farmgirl
02-05-2004, 09:05 AM
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=542&ncid=716&e=4&u=/ap/20040205/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/intelligence_cia
By KATHERINE PFLEGER, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - CIA (news - web sites) Director George Tenet is scheduled to speak Thursday at Georgetown University, his alma mater, to discuss the prewar intelligence on Iraq (news - web sites), the intelligence community's counter-proliferation work and the inherent difficulties of the intelligence business.
He planned to address what one senior intelligence official called "misperceptions and downright inaccuracies" concerning what the intelligence community reported — and didn't report — in its prewar assessments on Iraq.
"He is going to point out that it is premature to jump to conclusions," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Tenet has been publicly quiet on the debate in the 13 days since one of his advisers, David Kay, resigned as the CIA's top weapons inspector in Iraq. Kay's statements that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s purported weapons didn't exist at the time of the U.S. invasion have sparked an intense debate over the prewar intelligence which the Bush administration used to justify the war.
Tenet began exploring themes for the speech last week. He is expected to describe some of the intelligence community's successes, something Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld encouraged at a Senate hearing Wednesday.
"The reality is we have had some wonderful successes, and some of them not public," Rumsfeld said. "The failures are very visible, and that's always the case."
Even as President Bush (news - web sites) and his aides have backed away from their predictions that weapons would be found, Rumsfeld said he thinks Iraq may have had weapons of mass destruction before U.S. troops invaded and inspectors need more time to search for them.
Rumsfeld also denied assertions by Democrats that Bush administration officials manipulated intelligence to push for war.
At least five inquiries into the U.S. intelligence on Iraq are under way, and Bush was expected to announce another commission this week to review the intelligence community.
Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee, chaired by Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., scheduled a meeting Thursday to study a 200-plus-page report compiled by committee staff on the prewar intelligence. Last week, Roberts blamed problems with intelligence on the intelligence agencies, not the way policy-makers used what they were given.
West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the top Democrat on the committee, planned to reiterate calls to expand the probe to examine whether senior administration officials pressed analysts to make the case for war.
"The fact is that the report ultimately will not give an accurate picture if all questions are not answered," said Rockefeller spokeswoman Wendy Morigi.
By KATHERINE PFLEGER, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - CIA (news - web sites) Director George Tenet is scheduled to speak Thursday at Georgetown University, his alma mater, to discuss the prewar intelligence on Iraq (news - web sites), the intelligence community's counter-proliferation work and the inherent difficulties of the intelligence business.
He planned to address what one senior intelligence official called "misperceptions and downright inaccuracies" concerning what the intelligence community reported — and didn't report — in its prewar assessments on Iraq.
"He is going to point out that it is premature to jump to conclusions," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Tenet has been publicly quiet on the debate in the 13 days since one of his advisers, David Kay, resigned as the CIA's top weapons inspector in Iraq. Kay's statements that Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s purported weapons didn't exist at the time of the U.S. invasion have sparked an intense debate over the prewar intelligence which the Bush administration used to justify the war.
Tenet began exploring themes for the speech last week. He is expected to describe some of the intelligence community's successes, something Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld encouraged at a Senate hearing Wednesday.
"The reality is we have had some wonderful successes, and some of them not public," Rumsfeld said. "The failures are very visible, and that's always the case."
Even as President Bush (news - web sites) and his aides have backed away from their predictions that weapons would be found, Rumsfeld said he thinks Iraq may have had weapons of mass destruction before U.S. troops invaded and inspectors need more time to search for them.
Rumsfeld also denied assertions by Democrats that Bush administration officials manipulated intelligence to push for war.
At least five inquiries into the U.S. intelligence on Iraq are under way, and Bush was expected to announce another commission this week to review the intelligence community.
Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee, chaired by Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., scheduled a meeting Thursday to study a 200-plus-page report compiled by committee staff on the prewar intelligence. Last week, Roberts blamed problems with intelligence on the intelligence agencies, not the way policy-makers used what they were given.
West Virginia Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the top Democrat on the committee, planned to reiterate calls to expand the probe to examine whether senior administration officials pressed analysts to make the case for war.
"The fact is that the report ultimately will not give an accurate picture if all questions are not answered," said Rockefeller spokeswoman Wendy Morigi.