The Washington Monthly

September 28, 2004

CLUELESS....Here's the PowerPoint version of Dana Priest and Thomas Ricks' survey of opinion in the intelligence community regarding Iraq:

A former intelligence officer who maintains contact with CIA officials: "There's no obvious way to fix it. The best we can hope for is a semi-failed state hobbling along with terrorists and a succession of weak governments."
A U.S. government official who reads the intelligence analyses on Iraq: "Things are definitely not improving."
An Army staff officer who served in Iraq and stays in touch with comrades in Baghdad through e-mail: "There are things going on that are unbelievable to me. They have infiltrators conducting attacks in the Green Zone. That was not the case a year ago."
An intelligence expert with contacts at the CIA, the State Department and the Pentagon: "There's a real war going on here that's not just the [CIA against the administration on Iraq] but the State Department and the military."

So the war against the happy talk from the administration is coming from the CIA, the State Department, and the military. Is there anyone else who counts?

In other words, is there anyone outside the White House who thinks that Bush has the slightest clue what to do in Iraq?

—Kevin Drum 11:51 PM Permalink | Trackbacks

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