06/06/04 "ICH" -- Ms Montague interviewed David Kay on the BBC Today programme yesterday.
He served as IAEA/UNSCOM Chief Nuclear Weapons Inspector in Iraq following the Gulf War. From June 2003 he was appointed by President Bush to head the 1,400 man Iraq Survey Group. He resigned that position in January 2004 having concluded that there had been no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq at the time of the war. He is now Senior Research Fellow at the Potomac Institute of Policy Studies - a major body in the constellation of Washington 'think-tanks'. He is concentrating on counter-terrorism and weapons proliferation in a section which is also working on the enhancement of 'blast weapons'. He has appeared before three senate committees dealing with intelligence failures etc.
Ms M was quizzing him about the resignation of CIA head George Tenet and his deputy. Kay said that the intelligence services had under performed since the end of the cold war and he could see the logic of Bush clearing the decks before the election. And what of the hunt in Iraq for WMD - was it a waste of time? It was not of the highest priority and likely to be any bit of use said Kay. Ms M said that Blair still speaks of unmasking WMDs in Iraq. This is delusional said Kay, 'there is nothing there' but 'there were programmes'.
He served as IAEA/UNSCOM Chief Nuclear Weapons Inspector in Iraq following the Gulf War. From June 2003 he was appointed by President Bush to head the 1,400 man Iraq Survey Group. He resigned that position in January 2004 having concluded that there had been no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq at the time of the war. He is now Senior Research Fellow at the Potomac Institute of Policy Studies - a major body in the constellation of Washington 'think-tanks'. He is concentrating on counter-terrorism and weapons proliferation in a section which is also working on the enhancement of 'blast weapons'. He has appeared before three senate committees dealing with intelligence failures etc.
Ms M was quizzing him about the resignation of CIA head George Tenet and his deputy. Kay said that the intelligence services had under performed since the end of the cold war and he could see the logic of Bush clearing the decks before the election. And what of the hunt in Iraq for WMD - was it a waste of time? It was not of the highest priority and likely to be any bit of use said Kay. Ms M said that Blair still speaks of unmasking WMDs in Iraq. This is delusional said Kay, 'there is nothing there' but 'there were programmes'.
There was the question of the certainty of the advice given by Tenet to Bush and Powell - the 'slam dunk' certainty that WMDs existed in Iraq and that they were a threat to other nations including the US. Kay told us that Tenet had grown up in Congressional staff systems where one pleased those above. Tenet and his ilk were expert in the craft of politics but not in the craft of intelligence. In short he said Tenet was expert in 'scratching their itch' to keep them happy. In other words he and others knew what was required of them in providing pretexts for an invasion of a broken country.
As Kay, Perle and others gorge large slices of American humble pie, can we think that the humility is real and the light of truth pervades them? Perle has recently said that the 'coalition' should have won the war and then got out leaving Iraq for the Iraqis. Really? It is said Kay is tightly involved with the pro-zionist 'neo-cons'. Up until his appointment to the ISG he was a senior executive in SAIC. This corporation has been awarded multi-million dollar contracts in the evisceration of Iraq along with Halliburton (Cheney formerly its CEO) and Bechtel. Like so many in the US hierarchy, Kay has seemed to move noiselessly between 'intelligence', commercial and political responsibilities. The cabal that is building fourteen bases and a 3000 man Embassy in Iraq, as well as supervising the flow of receipts into New York to do with 1.5 million barrels per day of Iraqi oil, depends on folk like Kay being embedded at the centre of the world's leading democracy.
It is disturbing to hear our PM's beliefs in the existence of Iraqi WMDs being described as delusional. Aside from demonstrating Kay's opinion of Blair and the real value of his 'blood bond' with his trans- Atlantic cronies, it is also an echo of some Briton's opinion of their leader's reason.
My Lord Butler and Messrs Mates, Taylor and Inge are currently deliberating on the "failures of intelligence" leading to the massive assault on Iraq. They will not be too quick so that further priorities and failures subdue the effects of any discomforts which might just surface in their report. The pages will be many and the verbiage ivy clad. Why not write it instead on one page of A4.
"Scarlett et al scratched the itch which made them happy, overseen by Dr Campbell"
As Kay, Perle and others gorge large slices of American humble pie, can we think that the humility is real and the light of truth pervades them? Perle has recently said that the 'coalition' should have won the war and then got out leaving Iraq for the Iraqis. Really? It is said Kay is tightly involved with the pro-zionist 'neo-cons'. Up until his appointment to the ISG he was a senior executive in SAIC. This corporation has been awarded multi-million dollar contracts in the evisceration of Iraq along with Halliburton (Cheney formerly its CEO) and Bechtel. Like so many in the US hierarchy, Kay has seemed to move noiselessly between 'intelligence', commercial and political responsibilities. The cabal that is building fourteen bases and a 3000 man Embassy in Iraq, as well as supervising the flow of receipts into New York to do with 1.5 million barrels per day of Iraqi oil, depends on folk like Kay being embedded at the centre of the world's leading democracy.
It is disturbing to hear our PM's beliefs in the existence of Iraqi WMDs being described as delusional. Aside from demonstrating Kay's opinion of Blair and the real value of his 'blood bond' with his trans- Atlantic cronies, it is also an echo of some Briton's opinion of their leader's reason.
My Lord Butler and Messrs Mates, Taylor and Inge are currently deliberating on the "failures of intelligence" leading to the massive assault on Iraq. They will not be too quick so that further priorities and failures subdue the effects of any discomforts which might just surface in their report. The pages will be many and the verbiage ivy clad. Why not write it instead on one page of A4.
"Scarlett et al scratched the itch which made them happy, overseen by Dr Campbell"
