White House removes transcripts from WH site

[babsbunny]

According to www.bushsamerica.com the July 9th 2003 press gaggle while in Africa use to be at www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07 but it's gone.

[JDPriestly]

1. Does anyone have a copy anyway?

I'd like to know what it is they don't want us to see.

[babsbunny]

2. Just go to

www.bushsamerica.com and you will see a link, while it lasts!

[JDPriestly]

26. Thanks. I copied it to a document I will keep on Word.

It's quite amazing. July 9, 2003.

[The Night Owl]

3. Try Archive...

http://web.archive.org/web/*/www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/

[Jara sang]

13. Weaving spiders come not here.

LOL! :rofl: love your avatar!

[Jazzgirl]

4. Got it saved!

n/t

[Roland99]

7. Where?

[Ilsa]

5. Yeah, the only gaggle I saw was for July 4, 2003.

You'd think they didn't exist for all of July, except the 4th!

[Roland99]

6. They don't have the full URL or you could go to archive.org

[Ioo]

8. I got this tip from DU....

I saw this on another post here, and did some hunting...

So you should thank DU, not me :)

It is also saved on my site itself... just click the more link...

[Roland99]

9. Ah...they show it all in the "Read more" link

THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
(Pretoria, South Africa)
July 9, 2003

PRESS GAGGLE WITH ARI FLEISCHER TO THE TRAVEL POOL

Union House
Pretoria, South Africa

QUESTION: So what's happening this morning?

MR. FLEISCHER: So far, all quiet on the Western front. The President will do the avail. Is this the same pool that is going to be at the avail?

Q: Yes.

MR. FLEISCHER: Looks like it's two and two.

Q: Will we get a readout of the bilat?

MR. FLEISCHER: Yes. What we're going to do is ask Jendayi to come to the filing center I think between 1:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. for the entire press contingent. I think that's the plan right now. I'm not sure Jendayi can do it, but that's what we intended on the schedule.

Q: Anything new on Liberia?

MR. FLEISCHER: No, it's like I said yesterday, it's going to take some time for the assessments to come in, and they've got some thorough work ahead of them.

Q: The assessment team has run into difficulties in getting access to what they would need, is that a problem?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, I'll let DOD go through that. I think it turned out to be less than met the eye and they dealt with it. But DOD can tell you.

Q: Any discussions on the Middle East, Abbas and Sharon? Has there been any --

MR. FLEISCHER: (Inaudible) -- I think I just want to see if there's an update I can get you from either Powell or Condi on it. The President has not made any calls in the last day or two on it. No, it's just -- the Palestinian Authority still has some responsibilities and Abbas is working hard to meet those responsibilities -- internal issues with the Palestinian Authority that he's diligently working his way through.

Q: The fact that Abbas is talking about resigning, is that a cause for concern at this point?

MR. FLEISCHER: Internal policy and politics is complicated for the Palestinians, let alone for outside observers. The President is confident in his leadership and looks forward to continuing to work with him.

Q: So we don't think this is serious, or whether there's a serious possibility --

* * * * *

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: Let me say this on background. It is not an atypical way of internal Palestinian machinations.

Q: Kind of like the White House? (Laughter.) Are you always threatening to quit?

SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL: -- with the President. (Laughter.) The President tells Harriet -- I don't think that's -- (laughter.) It is -- it's just sometimes their way of doing business.

* * * * *

Q: What's the final language, Ari, your final position on the State of the Union speech and the uranium -- I know they were working on stuff last night, but I never got a chance to read it.

Q: Is this on the record?

MR. FLEISCHER: Yes, we're back on the record. After the speech, information was learned about the forged documents. With the advantage of hindsight, it's known now what was not known by the White House prior to the speech. This information should not have risen to the level of a presidential speech. There was reporting, although it wasn't very specific, about Iraq's seeking to obtain uranium from Africa. It's a classic issue of how hindsight is 20-20. The process was followed that led to the information going into the State of the Union; information about the yellow cake was only brought to the White House's attention later.

But there's a bigger picture here, and this is what's fundamental -- the case for war against Iraq was based on the threat that Saddam Hussein posed because of his possession of weapons of mass destruction, chemical and biological, and his efforts to reconstitute a nuclear program. In 1991, everybody in the world underestimated how close he was to getting a nuclear weapon. The case for going to war against Saddam is as just today as it was the day the President gave that speech.

Q: Ambassador Wilson said he made a case months before that there was no basis to the belief --

MR. FLEISCHER: No, he reported that Niger denied the allegation. That's what Ambassador Wilson reported.

Q: Was that report weighed against other --

MR. FLEISCHER: And of course they would deny the allegation. That doesn't make it untrue. It was only later -- you can ask Ambassador Wilson if he reported that the yellow cake documents were forged. He did not. His report did not address whether the documents were forged or not. His report stated that Niger denied the accusation. He spent eight days in Niger and concluded that Niger denied the allegation. Well, typically, nations don't admit to going around nuclear nonproliferation.

Q: But he said there was a basis to believe their denials.

MR. FLEISCHER: That's different from what he reported. The issue here is whether the documents on yellow cake were forged. He didn't address that issue. That's the information that subsequently came to light, not prior to the speech.

Q: Walk us through how much, if any of this --

MR. FLEISCHER: It was based on the national intelligence estimate; it was based on contemporaneous reporting leading up to the speech, which with the advantage of hindsight we now know that the yellow cake ties to Niger were not accurate. But again, in 1991, the world underestimated how close Iraq was to obtaining nuclear weapons. There is a bigger picture here that is just as valid today as it was the day of the speech.

Q: Are we going the other way now in overestimating their ability to reconstitute --

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, obviously the regime is gone, they're not reconstituting anything anymore.

Q: But that really wasn't the question. Did we overestimate his capacity for doing this before the regime was --

MR. FLEISCHER: It remains clear from the United Nations and others that Saddam had biological weapons, chemical weapons that he had not accounted for. Those are weapons of mass destruction. We continue to learn about the Iraqi nuclear program, information such as the scientist who had buried material in his garden for the purpose of bringing it out after the sanctions were imposed. The concerns are valid. The yellow cake report may have turned out to be inaccurate, but the broader concerns remain valid.

So it's important to get this in context. It's important to understand whether one specific sentence based on yellow cake was wrong, that does not change the fundamental case from being right.

Q: Does this increase the onus or the need to come up with significant discoveries of WMD that so far haven't been found?

MR. FLEISCHER: I think the American people continue to express their support for ridding the world of Saddam Hussein based on just cause, knowing that Saddam Hussein had biological and chemical weapons that were unaccounted for that we're still confident we'll find. I think the burden is on those people who think he didn't have weapons of mass destruction to tell the world where they are. We know he had them in the '90s, he used them. So just because they haven't yet been found doesn't mean they didn't exist. The burden is on the critics to explain where the weapons of mass destruction are. If they think they were destroyed, the burden is on them to explain when he destroyed them and where he destroyed them.

Q: What's the estimate on how long it will take, and what more access, if any, they need --

MR. FLEISCHER: It will take as long as it takes until they're discovered. The world is safer.

Q: Ari, back on the State of the Union, is there anything that the White House, that the administration is going to do differently to prevent something like that from happening, like how a piece of information that does not rise to the level that should be included in a speech, that ends up being inaccurate --

MR. FLEISCHER: There's always a thorough vetting process. We'll continue to follow the vetting process. But it is the nature of events that information can later be discovered after a speech -- and when that happens, as is in this case, it's important to be forthright, which is what this administration has done -- to discuss it openly, and that's what this administration has done.

Q: When you talked about the contemporaneous reporting right before the speech, what exactly do you mean?

MR. FLEISCHER: There was the national intelligence estimate, intelligence community.

Q: So you had other reports about Niger and about the yellow cake from Niger.

MR. FLEISCHER: -- part of the intelligence community's reporting leading up to the speech --

Q: There wasn't a lot --

Q: Some British --

MR. FLEISCHER: -- which subsequently -- no, the President in the State of the Union cited the British report. But there had been an independent American report which in the instance of yellow cake, subsequently turned out not to be valid. But keep in mind, again, we've said that about the yellow cake for an extended period of time. This administration has been forthright.

* * * * *

MR. FLEISCHER: Glad you guys made it in there. I was worried sick about you for awhile.

Q: Ari, Prime Minister Blair is coming next week, is that correct?

MR. FLEISCHER: I don't think that's correct.

Q: I've heard -- I thought I heard from somebody at the White House --

MR. FLEISCHER: -- saying I'm paying a little less attention to events after Monday than I used to, but I don't --

Q: I heard he's giving a joint address to Congress --

MR. FLEISCHER: I'll have to look. I don't know. I know there's another head of state visit that you guys know about.

Q: Right, to the ranch.

MR. FLEISCHER: But I'll have to ask.

Q: If you are able to get something on that I'd like to know.

MR. FLEISCHER: Okay.

Q: Is there anything else to link Saddam Hussein's attempt to acquire weapons to Africa, now that this yellow case -- Niger thing has been discussed?

MR. FLEISCHER: Yes, there was other reporting. But as I said, it didn't rise to the level of sufficient specificity. But there was other reports, yes.

Q: Is the President still concerned about Africa being a source -- potential source for these weapons?

MR. FLEISCHER: No, because the regime is gone. The regime is gone. You know, just because something didn't make it to the level where it should have been included in a presidential speech, in hindsight, doesn't mean the information was necessarily inaccurate. It means it should not have risen to his level.

This is the nature of some intelligence information. But, again, this is why I go right back to the bigger point, why did we go to war. We went to war because of chemical weapons, biological weapons. And as you know, in the case of nuclear, there are other issues that go into nuclear, not just yellow cake. So, again, that's why I urge you all to just keep this in perspective about what this one sentence means. And we have been honest about discussing the one sentence -- and I think that it's a case to be fair to the administration.

Q: Apparently, the Iraqi intelligence agent who had met with Atta in Prague, has there been help -- been apprehended, any information on that?

MR. FLEISCHER: I saw a report on it in the media. I don't have anything beyond that.

Q: Can I ask you one thing about AIDS? You know, here is the largest percentage of AIDS in the world, and yet it's not really on the agenda in southern Africa. I know you will be dealing with it in Uganda --

MR. FLEISCHER: It's on the President's agenda.

Q: Well, tell me about it. What is he going to be doing?

MR. FLEISCHER: He's in the meetings now, so we'll have a background briefing later today, and then you'll find out what the President said.

Q: So that's going to be at 3:00 p.m. at the filing center?

MR. FLEISCHER: I don't know what time. Somewhere between 1:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m.

END

[Ioo]

10. hehe Thanks!

:) Thank you for reading my blog...

[JDPriestly]

27. Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

It's just one lie after another. How can this man sleep? His conscience must be killing him.

[eShirl]

11. you'd think they had something to hide

veddy intedestink!

[Jara sang]

12. You can get them from the GPO

US Government Printing Office
Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents
Superintendent of Documents
Washington DC 20402

< 1 > Title: Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents (Relevance: 1000)
Weekly periodical with quarterly, semiannual, and annual indexes. Subscription price covers issues for 1 year. Subscription service begins with the first issue after the order is processed. Copies of the latest 85 issues are retained in stock for individual purchase. Single copy $5.00; foreign single copy $7.00. Domestic priority rate $174.00. Makes available transcripts of the President's news conferences, messages to Congress, public speeches and statements, and other presidential materials, released by the White House. PD. File Code 3A. Item 577-A.
Price: $ 133.00

http://bookstore.gpo.gov/collections/gwbush_papers.html

[Semi_subversive]

14. Business as usual

[nonny]

15. U.S. Department of State Press Briefing July 10, 2003

http://www.fas.org/irp/news/2003/07/dos071003.html


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

U.S. Department of State
Press Briefing
Secretary Colin L. Powell
Holiday Inn
Pretoria, South Africa
July 10, 2003


<...>

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, regarding that erroneous report last January that Saddam Hussein tried to buy uranium in Niger, does the administration owe Americans and, in fact, the world an apology for making that statement? And should the administration beat Congress to the punch by making a detailed investigation and a detailed explanation of how something so important and so wrong got into a presidential address?

SECRETARY POWELL: I think this is very overwrought and overblown and overdrawn. Intelligence reports flow in from all over. Sometimes they are results of your own intelligence agencies at work. Sometimes you get information from very capable foreign intelligence services. And you get the information, you analyze it. Sometimes it holds up, sometimes it does not hold up. It's a moving train. And you keep trying to establish what is right and what is wrong. Very often it never comes out quite that clean, but you have to make judgments.

And at the time of the President's State of the Union address, a judgment was made that that was an appropriate statement for the President to make. There was no effort or attempt on the part of the President, or anyone else in the administration, to mislead or to deceive the American people. The President was presenting what seemed to be a reasonable statement at that time -- and it didn't talk to Niger, it talked specifically about efforts to acquire uranium from nations that had it in Africa.

Subsequently, when we looked at it more thoroughly and when I think it's, oh, a week or two later, when I made my presentation to the United Nations and we really went through every single thing we knew about all of the various issues with respect to weapons of mass destruction, we did not believe that it was appropriate to use that example anymore. It was not standing the test of time. And so I didn't use it, and we haven't used it since.

But to think that somehow we went out of our way to insert this single sentence into the State of the Union address for the purpose of deceiving and misleading the American people is an overdrawn, overblown, overwrought conclusion.

QUESTION: So can I follow that up -- some British officials apparently think that what will happen in the end is weapons of mass destruction will not be found. There may be evidence that Saddam Hussein, before the war, either hid or destroyed weapons of mass destruction. Is that now what this administration thinks?

SECRETARY POWELL: No. And I cannot speculate on what an unnamed British official may or may not have said, or does or does not believe. Let's start at the beginning. I don't want to take you through the whole history, but it's instructive.

This is a regime that developed weapons of mass destruction, had them, used them, and in 1991, when we went to war, and I was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, we were concerned that they would use those weapons against them -- against us, and everybody knew they had them.

When the first Gulf War was over, Desert Storm, we found them, and we destroyed some. And we looked for more. And the U.N. took it over, and for years the U.N. kept searching for more. And they never were able to get a full accounting and could not find them all. Resolution after resolution was passed, agreed to by the entire international community.

In 1998, Saddam Hussein created conditions that caused the inspectors to have to leave. They were getting close, and they had to leave. President Clinton was so concerned at time that he bombed. What did he bomb? He bombed for four days, in Operation Desert Fox, facilities that were believed to possess or developing or producing weapons of mass destruction.

The entire international community has felt, over this entire period, that Saddam Hussein had these weapons, and there was sufficient intelligence available to all the major intelligence agencies of the world that they existed. And they do exist. And when we went to the United Nations last year, when the President spoke to the United Nations General Assembly last September, he put the charge to the General Assembly: you have been saying; put the charge to the Security Council as well, you have been saying for all these years that this is a nation that has not come clean, here is one last chance.

And in resolution 1441, 15 nations unanimously approved that resolution that begins with a statement that Iraq is in material breach. So everybody had reason to believe, good reason to believe -- not figments of the imagination -- that they had weapons of mass destruction and had programs to develop more. And if there is anybody who thinks that Saddam Hussein had ever lost the intent to have such weapons, then I think that is the most naive view imaginable. And he had the chance to come clean to the international community; he did not take that chance, he did not take that opportunity. And the war followed.

And we have now removed a tyrant, a dictator. We have freed people. We have found the mass graves. We have found -- we are starting to find evidence that I think will make it clear that there was a more than adequate justification for this war and more than adequate authority for it under Resolution 1441.

<...>

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, I believe you mentioned that the President in the State of the Union didn't mention Niger; he mentioned Africa.

SECRETARY POWELL: Right.

QUESTION: Do you think the other intelligence that was involved, has it stood the test of time? The Niger didn't. Did the other intelligence that went into that, did it stand --

SECRETARY POWELL: I think so. The definitive presentation of our intelligence case, frankly, was the presentation I made on the 5th of February. I spent an enormous amount of time with many of my colleagues and with a large part of the top leadership of the CIA, as well as a lot of the working-level analysts of the CIA, closeted in Langley at CIA headquarters for four days and three nights -- or it might be four weeks and three months -- it felt like it. And we were there well into the night, until midnight, 1:00 a.m. every morning, going over everything. We had lots and lots of information. The challenge was to get it down to that which was absolutely supportable and we were confident of.

There were a lot of items of information that I could have used if I had had three hours or three days. And there were other items of information that were pretty good, but maybe we didn't have a second, third, fourth source on, so let's not lead with that.

And the case I put down on the 5th of February, for an hour and 20 minutes, roughly, on terrorism, on weapons of mass destruction and on the human rights case -- a short section at the end -- we stand behind. And the credibility of the United States was at stake when that presentation was put forward. And I spent the afternoon waiting for the reaction -- not just your reaction, as important as that might be -- but I wanted to see what the Iraqis were going to do. I was interested to see what their response was going to be.

And I waited that afternoon and the next morning, I waited to see what their response was going to be. The first response was predictable: it's all a bunch of lies -- just as they'd been saying for 12 years, all a bunch of lies. And then I waited for, okay, hit me on something, attack some part of the presentation. Well, they're phony intercepts -- nonsense, they're real. I heard the actual -- you heard the voices. And then the only thing that came up over the next several days was a debate about one of the pictures I showed, as to whether those were chemical weapons bunkers or not. And that pretty much was it in the way of a counterattack.

One item I showed was cartoons of the mobile biological van. They were cartoons, artist's renderings, because we had never seen one of these things, but we had good sourcing on it, excellent sourcing on it. And we knew what it would look like when we found it, so we made those pictures. And I can assure you I didn't just throw those pictures up without having quite a bit of confidence in the information that I had been provided and that Director Tenet had been provided and was now supporting me in the presentation on, sitting right behind me.

And we waited. And it took a couple of months, and it took until after the war, until we found a van and another van that pretty much matched what we said it would look like. And I think that's a pretty good indication that we were not cooking the books.

And what I keep saying to people is, if that was really a hydrogen maker for a weather balloon, and I'm Saddam Hussein or the Minister of Information we all got to know and love so well, that van would have been pulled out the next orning and they would have tried to blow us out of the water as they blew up a weather balloon. They didn't, they couldn't, they never showed -- they brought other vehicles forward; they never brought that one out.

And so it stood the test of time. It stood the test of time a couple of weeks ago, when, if you'll go back to the presentation on nuclear capability and weapons, I said that they had the brainpower, I said they had the infrastructure, and they've never lost the intention, and they have hidden components of their program. I talked about the centrifuge. And I made the point then that there was a difference of opinion about the centrifuge and let's continue to study it. I didn't use the uranium at that point, because I didn't think that was sufficiently strong as evidence to present before the world. And what did we see two weeks ago? An Iraqi scientist coming forward with a bunch of diagrams and blueprints and some centrifuge parts that he dug up out of his yard.

And so I think as you let Mr. Kay and the ISG that support the team that's out there looking at this stuff continue to look, continue to interview people, continue to pore through all the documents that we have, I think the case will no longer be in doubt.

QUESTION: -- describe the process you went through on Niger, was it just that they only had a single source? It appears from what we've heard, the British had some report and they kind of went on a single source. Is that what it turned out to be --

SECRETARY POWELL: What I had available to me, as we went through this -- I can't recover all from my failing, fading, aging memory, but there wasn't enough that would say, take this one to the U.N. next week. So we didn't. We weren't trying to over-sell a case.

Now, the British, as you noticed in the last day or two, still feel that they have enough information to make the claims that they have made. And I would not dispute them or disagree with them, or say they're wrong and we're right, or we're right and they're wrong. I wouldn't do that. Because intelligence is of that nature. Some people have more sources than others on a particular issue; some people have greater confidence in their analysis. And what I've found over many years of experience in this business is, at the end of the day, you're essentially making -- very, very often -- judgment calls, as opposed to an absolute, 100-percent certain fact. When you have 100-percent certain fact, it's great. But very often, you're making judgment calls. And, you know, remember, the reason they call it intelligence is that people are working very, very hard to keep you from knowing the truth.

QUESTION: If I could follow. I mean, let's say the American people assume that the administration was not intending to mislead or misinform. Why doesn't the administration see it as an issue of credibility when it comes to the President's State of the Union address? I mean, this is a statement of record. The President used this, he used the facts to make the case that Saddam Hussein was trying to build up his nuclear weapons arsenal, and making a case for war to the American people. Why is this not an issue of credibility when it comes to the President's delivering his State of the Union address and using that misinformation?

SECRETARY POWELL: I think the President in the State of the Union address had this sentence in there and it talked about efforts on the part of Iraq to obtain uranium from sources in Africa. There was sufficient evidence floating around at that time that such a statement was not totally outrageous or not to be believed or not to be appropriately used. It's that once we used the statement and, after further analysis and looking at other estimates we had and other information that was coming in, it turned out that the basis upon which that statement was made didn't hold up. And we said so. And we've acknowledged it and we've moved on.

I'm not troubled by this. I think the American people will put this in context and perspective, and understand perfectly why the President felt it was necessary to undertake this military operation with a willing coalition, in order to remove this tyrant from office, to make sure there are no morequestions about weapons of mass destruction, because the regime that was determined to have them is gone. And we now have to focus on the future, and that is to build a better Iraq for the Iraqi people, and help them put in place a representative form of government that will make sure that there are never any more weapons of mass destruction in this country, and that it's a country that will live in peace with its neighbors. And we can chew on the sentence and the State of the Union address forever, but I don't think it undercuts the President's credibility.

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, the point is, I think, that very little time passed between the State of the Union address and your presentation to the U.N., little more than a week. You know as well as anyone how carefully a State of the Union message is vetted, there are speechwriters and agency people from far and wide fighting to get their material into the speech, to make it a priority. This was clearly one of the keynote aspects of the President's speech, the case against Iraq. It's in the speech, it's in the State of the Union. Yet eight days later, you go before the U.N. and it's not credible any longer. How quickly does information, intelligence, wither away? And does the fact that it withered away to the point where you wouldn't use it eight days later suggest -- with the benefit of hindsight -- that there should have been more questions about it?

SECRETARY POWELL: Well, with the benefit of hindsight, as we have said, it's a statement that, upon reflection and the test of time, we've acknowledged that there was trouble with it. And so -- yes?

QUESTION: But does intelligence usually get reevaluated so quickly?

SECRETARY POWELL: At the time it was put into the State of the Union, my best understanding of this is that it had been seen by the intelligence community and vetted. But on subsequent examination, it didn't hold up, and we have acknowledged that.

QUESTION: Who at the State Department vetted the President's speech with that line in the President's speech? Can you give us their names and their recommendations to the President?

SECRETARY POWELL: I saw the speech and I don't remember the specific line in the speech, but we all at a senior level get a chance to look at a State of the Union address. I saw it, and -- the whole speech -- and it was my understanding that it had been seen and cleared by the intelligence community.

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, you talked about intelligence being a process of judgment often. And I think what we're trying to get to is an understanding of the sense of urgency that the administration portrayed about the Iraqi threat before the war began. Was the underpinning of that intelligence making statements that were not totally outrageous? Or was it a determination to find the most credible understanding of the threat to present to the American people? In other words, we're looking for why a statement that is simply not outrageous would have been included in the President's State of the Union address, and not something that was thoroughly vetted and known to be true?

SECRETARY POWELL: I can't tell you more than what I've said to you, that the sentence in the State of the Union was not put in there without the knowledge and approval of the intelligence community that saw the speech. And what level and who, I don't know.

<...>



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source: State Department
http://www.fas.org/irp/news/2003/07/dos071003.html

[nonny]

23. Powell Discusses President's Trip to Africa July 10, 2003

I think this is same as above --- but I found the WH site
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030710-5.html

Secretary of State Powell Discusses President's Trip to Africa
Press Briefing by Secretary of State Colin Powell
Holiday Inn
Pretoria, South Africa
July 10, 2003

snip---

Q Mr. Secretary, regarding that erroneous report last January that Saddam Hussein tried to buy uranium in Niger, does the administration owe Americans and, in fact, the world an apology for making that statement? And should the administration beat Congress to the punch by making a detailed investigation and a detailed explanation of how something so important and so wrong got into a presidential address?

SECRETARY POWELL: I think this is very overwrought and overblown and overdrawn. Intelligence reports flow in from all over. Sometimes they are results of your own intelligence agencies at work. Sometimes you get information from very capable foreign intelligence services. And you get the information, you analyze it. Sometimes it holds up, sometimes it does not hold up. It's a moving train. And you keep trying to establish what is right and what is wrong. Very often it never comes out quite that clean, but you have to make judgments.

And at the time of the President's State of the Union address, a judgment was made that that was an appropriate statement for the President to make. There was no effort or attempt on the part of the President, or anyone else in the administration, to mislead or to deceive the American people. The President was presenting what seemed to be a reasonable statement at that time -- and it didn't talk to Niger, it talked specifically about efforts to acquire uranium from nations that had it in Africa.

Subsequently, when we looked at it more thoroughly and when I think it's, oh, a week or two later, when I made my presentation to the United Nations and we really went through every single thing we knew about all of the various issues with respect to weapons of mass destruction, we did not believe that it was appropriate to use that example anymore. It was not standing the test of time. And so I didn't use it, and we haven't used it since.

But to think that somehow we went out of our way to insert this single sentence into the State of the Union address for the purpose of deceiving and misleading the American people is an overdrawn, overblown, overwrought conclusion.

Q So can I follow that up -- some British officials apparently think that what will happen in the end is weapons of mass destruction will not be found. There may be evidence that Saddam Hussein, before the war, either hid or destroyed weapons of mass destruction. Is that now what this administration thinks?

SECRETARY POWELL: No. And I cannot speculate on what an unnamed British official may or may not have said, or does or does not believe. Let's start at the beginning. I don't want to take you through the whole history, but it's instructive.

This is a regime that developed weapons of mass destruction, had them, used them, and in 1991, when we went to war, and I was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, we were concerned that they would use those weapons against them -- against us, and everybody knew they had them.

When the first Gulf War was over, Desert Storm, we found them, and we destroyed some. And we looked for more. And the U.N. took it over, and for years the U.N. kept searching for more. And they never were able to get a full accounting and could not find them all. Resolution after resolution was passed, agreed to by the entire international community.

In 1998, Saddam Hussein created conditions that caused the inspectors to have to leave. They were getting close, and they had to leave. President Clinton was so concerned at time that he bombed. What did he bomb? He bombed for four days, in Operation Desert Fox, facilities that were believed to possess or developing or producing weapons of mass destruction.

The entire international community has felt, over this entire period, that Saddam Hussein had these weapons, and there was sufficient intelligence available to all the major intelligence agencies of the world that they existed. And they do exist. And when we went to the United Nations last year, when the President spoke to the United Nations General Assembly last September, he put the charge to the General Assembly: you have been saying; put the charge to the Security Council as well, you have been saying for all these years that this is a nation that has not come clean, here is one last chance.

And in resolution 1441, 15 nations unanimously approved that resolution that begins with a statement that Iraq is in material breach. So everybody had reason to believe, good reason to believe -- not figments of the imagination-- that they had weapons of mass destruction and had programs to develop more. And if there is anybody who thinks that Saddam Hussein had ever lost the intent to have such weapons, then I think that is the most naive view imaginable. And he had the chance to come clean to the international community; he did not take that chance, he did not take that opportunity. And the war followed.

And we have now removed a tyrant, a dictator. We have freed people. We have found the mass graves. We have found-- we are starting to find evidence that I think will make it clear that there was a more than adequate justification for this war and more than adequate authority for it under Resolution 1441.
snip---

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030710-5.html

[nonny]

16. Press Gaggle by Ari Fleischer July 7, 2003

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030707-5.html

Press Gaggle by Ari Fleischer
The James S. Brady Briefing Room
July 7, 2003

9:34 A.M. EDT

MR. FLEISCHER: Good morning. The President began this morning with his intelligence briefing, then had an FBI briefing. At 10:40 a.m. this morning the President will tour a Head Start Center at the Highland Park Elementary School in Washington, and then he will make remarks on early childhood development. He will urge Congress to take action to reauthorize the Head Start program. This is something that the President feels very strongly about as an important way to help children get on with early development and early learning, particularly with early reading.

He wants to make sure that in addition to giving children the right nutrition and regular medical care, that Head Start serves as a platform from which students can begin to read and learn at a very young age. Based on science, he knows it can be done. He wants to make sure we're doing everything we can to improve education for our children. That will be the tenor of his remarks.

Then he will return to the White House. Then he will depart this evening for his trip to Africa. That's it on the President's agenda. So, with that, I'm all yours.

Q What is the President's thinking at this stage about sending peacekeepers to Liberia?

MR. FLEISCHER: The assessment team has landed on the ground and the President awaits their reports. They will engage in a number of conversations with regional -- with nations in the region. And we have not yet received their reports back. We will await their reports before the President makes any call.

Q Do you think it could be a number of days?

MR. FLEISCHER: I am going to try to get you some type of update on timing later. What I will try to do is we'll let you know if something can be ruled in or ruled out, in terms of today, at least. I don't know the answer to that yet, I've asked -- I anticipate I will have a handle on that shortly, and we'll spread the word.

Q How quickly is the team expected to file its report, or is there a deadline for its report?

MR. FLEISCHER: You need to ask DOD for how much time they anticipate it will take. These are DOD officials, they are DOD experts and the President did not impose a timetable on them. He will allow them the time that they think is necessary to do it right.

Q How quickly does he want the information to come back, given the gravity of the situation inside Liberia?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, he wants it to come back in a way that makes certain that it's accurate and it is thorough. So, again, he has not imposed a timetable on the team.

Q Will this be primarily a strategic mission, to put peacekeepers in Liberia, that we have strategic worries? Or is it a moral mission that we have an obligation to Liberia, given the history of the country> Or is it both?

MR. FLEISCHER: It's both. The President said that during his roundtables last week.

Q Are you still talking about peacekeeping, per se, or have you -- is the sense that perhaps they would go on more of a humanitarian -- to help assist in humanitarian needs?

MR. FLEISCHER: Again, I'm not going to speculate about what the mission will be for a force that has not yet been decided on whether it will or will not be sent. So I think this is why the assessment team is on the ground, to determine what is necessary and I can't predict what the outcome will be.

Q On Taylor's statement yesterday, is that encouraging to you or -- and do you have any sense from --

MR. FLEISCHER: In recent days he's now twice indicated that he will leave. This remains encouraging, but at the end of the day it still remains essential that he leave, that actions follow words -- this is a question of deeds.

So it remains encouraging, but the President will still wait and see to make certain that he does, indeed, go. That is a vital first step in order for stability to be maintained.

Q "Wait and see" meaning wait and see before any troops could go in? Is that what you mean by "wait and see"?

MR. FLEISCHER: The President has always said what is essential is for, first, Mr. Taylor to leave, so that stability can be achieved.

Q Ari, three more soldiers, American soldiers have lost their life in the last 24 hours. What can be done? It seems to be a daily occurrence.

MR. FLEISCHER: What can be done is the continued dedication to fighting these elements that are loyal to Saddam Hussein or who are interested in bringing harm to the American military.

It's important to recognize that these people are the worst enemies of the Iraqi people. Those who engage in the murder of American military personnel, who are there to help reconstruct Iraq, do great harm to the Iraqi people. There are a number of them operating in a limited area. Their actions are at odds with the situation in most of the rest of Iraq, where the reconstruction efforts are accelerating, where conditions are peaceful. But there are certain very bad neighborhoods in one particular region where it is a dangerous, dangerous place. And the American military is there in a dangerous mission to help bring stability to the Iraqi people, and they will remain dedicated to achieving that mission.

Q Ari, Senator Warner said yesterday that he'd like an up or down vote in Congress before the President commits troops to Liberia. Is that something you all will seek or think is necessary?

MR. FLEISCHER: Again, the President has made no decision. The President will, as required by the law, engage in all the appropriate consultations. But the President has not made a decision about sending anybody yet so I can't, again, speculate about every action that will or will not happen. But the President will consult.

Q Ari, a little bit more on Charles Taylor. In the discussions with the President of Nigeria, is the asylum that is being talked about -- and apparently awkward -- temporary? Was there a deal made where he will not be tried as a war criminal? And did he give the President of Nigeria and President Bush any definitive timetable as to when he is going to step down?

MR. FLEISCHER: I'm still working off of the media reports about what Mr. Taylor has said. I don't know, Michael, if we did get official confirmation from the embassy in Liberia about Mr. Taylor's statements. But, nevertheless, I have no reason to doubt the media reports, let me put it that way.

And, again, these are encouraging reports that have to be followed by deeds.

Q No deal cut on not trying him as a war criminal?

MR. FLEISCHER: No, the first step is for him to leave. He hasn't left yet, so let events take their course.

Q Going back on Iraq, what is the President's thought on -- realizing, of course, that the military is conducting a review of whether more troops are needed -- but what is the President's position if they should say more troops are needed? Would he rule out the possibility of calling up more reserves or --

MR. FLEISCHER: Again, General Myers addressed this yesterday and his statement was that he's in regular contact to make sure that they have every resource that they need. It's an ongoing part of the mission to constantly review needs, and General Myers did not indicate there would be any changes at this time. So the President delegates these matters to the Department of Defense. They review it on a regular basis to make certain that they're doing everything necessary.

Q But the President wouldn't rule out the possibility of calling out more reserves, if they thought --

MR. FLEISCHER: According to General Myers, yesterday, it's not an issue for today so, I mean, there is nothing to speculate about.

Q Ari, is there any more to report on progress toward getting some other countries to send troops over to Iraq?

MR. FLEISCHER: Into Iraq?

Q Yes.

MR. FLEISCHER: The conversations continue with nations around the world and there are a host of integration issues that get dealt with, with this. And DOD has got the lead on that, as well as State, you may want to check with them.

Q Can I ask you a quick question on Head Start? There have been a lot of critics who say that the President's reforms in Head Start, or changes in the proposals going in, would kind of emasculate the existing program. What do you say to that?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, what's notable is when the President refers to some of the changes that he seeks in Head Start -- the President's changes are bipartisan, they're supported by the nation's governors, Democrat and Republican alike. Any criticism seems to be coming from only one party, and that's a liberal wing of one party.

And so the President is acting in a very bipartisan way as a governor -- as a former governor -- who is experienced in the Head Start program and how to make it the most effective to help children. The President has a long record of being a reformer and a leader in helping children to get the best education for public schools. And the nation's governors, on a bipartisan basis, are working with the President on this. So I dismiss those criticisms as coming from a very small, but liberal, faction. The President is pleased to be a bipartisan education leader and reformer who will continue to work with bipartisan governors to make Head Start do more for our children.

Q Can you give us the White House account of Ambassador Wilson's account of what happened when he went to Niger and investigated the suggestions that Niger was passing yellow cake to Iraq? I'm sure you saw the piece yesterday in The New York Times.

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, there is zero, nada, nothing new here. Ambassador Wilson, other than the fact that now people know his name, has said all this before. But the fact of the matter is in his statements about the Vice President -- the Vice President's office did not request the mission to Niger. The Vice President's office was not informed of his mission and he was not aware of Mr. Wilson's mission until recent press accounts -- press reports accounted for it.

So this was something that the CIA undertook as part of their regular review of events, where they sent him. But they sent him on their own volition, and the Vice President's office did not request it. Now, we've long acknowledged -- and this is old news, we've said this repeatedly -- that the information on yellow cake did, indeed, turn out to be incorrect.

Q Ari, has it yet been determined whether or not the -- last week Saddam tape did contain the voice of Saddam Hussein?

MR. FLEISCHER: I will have to check with the CIA to get an update. I've received some preliminary information, but let me see if there any more final or more updated information, and if there is I will see what we can do with it.

Q Ari, going back to Iraq and additional forces, a number of lawmakers over the weekend said they wanted to see a sizable force under the NATO umbrella, not just individual commitments from other countries. Can you tell us at this point why the administration is still resistant to bring in NATO? Under NATO, tho -- Lord Robertson indicated he was still willing not just assisting Poland, but willing to go in with a sizable force if Washington would ask.

MR. FLEISCHER: We're having conversations with NATO. We would welcome NATO's participation.

Q A force, though, under the NATO umbrella?

MR. FLEISCHER: You mean putting the 150,000 American forces under NATO?

Q No, no, additional sizeable under NATO.

MR. FLEISCHER: We've never ruled out using NATO.

Q But are you making a request to NATO to use forces?

MR. FLEISCHER: I think we've had conversations with NATO about it. That's how these things develop. We've never had any objections to NATO.

Q But in terms of making an actual formal request?

MR. FLEISCHER: Obviously, NATO is about to take over the ISAF in Afghanistan. NATO has commitments. And we are continuing to have conversations. I was in the Oval Office meeting with the President when he met with Lord Robertson and they discussed whether NATO could have a role in Iraq. It's something that the United States is open to. It's something we're open to. We're talking to NATO about it. So, no, there is no reluctance there.

Q Ari, there is some concern that if there is too large a window between Charles Taylor's departure and the arrival of U.S. peacekeepers that it might embolden rebels in Liberia to charge the capital. Does the President have a message for the rebels in Liberia, and what's being done to prevent that from happening?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, there is a cease-fire that is in place and continues to hold. And I assure you that any actions that the President make take here, if he does decide to take, will be taken with an eye toward increasing stability. The President is cognizant of the moving pieces and sequencing of events. And if any action is taken, stability, security will be forefront in the President's mind.

Q I just want to take you back to your answer before, when you said you have long acknowledged that the information on yellow cake turned out to be incorrect. If I remember right, you only acknowledged the Niger part of it as being incorrect -- I think what the --

MR. FLEISCHER: That's correct.

Q I think what the President said during his State of the Union was he --

MR. FLEISCHER: When I refer to yellow cake I refer to Niger. The question was on the context of Ambassador Wilson's mission.

Q So are you saying the President's broader reference to Africa, which included other countries that were named in the NIE, were those also incorrect?

MR. FLEISCHER: Well, I think the President's statement in the State of the Union was much broader than the Niger question.

Q Is the President's statement correct?

MR. FLEISCHER: I'm referring specifically to the Niger piece when I say that.

Q Do you hold that the President -- when you look at the totality of the sentence that the President uttered that day on the subject, are you confident that he was correct?

MR. FLEISCHER: Yes, I see nothing that goes broader that would indicate that there was no basis to the President's broader statement. But specifically on the yellow cake, the yellow cake for Niger, we've acknowledged that that information did turn out to be a forgery.

Q The President's statement was accurate?

MR. FLEISCHER: We see nothing that would dissuade us from the President's broader statement.

Q Ari, that means that, indeed, you all believe that Saddam Hussein was trying to obtain uranium from an African nation; is that correct?

MR. FLEISCHER: What the President said in his statement was that according to a British report they were trying to obtain uranium. When I answered the question it was, again, specifically about the Niger piece involving yellow cake.

Q So you believe the British report that he was trying to obtain uranium from an African nation is true?

MR. FLEISCHER: I'm sorry?

Q If you're hanging on the British report, you believe that that British report was true, you have no reason to believe --

MR. FLEISCHER: I'm sorry, I see what David is asking. Let me back up on that and explain the President's statement again, or the answer to it.

The President's statement was based on the predicate of the yellow cake from Niger. The President made a broad statement. So given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the President's broader statement, David. So, yes, the President' broader statement was based and predicated on the yellow cake from Niger.

Q So it was wrong?

MR. FLEISCHER: That's what we've acknowledged with the information on --

Q The President's statement at the State of the Union was incorrect?

MR. FLEISCHER: Because it was based on the yellow cake from Niger.

Q Well, wait a minute, but the explanation we've gotten before was it was based on Niger and the other African nations that have been named in the national intelligence --

MR. FLEISCHER: But, again, the information on -- the President did not have that information prior to his giving the State of the Union.

Q Which gets to the crux of what Ambassador Wilson is now alleging -- that he provided this information to the State Department and the CIA 11 months before the State of the Union and he is amazed that it, nonetheless, made it into the State of the Union address. He believes that that information was deliberately ignored by the White House. Your response to that?

MR. FLEISCHER: And that's way, again, he's making the statement that -- he is saying that surely the Vice President must have known, or the White House must have known. And that's not the case, prior to the State of the Union.

Q He's saying that surely people at the decision-making level within the NSC would have known the information which he -- passed on to both the State Department and the CIA.

MR. FLEISCHER: And the information about the yellow cake and Niger was not specifically known prior to the State of the Union by the White House.

Q What does that say about communications?

MR. FLEISCHER: We've acknowledged that the information turned out to be bogus involving the report on the yellow cake. That is not new. You can go back. You can look it up. Dr. Rice has said it repeatedly. I've said it repeatedly. It's been said from this podium on the record, in several instances. It's been said to many of you in this room, specifically.

Q But, Ari, even if you said that the Niger thing was wrong, the next line has usually been that the President's statement was deliberately broader than Niger, it referred to all of Africa. The national intelligence estimate discusses other countries in Africa that there were attempts to purchase yellow cake from, or other sources of uranium --

MR. FLEISCHER: Let me do this, David. On your specific question I'm going to come back and post the specific answer on the broader statement on the speech.

Last one?

All right, no last one. I'll accept that. No briefing today. So we will see you -- I guess we won't see you in Africa.

Q -- will you post something later?

MR. FLEISCHER: I'll just get the word out. If you don't hear from me, just assume that there is nothing new that moves the ball today.

END 9:52 A.M. EDT

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030707-5.html

[Ioo]

17. Oddly, if you look

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/

July 7, 2003
President's Interview With South African Broadcasting
President Discusses Strengthening Head Start en Español
watchVideo listenAudio
Nominations Sent to the Senate
Presidential Letter

No Press link there.... why was it removed from the list?

[nonny]

19. Yes -- I think it was removed

I have been hunting through google --- because there is always more than one way to find stuff.

"No Press link there.... why was it removed from the list?"

Hmmm --- maybe they didn't want us to read it again.

[nonny]

18. Press Gaggle with Ari Fleischer and Dr. Condoleeza Rice July 11, 2003

Press Gaggle with Ari Fleischer and Dr. Condoleeza Rice
Aboard Air Force One
En Route Entebbe, Uganda
July 11, 2003

12:15 P.M. (Local)

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030711-7.html

snip---


Q Dr. Rice, there are a lot of reports, apparently overnight, that CIA people had informed the NSC well before the State of the Union that they had trouble the reference in the speech. Can you tell us specifically what your office had heard, what you had passed along to the President on that?

DR. RICE: The CIA cleared the speech. We have a clearance process that sends speeches out to relevant agencies -- in our case, the NSC, it's usually State, Defense, the CIA, sometimes the Treasury. The CIA cleared the speech in its entirety.

Now, the sentence in question comes from the notion the Iraqis were seeking yellow cake. And, remember, it says, "seeking yellow cake in Africa" is there in the National Intelligence Estimate. The National Intelligence Estimate is the document the that Director of Central Intelligence publishes as the collective view of the intelligence agencies about the status of any particular issue.

That was relied on to, like many other things in the National Intelligence Estimate, relied on to write the President's speech. The CIA cleared on it. There was even some discussion on that specific sentence, so that it reflected better what the CIA thought. And the speech was cleared.

Now, I can tell you, if the CIA, the Director of Central Intelligence, had said, take this out of the speech, it would have been gone, without question. What we've said subsequently is, knowing what we now know, that some of the Niger documents were apparently forged, we wouldn't have put this in the President's speech -- but that's knowing what we know now.

The President of the United States, we have a higher standard for what we put in presidential speeches. The British continue to stand by their report. The CIA's NIE continues to talk about efforts to acquire yellow cake in various African countries. But we have a high standard for the President's speeches. We don't make the President his own fact witness, we have a high standard for them. That's why we send them out for clearance. And had we heard from the DCI or the Agency that they didn't want that sentence in the speech, it would not have been in the speech. The President was not going to get up and say something that the CIA --

Q Dr. Rice, it sounds as if you're blaming the CIA here.

DR. RICE: No, this is a clearance process. And a lot of things happen. We've said now we wouldn't have put it in the speech if we had known what we know now. This was a process that we've followed many, many times. But I can just assure you that if -- and I think -- maybe you want to ask this question of the DCI, but we've talked about it. If the DCI had said, there's a problem with this, we would have said it's out of the speech.

For whatever reason -- and I'm not blaming anybody. The State of the Union -- people are writing speeches, a lot is going on. But I can assure you that the President did not knowingly, before the American people, say something that we thought to be false. It's just outrageous that anybody would claim that. He did not knowingly say anything that we thought to be false. And, in fact, we still don't know the status of Saddam Hussein's efforts to acquire yellow cake. What we know is that one of the documents underlying that case was found to be a forgery.

Q Dr. Rice, given that, does the President -- given that the CIA cleared the speech, does the President remain confident in the CIA's Director?

DR. RICE: Absolutely. The CIA Director, George Tenet, has been a terrific DCI and he has served everybody very, very well. And we have a good relationship with the CIA. We wouldn't put anything knowingly in the speech that was false; I'm sure they wouldn't put anything knowingly in the speech that was false. In this case, this particular line shouldn't have gotten in because it was not of the quality that we would put into presidential speeches, despite the fact that it was in the NIE --

Q But, Condi, it's apparently the case that the CIA didn't even check the documents, didn't even discover the forgery until after the speech. And now there's a report that in September of '02 -- if I have this correct -- the Post is saying the CIA was encouraging the British to back off of that claim. So I'm trying to understand the sequencing here. Are you saying -- so my question is, in hindsight, would you say that the CIA did not properly vet this alleged sale?

DR. RICE: David, this was a complicated matter of a sale. There were other reports, as well, about Saddam Hussein trying to acquire yellow cake. It was not this Niger document alone. There are even other African countries that are cited in the NIE, not just Niger.

We also knew, let's remember, that this is the context of a nuclear program in which the seeking of yellow cake is only a small piece of the story. It includes training of nuclear scientists; it includes rebuilding certain infrastructure that had been associated with nuclear weapons; it includes a clandestine procurement network. Things that we're finding out now -- for instance, that the scientist buried uranium -- I'm sorry, centrifuge pieces in his front yard. So one thing that you have to do is to put this piece about seeking yellow cake in the broader context of what was known to be an active effort by the Iranians to try and reconstitute their program.

But let me just go to the point you made, David. The CIA -- I've read the reports that you've also read, that there were -- the British were told they shouldn't put this in the paper. I've read those reports. All that I can tell you is that if there were doubts about the underlying intelligence in the NIE, those doubts were not communicated to the President. The only thing that was there in the NIE was a kind of a standard INR footnote, which is kind of 59 pages away from the bulk of the NIE. That's the only thing that's there. And you have footnotes all the time in CIA -- I mean, in NIEs. So if there was a concern about the underlying intelligence there, the President was unaware of that concern and as was I.

Q You just said that the sentence, itself, was constructed reflecting some thoughts that the CIA had on the doubt. If I recall, the President said in his speech that, the British are reporting this -- about the transfer. Should we infer from that that there were some doubts within the Agency about the veracity of the claim, so that in the speech it was safer to defer to what was the British intelligence that they were confident in?

DR. RICE: The British document was an unclassified document, and so cite the unclassified document. The underlying intelligence to the British document is in the NIE, which is both talking about what a foreign service had said and talking about other attempts to acquire yellow cake. So the underlying documentation here is the NIE. The Agency cleared the speech and cleared it in its entirety.

Q If I could just follow up. On that sentence, you said that the CIA changed the -- that things were done to accommodate the CIA. What was done?

DR. RICE: Some specifics about amount and place were taken out.

Q -- taken out then?

DR. RICE: Some specifics about amount and place were taken out.

Q Was "place" Niger?

Q You won't say what place --

DR. RICE: No, there are several -- there are several African countries noted. And if you say -- if you notice, it says "Africa," it doesn't say "Niger."

MR. FLEISCHER: Yes. To be clear, the sentence in the State of the Union, just off the top of my head, stated, according to British reports, Iraq is seeking to acquire uranium from African nations or Africa. That's the sentence that was stated.

Q Dr. Rice, if the intelligence was the same used by the British government and by your government, and you had doubts about this, did you communicate to the British government at some stage that their continuing insistence --

DR. RICE: You'll have to ask the CIA what they communicated to the British government. I'm not -- I don't know --

Q But they were still wedded to this information while you, at some stage, already said, well, this is not --

DR. RICE: No, no. That's not what we said. Let's go back over what it is we've said. We've said that given subsequent information abut the Niger documents, this -- and some of the apparent uncertainty that was out there -- it doesn't rise to the level that we would put in a presidential speech. We don't say it's false. And I heartily object to headlines that say it was false, because nobody has still said that this was false. There are still reports out there that they sought materials from the DROC, that they sought materials from Somalia. In fact, there is -- if you look at what has even come back on Niger, it says that the Niger government denies that they sold it. So I'm not standing here to say to you, we know that these claims about Africa are false.

What I'm saying to you is we have higher standards for the President's speech, and that's why we have a process that we send speeches to the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, the Director of Central Intelligence Agency, and any other affected Cabinet officer.

Q What do we know about the source, or sources of the documents? Are they people -- again, without getting into anything that would compromise anybody or any operation -- are they people with a proven track record? Did that come up?

DR. RICE: There are a couple of bodies looking at this, including the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, and I think they'll be able to answer those questions. We don't generally get into that kind of issue.

Q But in the back-and-forth, especially with the massaging the language to the satisfaction of the -- I mean, was there any, even casual discussion about --

DR. RICE: I'm going to be very clear, all right? The President's speech -- that sentence was changed, right? And with the change in that sentence, the speech was cleared. Now, again, if the Agency had wanted that sentence out, it would have been gone. And the Agency did not say that they wanted that speech out -- that sentence out of the speech. They cleared the speech.

Now, the State of the Union is a big speech, a lot of things happen. I'm really not blaming anybody for what happened. But there is a fact here, in the way that we clear speeches.

Q So a week later, Colin Powell goes to the U.N., and he decides, as he told us yesterday, not to put that sentence in at all. So what was the new development in those seven days that led him to take it out all together?

DR. RICE: Well, first of all --

Q The time line seems a bit curious.

DR. RICE: He took out a lot of things. But I was with Secretary Powell when he was doing a lot of this. You will remember that it was the Secretary's own intelligence arm, the INR, that was the one that within the overall intelligence assessment had objected to that sentence, had said that they doubts about -- not to that sentence, had doubts about the uranium yellow cake story. So remember that it was the Secretary of State's own agency, the INR, that had in the consensus report, the NIE, taken a footnote to that.

Q But isn't it slightly strange that you have different agencies with different reports and different sentences? I mean, not everyone is singing from the same song sheet here.

DR. RICE: But let me just go through the process, because it's not at all unusual. We have several intelligence agencies, not just one. We have the Central Intelligence Agency, a Defense Intelligence Agency, the State Department has its own intelligence agency. And there is a process which the Director of Central Intelligence, who is the coordinator for all of those agencies, runs which is called the National Intelligence Estimate. The National Intelligence Estimate is supposed to come to a conclusion that is the considered, joint opinion of all of those intelligence agencies. If at the end of that process, a particular agency still has a reservation, they take a footnote. And so the INR took a footnote in this case.

Q But it's in the Estimate?

DR. RICE: It's in the Estimate. It's, by the way, in another section, but it is in the Estimate. But the DCI is responsible for delivering a judgment, a consensus judgment of the intelligence community, which is called the National Intelligence Estimate. And that's what the President --

Q Is there a chance that that particular citation could be declassified, so we could see it?

DR. RICE: You know, we don't want to try to get into kind of selective declassification, but we're looking at what can be made available.

Q -- the kind of terminology of how footnotes -- if the CIA had taken a footnote, would that have meant that's the end of the sentence?

DR. RICE: No.

Q What are footnotes --

DR. RICE: I understand. The Americans --

Q Bear with us, bear with us.

DR. RICE: No, no, no.

Q We're old Europe here.

DR. RICE: The CIA sits as the CIA, as the Central Intelligence Agency. Its head is both the Director of Central Intelligence and the head of that agency. Then you have a DIA and INR, and so on and so on. I'm now speaking from my own experience, not from my -- it's fairly rare that you get a CIA objection to a DCI product, because they are one and the same.

Q Some are more --

DR. RICE: Well, the CIA is the premier intelligence agency for the United States. And it is the one with a worldwide network, and so forth. So it's maybe not so surprising. But you do get footnotes from other agencies to the consensus argument fairly often. But what INR did not take a footnote to is the consensus view that the Iraqis were actively trying to pursue a nuclear weapons program, reconstituting and so forth.

Q So, Condi, if you look at this --

DR. RICE: And as you remember, the aluminum tubes, INR also had a part.

Q So if you step back from this, Secretary Powell said yesterday that relying on and reporting out intelligence amounts to a judgment call. So there was a choice here. You all could have been cautious or aggressive on this intelligence. You chose to be pretty aggressive, even though in a State of the Union speech, you hung it on the British.

DR. RICE: David, the British report was an open-source report, all right?

Q But the American people don't know all the this. What they know is when the President stands up in the State of the Union to declare something, pretty important --

DR. RICE: When the President stood up in the State of the Union and said, we had reports from -- the British were the primary reporters on this, I mean, the NIE also relying on the British reporting on this particular piece -- that we had reporting that Saddam Hussein had sought yellow cake in Africa. That's all it says.

Now, as I've said to you several times, that may well still be true. It is not, given all that we know of equality, that we would put in a State of the Union, which is why we've been saying to you, look, it should not have gotten in. It's not that it was false. It's not that it was erroneous. It was that there was a certain quality to the reporting that we now believe doesn't rise to the level of a presidential speech.

Q You would agree you were pretty aggressive in your interpretation then?

DR. RICE: No. The NIE says, he's seeking to acquire yellow cake, and cites several African countries. There's nothing aggressive about that. But now, knowing that some of the underlying reporting was problematic, we wouldn't put it there. But again, David, we do have a clearance process and the Agency cleared it.

Q During the week leading up to Secretary Powell's presentation at the U.N. then, was it the State Department's concerns about this intelligence that led to the review and then the decision by Secretary Powell not to put this in? Or was it something that the CIA or you or British intelligence or somebody else was concerned about?

DR. RICE: It was not even discussed in that way. Again, the Secretary has an intelligence arm. That intelligence arm had a particular view of this issue. If you got to the Secretary's statement, you will also see that on the aluminum tubes, the Secretary says that there's some disagreement about the nature of these aluminum tubes. That was also a consensus judgment of the NIA that the aluminum tubes were likely for nuclear centrifuges. The INR had taken an exception. So the Secretary noted that exception, as well.

But I want to go back to something. This is in the context of a broad set of -- broad and deep record of intelligence about procurement networks, about training of scientists, a man who in 1991 was way closer to a nuclear weapon than anybody thought that he was, and that where there were no doubts that he was trying -- he wanted to acquire nuclear weapons and was trying to keep that infrastructure in place. So you have to put it in that context.

Q Then what happened in those seven days --

DR. RICE: I'm saying that when we put it together, put together the Secretary's remarks, the Secretary decided that he would caveat the aluminum tubes, which he did -- he said there's some disagreement about what this might be -- and he decided that he would not use the uranium story. The Secretary also has an intelligence arm that happened to hold that view. But the NIE, which, by the way, the Agency was standing by at the time of the -- the time of the State of the Union, and was standing by at the time of the Secretary's speech, has the yellow cake story in it, had the aluminum tube story in it. Now, if there were doubts about the underlying intelligence to that NIE, those doubts were not communicated to the President, to the Vice President, or to me.

Q What we're trying to get at -- we're trying to get at, was there in the week -- again, only a week passed between when it was useful information, worth putting out to the public, and when the Secretary decided it wasn't. We're trying to get at what discussion there was, if any, or whether it was a triage, you have other examples that he liked better? I mean --

DR. RICE: -- but I -- there was no discussion in which I was involved about any problems with this, and therefore, the Secretary would not use it. I'm not surprised that given that the Secretary's own agency, the INR, had reservations with it, that the Secretary would decide --

Q Is it fair to conclude -- is it --

Q -- you're saying that the Secretary of State is overruling the President --

DR. RICE: He's not overruling the President's judgment. The Secretary of State said, you know, I don't want to use this particular piece of information, as I understand it. I don't remember this -- I don't think this discussion took place of this specific piece of information, but it did not get into the Secretary's remarks because the Secretary decided not to put it there. He told me yesterday that he decided it was not of that quality.

Q Is it fair to say then, Dr. Rice, that the only thing that changed in the seven days was just the person speaking?

DR. RICE: I can't give you -- I can't say yes or no to that. All right? What I do know is there wasn't a discussion of, oh, this should never have been in the President's speech, let's not put it in the Secretary's speech, no.

Q Were they put together on separate tracks?

DR. RICE: To a certain extent, they were moving along in parallel.

Q But isn't this a crucial issue? Did the President -- but you're discounting this. You're saying that the President relied upon a judgment by the CIA that it was solid enough to report out this intelligence in the State of the Union. A week later the Secretary of State decides it's not solid enough to do so. And you're saying it's because he had his own intelligence? You're shaking your head -- tell me what I'm not getting.

DR. RICE: No, David, what you're not getting is the following: The President made a statement in the State of the Union that in the NIE was the judgment of the intelligence community. The President didn't exaggerate that statement, he didn't make it up. The NIE says Saddam Hussein was seeking this yellow cake, and there are reports that he's seeking it in other African countries. It goes into the State of the Union.

The Secretary of State is putting together, on a somewhat parallel track, a presentation before the United Nations Security Council. And it's very broad and it's got lots of stuff in it. There is a lot of things the Secretary decided not to use and a lot of things that he decided to use. I'm going to tell you, we never really thought that this yellow cake issue was a major issue, because the overwhelming story about Iraqi nuclear reconstitution was really based fundamentally on every -- on these other factors. And so this yellow cake issue, we did not consider to be a major issue. So I'm also not surprised the Secretary didn't put it in.

Q But when we reported the State of the Union address, that was one of the headlines that came out of it.

DR. RICE: Yes, much to our surprise.

Q But it was written as such, as well. I mean, we were meant to notice that line.

DR. RICE: It cited a public document, which probably helped. It was also Britain which probably helped.

Q That was my next question. Sorry, Dr. Rice.

DR. RICE: But the fact is, this was one among many issues about the nuclear program. And so when the Secretary talks about the nuclear program, he talks about -- he was also, by the way, mostly concerned to do things that fit into a presentation that had some impact. So there were a lot of things he left on the cutting floor because they couldn't be visualized. There were a lot of things he left on the cutting floor because it didn't make the case powerfully enough. So a lot got left on the cutting floor.

Q Just one brief one, Dr. Rice. Are you saying that in hindsight, with the experience that we're going through now, you would be more careful to rely on British intelligence in the future --

DR. RICE: No.

Q -- especially when it comes to putting it into State of the Union addresses?

DR. RICE: No. It has nothing to do with British intelligence, nothing to do with British intelligence. We have great trust and faith in British intelligence. It is the fact that the underlying -- some of the underlying information later turned out not to be true, or turned out to be -- there apparently was a forged document involved. Anybody who, knowing that, would not say, oh, perhaps we shouldn't have put that in the State of the Union, would be pulling your leg. Of course, you step back and say, had I known that there was a forged document here, would I put this in the State of the Union? No.

But even with the forged document, there are other reports of his seeking yellow cake in Africa. It's just that we have a higher standard for the President. We don't make him his own fact witness. That's why we send things out to people and say, you know, you have problems with this.

Q Did the Secretary of State, during this seven-day period between the State of the Union and when he delivered his address, did he discuss with you or anyone on your staff his concerns about the yellow cake issue?

DR. RICE: No. In fact, we had a much more extensive discussion of how to characterize the aluminum tubes, frankly. I mean, that was a much more extensive discussion, because we had -- we had a real debate going on about IAEA and the Department of Energy and so forth. That we discussed in some depth. This we did not.

Q Dr. Rice, when did you all find out that the documents were forged?

DR. RICE: Sometime in March, I believe. Is that right?

MR. FLEISCHER: The IAEA reported it.

DR. RICE: The IAEA reported it I believe in March. But I will tell you that, for instance, on Ambassador Wilson's going out to Niger, I learned of that when I was sitting on whatever TV show it was, because that mission was not known to anybody in the White House. And you should ask the Agency at what level it was known in the Agency.

Q When was that TV show, when you learned about it?

DR. RICE: A month ago, about a month ago.

Q Can I ask you about something else?

DR. RICE: Yes. Are you sure you're through with this?

Q Actually, wait a minute. Would it be -- I mean, it would probably be instructive and useful at some point before we get back to Washington to have Secretary Powell explain to us his thought process.

MR. FLEISCHER: But he did explain. He didn't think --

Q He didn't go into it -- we'd like to know why this was left out, whether it was the subject of internal debate with him and his people, that kind of thing.

MR. FLEISCHER: We can't hear you. Everybody is speaking at one time.

Q I'd like to know whether it was a subject -- you know, any kind of ticktock about thoughts and discussions he had about this. We know he didn't discuss it with you. That's fine, but any of his own deliberations, why he left it -- ultimately, why he left it on the cutting room floor.

MR. FLEISCHER: I will pass that on. But look at the transcript last night, because he was asked that last night.

Q What you're saying is, even at the time of the State of the Union speech, the INR, the Secretary of State's intelligence arm, had reservations about the underlying intelligence for --

DR. RICE: As I explained -- well, the INR footnote says, we -- I should actually -- we're dubious about some of these reports about yellow cake. It's also not very specific, by the way. But what I'm saying to you is that there is a process called the National Intelligence Estimate that takes into account that some agencies may have reservations. And that's why it appears in the way that it does. It appears as a judgment and then it appears -- or as information passed. In this case, it is --

Q Rather like a court of third opinion in the dissenting view.

Q -- seven days later, why didn't Powell's -- Secretary Powell's presentation, you say, well, he relied upon the INR --

DR. RICE: No, I didn't say that. I said, the Secretary --

Q -- you said --

DR. RICE: No, I said, it is not surprising to me, given that the Secretary had -- that it was his agency that had some reservations. I'm sure he talks to his people.

Q But weren't they speaking with -- I mean, wasn't the administration speaking with one voice --

DR. RICE: And there were things that got left out of this talk.

Q No, but you're saying that they got left out for time, but he made it clear that it was left out because it was a --

DR. RICE: David, don't put words in my mouth. I said that there were several -- first of all, things got left out because they didn't make the presentation. Secondly, the Secretary chose to leave out some things and to caveat some things that the NIE did not caveat. The NIE is -- on the aluminum tubes, the judgment is they're for particular things. The Secretary says, there's a debate about this. But going back to the President's speech, which is really the issue here, the President of the United States went up to give the State of the Union on the basis of information that was in his National Intelligence Estimate and that everybody thought to be true. The fact of the matter is, it may well still be true. But having very high standards for what we put in a presidential speech, knowing now that at least one of the documents underlying this story was a forgery, we wouldn't have put it in the President's speech. It doesn't mean we disagree with the British that it may well still be true. The British may well be right about that. There are other African countries that are cited, which is one reason that the President's speech refers to Africa, not simply to Niger.

So the process is an NIE that is the basis of this, and then if the Agency had reservations about information that was in the NIE, then the DCI -- and I think he will tell you that if he had reservations, he did not make those known to the President, to the Vice President, or to me -- if he had reservations.

Q If you take into account the issue that we've just spent the last half an hour --

(end side one of tape; begin side two, same Q in progress)

Q -- (in progress) -- the fact that it hasn't been found yet, the fact that Saddam Hussein is still at large, the daily attacks against American troops, how would you classify the overall situation? And do you think there's a problem that ordinary Americans might think, why did we go down this route at all?

DR. RICE: I don't think there is a problem in that way, because the President told the American people early on that when we went to war to deal with the menace that was the Saddam Hussein regime, and that had defied the world on weapons of mass destruction for more than a decade, and that was known to have had unaccounted for stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction -- U.N. reporting, not our own -- a menace that President Clinton had tried to deal with, with actual military force in 1998, he told the American people, I'm doing this because I believe it's in the best security interest of the United States. He also said it's going to be hard, but we're staying there until there is a stable postwar Iraq. We have a commitment to the region for a stable postwar Iraq; we have a commitment to the Iraqi people, having helped them to throw off this bloody tyrant; we have a commitment to the entire region, which is very much now a region of great trouble and turmoil, leading directly to the attacks on the United

States in September of 2001. The President would stand up and say that today, just as he said it in January, February and March of last year.

Everybody has known that this was going to be hard, but we shouldn't lose track of what has been accomplished. Saddam Hussein is out of power. Yes, some of his henchmen who benefited from the terror of that regime against the Iraqi people are still terrorizing the Iraqi people. And it should be notable to everybody that they're going after successes of the coalition, so -- the power grid. We rebuild the power grid; they try to go after the power grid. Oil, which we are getting back up and running -- the Iraqis are getting back up and running -- for the benefit of the Iraqi people; they want to go after that. The Iraqis who want to participate in building their own future, like the Iraqi police, those are the people that these thugs are targeting, just like they targeted the Iraqi people for the two-and-a-half decades of Saddam Hussein's regime.

Now, the Iraqi people are getting control of their own future. I think that the -- when the leadership council is in place and you have Iraqi governance structures in place, that it will be even clearer to the world that this is not targeted against the coalition, this is targeted directly against the Iraqi people. And it's maybe not surprising given the way that these thugs behaved against their own people was for two decades, the last three decades.

Q Can I ask one more on Africa? As an African American, what has it meant to you to see Africa, to be here with this President? What are your impressions of what you're learning?

DR. RICE: I have found this an incredibly moving trip in a lot of ways. Goree Island was extraordinary to me. The incongruity of it -- it's such a beautiful place and that these horrors could have happened at this beautiful place, and you can almost imagine these stolen people suddenly arriving on the shore of this absolutely beautiful place and being put in these horrible cells where large numbers of them would die. And then I think the Gate of No Return I still have a lump in my throat for, thinking which one of my ancestors might have actually gone through that gate on their way to the United States.

But I thought that the President said something that really struck me as an African American, and it's funny, it's always struck me as an African American, which is that the remarkable thing is that those horrors and the horrors that they experienced on the way to the United States, and the horrors they experienced once they got to the United States didn't break the spirit of these people, that somehow they managed to, in many cases, find faith to find somehow a sense of community.

You know, jumping the broom is still an African American tradition at marriage -- not that I have done that yet -- (laughter) -- but, you know, it's still considered a tradition. It comes out of slavery, and it was in some ways a defiant act because people weren't really supposed to marry. And you just see the tremendous spirit and toughness of these people. And it just makes me extremely proud to be descendant from those people.

Q One more brief one, please? Guantanamo Bay, a big issue that's come up at the moment in Britain is relations between U.S. and U.K. over the British citizens held in Guantanamo Bay. The British government wants reassurances, especially members in the ruling party want reassurances that they will not be facing the death penalty. Can you tell us anything about negotiations?

DR. RICE: This is being worked out between the U.S. government and the British government. Britain is a friend, and so we're going to be open and transparent with Britain about what's going on here. I think we have to remember, these people were picked up for terrorism and so that has to be kept in mind. But both the treatment of them, which is in accordance with the standards of the Geneva Convention, and also the very careful process that the military commission sets up to try to deal with, and balance the concerns of national security with due process, those are being discussed with the British government and I'm sure will be fine.

MR. FLEISCHER: Thank you, everybody.

END 1:07 P.M. (Local)

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030711-7.html

[nonny]

20. Statement by George J. Tenet July 11, 2003

http://www.cia.gov/cia/public_affairs/press_release/2003/pr07112003.html

STATEMENT BY GEORGE J. TENET
DIRECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE
11 July 2003

Legitimate questions have arisen about how remarks on alleged Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa made it into the President’s State of the Union speech. Let me be clear about several things right up front. First, CIA approved the President’s State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my Agency. And third, the President had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound. These 16 words should never have been included in the text written for the President.

For perspective, a little history is in order.

There was fragmentary intelligence gathered in late 2001 and early 2002 on the allegations of Saddam’s efforts to obtain additional raw uranium from Africa, beyond the 550 metric tons already in Iraq. In an effort to inquire about certain reports involving Niger, CIA’s counter-proliferation experts, on their own initiative, asked an individual with ties to the region to make a visit to see what he could learn. He reported back to us that one of the former Nigerien officials he met stated that he was unaware of any contract being signed between Niger and rogue states for the sale of uranium during his tenure in office. The same former official also said that in June 1999 a businessman approached him and insisted that the former official meet with an Iraqi delegation to discuss “expanding commercial relations” between Iraq and Niger. The former official interpreted the overture as an attempt to discuss uranium sales. The former officials also offered details regarding Niger’s processes for monitoring and transporting uranium that suggested it would be very unlikely that material could be illicitly diverted. There was no mention in the report of forged documents -- or any suggestion of the existence of documents at all.

Because this report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the President, Vice-President or other senior Administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.

In the fall of 2002, my Deputy and I briefed hundreds of members of Congress on Iraq. We did not brief the uranium acquisition story.

Also in the fall of 2002, our British colleagues told us they were planning to publish an unclassified dossier that mentioned reports of Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium in Africa. Because we viewed the reporting on such acquisition attempts to be inconclusive, we expressed reservations about its inclusion but our colleagues said they were confident in their reports and left it in their document.

In September and October 2002 before Senate Committees, senior intelligence officials in response to questions told members of Congress that we differed with the British dossier on the reliability of the uranium reporting.

In October, the Intelligence Community (IC) produced a classified, 90 page National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iraq’s WMD programs. There is a lengthy section in which most agencies of the Intelligence Community judged that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program. Let me emphasize, the NIE’s Key Judgments cited six reasons for this assessment; the African uranium issue was not one of them.

But in the interest of completeness, the report contained three paragraphs that discuss Iraq’s significant 550-metric ton uranium stockpile and how it could be diverted while under IAEA safeguard. These paragraphs also cited reports that Iraq began “vigorously trying to procure” more uranium from Niger and two other African countries, which would shorten the time Baghdad needed to produce nuclear weapons. The NIE states: “A foreign government service reported that as of early 2001, Niger planned to send several tons of pure “uranium” (probably yellowcake) to Iraq. As of early 2001, Niger and Iraq reportedly were still working out the arrangements for this deal, which could be for up to 500 tons of yellowcake.” The Estimate also states: “We do not know the status of this arrangement.” With regard to reports that Iraq had sought uranium from two other countries, the Estimate says: “We cannot confirm whether Iraq succeeded in acquiring uranium ore and/or yellowcake from these sources.” Much later in the NIE text, in presenting an alternate view on another matter, the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research included a sentence that states: “Finally, the claims of Iraqi pursuit of natural uranium in Africa are, in INR’s assessment, highly dubious.”

An unclassified CIA White Paper in October made no mention of the issue, again because it was not fundamental to the judgment that Iraq was reconstituting its nuclear weapons program, and because we had questions about some of the reporting. For the same reasons, the subject was not included in many public speeches, Congressional testimony and the Secretary of State’s United Nations presentation in early 2003.

The background above makes it even more troubling that the 16 words eventually made it into the State of the Union speech. This was a mistake.

Portions of the State of the Union speech draft came to the CIA for comment shortly before the speech was given. Various parts were shared with cognizant elements of the Agency for review. Although the documents related to the alleged Niger-Iraqi uranium deal had not yet been determined to be forgeries, officials who were reviewing the draft remarks on uranium raised several concerns about the fragmentary nature of the intelligence with National Security Council colleagues. Some of the language was changed. From what we know now, Agency officials in the end concurred that the text in the speech was factually correct - i.e. that the British government report said that Iraq sought uranium from Africa. This should not have been the test for clearing a Presidential address. This did not rise to the level of certainty which should be required for Presidential speeches, and CIA should have ensured that it was removed.

http://www.cia.gov/cia/public_affairs/press_release/2003/pr07112003.html

[Vickers]

21. How 18-minutes-of-blank-tape of them

:rofl:

[Bucky]

22. That's a great adjective. Of course Nixon only erased private recordings

They had to know that a transcript of the gaggle would show up eventually. Then again, they had to know that bin Laden was "determined to strike" at us and they just sat on their asses crowing about what a bunch of goddamn adults they were compared to Clinton's folks.

[madeline_con]

25. off topic...but damn strange!

On the Brown Bag Blog front page, there's a pic of Robert's wife and kids.

Is this broad living in the 50's??? What's with the retro clothes??

[nonny]

24. Press Gaggle with Ari Fleischer July 12 2003

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030712-11.html

Press Gaggle with Ari Fleischer
The National Hospital
Abuja, Nigeria
July 12 2003

Q Ari, did Dr. Rice ask Director Tenet to put out the statement, or did anybody else from the White House ask him to put out the statement?

MR. FLEISCHER: Discussions with Director Tenet about the statement have been going on for days, have been worked out previously. It's appropriate for the CIA to speak out.

Q Did he bring up the notion of addressing a statement, or did the White House ask him to?

MR. FLEISCHER: It was mutual. The discussion was, the CIA needs to explain what its role was in this. And the best way for any entity in the government to explain its role is to issue a statement.

Q Why, if he was going to if it has been talked about for several days, did Dr. Rice come out and brief yesterday? Why not just wait for Tenet to put out his announcement? I mean, was there any reluctance on the CIA to put out a statement?

MR. FLEISCHER: Dr. Rice was always scheduled to brief yesterday, just as Secretary Powell was scheduled to brief at the filing center the night before. So we actually, literally the day before the trip or the week before the trip -- sit down. She was scheduled to brief on the flight to Nigeria. It was moved up to the morning flight. It was easier to do it that way, frankly, and to disseminate whatever she said.

Q Any postmortem briefing to expect on the plane back?

MR. FLEISCHER: No, there will be no briefings on the plane back.

END 9:31 A.M. (Local)

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030712-11.html

---------------------------
I'm finished -- promise!

[CyberChas]

28. Proof of a negative????

My favorite line (insipid lie?) is this one:

"The burden is on the critics to explain where the weapons of mass destruction are. If they think they were destroyed, the burden is on them to explain when he destroyed them and where he destroyed them."

That somebody didn't call him on this outrageous piece of spin-drivel is beyond me (well, not really, as I know what that bunch of non-journalists IS, realy).

Those who want to be critical of going to war on a lie should have to PROVE that there were no WMD, rather than the liars having to prove that there WERE.

What WILL they think of next?

Charlie L
Portland, OR
[e-mail]

[elemming]

29. Powell

Powell as Secretary of State was just so much better at
everything including being a liar.

Rice lies poorly and can be caught and then it turns out her
excuse for misinformation is she forgot or didn't read it or
just basic incompetence.