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Skriven 2005-11-13 23:33:12 av Whitehouse Press (1:3634/12.0)
Ärende: Press Release (051113) for Sun, 2005 Nov 13
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Setting the Record Straight: The Washington Post On Pre-War Intelligence
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For Immediate Release
November 13, 2005

Setting the Record Straight: The Washington Post On Pre-War Intelligence



The Washington Post Implies That The Presidential Daily Brief (PDB) Was
Superior To The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) Given To Congress.
"But Bush does not share his most sensitive intelligence, such as the
President's Daily Brief, with lawmakers. Also, the National Intelligence
Estimate summarizing the intelligence community's views about the threat
from Iraq was given to Congress just days before the vote to authorize the
use of force in that country." (Dana Milbank And Walter Pincus, "Asterisks
Dot White House's Iraq Argument," The Washington Post, 11/12/05)

But The PDB Was The Focus Of Intelligence Reform And Was More "Problematic"
Than The NIE Given To Congress.

  þ The Robb-Silberman Commission Found The PDB To Contain Similar
    Intelligence In "More Alarmist" And "Less Nuanced" Language. "As
    problematic as the October 2002 NIE was, it was not the Community's
    biggest analytic failure on Iraq. Even more misleading was the river of
    intelligence that flowed from the CIA to top policymakers over long
    periods of time--in the President's Daily Brief (PDB) and in its more
    widely distributed companion, the Senior Executive Intelligence Brief
    (SEIB). These daily reports were, if anything, more alarmist and less
    nuanced than the NIE." (Charles S. Robb And Laurence H. Silberman, The
    Commission On The Intelligence Capabilities Of The United States
    Regarding Weapons Of Mass Destruction, 3/31/05, Pg. 14)


  þ The Robb-Silberman Commission Reported That The Intelligence In The PDB
    Was Not "Markedly Different" Than The Intelligence Given To Congress In
    The NIE. "It was not that the intelligence was markedly different.
    Rather, it was that the PDBs and SEIBs, with their attention-grabbing
    headlines and drumbeat of repetition, left an impression of many
    corroborating reports where in fact there were very few sources. And in
    other instances, intelligence suggesting the existence of weapons
    programs was conveyed to senior policymakers, but later information
    casting doubt upon the validity of that intelligence was not." (Charles
    S. Robb And Laurence H. Silberman, The Commission On The Intelligence
    Capabilities Of The United States Regarding Weapons Of Mass
    Destruction, 3/31/05, Pg. 14)


The Washington Post Implies That There Have Been No Findings On The Use Of
Intelligence. "But the only committee investigating the matter in Congress,
the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has not yet done its inquiry
into whether officials mischaracterized intelligence by omitting caveats
and dissenting opinions. And Judge Laurence H. Silberman, chairman of
Bush's commission on weapons of mass destruction, said in releasing his
report on March 31, 2005: 'Our executive order did not direct us to deal
with the use of intelligence by policymakers, and all of us were agreed
that that was not part of our inquiry.'" (Dana Milbank And Walter Pincus,
"Asterisks Dot White House's Iraq Argument," The Washington Post, 11/12/05)

But Congressional And Independent Committees Have Repeatedly Reported No
Distortion Of Intelligence

  þ The Bipartisan Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Report "Did Not
    Find Any Evidence" Of Attempts To Influence Analysts To Change
    Intelligence. "Conclusion 83. The Committee did not find any evidence
    that Administration officials attempted to coerce, influence or
    pressure analysts to change their judgments related to Iraq's weapons
    of mass destruction capabilities. Conclusion 84. The Committee found no
    evidence that the Vice President's visits to the Central Intelligence
    Agency were attempts to pressure analysts, were perceived as intended
    to pressure analysts by those who participated in the briefings on
    Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs, or did pressure analysts
    to change their assessments." ("Report On The U.S. Intelligence
    Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq," U.S. Senate
    Select Committee On Intelligence, 7/7/04, Pg. 284-285)


  þ The Robb-Silberman Commission Finds "No Evidence Of Political
    Pressure." "These are errors serious errors. But these errors stem from
    poor tradecraft and poor management. The Commission found no evidence
    of political pressure to influence the Intelligence Community's pre-war
    assessments of Iraq's weapons programs. As we discuss in detail in the
    body of our report, analysts universally asserted that in no instance
    did political pressure cause them to skew or alter any of their
    analytical judgments. We conclude that it was the paucity of
    intelligence and poor analytical tradecraft, rather than political
    pressure, that produced the inaccurate pre-war intelligence
    assessments." (Charles S. Robb And Laurence H. Silberman, The
    Commission On The Intelligence Capabilities Of The United States
    Regarding Weapons Of Mass Destruction, 3/31/05, Pg. 50-51)


  þ The British Butler Report Finds "No Evidence" Of Intelligence
    Distortion. "In general, we found that the original intelligence
    material was correctly reported in [Joint Intelligence Committee]
    assessments. An exception was the '45 minute' report. But this sort of
    example was rare in the several hundred JIC assessments we read on
    Iraq. In general, we also found that the reliability of the original
    intelligence reports was fairly represented by the use of accompanying
    quali cations. We should record in particular that we have found no
    evidence of deliberate distortion or of culpable negligence. We
    examined JIC assessments to see whether there was evidence that the
    judgements inside them were systematically distorted by
    non-intelligence factors, in particular the in uence of the policy
    positions of departments. We found no evidence of JIC assessments and
    the judgements inside them being pulled in any particular direction to
    meet the policy concerns of senior of cials on the JIC." ("Review Of
    Intelligence On Weapons Of Mass Destruction," Report Of A Committee Of
    Privy Counsellors, 7/14/04, Pg. 110)


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