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02/11/2006:

"Bush ignored CIA advice on Iraq, says former spy"

The CIA official in charge of intelligence on the Middle East until last year has accused the Bush administration of ignoring assessments that sanctions and weapons inspections were the best way to deal with Saddam Hussein, and that an invasion would have a "messy aftermath".

In an article in the next edition of the bimonthly journal, Foreign Affairs, Paul Pillar, has become the highest-ranking CIA official from the prewar period to accuse the White House of manipulating the intelligence on Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction.

..."If the entire body of official intelligence analysis on Iraq had a policy implication, it was to avoid war - or, if war was going to be launched, to prepare for a messy aftermath."

Mr Pillar said a CIA assessment of the implications of a US-led occupation had "presented a picture of a political culture that would not provide fertile ground for democracy and foretold a long, difficult, and turbulent transition", including guerrilla attacks and sectarian conflict.
guardian.co.uk

That's cool...the more turbulent the better.


Rumsfeld cautions Iran and Syria about aiding Iraq insurgency
TAORMINA, Sicily (AP) - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld cautioned Iran and Syria against trying to undermine the newly elected government in Iraq, but he also said he understood their determination to resist U.S. efforts to stop them.

"I think they are making a mistake," Rumsfeld told a news conference Friday in this Sicilian seaside resort after two days of talks with North Atlantic Treaty Organization defense ministers.

...Rumsfeld did not cite specific examples of Iranian and Syrian behavior or detail what the United States was doing about them.