9/18/2002

The CIA “had actually penetrated Saddam’s inner sanctum by ‘turning’ Iraqi foreign minister Naji Sabri, a high-level cabinet official. [CIA Director George] Tenet delivered the news personally to [President] Bush, [Vice President Dick] Cheney, and other top officials in September 2002. Initially, the White House was ecstatic about this coup. That reaction, however, changed dramatically when they heard what Sabri had to say. ‘He told us that they had no active weapons-of-mass-destruction program,’ said Tyler Drumheller, the CIA’s chief of operations in Europe until 2005, in an interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes [on April 23, 2006]. On September 18, 2002, George Tenet personally delivered news to President Bush. ‘Tenet told me he briefed the president personally,’ a former CIA officer told Salon [on September 6, 2007]. According to the article, Bush insisted that Sabri was simply telling them ‘the same old thing.’ ‘The president had no interest in the intelligence,’ the CIA officer said. Another officer said, ‘Bush didn’t give a fuck about the intelligence. He had made his mind up.’ ”

 – Craig Unger, The Fall of the House of Bush, Page 246