Why the 'Iraq tried to negotiate to avoid war' story SHOULD be pushed

[salin]

I posted this post on the LBN thrad: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=201626&mesg_id=201626

This is a big story, should be a big story, but not just in and of itself - but as part of a big public package. Indeed the WH has already tried to start a counter story to avert the potential damage.

The damage - isn't the story itself. It is the potential to fit with a number of other stories - which as a whole work to prick at the public awareness. Read on - and please comment (more points - or link news items that back the points up.)

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

Much of the 'supportive' (for the war) public, believed the drama that the WH staged, including that they had exhausted all avenues. For those clinging to trying to believe that our government has acted in good faith (ala ... "they have more information than we do, they know what they are doing) - this is one BIG part of the story that unravels that faith. Lots of the public are still in great denial about the true nature of this administration.

News the public has now finally seen/been exposed to:

Rationale for war #1: IMMINENT THREAT:
so now: no wmd
so now: increasing evidence that the intel was available to the admin that there was no wmd, but they chose to ignore it. (okay less of the public is aware of this point)

still not penetrating the public psyche: The degree to which top admin officials were screwing with the process of intel to get cooked results (re: sy hersh's Stovepipe - has not gone beyond New Yorker readers and savvy progressive websites.)

Rationale for war #2: LINK TO ALQUEDA - War on Terror:

so now: even admin says publically - there was never a link between 911 and Saddam.

still not penetrating the public psyche: That the actions of this administration actually have increased the risk to national security regarding "The War on Terror".
1. Pulling troops/troop support from Afghanistan by March 2002 to begin the year long buildup in Iraq.
2. Pulling intelligence OFF of al queada/osama work in Afghanistan and world wide... to help create the public rationale to go to war in Iraq.
3. Blowing up intelligence gathering capability on Weapons of Mass Destruction, in order to protect the WH public image on the rationales for going to war in Iraq (Plame Affair)

AND that the end result was documented regrouping first of al queada by summer 2002 in and around Afghanistan and later the regrouping of the Taliban within Afghanistan, to now - the real fear that the Taliban is regaining control of parts of Afghanistan.

Rationale for war #3: WE HAVE DONE ALL WE CAN - AND IRAQ WON'T COOPERATE - WE MUST ACT... ALONE IF NECESSARY:

now known: UN weapons inspectors were having success - and their findings and intelligence were superior to that of US intelligence (since it was cooked); even GOP on this Hill (Brown - to give cover to WH by painting the CIA as the problem) has said that we should have given more credence to weapons inspectors/UN intelligence.
now known: (THIS STORY) That there were serious attempts to negotiate with the US to prevent the war - including agreements to items that the Admin at the time said were required - and the WH ORDERED these negotiations NOT TO HAPPEN.

Rationale for war #4: Humanitarian - Saddam is a brutal dictator:

This is the only rational that remains. To those desperately clinging to denial about this administration - this is the BIG one left, and for some reason the stories about our support for the Uzbek regime (recently reported as exceptionally brutal, including boiling people to death) - and other CURRENT brutal regimes that we are not rushing in to liberate - just doesn't seem to penetrate the public psyche.

--------------------------
My whole point - is that when the rationales are put together - and the public is confronted with each of these now PUBLIC items it is hard to remain in a state of blind, kneejerk, support for bush at all costs because he is a good and moral man, and his government is good and moral.

The problem is that the media doesn't keep looping back and putting the stories together for the public to read as a whole. You can bet that the media talking heads would have put this all as a neat package and public indictment if this had happened under president Clinton or a president Gore. The rightwing talkheads would have started it - and created the media meme - and pushed it straight into the mainstream news.

But it isn't happening. Thus - WE have to keep track of the stories that go mainstream - as I have above - and put them together with the public rationale - and get talking - and keep pushing the story as a complete whole. Sooner or later there will be a critical mass that will force the story as a complete whole to break out there - and to pierce the great middle public's awareness and state of denial.

[midwest_lurker]

1. i agree...your post is good...did you see talkingpointsmemo about this?

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Yep, and I must say

Josh has a good point, this is more like dogs fighting for
scraps.

Problem is, them scraps are our boys and girls...

DAMN THEM!

[salin]

5. Not yet - will have to check - thanks.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

3. Especially when considering all these rationales were floated by the

Defense Policy Board, whose member head companies that have profitted immensely from this war by scaring the shit out of ordinary Americans.

[TNOE]

4. Like your enthusiam but

Repubs are completely dismissing this as everything else - saying Saddam was given 48 hours... another non-issue for them. But the Democratic Memo is of course "really big" news - and the Joe Wilson outing of a covert CIA operative is no big deal either. They are so blinded - nothing these people do matter. Holding back 9/11 evidence - papers? Not a problem.

[salin]

7. ah... but they are countering... always a bad sign for them.

on many things they distract and move on. The few times they have actively had to counter - the stories often pick up additional life because of the countering.

But my point isn't just about this - it is about putting the stories together - and presenting them as a whole and a pattern. The media is NOT doing this. So we should.

[kentuck]

6. I agree Salin... I posted this earlier...

The Enemies of Peace ?


Did George Bush pursue all options to settle the Iraq situation without violence? The spokesman for the WH, Scott McClelland says all "credible" avenues for peace were exhausted. But a top "former" Pentagon official says that is not so. (Was it Richard Perle?) He says he was asked not to pursue a possible negotiated peace deal days before the invasion.

As we know, the US troops had been clustering in Kuwait and on the borders of Iraq before the war. In fact, some troops were already in Iraq in the northern areas. So did Bush spurn the possibility of peace in favor of war? What does that say about the troops that might now be alive if Bush had chosen a different route?
=====================================================================
<snip>
But Richard Perle, the then chairman of the Defense Policy Advisory Board, said in the weeks leading up to war with Iraq, he told the CIA but they refused the plan to meet with Iraqi officials to discuss a possible peace deal along the lines of the plan outlined by Hage to ABCNEWS.

"Although I was not enthusiastic about the offer, I was willing to meet with the Iraqis," Perle told ABCNEWS. "The United States government told me not to." Perle would not disclose which official or arm of the government rejected the talks.

[salin]

8. but we need a framework, for the public, into which to insert this story

it is about a BIG picture that is not yet penetrating the public psyche. Fraying the edges, perhaps, but not a big mental image.

We should use THEIR framework for selling the war. And then throw in those stories that have pierced the public psyche (as in - picked up by numerous sources, and talked about for at least a week....) and put it all into a singular view.

[Nadienne]

18. Especially use sources that they don't doubt!

Unbelievable as it may seem, I know some people who question what I say because I might be quoting Michael Moore. And, oh, no, ew, he's EXTREMELY LIBERAL.

[salin]

25. agreed - and all of these stories have been covered in the

mainstream. It is just that a story appears in the Washington Post back section, and the next related story shows up in the LA Times. The next story is covered in the New York Times, but the subsequent story shows up in the Chicago Tribune. Each reader gets a tiny slice of the story, but does not have the ability to look across resources, and thus get the follow ups, articles written with more information, etc., that we can get by looking across sources across times. But these stories - from 'reputable sources' are out there.

[Brucey]

9. Nice job, kudos.

I agree.

[Nadienne]

10. Try and try and try

One of my co-workers is Republican (not a supporter of Bush, any more at least)... She seems to understand that this war doesn't really make sense...

According to Hitler, "The great mass of people... will more easily fall victim to a big lie than a small one."

But if we be persistent, I think we can shatter these disillusions.

[salin]

11. kudos to you

I honestly believe the only way to combat the spin and media repitition of the white house spin is by one on one conversations. We have to keep bringing these inconsistencies (eg news stories that contradict the image painted by the wh) to folks attention, and then subtly remind them of the ten other things that we had previously brought up. COming to the conclusion that we are being lied to - and that the system we have grown up respecting can actually be so damaging to the world - is very hard to do. Even worse for those who attend evangelical Christian churches in which ministers have started preaching politics from the pulpit - thus to their congregations somehow creating the belief that Jesus sanctions whatever Bush does. For these folks who buy the line, they also have to come to terms with their church and their minister also being complicit in the deciet. Those are hard things to accept.

I bet that your conversations have had a great deal to do with her being questioning or at least a little ill at ease with the war. Ill at ease/discomfort is just about the hardest place to move to from comfort/acceptance of bush/war - from there anyone of these stories will push from illatease to full awareness.

Be gentle - as it is bruising to come to that realization. I remember how hard it was for me, and I was inherently liberal and skeptical of the reagan/bush years. But nonetheless it felt too awful to believe that they would be capable of such things... (for me it was years later the october surprise... and a piece of information that came to me later that confirmed it. I was ready to be skeptical of the baby/incubators in KuWait. But that first awakening - ow it is hard.

[lovedems]

12. What about the claims that Cheney would visit the CIA

building on a daily basis basically telling them to make the intel. fit what the administration was saying? That makes perfect sense to me. Make the CIA give you the INTELLIGENCE YOU WANT (rather than the intel. that is accurate) and when the shit hits the fan, bam, you can blame the CIA for not giving you accurate intel.

I hope I am not jumping the gun on your story but I thought some agents had come out with the Cheney threats during the plame affair.

[salin]

14. Agreed - not sure that the story

has yet broken public awareness - but it certainly fits under the catetory 1 (threat) as - still not penetrating the public psyche.

[lovedems]

17. I forgot to tell you "job well done"

It would be pain staking but I would love for somebody, anybody to come up with a timeline of reality vs. lies and what Bushco. was saying publicly and what he and his administration were doing privately. It would require alot of research but could be done. If it was all wrapped up in one nice little article with a time line of events (helps to jog ones memory)it would make for some good reading during an election year and it would KEEP the administration on the defensive which is where they should be for the entire year.



(an example would be on such and such date * was stating we were doing all that we could do avoid war. Well during that same week so and so was told not to persue peace talks with the Iraqi's)

[salin]

26. wouldn't that be beautiful... maybe someone like Soros

would be willing to print a single edition/issue magazine to go on news stands like the one the fitness industry put out on Arnold and Maria during the recall election.

[KoKo]

19. Blitzer brought it up on his MidDay Show. Asked guest from Brookings Inst.

(Jonathan Pollack (?) about what he thought of this. Pollack said, it didn't matter because we couldn't believe Saddam and we couldn't believe that the persons "supposedly representing him" really had the connections, and that Saddam wouldn't have given up power, anyway.

At least Blitzer brought it up, which was surprising.

[lovedems]

20. Yes, but I was using that as just one example from many

instances where the administration lied and was acting contrary to what they were saying to the public. I am glad to hear that Blitz. is asking the right questions and the Brookings Inst. isn't exactly sympathetic to the right. It would just be interesting for some zealous reporter to dig into this story and put some pieces together.

[buddhamama]

13. Rationale #1

was the basis on which the Administration sold this war to the public. The lies told and the selective use of intelligence around this one issue should be in every American's psyche. Included in this, and just as big, is the Wilson betrayal. The Admin didn't like what he had to report and so, they tried to discredit him. The Admin has put our National Security at risk by leaking the info of Wilson's wife.

She had connections and informants that are now in danger and certainly no longer willing to continue a relationship with the CIA.

It All needs to sink in and grab hold.

[salin]

16. agreed - i put it under #2 though

maybe incorrectly - because it was tied to the "NATIONAL SECURITY" excuse which they tied to 911 war on terror (and blurred/looped it with WMD).

I put it there as one of three ironic examples under #2 - that demonstrate how these actions, while the admin claimed to be protecting national security, actually worked to compromise national security.

I think you are right - aspects of that whole affair need to be under both places (so the latter under #2, refers back to the first.)

[Nazgul35]

15. Not so enthusiastic about this story as you are...

because I am confused about the reasosn behind the leak....

according to TPM, this guy was one of those hired to work outside the standard intellegence networks, ala Rumsfelds private pentagon intellegnce groups designed to go out and find facts that supported the Administration's stances on policies....

He was canned from his job cause he was particularly sucky at it and the part that concerns me is the direction he is pointing the finger....he seems to be saying that it was the CIA that put the kibash on his planned talks as not being realistic....

To me, and I may just be confused here, he is accusing the CIA, Pentagon and FBI for being the ones who prevented the talks...and if this is true, with his connections to Pearl....he is doing the Bush Cabal's dirty work as the next wave of attack in the war on the intellegence community from this administration that started shortly after 9-11!!!

SO if this is true...you'd only be carrying the Bush cabal's water for them by pushing this stoy...

If i'm wrong...please let me know....

[KoKo]

23. Nazgul, yes I found his connections disturbing. I read the NYT's article

and Marshall's teaser about it. But found it confusing as to what Marshall was trying to point out to his readers.

The "beneath the ripple" story seemed to be finger pointing at the CIA and FBI rather than Bush. So, the story might be a plant. But, if it has Salin's hope of working it's way into a question for the American Non DU public that "Saddam tried to stop the Invasion at the last minute and said he didn't have WMD, then the article might just backfire on who planted it, if it was a Rove engineered plant in the first place. :shrug:

[salin]

28. I didn't catch the rational for why he was fired

I missed the "sucky" part, though there was an allusion to his security clearance being yanked ostensibly to his connection with the guy now featured in the story.

In an article over the weekend, however there was a completely unrelated article about the lack of protections for whistle blowers and that the first line of offense taken by the government was to take away security clearance. One could appeal, but apparently the hurdles are high for an appeal and very few (less than five, if I recall, over a long period of time) were ever accepted and the job (and clearance) reenstated.

So the guy first gets his security clearance yanked. Then fired (if I recall because the lack of clearance impinged on his ability to do his job).

Then three months later (why now?) his buddy (the one in the story) breaks this 'could have averted the war' story. And Perle is in the middle of it.

Marshall's speculation, that this might be a way to prove that he was a good guy (as in ... see this guy you yanked my security over almost saved us from going to war)... why? Implied ... to reshape the decision to pull the security clearance block. Implied... to reget his job.

This actually makes little sense to me. He wasn't going to ingratiate himself with anyone, nor get his clearance back by having his buddy embarass the government - or Perle. So the motive offered, to my ears, rings hollow.

Going back to that whistleblower thing - could the speculation instead go - that he was making noise about this story and preemptively the security was pulled? And for good measure throw in the reason being the association with the other person who could blow the story (an assertion of power and warning to others.. ala the Wilson/Plame affair?)

Back to your speculation - that he is blaming the cia/pentagon... Isn't he claiming that Perle (representing the Pentagon through the Defense POlicy Board) suggests he has to get White House approval... then comes back being told not to talk. That cuts out the CIA, and presumably the state department (who was fueding with the powers around the White House). So it leaves the White House directly, the National Security Administration and/or the Pentagon.

[KoKo]

37. Maybe, but the pulling of his security clearance and the fact (from my

read of the NYT's article) is that he was trying to convince them there "were" WMD, then the story changes.

That is what is confusing about it. There's a piece of the puzzle missing, maybe several pieces which make tying it together for the reader almost impossible to figure out what the point of it is. But, that there really is a point we are supposed to ferret out, is obvious because Josh Marshall said to "look beneath the ripples of this story."

However, he doesn't give a clue as to what it is that might be below the ripples. Is it a shark, a gold coin, or a flounder?

And, as I posted, the added teaser is that Blitzer brought it up today on his noon show, and we know he wouldn't bring it up unless he was hearing a big BUZZ about it, or maybe it just interested him....but more likely a Buzz amongst the Beltway Insiders.

And, going back further, I seem to remember that after we invaded there were rumors here on DU that a last minute offer had been made to Bush by Saddam......but the story never went anywhere. We have lost some of our "information diggers" here on DU who used to keep posting things like that, and I can't remember the source, but I do remember there defintely was a rumor of a "Last Minute Plea." It might have been an Arab Newpaper or Debka (one of the sources that many people question, here)

[Nazgul35]

41. And tonight on ABC news....

when they reported the story they went to Rumsfeld...at which point I put my hands up in the air and told my wife to "wait for it..." and sure enough....at the end...Rumsfeld laid the blame right at the feet of the CIA and the report also said that...I may be remembering this wrong...that Powell said the same thing....blaming the CIA....

I say be carefull with this or it could blow up in our faces....perhaps I should go drop a note to TPM and say i'm to thick to get it...could he please clarify....

[salin]

44. I heard a reference to the CIA

elsewhere, as well. But they haven't done too well when the over push the blame the CIA thing.

After the congressional panel blamed the CIA for the '16 words'... the news broke that, following regular procedures the CIA had filed a complaint with the DOJ... and thus was born the Wilson/Plame Affair.

It is hard to tell what direction this will turn next.

But the push on the CIA does seem to be emerging (again). You are right to note it and be wary of it.

[KoKo]

45. I heard this mentioned on all the cables, and didn't think it would make

it to the end of the week, but don't know where it's going.

[Nederland]

21. My Prediction

This story will go as far as the Niger uranium story.

i.e., nowhere.

[salin]

29. alone - each story does that (in this current media climate that is to be

expected).

To the public psyche each story remains discrete.

The point is creating the framework in which these stories are all compiled and together - drawing from reputable news sources. It is the gestalt which is important. It is the gestalt that moves some people into a discomfort zone - which leaves them a little more open to processing the implications of the next story that flares up... then disappears in a week. But that new story pricks the brain, and is remembered. It is also the gestalt that moves some who were in the discomfort zone - out of it and into full skepticism.

[buddhamama]

22. wouldn't it be something if the...

leaked Democratic memo story backfired on the Repubs by getting people talking about the whole affair. Especially if they hear the DEMS like Rockafeller saying that, the Repubs are 'restricting' the scope of the investigation and trying to protect the Admin.

[salin]

30. we could only wish (but I am not so hopeful, yet)

that the two stories would intersect in peoples' minds.

Ala... why would they restrict access... don't they want to know so things can be corrected? (nice positive mindset of many)

but then... THEY ALLEGEDLY DID WHAT... Why?

And then

Aha... why would they restrict access (fill in any of a number of deceptive stories about the war that have broken) ... OHHHHHH.

But I sadly think this will just happen spontaneously, and I doubt that many mainstream journalists will make the connection for viewers/readers.

[KoKo]

24. Kick, because Salin has a point, and it's very confusing this story...

:kick:

[salin]

31. they seem to like us confused.. the Obfuscation Administration n/t

[maggrwaggr]

27. I think it's a waste of time to push this story

A guy like Saddam Hussein will say whatever he wants to in order to stay in power. He's kind of like Bush. He's lie, lie, lie, and then break whatever promise he may have made.

Evil people are like that.

So the only way Hussein could have prevented war (in this hypothetical situation) would be to have given up power in Iraq, stepped down, and turned himself over to the American forces.

He wasn't exactly offering to do that.

So to argue about this is a waste of time.

Remember how Milosevic would say whatever the hell he felt like it to avoid getting bombed? Same thing. Both evil. Both liars.

[salin]

32. did you read my thread? It is not about this singular story

it is about the pattern from the adminsitration.

[buddhamama]

33. there are some differences

between the two examples you gave.

the main one being that, the U.N. was in Iraq searching for thr truth at the time. verifying whether or not he had given up his weapons could have been accomplished. i think too, included in the offer Saddam would hold elections.

trying to hold it to Saddam can't be trusted also fails the Admin because there was a time when we did, trusted him enough to give them weapons.

[salin]

34. and Cheney trusted him enough to sell (extralegally) oil equipment...

which gave Saddam economic tools... Cheney wasn't worried back in 2000 about Saddam using that money to buy weapons of mass destruction.

[maggrwaggr]

43. listen, the American people can't be bothered with details

I'm serious. All people know is that Saddam was a bad guy who couldn't be trusted.

This actually plays into the George Bush story, because all this means to them is that they could say "ha, see, when he knew he was going to be invaded he wanted to try to lie his way out of it".

At that point, the only thing that would have "worked" politically as far as America was concerned, was for Saddam Hussein to give himself up, with his hands in the air.

Wasn't gonna happen. This story is a waste of time to push.

YES we all know Bush is a liar. YES we all know this is part of his pattern.

The American people don't care about his "pattern". And they obviously don't seem to care a rat's ass about anything that happened more than a day or so ago.

[1songbird]

35. We can't wait for critical mass.

The story needs to be compiled with all of the pieces first. There is enough reference material here at DU for this task. I'm sure there are journalist that could step up to the plate. Bill Moyers of NOW may be a source for getting the story into television media. We could also try the NYT and hope that mainstream media bites.

[proud patriot]

36. Thanks Salin

:-)

[KoKo]

Salin, even more confusing is Marshall's link to this older story.......

from Knight-Ridder News about Maloof's security clearance being revoked from August, 2003 and yet according to this article his security clearances were revoked in December 2001! And, to make it even more murkey why was he picked to
be part of a "two man team" to find links for the September 11, 2002 WTC attack? So his Security Clearance is revoked two months after he's picked to work on a 9/11 investigation to find links to terrorists and Knight-Ridder doesn't report that his clearance was revoked until August 2003? (Granted, this story is about the "Appeal" which was denied but still...)

I don't know Salin, this story has me :crazy: and I wish you good luck with it......I think it's a Rove Smoke and Mirrors Story, because it's too confusing to make any sense at all.

BTW: Josh Marshall posted this link on his site where he talks about "looking below the ripples." I don't know where he's coming from or going to on this either. :shrug:

Posted on Fri, Aug. 01, 2003


U.S. revokes security clearance for
Pentagon employee
By Warren P. Strobel
Knight Ridder Newspapers
(Snip)..................
Maloof was part of a two-man team created at the Pentagon after the
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to find such links. The team was a
predecessor to the Pentagon's controversial Office of Special Plans.

Maloof and David Wurmser, who's now an aide to Undersecretary of
State John Bolton, claimed they had found evidence that Sunni and Shiite
Muslim groups, as well as secular Islamic countries, cooperate to harm
the United States despite their many differences.

Pentagon officials briefed the CIA on the team's findings in August 2002.
CIA Director George Tenet sat in on part of the briefing.

Most intelligence analysts and terrorism specialists vigorously dispute
that any operational ties exist between Iraq and al-Qaida. One senior
official said no new evidence of active cooperation between them had
been found since the United States invaded Iraq.

After Maloof's clearances were revoked in December 2001, several
individuals close to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld came to his
defense and wrote supporting letters, officials said. They included
Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, the Pentagon's No. 3 civilian,
who oversees the Office of Special Plans, and Richard Perle, a top
outside adviser and former chairman of the influential Defense Policy
Board, a group of outsiders who advise the defense secretary.

The action was on appeal until late May 2003, when the appeal was
rejected.
More at............
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/6439555.htm

[KoKo]

38. double post, glitch.

n/t

[Octafish]

39. BFEE SOP: Poppy and Baker did the same in Gulf War 1.

Osama said he'd withdraw, but Bush Sr and the Texans said "Don't matter none" and ordered the slaughter of over 100,000 Iraqi conscripts trying to flee north from Kuwait on the Highway of Death.

It must be genetic or else they're vampires: The bloodlust of the Bushes is insatiable.

From Robert Perry's ConsortiumNews.com:

Behind Colin Powell's Legend

Persian Gulf War

EXCERPT...

Set on a Ground War

Though secret from the American people at that time, Bush had long determined that a peaceful Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait would not be tolerated. Indeed, U.S. peace initiatives in early 1991 had amounted to window-dressing, with Bush privately fearful that the Iraqis might capitulate before the United States could attack.

To Bush, exorcising the "Vietnam Syndrome" demons had become an important priority of the Persian Gulf War, almost as central to his thinking as ousting Saddam's army from Kuwait.

Conservative columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak were among the few who described Bush's obsession publicly at the time. On Feb. 25, 1991, they wrote that the Gorbachev initiative brokering Iraq's surrender of Kuwait "stirred fears" among Bush's advisers that the Vietnam Syndrome might survive the Gulf War.

"There was considerable relief, therefore, when the President ... made clear he was having nothing to do with the deal that would enable Saddam Hussein to bring his troops out of Kuwait with flags flying," Evans and Novak wrote.

CONTINUED...

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2000/122600b.html

[gulliver]

40. Good points.

I don't see how anyone can say the Bushies got us into Iraq as a last resort (as Bush himself brazenly claimed). Had Bush pursued diplomacy he could have gotten Iraq contained and under permanent inspection. Now Americans are paying a steep price for not much.

[Armstead]

42. "They know more..."

>>>For those clinging to trying to believe that our government has acted in good faith (ala ... "they have more information than we do, they know what they are doing) - this is one BIG part of the story that unravels that faith.<<<

So true.