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CIA investigates its intelligence on Iraqi weapons

A top secret US intelligence report last fall is now at the center of an internal CIA review to determine whether US intelligence miscalculated the extent of the threat posed by former president Saddam Hussein's weapons programs. The report had concluded that Baghdad had chemical and biological weapons and was seeking to reconstitute its nuclear program.

The document, which was described by intelligence officials familiar with the review, provided US President George W. Bush with his last major overview of the status of Iraq's program to develop weapons of mass destruction before the start of the war.

The document, called a national intelligence estimate, was issued last October. It is significant because it provided the White House with the last attempt by the entire intelligence community to reach a consensus concerning Iraq's weapons programs before the war started in March.

The national estimate has been an early focus of attention for a small team of retired CIA analysts who have been brought in by the agency's director, George Tenet, to assess the accuracy of the intelligence reports produced before the war, according to officials familiar with the review.

Separately, the CIA is now in the process of turning over to Congress the documents that were used by analysts to prepare the national estimate, just as lawmakers in both the House of Representatives and Senate are preparing for their own reviews of the prewar intelligence.
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