Carnegie Analysis: A Tale of Two Intelligence Estimates

[dennis4868]

A Tale of Two Intelligence Estimates
By Jessica T. Mathews and Jeff Miller
Wednesday, March 31, 2004

The failure to find weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq is frequently portrayed as the result of either intelligence failures or misrepresentation of the intelligence by others. In fact, both were involved. It appears that a third factor was involved as well: misrepresentation of intelligence by the intelligence community itself.

One week before lawmakers were to vote on the use of force in Iraq, the CIA released an unclassified version of its just-completed National Intelligence Estimate (NIE). As the intelligence community's definitive judgments on key issues, NIEs are always important documents on which great care is expended. However, this NIE was unusually important because it was the authoritative assessment of the Iraqi threat available to members of Congress on which to base a decision whether to support or oppose a war.

A close comparison of the unclassified version (CIA White Paper: "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction Programs," published in October 2002) and the original classified NIE (parts of which were declassified and released after the war), reveals striking differences. In addition to changes presumably made to protect sensitive sources and methods, the differences are of two types. Some convey the impression that the intelligence community was much more confident and more united in its views than it actually was. Others appear designed to portray a sense of heightened threat, and particularly of a threat that could touch the U.S. homeland. Sentences and phrases in the classified NIE expressing uncertainty were deleted while new formulations alluding to gathering danger were added.


More....http://www.ceip.org/files/nonprolif/templates/article.asp?NewsID=6178

TOO BAD THE MEDIA NO LONGER GIVES A CRAP ABOUT THIS ISSUE ANYMORE...it is the most serious of all issues....Bush played games with the intelligence and then lied about the Iraqi threat to our country....I dont even think Dems care about this issue anymore. The problem is people, including the media, are lazy and do not want to go to the trouble of investigating this issue. Really sad! Instead they simply blame the CIA and Tenet (not OSP and the WHIG):-(