Why aren't we hearing more about the OSP?

[Poiuyt]

I thought the Office of Special Plans, Donald Rumsfeld's secret spy agency, was responsible for giving intelligence to Bush, et. al. when the CIA wasn't giving them the intelligence that they liked. How come no one in the press or any of our Democratic leaders are questioning the Intelligence Commision about that? It seems like the entire blame for the Iraq war is being put at the feet of George Tenent and the CIA.

Just when it seems like the press is starting to get tough with the bastards.

[spanone]

1. Are you kidding? That would require some honesty.

[amandabeech]

2. Yeah, I want to hear about OSP, too.

Douglas Feith and his cast of flunkies were feeding all kinds of Chalabi nonsense to the White House. It has never seemed to me that the decision makers in the White House relied on the CIA to make their case to attack Iraq.

[librechik]

3. you know why

all this brouhaha is a distraction so that people will overlook and ignore the role of the OSP in the "bad intelligence." Sad to see the Senate (ruled by the relentless Pukkes!) and the entire media go flouncing off to follow that butterfly and ignore the really important element.

[Hoping4Change]

4. Great point. I haven't heard that mentioned in months

by the mediawhores.

[mmonk]

5. Because we live in a closed

society with a weak press.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. At last! One major news outlet has mentioned the OSP!

The Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1258055,00.html

Yet when the analysts came before the committee, as the report points out, none "stated that the questions were unreasonable, or that they were encouraged by the questioning to alter their conclusions regarding Iraq's links to al-Qaida."

Critics of the investigation have put that reticence down to the fact that CIA minders were present at the questioning and to the fact that it, in purely career terms, it would be worse to admit to changing analysis in response to political pressure, than getting the analysis wrong in the first place.

Whether or not the analysts who spoke to the committee felt they could speak freely or not, none implicated the administration. The single exception to this appears to be Doug Feith, the under-secretary of defence for policy, who set up the Office of Special Plans to prepare the way for the invasion, and who is alleged to have set up his own channel for unvetted intelligence from the Iraqi National Congress (INC) and its leader, Ahmad Chalabi.

But as Senator Rockefeller put it yesterday, the committee felt it had only scratched the surface. "We've done a little bit of work on the number three guy in the defence department, Douglas Feith, part of his alleged efforts to run intelligence past the intelligence community altogether, his relationship with the INC and Chalabi, who was very much in favour with the administration. And was he running a private intelligence failure, which is not lawful?"

I'm not quite sure what he means by "running a private intelligence failure" - maybe it should read "private intelligence operation"? Still, at least the names are out there.

[Poiuyt]

8. Unfortunately, most Americans don't read the British news

We can only hope that someone from a major American source picks this up.

[Literate Tar Heel]

9. ha

too bad it's a major news outlet in another country ... as David Cross says in his latest (and very funny) CD, it's bad when you have to look to the foreign press to find out what's going on in your own country

[seemslikeadream]

10. muriel_volestrangler please look at this

from your link

Whether or not the analysts who spoke to the committee felt they could speak freely or not, none implicated the administration.

However, the senate committee found that Doug Feith, the undersecretary of defence for policy, had set up an Iraq "intelligence cell" inside the Pentagon to forage through old reports about links between Baghdad and al-Qaida, which Mr Feith's boss, Donald Rumsfeld, and the vice-president, Dick Cheney, used to second guess the CIA's scepticism on the matter. Much of the intelligence it processed came from the Iraqi National Congress (INC) and its leader, Ahmad Chalabi.
------------------

Whether or not the analysts who spoke to the committee felt they could speak freely or not, none implicated the administration. The single exception to this appears to be Doug Feith, the under-secretary of defence for policy, who set up the Office of Special Plans to prepare the way for the invasion, and who is alleged to have set up his own channel for unvetted intelligence from the Iraqi National Congress (INC) and its leader, Ahmad Chalabi.

Reference to Office of Special Plans is gone! That's what first caught my eye, or did I miss it?

[Poiuyt]

11. OMG, You're right!

I could have sworn it was in the article yesterday.

[seemslikeadream]

12. Thanks so much

I wasn't sure of myself. Do you believe it's gone!

[seemslikeadream]

15. Senate Intel Report Whitewashes Deceptions on Iraq

The Senate report fails to answer critical questions about intelligence failures prior to the invasion of Iraq. The Committee's report fails to discuss the politicization of intelligence by the administration and its allies; the role of administration officials outside the CIA in producing phony intelligence; or the use of favored Iraqi exiles like Ahmed Chalabi. It fails to mention the Office of Special Plans in the Pentagon, Under Secretary of Defense Doug Feith's tightly controlled intelligence unit which had a direct pipeline to Vice President Cheney. Nor does it examine the administration's claims of links between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein which have already been rebuked by the 9/11 commission.

http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=116442

[Generator]

7. Maybe that's because

as I posted in my thread about my letter from the senator about this, "explicitly prohibited his commission from looking at how his Administration used intelligence in the build up to the war."

In other words, look at the CIA man, we didn't have nuthing to do with it.

Or in other other words, the CIA may have told the Admin it was an unproven threat & only from one source and we just heard & used the threat part and hey, there was A SOURCE!

Once again, we have a lot of noise signifing nothing much- as the 9/11 report. Limit the questions and who you ask the questions of, and it becomes worthless.

[BillZBubb]

13. Because that would put the lie to the "no pressure" story.

You don't expect our spineless Dem senators or the corporate media whores to actually get tough and expose these criminals do you?

OSP was set up to get the "right" intelligence--ie what the Bushwhackers wanted. The CIA afraid of being undercut, caved and gave them what they wanted.

One would have expected that little contradiction being the first thing people mentioned when the Repug senate whitewash came out. But NOOOOO!

[pinto]

14. you'd think the mention of Feith and possible illegal activity as a focus

for "phase 2" of the Senate Intel investigation (remarks of the Chair and co Chair yesterday) would have the press digging for a story.....go figure.

(No sex angle there, I guess.)