CNN: “Dead Wrong — Inside an Intelligence Meltdown.”

CNN will be airing a special entitled Dead Wrong — Inside an Intelligence Meltdown this coming Sunday night. In it Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, a longtime Powell adviser who served as his chief of staff from 2002 through 2005, is one of several insiders interviewed.

A former top aide to Colin Powell says his involvement in the former secretary of state’s presentation to the United Nations on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction was “the lowest point” in his life. [“Former aide: Powell WMD speech ‘lowest point in my life’” (CNN.com)]

Makes you wonder what he knows that we don’t, doesn’t it? I’m thinking of that song from one of the Charlie Brown musicals “If I knew then what I know now.” If only I knew then and now.

In preparation for Powell’s Valentines’ Day (2003) call to arms, Wilkerson makes it sound like Powell was unprepared and had not been given all of the information he needed to be well-prepared.

“(Powell) came through the door … and he had in his hands a sheaf of papers, and he said, ‘This is what I’ve got to present at the United Nations according to the White House, and you need to look at it,’” Wilkerson says in the program. “It was anything but an intelligence document. It was, as some people characterized it later, sort of a Chinese menu from which you could pick and choose.”

Wilkerson and Powell spent four days and nights in a CIA conference room with then-Director George Tenet and other top officials trying to ensure the accuracy of the presentation, Wilkerson says. [“Former aide: Powell WMD speech ‘lowest point in my life’”(CNN.com)]

According to Wilkerson, what they later discovered was that it was innacurate despite their four days and nights. At least one of their sources was untrustworthy — something Powell didn’t know at the time, though apparently the Defense Intelligence Agency knew. More lack of communication between departments and government tentacles.

In one dramatic accusation in his speech, Powell showed slides alleging that Saddam had bioweapons labs mounted on trucks that would be almost impossible to find.

“In fact, Secretary Powell was not told that one of the sources he was given as a source of this information had indeed been flagged by the Defense Intelligence Agency as a liar, a fabricator,” says David Kay, who served as the CIA’s chief weapons inspector in Iraq after the fall of Saddam. That source, an Iraqi defector had never been debriefed by the CIA, was known within the intelligence community as “Curveball.”

After searching Iraq for several months across the summer of 2003, Kay began e-mailing Tenet to tell him the WMD evidence was falling apart. At one point, Wilkerson says, Tenet called Powell to tell him the claims about mobile bioweapons labs were apparently not true. [“Former aide: Powell WMD speech ‘lowest point in my life’”(CNN.com)]

So, more conflicting information spilling into the media. I’m going to have to try to remember to set my DVR so I don’t forget to watch this.

Somewhere out there really is the truth. I’d like to find it, but I’m starting to feel like we’ll never really know the whole story.

tags: CNN, Iraq, Colin Powell, Intelligence, WMD, Conspiracy Theories, politics

3 comments

1. on August 19, 2005 at 4:48 pm

   monkeypup said:

   Maybe in 50 years, if we’re lucky…

2. on August 23, 2005 at 10:02 am

   LibertyPimp said:

   I did not get to see the “Dead Wrong” program. Does anyone know if Powel or Wilkerson were aware or the Wilson report that totally refuted and debunked the Niger uranium cake report. If they knew about Wilson’s report then why include it in the UN speech? Or was this report intentionally held back from them? By?

   I guess what many people want to know is wether was Powel played or was he in on the sham? In either case, in either case it is not hard to understand why Powel and Wilkerson were depressed.

3. on August 23, 2005 at 10:38 am

   n. mallory said:

   I kind of sort of watched the program while I was trying to fix my computer. Basically I didn’t see much in the 1 hour show that wasn’t in the article about it. I am kind of getting the feeling that Powell is an innocent bystander in most of this. I don’t remember them talking about Wilson’s report at all in the program, which is disappointing.

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