Reason to be Skeptical of Suskind's Claim
As I highlighted earlier, Ron Suskind claims in his new book that in late 2003, the White House authorized the forgery of a letter--purporting to be from a high level Iraqi intelligence official to Saddam Hussein--in order to validate its pre-war claims about Iraqi WMD and the supposed connection between Iraq and al Qaeda. If true, this would be the foreign policy equivalent of a police officer planting a gun on a suspect after shooting him in order to justify the shooting, and it would be a BIG DEAL.
I think there are reasons to be skeptical of Suskind's claim, though. Consider this. The existence of the letter was first reported by Con Coughlin, a reporter for the Sunday Telegraph in London, on December 14, 2003. Yet despite the potentially highly significant nature of Coughlin's find, most news outlets--other than gullible right wing rags like the National Review--were reluctant to run with the story, most likely because the document seemed too perfect, like something Bill Kristol would have dreamed into existence if he could have.
By December 17, just three days later, Newsweek ran a story reporting that the letter was "probably a fabrication." Citing multiple "intelligence and law enforcement officials," Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball made a convincing case that the document was fake, pointing out that Mohammed Atta's whereabouts in 2001 were well-documented by the FBI and it was incredibly unlikely that he could have been in Iraq as claimed in the letter. The Newsweek story even included the following amusing passage:
Then again, maybe they put someone like Doug Feith in charge of the operation. That might explain it.
I think there are reasons to be skeptical of Suskind's claim, though. Consider this. The existence of the letter was first reported by Con Coughlin, a reporter for the Sunday Telegraph in London, on December 14, 2003. Yet despite the potentially highly significant nature of Coughlin's find, most news outlets--other than gullible right wing rags like the National Review--were reluctant to run with the story, most likely because the document seemed too perfect, like something Bill Kristol would have dreamed into existence if he could have.
By December 17, just three days later, Newsweek ran a story reporting that the letter was "probably a fabrication." Citing multiple "intelligence and law enforcement officials," Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball made a convincing case that the document was fake, pointing out that Mohammed Atta's whereabouts in 2001 were well-documented by the FBI and it was incredibly unlikely that he could have been in Iraq as claimed in the letter. The Newsweek story even included the following amusing passage:
Ironically, even the Iraqi National Congress of Ahmed Chalabi, which has been vocal in claiming ties between Al Qaeda and Saddam's regime, was dismissive of the new Telegraph story. "The memo is clearly nonsense," an INC spokesman told NEWSWEEK.So while the letter is almost surely a forgery, it's not a very convincing one. Hardly anyone bought it, and a major news outlet exposed it as a fake within three days. I realize that the White House and the CIA have not exactly earned a reputation for competency over the last eight years, but for Suskind to be right, they have to have been stunningly incompetent in the execution of this plan.
Then again, maybe they put someone like Doug Feith in charge of the operation. That might explain it.
posted by A.L. at 6:06 PM
6 Comments:
Has it ever occurred to you that the CIA, knowing that the idea was ridiculous, would intentionally do a crappy job so as not to violate their charter?
I don't know. The Niger forgery was just as much of a sham - the IAEA determined it was a forgery within minutes of looking at it.
I'd like to see a full scale investigation into both leaks, then we won't have to speculate.
both documents, I mean.
A.L.
Why do you assume that the Bush administration and the CIA (with its utterly awful history) would not make this kind of mistake?
AL, you seem to be confusing the execution of the forgery and its effect after release with whether or not Suskind's reporting is accurate about the source of the forgery. Given all we know about the administration's incompetence at, well, everything, it's not at all hard for me to believe Bush ordered this forgery and botched it.
Incompetent perfectly describes the Bush administration. The Keystone Cops, the gang who couldn't shoot straight.
I've been utterly amazed at how stupid the American public has been at times, mostly November 2004, to accept the crap these morons shovel out.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home