Senate Republican Policy Committee Releases Policy Paper: 'Examining the Continuing Iraq Pre-war Intelligence Myths'

2/9/2006 10:18:00 AM

To: National Desk

Contact: Mary Sutcliffe of the Senate Republican Policy Committee, 202-224-2946

WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Following is an executive summary of a Senate Republican Policy Committee Paper titled "Examining the Continuing Iraq Pre-war Intelligence Myths," released Feb. 8.:

Executive Summary

Critics of the Iraq war continue to reissue their assertions/charges that the President "manufactured" or "misused" intelligence to justify the war.

In the most egregious cases, they continue to promulgate misleading critiques involving:

-- Iraq's procurement of high-strength aluminum tubes;

-- the source code-named "Curveball";

-- claims that Ahmed Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress ("INC") tricked the United States into war; and

-- the State Department "dissent" holding that Iraq did not have a nuclear weapons program.

When the facts surrounding these issues are examined, it becomes clear that it is not the President who is misrepresenting information; rather, it is the critics.

The Department of Energy's intelligence agency was in the minority when it assessed that the aluminum tubes were not destined for a nuclear program, and DOE still concluded, overall, that Iraq had a nuclear weapons program.

Policymakers did not deliberately misuse Curveball's information; they were never even made aware of hints that Curveball might be unreliable.

Intelligence professionals concluded that the program by which they obtained access to information about Iraq through the INC was a valuable program. Moreover, the INC's information was essentially irrelevant to the intelligence community's pre-war assessments.

The "alternative view" of the State Department's intelligence agency, INR, was no alternative. It still concluded that Iraq was "pursuing at least a limited effort to maintain and acquire nuclear weapons-related capabilities."

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Copies of this paper are also available at http://www.rpc.senate.gov. This site offers an up-to-date publication archive, as well as links to current RPC products.

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