CIA Director George “Tenet first pressed the White House for written approval [for using enhanced interrogation techniques on al-Qaeda suspects] in June 2003, during a meeting with members of the National Security Council, including [National Security Advisor Condoleezza] Rice, the officials said. Days later, he got what he wanted: a brief memo conveying the [Bush] […]
Category: quotes
6/15/2003
“The only indigenous Shi’ite group [in Iraq] to remain implacably opposed to the occupation are the Sadrists (followers of the radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr) whose military wing is called the Mahdi Army. …The Mahdi Army was created by al-Sadr in June 2003, in direct response to the American invasion.” [The 15th of the month used […]
6/12/2003
Walter Pincus of The Washington Post interviewed vice presidential Chief of Staff Scooter Libby for an article about Niger, which appeared on June 12, 2003. “The story reported that a ‘key component in President Bush’s claim in his State of the Union address last January that Iraq had an active nuclear weapons program…was disputed by […]
6/12/2003
“On 12 June, 2003, the main pipeline carrying Iraqi crude from the northern oil fields to Ceyhan in Turkey was attacked, launching the ‘pipeline war.’ This war was a constant struggle between saboteurs trying to shut down Iraq’s oil exports and repair crews, and a variety of installation protection forces trying to stop them from […]
6/11/2003
According to a Guardian article on June 11, 2003, chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said, regarding the weapons inspection process in Iraq: ” ‘They [Washington] would say I was too compliant with the Iraqis when in reality they meant I was not compliant enough with what the US wanted.’ ” – Robin Cook, The […]
6/10/2003
David Kay was hired by the CIA on June 10, 2003, to search for WMD in Iraq. “Over the next week or so, Kay embarked on a crash course in WMD intelligence. ‘…It was nothing new,’ he recalled. Anything with a strong or reasonable factual basis came from before 1998, when the U.N. inspectors had […]
6/10/2003
In the search for WMD in Iraq, President “Bush decided the administration needed a special weapons hunter, and on June 10 [2003], David Kay, a former chief U.N. weapons inspector with extensive experience in Iraq, was sworn in as an adviser to [CIA Director George] Tenet and as head of the CIA’s Iraq Survey Group. […]
6/9/2003
According to a New York Times article on June 9, 2003: “In separate briefings, both [9/11 mastermind] Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah, a high-level aide to Osama bin Laden, said that the Saudi billionaire had vetoed the idea of linking with Iraq because he didn’t want to be beholden to Saddam Hussein.” – Peter […]
6/9/2003
According to a New York Times article on June 9, 2003: ” ‘Two of the highest-ranking leaders of al Qaeda in American custody have told the CIA in separate interrogations that the terrorist organization did not work jointly with the Iraqi government of Saddam Hussein, according to several intelligence officials. Abu Zubaydah, a Qaeda planner […]
6/9/2003
President George W. Bush’s response to a line of questioning regarding US credibility being on the line should WMDs not be found: “I read a report that somehow, you know, that there is no al Qaeda presence in Baghdad. I guess the people who wrote that article forgot about Al Zarqawi’s network inside of Baghdad that […]