IDA does it again on Iraq.

I know.  I know.  This is old news, like Powell, BUT the interesting thing is that "US Joint Forces Command," (JFCOM) a unified comand of the armed forces hired the "Institute for Defense Analysis" (IDA) to study this.  IDA is a very upscale "Federally Funded Research and Development Corporation."  (FFRDC) It is wholly owned by the federal government and is similar to RAND, and the "Institute for Naval Analysis." (CNA) IDA produced a study on Iraq a couple of years ago that was a model of thoroughness and honesty.

It has been the dogma of the Bush Administration that it must have been true that the Saddamist government and Al-Qa'ida were more or less connected.  This was never likely, but the Bushies were insistent, ARE insistent.

So, now we have this new "paper" from IDA which disputes the basic narrative of the Republican story concerning Iraq.

One wonders if the ruling powers at JFCOM thought that they were going to prove the Bushy thesis or disprove it.  Perhaps they just wanted to know the truth?  Nah.  That can't be right.  pl

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/227/story/29959.html

Comments

[J]

Colonel,

sadly in the bush-cheney mind/mindset, there is the world according to bush-cheney view, and then there is the world according to what is out side the bush-cheney blinders. the second is 'irrelevant' according to the bush-cheney myopic viewpoint. and it's like you have said previous [so-to-speak], bush is the 'decide-n-tater-n-chief' and what the 'decider' says, goes and all other is 'irrelevant'

[Martin K]

Oh say it is, oh say it is USJFC finally getting ready to cut some dead weight out of the ship of state. Is it just me, or has the military more or less been acting out a quiet revolution after the Iranian threat analysis came out? Dick Cheney has been pretty muffled recently.

Oh please let some of the jacobins be purged old school style. There must be someone who had responsibility for the fiscal part of the Phase IV who are downright criminals. I think the whole of the US would applaud if the military had hearings about what exactly went wrong in that phase.

[ExBrit]

Saddam was a dictator, but Iraq was a secular dictatorship. He wasn't about to let the religious terrorists get a foothold in his backyard. If the Bush/Cheney administration were going to let facts influence them it would have happened a long time before this. They're idealogues, pure and simple.

[Andy]

JFCOM (pronounced "jiffy-comm" for those who don't know, btw) has done a lot of good work. I know you've mentioned it here before, Col. Lang, (and wrote about it as well, but I've lost the link) that they're also responsible for the IPP report which is certainly a valuable addition to what we know about the Iraq war.

[Dale]

Actually that's CNA. The Center for Naval Analyses. Otherwise known as The CNA Corporation.

http://www.cna.org/

[m savoca]

i dont think the truth about saddam not conected to a-q concerns them that much. just more lies in face of the facts.

they are concerned with public perception of the "their truth" ( administration's propaganda)

that's why Admiral William Fallon has to go. we have a sick government that can't respond constructively to debate nor dissent.

desperate people (administrations) do desperate things.

hope congressional leaders are ready to stand fast against another "preemptive" war.

[jonst]

m savoca,

You wrote, "hope congressional leaders are ready to stand fast against another "preemptive" war."

Was that written in jest? Irony? "leaders" and "standing fast" are not words many would associate with Congress these past 8 years or so.

[frank durkee]

Slate for Wed.has an intereesting article by Weisberg on Bush's religious stuff that elucidates much of his personality. These insight go a long way toward explaining his behaviour and mindset.

[Andy]

Michael Tanji has an interesting take:

I’m saying for some the presence of AQ where they should not be is enough, for others they would prefer pictures of UBL and Saddam together playing with their Polly Pockets before they called a relationship “operational.” I would prefer that we all operate off the same sheet of music, regardless.

[João Carlos]

I don't know if it was discussed here, but Admiral William Fallon resigned.

[Sidney O. Smith III]

That’s also the McClatchy Co. -- the media conglomerate that purchased Knight Ridder in 06. Knight Ridder is the only US media company that did not sell out in the lead up to the Iraqi Invasion. Warren Strobel (who filed the referenced report) was part of the Knight Ridder team at the time and he played a major role in leading an investigative charge against the deceivers within the beltway, including, yes, those walking the halls of the Pentagon.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/btw/watch.html

I am tempted to write, Knight Ridder does it again on Iraq.

If only someone from the McClatchy family would call Anne Cox Chambers and persuade her that the Cox media empire needs to adopt the Knight Ridder-McClatchy approach. It is extremely marketable and, at least right now, appears American.

[VietnamVet]

Colonel,

The Bush White House is composed of true believers. They make their own reality. The sad fact of modern America is that corporate media still treats President Bush and his followers as sane.

No clearer picture of this disconnect than last night's Interview on NewsHour between Frederick Kagan, Father of the Surge and Nir Rosen

Frederick Kagan: "The American presence in Iraq is not an occupation." A bald flat out denial of reality. Any endeavor designed and led by idiots is doomed to failure. No doubt, Admiral Fallon was forced out for introducing too much reality into the White House.

Bomb. Bomb. Bomb. bomb, I-ran.

[JohnH]

A banner week for analysis of Iraq (finally!) William Polk dissects the way forward. It's ominous, simply ominous: http://www.juancole.com/2008/03/guest-editorial-polk-iraq-war-and.html

In fact, it's so ominous that it has paralyzed the movers and shakers who supposedly represent us.

Polk concludes, "the real cost could be the destruction of the world in which we live and the replacement of our civic, cultural and material “good life” by something like nightmare George Orwell predicted in his novel 1984."

Polk's ends his speech with an exhortation, "is permanent war – one Iraq after another – to be our future?"

"That really depends on how much you and I care. If we don’t care enough to force our representatives to care, no one else will. As President Truman put it, in another context, “the buck stops here.”

[J]

Colonel,

if one wants a copy of the iraqi perspectives project report, they have to request a physical copy of it that they will be snail-mailed to them.

here’s jfcom's contact/request form to leave one's name and address at:
http://www.jwfc.jfcom.mil/webapps/forms/USJFCOM/feedback.jsp

[William R. Cumming]

Let's be grownups. What is past is past. Are we really going to waste the rest of this year and perhaps most of the next administration over witch hunts and assignment of blame? Okay answer me one question-- who made the decision not to disarm the Iraqi's both de facto and de jure? We did disarm the Japanese and Germans, with shot on sight rules for those people found armed and without authorization. And mistakes I know were made. Would this have resulted in a different post-Saddam Iraq? Oh that's right we did not have enough boots on the ground to take that posture and destroy and protect ammunition sites and in fact some estimates are that 25% of US furnished weapons have wandered off. If you are going to witchhunt make sure it is witches and not the old and down trodden that are picked upon. Simply wasted time and we learn nothing--NADA!

[J]

Colonel,

abcnews makes the full report available online. it's just under 12mg in size
http://a.abcnews.com/images/pdf/Pentagon_Report_V1.pdf

[m savoca]

jonst,

no i was not speaking in jest..." hoping congressional leaders stand fast..," against invading another country.

i accept your inference that little spine was shown by congress during the run up to the invasion of iraq.

last time 23 senators refused to write the president a blank check. those senators were leaders, but were outnumbered.

today the numbers are different, with the addition of Senator James Webb and others in both houses.

i suspect President Bush would launch a war (or an attack), probably air and naval bombardment with few if any ground forces involved, if he thought he could "get away with it". He may yet try.

invading iran without a vote in support, by congress, i believe, is grounds for impeachment.

with his violations of the constitution, use of torture and rendition, and preemptive war, this president has dishonored our nation.

i have supported candidates on both sides of the aisle who would bring a speedy end to the war in iraq.

[Andy]

After reading the report in its entirety, it becomes clear that there were ties between Iraq and Al Qaeda, but they were pretty tenuous and ephemeral. Certain right-wing sites are already highlighting those links as "proof." ISTM that the report itself provides an honest assessment in the executive summary:

But the relationships between Iraq and the groups advocating radical pan-Islamic doctrines are much more complex. This study found no "smoking gun" (i.e., direct connection) between Saddam's Iraq and al Qaeda. Saddam's interest in, and support for, non-state actors was spread across a variety of revolutionary, liberation, nationalist, and Islamic terrorist organizations. Some in the regime recognized the potential high internal and external costs of maintaining relationships with radical Islamic groups, yet they concluded that in some cases, the benefits of association outweighed the risks.

[matt]

here's hoping that the release of this report has some influence in shaping the media narrative that seems to be slowly emerging w/ regards to iraq. I guess james rendon and the rendon group isn't on retainer this time .....

[W. Patrick Lang]

Andy et al

The kind of contacts between Iraq and AQ were the normal thing that just about any Arab ruler would maintain with a dangerous group. They prove nothing with regard to an "alliance" between the two.

The mindless right (as opposed to the thinking right) will seize on any shred to support the administration's IO campaigns in the US. pl

[condfusedponderer]

The report is up eventually.