A former leading CIA official said on Sunday that the White House deliberately ignored intelligence that showed that there were no weapons of mass destruction in the run-up to the war in Iraq.
Tyler Drumheller, who was once the highest-ranking CIA officer in Europe, told CBS's 60 Minutes program that the White House shifted its focus to regime change in the months before the invasion.
"The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy," Drumheller said.
Meanwhile a leaked Pentagon document showed that US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is pressing ahead with plans to reshape the armed forces despite recent criticism of his stewardship from several retired military officers. Plans approved last month by Rumsfeld and leaked to the Washington Post revealed the increasing use of special forces and an increased role for the military in areas that have been the domain of the CIA. Drumheller, who had a senior role in the run-up to the war, told 60 Minutes that the CIA provided the White House with information from Iraq's then foreign minister, Naji Sabri.
"[The source] told us that there were no active weapons of mass destruction programs," Drumheller said.
He said that the then-CIA director, George Tenet, passed the information on to President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other senior officials, who were initially excited. But that changed, he said.
"The [White House] group that was dealing with preparation for the Iraq war came back and said they were no longer interested. And we said `Well, what about the intel?' And they said `Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change," Drumheller said.
Drumheller said the decision to invade Iraq would be remembered as a grave mistake.
"It just sticks in my craw every time I hear them say it's an intelligence failure ... This was a policy failure ... I think, over time, people will look back on this and see this is going to be one of the great, I think, policy mistakes of all time," he said.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines’ millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday’s mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement. Thousands of overseas Filipino workers have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and his impeached vice president, Sara Duterte. While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showed that at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened on April 13. However,
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
RSS