Did Iranian Agents Dupe Pentagon into Invading Iraq? Umm, No.

McClatchy's John Walcott is promoting speculation about a sentence in the Senate report about how Bush lied about WMDs in Iraq, to ultimately shift the blame for the US invasion of Iraq onto Iran.

The sentence in the Senate report says that Pentagon officials collected dubious intelligence on Iraq and Iran from Iranian exiles whom Defense Department counterintelligence investigators said might have ''been used as agents of a foreign intelligence service . . . to reach into and influence the highest levels of the U.S. government."

Walcott buys into the Senate's spin that the "foreign intelligence service" mentioned in the sentence must necessarily be Iran's:

The revelation raises questions about whether Iran may have tried to use a small cabal of officials in the Pentagon and in Vice President Dick Cheney's office to feed bogus intelligence on Iraq and Iran to senior policymakers in the Bush administration who were eager to oust the Iraqi dictator and who remain determined to combat what President Bush this week called an ''existential'' threat from Iran.

However, the "foreign intelligence service" that pushed for the war by promoting bogus intelligence could just as easily have been Israel's intelligence service (which, according to Israeli general Shlomo Brom, was "exaggerating the Iraqi threat" to push the US into attacking Iraq) as well as the Italian intelligence service (US intelligence agencies received several reports from the Italian intelligence service SISMI of a supposed agreement between Iraq and Niger for the sale of yellowcake uranium - see more here.)

But John Walcott of McClatchy doesn't want to discuss any of those facts - he just follows the Senate report to mindlessly speculate about an Iranian role rather than mentioning the evidence of the Israeli and Italian roles.

This reminds me of one of the many excuses that the Bushites tried to come up with in order to justify their invasion of Iraq in the glaring absence of any WMDs: that Iran, acting through the supposed Iranian "double-agent" Chalabi, had provided false WMD intelligence to the US, and so the Bush administration, being a bunch of good-hearted and naive dupes who just fell off of a turnip truck, believed the evil, duplicitious Iranians and ended up invading Iraq and toppling Iran's nemesis for them.

The other variation of this "blame Iran for the Iraq invasion" spin: Saddam pretended to have WMDs in order to deter and "aggressive" Iran, but accidentally ended up convincing the US that he had WMDs too, which led to the US invasion (nevermind that Saddam filed a 12,000 page report with the UN showing that he didn't have WMDs.) 

In fact, the whole idea that Bush was misled by "bogus intelligence" into invading Iraq is itself totally bogus -- the "Uranium from Niger" documents were known to be crude forgeries, and the Bushites simply did not care and cited it anyway. Bush had always planned on invading Iraq, whether there were any WMDs or not.

But since the Iraq invasion has turned into such a clusterfuck, some people are looking to shift the blame off of Bush and the Israelis who pushed so hard for the war -- and you can always blame it all on Iran. That's what the Senate is doing, and it is too bad that McClatchy is falling for it.

Comments

[99]

They seem to think they already paid that price in Nazi Germany. I say they look more like the true descendants of Hitler now than the people of Germany. It is almost beyond understanding how things could be as they are, and enough justice may end up taking more time than humans have left on the planet we're burning up.

[goodgirlroxie]

Now this is interesting. When I read that commentary, even though I do not agree with the implications made by Walcott, I consider his to be a good commentary for critical readers, because it at least doesn't promote propaganda, like every other article I've read about this issue, and provides readers with enough actual information, as opposed to propaganda, to come to their own conclusions. In other words, a critical reader can get glimpses into the actuality of this issue by reading his commentary, whereas a reader cannot by reading any of the other commentaries I've run across.

I don't think any reality-based followers of current events actually think that Bush was misled by bogus intelligence on Iraq. I think that it's pretty clear to many of us beyond a reasonable doubt that he knew exactly what he was doing.

Oh, and while I don't agree with everything you wrote in your analysis, I think it's a good analysis. Lots of good points. Clear description of a particular POV, and I think I completely understand your thinking. Thank-you.

[mb]

The blood thirsty Zionist regime, was one of the biggest architects for invasion and destruction of Iraq. They are, matter of fact, very proud of it too. Killing one million Iraqis and obliteration of the beautiful country. These criminals will one day pay a hefty price for their heinous crimes. Justice will prevail.