PA PCTEG PDB PFLP-GC PIJ PLF PM Department of State's Office of Public Affairs Presidential Daily Brief Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command Palestinian Liberation Front Prime minister SEIB SIGINT SIO SOCM SPM SPWR SRBM SSCI TEL TIN UAE UAV UBL UDMH UF6 UN UNMOVIC UNSC UNSCOM UNSCR 687 Senior Executive Intelligence Brief Senior Intelligence Officer Sense of the Community Memorandum Department of State's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Office of Senior Publish When Ready (a CIA finished intelligence product) Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Transporter, erector, and launcher Technical intelligence note (a Department of Energy finished intelligence product) United Arab Emirates Unmanned aerial vehicle Usama bin Ladin Unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (a type of missile fuel) Uranium hexaflouride United Nations United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission United Nations Special Commission United Nations Security Council Resolution United Nations Security Council Resolution prohibiting Iraq from having UNSCR 707 United Nations Security Council Resolution condemning Iraq for violating VX WINPAC WMD O-ethyl S-(2-iisopropylaminoethyl) methylphosphonothiolate (a type of Director of Central's Intelligence's Center for Weapons Intelligence, Weapons of mass destruction - 440 ADDITIONAL VIEWS Additional Views Chairman Pat Roberts joined by Senator Christopher S. Bond, Senator Orrin G. Hatch I have no doubt that the debate over many aspects of the U.S. liberation of Iraq will continue for decades, but one fact is now clear, the U.S. Intelligence Community told the President, the Congress, and the American people before the war that Saddam had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and if left unchecked, would probably have a nuclear weapon during this decade. More than a year after Saddam's fall, it also seems clear that no stockpiles are going to be found, the Iraqi nuclear program was dormant, and the President, the Congress and American people deserve an explanation. In short, the Intelligence Community's prewar assessments were wrong. This report seeks to explain how that happened. The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was formed in 1976 during a crisis of confidence in the country and in response to a need to rebuild the public's trust in government institutions including its intelligence agencies. The Senate created this Committee to conduct, for the first time, on behalf of the American people, vigorous oversight of the intelligence activities of the United States. While the underlying premise of legislative oversight is the need for "public" accountability, the Intelligence Committee's oversight usually occurs behind closed doors. This is a conundrum the Committee deals with on a daily basis. With the vast majority of our oversight being conducted out of sight, it is exceedingly difficult to assure the American people that we are doing our jobs. What may appear to be little to no Committee activity, often belies an intense and probing examination the result of which will never be made known to the public because the nation's security interests are paramount. However, the shear gravity of certain unique issues can raise the public's interest to a level that requires a public accounting. This is such an issue. The scope of the Committee's 12 month inquiry into the U.S. Intelligence Community's prewar assessments regarding Iraq is without precedent in the history of the Committee. The Committee has looked behind the Community's assessments to evaluate not only the quantity and quality of intelligence upon which it based its judgments, but also the reasonableness of the judgments themselves. The result is a detailed and meticulous recitation of the intelligence reporting and the concomitant evolution of the analyses. From the details emerges a report that is very critical of the Intelligence Community's performance. Some have expressed concern that such criticism is not only unnecessary, but will also engender excessive risk aversion. I believe that, although that is possible, we should not underestimate the character of the hard-working men and - 441 women of the Intelligence Community. While criticism is never easy to accept, professionals understand the need for self-examination and the men and women of the Intelligence Community are, first and foremost, true and dedicated professionals. In order to begin the process of self-examination, however, one must recognize or admit that one has a problem. Unfortunately, many in the Intelligence Community are finding it difficult to recognize the full extent of this significant intelligence failure. It is my hope that this report will facilitate that process. The painstaking detail and harsh criticisms in this report are necessary not only because the democratic process demands it, but also to ensure that there is an honest accounting of the mistakes that were made so that they are not repeated. It is the constitutional responsibility of the Legislature to conduct such an accounting. It was my hope from the outset of this inquiry that the Committee could handle this important matter in a responsible manner untainted by politics. Despite early setbacks and differences of opinion, I believe we achieved that goal. A clear measure of our success is the fact that this report was approved by a unanimous vote. However, this achievement did not come without very hard work and perseverance. The Committee's Vice Chairman and I have worked in full consultation throughout this process. I long ago lost count of the many meetings I have had with the Vice Chairman and Democrat and Republican members to hear and discuss their concerns about the inquiry. In response to Minority concerns and suggestions, we made many adjustments along the way. We conducted additional interviews, and most important, we expanded the scope of the review and made more than 200 changes to this report at the request of Democrat members. I am confident that every member of this committee has had ample opportunity to involve themselves to whatever extent they wished throughout the process. Despite our hard and successful work to deliver a unanimous report, however, there were two issues on which the Republicans and Democrats could not agree: 1) whether the Committee should conclude that former Ambassador Joseph Wilson's public statements were not based on knowledge he actually possessed, and 2) whether the Committee should conclude that it was the former ambassador's wife who recommended him for his trip to Niger. Niger The Committee began its review of prewar intelligence on Iraq by examining the Intelligence Community's sharing of intelligence information with the UNMOVIC inspection teams. (The Committee's findings on that topic can be found in the section of the report titled, "The Intelligence Community's Sharing of Intelligence on Iraqi Suspect WMD Sites with UN Inspectors.") Shortly thereafter, we expanded the review when former Ambassador Joseph Wilson began speaking publicly about his role in exploring the possibility that Iraq was seeking or may have acquired uranium yellowcake from - 442 Africa. Ambassador Wilson's emergence was precipitated by a passage in President Bush's January 2003 State of the Union address which is now referred to as "the sixteen words." President Bush stated, ". . . the British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." The details of the Committee's findings and conclusions on this issue can be found in the Niger section of the report. What cannot be found, however, are two conclusions upon which the Committee's Democrats would not agree. While there was no dispute with the underlying facts, my Democrat colleagues refused to allow the following conclusions to appear in the report: Conclusion: The plan to send the former ambassador to Niger was The former ambassador's wife suggested her husband for the trip Conclusion: Rather than speaking publicly about his actual At the time the former ambassador traveled to Niger, the Intelligence Community did not have in its possession any actual documents on the alleged Niger-Iraq uranium deal, only second hand reporting of the deal. The former ambassador's comments to reporters that the Niger-Iraq uranium documents "may have been forged because ‘the dates were wrong and the names were wrong,"" could not have been based on the former ambassador's actual experiences because the Intelligence Community did not have the documents at the time of the ambassador's trip. In addition, nothing in the report from the former ambassador's trip said anything about documents having been forged or the names or dates |