The Persistent Myth of "Intelligence Failure"

In the end, the Times says it "cannot say with certainty whether Mr. Bush lied about Iraq", but that withholding "vital information from the public" or leading the public "to believe things that" are known to be "not true" is "bad enough."

The New York Times should consider its own reporting on Iraq and take a long hard look in the mirror on this point. It should also look up the word "lie" in a dictionary, since making untrue statements with intent to deceive or creating a false or misleading impression is the very definition of the word.[10] So if the Times can say with certainty that Mr. Bush was guilty of the latter, then, by definition, he lied, and they could thus credibly say so with just as much certainty. Of course, the Times lied, too, so their reluctance to call Bush and Co. liars is perfectly understandable.

Others, of course, have even more self-interest in defending the administration. As the Washington Post noted, "The report's conclusions were sharply criticized by several Republican members, who accused the Democratic majority of rehashing old material for political advantage."[11]

Yet Democrats in the Senate have been just as complicit as Republicans not only in the decision to go to war, but also in attributing the patently false pretext for the war to an "intelligence failure".

In sum, the notion of an "intelligence failure" is a convenient myth for all who propagate it.

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[1] Joby Warrick and Walter Pincus, "Bush Inflated Threat From Iraq's Banned Weapons, Report Says", The Washington Post, June 6, 2008; A03

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/05/AR2008060501523_pf.html

[2] Mark Mazzetti and Scoot Shane, "Bush Overstated Iraq Evidence, Senators Report", The New York Times, June 6, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/06/world/middleeast/06intel.html

[3] "The Truth About the War", The New York Times, June 6, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/06/opinion/06fri1.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print

[4] Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Report on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq" (Phase I), July 2004

http://www.yirmeyahureview.com/archive/iraq/iraq_war/congress_senate_committee_prewar_intelligence.htm

[5] I've written at length elsewhere on a number of specific aspects of the so-called "intelligence failure" with regard to WMD and the true motives for the invasion of Iraq:

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