Iraqi war based on lies - more proof

[peaccenicked]

Blair's secret weapon

Investigation: A covert project, set up by the UK government, 'cherry-picked' intelligence to fit the hidden agenda of justifying war with Iraq

By Neil Mackay

06/08/03 (The Sunday Herald) It was in the immediate aftermath of the first Gulf war and Britain knew even then that Saddam Hussein would one day have to be deposed. Allied forces had stopped short of ousting the Iraq dictator, but the British government was convinced it would one day have to finish the job.

The problem was how to convince the world that even a defeated Iraq still posed a serious threat. The answer came in 1991, with the setting up of a secret military intelligence operation whose existence has only now been uncovered by the Sunday Herald in the wake of damaging claims that Tony Blair and George Bush exaggerated intelligence reports to justify their invasion of Iraq this year.

The covert project was called Operation Rockingham and it was designed specifically to 'cherry-pick' information which pointed towards Saddam having a WMD stockpile that he could use imminently. Right up until the outbreak of war, the staff of Operation Rockingham, which was set up by the defence intelligence staff within the Ministry of Defence, deliberately overlooked 'mountains' of reports and intelligence documents which pointed towards Saddam destroying his arsenal and instead used 'selective intelligence' from just a tiny pool of data to create a false and misleading picture that the Iraqi ruler was a direct threat to the West.

Proof of Operation Rockingham came to light in a Sunday Herald investigation and its existence was backed up in a series of astonishingly frank interviews with Scott Ritter, the former chief weapons inspector in Iraq who served on the staff of General Norman Schwarzkopf -- who led the allied forces in the first Gulf war -- before joining the UN weapons inspections team, Unscom. Ritter was also a US military intelligence officer for eight years. His claims about Rockingham are supported by UK parliamentary documents and briefings with other British intelligence sources.

'As inspections developed throughout the 1990s it became clear that Unscom were accomplishing a great deal,' said Ritter. 'This became a liability for the UK and the US. Because of the level of Iraqi disarmament, France, China and Russia began talking about lifting sanctions. This wasn't what Britain and America wanted to hear -- they wanted sanctions and regime change.

'Operation Rockingham became part of an effort to maintain a public mindset that Iraq was not in compliance with the inspections. They had to sustain the allegation that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, even though Unscom was showing the opposite.'

Operation Rockingham began to liaise with Unscom -- ostensibly it was there to share intelligence with the weapons inspectors from within the United Kingdom spying community, but it soon became clear that this covert operation had a hidden agenda: deliberately creating a fake picture that Saddam was armed to the teeth.

Ritter added: 'Operation Rockingham cherry-picked intelligence. It received hard data but had a pre-ordained outcome in mind. It only put forward a small percentage of the facts when most were ambiguous or noted no WMD.' Staff once connected to Rockingham are now thought to be involved in the new Iraqi Survey Group which has been sent to Iraq in a bid to find WMDs.

To back up claims that Operation Rockingham was deliberately 'cherry-picking' intelligence and producing misleading reports, Ritter described how its staff blatantly ignored proof of Saddam's compliance. 'Britain and America were involved in a programme of joint exploitation of intelligence from Iraqi defectors. There were mountains of information coming from these defectors, and Rockingham staff were receiving it and then selectively culling reports that sustained the claims that weapons of mass destruction were in existence. They ignored the vast majority of the data which mitigated against such claims.

'In theory, Rockingham wasn't dangerous,' Ritter said, 'in theory, it was a clearing house for intelligence. But what is dangerous is the policy behind Rockingham. When I was an intelligence officer, I didn't tell my commander what he wanted to hear, I told him what the facts were. In combat, we have an old saying -- if you lie, you die.

'Operations like Rockingham become a danger to democracy if they lose their integrity. They are behind the scenes, in the shadows and away from public scrutiny. When a government is corrupt by way of such a policy, the public has a hard time holding the government accountable. We were all subject to a programme of mass deception, but now the
Full story (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article3703.htm)

[RAM]

I know! Apparenlt Alistar Campbell write a letter to MI6 saying that they would not abuse intelgience again!

[Ghost Writer]

Only a moron would point to an Op-Ed piece and call it "more evidence".


(Edited by Ghost Writer at 12:41 pm on June 9, 2003)

[Invader Zim]

Yes it been all over the news that the Gov has been deliberatly taking intelegance which has been deemed by the MI6 to be unreliable to find justification of the war.

The thousands of corpeses they have uncovered throughout Iraq was more than enough justification for me, but some people care more about WMD as a reason for war than human suffereing.

[RAM]

I saw film of bodies with no head, no brain in there head just skin, burnt bodies and arms showing al of the blood vessels!

The real price of war!

[El Che]

Ghost Writer, this is a very serious situation, these are very serious allegations. The fact that the right wingers on this site don`t realise that says a great deal about them. But I would venture to say that most people on this planet and all people that possess a little common sense do realise just how serious it is.

[antieverything]

Peacenicked, could you find a more reputable source for this story? I wouldn't trust the Sunday Herald if I were you.

[MarxIsGod]

Charles Osgood from WCBS 880, flagship station of CBS News, has a segment every morning called "The Osgood Files" and this morning (6/9/03) he spoke about the issue with the WOMDs and did some speaking about it last week. You can find his reports at

http://wcbs880.com/osgood/

This morning's story isn't posted yet but I imagine it will be by tomorrow. In the mean time, the stuff from last week is interesting as well.

[Socialsmo o Muerte]

It's not a lie that Saddam Hussein murdered, brutalised, tortured and gassed hundreds of thousands of his own people.

[RAM]

That is very true but is that worth killling Iraqi civilanna dn leaving the country in the mess that it is in now?

[Ghost Writer]

Here are some other tales written by Neil Mackay.

A SECRET blueprint for US global domination reveals that President Bush and his cabinet were planning a premeditated attack on Iraq (http://www.sundayherald.com/27735)

US forces' use of depleted uranium weapons is 'illegal' (http://www.poop.org/Breaking/april-03/herald-3-31.pdf)

CIA evidence 'clears Libya' of Lockerbie (http://www.thelockerbietrial.com/appeal_sunday_herald_feb17.htm)

The transcript that proves police were warned of the bombers' plans (http://www.sundayherald.com/20708)

EU plan to send refugees home is 'breach of Geneva Convention' (http://www.paih.org/archives/2002-3/sunday_herald280103.htm)

How Did Iraq Get Its Weapons? We Sold Them (http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0908-08.htm)

This list of bullshit should be enough to convince anyone that Neil Mackay lacks credibility, and has absolutely no concept of objective reporting. In short, the man produces the mad dog liberal nonsense that mentally deranged characters like peacenicked cling to with hatred. The man is a liar, and appeals to other liars. You're right El Che. This is a very serious allegation, for people like Mackay's sake I hope they can back it up with more than words, otherwise they will prove themselves to be despicable people. Of course, that does not phase them, they place no value on respectiblility, or honour. That is why they are leftwingers.

(Edited by Ghost Writer at 10:53 pm on June 9, 2003)

[El Che]

Lies and statistics (http://www.observer.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,973098,00.html)

"It was known some time ago that a section of the Campbell dossier was nothing to do with our intelligence services, so much admired by Mr Blair, but had been simply copied from the internet from various articles in academic journals. But last week it was shown that Campbell had not only plagiarised these articles but that they too had been 'sexed up'.

Mr Ibrahim al-Marashi, a research student working in California, had written that Saddam's intelligence service was 'aiding opposition groups in hostile regimes'. But, he now reveals in the Daily Telegraph, his words have been changed in the Campbell dossier to 'supporting terrorist groups in hostile regimes'."


(Edited by El Che at 11:12 pm on June 9, 2003)


(Edited by El Che at 12:10 am on June 10, 2003)

[Pete]

US does have their Neocon cabniet seeking the New American Century

US forces have used depleted uranium

I don't know a lot about that Libya case...

This next headline I am also unsure of...

bah for the third...

But the last one the headline is also true.

I am going by the headlines, so forgive me if the guy does a complete 180 inside the articles. I was just wondering, what paper does he write for?

[Ghost Writer]

Here is an excellent example of the type of contorted thinking the Neil Mackay is guilty of. The following link is to a website that advocates gun ownership. Apparently, Neil Mackay showed his true colors, and demonstrated his anti-democratic, gun-grabbing liberal bias, once again. This man is about as despicable as Stanley Cohen, the Jewish RDDB (red-diaper-doper-baby) lawyer that defends Hamas.

Link to views expoused by your beloved American hating Stalinist, named Neil Mackay. The man is a fucktard (http://www.sarahbradycampaign.org/fan_mail_yt.htm)

(Edited by Ghost Writer at 11:34 am on June 10, 2003)

[Totalitarian]

Here's a good article about how the US government has lied throughout history in order to make war (which advances the interests of the ruling elite).

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/justincol.html

[Invader Zim]

Quote: from Ghost Writer on 11:02 am on June 10, 2003
Here is an excellent example of the type of contorted thinking the Neil Mackay is guilty of. The following link is to a website that advocates gun ownership. Apparently, Neil Mackay showed his true colors, and demonstrated his anti-democratic, gun-grabbing liberal bias, once again. This man is about as despicable as Stanley Cohen, the Jewish RDDB (red-diaper-doper-baby) lawyer that defends Hamas.

Link to views expoused by your beloved American hating Stalinist, named Neil Mackay. The man is a fucktard (http://www.sarahbradycampaign.org/fan_mail_yt.htm)

(Edited by Ghost Writer at 11:34 am on June 10, 2003)


No he didnt he was against gun control through out the whole conversation with those idiot KKK supporters. Also every thing he said in that artical was true.

[RAM]

Of course they lie! Nothing new there then!

[Vinny Rafarino]

Ghost whiner, besides being a *****y little twat, you obviously have no sense of reality. This fact has been proven countless times with your absurd posts and will continue to be proven with every bit of rhetoric and propoganda that spills out of that cesspool you call a brain.

Only a moron would point to an Op-Ed piece and call it "more evidence".

The term Opinion/Editorial is redundant boy as "editorial" means an article or publication expressing the opinion of its editors or publishers. I think you just wanted to try and look flash by saying "Op-Ed".

Here is an excellent example of the type of contorted thinking the Neil Mackay is guilty of. The following link is to a website that advocates gun ownership. Apparently, Neil Mackay showed his true colors, and demonstrated his anti-democratic, gun-grabbing liberal bias, once again. This man is about as despicable as Stanley Cohen, the Jewish RDDB (red-diaper-doper-baby) lawyer that defends Hamas.

This is just pure babble boy. Your statement and link information don't even compliment each other. I'm starting to wonder if indeed it is you that suffers from some mental disability. If you need a good Phsychiatrist, please feel free to ask me. My flatmate in undergrad turned out to be quite good.

-julian

(Edited by COMRADE RAF at 10:18 pm on June 10, 2003)

[peaccenicked]

AK47. The Mass murder of the Iraqi people was extended by the coalition of the killing. It had nothing to do with liberating Iraqis. Look at the facts before spouting BBC propaganda.
http://www.alertnet.org/thefacts/reliefres...ions/152535.htm (http://www.alertnet.org/thefacts/reliefresources/sections/152535.htm)



(Edited by peaccenicked at 11:40 am on June 11, 2003)

[RAM]

The BBC always try to be netural and unpatriotic and they have never been afraid to run the knife into anybody i.e. Polotics, Prime Minister, UK armed forces etc or any kind of authortiy

Any way I knew that there were unexploded weapons lying about that is the natutre of war that not all of weapons will go off

(Not saying that I support my observation or that it is justified!)

[antieverything]

Neil McKay is a dirty, dirty liar. When he reported about PNAC's plan for "world domination" (which it was...) he said that it was a top-secret document that he had uncovered (it's available on the group's website), that it was written by Bush's cabinet (it wasn't though they were involved in the founding of the think-tank and it may as well speak for them), and he cut up quotes and used them out of context to make the thing more incriminating than it really was.

So, could you please give me an alternate source?

(Edited by antieverything at 4:48 pm on June 11, 2003)

[peaccenicked]

I dont know anything about Neil Mckay.
I take it that the 'Sunday Herald' is not produced in glasgow, which I assumed initially.
I couldnt find much to confirm the details of the story but this article makes points in its favour.
http://www.reason.com/links/links060903.shtml

[Michael De Panama]

Quote: from peaccenicked on 6:24 am on June 9, 2003
Blair's secret weapon

Investigation: A covert project, set up by the UK government, 'cherry-picked' intelligence to fit the hidden agenda of justifying war with Iraq

By Neil Mackay

06/08/03 (The Sunday Herald) It was in the immediate aftermath of the first Gulf war and Britain knew even then that Saddam Hussein would one day have to be deposed. Allied forces had stopped short of ousting the Iraq dictator, but the British government was convinced it would one day have to finish the job.

The problem was how to convince the world that even a defeated Iraq still posed a serious threat. The answer came in 1991, with the setting up of a secret military intelligence operation whose existence has only now been uncovered by the Sunday Herald in the wake of damaging claims that Tony Blair and George Bush exaggerated intelligence reports to justify their invasion of Iraq this year.

The covert project was called Operation Rockingham and it was designed specifically to 'cherry-pick' information which pointed towards Saddam having a WMD stockpile that he could use imminently. Right up until the outbreak of war, the staff of Operation Rockingham, which was set up by the defence intelligence staff within the Ministry of Defence, deliberately overlooked 'mountains' of reports and intelligence documents which pointed towards Saddam destroying his arsenal and instead used 'selective intelligence' from just a tiny pool of data to create a false and misleading picture that the Iraqi ruler was a direct threat to the West.

Proof of Operation Rockingham came to light in a Sunday Herald investigation and its existence was backed up in a series of astonishingly frank interviews with Scott Ritter, the former chief weapons inspector in Iraq who served on the staff of General Norman Schwarzkopf -- who led the allied forces in the first Gulf war -- before joining the UN weapons inspections team, Unscom. Ritter was also a US military intelligence officer for eight years. His claims about Rockingham are supported by UK parliamentary documents and briefings with other British intelligence sources.

'As inspections developed throughout the 1990s it became clear that Unscom were accomplishing a great deal,' said Ritter. 'This became a liability for the UK and the US. Because of the level of Iraqi disarmament, France, China and Russia began talking about lifting sanctions. This wasn't what Britain and America wanted to hear -- they wanted sanctions and regime change.

'Operation Rockingham became part of an effort to maintain a public mindset that Iraq was not in compliance with the inspections. They had to sustain the allegation that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, even though Unscom was showing the opposite.'

Operation Rockingham began to liaise with Unscom -- ostensibly it was there to share intelligence with the weapons inspectors from within the United Kingdom spying community, but it soon became clear that this covert operation had a hidden agenda: deliberately creating a fake picture that Saddam was armed to the teeth.

Ritter added: 'Operation Rockingham cherry-picked intelligence. It received hard data but had a pre-ordained outcome in mind. It only put forward a small percentage of the facts when most were ambiguous or noted no WMD.' Staff once connected to Rockingham are now thought to be involved in the new Iraqi Survey Group which has been sent to Iraq in a bid to find WMDs.

To back up claims that Operation Rockingham was deliberately 'cherry-picking' intelligence and producing misleading reports, Ritter described how its staff blatantly ignored proof of Saddam's compliance. 'Britain and America were involved in a programme of joint exploitation of intelligence from Iraqi defectors. There were mountains of information coming from these defectors, and Rockingham staff were receiving it and then selectively culling reports that sustained the claims that weapons of mass destruction were in existence. They ignored the vast majority of the data which mitigated against such claims.

'In theory, Rockingham wasn't dangerous,' Ritter said, 'in theory, it was a clearing house for intelligence. But what is dangerous is the policy behind Rockingham. When I was an intelligence officer, I didn't tell my commander what he wanted to hear, I told him what the facts were. In combat, we have an old saying -- if you lie, you die.

'Operations like Rockingham become a danger to democracy if they lose their integrity. They are behind the scenes, in the shadows and away from public scrutiny. When a government is corrupt by way of such a policy, the public has a hard time holding the government accountable. We were all subject to a programme of mass deception, but now the
Full story (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article3703.htm)
What's your point?