(the original Knight-Ridder story)...
Common Dreams
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0506-01.htmPublished on Friday, May 6, 2005 by Knight Ridder
British Memo Indicates Bush Made Intelligence Fit Iraq Policy
by Warren P. Strobel and John Walcott (Knight-Ridder)
WASHINGTON -- A highly classified British memo, leaked in the midst of Britain's just-concluded election campaign, indicates that President Bush decided to overthrow Iraqi President Saddam Hussein by summer 2002 and was determined to ensure that U.S. intelligence data supported his policy.
The document, which summarizes a July 23, 2002, meeting of British Prime Minister Tony Blair with his top security advisers, reports on a visit to Washington by the head of Britain's MI-6 intelligence service.
The visit took place while the Bush administration was still declaring to the American public that no decision had been made to go to war.
"There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable," the MI-6 chief said at the meeting, according to the memo. "Bush wanted to remove Saddam through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD," weapons of mass destruction.
The memo said "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." ....(more)
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Same story in Seattle Times:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002265205_intel06.html?syndication=rss-----
(Refers to Knight Ridder story...)
Global Security Newswire
http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/W_2005_5_6.html#E34EFA4ABush Pressed for Iraq War Despite Doubtful Intelligence, Classified British Memo Indicates
From Friday, May 6, 2005 issue.
A classified British memo indicates that the Bush administration planned as early as summer 2002 to oust then-Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, and wanted U.S. intelligence to support that decision, Knight Ridder reported today (see GSN, April 29).
The memo recounts a July 23, 2002, meeting between British Prime Minister Tony Blair and top security advisers. A visit to Washington by the head of the British MI-6 intelligence service was discussed in the meeting.
“There was a perceptible shift in attitude. Military action was now seen as inevitable,” the MI-6 chief said at the meeting, according to the memo. President George W. Bush “wanted to remove Saddam through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD.”
“The intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy,” the memo quotes him as saying.
The memo is “an absolutely accurate description of what transpired,” during the meeting in Washington, a former senior U.S. official said.
The Bush administration at the time claimed that no decision had been made on invading Iraq, Knight Ridder reported. The U.S.-led Iraq Survey Group found no weapons of mass destruction following the March 2003 invasion.
The memo also cites British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw saying, “Bush had made up his mind to take military action.”
“But the case was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors, and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran,” Straw said, according to the memo (Strobel/Walcott, Knight Ridder/Seattle Times, May 6).