosion style detonation in the 1940s with computational tools much more primitive than the average person has in their Palm Pilot. As you mention the only problem is obtaining the fissile material. Now from a practical standpoint saddam could have purchased this already pre-processed from any of the several former states of the USSR that have unregulated stockpiles of the stuff hanging around. Why he would want to go through the trouble and expense of building calutrons to process the raw uranium is what doesn’t make sense. Even with the calutrons, he would need a supply of radioactive materials from somewhere and since the proportion of U235 in uranium is miniscule he’d need to be buying tons of yellowcake on a regular basis.
Damoon !! ROFL !! How did you discover that?
Being “Jewish” doesn’t disquality anybody from telling the truth.
Jews come in all different flavors.
Some want peace, some don’t. Some lie, some value truth.
The Zionist sect is the bad news, not “all” Jews.
Now, do you morons understand?
Damoon, et al. The Google spoof has been there for months if not a year or two.
Heckler, it would seem I posted too early in the morning (I get to sleep in on Saturdays). I was wrong when I said “helium”. I should have said Hydrogen. See how easy it is for a lib to admit a mistake? You’ll just have to learn by observation…you’ll never be able to do it yourself. Point is, they’re not bio-weapons labs.
” OK tell me what the two trucks were and cite a credible source.”
Why? What would that accomplish? Would it stop you from spouting Whitehouse talking points? Go google your own source. I’m not going to waste my time. You’re part of a declining minority: those who believe Bush hasn’t lied his ass off about the reasons to go to war.
JM, here’s a theory! Maybe they used the helium generators to make their voices sound funny. But I know now (from listening to Heckler and esod) that those trucks were hydrogen generators so Saddam could build a Hydrogen Bomb.
Quick! To the Batmobile!
Lot of opinions, lot of bandwidth to pushlish all these strongly held opinions. So, now a question, what do you DO about it, other than post strongly worded opinions? Armchair quarterbacking is easy….any volunteers for involvement?
In the meantime, here locally where we actually CAN make a difference, the mayor keeps espousing religion, the BOE’s hand picked commissioner keeps spending more money, school children are still being bused miles from home, and an arean is going to be built downtown without adequate parking and will cost taxpayers for years.
Any volunteers to get INVOLVED instead of arguing online?
ID, you’re right, the failure listing has been around for over a year. That ought to tell you something about our president. As Galahad is so fond of saying, “WORST-PRESIDENT-EVER!”
Actually Ray,
I’m already quite envolved. But thanks for the invite!
Let’s see if I got this correct,
Type in ‘failure’
Then
‘I’m feeling lucky’
Damn Damoon, is that the way a liberal finds romance? Why don’t you just email XXX if you are looking for a loser?
Nicely done, Brian–you point out that if SH wanted nuclear materials, he’d just buy them ready made. Kerry was going to make “loose nukes” his number one priority.
Esod, Heckler–It doesn’t matter to me whether you can’t think of a reason SH wanted hydrogen generators and that bottles of helium are safer and cheaper.
You aren’t experts and you didn’t look at the damn trailers. Oh, I mean “portable weapons labs.”
The experts who did said they were hydrogen generators.
Dingdingdingding . . . Sorry. Round over. You lose.
Thanks Galahad!
We can finally move on!
What do you think the 500 tons of yellow cake were going to be used for? What is the left wing spin on that TTBOI?
Dingdingdingding….Round Two
Well, the yellowcake is not of too much use without the gas centrifuges or calutrons to separate the uranium hexafluoride isotopes…oh yeah there would also have to be facilities available to convert the yellowcake uranium oxide to uranium hexafluoride.
As far as I know, no such separation facilities were found, even in the initial stages of construction.
Esod, again with regard to your knowledge of nuclear weapons technology, it must be hard speaking out of your ass for such extended periods of time. Why don’t you try actually saying something with some small iota of truth or fact behind it. Try looking at:
http://www.nti.org/e_research/cnwm/overview/technical2.asp
for the history of gun type designs (initially done by a professor and 2 or 3 grad students in the summer before the Manhattan project began – not exactly killer mathematics). You might also check out the fact that a Hiroshima sized supercritical mass of uranium would occupy less than a gallon milk carton.
Well Brian,
You really seem obsessed with this luggage bomb thing! I already admitted that you could easily build the Samsonite bomb.
The web site you referred me to actually has very little that I didn’t already know. I, like Kerry, am scared about small, easy to hide nuclear devices. The difference between Kerry and me is that I voted for a president that would do something about global terrorism other than just talk about it for political gain.The gun type device is very inefficient. It’s true that you could achieve critical mass with such a device. However, timing is everything. With the bullet-ring geometry you just can’t get the fissile material close enough, fast enough to achieve a useful yield. It’s the old geometry problem again. It’s relatively easy to draw up the plans. However, even with such a very crude device you would soon encounter problem with the construction that I doubt any college student could master. For instance, lets say you have the fissile material. You need a ring and a bullet. Take 50% of the material and make a ring. When you get done with this relatively simple request, I’ll tell you the next step. Hint, you can’t use lathe down in the school shop.
As far as having the facilities to enrich the uranium, there is evidence that Sadam was working on that. He had the scientists and the plans. We found them. We also found evidence that he was assembling the equipment to complete the job. And you are correct, it would take a shit-pot-load of yellow cake to get enough enriched U235 to build a bomb. About 500 tons would be a good start.
Why in the world would you invest in 500 tons of yellow cake if you didn’t have plans to develop a nuclear weapons program?
I enjoy this particular thread; I have enough knowledge about nuclear weapons that I could bury you! I can do it without doing a GOOGLE search also! I just have to be sure I don’t tell you something that I would later have to kill you for. For instance, I can tell you the requirements to manufacture U235 in a way that it can withstand the shock of the high explosives, but last I knew it was still secret. (Hint, it won’t happen at MIT) I have signed many of the same documents that Scooter signed promising not to divulge classified material.
Esod,
I wish you’d post more frequently. You’re more amusing than most of the TV shows on.
You could bury me huh?? (uncontrollable giggling erupts again). Didn’t somebody named Nikita say something like that a while back.
No, I’m not obsessed with luggage type bombs. I’m enjoying ever so much watching you run this way, then that, as you contradict yourself over and over again. Too bad Bush wasn’t aware of your particular skills; you’d have been quite the asset as a member of the inner circle. (there’s that uncontrollable giggling again).
I have plans to build a 30,000 sq. ft. mansion too. I have the blueprints. If you come over to my current place and search it, you’ll find them. I’ve had the building materials for over ten years. I figure it might take me another 10 to 20 years until I actually get around to completing the job, if I ever do.
Oh now Brian,
When ever you get bested in an argument you just get silly. At one time I thought you might be mature enough to actually carry on a logical discussion.
I guess I’m wrong, how old are you? 12? 13?
If I searched your current place would I find Harry Potter posters on your wall?
The Israelis bombed the nuclear facility Iraq was building in 1981. We invaded a couple of years ago and the best you can come up with as the ‘immediate threat’ to US national security is 500 tons of yellowcake in Saddam’s possession 22 years later? No centrifuges, no buildings, no mobile laboratories,…
This blog has aroused a lot of animosity and bad feeling, I think. I’m sure we could all use a laugh to break the tension. So esod, here’s a riddle…one has the intelligence of a 9 month old human baby and the other likes bananas…which applies to you and which to a chimp?
Well esod, I must be off for the evening. I do so hope to see you back posting on this or some other topic.
By the way. I don’t speak retardese all that well. Can you get someone by tomorrow to translate into meaningful English before you post, please?
Now Brian,
We all know that you can’t continue seriously after being bested, but for the amusement of all concerned, not just you, lets get back on subject.
This whole yellow cake thing is being touted by the liberals as another Bush lie. Oooh.. He lied about yellow cake in his state of the union address. But he didn’t!
I’ve never brought up any ‘immediate threat’ from yellow cake in my posts. I’ve merely pointed out that he had it. Only one reason to have it is a weapons program.
So, why don’t you quit setting up straw dogs and then attempt to make a point with them? Why don’t you just try, once, to address the points that I make in my posts? It would be the courteous thing to do; after all, I have tried to honestly address your points.
And the answer to your riddle? I may have misjudged you. I don’t think you are 12 yet.
Just finished brushing my teeth and thought I’d check back one more time.
So, the yellow cake posed no threat to US national security? Dis I just hear you say that? Then what was the urgency to overthrow Mr. Hussein?
Didn’t you say..
“Sadam continued to work on his various nuclear programs up to the end.”
“Sadam’s supply of yellow cake was known and being monitored. This was the reason he was in Niger trying to get more!”
“My God people, do you actually believe weather balloons!”
I don’t believe anyone here has said Mr. Bush lied about Mr. Hussein having yellow cake. I believe the contention is that Mr. Hussein did not try to obtain yellowcake from Niger as the administration earlier claimed..and this has now been established beyond reasonable doubt. Big difference.
Whether Mr. Bush knowingly deceived the American people, whether he was ill-informed by his advisors, whether he put the most ‘threatening’ spin on what was known…these are matters for deeper investigation.
BTW, you have a pretty sharp wit, and some pretty good retorts and ripostes. I’ve upgraded you to just asshole.
Poor Damoon. She has to do a google search to find a failure. All esod has to do is look in the mirror. Esod, Brian is too kind calling you an asshole. Actually, you’re just a loud-mouth fuktard. Worse, you’re about the dumbest republipuke I ever saw. Crawl back under your rock.
Brian,
You asked,
“So, the yellow cake posed no threat to US national security? Dis I just hear you say that?”
No dear, I did not say that. I believe that it was a threat to our national security. I wrote,
“I’ve never brought up any ‘immediate threat’ from yellow cake in my posts.”
This was in response to the straw dog you had set up to argue against because you couldn’t respond to any of the real points I had made.
You said,
“I don’t believe anyone here has said Mr. Bush lied about Mr. Hussein having yellow cake.”
At 6:52 PM, Nov 5th. in this thread, Galahad wrote,
“Saddam absolutely, positively DID NOT HAVE 500 tons of uranium.”
You then write,
“Mr. Hussein did not try to obtain yellowcake from Niger as the administration earlier claimed..and this has now been established beyond reasonable doubt.”
No dear, It hasn’t been proved at all! In fact, if you read Joe Wilson’s report on his visit to Niger, It states that the probable reason for Sadam to send his people to Niger to talk with the government was to buy yellow cake. Of course he has lied about it since, even in his NYT Op-Ed piece, but the Senate select committee on intelligence states that Joe Wilson is a lier, and he lied about what he had put in his report.
Niger exports yellow cake and peanuts. Sadam sent people to Niger to buy something. We found no peanuts in Iraq.
You may actually be older than 10, however, I have just proved that you have the reading comprehension of the average 5th grader. (public school 5th grader).
Esod,
I stand corrected..1 person mistakenly said Mr. Hussein didn’t have yellow cake. I missed that in my perusal of the posts.
With regard to the “Wilson” report, have you bothered to read the lead in story to this blog? Apparently not. Why don’t you take a look? It seems that the Italian government has acknowledged that one of it’s agents was the source of the false yellowcake information. In the face of this, your only response is to call Mr. Wilson a liar and grimly carry on with the now discredited story as “evidence” of the need for Mr. Hussein’s ouster…exactly the type of denial of reality I expected from you.
You’ll really have to explain the statements above concerning threat to the United States and immediate threat to the United States.
“I’ve never brought up any ‘immediate threat’ from yellow cake in my posts.”
I see…the material was not an imediate threat, only a threat. Is that it? So, we send Mr. Powell to the UN in this instance over a threat, but not an ‘immediate’ threat. We use the yellow cake information available at that time as one important reason to invade, but that’s because it was a threat, not an ‘immediate’ threat. We would have dealt with Iraq differently if the material had been an ‘immediate’ threat. Bill Clinton would be proud of that type of semantic hair splitting. BTW why don’t you define what an ‘immediate’ threat is versus just a plain old ordinary threat?
Gee, you signed papers swearing you to secrecy like “Scooter” Libby. Really? So what secret nickname did they give you? Did you get a decoder ring when you sent in the boxtops?
But on a more serious note. Neither of us seem to be able to behave and play nicely together. What do you say to this? We resist the urge to respond to one another’s posts here. I’m sure others find it tedious. As I suggested earlier, I’d be more than happy to continue in another forum, perhaps a live one like yahoo instant messenger…just post a real email address and we’ll be in business/
Here’s a rather nice summary for those who are interested or ill-informed:
in February 2002, three different American officials had made efforts to verify the reports. The deputy commander of U.S. Armed Forces Europe, Marine Gen. Carlton Fulford, went to Niger and met with the country’s president. He concluded that, given the controls on Niger’s uranium supply, there was little chance any of it could have been diverted to Iraq. His report was sent to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Richard Myers. The U.S. Ambassador to Niger, Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, was also present at the meeting and sent similar conclusions to the State Department. At roughly the same time, the CIA sent Ambassador Joseph Wilson to investigate the claims himself. Wilson had been posted to Niger 14 years earlier, and throughout a diplomatic career in Africa he had built up a large network of contacts in Niger. Wilson interviewed former prime minister of Niger, Ibrahim Assane Mayaki, who reported that he knew of no sales to Iraq. Mayaki did however recall that in June 1999 an Iraqi delegation had expressed interest in “expanding commercial relations”, which he had interpreted to mean yellowcake sales.[5] Ultimately, Wilson concluded that there was no way that production at the uranium mines could be ramped up or that the excess uranium could have been exported without it being immediately obvious to many people both in the private sector and in the government of Niger. He returned home and told the CIA that the reports were “unequivocally wrong”. The CIA passed this conclusion on to the White House, the FBI, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Defense Intelligence Agency.
In early October 2002, George Tenet called Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, asking Hadley to remove reference to the Niger uranium from a speech Bush was to give in Cincinnati on Oct. 7. This was followed up by a memo asking Hadley to remove another, similar line. Another memo was sent to the White House expressing the CIA’s view that the Niger claims were false; this memo was given to both Hadley and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
Further in March 2003, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released results of his analysis of the documents. Reportedly, it took IAEA officials only a matter of hours to determine that these documents were fake. Using little more than a Google search, IAEA experts discovered indications of a crude forgery, such as the use of incorrect names of Nigerian officials. As a result, the IAEA reported to the U.N. Security Council that the documents were “in fact not authentic.”
How “terrorism” has been manufactured.
You won’t read this in American newspapers. From Ha’aretz in Israel:
“These booms, whose only purpose is to sow fear among innocent civilians, have been added to the artillery shells pounding the Gaza Strip and the daily barrage of liquidation missiles, which indiscriminately kill armed militants and innocent people. The fact that the air force is employing this weapon mainly late at night, or early in the morning, when masses of pupils are making their way to school, only makes its wickedness more conspicuous.”
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/641839.html
The “sick” part about all this is that America has been financing all of it since 1948.
1,6 trillion dollars from 1973 to date.
The Israelis manufacture “terrorism” then Bush declares a war against it, and over 2000 of our soldiers have paid for this with their lives and another 17,000 have had their arms and legs blown-off.
Bush and all those who planned this “thing” need to be in jail.
Dear Brian,
Does your mommy know that you were up past your bedtime doing GOOGLE searches again?
Esod,
Sigh…nonresponsive as usual..brain dead in all probability.
Here’s some more “google” information for you..from the Select Committee on Intelligence Report…
Conclusion 19: Even after obtaining the FORGED documents and being alterted by a …INR analyst about problems with them, analysts at both the … CIA and …DIA did not examine them carefully enough to see the obvious problems with the documents.
Conclusion 26: To date, the Intelligence Community has not published an assessment to clarify or correct its position on whether or not Iraq was trying to purchase uranium from Africa… Likewise neither the …CIA nor the … DIA…have ever published assessments outside of their agencies which correct their previous positions.
Conclusion: Are Americans safer today? Are Americans less likely to suffer a terrorist attack because Saddam is out of power? Can the US military, intelligence agencies, and the remainder of our government better protect our citizens and interests around the world than it could before Operation Iraqi Freedom? Unfortunately the answer to all these questions is NO.
So Esod, aside from your standard acerbic and continual attacks (most likely due to approaching paranoid delusional Alzheimer’s), where’s the beef? Provide some evidence counter to that I’ve supplied.
As the old saying goes, put up or shut up. Take your time emptying mental colostomy bag. I look forward to your next non-response.
Brian,
You are addressing me in your posts again. I thought you decided we can’t play well together. Do you really want to engage in dialog? Does your mommy know you are on the internet with grown ups again?
I rest my case. Time to engage in interesting, stimulating, and PLEASANT conversation with some of the other posters.
I am still a little baffled. Have you ever noticed that whenever you sit behind a keyboard, some idiot starts typing?
Later
Reading the last few posts, I had to go back and actually read what esod had written (yawn). I confess I had gotten to the point that I was skipping over them because they were so boring and repetitious. But Brian mentioned signing secret documents (yes, I do read his)…My goodness esod, I guess I just didn’t realize you were so important. Does the president know you’re out making the world safe for neocons on a small Kansas blog? You must be a legend in your own mind. Seems a shame that someone on your level of brilliance is stuck defending lies. Most intelligent people wouldn’t waste the effort unless they were some kind of ideologue. But it does say something about your integrity. You’re obviously to smart to be taken in…I guess that just exposes you as another garden-variety liar.
You should put your superior mentality to better use.
Go find a boyfriend.
esod, I’m not sure what you pulled up on the web, obviously something different than I did.Please don’t attempt to label me, I don’t fit into the right or left box.
I have asked before, and will ask again…why does ‘esod’feel it is necessary to hide his/its identity behind the email addresses of eagle staff writers? Is he/it so ashamed of his opinions that he cannot come out with his real name?Anonynimity is great for the small and weak minded..if you can’t stand behind your convictions with your real name, you obviously are just out to provoke and don’t believe anything you write.
Dear Damoon,
I apologize if I have offended you in any way. I just assumed you had a sense of humor.
I’m sure you do, its just a little different than mine.
Again, please accept my apology.
esod
Ray,a comment about posting under your real name and internet security. Not to seem to be defending esod, there are some very good reasons to post anonomously. As I’m sure you’re aware, there are some very mean-spirited people on the internet. People who wouldn’t hesitate to damage you personally if you infuriated them. By giving out personal information on the internet, Name, email address, you give such people direct access to you and your family. I remind you of an earlier thread, the one about WalMart where RD Leibst posted several times about WalMart, his employer, and another contributor said he’d commented to a WalMart manager about Leibst’s posts. Now maybe in that particular setting it wasn’t a bad thing, but the results could have been quite different. I know personally of instances where people have had their families, themselves, or their jobs put at risk or threatened because they provided personal information on the internet. Personally, I work with a lot of republicans. I don’t voice my opinion at work because it would interfere with what I do to have to argue politics with my co workers and it might endanger my job. Therefore, I choose to post under a blog name and not give out my email address.
What level of risk you choose to expose yourself and your family to is your business. Please don’t criticize those of us who aren’t willing to accept that kind of risk to family, friends, and job.
Respectfully,XXX
Interesting points, XXX..but ‘esod’ goes to the extreme of posting email addresses of different people working at the eagle instead of his/its own address. Hiding behind technology.
I agree that it’s unethical to use someone else’s email address, but what do you expect from someone like esod?
I’m taking bets that esod is also “Hank”.
At any rate, esod is someone we’ve heard from before under a different name. I suspect that “Gail” and “esod’ are one and the same. Doesn’t really matter. I find esod boring and repetitive. I just scan past her/him/it.
I no longer thought that I woud be responding to Brian’s posts (at his request) but since has asked me to “put up or shut up” I will summarize what the liberals have been getting their panties in a wad about since the President’s State of the Union address on January 28, 2003. The sixteen words that they use to claim he lied are:
“The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.”
The democrat politicians and their liberal lap dogs in the press don’t actually believe that the president lied; devoid of any plan for the security of America they resort to name calling and the fabrication of false issues for political gain.
In Bush’s address he references the British Government as the source of his information. What is the official British Government response about the President’s so-called-lie?
After nearly a six-month investigation, a special panel reported to the British Parliament July 14 that British intelligence had indeed concluded back in 2002 that Saddam Hussein was seeking to buy uranium. The review panel was headed by Lord Butler of Brockwell, who had been a cabinet secretary under five different Prime Ministers and who is currently master of University College, Oxford.
The Butler report said British intelligence had “credible” information — from several sources — that a 1999 visit by Iraqi officials to Niger was for the purpose of buying uranium:Butler Report: It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999. The British Government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium. Since uranium constitutes almost three-quarters of Niger’s exports, the intelligence was credible.The Butler report concludes:
By extension, we conclude also that the statement in President Bush’s State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa” was well-founded.
What does the bi-partisan Senate Intelligence Committee say about this so-called-intelligence scandal?
The U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence reported July 7, 2004 that the CIA had received reports from a foreign government (not named, but probably Britain) that Iraq had actually concluded a deal with Niger to supply 500 tons a year of partially processed uranium ore, or “yellowcake.” That is potentially enough to produce 50 nuclear warheads.The Senate report said the CIA then asked a “former ambassador” to go to Niger and report. That is a reference to Joseph Wilson — who later became a vocal critic of the President’s 16 words. The Senate report said Wilson brought back denials of any Niger-Iraq uranium sale, and argued that such a sale wasn’t likely to happen. But the Intelligence Committee report also reveals that Wilson brought back something else as well — evidence that Iraq may well have wanted to buy uranium.Wilson reported that he had met with Niger’s former Prime Minister Ibrahim Mayaki, who said that in June 1999 he was asked to meet with a delegation from Iraq to discuss “expanding commercial relations” between the two countries.Based on what Wilson told them, CIA analysts wrote an intelligence report saying former Prime Minister Mayki “interpreted ‘expanding commercial relations’ to mean that the (Iraqi) delegation wanted to discuss uranium yellowcake sales.” In fact, the Intelligence Committee report said that “for most analysts” Wilson’s trip to Niger “lent more credibility to the original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports on the uranium deal.”Even though Joe Wilson later denied that uranium sales were discussed when he went to Niger, the findings in the Senate report prove he is a liar:
Committee Report: He (the intelligence officer) said he judged that the most important fact in the report was that the Nigerian officials admitted that the Iraqi delegation had traveled there in 1999, and that the Nigerian Prime Minister believed the Iraqis were interested in purchasing uranium, because this provided some confirmation of foreign government service reporting.
LoL, I had totally missed the reference to someone talk to Wal-mart about my post in the Wal-mart thread. It shook me at first then, I have said better and worst to management’s face.
But the point about true or false names on the net is vaid. I stand by what I say so I do not mind using my name ( If that is my name?)when speaking my mind.
I can understand seting up a different e-mail then what is a true one for use on some sites.But not using anothers I.D. as that could cause them problems.
Give him an obvious choice…put up or shut up…. and he STILL picks the wrong option !!
At some point, and I think that point has been reached along with about 70 percent of the American people, it doesn’t matter Bush actually LIED or NOT.
Anyone who gets things SO WRONG about something as important as war in Iraq–eventually, why they got it wrong doesn’t matter.
What does matter is how long are we Americans going to believe and follow this walking f*ck-up named George W. Bush.
The longer we do, the more screwed we get. And more and more people understand that.
Ah Galahad,
Forgive me! Joy! Democrats have lost the trust of the America people and all the democrats can do is whine and claim Bush lied.
We’ll have a republican in the White House for the next twenty years! Because whiners and complainers have taken over the agenda of the democrats!
Joy!
Esod–
Try reading the posts before you respond to them, assuming you CAN read, of course.
My point is that it doesn’t matter if Bush lied or not. The reasons WHY we went to war become less and less important as we see HOW Bush has prosecuted this war over the last two-and-a-half years.
Marine Maj. Paul Hackett, Iraq war vet and Democratic candidate for Congress in Ohio, has this to say about the war he recently served in–
Question: “What would you do (in Iraq) now?”
Hackett’s answer: “I’d tell the military to figure out how we systematically and in organized fashion get our troops out of there, because the war’s over. It’s not going to get any better.” . . . (We need to train the Iraqi military to take our place, but) “that’s not going to happen. Everybody knows that, so if wer’re not goting to train the Iraqi military, let’s quit spending our money and spending our lives.”
Esod, I don’t care if we have a Republican president or a Democratic president in office, really.
I just want a president who isn’t a total f*** up.
What I don’t understand is why people like you don’t want that too . . .
Dear Galahad,
Bush’s record on the war on terror is very good.
Just because the left constantly calls him a lair doesn’t make it so.
Its because of brain dead liberals like you either running the party or marching lock-step with what ever propaganda comes from the DNC that republicans will have the White house for the next 20 years.
Can you say, “President Newt”?
Joy
It’s Hank. Esod is Hank.
Okay, that clears a few things up.
BTW, I just said that I don’t care what party the president belongs to as long as he doesn’t stop the recount to install himself in the White House and screw everything up from then on out.
But I guess caring about my country instead of following a party line makes be a “brain dead” liberal.
WAIT! I’m arguing with Hank.
Might as well argue with a fence post.
Dear Galahad,
You have to come to the discussions with an idea before you can claim to argue!
Well, wasn’t that clever?
Thanks XXX!
Esod, do you understand the concept of Plagiarism?
XXX
Isn’t Plagiarism the church that Senator Joe Biden used to belong to?
interesting answer…..
It’s nice that esod, aka Hank, aka Gail has earned the trust of the staff at the mental institution again and regained his computer privileges for a couple of hours after meals and treatment.
I don’t think Hank is Gail. Gail was much more clever, in a really puerile infuriating way.
I’m not sure where Gail/Puny has slithered off to.
Just glad he’s gone . . .