by Byrne » Sun Mar 26, 2006 8:56 pm
Let's hear it from the dork himself.....<br><br>Q Mr. President, at the beginning of your talk today you mentioned that<br>you understand why Americans have had their confidence shaken by the events in<br>Iraq. And I'd like to ask you about events that occurred three years ago that<br>might also explain why confidence has been shaken. Before we went to war in<br>Iraq we said there were three main reasons for going to war in Iraq: weapons<br>of mass destruction, the claim that Iraq was sponsoring terrorists who had<br>attacked us on 9/11, and that Iraq had purchased nuclear materials from Niger.<br>All three of those turned out to be false. My question is, how do we restore<br>confidence that Americans may have in their leaders and to be sure that the<br>information they are getting now is correct?<br><br> THE PRESIDENT: That's a great question. (Applause.) First, just if I<br>might correct a misperception. I don't think we ever said -- at least I know<br>I didn't say that there was a direct connection between September the 11th and<br>Saddam Hussein. We did say that he was a state sponsor of terror -- by the<br>way, not declared a state sponsor of terror by me, but declared by other<br>administrations. We also did say that Zarqawi, the man who is now wreaking<br>havoc and killing innocent life, was in Iraq. And so the state sponsor of<br>terror was a declaration by a previous administration. But I don't want to be<br>argumentative, but I was very careful never to say that Saddam Hussein ordered<br>the attacks on America.<br> Like you, I asked that very same question, where did we go wrong on<br>intelligence. The truth of the matter is the whole world thought that Saddam<br>Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. It wasn't just my administration, it<br>was the previous administration. It wasn't just the previous administration;<br>you might remember, sir, there was a Security Council vote of 15 to nothing<br>that said to Saddam Hussein, disclose, disarm, or face serious consequences.<br>The basic premise was, you've got weapons. That's what we thought.<br> When he didn't disclose, and when he didn't disarm, and when he deceived<br>inspectors, it sent a very disconcerting message to me, whose job it is to<br>protect the American people and to take threats before they fully materialize.<br>My view is, he was given the choice of whether or not he would face reprisal.<br>It was his decision to make. And so he chose to not disclose, not disarm, as<br>far as everybody was concerned.<br> Your question, however, the part that's really important is, how do we<br>regain credibility when it comes to intelligence? Obviously, the Iranian<br>issue is a classic case, where we've got to make sure that when we speak<br>there's credibility. And so, in other words, when the United States rallies a<br>coalition, or any other country that had felt that Saddam Hussein had weapons<br>of mass destruction is trying to rally a coalition in dealing with one of<br>these non-transparent societies, what do we need to do to regain the trust of<br>not only the American people, but the world community?<br> And so what I did was I called together the Silberman-Robb Commission --<br>Laurence Silberman and former Senator Chuck Robb -- to take a full look at<br>what went right and what went wrong on the intelligence, and how do we<br>structure an intelligence network that makes sure there's full debate among<br>the analysts? How do we make sure that there's a full compilation of data<br>points that can help decision-makers like myself feel comfortable in the<br>decision we make?<br> The war on terror requires the collection and analysis of good<br>intelligence. This is a different kind of war; we're dealing with an enemy<br>which hides in caves and plots and plans, an enemy which doesn't move in<br>flotillas, or battalions. And so, therefore, the intelligence-gathering is<br>not only important to make a diplomatic case, it's really important to be able<br>to find an enemy before they hurt us.<br> And so there was a reform process they went through, a full analysis of<br>what -- of how the operations worked, and out of that came the NDI, John<br>Negroponte and Mike Hayden. And their job is to better collate and make sure<br>that the intelligence-gathering is seamless across a variety of gatherers and<br>people that analyze. But the credibility of our country is essential -- I<br>agree with you.<br> Yes, sure.<br><br><!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>The full transcript of the 'remarks by President Bush to the City Club of Cleveland on the War on Terror (Renaissance Cleveland Hotel, Cleveland, Ohio) on 20th March 2006 is <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/03-20-2006/0004323801&EDATE=" target="top"></a><!--EZCODE LINK END--></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--></em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END-->[/b] <p></p><i></i>
